Erasing Faith

by Julie Johnson

“Just teasing, Red. Carry on.”

  She huffed lightly, but a smile was twitching the corners of her mouth. “Anyway, these beautiful, historic lions are from the 19th century. Legend goes that the sculptor who made them was so proud of his work, he dared the crowds at the bridge’s opening ceremony to find a flaw. He was so confident in their perfection, he declared he’d end his life if anyone found a single mistake.”

  “Sounds like a prick,” I noted, taking a few steps forward onto the bridge. Faith was so wrapped up in her story, she followed docilely, not seeming to notice where I was leading her. Her eyes were distant and animated as she spoke, recalling facts and figures from long ago. With measured steps down the pedestrian walk, I guided her out over open water.

  “Well, then you’ll enjoy the rest of this story,” she told me, her cheeks flushed with enthusiasm. “The crowds gathered to see the new bridge and, when the statues were revealed, a little boy in the audience gleefully pointed out that the lions didn’t have tongues.” Faith chuckled under her breath, her whole face lighting up with mischievous joy.

  I bit the inside of my cheek. Hard.

  Better to focus on the pain than the way she made me feel when she looked like that.

  “Devastated his perfect lions weren’t so perfect after all, legend goes that the sculptor threw himself over the side of the bridge and fell to his death.”

  I snorted. “A bit dramatic, don’t you think?”

  “Tell me about it.” Faith’s smile stretched wider. “He didn’t really die, of course. It’s just part of the myth. But the tongueless lions have become sort of a citywide joke.”

  “You get your kicks where you can,” I murmured, drawing to a full stop.

  We’d reached the exact center of the bridge.

  Faith shook her head lightly as she laughed, still lost in her thoughts.

  “Red?”

  “Mhmm?” she hummed, turning her attention to me.

  As soon as she stopped thinking about the past and focused on her present, her eyes went wide with terror and her face drained of color. She backed as far from the railing as she could on the narrow walkway, tripping over a family of German tourists in her frantic flight with a series of whispered, white-faced apologies.

  Hand still clasped around hers, I followed until her back pressed against the stone partition dividing walkers from cars. I leaned into her frame, forcing her to focus on me.

  “Faith.” I whispered it like a benediction, my voice hushed and undeserving as I used her name for the first time — an unfit outlaw addressing a queen.

  Her eyes snapped to mine and held.

  “I’ve got you,” I told her simply, squeezing her hand in mine. “You hear me?”

  She nodded unconvincingly.

  “You’re safe. I can’t promise you much, but I’ll promise you this — you will always be safe with me.” I tried to convince myself it wasn’t a lie as the words left my mouth. “Look how far you’ve made it already, Red. You’re halfway there, without even realizing it.”

  Her eyes left mine for a moment, darting over my shoulder to glance at the waters of the Danube. I heard her breathing rate increase, felt her heartbeat speed up to a rapid staccato at the pulse point in her wrist. Panic was setting in again.

  “When I was a little boy—” I broke off abruptly and swallowed down the indecision that was clawing at my throat in a chokehold. I warred internally — did I follow protocol, as I’d done a million times before, and fabricate a convincing little anecdote to comfort her? Or, for the first time ever, did I throw the rulebook in the fucking river and give her a piece of my own past?

  Those beseeching honey-gold eyes returned to mine and the decision was made without another thought about proper procedure.

  “When I was small, I didn’t have anyone. And, for a while, I was scared of everything — the dark, the monsters under the bed, the kids who were bigger and stronger than me at the shelter. Thunderstorms, dogs, strangers on the street. You name it, I feared it. Solitude makes the world a helluva lot scarier, especially when you’re a kid.” My eyes lost their focus as my thoughts turned inward, to places I’d left unexplored for decades. “After one particularly bad day, which started and ended with an empty stomach, I’d crawled into this abandoned warehouse and curled into a ball on the floor. And I remember just crying like the fucking world was ending. For hours, till my eyes ached and my face was a streaked mess of dirt and snot and tears.”

  Faith stared at me, her panic gone. In its place was a look that I wanted to hate on principle, but couldn’t. It wasn’t pity — it was horrified compassion. I couldn’t meet her eyes when she was looking at me that way, so I stared over the top of her head at the buildings on the embankment, their windows illuminating like distant fireflies as dusk fell.

  “Hunger breaks you down, makes you weak. Not just your body; your mind.” I cleared my throat, as though that might expel the emotion that had lodged itself there. “I let it break me, that night.”

  Faith was silent, absorbing my words with rapt attention. I swallowed again, as more cobwebbed, dust-coated memories rose to the surface unbidden.

  “Finally, I heard a voice in the darkness. Nearly pissed my pants, I was so scared. It was this other street kid — bigger, stronger, meaner than me. He’d been on the streets for years. Told me to shut the fuck up so he could finally get some shut eye.” One corner of my mouth lifted involuntarily. “And then he gave me a piece of advice I never forgot.”

  I forced myself to look into Faith’s eyes.

  “He told me, no matter what happens, no matter how scared you are, you can’t let fear shut you down forever. So you give it five seconds — you let it own you, control you, take hold of every one of your senses. But only for those five, finite seconds. You breathe them in, count them down. And when they’re over..” I dragged a ragged breath through my mouth. “You tell the fear to go fuck itself.”

  Forcibly, I pulled out of my twisted stroll down memory lane. I was rattled I’d revealed so much. Once I’d started, I hadn’t been able to stop myself from spitting out the whole goddamn sob story. I’d kept it locked inside for too long, without an outlet. I hadn’t talked about this shit since…

  Actually, I’d never talked about this shit. Period.

  Our eyes locked. Both of us were breathing too fast, like we’d been running a goddamned marathon. I didn’t know what else to say to her, so I waited.

  “Just count to five?” she finally asked in a small voice. “That’s the big secret?”

  I nodded. “Just count to five, Red.”

  She looked over her shoulder at the water and panic flashed briefly on her features. Taking one shaky step closer to the railing, her grip tightened on mine.

  “Will you count with me?”

  I couldn’t hide the smile that was tugging at my lips. “Of course.”

  Together, we took a step closer to the edge.

  “One,” I counted, nodding in encouragement when she looked my way.

  A shiver of fear rippled through her body, but she took another determined step toward the water.

  “Two,” she whispered.

  “Three.” I squeezed her hand tighter as we moved in unison. Almost there, now.

  “Four,” she said in pinched voice, taking the final step. Waists pressed against the stone railing, we stood shoulder-to-shoulder and stared out at the river. I saw the whites of her eyes flash when her gaze dropped straight down over the edge. Shaking visibly, she crushed her lids closed, took a deep breath in through her nose, and released it with a whoosh of air that made her entire body sway like a reed in the wind.

  “Five,” she breathed, opening her eyes to stare into mine.

  I stilled for a beat, watching to see if the panic would return. Waiting for her to freak out or run from the railing, toward the relative safety of the wall.

  She didn’t.

  Instead, she did something so surprising, it nearly knocked me on my ass. She unlaced her fingers fro
m mine, stepped forward into my space, and wrapped her arms around me in an embrace that had me clenching my jaw and curling my fists in an attempt to maintain even the pretense of control.

  And there on a bridge in the middle of the Danube, with a beautiful girl pressed tight against me, I felt my mask slip. For just a moment, I let Wesley Adams fall away and Weston Abbott took his place. His thoughts filled my mind, swirling in a chaotic tangle, and for once I didn’t push them out.

  This girl.

  She kills me.

  Every look, every laugh, every smile.

  She slays me. Breaks me.

  Undoes me. Creates me.

  She sets everything in my hollow, heartless world on fire.

  And I let her.

  Because I love to feel the flames lick my skin.

  The chaos she incites, ignites…

  It’s the realest thing I’ve ever felt.

  My hesitant arms lifted of their own volition to return her embrace, wrapping around her frame in a light grip that wasn’t quite a hug. I was out of practice at this. Undoubtedly, I was fucking it up.

  She didn’t seem to notice, though. She just hugged me tighter.

  Minutes ticked by as we stood there, interlocked in an embrace I felt down to my tar-black soul. Her forehead tucked against my shoulder, her fingertips dug into the thin cotton of my t-shirt like she couldn’t bring herself to let go.

  The sun set, and the moon drifted up to take its place.

  The stars appeared one by one, sprinkling the sky with light.

  The summer breeze lost its warmth, and a chill blew off the water.

  And still, we stood. Frozen. Entwined like one figure, one soul, for so long the lines between where I ended and she began became blurred. There was nothing left to say — I had no pretty words for her. I didn’t even have more ugly ones. So I let my arms speak for me.

  I tightened my grip and returned her embrace, holding her until thoughts of who I was supposed to be and what I was supposed to be doing here disappeared entirely. Until I was just a nameless man on a bridge with a brave girl in his arms. Until it was just us.

  Wes and Faith.

  Faith and Wes.

  We were doomed from the start. A lost cause. A losing battle.

  And yet, in that narrow instant, I didn’t give a single fuck.

  Chapter Thirteen: FAITH

  UP TO FATE

  “You sneaky little bitch!”

  “Hello to you too, Margot,” I muttered, dumping my wallet on the countertop and making my way over to the couch where she was sprawled out beneath a fuzzy red blanket reading Tina Fey’s new autobiography. Birdy’s All You Never Say was humming quietly from the kitchen speakers. There was a large mug of tea sitting in front of my roommate — I snatched it off the table and took a swig without waiting for permission.

  “Hey!” she protested. “Make your own!”

  I smiled as I settled in next to her and set down the cup. “Relax, I only wanted a sip.”

  “First, you ditch speed-dating to run off with a scrumptious mystery man I’ve never heard a you utter a friggen word about, and then you steal my oolong,” Margot grumbled. “You have some serious explaining to do, woman.”

  “Can it wait till tomorrow?” I cast bleary eyes at the clock above the stove. “It’s past midnight and I’m beat.”

  “Ask me how much I care.”

  Uh oh. Margot was using her this-means-business voice. I sighed and snuggled deeper into the couch cushions, tugging a corner of her red throw over my lap. My roommate glared at me — blanket thievery was clearly even more unwelcome than tea snatching.

  “How was the rest of speed-dating?” I asked, hoping to delay the inevitable for a while longer.

  It was Margot’s turn to sigh. “Miserable.”

  “Why?”

  She grimaced. “Let’s just say, none of them were boyfriend material.”

  I tried desperately to hold in my laughter. “Didn’t you meet Earl?”

  Margot threw a pillow at my face when a flurry of giggles escaped my lips. I only laughed harder as I dodged the soft missile, holding up my hands in surrender.

  “Okay, okay, I’m sorry,” I managed to gasp out between laughs. “Seriously, there were some good looking guys there. I’m sure some of them were into you.”

  Margot shook her head. “All of the hot ones were either only interested in sex, or totally uninterested in me.”

  “I’m sorry, Margot. It’s their loss, not yours.”

  “At least mosquitoes still find me attractive,” she muttered darkly, scratching at several puffy red bumps on her arms.

  I snorted.

  “I’m serious!” she groused. “As soon as the sun went down, the little blood-suckers were out in force. You’re lucky you made your escape before then…” Her eyes narrowed. “Which brings us back to you. Time to spill about your secret rendezvous, Faith.”

  A deep sigh escaped my lips. “It wasn’t a secret rendezvous.”

  “What was it, then?”

  “Fate,” I murmured.

  Now Margot was the one snorting.

  I ignored her. “His name is Wes. And, honestly, I know practically nothing about him.”

  “So, you ran off with a total stranger because…” she stared at me like I’d grown an extra head.

  “There’s just something about him. I don’t know how to explain it. It’s…” I drifted off, trying to find the words but coming up empty. “We have a connection. It’s like… like nothing I’ve ever felt before. He just gets me.”

  “A total stranger gets you?” Margot’s tone was incredulous. “As in, he gets the money from your wallet when you’re not paying attention? Or he gets into your pants after slipping a roofie into your drink?”

  I shook my head absently, thinking back to the bridge. Despite my roommate’s words, I couldn’t dismiss the connection I felt to Wes. Memories from the night filtered through my mind.

  Dark eyes. Soft-spoken promises.

  Panic, fear. Comfort, compassion.

  Wrapped up in a stranger, as the moon rose over the Danube, my bloodstream had thrummed with adrenaline. My body was wracked with so many emotions I’d never be able to sort them all out.

  I’d never felt so alive.

  I cleared my throat lightly and tried to articulate my thoughts once more. “Wes Adams looks at me like he knows me better than anyone I’ve ever met in my life. So, yeah, maybe it’s weird that I don’t know his middle name or where he works or why he’s in Budapest, or what his freaking phone number is.” I swallowed roughly. “None of that changes the fact that when he looks at me, he sees me. The real me.”

  There was a brief pause as Margot contemplated my words.

  “You’re nuts,” she declared decidedly.

  “Quite possibly,” I agreed.

  “So, what did you do with this stranger who gets you?”

  “Faced fears. Counted to five.”

  “English, please.”

  I smiled a secret smile. “We walked the Chain Bridge.”

  “But you’re afraid of heights,” she pointed out.

  “Exactly.”

  “Do you have to be so cryptic?” she complained. “I want details, woman.”

  “I’m not being cryptic.” I was totally being cryptic. “There just isn’t much to tell. We walked the bridge, then he walked me home. End of story.”

  That wasn’t exactly the truth. Sure, we’d walked the bridge and, yes, afterwards he’d walked me home. But something monumental had happened between us in the dark, suspended over the river in an embrace. We’d barely spoken, yet I’d felt Wes’ impression on my soul like a brand since he walked away from my door stoop a half hour ago.

  But how did you put that into words for another person? How did you explain that to your roommate, as though it was nothing more than regular, post-date gossip and girl talk?

  I couldn’t trivialize it.

  Wouldn’t debase or dissect it for someone who’d neve
r understand.

  “Well, are you going to see him again?” Margot’s question interrupted my musings.

  “I don’t know,” I murmured. “I hope so. But I guess it’s up to fate.”

  She sighed, reached for her tea, and took a large sip. “What the hell does that mean? Don’t normal people just trade phone numbers, text awkwardly for a few days, then get together and have hot sex? I’m pretty sure there’s a rule about that inscribed in our generation’s book of dating norms.”

  I couldn’t stop myself from grinning. “Nothing normal about this, Margot.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I’m cranky, I haven’t gotten laid in weeks, I’m covered in mosquito bites, and I’m far too sober for conversations where you speak in 90% riddles.” She reached out and picked up her book. “So, if you don’t mind…” She glanced pointedly from the open pages to my bedroom door.

  “Oh, fine, you crotchety bitch.” I laughed and blew her a kiss as I rose to my feet. “I’m going, I’m going.”

  “Love you,” she called after me.

  “Yeah, yeah. Love you too.”

  ***

  “Please sign here, sir.”

  With my bike balanced between my legs and one hand holding the handlebars steady, I waited for the man to sign the electronic invoice on my company-issued iPhone screen. He scribbled something indecipherable with his fingertip, chuckled under his breath at the sight of his messy “signature,” and passed the phone back to me.

  “Köszönöm,” the man muttered, accepting his parcel with impatient hands.

  “You’re welcome!” I called, stowing the phone in a side pocket of my messenger bag. He slammed the door in my face and disappeared inside without another word.

  I blew out a huff of air. Apparently some people weren’t so enamored with the Hermes girls, after all.

  With a swift kick off the ground, I pushed my bike from his stoop into traffic. Navigating the city during rush hour was a nightmare. Hungarian drivers were fond of laying on the horn, cursing like sailors, and causing perpetual gridlock. Plus, they seemed to think that stopping for bicyclists was an optional pursuit — if I didn’t pay attention, I’d be run over multiple times each shift.