Before You Break

by Kyla Stone

  “Okay,” I mumble.

  “We’ve been waiting forever to visit you.” Eden unscrews the lid of the Faygo she brought with her and takes a swig.

  Simone plops down in the blue plastic chair next to the bed. “You hungry? We can smuggle in some Taco Bell.”

  I tear off the Twix wrappers and divvy up the single bars. I take the last bar, break it into thirds, and pass the pieces to my friends. “The hospital food isn’t that bad, actually. Except for the mashed potatoes that literally came in a square shape and jiggled like Jell-O. I was afraid to taste it.”

  “Gross.” Eden makes a face. She pops the Twix piece in her mouth.

  “Ahhh. Much better.”

  “Lots of people are asking about you,” Simone says.

  “Felix?”

  Simone nods. “Yes, Felix, too. But don’t get your hopes up.” “I’m so not,” I say. But I so am.

  Eden chews on the end of her braid, her face scrunched up. “So, are you like, okay?”

  “Eden!” Simone hisses.

  Eden rolls her eyes. “What? It’s too important not to ask.”

  “I’m okay. I’m fine.”

  “What happened?”

  I take a breath. What do I tell them? Will they stick around once they hear the worst of me? “I had too much to drink. I took some stuff I shouldn’t have.”

  “Everybody’s talking about it,” Eden says softly. “Reese told people you tried to kill yourself.”

  I flinch. Eden stares at me intently. I avert my eyes and open the origami book and look at the dull green and white animal shapes without really seeing them.

  “He actually sounded pretty broken up about it,” Eden says.

  “Whoop-de-freaking-do,” Simone says. “Someone give the drug dealer an empathy award.”

  I think about the way his eyes got all soft when I gave him the origami bat, how his face looked desperate and angry when he told me what Floyd tried to do to me.

  “Is that—is that what happened?” Eden asks again.

  “I’m not crazy.”

  They both look at me, waiting for whatever it is I need to say.

  “A bunch of horrible stuff happened,” I say in a rush. I’m not going to lie anymore. I’m not going to wear that mask that’s been slowly suffocating me, strangling my breath. I need to tell the truth. I have to. “Everything with my dad and my sister just brought back all these terrible memories, about my mom and stuff. I just—I lost it.”

  Simone lowers her brows. “It was on purpose?”

  How can I explain to them what it’s like? How the space inside my own head is a battlefield. What it’s like when my mind wants to murder itself.

  I can’t. I don’t know how. I can’t speak those things. I can only nod my head.

  Eden grabs my hand. Tears gather in the corners of her eyes. “I’m so

  sorry, Lux.”

  Seeing her tears activates my own. My eyes burn. My throat closes up. “I’m the one that’s sorry.”

  Simone looks furious. “How could you do that? Why didn’t you say something? Why didn’t you call me?”

  “We weren’t talking. I didn’t even know if we were still friends.”

  “Lux!” Simone shouts. “It was a fight. You know, that thing normal people do? Then they make up and get over it? You think every fight is the end of the world. I would’ve been there in a heartbeat. Eden, too. We’re your friends.”

  “I know.” Snot bubbles in my nose. I wipe it away with the back of my arm. “I’m sorry.”

  “You never told me you felt that way,” Eden says.

  “I just—I didn’t know what to do. I felt like—like everyone would be better off if I was gone.”

  “Never. We’d be devastated, Lux.”

  “Swear to us,” Simone says, her voice hard. “Freakin’ give us a blood oath, right here, right now, that you’ll never do that again.”

  My heart is going to burst. I have the best friends in the whole world. I don’t know why either of them want anything to do with me, but they do. They still want me. They still love me. “I swear,” I choke out.

  Simone glares at me. “I’m not even joking. I’m bringing a knife next time we visit.”

  “I said I swear! I’ll be fine. I—” Suddenly I remember Floyd, his cold, flat eyes taking me in, his breath on my cheek, his thick fingers pressing on my throat. “Something else happened. Before the party …”

  Eden squeezes my hand. “You can tell us.”

  “I got trashed. I mean, I don’t remember most of the night. When I woke up, I realized my dress was all bunched up.”

  The room is silent.

  My heart beats in my throat. “I thought at first it was Reese.”

  Eden shifts on the bed. “But it wasn’t.”

  “No. It was Floyd, the guy who deals to Reese, who owns the house.”

  I swallow hard. “He’s like, forty.”

  Simone stops fidgeting. Her body goes still. “What did he do?”

  Shame and humiliation burn through me. “I don’t remember,” I whisper. It’s the one terrible thing about that night I still can’t recall. When I try to search for it in my mind, it’s like looking into a bottomless black pit. There’s nothing there, only darkness.

  “What about Reese?” Simone stalks the room in tight, savage circles.

  “He said he walked in. That Floyd was trying to push up my dress—but it didn’t happen. He stopped it. If Reese hadn’t been there …”

  Eden grips my hands so tight my fingers go numb.

  “It’s a damn good thing Reese isn’t so worthless after all,” Simone says.

  The words curdle in my throat. I force them out. “I still feel horrible.

  Dirty.”

  “Oh, no you don’t,” Simone says.

  “I’m just another drunk girl who—”

  “Shut up right now,” Simone says.

  I lower my head. I’m repulsive. Junk. A piece of trash to use and throw out. “I’m damaged. Tainted.”

  “That’s not true!” Eden says.

  “Don’t you dare say that,” Simone says fiercely. “Do you hear me?”

  “I hear you, but—”

  “You hear me, but you’re not listening. You. Are. Not. Tainted.”

  I try to nod, but I can’t. They don’t know what I am. They don’t know the half of it.

  “I’m going to kill him,” Simone snarls, her eyes bulging. “I’m going to bust out his large intestine and wrap it around his slimy neck and choke him with his own—”

  “Let’s try to avoid murdering people, okay?” Eden says.

  “Why? Do you know the abysmal rates of incarceration for sexual assaults of any kind? Why mess with the broken, archaic judicial system when you can just put a bullet in his brain for free?”

  “Simone!” Eden hisses. “You’re not being helpful!”

  Simone snaps her fingers. “What’s that species of spider, Eden? You know the one I’m talking about.”

  “Tarantulas, black widows, wolf spiders. After mating, the female cannibalizes the male. Some female tarantulas just eat the guys without mating at all.”

  “Yes!” Simone pumps her fist in the air. “We need to do that. Maybe not the cannibal part. But the killing part. So much yes.”

  “Ignore her.” Eden looks at me, concern darkening her face. “This is not your fault.”

  I shake my head, about to argue, to spit out more words like barbed wire in my throat.

  The nurse sticks her head in. “Visiting hours end in five minutes, ladies.”

  The silence stretches between us. On the TV, the three contestants write down their final answers on their blue screens. Even without sound, the famous Jeopardy music hums through my brain.

  Simone clears her throat. “That disgusting creep? He’s responsible for every single thing he did and everything he wanted to do. It doesn’t matter what you did or didn’t drink. You weren’t able to give consent. That’s wrong. It’s wrong and it always wil
l be. Full stop.”

  “You didn’t do this.” Eden stares at me intently, her gaze not leaving my face. Her dark eyes drill into mine. “Do you understand? This is not your fault. You have to believe that.”

  I manage a small, trembling smile. “I’ll try, Skittles.”

  Simone says, “At least he’s going to prison. He deserves way worse.”

  “What?”

  “Reese rolled on him. That guy Floyd got arrested on major drug trafficking charges. He’s in jail.”

  Relief floods through me, from the top of my scalp all the way down to my toes. “Good.”

  Eden gets off the end of the bed, comes over, and grabs me in a tight hug. “We’re right here. We’re your friends, and we love you.”

  Simone leans in and squeezes my shoulder. “What she said. You’ll get through this. If you need us to, we can always cut off his head with a cleaver. Just say the word.”

  My heart fills up and overflows. I’ve treated them horribly, especially Eden. Yet here they are, still loving me. Lena’s here, still loving me.

  I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve any of it.

  45

  Lux

  Phoenix stretches on my bed, legs extended, claws out, kneading my pillow. She’s seven months old now and full-size. Her sleek coat ripples in the early morning sunlight slanting through my window. She rules the house, going where she pleases, sprawling on the couch or her absolute favorite spot, right in the center of my pillow.

  It’s been over two weeks since I left the hospital. The day they discharged me, I asked Lena to bring me clothes from home. I stuffed the black velvet dress and the ripped tights and my underwear into a plastic grocery bag and threw it in the trash on the way out of the hospital.

  I took the longest, hottest shower I’ve ever taken in my life, scrubbing every square inch of skin until it was pink and stinging. I can rub the smell of him off my flesh, but I can’t rub that black blight from my memory. Maybe I don’t want to.

  Reese can be a total asshat, but he did the right thing when it counted. Ordinary acts of courage happen every day. There’s no fanfare or celebration. It doesn’t make the news. But still, the world—in some small, perceptible way—is brighter.

  A week ago, I went to the police station. Lena, Simone, and Eden went with me. I don’t know what they can do. There’s no proof, no evidence. But I told my story. When I was finished, the female cop touched my shoulder. “Even though it’s unlikely we can prosecute your case, you can still have justice. We have plenty of evidence related to his drug trafficking charges. He’s going away for a long time.”

  This will have to be enough. It is enough.

  What I mostly feel is tired. A tiredness like a deep ache in my bones. And the need. The need is always there. Rustling beneath my skin. But I ignore it. I fight it.

  It’s grueling, excruciating, like climbing the same damn mountain every single day. My body is exhausted just trying to recover from everything I’ve done to it.

  Everyone else is celebrating the end of senior year, the start of the next big thing. Simone’s going to Michigan State, Eden to U of M. I heard Felix got that scholarship to Notre Dame he wanted so bad. I’m the only one treading water, fighting as hard as I can just to keep my head above the surface.

  I reach out and lay my hand gently, carefully on Phoenix’s back. She flinches, hesitates, then softly arches against my hand. After a minute, her purring starts, growing until it vibrates her entire body.

  Her whiskers brush against my fingers. “That’s my girl,” I whisper. Phoenix leaps off the bed. She stalks off, tail high in the air. She still won’t let me hold her. She goes frantic, writhing, spitting, and swiping at the closest object, usually my bare skin.

  I don’t need her to be a lap cat. I don’t need her to be anything more than she is. She’s tough. She’s a survivor. She’s like me.

  I turn back to the pile of clothes strewn across my bedspread. I pick up an old reindeer Christmas sweater I haven’t worn in three years and tuck it inside a cardboard box. If it was up to me, I’d grab handfuls of clothes out of my closet and drawers and just stuff them in boxes. Way faster. But no. Lena wants organization. Lena wants neatness.

  In the two weeks since I’ve been home, I’ve helped Lena pack up dozens of boxes, listed furniture on Craigslist, sold Dad’s old Honda Accord on Autotrader, and hauled bags of donated clothes and knickknacks to Goodwill. She’s decluttering before we put it on the market.

  The house I grew up in seems to shrink, becoming emptier every day. The echoes ring louder and louder as we remove all the things that made it a home—curtains, bedspreads, pots and pans, rugs, candles, lamps, clocks.

  There are ghostly squares on the walls where picture frames used to hang, the yellow paint around the frames faded from years of sunlight. The rooms look strange now, so stark, so blank.

  I asked Lena what that meant for me. “I don’t know,” she said. “I want you to come with me to Florida and go to that treatment center. We can rent an apartment together. But I can’t force you to do anything. If you won’t come, I hope you’ll see a therapist here. I’ll give you some of the life insurance money to rent a place and go back to school. The choice is yours.”

  “I’m not going to any crazy psych ward,” I snapped.

  She looked hurt. But she didn’t yell back or scream at me. “You get to choose, Lux.”

  My future is wide open. The weight of it is crushing me.

  Staying alive takes so much work. Not just staying alive. Not just surviving, but really living.

  I grab another shirt off the bed. It’s a cute oversized teal shirt with silver sparkles that I always wear with my gray skinny jeans. It’s the shirt I wore on my first date with Felix.

  He kept touching the sparkles. I slapped him away, playfully, flirting, until I grabbed his hand and kept holding it. He leaned in and kissed me, but our noses bumped and we both started giggling hysterically.

  That’s when I knew this would be different, that he was different from all the other guys. An ache starts deep in my chest. There’s still something I need to do. If I put it off, I’ll wuss out and never do it.

  I toss on some clothes, tug a brush through my bangs, and line my eyes with kohl. I drive to his house, my knuckles white on the steering wheel. The air is chilly, low-hanging fog drifting above the ground.

  My heart stutters in my chest when he opens the door. “Hey.”

  “Hey yourself,” Felix says, standing in the doorway in gray boxers and an oversized vintage Star Wars T-shirt that says, “May the Mass Times Acceleration Be with You.”

  My heart throbs just looking at him. He’s so good, so wholesome, like he belongs in a Norman Rockwell painting or should star in a commercial eating all-American apple pie.

  He runs his hands through his tangled mop of curls. “I wasn’t expecting visitors.”

  “I guess it’s a bit early in the morning.”

  “Lux, it’s eight a.m. on a Sunday. Most people in their right minds are still sleeping.”

  “Oh, sorry.” I grin sheepishly. “I can come back.” “It’s all right,” he says with a sigh.

  A sleepy voice from inside calls, “Who is it?”

  He hesitates. “Just a friend, Mom.”

  I’m hurt and relieved at the same time. At least he said, ‘friend.’ “I won’t take long. But I need—I’d like to talk to you. Please.”

  He squints at me, examining my face. “Okay. Five minutes.” He comes out onto the porch and shuts the door behind him. “We can sit on the swing.”

  He sits on one end of the porch swing and looks out across the driveway. I put down my messenger bag and sit on the other end. There’s a wooden end table with a glass ashtray and a purple lighter next to it. Nervous energy buzzes through me. I grab the lighter and slip it in my pocket.

  Felix clears his throat. “So . . . ?”

  It’s hard to look at him. I imagine us cuddling on this same swing, talking long into the n
ight. I imagine epic make-out sessions, both of us wrapped up in one oversized blanket.

  The space between us seems solid as a brick wall.

  “I screwed up.” Once I start, it all comes bursting out. “You’re the best thing that’s happened to me in like, forever. I like you so much, Felix. I can’t even …” I take a deep breath. “I have a problem. I know that. I can’t seem to keep good things in my life. I do bad things. I mess up. Everything I care about, I end up hurting. But I don’t want to. I don’t even know how it happens. It’s like I lose control or something. I don’t know how to explain it.”

  Felix just stares at me, eyebrows raised.

  “It’s like, I’ve been hurt so much, I just assume everyone else is gonna hurt me too.” I shove my bangs out of my eyes. “I get so afraid, I just—I hurt them back. Or maybe I do it before they’ve even done anything to me.”

  “It felt like you stabbed me and then twisted the knife,” he says softly. “Like you were trying to do as much damage as possible. On purpose.”

  I flinch, but I have to keep going. I have to see this through. “I thought you didn’t like me anymore. My Dad was dying of a heart attack. My sister had just come home, and I thought she hated me. My head was like this boiling cauldron of terrible, horrible thoughts.”

  “I’m sorry for you, I really am. I know you’ve had a lot going on. I would’ve been there for you, you know. If you’d just talked to me.”

  My heart jolts. Maybe there’s a chance. Maybe I can win him back. I move a little closer. “I know. I’m so, so sorry.”

  He looks at me, wetness in his eyelashes. His face looks stretched, pained. “I forgive you.”

  I want to weep with joy. I scoot closer, ready to fling myself at him, to kiss every inch of his body, to wrap him in my arms and never let go. Hot blood thunders through me and I’m remembering all the times we touched. All the times we hugged and held hands and kissed. All the times I fell asleep to the comforting sound of his heartbeat against my cheek.

  “I love you,” I say breathlessly. I don’t mean to say it. It just slips out. I know immediately it’s so right, so true. I do love him. I love him so much my body hums with it.