Spill Over

by Jolene Perry

  - - -

  I don’t know if it’s morning or not, but my whole body aches, churns and swims. Gem. Shit. I’m pretty sure I remember Gem sleeping next to me, but now she’s nowhere to be seen.

  I’m still dressed. That’s good. Do I want to know what happened? I’ve never passed out like that before. The thought of it kind of freaks me out—not knowing what happened. Phone’s in my hand and wallet’s still in my pocket. That’s also good.

  I stumble into the living room. There are a few people passed out on the couches, wrapped in blankets from last night. I start to look for my suit jacket, but don’t really care. I never want to see the damn thing again anyway.

  Dad’s probably pissed. Mom would be pissed, but she’s not around to be pissed anymore. She’s stuck in some damn metal coffin.

  I keep trying to blink the scratchiness off my eyes, but it doesn’t work.

  My feet stumble me into the elevator, and I hit the button for the lobby. When I step onto the sidewalk, I know where I was. I was at Gem’s house. Probably shoulda figured that out when I was still inside. Or, maybe I did, and just don’t remember.

  Fortunately for me, her building’s next to mine. My phone buzzes in my pocket. I slide it out. Twenty missed calls. Eighteen from Dad and two from… Amber? Amber’s name pricks at my chest. We talked. Didn’t we? I asked her to read to me. The air leaves my lungs. How crazy does she think I am? Then Gem’s smile and large brown eyes hit my memory. I’m immediately defensive. What the hell does it matter what I did with Gem last night? Amber’s barely even a friend.

  I’m nuts.

  “Morning, Mr. Preston.” A man opens the door to my building.

  Now I gotta get my ass upstairs to sleep off the rest of this hellish feeling. The elevator feels like a roller-coaster and every second feels like an hour. I just need to lie down.

  My key fumbles in the lock until the door jerks away from me, revealing a scowling Dad.

  “What the hell happened to you?” His voice is the most animated I’ve ever heard.

  “I’m going to bed.” I rub my sandpaper eyes again.

  “Look, Antony. I’ve tried to be really understanding about all of this, but you can’t be gone all night without letting me know where you are!” The door shuts behind me.

  “Sorry, Dad.” I rub my hand over my face. “I’m fine.”

  He stops, takes my shoulders, and looks slowly between my eyes. “What did you do?”

  “Something I’ll never do again, okay?” I jerk away from his gaze and stumble into my room.

  “Antony.” Dad follows and sits on the bed. “I know you don’t want to, but we’re leaving for DC tomorrow. Do you want to sort through some stuff here first?”

  “No.” I fall face first in my bed. “I’m keeping the apartment. I can afford it. I’m coming back here for school.”

  “Mom thought you’d go to Harvard, or to Paris.”

  “I’m coming back to New York. Harvard and Paris was before she…” but I can’t finish it. “It’s different now.”

  Dad relaxes next to me. I feel it. His hand rubs up and down my back. I open my mouth to tell him to stop, but I can’t. After a few minutes, I start to let myself relax and drift off. One of these days this nightmare will be over.

  - - -

  Something’s different. Dad and I are different. I now see the grief on his face, and even kind of recognize that some of it’s for me. I pack a big bag of some stuff to take back to Seattle. I even grab a picture of Mom, even though it feels so final—taking a picture. It’s one none of the networks have. One of Mom and I that she took with an outstretched arm last year in St. John’s. Our faces are tanned and smiling. Our dark brown hair is so the same in color that our heads blend in together. Same eyes. Same smile. Part of me. Or am I part of her? The last part left?

  It’s just another one of the shitty feelings that I push down and in, hoping my body will absorb the painful chaos that’s eating at me.

  - - -

  Arlington is horrible, but amazing. The soldiers give me chills. Even though Mom was against most of the wars our country fought, she was good to the soldiers. Anytime there was an opportunity for her to donate some time, she would. Every time. She deserves to be here. Dad’s arm is around me, and I don’t stop it. I know we’re met by some important people, but I don’t care who they are or why they’re here. Mom’s good friends from the Today Show are here.

  I hug them all tightly. They were almost as much her family as I was. Am. I am.

  This is real, and there’s no escape. Of everything in this mess that’s too horrible to be happening, it feels like I need to force myself to be present, to be actually here. My chest says otherwise, pulling it all in and down.

  Most everyone is ushered away before they lower her into the ground. I sit. Still. Once again tears streaming down my face. Once again, tears streaming down Dad’s face. Buried. Mom. It’s all real.

  We walk down the hill, past numerous graves of numerous people. I wonder if any of the family they left behind hurts as much as I do. Mom’s smiling face hits me again and again. The one that was her real smile, the one that almost never made it onto TV, and when it did, it made me remember how much she loved her job.

  “When can we go back to the boat?” I ask.

  “Never thought I’d hear you say that, but yeah.” He puts his arm over my shoulders, “Let’s get back to the boat.”

  My body starts to shake, and I have to suck in a few odd breaths, but I manage to hold it together. If I can hold it off. The pain. My body will continue to absorb this. I’m sure of it.

  Seven

  I don’t mind being back in Washington because it’s everything New York’s not.

  None of my old friends are here. Nothing here reminds me of Mom. Just the weight in my chest that I’ve decided might never go away. Well, and the fact that she sent me here and right now, being upset with her is a lot better than some of the other feelings I’ve been dealing with. I text Gem to tell her that she really helped me out when I needed it. She texts me back and says she misses me. It kind of makes me feel like shit because I like Gem, but mostly I like what she does for me. What kind of guy does that make me?

  I haven’t been out since we got back, a week ago, maybe two. I’m sure this is lame and pathetic of me, but I don’t want to be part of anything that will make me wish Mom could be a part of. I can’t imagine it. Not yet.

  Dad’s on the deck of the boat talking with Lynn. There’s no such thing as privacy on a boat. That, and, they’re right above my room on the bow.

  His voice is quiet, but I can make out every word. “Part of me was scared to death he’d want to live on his own out there. It’s not that I don’t think he can do it, because I know he can, but the stuff available to these kids…especially the ones with money…”

  “He came back with you, though. That’s something, right?”

  “I think he’s using this as an escape for right now. And that’s okay. I’d rather him spend time here for a bad reason than to not spend time here at all.”

  “You’ve missed him.”

  “Yeah, a lot. He was always so much like his mom. I knew she’d do great with him, give him things I couldn’t. And she did.”

  Part of me wonders if this is some of the reason he took off. I’m still not ready to ask, not ready to hear his answer. What if it’s crap?

  “You have a lot to offer someone, Harris.”

  “Hmm.”

  Why didn’t Dad ever say anything? About how much he missed me? It’s so weird. We have genetics in common, and that’s really it. Well, and writing I guess. But we don’t write the same. I’ve read enough of his books to know that much. He’s a lover of the suspense. I love language. Words. Dad loves them to get his story out. This is why I don’t tell people I write. What kind of guy admits to loving the way certa
in people put words together?

  But what do I do now? I know I could go back. I could get emancipated or whatever, but I’m almost eighteen anyway, and then what? At the same time, do I really want to stick around here? On a boat?

  “Antony?” Amber’s voice calls through the boat. “You here?”

  I shake my hands through my hair. I’m a complete mess. Whatever. It’s Amber. No big deal. Right. But I have these nerves that start to build in the center of my chest, because even though I don’t want it to be a big deal to see Amber, it sort of is.

  “Yeah,” I call back.

  “You gonna show your face or aren’t you pretty enough yet?” she teases.

  “Those are the first words out of your mouth?” I chuckle as I open the door to my room, and then I freeze. She’s in a sweatshirt and teeny running shorts. I’m sure my mouth drops open, or I do something equally embarrassing because all I can think right now is how much I’d like my hands on her legs, or to have them wrapped around my waist.

  “Hey, you here?” She darts her head back and forth to catch my eyes.

  “Sort of.” Now I wish I would’ve taken the time to shower or shave or something.

  “I’m driving up to Point No Point beach to run. I thought maybe you’d want to come along and sit. You game?” Her glass-blue eyes sparkle with friendliness as a corner of her mouth pulls up.

  “To watch you run?” I’m an idiot. Why the hell did that just have to come out?

  She smiles. “No. To write, or read, or sit or something. I didn’t think you liked being underwater much.”

  I look down. Right. My hole in the water. The one I haven’t left in days.

  “I don’t have time to shower or shave or anything.” I run my hand over my face. It feels good to know I need to shave to stay smooth.

  “Whatever, Antony. We’re not going downtown. We’re going further into nowhere, okay?”

  I stuff my feet into shoes and grab my iPad on our way out. This way I can read or write. One day they’ll do better screens so the sun doesn’t mess crap up.

  Dad gives me a nod, so I guess he knows what we’re up to.

  Once we’re in the car I realize the last time I talked to Amber was the bizarre conversation we had while I was in New York. Now what? I’m surprised that whole thing didn’t scare her away from me forever. I’m sure I sounded crazy.

  “You’re talkative this morning.” She puts her old truck in gear, and we start up the road.

  “Um…” Crap, Antony. Just get it out. “When you called me, I wasn’t really myself, and I’m. I guess I’m sorry.”

  “I was the one who called, and I said we could talk anytime.” Her hands grip the steering wheel and she stares at the road. She’s not looking at me. What does that mean? “I meant it.”

  And I’m searching her face or her body language for something, anything more than friendship. I come up empty.

  “I was really messed up.”

  “You said.” The corners of her mouth twist around, holding her smile.

  I almost thank her because I’m pretty sure she read to me until I fell asleep, but I realize that might say something about me. “So, beach?”

  “Yeah, but the water here’s freezing, so it kind of loses something with that. You know, the ability to jump in after a good run.”

  “Been to lots of places with hot, sandy beaches?” Places you’d wear a teeny bikini? And I can’t keep my mind out of the gutter with her, especially not with her toned thighs a mere couple of feet from me. Also, the thought is a nice distraction. It shoves the suffocation of loss aside. Not away, but moved, different.

  “Mom and I were almost always somewhere hot. I mean, if you’re going to live on a boat, you should do it in the tropics, right?”

  “Exactly.” That was one of my first thoughts when coming here.

  “But then she found this sailboat up here, and it was exactly what she wanted. We were going to do a long trek out into the Pacific, through the Panama Canal and back to the Virgin Islands.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  “Your dad. I know it. But she’ll never say.” Her eyes meet mine, and that little smirk that makes her look so cute is back. I never thought I’d go for cute, but in shorts this short? Cute is pretty awesome.

  “So, not only do we need to get them together, but we need to convince them to sail somewhere warm, is that right?”

  “That would be ideal, yes.” She hits the turn signal, and pulls her lips into her mouth as if concentrating. “She said that things changed for her after my dad left.”

  “And when was that?” I figure it’s okay to ask since she brought it up.

  “Oh.” There’s surprise in her voice. Did she not mean to tell me? I wonder if she blurts stuff out around me like I seem to do to her? “I think when she was pregnant.”

  I open my mouth to call him a jerk, but keep it to myself.

  She pulls her car to a stop. “This is it. High tide right now. Sorry, it means most of the beach disappears.”

  “That’s cool. I’m going to park myself somewhere and try to soak up some vitamin D. You run.” The weight pulling on my insides is still there, but I almost forgot about it for a minute when she was talking.

  We step out of the car and walk through some tall reeds to the large chunks of driftwood and thin, long strip of beach beyond. There’s a small lighthouse on a point, and I can see the beach curve again on the far side of it. Cool.

  Amber bends forward stretching, resting her forehead on her knees, which turns me on way more than it should. “See ya.” She’s up and running in long powerful strides on the upper part of the beach. Her large sweatshirt bounces with her, but her legs are strong, and push hard. And who would have thought that running in anything but a swimsuit could be sexy?

  I let myself watch her run until she’s so far away that I can’t really see her anymore. I start to read, but my brain keeps going back to this little boy I met in South Africa. I keep thinking I want to write his story, only it would be a made-up story, but partially based on truth. I could do that. It’s sort of what I did with the first two I wrote.

  I sit on a large driftwood tree. The boy’s voice is suddenly in my head so clearly that I have to get it down.

  Mom’s mad because my brother spilled water on the clay floor. It turns it slippery and makes it hard to clean. But when she yells, the guy from next-door bangs on the wall between our houses. The noise rattles through all of us. She’s silent. Sometimes I wonder why she’s so scared of him. Maybe just because he’s an angry man. All the men around here are angry, crazy or tired...

  His simplistic view of the problems facing the people of the outskirts of Johannesburg keep hitting me. My fingers fly across the keys on my iPad. I’m lost, taken into the world of a five-year old boy, now ten, and trying to help his mom keep them in food. Working harder than I’ve ever worked. I feel his desperation. His determination. I wonder if he’ll remain determined or if that place will beat him like it does to so many others.

  People move by. Dogs run in and out of the waves. It’s like none of it’s happening. It’s all outside of the world of heat, oppression, and poverty—the world I’m writing. A life I’ve never lived, but the desperate, aching feeling in my chest pushes me further. Tells me more of his story.

  There’s movement next to me, but I’m still in it. He’s twelve now and his younger brother is missing. It happens. Sometimes they’re taken. Sometimes they run away. Sometimes they just disappear. Maybe I’ll write his story next. Maybe I’ll finish with the mom’s point of view. But how do I write from the point of a view of a mom, when I’ve just lost mine? I gasp.

  “You okay?” Amber whispers next to me.

  “Sorry.” My eyes meet hers. “I got lost. That’s all.”

  “You’re not like this at home, are you?” She looks way too comfortable
, legs crossed in front of her, leaning back on the log. How long have we been here?

  “In my apartment, yes. Out? No.” This girl probably already thinks I’m insane. It’s like honestly just pours out of my mouth. Seems stupid to try and stop it at this point.

  “You’re writing?” she asks.

  I nod. The iPad suddenly feels heavy in my hands. I give it to her without thinking. “I’m going to walk.”

  “You want to be alone?” She pushes a few damp, sweaty stray hairs back off her face.

  As I look at her, I know she won’t be offended if I say yes. “I…I don’t know.” And it’s the truth.

  She stands, the iPad in her hands, and walks slowly next to me. The sand is uneven, but there’s a lot more of it than there was earlier. The tide’s going out—another sign we’ve been here longer than I realized. She’s staring at the screen, clutching it tightly. I try not to think about her reading what I wrote. I guess me handing it to her was sort of an invitation. I didn’t mean for it to be. But I also don’t mind. Way too late for me to make a good first impression anyway.

  I stuff my hands in my pockets and keep to the sand that’s still damp. It’s easier to walk here. My chest is so weighted and so tight, that it still feels like I’m concentrating on each breath. The air is cold, but the warmth from the sun penetrates my black jacket. The wet sand meets the dry sand, which meets stacks of driftwood and rocks, and then forest—huge old trees stand tall against the graying sky.

  Mom would love this.

  The thought’s hard and heavy. Will it always be? Every time I see or feel or think about something she’d love, will I feel it like this? I blink a few times and press my palm to the outside edges of my eyes. I need to shove this away. But before I can, Amber’s arms are around me, holding me tightly.

  There’s no thinking, only pulling her as close as I can. I breathe in her damp hair. She’s still sweaty from running, and I love it. I love that she doesn’t care. Her arms are strong, and we’re both holding on, like we’ve become the anchor for the other.