Unravel

by Calia Read

  I forgot about changing my clothes. I tossed my purse inside the house. I walked off the porch, as if I was in a trance. My feet slipped a few times on the slick grass, but before I knew it, I was running. Strands of my hair blowing behind me. The cold wind whipping against my face, making my eyes water up. My fingertips were tinged pink by the cold. I quickened my speed and my body started to slowly warm. Adrenaline started to course through my body. I smiled as I approached the thick swarm of trees.

  The closer I got, I swear I heard Lachlan’s voice. God, I love you, Naomi.

  I picked up the pace and his voice became louder. I promise I’ll be here.

  I ran through the trees. I pushed branch after branch away from my face. The trees shielded most of the rain above me, but dozens of raindrops still slipped past them and dropped down on my head. I finally reached the clearing and stopped. I was panting as I rested my hands on my knees and stared at the cottage.

  It was older and more weather beaten than before. But it was still the same. I smiled and laughed breathlessly.

  “You okay?” someone asked behind me.

  I gasped and turned.

  Lachlan stood there, staring at me thoughtfully. He was drenched from the rain, making his coat look more like a heavy weight than a comfort. His hair was stuck to his neck and his cheeks were slightly red from the cold. He looked out of breath like me.

  No hello. No greeting of any kind.

  I just said, “How did you find me?”

  “I saw you running and followed you.”

  We stood there in silence. I was practically numb to the rain falling down around me. This was the first time I was seeing him all summer. I was stunned. I didn’t know whether to break down and cry or run into his arms. I looked at him with a critical eye, looking for any noticeable changes. He was the same.

  The last time I had spoken to Lachlan had been on the phone. I had been two days away from leaving campus. Two days away from summer break and driving back to McLean to see Lana. We spoke every day, but there was a mounting tension surrounding us. I had pressure from school. Lachlan wanted to know what was wrong; he wanted to help me. Only, I couldn’t tell him what was wrong. And, I was mad because there was no way for him to help me either.

  Before we got off the phone, he had told me he would see me when I got back. I said okay. He said I love you. I loved him right back.

  But what happened between then and now? What had the power to pull us apart so vigorously?

  “Are you okay?” Lachlan asked.

  I blinked away the rain and the past. “I’m fine,” I said faintly.

  Lachlan still looked doubtful. He took a step in my direction. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You’re not acting like it’s nothing.”

  Lachlan stared at me, searching for a clue that would prove him right, and if I continued to look at him, he would find it. He stepped forward and reached a hand out. I dodged that hand like it was poison and made sure to keep a good distance between us, but it was killing me.

  Lachlan stared at me with a hurt expression.

  “Do you know I’m with someone?”

  My words were punctuated by the raindrops that were falling in big, angry drops from the sky. Lachlan stopped walking and was perfectly still. He said nothing and at first I thought he didn’t register what I’d said. His eyes narrowed and his jaw became clenched so tightly, a small muscle became visible around his cheek. His head turned a fraction of an inch.

  “What?” he said slowly. He didn’t raise his voice over the rain, but I heard him.

  “His name is Max. I met him at the beginning of the summer, at a party he was hosting.”

  His eyes merely widened.

  “Lana was with me,” I rushed. “I mean… I went with her. She had to go because her parents were there and—”

  I was rambling and I knew it. Yet it was the blank expression on Lachlan’s face that made me stop talking. His eyebrows were pinched together. Eyes scrunched as if he was trying to peer very carefully at me.

  “What are you talking about?” he asked in a low voice.

  I stared at him miserably; it was all I could do.

  “It’s me…” He pushed away part of his jacket and gripped the material of his shirt. “Lachlan.”

  “I know that,” I said a little defensively.

  “Do you?”

  “Of course I do!” I shot back. “I’ve known you practically my entire life!”

  Lachlan shook his head. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  I opened my mouth, but not a word came out. Lachlan was making me doubt myself. He was making me feel like I was losing my mind. I hated that.

  Then he opened his arms up to me. I thought having Max in my life would be enough for me.

  I was wrong. I needed them both.

  I went to Lachlan willingly. He was so warm and solid and stable. I told myself to breathe in and out, but it wasn’t working. My breathing was harsh, coming out in convulsive gasps. I wished that I could tell him everything that had been happening. I would start from the beginning and tell him Lana’s story. I pictured the pain falling away from my body. Lachlan would listen and I could lay all my fears to rest and things just might be okay.

  I said into his chest, “I’m not okay.”

  Lana and I reacted to Max’s arrest in our own ways. I shared her sadness and despair but it didn’t pull me under. I had too much anger and aggression inside of me to let that happen. She felt responsible for it all.

  I hadn’t seen Lachlan in a week. It didn’t matter though because nothing had been the same since. Throughout the summer I had done a good job of pushing him to the back of my mind, but seeing him made all my efforts evaporate. My head felt compressed and weighed down, like I was on the verge of a painful headache. Even now, I rubbed my temples methodically.

  Lana lay on the couch. A throw draped over her body. Hair pulled up into a greasy bun. She had a waxy, pale look to her skin that most people get when they haven’t been outside in a while. I felt restless energy building up inside of me. I couldn’t sit here idly, doing nothing. I jumped out of my chair and clapped my hands.

  “You gotta get up,” I announced. “You have to eat something.”

  Lana looked over at me, like she had forgotten I was even in the room. “I ate.” She pointed at the empty plate on the floor.

  “Yeah, but a piece of toast is not going to cut it. You see, your body needs this thing called energy to keep going.”

  Lana looked at me with a heavy lidded look, before she looked back at the television behind me.

  I grabbed the remote and turned it off. She gave a small protest as I sat next to her. I exhaled loudly and leaned against her legs.

  “Come on,” Lana said. “Get it out.”

  I looked at her, my eyebrows knitted together.

  “I know you want to tell me off right now.”

  I sighed. “I don’t want to tell you off. I just want you to cheer up. Things are… weird right now.”

  “You told me that a month ago.” Lana wrung her hands. “Are you going back to school?”

  I stiffened slightly. “Next semester I am. I mean… there’s nothing else for me to do, right?” I looked over at Lana and smiled weakly. She never smiled back. “My parents expect me to go back.”

  “But do you want to go back?”

  “I think so,” I said quietly.

  I stood up and paced the room. I tugged at the collar of my shirt, suddenly feeling like I was being choked. “How can I focus on anything else right now? It feels like my world is crashing down around me.”

  “Maybe it’s been crashing down around us the whole time.”

  I wanted to tell her to save her breath. It was nothing new to hear Lana talking so cryptically; she had been doing that for weeks. Yet her words were starting to eat at my conscience, making me paranoid and sending a cold feeling up and down my spine.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?�
�� I said.

  Lana shrugged, but didn’t avert her eyes. She looked me straight in the face. “I just think that the truth is finally catching up to you, to the both of us, and that’s what I wanted to avoid. The very thing I wished would never happen… did. People are being crushed because of my dad.”

  When she finished talking the apartment was so quiet, you could have heard a pin drop.

  We didn’t say anything. I had nothing but the sound of her words echoing in my head.

  I got up and left the room.

  We avoided each other the rest of the day.

  I woke up to the sound of a crash.

  I sat up instantly, feeling like I was being ripped out of a dream. It took me a while to come back to reality and when I did, I looked over at the clock. It was almost six in the morning.

  The disorientation wouldn’t leave. I had to stop my body from lurching forward. I felt almost numb, yet there was an organ inside of me, about the size of my fist, that wouldn’t stop frantically beating. I placed my palm over my heart and took a few deep breaths. After a few minutes, my heart rate still wouldn’t go back to normal and I gave up. I got out of bed. My legs were shaking as I opened my door and peeked my head into the dark hallway. Light seeped out from under the bathroom door. I called out Lana’s name. My voice was crystal clear and steady, but she never answered me.

  I finally walked across the hall. The apartment was so deadly quiet. I could hear everything: the blood roaring through my veins, my labored breathing, and my footsteps against the carpeted floor.

  When I reached the door I went to knock, but hesitated for a millisecond. There was the smallest part of me that was scared and urgently told me not to go in.

  I knocked lightly. My eyes closed when there was no response.

  “Lana?” I said.

  On the other side I heard drawers opening and shutting and the sound of sniffling.

  “Lana, I’m coming in,” I said as I opened the door.

  I opened the door. I was only one step forward when I stopped short. Lana was staring at her reflection with a knife pressed against her left wrist.

  I approached very carefully and said her name. She didn’t look at me.

  “What are you doing?” I said.

  She blinked before she resumed staring at herself. Turning her head this way and that, looking over her features with a critical eye.

  “My skin is perfect,” she said and grazed the blade against her wrist. Her hand started to shake. I sucked in a sharp breath. “But you know what?” She tilted her head to the side and stared at me through the mirror. I stared back. Lana may think she’s hopeless, but I see a person there. One that’s had to fight to survive her entire life. If she made it past this hurdle in her life she would be unstoppable.

  “Inside I have so much pain,” she said. “It just keeps multiplying.”

  “And you think cutting yourself will fix that?”

  “Yes.”

  I tried to reason with her. I told her we could go somewhere—anywhere—that would make her feel better. Was she hungry?

  Lana said no to all the above.

  I tried again. “What about something to make you sleep? You’ll take it, fall asleep, and tomorrow will be a better day. You’ll be able to think everything through!”

  Lana looked at me, still through the mirror, like I was insane. “I don’t need anything to make me sleep. I know how to make my pain disappear.” Lana held up the knife. The blade glinted in the light and my breath became stuck in my throat.

  “Just hand the knife to me,” I pleaded.

  But Lana wasn’t with me anymore. I could see in her eyes that she was stuck in the recesses of her memory. Drifting further and further away from reality.

  “You don’t get it,” Lana said.

  “Explain it to me.” I took another step into the bathroom and shut the door behind me. We were the only two people in the apartment, but I still felt the need to close the door. It felt like I was closing the world off from this extremely private conversation. “Make me understand.”

  She looked at me like I was the crazy one. “This,” she waved the knife in the air, “is the only way to get the pain out of me.”

  “No, it’s not,” I said quickly.

  The knife went back to her wrist and even though she had a white knuckled grip on the metal, her fingers shook uncontrollably. I was waiting for that perfect moment to lunge forward and grab it from her without either of us getting hurt.

  “Lana, if you just—”

  “Will you let me talk?” she shouted.

  I flattened myself against the door. I’d never heard her raise her voice to anyone, especially me.

  I held my hands up in surrender. “Yeah. Yeah. You can talk. The floor is yours.”

  She was breathing hard, staring down at her wrist like it was speaking to her.

  “Once…” Lana started out slowly. “When I was twelve, my grandma had a lady over from her church. They were sitting in my grandma’s living room and I was eavesdropping outside the door. My grandma asked her how she was. The lady, who was in her mid-thirties, had a small packet of tissues on her lap. She had just lost her baby at 20 weeks. She said, ‘He’s still in here.’ She rubbed her stomach. ‘Even though he’s gone, I feel him every day.’ She went on to tell my grandma that sometimes she lifts her shirt up expecting to see a swollen stomach and when she sees nothing there, she just wants to die. My grandma told her not to think like that, said suicide was a sin.”

  Lana continued to stare down at the knife. She had a laser sharp intensity on the knife. I finally took a step forward, my hand outstretched in front of me.

  “But you know what that woman said? She said, ‘Is suicide a sin? I know my son’s safe now. Safe and happy. I just want to be with him. I want death.’”

  “At first I thought, who wants death?” Lana looked at me, really looked at me, past my outstretched hand and cautious gaze. She laughed breathlessly as she said: “To me, death was terrifying. Most people fight it off for as long as they can. Yet this woman craved it. But then I thought of something. Maybe this lady understood something that we all will lose later on. When the tears and anger aren’t enough, maybe dying is the only guaranteed way to end your pain.”

  Lana had tears in her eyes.

  “I used to think that the abuse and humiliation would stop. But now I realize that it never will. So why am I putting myself through this pain? Why not end it all?”

  Tears dropped onto her wrist. There was a small second where the two of us both looked down at that perfect wrist, only marred by a single teardrop.

  Lana pressed down. The skin around the blade turned white. I lurched forward. It was too late. She dragged the blade across her wrist and then the other.

  It took her only two seconds to cut open both wrists. There wasn’t even a drop of blood on the blade.

  The knife dropped to the floor. Lana gasped and stared at me. I expected to see terror in her eyes over what she had done, but she looked happy, almost relieved.

  She smiled and gazed down at the blood that was slowly but steadily starting to rise to the surface and trickle down her hands, falling onto the floor. They looked like colored teardrops.

  “Holy shit,” I breathed. I stared between her and the blood. I felt numb.

  The life was slowly draining out of her and she still managed to lift her hand in the air, watching those teardrops trickle down her ghost white skin.

  “It’s all fading,” she said with awe.

  My breath was coming out in short gasps. The blood was making me queasy. I held my breath as I stepped forward. I kept my gaze on Lana’s face and I focused on her lips. They were curled up in a small smile. I tried to picture happiness and laughter, instead of the hopelessness and despair around me.

  “Lana, what did you just do?” I said, my voice a little faint.

  Her body sagged against mine like dead weight. I reached for a towel and when I did, I slipped on her blood. We both l
urched back and hit the wall with a loud thump.

  Lana rested her head against my shoulder. I breathed slowly and stared up at the ceiling in a daze. My head throbbed and the light above me blurred in and out.

  The two of us sat there in complete silence. There was only the sound of my labored breathing and Lana’s very faint breaths.

  “She was right,” Lana finally whispered. “You’re really only safe when you’re dead.”

  I heard the monitors beeping, steadily breaking through the silence. Lana lay in bed, staring at the television with a faraway look in her eyes.

  I stood outside her room. The only thing that stopped me from walking into her room was her parents. They arrived promptly at 10 in the morning and had been with Lana ever since. They were going on two hours. Instead of loving and fretting over their daughter with concern, they said nothing. Disgust and disappointment was written all over them. Her mom clutched her purse and touched the pearls around her neck. Her dad wasn’t much better. His lips were in a thin line, eyes hardened as he looked at Lana as if she was the weakest person he’d even seen.

  I peeked into the room and as I did, my foot tapped impatiently. They flanked her bed, both sitting down and both staring at the television across from them. They blinked every few seconds like robots that were trained to act human-like.

  The television cut to a commercial. Lana’s mom cleared her throat. Her hand went to the pearls.

  “Well… was it worth it?” her mom asked her.

  Lana turned her head, blinked, and said in a very slow, but sure voice, “Every single inch.”

  “Is this a joke to you?”

  “Absolutely not,” Lana said. “I can think of funnier, less painful ways to crack a joke.”

  “I’m serious.”

  “So am I.”

  “It’s a joke to her, Michael!” her mom ranted. She breathed through her nose and stood up. “All of this is a joke to her. She doesn’t care about how this will look for the family. I shouldn’t be surprised. If she doesn’t care about her own life, why would she care for ours?”

  “Mom—”

  “I can’t do this.” She grabbed her purse. Before she walked out the door she looked back at her husband, not her only child. “I’ll be in the waiting room.”