Hope's Café

by Sana Abid

  "Vivian…" Jay pulled me in for a hug.

  "I'm tired. I'm so, so tired of feeling shit like this all the time. My head hurts. I feel suffocated like someone's squeezing the shit out of my chest. Her face haunts me." I wailed on his lap letting him rub my back in comfort.

  "I know I can't help Eva, but I can help you."

  "How? " I sat up. He waited till it hit me. "No! I can't ask that from you. I don't want you to get sick because of me."

  "I had a feeling you'd say that, come on." Jay rose to his feet, dusting his pants off. I grabbed the hand he offered and clung on to him as he took us back inside the house.

  The walls were beige. It took me three days to acknowledge that.

  We went to the living room where he sat me down on the couch before crouching down in front of me. Then his hands reached into his pocket and fished something silver out.

  "What's that?"

  "It's for you."

  "A necklace?" I wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the gift. He thought a necklace will make me feel better?

  "Not just any necklace," he continued probably sensing my attitude towards, "it has powers." I raised a brow as he undid the ends of the chain before holding it over my neck.

  "What does it do?" I asked pulling my hair up, so he could put it on me.

  "Exactly what you don't want me to do," he said. His hot breath fanned on my skin as he hooked the ends together, smiling when I let my hair fall back into its place.

  "Thank you," I whispered, "I… I don't know what to say."

  "It's the least I could do." He gave me a sad smile. "You can take a break from it all whenever you like, even when I'm not around."

  "That's so nice of you." I held the pendant between my fingers. It was a sphere with gold, blue, and silver specks dabbed all over it. The middle was a tiny tube full of black glitter. It looked like an hourglass.

  "Just one thing you need to know. Whenever you do go, make sure you leave before the hour's up."

  "What happens if I stay longer?" I gulped.

  His words were a warning, "The same thing that happened to my parents. You'll get stuck in the book, and I will not be able to get you out."

  I didn't use the necklace on the first day. It wasn't like I didn't want to; I was dying to get out of here. However, with Jay's words looming around my head, it was hard not to be afraid of the consequences. Being stuck inside a book, now that was a new concept. Who would have thought I'd believe in such a thing? But I did now without any doubt. I'd believe anything nowadays, of course, I would; my mind was just all over the place. It's crazy how so much could change in one week.

  Jay had fallen asleep in my arms. He had a certain breathing pattern when he was sleeping, soft, barely audible.

  Like the past few days, sleep hadn't paid me a visit yet. My eyes were wide open, watching the ceiling above me. In the light you could tell it was a popcorn ceiling, but in the dark, it was a blank canvas that I painted all sorts of pictures using my imagination. Of course, things up in my head were a mess, one bad thought leading to another— a domino effect—so the pictures came out to be disturbing, dark, and depressing.

  My fingers toyed with the necklace that Jay had given me. He said to just open a book, focus really hard, and imagine myself away from reality. Not a hard task to do. I had been wishing for anything but reality for what felt like ages. Tomorrow. I could leave it all tomorrow. I was going to escape from this hell. I ran my fingers through Jay's silky strands silently thanking him again. He handed the key to my freedom right in my hands. I wasn't going to let his efforts go to waste. The outcome of his parents' fate didn't scare me anymore. It was almost comforting.

  You can't get hurt in here, Jay had said. I couldn't get harmed between the pages, neither could anyone around me. That didn't sound so bad. Rather, it sounded like music to my ears, a melody that I closed my eyes to and embraced. It was a melody that finally lured in sleep.

  I welcomed it all.

  The next day I didn't visit Eva. I just didn't have the heart to see the feeding tubes, the syringes, the white walls, knowing Eva was amongst them.

  Instead, I lied on Jay's bed in his black shirt, my hair dripping on the floor from the morning shower I took ten minutes ago. I'll clean it up later, I thought rolling over to the other side just as Jay strolled in. There was a blue bowl in his hands, steam rising from it and vanishing in the air.

  "Brought you breakfast," he said with a smile. I wasn't hungry, but I grabbed the bowl from him anyway. Jay had some important meeting today. It was not the best time to add more stress in his life. Plus, it was getting tiresome, arguing with Jay about not eating right.

  "You're not feisty today," he said jokingly. I shrugged. The smell of oatmeal made my chest hurt. It was like that each time I tried to eat as if my heart knew better than to enjoy even the simplest of things such as delicacy from food.

  "You drank water?" he asked running a hand through my hair. "You sure drowned yourself in it." It was another joke, I reminded myself that forcing a smile. What Jay didn't know was that there was some truth in what he said. The next second, my hair felt warm against my skin, no longer damp, as if someone had blow-dried it. "I have to go now, okay?"

  Nodding, I got up in a sitting position. "Okay."

  "You'll be fine?" He patted his lap.

  "Yes." I crawled over to him and got on top of his lap, his arms tightening around me.

  "Be safe, please, for me." I stared at the dressing table behind him where I had left the necklace before showering. He didn't have to worry about me. I was going to be just fine. "I'll be home at six," he said setting me down on the mattress. Then he got up and gathered everything that he needed: his phone, the red files on the desk, and his suit jacket. I watched him move fast yet so smoothly as if he had done this every day for the past however-many-years-old he was. He fixed his tie, the final touch before turning back to me.

  "Wanna escort me to the door?"

  I followed him downstairs, across the living room until we reached the front door. I unlocked it and pulled it open for him.

  "Thank you," Jay said with a grin. If that was the smile he was going to present to whomever the meeting was with, he'd surely seal the deal. I closed my eyes when Jay planted a kiss over my lips, opening them to find him halfway to his car already. "Six o'clock," he shouted before getting in the car. He blew one final kiss from inside, reversed and drove away.

  The house dripped with eeriness once I shut the door behind me. The interior wasn't ominous at all. In fact, it was comforting. The colors were classy, friendly, and the furniture complementing the different hues. There might've been a woman's hand behind the interior designing—Jay's mom, maybe. But that's not what I was talking about. The eerie part was the silence. The loneliness. With Jay gone, I felt needy and hopeless, both emotions driving me crazy. So, I did what I had to. I went back to Jay's room, grabbed the necklace and picked out a novel from the bookshelf next to the staircase.

  I was getting out of here.

  CHAPTER 12

  I had read this novel in high school in my English class. Mrs. Chrissy had told us to buy a copy, but I refused to spend money on it. Why pay for it when you could download a free PDF from the internet? So, I brought my tablet to class the next day. She didn't accept it.

  "It has to be paperback. Remember, no electronics in class," she had said with a slight pout—as if she actually felt sorry for me.

  Up till this day, I remembered the way she shook her head as she wrote down an F next to my name on her printed version of the grade book. My B went down to a C in that class. And that wasn't even the worst part. The worst part was when she stopped the entire lesson to call my mom home, made me stand there next to her when everybody else in the class started using their phones, and at the end my mom had to waste her hard-earned cash on a stupid book. I ended up Googling each chapter's summary anyways.

  Six years later, there are no memories of it in my head besides the fact that there was
one scene in chapter twelve where there's a description of a beach. I flipped the pages till I found the particular chapter, page 128, then I focused hard on the antiquated white pages, my eyes narrowing on the black ink. Come on. Come on. Take me away from here. Take me away.

  The pendant began to heat up under my fingers. There was that familiar light, bright, blinding. It engulfed every part of the room like a black hole. First the bed disappeared then the chair. The walls began to crumble as if they were soft cookies dipped in warm milk.

  I shut my eyes when the light became too intense. Jay's scent disappeared around me, replaced by the scent of a salty breeze. Under my feet, I felt the ground softened—sand. The sea breeze kissed my face. I fluttered my eyes open, finding the ocean in front of me.

  I did it! I finally got away.

  Smiling, I skipped over to the waving water. It reflected the happy hour's glow, an amalgam of blue, yellow and orange. My lips continued to stretch as wide as the horizon in front of me when the sounds of singing seagulls played in my ears. It was the happiest I had felt in ages.

  The relief washed over me. I was finally happy.

  A giggle escaped my throat, and I did a cartwheel for the first time since cheerleading in middle school. I knew I was rusty, but I didn't know I sucked that much. My wrists weren't used to carrying my weight, so instead of my legs kicking up in the air, they went sideways and took my entire body down with them. That was okay. A mild sprain in my left wrist was worth the pain. Plush sand broke my fall. My back landed on it, so I could stare directly at the evening sky. It was beautiful. It was perfect. It was a reminder that reality could never come close to this.

  Reality was a shithole.

  Jay's car was in the driveway exactly at six. My ears made out the sound of keys rattling by the front door until it swung open.

  "Hey," I said, grabbing a pile of papers from his hands, feeling his eyes on me.

  "Hey." He sounded surprised. "You're looking better. Is it good news from the hospital?"

  "I didn't see Eva," I told him as I set the files down on the coffee table.

  "Oh." His smile faded. "Well, I'm glad you're feeling better."

  I nodded, licked my lips. Why did he have to bring Eva up? "I saw the sunset in

  The Crystal Lamp." The lights finally seemed to come on because his eyes widen with realization.

  "I'm glad you enjoyed it." His lips curled up. "You're hungry?"

  Jay and I sat in the living room and watched more cartoons as we ate our food in silence. My eyes were glued on the screen, but my mind was not on the episode. I was itching to go pick up another book and just leave. I was pretty sure Jay had no intention to watch TV, either. I kept feeling his eyes burn on my skin every now and then. I worried he'd asked me what else did I do today. If I called Tate? If I was going to see Eva? But thankfully he didn't. Good. I was in no mood to talk about any of those things with him. Instead, we talked about his day, how the weather was the worst today— it had been raining nonstop— how long the meeting was, and other stuff that I listened from one ear and got out from the other.

  It wasn't that Jay was boring. He definitely wasn't. The way he talked, the ups and downs of his voice on parts that were important and parts that were not, made him a perfect conversationalist. But it wasn't enough. Nothing here was enough to take my mind off wanting to feel that escape again.

  And I did feel that escape again. Again, and again. The days went by with the same routine. Jay would leave for work, I'd wait for his car to drive away, I'd grab a novel and find a page with a serene setting, then I'd leave the old world behind. It was getting easier and easier to do so. I was getting better and better at it. Whoever said practice makes perfect, knew what he or she was talking about. I had also found a loophole in Jay's warning: I'd leave before my hour was up, wait for the hourglass to restart, then go back to any book that I wanted to.

  It always worked like a charm, which made me wonder why Jay never told me about it. Did he not know about the loophole or did he not want me to know about it? Whichever it was, it didn't matter. I had found my own way around, and I was taking advantage of it.

  I'd be between pages of a paperback or a hardcover about six times a day, leaving only when a few specs of the glitter were left. At first, I chose a bunch of different books because Jay had such a large collection of them. It was hard to choose just one. But then, I found a paperback with a pale blue cover, golden letters running across the front of the book. Ezra. On page 76, the middle paragraph had a detailed description of a lake. The name of the lake was Lake Grover and around it were red oaks. I'd never seen red oaks in my life, so I chose to go there today.

  My eyes focused on the ebony words and the sphere warmed up like a kettle on a stove. Then the world around me changed. Wow. This feeling was something that I looked forward to waking up.

  I opened my eyes when the light disappeared and unveiled the most exquisite setting. The trees were beautiful, each leaf painted yellow, red, orange, the colors of happiness. Their reflection glimmered in the water, not a single ripple breaking the mirror. The sky was clear and blue like the water. And the melodious voice of silence rang in my ears. So, so peaceful—

  "Hey there!" someone said. I tore my attention away from the trees to find a guy getting up from the dock.

  You can't get hurt in here, Jay's voice replayed in my head, so I didn't run away from the stranger.

  The man appeared to be my age. He was as tall as Jay but a bit buffer, the white long sleeve shirt choking his biceps. He had a cap over his head. Dirty blonde curls escaped loose from under it. Besides his camping attire, he reminded me of a surfer, the ones walking around shirtless in Malibu.

  "Hi, are you Ezra?" I asked.

  He cocked his head in confusion. "I'm not. My name is Will. Are you looking for someone?" he questioned as he extended one of his hand out.

  I shook it. "Vivian."

  "Vivian. You're new here?"

  My head bobbled in a nod. "You can say that."

  "It's a great place to be." He smiled. He had a crooked grin that suited his squarish face well.

  "It looks really pretty," I admitted.

  "I was just sitting down and admiring the lake." Will glanced over his shoulder to the azure water.

  "I came to do the same."

  "Well," he said with a chuckle, "want to join me? I have coffee and sandwiches." I lacked the appetite, but I accepted his invitation anyway. There was a lot of time left before I had to go. Why not spend it here?

  Will and I sat together on the dock and awed at our surroundings with a cup of coffee in one hand and a piece of turkey sandwich in the other. Usually when I transported inside a novel, I kept to myself. People in the real world couldn't understand what I felt, how could I expect the book characters to? But Will was different. He appeared so real like someone you'd randomly bump into on the street.

  "So, what are you really here for?" He turned to me.

  "I told you. To watch the—"

  "No." He chuckled. "I meant why. What happened that made you want to get away from everything?"

  I stared at him in astonishment. I couldn't be that easy to read as Jay had said. "My best friend. She got in an accident. I couldn't be around. It hurt too much." I blinked so my eyes wouldn't water up.

  "Ah." Will pursed his lips. "I'm sorry to hear that."

  "Don't, don't say everything will be all right. Or it'll get better. God, I've heard it all too many times. I'm getting sick of it," I snapped back.

  He put his hands up in defense. "I wasn't going to say that."

  "You weren't?" I was baffled. Finally, the right kind of company.

  "Nope. Life is shitty. I won't try to defend it."

  "Oh." I blinked, relaxing. "You're right about that."

  A smile broke on his face. He raised his cup in mid-air. "Cheers on feeling like crap!"

  I clinked my cup with his, laughing at how blunt he really was. "Cheers on that."

  CHAPTER 13r />
  That wasn't the only time the two of us crossed paths.

  I decided Ezra was the perfect novel to revisit, with its gorgeous landscape, calm atmosphere, a great company. It's all I needed. Will took me to see other parts of the book, parts of his world, and we talked about everything. He listened to my nightmares and hellish thoughts about Eva and what I began to realize life was about . Will was nothing like Jay. All Jay ever did was give me a small frown, a peck on my cheek, and an old man's wise words: it's going to get better. Will trashed the Universe how I wanted to. If he could, Will would beat the crap out of Life if I asked him to. That was enough for me. And that was the sole reason why I kept going back to him. Multiple times, every day.

  That day Will told me about a special recipe that his mom used to make for him when he was younger. It was shepherd's pie, but since they were vegetarian, she replaced the ground beef with finely chopped mushrooms. He asked if I wanted to tag along to his place, so he could make it for me, but I couldn't. I wanted to, but I didn't. Jay was coming home soon, and he'd go nuts finding my absence. I felt horrible for leaving Will. I wanted more time here, more time away from reality. Would Jay really mind me missing? He did say I could go whenever I wanted…

  My heart sank when I found myself amid Jay's beige walls. The air was just different too, cold and full of memories that I was desperately trying to forget. Sighing, I closed Ezra, shoving it back on the shelf where I had kept it since the day Will and I became friends. My head was groggy when it came to telling time but judging by the calendar on the fridge, I'd say I met Will five days ago. Maybe a week. It felt like I'd known him since forever.

  Jay's car pulled up in the driveway a little earlier today. I was in the kitchen dicing mushrooms when the front door opened, and Jay called out my name. My palms became sweaty as I started to get anxious about being around him. I didn't want to be. I just wanted to sit on the docks and talk to Will until the stars came out.