Possession

by Johnson, A. M.

  Me: Sorry running late, save me a slice.

  My thumb hit the send button, and I didn’t bother waiting for a response. I pulled out of the parking lot and headed home. Headed to the mysterious, possibly life-changing package waiting for me.

  The house smelled like basil and tomato sauce as I walked in through the front door, laying my bag and keys on the small foyer table. Lana was sitting on the couch with her legs crossed underneath her. A pizza box was sitting open and half empty on the coffee table. The television was on and from what it looked like she was watching porn. Her eyes were fixed on the couple practically conceiving on the screen as she sipped deeply from her bottle of beer.

  “Grab a plate, there’s beer in the fridge,” she said as she lowered the bottle from her lips.

  “What the heck are you watching?” I asked as I quickly hurried past the television to the kitchen.

  “Vampire Diaries.” Her expression fell as if to say I should’ve known this.

  “It looks like a porno,” I said as I grabbed a plate and bypassed the beer for a soda. I hadn’t had a drop of alcohol since… since I couldn’t even remember. Probably high school. I never drank. Not even before I’d joined the church. Declan’s father had been an alcoholic, so I… we avoided it, and once I became a member, it was prohibited.

  “It’s primetime TV, you Puritan,” she scoffed and moved over a little so I could sit down.

  “This is on primetime television?” I asked in horror.

  “Well, this isn’t, this is Netflix, you know Internet, streaming… but yeah, I think this year is the final season for the network show.” She leaned over, grabbed another piece of pizza and looked at my Coke with a scowl. “This weekend, we’re going to Bellows, and I’m breaking your vow of alcohol celibacy… or whatever you call it. We will drink, be merry, and get laid. Preferably by males of the largest persuasion.” She waggled her eyebrows and I rolled my eyes.

  “I’m not big on alcohol, I wasn’t even a drinker with–”

  “Declan. I know. But you’re past that, right? Declan? Clark? You gotta move on, Paige.” Her tone was soft, sad, and begged for me to accept my fate, my future.

  I took a bite of my pizza so I didn’t have to answer. Even though I was slowly figuring out who I’d become over these past nine years, I was past Clark. I wasn’t even sure I had ever loved him, but, Declan, he was the marrow of my existence. Every moment of my life, since that day at lunch, he’d always been the one. But, I’d tainted it. The pizza turned to dust in my mouth, and I swallowed a big gulp of soda to try and wash down the acrid taste.

  “I’m not very hungry.” I sat my plate onto the coffee table and stood.

  “I’m sorry. Just sit, eat. Watch hot vampires with me.” Lana’s green eyes glittered and for a second I thought she looked tearful. “I’m sorry, really.” She waved out her manicured hand at my empty seat.

  “I know.” I rubbed my hands down the front of my jeans then pushed my hair behind my ears. The nervous tension in the room reeked. “I should look at what Clark sent me. Save me a slice. I’ll be right back.”

  I didn’t give her time to protest before I rounded the coffee table and headed back to my room. The bright white of my comforter was interrupted with a small sized cardboard box. Clark’s address, my address, my old life was on the label. I searched my dresser for something to open it with, and I found my nail clippers. The small, attached metal file ripped through the packing tape with little struggle. My breathing was uneven as I lifted the flaps and removed the butcher paper from the top.

  My heart fell into my stomach.

  He did this on purpose.

  Sitting on top of a shoe box, my memory box, the only item I’d kept of my relationship with Declan once I married, was a piece of paper. I’d kept the box hidden in our closet, and when I’d left in a hurry I hadn’t had the time to grab it. Clark had opened it. He’d found the only piece of concrete evidence of my damnation, and placed it front and center. I lifted the piece of paper and it shook in my grip as I read the business name on the letterhead in a whisper, “Women’s Wellness Center.” The date stamped below, August Thirteenth. My signature was at the bottom, my payment agreement, my deal with the Devil. Big, wet drops of water plopped onto the paper. Tears. I hadn’t even realized I was crying. I dropped the paper to the bed and lifted the shoe box from the package.

  The lid was brittle from years of being opened, years of me rifling through a time I’d never get back. My skin crawled as I thought about how Clark would have touched everything in here to find that paper. It had been at the bottom. His fingerprints fouled the history I had never wanted him to see. My breath caught as I looked through the mementos and found the only picture I had of Declan. I raised it from the box with trembling fingers. He was wearing a tight, white shirt and worn jeans. He was covered in paint. His head tipped down, his hand running through his hair, his smile lopsided as he avoided the lens. He was just seventeen years old, but he looked every bit of a man. I let out a staggered breath and brought the picture to my chest as my knees sank to the floor in grief. My forehead rested against the edge of the bed, my shoulders shook with suppressed sobs, and my heart broke all over again, like it did every time I let myself see what I had destroyed.

  “Tell me again,” she whispered. Her head rested on my chest and, even though I couldn’t see her face, I could hear her smile.

  “You make me better… and I love you.” The palm of her hand splayed across my bare stomach and the muscles twitched.

  “I love you, too.” She turned her head and the tip of her nose grazed my skin. She inhaled and my lips spread into an involuntary grin. “So much.”

  The sound of my arguing brothers barging through the front door made me jump, and Paige’s body stiffened as I pulled her closer.

  “They won’t come in here, will they?” she asked, her voice strangled with worry.

  “Nah, they know you’re here.”

  She pushed away from me and raised up onto her elbow so quickly she almost seemed inhuman. She smacked my chest and I laughed. “What do you mean? Oh, my gosh.”

  She tried to pull the blanket over her naked breasts, but I pulled it back down and let my eyes run along her skin until she blushed. I played with a piece of her hair before I gently placed it behind her ear.

  “They knew you were coming over tonight, not that we… this…” I lifted my hand and cupped her cheek. “…is between you and me.” She closed her eyes and leaned into my touch as I sat up. My lips pressed softly against the lid of each of her eyes and, as I pulled away, they fluttered open.

  “I know how close you guys are, you trust them with everything, and I figured you’d—”

  “Paige, two years ago you sat next to me on that fucking hallway floor and opened up my world. You gifted me back my sanity, and today…” I wanted to kiss her. To create that electrical, expectant pulse again. I wanted to hear her breathe deeply, sigh, and to recreate the moment when we… our bodies finally aligned. Recreate the moment she took every piece of me and turned it inside out, and I exploded into more than just a sixteen-year-old boy. “Today… you gave me you.”

  “You already had me, Declan.” Her lips parted into a shy smile.

  “You gifted me your body. Those idiots out there, yeah, I trust them, but with you… our trust, it’s different, you have faith in me when no one else does.”

  She leaned her forehead against mine and raised her hands to my face. She exhaled and her warm breath tickled my cheeks. She smelled like mint and soap, and when she brought her mouth to mine, I groaned. The world outside my bedroom door didn’t exist as she sat astride me, filling herself with more than just my body. She filled her lungs with my heartbeat and tasted my soul with her sweet tongue. It didn’t matter how loud Liam was shouting at my drunk father just a few doors down. Our breathing, hurried puffs of sex and desire, clouded the room, and all I could hear was what I was feeling. Heated skin, silky against my chest, the building fire in my stomac
h burned low as I gripped her hips.

  She is meant for you.

  She is yours.

  The needle dug too deep and my eyes opened. “Shit.”

  “Buck the fuck up, Dex. I’m almost done. I saved the worst part for last. It always hurts like hell on the ribcage.” Liam shook his head with a grin. “You know this.”

  I decided to get the quote by Galway Kinnell, “Never mind. The self is the least of it. Let our scars fall in love.”, tattooed on my left ribcage. The Book of Nightmares had always been a book I could relate to, the crazy as hell imagery he’d created seemed to fit my warped brain. I never thought too much of myself. Paige had been the only one to build me up, but she’d also left me scarred and wounded, so the quote, it fit.

  “You going to Bellows tonight?” Liam wiped at my skin and it stung.

  “Yeah, but I have a studio session I booked for tomorrow, so I won’t be around long. Tana going with you?”

  His eyes darkened with regret. “Maybe. I don’t know. I told her I needed space.”

  “She’s never going to fill the void. You should cut her loose.” I watched his jaw tick, and I gave him a minute to calm down before I spoke again, “It’s not that bad being alone.”

  “Speak for yourself. I think at this point you’d be a better priest than Kieran,” he joked but I could hear the worry laced within the words. He rolled his stool back to admire his work.

  “I’m feeling better, Liam. You don’t need to worry about me.”

  He placed his machine down on the worktop. “When was the last time you got laid, little brother?”

  Paige. It was always Paige. My silence was answer enough.

  “That’s what I thought. You don’t date, you don’t fuck, and it’s making you crazy.” He stood, removed his gloves and threw them with force into the trash.

  “I’m feeling—”

  “Better, yeah, I heard you the first time.” He grabbed the ointment and threw it at me. I caught it and he shook his head. “You have to try. Just try, Dex.”

  He was right.

  Who will want you?

  I closed my eyes briefly, willing away that nagging voice.

  “I will.”

  Liam stared at me for a few seconds and then nodded. “Alright, then. Let’s get this place cleaned up. Kieran left thirty minutes ago. He texted and said he saved us a table.”

  I opened the tube and spread the salve on my skin before I stood to look at it in the mirror. My flesh was red and angry around the thick, dark letters. It looked badass, though, and I allowed myself to smile.

  “You going to help me clean or stare at your ugly mug all night?” Liam’s smirk made me laugh.

  “Grab my shirt, dick.”

  Both of my brothers were drunk. I nursed my bottle of water as I watched them prowl around the bar. Tana sat in the corner eyeing Liam with a sour expression as he whispered into some slutty looking girl’s ear. This wasn’t an O’Connell norm. My brothers didn’t get wasted, and seeing Liam whore himself around, in front of his current girl, it was pissing me off. Kieran was just on the other side of the bar. His smile was fake, and his jaw pulsed as he talked with a few guys I recognized. He’d gone to school with them and, if I remembered correctly, they were assholes. My eyes scanned the group to see if anything seemed off and it was then I spotted her. The girl from the other night. Kate. She stood next to one of the guys, and I swallowed when her dark brown eyes spotted me, too.

  Shit.

  I dropped my stare back down to my sketch pad. I chanced a glance up again and she was no longer standing by the guys, but I noticed my brother, Kieran, seemed more at ease. I checked on Liam again and my eyes narrowed. He was standing between the stranger’s legs with his mouth on her neck. He stepped away from her and took her hand in his. He looked over his shoulder and gave me a knowing nod. He was leaving with her, and didn’t give a shit about the wake he would leave with Tana who sat alone in the corner. If this was him moving on, I didn’t want any part of it.

  “Hey, you.” The voice was familiar.

  I turned my head as Liam left through the front door. “Kate, right?”

  Her smile was simple. The pink shade of her lips reminded me of the sunset as they pulled up into a dimple. I made myself notice her details. I’d promised to try and she was attractive. I liked that she wore old band t-shirts. Tonight it was a black Joy Division tee. It tented over her tiny frame. She took the seat across from me.

  “You remembered.” Her voice was full of hope.

  “I did.”

  She smiled again, this time it was flirty and it made me uncomfortable. “Drawing?” she stated the obvious and let her eyes fall to my work.

  Kate’s black hair was pulled into a loose bun. Stray strands fell every which way, and it reminded me of how Paige’s hair had looked when she would paint. It wasn’t a thought I wanted to have, but the longer I looked, the more I wished her black hair blonde. Kieran’s eyes met mine from across the room. His jaw was pulsing again. For a minute, I thought he wanted to leave. The look he gave me almost pleaded, for what I wasn’t sure. He scanned the room to where Liam had been and then shook his head before resuming his conversation. His posture no longer easy, but steel straight.

  Kate’s admiration of my work was short lived as she noticed my attention was not fixed on her, but on someone behind her. She looked over her shoulder and then back at me. “I went to school with those guys.”

  “Kieran’s my little brother.”

  “Oh, yeah? I can see a resemblance.” She smiled. “Kieran hates those guys, not sure why he’s chatting them up. I used to date the idiot with the fauxhawk.” She rolled her eyes and laughed.

  I shrugged. The silence fell between us too easily, and I hoped she would recognize it, but instead she watched me with a quiet effort.

  “Look, you didn’t call, but you have this whole silent is sexy thing, artist bad boy vibe. I like it.”

  My chuckle rumbled in my chest. “Silent is sexy?” I raised my eyebrows.

  “Mm-hmm.” She nodded and another dimple popped in her other cheek.

  “But I didn’t call.”

  “Why is that?” she asked and her grin wavered.

  She isn’t her.

  You had your chance and you lost it.

  “I’m not really—"

  “Available?”

  I nodded. “Not really.”

  “Ex-girlfriend?” Her brows furrowed.

  My jaw clenched.

  “Bingo.”

  “Kate—”

  She held up her hands as she stood. She leaned over and whispered into my ear. “Friends. Friends call friends all the time.” She pecked me on the cheek quickly and pulled away. I could smell the scent of liquid courage on her breath.

  “They do,” I said and forced myself to hand her my pencil. Maybe this time I would actually call her.

  She scribbled numbers, almost illegible onto the bar napkin before she walked away and, if I hadn’t been paying close attention, I would have almost missed the slight wobble in her gait. She was drunk. Before I could think much more about it, Kieran stepped into my line of sight.

  “You done, can we leave now?” He was angry.

  “Sure. You okay?”

  “Just fucking peachy. Let’s go.”

  The next morning Liam was sporting a huge chip on his shoulder and a nasty hangover. The woman from the bar hadn’t been there when I had left this morning. I’d been in a hurry to avoid the conversation we’d inevitably have to have about why he’d drank so much. But, I pushed away the previous night’s events so I could concentrate on the painting in front of me. I’d been at the studio for a couple hours, and I was lost inside the canvas. Chandler had stopped in a few times, asking me if I wanted something to drink. He’d told me that another associate would be coming in soon and he would be leaving, so if I needed anything I could ask her. I didn’t pay him much attention as I swirled two giant blue orbs in the center of the white. The purples, oranges,
and pinks blended behind them. They formed the ovals surrounding those haunting eyes, the same pair I loved to torture myself with. It was a mix of sunset and Paige. I hadn’t been able to get the color of Kate’s lips out of my head, not because I wanted them or her, but because the color pushed me to look harder, to see another female in the light of beauty beyond Paige.

  My mouth was dry and my gut was empty. The growl almost echoed throughout the work space. I covered my palette with clear plastic wrap and headed to the bathroom to wash my hands. The bathroom was located in the back of the studio, down a hallway that led to an emergency exit. The water here never really got hot enough, and I had to scrub my hands almost raw to get most of the paint off. When I got home I would use turpentine under my nails and on the rest of the leftover paint. Earlier, I’d asked Chandler to book out the studio for me for the next couple of weeks. I was enjoying myself and, as I took in my paint-splattered appearance, my white shirt covered in blots of color, my lips spread into a grin. I hadn’t been lying to Liam. I really did feel better.

  I dried off my hands and headed back to grab my bag. The music I had on played off the acoustics in the large space and it sounded fucking amazing. My mood was high, and I was so entranced I almost tripped over my own feet. In the entryway to the studio, I kneeled down and quickly tied my loose lace. A quiet gasp startled me and I raised my head. All the air in my lungs evaporated. The room was too bright, I was seeing shit. I focused my eyes on the apparition in front of me.

  Paige?

  I stood slowly, afraid of myself, afraid of the thin, blonde girl standing with her back to me in front of the canvas. Her head tilted back gazing at the giant pair of eyes looking back at her. She had to be a hallucination. But still, I moved with measured steps as my pulse pounded. Her hair was longer than I remembered, her waist leaner, her arms too thin. I imagined her face with fangs, and her nails as talons, and I was afraid that she would turn and look at me before I got within a safe distance. She looked too real to have been conjured up by my sick imagination.