It Starts

by Avery Kirk

  Kevin released me slowly, our skin sticking together for an instant with the steam. He put his hands on my hips at the end, squaring my body to his so he could double check his wound clean-up. He set his right hand, palm down on the center of my stomach and touched his head to his hand. We stayed this way for a long moment.

  Then, he stood abruptly, and I backed up, still looking down. I re-wound my arms around me. He reached for the T-shirt that he’d set out for me and tossed it around in his hands, orienting it for me. Without saying a word, he slipped it over my head and held the arm holes open, waiting for me to put in my arms. He pulled it down for me and scooped my hair out from under it. He put his hand around mine and led me to the bed.

  “I just want to take a quick shower, Will you be OK?”

  I nodded and looked up at him, trying to show my competence. It was a lie. I felt as though I was going to panic completely if he left me for even as little as three minutes. The feeling was totally irrational, but it was just how I felt. I hoped he couldn’t read this on my face. I looked away a little too quickly. He was just going for a damn shower, for goodness sake. He walked back to the bathroom and closed the door. A second later, he opened it again and left it cracked about an inch and a half.

  The shower had been running this whole time. I could see him moving around the bathroom from where the mirror reflected the door’s opening, and it relaxed me somewhat. I looked around the room, wanting to respect his privacy and his trust in me in leaving the door open. I wasn’t sure if he did it for me, or if he did it for his own comfort. Whichever reason didn’t matter.

  A wave of sadness came over me, and recalling my random images from before didn’t help in the least. I sat on the edge of the bed and cranked my head to the side so that my ear was on my shoulder. The posture wasn’t comfortable, but I felt overcome, so I didn’t pay much attention and let my body contort in this way.

  I felt my face crunch up and my breathing became erratic. I touched my toes together, popping my big toe into and out of the other foot’s first two toes. In an effort to regain control, I pictured myself staining a long wood bartop over and over. Long and slow strokes, over and over. I made myself breathe deeply with each imaginary stroke, but I didn’t relax my position. I said a few words, checking to see if they came out in English.

  I didn’t hear the shower stop, but the next thing I knew, Kevin was standing next to me, the smell of soap finding me just after he did. He almost matched me, his boxers just a different color than the ones he’d lent me. He pulled the blankets back the rest of the way and swooped up my legs, which I brought up to my chest in a hug as I lay down on the pillow.

  He quickly walked around the bed and slid in behind me. He reached over me to push the lamp button. Darkness. I was instantly uncomfortable and instinctively stopped breathing and stiffened up until I felt his arm slip around my waist and he pulled me closer to his chest.

  I couldn’t help it this time. Without warning, a low soft groan left my mouth, and I began to quietly cry in the dark. Kevin kept hold of me, tightening just slightly and running his arm resting above my head over the hair from my forehead and temple to behind my ear. It was his embrace and this rhythmic, soothing motion that kept me sane. I concentrated on my breathing, held his arm around me tight, concentrated on his clean smell and the feel of his breath on my ear, and allowed myself to drift to sleep.

  Chapter 16: Lightness

  That night I dreamt of fireflies. I felt happy, although I had thought that my sleep would be filled with nightmares. In my dream, I was standing in a grassy place with fireflies all around me. I tried and tried to catch them, but I was too slow. When I looked down at my hands, I found that they were alight with dozens of fireflies already. The creatures didn’t seem to be in any hurry to leave. They hovered on my palms as if they were attracted to them somehow.

  My hands were like a living torch. I could move my palms, my fingers, and they stayed. I smiled brightly and looked up at a man who I didn’t know. But I was comfortable with him. He was young and clean looking. He reminded me of Kevin.

  I watched the fireflies, and all but one flew away. That single one remaining stayed on my open hand. I blew on it, and it flew away. I heard a man’s voice in a gravely whisper very clearly say ‘thank you.’

  I woke up to the sound of a kid screaming. I gasped and sat straight up. That scream was a happy sound though, from a kid running past our hotel door and down the hall. Kevin was already up with sweatpants on and sitting at the table in the room looking at his laptop.

  “Damn kids.” He looked over at me, smiling.

  “What time is it?” I wanted to know.

  “It’s still early.” He was eyeballing me. “How are you doing?” he asked.

  “I’m fine.” I sat up, feeling the small surge of pain from my cut. I noticed that Kevin had slept next to me but not under the blankets. The blankets on his side were unused. He’d slept on top of them, right next to me, hugging me while I slept. I looked at him and pointed to the blankets. “Weren’t you cold?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “Nah, not really. I tossed my sweatpants on after you fell asleep. Just—you know—trying to be a gentleman,” he said, opening up his clasped hands in a sort of shrug.

  “Well done,” I told him, rubbing my eyes.

  “You barely moved when you slept. I was expecting that you would be restless. But you weren’t at all. I was glad.”

  “Oh. Yeah, that’s weird. You didn’t sleep well, did you?” I said as I noticed the puffiness of his eyes.

  “Well, you had me pretty worried,” he said quietly. “I do have some questions for you. When you’re ready. No rush,” he added, obviously trying to sound off-hand.

  A small wave of dread passed over me. I couldn’t help it. That was the conversation I’d been anxious about for weeks.

  He handed me a coffee he’d made in our in-room coffee maker. I thanked him. I knew Kevin well enough to know that he wasn’t the type to let things mold in the corner of his mind. He had to bring everything to the surface and work through them—it was just how he was built.

  His leg was bouncing, so I knew he was all bottled up. He waited until I drank a sip from my terrible coffee before he started in on me.

  “OK, I have to just say this—please never leave me somewhere with a cab without saying something or calling me. I mean, you just got a new phone. When some freaky bartender comes to tell me you’ve left and I should go with a cab driver, I hesitate. So I told him off. I thought for a minute that he trapped you somewhere and was trying to get me to leave, you know?” I was horrified to hear what his reaction had been.

  “Please don’t do that again. You acted like someone had stabbed you and then you disappeared. That wine girl, Gracie or whatever, came by afterward and I was short with her because I had no idea where you went until the guy walked over. I actually had her check the bathroom for you because I didn’t believe him.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t know what else to do.”

  “What happened to you?” he asked, a desperate and bewildered expression on his face.

  I was quiet, and a spike of anxiety shot through me. I worried what he was thinking of me, and I wasn’t quite sure how to put the experience into words. I just wasn’t ready to talk about everything yet. I didn’t want to tell him that, because I knew he’d been there for me when I needed him, and I was unbelievably grateful. Actually, grateful didn’t quite cover it. I was deeply in his debt.

  He came to sit next to me on the bed where I was staring into my coffee cup, trying to figure out what to say.

  “I don’t want to go to the hospital for my cut,” I said, softly. “It will be fine.”

  Kevin just looked at me for a moment and opened his arms to hug me.

  “We don’t have to talk about it yet. But, Mel, I don’t want you to do that thing you do.”

  “What thing?” I said.

  “Where you lock away your thoughts until you’re ready for them.”<
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  I didn’t answer. I laid my head on his chest. We stayed still for a few minutes. He took his hand and brushed my hair off my face and moved it to behind my shoulder.

  “You OK?” he asked.

  I nodded.

  “Because I have an idea. It’s our last full day in California, right?”

  “Yeah…” I sat up to look at him.

  “Let’s rent a convertible and drive to Malibu. We’ll drive along the Pacific Coast Highway. I heard it’s one of the most beautiful drives in the world.”

  I didn’t feel like it. What I really wanted to do was stay in bed and watch home improvement shows and action films. But I made myself do it. How did I know when I’d be back in California? Might be my only chance to see it.

  “OK.”

  “Really?”

  I nodded.

  “Want me to get your clothes ready for you?” he asked.

  “No, I’m OK.” I might have been lying.

  Kevin walked over to the bathroom and turned the shower on. He was in there for a few minutes before he reappeared next to the bed.

  “I put a towel on the toilet seat for you. It’s stupid, right—because they’re hanging right there.” He said that in a lower tone, shaking his head once he realized it. I’d been standing at my yellow suitcase and looked over at him with a half-smile.

  I nodded. “I appreciate it.”

  I walked into the bathroom and noticed that he’d lined up my toothbrush and toothpaste parallel to each other and filled a glass with water and placed it next to my toothbrush. He also had put a neatly folded washcloth next to that. My hairbrush was on the other side of the sink with my lip gloss lined up parallel to it. I smiled.

  My stomach twinged as I looked at the towel on the toilet seat where Kevin had cleaned me up. As the shower began to steam, the bathroom reminded me too much of the night before. I immediately grabbed the water temperature dial and turned it to cold. As cold as it went. I needed something different from the last time I had been in there.

  I took an ice-cold shower. It distracted me from my thoughts enough that I was comfortable closing the door. I felt very slightly proud of myself.

  Kevin located the phone number to the rectory while I was in the bathroom and spoke with a priest. They’d brought Chloe to the hospital by ambulance just a few minutes after we left. She had still been unconscious. They had no other update.

  While Kevin was in the shower, I grabbed one of the spare bags from the ice bucket and threw my bloodied jeans and shirt from the night before into their own bags. I also washed the rag that had been stained with blood until the water ran clear. I tossed the bags into my tote bag.

  We upgraded our original rental car for a convertible Camaro. It was black, and it looked tough. My mood lightened. I made it a point to throw away my jeans in the rental car company’s outdoor trash bin—just in case. I didn’t feel like explaining bloody clothes to a TSA agent at the airport.

  We spent the entire day driving. We took turns driving along the Pacific Coast Highway so each of us could enjoy the view. It was about 82 degrees out and sunny, and I couldn’t imagine paradise itself looking any better than this.

  We stopped at a beach and lay on a folded towel looking at the ocean. Kevin fell asleep for a little while, proof that he hadn’t slept well the night before. He slept with his arm extended, holding the belt loop on my shorts. I didn’t notice it until I tried to sit up. I gently slid his finger out and held his hand until I was sure I hadn’t woken him up.

  I hugged my knees and looked around. So this was California. The ocean had depths of blue that I’d never seen before and seemed to hold secrets far below the surface, secrets that most would never learn of. I felt comforted by the sights and by the idea that I was similar in that way to this magnificent ocean. I pulled my ponytail out and let my hair fling around in the wind. I understood why people risked earthquakes to live here.

  About an hour and a half later, we got back in the car and headed toward the hotel. After a while, we stopped to get gas and I threw my other bag in the garbage at the gas station. We ate roadside tacos and found a park bench where we could watch the sunset while we had tacos and pop.

  “Mel?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Feel like talking about it?”

  “No.” I dropped my head backward as if it were on a hinge and closed my eyes.

  He sighed and took a quick sip of his pop.

  “Ask me about anything else.”

  “Yeah?”

  I picked my head up and looked at him. “Yeah, why? Is there something else you wanna know about?”

  “Kinda.”

  “Oh boy, what.”

  “I don’t want to ruin the day. I just want to understand you and be—I dunno, be here for you. That’s all.” He was moving the grass in front of the bench around with the toe of his shoe.

  “I know.” I felt sad. What a mess. “Just ask then.”

  “That night we went out to the fancy restaurant,”

  Dread rolled over me. The makeup night.

  “Yeah.”

  “Why were you all done up?” He looked right at me.

  I felt as if I was about to take the ugliest, most broken box off the highest shelf in the unlit corner of my brain. I felt that if I touched this box, it would shatter. I wanted to lie.

  “I just want to understand,” he said again in a whisper.

  “It’s just something I do,” I said. I felt jittery.

  “What do you mean?”

  I rubbed my hands together and looked around for a bit. The sun was about halfway down to the horizon. People walked on the beach.

  “You can trust me,” he urged.

  “I know. I just worry that you’ll think I’m a huge spaz and never want to talk to me again.”

  “C’mon…” he said, nudging my knee. “I would never.”

  The words left me quickly as if they’d been behind a dam. “It’s just something that reminds me of my mom. I like the detail. I’ve never let anyone see me before. You know, before then. Before that night, I mean.”

  “Well, that is unfortunate because you were—I mean, honestly, I’m a sucker for a girl in a ball cap, but you were perfectly gorgeous. It was a good night. All around.”

  “It was—and thank you,” I said, looking at him.

  “By the way,” he said, flicking my shoulder. “Not that weird, Mel. Not that weird. I was ready for something way weirder.” He smiled, leaned over and put his arms around me. I put my arms around him and squeezed tight.

  “Oh and also,” he said in a muffled voice, squeezing me back, “I’m never talking to you again.”

  “Shut up.” I laughed.

  That night at the hotel, I dreamed of fireflies again. I knew it was a dream right away so I tried to enjoy the fireflies in my hands and control the movement of my arms. I felt myself smiling.

  The night sky became as black as a void and the fireflies left my hands. They flew into the black velvet sky and kept their form in a complete circle as they flew higher and higher. The center of the circle was left unlit by the fireflies and was perfect blackness. I watched them closely, and although they were too far away for me to touch—I tried. Their lights lit and faded at different times, which made them appear to twinkle as living stars moving just slightly around the void.

  I heard a voice. A voice in my dream. It was familiar.

  “Mel?”

  I looked around, but I didn’t see anyone. I felt wind, and my hair moved.

  “Mel, honey?”

  The words were louder than I wanted. We were in my room now. My room at Grandpa’s house. There she was. I sat up on the bed to look at her. She sat on the end of the bed. My mother.

  She smiled. “Focus on me, Mel. Please try to control your emotions because if you don’t, you’ll wake up. I know you can do it.”

  The volume of her voice lowered now. I looked at my mom. Her golden brown hair was curly and hung to the middle of her back. The t
op of it was swept up off her face. She was wearing a yellow crew-neck shirt with a necklace I’d never seen before. It was a silver-dollar-sized piece of blue glass that was wrapped in silver strands and hung from a silver chain. I felt an ache as I looked at her. I missed her so much. I missed just looking at her.

  I focused on her necklace to distract myself from her eyes because they made me sad. Her eyes were darker than I remembered. But clear green still. She looked just like she was alive. She wasn’t see-through or anything.

  “I wanted to tell you that I’m doing fine. I wish I could talk to you for hours. I have so much to tell you. I don’t have long, and I wish you could talk back to me, but you’ll be pulled from me if you do. Please don’t try. You’d think it would be easy for me to do this, but stuff is always more complicated than you figure it should be. It’s annoying even for me.

  “Mel, you’re doing a great job with work, and Grandpa is taking good care of you. I saw you the other night when you were out with Kevin. You were just lovely. Reminded me of you going to your senior prom. I miss you and I love you so much.” She looked off into the distance and then closed her eyes.

  “Wait, Mel, you’re controlling me. Don’t control what I say. Let yourself relax a bit. OK—there we go. Your mind is so strong. That’s good for you mostly, but sometimes makes things difficult. And yes, that’s all true. It’s just more what you want to hear than what I came to say.

  “Over there, I learned more about you than I knew before. Made me even prouder. I kind of suggested you for something important. Something I know you can do. I worry that it will impact your life more than I want it to, but you were selected by others and not only me, and way before I got here. I just let them know that you were up for it. I know you’re hurting.