by J P Barnaby
The hairs on the back of his neck stood up as he felt someone standing in line behind him. He didn’t want to be here any longer than was absolutely necessary. God, he didn’t know if he could sit in a classroom surrounded by people if he couldn’t even stand in line to get books. The girl stepped back to the counter and double-checked the bag’s contents to make sure they matched his receipt. It seemed to Aaron that she was almost deliberately taking her time checking his stuff. It made him uncomfortable. She pushed the bag to him, but didn’t let go of the bottom when he grabbed the handles at the top.
“I don’t know if you remember, but… uhm… we went to high school together,” she said finally. Warning bells started to sound in his head, and his heart raced. His breathing became shallow, and he tried to pull the bag away from her and leave, but she held on. “I’m so sorry about—” That was as far as she’d gotten before Aaron ripped the bag from her grasp and bolted for the door. He had no idea if she was going to express her sorrow about what happened to him, or Juliette, but whatever it was, he didn’t want to hear it. He fucking hated the word sorry. They couldn’t possibly understand what the word meant. The girl, well, all of them who tried and failed to console him, they couldn’t possibly be as sorry as he was. He didn’t want their hollow platitudes, no matter how sincere they seemed. Aaron didn’t know the girl behind the counter, didn’t remember her. She certainly didn’t know him, at least the boy he had become. There was absolutely nothing she could say that he wanted to hear.
His hands were still wrapped into tight fists, one around the handles of the bookstore bag, the other awkwardly hanging at his side as he walked out into the quad with its perfectly landscaped lawns and modest, well-kept buildings. The campus also happened to have the best IT program within a hundred-mile radius. His parents had insisted that he go to college, even if he didn’t feel like he had any kind of future. The shrinks had told his mother that Aaron should live as close to a normal life as possible, to assimilate him back into society. It was a joke. Aaron would attend this school not for its academics, but because it was ten minutes from his home. His mother stayed home to care for him and his brothers, so she would never be more than ten minutes away from him at any given time. It had been like that all his life, but now, more than ever, that proximity was crucial.
Exhausted and lost in thought, Aaron sat on one of the benches, trying to stop his heart from racing before he went back to the parking lot where his mother waited. The smell of freshly mown grass hung heavy in the air as the cool late summer morning turned into a warm late summer afternoon. He could hear a mower off in the distance, but mostly, the quiet chatter of students on the sidewalk near him was the only sound. With his bag held tightly in his arms, as if it were an anchor tethering him to reality, he stared unseeing after a long and sleepless night. The bench near where he sat was one of three in a semicircle around an abstract statue of metal concentric circles standing atop a square base. Small bushes sprinkled the open area, with little purple and blue flowers still in bloom. He should go back to the car before his mom started to worry, but he didn’t want to go yet. It was peaceful here, almost serene. Aaron never really went anywhere, and this beautiful oasis of freedom was much less oppressive than the bedroom he rarely left. A girl he did not know half waved at him, until he looked up fully and the sun brought his scars into relief. Her expression changed to the shock and horror he knew so well, almost like a welcoming friend, signaling a lucky escape from a would-be conversationalist.
The hand that touched his shoulder was so unexpected and scared him so badly, he shot off the end of the bench, stumbled on shock-numbed legs, and fell onto the ground. His bag landed near his feet and his books scattered from it along the sidewalk. A searing pain ripped through his side as he landed on the corner of the statue’s base and avoided screaming only by the sheer grace of God. Aaron curled in on himself, to the only protective position he could think of. Pulling his knees to his chest and covering his head with his hands, he didn’t even have the presence of mind to grab his cell phone from his pocket. At that point, the only goal was to keep himself safe.
The sound of the van door slamming was loud in his ears as he struggled against the guy who held him. His nostrils were assaulted by the stench of stale beer and sweat, as the arms remained clamped around him like a vise. Looking over, he saw Juliette struggling as hard as he was.
“Shhhhhh…. Calm down, kid, we’re just going for a little ride.”
Flashes of that night came back, strong and unbidden, as he cowered beside the concrete base of the statue. Its solid, unyielding presence was mildly reassuring, and Aaron pulled harder against it, trying to shield himself from the attack that he knew was coming. The burns, it would be the burns first.
“Don’t hurt me…. Please… d… don’t touch me,” he chanted over and over again to his knees, which were now almost directly in front of his face as he rocked on the ground. With his arms locked over his head, he was only vaguely aware that the figure standing over him was still looming. Then, a car door slammed in the distance, and he heard footsteps. Still, he didn’t dare move.
“Aaron… Aaron, I’m not going to touch you. Baby, can you hear me?” His mother’s voice filtered through the fog of fear and panic. Thank God. No one could hurt him with his mother protecting him. She’d even saved him that night. That horrible night she’d come through and she’d saved him.
“Mama?” Aaron’s voice was shaky and quiet as he allowed his arms to fall from his head and wrap around his knees. “Mama, I want to go home.” Her breathing hitched, and she sounded almost like she might cry. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d called her “mama”—probably not since he was a small boy.
“Okay, baby, we’re going home,” his mother replied in a soft, reassuring voice. Her voice changed then as he heard her addressing his unknown assailant.
“Did you need something?” Aaron’s mother asked coldly. She was obviously upset by Aaron’s incapacitation. The response that she got was strange, and sounded almost foreign, even though it was in perfect English.
“I. Am. Very. Sorry..” The guy’s voice was shaky, and he spoke slowly, enunciating every syllable very clearly, like he was not used to speaking or like he thought Aaron was slow. Frankly, Aaron didn’t care; he wanted to get the hell out of there. There was something about the stranger’s slow, measured pronunciation that just sounded off, and Aaron found that he didn’t want to look up to see the guy’s face. He didn’t want to see horror or pity. He wanted to go home.
“I. Was. Asking. Him. For. Directions.,” the guy continued, still in that slow, measured speech. “I. Cannot. See. What. He. Is. Saying.. What. Is. He. Saying.?”
“He said ‘please don’t touch me’. What building are you looking for?” The exhaustion in his mother’s voice filled him with shame. He knew that she just wanted to get him home, but the fact that he couldn’t even deal with a guy just asking for directions caused his chest to tighten. It infuriated him that he couldn’t act like a normal human being, that he had to sit cowered in the shadow of this boy who was no real threat.
“Patterson..”
“It’s the building over there across the lot,” his mother explained.
“Thank. You.,” the guy replied, and sensing an escape, Aaron scrambled to his feet and bolted for the car, not looking up at the lost student. It was a minute or so before his mother joined him, and together they got into the car and headed home. The silence in the car was almost deafening.
His mother brought him a tranquilizer and a bottle of grape juice as he sat on his bed staring at the door. The soft whirring of his fan was the only sound in the room as he took the pill without a word. It had been a couple of weeks since he’d needed one, but today he certainly needed it. Images from the flashback he’d experienced in the quad were burned into his mind, and he knew that only the tranquilizer would make them fade. Nothing made them leave completely, but for a while, they wouldn’t torture him. Still fully dressed with the
exception of his shoes, he rolled on his bed to face the wall, pulled his knees up to his chest and waited for the drugs to do their job.
This day hadn’t really started out so bad. How did it go so wrong?
He felt his mother’s weight leave the bed as she stood up.
“Mama, I’m sorry,” he said, his voice almost pleading. One day she would grow tired of his childish behavior and let his father send him away. That thought drained him of what little strength he had left. His mother sat back down on the bed, and with the powerful tranquilizer to keep him calm, briefly touched his hair. He wanted so badly to be able to cry.
“It’s not your fault, Aaron. None of this is your fault, baby. Now, just take a nap, and when you wake up, I’ll bring you some dinner.” She stood again and left the room quietly, turning off his light and closing his door behind her. He was asleep before she made it to the stairs.
SPENCER SKIPPED the search for his last class and ran for the safety of his car. He’d find the last class sometime before he had to be there on Thursday, but right then, he couldn’t get the image of that boy’s terrified face out of his head—so small, and just… helpless. He’d seen enough television shows to know that something horrible had happened to that kid. Normal people didn’t just drop to the ground with a tap on the shoulder. But then, what would Spencer know about normal?
The light at the intersection that led to the main road turned red just as he approached. Spencer drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and waited, hoping that the car pulling up next to him at the light wasn’t the boy and his mother. Please God. It wasn’t. Malibu Barbie pulled up next to him in a Jetta and smiled over at him. Normally, he’d have the patience to flirt back. Even if he wasn’t interested, he liked being wanted. Right then, he couldn’t be bothered. He just wanted to get home and talk to his father about what happened in the quad.
The next light turned yellow, and the car in front of him stopped, forcing him to stop as well. Jesus, it was a conspiracy. The boy’s face swam in front of his eyes again, terrified and lost. Spencer didn’t think he could pull himself into a ball as tight as the guy did. His knees had been practically behind his head in some sort of defensive position that someone who did yoga couldn’t have gotten into. Did he really think Spencer was going to hurt him?
The light on his console flashed, indicating a loud sound, and he looked up to see that the light had turned green and the car in front of him had moved. He looked around, ever cautious, and then stepped on the gas. His pulse pounded in his head, and he couldn’t stop the adrenaline coursing through his body. It was almost like he was the one who’d been scared.
Finally, he caught a green light and sped up. He drove a little faster than he normally did in an effort to outrun the images in his head, to leave them at the college.
Spencer gave a silent prayer of thanks to see his father’s BMW in the garage when he pulled in. After grabbing the bag from the bookstore out of his back seat, he ran to the back door. It slammed behind him, getting the attention of his father, who stood in the kitchen with one hand on his head and the other around a tall glass of something. Damn it, he’d started already.
With one look at his father’s bloodshot eyes and hunched shoulders, Spencer walked right past and up to his room. He wondered, not for the first time, what it would be like to lose himself in the fog of alcohol like his father. Would it help get the boy’s ruined face out of his head?
Five
TWO MORE days of freedom left to him before he started classes on Monday, and Aaron had an idea for how he wanted to spend one of them. He just hoped his mother agreed. It was important for him to do this, no matter what the cost to his own psyche.
“Mom,” Aaron said, and his mother stopped in the doorway, turning to look at her son curiously. He rarely, if ever, initiated a conversation with her, so she looked fairly surprised. “Would you mind taking me to visit… Juliette tomorrow?” It took her a minute to respond. Aaron had never visited Juliette’s grave, not once in almost two years. He had still been in the hospital when her parents held her funeral. Michelle stood in the doorway while she appeared to consider it. The silence between them hung heavy in the air while she no doubt thought about the damage that visit could do to her son, or maybe the way it might help his recovery. After several long and tense moments, she spoke.
“Sure, honey. We can stop by the florist on the way.”
The next morning, after making pancakes and sausage for all her boys, Michelle tapped into that strength that seemed to remain somewhere inside of her, and asked Aaron if he still wanted to visit Juliette. He said that he did, and went upstairs to change.
Neither of them spoke as they made their way to the commercial area of town. When they arrived at the small brick building with the displays of flowers exploding with late summer color, Aaron stayed in the car. His mother would pick out the flowers that she thought were best. What the hell did he know about buying gravesite flowers? It was all he could do to focus on something other than why the flowers were necessary in the first place.
“I decided to go with a mixed bouquet of pink roses, lilies, and daisies,” his mother said when she returned to the car with a subtly colored mix of flowers, which she handed to Aaron. Holding them on his lap, his expression was hard and cold as he wrapped his arms around himself, almost as if he were trying to hold himself together, or as if he wanted to curl up into a ball so tight and so small that he would just disappear into it. Aaron saw his mother glance periodically at him as they headed for East Park Cemetery.
She pulled off the side of the road near where Juliette’s grave must be. Aaron knew that his mother had been here a few times since Juliette’s funeral. Each time he stayed home and his father tried in vain to distract him. After turning off the ignition, Michelle sat waiting for Aaron to speak or move. He did neither.
“Aaron, honey, do you want me to go with you?” his mother prompted, but he shook his head. Aaron needed to do this alone, especially since he was unsure how he would respond to actually seeing Juliette’s grave, knowing she was buried there. However he reacted, his mother didn’t need to see it. She saw enough. After taking one last long moment to look over the small rolling hills of green, he opened the car door. The smell of freshly mown grass flooded over him, and he climbed out of the car. It didn’t take him long to find the small monument signaling the entrance to Juliette’s part of the cemetery. His mother had described the statue as a marble angel with a lamb at her feet. His friend’s parents had chosen to bury her in the children’s section. Maybe they wanted to maintain her innocence, or it could have just been that the plots were smaller and less expensive in this section. Whatever the reason, she was here, somewhere to the right of this statue.
The cemetery was silent, almost eerily so considering it was a nice summer Saturday afternoon. The only sound to be heard was that of a mower in the distance. Grass seemed to stretch on for miles around him, but for all its airy solitude, the place made him feel claustrophobic—almost as if there should be a grave here for him, like his grave was calling for him. He should be buried here, right alongside Juliette under the granite eyes of God’s chosen messenger. Sometimes it felt like he had joined her, suffocating, trapped inside his own head.
Balling his hands into fists, he forced himself to take slow, measured steps toward the grave, his breaths coming in quick, sharp pants. Goddamn it, he couldn’t go to pieces. He wanted to do it, needed to do it, needed to see what he could get out of this physical reminder of his own fleeting mortality—maybe it would make him want to live again. Being careful not to step on the graves of other poor dead children, he followed the dates of death marked on the headstones, year by year, until he saw her name.
JULIETTE ANNE MARTIN
AUGUST 14, 1991—OCTOBER 9, 2008
BELOVED DAUGHTER
There were no bears or blocks or even angels, as he had seen on the other headstones while he had looked for hers. It was dark gray, marble, and very elegant.
All at once, the realization that his friend, his Juliette, lay dead at his feet, caused his legs to buckle, and he landed hard on the soft earth next to her. The forgotten flowers fell to the ground, and dry heaves wracked his body. He wouldn’t cry; he knew that. He’d been unable to cry since that night. Just as he couldn’t stand to be touched, he was also not allowed the small measure of relief that crying would have afforded him.
It took a long time for him to finally get himself together. Remembering the flowers, he moved them to the grass just below the marble marker he could no longer bring himself to look at. Aaron considered just standing up and going back to the car, having done what he came here to do unassisted. Glancing over his shoulder, Aaron noticed that he couldn’t see his mother’s car from here, and he wondered if she was starting to worry.
“J… Juliette, it’s… it’s Aaron,” he whispered, feeling fairly stupid for addressing the flowers and a patch of freshly mown grass. Running his fingers gently along the prickly surface of the short green lawn, he felt a mild breeze pick up and caress his face. He wondered in that moment if maybe she could hear him, but shook the thought off as a silly superstition. Nevertheless, he continued to whisper to his friend.
“It’s been so hard, Juliette. The way everyone treats me, like I’m a bomb just waiting to go off,” Aaron said, his voice trembling as he knelt on the cool, damp grass. “The memories, the flashbacks, I don’t know how much longer I can keep doing this. The doctors don’t help. The pills don’t help. As selfish as it sounds, I wish you were here, Juliette. God, I feel so alone, so fucking scared all the time. I don’t know if you would have wanted to live, just like I don’t know if I do, but it would be so much easier to have someone that understood.” His chest ached as he continued to caress the grass with his outstretched hand, talking to the idea of his lost friend. He had no idea if she could hear him, if anyone could hear him. Talking about this shit just made it all worse. The self-hatred that he felt, the feelings that he tried to keep contained, burned like acid on his tongue as he spoke about them.
