by Rae, Nikki
My drummer shoves his index finger into the white, his ring finger in the black. Boo paints a line down his chin in white, and two black horizontal lines on his cheeks.
Trei dots three white circles on both of her cheekbones.
We watch each other do this slowly, like we’re learning something.
When it’s my turn, I paint a thick line from the base of my left ear, across my cheek, the bridge of my nose, and to the other ear. The paint is cool and thick on my skin, and I add more, this time in a thin white line beneath the black.
“What do you think?” I ask Boo, turning to him. I keep my expression even enough when the movement causes my new wound to sting.
“It needs something.” He digs his finger into the tin again and traces a thin white line from the bottom of my lower lip down, stopping at the edge of my chin.
“Now is it good?” I ask.
“Hold on,” Trei says, sticking her pinky in the black paint. She dots three small circles in a triangular shape on both of my temples. “There.” She smiles.
Then all three of us are smiling back at ourselves in the lighted mirror. We’re not exactly happy, but somehow we’re less sad, ready to do what we can to feel better.
***
We start off the show with Idioteque, which I know inside and out at this point. My head is swimming from the blood loss and the crowd cheering, the lights in my face are almost too bright, and I’m also trying to not let my eyes linger on Myles too long.
Thankfully, I have something more important than all of those things right now to distract me. I’m not sure what it is: the feeling that we’re doing something that Stevie would want us to, that we’re nailing each song, or what, but I go through each song without any snags, without crying, without stopping it altogether and just crawling under a rock because I’m a horrible person.
Before I’m aware of how much time has passed or how many songs we’ve played, we’re at the last one, and Boo and Trei are urging me to call Jade on stage.
This was one of Stevie’s favorite songs. My brother should be here.
“So,” I start, squinting into the audience, shielding my eyes from the spotlight that’s blaring pink in my eyes. “I’d like to invite someone special on stage for the next song.”
I can’t see well, so I stand up and walk to the edge of the stage so I can look up at the balcony. I find Jade in the sea of people looking around for this special person. He stares back at me, his eyes sparkling, his mouth in an almost smile. I’m sure he’s going to shake his head no when I motion for him to come up.
“Come on!” I yell in his direction.
Myles is standing next to him, saying something encouraging into his ear. Then Jade is descending the stairs, walking through the crowd, and I grab his hand to hoist him onto the stage. This makes the bandage at my waist crinkle and the wound scream, but I ignore it once my brother is standing next to me. People are clapping and I’m not even sure why. Most of them don’t even know who this is.
I sit back at my piano. Boo hands Jade the guitar he was just using and both he and Trei jump off stage to watch what we’re about to do.
Jade moves to my right as he adjusts the guitar strap over his shoulder. “What song are we playing, Sunshine?” he asks.
“No Surprises,” I tell him with a small smile.
He imitates it back, nodding. “I’m ready when you are.”
The commotion dies down a little when I tap the microphone to get the crowd’s attention. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to say. There is so much I could tell these complete strangers, but I decide that they get this piece of me and that’s all they need. They don’t need to know the whole story.
“We’d like to dedicate this song to Stevie,” is all I tell them, and I nod at Jade, who starts in with the first few chords. I join in a few seconds later with the piano and start singing.
Jade backs up my voice with his slightly higher one, making both of ours entangle and then separate, over and over.
I barely recognize how strong and full of ache and everything I’ve been feeling for the past few days my voice is when I start again.
This is my final fit.
My final bellyache.
I can calm myself long enough for Jade to come back with the chorus.
No alarms and no surprises.
But my voice is just above a whisper when I sing the last, “Please.”
It’s over after that. The crowd is silent for too long when we’re finished, but I don’t care. I can’t concentrate on anything besides how badly I want to hug my brother right now.
Jade’s already walking toward the piano and pushing the guitar behind him as I stand. We meet somewhere in the middle of the stage where we collide.
It’s then that the audience starts to clap and cheer. Not that it matters. All that matters is me and him right now. We both smell sweaty and I know I’m getting face paint all over his neck as the curtain closes in front of us. It’s a long time before we separate.
It’s still so loud. I want to ask Jade so many things in the dark, behind the shield of the red velvet cloth, but I don’t. That doesn’t matter either. What matters is that one small piece of us has been put back together somehow.
***
Boo, and Trei offer to ride back home with Jade and I beg him to stay at my place, but my brother has his mind made up. He wants to go home. Boo and Trei ask if I want them to stay with me, but I tell them that I want to be alone too. In the chaos of trying to get through the crowd and out of the club, Myles sends me a text, telling me that he’ll meet me at my apartment. I try to find the strength in me to say no, but I can’t.
Despite how good I felt on stage with Jade—working through everything together—when I’m back in my apartment, I’m feeling the worst I have in a while. My chest aches. My eyes are swollen. The spot on my waist is throbbing. And Myles is at my door no more that fifteen minutes after I’ve showered.
“Hey,” he says, standing idly in the doorway with his hands in his pockets. He’s taken off his funeral clothes and changed into jeans and a plain grey t-shirt.
I hoped to avoid this, being close, being near him and having to talk to him until at least tomorrow. “Hey,” I try to say in an even tone.
Myles sighs. “So, I know you’re probably tired,” he says. “But can I come in?”
I try my hardest not to make it noticeable when I take in a breath. What am I supposed to say? If I tell him no, he might be suspicious. He would probably never be able to guess the exact reason why I would send him away, but he would think there was something wrong. That I wasn’t okay. That I wasn’t getting better.
I smile and I swear, the skin around my lips cracks. “Sure.” I step aside.
I take the opportunity while his back is turned as I shut the door to make sure my loose T-shirt is covering me all the way. I don’t want him to see even a hint of a Band-Aid silhouetted against the cotton.
“What’s up?” I ask, heading back to the bathroom, pretending I’m preoccupied with hanging the towel back on the rack, then brushing my teeth.
He stands in the hall outside just close enough so I can hear him talk. “Nothing.” I see him shrug in the mirror as I spit.
I finally have as much courage as I can muster when I turn off the light to look at him. Nothing in his expression shows that he’s uneasy. When he smiles a little, his dimple appears at the corner of his mouth.
“I just wanted to see how you were,” he says, and it feels like it took a long time for him to say it, even though it was probably only a few seconds.
I don’t know where to go from here. In the living room, I’ll be expected to turn on the TV and flip through the channels. That could be seen as trying to avoid conversation. In the kitchen, I may have to eat something, but I’ve been nauseous since before the cover show started, so that’s no good. So I finally settle on my room, where I won’t be expected to do anything but crawl into bed and fall asleep.
When I motion
for Myles to follow me down the hall, he does. When I get under the comforter and roll onto my side so I’m looking at him, he mirrors my movements. Of course, he looks cautious when he takes off his shoes and lies on top of the blanket near me, but I don’t protest. I only make sure that the covers are wrapped around me tightly so there’s no way he could see me if the t-shirt rides up or gets tight around my middle.
“So, are you okay?” Myles asks quietly. He’s not pushing. He just wants to know.
I swallow. “I’m…” Okay would be a lie. Bad wouldn’t be true either. “Dealing,” I say, deciding that it’s the best answer. “I’m getting there,” I add, just in case the first answer isn’t enough.
Myles tucks a damp strand of my hair behind my ear. I look into his eyes, the color reminding me of two cracked robin’s eggs lying on a concrete sidewalk.
“That’s…” Now he’s searching for the right words to say. “Good,” he settles on, but judging by the way he’s not looking directly at me, the word doesn’t fit well enough for him.
I nod.
“So what did Evan have to talk to you about?” Myles asks.
I have to fight with everything that’s left in order to not let out a breath too fast and keep my pulse even.
“Oh,” I say. “He just wanted to make sure we really wanted to go on and stuff.” I wrap my arms around my waist like talking about Evan makes the mark more visible.
I also want to ask Myles more. Why he “marked” me, how, and what it means, but if I ask him that now, he’ll want to know how I know. And I’ll only have to lie more in order to cover up how I found out. I can only handle one lie at a time.
Myles smiles again. “Oh,” he says.
I nod again.
This is easy.
But this is painful.
How can it be so easy ? How can he not know? How can I not tell him?
I swallow, the backs of my eyes burning and my throat tightening. I can’t cry. Not now. If I do, it will take that much longer to convince him to leave. And I need him to leave. He can’t stay tonight. It’s not that I wouldn’t be able to sleep next to him knowing what I did and how hurt he would possibly be if he ever found out. It’s that I just can’t risk him staying here, finding the mark on me that was not caused by him.
“Hey,” he says, and I have to fight my muscles from becoming rigid. His hand cups the side of my face now, his fingers behind my ear and lifting my chin upward. There’s only a limited amount of time before my eyes are on his, and I try with everything I have to wipe my expression clean of any guilt.
“What?” I ask when my eyes are on his once more.
“You were amazing tonight,” Myles whispers, but even though I know he means it, something tells me that it’s not what he had intended to say.
I smile a little.
“I’m…” he says, looking away for a moment as he thinks. “I’m happy you have something that can help you feel better.”
I know he means my piano, my music, my band. He means that I can play when I’m upset and feel a little bit better. He means that any emotions I’m afraid of in real life I can deal with on stage, pack it into a box, and stash it back into a corner of my mind until next time.
But his voice cracks when he says it, and I know in that moment that what he isn’t saying is more important.
That he couldn’t help me. He couldn’t make the pain fade away.
“I’m okay,” I repeat, pushing the tears down. At least until I can get him out of here. If I cry now, he’ll think it’s because I’m upset about Stevie, not him.
“Are you?” he whispers back.
I pretend to be thinking it over, but I know what my answer has to be without having to mull it over. “Yes.”
Myles blinks slowly. “Good.”
He takes me into his arms so slowly, so carefully that I’m sure he’ll abort the mission at any second, but he doesn’t. My head sits underneath his chin and his arms wrap themselves over mine, across my back.
There’s a slight twinge in my middle, under the bandage, but I somehow manage not to make a facial expression that gives me away. We’re so quiet that I can only hear my pulse, his broken one echoing back. My breathing against his.
He kisses my forehead after a long time.
“Do you want me to turn out the light?” he asks.
I move away from him, and he does the same. His eyes are trained on me. There is nothing in them that makes me think for even half of a second that he would ever—not even in the distant future—guess what I have done.
“What is it?” he asks, leaning his head to one side.
Shit.
Maybe this won’t be as easy as I thought.
“Nothing,” I say, trying to stall whatever is about to come next.
Myles takes my hand and brings it to his mouth, grazing my fingers against his bottom lip. The gesture sends a chill through me, and my arm being outstretched like this, even with the blanket over me for protection, I feel vulnerable. Like he could glance down at any minute and see what I’ve done.
“You’re thinking.”His eyes are trained on me. “About what?”
“I’m just tired.”
His hand cups the side of my face once more, and I lean into it. I’m good at keeping secrets. It’s the way I’ve survived so many things. The question isn’t whether I can lie about this to the guy who loves me, the person I love. The question is, can I live with myself after I’ve done it? After I’ve said whatever I’m about to say, after Myles leaves. A week, a month from now, can what I’ve done—what I’m about to do—ever be undone?
“That’s understandable,” he says so quietly that I barely hear it. Then he shifts away a little, his hand leaves my face, and he stands up. He walks to the door, shuts it and then flicks the light switch off.
It takes everything, every part of my body and mind when he begins to walk back to push him away. I want nothing more than to have him cradle me against him and tell me about how it’s going to be okay, but that can’t happen.
I sit up and Myles stops in his tracks when I do. “What?”
“Uhm,” I have to stare at my comforter, but at my legs, not what I’m hiding. I gather the blankets around me like it’s armor.
“I kind of want to be…alone,” I say quietly.
It’s dark, but I can still see him blink as he takes in what I say. “Alone?” He tests out the word. “Are you sure?”
He’s looking right at me and his eyesight enables him to see everything in the dark. I can’t give anything away.
“Yeah.” No.
He takes one more step, but doesn’t make a move to sit down.
“I’m okay.” No, I’m not. “It’s just that…” Here I go, no turning back now. “I haven’t had a chance to be alone,” I say, staring at my hands. “Since it happened. I kind of just want to be alone.”
Alone, alone, alone.
I could hurt him a little bit by telling him to leave or hurt him more by letting him see that his vampire had to do something for me that he himself could not. That would kill him.
It seems to take him forever to answer me. “Okay,” he whispers, finally sitting on the edge of the bed after the word has left his mouth. “If that’s what will make you more comfortable.” The tone of his voice has almost returned to normal.
I nod, finally turning toward him, and I smile a little in the dark, knowing full well that he will see it and when he does, he may believe me more.
Myles’ cool hand rests on top of mine, which is holding onto the blanket tightly against my chest. He’s nowhere near the mark, but it still scares me. I think he senses my uneasiness at his closeness, because he pulls away.
“Sorry,” I say. “You’ve helped me so much these past few days, and I’m so glad you’ve been here with me.” I don’t want to cry. I cannot cry. Not now. “But I just need one night alone. I need to prove to myself that I can do it.”
That I can lie to you.
“I get it,” he says,
not sounding the least bit sad or offended that I don’t want him here. “I know what you mean.”
A wave of short-lived relief washes over me and I sigh. “Okay.”
“May I kiss you goodnight?” he asks after a few seconds. He shouldn’t have to ask. He shouldn’t feel like he needs to.
I nod, smiling again for extra effect.
He leans in closer, not touching me with anything but his soft lips against my chapped ones. “Do you want me to come back tomorrow morning?” he asks.
I want to say yes. I want to scream that I don’t want him to leave right now. I want to pull him to me and hold on until morning.
I’m afraid my voice may break when I answer him.
“No,” I say. Then quickly, before he has time to absorb it in the wrong way, I add on, “I have some cleaning up to do.”
Instead of questioning me further, he simply says, “Alright.” Myles kisses me on the forehead once. “Call or text me when you’re ready.”
When I move to follow him to the door, he motions for me to stay where I am.
“I’ll let myself out.” His voice is reassuring and there is no hint of him feeling bad about how I want him gone.
“Thank you,” I say when he’s opening the door again.
Myles nods. I can tell he’s trying to hide the hurt. ”Call me if you need me.”
I nod back and I sink down against my pillows, turning on my side so I don’t have to look at him. I hear the soft click of my door shutting, his footsteps fading toward the front door, and then the louder, more resounding shutting of that.
Somehow I get to hold myself together long enough for him to be halfway up the stairs so he won’t hear me.
It was easy.
Maybe in the pit of his heart, he might not be completely convinced that I’m okay, but I know deep down that I only say that to myself to feel better.
I lied to him and it was easy.
Then the tears start forming, a new crack in my surface starting to spread.
One pain disappears into a new, fresh mark that will never leave: I have betrayed the person I love and trust and it was easy. It was easy and he can never know.
