by Laila Blake
You’d been touring for weeks and I missed you so much. Harry, do you remember that kid? Raven black curls and a button nose? I still don’t know why they fell out, but it was in that time when he and Song were inseparable and his mum asked if Song wanted to spend the night. I know I shouldn't have, because you never know with Song, but I looked it up on the website and you were playing in Norwalk up Long Island Sound and that was just like 2 hours away.
I took the train to New Haven, got off at South Norwalk and took a taxi to the venue. I was late by then and stood in the back, bought myself a glass of cider. The barkeep kept asking me why I was faking an English accent in his booming voice, and I tried to weasel myself closer to the stage. I wanted to surprise you, but I also wanted to let you play—I hadn’t heard you guys like that, live with an audience, in forever, and I kind of liked the secrecy. You already had a pretty good fanbase then, and there were these girls in front of the stage, beautiful… really hot indie girls with multi-colored hair and piercings, tattoos. You know, like me a few years ago. I felt small and mousy, then. I hadn’t even had time to put any special make-up on, hadn’t done anything crazy with my hair in months; I was wearing jeans and some t-shirt, I think it wasn’t even clean—I hoped it was clay marks but it might have been something Song coughed up. I had forgotten about going out—how sad is that?
And then you guys came on stage and you stood there, like a god. Tall and your tattoos were bright and shiny in the spotlights, your hair just perfect—messy but glossy, and just the right consistency that made every single hand in the venue twitch to touch. You greeted the crowd like you owned them, like they were all your personal minions and they believed you. It was weird, I watched you and you were a stranger. You were theirs and it hurt.
And you played your set and it was all those songs about being on the road and adventure and the great America. Manly songs, free songs, you know? None of the ones you wrote about me, or Song. You were singing for people who loved Kerouac and, fuck, I don’t know, who wanted you to be their god—not some guy with a girlfriend and a kid at home.
I got that, sort of. But I also wondered, if you were the one who needed that illusion even more, whether you secretly wished Song hadn’t ended up with us, and consequently you and I had been less, well, you know, committed. I didn't want to think about that, I still don’t—and that was still back before those softer, sweeter more stripped songs suddenly became so popular and you wrote more of them.
Anyway, towards the end, you played that cover of that song I hate, the one about that asshole all but begging some groupie to come to his motel room, because he doesn’t want to call his family that night, he just needs someone to save him. And all those girls were lapping it up, you know? You were telling them that you were available, and needy and wanted them and they wanted you… And I knew that you wouldn't have called that evening. Maybe a few days later I'd have gotten a letter, one of those where you admit to something or other. I could always read it between the lines even when you didn't come out and say it. You would pick one of these girls and that would be that.
I stood there and there was no place for me anymore. Does that make any sense?
I mean, two years before, that was me! There were no crowds and no gagging fans, but I listened to you and I looked hot in a mini skirt and high heels, and you found me at the bar and I bought you a drink and you touched the swallow tattoo on my clavicle—and then, I don’t know.
I wasn't that person anymore. And so I left, I couldn’t bear pushing my presence onto you. I felt like a party crasher, an uninvited stranger. I couldn’t have fathomed waiting at that curtain with those girls, trying to convince security that I was indeed your girlfriend and not some groupie trying to suck your cock.
I sat at the train station crying, it was late and the next train wasn’t for an hour. It was cold and I felt like an idiot. Some guy stopped and offered me a lift, said he’d seen me at the gig, and he was heading back to New York, that he could let me out wherever. I thought: hey moron this is how you get raped, but I got in the car anyway. I cried some more and he didn’t ask, just offered me a tissue and some stale soda. He was nice.
He kissed me when we turned into the parking space in front of our flat. I climbed into his lap, he turned off all the lights and we fucked in the car. It was fast. I didn’t come.
I thanked him for the ride and went upstairs. Then I took a long bath and went into my studio. I didn’t sleep for a couple of days and when you finally called the next week, I dunno, it all felt digested and thrown up so many times, the only sense in telling you would have been to try and hurt you. But then I would have had to take the chance that it wouldn't have—and you know, I don’t think I could have survived that. So I kept it to myself.
I am writing it down now, because I am kind of a bad person. I feel bad about something I did, and so suddenly I remember those moments when I hated you, when you did things that hurt me. And fuck you, Sullivan, that makes me miss you even more. We were a train wreck you and I, but you were my family and I was yours and in that fucked up way you were mine, struggling like a fish, slippery and out of oxygen, but mine. And loving you, sometimes, that was so hard—it was work and it was real. It didn’t come easily, you know?
I kissed Aaron. And I want to kiss him again. He is warm and nice, and he makes me feel better. That probably makes me an even worse person, but as guilty as I feel, I honestly can’t imagine you’d judge me, you of all people.
I hate to live in a world in which you are not. I hate it so much, I can’t stand it but fuck, he makes it a little better. He has a nice smile and strong arms and he is so, so unlike you.
There is an absence, a hole that you left behind. I wouldn’t be a good girlfriend to anyone. I try to be a good mom at least, I’m trying, okay? Just to put one foot in front of the other. That is no excuse and it doesn't relieve me of any responsibility, but it’s also true.
I miss you. I love you.
Always,
Chapter Ten
Emily jumped awake, blood pulsing hard in her temples. She blinked, trying to penetrate the darkness until she found the tiny lights behind the wheel to her left. She was covered in sweat, shaking, and she leaned back against the seat, sniffing once, then again.
Slowly, her eyes adjusted; she heard Song’s regular breathing behind her, but Aaron was nowhere in sight. She reached for the axe and opened the door, carefully, then slid out of the van into the night.
“Aaron?” she asked in a loud whisper, creeping around the car.
“Em?” He lifted his head in surprise, but didn’t make a sudden move—even in the dim light, he could see the axe in her hand. He straightened up from where he was sitting on the back bumper, resting the rifle against it and smiled at her, that same sort of half-grin of weary apology that was on his mouth so often.
“Everything okay?”
“Are you?” she replied, lowering the axe, when she realized that her hand was shaking. She took a deep breath.
“I... you were gone, I thought...” She shook her head and lowered herself onto the bumper next to him.
“Sorry.” He understood better now, her reasoning, and shrugged again; it was cold in the night air, but it was still, just clear and icy without the biting wind.
“Needed to wake myself up to keep drivin’,” he said, running his fingers through his hair, something that had become a near compulsion, the locks too long now. “I’m already better.”
She leaned her head against the wall of the van to catch her breath, dispel the vivid images of yet another dream.
“How long was I out?” she asked finally.
“A couple hours?” He almost winked at her, but not quite. “Didn’t have the heart to wake ya. You looked like you needed the sleep.”
She wrinkled her nose at him, then let her cheek rest on his shoulder. She shivered in the cold.
“I told you, if we start with that, you at least have to make me stay awake with you to poke you and ba
bble at you.”
“You know that won’t happen.” It was only a moment’s hesitation before he slipped his arm around her, but lightly. “You feel any more rested?”
She nodded, then felt silly for lying.
“Dreams,” she said with a shrug. She was used to them, and the graphic nature of their day had not made her hope for any better. “Rested enough to help you stay awake, though.”
“What kinda dreams?”
“You know, zombies, blood, destruction.” She shrugged: her paltry attempt at making light of things. Song had them too, if less often. She was grateful for that.
“Yeah.” Aaron knew, and that might have been a large part of why he didn’t sleep much—grateful in a whole new way for his trained ability to stay awake for great lengths of time. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she answered quietly. “Better than the real thing.”
“Usually is.” He tipped his head back for a moment, squinting up at the stars that were so much brighter and clearer than they’d been before the world ended.
“Back before, ya know, when guys would come back from the desert, they’d put us in counseling for a while,” he said, finally. “Wanted us to talk about what had happened over there, what we saw.”
Emily smiled. “Are you suggesting something?”
“If I was,” he said, looking back down at her with a faint smile, “I wouldn’t admit that I found the whole thing pointless. People who haven’t seen the same things don’t know what you’re feelin', you know?”
“Can anyone... ever?” she asked, scrunching up her face. “I mean, every experience is different, isn't it? Maybe it’s not necessary to completely know what the other person is feeling if you want to help them.”
“You think you could explain to someone who ain’t never seen a zombie how it feels to face one like you did back on the road?” he asked, though not pointedly. “What it feels like to kill something with your bare hands?”
“Some people can...” she said quietly, a dark shiver running down her spine at his words, the hollow calm. “Some people can make music that explains it, some people make art that does. I’ve seen art like that. But... most people didn’t want to see.”
He shrugged again, unwilling to argue, but also unwilling to concede a point. “You know any constellations?” he asked, finally, looking back up at the stars.
“Just a few... like Cassiopeia,” she answered, easily led away from a painful subject. She pulled her head back. “Once I saw Orion... like all of the stars and it was like... yeah, I get it, I get what they saw. Do you?”
Aaron shook his head. “Never could really figure them out, outside the Big and Lil’ Dipper. I don’t get how those are supposed to be bears, either.”
“Some people call it a plow,” she said looking up at the figure in the sky. “I can see that.”
“Yeah.” He fell quiet again, making an honest attempt, for a minute or two, to try and design pictures out of the spots of stars but Aaron never considered himself creative, and thus nothing came to mind.
“You can talk if you want,” he said, eventually, though his face was still pointed at the sky. “I'm not bad at listening, even if I did just sound like a grade A asshole.”
“You didn’t,” she told him quietly; just hearing him say that made her desperately and inexplicably sad. “You were just honest. Honest is good. Honest is hard.”
“I never did well at those counseling sessions. They wanted me to say stuff I just didn’t feel.” He looked back at her, no trace of that usual, comforting smile on his face. “It seems real silly to try to make someone understand who ain’t seen what you did, hasn’t watched people you care about die. I know that.”
Emily sniffed once, her eyes filled with tears, and she tried to breathe. It only took one word and she was swimming, sinking into an ocean with weights on her feet.
“I... I always thought it’s... about the talking,” she whispered in a staccato sound, “the... expressing. Not what other people think.”
“Always seemed to me that they wanted me to talk more than I did,” he said, pausing as soon as he said that to snort. “Ain't nothing wrong with it, I guess, but it was hard comin’ from over there to over here and trying to match how it felt to sittin’ in an air conditioned office with someone who'd never seen combat.” He lifted a hand and tucked an errant lock of her hair behind her ear before drawing back.
“You didn’t have anyone you could talk to who did?” she asked, squinting. “One of the guys you, uh, served with?”
His smile twitched. “In my unit? Naw. We… we didn’t talk much. About things.”
“Maybe talking’s just not your thing,” Emily said gently, suddenly acutely aware of his discomfort. It was cowardly, but less painful. “Maybe it’s screaming or kicking things or... splattering paint against a wall or fucking, or I don’t know—any of a million things.”
“Don’t know,” he said, though he had to smile. “Guess I never spent the time to figure it out. Never felt much worse for the wear.”
“Not even now?” she found herself asking, jealous almost.
He shrugged; it was starting to appear almost as a nervous tic. “No real time to figure it out now, either, is there? Either we survive or...”
“Hm,” she hummed softly. She knew it wasn’t how she felt, always broken, every day. Maybe she was just better at pitying herself.
“You’ve done well though, with the surviving I mean. It’s like surviving plus if you can help others with theirs.”
“Better than surviving then,” he said, with a genuine smile at that. “Maybe that’s my coping mechanism,” he added, the quotes dipped in a good note of sarcasm. It was Emily’s turn to smile; she managed a chuckle and shook her head at him.
“I guess it feels like... if you’re a counselor, you chose to listen to people,” she said, expression gone serious and sad once more. “You’re trained for that, yeah? You have your own bloody coping mechanisms for that. But if you’re not... then it’s just cruel to put that on someone. Make them sad, too. Drag them through your own misery. I mean there’s a reason why people don’t want to see unfiltered art like that. It’s too much.”
He frowned. “I don’t know that I’m following,” he said, cautiously, unsure if he was to be hurt, or chastised, or in some kind of agreement.
“I ramble,” Emily said with a smile. “Sorry. I just meant that... you offered, you know, talking. But it doesn't feel fair to do that to you, that’s all.”
“I don’t mind it,” he said, exhaling a little in relief. “I am good at it. Always been told I listen good, at least. And I like you,” he added, almost as though it were an afterthought.
She managed a little smile. “Aahh...” she whispered, pushing her cheek harder onto his shoulder, “feels like that would be taking advantage.” There was something else in her voice, quoting or teasing, but mostly she just sounded tired and tender.
“Not taking advantage when I offer, is it?”
“True...” she agreed with a vague smile. “I just... He was my family. He and Song were. I never had that before, not with my own, not in that way. He was my family, he was... and now he’s gone.” Her voice quavered and she pressed her eyes closed, sniffing wetness up her nose.
“That sucks,” he said, honestly, hand going back to her cheek, the side of her face, to cup it, holding her against his chest. She was tiny compared to him, and fit easily under his arm, warm and small and sad.
“I dream of him dying over and over. Over and over they jump him and he disappears under their bodies for so long...” She opened her eyes, but stared ahead, wide eyed and holding her breath. “And I hate... I hate that he was alone at the end. I should have been there, I... I left him alone. He was all alone.”
Aaron was quiet, and so she continued: “Song used to think he’d come later, you know, find us. I never had the heart to... to really say the word. I dunno. I guess I was jealous Song still had that hope. And every time I drea
m it, I want to be faster but... I’m never faster.”
“You’re not gonna be, Em.” He’d not picked up that he’d shortened her name, but it came out that way all the same. “It’s happened, and it's horrible. And I can’t tell you the nightmares get better, but you can’t blame yourself, you know. That is never gonna help.”
“He really likes you,” she whispered then, unable to continue talking about Sullivan without feeling like her chest was about to tear apart. “Song, I mean.”
“I like him, too.” He smiled again, catching some of her tears with his thumb and wiping them down her cheek. “He's a good kid. You got lucky, huh?”
“Oh yeah,” she smiled, wet and tired, but she leaned into his touch. “He must have come out like this, all beautiful and smart and perfect.”
“He’s lucky to have you, too, you know.”
She couldn’t agree with him, and wanted to wave away the compliment, but this time there was just a hint of a smile. “It’s good to have someone...” she whispered and without meaning to at first, her lips brushed over his wrist.
His hand froze in place, but just for a beat.
“Yeah, I think so.” He breathed out, the exhalation warm on her face, close again, and the kiss that followed it was less of a surprise to them both, than the one just a couple nights before. It was wet and sticky with her tears, if less so than before, and they eased into each other faster, harder. Emily cradled his large face in her small hands; they had always been calloused and rough from her work with hard materials, and now they were cracked and dry. They could be tender though, girl’s hands still.
It was likely the wrong time to be kissing, but there seemed no right time for anything, not anymore—and both of them were lonely and aching, and whatever small amount of connection a kiss afforded seemed like enough, in the cold clear of the night, hidden off the road.
