by A. C. Dillon
She couldn't help herself. In her hand, a stick. Hornet's nest, here I come.
"Powerless over me, you mean?"
Andrew heaved a sigh so intense, it made her gasp. It was pained, raw and ragged. Is he... fed up with me? The thought was too much to bear. Constants don't change. They don't cease to exist. Had it all been a faulty equation?
"If you think I want to control you..." He paused as his fist curled, a twitch in his arm as it slowly unfurled once more. "If you think I could ever be like that bastard who hit you... Then there's nothing I can ever say or do that I haven’t already done to convince you otherwise."
"No, no, I never said you were anything like him—"
"You just did," Andrew insisted quietly. "Because he made you feel powerless. You told me so. And now you're implying I want power over you."
Autumn winced, cowering in her seat. When he put it that way… Yeah, she kinda had. And she was a bitch for it. Even if she hadn't once drawn a line between her abusive ex and the man beside her, she could understand how he would make that link. Words are weapons. Why was she looking to wound Andrew?
"I didn't mean that. Not at all."
No response. Not even a glimpse of his eyes. No way to know how he was feeling, or how much damage she'd done. But she had hurt him, and without cause. Her venomous tongue had lashed out again.
In the back of her skull, a droning: a hushed murmur that swelled to a symphony. The bees, as she'd called them for years. Incoherent, insidious and impossible to assuage once they'd made themselves at home. She grasped at what little composure remained, frantically hoping to stave off the panic attack, but the whisper of their wings drowned out all rationality. She was a wounded animal cornered in a cage, pawing at the bars of her prison.
I can't control it. I can't stay here. I can't be here.
Flight. Instinct consumed reason as she threw open the car door and plunged into the darkness, fumbling her way through poorly-lit hedges and uneven pathways to the rear of the hotel. Overhead, laughter. It was a knife in her heart, reminding her of the ridicule of high school. Bathroom stall refuges and ditched classes hidden beneath the false front of student club meetings.
You've been living a lie, the bees told her. A normal life for a worthless girl like you? You're tainted. Poison. You destroy.
"I don't mean to," she whimpered to no one and everyone.
Her heart began to race as streetlights flickered—left then right, then left and right again. Taunting her. Mocking her. The air grew thick, sickly-sweet and twisted with peppermint. She fan faster, winding between benches and down an alley, cutting towards a parking garage. The death pallor of the cement sucked the air from her lungs. A ladder. She remembered the scramble into pitch-blackness, remembered holding her breath in her clammy palms. Cupping her own life, pushing it back inside of her.
"You stupid bitch! Look what you did!"
Kearney. He was right behind her now, breathing down her neck, and there was no escaping him, no solving the labyrinth of the tunnels. Air turned to concrete as she pawed her way down a ramp, seeking a door, a turn, a hideaway.
Give up, the bees droned. You're dead.
Footsteps behind her now, growing louder. They echoed like a cacophony of angry, accusing voices, angry girls killed before their lives had even begun. Red hair tangled in a clump on the ground, discarded like so many young lives. Her vision blurred and she struggled to see past the yellowed shadows. Cars. Tunnels. A needle. Headlights.
What is real?
Vertigo twisted her vision, spun it upside down and she wheezed, her throat scratchy and raw. No voice. She could see the doors, feel her hand stretch weakly for one. Pain shot through her as she slammed into the floor—no, a wall?—and she gagged. She could smell him. Kearney. His hot, sweaty body smothering her with hate.
A new memory sent her reeling: a familiar figure. A hand outstretched. Let me in.
Autumn buckled and stumbled in pain as lightning shot through her skull. Too much. Too many thoughts. Too many feelings, too much for one heart to bear witness to. Whose anger was this? She felt her fist swing and connect with bone and understood that it wasn't her fist anymore.
It was Nikki's.
She watched her strike Kearney, watched his jaw swing wildly. And then, it was their body, their knee driving into his groin and she was running on borrowed legs, on borrowed time. She threw herself around the next corner, remembering how the story went. Safety.
But that wasn't now. It wasn't real. As she slammed into the side of the moving car, Autumn crumpled to the ground in a defeated heap.
Beside her, she heard the voice of her ancestor: "Here endeth the lesson."
* * *
Ashbury Residence. Room 308.
Few students dare approach the room where two of their own met gruesome fates at the hand of a faculty member. Knowing it was no longer a haunted space, I embraced it for the rest of grade eleven. When Veronica and I returned as roommates in grade twelve, 308 had been sealed off permanently. We were housed in 303.
Seated on the bed across from me: Nikki Lang, the ghost who'd reached out for justice. The ghost whom I now understood had saved my life beneath the campus in more ways than one. Her red hair smooth and shining, she crosses her legs and leans back on her elbows, grinning.
"Nikki... Why are you here?"
"To say hello, I guess. Or goodbye. I'm finally ready to see what comes after this." Nikki jerks her head to her left. "To help her make a point."
Following Nikki's gesture, I bury my face in my hands when I see her. "No more lessons. No more points or arguments. None of this."
Louise's voice is gentle as she enters the room, her dress swishing about her ankles. "We're only trying to help you understand that there's nothing to fear. You've done all this before."
"Done what?" I snap. "Seen ghosts? Received their messages? We've already established that."
"You've also let them in. You know you have," Louise insists, gesturing to Nikki. "You keep denying the questions, the gaps in your memory, the ways things have never added up—"
"Stop," I plead. Begging. I can't handle any more of this. It was just a delusion. Just a panic attack distorting reality.
"Nikki did more than show you the way," Louise continues, undeterred. "She gave you her strength. She gave you her will to survive, amplified your own."
A searing pain shoots through my chest and I press my palm to my heart to steady its galloping pace. "I wanted to live!"
Nikki’s voice is soft and soothing. "No one's saying you didn't. But you were drugged, sick and dehydrated. Didn't you ever wonder how you fought off a man more than twice your size? How you outran him for just long enough to be rescued?"
"No, no, this is crazy..." Struggling to my feet, I lean against the desk at the foot of my bed. "This isn't real."
"I owed you," Nikki insists. "I owed all of us. He wasn't going to get to take another life. I asked and you let me help you."
"Just like you let Sophia in," Louise says. "It's how she was able to show you her home. You know you couldn't have possibly imagined it."
Everything is hazy, unfocused. I squint and will myself to concentrate, but it's futile. I crumple to my knees, at the mercy of the phantoms in my mind.
"Thank you, Autumn." Nikki is sincere and somewhat overwhelmed. "Be careful out there. You're in danger and this time, I can't help you."
The pain intensifies in my chest and I whimper, looking to Louise for answers. Wistfully, she reveals her cherry-stain blossom upon her dress.
"We all have our scars, our crosses to bear. Don't be foolish. Don't bear them alone..."
"She's waking up."
"Thank God!"
Autumn groaned as she tried to draw a deep breath, her hand absently pawing at her left ribcage. What the hell happened to me? Had she lost time? I haven't done that in over a year... A cool cloth pressed to her forehead and she gave up on opening her eyes.
Too bright. Too much.
"Baby, come on. Talk to me. Please..."
"Give her a minute, Andrew." Veronica?
Somewhere, a light diminished to a pinpoint. Cautiously, Autumn opened one eye, gauging the potential for pain before the other followed suit. Cross-legged beside her was Veronica, dressed now in a black tank top and what seemed to be pajama shorts.
"V?"
"In the sleep-deprived flesh. How do you feel?"
"Like I got run over by a truck..."
"Chevy Cruze, actually," Evan chimed in from a shadowed corner. "And technically, you ran into it."
It was reflex: Autumn shifted her arms to sit up and immediately yelped as a sharp pain cut across her chest. Gasping for air, she relented and sank deeper into the pillows.
"It could have been worse. You could have broken your ribs."
Andrew. She tilted her head slightly, relieved to see him standing beside her. He's still here. The accident came back to her now, snatches of sound and sight. A panic attack. A flashback. She'd suffered these before, but one this severe... Not since the hospital, she decided. Not the running kind.
"Sorry," she managed to blurt out.
"You don't have to be sorry." His voice was soothing, honeyed warmth. "I'm just glad you're awake."
"We all are," Veronica echoed lovingly. "Now that you're up, it's time to get some rest. Fun paradox, isn't it?"
"Huh?"
"What Veronica is trying to say is that it's four in the morning and she has a show at two, so we're going to go sleep in our own room down the hall." Evan leaned down to kiss her cheek. "I recommend you follow our lead."
"Down the hall?"
"Security decision," Andrew explained. "Ray's keeping the floor secure for the night. Two birds, one wall of muscles like stone?"
Autumn managed a weak smile, ignoring the increasing pain in her chest and a dull ache in her shoulder. "Always wordplay..."
"One word away from foreplay. How else am I supposed to keep your interest?" Andrew teased gently.
"Alright, Andy. Behave and give my wifey a night to recuperate." Veronica leaned over her, kissing her cheek before whispering in her ear. "He feels terrible. Make up, already."
"I'll take it under advisement," Autumn murmured, intentionally vague. Message acknowledged.
With a lingering glance, Andrew gestured to their friends. "Be right back."
Listening for the tell-tale sounds of the door, Autumn waited anxiously in the bed, desperately pulling at the taffy strands of memory to piece together the night. A fight. I picked a fight. Why had she done that?
Because the happiness didn't seem real. Because we were upset and it was pushed away for the courier incident and Amanda's injuries. Because I'm tired of us avoiding the core conflict of our entire relationship.
As she heard the security latch swing into place, she swallowed hard. Because if he's eventually going to be fed up and leave, it would be easier now.
A fight and then flight: how psychologically predictable. Somehow, the threat of loss and the mention of her ex had sent her spinning into a flashback, a world of loneliness and isolation. Autumn against the world. But what about the rest? What about the dream that lingered just beyond conscious reach?
"Did you want Tylenol?"
"Hmm?"
Andrew gestured to the dresser beneath the TV. "The doctor said you couldn't have anything stronger until after the first twelve hours, just in case a concussion set in. He was pretty sure your arms took the brunt of the fall, but..."
Autumn frowned. "I... I don't remember a doctor."
"House call. Or hotel call. This place really does anything you ask, for a price." Andrew gestured to the Tylenol again. "Pain?"
"Much," she admitted.
Two pills were placed in her shaking hand and she dry swallowed them, accepting the water he offered with quiet thanks. Shuffling back and forth upon his feet, Andrew seemed to be waiting for her to make the first move.
Easy part first. "What happened?"
"You bolted from the car when we got here, ran off around back before I could really process what was happening, that it wasn’t just you being mad... You were so fast and I... I tried to keep up."
"Andrew, it's not your fault."
"I tried," he continued hoarsely. "You cut into a parking garage, somehow. You collided with a car that was pulling out of a parking space and you just... fell..."
A sob ripped from her throat and with it, a yowl of pain. Andrew rushed to her side, frantic and wild-eyed.
"What? What can I do?"
"So sorry..."
There were no words, no clever puns, no remedy to undo the damage done. He was hurting because of her insecurity. His forehead rested against hers, his every breath a ragged struggle.
"I'm sorry too," he murmured. "I've been on edge, worried that... this would happen. Maybe it wouldn't have, if I'd... Well, if I’d controlled my temper, for starters."
"I was mean to you. Scared you would leave me," she confessed.
"I won't. I can't." One kiss, two.
"This... it won't end," she warned him. "The door is open, Andrew. I know it now. I believe."
"And I believe in you," he replied softly.
Moving around the foot of the bed, he peeled off his jeans and t-shirt, discarding them in a rumpled heap. With a great deal of care, he slid beneath the covers, mindful of any physical contact. Autumn couldn't decide which ache was worse: the misery in her chest, or her heart longing for his touch.
"I've had about two hours to seriously think about today," he began, propping himself up on an elbow. "To really think about why I got angry this morning, and how rational it was. In the end, I concluded that I'm a fucking hypocrite."
Gingerly, she turned her head to face him. "How?"
"Let me explain," he began, winking. "No. Let me sum up." As she giggled, he continued. "We're both going into a form of journalism, right? Documentary films, investigative stories—same core principle, right? We want the truth. We want to tell it."
"Yes..."
"So when I go out and make a film about, say, protests or civil unrest, I'll be in harm's way. I could get hurt." At her worried look, his hand reached out to squeeze hers. "I will always take every possible precaution, but you and I both know I can't promise that shit won't hit the fan."
"I know."
It was a fear she'd struggled with in therapy for several weeks, ultimately reaching no resolution save I'll face it if it comes true. An overseas project in a war-torn country, or a domestic terrorism story... A protest gone wrong... But it's his passion, she often reminded herself. And I love how passionate he is about showing others the world—the ugliness and the beauty.
"When we were waiting for the doctor to examine you, Veronica mentioned how much you'd reminded her of one of those criminal investigation shows you got her hooked on. How you'd pulled information out of Zoe, somehow encouraged her to open up. And I knew that you were only doing what I've always done: trying to get at the truth. But more than that, you wanted to help people with that truth."
Autumn understood now what he was trying to say. Awash with emotions—relief, fear, admiration—she struggled against the urge to roll over, to burrow into him. To show him how immeasurable her gratitude and love for him were.
“I don’t like thinking of you in danger, but I don’t give you a choice about the danger I’m probably going to be in down the line. Conclusion: me getting protective and pissed all the time is hypocritical and selfish.”
“Possibly sexist,” she suggested, smiling weakly to ensure he knew it was a joke. “What’s a couple to do when they’re mutually terrified of their respective choices?”
“I can’t change who I am. You can’t change who you are. And I don’t want you to,” he added emphatically. "I don’t. So we'll both chase our versions of the truth, and we'll both be scared out of our damn minds when we're apart. I can live with this, on one condition."
"Anything," she breathed, lacing her fingers through his
.
"You will always do everything in your power to come home to me..." His gaze met hers and a wave of heat swelled between them. "And I will move mountains to come home to you."
"Sealed with a kiss?"
Soft as it was, there was nothing chaste about the way their mouths met. Careful not to lean on her battered frame, Andrew burned away all reservation, all hesitations and uncertainty as they tasted each other. They were a unit, a partnership. Indivisible.
She was as much his constant as he'd always been hers.
SIXTEEN
By ten in the morning, the doctor had returned, concluding that no signs of a concussion were present and that Autumn's mild (ha!) bruising of her ribs would resolve itself within a couple weeks. Mild abrasions to her forearms and knees required no attention. Reluctantly, she accepted a prescription for Percocet, reasoning that comfortable sleep was important for her mental health.
By eleven, her phone had rung four times: one call from Courtney, concerned for her safety and health; and three calls from Jeremy, adamant they meet about her publicity issues. After talking Andrew out of unleashing several choice phrases, she'd agreed to have lunch with him in the hotel.
"I still don't know why this can't wait until tomorrow," Andrew grumbled in the elevator.
She flashed him an article from a local paper. "Because of this, I assume."
Veronica had shot her a quick email with a link, accompanied only by the word crap. Right there for the world to see was a shot of Autumn and Veronica talking to the first responders. The headline: Broadway Stalker Creates Own American Horror Story.
Andrew grimaced. "Okay, maybe he has a point. But you are in need of rest. The doctor said so."
"And I will—after we shut up Jeremy."
Jeremy, however, was not so easily reassured or dismissed. If anything, Autumn's visible limp and awkward posture in her chair only created further panic.
"My God! What happened to you?"
