The Debt

by Karina Halle

  The room is spacious and very blue indeed. Blue toile wallpaper, sky blue and ivory chairs, blue and white bedspread with a blue canopy above it. The furniture is all dark wood. There’s a bump-out area with a single chair surrounded by three long windows on either side, looking directly out to the sea and the ruins of even another castle far in the distance.

  The bathroom is more or less the same. The size of the flat I had in my twenties, with a tub and shower and one of those toilets where the toilet tank sits high above you. You have to pull a cord downward to flush it.

  The sea is all around us, swooping in through the window cracks, tussling the delicate white curtains. The air is perfumed with salt and sunshine.

  “This good?” the receptionist asks and when Jessica answers her with an enthusiastic yes, the girl invites us to make ourselves at home. We can lounge in any of the main rooms downstairs and they’ll serve us alcohol whenever we want it. Dinner will be in a few hours in the main dining hall.

  The minute she leaves, Jessica limps quickly on over to me. She’d run if she could. She grabs my face, kisses me hard.

  “Thank you,” she says softly against my lips. “Thank you, thank you.”

  Something pinches inside me. I swallow hard. “You’re welcome,” I whisper.

  She breaks away, running her hands down my chest, pressing her fingers in as if to test my strength. “How did you know I harbored fantasies about being a princess?”

  “Lucky guess?”

  Honestly though, as we explored the room a bit more, the old books stacked above the fireplace, property of the Sinclairs who took over the castle, the vintage mirrors and armoires, I can’t help but think that Jessica would have been a princess in another life. Not because she acts like it, but her face, her mannerisms, are absolutely aristocratic.

  “How about we go up to the very top of the tower, where the battlements are. The girl told us how. We can continue your princess fantasies from up there. I bet there’s a stunning view of the sea.”

  She enthusiastically agrees and we leave the room in search for adventure.

  It’s all stopped short.

  To get to the top you have to go down a hallway and up another stairway. Then on that floor, walk around through another door until you get to a tiny spiral staircase made of stone. I can barely go up it, my shoulders brush against the stone walls and the steps are far too narrow for both Jessica and her cane. It’s so narrow that I couldn’t even get her on my back. We wouldn’t fit.

  I turn around, giving her a sorry look.

  She puts on a brave smile. “That’s okay. I don’t feel like tumbling to my death anyway. I’m not even sure anyone but a child could go to the top.”

  She’s taking it all in stride but I feel horrible for even suggesting it. I should have known that a castle wasn’t exactly built for someone in her condition. She has such a way of hiding her injury that sometimes I forget.

  Sometimes I forget a lot of things.

  “How about we get drunk,” I say, clapping my hands together. The sound travels up the staircase, echoing loudly. If sleeping beauty is snoozing at the top, she’s awake now.

  “Now you’re talking,” she says.

  We make our way downstairs slowly. The staircases in the castle are open and wide but the wool tartan runner that runs down them catches on her cane more than a few times. We’re in no hurry, though.

  The second floor is where the dining room and gathering rooms are. We pause by an old brass telescope propped up at an alcove and take turns peering through it. To the left of the castle is a wide expanse of white sand, right in front is a rocky shore laced with layers of dark sediment that reminds me of charred jawbones.

  The water is startlingly clear, patches of turquoise that fade out into a deep cerulean. It almost tricks you into thinking you’re somewhere in the Mediterranean but the water is ice cold to touch and there’s nothing but oil rigs and fishing vessels until you hit the coast of Norway.

  We settle into one of the gathering rooms, pleased to find it empty. The ceilings have to be twenty-feet high, patterned wallpaper stretching the whole way, accented by sconces. The make yourself at home attitude really does apply itself here – with all the china cabinets, overstuffed couches, fireplaces adorned with photos of the castle, and flickering candles in every window, it really does look like we’re in some rich lord’s house. There’s even a piano by one of the large windows, which I quickly make my way toward.

  “You play?” Jessica asks, sitting down at the end of the bench.

  “Not really,” I tell her and gingerly touch the keys. There’s only a handful of songs I know and most of them were written by an unknown. Back in my punk Glasgow days, I sometimes played keyboard for a little extra money, usually for a friend’s show. They sucked so it didn’t really matter if I did.

  “You?” I ask.

  “No. But I’d like to. I always thought I’d have a piano in my house. Even if I never learned, just so anyone coming over could play. Music soothes the soul.”

  The words rest on the tip of my lips but I don’t dare say them.

  You move in with me, I’d buy you the piano. I’d buy you anything and everything that feeds your soul.

  I’m not sure if she reads this in my eyes or not and if she does, it’s probably too much for her. She suddenly excuses herself, saying she wants to grab her phone and send Christina a message. There’s been no mobile reception most of the drive up here and the wifi in the castle is contained to this room. Fine with me. This is where the staff bring you drinks anyway.

  Only they haven’t come by yet. I get up, about to go search the castle for one of them, maybe get some scotch for the two of us, when I hear a scream and then the awkward, painful sound of someone tumbling.

  Fuck!

  I nearly jump over the couch trying to run out of the room to main hall and that’s where I see Jessica lying in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, her cane a few stairs up, abandoned.

  For the second time today I drop to my knees and pull her to me.

  “Jessica!” I cry out.

  But unlike earlier today, this is serious. Her nose is bleeding, she’s more in shock than anything, rubbing her limbs, unable to open her eyes.

  “Stay still, don’t move,” I command her. “You need to stay immobilized. You may have injuries you don’t know about.”

  Two staff members join us in a panic, asking if they should call an ambulance.

  Jessica shakes her head. “My cane,” she mumbles. She opens her eyes, taking me all in, blinks over and over. “It caught on the stairs, I fell.”

  My heart sinks but I push it aside.

  “Let me take a look,” I tell her, craning my head back to get a better look. She’s sprawled out, her good leg tucked under her bad one. The splint is starting to come loose but it’s holding up. “Where does it hurt? Here, hold your head back.” I pull a napkin out of my pocket that I’d taken from lunch and tilt her head back to stop the flow of blood.

  “Everywhere,” she says. “My shoulders…ow, my hips. I knew what to do. I rolled with it. My leg feels a bit shitty but I don’t think I fucked it up too much.”

  “Should we call a doctor?” the blonde receptionist asks. She sounds frightened, maybe more for the impending lawsuit than for the well-being of one of her guests but of course that’s the cynical city boy side of me talking. Up here in the remote north, the Scots are more than genuine.

  “No,” I tell them, not taking my eyes off of Jessica, making sure she holds the napkin to her nose. “She’ll be bruised but I think that’s it.”

  Jessica nods slightly, looks up at them and puts a smile on her face worthy of an Oscar. “I’ll be fine,” she says. “Sorry. I’m not used to this cane and I was in a hurry.”

  I give them a glance. “I’ll take her up to the room. But if you want to bring us a bottle of whisky on the house for her troubles, that would be greatly appreciated.”

  The girls nod, happy that any trouble
can be forgotten with a bottle of Macallan and they hurry off to the pantry.

  I scoop Jessica in my arms and head up the stairs, bending down to snatch up her cane as I go. We get to the room and I lay her gently on the bed. Moments later, one of the girls appears with a bottle of 15-year old scotch, which I gladly take.

  “Here,” I tell Jessica, getting glasses from the display above the fireplace. The evening is settling in now, turning the sky to a show of clouds and light. I quickly pour us two glasses, then come over to the bed, handing her one.

  “Thanks,” she whispers before she slams hers back and tosses it on the bedspread.

  Without question, I give her my full glass and then set about inspecting her body. She’s dressed in knee-length leggings and a long woolly sweater, so it’s hard to look everywhere. I make her take the sweater off and see a bruise forming on her shoulder. I peel down her leggings and see the same purple skin forming on her hip and later her knee. Thankfully it was the good leg that took it.

  “Well, this side definitely took the fall for you,” I tell her, pulling her sweater back down as she finishes my glass too. “You’ll be bruised for a few days I’m sure but you didn’t break anything, your nose has stopped bleeding, and I think your leg will be as it was before.”

  “You mean fucked up and useless?” she says, her voice dull.

  “Hey,” I tell her, putting my fingers under her chin and guiding her face toward me. “Stop talking like that. I’m serious. You don’t want people to pity you but you have to stop acting like a person to be pitied.”

  The words just slip out. I didn’t mean them so bluntly, even though it’s the complete truth. She doesn’t like this. She balks, her mouth dropping open.

  “You don’t expect me to be hurt when I just fucking fell down a flight of stairs?” she exclaims, her eyes alive with anger. “You think I’m supposed to just brush it off?”

  “Yes,” I tell her, knowing I’ve pissed her off already. “You’re supposed to get back up and deal with it.”

  She’s speechless. “I did get back up. I am dealing with it.”

  I stare at her for a moment. “And if I didn’t come get you, how long would you have sat there on the floor for? Either time today.”

  Her eyes narrow. “I don’t think I like this asshole side of you.”

  “It’s not a side of me.”

  “Playing Devil’s Advocate is fun when you’re at a bar, not when it has to do with your fucking tragedy. Do you think this shit can just happen to people and they aren’t supposed to feel? Something happened to you, something brought you down to your knees.” I flinch internally. “Just because you’re so fucking good at burying it, at hiding it, doesn’t mean I am. Okay, maybe I’m being a bit negative lately, but so sue me. I’m dealing with this the best way I know how.”

  I take in a deep breath through my nose. She’s right. I am being a bit harsh on her. I know how to bury my pain pretty deep and she hasn’t learned that yet, not in this context anyway. That’s probably a good thing.

  “Sorry,” I tell her, picking up the empty glasses from the bed and placing them on the nightstand. “I just want you to keep being positive, that’s all. I hate to see you like this.”

  “Well guess what, Keir? I hate to see me like this too. Do you think I like feeling like a whiny little bitch every time the going gets rough? Well I don’t. I hate it. And it in turn makes me hate me and then the vicious cycle continues.”

  I fold my arms across my chest, wishing there was something I could do.

  It’s your fault she’s like this, I can’t help but think. If only you were the man your father wished you would be, you could have spoken up, made things happen. Lewis would have never gone out there with that gun.

  I ignore the thoughts. I can’t go down the same road she’s on.

  “I’m sorry,” I say again but she’s turning away from me, a visible cue to fuck off. If I knew Jessica a wee bit better, I would know whether that was a sign for me to try harder or a sign to back off. But I don’t. For all that I feel for her, she’s still a mystery to me.

  I decide to play it safe, even though I have a feeling there is no playing it safe when it comes to relationship games.

  “I’m going to take a shower,” I tell her and go inside the bathroom, shutting the door behind me but leaving it unlocked, just in case she has a change of heart and decides to join me, though the first thing I would do is get her to take a bath. If only this hotel had a load of Epsom salts at the ready.

  I’m just lathering up my hair when I think I hear the door to the room shut. I figure it’s another door in the hall. Castles aren’t exactly soundproof.

  But when I’m done and wrap the towel around my waist and open the door to the bedroom, it’s empty. Jessica is gone. And so is half the bottle of whisky, lying on the bed.

  Jesus, she drank a lot. I pick it up and put it on the mantel while a shuffling sound catches my ear. I move over to the alcove and open one of the windows facing the sea.

  Jessica is on the beach below, the slick, rocky section where it reaches into the water like burnt bones.

  “Hey!” I call out after her. “What the hell are you doing?”

  But the breeze is picking up my voice and throwing it away. Jessica doesn’t turn around. Instead she hobbles further along the rocks until she’s at the water’s edge, her cane nearly slipping a few times.

  Christ. This is recipe for disaster. “Don’t go any further!” I yell just in case she can hear me. “Come back in, you’ll hurt yourself.” The last thing she needs is to take a tumble there. The rocks are sharp and jagged and she’s already off-balance.

  I pop my head back inside the window, about to close it, when the unthinkable happens.

  Jessica throws the cane to the ground.

  She jumps off the edge of the rocks and into the water, fully-clothed and disappearing with a splash.

  “Jessica!” I scream and for a split-second I’m frozen, afraid she might not come up. It’s that split-second that could so easily doom me, the same split-second that doomed my men. I waited too long to speak up. Here, I waited too long to stare.

  She’s not coming up, it’s too cold.

  Oh come on, come on, come on.

  But then her head pokes out of the water and she starts swimming.

  Away from shore.

  Even worse.

  I don’t even bother to put on pants. I run out the door in my towel, down the many stairs of the castle and out the front where the path loops behind to the shore. The whole time she’s out of my sight and I’m afraid of the time passing where I can’t see her. I keep having visions of her back bobbing to the surface, pale and lifeless, her hair swirling around her like red seaweed.

  I round the corner of the castle walls and finally see the water. My eyes are automatically seeking out the shoreline and when I don’t see her, I almost throw up. I’ve been trained not to panic but I’ve never been trained for someone like Jessica.

  Then I see a tiny head in the distance, at least a hundred feet away. She must have swam like hell.

  “Jessica!” I yell, waving my hands as I run to the shoreline, the rocks biting into my bare feet.

  She doesn’t respond. She’s so far out that I can’t tell if I’m looking at the back of her head or the front. What I do know is that her head is starting to dip beneath the surface, whatever adrenaline she had at the beginning is starting to wane dramatically.

  There’s no choice. I don’t even think about it. I take off the towel and head for the water.

  I yelp, shocked when my feet first go in, not from the sharp edges but from the intense cold. It’s like stepping into a pool of ice cubes. But it doesn’t matter. There is no time to even feel it. I go in to my thighs, until the rocks drop away to soft sand, and then I launch myself in.

  The water is a knife. One big cold knife slicing its way down the middle of me. My lungs collapse, my heart stops, my thoughts freeze. For one horrible moment I am a sla
ve to the cold and will do whatever it tells me to.

  Then I break out of it.

  Nec aspera terrent. The strong fear nothing.

  Here is my time to prove it.

  I start swimming, grunting past the numbing pain, my arms and legs working into overtime as I blur through the water after her. The water sluices around me with ease though I know that it’s because I can’t feel my limbs anymore. That makes a lot of things seem easier.

  I get closer though, trying to keep my eye on her as I swim in powerful strokes, to make sure she doesn’t go under. I’m not sure what I’d do if she did. Dive down into the depths to get her, dive down even if I would be diving forever.

  But she’s still there and when I finally catch up, she’s just starting to go under.

  “Jessica.” I’m gasping, the air not reaching my lungs. I grab for her, pulling her up and to me. “Jessica.”

  She’s barely conscious and doesn’t say anything. Her eyes are glazed, unfocused, skin more pale than I’ve ever seen.

  I quickly glance back at the shore. The castle seems impossibly far away. I have no idea how I’ll manage. But I must.

  I pull her onto my back, hooking her arm around my neck. “Hold on, please,” I tell her, trying to swim.

  She does, weakly. “I was trying to see,” she mumbles, her head flopping against the back of mine. “I was trying to see if there was something better.”

  The futility in her voice nearly makes me lose it. She’s drunk and numb and yet her words strike me, exploding where it hurts.

  For the longest time I’m not sure I can make it. I’m strong. I’ve had to do crazy endurance tests and even if my body isn’t the same machine it was in the military, I know I can do more than the average muscle-head at the gym.

  But this is different. This is testing every cell in my body. This is a challenge that seems impossible to overcome, especially as the castle doesn’t seem to get closer, no matter how hard I swim, my precious cargo in tow.

  Then, finally, it does.

  The stone walls loom up in front of me, my feet are hitting the shore, even though I can’t feel them at all. I half collapse right there, rocks cutting into my hands and knees, then manage to carry Jessica the rest of the way.