Scars and Songs (Mad World)

by Christine Zolendz

  Jacob and I both stood at the opening of the room, but when he moved forward, I hesitated a moment behind him, unsure if my legs would hold me. I know I cried aloud, I know I sobbed her name, and I know I never felt such anguish as I did then. Grace lay before us beaten and bruised.

  Jacob slowly pulled the chains that bound her broken mangled body to the small wooden chair she sat on. It was toppled over, and knowing Grace, she had struggled her way there, bleeding on the cold hard floor, fighting whoever had chained her there. I collapsed to my knees in front of her and gently brushed her matted hair from her face. I heard my voice whimper her name. Her swollen battered eyes slowly blinked open to my voice. She tried to talk, she moved her lips, but only a small cry escaped. If this is what Gabriel did to her soul in her subconscious, what has he been doing to her on earth for thousands of years? What lies has he told her? What horror has she seen while he tried to break her spirit?

  Hot tears fell from my eyes, blurring my vision of her. “Shh, baby, Iʼm here now. Selah, it’s me. I’m Shamsiel.” I gently gathered her in my arms. Softly placing my lips to her forehead, I brushed my lips over her tender skin, “You’re okay, Grace, this isn’t really happening to your body, you’re just in perdition. I’m so sorry.” I lifted my eyes to hers to see if she understood where she was, that Gabriel had brought her to limbo, a state of purgatory in her own mind. Her body still lay safe, healing itself in her hospital bed, surrounded by people who loved her.

  Her eyes spoke volumes to me, her body trembled and her lips tried desperately to move. “What was the gift you gave me?” she whispered.

  My tears streaked faster down my cheeks, “Shh, Baby, itʼs okay…” Shit, she doesn’t think it’s really me. Michael’s right…Will she still want me, love me now that I’m not an angel any longer?

  “No...I need to know itʼs you...if after everything...itʼs you.”

  Michael’s shadow fell over us, “Shamsiel, are you positive about your decision? Gabriel might still come after the girl here. We need to take her now.”

  I pulled her body closer and softly ran the tips of my fingers along her bruised face, as if I could wipe her hurt away. “Absolutely, Michael, she’s worth it.”

  “So be it,” Michael whispered. I knew he would never understand. His angelic soul had never felt the freedom and love of being in a human shell.

  Please, Grace…Selah…don’t stop loving me because I am only human now. “No matter what happens from here, know that I have always, I will always love you and I will protect you always.”

  Her eyes grew wider and her breath came out in rough gasps. “What did you do?”

  Would she ever forgive me for giving up my wings for her the minute I could have had them back? Was Selah like all the groupies Shane was used to, just in love with me for what I was? Being human came with such doubts and insecurities, they were nearly crippling to me. “If it weren’t for me, you’d be where you’re supposed to be. So this is my chance to let you start over. Itʼs over, baby. Your punishment is over.”

  Lifting her body gently, I placed her into Michael’s outstretched arms. “Will she remember this, Michael? Will she remember me?”

  Michael cradled her tiny body in his great big arms and immediately her bruises disappeared and her cheeks filled with a beautiful splash of crimson. In this human form, I had lessened myself to, I envied Michael being able to heal her. That was supposed to be my job and it should have been me. But, I no longer could. “Have her love you as Shane and only Shane. For that, my dear lost brother, is all that you are, for now. You are not to tell her who you were, not until I have a final say in this. She may not remember any of this.”

  I weighed his words carefully. All I had to offer this beautiful creature was Shane and his pathetic selfish existence. And the hope that one day soon, we would be absolved for all our deeds and be given entrance back home to heaven one day. For now, I would just be Shane. And I couldn’t tell her a damn thing. I was screwed. I just had to pray that she remembered all of this.

  Turning my back, I walked away towards the unknown mortal human life that lay ahead of me. Then I heard Grace’s voice scream out, “NO! No! It doesnʼt end this way! You canʼt leave me!” I turned back to run to her, but it was too late. She was no longer there. Nobody was. I was alone again, surrounded by a heavy darkness.

  Out of the blackness, something pungent slowly crept past my senses and began burning my mouth and nose, traveling like lava through my nasal cavity and pooled into my lungs. Ammonia, yeah that’s the damn smell, ammonia. Triggering my inhalation reflex to kick in, it felt as if someone grabbed my nose from the inside of my head and yanked on my brain. My eyes snapped open and I bolted upright. Damn, that was really strong stuff, and why can’t I move my arms.

  Where the hell am I now? White walls, hospital noises…lightheaded, dizzy, room spinning, my entire head was on fire and my eye socket throbbed like a bitch. A police officer sat in front of me with a small container of the offensive smell that woke me up. Smelling salts. Oh right, now I remember, fondly I might add, Ethan knocking me out. Well, my getaway seemed to be an epic fail because my wrists were pleasantly handcuffed behind my back. What a clusterfuck I woke up to. And it just got worse from there.

  When I could get on my feet, the two officers dragged me through a small crowd of my friends. The only one able to look at me was Ethan and hatred filled his eyes. Lea clung to Conner and cried into his shoulder. They all thought I did this to Grace?

  The officers hauled me through the exit and shoved me into the back of a patrol car. They didn’t even tell me to watch my head like they do on television when I got in, so of course, my forehead slammed itself against the top of the open doorframe as they pushed me through. I sat silently in the back of the RMP, blood dripping down my forehead and into my fucking eye as the two officers joked about getting laid at some party the night before. It took twenty minutes for the cops to get to their precinct, and in that time, I could tell they were both lying about getting laid at that party the night before. Doucheofficers.

  Next, they not so pleasantly dragged me out of the car and yanked me into a busy police station that smelled like piss and deeply fried Chinese food. Cops in dark blue uniforms walked around with papers flying out of their hands, radios blasting crimes and calls, yelling and throwing shit at each other. If I wasn’t handcuffed it would’ve probably been fun to hang out with them.

  Then they threw, yes THREW, me into a cell and locked me inside.

  After two hours of getting to know the junkies in the jail cell I was kept in personally, a plain-clothes detective called my name and held the cage door open for me. As I was leaving, I bowed to my new junky friends and thanked them all for pissing and shitting right in front of me while asking me all about my music. Epic experience.

  The detective, a tall muscular guy with a goatee, led me to a small interrogation room, offered me a cup of coffee with a sandwich and sat across from me. A small voice recorder lay on the table memorizing my words. The detective introduced himself as Detective Murrows and then fist bumped me.

  “Listen, Shane. I get it. I understand.” Murrows started running his hands over the blond peach fuzz that covered his head. “My girl pisses me off too. She just pushes me to the edge sometimes, so I get it.”

  Textbook interrogation technique - make the perpetrator think their crime was understandable so they would admit to it. The only damn problem was, I didn’t commit any crime. “What is it that you get, Detective?” I asked sitting back against the cold metal chair, relaxing.

  “I’m just saying, I understand. If I saw my girl dancing with some other guy, especially a loser like Blake Bevli, I’d want to hurt her too. I’d want to hurt the both of them. I don’t think that I’d be able to control my anger under those circumstances.” Murrows’ caramel-crap colored eyes drew in a long blink and then looked slightly to the left and up; his lips tightened into a line and casually curled down. This jackhat needed to work on learning h
ow to make up better stories, he sucked at it.

  I offered him a small chuckle and nodded my head. “Looks to me like you’re the one who should be behind bars then, because doing something to hurt your girl, any girl - I wouldn’t understand that. And I sure as hell wouldn’t have done anything like that to Grace no matter what happened between her and Blake.” Giving him a wider smile, I continued. “However, I do agree with you on one thing – Blake Bevli is a loser.”

  Murrows stared at me through narrowed lids and blinked twice. Maybe someone should get a professional to come in here and ask these questions, because I was kind of starting to feel sorry for this guy.

  “Maybe you don’t understand, Shane. You are our prime, number one suspect. I can tell you’re a man’s man and don’t like to be bullshitted, so let me lay it all out for you. Grace Taylor’s blood was all over you. Shane, it still is. The EMTs and all your friends witnessed you holding Miss Taylor, explaining to everyone that it was ‘all your fault.’ Shane, the EMTs saw the murder weapon in your hand when they got to the crime scene. If it wasn’t for the snowstorm and one of our patrol cars had made it there to secure the scene prior to the EMTs moving the victim, you would have been arrested on the spot. So, why don’t you just make this easy on everybody and tell me the truth.”

  I looked him dead in the eyes. “That’s all circumstantial evidence, Detective. I didn’t do anything to Grace except try to get her to a hospital. Ask your EMTs who carried Grace’s body through the snow to the ambulance, because it wasn’t them. And the last I checked, this was America I believe, right? I’m innocent until you prove I’m guilty. Have fun doing that.”

  “Maybe you don’t understand the weight of the charges they want to bring against you, Maxton. Attempted murder 2, Assault 1, Reckless Endangerment, Criminal Possession of a Weapon 2 and a slew of whatever else they could find to slap you with to put you away for a long time.” Murrows started tracing circles on the top of the metal table with his index finger, “If you want me to help you with those charges, make them a bit less – you could lessen the time you get, all you have to do is come clean to me and I’ll see what I can do.”

  I chuckled.

  He leaned in closer and lowered his voice, “Come on, Shane, help yourself out here. If you don’t, it’s going to be a long time until you get to see her again. Hey, I mean, think about your band, man. Mad World isn’t going to have their lead guy, think about what you’re doing, Shane. Your band is hot right now. Don’t you want to get back on stage as soon as you can?”

  “I think you want my autograph. Maybe you want me to sing for you? Fuck you, Murrows. You know as well as I do that I didn’t hurt Grace. So, go and find the person who really did. Yes, I found her there. Yes, I picked her up and carried her to the ambulance. Yes, I have her blood all over me. And yes, I gave the knife to the EMTs to bag up for the police. Check the prints on it, there will be more than just mine, I can promise you that.”

  Detective Murrows stood up abruptly, slammed his chair into the table, and stormed out of the room. Laughing, I looked towards the two-way mirror, shook my head and asked, “Does he have a lot of tantrums like this?”

  I was then formally arraigned - charged for the attempted murder and attack on the girl I loved. The judge, being a hard-ass decided to remand me, deciding not to set bail and hold me until grand jury could indict me.

  Every time I asked about Grace through the whole ordeal, every one told me she still hadn’t woken up yet.

  I asked about Grace every day, for seven days, while I waited in a cold cement jail cell. Each day, it was the same thing, she was still in a coma, and nothing had changed. I knew I made the right choice, I knew what I gave up to save her, so why wasn’t she coming back to me?

  With every passing day, I became more human than I ever was. Emotions ran raw through my body and clawed at my insides like a cancer. I barely ate the food they gave me and I couldn’t tell how much time had passed, all I thought about was Grace and getting her back to me.

  Grand jury came and went. I testified on my own behalf. Yes, I had said it was my fault, because I was supposed to protect her, but I wasn’t the one who tried to kill her. However, given the circumstantial evidence against me that was presented, it was enough proof for a trial against me. So, I was transferred from a holding cell filled with the dregs of life to the majestic (read as shithole of the universe) location of Rikers Island, surrounded by the murky polluted waters of the East River, to await my trial; general population, housed in the dormitory cells of the Taylor House. Me, Shane Maxton, singer and lead guitarist of Mad World, once angelic being, surrounded by 14,000 prisoners who swore they were just as innocent as me.

  Grace still hadn’t woken up. This shit wasn’t going as I planned.

  Chapter 17

  “Hey, Maxton. That girl of yours wake her pretty little ass up yet?” Luscious Carter, in for murdering his girlfriend and her family (husband and kids) - which he without a doubt committed, asked me. He seemed to try to take me under his wing. Said he loved music. Played a few instruments himself. Wanted to jam with Mad World. He was in for life.

  “Nah, bro. Not yet.”

  “She’ll come round, Rockstar, she’ll come round soon.”

  “Hope so,” I whispered.

  “Then you could hire someone. Finish the job you fucked up on. Teach that bitch a lesson. ‘Cuz, lemme tell you, Rockstar, when push comes to shove, you gots to start stabbing.” Scratching at his chin he seemed deep in thought, “There’s a trick to it. Gots to get them in the heart a few times, so no one can fix ‘em.”

  “Holy fuck, Carter! Don’t talk to me about it again. Shit, you are going right to fucking Hell.”

  He shrugged his shoulders and laughed, “Bet it ain’t much different then here.”

  The small window in the prison library let a small amount of the brilliant sunlight in, lighting up the colorless prison walls. Every damn day since they locked me in, it was the same monotonous routine: get up from sleeping in a dorm filled with about a hundred prisoners, who smelled like piss and the worst body odor ever in existence. Get dressed in front of the prisoners, most of which called me Rockstar. Eat breakfast, and then back to the dorms until lunch, and then back to the dorms until dinner. There was a one-hour block of free time, either in a large gymnasium where we lifted weights, the prison library which housed about fifty books, or an outside courtyard each day at various different times.

  There was a strict visitation schedule, which was based on the first letter of each inmate’s last name. Three visitors at a time, one time per visiting day, and all visitors needed to be registered before hand. Alex, Conner and Brayden came to see me every week. They told me all the bar gossip, anything going on that they thought might be interesting to me, but they always came with the same news about Grace. She hadn’t woken from her coma.

  Ethan visited me twice. The first time he visited all he did was grunt and yell, and then threatened to kill me if I got sentenced for her attempted murder. And if she didn’t wake up, he’d kill me with his own bare hands.

  The second visit was to give me the news that Blake overdosed and was dead. What could I possibly have said or felt about that? That’s exactly how the real Shane Maxton’s life ended. It was no surprise to me that Blake, Shane’s old drug dealer went the same way.

  It was five weeks, two days, six hours, fifty-six minutes and thirty-four seconds since I held a dying Grace in my arms, when a guard called my name over the crowd of inmates in the general pop recreational area. It was less than an hour before lights out and I was lifting weights with a bunch of bikers when they called for me. My heart almost burst from my chest thinking that someone had news for me about Grace.

  There was no news about Grace.

  The guards escorted me straight past the cells into the visitor’s center and right to a young high maintenance looking district attorney who looked like she painted her business suit on and smelled of sex and vanilla body spray. She had her
back to me and was busy talking on her cell phone. “…yeah, I have to 343 the case with that hot guitarist everyone is talking about…yeah he’s so hot, you have to see how I dressed to meet him…so I’ll be at the office in the morning with the papers since they’re pushing this through so late…but I was thinking to offer to drive him home, you know what I mean…” She turned around, caught me smirking at her and ended her call immediately. Stumbling over her words, she basically informed me that I was free to go. I was being ‘pulled and released since there was evidence that had come to light that excluded me without a doubt from being the perpetrator of the crime against Grace Avery Taylor.’ She wouldn’t tell me what it was, but slipped me her card with her personal cell phone number on the back. Yeah, you just wait by the phone there, sweetheart.

  “When do you think you’ll call me?” She asked seductively.

  I smiled at her, standing there in my fucking bright orange prisoner jumper wondering what psycho fucked up daddy issues or sexual dysfunction this chick might possibly have to give me, prisoner #122773, her damn number. “How about never? Is never good for you?”

  “How about a ride home then? You’re going to need someone to get you off this island, Rockstar. You don’t strike me as someone who waits for a bus in the middle of the night.”

  “Nah, I’ll swim if I have to. But thanks for the offer.”

  “You’re not afraid of sharks, huh? You’re that much of a badass?” She was slithering closer to me. Ooookay, I’m still a prisoner. I still have the orange fucking jump suit on and all she sees is a badass rockstar. Nut.

  “Lady, how long have you lived in New York City? There’s no way that sharks live in the East River. They all seem to work for the district attorney’s office.”

  It took her a minute, but I think she understood my meaning.

  I was handed back my personal effects in a sealed manila envelope and given my bloodied clothes back. Nice. My clothes covered in Grace’s dried blood. I sat down heavily on the hard wooden benches they offer the wonderful prisoners and their visitors here for comfort, and clung to the bloodied clothing. All I wanted to do was get the hell out of this prison, off this damn island and head straight for Grace’s hospital room. I wasn’t leaving her side until she woke up. But showing up with clothes stained with her blood would probably get me lots of attention from the authorities.