The Dreamhouse

by Thorn, Nicole

  I screamed again at the mirror for whatever sin it committed. It was there. It smashed into pieces, and I dropped the broken frame onto my floor. My hands were bloody and dripped onto the floor. I didn’t know where it was coming from. The smell filled my nose, and then there was nothing else in the world.

  I dropped onto my knees, and the glass cut into me. I could only barely feel the sharp stinging of the wounds. Everything hurt, so nothing hurt. My eyes blurred with the tears that stained my carpet, mixing with my blood. My hands hit the floor, and I couldn’t scream again, as much as I tried.

  I lay down, sobbing and shaking. I couldn’t see, and I wished I couldn’t feel anything either. Not the pain in my hands, feet, throat, and eyes. Not the weight in my head. Not the failure in my heart. I wanted to be numb. I didn’t want to be anything at all.

  So I closed my burning eyes and tried as hard as I could to be nothing.

  Bennett

  y torso had turned a sickly yellow, but I could breathe without it hurting, so there was that. I winced when I poked at the colored flesh, and I watched it turn more colors. My ribs were still purple, possibly cracked. No problem. Those healed on their own. The real bitch was when I needed stitches. Thankfully, I didn’t this time. I just needed rest.

  I dried my hair with a rubbing of my towel, and I tossed it in the hamper. I walked back to my room in my jeans, having forgotten the rest of my clothes. I was home alone, so it didn’t matter that I was half-dressed. I closed my door when I got to my room and wasn’t sure why.

  After I threw on a sweater, I sat at my desk to finish up the chapter that I started after Layla left last night. She’d been so broken, and she carried it in her eyes. I hated myself for how happy I was that she chose to seek comfort in me. My eyes closed, and I could still smell her hair, and I could feel her fingers on my skin. I could hear her heart beating in my ears, and I could feel it like she still pressed against my side, molding to me like we were two halves of a whole. The broken little angel lay on me, and my heart shattered when she stopped.

  I typed away on my computer, losing myself in the scene without much prompting. Funny how when a light-haired beauty decided to pop up in my story, I had the focus of a surgeon. The words came, I blinked, and two hours had passed. After I took a sip of my water, I stretched my arms out and stood from the desk to take a break.

  It started with one ring of my bell. Then three seconds passed, and it was followed with another six, and finally something pounding on my front door. It didn’t stop as I walked through the house. Not till I opened up the door.

  The very first thing I saw was Layla, and her eyes widened as her grin took over her face. The corner of her eyes crinkled, and she looked as if she was caught with her hand in the cookie jar and proud of it. Her hands were still curled into fists and raised for another knock.

  My eyes shamelessly raked down her body, taking in the outfit she chose for this brisk morning. Her dress was black, white, and red harlequin patterns, and she had on some very fancy looking fishnets that looked like they would easily tear if one started pulling at them. They led down to leather ankle boots. The look was topped off with a tilted fedora on her head, and her hair in ringlets all around her face.

  Fuck.

  Layla brought company with her. At her left side were Riley and Wilson. Riley wore jeans and a sweater so loose that I had to believe it belonged to Wilson. The entire outfit was black which seemed odd for her. What really topped it off was the smooth black swipe of something under her eyes. I thought it was that gunk that football players wore. Why she had it, I didn’t know. Atop her head was a derby, and it pressed down on her so far that the tops of her ears were smushed against the brim.

  Finally was Wilson. He had no hat, and his hands were in his pockets.

  “Wilson bought us hats,” Layla told me with that wide smile.

  There was more childlike lightness to both Riley’s smile and voice. “Wilson bought us hats.”

  I looked to the man, smirking. He nodded once and spoke with the seriousness of a man taking a vow. “Wilson bought us hats.”

  I laughed and looked at Layla again. Everything about her startled me. It was a shock to my system, seeing something so beautiful. And then she took my hand and tugged me onto the porch.

  “We’ve come to bring you somewhere,” Wilson said, dropping some of the seriousness from his tone. “I was informed of this only an hour ago, by the way. My woman woke me up with donuts, and told me I was Bitterman today.”

  Riley smiled, and somehow, her ears dropped a little. “I love you,” she said to her boyfriend.

  He caught her with an arm around her shoulders to drag her body to his. He kissed her temple and whispered something in her ear that had her smile turning up again.

  Layla looked from them to me, tugging on my hand again. “I wanted to take you out with us. Adalyn is with her dad today, and I figured you’d be alone here. I didn’t interrupt your work, did I?”

  She was the only one I ever met that called it work, and it made me feel so… validated. And flustered. I had to compose my pathetic self before I could speak. “No, I’m free.” I wouldn’t pass up a chance to spend time with her.

  She smiled again, tilting her head up to me. “Good, ‘cuz we got you a hat too. It’s in the car.”

  I let her drag me away from the house to a plain-looking blue car. Wilson got in the front seat, and Riley sat on the passenger side. Layla and I took the back, and then they promptly gave me a porkpie hat. Layla squished it onto my head and told me I looked handsome.

  “If you doubt my love after this,” Wilson started. “I will be very sad.”

  It would seem that Wilson wasn’t left out of the fun. His hat was… I could only describe it as the kind of hat a barbershop quartet singer would wear. Riley looked like she was in love with it.

  We drove on, and Layla didn’t let my hand go. I stared at our entwined fingers between us, and I studied the way her thumb absentmindedly brushed over my knuckles. The heat from her skin as it soaked through to my bones and tangled up inside of me. I felt tied up in knots, but I didn’t mind it. I memorized the way she stared out the window and what things caught her attention. She seemed to like when the odd bird flew by. Her eyes flickered up when the clouds began to move, and she watched them cross the sky.

  She consumed everything around her, and it felt so desperate. As if she needed it all. To be a part of it. It felt like she wanted to dig her fingernails into nature itself and take it by force. Keep it forever. Like it was meant for her and no one else.

  We got to a little strip mall near some kind of dog park. It was fairly empty, but the shopping center was filled with enough people to make me uncomfortable. They weren’t looking at me, but I still had that ice-cold fear that they were and that they hated me. Strangers. I saw them, and it felt like with one look they could see all the cracks in my soul.

  I was led into an ice cream shop, and I remembered that it was ten in the morning. No one here seemed to be concerned with that fact, so I didn’t point it out. I walked alongside Layla and behind Wilson and Riley.

  “Strawberry and mint chocolate chip for the missus,” Wilson said to the teenaged girl behind the counter, “and mint for me.”

  The girl made a face at Riley’s choice, but she started scooping anyway. It hit me then as I felt my pocket. I didn’t have my wallet. Damn. My skull tingled, and my stomach dropped as I confirmed that I didn’t have a dime with me.

  I cursed out loud, and Layla arched an eyebrow at me. “Something wrong?”

  I swallowed, and told her the truth. “I forgot my wallet.”

  She smiled, and her nose wrinkled as she looked at me like I was daft. “You think I would make my date pay? For shame.” She shook her head. “I am treating you, lovely.”

  I tripped over my own words, stuttering at every turn. “I… I don’t think… You shouldn’t buy things for me. I can skip the ice cream.”

  Layla covered my mouth with her ha
nd. “Shut your pretty mouth,” she ordered me. “I’m buying you ice cream, and you cannot stop it. Also, since I am buying you food, that means that if I want, you have to give it up to me later. Them’s the breaks, kid. Accept them.”

  She was clearly joking about the last part, but I got nervous anyway. All I could do was nod since she still had my mouth covered.

  “Good boy.” She smirked and released me. “Things go easier when you listen to mama.”

  I smiled and walked to the front of the line with her. Riley was going to town on her ice cream cone while Wilson picked at his with a spoon. I noticed then that we were getting looks from the patrons inside. I assumed it was the hats, so I ignored it and focused on Layla.

  “Mocha and two scoops of caramel,” Layla said in almost a singsong voice. She leaned on the counter and propped her head on her hand. “And for you, my darling?”

  I rubbed the back of my neck and glanced at the choices. “Toffee?”

  The girl started making up the cones while Layla dug cash out of her pocket. I felt like garbage as she paid for me, but I wasn’t allowed to complain. I took my ice cream cone and thanked Layla.

  I saw something then, and I didn’t know how I missed it before. Cuts ran across her palms, straight and thin. Like she fished around a bowl of razor blades.

  “Are you okay?” I asked her.

  She followed my gaze. “Oh, yeah. I broke a mirror and stupidly didn’t put gloves on to pick up the glass.” She shrugged it off. “I’m not good at thinking ahead.”

  We walked outside without another word about it, and we headed out to the cold grass to sit. Riley lay with her head on Wilson’s lap, and Layla sat beside me. We ate our ice cream mostly in silence. Riley had some fun because she found an old tube of lipstick that she chose to smash between two rocks until it was nothing but a red mess.

  “Lovely, Cookie,” Wilson commented.

  “Thank you.”

  She pulled her hat back into place and moved onto Wilson’s lap to work on her flower crown. She picked at the little blades of dead grass and leaves and did the best she could. It was actually coming up better than I thought it would.

  “I would like to go on a Ferris wheel,” Riley decided, popping her head up, and squinting. “Where is there a Ferris wheel?”

  Wilson chuckled. “I don’t know, baby. But mark my words, I will find you a Ferris wheel.”

  She grinned and kissed his cheek. He seemed so pleased with that.

  Wilson and Riley looked like they had an easy relationship. Fun and light in every way. I wanted that. I wanted someone to hold and to make silly promises to. I wanted a girl that was happy to see me and smiled when I looked at her.

  Layla tapped on my arm, and I glanced over at her. “Look. Those ladybugs are totally doing it.”

  My forehead wrinkled, and I looked at the dead grass. How? How were there ladybugs here? I tilted my head and squinted at them. “I think one is just giving the other a piggyback ride.”

  Layla giggled at me when I turned to look at her again. Her eyes were bright, and her lips pulled back in a grin as she laughed either at me or with me. I’d be happy with either one.

  “Oh…” Wilson was grimacing when I saw him. “Well, glad that winter means nothing when you’re a little bug with big dreams.”

  Riley made a face and then stared at her hands. “I am sticky with ice cream and embarrassment that we’re all staring at those poor ladybugs as they try and start their ladybug family. I have to wash my hands.”

  Layla sighed. “Of course you think that they’re married and trying for a baby. Maybe they’re fuck buddies.”

  Riley wasn’t pleased with that. “No, they are in love.”

  She stood up, and Wilson went with her, his body automatically moving as if he had no control in the action. His hand went to the small of Riley’s back, and they waited for us.

  “We’ll go as a team,” Layla said as she stood up. “I like peeing with someone else in the room.”

  Riley laughed, and we started walking. We dropped the hats off in the car, and I waited with Wilson outside of the ice cream store. We leaned on the car, and I felt him staring at me.

  “Yeah?” I asked.

  He smiled. “So… Layla.”

  Uh, oh. “What about her?”

  He shot me a look. “Come on, man. Riley is making me grill you. Don’t make us both suffer.”

  I blinked at him. “Um… I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  He patted my shoulder. “Really?” He narrowed his eyes. “Dude, you’ve been staring at her the entire time we’ve all been together.”

  “Fuck,” I said instantly. “Did she see?”

  Wilson laughed, and crossed his arms over his chest. “No, but she will if you keep it up.”

  I nodded and slipped my hands into my pockets. “I’ll knock it off. I promise.”

  There was a silent beat before he said, “What? That’s not what I was saying. Look at me.” I did, and his eyebrows rose high on his forehead. “Did you think I was gonna kick your ass or something?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe.”

  He shook his head once. “I wasn’t sent for the protective big brother talk. Riley wants to know what’s up with you two. I don’t have to tell her a thing if you don’t want me to.”

  “You’d lie for me?”

  Wilson glanced the way the girls went. “It’s pretty clear that Layla is already lying to her. Riley’s not so good with knowing what’s wrong, but she sure as hell knows when something is wrong. She’s getting better the more she adapts to the real world.”

  His wording threw me, and I stared at him with confusion. “As opposed to what?”

  He opened his mouth and seemed to think better of whatever he wanted to say. “She’s young is all. But we were talking about you and Layla. Not Riley.”

  I hesitated because I didn’t really know how it would be taken. “She kissed me the very first time we met, and she’s the only person in my life that makes me feel at ease. I didn’t really know what it meant to be at ease before her and then she dropped in on me. She kept me from killing myself when I had every intention of doing it after we stopped speaking. But she smiled at me, and she made me feel better, and I need to know how this ends.”

  Wilson was silent as he watched me with wide eyes. “You met her through the center, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does anyone else know?”

  “No.”

  He nodded. “Okay, I’ll keep it to myself. How about you tell me what exactly you want out of this with Layla because you got this look in your eyes when you said you kissed her, and I can’t imagine that was the sun in your eye.”

  I’d honestly never thought it all the way through, what I wanted from Layla. I liked being around her, so that was all I hoped for. But I could want more than that. It didn’t mean I would get it, but I was allowed to want the girl with sorrow hidden behind her eyes.

  “I guess I kind of…” I didn’t know how to say it. “I want her,” was what I went with. It was as true as could be.

  To my surprise, Wilson grinned. “Ah, good for you. Layla’s an entertaining girl to say the very least. I think she’d do well with a guy that can keep up with her.”

  I pointed to my chest. “Are you… are you talking about me?”

  He sighed. “Yeah. Was that not clear?”

  “Hey!”

  Wilson and I looked over our shoulders at the same time to see two guys walking up to us. I wouldn’t normally have assumed they were talking to us, but it seemed impossible to think otherwise when they grinned like crazy people and stared straight at Wilson and I.

  They looked like teenagers. Both of them had backwards baseball caps on, and I learned in that moment that that actually was a thing people did. As well as droopy pants.

  “Hey,” the boy on the left said. “Those chicks you’re with, those are the Paperdoll ones, right?”

  “Yeah,” the other one said. “T
he tall one looks like one of the girls on TV.”

  “What?” fell out of my mouth. Who the hell were the Paperdolls?

  I looked to Wilson to see if he knew what they were talking about, but I flinched when I saw his face. It was a mix of things like fear, being resigned, and bitterness. He didn’t say anything.

  “Yeah, here.” One of the kids pointed to his phone. “The interview thing is on YouTube. That one with the crazy hair went into the ice cream place, and the really hot one went with her.”

  “Didn’t one of those girls blow her brains out on the pavement?”

  Wilson rushed past me when the guy held the phone out, but I saw the video. There was no sound, but that was definitely Layla on the phone. I saw Riley and Adalyn too. And a girl I didn’t know.

  “Turn that off,” Wilson growled at the boys. “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

  My head ran over the word. Paperdolls, Paperdolls, Paperdolls. It was like the thought was on the tip of my tongue. The Paperdolls… Something a few months ago, I thought. I didn’t know the story, but I heard my father talking about it. Something about kids getting kidnapped.

  “I bet those chicks are off their rockers,” the first boy said to the second. “Hey, we should get them to sign something. Do you have anything, Pete?”

  “I don’t know. Buddy,” he said to Wilson, chuckling. They seemed to miss that he was seething. “Which is yours? The tall one? She looks extra cuckoo. I bet she’s fucking amazing to roll around with.”

  It was probably about point-five seconds after he said that that Wilson broke his nose, and it was the same time the girls walked out of the shop. Riley’s eyes got huge, and Layla looked utterly amused by the whole thing. She even laughed.

  “What the heck?!” Riley squeaked when she got to Wilson.

  He shook out the injured hand as the boys screamed at him. He took Riley’s hand, and then pulled her along, telling her to run. She did. And with utter glee, Layla took my hand as well, and we followed Riley and Wilson back through the field and into the woods.