Best of 2017

by Alexa Riley

  My father's face pales, and a cold sweat forms over my body. I don’t know what he’s saying. That my father did this to him? That he did to Javi, what Javi did to me?

  I look up at Javi and see nothing but genuine sincerity on his face. He reaches out to touch my face, and for a moment, I forget everything else and focus on him. On the light in my heart. The one I thought long since extinguished, which now burns bright.

  “My Bella,” he whispers. “I wanted to be selfish. I would give anything to be selfish if I did not know that there was only one possible outcome from all of this.”

  My heart stops beating. My lungs stop taking in air. And I’m shaking my head before he can even say it.

  “What do you mean?”

  "Isa."

  My father’s voice is harsh. Harsher than it's ever been with me, and he's looking at me like he doesn't know me at all right now. Like I am no longer his daughter, standing here in the house that I grew up in.

  “What Javi is trying to say is that the things you are feeling right now, they aren’t real. And in time you will see that. You will understand that when you’ve had some time to heal. To contemplate the reality of your situation.”

  “No,” I tell them both. “Don’t try to tell me what I feel. I love Javi. And it’s real. I will always love him.”

  My father sighs and Javi looks away. I don’t like this. I don’t like where this is going. I won’t let him leave me behind, and I tell him so.

  "I need a drink," my father says. "Will you get us a drink Isa, please."

  His bar is still stacked against the wall where he left it, so I don't have to leave the room. It gives me the opportunity to clear my head. To digest everything that's happening.

  I reach for the bourbon, and my father interrupts me.

  "Not that," he says. "The Macallan."

  I look back at him in question. He only drinks this whiskey on special occasions. But I guess today is a special occasion, being that he is alive.

  I pour two glasses and take one to him and hand the other to Javi. They stare at each other from their seats, and I remain quiet between them.

  My father swirls the amber liquid in his glass, staring into the abyss as he gathers his thoughts.

  "This is over,” he says to Javi. "I'll never allow it to continue."

  I rub my temples and look at my father.

  "It isn't up to you," I tell him. "Dad, please. Don't do this. Not today."

  "You don't know what you are saying, Isa. You have been brainwashed."

  Javi meets my father's gaze head on.

  "And you have a right to speak about brainwashing?"

  Dad's face is red and mottled all over again.

  "There are many things you do not understand," he tells Javi. "That you never could. You want to believe only what you want to believe."

  Javi looks at me and shakes his head, his eyes sad.

  "Bella does not need to hear these things.”

  My father silently agrees, and the room falls still again. Too still. Like the calm before the storm. The tension is still there, simmering below the surface. And I am anxious now because I don’t know when it’s going to erupt. But I know one thing, and that is I won’t let Javi leave without me.

  Not today. Not ever.

  They both stare over the rims of their glasses, like snakes poised to strike. Javi is the first to drink, swallowing the entire contents of the tumbler in one fell swoop.

  And then he looks at me again. His face contorted. At first, I think he is angry with me. But then he coughs. And sputters. And coughs again.

  "Javi?"

  I move to his side, but he doesn't respond.

  It all happens in horrific slow motion. The color drains from Javi’s face while my father looks into his own tumbler and it shatters to the floor.

  "Dad?" I scream.

  Javi falls back against the sofa and begins to convulse.

  "Dad! Help him. What's happening? Please help him."

  My father rushes to Javi's side and begins chest compressions. I grab Javi’s face, trying to see him. Trying to see his eyes, but they are closed, and he is lifeless.

  It's all happening too fast.

  It's all too real. Nothing about this makes sense. He was just talking to me. And now he's lying here, and I can't see his eyes. I can't feel his heartbeat or hear his breath.

  I'm sobbing. Begging him not to go anywhere. Demanding that he stops this right now. He can't trick me anymore. He can't play these games with me anymore. I’m too fragile, and I can’t survive it. Not this time. Not when he said he loved me, and I believed him.

  During the chaos, the front door opens, and someone else appears. In the back of my mind, I hope that it's the ambulance. The ambulance that's coming to rescue him. To fix him. The ambulance that we haven't even had time to call. But paramedics don’t wear a mask. And they don’t have guns, either.

  "Time to say goodbye, little Bella," the strange voice tells me.

  "What?" I blink and cling to Javi. "No."

  None of this is real. It can't be. It just can't. I don't know what's happening. Only that I'm sobbing hysterically and Javi isn’t moving, and I’m so scared. My father keeps saying that he's sorry. He's so sorry. There's nothing he can do.

  But he’s a liar, and I hate him.

  I hate him so much, and I can’t even comprehend why at this moment. He's dragging me away from Javi.

  The masked men are shouting orders. But I can't hear them. Because I'm trying to get to Javi. I'm trying to fight my father off. But he's too big. Too strong. And the men are taking Javi away from me. Dragging him out the front door.

  I scream at them to stop. Only one of them does, just to look back at me one last time.

  "I will send you the ashes, little Bella. It's what he would have wanted."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  DARKNESS.

  It possesses me. It entombs me. And darkness is all that I am now. The void is empty and vast. It cannot be mended.

  Nothing can ever be fixed again.

  My father comes to my room often to check on me. The room where he has locked me. The room where he tries to feed me.

  I have traded one prison for another.

  He tells me he wants to keep me safe. He tells me he doesn't know who to trust. But when I look at his face, it is him I don't trust.

  I trust nobody. I feel nothing. Nothing can hurt me anymore. It's what Javi wanted. And I refuse to believe that this is my reality. I refuse to believe that he isn't here with me.

  I'm back in the piano room. Everything else is an invention of my imagination. My hallucination. That's what I keep telling myself. That's how I go on, breathing and thinking and living.

  He's going to come for me soon. He will tell me that it's all been a trick. And now it's time for my reward. Because I've been a good girl for him, he will comfort me. He will take me in his arms and hold me. Fix me. Give me the thing only he can provide.

  My sanctuary.

  My peace.

  "Isa," my father's voice echoes through the cavernous space of my new prison. "You must eat. You must stay healthy and strong."

  I blink up at his distorted face, and I am glad that he is obscured. I can’t bear to meet the eyes of this man who has raised me.

  This man who- in my nightmare- took Javi away from me.

  It plays on in my head. Over and over again. The whiskey. The whiskey he asked me to pour. The whiskey he did not drink. And the expression on Javi's face.

  Betrayal.

  It was the last thing I saw in his eyes. The last thing he felt in this nightmare. He thought I had betrayed him. My stomach churns, and I curl into myself. My cheeks are wet, but I know the tears don't mean anything.

  It still isn't real.

  Javi will come for me. He will ask me to play him a song with words only he can hear. I will play him a million songs. And I will sing words that I have never sung before.

  When my father leaves, I scribble th
em down in my journal. I write pages upon pages of lyrics. Frantically. Endlessly. Until my hands are black with ink and my eyes are too blurry to see anymore.

  "Sing me a song, Javi," I whisper into the darkness. "With words only I can hear."

  I repeat it, over and over. I cry. I pace. I never sleep. I don't eat. I drink water only when my father makes me.

  I'm dead inside already.

  And the longer the days go on, the less certain I am. The harder it becomes to deny. He will come for me. That's what I tell myself. That's what I tell my father. Until the day that he comes for me instead. And he carries something with him this time.

  It is a card. And something else.

  A silver urn.

  An urn painted with crimson roses.

  "This came for you today.”

  His voice is solemn, and I hate him.

  "No." I yank the urn from his arms and clutch it to my chest. "No!"

  I scream. I scream it over and over.

  "This is your fault! You did this to me!"

  Tears fill his eyes, and he looks at the floor. I can't pretend anymore. Because I'm dead inside. There is nothing left in me.

  Nothing.

  And I know that Javi is really gone.

  And I know that I'll never be okay again.

  MY ROOM IS SMALL. Sterile. White. But the tiles are sea foam green. Like the horror room at Moldavia. I wonder if Javi noticed that too when he was here.

  In the sanitarium.

  My therapist sits across from me, observing the pattern my fingers trace over the urn that doesn't leave my side.

  "Tell me what's on your mind, Isabella," she says.

  I forgot her name. Or I don't care. Names aren't important anymore. Nothing is important anymore.

  "I was wondering if this was his room," I tell her. "I was wondering if the bed that I sleep in was his too."

  "And if it was, how would that make you feel?"

  I look at her this time.

  "It would make me feel happy."

  But that's a lie. Nothing can make me happy anymore. Not when grief is the only thing that exists.

  My father thinks I'm wrong. Disjointed. Mentally incapable of understanding my own thoughts. He thinks I have Stockholm syndrome. He says I've been brainwashed into hating him and loving Javi instead.

  But he's wrong.

  I hate them both. I hate my father for his lies. And I hate Javi for leaving me. For ever loving me. For making me love him. I tell the therapist so, and she doesn't judge me. At least not out loud.

  "I hate them," I tell her again. My voice is rougher this time. "I hate them both."

  "Anger is a normal part of grief," she replies.

  I don't want her justifications. Her agreement. I don't know what I want. I've been here for two weeks, and nothing has changed. She can’t fix me. Only Javi can.

  But nobody understands that. They think I'm wrong for thinking so.

  "Would you like to play the piano today, Isabella?"

  I nod this time. Because I will play every day now. Every chance I get. I play him songs. But I don't sing the words out loud. Because they are only for him. Words only he can hear.

  The room is quiet, and the therapist is too. I don't like it when she's quiet. It's easier when she asks me questions. Otherwise, I say things. Things that I shouldn't say.

  "He isn't bad," I tell her. "You don't know him."

  "I never said he was," she answers.

  Her voice is gentle, but I don't believe her.

  "His mother did awful things to him. And then my father. Something happened to him. He was tortured."

  She sits back and crosses her legs. Folding her hands over her lap as she watches me carefully.

  "Why do you feel the need to validate, Isabella?"

  "I see how you look at me," I answer. "I see how you all look at me. How you scribble your notes. How my father whispers to you when I can't hear. I know what you think. But you won't change my mind. You won't fix me. Or unbreak me. Or convince me that what I feel isn't real."

  She sets her pen aside. Her notebook is empty today. And I'm glad.

  "What if I said that I do believe you?" she asks. "What if I told you that what you feel is real? That your love for Javi is real. Would you believe me?"

  I trace over the roses again.

  "I don't think so."

  "Then perhaps the person you are trying to convince is yourself.”

  Her words confuse me. They make my head hurt. I don't need to convince myself. I already know that my love for Javi is real.

  "Do you feel guilt for loving him?" she continues. "Or is it guilt for his death?"

  Death.

  The word punches me in the gut all over again. I want to tell her to shut up. I want to tell her that he isn't dead. But he is.

  He's right here beside me. And I'll never hold him again. I squeeze my eyes shut, and the only thing I can see is that look on his face.

  The betrayal.

  It's the only thing I see. Day and night. Every other memory has vanished, and this is all that remains. The haunting final moments when he was there, and then he wasn’t.

  "He thought I did it," I whisper. "He thought it was me. It was the last thing he thought."

  Tears leak from my eyes and I feel weak for crying all the time.

  The therapist doesn't say anything. She lets me cry. She lets me feel. And it hurts so much. I wish she would just give me some pills. To numb everything. To make it go away. But she hasn't given me any.

  I ask her why, and she reaches for her pen again, tapping it against the corner of the desk.

  "I can't give you any pills, Isabella.”

  "But why?" I ask her again. "Isn't that the whole point? The whole point of me being here?"

  "The whole point of you being here is to rest," she replies. "To be well."

  I ignore her and go back to tracing over the roses. She watches me. She is silent for a long time before she speaks again.

  "I think you are strong, Isabella. I think you are brave. And I think Javi would want you to be well too. He would want you to be at peace."

  "How can I be at peace?" I demand. "When he isn't here?"

  She is quiet again. Her brow furrowed.

  "What if I told you that a part of him was? What if I told you that you had another reason to be strong?"

  Her words capture me. She knows it. But she does not explain right away. She watches me closely, gauging my reactions. And then when she has determined that I am ready to hear it, she goes on.

  "Do you remember when your father brought you here? Do you remember the tests we ran that first day, Isabella?"

  I nod. I was despondent then. I wouldn't answer their questions. I didn't need to. They took their answers from my father. From blood tests and eye tests and reflexes and other things that were supposed to measure how sick I was in the head.

  The answers to those tests are in my chart. The chart she carries with her now. She opens it up and reaches inside, flipping through to the back. And then she pulls out a piece of paper, sliding it across the desk towards me.

  "Isabella, the reason Javi still lives on is because he is here with you right now. Inside of you. You are pregnant with his child."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  MOLDAVIA IS the same as it always was.

  Shadowy. Secluded. Mysterious. But somehow, everything has changed.

  Inside is dusty. Stagnant. A time capsule of our last moments together. Javi's bed is still unmade, where we slept together that night. The bandages remain on the bedside table, from when he mended me after I tried to escape. And the glass he brought me to take my pills remains, empty.

  It is an ache unlike any other when I walk around this house. When I don't feel him here. I try to be strong. I try to remember everything I learned from my therapy. I want to hold on to the good memories and push forward. But it's hard when everything is so desolate around me.

  It's hard when every time I have to breathe, i
t hurts.

  His child grows inside of my belly. And I have to do this on my own. It cracks me open and makes me bleed all over again. But the worst pain comes when I visit the conservatory. When I see the roses have withered and died in his absence.

  The once familiar scent that used to surround us no longer lives.

  Even the house is in mourning. I can’t feel him here. I don't feel him here at all. I have to see him one more time. In the only way I can.

  I walk to the bathroom, and I find the makeup case. The one where I stashed the tapes. The tapes that have haunted me for so long.

  I don't know what's on these.

  I don't know why they were hidden away from the others. But I have nothing left to lose now. I have nothing left to fear. The worst has already happened. There can be nothing on these tapes that’s worse than what I've already witnessed. That's what I tell myself as I walk to the projector.

  They are numbered, so I start with the first. The projector sputters to life, but nothing plays on the screen. I try the next tape. And the next. And the next. They are all blank.

  All along, they meant nothing.

  There was nothing here. It doesn’t make sense. Why were they locked away?I can’t think about it anymore. I can’t focus.

  I put on one of his tee shirts, and I cry. But only for an hour. That's all I will allow myself. Because I have to keep moving forward. I have to, for my baby. For our baby.

  I have to make a home. I have to play my music. I have to stay busy. And most importantly...

  I have to plan a funeral.

  MY FATHER COMES to the door in the afternoon, his shoulders falling in relief when I answer it.

  "Isa, I was so worried. You should not have run off like that."

  "I’m an adult," I answer. "And I was free to go. I did not need your permission."

  His eyes are sad when he looks at me. I am sad too. I don't know how it came to this. I don't know who this man is.

  "I know what you did," I tell him.

  "I did not kill him, Isa," he insists. "I know you find this difficult to understand, but I cared for Javi. I cared for him like a son. And I am mourning his death too..."