The Sound of Light

by Claire Wallis

  If he were still alive, he’d be seventeen years old.

  Every day since, I’ve wondered why my mother let him go. I’ve never forgiven her for it. And I never will.

  Even after Bradley died, I refused to let her back into our lives. She didn’t deserve to be a part of my life. Or Adam’s. Not only was my mother holding my biggest secret in her careless hands, but her mistake was beyond pardon. Having her in my life was too risky. It was easier to continue to shut her out.

  I didn’t expect Adam to understand. When I took the picture of Bradley to my mother’s room at that godforsaken nursing home and told him the half-truth about his brother, I wasn’t doing it to make him understand. I was doing it because I knew if I didn’t, he’d keep pushing my mother. And the facts she might eventually give him would be far more damaging than any lie I could tell. I told Adam everything about Bradley, except for the truth about why I kept him a secret. I admitted to a one-night stand and told him about the car accident. But, I told him I kept Bradley’s existence from him only to protect his mother. I told him it would destroy her to know she wasn’t the only one. Even now, all these years later. I couldn’t risk losing her. I said he could hate me if he wants to, but he would only be hurting his mother by dredging up the past and telling her about Bradley.

  He was angry and confused, calling me an asshole for keeping it from them for all these years. After that smug nurse kicked us out of Pine Manor for arguing, we took our conversation out to the parking lot. There, Adam accused me, yet again, of trying to control his life. He was furious, saying I’m always manipulating everyone to my own favor and asking me why the hell I just can’t stay away from him. When he brought that little girlfriend of his up as an example, I totally lost it. I screamed at him, telling him he was a fool for thinking she was in love with him and not his trust fund. I told him he deserved a better fuck than some minimum-wage loser from the mosquito-ridden backwoods of Louisiana.

  He stood there staring at me, his eyes burning with a fire I’ve never seen before. His lips pressed closed, and his hands clenched into fists. I saw it coming, but before he could raise a hand, I dropped the bomb. I told him about my deal with her. I told him she picked my money over him. His mouth didn’t open again, but his eyes kept burning. Even as I climbed into my car and drove away, I could feel his stare scorching through me.

  I don’t regret telling him any of it. I only regret I didn’t live long enough to see how it would all play out.

  The irony of my car accident was not lost on me. Though the Jag didn’t end up wrapped around a phone pole—and I didn’t die instantly like they did—it’s a biting twist of fate that Bradley, Marissa, and I all left this world because of a crumpled-up hunk of metal. I’m glad, though, that he wasn’t the one to suffer. His death was quick and straightforward; Marissa’s, too, they said.

  Mine, though…mine was far from straightforward.

  My death was agonizing and infinite. He let it go on far longer than he should’ve, mostly because I think he enjoyed watching me suffer. When they brought me out of sedation and I was conscious enough to see his face, I already knew what he was thinking. I saw the flatness of his expression, the lack of empathy when I cried out in agony. And I knew what it meant. He was reveling in my misery. Taking pleasure in my pain.

  He waited for three days—three days—just to see me squirm. When he finally saw fit to put that pillow over my face, my last breath was filled with far more than relief. If my death is not blamed on my own burned-out lungs, it might seem a justifiable murder; death to end suffering. But, it was far more than that. It was deceit and betrayal, the likes of which I’ve never seen. Even in all my years of politics.

  I once told him, a long time ago, that life is full of hard choices. I told him he could tackle those choices head-on, like a man, or he could second-guess his every decision and end up being nothing more than a powerless over-thinker.

  Tonight, he chose manhood. And, despite the sting of his betrayal, I’m proud of him for it.

  CHAPTER 37

  I touch the syringe of pentobarbital in the pocket of my scrubs. It’s slender and rigid; full of mercy by the milliliter. And, for the first time ever, it’s unnecessary.

  Winston Sinclair’s lifeless arm sits in my lap, dense and gauze-covered, save for the IV entry site. I look at it there, limply resting across my legs, and I wonder what happened. What did I not see?

  The last note of “Ecce Homo” slams through me then, and inside my head, Jarrod throws his arms out to his sides, crucifixion-style, as a haze of music and lights and smoke fills the air around him. He’s frozen there, his last words lingering in my ears. “I am no man. I am dynamite.” The room around him pulsates with a new energy. It buzzes with life.

  I carefully lift Mr. Sinclair’s arm to put it back on the bed, and when I brush a small patch of his exposed skin, a hot slurry of new notes rips into me. It’s “Soul to Squeeze,” and it’s way faster and louder than it should be. The bass line climbs up my body like a still-clawed kitten, digging into my skin with its pricks and jabs, and causing a shiver to shimmy its way up my spine. Inside my head, it’s dark now. Crackerjack Townhouse is gone.

  “Soul to Squeeze” is coming out of me, not them.

  I leave Winston Sinclair’s room—and Penn Presbyterian—with a mixture of fear and wonder and celebration fumbling around in the darkness of my brain, each looking for a reason to exist. I’ve never been wrong before, and I don’t quite know how to feel about it. Winston Sinclair was definitely dead. And I definitely had nothing to do with it. Questions dance through me. Hows and whys and whats power across my synapses as the Chili Peppers set fire to my skin.

  By the time the bus pulls up to the curb, “Soul to Squeeze” has ended, leaving me numb and stupefied.

  Somewhere inside, I know it’s the last time I’ll hear it.

  My apartment is quiet and calm, a perfect partner to my confusion. I leave my shoes at the door and head back to my bedroom. I take the vial and needle out of my pocket and put them carefully into the small, empty wooden box tucked in the back of my closet. I tug off my scrubs, tossing them into the wash basket with my socks, and drop a clean T-shirt over my head. I sink into bed, clicking off the light switch and wishing I could turn my brain off with the same kind of abruptness.

  In the dark stillness of my bedroom, the lights and colors return to my mind, kicking up thoughts as if they were dust. Behind my closed eyelids, I watch Winston Sinclair’s movie unfold from my memory yet again. It’s the same as it was before. Nothing has changed. There are no missed details, no moments of clarity. Nothing that tells me why the man was already gone.

  Mr. Sinclair’s movie hasn’t changed. Instead, someone has edited it. They’ve severed the film before the final frame could turn into real life. And they did it without even knowing what that final frame would be.

  A thought bites into me.

  Maybe they didn’t do it because they knew Winston Sinclair would die. Maybe they did it because they thought he might live.

  THE SOUND of my alarm rouses me from sleep well before my body is ready. I swat it off as I stretch and roll onto my side. My eyes flash open the moment I hear a soft scuffle against the floor.

  Adam is standing in the corner of my room. He’s wearing jeans and a plaid button-down. His arms are slack at his sides, and there’s a massive, convenience-store bouquet of daisies in his breast pocket. His bed-head is screaming at me.

  I sit up in bed, scrambling to collect my thoughts before he speaks.

  “My mother called me last night. She said my father’s dead.”

  I stare at him blankly, as if his words come as a surprise. “I…I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” he says. “I’m not.” He walks a few steps closer to me. “Actually, I’m relieved. I mean…my mother’s a wreck, but I think everything’s going to be all right.”

  An unwanted nervous jitter starts wiggling its way into me. It’s a different kind of jitter this ti
me. Darker. Filled with doubt and suspicion instead of hope.

  I brush my fingers through my hair and swing my legs over the side of the bed. I look up at him and see a strange sort of cautious optimism in his eyes.

  “What happened to him?” I ask, not sure I really want to know the truth.

  “They said his body just couldn’t handle the injuries. His organs shut down around eleven last night. Someone from the hospital called my mother to tell her.” That means Mrs. Sinclair knew her husband was dead even before I got to Penn Presbyterian; the hospital morgue just hadn't come to collect his body yet.

  I nod my head in understanding, even though I know that what Adam just said about the cause of his father's death can’t be true. I listen carefully for any regret or transparency in his voice. I hear nothing but his words.

  “I know it makes me a giant dickhead,” he continues, “but I’m kind of glad he’s gone.” He pauses for a second, inhaling a shallow breath. When he talks again, his voice seems to be choking on itself. “It was really tough to see him in so much pain. I can’t imagine what his life would’ve been like, if he would’ve lived. My mother’s, too. There would’ve been surgeries and skin grafts and years of therapy, and he probably wouldn’t have ever been the same again. I mean, who knows? Maybe he would’ve been a vegetable or something.” He shrugs and stares at the floor near my feet. “I didn’t like my father very much, but I didn’t want to see him go through all that. No one should have to go through all that.” He swallows hard. The transparency I was looking for suddenly comes screaming out at me via a small line of tears and a crack in his voice. “My mom…she’s ruined. She loved him so much. I don’t know why, but she did. She might not be the greatest mom, but she was the perfect wife for him. I don’t know what she’s gonna do now.” The emotion in his voice is striking and pure. It extinguishes the jitter of doubt and suspicion immediately, wiping away all the uncertainty.

  If Adam was the one who edited his father’s movie, I think his motive was sincere. Just as mine would’ve been.

  I stand up in front of him, and he lifts his gaze to meet mine. Love rushes through my veins again, igniting a new spark of hope.

  Adam’s head tilts to the side as if he’s carefully memorizing my face. He pulls the bouquet of daisies from his pocket and sets it down carefully on my nightstand. A moment later, he steps over to me, wrapping his arms around my shoulders and pulling me into him. The broken pieces of my heart collide, zippering themselves back together again. My cheek rests against his chest as my arms slide around his waist. I fold myself into him, and a new song begins—an unnamed love song—and it brings sweetness and forgiveness and peace. The notes glue the zippers closed until my heart is whole again, the tiny Cupid’s arrow now permanently fused into the healed muscle. I hear his heart, too, beneath his shirt and skin. It’s singing to me. Thumping out a song of its own.

  “I believe you,” he says, his breath skimming across the top of my head. “I always believed you.”

  “I’m sorry I made you doubt me.”

  “You didn’t make me doubt you. My father did.” His arms wrap around me tighter, and as they do, the rhythm of his heart picks up tempo. “I should’ve known there was more than what he was telling me. When you told me why you took his money, all I could think about was how much further he might be willing to go in order to keep us apart. I walked away because I didn’t want him to hurt you any more than he already had.”

  Yesterday morning’s conversation with Jarrod replays in my mind, offering me an extra dose of comfort and confirmation.

  “It’s okay, Adam. I understand.” And I do.

  “He told me other things that day, too, things that completely ripped me apart. And then when he told me you took his money…it was like one final knife to the heart. I just lost it.” He’s quiet for a minute, his hand circling my back over and over again. “I was totally blindsided.”

  I hug him harder, to let him know everything’s going to be all right.

  He tells me how he felt as his father told him the truth about Bradley. He tells me how angry he was to hear about this missing piece of his life and how powerless all of it made him feel.

  “It’s like he’s put this horrible burden on me,” Adam says, his tone a hearty dose of exhaustion and disdain. “And I think that’s what pissed me off the most. He told me this terrible thing, and then smugly reminded me why I could never tell my mother—the one person who deserves to know about Bradley the most. He made me a part of his sin, and I really want to hate him for it.” Adam’s arms unfold from my body, releasing me until I can no longer hear the song inside of him. His chin drops down, and he lets out a long, thoughtful sigh. “And now…now I have to carry around a little brother I never even met for the rest of my life.”

  I pause for a moment, thinking about Charlie and how sometimes siblings can be burdens. But, they’re ones worth carrying. Adam just doesn’t know it yet.

  “Your gram’s been carrying him around for seventeen years already.” He looks at me with surprise, his soul suddenly visible through his watery eyes. “I’m sure she’d love to tell you more about him, if you ask. It might help if you have each other to share the load.” I shrug and raise my brow before adding, “Maybe your father gave you a gift by telling you about your brother before his accident.”

  He slowly nods his head in understanding and wipes his cheeks with the back of his hand. “It’s just like I said in Wicked Mocha right after we met: you’re a bundle of quality, K’acy McGee. I knew it even then.”

  I rise on my toes and lift my hands to his face. My mouth presses against his and everything that matters comes back to me. His lips are warm and soft, and as his tongue dances against mine, I feel the lightness return. My hands cup his face as his grab on to my hips, drawing me closer to him. As our kiss deepens, his fingers work their way up under the hem of my T-shirt and dance across my skin. A new surge of endorphins push their way through my flesh, and I celebrate their sweet, familiar burn. I’m immediately drunk with the desire to hear Miriam Hansen repeat her words in person, to hear her voice tell me love will come. If she were to say the words again, this time I would hold them in my hands as a fragile, but very real, truth. I would cradle them like a precious dove, one that isn’t afraid of death because it knows about rebirth and forgiveness. It knows love never dies.

  I raise my arms so Adam can take off my shirt. His hands lightly skim over me before his thumbs tuck under the top rim of my panties and push them down. When they drop to the floor, he steps back and stands in front of me with his arms flaccid at his sides. His stare travels leisurely across my skin, stopping only to linger on my face. It feels right to be so exposed. Everything I am is right here in front of him, laid bare. The secret part doesn’t matter anymore. What I can see in peoples’ eyes, and what I choose to do with it, has everything to do with who I am. But, it has nothing to do with us. It’s irrelevant to who we are together.

  Adam reaches out and takes hold of me again, surrounding my nakedness with his arms, pressing his chest to mine and covering my mouth with another kiss. My hands work to unfasten his shirt and jeans as my nerves snap to attention. The contrast of his skin against mine fills me with want as we fall onto the bed behind me. Adam lies on his back, and I take my time and touch him with reverence and appreciation and understanding, stroking every square centimeter of him with every square centimeter of me. When my fingertips graze his lips, I see happiness in his eyes. I hope he sees the same in mine.

  I bend down and take him into the warmth of my mouth, using my lips and tongue to tease and pleasure him. When his breath starts to twitch and catch, I sit up and straddle his hips, absorbing his light into my dark before he can find release. My body bends and flexes in time with the sharp rise of his hips until we’re both breathless and slick with sweat. A moment after his hand reaches down to rub the place where my body meets his, the added friction sends me over the edge like a shot of thick lightning. My brain fills with light
and crashes over on itself until I can’t see anything but Adam’s face looking up at mine. His eyes close, and he lets out a deep, throaty grunt when he grabs my waist and lifts his hips sharply so he can sink himself into me deeper. All the way up to my heart.

  A few minutes later, snuggled up to Adam’s side with a morning full of sunlight filling my bedroom, I stare again at my dark fingers splayed against his pale chest. The alternating Vs of light and dark are just as breathtaking as ever, only now they’re different. They aren’t two separate parts anymore. There’s no more yin and yang. No more dark and light. No more opposite yet interdependent pieces. Instead, we’ve been stirred through each other until the dark and light have become the same thing. We’ve been blended together into one whole.

  “I have something for you,” he says, breaking the long silence with his raspy voice.

  “Oh yeah? What’s that?” I prop myself up on an elbow, so I can see his face.

  Adam turns away from me and reaches out toward my nightstand. He carefully picks up the bunch of daisies sitting there and splits the cluster of stems in half. He puts one half back on the table and hands the other half to me.

  “These are for you,” he says with a smile, lowering his head back onto the pillow.

  I smile back at him as I take the flowers from his hand, joy welling up inside of me and filling me with a brilliance I’ve never known before.

  I’m glowing from the inside out.

  “I love you,” Adam adds, his hand lightly touching one of my curls.

  Just like that, every note from every song I’ve ever heard rips through my veins and jets out of my body. They whirl around me, like a melodious tornado, enveloping me with their comfort and protection. Nothing can stop us again. No doubt. No lies. No giant dickhead.