by S. L. Naeole
“Seriously, what happened, Grace?” Stacy asked once more.
“I don’t know. I think I was in a car accident…” My breathing had become so labored the end of my sentence became lost in a wheeze.
“Where?”
I looked down towards my feet and with steady, measured breaths replied, “In that direction. I think the car was pushed off the ledge. Mrs. Deovolente…she’s still inside.” My voice had lost its ability to emote, the sound of it just a rasp of airy words. But when I paused, I knew Stacy saw the pain that I felt at knowing that another person had lost their life because of me.
“I’ll go and check. You stay right here.”
“Okay,” I told her, not pointing out that I couldn’t yet move.
She returned shortly, bending down to confirm that Mrs. Deovolente was, indeed, dead. “She looks like she didn’t suffer though. Her neck is broken pretty cleanly, but there’s a pretty bad injury to her chest. How did you manage to get out alive?”
I looked at her and told her with absolutely no humor, “I was wearing my seatbelt.”
“Well, plus one for following the traffic laws, Grace, but what were you doing out alone? And with Mrs. Deovolente on top of that?”
“I wasn’t alone. Someone was supposed to be watching me,” I pointed out.
“Well, whoever it was should be fired, Grace. You could’ve been killed. Where the hell is Robert? Why hasn’t he arrived yet to take you home?”
“He’s…we’re…” I couldn’t finish the words, but it wasn’t because I was too ashamed to admit them. It was because my lungs had finally started to cave in on themselves, and I started sucking on my throat in a desperate bid for air.
I struggled to move my arms, to reach for Stacy, for anyone, but I couldn’t move. My body felt like dead weight, and my head began to fill with large spangles of disorganized colors and frantic dots that danced in front of my eyes, hypnotizing me as the lack of oxygen began to cloud my thoughts.
Was this how it ended? Did I simply die of suffocation, with Stacy by my side, her mouth screaming out in a panic? I couldn’t hear her, as the buzzing in my ears grew too loud to separate from everything else. It couldn’t end this way—I wasn’t ready.
“Grace, you hold on—you hold on,” I could hear Stacy say to me, though her voice grew further and further away.
I wasn’t ready.
UNMADE
“She could have been killed. This is your fault.”
“I know.”
“You promised to keep her safe. You promised to keep her from being hurt. Where were you? Why weren’t you with her?”
“You know I cannot tell you that.”
“How convenient. My daughter lies dying and all you care about are your secrets.”
“Dad…” My lips felt cracked, my mouth dry and dusty. The voices would have been enough to wake me up, but I could feel the tension that extended between the two voices that flanked me, and I wondered at that.
“Grace? Grace, are you awake?”
Dad’s voice sounded frantic. God, my guilt was starting to pile up.
“Love, are you alright?”
Great, add another brick to that pile.
“Of course she’s not alright! Look at her!”
I allowed my eyes to flicker open, and the faces that greeted me, one lined with guilt and concern, the other lined with concern and anger, were like salves to the pounding in my head that I only now realized existed.
“Stop…fighting…” My throat burned with the effort to speak, and I winced as I tried to swallow down the rest of the sentence before I couldn’t talk at all.
“I’m sorry,” Robert whispered in my ear, warm lips pressing against my forehead and causing my skin to burn. “You rest. I will not say another word.”
“Grace,” Dad cut in. “Do need anything? Do you want me to call the doctor?”
“Water,” I managed to croak before a straw was placed against my lips and the cool beads of water reached my parched mouth. I drank greedily until the gurgle of liquid could be heard sloshing inside of me.
Sighing, my gaze shifted from left to right and I saw the familiar hospital setting of chained curtains and an IV pole standing next to me. The beeping of a machine beside me, and the cold, sticky feeling of something on my chest confirmed that I was, indeed, in a hospital room, confined by my own pain and by wires and tubes that shackled me down. “Why am I here?”
“You were in an accident, Grace,” Dad told me with as grave a tone as he could manage. “Janice’s car was struck from behind, and you-”
“I know about the accident. Why am I here, in the hospital?”
Dad’s eyes lifted to glare at Robert—a visual slaughter if ever I’ve seen one—and then lowered once more, his voice thick and filled with pain as he explained.
“Because you were dying. No one could heal you—no one was around to heal you. There was no other alternative. The doctors believe your injuries are worse than they are because of the strange… bruising on your body.”
I listened to him explain, his words getting lost in my thoughts as I looked at Robert and saw the guilt plastered on his face, his eyes growing dark with it, the downturn of his mouth as each hidden accusation was lobbed by Dad’s explanation.
“You weren’t there,” I whispered. “You didn’t come.”
“No,” he confirmed.
“Then who brought me here?” I knew it couldn’t have been Stacy—she was supposed to be dead.
“Llehmai and Lark…after they were informed of your accident.”
“What about Melanie? What about Mrs. Deovolente?”
“She didn’t make it.”
I closed my eyes and moaned in distress at this news; not because this news upset me. I was already upset, and I already knew that she was gone. No, I was disturbed because the list of dead bodies that were caused because of me was growing ever longer.
“Grace, don’t blame yourself for her death,” Robert said to me, my thoughts obviously free for him to fish through. “This isn’t your fault. None of this is your fault.”
“She wouldn’t have been in the car if I hadn’t agreed to go to dinner with her. If I hadn’t opened up to her, she wouldn’t have felt a need to finish the conversation somewhere else. We wouldn’t have been on that road; we would have been eating awful Greek food in a dinky restaurant. She wouldn’t be dead if she had been with anyone else.”
I tried to sit up but the pain that ricocheted through my body forced a cry from me and I fell against the pillows, instantly exhausted. “I-I ca-can’t stay like this,” I panted. “I can’t stay here.”
“Of course,” Robert breathed before placing his hand on my chest, warmth immediately surging into me, centering on my solar plexus and radiating outward. “Stay still.”
I tried to, but feeling his touch after so long was like that first taste of water after a year in the dessert. I rose to press myself into his hand, the feeling of my body mending because of his touch alone acting like a cast to my broken heart. A heart that, when looking into his eyes and seeing the overwrought concern and love in them, I realized finally I had shattered on my own.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, before breaking into a sob.
“For what?” he said, lowering his head to mine, his cool forehead resting against my temple.
“For doubting you. For not believing in you.”
I felt his head move, shaking in refusal of what I was saying. “You had every reason to doubt me. You felt abandoned, and I did nothing to dissuade you from that. I should have been with you; I should have never left your side. Your father is right—this is my fault.”
“It isn’t. You weren’t there; you couldn’t have done anything to prevent this-”
“But I should have been. I should have been there with you.”
“No one was there—no one was watching you,” Dad spoke up, his ire undeniable. “They all abandoned you, and look at what has come of it.”
“No
. Llehmai was supposed to be looking after you. He should have seen the danger coming—he would have seen it and prevented it had he been there,” Robert remarked, his head lifting above mine to look at my father. “But ultimately, it is my fault.”
“Lem was probably still angry,” I said softly, knowing what was coming.
“Angry? He is the peacemaker amongst us and is incapable of becoming angry—his patience knows no limits.” Robert’s eyes delved into mine, and I couldn’t keep the truth from him. I wouldn’t.
“I think he found it yesterday—I think I helped. Robert-” I took a deep breath and just let the words fall out “-he kissed me, on the way home from class.” I didn’t wait for a response; my confession was not yet complete. “And then he kissed me again when we got to the house. It…it wasn’t a friendly kiss.”
Robert’s gaze moved to my dad’s, his face stony and unmoving. There were no words spoken between the two men, and yet Dad still left the room, obviously uncomfortable with what he knew was about to take place between the two of us.
When the door to the room closed, Robert bent his head down and looked at me, the steel of his eyes cold and hard. He was hurt, and I hated myself for being the cause.
“Did you want him to kiss you, Grace?” he asked in a low voice.
I didn’t lie to him. I wouldn’t lie to him—I couldn’t. “Not at first, but when he kissed me the second time, I did.”
“Why?” It was one word that held a million questions within it, but none of the answers were welcome.
“Because…because I needed it. Because I needed to feel wanted. Because I needed to feel desired. Because I needed to feel something other than being alone. I wanted to feel my heart race in my chest. I wanted to forget what it felt like to hurt so much and, God help me, I wanted to hurt you. I wanted you to know what it felt like to hurt, to bleed inside and never know when it was going to end.”
The warmth that flowed through Robert’s hands had reached the tips of my fingers, and my hands came up instinctively to cover my face, ashamed at what I had done. I couldn’t look at him anymore. I couldn’t look at his face and see the pain there, see the hurt that I had caused him, even though I had admitted that that was what I wanted. Because it wasn’t. I didn’t want to hurt him—I loved him. I love him. I was nothing without my love for him, and if I was willing to put that aside for a moment of sadistic and spiteful pleasure then my love was worthless, and that meant that I was as well.
Strong yet gentle hands pulled mine away, revealing the layers upon layers of guilt that I could no longer hide. I felt the hiccup of grief as I saw the betrayed and heartbroken look on Robert’s face, and fully prepared to give up everything, to accept losing him for my faithlessness, I took a deep breath and waited for his rejection.
His mouth turned down, his eyes turning glossy with the damage that I had caused. I had done this to him. I had destroyed the heart of an angel who had loved me and wanted me despite my shortcomings.
“Grace, just shut up,” he said before he brought his mouth down hard onto mine, the act so powerful, so filled with meaning that I knew if he were to let me go, I’d still feel it. I’d feel it until I died.
My arms looped around his neck, intent on holding him to me for as long as possible. He in turn scooped me into his, lifting me from the bed as far as the wires would go, crushing me against him, my heart beating so hard and so fast that I was certain it would burst through my chest and dive into his. It was a scattered beat, though, my physical reaction to his touch sending one message while my brain still frightful and wary of his rejection sending another. What if this was not forgiveness? What if this was a farewell?
I could feel him begin to pull away, and I shook my head, pressing my lips even harder against his, not caring if it hurt, not caring if someone walked in on us. I was not going to let him go, not again.
“Grace,” he mumbled against my mouth. “I don’t want to go—I won’t. I just need to look at your injuries. Please.”
Reluctantly, I forced myself to release him. He eased me back onto the bed and then pulled the sheets down, revealing my legs that were still horribly bruised, blackened almost to the point of looking dead. But even now, I could see that my skin was changing, lightening, pinking up. Glass lay on the bed on either side of my legs, the shards being pushed out as my flesh mended, torn and sliced tissue coming together as if they had been planning to all along and had simply been waiting for an audience.
Robert grabbed my hands, and I looked down at them for the first time, seeing in the light the crosshatched scarring that lay as evidence to my holding them up against my face. Remembering how difficult it had been to breathe, I pulled down the front end of my hospital gown to see stitches there, their ends pushing up through my skin as the wound that had been sutured healed. Eventually the tiny fragments of black fell inside of the gown, and I rubbed the spot where they had sat, wondering what had caused the need for them in the first place.
“I can search your memories for you,” Robert offered. “May I?”
I nodded, and immediately felt him probing my thoughts, his sifting and searching of the events that took place yesterday bringing things to my eyes that I had not realized I had seen, pushing feelings towards my heart that I had not realized I’d felt.
I could hear the sounds of metal scraping against metal, and glass raining down on me like glittery hail. I could see the frightened eyes of Mel staring at me just moments before she had launched herself at me, my body twisting in the car seat as hers came forward.
There was a burning sharpness in my chest, and then the tumbling and falling had followed, leaving me with nothing but the darkness and smell of blood and smoke and chafed metal. As his thoughts traveled further back, I felt a small sense of panic, and then I felt him stop—and I knew he had arrived at the memory of my kiss with Lem, burned as he had explained, into my mind forever.
My kisses with Lem. And how it felt, how I felt. They were all there, all of them a virtual display case of my crime. There was a chill that seeped into my mind, icy fingers of pain and disappointment that I knew he felt, but he did not linger long over these images of my betrayal.
He didn’t have to. Being told about them was one thing—one could easily ignore a spoken confession. But this—this was like being there, like being in my mind as it happened, as I wanted it to happen, and there was no ignoring that. I regretted in that moment allowing him inside, regretted giving him carte blanche to see for himself what had happened because now I felt his pain and it was tearing me into pieces even as he pushed forward, returning to the moment just before the accident, learning all that I had been told, the impossibility of Mel’s story, the suggestion of how we could be together, and my confession to her.
During all of this I held my breath, hovering dangerously on the brink of passing out. Only when I felt his presence inside of my mind ease away did I take that first gasp of air, my nerves needy as I inhaled in short, rapid bursts, waiting for a word, any word from him.
“Your teacher saved your life,” he finally said as he looked away from me, unwilling to allow me to see his face this time. “She protected you from something that was coming at you. It didn’t come from behind—it came from the driver’s side—your side—and she saw it approaching. She threw herself on you to keep you safe.”
“Robert-”
“What she told you might not be the truth…or it might be. I cannot say for certain because I do not know. I only know that I have neglected my responsibilities to you and the consequences now lay before me as memories that I have burned into my own mind.”
I leaned forward and placed my hand on his the hard edge of his back, fearing that he’d pull away—terrified of it.
But he didn’t. Instead he leaned into my touch, relaxing against it, and this encouraged me to place my other hand against him, reaching forward to touch the silk of his hair as it faded into the corded muscle that remained tensed in his neck. I squeezed gently, and inched
myself closer to him.
“Robert, I-I’m sorry for hurting you.”
He spun around, my hands flying away to keep from getting lost in the motion, and when he faced me, there was such a ferocity in his eyes that I backed away. “I hurt myself!” he said with a shudder.
“You did nothing that I did not bring about. You were alone—I left you that way—and you needed the comfort of someone. I should have been that person but I wasn’t. I wasn’t there to give you what you needed, not affection, not love, not protection, and when it was offered to you by someone else and you accepted it you did so because I allowed it to happen.”
“That’s not true! I’m your wife—I should have remembered that!”
“You’re my wife, but what kind of husband have I been to you?” he said angrily. “I married you and then abandoned you, and now I have to deal with the consequences of you wanting to be with someone else.”
“But I don’t!” I shouted. “I don’t want to be with anyone else! I’ve only ever wanted to be with you!”
I tried to crawl towards him, but found myself limited by the wires and tube once more. Furious, I grabbed at them, tearing the pads from my chest, and pulling the tube from my arm, not caring as the blood spurted out. I threw myself at him, wrapping my arms around him, climbing into his lap and sobbing with relief when I felt his arms enfold me, his embrace growing tighter and tighter until there was no beginning or ending, just us.
I kissed his face, tracing his jaw with as many tiny pecks as I could, burning the shape of his mouth to memory, feeling the curved edge of his nose as it rubbed against mine. He in turn pressed warm kisses to my eyelids, tickling my lashes with every exhalation, every word he spoke of love, every plea of forgiveness that echoed my own.
His hands cradled my face, and I did the same to his, holding him and needing to feel his smile, see it, see that it was still meant for me, see that it was still mine to have. And when he smiled, when the corners of his mouth turned up and his lips separated to reveal the glistening white behind them, I was giddy knowing that nothing else could make my heart feel more complete.
