by Nicole Thorn
The phone rang, and I waited for her to pick up. It took for rings for someone to answer.
“Hello?” a woman said, and I could feel something wrong in her voice.
My stomach dropped, and I had a flash in my mind of hanging up and throwing the phone at the wall so I wouldn’t have to have this conversation. But I didn’t do that. “May I speak with Mary please?”
It was dread that bled all through me, and I couldn’t escape it. It was so familiar to me now. I blinked, and I was back at The Dollhouse, and it felt like I was waiting for that man to walk through my door, and get into my bed. I was scared to wake up, knowing what he would do to me once I did. What he did to all of us. Seven years of violation, and endless torture. Dread was a part of me.
The woman paused for so long that I had time to compose myself as my stomach started turning over. “I’m sorry, miss, but Mary… she passed away last night.”
Passed away. I hated that fucking phrase. Passed away. Sugar coating something that you couldn’t run from, but people tried anyway. They say it like you’re transitioning. Moving on to a new experience. There was nothing, and there would always be nothing.
“Can I…?” I started, stuttering. “Can I ask what happened?”
Her pause was shorter this time, but every moment felt like a hundred. “She and her mother were on their way home. A drunk driver hit them in a parked car. Her mother is still in the hospital.”
The words played in my head over and over until they became meaningless. Mary was dead, and she wasn’t the one to do it. A car came out of nowhere, because some careless son-of-a-bitch decided to be cruel. Mary… she had everything in front of her…
“I’m…” I whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
“Thank you, miss,” the woman said, matching my tone exactly. “Would you like me to give Mrs. Holden a message?”
I shook my head purely from my reflexes. “Umm, no. I’ll check in on her later. Thank you, and I’m sorry for your loss.”
I ended the call, and my body went into autopilot while my mind stopped functioning. My phone went into my pocket, and I gathered my things up before I left the building, not telling anyone. I didn’t suspect they noticed.
Everything flashed by me like I was in a dream. One moment I sat at my desk, another I stood in the elevator and then in my car. I turned on the ignition, and the sound made me whimper. Cars were what hurt my people. Mary and Bennett. I didn’t want to be inside of this stupid machine, but I needed to go home. Why, I wasn’t sure. Something told me that I needed to be there.
My body took over, and I moved purely on instinct at that point, getting myself far away from the building, and the conversation I’d just had. I wanted it gone from my head, all memories of it burned to ashes. How could she be gone after everything she went through? It was like it didn’t mean anything that she overcame her feelings. I couldn’t see sense in anything anymore. It simply wasn’t there.
I pulled up in my empty driveway, noticing that my parents were long gone. That was good, because I couldn’t deal with them on top of the mess in my mind. If they knew what happened, it would give them one more reason to try and make me quit at the center. They thought it was bad for me, and this would push it over the edge.
My feet dragged up the driveway and to my front door. My key was in the lock before I noticed the large envelope taped to the door. My name was scrawled across it with handwriting so beautiful that my name had no right to be printed with it. I pulled it down and felt the weight of it.
I walked into my home, pet the dog, and walked up to my bedroom without opening the envelope meant for me. Once I sat in the middle of my bed, I bent the little clasp, and poured the contents out in front of me.
The first thing I saw was a letter that looked like it was made with a typewriter. Some of the letters were uneven or faded, adding to the charm.
Layla,
There are no words that exist to properly express how I feel about you and what you’ve done for me, but I wanted to try anyway.
The world has always been dark for me, and I’ve been content to stay that way, hiding in all that darkness. It is my place and where I belong. I cannot honestly say that I have any right to be in this world. I’ve never felt like it was meant for me. I was too small in a world far too big. I wanted the darkness to finally take me over.
Then I met you, and you collapsed on my living room floor and told me that I wasn’t alone. For the very first time, I believed that. I saw someone who could understand what it was like to be awake in the middle of the night and truly believe that there was no hope left in the world. I can see it every time I look into your eyes, and I can hear it every time you open your mouth. I don’t feel alone when I am with you, and you are the only soul that has brought mine peace. Thank you for that.
Thank you for introducing me to the sun and blinding me with light. It is the most beautiful pain I have ever known. Funny how your name means night, but you are so purely everything it means to be in the sunlight.
With all of me,
Bennett
A tear hit the corner of the paper, and I quickly moved it to avoid more damage. I put it aside where I could keep it safe. That piece of paper meant more to me than I could have told Bennett.
A smile touched my lips when I saw what other gifts he left me. Bound by rainbow colored yarn was a worn out “book.” It was about thirty pages long, and the cover was drawn in crayon. The story was entitled All Cheese, All The Time, and the cover had two girls and a cat drawn on it. One girl with pink hair, and the other, yellow.
I read through the story, laughing at the big block letters written in colored pencil. There were a lot of misspelled words, and I loved them all. They told a story about two girls trying to catch a “gutter kitty” and failing at every attempt. In the end, they managed to lure her with a trail of packets of American cheese. It was perhaps the most delightful thing I had ever read in all of my life.
Once I was finished, I took the letter and the story to put somewhere safe. I wanted to keep them forever, and they touched me in a way I wasn’t expecting. A little light in my darkness, if I could borrow Bennett’s phrasing. He saw something in me that I didn’t believe was there. Something bright and warm. I had no illusions on what I was. The beauty he thought he saw in me wasn’t real. I was just there when no one else was.
As I put the envelope away, I thought about Mary. She would never get a letter like that. She wouldn’t read a silly story about a cat that lived in the gutter or two strange girls that chased her. Mary lay in a morgue, never to wake up again. She was trying to live her life, and it was stolen right out from under her.
I was wrong before when I decided I had to be here. Whatever thing in me that told me to come home, it picked the wrong place. I didn’t need this house. I needed someone who would understand what this felt like.
I needed Bennett.
rushed from my house and back to my car. I didn’t hesitate, but that could be because my body took over again. I felt little control over anything I did, yet it all felt right. It was like my car drove itself and my feet moved on their own. My brain got a break I didn’t know it needed.
It made me so happy in such a dark moment, those things Bennett left me. I couldn’t know when he stuck them to my door, but he should know how much it all meant to me. That he trusted me with such openness and with that sweet little story he wrote. It made me feel special. And not just because I was some story on the news. I wasn’t a paperdoll to him. I was Layla and absolutely nothing more. It was beautiful.
Darkness followed me up his steps like it was a living thing that attached to me some time ago. It all rushed out of me the second my knuckles hit the door.
I jittered there, anxious as I waited for him to answer when I knocked. When he did open the door, I hugged him before he could say anything at all. He let me squeeze the life out of him until I could stand on my own. His hand rested on the small of my back when I looked up at him.
“Sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have jumped you.”
Bennett shrugged it off with a smile. “What’s a jumping among friends?”
I gave him a little space, and he shut the front door. I took it upon myself to walk through his house like I owned the place. He followed me to his bedroom and watched as I kicked my shoes off and crawled under his covers. I held onto his pillow once I was there.
“Umm,” he said, scrutinizing me. “Did I miss something?”
I let out a breath, and squeezed his pillow. “One of the people I helped died last night.”
His eyebrows shot up as his dark eyes filled with sympathy. “I’m so sorry, Layla.” Bennett sat beside me on his bed, and he went to take my hand before he thought better of it. “What happened?”
“Car accident,” I said with utter numbness. “She and her mom were sitting parked, and some asshole who had a few too many slammed into them. She was fifteen… fifteen, and she had all these plans.” I finally turned my head to look at him, and he looked heartbroken for me. “She wanted to travel around the world. Learn a new language. Have a son so she could name him after her father. And she’s gone. There is no fucking reason for her to be dead, and she’s still gone.”
I turned onto my side and attacked the poor boy again. I wrapped my arms around him and used his shoulder as a pillow, throwing my leg over him. He took it like a champ, letting me take advantage of him. He actually smelled kind of good when I buried my face against him. Fabric softener.
“Were you close?” Bennett asked, and I thought it was mostly to break up the tension.
“As close as I am with any of the people I’ve helped. Not including you, I guess.”
It was odd how I didn’t realize until then how much more of me I gave Bennett than the others. He lived close, and he seemed like he needed me. I wanted to say I gave everyone all of me, but I didn’t. Bennett got extra.
Bennett pulled me closer to his chest, my body pressing against his entire left side. His lips were in my hair, and my fingers brushed against the buttons on his shirt. It was utterly silent but not uncomfortable. The normal antsy feeling I would have around people wasn’t there right now.
“I got your letter.” I smiled and tilted my head up a little so I could see him. He tensed under me. “It was beautiful, and the story was adorable.”
His cheeks turned pink, and he cleared his throat. “The letter didn’t… make you uncomfortable?”
I had to sit up because a glare was totally needed here. I kept my hand on his chest, and my hair fell all over him. I pulled it out of his face because I was nice, but I still scolded him. “Why would you think I was uncomfortable? It was the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen. No one’s ever said anything like that to me.”
His hand fell from my hip, and we both ended up sitting on our knees. “I just…” His eyes were downcast, glued to the bed. “I don’t know. I felt like I may have made a fool of myself.”
I picked up his chin in both hands and smiled at him as warmly as I could. “You are not a fool, my love.” I gave him a peck on his lips, and he inhaled sharply through his nose. “Sorry!” I squeaked as I pulled back. “Too much?”
All he did was shake his head and watch me with eyes too wide. Okay, so maybe no more on-the-mouth kisses. Though his lips were delightfully soft, and he always tasted like sugar.
“I liked the old-fashioned letter,” I said, still smiling at him. “It looked really pretty.”
He smiled. “Thanks. My mom got me a new typewriter.”
“She did?”
He nodded to his desk, and I looked over. It sat next to his other one, but the new addition looked much newer. All the keys were perfect and bronze. The thing was beautiful.
“We got in a fight,” he said, and I looked back at him. He watched the wall, expressionless. “She felt bad.”
“Oh, that’s kind of sweet.”
I scooted back to my place beside him, and I put my legs back over his body. He didn’t seem to mind as he rested his hands on them. I very much liked them there, so it was a good thing he was so willing. I full on cuddled him after that. My head tilted back on his shoulder as my thighs stayed firmly on his lap.
“That girl,” he said. “She used to want to kill herself?”
“Yeah. She did. Her dad was everything to her, and he got really sick. He hung in there for a couple years, but she had to watch him lose himself more and more every day. Then he died, and she didn’t feel like she had anything to hold onto. She was an amazing girl. She was smart and mouthy and strong. She didn’t deserve to die at fifteen.”
Bennett’s lips pressed against my temple for a long few seconds, and they were gone too quickly. “No one does.”
I held onto him tighter, his side against my hand. “Her mom’s in the hospital now. I didn’t ask how bad off she was, but I was thinking of going to see her in a day or two. I don’t want to swarm her.”
I thought about asking my parents to check up on her next time they had a free moment during a shift, but I didn’t want to be too nosy with this. Dad ran himself ragged down there anyway, and Mom was always seeing a patient.
“That sounds very kind of you.”
It was literally the least I could do for the woman who lost her whole family. I couldn’t imagine how she must have felt right now. All alone in the world. Her body and heart broken. I didn’t know what it was like to lose a child, but my parents did. Like Riley, Adalyn, and Kylie, my parents assumed I was dead after I’d been taken. They didn’t tell me that, but Melissa did. Not in a cruel way, but it came out when we were talking one night. It was a perfectly reasonable thing to think. We were gone for so long. I was nothing more than a ghost.
“It feels like it means nothing,” I admitted. “Like it doesn’t matter what I say, or how hard I work. Life can come in and smash everything to pieces. That drunk driver didn’t care that she had a long life ahead of her or that she wanted to make a family and travel. It thought about himself, and now Mary is dead.”
Bennett rubbed my arm and spoke softly, making my body feel at ease. “I know that nothing can make this right, but I want you to know that if you meant half as much to her as you do to me, then she died knowing that someone really amazing cared about her. That’s probably not worth all that much, but it’s true.”
I turned my head up to him again. “It means a lot. Thank you, sweetheart.”
He smiled slowly, and he brushed the hair out of my face. “Any time, Layla.”
I had to leave Bennett after a few hours, but we had a nice little talk about his story and what he wanted to do with it. He sat on the floor, and I lay on my stomach on his bed, looking over his shoulder as he took notes. His eyes got so bright when he started talking about his work.
I really wanted to get him teamed up with Adalyn. He was a nice, nonthreatening boy that she would be able to talk to, and she could draw for him. He needed covers for his stories and panels for the comic he wanted to make. It was a perfect match, if only I could get her to open her mouth once in a while. So reluctant to try and move on.
My house was empty. I could feel it in that way that lets you know that nothing alive is around. Not even the dog today. He must be at the vet appointment Mom was supposed to take him to. I was utterly alone in the house, and it made me want to run out the door and right back to Bennett.
I had gone to him and not my sisters. I thought about that on the drive home. They didn’t cross my mind until then, and even now, I knew I made the right call. Not only did I not want to weigh them down, but I felt like Bennett was the one to go to. He knew what I felt, and he knew what to say.
As I thought about my sisters, it stirred an old guilt in me. One that I had for lying to Adalyn and Riley about how I met Bennett. It was a white lie, but it still didn’t sit well with me. It was so new to me to not lay myself bare. To have something separate from them and with no plans to change that. I was scared that it would cause us to break apart.
Then the
flipside of it being Bennett. He didn’t seem to have a damn clue who I was or where I came from. We were big news when we got home, but I supposed it wasn’t too odd that someone his age wouldn’t be watching. It was a small relief to be able to talk to him, and he didn’t know all the ugly things that had been done to me. He didn’t know about all of my other scars. It still felt like some kind of lie, not telling him about my past. It was done and over, but it was who I used to be. Would he even want to know about that? It was so much to deal with, and he was so sad with his own life. I didn’t want him to have to worry about me. He, like everyone else, didn’t understand that I was perfectly fine.
Best keep him in the dark, I decided as I walked up my stairs. It was a bad idea to dump all this on him. He was good to talk to, but I would leave it at that. He could be my friend and not know every shadow in my soul.
I was in my bedroom, pulling my shoes off as I stared out my window. I walked to it, seeing the snow begin to fall again. It wasn’t supposed to stick this time. Too warm, and it wasn’t going to get colder for another couple of days. Mary had liked the snow. She said that she and her father used to make little snow families together every year. I’d seen the pictures that her mother took. It was her favorite tradition. One that Mary wanted to pass on to her children and grandchildren.
I started to scream, and I didn’t stop. Not when my ears rang and not when I felt my throat shred. My hands pulled into tight fists, and I let out every bit of air I had in my lungs. I felt nothing and everything as the pain sank into my eyes, and ears, and throat.
The mirror on my wall was my victim when I took it in both hands and ripped it out by the nail. I held it high in the air and brought it down on the corner of my dresser. Glass shattered, but the frame stayed strong. That wouldn’t do. I brought it down again, and more glass fell to my floor in shards. They hit my bare feet, slicing through my skin. I didn’t care. Blood was nothing.
