by W Winters
“Did you read the book?” she asks in the quiet air. Nothing else can be heard but the owls from outside the windows and far off in the forest. They’re relentless as the sky turns dark and the end of winter makes its exit known.
“I did,” I answer her and before I can tell her what I thought, she speaks.
“I hated the ending. I’m sorry, I ripped it out.” I almost tell her I know. I almost say the words as she does. “I wanted them to have a happily ever after.”
My blood turns to ice as the memory of her sobbing on the floor while she ripped out the pages comes back to me. It was only a dream, I remind myself. Only a dream. It didn’t really happen. But yet, the question, the question asking her if she did that is right there, waiting to be spoken.
A different one creeps out in its place. There was a line I could never forget. “Why did you cross out ‘I hate you for giving me hope?’”
“It wasn’t me,” she answers me and the chill seeps deeper into my bones. “It was Mom. Mom left it for you. I don’t know why she pulled off the cover, but I hated the ending, so I ripped out the pages.”
Goosebumps don’t appear then vanish, instead they come and stay as I remember the dream. My sister and Mom did always look so alike.
“When she died there was that stack of books. This one had a post-it on it instead of a cover. She left it for you, but I took it.”
“Why?” I don’t know how I can speak when as we sit here, all I can see is the woman in my terrors.
“She said, ‘Only you would understand, Bethany.’ It pissed me off,” my sister admits. “I took it and wanted to read it. I had to know why… why it was always you.”
The eerie feeling that’s been coming and going comes over me again, clawing for attention and I can barely stand not to react to it.
Bringing my knees into my chest, I try to avoid it, to shake it off. “What was the ending?” I ask her although I already know. It was some kind of tragedy.
“She died,” Jenny says and her voice is choked. “That night, their first and only night, she died because she was really sick and there was no way to save her.” My sister’s shoulders heave as she sobs.
“It’s okay.” I try to reassure her that it’s only a book, but both of us know it’s so much more. It’s the last words our mother left us.
“Her mother killed herself. The last ten pages is the mother facing Miss Caroline and telling her she hated her for giving her any hope and making her wait longer to end it all.”
“That’s awful,” I comment.
Jenny sucks in a deep steadying breath and says, “The book is awful. It’s all about how the ones you love aren’t supposed to die before you.”
Chills play down my shoulders, like a gentle touch. “What?”
I hear my mother’s voice. Everyone you love will die before you.
“That was the point, that the greatest tragedy is watching everyone you love die before you do,” my sister tells me with disgust. “I hate the book. I hate that Mom left it. I hate even more that she said you’d understand. You don’t, do you?” Her eyes beg me to agree with her and I do.
“I hate it too. Mom wasn’t well.” I use the excuse, but her words keep coming back to me. She thought my life was a tragedy. She hadn’t met Jase though. She couldn’t have known my life would take this turn. “She’s wrong,” I say more to myself than to Jenny, but she nods in agreement.
“Even if they die,” she whispers before staring out of the window, “you still got to love them.”
“Do you ever feel like she’s with us?” I ask my sister, feeling the eyes of someone watching us, but not daring to look to my left, toward the bathroom. No one’s there, I already know that. But still, something inside of me doesn’t want me to look.
“All the time. I can’t sleep because of it.”
The cold evaporates, the uneasiness settles. It’s only me and Jenny and I’ll be strong for her.
“We’ll get you on a good sleep schedule. I promise everything will be all right.” I would give her all the promises in the world right now to keep her safe. Safe from Marcus and the world beyond these doors. Safe from herself and the memories that haunt her.
“I think I know why,” Jenny says offhandedly as if she didn’t hear me, still staring out of the window.
“Why what?”
“Why she crossed it out…” She doesn’t give me the answer until she realizes I’m staring at her, desperate for a reason. “It didn’t belong there. Hope is the best thing you can give someone, second to love. If it wasn’t there… the mom wouldn’t have killed herself.”
It’s quiet for a long time. The memories of my sister hurting herself stare me in the face, daring me to mention them and beg Jenny to realize there’s so much hope.
I cower at the thoughts, mostly because she squeezes my hand, and I’d like to think it’s because she already knows.
“If I had known it was a tragedy, I wouldn’t have read it,” I admit to her and then question why my mother would think I’d understand this book better than my sister. Why she would leave that book just for me? She wasn’t well though so there’s no reasoning there.
“That’s what you have when there’s no hope… tragedy.” Jenny’s comment doesn’t go unheard and I let the statement sit before speaking out loud.
Not really to her, more to myself.
“Hope is the opposite of tragedy. It’s a glimmer of light in utter darkness. It isn’t a long way of saying goodbye. It’s knowing you never have to say it, because whoever’s gone, is still with you. Always. That’s what hope is.”
“They really are. They’re always with us,” she remarks.
“That’s what makes it hard to say goodbye.”
“You don’t have to say goodbye,” she says softly, as if she’s considered this a million times over.
“Then how can you ever get over it?” I ask her genuinely, thoughts of her disappearance, of Mom being laid to rest playing in my mind. “How do you get over the loneliness and the way you miss them all the time?”
“Get over it?” she asks with near shock – as if she’s never thought of it that way - and I nod without conscious reason.
“How?”
“You can never get over it. Whether you say goodbye or not. Loss isn’t something you get over.” My sister isn’t indignant, or hurt. She’s simply matter of fact and the truth of it, I’ve never dared to consider. She looks me dead in the eyes and asks with nothing but compassion, “So why say goodbye? Why do it, when they’re still here and you’ll never get over it? Never.”
Jase
“I just need to know…” Bethany’s voice is desperate, a sound I’m not used to hearing from her unless she’s under me. She hasn’t laid down since I told her it’s time to go to bed. I don’t know how long it’s been since she’s slept. Instead, she sits wrapped in the covers, staring at the door.
“She’s all right.” My words intertwine with the sound of the comforter rustling as I lean closer to her and wrap my arm around her waist. I pull her closer to me, making her lean slightly so I can kiss her hair, but I don’t move her. She’ll move when she’s ready. I can wait for that.
I’ll wait for her.
“Tell me you’ll protect her.” She swallows hard after blurting out the words. Her eyes are wide and glossy. “Please. I’ll do anything.” As she speaks her last word cracks and the only thing I can hear is her thumping heart, running like mad in her chest.
“Of course I will. She’s family now.”
“Family?” she questions me as if it’s a foreign word.
“Bricks, cailín tine. I was serious when I said it, and serious about marrying you… even if you aren’t ready.”
“You really are bringing bricks and not just to fence me in, huh?” I have to laugh at her playful response. More than that, I love that she smiles. Even if it’s gentle and small, it’s there.
It falls quickly, though, as her gaze moves behind me to the door.
&
nbsp; With one arm resting over her midsection and her other hand cradling her elbow, Jenny looks lost and uncertain as she clears her throat.
“Are you okay?” Bethany’s quick to question and rise from the bed.
“Sorry,” she answers and almost turns to leave, but Bethany stops her. “Wait. What’s wrong?”
I stay where I am. Observing and waiting. Waiting for Bethany to tell me what’s needed. Whatever it is, I’ll be ready.
“I didn’t mean to intrude.”
“You weren’t,” Bethany assures her. I have forever with Bethany, so forever can wait a moment.
“Can… can we talk?” Jenny asks Bethany, although she looks hesitantly at me.
“Of course.” If Bethany is aware of Jenny’s objection toward me listening, she doesn’t show it. Instead she drags the bench at the end of the bed closer to the chair by the dresser and pats it, welcoming her to sit.
“If you want me to go,” I speak up, “I can grab you something to eat while you two talk?”
Jenny’s gaze flicks between the two of us before she shakes her head. “You’ve already given me dinner, and a place to sleep… and clothes.” She goes on and the baggy long-sleeve shirt pools around her thin wrist. “I don’t need anything else.”
As I stand to go the bathroom and busy myself so they have some semblance of privacy, Jenny adds, “Thank you.” A tight smile and a nod is given to Jenny, but Bethany reaches for my hand and squeezes it before I can walk away.
I nearly think she wants me to stay, but she releases me with a thank you.
My hand is still warm from her touch when I turn on the faucet. Even over the sound of the water splashing in the sink, I can hear Jenny asks her questions about me.
Does she trust me?
What is she doing with me?
And finally, does she love me?
All of which are answered with many words, but the first of them each time is yes.
“You led him to me,” Bethany informs her sister and I remember the first time I saw her. Across the bar, my fiery girl, picking a fight with whoever she could because she was hurting and needed help. Fighting is all either of us knew.
I scrub my face, feeling the roughness along my jaw and listen intently even though I hadn’t planned on eavesdropping.
“The only clues you gave me before you left were The Red Room and the Cross brothers. So I went there, searching for you.”
Opening the cabinet to get my razor and shaving cream, I grab the bottle of pills and stare at them until they fall from my hand into the bottom of the trashcan beneath the sink. The inhale I take is deep and cathartic, but it doesn’t stop the twisted hurt that will always come when I think about that time in my life. I don’t need the constant reminder though.
Gripping my razor, I use the back of my hand to close the cabinet door. Jenny’s reflection is clear in the mirror. A disturbed look plays on her face when she tells Bethany, “Marcus told me to. He said to make sure you heard me say it.”
Staring down at the rippling water, I listen to her explain that she’s sorry. She’s sorry for everything.
I don’t shave. I don’t move, other than bracing one hand on each side of the sink and staring down, wondering what Marcus planned, how he thought ahead and what he thought would happen.
It’s not until Jenny says good night and I feel Bethany’s hand on my back that I bring myself to look at Bethany in the mirror.
“You okay?” she whispers against my back and I almost tell her that I’m fine. Instead I answer, “I hate hearing his name.”
“Marcus?” she asks and I nod.
“Seth will find him,” she answers me and plants a small kiss on my back through my white t-shirt when I turn off the faucet.
She watches me as I dry my face and thanks me for giving her sister space.
The smile on my lips falters until she reaches out, grabbing my hand and kissing it.
“Isn’t that what a man is supposed to do?” I toy with her. “Kneel and kiss the back of a lady’s hand.”
A glimmer of surprise filters in her eyes as she says, “I thought it’s what ladies did to the knights? I thought they kissed the back of their hands when they saved them.”
Even though I’m still, she moves, pushing herself between me and the sink and reaching up to kiss me. It’s always the same with her. The first is quick and teasing and then she gives me what I need, deep and slow. As I groan into her mouth, she lets out a soft sigh of affection and balls my shirt in her fist, bringing me closer to her.
“So needy,” I tell her, my voice low and playful before tugging her bottom lip between my teeth and then letting her go.
I move my hands from her hips to her ass and pick her up, loving the gasp and then the squeal she gives me when I toss her on our bed.
The air heats as I kick off my pants and watch her right herself on the bed, her gaze wandering down my body until I climb on the bed to join her.
With both of her hands in my hair and mine bracing me on the bed as I lean over her, forcing her to lie down, she kisses me with soft, quick kisses all over my lips. I smile as she does it, short pecks moving in a clockwise motion.
I lift my head to look down at her, to joke about what she’s done. I stop myself though; there’s nothing but seriousness in her gaze.
“Thank you for saving me, Jase.”
“You saved me too, you know,” I tell her as I pull my shirt off, knowing damn well she has.
She stares at me for an awkward moment and then looks down with a huff. “I don’t know what to say.”
Confusion takes over. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t know what would mean more right now. That I love you. Or that I don’t love you.”
The short huff of a laugh leaves me with relief. Thank fuck.
“Let’s stick with I love you from now on.”
“Then I love you, Jase Cross. I love you with everything in me.”
Bethany
Good things don’t come often. Not for me. Not for most people. I’m aware of that. I get it. Life isn’t meant to be a garden of roses.
I’m used to the thorns. I would even say I like them. They’re predictable, when nothing else is.
The sound of the printer in Jase’s office that isn’t an office makes me jump. It’s louder than I anticipated, and I anxiously look to the doorway.
He should be here soon.
Jenny’s tucked away in her room. Some days are better than others, but overall she’s better. She’s better than she has been in a very long time. If only she could remember what happened over the past few months, I think she’d be like my old sister again. Or at least who that girl was supposed to be.
Before the paper can fall to the tray, I catch it and lift it up to look at the certificate. It’s so simple and not as expensive as I thought it would be.
It’s merely a sheet of paper with ink on it. But then again so are books, and they can be wielded like weapons. They can destroy people; they can give them hope too.
“There you are.” Jase’s deep voice greets me with a sensual need. I can already feel his warmth before he wraps his arms around my waist and pulls me into his chest. The paper clings to my front as I keep it from his prying eyes.
“What are you hiding from me?” he questions.
“No hiding anything anymore. Isn’t that the deal?” I remind him, peeking around to not just see him, but to steal a quick kiss as well. I love it when he smirks at me.
With a lift of his chin he tells me, “Then show it.”
I do so willingly, listening to the paper crinkle and watching his dark eyes as he reads each line.
“Marriage certificate?” It’s a sin that he looks so handsome, even when he’s confused.
“It’s a certificate to get a marriage certificate. Like a gift card. I didn’t know you could get one of these. You have to be there for it to actually be done and all,” I explain to him. I thought this would be the best way to tell him that I want to
marry him.
As he steps back, snagging the paper from me and then looking between it and me, nerves flow through every part of me.
“My answer is yes.” In my mind, when I decided I’d do this, I said it confidently, playfully even, but the way the words came out now was hurried and with an anxiousness to hear his response.
Which he still hasn’t given me.
“At least I answered you quickly,” I tell him and pretend like my hands aren’t trembling.
“You want to do this?” he asks me, his shoulders squared as he lowers the paper to the leather sofa and closes the space between us.
Reaching up to adjust the collar of his pressed white shirt, I tell him easily, as if he’s said yes, “I don’t want a big wedding.”
“Are you proposing to me?” he finally says with a grin and the playfulness and the charm are obvious. This is the man I love.
Nodding, I fight back the prick at the back of my eyes and tell him, “I am. Are you saying yes?”
“I already asked you, though. You don’t get to ask me now.” He walks circles around me, making me spin slowly.
“You aren’t exactly good at it, so I figured I should give it a shot.” I’m just as playful with him as he is me, nipping his bottom lip and then kissing him. He deepens it, stopping where he is and splaying his hands against my lower back and shoulder.
When he breaks the kiss, he stares down at me. “Why?” he asks me, toying with me and my emotions instead of just ending it quickly.
“You have no mercy,” I joke with him. “Are you not saying yes?” I can’t even voice the word no right now.
He only stares down at me, waiting for a response with a smug look on his face.
“When I’m sad, I want you to be there because then I feel less sad. When I’m happy, I want you there because I want you happy with me. I just want you there… and I want to be there for you. If you’ll let me.” Tears form but I blink them away.
