by Jack Parker
Finally, the doctor walked into the waiting room with sweat on his brow and smiled. I shook Barb awake and bounced on the balls of my feet with excitement all the way to Mom's room. She grinned goofily at me when I walked through the door. Barb lifted me onto the bed at Mom's feet and cautioned me to be gentle as I crawled to her side and nuzzled into her shoulder. My little sister was stretched across her bosom, asleep.
"What's her name, Mommy?" I couldn't take my eyes from her tiny form even though she looked like an alien.
"What do you think her name should be?" She whispered into my hair. I stared at the little alien's face in concentration and then looked at my mom's eyes. They were looking at the baby with such tenderness, so much love. I wondered if she'd ever looked at me that way.
"I want it to be Lil-Lee." I confided after a few moments of concentration. I'd heard my mother talking about flowers before, and Lilies were her favorite. She gazed at them with the same adoring eyes that were cast upon my sister when Dad brought them home to her.
My mother smiled at me and leaned her head on mine. "Lilly it is then." I brushed my hand gently across the baby's head and looked up at my mother.
"Mine. I named her." My face dropped with the seriousness of my question, but my mother only smiled.
"She's yours, Darling, so you have to protect her and look after her forever. Think you can handle that?" I nodded enthusiastically and covered our mother's arm in a protective embrace around the baby.
"I promise."
A shriek tore me from the dream memory. I must have fallen asleep in the side chair beside the couch. I blinked rapidly as the memory of the night before flooded my thoughts. Lilly was experiencing extreme withdrawal, and it wouldn't end any time soon. My back popped and snapped as it realigned when I flung myself at the couch. My knees hit the floor hard, but I ignored them and held her wrists into the sofa.
"Let me up!" Lilly kicked and spat at my face. I waited.
"It hurts, Lauren!" She whimpered as tears leaked from her eyes. Tears of my own burned my eyes, and I wiped them against my shoulder. She jerked her hand free in my distraction and scratched at my face. The wounds stung as my salty tears cleansed them.
"Let me go, you stupid bitch!" She was screaming again. I pressed her wrists into the sofa and rode the turbulent waves until the pain and itching subsided. All that remained were the tears. She stopped struggling, and I laid my head on her chest. Dawn slowly stretched its fingers around the curtains and pulled my thoughts to Ashley. How many sunrises had she watched without me? I pushed them back into the recesses of my mind; Ashley was gone. I had only my sister and my uncertain future.
"Are you back?" I held myself over her face and studied her eyes. They were tired, but they were Lilly.
"I'm okay. Water, please." She croaked. My hands shook from spent adrenaline as I pulled myself to my feet. I'd never been so incredibly terrified, not when Dad beat me, not when I realized Mom had abandoned us, not when Luci told me that she'd murdered people. Witnessing my little sister go through withdrawal was absolutely the worst thing I'd ever experienced.
The water ran a faint red as I rinsed the cuts on my cheek. I watched the swirl until it cleared and then filled two glasses. My reality felt fake as I sat on the coffee table and helped Lilly drink the first glass. Her hands trembled and shook violently after a bad episode or craving or whatever the clinical term was, and she couldn't hold the glass herself.
"Better?" I smoothed hair from her face and tried to smile. Despite the burning friction of the circumstance, I'd never felt closer to her. Of everyone in her life, she'd trusted me to take care of her and guide her through this excruciating process. I felt honored, not burdened.
"Did I do that?" She aimed a shaking finger at my face, and I grabbed her hand and pulled it to my mouth.
"Don't worry about it." I kissed her hand. "Go back to sleep." She nodded, eyes already closed. I held her hand until her breathing evened and then moved to my computer, taking the second glass of water.
My heart raced as I waited for the monitor to wake up and my email to load. I wanted so badly to know that Luci was on her way to us, and I hoped that she never came. It had been six weeks since I left her and had only just begun to fall into a normal routine. I had made a friend in Jason and Lilly finally admitted her desperate need for help. Sure, Luci's face occupied every other thought that flitted through my mind, but I had broken her spell. I no longer felt lost when I woke up in the condo instead of the mansion.
I'd considered calling Mattie a few times, just to talk, but feared becoming homesick even more than I was. I often drove for hours outside the city, just to be closer to nature, close to the person I was before Luci stepped into my path. At first, I thought I would return to the promiscuous, unaware being I had been, but as I discovered with Jason, meaningless sex had become displeasing, excruciating to endure. I had loved Luci, part of me remained at her side still, and I wanted only her hands upon me. I longed to recreate the way she had made me feel, like my body and my emotions were no longer two individual entities of me anymore, and the only person who had ever pulled them together before was the one person I could never allow myself to fall for again, if she even came at all. She had broken me.
I nearly jumped out of my chair when I saw an email waiting for me. She'd answered me immediately last night. I clicked on her name and smiled. "I'm coming." She hadn't signed her name or offered any elaborative information, but she would help Lilly. She'd come for us. Despite her sordid decisions, she had a good heart, and I adored it. I leaned back in the chair, surprised at the thought, and then clicked the delete button. I denied my mind the comfort of those thoughts, and all evidence of Luci had to be erased immediately. Anything that Luci and I had shared dissolved the day I left Carver. Yes, I missed her greatly, but I would not fall under her spell again. I had contacted her for Lilly's sake because she was the only person I knew who could help, not because I wanted to reconnect and certainly not to return to the mansion.
A knock on the door jumpstarted my heart. Could she be here already? Surely not. I switched the monitor off and approached the door cautiously. Perhaps Andre had found us. I'm sure Lilly had divulged the address. Maybe he'd come to collect her, hurt her, hurt me. I checked through the peephole and gasped when crystal blue eyes stared back. My fingers fumbled with the dead bolt, detached from the whole of me in their haste to remove the barrier between them and that delicate porcelain skin.
We stared at each other. Her shoulders were tight with tension beneath a long sleeve button up silk shirt. It had a high collar on it and hung more loosely than I remembered. Her pale face seemed gaunt, hoary almost, like she'd been struggling with a chronic illness. She was exhausted and sad, but she was Luci. My beautiful, daring Luci. I blinked, and when my eyes opened, my lips were pressed against hers. I told myself that the brisk September wind had livened my nerves, not the touch of her lips and pulled back. She hadn't moved from her spot, but I didn't remember stepping forward into her arms. I stepped away.
"Uh, hi." I found the sidewalk particularly interesting and leaned against the door frame. "Come in." She smirked and hoisted her shoulder bag higher.
"Thank you." Her eyes immediately fell to Lilly's squirming form on the couch when she stepped through the door. I shut out the cool wind and stepped beside her.
"This is why I emailed you." She nodded, disappointment in her eyes.
"I had hoped you'd be coming home." She sat her bag on the floor by the door and unzipped her coat, but I was too mesmerized by her voice to direct her towards the spare room. Six weeks had passed since I'd heard that cadence of blue silk, felt the deep timbre slip down my spine. I'd nearly forgotten how incredibly stunning her voice was, how hypnotic.
"What is it you need, Darling?" The term of endearment snapped me back to reality despite how quickly her voice was pulling me into her enchantment. Her very presence caught me off guard. She emitted an overwhelming energy that soothed any unsuspecting soul in
to her web. I stepped away from her and sat on the edge of the side chair.
"She needs real help. Rehab. I don't even know where to begin, and I know I have no right to ask but I'm asking anyway. She told me some pretty messed up stuff about her boyfriend. She needs to get out of here, Luci. Please help her." I hated the desperate tone to my voice, but it didn't matter. If Luci saw how scared I was, she'd be more inclined to help me. That was her fatal flaw, rescuing the damsel.
"Is he dangerous?" She sat on the coffee table in front of me. Her hands flexed into fists and then released several times like she fought the urge to reach out to me.
"He attacked me with this when I confronted him about giving her more of… I don't even know what he was giving her." I pulled his knife from my pocket and handed it to Luci. His initially were carved into the handle.
"He attacked you?" Anger flared in her eyes for a moment before she squashed it. I almost smiled at her over protectiveness. I'd missed it. I'd missed her.
"Don't worry. I kicked the shit out of him." I leaned back and pulled my knees to my chest, pressing into the chair as far from her as I could be. Her earthy scent surrounded me, intoxicating me.
"Will you help her, Luci?" I ignored everything about her except her eyes. I wanted to see the truth in them, the compassion as it sparked under my desperate gaze. I was not disappointed.
"Of course, Darling." She bowed her head in concession and then turned the knife over in her hands, studying every detail.
"May I freshen up a bit while she still slumbers?" She asked suddenly, eyes returning to mine. "I drove through the night and haven't slept, and I fear that I smell of grease-filled potato sticks."
"You ate fast food?" I blurted, a genuine smile on my face at her obvious discomfort. She licked her lips and raised one thin eyebrow, and I resisted the urge to giggle.
"Sure. The spare room is down that hall. There is a bathroom in it." She glanced over her shoulder and then back to me. Her hand reached out slowly and stopped just short of my knee.
"Won't you keep me company? I have so desperately missed our conversations." My gaze shifted between her eyes and her hand several times before any real thought formed in my mind.
"That's not a good idea." I pressed into the chair and held my breath. If she countered my rejection, I hadn't the strength to resist.
"Oh." Her hand dropped to her knee as she stood. "Of course."
Her haunted eyes broke my heart, but I gripped the chair arms tightly and waited for the urge to follow her to subside. Could she even feel sadness? I instantly regretted the thought. Of course she could. I'd seen it a thousand times, right? My short nails scraped the scar on my forehead, and I closed my eyes against the guilt that settled into my chest. She saved me, after all, and I had yet to repay that debt. I rolled my eyes as I stood. Keeping her brief company counted poorly on the road of restitution, but it was all I had to offer and the only thing she'd ever asked of me since I'd first met her.
She'd already disappeared into the room, so I knocked on the wall before I rounded the corner. She appeared at the door, shirt unbuttoned, scars on display. My hand rose to trace them before I gained control of my actions. Seconds ticked by slowly. Of the many nuances of Luci Pravitas, the feeling of her scars beneath my fingers was one sensation I forgot to forget. I plucked the passion from my mind and cleansed my soul as reminiscence and reality melted together and destroyed my carefully constructed behavioral instructions in regards to Luci in the growing conflagration. Luci created a unique morality that I secretly entertained while obediently immersing myself in society's black and white constraints.
"I'm sorry." I closed my eyes painfully and bit my lip as my fingers curled into a fist. The quiet words slipped from the back of my throat breathily, and I wondered if she might have missed the apology completely. The logic of Luci's decisions reflected my own heart, but the resistance to that darkness grated too harshly for reconciliation of the two worlds. The two ungreased, rusty cogs screeched inside my mind until my hand thumped against my thigh. I'd straddled two worlds for too long, and a decision had been made if not spoken.
I heard shuffling across the room and then the spray of the shower.
"I'm covered, Darling." Her voice was muffled by the walls and water, but it still slid across the inside of my skull smoothly.
I blinked. The moment passed. I stepped into the bathroom, put the toilet lid down and averted my eyes to the wall, ignoring the silhouette behind the frosted glass. Luci sighed under the warm spray, and an involuntary shiver slid up my spine. Damn her. I shouldn't have contacted her. Simply seeing her again evoked everything I'd spent the last six weeks trying to purge from my mind, my heart. I loved her. I would always love her, and that terrified me. How much would I excuse, like my mother, because I loved her? How far would I go to protect her, to keep her secrets? One touch of her warm fingers lubricated the caustic strain of my conflicting realities. I lurked in the shadows of both her harsh truth and the cookie cutter morality we're all conditioned to respect. I understood both and belonged to neither, knowing one touch tipped the balance. I waivered, unsure of which destructive ideal I'd choose should her skin only ghost mine.
"So, how much concern should I lend Lilly's boyfriend?" Water spattered on the bottom of the shower, probably from rinsing her hair. Images from that last day we shared in the river flashed into my mind, and I bit my lip before it quivered.
"Enough." I answered distractedly, trying to keep my gaze on the wall before me.
"What makes you believe he would tangle with you again?"
"Like I said, Lilly told me some pretty messed up stuff." I preserved Lilly's dignity for a moment longer but ultimately understood that Luci deserved to know every facet of this complicated puzzle before she became officially involved.
"Such as?" I sighed and rubbed my eyes. I was so tired and every ounce of the energy I had left was being used to distance myself from the one person I wanted to be closer to than anyone else in the world.
"He's her pimp. From what I understand, Lilly sleeps with a person of his choosing. He gets the money, and she gets drugs, whatever he's been pumping into her. I don't even know what it is, but she has a bunch of needle marks on her arms."
I hated my shaking voice. I needed to be strong for Lilly, for myself, but Luci's presence made me want to run into her protective arms and let her save us. The shower door banged open, and I nervously leapt to my feet. Luci's eyes glowed with anger, and her hands squeezed into fists at her sides. Water droplets trickled over her breasts and shoulders. I traced her body with my eyes. She'd definitely lost weight. I counted her ribs, noticed the tightly stretched skin over her jutting hip bones. If her withdrawal from my presence resembled my own, Carver must have become unbearable for her after I'd left. I had freed myself, but she had been forced to walk those beautiful halls every day, remembering our time together, seeing me in everything she touched and fearing I would never return. I swallowed roughly and forced my eyes back to hers.
"He's trading sex for drugs?" I nodded. "Are you aware that it is common for certain gangs prominent in this area to deal in drug trafficking as well as prostitution rings?" I shook my head. I'd never left the 100 mile radius surrounding Carver and knew nothing about gangs or prostitution or even drug addiction for that matter, despite its prominence in rural West Virginia.
"I cannot be certain until I speak with Lilly but I believe this is the situation your sister has stumbled into by mistake. If it is so, it shall require more than rehabilitation and a fresh identity to rectify."
My skin hummed with the intensity of her words and gaze, and I focused on the meaning behind them. Was she suggesting…? No, I would not allow her to murder another human being. I couldn't, even if they were a member of a gang, which I wasn't even sure was accurate. I swallowed as she stepped out of the shower and grabbed my shoulders. Fear slivered up my spine until I realized that Luci held my body upright. I sent for Luci in order to help Lilly, but my heart knew t
hat was a lie my mind needed to hear in order to contact the ethereal heiress. I'd called her here to commit murder.
"Lauren, listen to me." I stared into her eyes and gripped her shoulders tightly for balance as my strength returned. "If they discover that Lilly is attempting to leave the arrangement, gang or not, they will track her down and they will kill her. She was allowed a leave of absence from the arrangement to return home for your father's funeral, which indicates she is a sought after commodity with much loyalty to the organization or at the very least Andre. Otherwise, she would never have been permitted to travel so far unaccompanied. I imagine she knows information they deem more important than her life if she is involved in an organized crime syndicate. Even if she isn't, Andre shall not simply allow her to walk away from their arrangement." Not like me. She never spoke the words aloud, but I heard them anyway and glanced up at her blue eyes once more
"Let me protect both of you." Her fingers slipped through my tangled hair and rested on either side of my neck. "I missed you so much, Lauren. I'm so sorry that I made you believe I was anything different than what I am." She pulled me into an embrace, and I greedily accepted her thin, wet body against me. I was hers.
"I missed you, too." I pressed my face into her damp neck. The last time I'd seen that side of her neck, it bore a bruised bite mark from our passionate embrace at the river. I'd branded her skin atop the scars, in more than one place, and I pulled back when I realized that her skin seemed incomplete without those telling marks.
"I can't do this, Luci. As much as I want to, I just can't. Everything has just started to heal, and I can't go back now. It took six weeks before I didn't wake up feeling your touch anymore. I'm sorry. I have come too far to turn back now." I begged her to understand, even as my body unconsciously pressed more tightly against hers.
