[2014] Ten Below Zero

by Whitney Barbetti

  “Why did you do this to me?” I asked. My heart was aching so intensely. I couldn’t breathe. The pain wracking my body was worse than anything I’d ever felt.

  “Because I want you to live. Your life is a gift, Parker. Live while you can. Smile, dance, see the world, fall in love-”

  “Shut up!” I couldn’t keep my voice down. “I already did fall in love, you asshole. You made it so fucking easy. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.” My voice broke on the last three words and I stood up, looking around. I couldn’t think. My head and my heart were so full of pain that thinking clearly was not an option. I wanted to scream.

  I looked at him, accusation in my eyes. “I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you.” It was the truth, and it was painful to say, to admit.

  “Isn’t it enough to spend the rest of mine with you?” he asked, his eyes pleading.

  “No. It’s not.” I rubbed a hand over my face. “I don’t want to be in a world where you don’t exist.”

  “But I will, Parker. You’ve made sure of that. I’ll be at the Purgatoire River. Come here.” He held his arms out for me and I climbed in his bed again, not wanting to ever leave. “I’ll be here.” His hand touched the spot my tattoo was on. “And most importantly to me, I’ll be here.” He touched my heart. “You’re not ten below zero, Parker. Not in here. You’re warm. A little broken, but warm.” His lips pressed against my head. “And you’ll have me in here. In your memories.”

  My lip trembled and I choked on a sob. “We never made it to the east coast. You wanted to make it to the east coast.”

  “Go there for me. Dip your toes in the Atlantic. Visit Central Park. People-watch.”

  I rubbed my eyes with the back of my hand. “I don’t want to go there alone.” I stood up and walked away, trying to get some distance.

  “Don’t you remember what I just told you? I’ll be with you.”

  I shook my head. “It’s not the same and you know it.” I took a deep breath.

  “Parker, I bought your plane ticket back home.”

  I stopped pacing, stopped looking around and brought my eyes back to his. “What did you say?”

  “Your plane ticket home is in your email. You leave tonight.”

  “What are you talking about?” My voice was up several octaves and I saw the nurse move towards me.

  Everett held up a hand to the nurse and then he turned to me. “I told you, if you fell in love, your ass would be on a plane. And it will be. In four hours.”

  I was speechless. I stared at Everett like he’d grown another head. I shook my head, over and over, back and forth.

  “Yes,” he insisted.

  “I don’t want to go.” I placed a hand on my stomach and the other on my mouth. This pain, this was worse than anything. “I don’t want to leave you.”

  “You won’t.” His eyes, though tired, were bright. His hand slid up to his chest. “I have your name on my chest now. When my heart stops, you’ll still be here, permanently, on my skin.” His hand slid off his chest and a look of peace came over his face. “It’s a superficial representation of what’s already on my soul.”

  I shook my head again. “I don’t care. I don’t-” I swallowed. I didn’t think I was strong enough for this.

  “I don’t want you here for this, Parker. I don’t want you to remember me like this.”

  I collapsed into the chair beside his bed and sobbed into my hands. This was more than I could physically bear. I lifted my head to see him again, my nose running and my tears tracking a hundred lines on my face.

  “Come here,” Everett said, his voice breaking again. He opened his arms and I climbed into the bed a third time. He wrapped his arms around me and held me tight, squeezing me. He was always pulling me to him. I wanted to pull him to me, to keep him.

  “I love you, Parker. More than I’ve ever loved anything. I am so thankful for that text, so thankful it was you who replied. I’m thankful you drove halfway across the country with me. But most of all, I’m thankful for what you’ve given me. It’s been the best time of my life. And it wasn’t all the pit stops or the main attractions. It was you. It was always, only you.”

  I didn’t think I would ever stop crying. My hands balled into fists against his chest. “Then fight, dammit. If not for you, fight for me. I need you.”

  “You don’t, Parker. You’re strong. You’re a fighter. You’re brave and beautiful and ornery and so many things. You don’t need me.”

  I knew then, with absolute certainty, that nothing I could say would change his mind. He was done, he wasn’t going to fight. I pushed my lips to his chest and squeezed my eyes tight. “I need to go then. Now.” I held his hand and he squeezed three times. The moment he let go would be it. I’d lose a limb.

  I tugged.

  He let go of me, albeit hesitantly. I stood up and walked to the door. But before I reached the handle, I turned around.

  Everett was right when he said I was stubborn. But I was right about this.

  “Everett,” I said. He lifted his head to me. His eyes were tortured, red-rimmed. “If you die, I’m the only one with our memories. But if you have the surgery, if you lived, you might lose them. But you’d be alive. I’d still have those memories. And I’d still have you.”

  And then I left, without looking back.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Two months later

  I received a box in the mail a few days earlier. The return address was Dallas and the sender was Bridget. But I couldn’t open it. It sat in my bedroom untouched. It wasn’t very big, but I was afraid of it. Loving Everett brought with it a range of emotions. I was a wreck. From anger to fear to happiness to love. I felt them all. And they hurt, all the time. Feeling things was painful. But if I had learned anything, it was that every bit of good came from a little bit of pain. I wouldn’t be like Eloisa. I’d choose the memories of Everett and live through the pain. Because at least I was living.

  My dreams were either replays our trip or an alternate reality. Where Everett lived. He wore all black and had a new scar on top of the old one and we spent a weekend in the Picketwire Canyonlands, a weekend in purgatory, together. That was my favorite dream, the one that made me cry whenever I woke up. Because my reality was often a nightmare.

  Carly and Jasmine had invited me to go out with them a few times since I’d returned. But I couldn’t. I was a different person in many ways, but I wanted to avoid people as much as possible.

  That box in the corner of my room was a lot like me. Filled with Everett, but afraid to open up. It could collect dust in the corner of my room forever.

  I testified against Morris Jensen. I sat on the stand, answered the questions from the county prosecutor. He pulled up photos of me from when I’d been brought to the hospital. I stared at those photos and ached for the girl I was when they were taken. Ached for the years of indifference I would embrace. I removed my suit jacket partway into questioning, to let them all see the scars that Morris Jensen left on my body.

  I avoided looking at Morris the entire time. When the defense attorney questioned me, I answered all the questions, but Morris’ fate was already sealed. If it hadn’t been sealed by the DNA evidence under my nails, it was sealed with Mira’s testimony.

  She’d taken the stand, unhappily. When I’d returned to California, I asked her about the shot I’d heard in my flashback.

  She’d looked at me with impatience, but also with resignation. “Yeah, I shot at him,” she’d answered, pursing her lips. “He’d have died if he hadn’t gone to the ER. So he fucked himself with that.”

  Mira had testified and her gun was used as evidence, confirming that the bullet found in Morris Jensen’s abdomen belonged to Mira’s gun. Mira wasn’t charged with a crime, but she’d received a bit of heat for not coming clean sooner. I felt bad about that, but Mira shrugged it off.

  “I’m moving anyway,” she said as we left the courtroom.

  “With Six?”

  She looked at m
e like she was annoyed for me asking. But she was coming to see that I’d changed. I’d hardened a little. She teasingly called me a rat, saying it was more appropriate than mouse. And then she’d sighed. “Six has a lot going on right now. I’m not sure that I should hang around him.” I didn’t push her for more information, because that was practically a heartfelt confession from her in and of itself.

  When I came home from the trial, I stared at that box in the corner of my room with contempt. And then my phone rang.

  I didn’t recognize the number, but the caller ID said it was Texas. My heart roared in my chest and my finger shook over the Answer button.

  “Hello?”

  “Parker.” A woman’s voice. I sat on the bed, overcome with emotion. I’d wanted to hear his voice. But this was likely the reason I couldn’t.

  “This is she.”

  “It’s Bridget.”

  The breath left my mouth. “Bridget.” I said her name with equal parts dread and hope.

  “Can you come to Texas?”

  My heart burned. “When?”

  “Right now. I’ll buy your ticket if you need me to-”

  “No, I’m already coming,” I said, not bothering to change my clothes. I rushed out the door with my purse in one hand and my phone to my ear. “Should I call this number when I land?”

  There was a rush of relief in her voice. “Yes. Yes. Text me your flight details when you get to the airport.”

  I didn’t ask for any other information. I didn’t want to cry on the flight. I didn’t want to be the object of anyone’s interest. I only wanted to get to Texas as soon as possible. I could cry then, with confirmation from Bridget.

  By the time Bridget met me in front of Arrivals at the airport, I was a wreck. She climbed out of the car and threw her arms around me. She was shaking and crying in my arms, so I started crying and shaking too, feeling a loss deep in the pit of my belly.

  Everett was gone.

  We held one another, limbs shaking, tears soaking our cheeks.

  I wanted to scream.

  By the time she pulled away, my entire face was covered in tears. I couldn’t see her, couldn’t stop the flood from my eyes. As the tears slowly subsided, I inhaled in deeply.

  I was wiping the last of them away with the back of my hand when I saw her face.

  Or more specifically, the smile on her face. “Thank you,” she said, her eyes brighter from the tears, the smile wider than I had ever seen.

  My heart stumbled. “What did I do?” I wiped away more evidence of my grief as I felt the first glimmer of hope.

  “Everett had the surgery.”

  I felt my knees grow weak and I grabbed a hold of her, desperate to stay standing. “Are you kidding?”

  “No!” she exclaimed. “He had the surgery three days ago. His MRI scans look amazing. He’s awake. He starts chemo to kill the cancer cells soon, but we wanted you to come. To see him.”

  My heart was aching. But it was the good kind of hurt. “How is he?” I felt my hands trembling. I’d been nearly brought to my knees with grief and then again with relief only a moment later. My body couldn’t keep up.

  Bridget knew what I was asking. And that’s when I saw her smile slip. “He did suffer some memory loss. But it seems like it’s just pockets right now. Not a specific duration.”

  I told myself that if he lost his memory, it’d be okay. I’d have it for the both of us – it’s what I’d told him when I left the hospital in New Orleans. But if he was someone else, if this Everett wasn’t my Everett, it would tear me apart.

  Bridget broke a few traffic laws on the way to hospital, but I was thankful. I was desperate to see him. I didn’t have a photo of Everett, so my dreams had been my refuge, my way to see him again.

  When I arrived at the hospital, I followed Bridget down the corridor with shaky legs, pressing my hand against the wall for support. I saw Patricia, Everett’s mother standing next to a man in a white coat outside of a closed door. Bridget stopped and introduced me to Everett’s doctor. But my hands were itching to open the door, to see him.

  The doctor turned to me, compassion in his eyes. “Parker. I want you to be prepared for what is about to happen. We don’t know if this is short term or long term memory loss. We don’t know how much he actually does remember. Memory loss is a tricky thing. He could regain his memories, but it might not be for some time. Or he might never remember.”

  “Parker,” Patricia interrupted. “Everett doesn’t know you’re here. He doesn’t remember you,” her voice wavered. “You can walk away, right now. If his memory is completely gone, it will be like you were never here.” Tears pooled in her eyes and she lifted a shaky hand to grasp mine. “No one would judge you.”

  I stared into her eyes, frosty blue like those of her son, who was lying on the other side of this door. I swallowed and then squeezed her hand. “I would. I would judge myself, for walking away from him. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t. I love him. I’m here, I’m alive, because of him.” What was it about Everett’s family that caused me to speak without a censor?

  She smiled, her lips trembling as the first tear spilled down her cheek. “And he’s here because of you. Thank you, thank you for saving him.”

  I pulled her in for a hug and swallowed the lump that had settled in my throat. “He saved me first.”

  And then my hand was on the door knob, turning and pushing it opened. The door opened with only a quiet whoosh. My eyes instantly found him, asleep on the hospital bed. His head was wrapped with thick white bandages and his left arm was resting across his abdomen, the wires coming from his veins resting peacefully against his hospital gown. One foot was sticking out of the blankets and my hands itched to cover it.

  Instead, I walked towards the large window. The light flooded the room, making everything appear more alive. I looked back at the bed, took in Everett’s warm complexion. He looked the opposite of how I thought he would. He looked peaceful, healthy. I knew, from what Bridget had explained on the ride over, that the doctors felt confident they’d removed the entire tumor. I felt relief then. It poured into my veins and into my bones, and I was nearly brought to the floor with it. I turned to the window, tears pooling in my eyes. I bit my lip to stop its trembling.

  “Are you a nurse?” His voice was groggy, as if he was learning to use it for the first time. And the words themselves pierced a small piece of my heart. But it was his voice. It was Everett. I held on to that knowledge before I wiped the tears from my eyes and turned to face him, the window at my back.

  He was squinting at me. I moved one step closer to his bed, but kept my hands clasped in front of me. “No,” I said, slowly shaking my head. I took another step closer.

  “Are you a doctor?” he asked, confusion on his face.

  I shook my head and moved one tentative step closer.

  “Are you going to a funeral then?” It was said with mild disdain. I let out a breath of relief. It really was him.

  “No, I’m not going to a funeral.” I was reminded then how I’d boarded the plane, thinking a funeral was precisely what I was heading to attend.

  He gestured to my clothing with his hand, the hand that wasn’t poked with needles. “What’s with the fancy clothing then?”

  I was close enough to sit in one of the bedside chairs, so I slowly lowered myself into one of them. I didn’t let my eyes meet his. Instead, I just glanced around him. I knew if I stared into his eyes, I would fall apart.

  “I just came from a trial.” I brushed my hands down the black slacks, wiping away the sweat that had gathered on my palms. “I helped put someone, a bad someone, away for a long time.”

  “Good for you,” he said. It sounded earnest. And it stabbed my heart again. I wanted to tell him all about it, to thank him for pushing me. For breaking the ice that I let form around me. For helping me remember. But I stayed silent and nodded, swallowing another lump.

  “So…” he started, dragging the word out. “I’m guessing we know o
ne another?”

  My heart stumbled in my chest. This was harder than I’d expected. I nodded, not trusting my voice.

  “Sorry. I am a bit forgetful these days.” It was said with a laugh from him, and a wince from me. I looked down at the tiled floor and tried to think of what to say. “But there’s good news,” he said, his voice sounding hopeful. I lifted my head and finally soaked up some bravery and looked into his eyes. His eyes shined back at me.

  “Your brain tumor is gone,” I said, feeling happiness at that truth. “You’ll start chemo soon, but you seem to be bouncing back better than expected-”

  “I already know all of this,” he interrupted. His abruptness hadn’t changed. “I am more interested in what I don’t know. Or, rather, what I don’t remember.”

  I nodded. It would be a long road with him, especially if his memory never returned. We’d have to start from scratch. If his memory was permanently gone, he’d never remember how much he changed me, how far we’d come. I wouldn’t let myself mourn for that just yet. I’d let it be enough that I knew, that I remembered. I would not fall apart in front of him.

  “I’m told I brought this with me to the hospital,” he said, reaching his IV-free hand under the sheets and pulling out a small book. His journal. I sucked in a breath. It was gray, the color worn and the material tattered, but I could see as he opened it and flipped through the pages, it was covered in writing. In drawings. My heart beat sped up as he turned the pages. He closed it and picked it up, tossing it to me.

  I caught it clumsily, nearly dropping it. I heard him laugh from the bed and looked at him with a sharp look before remembering where I was, where we were. “Sorry,” I said, pushing out a breath.

  “Don’t be.”

  I turned the journal over in my hands. ‘PARKER’ it said, in bold letters on the cover. My hand moved to trace the letters, and my eyes closed as I imagined him writing each letter. The way his wrist moved with each stroke. Knowing that I was the only thing on his mind in that moment. It was a profound moment for me. The knowing. I was touching a piece of the Everett that remembered me.