Strength

by Daws, Amy

  “Aunt Agitha,” I smile broadly. “Vi Harris. Thank you for agreeing to do this!” I shake her hand. “This is my…boyfriend…Hayden Clarke.” I bite my lip realising it’s the first time I’ve referred to Hayden as my boyfriend. The slip wasn’t lost on him either as the corner of his mouth lifts in appreciation.

  Her chubby fingers grip Hayden’s large hand. She looks between the two of us. “Glad to see you two figured things out.”

  I frown. “What do you mean?” I ask curiously.

  She beams happily. “We’ll get to that. Come, come! And please, call me Aggie.” She bustles us into her flat that looks like it’s a snippet of English Home and Country Magazine. My eyes widen as I see hutch, after hutch, after hutch filled with…

  “Salt and pepper shakers!” she sings, answering my silent question. “I’m a bit of a collector. I have a set dated back to King George the III! Do you want to see it?”

  After a polite amount of time oohing and aahing over her collection, she leads us into her kitchen. Benji is out of town, apparently at a comic book convention, which is extra convenient for me. I prefer to not have him around while we do this.

  She offers us a seat at her round, retro-style table with sea foam green chairs and a white and green designed top. It’s a bright room with lots of natural light streaming in from the pigeon-scattered window. On the table, she’s got some votive candle holders, a deck of tarot cards, and what appear to be some tuning forks.

  “I haven’t told him why we’re here yet, Aggie, so just one second.” I look at Hayden’s quizzical expression as he adjusts in his chair to face me. “Hayden, Benji’s aunt is a psychic.”

  “Okay,” he replies slowly, his expression wary.

  “She specialises in numerology.” I touch his arm encouragingly and he instinctively shifts closer to me.

  “Interesting,” Hayden says politely, crossing his cuff-covered wrists over each other on the table.

  “I thought we could talk to her about 11:11 a bit.” My eyes watch him as I see it all click together.

  His jaw clenches.

  “All due respect, Miss Aggie, I’m not sure this is necessary.” He moves to stand up, so I hold him down.

  “What could it hurt to get a little background information on the number, Hayden? It could be really interesting.”

  His jaw shifts side-to-side, but I see that look in his eyes. That look that shows how utterly difficult it is for him to say no to me. “Fine,” he snaps and shifts in closer to the table.

  Aggie beams. “Brilliant! So tell me, what specifically do you want to discuss today, love?”

  I look at Hayden, who is doing his best to remain polite but is visibly struggling with this idea.

  “Well, Aggie, my boyfriend here has a strong connection with the time 11:11, and I wondered what kinds of things you can tell us about the meaning behind that number. I assume you may have some insight.”

  “Oh yes, certainly. I’ve studied numerology for many years and it is incredible how much it plays a part in our everyday lives.” She moves her glasses to the top of her head and leans her plump arms on the table as she continues. “Some say that 11:11 is the angelic hour. It’s when your angels can send you messages. Specifically noticing it on a regular basis is often times the Universe’s way of providing a wake-up call so to speak. It’s a sign that you’re about to embark on a journey of discovery.”

  “How do you mean?” I ask, glancing at Hayden, who seems to be listening intently.

  “Well, often times, 11:11 can help you unlock parts of your subconscious that you have maybe been hiding from yourself or not sharing with anyone. It’s a symbol to help you get in sync with the greater workings of the Universe. The Universe has a purpose for you. Whether you believe it or not, there’s a reason you’re alive!” She chuckles gaily.

  I cringe recalling how in Hayden’s speech, he said he chose the time 11:11 to slit his wrists. I want to ask her about the meaning behind it, but I don’t want Hayden to feel completely ambushed.

  “Why do people say to make a wish at 11:11?” Hayden demands, surprising me. I look at him, and he’s eyeing Aggie very seriously.

  “Oh yes, that’s definitely what lots of people do when they see that time, isn’t it? Make a wish!” she snickers. “I think that began because 11:11 is a sign that our innermost thoughts are turning into reality, so you see it and you take control of making blessings in your life happen.”

  “But what does it mean if you’re only wishing to change the past?” Hayden’s hand finds my knee beneath the table, and he squeezes it for reassurance. I place mine over his.

  Aggie’s face turns grave, and I notice the stunning clear blueness of her eyes, almost as if they are colourless. They were so small when she was smiling before that I never got a good look. She reaches out and touches Hayden’s hand. The loose skin on her cheek tremors ever so slightly. “Your heart is heavy with a large burden, love. But you are seeing 11:11 for a positive reason that has everything to do with the present and your future, and nothing to do with your past.”

  She cuts her eyes to me with a meaningful look. I pull back slightly. “What is it?” I ask.

  “Her.” She gestures to me while looking at Hayden like he will get it. He remains still, so she looks to me again. “Tell me, Vi. Does 11:11 hold any significance to you?”

  My face freezes. I didn’t expect her to turn this on me. I’m even more floored that she knows to ask me anything about it. I refuse to lie to Aggie when she was generous enough to do this for me, but I’m kicking myself for not telling Hayden all of this before we got here.

  I nod.

  “Well go on then, love, tell us.” She nods encouragingly at me, her transparent eyes sparkling with anticipation.

  I swallow hard, the room suddenly feeling very still and quiet. The hum of the fridge halts and even the pigeons outside her window stop flapping about. “My mother died on November eleventh.”

  She smiles knowingly. “And you have a special connection to your mother, correct?”

  Nodding, I add, “I share my birthday with her.”

  “And the two of you are Geminis, correct?” She beams.

  My mouth opens. “Yes, my birthday is June fifth.”

  “Oh, how funny,” she replies. “Six plus five equals—”

  “Eleven,” Hayden finishes.

  Aggie chuckles and begins shuffling through her papers. She pulls one out to show us. “Gemini is the Zodiac house of twins, symbolised here.” She points to the sheet. “See? Two pillars joined at the top and base, which is a representation of the twins seated side by side with embracing arms. Similar to an eleven, don’t you think?”

  Hayden’s hand moves from my lap. His eyes are wide and accusing when I turn to him. “How could you not mention that about your mum?”

  I shake my head nervously. “11:11 seemed so important to you, and I didn’t want to scare you. You were already spooked by the fact that I live on the eleventh floor.”

  “Oh!” Aggie chuckles. “The Universe is a wicked creature sometimes, isn’t she? This is all so perfect.”

  “Perfect? Why?” I ask, looking back at her.

  “Because you two are each other’s twin flame, of course!” Hayden and I stare at her in confusion. She chortles, “I felt it plain as day when I first saw you the night you brought my naughty rat-arsed nephew home. Surely you two have sensed it since then. I couldn’t believe you held out as long as you did. That deep, burning, pulling connection is intense, isn’t it?” She twines her hands together in a powerful grip to visualise.

  “What do you mean? What are twin flames?” I ask, my mind reeling.

  “It’s like this…You’ve heard of soulmates, right? Well, twin flames have an even deeper connection that supersedes soulmates. The moment you meet your twin flame is the moment the earth beneath your feet begins to shift.”

  My memory flashes back to the night Bruce knocked Hayden over outside The White Swan Pub. The energy between us
was just chemistry. An obvious physical attraction, nothing more. Yes, it was intense. More intense than with any man I’d ever met. But I thought that was because it was Hayden. And Hayden is well…Hayden. I’m not all together sure I believe whatever it is Aggie is trying to say we are.

  “I’ve never even heard that term before,” I state dismissively.

  “Twin flames are mirrored souls because they essentially reflect the deepest needs, desires, dreams, and even the dark elements of our souls. The yucky stuff. They can accept and absorb.”

  A loud scratch echoes in the small kitchen as Hayden shoots up from his chair.

  “Hayden!” I exclaim as he turns and strides out of the room. I look at Aggie with wide, apologetic eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

  Her face looks crestfallen. “I’m sorry if I’ve spoken out of turn, love.”

  “No, you did just what I wanted you to do. It’s been a very enlightening day. I think he’s just overwhelmed. Truly, though. Thank you.”

  She nods, but her face still appears sympathetic. “It’s all right, love. You two take care.”

  I nod and run after Hayden, hustling down the stairs and out onto the busy Notting Hill road. Traffic whizzes by nosily as I step around a group of tourists hopping off a red, double-decker bus.

  “Hayden,” I shout when I see him storming down the sidewalk.

  His shoulders tense at the sound of my voice, but he slows. When I get nearer, he turns his head and barks at me like a wild animal. “I hope you’re fucking happy, Vi.”

  I recoil, clearly underestimating his reaction to Aggie’s reading. “What do you mean? Happy about what?”

  His face pulls a menacing expression as he stops and turns to look at me. “We’re destined to be together, so now I’m all better. All healed. Isn’t that lucky for you.”

  “Hayden, stop it.” I reach out to touch him, but he pulls away from me.

  “I don’t know what you were after in there, but whatever crap that scamming quack just told us is rubbish.” He grips one of his cuffs and shoots accusing daggers at me.

  “She’s a nice woman, Hayden,” I retort, my tone defensive. “It wasn’t a scam. She did it as a favour. I didn’t even pay her.”

  He scoffs loudly. “So now what? I’m just supposed to accept you as my twin flame and we go run off into our mythological future together, happily ever after? Life doesn’t fucking work like that, Vi.”

  “I never said it does!” I exclaim, crossing my arms over my chest for some semblance of comfort. We’ve argued before, but never like this. “I was only trying to help you understand. I didn’t know she was going to say all that.”

  He huffs out a mean, menacing laugh and a scary, dark cynicism shadows his eyes. “You don’t get it, Vi. You haven’t suffered as I have. There’s no quick fix for me. There’s no easy bandage for my kind of pain.”

  “Pain is pain, Hayden!” I screech in frustration and mindlessly stamp my foot. His eyes glower down at the action. “You don’t have to have suffered through the worst of pain to have empathy.”

  “I don’t need your empathy!” he shouts, his tone reaching a high, manic level. I think I prefer the dark, ominous Hayden better. He shoves his hands through his hair, yanking at the roots before letting go. “I’ve been trying to protect what I have going here. Telling myself that I don’t need you in order to be healthy because I’m doing this all on my own. Then you take me to that crazy bird who tells me you’re my life mate!”

  “Stop,” I grind out through clenched teeth, but it falls on deaf ears.

  “It’s fucking mental, Vi! All of it. One person can’t depend on another that much. Soulmates? Christ. We ran into each other. I thought you were hot. End of. Let’s not magic this into something bigger than it is.”

  My legs feel like they’ve been kicked out from under me, but he still doesn’t slow.

  “And what’s with you hiding shit from me? I’ve told you so much, Vi. So much that you could write a damn book about me. You hiding that stuff about your mum feels like I’ve been lied to all this time.”

  My stomach convulses in response to his spot-on accusation. “I wanted to mention it, but I was scared, Hayden. I never knew much about my mum, and it’s always been an odd feeling to share my birthday with someone I barely remember. So to have her death anniversary mean something to you would mean another part of my life is tainted by her. And 11:11 is important to you. Not me.”

  “Oh, whatever,” he growls. “I was doing fine on my own until you came along. I made it through Reyna, through rehab, through living with my parents, through a bloody speech at the gala. I’ll make it through you. I don’t need to depend on anyone in order to be healthy.”

  Needles prick behind my eyes.

  “And what happens when I go off the rails again? What then?” he snaps, his gaze glacial as he steps within inches of my face, towering over me with his most intimidating stance. His scent toys with my emotions as his hot breath on my face speaks in acerbic tones. “I’m going to crash, and I’ll take both of us down with me. You’re going to get caught in the crossfire, and I will ruin you. If what that woman said has an ounce of truth to it and you are my twin flame, then that means anything I do has the potential to fucking kill you. It might not be with a blade across your wrists, but I promise you it will hurt.”

  I bite my lip as tears flood my vision. I look away, my face fixed and frozen. I need to remain silent so he stops.

  Just wait until he’s finished, Vi. Just wait. He’s just processing. Saying anything right now would be like poking a bear. Don’t poke the bear.

  He moves to walk away, but I catch his arm as quiet words escape my constricting throat. “Getting hurt is part of being alive.”

  “Alive?” He swerves back to me with a haughty bark of a laugh. “That’s a joke when you’re talking about me.” He slides his hands up my wrists and clutches my arms harshly. “Look at me, Vi. You don’t have anything good with me. It’s best you find that out now.”

  His face crushes me. His eyes are merely hollow shells of the man who’s been opening up to me the last few weeks. He moves to turn away from me, but before he lets go of my arms, an explosion erupts from the very depths of my soul.

  “You don’t get to keep forever to yourself!” I scream loudly into his face and shove his chest with all my might. He blinks hard as if the outburst broke some protective shell around him. My emotional shove proves more effective than my physical. Acidic tears slide over my lips and into my mouth, the salty liquid doing nothing to quench the burning in my chest. My spit is thick in my throat as I touch my hands to his face. He flinches like the tips of my fingers are made of razor blades. My voice trembles as I utter, “Hayden, I love you.”

  His expression turns grim, and he deftly yanks free from my grasp. “Vi, I need to be on my own.” His voice is calm and professional as he backs away from me, like he’s addressing a business transaction. “This isn’t good for my recovery.”

  I swallow back the thickness bubbling up as every insecurity from my entire life starts pulling at me like quicksand. Like the underworld is reaching up from beneath the ground and dragging me down into the depths of Hell. “Hayden, if it’s that you’re scared or you’re unsure, I get it. But if it’s me, have the courage to tell me. If you don’t love me, then that is something I can’t help you through.” I fist my hands against my chest in agony over the doom I feel coming. “At this point, either you love me or you don’t. There is no way you don’t know by now.”

  Sobs crack from my throat as I look at Hayden and all he offers me is a pitying expression. All the days we spent revealing the deepest parts of our lives, gone. Vanished. The pain is horrifying.

  I look into his eyes one last time, and everything I love about him is magnified. His heart, his pain, his passion, his temper. I’m looking at everything I want.

  And he’s looking at me like a charity case.

  Without waiting for his verbal confirmation, I walk to the edge of the
sidewalk and wave down a passing cab. I slide onto the smooth leather and crumble inside the quietness.

  I don’t look back. I can’t look back.

  My broken man…

  …just broke me.

  MY KNUCKLES TURN WHITE AS I grip a bottle of beer nestled inside the cooler door amongst a sea of other brown bottles. I blink furiously against the flickering neon lights casting a putrid green glow on the back of my hand. On the back of my scarred, mangled, fucked-up hand. I didn’t even make the conscious decision to step inside this rundown corner shop that has the faint smell of ammonia and urine. I barely even noticed the foreign man behind the counter shouting into his mobile in another language.

  But, here I am, staring at row after row of assorted booze inside a supermarket cooler section.

  Seeing the bottle in my hand, my eyes narrow. I squeeze the base of it. Hard. Harder. It doesn’t break. I’m not strong enough. I’m fucking weak. I have to choose between climbing up an enormous mountain or falling down a slippery hill. Rage explodes inside of me over that realisation. I yank the bottle from the cooler. The door slams shut as I swing my arm back as far as I can and launch the offensive bottle onto the ground by my feet. The scent of beer invades my nose as the amber liquid splashes on my pants. My boots crunch the shiny glass as I move back into the fridge to grab two more bottles that are staring me down at eye level. I hold them in place and squeeze them as hard as I can, letting out a garbled grunt when I still can’t break the fucking glass.

  The man at the counter begins shouting in a foreign language. I release the bottles in frustration and, without pause, storm down the aisle, chucking a twenty-pound note on the counter as I stride out the door. My walk turns faster and faster, eventually shifting into a full-on run. I sprint through the busy and narrow streets with cabbies honking at me at nearly every intersection. I run and run until my lungs are about to explode. In the end, I find myself back in Shoreditch in front of C. Designs. My stomach roils as I hunch over, propping my hands on my knees for support. Silently screaming in agony, my chest rises and falls in terrifyingly fast measures.