by Olivia Grey
I watched as mom plated two portions of lasagna- one for me and one for her.
“I didn’t eat without you,” she said, turning her head to catch a glimpse of me.
“I know. You worried your hunger away,” I laughed. “But hey, in a way it’s a good thing because I hate eating alone. What do you think about a movie? Would you like to watch something?”
I reached for the remote and flicked the TV on.
“Whatever you want,” mom called back.
“No. I think today we should watch whatever you want. You’ve sat with me through so many action movies in the hospital now it’s time for me to repay you.”
“Aha,” she chuckled, “that’s an offer I don’t think I can pass up on.”
Mom stuck one plate of lasagna in the microwave and then the other, bringing our conversation to a halt with all the humming and crackling as our dinner went from warm to hot.
After the movie with mom, I went to my bedroom to do a bit of reflecting. The visit to Frances sat heavy on my chest and it was time for me to replay what she said and scavenge for a few pieces of the jigsaw that I knew were missing. For starters, I hated the fact that we were shimmying around Jemma’s name like there was some deep taboo attached to it that the both of us feared to get stung by. So many things just didn’t add up and Jemma leaving town was one of them.
She managed to win my mother over before her exit; confessing how much she loved me, how much she cared. But when it all came down to it, Jemma and I resented each other. She’d always been an actress though, so I wasn’t surprised to hear about all the crying and all the ways in which she couldn’t deal. I wasn’t surprised to hear that she’d sat by my bed, night after night, only to be sent home when my mother pleaded hard enough. And, in the off chance that she was being genuine, I appreciate her. But still, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was missing a very important slice of information. I would find it and sink my teeth so deep inside that the truth would come oozing out.
I pulled up a picture of Frances in my phone, remembering what she looked like before all this. Her face, once round at the cheeks was now sunken into a hole that accentuated her cheekbones. Her arms looked thin; unhealthily thin and her eyes were sad as though the same hole that consumed her cheeks were threatening to consume them too.
Scrolling through my phone, I took a look at the message I’d asked Frances about earlier. The words didn’t seem like her words, regardless of them being sent from her account. The fact that she didn’t remember sending me a message made everything just that much more suspicious. If Jemma was the one to send the message, I could only begin to think of what crooked plan she had in place. Sure, she might not have been the one to pull the trigger, but with the way she sunk her nails into Frances, she was the one to start the wound.
I rocked my brain some more, visualizing the day it all happened. After speaking with Frances, some things seem a bit clearer- but not everything.
“The tapes,” I said to myself, jumping out of bed and scavenging around like a rabid raccoon. In my drawers, underneath the bed, on the bookshelf. There were no tapes in my room which meant one of two things.
I hated to wake mother, knowing that she’d have a minor panic attack before realizing that I was okay. But I just had to know.
“Mom,” I whispered, shaking her shoulders.
She immediately spun around, eyes wide open and her heart undoubtedly thumping a million miles per hour.
“Are you okay? What’s wrong? Do you need to go to the hospital?” Her questions came all at once.
“I’m fine,” I assured her. “Sorry for waking you but I just couldn’t sleep.”
“It’s been a while since you cuddled in my bed but…”
“No mom, I’m much too old to share a bed with you. I just wanted to ask if Jemma came here while I was in the hospital.”
“To the house? No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, a hundred percent sure. I pretty much lived in the hospital while you were in there and the alarm was set at home so I would have known if anyone entered. Why, Axel? What is it?”
“I’m just looking for something and can’t seem to find it.”
“You know,” mom ran a hand down my cheek, “Jemma’s a really sweet girl, she’s not the one you need to be mad at.”
“I’m not mad at Jemma,” I lied. “I just… You know what, it doesn’t matter. Get some rest. I’m sorry for bothering you.”
“Sure you don’t wanna take me up on my offer to sleep here?”
“I’m fine in my own bed, mom. Thanks.”
The tape was nowhere to be found. I even checked the secret compartment in the kitchen cupboard where I’d hidden just about everything that I couldn’t bear for anyone to find. A crumbled pack of cigarettes that I’d bought in the tenth grade was still there, along with a white BIC lighter. But a sex tape- one that I apparently made- didn’t exist in any corner of the house. Just as I was about to make my way to my feet, something dawned on me and then like a tornado fizzling out, a chunk of memories threw themselves at me.
I knelt, with my jaw dropped wide and my body burning with anger. I needed to contact Frances. I rushed over to the coffee table where I grabbed the house phone from its hook and tapped in her number.
We’re sorry, you have reached a number that has been disconnected or is no longer in service, toned a robotic voice.
“Damn it,” I yelled, slapping a hand against my thigh.
46
Frances
Axel wasn’t making things easy for me. His visit, the flowers, it all was a little too much and the fact that first thing in the morning the doorbell started to sound made it clear that he really had it out for me.
My mom showed up to my room door, her hand on her hip and a look of frustration smeared all over her face.
“I don’t know what this is about,” she huffed, “but Axel’s at my front door asking for you.”
“Neither do I mom. Neither do I.”
“Frances, you need to stay away from him,” she warned.
“Mom, if anything, he’s the one who needs to stay away from me. You don’t see me knocking on his door.”
“You did show up to the hospital.”
“That was six months ago,” I replied, throwing my hands in the air.
“I’m just looking out for you, Frances. I can’t imagine what it is that he could want with you and I understand that he got the shittier end of the stick but…you don’t have to deal with him tormenting you about it.”
She was wrong. Whatever it was that Axel wanted to dish out, I would take it- I had to take it. I owed him that much.
“I think I beat myself up enough, there’s nothing anyone can do to make me feel any worse.”
“I’m just saying.”
“I know mom. I know you’re trying to protect me, but it’s okay. I’m old enough to fight my own battles, especially since I’m the one who started the war.”
Downstairs, Axel waited on the couch, one leg crossed over the other. I didn’t greet him in the living room. Instead, I stood a considerable distance away and waved a ‘hello’.
“Let’s go outside,” he said immediately. “Do you have your keys?”
“This is a bad idea, Axel.”
“Oh come on, stop acting like you really think I have a reason to fear you.”
“Just tell me what this is about. Ask me whatever it is you want and I promise, I’ll answer you honestly.”
“I don’t need you to tell me anything. I need you to show me something.”
I agreed, fully aware that I wouldn’t like what I was getting myself into. However, what I didn’t imagine was that he’d have the balls to actually drive with me to the spot where his life almost came to a complete full-stop.
“Get out the car,” he said.
I did as I was told, my hands, my legs, my entire body shaking, my teeth chattering.
“What are we doing here?” I whispered.
“Remembering,” he replied, stepping through the woods.
With each step I made, I felt another sword slide right through my heart. I remembered what happened. Every detail was stuck in my head and replayed at least ten times a day. But to come back to the actual spot, that contained a level of torment that I didn’t know how to deal with. A torment that Axel shouldn’t want to put himself through.
“This is where we were,” I said, stopping a few feet away from where his body went down.
A lump as big as a boulder formed in my throat and I could feel the first signs of tears stinging my eyes.
Axel lifted his shirt and pulled something out of his waist.
“Oh my God,” I shrieked, slapping a hand to my mouth. “Axel, why do you have a gun!?”
He laughed and I saw my life flash right before me. Even with all the nights of hoping that I’d just slip away in my sleep; that one of those nightmares I had would devour the last ounce of life in me, I was shocked, disappointed. It was then that I realized that I wasn’t ready to go, that even the most horrible life was better than no life at all.
“It’s not real,” he chuckled, taking hold of my hand and planting the gun in my palms.
I held onto it without thinking, my hand still shaky with fear.
“What’s this about?” I pleaded.
“Okay, so something came to me last night but before I go spilling anything, I want you to completely lose yourself in what happened. We’re gonna replay it and if you come to the same conclusion as me, then I’ll know that I’m not crazy.”
I played along, feeling as though I had no other choice.
Axel skipped away from me and then called out, ‘ready’.
He approached, the same way he did that night, and I did what I had done. I yelled at him, told him how much of an awful person he was and somehow, managed to feel a pain similar to the one I felt when I found out about the tape.
I waved my hand around a bit and Axel dropped, to the floor. As he fell, I felt as though someone had reached into my chest and ripped my heart right out. My skin was prickled in goosebumps and my face wet with tears.
“Don’t drop it,” he said, motioning to the gun.
I looked down, not wanting his eyes to catch a glimpse of mine.
“Does it feel right?” he asked.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“How you’re holding the gun, does it feel like how you held it that day?”
“I guess… I mean, I dunno. It’s almost been two years. I can’t remember for sure. What are you getting at, Axel?”
“Sit,” he instructed and I followed his lead, clearing away a few leaves before settling down on the forest floor; the toy gun still in my hand.
Outside of the ringing in my ears that I’d get when I came to this spot with Jemma, it used to be peaceful. Now, however, it was tainted in a way that made me want to crawl out of my skin.
“I was shot in the chest. Hit right here,” he brought his hand to his heart, “less than a centimeter higher and I wouldn’t have made it. At least that’s what the doctors said.”
“I’m sorry,” I started to apologize again.
“You don’t get it, do you?” He took my hand and analyzed the position of my finger.
“Do you remember shooting me?”
“I remember you falling. I remember the gun in my hand but the actual shot is blurry,” I admitted.
“It’s not blurry, it just didn’t happen.”
47
Frances
Death or rather, almost dying makes you crazy. Axel’s living proof of that. Clearly, he took a bullet to the chest, so why on earth he was trying to prove otherwise, I had no idea.
“You have a scar, don’t you?” I asked. He nodded. “That means I did it. And as much as I would love to believe that I’m not capable of harming anyone, I harmed you. It’s a fact, not some theory you need to work on proving or disproving.”
“Then you’re lucky,” he said. “We should go play the lottery tonight. You’ll pick the numbers.”
“Axel,” I pleaded, hoping he would start to make some sense; so torn up about what happened that I would do everything he asked.
“Here’s the thing. You were waving the gun around like a lunatic. Sure. I remember that. Like, I can see it clearly. I wasn’t scared even though you had the gun, because I knew that you wouldn’t hurt me- not matter how angry you were. You’re short, you never brought the gun up that high. If in between waving it around, you happened to lose a bullet, you would have lost it in my…” he circled his hand around his groin, moving it up to his chest, “or maybe somewhere here. But the position of your fingers show me that it’s unlikely that you actually pulled the trigger and not to mention the fact that your aim was impeccable, like you really wanted to make sure I was…”
“I never intended to,” I started, but he pressed a finger against my lips and took over the conversation.
“This is going to be just about the craziest thing you’ve ever heard and I know that you won’t believe me but I’m going to say it anyways.” He took a pause, opening his lips and closing them. Then he blew out a breath in preparation. “I didn’t make a sex tape. Jemma claimed there might have been copies at my house, well, there weren’t any. You said you don’t remember texting me- that’s also weird. The fact that after I received your text to meet you here, your phone was turned off- that’s even weirded.”
“You don’t think…” I gasped.
“No. I don’t think. I know for a fact that Jemma was the one who shot me. As freakin’ ludicrous as it may sound, it all came back to me last night, like a vision. I was looking for that damn tape or the copies or whatever and then it just kinda flashed before my eyes. Her, pointing the gun at me, you, yelling at me and then everything went black.”
“No,” I shook my head in disbelief. “You’re just looking for a reason to believe that I’m not a monster.”
“Frances,” he said, resting a hand on my shoulder, “I don’t have to look for reasons to know that you’re not a monster. But this, what I just told you, I’m more sure about it than I’m sure about anything.”
“How is it that the one memory from the first time we had sex that I can’t get back is the one of me planting a camera somewhere? I don’t care how traumatic that is, I would have remembered. Plus, why do you think she was so interested in having a threesome? She had ulterior motives. I know it. I just know it.”
“If,” I said, “and only if, this is true. What do we do?”
“We nail her. For all the agony you felt thinking that you were a killer, for almost taking out one of the most handsome men on earth; the love of your life. We nail her for everything.”
He laughed, a boisterous laugh that sunk his dimples so deep, a penny could get lost in it.
Even though a weight seemed to have been lifting from my shoulders, it didn’t ease itself high enough for me to feel joyful. Axel could be right but he could also be wrong.
‘‘It’s not fair,” he said, “that she gets to move on with her life, fulfil her dreams and we’re just stuck.”
“You’re not stuck,” I replied, “at least not forever. Once you’ve fully recovered, you’ll be able to go to college, move on with your life in any way you please.”
Axel reached for my hand and I let him take it. He kneaded his thumb into my palm. “I am stuck,” he said, running a finger over my cheek, down my chin. “If I can’t be with you, then I am stuck. Sure, I wanna go to college and I want to be somebody but even with all of that, I want to be someone who gets to love you.”
“You don’t want to love me.” I let go of his hand, moving my face away from his embrace.
Carefully, he guided me back to him, so that he was staring into my eyes and I had no choice but to stare into his- those big brown eyes that used to brighten up every part of my world.
He moved closer so that his lips were less than a millimeter away from mine. My body tensed, my heart raced and my t
houghts jarred. “I don’t have a choice but to love you,” he said. “And even if I had full control over my feelings… I’d choose to love you every…single… time.”
I breathed the scent of fresh cinnamon, remembering the taste his tongue introduced to mine, reveling in the way each warm exhale scattered sensations across my lips. With one hand, he glided away the strands of hair that draped over my shoulders, pushing them behind my ear. His finger, long and soft, tickled my earlobe as he brushed past it and into my eyes he stared again. So many memories, so many days lost staring into those eyes. Such familiar eyes that seems so far away regardless of how close they were. He leaned in, his lips parted, his lips wanting mine to cover his. But when he came closer, his hand sliding easily through my hair, I froze. Where we were, what I’d done, what I might not have done, it all came rushing in, pouring down on me like a million nightmares that I needed to wake from.
“I can’t,” I gasped, turning my face away from Axel’s.
“But you want to,” he resisted. “You want us to love each other again, properly this time.”
“What I want and what’s allowed are two different things.”
“You know you didn’t do it Frances,” he said, dropping his hand to the ground, his face wearing the frown of defeat. “You know it was Jemma. It’s always been Jemma- getting the way of ‘us’, of what we should have.”
“I know…” I said as apologetically as I could managed, “I know that I know nothing for sure. What just happened, you coming to the conclusion that I didn’t hurt you, it’s not a fact. I get that you don’t want it to be the truth and neither do I. But until I have concrete proof, I can’t allow myself to love you.”
“It should matter to me,” he said, shaking his head. “I should be the one to decide. If you did it, if you didn’t, I still want to be with you.”
I loved Axel. And my heart wanted nothing more than another heart to beat in sync with- Axel’s heart. My body longed for nothing but his touch. But on the outside, where the truth had already been decided, where I wore a label I could never shake, it mattered. Who I was to Axel would only be who they allowed me to be. Once upon a time, I wasn’t the girl who strived to be accepted. I didn’t care about the names the popular kids called me. I didn’t care that my eyebrows were bushy or that I was a little overweight. Once upon a time, I was comfortable being me. Things were different now. The world was watching me. I didn’t have sidelines to blend into, walls to hide behind. I had eyes and ears that were waiting to see and hear something that they could use against me. This entire town hated me for what I did to Axel and until I won their forgiveness- until I won his mother’s forgiveness- we could never be together.
