by Olivia Grey
“It’s about to get dark,” I turned to Frances.
I wasn’t afraid. I’m not the kind of guy who hates the darkness- not that any guy would admit to such a fear. But me, I wasn’t hiding behind pretenses. After all, I’d been stuck in a darkness that didn’t have the luxury of a light switch… or a moon.
“We have to find Jemma,” she insisted, her face twisting in confusion.
“I doubt you’ll find her here.”
“We’re only two minutes away. Five at the very most.”
I forced a laugh. “Sweetie, Jemma does not live here.”
“But this is the address Alexis gave us. This is where she is. This is where she has to be.”
She was desperate, I hated seeing her that way. A nervous tap she released on the steering wheel, eyes that darted from here to there and back again- not finding Jemma would be damaging.
“I should have never forced you into this,” I said, a hand resting lightly on her knee.
“No…” she looked at me alarmed, “don’t apologize. You were right. You were right all along. I need to know if I did it. I need to be able to sleep at night without…” she paused. “I need dreams back. I need to be able to dream- at night time and during life.”
61
Frances
There’s this feeling I used to get when I was younger, having permitted a smidgen of mischief to overcome me. It wasn’t never up to anything horribly bad- not until I met Jemma but the guilt of the small devilries would consume me, even before I’d worked up the courage to follow through. The most common misdoings usually involved sweets. My parents had rules about candy- how much I was allowed to eat and when I was allowed to eat them. After dinner, that was the rule. However, before, sometimes long before, like after breakfast, I’d get a craving for something sweet. I’d always wait by the kitchen, my heart racing and blood steaming. I’d wait there with one eye on the cookie jar and another hoping not to catch a glimpse of my parents. In these moments, I felt wrong- like there was something mean inside of me, tempting me to do what I regarded an unforgivable action. But the reward, it would be sweet by all definitions of the word and I’d give that meanness permission to win. I’d steal a cookie or chocolate bar and I’d enjoy it, wipe away any guilt until I felt it rumbling around in my stomach. Looking for Jemma made inklings of my childhood resurface. The agitation in my stomach, the quickening of my pulse… the guilt. And though I knew that this was different, I felt the same. I was so close to the cookie jar and I just had to open it.
“We should turn around,” Axel said.
“Let’s stay in a hotel and think about it,” he insisted.
“I’ll pay for the hotel,” he offered.
If I had agreed, I’d have been walking away from that cookie jar with an unappeased appetite. And I know what it’s like to walk away. The agony of not taking the cookie was always harder to console than the guilt of sneaking a bite.
“Frances,” he said, his hand massaging my thigh, “just turn around.”
“No. We can’t,” I resisted, “we’re here. She’s sitting in that building, probably smiling at all the lives she’s ruined and that hurts.’’
“It’s dark, Frances. We can come back in the morning.”
“I’m not afraid of the dark, Axel. I’ve dealt with the darkness inside of Jemma… the darkness in me and I’m okay to deal with this kind of darkness too.”
We were parked on the side of the road in a rather shitty part of town- maybe the shittiest. I wondered, but only for a moment, what brought Jemma to such a place but I didn’t allow my imagination to play out scenarios for too long. She’d traded her glitzy friends for normalcy when she chose me and now, she’d done the same with her surroundings. A beat up one story house which even in the dark, showed years of lack of maintenance. There was a small yard with knee high grass, accented with bulky yellow trash bags.
“Ready,” I turned to Axel.
He nodded but only because he knew he couldn’t change my mind. And he was right. I needed to see Jemma, I needed to confront her and walking away wasn’t an option I even began to consider- not in that moment.
I stepped out of the vehicle, one foot on the rocky stone paved road… and then another. The air smelled rotten, like burned trash with hints of something more putrid- dead animals, a broken sewage system.
My eyes met Axel’s, but only for a moment, as he took in his surroundings.
There were lights on in some of the houses, but not in the one Jemma apparently called home. There were voices, but not one comparable to Jemma’s high pitched tone.
I was the first one to make steps toward the house, through the grass and to the front door. Axel weaved his fingers into mine, protectively. He was scared, maybe more for me than he was for himself. He didn’t need to be. As long as I got the answers I was looking for everything would be alright.
Axel squeezed my hand and then pulled me around to face him. I stumbled on an empty beer bottle on the litter ridden porch. We both froze, looking at each other as the glass clanked from step to step- the sound disappearing as it found a home in the grass.
“Shit,” Axel gasped, his face pointed in the direction of the bottle.
I heard footsteps, quiet but quick. There was someone in the house; someone who didn’t wish to be seen.
“Shhh.” I pressed a finger against Axel’s lips, drawing his attention to the movement inside.
“There’s someone in there.”
“Uh-huh.”
I don’t know what came over me. We could have hidden, come up with a concrete plan and then moved forward. But my fingers took control and I found myself knocking on the door, yelling Jemma’s name at the top of my lungs. Axel, who’d previously tried to pull me back, now stood with a hand over his mouth and shock in his eyes. There was a chance, of course, that she wouldn’t let us in. There was a chance that my voice scared her away. But the Jemma I knew, she didn’t fear anyone and as much as I thought we had a plan in coming here, I knew she most likely had a better one.
“Jemma,” I called, “open the damn door.”
The door remained closed, footsteps shuffling around even faster.
“Open the damn door, Jemma,” I called, louder this time.
To my right, the curtain moved, just a peek and before I could catch a glimpse of the person who opened it, it was closed again.
“I’ll break the damn door down if she doesn’t open it,” I said to Axel.
“We should leave, Frances,” he insisted.
“I’m not going anywhere. I know she’s in there. Do you hear that Jemma. I know you’re in there and I won’t leave until I talk to you.”
“Jemma’s not here,” came a voice: a rough voice, a masculine voice.
“Alright,” Axel said, “she’s not there, let’s go now.”
“No. No. No. I know she’s there. You’re trying to tell me that some dude is on the inside and he’s afraid to open the door. I’m not buying it.”
“Have you seen the neighborhood,” Axel replied, “the Hulk would be afraid to open the damn door. Now, let’s just leave before…”
I don’t know why, but in that moment, I felt like I could read Axel’s thoughts. The neighborhood was terrible and with all terrible neighborhoods the crime is high. There’s a common denominator here though, and one I didn’t consider until I saw the suffering on Axel’s face consider- guns. Neighborhoods like the one we were standing in often came with gun related crimes; gun related deaths. Axel’s been on the other end of a gun, receiving a bullet that took him out for a year, one that could have taken him out for good. I was being inconsiderate, thinking about a cookie jar when I should have been thinking about him.
“We can go,” I settled, feeling defeated but knowing I had no other option.
I made up my mind to leave but I didn’t make up my mind to stay away. Axel would book a hotel and soon after, I’d find my way out- that much I was sure of. If Jemma was in that house, I needed to get to her b
ut I also needed to keep Axel protected.
Axel leant a hand to me and I took. But what happened next was so sudden, so unexpected, that it felt like someone thrust a fist right against my heart.
62
Axel
I woke up to Frances’ voice. There’s something about the melodies in voices that work their way into our cores, igniting senses, bringing out emotions, restoring faith. Frances had that voice, the one that caused the good kinds of goosebumps to coat my body from top to bottom. A chirp, I think that’s the best way to describe it. When she talks it’s like a song and one that my body responds to in all the right ways.
Jemma, on the other hand, had a devilish voice. She wasn’t soft spoken or chipper. A politician’s voice- it, the voice of a politician. No matter what they say, you know there’s an ulterior motive, you know that there’s a lie embedded in its demands. She wasn’t the politician you’d vote for- not just by hearing her on the TV. But she’s the one, who would show up at your door with her sinister tone making you vote for her and ensuring you’d regret it. That night, I didn’t hear that voice. I didn’t hear the mean girl or the politician coldness her tongue usually vocalized.
“I’m sorry.”
Two words. That’s all she said, both in speech and in meaning. I’m sorry.
“I thought,” she said, looking at me, “I… um… I thought you were… I thought they would have… I just… I’m sorry.”
“Well sorry’s not good enough,” Frances spat. Her voice was venomous. “You have no idea. Just no idea.”
“I do,” Jemma insisted, her head peeking through the crack in the door.
She didn’t dear to open it any further and maybe that was a good thing. The rage in Frances had turned her into a person I didn’t recognize. Turned her voice from chipper to rough.
“You were the one who shot Axel,” Frances yelled, her voice breaking. She steadied it with anger. “You did that. You tricked me into being your best friend so that you could pin a murder on me.”
Jemma’s face disappeared, the door closed and Frances was right there, throwing fists against it. Within a matter of seconds, a light was flicked on and a creaking illustrated that the door was being opened again- this time wider.
Jemma never ceases to surprise, to amaze, to shock. Never. I stood there, with my jaw dropped wide and no conceivable way of slamming it shut. My hands could have helped but they were shaky with nerves; shaky with disbelief.
63
Frances
Like fish need water, that’s how much my fists begged me to throw them against Jemma’s face. One hand, right to the nose. Another, cracking open those deceitful lips of hers. And then another. And another. Some more, until my fists were red with blood that couldn’t be designated. Mine or hers? Hers or mine?
Axel sighed, a long hard breath that fizzled out like air from a balloon. My fists unclenched, unwillingly, or willingly, I wasn’t sure. And Jemma, she cried; not tears that needed to be blinked out, sending only a smidgen of liquid above a cheek. Instead, tears that ran like a waterfall, unobstructed, persistent large droplets that wouldn’t have stayed put with eyes wide open or a head tilted back.
“You’re…” I started.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s not about what you see. None of that matters. I’m just sorry. A horrible person. A horrible person who’s just sorry and happy,’ she sobbed some more, this time using the back of her hand to smear away a few droplets. ‘I’m happy that you’re okay,” she tilted her head to Axel. “And Frances… I just…”
“You did this Jemma. You’re the one who put us in this horrible situation. Admit that. Admit that you did this to us. To me and Axel. Admit it.”
All the time she was nodding, her head moving slightly up and then down again. I’d disregarded it as a kind of pause; waiting for me to finish until she put her witches mask right back on and took us on another trip. But she said ‘yes’ and I didn’t know what to do. My phone was tidily tucked away in my back pocket without whizzing through a timer, collecting a confession. I wanted to pull it out, catch her voice convicting herself. That’s what we came here for; that’s the big hurrah at the end of the race. But my phone wasn’t recording. My phone wasn’t capturing her voice. My hands didn’t help either. They were stuck on my hip, trying to stay bold; to make me seem stronger than I was.
“I did it,” she said, this time in a whisper, her head tilted away from us and her body following.
Jemma entered the house, a wobble in her step, sniffling, breathing heavy.
I could see Axel from the corner of my eye, watching me but I didn’t have the courage to let him know that I saw him; to see him eye to eye. We lost. This wasn’t the battle we came to fight. We, or at least I, had brought fists of steel and a heart of vengeance- the wrong weapons.
“Come in.” She looked over her shoulder, flicked two fingers forward.
Axel was the one to make the first hesitant stride toward her and then, not knowing what other approach to take, I followed. The hallway was murky, sticky, stained, like a kid who spent days on the playground, rolling around in the dirt. The tiles weren’t any better. Every few steps something on the ground would hold my foot in place, only to be pried away when urged. Someone ought to take a mop through the place, I thought.
“Sorry we didn’t clean up,” Jemma commented, seemingly having read my thoughts. “We just don’t usually have visitors.”
A few more steps and we entered a living room that kept up the gloomy ambiance. A bulky television sat atop a chipped wooden table, thrown over a stained rug that stretched to the foot of the couch. The living room couldn’t have been any more than a generous one-hundred-and-thirty square feet and everything was crammed regardless of the limited number of fixtures. A lamp plugged out and leaned up in the corner- out of use. A picture of a forest that hung slanted on the wall. A couch: old, used, worn, wishing to be thrown out.
“Sit, please,” Jemma said, her fingers doing that forward flicking motion again.
Axel sat down then raised to his feet again when he noticed I wasn’t following her lead. Even in this moment, where I felt like she was the vulnerable one, I needed to rebel. She told me to sit and so I stood. No more control, Jemma. I’m not in your palm anymore.
“Understandably,” she breathed. Her tears were gone now but her eyes still looked like they wanted to cry.
Axel cleared his throat. “You owe us an explanation.”
I rolled my eyes. I needed her to be guilty. Not only by definition but in all aspects of the term. I needed her to walk the same walk of shame I’d gotten used to. My heart bled to have her feel the seclusion, the loneliness I’d felt. I needed this. I counted on it.
Resting a hand on the arm of the sofa, Jemma guided herself into it. A screech replaced the silence as she wiggled around, finding comfort before clasping her hands on her stomach.
“Why are you pregnant?” I blurted out. They words couldn’t sit any longer on my tongue. From the moment she pulled that door wide enough for us to catch a glimpse of more than half her face, I wanted to say it. I wanted to curse her for it.
She gave a chuckle, albeit a forced one. “Well…” she started and then paused. Searching for humor?
I knew what she wanted to say. I got pregnant the way people do, sex? Forgot to keep my legs closed.
“I made a mistake,” she said.
“Just one,” I cut her off, my voice finding it impossible to rid itself of the sting.
“Not this,” Jemma released her fingers, rolling a hand around her stomach. “This isn’t a mistake. It’s not.”
She seemed to look at us for approval. I bowed my head. I will not feel sorry for her. I don’t want to feel sorry for her. I will stop feeling sorry for her.
“I wish you would sit with me, Frances.”
“I wish you would push that child out behind bars.”
“Frances!” Axel’s head whipped itself in my direction. My heart had tightened long before that
; at the thought of saying what I’d said.
I needed to hate her. I needed to say callous things and I needed to mean them but how do you hate a woman who’s stripped away all the evil you could see? On the inside, I believed she was the same- always thinking she’s one step ahead of the game, always scheming. But on the outside, Jemma wasn’t the Jemma I knew. For starters, she was round, her cheeks were swollen and her nose pudgier than I remembered. Her face was bare, not even a smudge of eyeliner in sight. A pimple, just above her eyebrow wasn’t covered over with a mountain of concealer. She wore a t-shirt, tainted with tonight or maybe last night’s dinner. Her pores didn’t ooze something sweet; something your nose pleaded to get a second whiff of. And, she lived in a dump! Sure, the trash was properly strewn on the lawn outside as opposed to inside the house but compared to where Jemma came from…this place was unremarkably remarkable.
“It’s okay,” she turned to Axel, her lips pressed together and her eyes wide. She wanted to start with the waterworks again, I could tell. “Frances has ample reason to hate me… and… so do you… even more. You have even more reasons to hate me.”
She was right about that!
“Mhmm,” Axel said and somehow it sounded soothing.
My mind ran away for a bit, doing a calculation that should have been obvious. In jail for a year. Axel’s been out of his coma for seven-ish months. One-point-seven. A baby takes 9 months. Not Axel’s!
“Can I just ask one question?” Jemma sniffed. She directed the question to Axel, fully aware that he was the most approachable party. “You love her,” she sobbed and then her glossy eyes flickered in my direction. “You love that girl so much and I always knew it. It gutted me and then I thought it saved me. That kind of love…”
