by Ali Merci
Carmen ran her fingers through her hair, pushing away strands from her face and furrowing her eyebrows as she stared at her index finger drawing soft circles on Asa’s cheek. “But even after seeing someone, I knew I couldn’t just come to you. You probably needed time to cope, too, and it was only fair that I gave you that space to decide for yourself what you wanted. In the meantime, I figured I needed other relationships in my life too if I ever planned on making one work with you. I had to build other bridges, to put myself out there before I approached you. Otherwise, I would just become used to your presence and yours alone, and I didn’t want this to get toxic. I knew it wouldn’t be a healthy choice for me to continue keeping other people at bay and only making room for you in my life. I needed to make friends, try connecting further with acquaintances, try reconnecting with Dad.”
Carmen’s eyes flickered to Asa’s. “Does—does that make sense?” she asked in a somewhat timid voice. “I—I know I’m speaking too much, that I’m saying a lot. That I’m probably repeating the same point over and over but I want to know if you—”
Asa gently brushed his thumb along her lower lip with a small nod of his head. “Perfect sense,” he promised. “I’m glad you found it in you to finally make a stand and show priority towards your health. I wish things had transpired differently, that your path towards finding yourself and starting to heal all those old wounds didn’t have to include breaking my heart. You made a choice, a terrible one, with painful consequences. But you’ve always accepted me for who I am, always shown a genuine interest in where I come from, always been ready to remind me to love myself and that I’m worth more than I let myself believe. And I don’t want to be that person who forgets all the good that comes with knowing you, just because of one bad choice.”
He brushed away the hair from her forehead and placed a soft kiss there. “I don’t want to let that one choice you made define you for the rest of your life, Carmen. I don’t want to let it define my perspective of you. You’re so much more than a single choice made in a confused and lost state of mind.”
“Thank you,” she told him softly, sincerity swimming in her eyes, and for the first time since Asa had known her. He saw it. Asa saw those three words dancing around in those pools of raw emotions and unknown depths.
A part of him, however, was thankful when she didn’t utter them, because it had been a long night, and so much that had remained unsaid between them were out in the open now. The air around them was crackling with an overwhelming amount of feelings clashing into each other, setting off mini explosions. If she’d said the words now, he didn’t know if he’d be able to truly let himself believe them. It would’ve been a little too soon.
So he just buried his nose into the crook of her neck and breathed in the scent of damp earth, wind and rain that was still clinging to her hair and skin. Carmen was going to tell him she loved him one of these days, he knew that. And on that day, Asa would let himself believe her, before telling her still loved her back too.
For tonight, however, this was enough.
•••
Asa’s eyes landed on the clock next to Carmen’s bed, sitting on top of the small desk with a lamp right next to it. It read 01:00 A.M. in red neon lights. His gaze travelled back to where she was sound asleep in his arms, a single strand of dark hair resting across her face and her breathing steadier than it had been when she’d been reliving her childhood or lack thereof.
He wished he didn’t have to see the beaten-down and worn out part of her, wished he didn’t know it even existed. He wished it had never happened to her, that she didn’t have to go through what she went through. He thought he’d seen how ugly the world could be, thought he’d seen the worst of it—but it had still taken away her innocence and made her see things that she shouldn’t have had to.
But at the same time, wasn’t everything that had happened so far turned Carmen into the person he found himself falling in love with? Because despite everything, she refused to let the world turn her bones to steel, her heart to stone and her tongue to a sword.
Compassion, empathy—these came from places of suffering. And Carmen had seen suffering. That was what made her into the person she was today, the person Asa had loved and will probably continue to love for as long as time allowed.
He didn’t love the girl she could’ve been; he loved the girl that wanted to stick her hands out and dig her way up from beneath all those broken shards and rubble. He loved the girl with the dents and the scratches and the bruises and the scars. He loved the girl who carried an unimaginable amount of light within her, but he understood now that it shone from a place of cold and empty darkness.
And somehow, that made Asa love her even more.
The world broke everyone at one point, but so very few had the strength to pick up the pieces and fit it together, knowing the cracks weren’t a symbol of weakness but a testament of I survived, I survived, I survived.
Asa didn’t need to save Carmen. She’d learnt how to pick herself up and she had survived a long time ago. And for someone who always felt the need to be someone’s saviour, loving Carmen—loving a survivor—was a form of liberation.
Carmen set him free, and Asa gave her a sense of direction. It was as extraordinary and as simple as that.
•••
After gently moving out from under her and placing her head on a pillow, Asa grabbed the blanket folded at the foot of the bed and draped it over Carmen’s sleeping body, letting it fall just underneath her chin. He leant down for a quick peck on the forehead, trailing his thumb over her eyebrow affectionately one more time, before switching off the lights and heading down the stairs.
It was dark down here, too and as Asa was walking past the living room, having to cross it in order to get to the front door, his ears caught the faint sound of the television that was on, and he faltered in his steps.
For one panicky moment, he thought it was Carmen’s dad, but when the light from the screen fell on the person in front of it, allowing Asa a glimpse of the familiar mop of brown hair laying against the sofa’s headrest, he relaxed.
The relief lasted only a while though, before Asa started feeling slightly anxious again. Running into Hunter here hadn’t been part of the plan. At the school cafeteria, or in the hallways, or even during parties, crossing paths with him wasn’t all that huge of a deal, but here, in times like these, when it was just the two of them, Asa truly didn’t know how to handle the situation, and it made him uneasy to the very core.
“I don’t know if you’re enjoying the view from behind.” Hunter’s slow drawl floated over the couch and towards Asa. “But it’s beginning to make me uncomfortable.”
And just like that, the uneasiness dissipated and was replaced by the usual wave of annoyance that washed over Asa every time Hunter opened his mouth.
Rolling his eyes to himself, Asa walked forwards and past the sofa, coming to a stop only when he was at a considerable distance from the idiot.
“You don’t seem surprised to see me here,” Asa remarked, sticking both hands in his pockets.
Hunter’s eyes were glued to the television, the ongoing action on the screen casting various shadows and lights across his face, obscuring the colour of his eyes in the dark room. It made him appear more intimidating than usual.
“Your truck’s out the front, genius,” he muttered, raising the beer bottle to his lips and taking a swig. “Doesn’t take rocket science to put two and two together.”
It was becoming quite apparent that Hunter didn’t know any other language than sarcasm. But, for one wild second, Asa wondered if the feeling of discomfort was mutual, and this was just Hunter’s way of covering up his awkwardness compared to Asa’s natural response which was to freeze and falter.
A beat of silence passed, heavy with a palpable kind of tension.
“Congrats on the win,” Asa said suddenly, rushing to fill in the silence because his feet were still not moving. “I’m guessing that you managed to put t
he quarterback in his place? You know, the one that you almost took a swing at.”
“You mean the one that you just had to get in the way of?” Hunter’s lips twitched, traces of a smirk appearing on his face.
Asa ignored the remark, eyeing the bottle in Hunter’s hands. “Shouldn’t you be out celebrating with the team?”
“I was.” Hunter shrugged, eyes still following every moment on the screen. “But eventually got bored and came home. Besides, this is my idea of celebrating: Daredevil on repeat, popcorn, and a drink.”
“Home?” Asa blurted, unable to stop himself in time and completely taken aback at Hunter addressing this place as home.
For the first time that night, Hunter’s eyes flashed to Asa’s. They almost looked like glass paint in the dark, illuminated by nothing but the light from the television.
“Does that bother you?” he asked in an even voice, his tone giving nothing away.
Asa was even more bewildered than before. “What?” He frowned, pulling his brows together and staring with utter perplexity at the boy seated in front of him.
Hunter sighed and placed the drink next to the small bowl of popcorn on the coffee table, before grabbing the remote and hitting pause.
Asa didn’t want Hunter to pause the episode, as pausing implied the beginning of a conversation. And Asa didn’t want a conversation; he just wanted to congratulate the other boy on the win and keep going on his merry way.
“Carmen wanting to reconnect with me,” Hunter explained. “Me choosing to be back in her life.” His eyes narrowed the slightest fraction as he leaned further back into the couch and regarded Asa. “Does that bother you?”
Asa opened his mouth to answer when he realised that he actually didn’t have a very good response to that. Clamping his mouth shut, he allowed himself to think his words through before saying anything. Speaking to Hunter was walking on a fine line between civility and war; it was tiptoeing around a minefield, the smallest misstep and everything would explode in both of their faces.
“Carmen loves you,” Asa finally said, his tone cautious but steady. “A lot, it seems. Your presence in her life makes her happy. And I care about her being happy.”
“That’s not answering my question,” Hunter said matter-of-factly.
Asa bit down on the inside of his cheek, willing himself to not lose his temper.
“Your presence in Carmen’s life does not necessarily mean you being a part of my life,” Asa told him, not breaking eye contact. “As long as there are clear boundaries between you and I, there’s no reason for me to feel bothered by you and her.”
Hunter stayed silent, observing Asa for a moment longer before he shrugged and ran a hand through his hair. “Fair enough,” he said eventually, but there was something else in his tone—just a tiny hint of it—that Asa couldn’t put his finger on.
“Hey—” Hunter suddenly sat upright, eyes narrowing and nose crunching in confusion “—are you wearing my t-shirt?”
“Are you out of your goddamn mind?” Asa snorted, wondering if the boy had truly lost his mind. “Why the hell would I even want to wear your—” He stopped abruptly, suddenly recalling Carmen handing it to him hours before. Asa had wondered how it had been an almost perfect fit for him. Now it made sense.
“I’m going to kill her one of these days,” Asa finally said in a flat tone, looking down at the t-shirt with a disgusted face.
“That’s my favourite one, too!” Hunter exclaimed, looking genuinely miserable and just flabbergasted. “Now I have to fucking burn it.”
Asa’s head whipped towards him, a deadpan look on his face. “Burn the t-shirt? I have to bleach my whole body once I get home!”
“Asshole,” Hunter muttered.
“Pendejo,” Asa returned.
Hunter sighed like he was dealing with a child. “What have I told you about swearing at me in Spanish?”
“To not do it?”
That earned Asa a glare, not that he particularly minded or was intimidated by it, of course.
A few more beats of silence passed, but the underlying tension wasn’t as overwhelming as it had been minutes back. The awkwardness remained though, doubling, then tripling in its magnitude, until Asa just needed to get out of there.
Was it shame he felt when in Hunter’s presence? The inability to accept that someone who was a stranger had somehow had a huge impact on who Asa was today? The knowledge of the fact that the boy in front of him knew all of Asa’s weakest spots and how to press them?
“I need to go,” Asa said, holding his breath and releasing the words in a rush. “Congrats on the win again.” He turned around, heading straight towards the door and pulling it open, taking in huge gulps of the cool night air as soon as his feet hit the floorboards of the porch.
He didn’t hear the door swing shut nor did he turn around to check if he hadn’t pulled it after him, when he found Hunter’s foot in the doorway, stopping it from closing fully.
Hunter held a finger up, cutting off whatever Asa was about to ask him in confusion. “I need to say something,” he told him.
Asa blinked. “I was just inside. Could’ve told me then.”
“I wanted to,” Hunter said curtly. “And was just about to when you started taking off.”
Asa stuffed his fists into his pockets again, irrational anger simmering inside him. He didn’t want this. Didn’t want to have to speak to this person standing in front of him.
But Asa was also not walking away.
Why was that?
“I know you said that it wouldn’t make a difference to you anymore whether I had this conversation with you or not,” Hunter began, stepping over the threshold and closing the door behind him. He moved towards the railing of the porch and leant his back against it, crossing one leg over the other and folding his arms across his torso. “You also said you no longer needed the closure.” Hunter held his gaze.
“I don’t,” Asa said stiffly, grounding his teeth together.
“I call bullshit,” Hunter stated easily enough. “But for your sake we’ll say you don’t need it anymore and that I’m doing this for me.”
Asa furrowed his brows together, frowning hard as his perplexed state only grew worse. Every time he thought he had Hunter figured out, another layer was peeled off and he got another peek beyond the surface of the cold shell.
“I don’t have a problem with who you are, never did.” Hunter shrugged indifferently, but this time Asa’s eyes caught on to the façade. It was crumbling now, ever so slowly. This—whatever was happening now—seemed to matter to Hunter, despite the nonchalance he was trying so hard to feign.
“With who I am?” Asa asked.
“Yeah—” Hunter nodded “—with where you come from. With your language. Your skin. Your identity. Whatever.” He shrugged again. “Doesn’t matter to me.”
Asa was feeling a little dizzy with all the questions that were storming his mind right now, but he kept his lips sealed because Hunter looked like he had more to say.
“I only picked on you for them because it was easy to,” he said slowly, wincing when the words spilt out of his mouth, apparently only realising how blunt they sounded once he heard himself saying it. “Sounds harsh, but I’m not going to bother sugarcoating. Too much has happened for me to downplay things. I’ll say it like it is. And when I say you made it easy for me to identify all your breaking points, I don’t mean it in the sense where I blame you or where I’m trying to tell you that you contributed to the shit I put you through.”
Hunter exhaled, looking away and running his hand through his hair before bringing it down over his face again. “I mean it in the sense that I saw weakness and I was terrible enough to feed on it.” His eyes met Asa’s once again. “There were cracks in the wall you’d started building around you because of all the hate you got from other people, and instead of helping you mend those cracks, I decided to take a hammer and keep swinging at those spots ’till it was you who broke.”
; Asa could hardly do anything else but blink repeatedly, his brain and every other sense deciding to hibernate during that conversation.
“Why…” Asa cleared his throat, forced himself to sound composed. “Why are you telling me this?”
Hunter tilted his head to the side, narrowing his eyes slightly as he studied Asa. “Because you told me that redemption starts with the people I’ve wronged. That it starts with me making things right with people I have no personal ties to, in places where I don’t have any personal gains…” Again, he shrugged. “So here I am, at that starting point.”
If Hunter seemed to be doing a lot of shrugging tonight, it seemed like Asa was doing a lot of blinking. As if each time his eyes shut and flew open within a matter of seconds, the scene before him would vaporise. As if it would turn to smoke and float away like one of those phantom effects they showed on screens.
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to say,” Asa said slowly, uncertainly.
Another shrug. “You can walk straight to your truck and drive away. I’m not telling you this because I expect you to respond. I don’t expect your forgiveness, or your empathy, or even your understanding. I owed it to you, and closure is probably the only thing I can give you that would mean anything anymore. I’m just stating the cold hard truths here, San Román.” He unfolded his arms from across his chest and placed them against the railing. “I don’t give a shit about your race. It makes no difference to me. And I wanted to let you know that the only reason I picked on you for it was because I saw how much it broke you when others made racist comments at you. I saw your insecurities form, saw them pile up, and I took pleasure in kicking you where it already hurt.”
