Oblivion (9 page)

“Ethereal me. Right.”

“Don’t you ever want to blindly believe, Callie?” A smile
slowly spreads over his face. “In something? Anything?”

I force a swallow over the half pill lodged in my throat.

“Hey, baby.”

I startle, but manage a smile by the time Elijah is nudging me farther into the booth. Sitting next to me now, he leans toward me, presses an open-lipped kiss to my mouth, and squeezes my leg. “Sorry I’m late. Missed the train.”

He smells like fresh air and antibacterial soap. There’s a smudge of dirt on the inside of his left elbow. I’m guessing he came directly from the soccer field, after too quick an attempt at washing up.

John offers his right hand. “John Fogel.”

Elijah gives my thigh another squeeze before releasing me to shake John’s hand. “Elijah Breshock.”

The two of them remain locked in the gaze, hands firmly grasped, like they’re involved in some sort of showdown. I wonder what Elijah overheard. Although the conversation was cryptic—anything incriminating happened only in my mind—discomfort courses through my veins like polluted water through a faucet.

I close my fist around the tiny marquise ruby ring hanging from the gold chain around my neck.

At long last, their hands part. “What are you drinking?” John asks, signaling again for the wait staff, which has effectively avoided his previous summonses.

Elijah slaps his fake ID down on the table. “I’ll take a Miller.”

“Omigod, I am so sorry!” Lindsey—wearing jeggings, an off-the-shoulder black sweater, and over-the-knee, five-inch-heel, black suede boots—slides into the booth.

Suddenly, I feel uncomfortable in my worn jeans, T-shirt, and hoodie. I wonder why Lindsey didn’t clue me into the fact that she’d be dressed to the nines when she arrived here after the homecoming committee meeting. The ambrosia of mary jane and Vera Wang’s Princess wafts in her wake, but her blue-green eyes are clear. Her black hair is twisted up in a claw clip, with a few tendrils framing her ivory face.

“Hello, Jon.” Her lips curl into half a pucker, like a bow she’s daring him to untie.

After a quick acknowledgment—“Hi, Lindsey”—he glances down into his mug, then back up at me, only to again look away.

Elijah gives her a nod. “What’s up?”

Her eyes flash their jade brilliance. “Ooh, we’re drinking.” She must’ve seen his ID. Her yellow Fendi shoulder bag lands with a
thunk
in the center of the table, concealing a green
Musicians Do It with Rhythm
sticker. She digs into her bag and produces her own fake before nudging her way into the booth.

As John scoots in farther to make room for Lindsey, one of his feet bumps into mine. We share a glance, but I quickly look away.

Elijah’s hand returns to my leg. “Want a drink?”

Cobblestone paths of her memory
.

“Just more water.”

Someone onstage is singing a bad cover of Eric Clapton’s “Bell Bottom Blues.”

It’s a song I’ve heard a hundred times or more throughout the course of my life, a song my mother sang when I was a little kid. The memory is misty at best, but I remember her voice echoing through a long white hallway. Afternoon sun slanting through the windows and warming my cheeks. Me, stringing beads on a thread: blue, purple, pink … blue, purple, pink.

The image attempts to fill me with a cozy feeling, not unlike the way I feel the first moment Elijah closes his arms around me, but I can’t quite grasp the warmth. I tighten my hand into a fist, but the comfort slips away. I sprint down corridors in my mind, searching for the right door, the one that will lead me back to that safe, carefree moment, but I can’t feel it, can’t find it.

“And the best part about it,” Lindsey’s saying, “is that the staff will decorate the ballroom for us. So we homecoming committee members don’t have to get there early.”

My ears begin to ring, drowning out the sounds of the Lindsey Show. Today’s topic of conversation—All Things Homecoming according to Lindsey Hutch. Special guest of honor—Lindsey Hutch. Interviewed by your host—Lindsey Hutch.

A plate of bread and cheesy asparagus dip sits where Lindsey’s purse used to be. Its aroma is a nagging lure, pulling me from the warm white hallway. Pulling me out of the memory I so desperately want to grasp.

Elijah’s bouncing a quarter against the table; it clinks off the rim of a highball glass.
Chink, chink, chink
.

Another memory: cold rain, a shovel.
Chink, chink, chink
.

Elijah bounces the quarter again; this time it clangs into the glass and plops into four ounces of beer, which he’d poured from a pitcher he’s sharing with Lindsey. “Niiice.” He slides the drink across the table.

Lindsey takes it up, begins to drink. It’s the only thing that’s shut her up since she walked through the door.

John looks to Elijah and me. “So, how did you two meet?”

Elijah’s hand finds its way back to my thigh again. “We had some mutual friends.”

Meaning social workers at County. I’m glad he was cryptic about it. No need to go into the day I arrived there, wearing County-issue scrubs. No need to elaborate on his being there for breaking and entering … again.

“Been together since the day we met.” Elijah’s walking his fingers up and down my thigh. “Isn’t that right?”

“Just about.” I feel John’s stare, but I don’t dare to acknowledge it any more than I dare to challenge Elijah’s definition of together.

Lindsey triumphantly slams the glass down on the table, and displays the quarter she’s retrieved from its pool of amber ale.

Elijah refills the glass, pouring from the pitcher.

“So as I was saying, I won’t have to be at the hall early.” Lindsey begins to bounce the quarter, aiming for the glass.

Chink, chink, chink
.

Again, the memory of a cold night encompasses me. Digging.

Cobblestone
.

I shake my head. I can’t take it anymore. The medication has done nothing to help the words go away. My head pounds with the pressure.
Walk not on cobblestone paths of her memory. Walk not on cobblestone paths of her memory
.

Everything’s getting blurrier by the second. It’s coming. I feel it.

“You all right?” John asks.

Elijah, after a quick glance, gives my water glass a nudge toward me. “Breathe, baby.” He squeezes my thigh.

I hear the
chink
of the quarter against the table.

“Pay no attention.” Lindsey’s voice sounds in an echo, as if she’s speaking down a tunnel: “Don’t make a big deal out of it.”

I wonder if John’s heard about my affliction, how he’ll react when he sees me drowning in the words. I reach into my bag, close my fingers around my red felt-tip pen. My
knuckles graze against the spiral binding of my notebook.

The Vagabond starts to spin. I focus on my notebook to ward off the dizziness. It’s hot in here. Sweat breaks on the back of my neck; it feels like a pelting of icy rain.

I bite off the pen cap and press the tip to paper:

Walk not the cobblestone paths of her memory in black veiled

I need a new pen. The red has faded to pink. It’s hard to make a mark.

Chink chink chink
accompanies the acoustic guitar onstage, becomes the wind and the broad blade of a shovel pressing into the moist earth, shifting the dirt, disturbing a resting place.

Black halos threaten to close in on my vision.

I shove my hand back into the bag, in search of another pen. Lollipop. Hairbrush. No pen. No pen. No pen! My stash of felt-tips is in here somewhere … just can’t find it. Too much stuff. I pile it all on the table: note cards, receipts, gum wrappers …

“I’ll get it.” Elijah’s pulling the bag from my lap.

“Here,” John’s saying. “I’ve got one.…”

Lindsey’s sigh reverberates around me. “Has to be red.”

My breath comes in staccato increments. God, I’m such a freak.

Chink chink chink
.

The room is spinning fast now. I focus on my notebook and blink a few tears onto the lined paper. Try again with
the red felt-tip. Only a streak of light pink. I bring it to my mouth. Suck on it, in hopes my saliva will rejuvenate the tip. Just a few words. Just have to eke out a few words before I black out.

A blue ballpoint lands on a diagonal slant atop my notebook. Moments before I snatch it up—I have to, have no choice—Elijah presses a red felt-tip into my hand.

And suddenly, I feel the cool mist of lake water spraying off rocks at the shore. Someone’s singing. Someone’s laughing.

It’s my mother. She’s laughing.

Laughing.

Leaning back into the arms of a handsome man.

Laughing!

Chink chink chink
.

I flinch, and the Vagabond bleeds back into view. I gasp.

“You okay now?” Elijah asks.

“Yeah.” I wipe away a tear before it manages to escape, and release my held breath.

Elijah’s lips brush against my temple a moment before I hear the quarter plop into the beer. His hand leaves my thigh, quick to snatch up the glass and pay his dues.

When I look up, John’s staring at me. It’s a casual expression, as if he’s not surprised with what’s just transpired. But of course he must’ve heard about the girl who showed up at Carmel four weeks ago at the beginning of junior year, the girl who maybe killed her father, maybe knows
what happened to Hannah Rynes, the girl who’s a slave to the words in her head.

I wipe another tear.

He repeatedly clicks open and closed the blue ballpoint.

I scan the words, as familiar to me now as my own name. I’ve written these exact phrases before, but I can’t remember when:

Walk not on the cobblestone cobblestone cobblestone cobblestone paths of her memory in black-veiled grief to relieve you. Mourn not for her mind mindmindmind, her beauty, her mouth, drawn down, so quick to believe you.

When I look up from the page, my gaze trips into John’s, who was sneaking a peek at my words.

One corner of his mouth turns up.

I feel a heated blush painting my neck, my cheeks. I break eye contact.

Chink, chink, chink
.

“So, Lindsey,” I say. “When do homecoming tickets go on sale?”

“Tomorrow.”

My phone buzzes twice in succession. I give it a glance.

“Who’s that?” Lindsey asks.

Everyone who’d normally text me—Lindsey, Elijah—is here. I recognize the number. John gave it to me during Lit class. What’s he thinking, texting me in front of Lindsey? In front of Elijah? “It’s Yasmin Hayes,” I hedge. “Question about homework for calc.”

John raises an eyebrow. We’re bonded now. By a lie I just told.

“Yasmin’s a square,” Lindsey says.

With a smile threatening to spread over his face, John engages Lindsey: “She’s not so bad. Crazy smart. Going to Harvard, I hear.”

“Whatever.”

I click on the first of John’s messages:
ur a poet
.

No
, I want to say. I’m
insane
.

And the second:
slip 43. midnight
.

T
his is risky.

But I suppose it was risky to Facebook with him all evening, too.

Something innate is pulling at me, forcing me to put one foot in front of the other, to flee from the safe, warm confines of the Hutch house, into the black uncertainty of night, toward open, waiting arms.

I sneak out the back door, and set the alarm again before I close the door; I don’t plan to be back until late. The senior Hutches won’t wake up, but I left a note for Lindsey in case she does. I told her I’m going to see Elijah at my old apartment above the Vagabond.

She’ll believe me. It’s not like it’s an unheard-of possibility.
I think about the clinking of quarters in glasses and wonder if she and Elijah now consider each other friends. If they ever compare notes about this late-night absence, I’ll have some explaining to do.

As excited as I am to reach the harbor, part of me wishes I were doing exactly what I told Lindsey I’m doing. I want things to be the way they used to be. I don’t like keeping things from her. I want to fall asleep in Elijah’s arms, awaken to kisses and clarity, and all things that make sense.

Shutter
.

Elijah’s the only guy who’s consistently been here for me, and he’s the only one I’ve ever been with. I made out with Palmer’s protégé a few times—on the altar at Holy Promise—but I don’t think I would’ve taken things much further, even if Palmer hadn’t caught us. God, the punishment I’d suffered for kissing Andrew Drake was brutal. I wish I’d gotten away with it, without the lash of Palmer’s belt across my back, without the rebaptism in the holy water fountain in the center of the labyrinth.

I wonder if I’ll get away with what I’m doing tonight.

Anxious nerves in my fingers twitch. Images of red felt-tip words dance in my brain:

Flutter shy. Shutter fly. Flutter shy. Shutter fly
.

My hand is in my bag now, fumbling for a pen. I’m wheezing with every inhalation, can’t draw in a breath, can’t focus on anything but the words engraving themselves in my bones, stabbing my brain.