“Will your aunt be wondering where you are?” I ask.
Ben shakes his head and rolls up his sleeves, exposing his scar. “She pretty much gives me free rein.”
“You’re lucky.”
“I don’t know.” A lock of hair falls over his eye. “Sometimes it’s nice to have someone waiting up for you.”
“Did your parents used to wait up?”
“My mom did. My dad was always too busy.”
“Do you still talk to them much?”
“At least a couple times a month. I talk to my mother, mostly. My dad and I have always had our issues.” He looks down at his scar, perhaps suddenly self-conscious. “What happened with Julie only made things worse.”
“Because he blamed you?”
He shrugs. “He never really said either way, but he was definitely disappointed.”
“That must have been hard,” I say, wishing I could’ve been there for him.
“Yeah, I was pretty messed up about it. I started meeting with a therapist, but it was only for a short period of time, because even she didn’t support me.”
“I’m sorry,” I say, reaching out to touch his scar, and feeling how truly wounded he still is.
“So, shall we get down to business?” he asks, nodding toward my worktable.
I lift the pieces of tarp to show him my crossword tiles, and how I’ve etched in some of the clues.
Ben looks at Adam’s most recent crossword puzzle—the one that says I WANT TO SEE YOU BLEED lying open on my work board. He picks it up and presses it between his palms. I watch as he closes his eyes and concentrates hard. His hands quiver slightly, and the paper crinkles up.
“What do you sense?” I ask.
“You,” he whispers.
“Because it was with my pottery stuff?”
“I guess…. I’m not really sure.”
“So, let’s get started,” I say.
Ben stands just behind me, and we begin to wedge out a fresh piece of clay. I try my best to concentrate, to ignore the fact that my heart is beating at five times its normal speed. I watch his arms as he kneads the clay—almost a little too hard—and as the muscles in his forearms flex. “That’s good,” I say, in an effort to stay focused. I dip a sponge into a bowl of water and squeeze the droplets down over his hands to keep things moist.
After several minutes, Ben lets me take the lead. I place my palms over the clay mound and close my eyes. Meanwhile Ben’s chest grazes my shoulders, and his clay-soaked fingers stroke the length of my arms.
“You’re doing great,” he whispers in my ear.
We continue to sculpt for another hour, working the mound down into a flattened surface—until we have a total of four tiles.
And until I can no longer hold myself back.
I turn around to face him.
“Camelia?” He squints slightly.
I bite my lip, wishing that he could read my mind, and that he would kiss me until my lips ache. “What are you thinking?” I ask, slipping my hand inside the waistband of his jeans and pulling him closer.
His mouth trembles, but he doesn’t answer, and so I turn back to our work. A jumble of emotion swims inside me—need, disappointment, embarrassment, frustration—and my eyes suddenly sting. Still, I glide my fingers over the surfaces of the tiles, confident about the word that fits inside. It plays in my mind’s ear. I can see it in my mind’s eye. It’s like a flashing neon sign that makes my head throb.
“Soon,” I whisper, writing the letters using the tip of my finger. I look at my clay replica of the crossword puzzle, somehow confident about where the word fits. I remove the four tiles at the lower left—the horizontally placed ones that help make up the capital L shape—and replace them with these tiles. Then I turn back to Ben, eager for his response.
“Stay out of it,” he says.
“Excuse me?”
“Stay out of what’s going on with Adam, I mean. It isn’t safe.”
“How can you say that?” I ask. “I mean, you, of all people, should understand what I’m feeling.”
“I do understand.”
“So, then, where is all of this coming from? Why does the word soon suddenly change things? This person still wants to see Adam bleed; he still thinks that Adam deserves to die….”
“I know.”
“Then, what?” I ask; my voice gets louder. “Because I feel like you’re not telling me everything.” I look up at the door that leads to the kitchen, hoping I haven’t awakened my parents.
Ben studies my face for five full seconds, noticing maybe how red my eyes are, how flushed my face is. “Just trust me on this,” he says.
“On what?” I snap, keeping my voice low.
“On the fact that I’m trying to protect you. That I’m trying to protect us and our relationship.”
“You can’t do this,” I insist. “You can’t go on leaving me out. This is my relationship, too.”
“It’s our relationship.”
“So how come lately I feel like you’re the only one in it—calling all the shots, playing with my head?” I think of all the times he’s shown up on a whim—at my house, at my bedroom window, in the parking lot at school, and when I was on my way back from Detroit—only to pull away, leaving me confused.
“I’m sorry,” he says, nearly choking on the words. “But believe me when I say that I never meant to hurt you. That’s what I’ve been trying to avoid all along.” He reaches out to take my hand, but it’s way too little and far too late.
And so, for once, it’s me who pulls away.
“I really think you should go,” I tell him. There’s a crumbling sensation inside my heart.
Ben’s eyes are red, too, now, but he still doesn’t argue. Instead he gives me a paltry peck on the cheek, and then heads out the bulkhead door.
AUDIO TRANSCRIPT 8
DOCTOR: What do you have there?
PATIENT: What does it look like?
DOCTOR: A pen. Some paper.
PATIENT: Let me guess: did you graduate with honors?
DOCTOR: High honors, if you must know. What are you writing?
PATIENT: Soon.
DOCTOR: Soon what?
PATIENT: Soon, I’ll get what I want. Soon, things will be as they should.
DOCTOR: What do you want? How should they be?
PATIENT: (Patient doesn’t respond.)
DOCTOR: Can I see your notebook?
PATIENT: (No response.)
DOCTOR: Is that a crossword puzzle you’re doing? See, I knew you liked puzzles. And how are you doing at finding the answers?
PATIENT: Great. Really, really great.
AFTER BEN LEAVES, I head back upstairs to my room, only to find Dad in the kitchen. He has his back toward me, sneaking a bag of Bugles from one of the baskets above the cabinets.
“Caught you,” I say, switching on the light, making him jump.
“Shouldn’t you be in bed?” he asks, keeping his voice low.
“Shouldn’t you?” I give him a pointed look.
“Probably, but your mom actually fell asleep tonight—probably the first night all week. Meanwhile, I’m too hungry to nod off.”
“So, where does that leave us?” I ask, eyeing his bag of Bugles.
“Can you be trusted?”
“That depends. Are you willing to share?” I smile. “Good hiding spot, by the way. Nobody ever uses those baskets.”
“That’s what you think.” He gazes down the hall to make sure the coast is clear and then snags a bag of Hershey’s Kisses from one of the other four overhead baskets.
We park ourselves at the kitchen island and rip both bags open. Five full minutes of lusty devouring pass before either of us speaks.
“I wanted to talk to you about earlier,” he says. “About Aunt Alexia. Apparently, her treatment isn’t working so well.”
I pop a Kiss-stuffed Bugle into my mouth. “That facility isn’t the right place for her. I’ve even told Mom so.”
Dad
stops chewing and studies my face, curious, maybe, as to why I’m so convinced. “Aunt Alexia got into some trouble tonight,” he tells me. “Shortly after you left for Wes’s, Mom got a call from the director of the facility. Alexia stole a nurse’s cell phone and tried to make a call.”
I close my eyes, thinking about the phone call I got earlier. “Do you know the nurse’s name?”
Dad resumes eating as he thinks about it a moment. “Haven,” he says, between chews.
“Haven,” I repeat, standing up from the stool. My face gets hot, and my mind starts to scramble. I replay the voice-mail recording in my head, sure now that it was Alexia who called me earlier tonight.
“Is something wrong?” Dad asks, reaching out to touch my arm.
I shake my head and sit back down.
“According to your mom,” Dad continues, “Alexia feels different somehow—misunderstood and at the same time more intuitive than anyone else around her.”
“Intuitive?”
He nods and continues to study me. “She says she’s able to sense things about the future. Can you imagine what that must be like?”
My eyes betray me by filling with tears. I look away, down into my palms, suddenly feeling as if it’s me who’s going crazy.
Dad gives my forearm a squeeze and asks again if something’s wrong.
But I honestly have no words.
Tears course down the sides of my face, and yet I have no idea what I’m crying about anymore—if it’s for Aunt Alexia, or my relationship with Ben, if it’s for everything that Kimmie and Wes are going through with their parents…Maybe it’s just for me.
Dad allows me to crumple up in his arms. He holds me for several minutes before escorting me to my bedroom and tucking me into bed. “Is there anything you want to talk about?” he asks.
“I’m tired,” I whisper, rolling away so he can’t see my face.
“You’ll feel better after some rest,” he says, kissing me on the temple. “And don’t you worry about your aunt. Everything will work out fine in the end. It always does.” He moves her journal from my pillow, placing it on my bedside table without so much as asking where it came from. Without so much as a hint of surprise that it even exists.
I LIE IN BED, my head full of questions; the word SOON is lit up behind my eyes, making my head ache. I glance over at Aunt Alexia’s journal, noting how the pages are yellowed; how the cover’s been torn, patched over, and torn again; and how Alexia’s name is emblazoned across the front in thick black marker.
Is it possible that Dad didn’t notice what it was?
Unable to fall asleep, I grab my cell phone to get Kimmie’s take on things, including my recent blowout with Ben, but before I can even dial, it rings.
“Hey,” Adam says when I answer. “I’m sorry to call so late.”
I check the clock. It’s a little before midnight. “Is everything okay?” I catch my reflection in the dresser mirror, noticing right away how tired I look. The skin beneath my eyes is bluish gray, and my hair looks matted and dull.
“I got another one,” he says.
“Where?” I ask. My head throbs.
“On my windshield. I was at the library for a couple hours. When I got back out to my car, it was there, folded up in an envelope.”
“And what did it say?” I ask, almost expecting to hear him tell me, “Soon.”
“Check the bed.” His voice cracks saying the words.
“Excuse me?”
“That’s what it said.”
“And what’s it supposed to mean?”
“Call me crazy, but I think it might mean that I should check my bed.”
“Not funny.”
“Who’s laughing? I’m paranoid about going home now. I’m having major flashbacks to summer camp. You know, itching powder in the bedsheets, snakes under the pillow, getting your hand dipped into a bowl full of water while you sleep—”
“You’ve started locking your door, right?”
“Yeah. I mean, mostly.”
“Which one is it, yeah or mostly?”
Adam lets out a sigh, making the answer pretty obvious.
“I just don’t get it,” I tell him. I mean, if he’s so concerned about his safety, if he’s really as nervous as he’s making himself out to be, he’d be locking his door. Every time.
“Say something.”
“Were you alone at the library?” I ask.
“Initially, but then I saw Tray and Janet. Melissa was there, too. We all just sort of bumped into one another.”
“And did they see the crossword puzzle? Have you even asked any of them if they’ve been receiving these puzzles, too?”
“I asked Piper.”
“And?”
“And she had no idea what I was talking about,” he says.
“So, where are you now?”
“Driving around, talking to you. I just passed the Press & Grind. God, I wish they were open right now.”
“Come and get me.”
“Camelia—no. It’s way too late. I’m sorry I even bothered you.”
“Come now,” I insist, pulling on my coat. The word SOON still flashes before my eyes. “We don’t have much time.”
I CRAWL OUT OF MY bedroom window and meet Adam at the end of my street.
“I hope I’m not getting you in trouble,” he says, once I’m inside his car.
“Is that the puzzle?” I ask, ignoring his comment, eager to get down to business. I grab the envelope from the dashboard and unfold the paper inside. Adam’s filled in the letter blocks; the words CHECK THE BED scream up at me in bold black letters.
Adam turns toward me. His eyes are wide, and his face looks slightly sweaty. “So, what do you think?”
“I think we’d better go check your bed.”
He swallows hard, seemingly surprised. “For real?”
I nod, and he reluctantly puts the car in drive, pulls away from the curb, and heads toward his apartment.
“Did you tell anyone that you were coming out with me?” he asks.
“Of course,” I lie, feeling like an idiot for failing to tell a single soul, especially since he’s duped me in the past. “I called Kimmie and Ben.”
“And what did they say?”
“That they’re giving me an hour, tops, before they come looking for me and/or calling the police.”
“That’s a pretty protective posse you’ve got there.”
“It is,” I agree, gazing out at the street. I rest my hand on the cell phone in my pocket, relieved to know it’s there.
About fifteen minutes later, Adam pulls into the parking lot at the back of his apartment building. But instead of going around to the front, he leads us down a narrow alley, insisting that we use the side entrance.
“It’s quicker,” he says, opening the door for me.
The entryway is almost completely unlit except for one low-watt bulb that hangs down from the center of the ceiling, illuminating a dank and tiny space.
“Are you sure this is the way?” I ask, startled by how dark it is.
“I live here, remember?” He smiles and opens the stairwell door, sticking close by my side.
We climb the two flights to his floor and then stand outside his apartment. Adam looks more nervous than I’ve ever seen him before. He fumbles for the right key.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, aware that he’s stalling. I look at my watch. It’s well past midnight now.
“I just don’t know what I’m doing,” he says.
“Why? What do you mean?”
He shrugs. His jaw is visibly clenched. And he looks almost as fragile as I did a few months ago. “I shouldn’t have brought you here,” he whispers.
At the same moment, there’s a creaking sound, like someone’s walking nearby on the floor. I peer down the hall, but I don’t see anyone.
“I mean, what the hell am I doing bringing someone I really care about into a messed-up situation like this?” he continues.
“I care abo
ut you, too,” I say, reaching out to touch his hand. “That’s why I’m here.”
Adam clasps my fingers, but he doesn’t quite look me in the eye now. “I should’ve called Tray. It’s just…I don’t know. It’s like I don’t know who I can trust anymore.”
I nod, knowing exactly how he feels. “You can trust me,” I say, almost able to hear Kimmie’s cynical voice inside my head, telling me that this is Adam’s ploy—that he’s acting all vulnerable just to gain my trust and sympathy, and that I’d be better off walking away.
But instead I squeeze his hand tighter and remind him that the police are just a phone call away. “They could escort us inside. We could turn everything over to them right here. Right now.”
“Not yet.”
“Then when?”
Adam shrugs again. “I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers.”
“Hence the puzzle,” I say, trying to make him smile.
It works. His face brightens slightly, but still…He looks almost as remorseful as that night about a month ago, when he told me how much he cared about me. When he realized what a big mistake he’d made by seeking me out as a way to get revenge on Ben.
“I should take you home,” he says.
“No,” I say, pulling him closer to the door. I try the knob, relieved when it doesn’t turn.
Adam unlocks the door; it makes a deep clicking sound that cuts right through my core. A moment later, I hear more creaking noises from down the hall. I turn to look just as Adam ushers me inside the apartment and locks the door behind us.
“When was the last time you were here?” I ask.
“Around dinnertime. I went to the library after that.”
“Did you see Piper?”
“Just for a second,” he says, looking toward his bedroom. “Oh, right, she mentioned you’d stopped by.”
Instead of asking me what I’d wanted, he moves in the direction of his open bedroom door. “I might as well get this over with, right?” he asks. “Like ripping off a Band-Aid?”
I follow close behind him, my cell phone clenched in my hand. From just inside the doorway, his room looks completely normal. I move to the foot of the bed.
“So what now?” Adam asks before venturing toward his bed pillows. With shaking hands, he checks beneath them. “Nothing,” he says with a smile of relief.
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