The Storm and the Darkness

by Sarah M. Cradit

  “That’s why I come here,” she said. “Or Carl’s, or Voodoo Lounge, or wherever else I end up. To find someone I can take home and never speak to again.” She looked around, her gaze even and steady. “There’s too many familiar faces here now. I think I’ve overstayed my welcome.”

  Oz reached across the table and grabbed her hand without realizing it. She didn’t seem to notice, occupied with signaling the waitress her intention to close out the tab. Oz wasn’t ready to leave. He wasn’t ready to go home. He was feeling something he hadn’t felt in so long. Exhilaration? Hope? He knew the night would have to end eventually, but he wanted to delay it as long as possible.

  Oz didn’t know why they had happened upon each other in that dive bar, and he didn’t care. He didn’t care about their silly past–it was so many years ago, really–or whatever her demons were. He just wanted to be in the presence of someone who took his mind off of Adrienne. He loved his wife so very much, but it was a love that was slowly killing him. Sometimes he thought he might claw his own eyes out in frustration at how hopeless his situation was. While he could not stand living with the constant anxiety of waiting for her to run, or leave, he could not live without her, either.

  But that night, Oz wasn’t thinking of any of that...

  He watched Ana as she paid her tab, signing her name in one messy line that looked nothing like a signature. She closed the small black book and stood up in one move, gliding toward the door without looking at anyone. He followed her out, and when she turned to say her goodbyes, he put his hands on either side of her soft, pale face and kissed her.

  “Adri-” she began, breathlessly, but he pressed his lips against hers to stop the words. He backed her into the wooden building, feeling her at first reluctantly, then willingly slipping her arms around his shoulders.

  Oz didn’t remember her flagging the cab, nor did he recall any of the details of the drive to her apartment back in the Quarter. He did catch a few suggestive comments from the cab driver, but Ana tipped him well anyway. Oz only faintly recalled the sound of the car driving off as he stumbled with Ana onto the sidewalk, twisted in a sweaty embrace.

  “I want you,” he panted, slipping these words into any momentary pauses in kissing as they fumbled up the stairs and into her apartment. “I want you...”

  She might have asked him a few times in the cab if he was sure? If this was what he wanted? But by the time they were in her home, and her bed, there were no further objections from Ana. Her experiences with strange men had left her far more commanding and skilled than he recalled from the night of their prom, the night he took her virginity. Back then, she had looked at him with wide, frightened eyes, but this time her eyes were forceful, hungry. Not even with Adrienne had he experienced such a heat and intensity. He realized, as night turned to morning, that his longing for her was so great that it would never be satisfied. Where was this Ana, years ago? Whoever she was now, he could not get enough.

  But when, late the following morning, he awoke next to her, the humid breeze sweeping through her open windows across his face, the only thing he felt was horror and regret. His heart leapt into his chest, racing. His palms were covered in sweat. She was already awake and while the look she gave him was blank, her posture was heavy. He sensed her regret mirrored his.

  Oz was too consumed by his own feelings to think of hers. His mind was reeling with the events of the previous night–that amazing night, that horrible night–and he was rambling to Ana now–“oh god, what did we do? Oh god, oh god…” Ana was trying to help him find his clothes but she was too slow for him, so he was snatching them out of her hands–“This...I can’t...no, no, we did not, what is…” She tried to reach for him but he pushed her away, accidentally pushing her to the floor. “I..I’m sorry-” he mumbled but was looking for his wallet, his keys, his phone.

  He had twelve missed calls, all from Adrienne. Of course she had called. Oz had never stayed out all night, never not come home.

  “Colin!” Ana screamed, using Oz’s given name, bringing him temporarily to his senses. “No one has to know,” she said, when she knew she had his attention. “It never has to happen again.”

  “No one has to...are you mad? Look at me?” He lifted up his shirt to display the marks from her lips, hands, fingernails. “It’s all over me! It’s all over my face! It’s all over your–well no, nothing is on your face because, as usual, you’re a frigid bitch!”

  She slapped him and the sharp sound reverberated through the quiet room. “I didn’t see you complain last night,” Ana said with an eerie calm; as if he hadn’t yelled at her, as if she hadn’t just slapped him so hard his face was stinging hotly. “I’m sorry it happened, Oz, but your life doesn’t have to end because of a mistake.”

  Oz was trembling with fear, rage, and confusion as she slowly dressed in front of him, her face only slightly betraying her own inner turmoil. “Tell her you got beat up,” she suggested as if it made perfect sense. “Robbed, left for dead in an alley. She will believe you. She would never suspect you, of all people, of doing something like this.”

  He could not believe how calm Ana was, and it only made him angrier. “She’s your cousin, Ana! How are you going to face her? How are you going to face Nicolas? How can we possibly keep this a secret? ARE YOU INSANE?”

  She laughed, and he felt his hands ball into frustrated fists. “You’ve called me worse than that, Oz. Hell, you called me worse than that a few seconds ago. You know how I will keep it from Adrienne? And Nicolas? Same way you will...because I love them, and I would rather see them happy than unburden my guilty conscience, causing them pain and possibly destroying their lives.”

  “You don’t sound very guilty,” he accused her.

  When Ana looked at him then, he saw the tears in her eyes. He saw the dark circles; the lines. He saw her toes curling around each other, something he had seen her do years before when she was sad, or frustrated. “We can’t take it back, Oz,” she said softly. “I wish we could, but we can’t. So what option do we have, other than to do our best to keep it a secret?”

  Oz softened. He knew Ana was not a bad person...cold and difficult to connect with, but not bad. She had been his friend for many years, and in thinking back on her actions after their breakup years ago, she had actually done him a favor pretending nothing had happened. It saved his friendship with Nicolas, and meant that his life could go back to normal. With what happened last night, it could have been so much worse. She could have been sick with remorse and insisting they tell Adrienne. She could have been crying in a corner, asking why he did this to her. She could have responded a lot of damaging ways, but instead she was removing her emotions and seeing it logically, as he should. They made a terrible error in judgment, but she asserted they didn’t have to ruin everyone’s happiness over it. Could she be right?

  The tears were flowing down her face now, and she looked away in shame. She never liked anyone seeing her cry. He walked over, feeling remorseful at his earlier behavior toward her, and laid his hand on her shoulder. She still carried the perfumed scents from the night before, but there was also that light, fresh smell that he knew as hers. Of clean laundry and a windy day at the beach.

  She slipped into his arms, and as he held her he was overcome with the extent of his feelings for her. She had been in his life as long as Nicolas, and was his friend. His good friend. Maybe even, if he could admit it now, his first real love. She was the woman he might have ended up with had she been able to let him in, past her defenses.

  Right then, though, the only woman that mattered was Adrienne, and getting home to her as quickly as possible. He couldn’t tell his wife what had happened–Ana was right, that would be selfish. He could make it up to her by trying to understand her better, and being more empathetic of her situation; less resentful.

  Oz walked away from Ana’s apartment that day feeling an unexpected hopefulness that he knew was strange given the circumstances. On the way home, his mind filled with memories of
Adrienne. Remembering moments when he had loved her deeply, and his worries were nonexistent. Oz would do anything to recapture that magic, and he knew it was in his power now. His complete betrayal of Adrienne had opened his eyes, bringing him out of his numb existence to the realization of how much he still loved her. Of just how much he would do to see her beautiful smile again.

  Adrienne bought his story, just as Ana said she would, but that only brought Oz’s guilt back to the forefront, dwarfing his newfound happiness and energy. The more time went on, the more the guilt crept forward, pushing his hopefulness further back. He didn’t know how to recover that feeling of empowered euphoria he had after leaving Ana’s apartment.

  He hadn’t wanted to, but he found himself, on several occasions, calling Ana and talking to her about it. Each time they talked, he could sense that she was growing more and more worried for him. “I can’t do this,” he would tell her. “It’s eating away at me, like a cancer.” He kept remembering that night with Ana, but the memories filled him with longing, not shame. He wanted to see her again. When he suggested it once–“just to talk, you’re the only one I can talk to about this”–she gently refused.

  Oz should have known Ana would leave. He was ashamed of all the cruel things he’d said to her. For all her aloofness and coldness, her heart was a mile wide. She had given him an out; with her gone, he might be able to move on and get past it. Ana had given him a way to save his marriage.

  Now there was only guilt, guilt, and more guilt. Oz would not let her suffer any longer for a mistake that they had shared together.

  Chapter Thirty-Four: Ana

  Ana was speechless. She may as well have been physically frozen for all her body’s unwillingness to move. Her head throbbed with such intensity that her vision pulsed, making the room flow in and out of focus. She stared at Jon in very real terror, a prisoner in her own body. She wanted to scream, talk, anything, and in the end the only word that croaked out was, “You.”

  At the same time, both of them realized his hand was over hers. Why on earth…what the hell was going on? She tried to sit up, but her vision throbbed into blackness and her head quickly found the pillow again. Jon rushed to tend to her and, her mouth still uncooperative, she spoke with her eyes. Back off.

  “You…you’re awake.” He seemed nearly as flustered as she was. She needed to know what was going on, whose bed she was in…how she had gotten there. Questions; she had so many questions, so many that her head could not wrap around all of them so they spun there, unasked, making her head pulse and ache all the more.

  Ana looked at the IV in her arm, and her hand grasped at the tube in her throat. She pawed at it like a wounded animal and Jon rushed to her side again. He asked her to calm down so he could remove it. She nearly threw up as the tube brushed up the back of her throat.

  “I’m sorry if that hurt a little...”

  Ana opened her mouth to respond but no sound came out, just dry, heaving gasps. Her throat felt full of cotton. Jon seemed to grasp that at least, and he made a clumsy move to grab what looked to be his water, bringing it to her. She wanted to snatch it from him and help herself, but her body was stiff, the tingling telling her that it was still trying to wake up. Warily, she let him put his hand behind her head, and tilt the glass toward her dry lips.

  “Thank you,” she said, surprising herself at the sound of her voice. Sound, feeling, sensation. How long had she been here? So many questions…

  Nicolas. She needed to talk to Nicolas.

  When he put the water down, she closed her eyes to get control of herself. She did this when the world would spin out of control around her, but it wasn’t helping this time. Her toes tried to curl, but her muscles rebelled. What was the last thing she remembered…dinner with Finn? No, it was after that, but her head hurt so bad…

  “Easy,” Jon said tentatively, as if he were a visible witness to her internal struggle. “You’ve been asleep for over a week, you need to take it slowly.”

  Ana watched him, unable to do anything else. He looked terrified. What does he have to be so worked up about? She wondered. It couldn’t be that he was frightened of her, could it? She was just a helpless girl who couldn’t even prop herself up in a civilized manner.

  The familiar ache in her chest started, spreading throughout her body. Her dead limbs came to life at this new sensation, but the ache was overwhelming. Nicolas, where is Nicolas, she wanted to say; he had always been there when she had needed him. Where was he?

  New Orleans. And I am in Maine. And I have been asleep for…what did he say…over a week? Shit.

  Ana wanted her own bed, her own surroundings. She needed to feel in control even to breathe, and had not gained her beloved sense of control since awakening.

  She remembered that accident from her youth, that horrible accident. I don’t understand how your daughter can sleep for a week and wake up perfectly fine, the doctor kept saying.

  Do you remember sleeping for a week, Ana? Her father had asked, when they were home again.

  No, daddy. The doctor’s questions had terrified her.

  Don’t be scared, darling. It’s how your body protects itself against bad things. You go to sleep, and when you wake up you’re all better. That’s not so scary, is it?

  No, I guess not...

  Jon was still staring at her, but when she started to take heavy breaths, he moved to sit on the edge of the bed and began examining her. He had his hand on her forehead, then he pulled a stethoscope out of the nightstand. His close proximity was worsening her physical reaction. Go away, go away, go away. “Go away!”

  He sat back, blinking. He is so strange. “I have medical training,” he explained, his eyes pleading for understanding. “I’ve been taking care of you while you were…asleep.”

  “You’re a vet,” Ana panted through her panic attack. Her toes were curling harder and her tongue was fixed to the roof of her mouth. Breathe.

  “I know people medicine too,” Jon insisted. “I trained for years with my father. It’s a long story.” He sat back further, allowing her space. “We didn’t know when you were going to wake up. He would have been here, but he went to get food. I’m sure if he had known you were going to wake up he would have waited-“

  She cut off his rambling. Jon was just as terrible at small talk as she was, but that didn’t make it easier for her. “He?”

  “Finn. My brother.” He looked concerned, as if he might need to ask if she knew her name and who was currently president.

  “Oh.” Of course. Finn. Things were still fuzzy, but the connections were coming back to her. “I had been coming here to return his keys…”

  “When you fell?”

  Ana looked at the bed. “I guess that’s what I did.”

  “You don’t remember?”

  “It’s not that I don’t remember, it just happened so fast.” The rocks were slippery and the snow was whipping around her so furiously she couldn’t see her hands in front of her anymore. Her breathing was rapid again, and this time he didn’t ask for permission. He propped her head back up, offering her some more water, and then coaxed her: “You have to breathe.”

  No shit.

  Ana curled her toes tighter and slowed her breathing, forcing herself to calm down. She didn’t want to pass out again in this house.

  “I should go,” she said, pushing herself up.

  Jon laughed. It sounded unnatural coming from him. He was looking down, trying to hide it.

  “Is that funny?” She asked, offended.

  “No, it’s just…here, let me show you something.” He came to help her out of bed. She wanted to refuse, but was still shaky and didn’t want to humiliate herself by falling on her face in front of him. He walked her to the window and her breath caught in her throat as she looked outside.

  “Holy…mother of…” She started to fall, and Jon’s arms quickly righted her again.

  “Yeah,” Jon said. “Over two feet deep. Roads are closed, the ferries are shut down,
and we ran out of food because the boathouse tanks spilled.” He helped her back to the bed. She hated it, but appreciated it. “That’s why Finn went to get food.”

  “How is he out getting food if the roads are closed?” Ana asked, as he helped lower her back onto the bed. For as much as she had wanted out of the bed, she felt exhausted and relieved to be back in it now. Then Cocoa jumped on to the bed, startling her. She gasped as she saw, with relief, how nimble and healthy she looked. The cat rubbed up against her and purred loudly. Ana ran her hands over her soft fur, feeling a lump rise in her throat. He did this, and he’s been caring for her ever since.

  “He took the snowcat.” Jon frowned, and Ana could see this disconcerted him. “If he doesn’t make it back tonight, we can expect him tomorrow.”

  She didn’t say anything. These guys knew their snow; certainly more than she had when she foolishly risked her neck to deliver some keys, of all things.

  Jon pulled out a leather doctor bag and she resisted the urge to chuckle. I didn’t know those existed outside the movies.

  She tried to sit still while Jon checked her pulse, her eyesight, her reflexes, and what seemed like a hundred other things. He asked her a series of questions to test her memory. Growing in confidence that Jon was trying to help, she was patient with the, perhaps overly thorough, exam.

  “You seem to be...okay,” he said, perplexed, as if he was expecting her to have no heartbeat, or be speaking in monosyllables. “I’ll have to monitor you, of course, but...” He was still touching the side of her head again, checking her neck, the base of her scalp. She wondered if maybe he wanted something to be wrong.

  She noticed the large medical books lying open on the desk across the room. Or maybe he’s realized that I’m doing a heck of a lot better than I should be. Whether he had or not, Ana knew she needn’t explain it. He would never believe the truth even if she told him.