by Melissa Marr
tunes.
Tunes some more.
And then some more.
Tunes
tunes
tunes,
But never plays.
Krista shifts in her chair,
stretches her bare feet,
which are probably
falling asleep.
Her movement stops Mickey,
fingers on the guitar’s pegs.
He lowers the head
and lets the instrument
roll forward,
strings facing down
in his lap.
“I haven’t written it yet,” he says.
“Not one note, in all these months.”
Krista holds up her hand,
speaking for herself.
“Why not?”
He traces the curve of the guitar’s body
with his palm,
and I want more than ever to be him
for one moment,
touching the smooth wood.
I would make it sing.
Finally he says,
“Writing his song
would be too much like saying good-bye.”
I can’t believe I’m hearing this.
“That’s bullshit, and you know it!”
Before she can finish translating,
I point straight at his heart.
“You’ve been saying nothing
but good-bye
since the night I died.
All you care about
is me passing on,
getting out of your life.”
Krista speaks my words,
inflecting them just like me,
and I wonder how much anger
is mine
and how much is hers.
Mickey says,
“I just want him to be at peace.”
“No!” I hurl back.
“You want you to be at peace.
And you think dying—
or at least not living—
is the best way to find it.
And I totally don’t get that.”
Krista says what I said,
then turns to me.
“I get that,” she chokes out.
“He thinks he could’ve stopped you.
He thinks he could’ve saved you.”
“I could have.”
Mickey grips the neck of the guitar.
“I could’ve kept the drugs
out of his hands.”
I shake my head.
“You saw me turn it down,
just like you and Siobhan—”
“I should’ve known,”
Mickey says over me.
“I should’ve known
that record company rep
would push him harder
when I wasn’t looking.
He was always so eager to please.
I should’ve asked later.
One question:
‘Did you keep the cocaine?’
But I was too busy
and too annoyed,
thinking, He’s a such a big shot now
he can take care of himself,
and if he can’t,
that’s his fault.”
Mickey closes his eyes.
“One question.
It could’ve saved his life.”
I turn my head
from the sight of the pain
that’s twisted Mickey’s memory
and broken his soul.
I did this to him.
“He knows that’s not true,” I tell Krista.
“He knows I would’ve lied.
I always lied
to keep from pissing him off.”
He gives a bitter laugh.
“Yeah, or to keep from pissing off
Dad.”
Then Mickey freezes,
his eyes creasing harder than ever.
“Oh God.”
He clutches his elbows,
bends forward like he’ll be sick.
“He was afraid of me.”
Krista raises her hand.
“He still is.”
“Why? When?
I thought . . .
I thought we were friends.”
I try to remember
when Mickey and I were friends.
Before we were
the Keeley Brothers
with a capital B?
Maybe when he was George Clooney
and I was Brad Pitt.
“So what do you want?”
I realize Krista’s talking to me.
“Huh?”
“What do you want?” she repeats.
“You brought us together
so you could talk to him.
What do you want him to know?”
Mickey braces himself,
hands squeezing his knees,
eyelids squeezing each other,
like he’s about to be sprayed
with poison.
After 233 days,
I have no eloquent speech,
no moving lyrics.
“Besides being alive again,
I want . . . more than anything . . .”
I wait while she translates,
then continue,
so she won’t have to stop
through this next part.
“I want you to know
that I love you, dude.
And no matter what you think,
it wasn’t your fault.
It was mine.
But I forgive you
for not saving me
from myself.”
I wait for him to explode with,
“You forgive me?
That’s a good one.
You should beg me
to forgive you
for ruining my life,
for hurting
Mom
and Dad
and Dylan
and Siobhan
and everyone else
stupid enough to love you.”
But instead,
Mickey’s shoulders rise
and fall
in the longest,
fiercest
breath
I’ve seen him take in months.
He closes his eyes
and pulls the head of the guitar
toward his own,
presses the pegs
against his forehead,
so hard,
that when he turns
to look straight at me,
not through me,
there’s a dent
in his skin.
“Thank you.”
And then.
(Uh-oh.)
He starts to cry.
I haven’t seen this
since the night I died.
I don’t know what to do.
But Krista does.
She kneels before him
and takes the guitar from his lap.
He sinks forward
into her arms,
adding his tears
to the water from her hair
speckling her new shirt.
They cry together
for their
loved,
lost,
dumb
brothers.
Kurt Cobain
didn’t die in the bathroom,
because he died on purpose.
Anyone with a plan
wouldn’t choose the bathroom,
unless they’re super considerate
and thinking of the mess.
I don’t know
if Mickey was thinking of Cobain
when he decided
Ocean City would be the last stop
on the road trip of his life.
I don’t know
what he was thinking
when he packed
that gun
and that shirt.
But the important thing is,
Krista now has bot
h.
When the rain ends,
we take Mickey’s guitar
to the beach,
find a spot where I sat
when I was alive.
He plays
with trembling fingers
and a voice
rough from weeping
but stronger than before.
Others gather around,
in twos and threes.
Mickey takes requests,
but mostly he plays
our old favorites.
For once, I carry the harmony
instead of the melody,
since Krista’s are the only ears
that hear me.
Siobhan and Connor appear,
fiddle and guitar in hand,
summoned by a text from Mickey.
And now it’s like
a Keeley Brothers
acoustic reunion gig.
Perfect.
But after a while,
I fall silent
and just watch
my brother and sister
sing without me
smile without me
live without me.
They’ll be okay.
Without me.
I give Krista a soft “Thanks”
and brush her shoulder
with a hand she can’t feel.
She watches
as I stand and turn away.
I’m pretty sure
what she’s done tonight
wouldn’t count as
an official Senior Week
“Play It Safe” activity.
But Mickey was long past
being saved by safety.
I walk to the edge of the water
where I can still hear their voices
mixed with the ocean.
The lifeguard stand beside me
is empty and bare
except for one thing:
a long black ribbon
faded to gray,
the name Cindy
printed in gold-turned-yellow.
The girl who drowned at spring break.
That’s how she’ll be remembered—
for her death,
not her life,
as people our age always are.
Did she become a ghost?
Is she standing next to me
right this second?
Has she already passed on?
My own trip to peace,
too long and too strange,
is nearing the end.
Mickey was my last,
biggest,
scariest
detour.
Behind me I hear Krista say,
Something-something “lifeguard stand,”
and I want to run
or swim
or just disappear.
But I stay.
As the next song starts, it’s missing
one voice.
Soft feet thump the sand behind me,
one pair.
I don’t turn,
don’t hope,
don’t dare.
My brother stands beside me,
alone.
He takes a deep, soft breath,
and speaks my name.
SKIN CONTACT
by Kimberly Derting
Rafe stopped where he was in the middle of the blacktop and stared out ahead of him, straining to see through the darkness. He tried to gauge how far the road stretched before him, tried to calculate how much farther he had to walk.
He really didn’t need to see, though. He knew, even without ever having been there before. He was close now.
He started walking again, counting his paces as the chain that hung from his wallet slapped against his hip in a steady rhythm. Trees rose up from both sides of the narrow stretch of deserted highway, and the sound of gravel crunching beneath his heavy black boots was the only noise he could hear. It seemed too loud, and it reminded him of how alone he was out there, in the dead of the night. He felt like a target, walking down the middle of the road like that.
It had been easy enough to ignore the strange look from the trucker he’d hitched a ride with, when he told the old guy he’d be walking the rest of the way. Rafe knew what he’d been thinking when the rig shuddered to a stop in front of the insignificant mile marker—not even a real exit—with no restaurant or gas station in sight: Walking to where? Where the hell was this kid going, out here in the middle of nowhere?
But it didn’t matter what that grizzled old fart thought; Rafe needed to be here. He had to find out if this was real or not.
From somewhere behind him, he heard a bird—an owl, probably. He’d never actually heard one in real life before, he’d only seen them in cartoons as a kid, but that was exactly what they’d sounded like on TV.
He continued counting his steps and doing the math in his head. Fifty-six down. A hundred and sixteen to go.
A hundred and fifteen . . . fourteen . . .
How do I know that? How can I possibly know how many more steps I have to take till I get there?
He shrugged, feeling the weight of his backpack, heavy on his shoulder. He just did, that’s all. He used to doubt them—his dreams, the ones that came to him like memories—but he was starting to realize that they were rarely wrong. Even when he wanted them to be, like this time. He wanted so badly for this one to be wrong . . . just a plain old stupid fucking dream.
He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out the cell phone he’d bought at the truck stop where he’d hitched his last ride. It was one of those prepaid deals, so no one could track him down, so no one could figure out where he’d gone. He flipped it open to make sure he still had service—way the hell out here. There were three bars left; he shouldn’t have a problem placing the call when the time came.
When he tucked the phone away again, his fingers brushed over the doll Sophie had given him before she’d disappeared, and his chest ached as he rubbed his thumb and forefinger over the woolly hair sticking up from its head. He missed Sophie. He missed holding her, kissing her, arguing with her.
The doll was one of those ugly little trolls with a scrunched-up face and a naked stocky body and shocking neon-pink hair. Only this one had been altered. Sophie had used a Sharpie to streak its pink hair, and to paint its fingers and toes her favorite color: black. She’d even given it a piercing, shoving a tiny silver stud through its wide, flat nose. She called it her lucky doll.
“Here, keep him,” she’d said, pressing the doll into Rafe’s hand and forcing him to close his fingers around it.
“I’m not keeping Goober.”
“His name is Goob, and I want you to have him. This way you won’t forget me while I’m gone.”
Rafe had tossed the doll onto the bed behind him as he reached for Sophie, pulling her down onto his lap and squeezing her, crushing her against his chest as he inhaled the scent of her cheap strawberry shampoo. He didn’t want to think about letting her leave. “Damn it, Soph, don’t go. I don’t want to have to remember you with some fucked-up doll.”
Sophie gazed up at him, her eyes glittering. She’d cried so many times since she’d told him she was leaving that he wondered how she could possibly be doing it again. He, on the other hand, hadn’t shed a single tear, and he knew that made him some kind of prick or something, but he didn’t care, he was too pissed to cry. “I mean it, Sophie. Stay with me; I’ll keep you safe. If that bastard tries to come anywhere near you—”
She shook her head, wisps of her dirty-blond hair tickling his chin. “My mom needs me, Rafe.” She pushed away from him, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. “She can’t take care of Jacob by herself. She can’t get a job if she can’t afford a babysitter, and she can’t get a babysitter without a job.”
“So you’re supposed to . . . what? Just quit school so you can babysit your little brother? Connie’s supposed to be the mom, not you.” Same goddamn argument, different goddamn day. One he’d already lost, e
ven before it had started.
And Sophie knew it. She bit the ring in her lower lip, the sparkle in her impish pale-gray eyes telling him she was no longer interested in fighting. She shoved him backward until he fell onto his twin bed—the one that was almost too cramped for the two of them. Almost. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and he felt the familiar jolt, the charge of electricity he always felt whenever their skin touched. She pressed her chest—her breasts—against him. Sophie was great at distractions. “C’mon, it won’t be forever. I’ll only stay until she can get settled somewhere, get a job, and get Jakey into day care or something. Then I’ll come back.” She nuzzled his neck, her lips and her tongue promising all of the things her words didn’t.
He sighed, surrendering to everything she offered. But if he was going to let her go, he needed her to have a keepsake too. He tugged at the ring on his finger, a black stone surrounded by carved stainless steel that he’d picked up when they’d gone to get her lip pierced. He’d bought it because of its cool biker vibe, but it had never meant anything to him. Until now.
“I want you to have this.” He inched back just far enough so he could hold the ring between them.
Sophie’s eyes filled with tears again. He loved that about her: she was an emotional wreck.
He grinned. “Does that mean you’ll take it with you?”
She sniffed, her fingers shaking as she took the ring. “Does that mean you’ll keep Goob?”
Rafe grimaced. He reached behind him, his hand searching for the ugly-ass doll. When he found it, he held it up by the tips of its hair. “I’ll keep him safe till you come home, but then you have to take him back.”
Sophie slipped the chunky steel onto her finger. It was way too big and it spun in loose circles, even when she tried it on her thumb. “I’ll get you a chain,” Rafe promised. “You can wear it around your neck.”
She’d left just three days later. That was less than two weeks ago.
Rafe hated her for leaving that doll with him. If he’d never had it in the first place, he might not be here now.
He jerked his hand out of his pocket as he tried to remember what number he was on. He didn’t want to lose track of how many steps he had left . . . not now, not when he was so close.