by RJ Gonzales
I heard the a gasp from one of the witnesses peeking over the corner of the cabin. Sarah.
“Excuse me?” she smiled a noticeably forced smile.
“Rini?” Jett was puzzled at my sudden appearance.
“I said, what the hell are you doing here!” They both looked at each other then back to me, the enraged girl—waiting to explode. “I have nothing to say to you right now.” My attention was now on Jett, who still stayed at Vera/Vienna’s side.
“Sorry, I was busy,” Jett said, as if it weren’t a big deal. Geez, where have I heard that before? “I told you.”
“Hello, I’m Vienna,” Vera greeted in too nice of a tone and extended her hand. She couldn’t even think of another name that didn’t start with the same letter as her real one to go incognito as.
I smacked her hand away, “Bullshit Vera, what are you doing here?”
“Rini, don’t be rude,” Jett added, closing the closeness of us two by standing in the middle. “She’s just a new friend that’s come to live with us, that’s all!”
“Ha!” I exclaimed. What was Vera doing here and calling herself Vienna? And why was she acting nice all of a sudden? My hands were balled into fists, my face grew hot, and I could feel my heart thumping in my ears. I turned back to “Vienna”, who had a dumfound smile across her face. Clearly, of a satisfied nature.
“Look, bitch!” I spat. “You better stay away from this family because I care about them, and if this is one of your pathetic little games, you can cut the crap and get the hell out of here!” I didn’t care to censor myself. I was an enraged teen. And “golly, gosh, darn it!” didn’t seem to suffice. She remained unmoved. “Get out of here stick!” I pointed to the dirt road.
“Please don’t call me stick, it really offends healthy people like myself.” she said, sounding like the victim yet at the same time getting her knife in with a calm voice.
“Oh honey, I am not calling you a stick because you’re freakishly thin. I’m calling you stick because it seems as though you go about your days acting like you have a stick up your ass!”
“Jay, I’m getting scared,” Vera backed into Jett’s arms. “Please do something. Control her, or something.”
“It’s all right Vee, she’s just acting out,” he said.
Vee?! Acting out?! Jay?! “Since when the hell were you on a nickname basis with each other?”
“Rini, you need to calm down. You’re overreacting!” Jett held his stance beside her—hand out, keeping Vera/Vienna safe from my clutches. He was acting like I was some wild animal waiting for the perfect moment to go in for the kill. Which really, I was.
“Jett, she’s lying to you! Her name’s Vera. I go to school with her, you have to believe me!” I cried. “She’s in the news. She’s been missing for the past few days!”
“Rini, stop it!” he stammered, sending a drop of spit from his mouth pummeling to the floor. “Her name is Vienna, she’s from my land of Mundahlia, and she’s just searching for a safe place to stay after barely escaping with her life, and I’ll be damned if you have any input on this situation. You are not family! You get no say in anything we decide to do!” Ouch—again! He sucked on his lip, trying to suck back the hurtful words he’d spilled, but it was too late—they were already airborne. I was a ticking time bomb now, waiting to explode.
Tick.
“Rini, are you all right?” Jett continued, trying a calmer approach. “You’re acting crazy.”
Tick.
Vera/Vienna grabbed Jett’s hand and took it into hers. He didn’t move it, or at least make the effort to either. “See this is exactly what you’re getting with her Jett. You’re settling for this,” she pointed to me as if I were nothing but a creature or other object. “Maybe we should go inside and let her cool off a bit. I wouldn’t want her lashing out at you—or me.” She tiptoed up to meet his ear and whispered something I couldn’t make out. Jett’s eyes moved to me, and he grinned. As though she’d said something bad about me, and he laughed along with her.
Tick-Tick-Tick-Boom!
I lunged toward her, shoving Jett aside. Their hands broke free and I pushed her off the edge. Vera/Vienna grabbed ahold of my shirt and took me down with her. By the fabric of our shirts, Jett caught us both before we hit the water. I could feel the coolness rising from the freezing lake brush against my face. The moss and dirt-filled scent wafted inches away from my nose. I managed to get a firm grip of his arm and turn myself around to face him.
“Pull me up!” Vera/Vienna cried. “Jett! Pull me up!!”
“Jett, babe, please don’t drop me.” It was already chilly, so the water was probably ice cold.
“I can’t swim, Jett!” Vera/Vienna whined. “I’m going to drown!”
“Jett please!” I said, looking into his eyes. He was too caught up in his mind, making a decision. He’d have to drop one of us to pull the other up. “Jett?” I said again. “Please, baby.”
Vera ordered almost controlling, “Jett! Choose me over her! Pick me up and let her fall!”
His mind was made up in that very instant. And with a short, “I’m sorry, Rini,” he let go of me, and pulled Vera/Vienna back onto the dock. The frigid water rushed over my face, stinging all the bare parts of my body. Still in shock, water filled my mouth. In a rush of panic, I swallowed some of the green, algae infused liquid. It tasted like dirt and felt slimy. I was cold. It was as though I were trapped in a freezer, slowly turning into ice. I needed to feel warm again, immediately.
When I surfaced, Jett was leaning over with his hand stretched out for me. “Give me your hands so I can pull you up,” he said.
I looked at him a long while, directly into his eyes. I could see him do the same. Where was the romance that was there just days before? I was searching into his eyes for it. The kind and flirtatious side he had shown me. The side I had so eloquently fallen for and wanted more of. May I collect you, I recalled him saying into my mouth the very first night we kissed. “It’s okay. I’m yours, remember?” I remember saying to him when he’d read Ray’s little note and gotten angry. Only a short time together, but it felt longer than that. Like ages, wrapped up into a few days. “Need help?” were the first words he’d ever uttered when I first met him. And yet, there I was, teetering over the edge—in need of his help. And he chose to let me go, and instead help the girl that appeared to brainwash him or stroke his ego enough to make him think I wasn’t good enough for him. The very thing that bothered me the most over these passed days. That I just wasn’t good enough to get someone like him. Where did my Jett go?
“She didn’t know how to swim. Besides, it might of helped you cool down a bit, now come on!” he said aggressively. My Jett—was gone.
I had nothing to say. I wiped a falling tear—which could of easily been mistaken for a water droplet—away, and instead swam around the dock to the shore. Once on land, the air encased me in an icy cocoon. I squeezed a good amount of water out of my drenched shirt, and pulled out my now broken phone from my pocket.
“Oh my god! Are you all right?!” Sarah questioned, running to me.
I heaved my phone at a nearby tree, shattering it into pieces. I was silent—wiping away another escaping tear.
Jett and Vera/Vienna walked passed us and headed up the porch. He didn’t even have the nerve to look back at me. He looked agitated as if I was the one adding fuel to the fire. I—as well as Sarah and Max—caught “Vienna’s” gaze. She flashed an evil grin as she and he slouched over the railing, making sure I saw it. You’re settling for this, her words echoed in my mind. I felt the heat growing again, and continued toward them. Who the hell is she to say I’m not good enough. I’m perfectly good enough! As I neared the corner, I picked up a rock from the ground and flung it at her. It bounced off of her head and thudded on the ground.
“Ow!” she roared.
I hopped up the stairs.
“Rini, just stop!” Jett said, holding me back. “You’ve done enough.”
“No! I’m
telling the truth, Jett!” I ducked under his arm and cornered my nemesis.
“Leave us alone. Go bother someone else, you venomous bitch!” I spat. Jett tried to get a hold of my shoulders, but I shoved him away.
“Like I said, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Vera/Vienna spoke in a condescending tone. “You must have me confused for someone else. It’s perfectly common for people to act a little delirious sometimes.”
And with that, I sent a backhanded slap across her face. Thwack! It left a throbbing, stinging pain in my hand, but it was worth it. “Now do you remember me?!” I spat. “Huh?! Remember me now?!
Vera/Vienna held her cheek in astonishment, and began to sob, “Why do you hate me, I’m trying to be nice to you!” she had the emotional face to show that of someone crying, but there was one thing missing. Tears. Truth.
In that instant, Jett pulled me away, turned me around, and slammed me against the wall of the cabin underneath his hands. I let out a rush of breath at the sudden motion “What the hell is your problem, Rini?!” Anger pulsed thorough his voice and clenched teeth, and his once beautiful brown eyes that I could once get lost in forever were now hollow and dark, not letting me in. “Can you stop being such a bitch for a second?! Okay, so maybe my attention isn’t all focused on you, but today is not your fucking special day, it’s hers!” He pointed to the fake crying girl who’d ruined it all. “This is her day! She’s still trying to get adjusted and you’re being rude! She was trying to tell me her story at lunch, but you kept interrupting! Now quit getting all pissed off because things can’t be about you for once!” His grip tightened and he didn’t let go.
“I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” I said quietly. “I just wanted to talk to you. Didn’t you get my voicemail?”
“Just stop!” he yelled. “We aren’t even married and yet you act like an over-protective wife!” He wasn’t Jett—he was a monster. A vicious, blood-hungry monster. “Are you really that self-conscious about yourself that just because I talk to a beautiful woman, you automatically made the assumption that I’m cheating on you?” So he didn’t think I was beautiful, too? Had I been myself, I would of tried to stick up for myself better. But, I was getting tamed down by love. And unfortunately, even then, I didn’t have the heart to defend myself from someone I cared about.
The throbbing pain in my hand from slapping Vera was nothing compared to the venom Jett was spewing at me in the form of razor-sharp words. This was my biggest fear of love. The end—the break-up. It was happening right before me.
“Jett!” Max yelled. “Back off her, dude! You’re hurting her!”
“Yeah!” Sarah finally broke her silence. “It’s true, her name is Vera.” It was about time my best friend stood up for me, but even so it was too late. He’d already said spiteful things. Ripped our blossoming relationship from the plant of love before it could fully bloom.
He turned back to me, not paying any attention to my saviors behind him. “No wonder Martin didn’t want us to date people like you!” he continued, but I really wish he hadn’t. “You all are nothing but jealous, self-centered and crazy wastes of creation. You’re no better than the humans that forced our kind away back then. I’m honestly starting to think that it was a bad idea to even date you in the first place! And now you have your friend lying for you so you don’t look like the crazy one. Ha!”
“J-Jett, I-I-I?” Tears were beginning to flood my eyes as I watched the person I cared for and admired, attack me to defend my enemy. The last words of Julius Caesar entered my mind, Et tu, Brute? And you, Brutus? I was stabbed in the back by someone I thought I could trust. Someone I thought I could finally let myself fall victim to love with. I had to blink and send streams of tears slithering down my cheek to clear the walls of water blurring my vision.
“Dude!” Max spoke again, this time trying to pry Jett’s hands off of me. “She’s your girlfriend Jett! And if she says that that girl is someone else, then it probably is. Are you really believing a stranger over your own damn girlfriend?”
“Not you too, Max! She brainwashed you too?!”
Max countered, “The only one that got brainwashed here is you, dude! Look at what you’re doing to Rini! She’s shaking in fear. Just because someone decided to stroke your ego or something, doesn’t mean you have to turn into a douche!”
Jett looked at me, his eyes different as he saw my shivering body underneath his strong grip. As though my Jett was trying to pull through this Jett and take control. But then, as fast as it had appeared, it was gone. He was not the same guy I met on my first night here, or in the forest. The same guy that matched my playful sarcasm and wit. He was someone else. As though he were being controlled, or was under the influence of something making him act in such a way.
“I want my Jett back!” I told him, my voice cracking. “Whoever you are, I want him back!”
“What the hell is up with that?! I’m not different, you are the one that changed! You are the one that’s acting crazy and attached. I’m still the same!”
“No, you aren’t!” I cried. “You’re different. You are not my Jett! I don’t know who you are anymore!”
“What makes you think you ever knew me at all?” he said curtly, words stinging me like acid. “We just started dating, you know. I’ve only known you for a few damn weeks! Weeks of my life that I will never get back!” There it was, out of his mouth and in the air—words hovering around us and making sure everyone around us heard them.
“Dude! Stop!” Max yelled. “Stop, before you do something stupid!” It was too late for that.
“The only stupid thing I’ve done is let myself have feelings for her!” He whirled his head to me and let go. “Now please, go home! I’m getting sick and tired of your annoying whining!” He pointed to the direction of my cabin. “And, take your friend with you too.”
I stumbled over my words like a child trying to talk when they are crying, “W-What-ha-happened-to-not-letting-me-out-of-your-s-sight?”
“I don’t care anymore, just leave me alone! Please!” He went back to Vera/Vienna. She was still pretending to cry. “Are you okay?” he asked nicely and comforting, a tone completely opposite of the way he’d shown me. “It’s all right.” No. It isn’t. Not anymore. Everything was shattered. Broken into pieces on the floor that I wanted to put back together, but each time I tried, the pieces only grew smaller and smaller.
I took a few steps closer to him, “Jett please!” I cried, trying to get his attention. I didn’t want to lose him. I’d finally let myself be vulnerable to being in a relationship and here it was crashing down. He was special. I need him. I love him. There was the word I’d uttered into his voicemail and was unable to retract. Now that he was straying away from me, I felt it. That feeling of not wanting to lose this particular person. Had I only liked him, I would just leave like I did with the other guy who dumped me when I wouldn’t put out. Sure it was a little too soon, but love has many stages. It was at the beginning, yes, but I didn’t want to lose him. I love Jett! I love him! I needed to say it aloud. In person. Make it real—my declaration.
I touched his shoulder, “Please Jett, I-”
“Get the hell away from me!” he stammered and pushed me back. My foot skidded across water. It happened in a flash. Before I knew it, I slipped on a puddle of water at the top of the stairs that had formed from my dripping clothes, and was stumbling down the porch stairs—my body twisting in the air. My sight was blurry, erratically shifting into blurs of grey from the sky and green from the trees and then—brown, from the dirt.
Crack!
I let out a high pitched wail. I had fallen onto my left hand and dislocated my wrist over a rock. I couldn’t move it anymore. I’d lost all connectivity. The pain was immense. Sharp like needles prodding my skin. Sarah and Max rushed to my side, helping me to my feet. I cradled my limp hand, slowly loosing its color, in my right as more tears flooded down my cheek. I could hear both of them talking, but tuned them out. I was fo
cused on other things. My heart was broken figuratively, and now, my hand was broken physically.
“Are you okay?” I heard Sarah say.
“I think it’s broken.” Max followed.
“She needs help!” Sarah yelled, but it was all a distant sound. Dizziness overtook me and almost swept me off my feet.
“Oh, fuck!” I heard. A voice belonging to neither of the duo around me. “Rini, I’m so sorry! Let me see it!” Jett was at my side, shoving the pair aside and trying to help.
“Don’t—touch me,” I managed to get out in a sob, not facing him. My voice was uneasy. I was balling and my breathing became heavy and out of sync.
“Just let me see it,” he reached for my hand again.
“I said, DON’T TOUCH ME!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, and shoved him away with my good hand.
I turned to Vera/Vienna who looked amused from the porch. “YOU CAN HAVE HIM!” I yelled to her, before turning toward the forest and bursting into a dash. Sarah stayed behind. It was a good thing. I wanted to be alone. I needed to be alone. I wanted to get as far away as I possibly could. Even journey to the end of the world if it meant that was far enough.
“What the hell did you do!” I heard Del scream at Jett. The slap of the screen door followed.
“I just pushed her and she fell down the stairs....”
That was all I heard as I disappeared into the forest toward my cabin, with tears streaming down my face and the salty taste at the corners of my mouth—alone.
Del
26
“Why the hell would you push her!” I was furious upon hearing what had happened. This was unacceptable. Rini was a sweetheart. She cared about Jett and our family with her heart. I absolutely adored her, which was rare for me. I never give people the benefit of the doubt. They’re usually exactly how I expect them to be. But not her, she was different.
I had thought everything was calm. But when I heard the scream and saw Rini soaking wet and holding her hand and running into the forest crying, I knew something was wrong. I had just gotten in from getting Rini’s gift from the car to put on Jett’s bed, which is when I thought I had heard a suspicious splash, but ignored it.