The Contradiction of Solitude

by A. Meredith Walters

  “I lit it on fire,” my brother said and I could hear his soft chuckle. I didn’t laugh Perhaps he was stronger than I was. Being able to laugh in the face of all this ugliness.

  “I kept it.”

  I kept it.

  I couldn’t throw it away. What did that make me?

  “It doesn’t mean anything, Lay.”

  “Yes it does,” I argued softly. The fight was gone. He knew it. I knew it.

  “Throw it away.”

  “I can’t.”

  My brother said nothing else. We sat on the phone, a hush between us. I watched the flickering flame wondering if my life wouldn’t be easier if I just…

  “I’ve met someone,” I said quietly.

  “Me too,” my brother admitted. I didn’t know anything about Matt’s life. I never asked. He never volunteered any information.

  We didn’t have that kind of relationship.

  Ours was that of two people using one another to hold onto their last shreds of humanity.

  “Will you tell her?” I asked him, though I knew what he’d say. His answer was mine.

  “No.”

  “Wouldn’t it just be easier—?”

  “You’re not him,” my brother broke in.

  I smiled. He was a fool.

  Such a naïve, sweet fool.

  “Liar.”

  I watched her. Always watched her. I was bewitched. Entranced.

  I was going under.

  I had kissed her once.

  Held her hand twice.

  That was it.

  And I was ready.

  For everything.

  For anything.

  She was my lack of reason. My painful heart. She was my inevitable demise.

  Because of her, I would lose my soul.

  “Where have you been, Elian?” Margie looked upset. I knew why. I hadn’t spoken to her about things between us. I had meant to.

  But I had been swept away.

  I was out of control, fixated. Focused.

  On other things.

  “I’ve been around, Marg,” I said tiredly, swiping at the fret board on my workbench. Wood shavings scattered on the floor with each vigorous brush.

  “I tried to call you.”

  Tate looked up from across the room and smirked. I knew how much he enjoyed being right.

  I should never have shat where I ate.

  I was an idiot.

  I dropped the sandpaper and picked up my pack of cigarettes. I inclined my head towards the rear entrance of the studio. “Come on, let’s go have a smoke.”

  Margie brightened a bit. “Okay, let me go grab my lighter.” She hurried back to the front of the shop.

  Tate started to get to his feet but I gave him a look. “You can have yours later,” I told him.

  “Oh. Gonna let her down all gentle like, huh? Is this about that chick?” Tate whispered.

  “Shut up,” I warned just as Margie returned.

  We walked outside and I immediately lit up. The smoke billowed out in front of me. It had started to rain. Margie huddled underneath the awning but I stepped out into the downpour, not caring in the slightest that I was soaked in only seconds.

  “You’ll get sick, Elian,” Margie scolded.

  I ignored her. “We need to talk, Marg. About what happened two weeks ago.”

  Had it only been two weeks?

  Margie sucked on her cigarette and blew it out in an angry breath. “Don’t you dare tell me it was a mistake.”

  “I wouldn’t, Margie. But it’s over. That part of our relationship anyway. I hope we can still be friends.”

  I had always been adept at doing this. Ending things.

  No hurt feelings.

  Soft. Gentle. Tender.

  People liked me. I counted on it.

  But I was fumbling this. I was going to make it worse.

  Because I had changed.

  Two weeks.

  That was it.

  And Elian Beyer was finished.

  “Friends? Are you kidding? You fucked like you meant it, Elian!” Margie spat out and I knew this was going to get nasty. There was no easy cutting of loose strings. Not this time. Or ever again.

  I was all wrapped up in loose strings, dangling, ready to strangle me.

  Just don’t see her.

  “We had fun, Margie. It was great…” I trailed off, not knowing what else to say. I had built my life on saying the right thing. On being able to tell people what they wanted to hear.

  Why was it suddenly so hard to remember my role? To play my part?

  Elian Beyer. Twenty-eight years old. Son of a happily married couple. Brother of Wade and Leanne. Uncle to two nieces and a nephew. Lies. Lies. Lies.

  But it’s who I was. Who they knew.

  Margie threw down her cigarette butt and ground it out underneath her shoe. “You’re a jerk, Elian.” She meant it. She hated me.

  I didn’t want that to happen.

  I needed her agreement. Her acceptance. I needed to be the nice guy.

  The first kinks in my armor were starting to show.

  When you go home tonight. Go alone.

  “I know,” I agreed, knowing that even as I struggled to smooth this over, I couldn’t leave the door open to anything between us. Margie wasn’t who I wanted.

  “This is about that freaky girl from the bookstore across the street, isn’t it? Tate says you’ve been engaging in mutual stalking for months. It’s weird, Elian. Seriously.”

  I was going to have to have a conversation with Tate regarding his too big mouth.

  “She’s not freaky,” was all I could say. I sounded ridiculous. Margie looked ready to stomp on my testicles with her shit kickin’ boots. I had completely underestimated the power of estrogen scorned.

  Margie glared good and hard. I felt some guilt. I wasn’t heartless. I never went out of my way to hurt anyone.

  Even the people I had left behind…

  “I don’t want things to be awkward here at work, Margie. Tell me what I can do to make this easier on you.” Did I have to sound like such a condescending douchebag? But my mind wasn’t really here anymore. It was elsewhere. Thinking about plans made and futures undecided.

  Margie snorted. “You should have thought about that before you bent me over my kitchen table.” Then without another word, she slammed through the door, and I stood out in the rain, caring, but not enough.

  I had left home thirteen years ago. Before graduating from high school. Still wet behind the ears. With no freaking clue what I was doing or where I was going.

  But I had an idea of how the world really worked.

  I had been given a horrific introduction into the lives of real men and monsters.

  Elian Beyer was born the day I left the boy behind and forced myself to become someone else.

  The real name, the real person was gone.

  Or was he?

  I stared in my bathroom mirror, shaving the two-day growth from my chin. Last month when I had looked in this same mirror I had been comfortable with the man who looked back. I had been sure who he was.

  I had worked hard to establish his roots. His guts.

  But now…

  I saw him.

  And that scared me.

  But I was incapable of stopping the wheels that were already in motion.

  My fingers slipped and the razor cut into my skin. Bright red beads welled up and flowed over, dripping into the sink. Sticky and warm, oozing to the surface.

  “Son of a—” I winced, licking my thumb and wiping away the blood. I turned on the faucet and watched the bright scarlet dilute and rush down the drain.

  I tore off a piece of toilet paper and stuck it to the open cut.

  I was a jumbled mess of nerves and anxiety.

  Every time I saw her, it was the same. It never lessened. I thought by this point we had been on a date, we had spent some time together, I wouldn’t feel like my insides were folding over on themselves.

  What was it abou
t Layna Whitaker that made me lose sight of everything?

  Of whom I had trained myself to be?

  She had been watching me for a long time.

  I had been watching her for just as long, I just hadn’t realized it.

  Margie had called it mutual stalking and she wasn’t far from the truth.

  Something tapped against the bathroom window. I didn’t jump or startle. I was long past getting the willies in this place, on the edge of the cursed quarry in the middle of nowhere.

  The sound of nails scraping, but more likely a branch. The wind had picked up considerably in the last hour and I could feel the storm approaching.

  You slip in quietly,

  Before the storm.

  What had she meant? What storm?

  She protected her secrets as fiercely as I protected mine.

  I ran the comb through my still wet hair and mentally made a note to get it cut. I hadn’t worn it this long in a while. Not since I was fifteen.

  The scraping at the window continued, followed by rhythmic patter. I felt comforted by the noise.

  Like I wasn’t alone.

  I walked out into my bedroom. I hadn’t done much to the upstairs rooms. I had been devoting my energies to fixing up the main floor. So my sleeping area consisted of a mattress on the floor and several plastic tubs holding my clothes.

  It was better than some places I had slept in.

  Under bridges. In old warehouses. In wet, soggy fields under the stars.

  This place with its ghosts and haunted past was all mine. And that was an amazing feeling.

  Home wasn’t something I had allowed myself to have in all of my adult life. I had no intention of putting down roots in Brecken Forest, Virginia when I had driven into town all those years ago.

  But when I came upon this place not long after moving to the area, I had impulsively called the town office to track down who owned the tract of land. I was given the name of Grenadine Olinger, whose grandfather had been the foreman at the mine.

  She sold me the house and the surrounding acre for thirty-thousand dollars. I had paid her in cash. Money I had received after the death of my mother that I had refused to spend.

  Until the day I bought the house.

  Now I had roots. And they were going to be nearly impossible to dig up.

  I would live at Half Moon Quarry.

  And if fate would have it, I would die there too.

  And that didn’t make me feel caged in or imprisoned. Quite the opposite.

  I felt free.

  I found a pair of jeans that weren’t covered in lacquer and stain then smoothed out a button down shirt.

  I wanted to make an effort.

  I finished dressing and thought about where I had planned to take Layna. She wasn’t a dinner and movie kind of woman.

  She was a night under the stars, run through the fields kind of girl.

  A flash of lightning lit up the room, followed by the boom of thunder. The storm was close.

  I grabbed my phone and my wallet and started to head towards the stairs when a buzzing caught my attention.

  My phone was lit up and vibrating.

  My finger hovered over ignore as I had done every single night.

  The lightning flashed again.

  I answered it.

  “I’m here,” I said by way of greeting.

  “You answered,” the soft voice on the other end sounded surprised. But relieved.

  I wished I had never picked up.

  Why had I chosen to answer the call I had been avoiding every night for sixteen years?

  Why tonight? In the storm. With Layna waiting.

  “Why won’t you come back?”

  “You know why.” I was suddenly tired. Exhausted. The old arguments, the tired excuses seeming not enough.

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “Of course it is.”

  Silence.

  Agonized, bone weary silence.

  Then I hung up.

  There was nothing more to say. I turned off the phone, knowing the text that would follow. And tonight I couldn’t handle the comfort that it tried to offer.

  The guilt, the resentment, the anger became too much, and I let out a yell. A deep, mournful scream that I felt everywhere and nowhere.

  It came rushing back. Everything I had tried to forget.

  All because I had answered the phone.

  I should know better. Why tonight? Why?

  Because of Layna.

  She had changed everything.

  I was weak. Pathetic.

  I hated so much about myself.

  I never went to pick her up. I stayed at home, curled up in my own self-hatred. Despising all that I was and all that I had been.

  I didn’t call her. I didn’t text. I left her wondering. Waiting.

  Because I was a coward.

  A sick, masochistic coward.

  Memories unleashed their wrath as the rain splattered against the windows. Phantoms I couldn’t keep away crept inside and wrapped around me, refusing to let go.

  I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t shut them out.

  All I could do was sit in the corner of my bedroom, my back against the wall, my head in my hands and die inside—all over again.

  And I did. A thousand times until morning. Each as painful as the first.

  The night was long and hard. And I had left Layna waiting. I should have called. I should have explained.

  But how do you explain a meltdown?

  How did I tell the girl I was finding myself completely consumed by that my past had come back to slaughter me?

  When the sun finally rose, I was still backed into the corner of my bedroom, my head in my hands. My eyes heavy and gritty with lack of sleep. I slowly got to my feet and stretched. My joints popped and my muscles strained from being sedentary for so long.

  I looked out the window and watched the light bounce off the water. Right now it was peaceful. The only traces of the storm were a few broken tree limbs.

  And the heavy weight in the pit of my stomach.

  I picked up my phone where I had dropped it on the floor many hours before and turned it on.

  No texts.

  I frowned and scrolled through my saved messages. They were all gone. As though they had never been there.

  My throat felt tight and my head fuzzy.

  Even worse, there was nothing from Layna. She had never called.

  I went into the bathroom and brushed my teeth, avoiding the mirror. I didn’t want to see my reflection.

  I knew what I’d see.

  Nothing.

  I didn’t bother changing my clothes. I tugged on my boots and grabbed my car keys, stepping out into the brand new morning.

  The birds were quiet. There were never many around the quarry. I had noticed in my first days there that the wildlife seemed to give this place a wide berth. I never worried about the raccoons getting in the trash or snakes coming in through the windows.

  They stayed away.

  My heart was the only one that beat in this solitude.

  I got in my car, drove out to the main road, and headed for town. I had the day off but had planned to go into the studio anyway. I wasn’t a man content with down time.

  But things changed. And there was somewhere else that I needed to go.

  Ten minutes later I stood outside of Layna’s door, my palm pressed to the wood, my head bowed low. I should knock.

  She never called.

  “Are you looking for Layna?”

  I looked up to find an older woman coming down the stairs. Another woman that looked to be about my age was just behind her.

  “Yes. Is she home?” I asked.

  The older woman was carrying a plate of cookies wrapped in pink cling film. The younger woman gave me a shy smile. One I didn’t bother to return. I was standing outside of Layna’s door. I was incapable of flirting.

  “She should be. She doesn’t work today. I’m Debbie Statham, her neighbor. And this
is my granddaughter, Chloe. She’s visiting from New York. She lives in the city. Works at that store, Sak’s on Fifth Avenue.” I didn’t understand people that felt comfortable with sharing life stories to complete strangers.

  As if their words were worth saying.

  Chloe, the granddaughter, looked embarrassed. I didn’t blame her. She flushed a pretty red.

  Layna’s apartment door opened suddenly and there she was. Her hair was tied in a low bun at the nape of her neck and she looked as though she had just gotten out of bed. She wore sleep pants and a purple tank top with no bra. I couldn’t help but notice. I was attracted to Layna in ways that were still founded in something absolutely physical.

  Her eyes met mine and I felt frozen from the inside out. She was not happy to see me.

  Her face was impassive as always but her eyes…they gave her away. She was pissed off. I really wasn’t sure how to make things right with a girl like Layna. Flowers and chocolates would never work. Perfumed promises and emphatic declarations wouldn’t sway her.

  “There you are, sweetheart, Chloe and I made you some brownies. We’ve been baking all morning.” Mrs. Statham nudged me aside and handed Layna the plate in her hands.

  I thought very seriously about body checking the old lady.

  The granddaughter hung back, and I noticed that she directed several coy glances my way. A smug smile on her full lips. What sort of woman gave such a blatant unspoken invitation to a man they didn’t know? To a man obviously there to see someone else?

  Chloe bit down on her bottom lip and raised her eyebrows in question. What did she expect me to do? Drag her into the corner with her grandmother and Layna five feet away?

  I glanced away, my lip curling in annoyance, to find Layna looking over Mrs. Statham’s head at me. She hadn’t missed the looks her neighbor’s granddaughter was slinging my way.

  And while she smiled at Mrs. Statham as the woman explained why she used wheat instead of white flour, her eyes snapped and sizzled. There was fire there. Fuck. I was burning in it.

  “Elian,” Layna murmured, interrupting the old woman.

  I stepped forward, away from Chloe and her overly familiar eyes. I pushed past a surprised Mrs. Statham, who seemed unused to this less patient side of her sweet neighbor.

  Layna held the door open, giving me room to come inside, and then she turned to her unwelcome intruders. Her eyes on Chloe, not her grandmother. “He’s here to see me.”