A Sky Full of Stars

by Melissa Josias

  He wasn’t wearing his seatbelt. The world goes quiet. No. No no no no. I try to speak, but I don’t have enough breath. I struggle toward him, trying to fight against my restraints to reach him. The pain makes it difficult to see for a second. I take a wounded breath. Agony travels up my side. The second breath is harder to take.

  I blink back tears, trying to find any evidence of life in Eric’s body. I’m trying to be calm, but inside I am scared to death. I manoeuvre just enough so I can see his face. My heart stops. He looks at peace. His eyes are closed, like he’s sleeping.

  “Eric,” I manage. His name comes out jagged and broken, the way my body feels. He’s not moving. He’s not opening his eyes. He’s not looking at me. There is blood on his face, his mouth.

  Through the ringing in my ears, I start to hear voices. People are shouting and calling out to us. I can hear sirens in the distance, not too long off. Hurry, I want to yell at them, but instead say his name again.

  “Eric.”

  I hold out my arm. With shaking fingertips, I reach for his face. I plant my fingers at his throat, waiting for the trembling to stop so I can locate his heartbeat.

  Nothing. Just his skin, still warm.

  I still my urge to cry and try again. My fingers settle elsewhere on his neck and wait. There, faint and slight but there, I feel his pulse start to grow, like a young earthquake.

  My hand falls from his neck. I exhale. “Don’t go anywhere,” I whisper to him.

  Through the window outside, I think I can see an asteroid falling, hear the devastation it leaves in its path. My eyes close. I grow tired very quickly.

  Bay is right.

  It’s a lot like falling asleep.

  A Brief History Lesson – 2 Weeks Ago

  On the morning of my twentieth birthday, before I got any calls from my family and friends joking about how old I was getting, I drove to Cape Town International Airport and used up almost all the money I had to my name to book a flight to Los Angeles. The flight would be in eight days. I drove back to my flat, where I had already missed a call from my mother and sister, my fingers trembling and my heart nervous.

  This was the plan. This was the solution I had come up with that night, sitting in the dark in the living room, praying for answers. It was a delusion of grandeur, I knew, but it was also the only thing I could think of. It was the only thing I had left.

  I spent that afternoon with my family celebrating another year in my life. I accepted gifts and well wishes, eating homemade cupcakes and drinking red wine, all the while keeping the secret that in a little over a week, I’d be flying to the other side of the world to find a place to die.

  When everyone had gone home, their presence still lingering in my house like phantoms, trailing behind me as I walked through the rooms, I locked all the doors and closed every window. I made sure that I was safely secured in my small home so that nothing could happen to me for a week.

  It was the longest week of my life. That Saturday afternoon, after spending one final moment with the people I loved, after hugging Ben so hard he complained a little bit, I secretively took a cab to the airport and boarded a plane set for North America.

  My entire body felt at ease. I wasn’t afraid. It felt like exactly the thing I needed to do. It was, like Bay would say to me a few days later, kismet.

  It was my first time on an airplane. It was my first time going anywhere by myself. It was the first time I had decided to take control of my destiny.

  I settled into my window seat, waiting for the plane to take off, thinking of the twenty years I’d spent existing in that place. And existing was all it had been. Nothing more.

  When we finally started moving, I closed my eyes and fought against the fear and nausea that was starting to rise up in my throat. I took deep breaths, assuring myself that it would all be over soon.

  When I had the courage to open my eyes again, we were soaring above the clouds. It was the most spectacular sight. I marvelled at the thought of flying, of being up in the air, thinking about all the times that I’d wished this was my second lifetime, and that I could remember my first.

  Chapter Eighteen

  A sudden clatter jolts me awake. I’m in motion, but I can’t seem to move my body. Lights flash bright, flickering away and reappearing above me. I sense a lot of people around me, all talking at once. Someone is holding my hand. The world is spinning.

  “Abernathy,” a hurried voice says, one that I do not recognize. “Stay with us, okay? We’re almost there.”

  My eyelids are growing heavy. My head is pounding. Everything is too bright. “Am I dead?”

  The voice has a soft laugh to it. “No, you’re not dead, honey. We’re getting you into the hospital right now. The doctors are waiting for you.”

  I want to hear Ben’s voice, or Eric’s, or anyone that I recognize. A tear slips from my eye. “Am I going to die?”

  The spinning stops. A blurry face comes into view. I get lifted onto a hospital bed by a lot of hands.

  “Absolutely not. Not today. We’ll fight if you’ll fight, alright?” The hand squeezes my fingers.

  “Please,” I whisper to the voice. “I don’t want to be alone.”

  “You’re not alone. I’m right here. Abernathy? Stay with me. Stay with me.”

  *

  As soon as the mist thins out, I know that I am on the bridge. I used to dream about this bridge. It used to haunt me. I take a step forward, holding my fingers out in front of me to feel my way through the retreating mist.

  “Abby Jones,” a friendly voice calls out suddenly, somewhere. I turn; glance around for signs of anyone. “Look at you. All grown up.”

  A figure materializes slowly near the side of the bridge. I recognise her fiery red hair, brighter than I can ever remember seeing.

  “Morgan?”

  She leans her elbow against the railing and smiles at me. “Didn’t think you’d ever see me again, did you?” I look around. I can’t see anyone else on the bridge. Below, I don’t see anything but the floating mist.

  “Oh, no,” I say, putting the pieces together. Morgan smiles knowingly. “I’m dead, aren’t I?”

  Morgan pushes herself off the railing and takes a step toward me. “Well, that all depends.”

  I frown at her. “On what?”

  “On what you decide in the next few seconds.”

  *

  When I open my eyes, I’m in a bright space. Everything is loud: the lights, the noises. I feel sluggish, and the world still spins. I stir, and someone else stirs next to me. Ben lifts his head from the bed, his eyes wide and fearful.

  “Oh, thank God,” he says, grabbing my hand. “Thank God, you’re up.”

  I wet my lips. “Benji...did you see her?”

  “Don’t try to speak. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

  “Where’s Eric? Is he...?” My voice falters. I am being dragged back down again. The earth is sucking me in.

  Ben squeezes my hand softly. “He’s gone...”

  My ears shut down hastily. I don’t want to hear what Ben has to say.

  *

  When I get back to Morgan, she’s standing on the bridge ready to jump, just like that day when I was eleven years old. My heart thunders again. My mouth dries up.

  “Morgan, wait!” I call out to her. “Please, don’t.”

  When Morgan looks at me I can see light in her eyes. “My decision was made a very long time ago.” She smiles again, like she knows something about me that is secret. “It’s up to you now.”

  “What is? What’s up to me?”

  “Everything. All of it.”

  I take a step toward her. “I don’t understand. You need to stop speaking in riddles. Please just tell me.”

  Morgan chuckles. “If it was that easy, I would still be here.”

  “But you are. You’re right here.”

  Morgan tilts her head. “Am I?”

  She does the thing I know will happen; she spreads her arms wide. I know what comes ne
xt. I know exactly what she does.

  “Give up or fight. You choose, Abby.” Morgan’s hair starts moving like it is being tossed in the wind, but I don’t feel anything against my skin.

  “What do you mean? I have a choice?”

  Morgan laughs. “You always have a choice. You either go back or you come with me. You have to decide.”

  I peer down the side of the bridge, into nothingness. Morgan is waiting for an answer, her arms still spread wide. She’s looking out at something I can’t see, like she knows exactly what’s waiting for her.

  “Where would we go?”

  “That’s just it. You don’t get to know before you choose.” Morgan’s right foot leaves the railing. My heart falls into my stomach. “Give up or fight. Breathe or don’t.”

  I want to stop her, but I know that I can’t. I know that she jumps, that she falls. I know how this ends for her.

  How will this end for me?

  Morgan steps off the bridge. I look up at her for the split second that she’s airborne. She looks at me with that light in her eyes. She sees my answer in my face and smiles.

  “Good girl,” she says.

  Then she drops all the way down and out of my sight.

  *

  The next time I wake up, I’m not sure if it’s the same day or not. The blinds have been drawn and there is only a small patch of sun filtering into the room. Across from me there is another bed, the blankets thrown back as if whoever had been in there had just gotten up and walked away.

  I turn my head. A figure is sitting in the chair beside me. He has his head down in a book. The tattoos on his right arm punch colour into the room.

  “Bay?”

  He looks up from the book and smiles. “She lives,” he says, and gets up. “Hi, Cape Town. Fancy meeting you here.”

  I want to reach out and grab a hold of him, but my body is still waking up. The best I can do is wiggle my fingers. “What are you...?”

  Then I remember. My heart leaps violently. I struggle to sit up. Wires pull at my arms.

  “Whoa! Hey, you can’t get up yet,” Bay says, pressing down on my shoulders. “You’re connected to a whole bunch of machines. Stay down.”

  “Where’s Eric? I need to find him. I have to see him,” I say, trying to fight against him but not getting anywhere.

  “He’s okay, Abernathy. I promise,” Bay assures. “He’s just in another room down the hall.”

  I stop fighting and sit back hard. “What?”

  Bay relaxes, takes his hands off of me. “He’s down the hall. Jodie’s with him.”

  I try to clear my head. “Wait. He’s okay?”

  “Yes.”

  “Ben told me he was gone. Did I imagine it?”

  Bay smoothes the blankets at my feet. “He was trying to tell you that he’d gone into surgery. He got hurt pretty badly.”

  Panic shoots through my temples. “I thought you just said he’s okay.”

  “He is right now. They fixed him. No need to panic.”

  I sigh. I close my eyes and relive the moment of impact. Metal screeching. Sparks flying. I open my eyes again and Bay is grinning at me. “You did good, Cape Town.”

  I offer him a small smile. “What the hell even happened, Bay?”

  “A simple fluke. Some rando lost control of his car and couldn’t avoid hitting anyone,” Bay says and clicks his tongue. “Cars, man. Complete death-traps.”

  “Anyone else get hurt?”

  “Just a few scratches. One broken leg. You guys had the worst of it.”

  I’m relieved. My ears are still ringing. “Where’s Ben? Is he okay?”

  “Yeah, we sent him home to get some sleep. He’s been standing guard over your bed for almost two days.”

  My world is falling back into order again. I rest my head on the pillow. “He’s okay, though? Everyone’s okay?”

  “Yes,” Bay says and takes a hold of my hand. “We’re all okay.”

  I nod, but say nothing. I want to sleep.

  “I had a word with one of the nurses that helped you when you came in,” Bay says, his voice soft and calming. “She says that it was touch-and-go with you for a while.”

  “It was?”

  “Yeah. In fact, you flat lined. You were gone for almost two minutes.” Bay smiles. “They brought you back.”

  “They did?”

  “Yeah. Now, I know that things could have been very different, but they’re not. You’re alive and you’re okay.”

  My body starts to wake up. I can feel my heartbeat, the rush of blood through my veins.

  “You came to California to die, Abby, and you did.” Bay leans forward and kisses my forehead. “Now you get a second chance, too. Live this time, Cape Town. Live.”

  *

  An hour later, a nurse removes the saline drip from my arm and disconnects me from the heart monitor and helps me out of bed so that I can use the bathroom. Bay and Jodie are in the cafeteria getting something to eat, so when I reach Eric’s room there is no one except the other patient sharing the room with him; a middle-aged woman with a row of stitches across her right eyebrow. She’s sleeping so I stay very quiet. I sneak toward Eric’s bed.

  A telephone rings at the nurse’s station. Voices carry along the hallways and out the windows. Eric looks better than the last time I’d seen him. He has fresh stitches on his forehead and random cuts along his cheek and neck, but there is no more blood. He’s been restored to his usual self. I have never been so happy to see someone in my entire life.

  I step up to his bed and touch his hand. His eyelids lift slightly and when he focuses on me, he manages a smile.

  “Abby,” he whispers to me. “You are a sight for sore eyes.”

  I slip my fingers in between his. “How are you feeling?”

  “Well, I’m hopped up on pretty heavy drugs so I’m feeling really good right now.” He pats the space next to him with the back of his hand. “Lie with me for a while.”

  I look around the room. “I don’t think that’s allowed.”

  “No worries. I’m in cahoots with the head nurse. She’ll give us a heads-up when the doctors start doing their rounds.”

  I carefully squeeze myself in next to him, my bruised ribs protesting with every hobble. I’m careful not to pull at the wires in Eric’s arm. The pain is a dull ache in this bed. I settle next to him and Eric grazes his fingertips along my knuckles.

  “Does it hurt?” I ask, closing my eyes and listening to his heart beating through his shoulder.

  When he speaks, his voice echoes through my ear. “Not anymore.” He tells me, and a few seconds of silence passes between us. The sound of people talking down the hall is the only thing that permeates the quiet for a long time. “I’m sorry,” Eric tells me, once I’m sure he’s fallen asleep.

  I don’t know exactly what he’s apologizing for, but with those two words I feel something start to change between us. The moment goes tense, the way you pick up the shift in the air right before a storm. It feels small but mightily significant.

  “I’m sorry you got hurt. I’m sorry that things turned out this way.”

  “Don’t apologize for this. You couldn’t have avoided it.”

  “If I’d just stayed, if I hadn’t rushed out of there like an idiot…”

  “Stop,” I tell him, and he goes quiet. “Regret nothing. We’re okay.”

  Eric presses his lips to my cheek. This doesn’t ease the tension for me. “We’re okay.”

  I stop talking. For a while, we stay on the bed that way, two people with wounded bodies, momentarily missing from the world.

  A nurse comes in a few minutes later, sees us but doesn’t object to the spectacle that we must be. She speaks quietly when she tells us that the doctors are going to be checking up on our floor in the next few minutes.

  “This is going to be one hell of a story when you get back home, don’t you think?” Eric murmurs to me while I gently make my way off the bed. I think I hear a smile in his voice, but I d
on’t have the boldness to look at him just yet.

  I tell him that I’m going back to my room. He requests me to stay a while longer, to wait until the doctors show up. I hesitate for a moment while he struggles to sit up in bed, but then I make my excuses, feigning exhaustion, and walk back to my room alone.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “So now that Eric has a baby mamma, I think the question has to be asked here,” Bay says as we pull up to Eric’s apartment the next day. We are all in Jodie’s tiny car; Jodie and Bay in the front seats, with Eric, Ben and myself in the back. “What are you two crazy kids going to be doing with that awkward situation?”

  “Bay...” Jodie says as she unbuckles herself from the driver’s seat. The afternoon is bright as we pile out of the car.

  “I mean, attempting a long distance relationship is hard enough without throwing a kid in the mix,” Bay continues, turning his body to face Eric and me. “Do you think it will work out?”

  “Bay,” Jodie says again, shooting him a look.

  He squints at her through the sunlight. “What? Is this not the right time for this conversation?”

  Eric gives me a look. I shrug with one shoulder, and muster a smile.

  The apartment becomes chaotic when we all get back inside. I’ve never seen the space occupied by so many people. It’s disorientating since it was always just Eric and myself. Jodie and Bay are animated, talking loudly and happily, commiserating about being back in the city. For a few seconds it’s quite jovial for people who have just returned from the hospital. Even Ben, who has gotten to know Bay and Jodie over the past day, seems placated enough to just hang back and not linger near me quite so often.

  Eric is quiet and seems distracted. He looks exhausted.

  “Oh my God. I am starving! I am so hungry I could literally eat a camel,” Bay declares just as Eric disappears into his room, Jodie following. Ben shoots him a grossed out look, frowning. “Okay, so perhaps not a camel because they are hella ugly,” Bay concedes, which makes Ben chuckle a little. “But maybe, like, a baby giraffe.”