Mirage

by Tracy Clark

  He shakes his head. “Driving.”

  “Good answer. One of us has to be the mature one.” My tone’s a bit more sardonic than I meant it to come out.

  “Want to tell me what ghost passed through you back in your room?”

  My eyes snap up to meet his. Joe has no idea how interesting his choice of words is. I feel like I met a ghost.

  “Huh. I was hoping I played that off.”

  “Please, I know you better than that. You’ve been my best friend since first grade.”

  I smile. Our story will go down in history as the friendship that started because a little boy came to school on Halloween as Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz and a little girl kicked some bully booty that day. Ironically, I was dressed as Batman, but you didn’t see anyone jeering at me the way they did at Joe. Even then, the hypocrisy was not lost on me. “You rocked those sparkle shoes.”

  “You were saying . . .”

  Clear throat. Decide whether to tell the truth. Decide that I can’t not tell him. “You have to promise to keep it to yourself.”

  “Does that even need to be said?”

  “No.” The spiked juice goes down easy, and I gulp some more, hoping the warmth will chase the damp chill of dread out of my bones. I tug my picnic blanket from my bag and get out of the car, wrapping it around my shoulders as I sit on the warm hood. The light wind makes the edges of the blanket flap like the sound of a parachute. I close my eyes and imagine being up there right now, floating in the stars. What would it feel like to fall up?

  The car door shuts loudly when Joe gets out, snapping me back to the moment. We both know I’m stalling. I look at my lap as I speak. Bite my lip. Stop myself from curling into a ball. “I think I’m losing it.”

  “That would imply you hadn’t already, my love.”

  I sock him in the leg. “Three times today, I could swear I saw someone looking back at me out of my reflection.”

  “Ryan, isn’t that, like, the very definition of reflection?”

  “Someone besides me, dope!”

  His smile says, C’mon, quit screwing around, but it fades when he sees how serious I am. “I​—​I don’t know what to do with that information.”

  “Me neither.”

  “It’s not normal to see other people when you look in the mirror.”

  “You don’t say.”

  Lights bounce erratically behind us, and we both realize that someone is coming up the hill. Dom rumbles up next to us in his brother’s car. He smiles at me, no trace that we had a fight earlier.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey.”

  Dom chin-lifts to Joe. “What’s up, man?”

  “Oh, ya know, gas prices, value of Apple shares, concerns over America’s increasing military presence in foreign countries . . .” I nudge Joe in the ribs, and he hops off the hood. “I’d better be getting back. I’m guessing you might want to stay?” he asks me with his hands stuffed in his pockets. I still don’t get why Joe doesn’t like Dom. If he would only get to know him . . . Seems Joe’s nonjudgmental ways stop at Dom’s door.

  “I’ll stay.” I slide onto my feet and kiss Joe’s cheek. “Call you tomorrow. Love you.”

  We watch him back up and pull away. His engine fades as it descends the hill.

  “C’mere,” Dom says, holding out his arms.

  My hands are on my hips as I take one soldier step toward him and halt. Dom bows his head and rubs his jaw, trying to hide his smile behind his hand. He takes one step toward me, stops.

  Crickets chirp in the night around us.

  “Still mad?” His voice is soft.

  I take another step forward. “Not really.”

  His move. “I’m sorry.”

  One step. “Me too.”

  We are one last footstep away from each other, both of us smiling. Dom draws a line in the sand between us with the toe of his boot.

  “Daring me to cross the line?” I ask with a laugh. “That’s like asking a tiger not to eat meat!”

  “Ha! After today, tiger, I know there’s no line you won’t cross if you really want to.” He bites his bottom lip in that slow way that invites attack, and fixes me with sultry cinnamon eyes. “Want to?”

  Trusting him to catch me, I pounce, wrapping my legs around his waist as he holds me up. His jeans scratch pleasantly against my bare calves. When I grab both sides of his head and kiss him hard, hungry, he matches my force with lips seasoned with a bit of guy sweat and cool mint. I tease them open with my tongue, exploring, tasting. He’s my cake.

  The moon is a spotlight on Dom’s upturned face, bathing him in an incandescent blue glow. I trace the light on his heart-shaped lips with my fingers. It’s such a turn-on the way his breathing intensifies and his mouth opens when he wants me.

  I yank his T-shirt sideways to expose his corded neck and shoulder and revel in his groan when I bite the tattoo there. A sense of power rolls over me when I leave a mark. It’s exhilarating to pull my shirt over my head and throw it on the ground. The desert blows on my skin like it’s making a wish, and I think that we, clutching each other on this mountain, are the pin the world revolves around.

  Dom’s gaze devours my bare skin.

  I am black silk against the moon.

  He lifts me higher to clamp his mouth on me, and I cradle his head against my chest; my face burrows into his black hair. It tickles my neck. He carries me to the car and sets me down softly on the hood, my bare back registering the residual warmth of the engine’s heat. But the warmth that radiates through me has nothing to do with the car. My fingers rip open his jeans, and I push him away with my foot to squirm out of my shorts. He moves my foot off his belly and runs his hands down my thighs. The question burns in his eyes.

  My answer is to hook my heels around his back and pull him to me.

  “I don’t have a condom,” he whispers, pressing his body against mine.

  “I want you now, Dom.”

  I love that first push.

  All of them, really.

  I like how we say no more words but have expressed . . . everything.

  “Do you see that?” I point to the east. Miles away, flashes of lightning split the sky, flickering across it in enormous white sheets. It’s so far away I can’t hear the thunder. There’s hot wind, though, and it whips against my skin as I stand naked on the hilltop with my arms stretched over my head. I feel feral. Elemental, like lightning could shoot from my fingertips.

  Clicking noises fire off behind me. “Put that camera down,” I tell Dom. “Can’t you enjoy the moment without filming or snapping pictures?” I don’t actually mind, though. He sees something through that lens that magnifies reality.

  “Nope. I have to capture you in all your wild glory. You don’t know how ragingly beautiful you are. You’re larger than life, Ry.”

  I look over my shoulder and think, If I were, would I have to prove it all the time?

  A rueful smile passes over my face. That sounds like something Joe would ask me. Or my dad. Why is brave only brave if it’s saving a life or fighting for your country? Why isn’t it considered brave to live your life to the fullest? I see so many people afraid to do that simple thing. We all die. Might as well skid into death, breathless and laughing, with life still clinging to you like perfume.

  My clothes are scattered on the desert floor, so I gather them up and give them a shake, in case a spider or scorpion has scrabbled inside, before slipping them back on. Dom stares at the faraway lightning with his brows furrowed. He’s got some words for me​—​probably about our fight today​—​and is trying to figure out how to spit them out.

  “I have to tell you something,” he finally says, which makes my hands curl into fists. “Your dad asked me to be in charge of the big-way for the corporate suits.”

  “Great!” Maybe there’s hope after all. “So you can add me​—”

  “He’s given me firm orders that you are not to be included in the jump.” I spin around to face him. His forehead creas
es as though he’s cringing to tell me this. “I know how bad you want to do it. I’m sorry, babe.”

  “I will do it.”

  “I gave my word.”

  His voice rings with apology and helplessness, but that’s not soothing me. “You promised to screw me out of helping my family? Out of possibly being a part of the X Games? What about being fair to me? You know my dad’s being unreasonable.”

  “It’s not my call. If it were, I’d let you do it.”

  “You’re not one of his soldiers. Not every one of his orders has to be followed.”

  “This one does. I hate to put it this way, but it’s not about you, so don’t pull any crap and jeopardize this for the rest of us or jeopardize your family’s business. It’s too important.”

  While Dom has remained calm, my feelings are a tempest in the middle of my chest. I stand in the summer wind and puff through my nose like a bull deciding whether or not to charge. I want to light into him, even though it’s not his fault. I want to rip the goddamn wings off my dad’s planes. I want the entire big-way team to throw their rigs on the ground and refuse to jump unless I’m with them, like some movie football team. I want my dad to shake his head in defeat and say yes, yes, of course I’m needed.

  Yes, I’m good enough.

  Yes, I’m worthy.

  One thing I won’t do is cry the tears that are closing up my throat and blurring my eyes. Behind all this talk of being “special” and “larger than life,” I realize, I just want a normal little thing, my father’s love and respect, and I’m sure he’s not capable of giving it to me.

  “Say something.” Dom reaches for me. “It’s scary when you’re quiet like this. I don’t know if you’re calming down or plotting to bend the world to your will.”

  I’m sure as hell not going to bend to the world’s will.

  This defiant declaration is poised on my tongue, but I don’t say it. Instead I fall into the arms of the person who gets me because he’s so much like me. While Dom may be a calmer version, we both have unpredictable storms inside us. We both follow our hearts. We both get high off pushing the envelope. I admire that about us. If no one ever went outside of acceptable limits, we’d never know what we’re capable of. I know I’m capable of doing this jump, of helping my family, of earning my dad’s respect.

  “I want to be part of something special.”

  “Look in the mirror, Ryan. You are something special.”

  The mirror . . .

  “I don’t want to look in any more mirrors today.”

  Remorse hits me. He probably thinks I’m talking about his idea to play in front of the mirror. “I don’t mean us,” I try to explain, but I can’t possibly explain this. Especially not when I’m attempting to convince him I can do the big-way.

  My reflection is supposed to be mine alone. Now it’s like someone else is trying to step out from it. I hope this day was a glitch in the wiring, some kind of temporary mental speed bump. There’s the live-life-on-the-edge brand of crazy and the seeing-spirits-in-the-mirror brand of crazy.

  I’ve felt more cold fear this day because of those searching, ghostly eyes than I did with pulling my chute at a thousand feet. That thrilled me but scared everyone else.

  Better to be feared than fearful.

  Seven

  Dom pulls the car into my driveway, shuts the lights off, and turns toward me. “I’ve got something special you can be a part of,” he says. “Mauricio’s planning a party. You want to go on a little trip in the motor home?”

  “My folks are never going to let me go off on a trip with you and your brother in some stranger’s abandoned motor home. Where do you guys think you’re going?”

  “Nowhere . . . everywhere . . .”

  I pinch his arm. “No hablo mysteriously vague.”

  “We’re gonna do LSD.”

  “LSD? As in peace, love, and sixties? LSD as in dancing like a chicken in a blender with your top off in the rain? That stuff’s still around?”

  “I know! It’s old-school cool. Mauricio’s done it a few times, says it’s the ultimate mind trip, totally expanding. He said he never experienced anything like it.” Dom lifts his camera and snaps a shot of the frog-legged underside of a giant June bug on the windshield. “We’re having a small, private party tomorrow night in the motor home. It won’t leave the hangar. We figured it’ll be a safe, isolated place. Contained​—​in case anyone wigs out.”

  “Wigs out?”

  His face lights up like an explorer. “I’ve always wanted to try it, to see for myself how mind-expanding it is. It could be great for my art. Feel like doing it with me? It’d be another first for us.”

  My insides warm. Dom and I have had many firsts.

  The porch light flicks on, and my father’s silhouette fills the doorway. He points at the ground directly in front of him. I guess I’m supposed to run right over there and stand at attention like a good little soldier. Or his dog.

  I clench my jaw, lean over to kiss Dom’s cheek, and whisper, “What the hell. I’m in. You only live once.”

  My dad starts up before I’ve even reached him.

  “Where have you been?” His eyebrows are so pinched I bet I could store a quarter in the grooves above his nose.

  “You grounded me from jumping. I didn’t realize you grounded me from life.”

  “I want to talk​—”

  I shove past him through the front door. “Oh, now you want to talk to me? That’s novel. You took jumping away from me, the one thing I love to do more than anything. Punishment has been meted out. Go back to your regularly scheduled programming and leave me alone.”

  “Don’t give me your smart mouth, Ryan. Jumping isn’t the only thing I can take away from you.”

  “In less than one month I’ll be eighteen, and you won’t have a say in what I do!”

  He steps forward, gets all up in my face. “That’s right. In one month you can move out, support yourself, screw up your own life, and be responsible for the fallout. But for now, your ass belongs to me, and you will obey me. Got it?”

  “My ass belongs to no one!” I rage back. “You’re so shortsighted, Dad. Take away skydiving​—​go ahead. I’ll get my kicks some other way. It’s my life!”

  He jabs a finger toward my nose. “Don’t threaten me, kid. I’ve dealt with worse punks than my own surly, stubborn daughter.”

  “Enough!” Mom yells. It’s so rare to hear her raise her voice that it shocks both of us out of our trenches. Her face is a black storm, threatening rain. “What is it about the two of you that rattles each other so? You’re like a couple of spitting roosters, dancing around with your chests puffed out. I don’t like this fighting, this disharmony in my home. Stop it, now!”

  “Hose ’em off like you do the house,” Gran chimes in.

  Dad throws up his hands and stalks away, leaving a vapor of anger behind him, but Mom is there to pick up where he left off. “You have a grand sense of timing, don’t you? Can’t you see that he’s under tremendous pressure?” Her voice descends to a whisper. “I told you earlier, someone in his condition shouldn’t be under such stress. Why are you adding to it?”

  “By standing up for myself?”

  “Uh, child of mine! At least call it what it is!”

  “A tantrum!” Gran blurts. I wish she could see me roll my eyes at her.

  Mom blows out an exasperated breath. “Lay low for a few days. I’ve got my hands full enough with your daddy and the business.”

  “But Mom, he​—”

  She turns her back and walks away, mumbling something about how she doesn’t need to attend every fight she’s invited to.

  Gran shuffles across the room and straight to me like a homing beacon. “I used to have to rub your mama’s legs when she was a girl, growing pains were so bad.”

  “Yeah?” I answer noncommittally. Who knows where Gran’s going with this. It’ll either be gibberish or a frying pan of hot truth upside the head.

  “I susp
ect your growing pains will be the kind I can’t rub out.”

  “Maybe,” I answer. I know I sound obstinate. I’m so freaking exhausted all of a sudden.

  Gran’s broken eyes somehow bore into mine. It’s unnerving. “When you gonna realize that every threat you make to your parents is really a threat against yourself?”

  “I’m tired. Can I just go to bed and have a do-over tomorrow, Gran?”

  “Wish it worked that way, sugar. My advice is, don’t go doing things you wish you could undo.”

  Eight

  I THOUGHT SLEEP WOULD quiet me, but I’m too restless. It’s not a physical restlessness; sex and skydiving smoothed that edge. It’s a mental itch. My head is my problem. It wants to replay everything that scared me today, everything that stripped the protective coating off my wires. It wants to open doors labeled fear, vulnerability, and self-doubt.

  I don’t open those doors.

  Not for anyone. Or any thing.

  Behind what psychological door is the mirage girl hiding?

  As soon as the house slips into the quiet hum of night, I slip out the back door. Sneaking out drunk and alone is the potent dose of rebellion I need after the fight with my dad, the lecture from my mom, and Gran’s vague warnings. They gang up on me and expect that I’ll swallow their bitter medicine without a chaser. Ha. I take another swig of my spiked cranberry juice and march down the road, using the raised road reflectors like braille so I don’t veer off into the brush and disappear forever.

  The night stills me. The sky is a cap of blue-black with constellations as familiar as Gran’s age spots. I’m lost in it until a reflector winks light at me and I realize a car is approaching from behind. The tires make a sticky-wet sound on the asphalt as the car slows. It crawls alongside me as I walk the dusty shoulder. It’s not the leering face of the crusty old man that kicks my adrenaline into high gear and sends my heart rocketing. It’s her face, rolling up and over, up and over in the chrome rims: a ghost on wheels with eyes that promise to follow me everywhere.