Volition

by Lily Paradis

  More than a century had passed since the Evers Plantation was overturned. Catherine and Lee Evers had lived there with their daughter, Delilah, for as long as anyone could remember—up until the slave revolt. The neighbors watched in horror as Lee and Catherine were hanged from the big black oak tree out back that night. Beau Morgan, Delilah’s fiancé, heard the screams and thought Delilah was in danger. He charged in on a white stallion to save her, but he soon joined her parents on the tree. The slaves lived in the big house until Delilah returned home from finishing school the next day to find them all dead.

  Rumor had it that Delilah fled the South. That house had been rotting ever since she left, and no one wanted it. The dark history of the land was too much for anyone to want to rebuild it, no matter how much it was worth. The house belonged to the spirits now.

  Clark McCallum and Sam Fields were not naive. They didn’t want their children anywhere near the Evers’ house. The four McCallum boys, Mason Fields and his little sister Caroline had disappeared over an hour ago, completely shirking their chores. When Sam and Clark heard voices from the east, they shared a grimace, tipped their hats, and stalked over toward the Evers’ property.

  “What in the name of heaven are y’all doing over here?” Sam’s drawl surfaced through his anger.

  None of the children had an excuse. Mason still held what they were using as a bat, and Caroline dropped what they assumed to be a small stone that had been used as a ball.

  Clark took one look at Mason, and his stomach churned. “All you, get home right this instant, and we won’t tell your mothers.”

  That struck fear in their hearts, and they ran as fast as they could, navigating through the overgrown grass and brambles that tore at their feet.

  “Look here,” Clark said gravely once the children had gone. He held up the bat that Mason had been using.

  “What is that?” Sam asked. “Is it—”

  “Human?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s a humerus bone.” Clark ran his finger along a line on the bone. “See here? That’s a bicipital groove, and that’s olecranon fossa.”

  Sam looked at him like he was speaking a foreign language.

  “It means this is a right humerus human bone.”

  “And our kids were using it to play ball.” Sam shuddered. “How old do you think it is?” He wasn’t sure he really wanted to know.

  Clark shrugged. “Looks old. Could be from…you know. Why didn’t anybody clean these up? You’d think Delilah Evers would have wanted her family to rest in peace.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t her family,” Sam suggested grimly.

  Clark carefully set the bone down and buried it as he recited a Bible verse he remembered from the church service last week. “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting contempt.”

  They stood in silence, looking in awe at the mysterious house, as Sam contemplated the verse.

  “Whatever it is, I don’t like it. Let’s get out of here.”

  As he turned to take another look around, he paused and started to blink. He couldn’t believe his eyes.

  “What’s the matter?” Clark asked.

  Sam shook his head. “Nothing. Just my eyes playing tricks on me.”

  But as they walked away, Sam would have sworn on his life that he had seen a beautiful girl in a white dress, leaning against the stone doorway, her blonde locks spilling out from under her hat.

  Caroline Fields begged her father to go back to the Evers Plantation. “Please, Daddy, please! I dropped Molly in the grass, and now, she’s lost. I can’t let her be lost forever. She’ll be so sad. She’s all by herself with no one to play with.”

  He could barely say no to his youngest child, let alone when she was upset.

  “Annaleigh,” he told his wife, “I’ll be back in time for dinner.”

  She nodded and went back to the pot on the stove.

  The sun was already starting to move toward the horizon as he walked back up the hill he had hoped to never ascend. Here he was, doing it twice in one day. It was enough to make him laugh to himself. He couldn’t help but wonder if the old stories were true or if they had just become something over the years.

  He arrived at the spot where the children had been playing, and he scanned the ground for the little doll. How would he ever find her in grass that came up to his knees? He started running his hand through it, trying to be methodical. It was a labyrinth—one of those constructed mazes where you thought you were going forward, but in fact, you were only traveling in a circle.

  He picked up something and rolled it over in his hands. It looked like a small rock, but it had a strangeness about it. Out of curiosity, he knelt down and set it on his knee.

  That was what it was. A kneecap. A patella, Clark might say. There were too many bones around here. Too many pieces that weren’t buried. It unnerved Sam. He decided that when people died, they should be tied up in a neat bow, not scattered around the earth. This was why people weren’t settled.

  This was where the stories came from.

  He tossed the bone far enough away that he wouldn’t find it again, but he continued to stumble on more pieces of what he assumed were once human. He kept throwing them as far away from himself as he could until he was so frustrated that he decided he would go back home. He could buy Caroline another doll. The sun was setting, and he was already late for dinner.

  “Well, I declare.”

  Sam laughed. He thought he had heard a voice. He turned to walk back toward his own land.

  “Sam.”

  He stopped in his tracks.

  “Sam.” The syllable was drawn out into two as if he was being called from afar.

  He turned slowly, seduced by the sound.

  There she was. She held out a hand to him, her ring glinting in the setting sun. She was even more beautiful than he’d thought she was before.

  Oh Lord, have mercy. When she smiled, nothing else mattered.

  “I’m Lila.”

  He took off his hat.

  “I’m Sam,” he said even though she already knew who he was.

  She nodded and smiled even bigger. There was something so magnetic about her that he couldn’t look away. Even if the Battle of Carthage raged nearby, he would be oblivious.

  “Come inside, Sam,” she said, her voice like music to his ears.

  It was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard.

  He knew he shouldn’t. He was supposed to have dinner with his family, not the beautiful girl in front of him.

  “Come inside,” she said once again.

  He couldn’t say no. He tried to form the words to deny her, but his mouth was inexplicably frozen.

  She clicked her tongue three times, and as she turned to walk toward the house, he followed her. His feet were like lead, but he clumsily stomped his way up the hill behind her. She seemed to glide through the grass, unconcerned for the state of the land, while he had to trudge his way through.

  He stopped when they got to the white stone doorway. The once blue porch ceiling was covered by dirt and vines.

  “I shouldn’t,” he said, panting. He had begun to sweat. “I can’t.”

  She put a hand on his shoulder.

  “Bless your heart.” Her eyelashes fluttered.

  For a moment, the last sunshine fell with romantic affection upon her glowing face.

  Her voice compelled him forward breathlessly as he listened. “It’s just tea, Sam. Wouldn’t you like some sweet tea?”

  He started to shake his head, but she clicked her tongue again, and he snapped up, holding his own arm out for her to take.

  “There’s my Southern gentleman,” she said in a thrilling low voice.

  She smiled again and led him into the darkness.

  Several hours later, night had fallen. The cicadas owned the night, creating a buzz that competed with the one Sam felt in his head. He wandered down the hill from the Eve
rs Plantation to the Morgan Plantation, guided only by a light from his home in the distance. He had married Annaleigh Morgan, who came from the same family line as the ill-fated Beau.

  As he made his way off the property, he came to stand before a great oak tree. The bark was completely charred as if someone had set it on fire. After all these years, it still stood. He had always hated this tree. If it hadn’t been here, maybe things would have been different. He put his hand on the trunk, feeling the spirits trapped inside.

  “I’m back,” Sam whispered to the hanging tree.

  When he arrived home, he was greeted by his anxious wife and child.

  “What kept you?” Annaleigh hurried over to the door, shucking off her apron. “I was worried.”

  She stopped when she saw his eyes.

  “Sam, what happened?” Annaleigh took a step back from her husband.

  He clicked his tongue three times.

  “Where’s Molly, Daddy? Where’s my doll? Did you find her?” Caroline pleaded, tugging on the hem of his shirt.

  He shrugged. “What doll?”

  Now

  “YOU’RE IN The New York Times, Tate.”

  Catherine’s telling me something I already know while she waves the paper in my face. I’m leaning against the counter, dipping cold bow-tie pasta into cold spaghetti sauce.

  “Are you really going to do that out of the jar?” Hayden asks, looking at Catherine as if to ask her if this is normal.

  It is. The noodles aren’t even cooked all the way. They’ve been sitting out for hours—just the way I like them. In high school, she never finished her pasta, and I would eat them later when they were all dried up.

  “I remember when you wrote this story. You won so many awards. People were fawning over it and that ending. You made people think. You made them wonder if they understood it the right way or not. Now, it’s here for everyone to see how brilliant you are. Why aren’t you more excited?” Catherine urges me.

  Colin shoves me to the side gently, so he can have some spaghetti sauce, too.

  “I don’t know.” I shrug. “I mean, it was in my head, then it was in my fingers, then it was on my computer screen, and now, it’s printed. There it is. It’s just there. I wrote it a long time ago. I just now submitted it. It’s just there.”

  I point to the newspaper sprawled over my kitchen table next to Hayden.

  “It’s a really big deal,” Catherine tells me again as if it’s going to sink in this time. “People die, trying to get into the Times.”

  I hate it. I don’t care that it’s published because it doesn’t make anything any different. People can read about Sam and Delilah and the creatures and darkness in my mind, but I don’t care, not right now.

  I shove one last bow tie into my mouth as I stalk out of the kitchen and out of my apartment before anyone can stop me. I hear Hayden’s chair scrape against the wooden floor as he gets up to follow me, but Colin stops him.

  “I’ve got it,” I can faintly hear his voice from the hall.

  I know Hayden sits back down even though I’m standing outside. I know him that well now.

  Colin shuts the door to my apartment, and I start walking down the hall again. He follows me into the elevator and stands there with me in silence.

  I’m okay with elevators and Colin. He doesn’t make me lose my head.

  Then, we’re outside with the street noise, and I don’t feel like I’m suffocating anymore.

  Colin pulls a cigarette out of his pocket and lights it, but I pull it out of his mouth and into mine.

  “Okay, Penny Dreadful,” Colin says as he pulls out another for himself, “what’s clouding your soul today?”

  I take a drag.

  “My soul is always clouded—just like yours.”

  “I know, but I think it’s kind to ask, don’t you?”

  I puff smoke in his face. “I can’t do Hayden.”

  “Haven’t you already?”

  In my mind, I threaten to put the cigarette out on his arm.

  “No,” I say.

  His eyebrows go up. “Oh, Tate McKenna, I didn’t think you were a prude.”

  “I’m not. I’m just not his. He’s not mine.”

  “But you want him to be?”

  “Yes. But I can’t. I can’t do the Hayden thing. I can’t go to Kyler Place. I can’t be who he wants me to be. It’s Lara all over again.”

  “He’s not Lara.”

  “No, but his family may very well be.”

  “You’ve never met them.”

  I try to come up with another excuse, but I can’t. Colin has me.

  “Ah,” he says, “a burnt child loves the fire.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Wilde,” I say sarcastically as I put out my cigarette.

  He smokes his until the embers are burning through the first three layers of his skin—just the way he likes it.

  “It’s true. You can’t stand for things to work. You need conflict.”

  “So do you.”

  “We’re not talking about me.”

  “He’s not my soul mate, Colin.”

  I lean against the side of the building and feel the hot pavement beneath my hands. I wonder if this is what the decor in hell feels like.

  “Yes, he is. He’s just not the same soul mate as Jesse.” He throws his cigarette away before he leans against the building next to me.

  “You can’t have more than one soul mate,” I tell him because I’m an expert.

  “You can. We’re soul mates. Did you know that? In a different way. You and I, Tate Evaline McKenna, share space that no one else shares. We’re the same person in two different bodies. No one else will ever understand us the way that we understand each other.”

  He sounds like he’s reciting his vows, and I wonder if I’m marrying Colin Conrad right here in this tiny patch of shade against my apartment building.

  “Not even Catherine?” I ask, but I know the answer.

  “Not even Catherine.”

  “Is she your soul mate, too?”

  “Yes, in the way that Hayden is yours. Not in the way that Jesse is because Jesse hurts you.”

  “So does Hayden.”

  “But Hayden’s a good hurt, Tate. Jesse is the bad kind that turns you into someone else, someone that I don’t quite understand.”

  “How do I let him in?”

  “Letting someone love you takes practice,” he tells me.

  I see him reach into his pocket for another cigarette before he changes his mind.

  “I should know.”

  Somehow, Colin has become some kind of guru, and I don’t understand when that happened.

  He takes my hand and walks me back upstairs because the heat is sweltering. He knows I hate it.

  Hayden and Catherine don’t say anything to us when we walk back in. I think Catherine’s training Hayden on how to deal with the two of us.

  For a long time, I just stare out my floor-to-ceiling windows with Colin by my side.

  He’s right.

  He and I do share a space that we can’t share with anyone else—not even Catherine, as much as we love her.

  A bug is buzzing around the side of the windowsill, and it thinks it can get out because it doesn’t understand that there’s glass.

  I slide the window open as far as it will go, so the bug can fly out if it wants to. The windows don’t open very far because the building owners don’t want any jumpers. They don’t want to clean up my splattered body on the pavement below, so they cage me in here and give me an inch to open the window for air.

  The bug doesn’t understand that if only it goes backward, it can move over to where the window is open. It’s going to die here because it doesn’t understand. I can’t help it along. I’ll only kill it in the process.

  Colin looks over at me out of the corner of his eye, and I swallow hard.

  “Don’t be that bug,” he says under his breath.

  That scares me.

  Because as of right now, I’m
not letting Hayden in. I’m not setting myself free. Right now, I’m that bug.

  Catherine and Colin excuse themselves to leave shortly after Colin and I get back.

  As they walk out the door, Colin shoots a pointed look at Hayden that everyone in the room catches. I know it’s on purpose.

  Then, I’m left alone with him, and it’s like the particles in the air aren’t charged right. There are too many electrons or too few. It’s like when you walk around on carpet in slippers gathering static electricity, but you don’t quite know that it’s there until you touch someone, and it releases. It hurts, but at least it discharges.

  That’s how it is with Hayden and me.

  I know that if I touch him, it’s all over. That’s why I haven’t touched him since the elevator. I’ve made sure of it because I’m afraid of the hurt.

  He’s looking at me now.

  He’s looking at me in a way that reminds me of Jesse, but it doesn’t at the same time because it’s different.

  He’s looking at me the way that every woman wants to be looked at by a man.

  “Hayden,” I say his name softly, tasting the way each letter comes out of my mouth one by one and then as a whole. “Hayden.”

  When I speak, he doesn’t come out of his daydream like I expect him to.

  This is dangerous.

  He’s dangerous right now.

  “Tate.”

  That word comes out of his mouth, and I don’t even know what it means. It’s what I’m called, but right now, it’s something else, like when you stare at a word too long and it loses its meaning. It has an entirely new meaning when it’s coming out of those lips.

  “You should go,” I tell him, breaking our stare. I can’t handle it.

  He doesn’t want to go, and I don’t want him to either, but my stone heart won’t have it.

  I don’t even know him.

  Yes, I do.

  No, I don’t.

  “I’ll have Al pick you up and bring you to my apartment on the night of the third,” he tells me.

  “Oh, not in the morning on the fourth?”