by Tillie Cole
Maybe, I thought, just maybe, by helping her through, I might finally find the strength—find my strength—to tell it all.
Entirely.
Unbarred.
Without it killing me inside.
Maybe.
* * * * *
A week and a half passed. The days I didn’t spend with Levi, I came to the center and sat with Clara. Each time I lost more and more hope. If there was a living embodiment of a soul destroyed, it was Clara. She would sit at the window, staring out at the river, and I would sit beside her. She would make small talk, she would occasionally smile, but I was convinced it was all contrived.
Nothing I said or did seemed to lift her from her depression. It began to destroy me that I couldn’t give her hope. Lexi and Celesha told me not to be disheartened, not to give up, but to keep trying. I was at a loss; it seemed like her inner light was fading with every passing day.
The rain came down hard as I walked into the sunroom, the heavy drops ricocheting off the glass roof. I clutched my old notepad to my chest, and took my usual seat beside Clara.
“Hello, Elsie,” she signed, without looking my way. Her eyes were back on the river, watching it rush by, the current strong, swollen by the heavy rain.
I placed my notepad on the table beside us, and moved into her line of sight. “How are you today?” I signed.
Clara lifted her hands and signed, “Okay.”
I sighed. It was the same answer she gave every day. It was the answer she gave to most enquiries, ‘okay’. It was as frustrating as ‘nice’ or ‘fine’.
My nerves built as I stared at the notepad sitting on the table. I hadn’t spoken to Clara about my time in the group home; I hadn’t spoken to anyone. I hadn’t spoken to anyone, had not disclosed my personal horror and shame. Though I’d definitely opened my heart and poured out my soul to something—that notepad.
After days of being unable to explain or help, or to tell her it would be okay—because I wasn’t sure it would be, I wasn’t sure that it’d ever be—I knew I had to try something different. I had no words for her to hear, my sign language was too rusty to express what I wanted her to know—that I understood. Everything. I understood it all.
The words from my heart were my best shot at helping her, at saving her from the gathering dark.
I looked to Clara whose head was resting back on the chair, and I waved to get her attention. Her sad, lifeless eyes rolled to me. I lifted my hands. “I know you have probably heard it a million times, but I want to tell you that I do understand.” Clara didn’t react, but she continued to watch me. This was progress.
I tapped my finger on the notepad and signed, “I was fourteen when I was taken into care. And I was sixteen when the bullying began.” Clara shuffled forward an inch. That solitary inch gave me the hope to spur on. “Like you, I didn’t talk, but I wrote. I wrote all of my feelings in prose, in poems.” I paused. “I had to, or I wouldn’t have been able to cope for as long as I did.”
Clara frowned. I pointed to the notebook again. “Read it,” I signed. “These are the poems from my darkest times. How I felt when I was alone, when I had no one to turn to, and nowhere to go. When I felt like I couldn’t go on.”
Clara’s eyes dropped to the notepad, then flicked back to me as I rose from my seat. “I’m going to take a walk, then I’m going to come back. Please read this if you want to. Then perhaps we can talk, if you want to.”
I walked off, feeling like I was leaving a large part of my soul behind. But I kept one foot moving in front of the other, praying to God that something in that book would help her. Something, about the hell I went through, would show her she wasn’t alone.
I walked and I walked; I couldn’t stop. I walked through the busy rooms, waving at the teens who were seeking help and healing their hearts. I walked out to the covered gazebo in the yard and I sat down. I sat for as long as I possibly could. I stared at the river rushing by, cradling my hands around my waist as the wind whipped through my hair. I wondered what made it so fascinating to Clara. I wondered if it would fascinate me too, if I’d never be gifted sound. Would I spend hours wondering what it sounded like? Would I too become lost in its rhythm?
My leg started bouncing, and I couldn’t sit here anymore. Getting to my feet, guessing that a good ninety minutes had passed, I headed back into the sunroom to see Clara’s brown hair leaning back against the chair.
I approached slowly and cautiously, more out of fear of her having read my poems than how she would be. Then I heard a soft sniff. I turned to face Clara sitting on her chair, and my heart broke in two when I saw her cheeks were wet and her eyes were red.
My book was clutched to her chest, open on a page.
“Clara?” I signed. “Are you okay?”
She watched my hands, and then nodded her head. I sat down before her and she lowered the notepad, resting it on her lap.
“This one,” she signed, then patted her hand over her heart, “It is me,” she added, a tear falling from her puffy eyes. “This poem is me.”
I flicked my gaze down to the poem, and I stilled. It was the one I used to read most. The one that tore me apart. The one I’d written at the worst of Annabelle’s taunts. The one I wrote just before I succumbed to their cruelty.
“Clawed Heart,” I mouthed on seeing the scribbled title of the poem. Clara nodded her head and I watched as she started reading from the first line:
“Spears from mouths, they fire at will,
Malicious and sharp, with poison they fill.
The venom is fast, destroying the vein,
Melting the flesh, racking with pain.
Invading heat, like rivers it flows,
Eyes firmly set, the place it hurts most.
Like ink it is black, polluting the light,
The words manifest, one goal in its sight.
The skin shreds away, leaving naught but bone,
It rips away life, leaving fear on its own.
It sweeps through the mind, taking happiness and soul,
With talons like razors, it moves, dipping low.
It creeps down the neck, tears the body apart,
The darkness consumes, the last bastion: the heart.
It wraps it in vines, strangling its breath,
It pierces with needles, no beat there is left.
The blood, it runs deep, its shell empty and bare,
The claws shred and they maim, ‘til there’s nothing left there.
The darkness it smiles, the weak they can’t cope,
Then it moves to the next, to victor cruelty, not hope.”
I breathed through my nose as I saw Clara’s eyes leave the page, and she ran her fingers over the words, to victor cruelty, not hope… to victor cruelty, not hope… to victor cruelty, not hope…
She traced the words three times, then pointed to herself. My skin crawled with a feeling, the feeling of knowing. I knew what that line meant. I had lived it. Was living it still, as was she.
“Cruelty,” she signed. “That’s what they do. They use cruelty to hurt, until all hope fades away.”
“But you can fight it,” I signed, and Clara tipped her head to the side.
“Did you fight it? Have you fought it?” she asked, and I dropped my hands.
She smiled sadly, then pointed back at the last two words… not hope…
Clara stared at that poem so hard that I took the notepad and ripped out the page. Her brown eyes widened in surprise as I placed the paper on her lap. She shook her head, and went to lift her hands. I stopped them from moving, my hands over hers. She focused on my mouth. “It’s yours,” I said, and watched her read my lips.
She dipped her eyes and said, “Thank… you…” My heart filled with light as the heavenly sound of her stuttered monotone voice filled my ear.
“You’re welcome,” I mouthed back and squeezed at her hand.
I heard the sound of Lexi’s heels coming down the hallway to take me home, so I could dress for the dinn
er tonight.
Sitting back, I signed, “Are you okay, Clara? I have to go.”
Clara inhaled a long deep breath, then she smiled. She smiled. And it wasn’t fake or even small. She smiled showing me her teeth and she nodded her head.
She lifted the poem in her hand, then put it back down and signed, “This gives me hope. Thank you.”
I saw Lexi enter the doorway, and I got to my feet. For the first time since I started coming here, I had gotten through to Clara.
My pain had helped. My words had shown her she was not alone.
Her reaction showed me I was not alone.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, Clara, okay?”
Clara reached up and caught my hand, squeezing my fingers. Nodding, I pressed a kiss to the top of her head, then walked toward Lexi who was smiling at me with pride.
We walked down the hallway, and when we got into the car, Lexi turned to me. “You had a breakthrough?” she asked. Smiling, I nodded my head.
“It was one of my poems. It helped her.”
Lexi’s head tipped to the side. “You write poems?”
I hesitated, not realizing that I had given a secret away, but I answered honestly. “Yes.”
“You’re quite the remarkable girl, Elsie,” Lexi announced, and patted my leg. “I’m real glad you saw progress with Clara, it helps open them up to talking. It’s the first step, Elsie. You should be proud.”
We rode home and all the way there I felt changed inside. I’d helped someone see they weren’t alone. Even the nerves that were threatening to rise at the trepidation of tonight, couldn’t steal this positive feeling.
Maybe, I thought, maybe there is a place for me in this world after all.
Chapter Fourteen
Elsie
“Just hold it there for one more second,” Ally said as she ran the powder brush over my forehead and cheeks, one more time. I held still, the fat brush bristles tickling my nose. Ally stepped back, her bright smile taking over her face. Her brown eyes softened. “You look beautiful, darlin’, I’d kill for that skin of yours.”
I blushed at her compliment, getting to my feet when Lexi walked into the pool house. Lexi stopped, then she looked at me and put her hand over her chest. “Elsie,” she said gently. “You look stunning.”
I glanced down at my gold dress which Ally had taken me out to buy, the tight strapless sweetheart bodice, running into a flowing net skirt that fell to mid-thigh. I was in heels—I’d had to practice walking in them—and my hair was down my back in big thick curls.
Ally’s hands landed lightly on my shoulders. “Take a look at your makeup, Elsie. I’ve kept it light seeing as you don’t really need a lot to begin with.”
Doing as she said, I looked in the mirror she held in her hands, and I swallowed. I looked so different. I wanted Levi to like it.
“Well?” Ally asked, concern in her expression.
I pressed my hand over my chest. “Thank you, it’s beautiful.” Ally beamed in response, and she handed me a gold beaded bag.
“You’re all set,” she said. I headed for the door. Levi was waiting in the main house with his brothers. I’d already seen him in his team suit, and as always, he looked breathtakingly handsome. Then again, no matter what he wore, one look at his kind face and my heart skipped beat.
The wind was blowing stronger as the night rolled on. I took the thick, cream dress coat that Lexi had lent me and held it close. I rushed over the yard, not wanting to mess up all of Ally’s good work. I almost ran through the back kitchen door.
The sound of voices that filled the kitchen suddenly dropped when I entered. I looked up, wondering why the Carillo brothers had gone silent, when I saw Levi step up from leaning against the kitchen island, his hand gripping tightly the bottle in his hand.
I dragged in a slow breath when I saw that he was staring at me, his gray eyes scanning my body, only to soften when they landed on my face. I cut a glance to Austin and Axel, to see them smiling at Levi; the two darker brothers, stood side by side, watching the youngest with amusement in their eyes.
“Elsie,” Levi said roughly, as he placed his bottle down. He made his way toward me, a warm blush dusting the apples of his cheeks. My heart beat wildly as he approached. When he stopped before me, his hand went on my cheek—a single touch that assured me he cherished me—and I nuzzled into his palm. “You look so beautiful,” he rasped. I heard the back door open, slicing through the heavy atmosphere we found ourselves in.
“Well?” I heard Ally ask in a loud voice. “What do you think, Lev?”
Levi dropped his hand and looked over my shoulder. “She looks incredible,” he said shyly, then added, “but then she always does.”
“Aww,” Ally crooned and pressed a kiss to Levi’s cheek as she passed on her way to get to her fiancé. She stopped by Axel’s side, and she nudged him in the side. “You could take some tips from your little brother, querido.”
Axel pulled her closer into his chest, rolling his dark eyes. Ally laughed, wrapping her arm around his waist.
“Let me get a picture before y’all leave,” Lexi said and crouched before us. She pulled out her phone. Levi put his arm around my shoulder. I smiled to the phone, then she pulled out another camera. It was bigger and yellow. “And a Polaroid for my scrapbook,” she said. Levi laughed under his breath.
“Babe,” Austin called from behind. “You planning to have them there all night?”
“Hush!” she scolded, and snapped the button. A hand sized white picture rolled from the camera. Lexi shook the picture before bringing it to us, holding it out until the coating processed and our image came into view.
Butterflies burst in my stomach at how we looked on that picture, both of our faces presented timid smiles. But we looked happy.
“You look amazin’,” Lexi complimented, her tight throat causing her southern accent to become thicker.
“Can you put it in my room?” Levi asked. Lexi smiled at Levi like a mother would look at her son.
“Of course, sweetie,” she confirmed. “I gotta frame that it’ll go in real nice.”
Levi leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Lexi’s cheek, before taking my hand. “You ready?” Levi asked. I nodded my head. My stomach rolled; my butterflies flew away to leave only racking nerves.
We waved at everyone as we left the front room and we rushed into the Jeep. The music was playing low as we belted up. I expected him to pull out onto the road, but before he did, Levi leaned over the console and took my mouth in a kiss. I sighed as his lips moved gently against my lips, his tentative tongue slipping in to duel against mine.
Levi’s hand wrapped in my hair. He broke from the kiss, breathless, gray eyes leaden with need. “You look real fucking good, bella mia,” he rasped. My heart beat wildly as he swore. Levi rarely cussed. I fought a smile. It showed me how beautiful he truly thought I was. It made me feel like the prettiest girl in the world.
Moving back to his seat, Levi pulled out onto the road, and all the way to the hotel in central Seattle, he kept our hands entwined on my lap. As he pulled into the parking lot at the fancy hotel, players and their dates were entering the main door. I suddenly felt frozen by fear.
Levi held me tightly, lifting his hand to stall the valet that tried to come and take our car. My nerves increased when I saw the valet look at Levi in confusion. “We’d better go,” I hushed out, trying to keep the tightness from my throat.
“No,” Levi pushed. “He can wait. I can see something’s wrong.”
“It’s just nerves, Levi. I’ve… I’ve never been to anything like this, wearing fancy clothes, eating fancy food. I,” I sighed and shook my head, “I’ve never been around this many people… I’ve never had to talk to people like this. I’m,” I pushed down the lump clawing up my throat and asked, “What if I have to speak? What if they hear my voice?” I felt sick just at the thought of going in, my eyes drifting to watch the many girls glammed up in dresses entering the dinner in groups. They were lau
ghing, linking arms… they were all so perfect and normal.
Just like Annabelle and her friends.
Everything I wasn’t.
“What if they do?” Levi said softly, as I looked to his understanding face. “What if they do hear you speak?”
“It’s not like everyone else’s. I’ll…” I swallowed hard. “I’ll embarrass you, Levi. In front of all your friends.”
Levi’s jaw tensed, then he said firmly, “Bella mia, I promise you, it’s not so different that people will judge you.” He leaned forward, his face an inch from mine. “And I’ll be with you. All night, I’ll be with you. I can be your voice if you need it, but you have nothing to be ashamed of. I promise. Just… just trust me. I’d never do anything to upset or hurt you. You don’t need to be so scared. You’ve got me, and I’m not letting you go.”
I read his face and watched his kissable lips promise me I’d be safe. And I believed him. I knew he wouldn’t see me hurt. I knew he’d protect me no matter what.
You have to take this chance, I persuaded myself. You can’t always live in the shadows.
The sound of a horn blasted behind us, making me jump. Levi laughed at my shock, shaking his head. Bringing my hand to his lips, he asked again, “Are you sure you wanna do this? If it’s too much I can take you home. I won’t be mad.”
As I watched his lips brush against my skin, I said, “No. I want to be here with you, for you. I need to do this, for me too. I have to do this sometime. Why not now?”
Levi gave me the brightest smile, then he opened his door. The valet opened my door too and helped me out. I walked round the car and immediately took hold of Levi’s outstretched hand. He proudly led me into the foyer. I looked around in awe at the opulence surrounding us. “Crazy, huh?” Levi said pointing the huge crystal chandelier hanging down from the ceiling.
I nodded my head just as someone came over and asked if they could take my coat. I shrugged it off, Levi’s storm gray eyes roving over my bare arms. He licked along his lips. I caught the flush traveling up his neck.