by Lori L. Otto
“She’s had every opportunity to,” I argue. “She asked for my help to write our professors. It was more efficient to do it that way. I haven’t done anything without her wanting me to.”
“I’m not saying that, honey. You’re misunderstanding me.”
“I think your mother is suggesting you give her a forum.”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying. I noticed her scribbling in her notebook in the car on the way here. I don’t think she’s writing a grocery list. It’s how you get when you write fiction. Was she writing poetry?”
“Yeah.”
“Have you read it?”
“Only what she shows me.”
“What does she write about?”
“Things that inspire her. Things that happen in her life.” Mom looks at me, allowing me to catch up. “You think she’s writing about what happened?”
“Ask her. And ask her if what she’s writing are things other people should read. Will they help other people? Will they help her heal?”
“And then what?”
“Get her an audience. You have a blog following of empathetic people who want to help others. Who better than to see what Coley has to say?”
“I could tie it in with a non-profit here in the city. There was one she mentioned she wanted to raise funds for.”
Dad smiles. “Now you’re thinking.”
“That’s how people get to know the Coley you know. It’s not about taking her on a trip somewhere and leaking pictures,” Mom says. “Although I know I’m not talking you out of this trip…”
“No,” I tell her with a laugh.
“It’s not like you to run away from your problems, but if you think it’s best for both of you, then do it. Get your homework done, but have a little fun. And work on your books. Let her work on her poetry. On top of all of your school work, you’ve been dealing with circumstances no one should have to. Carrying the burden of proof to make sure Asher couldn’t hurt anyone else? Accepting that someone you trusted was behind these vile attacks? Losing the majority of your friends? And then adding the breakup with Zai to the mix, Trey. It’s an undue amount of stress on a nineteen-year-old kid.”
“I feel like I’ve aged ten years in the past few weeks.”
Mom takes my hand in hers. “I’ve been impressed with your maturity, Trey. And I’m sorry we jumped to conclusions Saturday morning.”
I smile at them both, understanding what they must have thought. Regardless of the fact that I’ve rarely made any missteps–except for partaking in a little too much alcohol one too many times when I was in high school–I know it was hard to imagine the reality of what actually happened. Having an apartment bugged with a video camera isn’t something that happens every day. It’s much more common to hear about some idiot taking an explicit video or picture that inevitably finds itself into the wrong hands.
“I blame Livvy,” I say to them, joking, but then remembering that she did have a situation where an explicit photo taken by Jon ended up in the wrong hands. “It’s always her fault,” I add, still grinning. “But you have to remember, I’ve always been the better child. Your favorite.”
My parents laugh. “Get back there with your guests,” Dad says. “You’ve got some sign language to learn so you can teach us. I hate not being able to talk to Joel.”
“Yeah,” I agree. “Coley sent me links this morning. I’m going to study a lot in Palau.”
“Send them to me. I want to be much better prepared next time we see him.”
“Me, too,” Mom adds. “I don’t want him to feel awkward and isolated when he’s around us.”
“I’ll do it right now,” I tell them, returning to my seat. “Coley,” I say, spelling her name in ASL. “Help me out.” I know those signs, at least. She nods her head. I speak slowly in case Joel tries to read my lips, but my request is for her to translate. “I’d love to feature some of your poetry on my blog.” I manage to communicate “I’d love,” but nothing more.
She speaks and signs at the same time. “That doesn’t really fit with your objective. Aren’t you being graded on your site for a class this semester?”
I sign as much as I can, being thoughtful of my word choices as I speak. “Yes. But I think I can pair them up with the organization for women you wanted to raise money for. That way, I stay on target with my mission statement, but branch out creatively. Another one of my goals is actually to expand content, so you’d be helping to get me some extra credit–not that it’s the reason I’m asking.
“Do you… have you written anything that might fit with that?”
She nods and bites her lip, staving off tears. “I would love to work with you.” She doesn’t say it out loud, but I understand all the hand signs.
I silently thank her, too, then link her fingers with mine. Joel gives me the red notebook I presented her last Friday, opened to a page. “Read this one,” he instructs me.
A good man treads away
But his thoughts stay
Behind with the woman he loves
But can't hold. Not today.
In the wake of wanting
He abandons parts of himself:
His heart. His desire. His future.
His future.
His future, he casts aside in his past
And for that, what has he to live for? To work toward?
In the wake of wanting
He leaves everything and retains nothing,
And that has to be good enough for him.
For her.
For now.
Another man runs.
Can he even be called a man?
It never looks back; never gives thought
To the women it's taken
But not once loved.
In the wake of wanting
It leaves no discernible trace.
It's cold. Methodic. Ruthless.
It lives in the present. It. Lives.
While the victims in its past slowly shy away
Lie awake
Cry, ashamed; pray to die.
In the wake of wanting
Through taking everything, it has even less, yet presses on.
Taking, taking. Taking more.
“Laureate, this is startling… raw.” I don’t know a better word for it.
“I just find it so confounding how two men from such similar backgrounds can deal with one emotion–one feeling–in such vastly differing ways. Desire. One can have restraint and self-control, so thoughtful about every decision he makes because of the chain reaction they’ll set off to the women involved. The other moves forward with no care or caution for the human lives he tramples. How does that happen?
“Doesn’t it make you wonder?”
“Wonder?” I ask her. “No. It makes me sick. He makes me sick.”
“But the polarity of it.”
“I don’t like considering any similarities that he and I may have shared.” I swallow hard. “I’m nothing like him.”
“Of course you’re not. That’s what I’m saying. Exactly what I’m saying.”
“Our backgrounds weren’t so similar. Sure, we both had money. Yeah, we went to private school. We both like to write. That’s where the resemblances end. I would never have guessed he would do such horrible things, but I would believe him to be disrespectful to women. That’s something I’m not.”
“Why were you friends?” she asks. “You had to have something in common.”
I shrug my shoulders. “I pledged Sig Rho, and he was a member. We were both on The Wit staff. It was enough to make us think we had things in common. The fraternity makes you think you’re joining a group of like-minded individuals. Anyone can lie taking an oath, though. And allegiances are easily broken, or so I found. I walked away feeling disillusioned that someone like Asher could be a part of that organization, and then they all spoke out against me.”
“Have you ever been afraid to stand on your own?”
“No,” I tell her. “Not when it’s the rig
ht thing to do. And not when it matters.” She pushes against the chair to kiss me on the cheek, then turns a page in the notebook.
“There’s more.”
For weeks I waited, patient,
Affections understated
Commonalities celebrated.
In the wake of wanting,
I found friendship, kinship
An underlying hope of courtship.
While our friends fell–
A yell, then silent–
Never tell, in their own hell,
at the hands of a violent
Imposter. Someone they trusted.
In the wake of wanting
Attention, affection, love–
Scars and tears and fears carry on.
But can they?
I stare at the page, moved beyond words. Beyond thoughts, really. The ink on the paper blurs into a mess of black smudges against the off-white lined grain.
“She’s amazing, isn’t she?” Joel interrupts the moment of quiet contemplation.
I start nodding before I look up at him, my eyes watering. I feel immense reverence and respect for the woman sitting next to me, but also realize quickly the depths of her I have yet to reach; have yet to know. I’m impatient and feel a sense of urgency to learn everything about her because there are monsters like Asher who prey upon caring, optimistic, loving people like Coley and have the power to alter them at such a level that the person with me today could be completely unrecognizable after a traumatic experience brought about by the Asher Knoxlands of the world.
In fact, she has probably already been changed by him at a fundamental level from her public exposure this past weekend. Already, she’s not the person I met. Not the same person I knew last week. The one I made love to last Friday. The one in the video, even. He’s already stolen away parts of her I’ll never know, and that realization is crushing to me.
I don’t want to lose any more pieces of her.
I unfasten her seatbelt and take her hand in mine, leading her into the small room in the back of the plane. I don’t care what my parents or her brother think.
After I close the door, I gesture for her to sit down on the bed and then take my place next to her. My hand behind her ear, I kiss her deeply, staving off emotions I’d wanted to hide from everyone–including her. When we part, I lean next to her, touching my temple to hers as I run my fingers through her hair. “I love you, Coley,” I whisper, then press my lips to the side of her head.
“What's wrong, Trey?”
“What’s your greatest fear?” I ask her, needing to know all the things about her she’d never shared with me before.
“Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia.”
“No,” I tell her, appreciating her attempt at levity with a chuckle, but returning to my question. “Seriously. Your greatest fear. You’ve obviously overcome that one.”
As she glances up at me, the sun catches flecks in her blue eyes. I study them intently as I wait for her answer.
“Not leaving my mark. Passing on from this life and being… forgotten. Not doing anything of significance.”
“I think you’ve overcome that one, as well.”
“The fucking video doesn’t count,” she says bitterly. “That’s not even funny.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about, Knee-jerk,” I tell her.
“I’m sorry,” she says quickly. “It’s been on my mind. I’ve been worried that… that’s my legacy. That maybe I should have just taken the underwear model job and called it a day.”
“Laureate.” I drop the notebook that I’d brought with me onto the bed and point to it. “You’re writing your benefaction to the world in this book–and probably countless others just like it. You don’t need to worry about fading into nothingness when you’re gone, Coley. That one poem made my pulse cease. I stopped breathing. It left me feeling… fractured. Horrified.”
“Didn’t you like it?” she asks, unsure.
“Was that not your intention? To provoke genuine alarm and anxiety? Women were raped and silenced by their own fear. Silence that led to more people being hurt. It’s devastating. Surely it’s how you want the reader to feel.”
She nods.
“It’s deep, Coley. Deep-rooted. Hits you in your gut. It’s brilliant.”
“Do you like the contrast of it?”
“I could pick it apart and analyze it all day,” I tell her, wrapping my arms around her. “It’s the contrast that makes it so shocking. Because it seems so light and innocent before it turns on you and wrenches you in the side; stabs you in the back. Betrays you with its ugly, foul visuals.
“You want a Pulitzer for your poetry? It’s going to be yours someday. Mark my words, laureate. You may actually be a poet laureate someday. Maybe I knew it from the first poem I read of yours.”
“I don’t think so,” she whispers. “My sonnets sucked snow cones.”
“Your sonnets did not suck snow cones. Your sonnets meant so much to me that I locked them in my safe when I got home that day. I didn’t want them to be discovered by someone or lost or destroyed. The fact that you thought anything of me back then made me feel like the most important guy in the world. I wanted to be everything to you.” I swallow after telling her this. She reaches behind my neck and pulls my head toward her for another kiss. “What’s your favorite flavor of snow cone?” I ask, my smiling lips still pressed against hers.
“Raspberry.”
“Who had the biggest influence on your life?”
“Nyall,” she says quickly. “He wanted to be a rapper when he was younger. We used to write together. He taught me about free verse poetry.”
“Why don’t you two still do that?”
“Because he sees no future for himself anymore. He’s depressed, Trey. Nobody shares their talents at the hospital, and if he were to write, I have no doubt it would be dark shit…”
“And discouraged by the nurses, I’m sure,” I comment.
“It’d probably get his meds increased or changed or something. I told you I send him things that I don’t think he reads.”
“I guess I can see why… I guess. But I think he would be so proud of you, Coley. Maybe you should push him to read some of them. Be more active. It could inspire him.”
“I don’t know…”
I nod my head. She knows his treatment better than I do. “What’s your biggest dream for the future?” I ask.
“Why all the questions?”
“I just want to know everything… everything about the girl I fell in love with.”
“I want a long life that’s filled with love and good health,” she says. “I see my brothers and realize how lucky I am. How close I’ve been to tragedy all my life, but somehow managed to escape it. It can only be luck, and it can’t last forever. I dove side-by-side with Joel when he lost his hearing. I was fine. I went with Nyall many times to his friend’s house, and no one ever laid a hand on me.
“And now, I avoided Asher just by trusting my instincts to stick with you. But in the realm of love, every boy I ever dated broke my heart. Derrick cheated on me, but all the others before him found other reasons to break up with me. I never ended a single relationship. I always give everything to make things work.”
“I can’t even fathom why…” And I can’t.
“A couple reasons. One: my depression. Guys get personally offended when things they do ‘don’t make me happy.’” To emphasize her point, she uses air quotes. I nod my head, showing my empathy to her plight. My mother has been through bouts of depression at different points in her life, and I’ve come to understand that–at least in her case–she just needs a little time and space to work things out. “The other reason? I love quickly. Passionately. Fully. And it scares guys off.”
“That doesn’t scare me. All I know are relationships–the committed kind. I don’t like the idea of casual dating,” I confess to her.
“Those are my big flaws. That’s why I can’t keep a boyfriend. Well, ther
e was one guy who didn’t like my ‘obsession’ with you.” I laugh at that admission. “But I love being in love, Trey. I seek it out and have been willing to overlook a lot.”
“What do you overlo–“
“Nothing,” she interrupts, then shakes her head. “I haven’t had to overlook anything with you. You’re what I’ve always wanted. What I’d hoped you’d be. You’ve never once let me down. In fact, you surpass my expectations all the time.”
“No one’s ever broken up with me,” I tell her. “So if this ends, you’ll be the first to do that.”
“I just told you–I give everything to make things work.”
“Well, I’m going to do everything to give you what you want throughout your long life, Coley: love and good health. I’m going to give everything to make it work, too, because being in love with you is the only way I see myself being anymore. I understand depression. Just tell me what you need, if you can. If you can’t, hopefully I’ll learn. And I’m glad you fell quickly, passionately and fully. I was never alone–from the moment I met you. I knew you were with me. Even when I had to tread away. Absolutely, my thoughts stayed with you.
“And honestly, it was never okay. It was simply what had to be done, but it felt wrong. And not wrong in that I shouldn’t be feeling things for you while I was dating someone else, but wrong in that I wasn’t allowing nature to take its course. I believe we’re supposed to be together, laureate. Forces bigger than us worked to put us together. All we had to do was obey.”
“Gladly,” she says.
“I’ve always been good at following rules,” I joke with her.
“I guess we’re stuck with each other?” she asks.
“I’m not leaving.”
“I’m not leaving,” she vows. “I love you so much.”
Our kissing leads to lying down on the bed, where we make out until the pilot announces our descent and we head back into the main cabin to fasten our seatbelts. Coley apologizes to her brother, but he stayed busy reading a book while we were gone. Dad leans into the aisle to give me an aside glance, then signals for me to fix my hair. He nods once it’s in place and goes back to reading on his iPad.