Sparrows For Free

by Lila Felix

Moving under the canopy of his arm, another tear forms in my funky eye. It’s not just this one gesture. I’ve felt more care and kindness from these people, despite the almost accident the night before, than I have in a very long time.

  Does he know how much the little gestures of kindness mean to someone like me?

  Like the sweatshirt for me last night.

  Like not making fun of me for my one man band Christmas party.

  Like inviting me to breakfast and now the movies.

  Where have these people been all my life?

  I wipe the tear away and then when he turns I pretend to be swiping something from my face. Usually an externally strong person, able to cope with many a harsh word, this boy next to me has drilled a hole into my defenses.

  He rubs my shoulder, trying to get my attention.

  “You okay?”

  I nod, unable to conjure a whimperless sentence. I hope he will let it go. I pray he will let it go. And for the next five plus hours, he does. I glance at my watch as the last movie starts and realize I’m starving. I hadn’t eaten anything all day except the sporadic handful of popcorn and the monster sized Coke. I firmly intended to be a big girl about it and just finish the movie, but my stomach betrayed me with a rumble loud enough to be heard over the Elven remembrances.

  “Damn Ezra, feed your girl already!” Someone shout whispered from down the row. I think it was Dauber.

  It started a consensus among the ranks. Everyone was hungry and they’d seen the last movie about a hundred times. Before I know it, we are leaving and head to some place they herald for having the best greasy piled high burgers. While walking up the incline toward the exit, I allow myself one glance at the seat where I’d been cocooned under his arm. The first time I’d ever felt a single sliver of security in my adult life.

  We eat at a greasy spoon and everyone seemed to be impressed that ‘such a little thing’, their words, not mine, could put away a double burger plus sweet potato fries. My mother would’ve been appalled at such conversation. She would say it was their politically correct way of saying I’m a pig.

  It is the first time I admit to myself how cruel my mom actually is, in her passive aggressive way.

  Ezra comes in with me and checks all the closets and even my bathroom for robbers or something while the others wait outside in the car. He hesitates at the door, and I think, for a moment, he might actually explain his previous wiggage. He looks back, those eyes pierce me and I try to contain my girly squeal at the thought he might kiss me.

  But instead, he shakes himself of whatever thought runs through his head, mutters another heartfelt apology, and leaves. I whisper to the closed door that I had a great time and that I can still feel the warmth of his embrace along my shoulders.

  I lock the door behind him. On my way to bed, I run my hand along the plane of wood atop that cabinet. For the first time, after a social encounter with a group of people—I don’t need to hide.

  Monday is a real bitch. Not because it’s Monday. I’m not one of those generalized haters of Monday and Thursday just because they’re not Friday. But today is particularly heinous. Harvey claims I didn’t warn him about the owner of a partner business coming in for a meeting at ten, even though it’s been on his calendar, both printed and digital for three months. The people were coming in from Tokyo for crying out loud. I had also emailed him on Thursday night. And I may be a lot of things, including a pushover and oversensitive. But this girl knew how to put a return receipt on an email. The bastard opened it on Sunday afternoon. He was just looking for someone to ream this morning.

  Of course, that would be me. I have ‘abuse me please’ stamped on my forehead.

  Around noon, I get a text, and it actually startles me. I never get texts during the day—ever. I reach down to see who it is and can’t squash the shit eating grin that spreads across my face. It’s Ezra. It just says ‘Hi’, but it vaults me into a state of happiness. I respond with a ‘Hi’ back. I’m not really familiar with texting relationships.

  I may have just blown it with one word.

  He never texts back, but it doesn’t matter. It may as well be a Friday for me.

  Ezra

  I saw her cry at the movie. She tried to wipe the tear away, pretending there was something on her face. It was too late.

  Crying was a foreign thing to me.

  I never cried at Mara’s memorial.

  I never wiped away her tears when she told me about him.

  The blood—I wiped one drop of blood from her lips before running.

  I’d never intended to apologize to Aysa. After that night, I went inside and both Dauber and Gray could tell I’d lost my shit—again. Humiliated, I told them the whole damned thing from the brakes to the yelling.

  God, the screaming.

  After my outburst, I figured if I didn’t apologize, she’d stay away. A girl like that? Sweet and had probably never wronged anyone in her life. She was better off without me and my antics. She would become one of the group, one of the ones that fled a room when I did, making sure the nut was okay. One of the group that silenced with the rest when anyone, even on the TV, mentioned cars or wrecks or babies.

  That was my resolve after I got in— not apologize—until I relayed the drama to my friends.

  After I finished telling my story, I began to panic. What if she was upset and wrecked her car. What if she was on the side of the road, calming down and some creeper came after her.

  Then Knox called and said he’d inadvertently added salt to the wound.

  That’s when the texting and the calling began. When I figured she was just ignoring me, Gray began to text and call, followed by Dauber. I considered driving to her house or looking for her, but I didn’t even know where to start.

  I’m putting all my stock in this girl, emotionally, and I don’t even know where she lives.

  When she opened the door, everything I’d promised myself about leaving her life uncracked by the likes of me, vanished. I wanted in her life, and I needed her folded within mine.

  I lay in bed later that day, after the movies, rolling through the things I’d figured out about her so far. Her parents were real douchebags. I could tell you that. Ten minutes around her and I just wanted her to make me a list of everything she’s ever wanted for Christmas and buy it all, wrap it and video her opening it all.

  And then there was her constant second guessing, the cloud of self-questioning that she carries around like most people carries their car keys. I could see it every time someone asked her a question or every time she opens her mouth to speak. She cut her eyes downward and to the right. That’s when you know she’s having an internal debate about what to say and how the people around her would take it.

  I would admit this to no one, but instead of leaving her apartment that night, I had a carnal desire to sit outside her door like one of those lion statues that people put outside their entrance ways.

  I wanted to block anyone that would ever hurt her—chew them up and spit them out.

  Including myself.

  I didn’t know how to move forward. I only knew bastard Ezra, the one who said what girls wanted to hear and did what they wanted him to do, a means to a pleasurable end.

  Aysa deserves better than that.

  She deserves someone better.

  But I can’t stay away.

  I texted her on my lunch hour, but she just texted ‘Hi’ back, nothing else. So I thought she was busy and left her alone. But as I lay here, it’s the first time in a long time the run can’t pierce the walls of wake. I’m laying here, fully awake, but not thinking of Mara, I’m thinking of Aysa.

  Does God give second chances? Does he give us ways to right the horrible, sinful wrongs we’ve committed? If so, was this my shot? Was Aysa my shot at making amends?

  I push those thoughts back with the ones about Mara. No, this was more than a chance at retribution, more than penance.

  I pick up the phone, debating with myself about whether or not
to call when Gray knocks on the door.

  “Hey,” I say, smiling and sitting up, relieved she saved me from myself.

  “Hey, I went to the counselor person today. Knox set it up for me. This one wants me to go to some group therapy. It starts on Friday night. Do you want to come?”

  I stall. No, I do not want to go. Group therapy. Shit, no.

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “Okay,” she says, making her exit, patting the wall. “Oh, and one more thing. Just call her.”

  She smiles and shuts the door behind her. She’s right. I should call. It seems like we’re always in a group when we go out, and I don’t have the chance to really get to know her, only through observation.

  So I call.

  “Hello?”

  Her voice is small but fierce. Like she’s strong and weak at once.

  “Hey, it’s me.”

  “Hey,” hear some shifting, I glance at the clock and realize it’s past eleven. I’ve probably woken her up.

  “Sorry. I was reading. I had to unplug my phone.”

  “I just realized how late it was, sorry.”

  “We really need to stop apologizing so much,” she laughs into the phone. I want to reach through it and pull her through so I could hear it in person.

  “What are you reading?”

  “Oh, cheesy romance.”

  “You like that stuff?”

  “Yeah. It’s the only place I get romance, so…Oh, my God. I get so brave over the phone. Why is that? I can’t say jack when I’m in front of someone, but over the phone, I’ll just spill my guts.”

  A chuckle rumbles through me, and I look down at myself, wondering where it had been hiding.

  “Maybe I should just call you when we’re out on dates then.”

  Shit, I immediately know my folly. We aren’t dating. We are just hanging out.

  “Maybe so,” she lets it slide.

  “I texted you today,” I say and then cringe. She gets braver over the phone, and I get a nasty case of dumbassitis.

  “And I texted you back. It kinda made my day.”

  “But you just said ‘Hi’ back. I thought you were blowing me off.”

  “No. I waited for another text from you, but you didn’t. I smiled all day about that text.”

  “When can I see you again?”

  “You or all of you?”

  “Just me.”

  “I don’t really have plans, like ever. Tell me when.”

  “Tomorrow. Dinner.”

  “Can I cook for you?”

  “Yeah, your place?”

  “If you don’t mind the decorations.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Six?”

  “Six thirty. I need to come home and shower.”

  “See you then. I need to get to sleep.”

  “Goodnight, Ace.”

  “Goodnight.”

  That night I dream of Mara crying. She’s sitting in the car, but instead of moving, she’s seat belted in lifelessly. She’s sobbing. She’s telling me about Luca. I can smell the hint of metal in the air, the smoke of the engine curls into a U. The seatbelt digs into her skin. She’s fading in and out until I turn away from her, not able to bear watching her fade from me for the thousandth time. She calls my name and I can’t resist her. I turn back. I look at her, starting at her shoes and drawing my gaze upwards. Everything is the same, her weird purple pants I begged her not to wear, her MegaDeath shirt, but as I look at her face with every intention of praying to her to stop tormenting me—the face now belongs to Aysa, the sinewy, smooth texture of her skin, the lilt of her nose, the thumbprint on her eye. She’s bleeding and pleading with me to save her. I reach for her, but she’s already gone.

  And then I wake, breathless.

  I reach for my phone and check the time, a little after four in the morning. I don’t hear the stomping of feet racing down the hall. That means I must not have screamed. If I didn’t, it was a first. I take off in my pajama pants and throw on a pair of shorts with no shirt, then finagling on my shoes. I need to get rid of the energy—the buildup of terror.

  I run. I run in no direction and at no specific pace. I breathe with the pounding of my feet on the concrete. I stop at an intersection when the six o’clock alarm goes off on my phone and look at where I am. I turn around once the realization pours over me.

  Shit, I’m only a few blocks away from Aysa’s apartment. I’m tempted to run over to her place and knock on the door simply to see how she looks first thing in the morning. Instead I high tail it home, making it just in time to rush through a shower and get dressed. As I get into work, I grin to myself seeing the Christmas decorations by the time clock.

  I text Aysa just because. ‘Good morning. Just got into work. See you tonight.”

  Now that’s a text.

  I resist texting her during lunch. I don’t want to overstep my bounds.

  Getting home that night, I realize I didn’t even tell Gray about it. Maybe that’s healthy. Yes, she’s my best friend, but possibly this is the space we need to grow.

  I shower again and get dressed, a black button down shirt with jeans and Chucks. I debate myself over little things like which watch to wear, two sprays of cologne or one. Finally ready, I head out the door, more anxious than ever about seeing her.

  I knock on her door, but there’s no answer. I knock repeatedly until I finally decide to call her. I notice she never texted me back this morning. She answers on the third ring, “Hey, Ezra.”

  “I’m here. Are you okay?”

  “No, I’m not really feeling well. Can we cancel?”

  “You don’t sound good. Just let me see you’re okay, and then I’ll go.”

  “I’m fine.” Her voice waivers. She’s lying.

  “Let me in before I kick the door down.”

  “Ugh!”

  She opens the door a hairline only and shows me half of her face; “See? I’m just not feeling well.”

  “Open the door, Aysa.”

  “You are freakin’ impossible.”

  Flinging the door wide open, it bangs on the wall behind the door. Her hands are back on those killer hips. I raise my eyes to hers and see red. The left side of her face is banged up. A line in the middle of the bruising is raised. The red rings around her usually vivacious eyes are red and irritated.

  “What happened?”

  “Life,” she says turning from me. As I shut the door behind us, she sits in a worn leather recliner and bundles herself up in a comforter. I sit down on her couch and look around while she decides whether or not she’s gonna tell me what happened. I look at the flat screen TV across the room and see it’s on one of those cooking competition shows. And one of the cabinets of her entertainment center is wide open, but nothing is inside.

  “I didn’t cook. I didn’t shower. I didn’t get dressed. I just came home and sat.”

  She didn’t really think I cared about any of that. Did she?

  She’s trying to push me away.

  I get up and go to her kitchen. I grab a dish towel off the counter and fill it with ice. I bring it over to her and press it to her face. She’s crying again.

  When Mara used to cry, I would make my excuses and leave as fast as possible.

  I grab her up, comforter and all, cradling her to me. She cries harder and winces when I replace the ice on her face. She goes on for an hour, and who knows how long before she gets up wordlessly and stomps into the bathroom.

  “I’m sorry,” she whimpers, coming back into the room. Her welt has lost some of its anger, but I haven’t lost mine. I try to tell myself she fell, or just had an accident. But her cries belonged to someone who’d gotten a bruise not only on her face, but on her heart.

  “Just tell me what happened—whose ass I need to kick.”

  She half smiles and rambles, “Then kick my ass. It was my fault. Harvey, my boss, said his chair was broken, so he took mine and told me to get another one. But I was running around doing all kinds of thing
s, and when I went back to my desk, I forgot it was broken, and I just sat on it like an idiot. I fell backwards and hit my face on the file cabinet behind me. What an idiot.”

  “You’re not an idiot. Don’t say that. I could kick your boss’ ass though. So that upset you this much, falling?”

  She pulls the move, the one where she ticks her eyes to the right and at the floor, but this time they also jerk to that open cabinet under the TV, and it makes me think it has some kind of significance. Then she reaches under the TV and clicks the button to turn it off.

  “I just don’t want to say, okay?”

  “Okay. Did you at least take something? It’s gonna hurt like a bitch in the morning.”

  “I took some Tylenol earlier. I’m sorry I ruined your night.”

  Her hands fist on the edges of her gray tank top. She kneads and tugs on it like it was her offender. I couldn’t imagine just falling and having an accident would make someone this upset. I wish she would just let me hold her again. That’s all I want to do.

  “Why don’t you let me order us dinner?”

  Her eyebrows bounce in disbelief. She’s still looking at the ground. And it probably isn’t the most appropriate moment to think it, but she is completely beautiful this way—a sorrowful, rumpled mess. Her make-up is gone, the remnants of whatever black stuff leaves a faint shadow under her eyes. Her hair is up, swirled around on top of her head.

  She shivers once and heads for the kitchen. Another thing different from Mara. She would’ve been all over me, not letting me go. This girl can take care of herself all freakin’ day without even thinking about me. She isn’t going to be one of those girls who leaches onto me—this one would take some chasing.

  I follow her into the kitchen and see her putting a kettle on the stove. She turns it on and pulls out a drawer next to me—take out menus. She splats them all on the counter, shoves the drawer closed, and bends her torso over the counter, putting her wound on the tiles. I’m sure they’re cool on her face.

  “I need soup,” she says.

  “Ok, what kind,” I spring into action. She finally allows me to do something for her.

  “Don’t care,” she mumbles, eyes closed.

  I sidle next to her and call the Chinese place, ordering every kind of soup they have and practically everything else on the menu. I listen halfway as the woman recalls the order to me in broken English. I can’t help myself. I reach over and rub a pattern of spheres on her back. She arches into my hand, and I smile thinking I’ve done something right. I’m so damned out of practice.