Between Here and Gone

by Barbara Ferrer

  “Why here, Ava? How did you even—”

  “You really thought I wouldn’t find out?” Peering around his shoulder, I watched as she bent slightly and slid a magazine across the floor. The glossy paper slid against the tile with an ominous hiss before coming to a stop just shy of Jack’s shoes, the simple block title Reflections facing up. A heraldic crest blazed from the cover, a rearing horse silhouetted against a pair of crossed swords, the motto, “Cui servire est regnare” imprinted on a banner unfurling from the rider’s upraised arm.

  “Whom to serve is to reign,” I murmured almost absent-mindedly, drawing from another lifetime of Sunday Masses and long afternoons spent in tedious study of an ancient language.

  “Or the interpretation we used, ‘whose service is perfect freedom,’” Jack responded, his hand reaching back for mine, although his gaze remained trained on Ava.

  “What is it?” I asked quietly.

  “The alumni magazine. I wrote an article.” A deep, shuddering breath wracked his body so thoroughly, I put a hand to his back, a steadying touch.

  “About Montgomery?”

  He nodded. “It was stupid. Just feeding my own vanity.”

  No. An attempt to hold on to a piece of himself. An act for which he hated himself, only because of her. And like a shark scenting blood, every time he attempted to break free, to live his life, the closer she circled, attempting to keep him trapped. My fingers curled, bunching into the material of his shirt within.

  “You were a fool to think I’d never find out.”

  “I wasn’t trying to hide it, Ava. I just can’t imagine why you would care. You’ve never given a damn about anything but yourself.”

  “I care if it takes you away from me. Who else is going to fix things? I need you to fix things.” Her voice rose, tinged with a hysterical edge. Looking around, I noticed that all motion had stopped, all attention focused on the unfolding drama. Ava at center stage, finally holding an audience rapt. Her voice steadier, she said, “Now tell her goodbye,” the last word almost lost amidst gasps and cries and the sounds of toppling chairs and rapid footsteps and pleas to call the police.

  “Christ, Ava, have you completely lost your mind?”

  Hearing the tremor in his voice, I grew frantic, trying to look past him, clawing at the arm he had barring my way, his hissed, “Don’t,” fueling my panic. Turning my head, I saw our reflections in the large plate glass window—Jack, positioned between me and Ava, one arm thrust protectively back around my body, the other outstretched, placating, his gaze focused on the gun held in a steady hand.

  “You can’t go, Jack.” Her voice rose and fell in a dreamy, childlike sing-song. “Don’t you understand? You can’t leave.”

  “Ava, I’m here, I’m not going until we have this figured out.”

  My grip tightened in his shirt, my forehead tucked against his back, trying to hold on, terrified to let go.

  “There’s nothing to figure out. You just need to fix it. Like always.”

  His back rose and fell beneath me in a shuddering breath. “You need help, Ava—can’t you see that?” His voice remained steady and gentle even as his back shuddered beneath my forehead. “More than what I can give.”

  “I don’t need help. I just need things to be … fixed. And you can’t do that if you’re out playing at these stupid games.” Another peek at our reflections revealed her waving the hand holding the gun at the magazine still resting by Jack’s feet. “Trying to rescue worthless niggers and whores and God knows what other kinds of trash. You not allowed to help them—you’re supposed to help me.” Her voice grew more bitter and shrill with each word. “And you certainly can’t fix anything if you’re busy fucking her. You’re not supposed to be with her.”

  “Leave her out of this. This is between you and me.”

  “Exactly.” The dreamy quality of her voice intensified, a siren’s ethereal call. “It’s always going to be between you and me, Jack. Always.”

  The world tilted, the ground shifting and going out from beneath my feet, as I went tumbling, clutching my hands to my head, trying to block out the thundering roar that was so close … so much more deafening than the echo of memory it had been for all these years. Slowly, almost gracefully, Jack fell, pain and fear clouding those beautiful, haunted faun’s eyes as he reached for me, brilliant scarlet blooming across his chest.

  No. No. Not again. Dios mío, no, no, no…

  Amidst the screams and sounds of shattering glass, I scrambled across the floor, throwing myself over him, blanketing his body.

  “Get away from him!”

  I looked up at her, still so perfect amidst the chaos, perfect but for the wild shaking of her hands as they attempted to hold the gun steady.

  “Get away! He needs to get up. Jack, come on, Jack … it was just a joke. Get up, Jack. Get up, get up, get up. Stop playing. It’s not funny, Jack! It’s not, it’s not funny, it’s not!”

  “Shut up!”

  With jerky motions, I yanked off my cardigan, balling it up and pressing it to Jack’s chest. “Stay with me, please. Please don’t go, Jack. Please.” A tiny, isolated corner of my brain echoed with laughter tinged with more than a little hysteria at the fact that I was using Ava’s very words, begging him not to leave me. Peals of laughter that turned to pained cries as I released everything I’d held locked away for so very long, every word I wished I could have said to Nico. Reverting to Spanish as I implored him to stay with me, that I couldn’t let him go, couldn’t bear to lose him—

  “Get up, Jack, or I’ll … I’ll shoot myself. I mean it this time. I’ll really do it. I swear.”

  Ava stood with the gun to her temple, twisting it back and forth, the barrel tangling with the glorious red-gold strands of her hair in an obscene embrace.

  “Do it,” I spat. “Do you really think anyone would care?”

  Wild-eyed, she looked around, taking in the near-deserted surroundings, only a few brave or unlucky souls left crouched behind ticket counters and peering around the edges of doors.

  “Jack?”

  Sirens wailed, growing closer as she repeated, “Jack?”

  Damp fingers curled around my wrist. He met my gaze, his hand moving from my wrist to my face, cupping my cheek. As I turned my head, kissing his palm, he spoke, his voice faint, yet every word clear.

  “I can’t fix things anymore. I never could.”

  An admission to me. A dismissal of her. Finally done—as he’d promised. But at what cost?

  The gun lowered, almost as if of its own volition, as she continued to stare at Jack, head cocked. Her ocean blue eyes glittered brilliantly, endlessly empty and lost beyond their beautiful façade.

  The approaching sirens grew impossibly loud, bullhorn amplified voices booming with orders to surrender competing with calls for medical help, and almost, but not quite, managing to drown out the screams.

  Twenty-seven

  Please don’t go, Jack. Please. Stay with me.

  Please, Jack … don’t go … don’t go—

  Don’t leave…

  Blurred, wavering outlines gradually took shape and substance as I slowly blinked—the bullet-shaped metal shade of a gooseneck lamp, a white window frame, the unfurled petals of a large flower arrangement, their vibrant yellows and creamy ivories competing with the silver and gray of steadily falling rain and heavy clouds, the completely unexpected rumpled visage of Dante Campisi, collar open, shirtsleeves rolled to the elbow, slumped in a nearby chair.

  “Dante?”

  He straightened, a slow smiled crossing his face, but even in my muzzy state, I could see it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “There you are, doll. We’ve been worried about you.”

  “We?” More indistinguishable croak than actual word, but Dante was clearly able to decipher its meaning, answering as he rose to pour a glass of water from a nearby plastic pitcher.

  “Greg and Constance. They’re with Jack right now.”

  “Jack—” I struggled to sit up
, memories returning in a terrifying rush. Rain. Confrontation. Rose-gold hair tangling with the barrel of a gun. Thunder and burnt-metal combining with a rush of red and the hot scent of fresh blood. “I need to see him—” It was suddenly the most important thing in the world that I see him. Right now. Didn’t Dante understand? I needed to see him. To make sure—

  Pain shot from my hand up my arm as I inadvertently jostled the needle connecting a long tube to a bottle of IV fluid, the glass rattling against its metal stand.

  “Hey, enough of that—” The mattress sank as Dante blocked my body with his, murmuring, “Enough, doll … enough. You need to stop. He’s fine. I swear on my mother’s grave, he’s going to be fine.” Big hands gripped my shoulders, their hold gentle, but firm as they eased me back to the pillows.

  A wave of exhaustion suddenly overwhelmed me, draining what little fight remained. Sinking into the pillows, I asked, “What am I doing here?”

  An unexpected grin crossed his face as he eased back. “Apparently, you went after Ava like a bat out of hell when she tried to make a move toward Jack.” Inserting a straw into the plastic cup, he held it to my lips. “Wouldn’t calm down even after the cops split you up, so the medics finally had to knock you out with a shot. Doc said you’ve been hysterical off and on, so they’ve been keeping you sedated.”

  Pulling a tray table over the bed, he placed the cup within easy reach. “I figured the reason you were so hysterical was because you needed to know about Jack, so I told them to lay off the sauce and I’d stay with you until you woke up. I wanted to tell you what you needed to know myself.”

  “He’s really fine?” I managed, grateful to hear my voice sounding more like itself, albeit a bit hoarse.

  My fingers traced the cup’s edges, heart in my throat, even as I kept hearing Dante’s reassurances. Jack was fine. He would be fine.

  “About as fine as someone who’s survived a bullet to the chest can be.”

  Before I even realized what had happened, he was leaning over me again, righting the overturned cup and throwing a towel over the water. “You can see him soon, if you want.” His hand covered my shaking one. “He’s been asking for you,” he added before I could even form the words, much less speak them aloud.

  “But … how?” I croaked, so much more to the question than the two words could convey, frustrated that my battered throat seemed to be incapable of producing more than a few words at a time. Luckily, Dante didn’t appear to need more than a word or two, understanding the depths of my confusion and curiosity over what was clearly many lost hours. Perhaps even days.

  “The nurses found my card in Jack’s effects and called me.” He pulled a slim engraved gold case from his pocket and extracted a thin, dark cigar, rolling it between the fingers of one hand while the other toyed with a matching gold lighter. “I called Greg and Constance and we all got here as soon as we could.”

  “And Ava?”

  He leaned back in his chair, his posture ostensibly relaxed, but with a visible thread of tension lining him with sharply defined edges. “Locked away in the psychiatric ward until Jack and Greg can arrange for her to be transferred to a long-term home.” He flicked the cap of the gold lighter open and closed, the metallic clicking ominously loud and foreboding.

  “She’s not going to get better.” The words were flat, colored with an accepting matter-of-factness, but his gaze was distant and perhaps even a bit wistful, revealing that even he, too, had continued to hold out hope. Hope that had finally dissipated with the pull of a trigger. “She never was.”

  Rain continued steadily drumming against the windows, nearly drowning out the sounds of the door opening and the murmured conversation between a uniformed nurse and Dante which preceded his absenting himself as she approached with a whisper of white stockings and crêpe-soled shoes, her easy southern charm and kind eyes barely masking curiosity. After all, it wasn’t as if there was anything physically wrong with me. However, her efficient manner never faltered, starched black-ribboned cap bobbing as she bustled about, fluffing pillows and adjusting the bed so I could sit more readily. Two fingers firm against my wrist, she stared at her plain, serviceable watch—worn with the face resting against the inside of the wrist, I idly noted before shifting my gaze back to the window and the brilliant flowers. Who had brought them?

  “How do you feel about him?”

  I turned my head away from the window to discover that Dante had silently returned and resumed his former post in the chair. How long had he been there, I wondered, studying me with that sharp, green gaze that saw so much?

  “Excuse me?”

  “I need to know how you feel about him.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I love that man like a brother and he’s got a hell of a road ahead of him.”

  My pulse, so recently praised by the nurse as steady and downright normal, skittered erratically before accelerating, drumming heavily at the base of my throat. “I thought you said he would be fine.”

  “Physically, sure.” The toothpick resting in one corner of his mouth smoothly shifted to the other. “But after a lifetime of Ava’s shit—after what just happened—do you really think he’s going to be okay up here?” He touched a finger to his temple. “I guarantee you, he’s not okay. Not right now. Maybe not for a long time. Maybe not ever.”

  My gaze followed the almost meditative motion of the toothpick as it shifted once again.

  “I …” I stopped, swallowed hard. I knew without a doubt, I hadn’t wanted to lose him. Couldn’t bear the thought of losing him. But was that because it was him? Or simply the idea of losing again? “I care about him,” I admitted quietly, staring down, my fingers twisting the satin binding of the blanket the nurse had so solicitously tucked about me. “But … I don’t know.”

  “Caring’s not good enough, Natalia.” Pulling the toothpick from his mouth, Dante leaned forward in the chair, his expression set in harsh lines. The scent of fresh tobacco clung to him, adding a subtle edge of something dark and potentially unforgiving. Here, then, was the hardnosed man behind the genial façade he presented to the public. Not a man anyone with sense wanted to cross.

  “Just a few years of Ava left me ass-end up and praying to the Holy Mother for salvation. So how do you think Jack must feel right now? With everything that’s happened between them?”

  His eyes narrowed as he leaned further forward, propping his forearms on the mattress. “Truth is, even if you loved him to the ends of the earth, I’m not sure either of you are good for each other right now. He needs to figure out what’s next for him. Needs to figure out how to live a life where he’s not constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop.” I flinched as his hand came to rest over mine, bringing a momentary halt to my restless fidgeting. “And unless I’m completely off the mark, you, doll, have unfinished business of your own you got to make peace with.”

  “What makes you say that?” I would have congratulated myself on how cool and neutral my voice sounded except for the telltale prickles of heat beneath my skin—the uneasy twitching of my fingers that caused Dante’s hand to further tighten over mine.

  “Because—” His voice held an extraordinarily gentle note. A note that gave more weight to his words than if he’d shouted them. “People like you and me and Jack—we tend to have unfinished business. It’s what drives us. Trying to outrun the devil.”

  “Like Ava?”

  “Like Ava.” He leaned back once more, his gaze shifting to the window, staring out past the rain. “So tell me, doll—what’s your unfinished business?”

  • • •

  I hovered in the doorway, swaying back and forth, as if to some rhythm understood only by my body. Fear did that to a person, I supposed. But there would be no turning and running. No longer. I’d made that promise to myself, what seemed like several lifetimes ago. Finally done running away. If there was any running to be done, it would be toward something. Toward new beginnings Toward what I wanted. Except I had no idea wha
t I wanted. But at least I know had some inkling what was needed to begin the journey toward that discovery.

  Or to quote Dante—clean slates were a necessary bitch.

  “Courage, doll,” the man himself whispered in my ear, his hand against the small of my back as much gentle urging as firm hold, keeping me from bolting. Dante was no one’s fool. He knew just how torn I remained.

  With a final deep breath, I crossed fully into the room, reassured by the warm presence of Greg and Constance, seated by Jack’s bed. We’d already visited—they knew of my plans and agreed with Dante that it was the only real viable choice—for both of us.

  “We’ll be out in the hall, Natalia, if you need anything.”

  I registered Greg’s quiet words and even managed a smile at the comforting squeeze of Constance’s hand around mine as they passed by on their way out, but all else was a blur, my attention resolutely focused on Jack, still and unmoving as he stared out the window. His expression remained perfectly blank, seemingly oblivious to the movement and conversation around him, yet the minute twitching of his fingers against the blanket gave lie to the illusion.

  With the room finally clear, I allowed myself to simply drink in the sight of him. Pale, his hair tumbling over his forehead and a slight glitter heightening the amber hues within his eyes and highlighting the two red splotches along his cheekbones, evidence of the slight fever he’d been running off and on. Not at all threatening, as Greg and Constance had reassured me during their visit. Just his body righting itself. And despite the frightening tangle of wires and tubes connected to him, the steady beeping of the monitor served as evidence that he was fine.

  At the very least, alive.

  “When are you leaving?”

  His voice was pitched low, with ragged edges, ravaged by anesthesia and the tube which had fed him oxygen during those first terrifying hours.

  “Soon.”

  He nodded and held out his hand. Closing the distance between us, I clung to it like a stranded swimmer clinging to a buoy. Warm and strong, his fingers closed over mine, his thumb stroking the erratic jackhammer of my pulse—even now, trying to soothe.