Black Iris

by Leah Raeder

  “That’s why we’re just friends,” Armin said, so softly I barely heard. “She can’t fall in love, and I can’t fall out.”

  ———

  We hit the dance floor after Blythe left. Armin filled in for the DJ and I joined him in the booth. “What do you want to hear?” he said, and I remembered Donnie at home and asked for “All I Need Is a Miracle.” Our song. Armin let me do the crossfade, which felt amazing, my hands gliding over the starship controls of the mixer and filling the cosmos with sound, giving life to three hundred pounding hearts. His hand floated over mine, then pulled away. He played “Don’t Lose My Number” by Phil Collins and I thought of my half-assed garage band with Donnie, crooning eighties covers on Dad’s karaoke machine, our hair teased out with mousse. Armin caught me lip-syncing and grinned. Despite my best intentions, I was enjoying this. Too loud to talk. We spoke through songs. Me: “Everything She Wants.” Him: “Invisible Touch.” Me: “What Have I Done to Deserve This.” He laughed at that, a beautiful laugh, really, his teeth gleaming opal behind those dusty-rose lips, and I wondered what it would be like to kiss him. If I would feel anything, or if it would be vacuum and void like it always was.

  The original DJ came back and we stepped down, bouncing on our toes, energized.

  “Impressive,” Armin said in my ear, and my spine lit up like a strand of Christmas lights. “You know your eighties.”

  “Me and my brother are total eighties nerds.”

  “Younger brother?”

  “Yeah.”

  We waded through the crowd to the bar, where he ordered two Sprites. “I have a younger sister.”

  “Is that why you decided to be my white knight?”

  His shoulders stiffened. He wore a dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up and faded, form-fitting jeans. When he frowned his eyes nearly closed, his eyelashes so long and kohl-black they seemed almost feminine.

  God. I’m describing a man’s eyelashes. Fucking shoot me.

  “How was I white-knighting?” he said.

  “Come on. Blythe stalked me. I caught her in the bathroom. You guys were watching out for the dumb pledge.”

  “She has a thing for lost girls.” He handed me a tumbler. “Were we that obvious?”

  “She looked super guilty when I caught her.”

  “Her face doesn’t hide anything.”

  I looked down into my glass, thinking, Perfect.

  “It was her idea. Like I said, I don’t harbor delusions of being anyone’s savior.”

  “Whatever. It was nice.”

  His eyes did that crinkling thing again. “You don’t like saying thank you, do you?”

  “I don’t want to get a reputation.”

  “For what?”

  “Being human.”

  He laughed and took a swallow of his drink. I set mine on the bar. When he raised an eyebrow I said, “I don’t take drinks from strangers.”

  “Are we still strangers?”

  I averted my eyes, my face inexplicably hot. “Or from doctors.”

  “Fair enough. You’ve made your hatred clear.”

  “I don’t hate you. I can’t hate a man who shamelessly loves the eighties.”

  “So what did you give her?”

  This guy was good. Lull me into camaraderie, then cobra strike. “What?”

  “Don’t play coy. What was it?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I’m talking about the pills you gave Blythe in the cab.”

  I shrugged one shoulder. “Just some oxy.”

  Armin sighed.

  “Hey, she wanted it—”

  “You hate meds, but you’re a pillhead. I should’ve known.”

  “Dude.” I gripped the counter. “Don’t judge me. You don’t know the kind of shit I have to deal with. Look, I kept my grades up and got into CU. I’m fine.”

  “That doesn’t mean you’re fine.”

  “It means I’m a high-functioning addict.”

  Surprisingly, he shrugged, too. “Okay. Honesty. Points for that.”

  “Don’t patronize me. I don’t need your approval.”

  “I’m not giving it. I’ve just seen too many people ruin their lives with drugs.”

  “Like your sister.”

  “Like my sister.” His gaze turned shrewd. “How’d you guess?”

  “I watch and listen, too.”

  “You have a good sense of people.”

  But I didn’t. My mother had a good sense of people. We’re all bad, she’d said. The only thing we’re good at is hiding it.

  Someone bumped into me from behind, and Armin slung an arm around my shoulders protectively. Whoever it was mumbled an apology, but neither of us were paying attention. I was staring at that rose-lipped mouth, then up into his eyes, a clear reddish-brown like carnelian, speckled with tiny flaws of amber and copper where the light caught.

  Fuck. They’re brown. His eyes are fucking brown, okay? Stop being a terrible writer, Laney.

  “Want to get out of here?” he said.

  “Yes.”

  God, yes.

  ———

  Downtown was eerily beautiful at night. In the hot spill of cider streetlight, the asphalt glittered as if coated with crushed diamond. We crossed wide, wind-haunted streets that were almost postapocalyptic: no cars, no people, perfect stillness, and the shop signs—TRY OUR NEW, TWO FOR ONE—somehow portentous. “Try our new Prozac milkshake,” I said. “Two lobotomies for the price of one.”

  Armin shook his head. “Ghoulish.”

  We walked for miles. It was after three but before dawn, that timeless, silky stretch of night that feels as if it’ll run on forever. My feet were numb and my fingertips buzzed with blood. I felt immortal. We found the plaza where a giant steel sculpture crouched, the Picasso, that weird chimera with its long baboon face and arching wings and stick ribs, and I climbed up for a pic. Armin gave me a hand, and when I braced myself on his shoulders I felt the heat of his body through his thin shirt. My fingers curled in the linen.

  A breeze wafted off the lake, water-cool. “Where are we?”

  “Almost to the beach.”

  I hopped down and he caught me, even though I didn’t need it. Our hands joined for a second.

  The skyscrapers fell away, stone wings unfolding and exposing the dark blue heart of the lake. There were cars on Lake Shore Drive, but when we crossed it felt like the waking world behind us winked out. The sand had a lunar glow, like moondust. I kicked off my shoes and let my feet sink in. The top layer was still warm, but when I dug deeper I hit a colder reservoir. Where the lake lapped the shore the smell of wet sand and algae was dizzying.

  “Come on, Eileen,” Armin sang out.

  “Can we even be here?”

  “Nothing’s gonna stop us now.”

  “What about the cops?”

  “I’ll run. I’ll run so far away. With or without you.”

  “Stop making bad song jokes.”

  “Stop laughing at them.”

  His voice was doing something to me. A hot coal lay low in my belly, and every time he spoke it flared. “This will never work,” I said. “You and me.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you’re an East End boy, and I’m a West End girl.”

  I could see that big damn smile in the dimness. He kicked his shoes off, moving toward me. His shirt and eyes were ghostly blurs. I smelled wintergreen on his breath.

  “But I’m the king of wishful thinking.”

  “Armin, shut up and kiss me.”

  He leaned in and I reached for his face. Stubble tickled my skin. His breath warmed my palm and lit a nerve all the way up my inner arm to my spine. It shrieked through me like a firework, ending with a bright pop in my brain. My eyelids fluttered closed
, my belly tightening and mouth opening, and the kiss felt so imminent I gave a start when it didn’t happen.

  “Don’t you want to?” I whispered.

  His hands settled against my face. “That’s not why we’re here.”

  The words were a denial, but his hands wouldn’t move and we shared the same hot breath. My heart flung itself fiercely at my ribs, as if it could close the space between us.

  “I don’t believe you.”

  He brushed my bare arm, teasing out a shiver.

  “Come on,” he said.

  I followed him to the shoreline. There was a rock-walled harbor to one side, the water slapping gently against fiberglass hulls, a sound like something breaking delicately, prettily. We sat in a hollowed-out dune and leaned on our elbows, hidden from the street. My bare toes spread against the horizon. The sky switched on, heating up to a vibrant indigo.

  “This is my ‘away from here,’ ” Armin said. His voice sounded like sand flowing through glass, at once grainy and smooth.

  I was going to tell him he was wrong. Away from here isn’t a place, it’s a state, inside you. It’s escape velocity. It’s losing yourself, anywhere. But then I thought, Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this isn’t a where at all.

  “What about the club?”

  “That’s Blythe’s. This is different. This is mine.”

  But you brought me here, I thought. “How’d you become a DJ?”

  “Questioning my skills?”

  “No, just curious.”

  “I know somebody.” His eyes danced away. “This world is run by people who know somebody. You scratch my back, I scratch yours.”

  I sketched a pattern in the sand, a dark disc eating a light one, the Umbra logo, then smeared it out. “You take my eye, I take yours.”

  “Are you always this morbid?”

  “Is it at all endearing?”

  He laughed.

  “So why’d you guys adopt me?” I said.

  “I don’t pretend to understand Blythe’s motives. I’ve known her for three years and she’s still an enigma. Either she has some brilliant master plan I haven’t figured out yet, or she’s totally irrational. But I went along because I couldn’t take my eyes off you.”

  My heart gave a small hiccup.

  “You’re not like them, Laney. I saw it the second you arrived. You didn’t belong there.”

  “Where do I belong?”

  “On a rocky cliff above a tempestuous sea. With the salt breeze whipping through your hair, and a house burning behind you.”

  I had to smile. “Maybe you’re not so bad at the whole head-shrinking thing.”

  “Maybe we’re more alike than you think.” When he spoke I was aware of the way his lips moved over his teeth, enunciating words so meticulously. Little things like that tell you everything about a person. “It’s almost time.”

  “For what?”

  “What I wanted to show you.”

  We both lay back in the sand, and the drain of the long night and the last dregs of my high hit at the same moment, making me immensely weary. My eyes drifted closed. When I jerked awake it felt like hours had passed. I’m not sure how long I flickered back and forth between states of consciousness before Armin touched my shoulder. I sat up, disoriented. The sky looked like layered sherbet, creamy peach melting into raspberry and blueberry, shading the world in soft, milky tones. The sun was an eye-smarting bead of white light trembling at the horizon. A woman jogged barefoot along the tide line, sand sticking to her shining brown shins. I felt like I’d woken up in another universe.

  “Where am I?” I said blearily.

  Armin’s voice floated to me like a breath of morning mist. “Away.”

  ———

  I slept on the Metra, asking the guy across the aisle to wake me at Naperville. The town air was drowsy and sweet after the city. I walked home half-asleep on my feet, a zombie in Wonderland, taking off my shoes to tread barefoot on lush store-bought lawns. Armin and Blythe and Umbra seemed like a bizarre, fading dream. I unlocked the front door and headed for the stairs.

  Dad was in the kitchen, sitting with his coffee and tablet. Neither of us spoke. He cleared his throat, then looked down.

  When I paused at the top landing I could see the bald spot on his head. It seemed so vulnerable, so babyish. It made something sad twist inside me. His gaze remained fixed on the whorls in the wood grain.

  I locked my bedroom door. Pulled my dress over my head, tossed my shoes into a corner. Slipped the small silver key from my purse and stepped into my closet.

  Upside to having a brother obsessed with architecture: he will help you build a concealed door in the crawl space between your rooms.

  I shut the closet, sealing myself in darkness.

  I could find the lock by touch. I knew the furry splintered surfaces like my own heart, the taste of sawdust and wool and time. The smothering heat like a human hand over my mouth. I knelt gingerly and felt for the portable light.

  Flick.

  The space was about the size of a car interior, a rectangle of cinderblocks and plywood.

  And every square inch of it was covered with him.

  His face, printed from Facebook and newspaper articles. Rising star. The boy with the golden touch. [Scratched out] carries Redhawks to state championship. His transcript. Schedule from senior year. Bills and bank statements sent to his parents. His daily routines, traced on maps. A massive dossier.

  I picked up a pen and crossed PI/PHI SUMMER MIXER off the July calendar.

  He was going to Colorado for the first half of August—I had a copy of his hotel reservation and hiking itinerary—then no data until classes started in September. I wouldn’t see him till school began.

  But that was okay. Like my mother, I was nothing if not patient.

  I plugged my phone into my laptop and copied the photos I’d taken at Umbra. Strange, twisting staircases and labyrinthine hallways. Places to get lost. Places to be among hundreds of people without being seen.

  I paused at the pic of Blythe.

  She was wrong about looking wretched. She had an unreal beauty. I’d caught her with a curiously wry expression, mouth half-open, brow furrowed. Her canine teeth were longer than the others and it made her slightly impish. Vulpine jaw, the sort of absurd cheekbones only mannequins possessed. Her eyes had a look of lazy cunning and were the blue of ice on a winter creek, shot through with frost, arrestingly pale. I brushed a finger over her cheek.

  Something thumped in my bedroom.

  I shut everything down and backed out of the crawl space, locking it behind me.

  Donnie lay in fetal position on my futon. I hadn’t even noticed him when I came in. He’d kicked my desk when he tossed. I sat beside him.

  “Laney?” he murmured.

  I nudged him over and wrapped an arm around his waist. I still had only my underwear and bra on, but this is my baby brother, for fuck’s sake. He’s like my kid. The way I love him is the way you’re supposed to love your children. The way Mom never did.

  “What happened?” he said.

  “Nothing yet. Just surveillance.”

  Donnie let out a long sigh. There was no mistaking the relief in it.

  “It’s okay,” I whispered. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

  He sighed again, shuddering, and the breaths after that were ragged and I knew he was crying and my arms tightened around him so hard it hurt us both, but I couldn’t stop.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d come back,” he said.

  “I will always come back to you.” My voice was fierce. I rocked him, waiting for his tears to end, for mine to start. “I’m not her. I won’t leave you. I promise.”

  It became a sort of lullaby, me telling him it was okay, that we were both okay and I would never leave and someday, soon, everything would be bett
er.

  Someday I would make everything right.

  AUGUST, LAST YEAR

  Blythe blew a stream of smoke in my face. “That bloke with the arms is looking at you.”

  We stood outside Umbra on a simmering summer night, the concrete still soaked with heat. Her hair was wild and wind-tossed, curling over her bare shoulders, shining like spun gold in the streetlight. I studied her tattoos. Watercolor style, cyan and magenta and canary washing down her skin as if a painter would come back any moment to finish. On one shoulder, a skull leaked rainbow acid. On the other was a lily that was sometimes a flower and sometimes a girl’s lush pink mouth. Images from her poems. Half-melted, dreamlike.

  I’d read every one. Some I could recite by heart. “Neon Narcissus.” “Wide Blue Nothing.”

  I was becoming sort of an expert on Blythe McKinley.

  “He’s looking at you,” I told her. “Don’t lie to make me feel better.”

  She smiled, all sun-kissed blondness. Next to her I felt like Wednesday Addams. “I’m constitutionally incapable of lying.”

  “Also a lie. Remember the guy at the theater who asked for your number, and you gave him mine?” I counted off my fingers. “And you told that cabbie you were married. And the guy on the L that you’re gay. And yesterday, the dude in the suit—”

  “Okay, okay. Let’s not get Kafkaesque with the accusations.”

  “We’re the sun and moon, Blythe.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I turn invisible when you’re out.”

  She laughed and swirled a finger in my hair, resting her hand against my face. Personal boundaries meant nothing to her. “Don’t be fucking ridiculous.”

  “I’m never ridiculous.”

  “Except when you’re ridiculous.” There was fondness in her expression, and it made me warm. “I don’t blow smoke up people’s arses. If something’s shit, I call it shit.”

  “Australia’s national poet, ladies and gentlemen.”