Dark Touch

by Aimee L. Salter

  I feel the tears pressing again, and it hurts my throat. Either she doesn’t notice, or she’s being kind, because she pats my arm again and stands up. “That’s enough for now. You’ve been through enough today. I’m going to sit right outside that door and let you get some rest, okay?”

  I grab her hand before she can walk away, then write something else on the pad: THANK YOU.

  She gives me a soft smile. “Thank you for trusting me.”

  ~

  The next morning Ms. Pine has left to go to school and I’m watching TV, trying to ignore the burning in my throat when the door thumps. I think it must be yet another nurse coming in to check my blood pressure. But the door swings partway open, letting in a white rectangle of light from the brighter hallway outside. Then there’s a wheelchair moving awkwardly into the room. The front wheels bump into the wall, then the door swings fully open, and Chris rolls into sight.

  He maneuvers into the room, grimacing every time he knocks something with the chair. His eyes are puffy, and there’s an ugly haggardness in his skin. But he’s in a sweater and jeans and he’s here.

  “By the time I figure out how to drive this thing, I won’t have to use it anymore,” he says with a wry twist of his lips as he wheels across the floor.

  I stare.

  He starts to run a hand through his hair, connects with the bandage, grimaces again, and slumps. There’s a shadow in him that scares me. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have just shown up. I just . . .” He raises his chin. “I had to see you. I’ve been . . . worried.” Something passes over his face at the last word, and I wonder what he meant to say.

  He clears his throat. “I know you can’t talk.

  “They cleared me this morning,” I rasp. It’s a lie, but I can’t not talk to him.

  “Oh.” Chris rolls himself forward until his knees bump the side of the bed.

  I take advantage of him not looking at me, drinking in the sight of him until the silence has stretched on too long, even for me. “Why are you in a wheelchair?”

  “I’m still a little dizzy.” He squeezes the arms on the chair. “It was the only way they’d let me leave my room alone.”

  I swallow carefully, because my body punishes me for it. “Thanks for coming.” The words sound trite and stupid. I wish them back.

  “How are you . . . how are you doing?” he stammers.

  “I’m fine.” As soon as the words are out, I can’t help but snort because I am so obviously not fine that it sounds ridiculous, even to me.

  Chris shifts in the chair. “Right.” Then his expression drops into sadness and he looks at his hands. “I’m so sorry, Tully.”

  My breath catches. “It’s not your fault my father is . . . is . . .” Is there even a word for what he is?

  But Chris rubs a hand over his face. “I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry about that, too, of course. But I’m sorry because I knew things were bad at home, but I never thought . . . I mean, I didn’t want to even consider that he could . . .” He trails off. “I’m sorry I didn’t do more. That I wasn’t better at helping you.”

  My muscles twitch and want me to go, to run. My skin crawls. I can’t talk about this right now. I don’t have it in me.

  “Tully?”

  “I can’t . . . I can’t do this right now.”

  Chris’s brow furrows. “It’s okay. I’m not asking you to talk about it. Not until you’re ready.”

  I shake my head, then wince. “No, it’s not that.” Though it is. Part of it, at least. “I mean this. You. Me.” I flap a hand between us. “Look at us,” I rasp. Everything that’s gone wrong hangs over me like a pall. I’m sitting in a hospital room with broken blood vessels in my eyes and bruises on my neck while he’s in a wheelchair.

  His expression sharpens. “Tully, I’ll heal.”

  “So will I. But it’ll take a long time, I think.”

  It takes a second, but he hears what I’m not saying. What I mean. He sits back, rubbing his jaw. Our eyes finally meet. We both tear away from the contact.

  “I’m sorry I hurt you,” I rush on before he can speak. “There’s so much I’d change if I could. But now . . . I have a lot to figure out and if I’m worried about us, then I can’t. If I’m going to figure out my life, I don’t have room for anything else.” Anyone else.

  I risk a glance from the corner of my eye. Chris is slumped in his chair, staring at his gorgeous hands gripping his thighs. I look at his hands, too, the tendons standing proud. I remember how they feel on my skin and it takes my breath away with a longing so sharp I almost beg him to hold me, help me, forgive me. But the idea of carrying him—carrying us—through where I’m going . . . it’s too much.

  Chris clears his throat. “I understand,” he says.

  “I’m glad you do. Because I’m going to need a . . . friend I can call when it gets too much.”

  Chris’s head snaps up at the word friend, the old fire in his eyes. I remember the day he said I don’t want to be your friend, and my heart gives that little lurch again. I think he’ll demand I take it back. But then the light fades and he turns away, rubs his jaw again. Speaks to the wall. “Friends, then. Sure.”

  “Can we . . . can you forgive me enough to do that? To be a friend?”

  “Of course.” There isn’t a second’s hesitation. But he squares his shoulders. “You know . . . friends still care about how friends are doing.” And for the first time, he seems to take me in. The bruised neck. The bloodshot eyes. The split lip.

  He puts his hand on the bed, palm up. Looks questioningly at me.

  I have to work hard not to flinch. Instead, to escape, I turn to look out the window. “Right now this friend is tired,” I say, suddenly exhausted by the conversation.

  He looks down at his lap. “Of course. I should have thought . . . Sorry. I’ll let you rest. I’ll come back in a couple of days . . . or something.”

  Or something.

  I don’t know if the word echoed for him, too, because by the time I look up to check, he’s already turning the chair away. It takes him several tries to get it out of the room. On his way he bumps the bed, then almost knocks the door closed with his extended foot. If I weren’t so tense it would be hilarious.

  Then, just as he’s about to roll out the door, he turns his head and flashes me a small, awkward smile.

  “You did it, Tully. You got out. I’m proud of you.”

  Chapter 41

  “Well, that was quick,” Ms. Pine says, dropping a small box over a stain on the carpet in my new room. She came to help me “move in” to the halfway house. But I have so few things, it was a single trip from her car on the cracked driveway outside, up two flights of stairs, and into this room.

  This tiny little room with weirdly burnt-orange walls and gray carpet.

  From the outside, the halfway house could be an old hospital. It’s a three-level rectangle with peeling paint and wooden window frames. But they’re giving me a single room at the top, so I am grateful. After a week in the hospital, it’s a relief to walk around and not have people poking and prodding me, afraid, like I’m some kind of bomb that might go off.

  From what I hear, around here I’m the least of their concerns.

  Ms. Pine folds her arms over the heavy woolen vest that reaches almost to her knees and looks around, smiling too brightly. “Do you want help making your bed?”

  It’s a single bed in the corner next to the door. “I’ll be fine. I’ll unpack and . . .” And what? I don’t know. “Maybe I’ll get started with all that homework,” I finish dryly.

  As she gives a little chuckle, another woman appears in the doorway. There wouldn’t be room for her in this tiny space. “Tully, this is Marjorie.” Ms. Pine nods at her. “She’s the house mother. She’s the one who’ll show you around and help you with whatever you need, okay?”

  “Hi,” I say, shi
fting on my feet.

  She lifts one hand from where it’s folded over her chest for a brief wave. “Lemme know if you need anything, ’kay?” she says in a deep voice. “I’ll let you get settled.” Then she’s gone.

  Ms. Pine presses her lips to a thin line. “She’s nice. Promise,” she says. “She’s just a little gruff.” She smiles an apology at me, then claps her hands together and brightens. “Do you want help unpacking?”

  I shake my head. “It’s been a big day. And I don’t have much stuff. I’ll probably take a nap, or something,” I lie.

  Or something.

  Immediately, I’m back at the hospital, watching Chris slink out of my room.

  He keeps calling the new cell phone Ms. Pine got me, his voice always warm, but hesitant in a way it’s never been before. It’s too hard hearing him that way, so unsure of himself. I keep telling him I’m fine, don’t need anything, thanks for calling . . .

  I don’t want to talk to him. It makes me shiver inside. Yet I always feel emptier than before as soon as he hangs up.

  Ms. Pine puts a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry. Everyone will get used to this and they’ll stop acting strange,” she says. “Right now they keep seeing what you’ve been through and they don’t know how to make it better. It makes them . . . stiff.”

  She’s right, of course. But will I ever stop feeling weird? Stop acting stiff?

  “Ms. Pine, can I ask you something?”

  “I think it’s about time you called me Catherine, don’t you? At least, outside of school.”

  “Catherine.” The name feels odd on my tongue. “What’s going to happen now?”

  She grimaces and seats herself on my unmade bed. The mattress is covered in a plastic sheet that crackles as she sinks onto it.

  “Well, first we’ll get you caught up on school as much as we can. Mr. Garrison says you can come work on the woodshop projects on the weekends, or after school, until you’re ready to be back in class. If you want to.”

  I shrug. Ms. Pine—Catherine—pats the mattress next to her. I sit.

  “As for the rest . . . There isn’t a rule book for this kind of thing, Tully. But the thing I want to make sure of is that you know we’re here. That you aren’t alone. That you’re better off not being alone.”

  “I do know that. Now,” I say. My voice is still hoarse, but much stronger than it was. “I just . . . I’m not sure I can go back to school, you know? Not when everyone knows.”

  She taps her lip thoughtfully. “Well, let’s get you to the end of the semester, get these credits under your belt, then we’ll talk. Maybe . . . I mean, I wouldn’t normally encourage someone to drop out, but we could help you get your GED. And you’ll hear soon about that apprenticeship.” She puts a hand on my knee. “We’ll figure it out. Whatever you need, we’ll do it.” She says it quietly, as if it’s something for the future. But there’s one thing that’s been burning for me ever since I knew I’d be released from the hospital.

  “I want to go home,” I blurt.

  She turns to me in shock.

  “Not like that,” I say before she can get the words out. “I mean, I want to visit my house. Make sure I’ve got everything and . . . I . . . need to say good-bye to that place.”

  She closes her mouth slowly. “Tully, I’m not sure . . .”

  “Would you come with me? I know it’ll suck. But it’s pulling at me. I don’t want to go back to that. But I feel like I can’t walk away until I’ve done it on my own terms.”

  Her mouth opens and closes a couple times. Finally, she squeezes my knee. “I tell you what, when the time is right—when your counselor says it’s okay—then we’ll go, okay?”

  Blah. Counselor. Right.

  They said because I’m a ward of the state, and I went through a “traumatic experience,” I have to see a headshrinker. I asked them to let Ms. Pine do it, but she rejected the idea before we could even talk about it. I’m a little too close now, Tully, she said.

  “I still don’t understand why I have to see that woman,” I mutter.

  Catherine sighs and puts her hand on my back. “After she’s helped you, you’ll be glad you stuck with it.”

  We make the awkward farewells then, her promising to come back the next day after school. Me promising to do some of the homework they’ve collected for me.

  When she’s gone I make my bed with the gray sheets they gave me, and put my few things into the drawers underneath it. I’m reminded of Nigel’s bed, and have to push away images of being there with Chris. Instead, I pull the deep drawers out to see how they’re made.

  Solid wood. Slotted joints. No runners. It’s why they squeak.

  Then I close the door to the room, lie on the bed, and stare at the ceiling.

  Despite everything, all the awkwardness, all the people watching me like I’m a grenade, there’s something underneath it all, something I don’t have a name for.

  I scan the walls of my room. There’s a thump down the hall, the squeal of a child on one of the lower floors. But they aren’t coming for me.

  I roll onto my side and stare at the orange walls. Catherine told me I can stay here as long as I need to, but I still feel as though I’m on borrowed time. This room isn’t truly mine and that means there has to be something more to come.

  The question is . . . what?

  Chapter 42

  The first three weeks in the halfway house are an adjustment. If nothing else, it’s a relief that I can shut my door and no one will bother me. I need that quiet. And Catherine is right about Marjorie. She is nice. She’s got a wry sense of humor, and she cooks great spaghetti. But she always watches me like I might break, or something.

  Or something.

  It isn’t until Christmas looms and we have the first snowfall that I start to feel almost normal again—physically, at least. The old me has passed so far behind it’s hard to remember what she felt like.

  Some of this new me hurts even more than I did before. The part that accepts that both my parents are gone. That I’m not, in fact, strong enough to jump in Nigel and leave everything, everyone, behind. The part that needs other people and has to risk getting hurt.

  That part of me is even more terrified than I used to be.

  I spend a lot of time lying on my bed, wondering what it would be like to go to school and see Chris again. Whether he would light up, or turn dark for me.

  I wonder if he’s spending time with Caitlin.

  He’s been really good about phoning. But I haven’t seen him since the hospital. He keeps asking and I keep saying no. It would hurt too much. I don’t have room for that. Still, I can’t help looking for him. I keep thinking I’ll turn a corner and he’ll be there, reaching for my hand. Or that he’ll hear I’m in the woodshop after hours and he’ll show up.

  Anything.

  But he never does.

  Life is a gray landscape without the gold flecks he brought to it, but I’m pushing through. I’m determined. I will graduate. I will have a life. I will move on from this.

  Maybe that’s why I need to go home. To remind myself why I don’t want to be there.

  There’s a knock on my door and I roll to my side.

  Catherine pokes her head inside, her expression solemn. “You ready?”

  “Yes.” It’s a lie.

  But I roll myself off my bed, pick up my fluffy jacket—donated by someone who doesn’t know me—grab a scarf, and follow her out of my room.

  Catherine takes my hand in the car on the way there. I don’t stop her. It’s weird, letting someone in like that. Reminds me of Chris.

  “You’re scared,” she says simply.

  I don’t bother answering. She already knows.

  “Are you sure you’re ready for this?”

  “Not even close.”

  “Tully—” She’s easing onto
the brake, slowing the car.

  “I need to do it.” She can feel how sure I am of that, at least.

  She sighs and the car accelerates again.

  We don’t talk again until we reach the house.

  ~

  I stand in the middle of my room. My narrow bed is stripped down to the stained polyester mattress. The rest is just as bare—the drawers, the closet door, the walls. Everything is gone that said I was here.

  The air is bitingly cold and smells like mold. No one’s been in here for weeks. There’s a For Sale sign outside.

  We’ve been here twenty minutes and I haven’t been able to move past this spot. I keep circling, looking for . . . something. But all that comes is memories.

  No money.

  No food.

  No father.

  That Man . . .

  I gag and Ms. Pine steps forward.

  “I think that’s enough, Tully. I’m not sure this is healthy—”

  I put up a hand to stop her. She’s wrong. This hurts, but it’s healthy. Healing. I talked to my counselor, Davida, about it yesterday. She said to let the pain come. To acknowledge it. Not to deny its existence. But to embrace it and see that I am capable of bearing it.

  She said it would hurt. Then it would ease. That I would heal.

  I hope she’s right. Because this doesn’t hurt. It shrieks.

  “I’m okay,” I croak. “Can I have a minute, please?”

  Catherine’s brows pinch, wrinkling her forehead. But in the end she agrees. “Fine. I will step outside for five minutes. Then we’re leaving, okay?”

  I nod.

  She gives me a sad smile. “You’re very brave, Tully.” She pats my arm, then turns on her heel and walks out.

  As soon as she’s gone I almost call her back, not sure I want to be alone here. But I make myself turn, scan the room. Find every detail, every crack and pit and hole.

  This is the place that ruined my life.