I already knew everything about you, but I wanted to know more somehow. I wanted to meld your heart with my own.
You made me whole.
Driving does not chill me out. I hate everything on the radio. Every song and melody only reminds me of you.
How predictable.
I jam my finger into mute.
Silence is not solitude.
I was never alone with you. You remember that feeling don’t you, Flo? See I know you do. You have to remember it because going through this alone simply isn’t possible. I know you miss me too.
I can still feel you.
How Could You? - Flo
Of course, I miss you, too, Mal, I mean God! How stupid are you? Are you just fucking figuring this out?
I followed you. Of course, I followed you. I will always follow you. That’s like my only job now. It is the only thing that I still know how to do without coming across like a total asshole.
I totally look like an insane person right now.
I’m still soaked. I ran away from this school. A good-old college dropout who couldn’t even take three weeks of being bossed around and corrected in class. I don’t like to listen.
You knew that, and yet you were the only one who looked disappointed when I showed up to tell you that I quit. I quit college, and I quit my classes. My heart wasn’t in it.
You said that you understood that but still, you were against it.
“I want you to have a future kid,” you said, and I screamed something rude at you for calling me kid. “If the teacher is saying that you’re doing something wrong, fix it.”
Mal’s wise words of wisdom: fix it. Just like that.
As if I had any control of the situation. The prick teaching English told me to write, so I did. I wrote an essay that ended up being a column because my voice just flows like that. I can’t help it.
Couldn’t help it. Not can’t. Once again not to point out the obvious, but I’m dead.
I can’t write anymore because it’s hard to turn on a laptop when you’re dead. I don’t know what happened to my laptop.
I don’t want to think about any evidence of my heart and soul being neglected and or tossed into the trash.
Writing was my thing, is my thing. Fuck I can’t get this past tense thing right. I’m still here aren’t I? Still feeling and screaming and following you like a lost, love sick puppy.
Your classmates are staring. I guess the hot moody guy is a real sight to see. I can’t stop looking, any other face is a mystery to me.
Mal looks terrifying. Strolling beneath beautiful trees, one foot in front of the other. His hands and arms are swinging. He walks like a machine.
I walk like a baby deer ready to be hunted and eaten alive. I keep ducking away from stray eyes that look right through me. My clothes are still dripping water, and I’m freezing. I walk close behind Mal, trying to absorb his body heat. It isn’t working.
“Hey, Mal,” a beautiful girl speaks up suddenly. Her bright eyes say everything, she’s a busybody, blond haired, blue eyed and tiny. I envy the fact that she’s wearing leggings where she can be seen by anybody. I can’t even wear those things in front of my parents without cringing. Skin tight and revealing isn’t my thing.
She’s totally Mal’s type: obviously pretty without loads of makeup and a smile that blinds, her cleavage on full display.
My body isn’t wonderfully curvaceous or anything, I’m kind of scrawny and average looking. Boring.
My hips are wide and full of potential for child baring.
Mal always liked girls from a size zero or a size three. Even though he kissed me and touched me, I still kept waiting for me to leave me. I never believed that he could love me.
“Hey, Casey,” Mal looks at the blonde with a dead gaze that kills me, well metaphorically speaking obviously.
Geeze. I roll my eyes.
“What you been doing?” Casey tucks her hands in the pocket of her red hoodie. It looks fuzzy and comfy. I cry a little on the inside. I miss shopping and being able to change. I miss sweat pants okay? Scratch that. I miss leggings. Oh God. I would kill for a pair of leggings.
“I’ve been busy,” chuckles Mal, scratching at his face. That shave did nothing.
The three of us have stopped walking. I’m still stalking.
“Oh yeah?” Casey takes a sip of the coffee that I didn’t realize she was holding. It smells somewhat minty. Suddenly I wonder what would be the harm in me doing something, I don’t know, A little creepy?
“Yeah,” Mal shrugs. He’s only wearing a hoodie and the skin around his ears is getting red. He doesn’t look angry, just annoyed.
Mal has never been overly friendly, he doesn’t have to be. He’s popular and good looking, girls fell into his arms easily. With girls like Casey he was usually just smooth enough to get his way.
He’d get what he wanted and leave. That was just his way. I stop listening to Casey because looking at her with jealously is a waste of time. She’s already winning while I rot away in a garden across from a lake.
“Do you mind?” I ask while reaching and concentrating, aiming for her hot coffee. It feels like forever since I’ve eaten or had anything to drink. That is such a strange feeling. I’m not hungry, but my throat is dry from aching.
I'm polite about it anyway. Sort of I think. Slowly skimming my fingers along the lipstick stained lid, I’m right next to her. My elbow hits her chin. She doesn’t feel it. She just keeps looking at him.
“I heard about your …. your friend. I saw the announcement in the paper. It sucks what happened.” Casey’s face looks genuinely sad. “Did she leave a note at least?”
She asks and that nagging guilt is back. I did this.
“Did she what?” My aching heart says. Mal’s face is no longer a careful mask. His eyes blaze with death. Anger. Hurt. I did this.
The pain in Mal’s voice, I did it. I caused it. I put it there, and I made a show out of it. I zoomed the camera in on his expression. Would having left a note or text have lessened this? I doubt it.
“What kind of question is that? Are you interested so that you’ll be the first to know what it said? Do you want to write it online where everyone can like and comment on it?” Mal demands. Casey is silent. I realize her coffee is hot chocolate that smells deliciously like mint. I stop trying to steal it.
“It’s not like that.” Casey starts to defend, but Mal cuts her off by simply raising his hand. I doubt that she fears him. Mal has never been a very gentle man, but he’s not one built of violence.
Still, Casey falls silent.
“Yes, it is.” Mal’s voice falls flat, and he just starts off. It takes me a minute to shake my head before I take off after him. Relentless when it comes to keeping an eye on him. Three Hill is peaceful looking from the outside in, completely perfect with burnt red trees and a mailman grinning behind every hedge. Everyone looks pleased with some mass secret. I was never good enough to be let in on it. For me, this place was a prison.
You were different. You always had the chance to be different, to be perfect. You had it, why did you try to destroy it?
“Mal come on slow down.” I try to catch up. He just keeps his head down, his long legs moving faster than I will probably ever be able to go. “That girl didn’t mean anything bad; she was just trying to talk to you.”
“It’s normal, my death was kind of wild and people want to know the details. That’s understandable, but I’m sorry that I’m the reason that people are bothering you.” This is totally the truth.
“Mal?” he doesn’t even turn around. The side entrance to Three Hill community college is open, and Mal is an avalanche pushing through it.
The walls are all made of brick. The front entrance is massive, six doors spread out for going out and in. I was glad when I heard that he enrolled here as a student, but I was still confused by it. Mal never loved anything enough to stick to it. Girls or classes. Music or drawing.
He was so God damn good at
making music. I used to watch him humming along creating a rhythm. He always had the lyrics just ready in his head, already full of passion. He stopped writing that first time that I kissed him, and I couldn’t help but notice it. Did I kill something inside of him? Trying to smother him? All I wanted do was touch it. Feel it.
I wanted to experience it, and instead I killed it.
“Mal stop it!” Again I reach out for him, but I must not want to touch him because my grip on his sweatshirt just slips. He disappears down the hallway, and I’m alone again.
Not Yet - Mal
I last five minutes. Five minutes spent listening to some waste of skin in some fucking class that did not even pause as I walked in.
No one tried to stop me, so I sat in the back. I wish I had my backpack, at least then I could lean on it. My legs are shaking; my skin is damp. I’m clammy and uncomfortable and I hate it. The classroom has an auditorium style to it, high rows of chairs narrowing into a circle where the professor is meant to stand.
I get up with a grunt and turn with a twist, pushing open the heavy metal door. It slams behind me when I exit. I let it. I do not care if anyone is bothered or interrupted by it.
No one calls out demanding an explanation. No one gives a shit. At least I’ve learned that.
I storm along the walking path. Head down, rage blooming inside of my chest. No one bothers me again.
My ride is still parked right where I left it, in front of my townhouse. I don’t know what moronic part of me expected this to be different. Why would it?
I am only haunted in my head.
My girl is gone, God dammit.
She’s not coming back.
I Can't Do This - Flo
“Mal what the hell are you doing? I’m dead, and even I’m exhausted.” I dropped into the passenger side of his Camaro™ and grunted at a sudden, unexpected difficulty in the situation.
I can feel him.
I can feel the seat I’m sitting in. The door handle was in my hand. I was suddenly unable just to shift my way through it. I had to open it.
“What the…” Mal says. Forest green eyes wide open. He looks over at me or where he has no idea that I currently am before shaking his head and revving the engine. I close my door and shrug at him.
“What? How else did you expect me to get in?”
He has no response to that, which would probably happen even if he could hear my stupid question. He backs out and merges into the parking lot’s slow and meagre traffic.
“What happened to my car?” I ask him. “I mean, not my car, not the fabulous Old beater, but the car I was driving right before it happened. The one I rented, Do my parents think I stole it?” I didn’t need their permission to rent it.
Mal gives me nothing. Nada. Not even a grin. He can’t feel this. “It was a last minute decision to leave it where I parked it. I wanted to drive it over the edge like that badass movie where those two women did but meh. That seemed too dramatic. Plus, I only rented it. I didn’t want to be responsible for the rental company having to pay for damages. They gave me a good deal, but I had to empty out my pockets to fill it full of gas. Damn gas guzzling piece of shit.”
Mal signals left.
“My real car though. My Old beater? What happened to it? Do my parents still have it? I would be totally okay if you wanted to drive it. My mom would only wreck it. Plus, I left a bunch of personal shit in the back but I guess you already know that.”
Who has it?
My shit? God, I hope it didn’t all end up with my parents although I don’t know why that wouldn’t happen. Of course, it would go to them. When I ran I wasn’t thinking about that. I was just looking for the next exit. I found it with a casual glance. I never intended for Buffalo Falls to be my final destination. I had never really believed in any of that.
Did Mal? I honestly never thought to ask.
Again he signals left, and I realize we’re headed towards one of the many highway exits. He’s headed right for it. I don’t even know how to explain how I know this. I have to stop him. He doesn’t want to see what I did. He can’t. I won’t let him.
“Mal come on man. Think about this. That place, I’m not in it. If you’re looking for some sort of reasoning that death trap isn’t going to help you see it. Trust me, I already went looking for it.”
Reasoning with him may be a waste of breath but I’m up for it. Before anything else Mal is my friend. My best friend. I love him before I’m in love with him. I only want what’s best for him.
“If you’re listening Pretty Girl I need you to show me something,” Mal suddenly says, gripping the steering wheel as he looks only at what’s ahead of him. “I need you to show me what it looked like when you looked over the edge. Did it look like a requiem? Did the sunset make you see everything but sadness because honestly Pretty Girl? I don’t get it. I don’t know why you did what you did, and I can’t stop thinking about it. If this is my end, then so be it because I can’t handle this.”
“Of course you can’t.” I cut in. “No one can handle death. No one human. That’s what you are Mal. You’re human, you feel everything, and you help people without them having to ask for it. You were a good kid, a good friend, and now you have the chance to be a good man. Don’t do this, my friend, just don’t do it.” I don’t know what happens, but suddenly I’m crying and reaching for his hand.
He flinches at the chill of my skin. God I really can feel him.
“Don’t do this,” I tell him. I do not beg or plead with him. I just simply tell him and believe that he has to listen. Even if he can’t hear it.
Buffalo Falls isn’t far from Three Hill. I ran and drove for hours and days only to come back. Months of being gone and the thought of Mal brought me right back. I wanted to feel close to him.
I missed him.
“Do you think that I don’t regret it?” I whisper for him. “I regret everything about it, but I know enough to know that the only way I was going to realize how permanent death is, was by committing myself to hell with it. I was destined for damage Mal, you know that. No matter what I would give I know that I can’t change what happened.” My hand closes over his and I watch his fingers flex with the movement.
I’m not brave enough to look at his expression.
“Do you feel that?” I ask. I already know the answer is yes, but I would give my entire body and this moment to hear him say it.
“Yes,” Mal says, and I am so sure that I imagined that, but it doesn’t matter at this moment. I let go of him as he breathes in.
“Okay now stop being dramatic. I may already be dead, but I would appreciate it if you stopped trying to give me a heart attack. First the nakedness now this? Come on Mal. I’m only human.” I tease him, “Let’s head back. I can creep you out but somehow managing to have a bubble bath while you take a much needed nap.”
I reach again to pat his hand. I’m halfway there when something glimmers up ahead, a sudden spark of madness. Suddenly I know that we’ve skipped to the end and missed a bundle of pages. There’s a flash, and I blink to rid my mind of it. We are pulling over, and I feel like I’m being pulled into his lap. No. I’ve lost it. I imagine this only because of how badly I want it. His body is hard and welcomes me right in.
I scramble for a steady grasp.
Trying to blink my way out of this, whatever this is. It hurts, and I know that my brain is only playing tricks, but suddenly I am consumed with the possibility of it. I want to give in to my illusions.
I’ve snapped.
I’m somewhat okay with that God dammit.
Mal’s voice breaks with three words—one sentence —followed by a soft and easy laugh. I feel my entire chest collapse.
“You came back.”
Tastes Like Sex - Flo
His hands are on my lower back. I have my hands against his chest, and suddenly I am looking everywhere but directly at him.
Mal.
My buddy.
My friend.
My eyes
burn with a faded recognition.
He’s real, I can feel him. It feels like forever since I touched him. I told him that I loved him. Even if he didn’t hear it I’m embarrassed. My body feels feverish but my skin is like ice when it touches his.
“You came back.” He says it again as if the first time didn’t quite stick, as if somehow I didn’t quite hear him. That would be ridiculous seeing as I’m sitting right on top of him.
I’m in his lap. What. The. Frack. My lips just barely brush his, like an almost-kiss, despite the fact that his hands have moved to the back of my head and are trying to fuse my face against his. His eyes are closed but I just can’t stop gaping at him. Mal just seems drunk with all of this. Drinking it in.
I can’t get away from him. I need to stop him.
“I knew that you didn’t mean it,” Mal says. “I knew that you’d come back if I tried to make you mad.” He laughs a soft laugh that is almost enough to do me right in.
Every part of me is almost touching him. As if I’m only here for a millisecond. This kiss could be real if we both wanted it. Perhaps.
Or it was never real to begin with. I do not want to give too much thought to the possibility of that.
“Yeah I’m so not doing this.” I grip his sweatshirt in my fists and start to push off of him. The steering wheel is digging me in the back. All I can almost feel is the pressure of Mal’s hands. It’s like we’re dancing.
Like magnets, the push and pull force me back from opening my mouth to kiss him back. I’m exhausted. Touching him and not slipping right through him takes a lot of concentration.
“Not doing what?” an intoxicated Mal asks as his lips find my neck. My ears, my eyelids. One hand clutching at the back of my head, the other curving over my ass. I’m still in his lap. Straddling him.
I can’t take this.
I kiss him back. Opening my mouth to let his eagerness and taste in. It’s like a flood of emotions. I’m so suddenly consumed by it but unable to stop him with my two hands. Mal has always been determined. I cannot help but lean into him. Running my hands along his chest, touching his shoulders. His neck. I love all of it.
Ache for You (Trapped in Three Hill Book 1) Page 6