Dancing in the Dark

by T. L. Martin

  After a few seconds of silence, though, reality creeps back in and our faces go somber again.

  “So,” I whisper, “what are you gonna do now?”

  “Me?” She rolls onto her back, staring up at the ceiling. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think I found a new appreciation for home. I’ll probably stay for a little while, make Mama suffer before I head back to New York.”

  “You’re leaving again?” As I say the words I’ve said so many times before, they sound different to my ears. There’s nothing hollow in my chest. No desperation. No fear of being alone.

  It’s just a question. A question whose answer no longer has the power to hurt me.

  I glance away, letting the unfamiliar sensation soak in. My time at the Matthews House was many things. I’d never truly been on my own before, and the broken pieces of my soul ache to be mended. Still, all I can feel is stronger.

  “Yeah, I think so.” Frankie’s lips tip up. “I made some great friends before signing up with the Matthews, and I think I can really get far there. But maybe I’ll let Mama take me to church a few times first—after having Priest Henry cleanse her of her demons.” She winks, and we both chuckle. When she turns back to me, she whispers, “What about you?”

  I let out a long sigh. “I’m not going home.” My brows furrow. “I don’t think I really have a home. But I think . . . maybe that’s okay. Maybe home isn’t a place anyway.”

  I hold a hand over my chest and take a breath, absorbing the strange feeling of my broken pieces trying to sew themselves back together.

  “Yeah.” Frankie’s hand squeezes mine, and she nods. “It’s so much more.”

  “There is true life somewhere inside this body,

  claw your way through until you find me.”

  —Maya Luna

  It’s the strangest thing, looking at your reflection and seeing someone you don’t recognize. My hair is wet from my shower, and a shiver runs down my bare body despite the warm steam clouding the bathroom. I lean over the sink, pressing a hand to the glass. I can’t stop staring.

  I’ve thought before that my soul was split in half.

  Now I finally know why.

  I wish I could talk to her. Sofia. I would tell her she’s right. Life isn’t a fairytale, and for some of us, nightmares are real. If we’re really unlucky, they make a home inside us, wrapping their claws around our souls.

  But then I would tell her she’s stronger than she knows. And sometimes, that’s enough.

  My fingers curl against the mirror, and tears prick my eyes.

  It has to be enough.

  I jerk when Frankie’s voice hits my ears. “Mind if I hop in the shower before you take me home?”

  Wiping a tear before it falls, I grab a towel and curl it around my body, then open the door. I force a smile. “Yup. I might have used all the hot water, though.”

  Frankie pulls her towel back, steps around me, and snaps it against my ass.

  “Ouch!”

  She grins and closes the door before shouting, “Now we’re even.”

  I shake my head and walk to the little black dress draped over the bed. Aubrey washed it for me this morning, but it’s still going to be weird putting it on now that I’m back in the real world. I drop the towel and slip it on, getting it over with. First thing I’m going to do when I drop Frankie off is borrow some of her clothes. If Mama hadn’t burned my belongings, I’d pack a bag of my own. Not that I know where I’m headed, but I kind of like that.

  There’s something freeing about being able to create my own future. One that doesn’t chain me to my past. I’ve spent enough time confined, I think. It’s time to see what happens when I fly.

  A soft knock raps against the door, and my chest tightens.

  I still haven’t seen or spoken to him yet. Adam. I don’t know how to when the ache in my heart is still so tender. That night he left me may have happened fifteen years ago, but to my mind, it may as well have been yesterday.

  “Hey, Emmy?” Felix’s voice filters through the closed door.

  I clear my throat and walk toward him, turning the handle. He’s still in his suit—suspenders, bowtie, and all. “Hey.”

  He glances down, rubs his neck. “I’m heading out with Aubrey for a minute to grab us some food. Any requests?”

  A form shifts behind him, and my heart lurches when I spot Adam. He’s standing not even ten feet away, leaning a shoulder against the wall with one hand in his pocket. His chin is dipped, but a muscle twitches in his jaw and his eyes are honed in on me.

  I swallow, still watching him when I answer Felix. “Whatever you guys want is fine. Thank you.”

  He nods and walks toward the exit, where Aubrey is already waiting for him. “Be right back,” he calls as he leaves.

  Then we’re alone.

  Adam pushes off the wall and steps toward me. For a second I’m frozen. Every bone in my body is determined to stay where he can reach me, where he can touch, hold, taste me. But my heart knows better.

  I move to slam the door shut, but he stops it with his shoe.

  With my hand still on the knob, I look away. “Adam, don’t.”

  “You’ve been avoiding me.” His words are strong, smooth, but when I face him there’s desperation in his eyes.

  The look only hurts me more.

  I let go of the knob and distance myself from him, turning my back and folding my arms across my stomach.

  God, it’s so fresh.

  Every word from his lips.

  I promise I’ll come back for you.

  Every minute behind those bars.

  Baby girl. You still like to color, don’t you?

  And every second that followed after he left me to die.

  I’ll let you in on a little secret Lucas didn’t tell you. Promises are made to be broken. People like you and your mom? You deserve to die.

  I snap back to reality when Adam steps closer, his warmth on my back. Rough fingers trail up my bare arms, and a shudder runs through me.

  “I trusted you,” I whisper.

  His hands freeze.

  I step forward, out of reach. “I waited for so long.” A sob works up my throat, but I force it down. “Even when the door closed. Even when I climbed as high as I could and water still reached my mouth. I waited. I still thought . . . I thought maybe . . .”

  The air is so still it feels frozen. Images, sensations, emotions—I’ve opened the floodgates, and now I’m drowning in them.

  I hear him swallow, and I whirl around.

  He’s looking anywhere but at me, his fingers working his collar like it’s too tight to breathe.

  A rush of anger surges through me. My eyes narrow, and I move forward.

  “Do you have any idea what it’s like? To watch your mother drown right in front of you?” When my toes brush his shoes, I lift my chin and grit my teeth. This would be so much easier if he’d just back away. Why won’t he back away? “To be so scared you can’t breathe? Can’t cry? Can’t call for the one person who was supposed to—who was supposed to—” My words choke on a sob, and I hate it.

  I step around him, my arm brushing his shirt, and he catches my wrist, keeping me in place.

  He holds my gaze with his, the coldness in his voice not matching his eyes. “I wanted to be there—”

  “You abandoned me!” Tears stream down my cheeks. I tug my hand, but he only grips it tighter. “You left me with Raife. Was that part of your plan from the start?” My words hang between us, and I know I’m being ridiculous, but they spill out on their own. I can’t stop the conflicting mix of emotions gripping me. “Did you tell him to lock the door after he took the key too?”

  A low growl works up his throat, and he walks me backward until my spine hits the wall. I suck in a breath.

  “What key?” he grits.

  The door to the bathroom opens, but neither of us break our gazes. I narrow my eyes. “The key he took from my mom. The one he used to lock the deadbolt.”
r />   Something flickers in his eyes, and a vein pops in his neck. He places his palms on the wall on either side of me, then he leans down, his lips grazing mine. “I came back for you, Emmy.”

  My heart skips in my chest, and butterflies jump from my stomach to my throat.

  “I came back,” he rasps, his shoulders rippling with tension. “I never meant to abandon you. I was a fucking idiot. I thought I could do it. I thought I could get everyone out of there.” His eyelids lower, and he dips his head so he’s somehow closer. His breath skates across my skin. “I fucking failed you.”

  His nose brushes mine, and I run my tongue over my lower lip. His gaze drops, his lips parting, and just when I think he might kiss me, he pushes off the wall.

  All the air releases from my lungs at once. My chest is pounding, and I can feel the disappointment all the way to my toes.

  He turns away, runs a hand through his hair, and clasps the back of his neck.

  I can’t tear my eyes from him. The banging in my chest makes it harder to breathe with each second I stare.

  He came back.

  He came back for me.

  “Madness, as you know, is like gravity.

  All it takes is a little push.”

  —The Joker

  I scrub a hand down my face, flicking my gaze to the clock on the wall again in between pacing. It’s been two hours. Their trailer is seven minutes away. How long does it take to say a fucking goodbye?

  “Hey,” Felix calls from the mini kitchen to my right. “Deep breaths, man. In and out.”

  I snarl, and he chuckles, shaking his head.

  I’m tempted to look out the window again, but the sunlight rips right through my head every time I do. We already had to hang a spare blanket over the glass. It’s sunny as shit in August, and the curtains here might as well be non-existent.

  Jesus, I don’t get the painful sensations running rampant inside me. Two days of her resting, then she leaves right after she finally talks to me. The adrenaline racing through me is ready to burst. I keep going for my knife, thinking the feel of the blade in my hands will calm me, but it doesn’t. My chest burns, and my lungs are too tight to pull in enough air. I try to focus on somehow getting to my last two kills for some goddamn relief, but all I can think about is her.

  I’ve even tried distracting myself with other things. Felix and I have talked in length over these past couple days. For a while, we monitored the house through the camera access he has on his laptop. Watched the police raid the place, trying and failing to get info off the software Felix fried and from the desks Aubrey cleaned out before she organized getting the secretaries to our extra vehicles.

  Call it bittersweet. All I feel is bitter.

  Nothing is foolproof. There’s still shit to lead back to us and what we’ve been up to. And then there’s Raife. Felix and I went through the backlogged recordings; Raife, with Stella’s help, walked away from the bullet he took in his side. He’s somewhere, his heart beating and his Emmy/Katerina obsession most likely thriving. But we’ve escaped death, prison, and worse before. Recreated ourselves and found sources of income behind screens. We can do it again, and better this time. As far as Emmy is concerned, if Raife comes looking for trouble, he’ll find it in the form of my knife in his throat.

  None of that is behind the tension in my muscles and craving in my bones.

  The last words Emmy spoke to me were filled with loathing, and before that, she didn’t speak to me at all. I watched her sleep, seeking something to fix me, but all that built was a weird ache in my chest. That shit was worse. I need her to look at me with something other than pain and venom. I need to feel her grip me back when I hold her. I need her exhales to saturate my lungs.

  My body can’t seem to function without her, so it’s basic fucking survival I’m concerned about.

  “Dude, we’re missing it,” Felix mutters, pulling my thoughts back to the room. He grabs the remote from the counter and turns up the volume. “Showtime.”

  I step closer, my eyes narrowing on the screen. Felix wasn’t kidding the other day when he said the files were set to automatically release to all major platforms.

  “. . . that the investigation into the murder of attorney and soon-to-be Kentucky state senator elective, Arnold Murphy, is still ongoing. However, officials have since acquired further evidence of the atrocious acts committed by members of Misha, an underground criminal group Murphy allegedly operated and oversaw. Fifteen years ago, Misha reigned in the black market, with records showing millions of dollars gained through sex trades and . . .” the brunette reporter folds her hands over the desk, a swallow passing through her throat as the first image appears in the upper right corner of the screen, “selling the disembodied bones of kidnapped minors.”

  It’s bright when I spot it. Colorful and lively. It can’t be more than four inches long on the screen, but in person, it’s closer to nine.

  I remember this skull. The way Katerina carefully glued the peacock feathers on all sides but the face. The white paint that lingered on her fingers long after she smeared the color across each cheekbone. I also remember the forearm that belongs to the same subject, a bone Katerina once handed her daughter just before asking if she still liked to color.

  My lungs constrict more with each second I stare at it, making every inhale feel like a goddamn chore.

  I wasn’t expecting this. Actual photographs as real as my memories, maybe more so. I refuse to look away. I’m a part of it, Misha and that very skull. They’re embedded into my soul, stitched with the blood I’ve witnessed and drawn.

  When the image changes to spotlight a small white notecard sitting in front of the skull, Felix pauses the TV and cranes his neck toward the screen.

  “Fly for me,” he reads aloud. “I’m not a bird. I’m not a swan or a dove above your head. Perhaps my wings are made of dirt from the earth below your feet. Perhaps my soul, the very air you breathe. My heart is fire; don’t get too close, for you will fall to ash deep in the shadows. Don’t go too far, for you will thirst for me like you would a cascading waterfall in the desert. I’m not a bird, for I am you, and you are me. I’m not a swan, for I am everything, you see? I’m not a dove. I’m only human with dreams of being set free. Won’t you fly for me?”

  Silence expands in the room when Felix finishes. His eyes are stuck to the TV, his body as still as the news reporter on pause. “Hell,” he whispers. “Katerina makes us look normal.” He shifts his gaze to me then winks. “Well, me at least.”

  I pull at my collar and squint at the walls, certain they’re inching closer. Was this room always so damn small?

  Felix hits play, and as the news reporter resumes speaking, I glance at Emmy’s bedroom. It’s so empty. A strange rhythm erupts in my chest, each beat lingering like an echo. Digging my knuckles into the area, I try to rub the irritating sensation away.

  So fucking empty.

  “. . . and a string of those allegedly in connection with Misha at one time or another have reportedly begun disappearing over the past several years, including Hugo Perez, the well-known CEO of Shaggy Entertainment Industries who was officially reported as missing on July 22nd of this year. While there are currently no leads on the person or persons behind the disappearances, viewers are being encouraged to speak now if they have any information on—”

  “Cut it off.”

  Felix looks over his shoulder, his brow shooting up.

  I press my fingers and thumb to my temples, attempting to quiet the throbbing in my head.

  A second later, the screen goes black. It doesn’t relieve any of the tension from my body, but it does shut that reporter the hell up. I blow out a breath. What the hell is taking Emmy so long? I flick my gaze back to the clock, then the shaded window, my shirt feeling too tight across my shoulders.

  Felix walks back to the kitchen, watching me as he passes. He doesn’t say anything as he places our leftovers in the fridge. After a minute, I pace into Emmy’s room, stopping midw
ay and wrapping my fingers around the doorframe.

  Fuck this.

  “Dude, wait—”

  I barely hear Felix when I barge past the exit. Within seconds, I’m in the shoddy lobby and blurring past two young receptionists. The news is on, that reporter’s grating voice filling the space, and one of the guys behind the desk is clapping his hands.

  “Serves the bitches right, though. Doesn’t it?”

  “Yeah, man. Sick shit right there.”

  “Call the person behind the disappearances a hero and move on with your damn life, reporter lady!”

  Sunlight beams in my eyes as I push the front doors open, and I groan. My head pounds like a hammer is swinging inside my scalp. A fucking hero. Those kids don’t know what in the hell they’re talking about. Draping an arm over my forehead, I take a step forward, no clue where I’m headed, just that I fucking need her. The rays of light creep past my arm and beat on my skin and eyelids. My throat tightens a little more with each step I take.

  When the light closes in on me, cutting off my breath, I curse and bend forward, placing my palms on my thighs and trying to suck in some goddamn air.

  What the fuck?

  I start to turn around, but specks of black dot my vision. Where the hell is Emmy?

  “This is my confession.

  As dark as I am, I will always find enough light to

  adore you to pieces with all of my pieces.”

  —Johnny Nguyen

  I rest my head against the seat. My eyes are set on the familiar houses flicking by, yet all I see are peacock feathers, bright and blue, bones and paint, white and smooth. After saying my goodbyes to Frankie, I stopped by Batshit Betsy’s trailer to say hi, and the news was on. But the images featured felt off to me. My child self saw many things, but not one memory is as clear as that skull I just saw on screen.