Together We Caught Fire

by Eva V. Gibson

  I tried. I doubled my grip and dug in my heels. Tried so hard to stand again and pull him with me, until my wrist popped, and my foot slipped, and I landed back on my knees, and what was I doing, I couldn’t help him. I couldn’t begin to unwreck this train.

  “Get up. Get up, get up, oh God, stop. Please, please stop.”

  And he did. His tremors subsided, his head lifted, his eyes hooked on mine, and it wasn’t any better, that stillness—it would never be better again. His scabbed lips parted around a wet gasp. His body curled in on itself, slumped like an unstuffed doll. Released its contents, breath and waste, and it was that same dank stench—that same filth, overwhelmed by eye-stinging bleach; the tiles hard beneath my knees; the flow of still-warm blood around my tiny, bare feet; her face, icy to the touch; his hand, rough and cooling, already changing around my fingers. How was this happening again? How had I doubled back to this place?

  “No.” The word was a whisper, building to a wail, filling and then spilling from my mouth. “No. No no no no no.”

  “Lane? What’s going on?” Connor’s voice reached me before he did. “Are you—oh. Oh God.”

  “Connor?” Sadie was a trill in the distance, tripping toward us in a slur of twang and unsteady footsteps. “Connor, what is it?”

  “Sadie, stay back.” He was close, then closer, prying my hand from the literal death grip. Catching me as I sagged against him, holding me tight to his pounding heart. “Get Paul. Tell him—oh God. Oh my God.”

  “Tell him what? Grey, baby, can you—where did you go? Connor, Grey was right here. I think he’s—oh, Lane, there you are. What’s happening?”

  “Get back, I said!” Connor’s voice ripped through me even as she defied him, weaving her way into the tiny room. Choking on her drink as she took in the sight at my feet.

  The thing in the bathroom, slumped sideways, stuck between the sink and the wall—just a thing now, though at one time it had been a he. A pitiful scarecrow of a he, all jitters and sores and underfed limbs. I don’t know if he’d known me at the end, recalled my eyes or my hair, or the nervous tilt of my chin, but it didn’t matter. His eyes stared through me; his mouth listed open, as if poised to speak. As if he hadn’t yet realized he’d never say another word.

  Aiden. Another dead body on another bathroom floor.

  And just like him, I couldn’t make a sound.

  Then Sadie found her voice, and her screams were more than loud enough to compensate.

  23

  BEFORE SADIE’S SHRIEK SHOOK OFF its own echo, Connor was moving. He hauled me to my feet and out of the bathroom, cut a rough furrow through the gathering onlookers, one arm curled around my shoulders. We broke through the crowd, and he picked up the pace, hustling me down the hall and through the front room, where he left me by the front door before disappearing back into the chaos.

  I slid down the wall and into a ball, knees drawn up, hands splayed at my sides, braced against the cool, slightly gritty floor. It wasn’t long at all before I registered Sadie’s hysteria, a low wail looming closer, then bursting into the room ahead of her. She trailed behind Connor, who half carried, half dragged a staggering Grey. It was all nothing to me; an underwater cacophony of noise, motion, and somewhat familiar voices.

  I’m not sure how, but Connor got the three of us outside and all the way across the street to Sadie’s car. He dug the keys out of her purse and deposited her in the shotgun seat, then stuffed Grey into the back along with my messenger bag. I braced myself against the trunk, streaming eyes darting over every crack in the world until they landed on the warehouse—it squatted blamelessly in the lot, still and silent, but was that a thump from inside? Was the door still firmly shut, or was it sliding sideways an inch at a time, slow beyond notice, and was that a pale, bloodshot eye peering through the tiny crack? Was it staring at me from a peeling face, pocked and crusted with pus? Were there fingers just beyond the eye, ready to lock themselves around my arms, or dig my teeth out one by one with dirty nails?

  There had been no blood. Not on the floor or the walls or the body in that bathroom—today’s bathroom, the most current in the now-pluralized list; only that knowledge kept me on my feet. I didn’t see Connor standing there until I felt his hands—on my arms at first, then my shoulders, urgent, and finally cupping my face. Gentle all at once, thumbs brushing the tears off my cheekbones. His calluses rasped against my wet skin.

  “Lane. Look at me.”

  His voice snared me, dragged me in, snapped my gaze to his. That same voice that once commanded me to cut, insisting I hurt him to help myself—now steeled and ready, braced for both our pain.

  “Paul’s calling 911,” he said. “Get my sister out of here. Get yourself home safely.”

  “What about you? Come with me, Connor. Please. I need you.”

  “God. Lane, I—” He pressed his forehead to mine, squeezing his eyes shut. “I have to deal with things here. You can do this. Be strong.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You can. I love you.”

  His kiss blocked any possibility of a reply. I pulled him closer, clung to him, the words racing through my veins, welling beneath my eyelids. Then he broke away and was gone all at once. He bounded across the street without looking for traffic. Without looking back at me.

  The warehouse swallowed him whole, and I was on my own.

  * * *

  I drove away from there on someone else’s autopilot. Sadie was drunk and hyperventilating; Grey was drunker, facedown and moaning into the seat, and the fact that I was still somewhat functional and not yet fully catatonic rendered me the best driver by a margin so slim it barely existed.

  I don’t know how I got the car home in one piece. I do know Skye took one look at all of us as we staggered in the door and went into Emergency Mom Mode—that kettle was on the stove before I had my boots off. She was blending tea leaves and wetting dishcloths, helping me into a chair. Wiping Grey’s flushed face as she would a child’s, then rushing him to the bathroom when he started gagging. Holding Sadie against her shoulder as she sobbed out the events of the night.

  I slouched in a kitchen chair and tried to ground myself—tried focused breathing, five different ways. Meditation. Sipping my tea. All the tricks I knew, all useless. Finally, I left the table and headed down the hall, ready to ball up forever under my quilt. Instead, I found Skye tiptoeing out of my bedroom, closing the door gently behind her.

  “I put Sadie in your bed,” she whispered, glancing over my shoulder at the bathroom, where her son stretched prone in front of the toilet. “I wasn’t sure if they’re sexually active. I didn’t want to create a situation.”

  “Oh.” God. Fucking kill me. “Um, no. It’s fine if she stays with me. Thank you.” I met her eyes, beyond grateful they held the compassion we needed, instead of judgment or rage. Speaking of which. “Her parents, though. I don’t—”

  “Oh, that’s handled. I called her mother, told her you two were having a sleepover and Greyson was staying at a friend’s house. I know how they are.”

  “Wow. You’re being really great about all this, Skye.”

  “It’s not that I approve of their behavior,” she said, thoroughly failing at the whole stern-mom thing. “It’s one thing to have a drink or two, and quite another to be irresponsible and sloppy. I’m glad you were sober, and able to get them home, but you can always call us. You and Greyson are adults now, but we won’t—well, we’ll never not worry. This is just so horrible. That poor boy. You poor, poor kids.”

  The words overwhelmed me, as did her gentle hug. Both fed the gnawing in my chest.

  “I need to get ahold of Connor,” I wavered. “I need to see if he’s okay.”

  “He can stay here tonight, if need be. I can pick him up.” Grey came to life behind us, ejecting a stream of beer vomit onto the rug. “Oh, honey. Sit up, Greyson. Take aim.”

  I left her to haul him up and redirect his face to the toilet bowl. Sadie was out cold, so I crept through the hou
se and slipped out the back door, sat on the steps overlooking the yard. The night was clear and still; the air nipped my face with frost-edged teeth. I pulled up Connor’s number and started a text, fingers stuttering over all the wrong letters. Stumbling over the memory of our last kiss.

  I shook the thought away, turned all focus on my breath, as if pranayama could counteract Connor’s words, let alone his love. That moment yawned like a mouth around my heart, chewed through flesh and senses, left me weak. Left me shaking, in a way even his body never had.

  Connor Hall was in love with me. And now I had to text him.

  Fuck.

  Fine. It would be fine. He was a pragmatic kind of guy—he’d know better than to expect a hot take on his feelings less than an hour after he’d pulled my fingers from the clasp of a freshly deceased hand. He’d be cool about it regardless of how I’d fucked up before, what with all the kissing and sincerity, and other bad ideas, and I’d do exactly what I’d planned: I’d make sure he was okay. I’d pass along Skye’s offer. I’d stonewall any attempt at emotional discussion, and if it meant I had to camp in the goddamn backyard to avoid that little nighttime chat, so be it. Sadie was in my bed, anyway—even if he did stay over, he’d likely sleep on the couch.

  I could do this. It would be all right.

  I shook off the tremors and doubled my focus, finally managed coherency on the fourth try.

  It’s Lane. Are you okay?

  We’ll be fine. Can’t really talk now, cops are all over. You made it home?

  Yes. You can stay here tonight. Skye says she’ll pick you up.

  Tell her thank you, but I can crash w/Paul at his family’s place. Don’t know how long we’ll be here. Don’t want anyone to wait up.

  OK. Take care of yourself.

  You too.

  And that was it. I wiped my face and stowed my phone, headed back inside, ambled aimlessly through the kitchen and down the hall. Skye emerged from the bathroom with an armful of towels and the rug, all wadded up and reeking of sick.

  “Connor’s staying with his roommate,” I told her. “He said thank you for the offer, though.”

  “As long as he knows he’s welcome here. Sweetie, could you go sit with Greyson? I’ll be back to take over after I load the washer and check on Sadie. Oh, and I texted Rob—he’s on his way home now. Shouldn’t be long.”

  I nodded at her retreating back, zombied on past her to the bathroom. Grey emerged from the toilet, blinking at me through teary eyes as I slid down the wall to sit beside him. We were far too familiar with each other’s puke.

  “Oh. Hi, Elaine.”

  “Hi.”

  “That guy,” he croaked, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. “Was he—”

  “Yeah, Greyson. He was.”

  “God. That’s so fucked up. Did someone call the police?”

  “Why do you think we ran out of there so fast? Connor practically shoved us in the car.”

  “Quick thinking. Good for him. The underage thing, and all that—nothing but trouble. Is this one of his?” He dragged his finger over the bracelet, eyelids drooping shut at my nod. “Pretty. Suits you.”

  “He made it for me.”

  “Inspiring. Inspirational. He gets you. Really sees you. Must be nice.”

  “He loves me.” It was an exhale wrapped in a bone-weary sigh, less a whisper than a ghost—the kind that haunts an already occupied space. The kind that clamors for human attention, waiting for acknowledgment to set it free.

  If Grey heard me, he didn’t react. Instead, he dry-heaved again, slumped against my shoulder. He was heavy and solid and warm, his hair silky on my cheek. It smelled familiar, a vague blend of his sweat and my own shampoo. His lips grazed my collarbone, jump-starting my pulse; my arms rose to circle him, but just barely—carefully, as if anything more would break us both. My name slid out on a half-formed mumble, sultry and sour against my neck. This was so very far from the way I’d once imagined holding him.

  “I’m sorry,” he moaned. “I am so. Sorry. I didn’t mean those things I said to you. I didn’t. I’m just so tired, like, just when I think I can deal—that I’m enough, and it’ll be okay—then it all comes apart on the insides, and it’s not fair. It’s not. And I end up hurting everyone—hurting my Sadie—and I can’t do this any—”

  He gagged on his words and lunged for the bowl again, barely making it. I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes, too drained to translate his angst. Instead, I waited out his spasms, dismembering the evening in my mind. Placing each piece in a separate mental pocket.

  I severed Aiden immediately from the rest, tucked that one far away, knowing, even then, he would never ever stay buried. Aiden, and his stare and his stench, the jut of his bones. His rotten teeth and sores and runny eyes. His threadbare sock, peeking through a hole in his boot. His dirty hand, tight around mine, then slack. Dead in my grip, long beyond help.

  The memory undid everything else about that night—the horrible things Grey said to me; his attitude and drunkenness; the revolting mess to which he’d reduced himself. Sadie’s proud spine, and her tears, and the barely there mask of her stern frown. Connor’s hands and mouth and laughing eyes. His parting words, which should have sparked a surge of that gentle, floating contentment I’d felt when he’d gifted me the bracelet—that temporary cradle, upended all at once onto stone.

  And holy shit, even if he’d always planned to tell me tonight—even if the bracelet had been the natural first step on a path to those words—his actual timing couldn’t have been worse. Who declares his love on the heels of such a grisly scene? Connor Hall, that’s who—a boy so damaged and cynical, it was a miracle he could stand to love at all, much less love a girl who picked sensation over feeling at every opportunity. Who’d gone ahead and walked the line between the two until she’d scuffed it right down into the dirt.

  I’d loved Grey so long, I wasn’t sure what the word looked like when pried apart from his name. Surely it was more than a desperate jumble of words, or a scorched-earth kiss. More than a whisper tucked between a car and a corpse.

  It was probably a good thing I’d been too fucked up to answer.

  24

  SHE LAY IN THE BATHTUB, one eye open in a horrid wink. She’d pulled the stopper already, and I knew what would happen next, because I’d seen it endless times before: The blood would drain faster than gravity, faster than reality. It would disappear down the drain, and her toes would follow. Then her feet; her legs, bones cracking and warping, crushed into the shape of the pipes. All the way up, hips and waist and ribs and arms. Her mouth would open, and she’d scream herself bloody once more, restain the world in a wet, miserable shriek.

  * * *

  The bathroom door locked behind me again, not that I’d closed it. Not that she had either—she couldn’t have, not from the bathtub. Her sobs echoed off the tile, distorted by the drip-drop of falling water. Not water at all, though—blood. My blood. My arms, opened to the elbows. My legs, soaked in the aftermath of cyclic pain. My reflection, shifting to hers, then back again; her mouth, shifting from laughter to screams until her voice ran out over my fingertips. Until the mirror burst into shards that pierced my eyes, and all I saw was red.

  * * *

  She knelt on the blood-soaked rug, her arms extended, reaching for me in a silent plea, and it was my mother. How could I not go to her? How could I pull away, even as her teeth bit and tore into my cheek, mangling the soft, defenseless flesh? Why couldn’t I get away when she started in on my jaw, popped it loose, ripped it free, taking my tongue along and swallowing them both? Why couldn’t I wake up, even when I saw her mouth unhinging, opening impossibly wide as she leaned in to consume me whole?

  * * *

  Those were the things that followed me through a day. Those things lurked beneath every automatic smile when I was called upon in class, or working or texting or spinning or breathing—a constant flow of tasks and motion. Anything to bury them deeper. Was there help enough for it in
the world? Was there a magic pill or drink or bullet—some first step on a path leading safely out of my own mind?

  It was no big trick to skip bedtime that first night, binge on Netflix and double-strength coffee. Knit a hat or two. Nothing I hadn’t done before. Grey even wandered out and joined me on the couch, those eyes grazing my limbs, lingering on the length of my neck. Hanging a beat too long on my parted lips.

  Grey. My earnest, anxious, well-meaning stepbrother, who hadn’t looked me in the face since the night he’d lain drunk in my lap. Who hadn’t gone a day without finding an excuse to touch me, no matter how minor: a nudge of his shoulder at the kitchen counter. His foot bumping my leg as he settled on the couch. Our fingers brushing as he passed me the remote or the throw blanket or a cup of tea. All minimal and neutral, almost accidental. All too deliberate to pass off as nothing. He’d been attentive and subdued, kind to me in little ways—fixing my coffee in the morning, picking up my slack on chores. Setting up study sessions in hopes of slowing my academic free fall, helping me stay afloat with extra-credit homework. Tiny peace offerings, absent of strings.

  Not two months prior, the slightest nod from him would have left me reeling, senses heightened and helpless and hoping for more. Now I was as numb to him as I was to everything else. She engulfed the world, my mother—blotted out the sun itself, never mind the barely flickering flame of Grey.

  So it went: the corpse of Annie Jamison, splitting every seam of night. Flung at my feet, over and over, by Aiden’s stiff, dirty hands.

  My mind was earthquake rubble, the world mixed and muddled, well beyond the boundaries of plain old fucked up. Everything bleeding into everything else.