Love Nouveau

by Berry, B. L.

  In spite of everything that has happened, I still miss him.

  I want nothing more than to open my eyes and be somewhere else. To be lying next to Phoenix. To be completely oblivious to his lies. To disappear into a state of being where the lines of numbness and happiness are blurred. I want to rewind life and start things over. I don’t care if I’m blissfully ignorant. At least I wouldn’t be in pain.

  But each time I close my eyes, I’m taken back to the night on Lake Mendota, trying to find the exact moment things went wrong. I think about all of that blood and Phoenix’s outburst. Sully’s silence echoes through my ears. I hear the doctor say the words “spontaneous abortion” again and again and again, breaking my heart all over.

  I refuse to think about what Sully supposedly did to me. Each time that I do, the scab on my soul rips wide again and the sting consumes me to the point of hysterics. And I refuse to think about the secrets that Phoenix kept because the memory of him is the salt in the wound and I just want to bleed out.

  So instead of thinking at all, I open my eyes and stare at the beige popcorn ceiling and will myself to sleep. I count backwards from one hundred and start again when I reach zero. It’s all I can do to keep my mind from drifting to him.

  THE MOVEMENT ON THE MATTRESS stirs me. At some point during the course of the early afternoon I must have fallen asleep. Rachel is perched on the edge of the bed holding a moving box marked “Kitchen” in bold letters along the side.

  “Get up,” she commands. “We’re going outside.”

  Groaning, I put the pillow over my head. Damn it, why won’t she just leave me the hell alone? Misery doesn’t love company. Misery wants to hole up in peace and quiet. I am perfectly content living as a recluse in this moment. I can’t deal with Rachel’s saccharine sentiments. I just want to be by myself. There is no way in hell I’m going anywhere today. The pain is all too fresh and raw and I’m too busy burying myself in a landslide of remorse and self-pity.

  “I’m fucking serious, Ivy. I know your life sucks right now, but that’s just how it goes. Life sucks. It gets better temporarily. And then it will inevitably suck again. But I’m not going to allow you to sleep away the pain. You want to feel numb? We have some pills for that. Now get up.”

  Rachel yanks my arm as I sit up. Resistance is pointless. Numbly, I stand and follow her out of the apartment. But rather than taking the elevator down to the ground floor, we head up the emergency stairwell. She pushes the door open and I’m blinded by white light. For a brief moment, I envision moving on from this world. The warm breeze wraps around us like a blanket, comforting me.

  I look down … when did I put shoes on?

  The roof.

  We’re on the roof.

  And for one fleeting moment, I welcome the thought of being pushed off the side of her complex. I bet it would feel like I’m flying. Not falling. Because I’ve been falling for days and there’s no ground in sight. I just want to fly. Be gone from here. Be done with all this drama.

  My eyes focus on Rachel. I see her lips moving, but I hear nothing. She’s talking. Nothing registers.

  Maybe that’s because nothing matters?

  Or because I am nothing?

  Perhaps both?

  Why doesn’t anything matter?

  Rachel hands me a plate and I vacantly examine the cool porcelain in my hands. “Go ahead,” she says, gesturing to the plate in my hands. “Throw it.”

  What? Is she mad?

  “This will be much more therapeutic than putting a hole in my kitchen wall with your cell phone. Go on, Ivy. Throw it.”

  Yep. Rachel has definitely gone mad. I’m not breaking her dishes. This whole notion is utterly ridiculous.

  I feel the heaviness of the plate in my hands. It’s the same heaviness I feel in my chest and my shoulders and my soul. I reluctantly trace my fingers over the scalloped edges.

  Rachel grows impatient and a pissed-off hardness punctuates her eyes. “BREAK THE DAMN PLATE, IVY!” she screams in my face.

  Without thought, I obey and gently sling the plate toward the wall, watching it snap into large chunks against the rooftop.

  “No, don’t toss it. You feel like breaking shit? Then fucking break shit. Don’t you dare pussyfoot around.”

  Jesus. Why is she so angry with me? I want to tell her to chill out. She has no right to be pissed. This bullshit happened to me. Not her.

  Rachel grabs a mug from the box, stretches her hands high above her head and smashes it against the ground forcefully with a primitive grunt. The mug fractures into thousands of tiny little pieces and dust at our feet.

  Rachel reaches back into the moving box and grabs a small white dessert plate and places it in my hands.

  “Go. It’s your turn.” Her eyes burn deep and her jaw is tight. I know she means business. “It is not okay to not feel anything right now. You are blindingly angry and are too numb to realize it. Has any of this shit actually registered with you?” Rachel squints into the sunlight and I finally notice that she is on the verge of crying.

  I want to shout that yes, it has registered. And each time I recognize the devastation, I die a little more inside.

  I hate myself that much more.

  I hate the secrets and the speculation.

  I hate Phoenix and how confused he makes me feel.

  I hate this world and all of the fucked up cards I’ve been dealt in my lifetime.

  “Break it, Ivy…” her voice trails off in a whisper as she wipes the trails of moisture streaming down her cheeks.

  I clench the saucer and sling it like a Frisbee against the neighboring building’s wall. Chips of white ceramic ricochet into a million tiny pieces and the shards rain down into piles on the black rooftop.

  Slowly, I begin to hear the beating of my own heart deep inside my ears. Adrenaline picks up and the pulsing vein in my neck throbs as if an angry demon has been awakened inside of me. Waves of anger pulse through my body and I want to fist my hair and rip it from my skull, absorbing the pain to make sure I can still actually feel something other than anger; that I’m still capable of feeling physical pain and not just emotional pain. Instead, I fist a teacup, then wind my arm back and pitch it against the wall with so much force I fall to my knees.

  I watch it burst with satisfaction.

  I crave release. I’m driven by the insatiable need to damage. To break. To shred. To crush every last little thing in my path.

  I push myself back to my feet and my chest heaves as I snatch another plate from the box. I will not stay down—I refuse to be defeated. I will come back from this shit. I bite the inside of my cheek so hard that warm metallic liquid starts to fill my mouth. As Sully invades my mind, I fight back the tears. That piece of disgusting filth makes me ill. That asshole deserves to die.

  I look at the plate. That motherfucker. This should be his face right now. “Fuuuuuuuuuuuck!” Anger rips through my frame as I hurl dinnerware in rapid success.

  Smash.

  For the contempt I feel for my sister.

  Smash.

  For Phoenix.

  Smash.

  And every last thing I ever felt for him.

  Smash.

  Thought I could feel for him.

  Smash.

  For thinking I could love him.

  Smash.

  For Matt.

  Smash.

  Fucking, Matt that I cannot seem to get out of my life.

  Smash.

  For my goddamned parents and their need for appearances.

  Smash.

  Approval.

  Smash.

  For my need of their approval.

  Smash. Smash. Smash.

  “I hate you!” I scream as I wind my arm back and hurl the last plate in the box at the barrier wall, watching it shatter into tiny smithereens.

  I crash back down on my knees. I don’t know whether to laugh or collapse into a fit of sobs. I can hardly contain my panting. Adrenaline pushes and pulls through my veins.
r />   But this feeling …

  This feels …

  Damn. This feels incredible.

  I grab the empty box and punch the ever-living shit out of it as it caves-in upon itself. When it’s finally flat, I grab it and begin tearing it apart until I’m surrounded by a messy confetti of the corrugated box.

  A guttural sob rips through my soul. How has my life gotten to this point?

  I throw my head back as an inhuman roar escapes my body. All of the hatred I carry for Sully is unleashed. My soul, my security, even my sense of self … it has all been violated and left in shreds.

  I hate him. With every fiber of my being, I hate him. And I hate Phoenix, too.

  I hate him for knowing.

  I hate him for telling me the truth.

  I hate him for loving me.

  And I hate myself for ever loving him. I am so pathetic. And foolish.

  I look at the remnants of Rachel’s dinnerware scattered across the roof as the tears continue to flow. I am fully aware of my lunacy in this moment. Anyone watching would surely have me committed.

  But my God … breaking shit, breaking myself, breaking my world is exactly what I need. I imagine this it the kind of despair Edvard Munch tried to paint in The Scream.

  Exhaustion sets in and my head falls to my chest, aching with each heave. Rachel lays a delicate hand on my shoulder and gives it a reassuring squeeze.

  “I’m gonna go inside, sweetie. Stay up here and take all the time you need. I’ll come back and clean up later.” Her voice rings soft, like tinkling wind chimes. I can’t summon myself to look at her in the eye, but I give her a tight appreciative nod before I hear the door close.

  Grabbing a jagged fragment of broken plate, I lie flat on my back and gaze up at the sky. Clouds in shapes of my childhood imagination roll by with graceful ease. In the distance, a car horn blares, the Blue Line train rumbles, a dog barks. The white noise of the city calms my restless soul as I mindlessly twirl the porcelain in my fingers, careful not to cut myself. Heat radiates off of the rooftop as the thick summer air sticks to my skin like honey.

  I learned at a very young age that the world only cares about what you can do for it. It craves discernible output. The intangible things, like kindness and love and justice, are simply nice haves. I used to believe that I wanted the tangible things in life, but not anymore. Those things aren’t important.

  So what is it I want for myself?

  It’s a challenging question to ask. But arguably more challenging to answer truthfully.

  Even in light of everything that has happened I still want Phoenix. My body aches for his touch, yet I hate him with a ferocity that scares me. Everything I feel for him is an extreme of passionate emotion. Hate. Love. There is no in between. He will forever be entwined with Sully and the aftermath of that party. Of being raped. The baby that never was. It all bleeds together and feeds off of him. As much as it would kill me to let him go, holding on would be a slow, painful suicide. I need to be free of Phoenix.

  I want to be independently happy from my parents, from my friends, from any potential love interest—be it Phoenix or Matt or the next dark, tall, and screwable guy who catches my eye. I know that I can’t carry them with me. Whatever comes next is something I have to do on my own accord. After all, if you want something you’ve never had, you have to make yourself do something you’ve never done before. And that means leaving them all behind.

  I come with too much baggage, especially now, for anyone to truly love me. I’m damaged. Used. And as much as it hurts, I’m okay with my new reality. I played that part for so long it has become second nature, but I’m not okay with what happened—I doubt I’ll ever be. But I am trying to be at peace with my emotions through it all. There is a little voice in the back of my head that taunts me. It tries to convince me that I am deserving of everything I'm going through right now … that my current reality is a penance for my past transgressions. But I know better than to feed that demon. I know that there is only one person to blame for this, and that person is not me.

  It’s amazing how in two days the world can shift and drastically change the course of your life. Everything can be taken from you without you ever even knowing it. Nothing is in control. Life is just a series of coincidences in expeditious succession. My coincidences just happened to wreck my self-being, self-worth and shattered any sense of normalcy I ever had. All it takes is one crack, and how quickly your world will shatter.

  The colliding of two souls along a lake under a starry sky.

  The slip of a pill.

  The shout of an accusation.

  The smash of a plate.

  The collapsing of a soul.

  My life is Newton’s Third Law of Physics. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Cautiously give your heart away? It’ll be torn to smithereens. For every moment you feel alive, there is a point of emotional death. But in order to pick up the pieces and become whole again, you need to allow yourself the opportunity to crumble, and be less than perfect. Vulnerable.

  Pieces of porcelain litter the rooftop. My fingers still. And the world moves in slow-mo.

  My eyes catch a black cloud of sparrows circling the sky above. They float, dive and shoot back up into the sky in unison, over and over, like an amoeba dancing in the air. I can’t help but wonder, with wings and freedom and the ability to fly anywhere in this world, why do they stay here, in this neighborhood, flying in the same circle over and over again.

  I’m just like those damn birds.

  Except for I have the sense to break free from the rut.

  I have the capacity to chart a different course for myself. Nobody but me gets to write the ending to my story. And I refuse to let the hand I ache to hold be the hand that holds me back.

  I will start over. Pretend none of this ever happened. Pretend Sully doesn’t have this horrible, humiliating claim on my life. Pretend Phoenix was just another meaningless name on my laundry list of guys. Leave all the bullshit, deceit, and unnecessary drama in Chicago.

  This is it.

  I’m moving to New York.

  THREE QUICK RAPS BEAT THROUGH the door and echo down the hallway to the kitchen where Rachel and I stand hugging each other. I’ve just told her about my decision and she is unbelievably supportive of me moving, even though I know it’s killing her inside. She is, hands down, my rock through all of life’s dramas.

  “Ivy! Rachel? Open up. I know you’re in there!” My heart crumbles at the panic in Phoenix’s voice. He beats on the door again with such force that we can hear the chain on the back of the door rattle. “Come on, Ivy. We need to talk.”

  Yes, we need to talk, but I can’t talk right now. If I see him, I will slap him so hard that we’ll both go back in time so he can have the opportunity to make all of this right. I want to hurt him like he hurt me. I want to open him up and tear apart his insides so he knows how it feels to be violated. But more importantly, if I see him now I know I’ll cry. And Phoenix is not worthy of seeing me in tears.

  Rachel releases me. “Do you want me to get rid of him?”

  I choke back the tears as I nod. The weight in my chest is heavier than a loaded gun. I sit down on the wooden chair at our kitchen table and fold myself in half. I need to be small. Invisible. I want to disappear completely and forget about him. This is all just too much to take in right now.

  In the background, I hear Rachel crack the door open and say something to Phoenix—what, I’m not sure.

  “I’m not leaving until she talks to me!” he shouts as he tries to assert himself through the doorway.

  “Hey! Back off, jackass. She needs some space right now!” Rachel throws her shoulder into the door with a grunt, slamming it shut. That is sure to leave a mark. “I mean it. Leave her the hell alone.”

  I have never heard such an acidic tone from her before. She massages her shoulder gingerly as she returns back to the table.

  A string of obscenities floats through the air from the hal
lway. A low thud makes me question if he’s starting to kick the floorboards. Perhaps Rachel should offer him a plate to break and send him on his way.

  Returning to the kitchen, my best friend’s eyes look haunted. She doesn’t say anything but shakes her head and slides into the seat across from me.

  “You know what we need right now?”

  More plates? A restraining order? A time machine so I can go back and be fourteen years old eternally before all of the drama began? Any of these would be welcomed right now.

  “Pancakes,” she says with a small, sympathetic smile.

  Yes, I do believe that breakfast food would help. While it won’t solve my problems, it will at the very least help make my stomach stop growling.

  “Go in the other room and relax. I’ll grab you in a bit when it’s ready.”

  I do as I’m told and retreat back to my temporary bedroom. The mouthwatering scent of the batter sizzling on the griddle fills the apartment as Phoenix’s assault on our door continues. This incessant ruckus has got to stop. I grab my iPod and crank the volume up to eleven, but even the melodic wails of Trent Reznor aren’t enough to drown him out.

  WHILE RACHEL BUSIES HERSELF IN the kitchen, curiosity gets the best of me and I stupidly decide I need to see Phoenix one final time. I creep quietly into the living room and glance through the peephole, convincing myself that all I need is one quick peek. I can hear him, but he’s hidden from my view so I crack the door, keeping the chain latched to the lock so he can’t force his way through. Upon seeing me, his jaw softens and he appears lighter. His beautiful face is anguished, like he hasn’t slept in weeks.

  “Are you okay?” he asks softly.

  I divert my eyes quickly to the floor. Am I okay? No, I am most definitely not okay. Frankly I don’t know if I ever will be okay again.

  “I’m fine,” I say, the lie becoming easier each time I say it. I’m not fine. I’m anything but fine. But I’ve learned that other people need to hear those reassuring words more than I do.