by BB Easton
No!
Looking up, I pound on the glassy surface, sucking in lungfuls of water as the mace-wielding horseman watches me drown. From this angle, I can see that he does have a face under that hood after all.
A beautiful one with soft green eyes and full, smirking lips.
I bolt upright, clutching my chest and gasping for air. Every breath makes my raw throat sting. When I open my eyes, I find myself staring at a toilet. My toilet. There’s a pillow on the floor by the door, which is letting a little bit of daylight in around the edges. A few candles on the counter provide the rest of the light. I recognize them from my room.
I rub my pounding temples as I try to figure out how I ended up on the bathroom floor.
The smell of vomit lingering under the vanilla is my first clue.
The man watching me from the bathtub is my second.
Wes is lying down in the tub, fully clothed. His muddy boots are propped up on the ledge, and his head is on the opposite corner. His eyelids are heavy, like I just woke him up, but his blown-out pupils are alert and trained on me.
He doesn’t say anything at first, and neither do I. We just stare at each other, both waiting for the hammer to drop, and when we finally speak, it’s at the exact same time.
“You slept almost all day,” Wes says.
“You’re really here,” I blurt out.
Wes nods, and the look on his face isn’t happy.
It’s sad and sympathetic.
Reality wraps around my empty stomach and crushes it like an aluminum can as the meaning behind that look takes hold.
“You saw,” I whisper.
Wes nods again, pressing his lips into a hard line. “I’m so sorry, Rain. About everything, but … fuck. I just … I had no idea.”
“I’m so sorry.” His words hit me like an ice-cold bucket of reality.
My chin buckles as my gaze drifts over to one of the candles. I stare at the flame until I convince myself that that’s why my eyes are burning.
I’m so sorry makes it real. The way he’s looking at me right now makes it real. The fact that he saw it too makes it real.
I reach into the neck of my flannel, desperate for something to shut down the pain, but my shirt has been ripped wide open, and my pills are long gone.
Because I took them all.
And he made me throw them up.
Grief and shame and irrational rage blur my vision and turn my hands into fists. I was going to die without ever having to feel this. Without ever having to miss them. I was going to stay numb and distracted until April 23 and then the horsemen would take me to wherever they had gone and we’d be together again like it never happened. I had a plan, but then Wes showed up and ruined everything. Now he’s here and he’s saying he’s sorry and he’s looking at me like my parents are dead and my painkillers are gone and it all hurts so fucking much and—
“I hate you!” I shout. The words echo off the walls, and tears blur my vision, so I squeeze my eyes shut and scream it again, “I hate you!”
I grab a hairbrush off the counter and throw it as hard as I can at him. Wes catches it just before it hits him in the face.
“You ruined everything! I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!”
“I know,” he says, deflecting a toothbrush holder and a bottle of soap. “I’m so sorry, Rain.”
“Stop saying that!”
I lunge toward the bathtub, hoping to claw his stupid green eyes out. The same ones that watched me drown in my nightmare. The same ones that are watching me drown now. But Wes grabs my wrists as I come across the edge of the bathtub and pulls me in with him.
I land on his chest, and his solid arms lock around me, pinning me in place.
“Let me go!” I howl, writhing in his grasp and kicking the tub with my bare feet. “Don’t touch me! Let me go!”
But Wes just holds me tighter, shushing me like a child. I struggle and fight and kick and flail, but when I feel his lips press against the top of my head, when I feel his arms rock me from side to side, all the anger leaves my body.
In the form of a sob.
“Shh …” Wes runs a hand over my hair, and it reminds me of the way my mom used to do it before she left for work.
I picture her exactly the way she looked the morning before it happened. Stressed. Frazzled. Her dirty-blonde hair gathered in a lopsided ponytail. Her blue hospital scrubs stained with coffee.
“Mom, we have less than a week left. Why are you still going to work? Will you please just stay home? Please? I hate being here with Dad. He just drinks and takes those painkillers for his back and messes with his guns all day. He doesn’t even talk to me anymore. I think he’s, like, snapped or something.”
“Rainbow, we’ve talked about this. Not everything is about you. Other people need me, too. Now more than ever.”
“I know, but—”
“No buts. There are two types of people in this world, honey—wallowers and workers. When the going gets tough, I deal with it by working, by trying to help. Which type of person are you going to be? Are you going to stay home all day and wallow, like your father, or are you gonna get out there and try to help somebody?”
“I want to help,” I said, dropping my eyes to her scuffed white sneakers.
“Good. Because, when this thing blows over—and I’m sure it will—a lot of people are going to need your help.”
Even though it hurts to remember her, it’s also surprisingly comforting. It’s almost like she’s right here with me. I can still hear her voice, still smell the hazelnut-flavored coffee on her breath as she kissed my cheek. The worst part isn’t seeing her again; the worst part is knowing that she’s been here the whole time, but I’ve kept her locked away.
She deserves to be remembered.
Even if it’s only for a few more hours.
When my cries die down and I finally catch my breath, Wes runs a soothing hand down my back.
“Better?” he asks, his voice barely above a whisper.
I nod, surprised to find that I actually mean it. My parents might be gone, and tomorrow might not exist, but here, in this bathtub, with the one person who came back for me, I do feel a little bit better.
“You wanna tell me what happened?”
With my cheek on his chest and my eyes lost in the flickering candlelight, I nod again. I want to get it out of me. I want to finally be free.
“I … I couldn’t sleep that night, so I snuck outside to smoke one of my dad’s cigarettes. I had a few stashed in my dresser, and I thought it might help calm my nerves. He’d gotten so paranoid about the rioters and the dog attacks that I knew he’d flip out if he saw me going outside that late, so I was super quiet. I even smoked out in the tree house because I was afraid he’d see me on the porch.”
I take a deep breath and focus on the rhythm of Wes’s heartbeat beneath my cheek. “Just as I was finishing my cigarette, I heard a gunshot. It was so loud; it sounded like it came from inside the house, but I thought that was crazy. Then, I heard another one.”
“Your room,” Wes says, stroking my hair. “I saw the hole blasted in your bed when I carried you in here last night.”
I nod, staring at nothing. “He thought I was asleep under the covers, like her.”
I lift a shaking hand to my mouth and then still when I realize I’m not holding a cigarette. I can almost feel the grass slashing at my bare legs as I flew across the backyard and around to the front of the house, grabbing the handle on the front door as the third blast went off.
“I saw it happen.” I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to stop the flow of fresh tears. “I saw my dad—”
Wes wraps his arms around me tighter and begins rocking me from side to side again.
“And, when I called my mom’s name, she didn’t answer …” I catch my sobs in my flannel-covered hand, remembering the way she looked before I pulled the quilt over her head. I kissed her goodnight over the covers and told myself that she was just sleeping. That they were both just s
leeping.
Then, I shut the door, polished off a bottle of cough syrup, and I went to sleep, too.
“I’m so sorry,” Wes whispers into my hair.
There are those words again. “I’m so sorry.”
But, for some reason, when Wes says them this time, they don’t hurt.
They help.
Wes
I lead Rain down the stairs and out the back door with my hand over her eyes and my stomach in knots.
“Can I look now?”
“Not yet,” I say, guiding her off the patio and into the knee-high grass.
We walk about thirty feet until we’re standing in the shade of a giant oak tree on the right side of the property.
Last night, once I was sure that Rain didn’t have anything left to throw up, I didn’t know what the fuck to do with myself. I couldn’t sleep in that house. I couldn’t stand to be in there a second longer than I had to with those fucking corpses just a few rooms away. And knowing that Rain was going to have to face all that as soon as she woke up … completely sober, I knew I had to do something before I lost my shit.
I just hope it was the right thing.
With a deep breath, I uncover her eyes. “Okay. You can look now.”
Even though I spent all night and most of the day on it, the job isn’t pretty. The graves are shallow and the mounds are muddy and the crosses are made from sticks fastened together with grass, but at least I got those fuckers out of her house and into the dirt where they belong.
I chew on my bottom lip as I watch Rain open her eyes. After everything she’s been through, the last thing I want to do is hurt her more, but when she covers her mouth and nose with her hands and looks up at me, it’s not tears of pain I see in her big blue eyes. It’s tears of gratitude.
I pull her against me, feeling every bit the same way. She’s here, and she’s okay. Even though I might only have her for a few more hours, or even minutes, every single second feels like an answered prayer.
The first one in my entire fucking life.
Prayer. That reminds me …
“Do you want to say anything?” I ask, kissing the top of her head.
She nods against my chest and lifts her glassy eyes to mine. “Thank you,” she says, and the sincerity in her voice cuts me to the fucking core. “I don’t … I can’t believe you did all this. For me.”
I smile and brush a tear away from her cheek with my thumb. “I’m beginning to realize there’s not much I wouldn’t do for you.”
That makes Rain smile, too. “Like what?”
“What wouldn’t I do for you?”
She nods, a glimmer of mischief returning to her sad red eyes.
“I don’t know … piss on Tom Hanks if he were on fire?”
Rain snorts out a snotty laugh and covers her nose with the crook of her elbow as she giggles. It’s the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen. As I watch her, I try to commit every sound, every freckle, every eyelash to memory. I know it’s stupid. I know I can’t take these memories with me any more than I can take her, but I hang on anyway.
If the horsemen want her, they’re going to have to pry her out of my cold, dead hands.
When her laughter dies down, I gesture toward the graves with a flick of my chin. “I meant, is there anything you want to say to them?”
“Oh.” Rain’s face falls as she turns to look at the twin mounds of dirt again. “No,” she says with a heartbroken yet somehow hopeful look on her face. “I’ll tell them in person when I see them again.”
I nod, hoping that time comes later rather than sooner.
“So, what do we do now?” Rain sniffles, looking around. “What’s the new plan?”
“My only plan is to sit in that tree house”—I point in the direction of the wooden box a few yards away—“watch the sun set with this super-hot girl I kidnapped a few days ago, and then maybe make her dinner. I saw that this place has spaghetti and pancake syrup.”
Rain pulls her thin, dark eyebrows together. “You mean, you’re just … giving up?”
“No,” I say, taking her by the hand and leading her toward our home away from fucked up home. “I’ve just had a change of priorities; that’s all.”
“What could you possibly prioritize over surviving?” Rain asks, becoming eye-level with me as she steps onto the first rung of the tree-house ladder.
“Living.” I smile.
Then, I lean forward and kiss my girl while I still can.
Rain
Living.
The moment Wes’s lips touch mine, I understand exactly what he means. All the death—both past and future—falls away, and there’s only him. My living, breathing present.
I’m overwhelmed with love for him. I love him for coming back for me. I love him for saving my life even though I only have a few hours of it left. I love him for doing for my parents what I was too weak to do myself.
“I love you,” I whisper against his lips, needing to say it out loud. Needing him to hear it.
Wes doesn’t respond at first. He simply closes his eyes and presses his forehead to mine. Whatever he’s about to say feels important, so I hold my breath as he takes one big enough for the both of us.
“The moment I saw you, I knew I was fucked.” His voice is raspy and low. “I knew it when I used my last bullet to pull you out of Burger Palace instead of saving it. I knew it when I pulled that stupid fucking stunt with the dogs instead of leaving you at Huckabee Foods. I knew it when I got shot for you, when I got a flat tire because of you, and when I went back into a burning building to find your ass. The whole time, I thought you were distracting me from my mission, but it wasn’t until you left that I realized you were my mission.” Wes opens his eyes, and his pupils drink me in. “I think I came here to find you, Rain. I’m just sorry it took me so long to figure that out.”
“Don’t be sorry,” I whisper around the lump in my throat. “I’m sorry. It sounds like I’ve been a real pain in the ass.”
Wes laughs, and the vision is so beautiful that I feel like I’m looking into the sun. I take a picture of him with my mind, the way he looks right now—backlit by an orange sky, white teeth glowing in his crescent smile, and a lock of brown hair grazing his perfect cheekbone. I want to remember this moment forever.
Even if forever is only for tonight.
“I fucking love you,” he says with that perfect smile just before it crashes against mine.
I let go of the ladder and wrap my arms around Wes’s neck, knowing without a shred of doubt that he won’t let me fall. What I don’t expect is for him to grab the backs of my thighs and wrap them around his waist in the process. It’s fitting that I’m no longer attached to the earth because that’s how I feel whenever I kiss Wes—supported, secure, suspended above my problems.
His tongue and teeth aren’t gentle as they take what they want, and neither is his body as it presses mine against the ladder. Desperation fuels us as we bite and suck and push and pull. We have so much lost time to make up for and so little of it left to spare. April 23 is almost over, and every heartbeat that pumps through my veins is another second I’ve wasted not making love to this man.
I lock my ankles behind Wes’s back as he reaches over my head to grab the ladder. Squeezing my eyes shut, I hold on tight as he begins to climb, never once breaking our kiss. As soon as Wes reaches the top, we become a blur of hands and zippers and shirts and skin.
I lift my ass off the plywood floor as Wes shimmies my pants and panties off. Then, I part my knees for him as he frees himself from his jeans. As he climbs over me, I reach for him, desperate for him to fill me—to make me whole again—but Wes stills and gazes down at me instead.
“What is it?” I ask, reaching up to cup his stubbled cheek.
Two deep lines have formed between his dark eyebrows. I feel mine do the same.
“Nothing. I just … wanted to look at you …”
One last time, his sad smile says.
I don’t want to see that
look, so I kiss it away as I lift my hips to let him in.
But something happens as soon as Wes and I are joined. All that time that felt like it was slipping away? It doesn’t just slow down. It stops. We inhale. We exhale. We kiss. We connect. And when we finally start moving again, it’s with the lazy grace of melting ice cream.
Because that’s all we are.
Something to be savored before it disappears.
Wes
“This is so nice.” Rain sighs as she rests her head on my shoulder.
The Franklin Springs Cinema wasn’t exactly hard to break into. Now, figuring out how to work the projector, that took a minute.
“I would have taken you to dinner too, but I can’t exactly afford to pay sixty-eight bucks for an Apocasized King Meal right now.”
Rain giggles and pats the cardboard bucket in her lap. “I’d rather eat stale popcorn for the rest of my life than step foot in that place again.”
“That’s good because it might come down to that.” I smile and kiss the top of her head.
It feels so fucking weird, being on a date with this girl. I mean, I’ve dated lots of girls, but it was always an exchange. An understood transaction. With Rain, I just … want to make her happy.
“Aquaman?” she asks as the opening credits begin to roll.
“What? It was that or Dumbo.”
A flirty grin tugs at the corners of her mouth. “I’m not complaining.”
“Oh, really? You gotta thing for Jason Momoa, huh?”
“No.” She drops her eyes, and I can see the blush rising to her cheeks, even in the darkened auditorium. “But I might have a thing for another guy with tattoos.”
“I fucking hope so,” I say, pulling her into my lap as her squeals compete with the booming speakers.
When I glance back at the screen, Jason Momoa is carrying a rescued fisherman into a bar. The camera pans from a table full of fishermen to the counter where he’s ordering a shot of whiskey. The movement is so fluid, so fast, that I almost miss it, but I swear, on the wall of the bar, I saw a red banner with a black horseman on it.