Summer's Desire

by Olivia Lynde

  Am I suffocating him?

  I mean, I don't think that I am. It's not me who's always looking for him in school, or saying he should pick me up from work, or saying that I should go with him to Joe's and read something there while he's working. It's not me saying no to more than half the party invitations we get, because "it's more fun if we stay in, just the two of us".

  No, it's mostly him doing all that.

  And spending all this time together feels so right to me—and necessary, even—that it never occurred to me to question it. I sure as heck would never feel bored in his company, so I never thought to ask myself if maybe he is getting bored. But no, if he didn't want to be with me just as much as I do with him, he wouldn't arrange it so that we never have to spend a lot of time apart.

  Oh no, you stupid Kristie, I'm not going to start doubting my ability to keep Seth happy! We won't get bored with each other. And eventually, we'll probably get to a point where we won't feel the need to spend together every single second of our spare time—that is to say, someday we'll become more like a normal couple.

  But I kind of feel that won't be happening any time soon. Right now, we're still playing catch-up after our five lost years, and we still have the uncertainty of our future together hanging like a sword of Damocles over our heads. So for now at least, I think that Seth and I will keep giving all that we have to give and keep taking from the other all that they have to offer. In other words, we'll keep giving our all to our relationship.

  Living like this, so utterly meshed with each other, with this obsessive need we seem to have for each other—I realize it may not be exactly... healthy. Not exactly sane, maybe, according to the usual societal norms.

  But hey, it's not like I was sane before, when I was living on my own. If anything, he makes me sane. He makes me whole. And I think I do the same for him.

  So if anyone wishes to judge our relationship... they can just go and do it somewhere far away.

  I'm not afraid, then, that I might bore Seth. But after the conversation I overheard today, I'm afraid that I may be asking too much of him, expecting him to be faithful to me even though I'm not fulfilling his sexual needs myself.

  Our bed play has gotten ever more intense over the past few weeks. Still, he's never seen me completely naked, nor have I seen him. But I've seen and felt and know how very much he wants me, how crazy I can make him with desire. I've seen and felt the salty layer of sweat on his body, the frantic heartbeat inside his chest, the tension turning his muscles almost to granite with the self-control he has to impose on himself in order to stop. To stop after we've made out for hours and we've both been driven to our limits. To stop after he's brought me to release multiple times but wouldn't let me return the favor—not until, he says, I'm ready to go all the way with him.

  I realized today with a clarity I couldn't grasp before that what I'm doing to Seth isn't fair. In fact, it might be so unfair and bad that it could become a real problem for our relationship. Oh God, please not that! I can't lose Seth.

  Since the night I found the letters and reconciled with Seth, it's the first time I've been so stressed, so overwhelmed with uncertainty and fear. It's definitely not a good moment for sleep to steal in, but after a few weeks with no nightmares, I've forgotten to be wary and so I don't resist until it's too late.

  The blood, Mummy's lifeblood, kept flowing out and out, whole rivers of it, but now it's slowed down to a trickle. Her whimpering has gone quiet too, and instead there's this awful wheezing sound rattling inside her chest.

  He turns to me with his red, dripping knife held in his hand. His face is contorted in what could pass for a smile—if not for the yawning black soullessness in his eyes. "It's almost finished now," he tells me. "Want to end it yourself?"

  With his eerie smile and his bloody knife he walks to where I'm lying bound. To where I'm lying drenched in blood that is not my own. Everything inside me flinches at his approach, but still he keeps coming.

  Then he's right in front of me. "You've been a very good girl, buttercup, but if you want to live... you'll have to be even better now."

  Quick as a flash, he cuts through the tape around my legs and hands, and watches me expectantly. I know better than to move just now.

  Satisfaction overlays his face like a noxious mask. "Very good, buttercup."

  He grabs my arm and I let him lead me to Mummy. My head barely clears his waist. He stops us beside Mummy's torn, wheezing body and turns to me. Smiles again. Puts his bloody knife in my hand.

  "Now, buttercup, a quick, clean slash across her throat. If you want to live."

  "Sunny, baby, wake up! Wake up for me now, please!"

  My eyes fly open and clash with Seth's tormented gaze. He's very pale and tense, deep lines bracketing his mouth. His hands are gripping my shaking arms, and he's lifted me almost in a sitting position. His grip hurts and my throat hurts and my ears are hurting because someone is screaming nearby, and it's an inhuman cry filled with so much agony it must be coming straight from hell.

  "Stop screaming, Sunny," says Seth, his voice hoarse. He pulls me to him in a fierce embrace, tries to contain the shudders quaking through my body. "Please, Sunny, I'm here now. Stop screaming, baby."

  The inhuman cry cuts off abruptly. Oh God, that was me. Me! And I'm sobbing and sobbing and trying to get away from Seth because I don't want him to see me like this. But he doesn't let go.

  "Sunny, please! I love you, baby, please let me hold you. Please, Sunny."

  Finally I stop fighting his embrace and melt into his warm, sheltering body. And I take all his love and his comfort even though I've never been more aware of how much I don't deserve them. I don't deserve him, I never have, and it was folly, it was completely insane to ever think otherwise. I have blood on my hands; I don't deserve someone as good as him in my life.

  Eventually, I stop crying. He doesn't stop holding me.

  "Seth, let go of me now." I feel him flinch. I know how my voice sounded to him: empty and frozen—just like I feel inside. I've never spoken to him like this before.

  The arms binding my body to his withdraw, and instead he grips my upper arms and gently pushes me from him, enough that he can see my face. He flinches again, and I look away because I can't bear to see the pain in his eyes.

  "I got into a traffic jam on the way back—there'd been an accident on the highway—that's why I'm late. I tried to call you, but I think your phone was off. I'm sorry, Sunny. I'm sorry."

  The ice around my tainted heart shakes. Summer, you're just an all-around super person, aren't you? Take a strong, fearless man and make him flinch because of your pain. Make him apologize brokenly because you're not sane without him. Bring him to his knees and damn him to your hell—because he loves you.

  "It was just a nightmare," I say, my voice still echoing with emptiness. "It's all right."

  "Sunny, please look at me! Please, baby."

  The ice around my ruined heart splinters. I look up.

  "Now tell me you forgive me, Sunny."

  "I'm sorry, Seth, for doing this to you."

  "Forgive me that I wasn't here."

  "And I'm sorry for not being good enough for you."

  "Sunny, I love you more than life."

  The ice around my unworthy heart shatters. A scalding tear splashes on my cheek. Slowly, hesitantly, I raise my hands and lay them carefully on his chest. Beneath my right palm, I feel the thud of his heart. The powerful, dauntless rhythm of his beating heart that makes order out of chaos and turns weakness to strength inside me.

  "Seth, I don't deserve you. But know that I am yours for life."

  His eyes flare brighter than a supernova, burning me clear to my soul—and what a sweet, delicious burn it is. I want to soak in it forever. He pulls me to him with more force than he's ever used on me, and his arms seal around me, locking me to his body. I'm so deeply buried in him that I hardly know where one of us ends and the other begins.

  Midnight finds us still on the sof
a, intertwined with each other, only he's laid down on his back and I'm splayed on top of him, his arms around me securing me to him. He's playing with the strands of hair on my back that are within his reach.

  "I asked you once," he says quietly, "and it was like I had flipped a switch: suddenly all light in your eyes was extinguished. You were so small, all fragile bones and bruised air of vulnerability, and I couldn't bear the look of you in pain. So I never asked again. But Sunny... I think you need to tell me now."

  "Seth..." My voice is a pleading whisper.

  "Tell me how your parents died."

  "Seth..."

  His arms clench around me harder. He's stopped playing with my hair. "He can't hurt you now, Sunny. You're mine and you're safe in my arms."

  "I know he can't hurt me." But you can.

  "Why won't you tell me?"

  I wet my parched lips. "I don't want to lose you."

  He moves a gentle hand to tip up my face. His eyes brim with concern and tenderness. "It doesn't matter what you have to say—you can't lose me over this. You can never lose me. Didn't I tell you I was yours?"

  I nod.

  "So trust me. I think you also need me to hear this."

  I do trust him. And I do need him to know the whole truth about me. I need to entrust him with the worst part of myself the same as I already have with the best. I need to know that he loves me regardless.

  Please God, don't let him hate me for what he's about to hear!

  I lay my head back on Seth's chest, let my eyelids drop, and snuggle into his body. In the darkest corners of my mind still crouches the fear that, on telling him my story, I'll see his eyes fill with disgust, and I couldn't bear it. So better not to see at all. His arms around my body urge me even closer to him.

  "You know that my birthday is the 15th of January," I begin quietly. "I was a mid-winter baby, and naming me Summer was my parents' little inside joke. They had me late in life after many years spent trying to conceive. They used to say they chose this name for me because I came to them in the cold of winter and brought with me the warmth and joy of summer into their lives.

  "My memories from when I was very young aren't clear, so I don't remember much of my life with my parents. But the memories of how I lost them—those are vivid." Since those are the memories that I keep reliving in my worst night terrors... over and over and over again.

  "I remember our roomy suburban house with the white picket fence. I remember how much my parents loved me..." My voice cracks. I clear my throat and continue in a husky voice: "I remember that I used to act like a terrible princess, that I was spoiled and stubborn. Mostly, I remember that my parents are dead... because of me." His embrace tightens around me, and I draw from his protective strength so that I can keep talking.

  "I... It was the day before my fifth birthday. I whined and wheedled until Mummy agreed to drive me to the city so I could pick my own present. We were in this little toy shop, just looking around, when I noticed a tall, wiry man at the checkout, paying for a huge teddy bear."

  I hear Seth inhale sharply. "Like the one you used to carry everywhere when you first moved into Grams' home?"

  "The very same, actually. I... I kept it with me so I wouldn't forget, not for a single moment. It was... part of my p-penance." My voice breaks on the word.

  "Your penance?" His tone is very careful.

  "I saw that toy, Seth, and didn't care that someone had already taken it. I shouted: 'I want that teddy!' The man and the seller both turned to look at me, surprised I think, and Mummy was so, so embarrassed... She apologized for my rudeness. She asked for another teddy... but there wasn't another one. There was only the one that the man had bought.

  "Oh Seth, and I threw the most awful tantrum you can imagine. I stamped my feet, I drew on Mummy's coattail, I cried... I yelled over and over that I wanted that teddy, and the man should let me have it. Mummy tried to quiet me, but there was no stopping me until I got what I wanted... Which I did, eventually."

  "What happened, Sunny?"

  Always when he calls me Sunny, his voice somehow softens, fills with warmth and affection. It's the same this time too... but he has yet to hear the worst of what I've done.

  "The man, the customer... He didn't say a single word the entire time I threw my fit. When I paused in my crying to get some air into my lungs... he walked up to me and just gave me the bear. 'As a gift for your daughter,' he told Mummy. She protested that we couldn't accept, and I pulled on her coattail to stop her from saying that. Because I wanted the teddy... and that was all that mattered. The man noticed my gesture too and smiled down at me. 'Really, I insist,' he said. 'Seeing this beautiful little b-buttercup"—I stumble on the word—"has been the highlight of my day.'

  "I remember looking at his seemingly kind smile and thinking that it didn't match the coldness in his eyes. I had this feeling of... unease. But I didn't know what to make of it, so I ignored it. And then Mummy and I left the shop and drove home.

  "Later, after all the rest happened, I heard the police say that the man must have followed us when we left the store. And he came back that night, just after midnight. Right around the time when I'd been born five years earlier. We were all sleeping. He broke in through the back and... used chloroform, I think, on my parents. So they wouldn't awaken while he bound them with tape. Then... he came to my room and woke me up."

  I inhale deeply, once... twice, and say, almost in a whisper: "He tied me up and... took me to the master bedroom. He sat me in a corner and woke my parents up. He..." Another deep breath but I just can't seem to get enough air into my wretched lungs. Sweet heavens have mercy and give me strength to do this! "He dragged Daddy to the floor, just a few feet away from me, and left Mummy on the bed.

  "He had covered their mouths with tape. But not mine. So I screamed for help and screamed for his m-mercy... and screamed and screamed until I had no voice left. And he just kept on s-smiling."

  I inhale again, but it's useless. It's like my lungs have contracted to dry husks. "He made me watch," I croak out, "as he c-cut Daddy up and let him... b-bleed to death. Then he started on Mummy... and while he was c-cutting her up... I lay in Daddy's cooling b-blood. There was s-so much b-blood that it had spread as far as where I was."

  Seth's body around me is rigid with tension and, I sense, awful rage. I'm even more afraid to look into his eyes now, so I'm glad that I don't have to. But the clasp of his arms around me hasn't faltered, even now, and I draw strength from it.

  My closed eyes are burning but I just scrunch them tighter and grit my teeth and force myself to go on. "When Mummy had nearly b-bled out... he turned to me. 'Be a good little girl now, b-buttercup,' he said, 'if you want to l-live.' Then he cut the tape around my hands and ankles... and took me to Mummy. He gave me his b-bloody knife. And he said I should f-finish her off—if I wanted to l-live myself."

  "Jesus Christ, Sunny..."

  I take a deep breath and speak in a rush. I'm garbling my words, but I don't slow down; I have to get this out quickly, while I still have the will to do it. "I had become so quiet and d-docile he really thought I would d-do it. But I didn't want to l-live anymore, Seth... I knew I didn't d-deserve it. I had been the one who brought this k-killer into Mummy and Daddy's house.

  "So I spun around and stuck the k-knife in him. He was stunned. For an endless moment he just stared at me, then his face... It changed again, and I thought, 'At least he's not s-smiling anymore.' As I knew my name, I knew he'd k-kill me now.

  "He backhanded me so hard he took me off my feet. I flew through the air and landed maybe five-six feet away. He pulled the k-knife out and s-started toward me. I remember thinking, 'And now I go with Mummy and Daddy.' But he died before he ever made it to me."

  "How?" Seth asks hoarsely, holding me unbearably tight.

  I'm crying now: great, ugly sobs quaking through my body. "When I spun around with the k-knife... my hand went up and I got him in the g-groin... The EMT at the scene said his f-femoral artery
was sectioned by the k-knife thrust. He b-bled out. But Mummy was already d-dead."

  "Did the police know...?"

  "I... I didn't know at first that Mummy was d-dead. I c-cut the tape off her... But she was so s-still and quiet... And there was s-so much b-blood everywhere. The police thought Mummy s-stabbed him before she d-died. Because her hand wasn't t-tied. They asked me questions, but I couldn't t-talk. Later I didn't want to t-talk. I... I'm not s-sorry I k-killed him, Seth. But I used to wish... he had k-killed me too. Not just M-Mummy and Daddy. It's what I d-deserved, Seth."

  I'm buffeted by the bitter gales of my grief, and Seth is my only mooring. His grip on me is strong and secure—even now—and I cling to him desperately. Out of my mind with grief and regret and fear, I keep pressing myself against him, trying to get closer, trying to nestle deeper into him.

  Over my cries, I hear his beautiful, anxious voice: "Shh, Sunny, I'm here. I'm right here with you. You're safe." Then, very fiercely: "Don't say you deserved to die, Sunny! Jesus Christ, baby, it wasn't your fault! None of it was your fault! Shh, Sunny, shh, baby, please stop hurting like this..."

  "It was m-me who brought this upon my p-parents," I sob. "I was s-stupid... and thoughtless and s-spoiled... r-rotten. I enraged that m-man, I brought a k-killer into my h-home...." My voice breaks. Then, with perfect clarity, I say: "It may as well have been my hand that wielded the killer's blade when he killed my parents."

  Lightning fast, Seth tips up my face. My tear-logged gaze connects with blue, anguished eyes. Again he tells me in a ragged voice, "It wasn't your fault! You hear me? It wasn't your fault! Sunny, you were just five years old, baby.

  "Damn it all to hell and back, but how can you think you're guilty for what that whoreson did to your family?! He was a psychopath and he latched onto you because he was a psychopath—and not for any other reason. I'm telling you again: it wasn't your fault!"