At school, he did not really speak to Elise other than an occasional “Hi” or nod of the head. Sometimes, if both of them knew no one was paying attention to them, they would briefly reach out and grab each other’s hand. Just the slightest friction of skin on skin was enough to send shivers through his body and help him happily through the rest of the school day.
The atmosphere at school had changed. It was something like morose hesitation. The school had become a place of research. The principal had invited no fewer than three psychiatrists in to question and council the students. In the week following Mary’s death, there were a few camera crews set up outside the school, hoping to catch a student on his way to or from the building so they could get a few words from this potential suicide. Students who had been friends of the deceased were more on edge than usual, knowing they could be called away at any time to be interviewed by one of the psychiatrists. There was very much the feeling the students were fish in an aquarium and Steven was unsure of the truth in the image they presented to the outside world. Even if it hadn’t been for Elise, he would have done his best to look a little less depressed, not wanting to be dragged away by one of those beard-wearing sharp-eyed doctors.
Given the time of year, it was an interesting and contradictory air. Just weeks away from graduation and summer break, the halls were usually more ebullient. Now a weariness painted the fluorescent hallways. Kids wanting to survive the year and each of them wondering how many would meet back here next year.
Steven missed as many days as possible, placing much more importance on what happened after school.
He came home from school and napped. When he woke up, he ate dinner with his father. Then, after dark, he went in search of Elise. He usually started out for her house but he always met her before reaching it. And each time he saw her, coming down the sidewalk, his skin prickled with ecstasy. He was still not used to getting things he wanted and he held her hand, maybe just a little too tightly, afraid she would disintegrate in front of his eyes.
And from that point, they established their own routine of lazy walking and conversation. They both enjoyed reading and watching movies. He brought her books he told her she had to read. She usually finished them in about a day and he wondered if she actually read them or just said she did to please him. But he knew the answer to that. If she didn’t like something, she told him.
Being around Elise sent his hormones into a rage. She had set her boundaries fairly early. After the first kiss, they had concluded each night the same way, the kisses becoming a little longer, a little wetter, a little more. He wondered why they always had to wait until they were saying goodbye in order to kiss. One night, while they were on the bench in the park, he began kissing her and she had responded at first. Wanting to take it just a little further, he slid his hand under her shirt, momentarily feeling her skin against his palm before placing it on the thin fabric of her bra. She had broken the kiss and scooted away from him.
“When I want to give myself to you, I’ll give all of myself. Okay?”
He wasn’t exactly sure what that meant so he mumbled a weak apology and realized her staving him off only intensified his desire.
So they kissed each night and he put all his passions into that kiss. It was painful when they broke apart. Consequently, he had turned into a chronic masturbator, going home and spilling his desire over his hand each night. He didn’t really know why neither of them had gone back to each other’s houses. They seemed more content to aimlessly wander the night. Elise said it was because her parents wouldn’t let any boys in the house, especially not so late. Steven knew Connor wouldn’t mind, but if he took Elise home then they would probably exclude his father from conversations and Steven thought that might make him feel even lonelier and he didn’t want to do that.
They made the outdoors their home and neither one of them seemed to mind. But, eventually, they grew tired of the sleepy neighborhood. Mainly because it was just that—sleepy, asleep. Nearly everyone had turned in by the time they went about their walks. The emptiness was remarkable. They could go an entire night without seeing so much as a car drive past. Occasionally, they would make up stories about the people living in the houses, even though neither one of them knew the occupants. Most of the stories were things that belonged more to soap opera than reality but they made him appreciate the cool clicking of Elise’s brain.
Stories could only carry them so far, however. Somewhere along the line, one of them came up with the idea they could take Steven’s truck and go wherever they pleased.
They usually ended up driving around, talking and listening to the college radio station.
One night just a few days before graduation, while driving through the woods on the outskirts of Gethsemane, they came upon a vast field. It looked pristine in the moonlight, just the faintest hint of ground fog hugging its surface, a large barn on a hill at the far end. An empty field full of soft grass was a rare sight in Gethsemane. Theirs was a farming community and more often than not, these perfect flat spaces were turned into soybean or corn fields.
“Do you think it belongs to anyone?” Elise said.
“I’m sure it belongs to someone. Everything belongs to somebody these days.”
He had stopped the truck on the side of the road. He watched Elise as she looked out over the field and thought he recognized a little of what he saw in her eyes. It was enchantment. He didn’t know what the chemistry of enchantment was, but he thought he experienced it, right there in the car. Perhaps it had something to do with seeing the field for the first time. Or maybe it was just seeing it for the first time in exactly this way—under the moonlight, at this time of night, with Elise in the truck beside him, seeing his thoughts expressed in her face.
“Do you think it’s okay to go out in it?” She spoke of it as though it were an ocean.
“I don’t see anyone to stop us. If we hear gunshots, we can just run back to the truck.” But he knew there wouldn’t be any gunshots to sully this perfect geography. “In fact,” he said, opening the door, “I bet you can’t catch me.”
On saying that, he slung himself out of the car and charged toward the field in the still chilly night air. Running through the damp ankle-deep grass, he felt drunk—drunk on the night, drunk on this place, drunk on Elise. And she ran behind him and he knew she felt things exactly as he felt them, the air rushing against him stiffening his nipples and stealing his breath. At that moment, for what amounted to only a few seconds, he felt completely alive and hopeful and he didn’t think about anything else. He ran until he nearly reached the barn. Briefly, he thought about running into its darkness but decided that was too great a risk. That was too much like trespassing. Instead, he slowed his pace somewhat, letting her nearly catch up with him. Once he heard her on his heels, he turned and grabbed her around the waist, dragging her into the dewy grass with him. They were both laughing as they lay there, side by side in the grass.
“What are we doing?” Elise said.
“Feeling good.” A smile plastered his face. He wanted to get rid of the damned thing. He didn’t think it suited him at all, but he couldn’t.
“You’re very cute when you smile,” she said into his ear.
“I’m not smiling.”
“Oh, okay, well, you’re very cute when your facial muscles do that.”
“You’re cute all the time.”
“I love you,” she said.
“I love you, too,” he replied without hesitation. “Right now, I think I love just about everything.” Then he leaned his head over and kissed her. They kissed for a very long time, but it didn’t go any further than that. He respected her boundaries and wished he didn’t. The kiss was nice. The kiss was great. But he wanted more.
This time, he was the one to break the kiss. Slightly bewildered, she looked at him.
“I think I have to stop.”
“Okay,” she said.
“I mean, just for right now.” He paused, looking out into the blue
-purplish night. “You just don’t know how badly I want you right now.”
She nodded her head, looking almost guilty.
“You know,” she said. “You have me. In our own way. We don’t have to do that for you to have me.”
He almost wanted to explain the urge to her but he didn’t know if she would understand. Maybe she had the same urges he did. He was slightly confused because he didn’t understand how she could not want something he wanted so badly.
They were silent for a while, the dew seeping in through their clothes and chilling them.
“This is why I don’t have boyfriends.”
“Being pressured to have sex?”
“A little. That’s all my friends talk about is what their boyfriends have tried to do to them on their big Friday night date.”
“But I don’t think it would be all we do.”
“If we have sex because you want to, then how many other things will we start doing just because you want to?”
“I’m not really the controlling type.”
“I know.”
“I understand . . . I’m sure it’s like an invasion or something to you.”
“Maybe a little. It just scares me. I mean, Jesus, I’ve never even seen a penis before.”
“I have one of those.”
“Then take off your pants.”
All this talk of sex had kept him hard. Mostly a modest person, his hormones rumbled inside and he didn’t see any harm in doing what she asked even if she might only have been joking. He unbuttoned his jeans, unzipped them, and pulled them down along with his underwear so his penis jutted out at a right angle from his lower stomach. He watched Elise as she stared at his sex. She reached out her hand and closed it around his penis. He felt a hot shiver explode through his groin. He didn’t realize how it could feel so different being touched by someone else. Slowly, delicately, without saying anything, she moved her hand over him, squeezing, then touching with the fingertips. She found a sensitive place on the underside and he moaned. She continued to massage this area. The orgasm was sudden and there wasn’t any stopping it. At the first flood of semen, she jerked her hand away.
He quickly pulled up his pants and covered his eyes. “Jesus, I’m sorry.”
“No, I guess it was my fault.”
“I should probably take you home now.”
“Are you embarrassed?”
“Embarrassed? Not really. A little messy maybe.”
“I guess you liked that?”
“That’s putting it mildly.”
They walked back to the car without saying anything. He drove Elise to her house. They kissed briefly while in the car but the gulf between them was palpable.
“That’s further than I wanted it to go,” she said.
“I know.”
“I just need to get used to this.”
“I know. Me too.”
“Are you still happy?”
“Just as happy as I was before.”
He could tell by the way she sat there, looking suddenly sad, not getting out of the car, that something was wrong. Maybe this gulf was more than just a misunderstanding, more than just different agendas.
“I think . . .” she began.
He waited for a few seconds, really dreading the fact that she looked on the brink of tears.
“What?” he asked softly.
“I think maybe we should stop for a while.”
And then she began crying in earnest. A million things flooded though his head. A million reasons why they should not stop. Why they couldn’t stop even if they wanted to. But he knew she wasn’t looking for an argument. She was only looking for . . . a way out. Once he finally realized this, he was inexplicably mad at her. But he didn’t want to argue. Didn’t want to try and make her feel any worse.
“I don’t know what to say,” he said.
“I’m going to go in now. Don’t hate me . . . okay?”
“I could never hate you. If you change your mind, you know where to find me.” And, just like that, he had shut himself off.
She nodded her head. Her eyes looked dark and her face looked too pale. He wanted to say he loved her before looking away but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He stared at the steering wheel until he heard her door click shut.
And in those few minutes after the last exchange, every bad feeling he had ever had came washing over him. Coming so soon after tasting paradise, the sensation was twice as crippling. This was what he felt the first time he had stared up at the water tower. This was the feeling that had resonated until he met Elise. And now she was the cause of this feeling that made him so close to spiraling out of control.
Why do the kids in Gethsemane kill themselves? the headlines asked.
And Steven knew. He wanted to scream the answer back at them. Because the world was shit and people were shit and your mind was only there to play tricks on you.
That was why kids, hell, anyone killed themselves.
Because when you turn over the rock of happiness we have covered ourselves with you realize there is nothing beneath it. Only despair and sorrow and death. And what was a little death in a world so harsh and meaningless?
Might as well add his body to the pile already created by God’s genocide.
Fifteen
Doombuzz
In the weeks before Steven’s graduation, Connor floated. He didn’t know why. For once, he felt like maybe he shouldn’t try and analyze why he was in such a good mood. Perhaps it was the weather. The tumultuous spring was passing, bringing in a pleasant precursor to summer. Or maybe it was because he knew Steven was happy. He hadn’t met his girlfriend. He knew Steven probably wouldn’t even call her a girlfriend but he could see the happiness on the boy’s face when he went out for his night walks, not admitting he was going to see the girl. But Connor knew. And there he went again . . . analyzing.
He left work early whenever he could, skipping days here and there. He took walks around the neighborhood throughout the day. He went to a garden center and purchased some flowers for the garden. He mowed the grass and read, thinking maybe life wasn’t so bad. He tried not to think about anything bad. That one night, chasing some ghost that was most assuredly just the figment of his imagination around the neighborhood like a crazy person . . . and then going into the house only to have an argument with Steven. It all left him feeling like he was on some kind of brink. Amazingly, the next morning, he woke up feeling curiously alive and liking the feeling.
Sure, he wasn’t entirely comfortable. Part of him believed it was some kind of cosmic setup, like a comfortable carpet was being woven beneath his feet so it could be yanked out sometime in the near future.
But that was badness and he didn’t want to think about any of the badness.
Even when Steven came home looking as sad as he had when his mother died, he remained strangely upbeat.
It was around three in the morning. He had given up waiting for Steven ever since finding out he was out with a girl rather than brooding or contemplating suicide. The only reason he was still up was that he had been sleeping in and had, earlier in the afternoon, became highly involved in a book.
“What’s up?” he said to Steven when he opened the door.
Steven didn’t say anything. He just looked at him and then went into his room. Connor went to sleep shortly thereafter, full of suspicions but not allowing himself to analyze. The next day, when Steven didn’t go out for his evening walk, he knew what had happened.
Steven came out to turn on the TV and sit on the couch.
“You know,” Connor said. “There’ll be other girls.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay. Then we’ll talk about something else.”
“I don’t want to talk at all.”
“Come on, talking will do you some good. You haven’t gone to school. You can’t just . . . not talk.”
“Sorry. I’m not feeling too chatty.”
“Fine.”
&
nbsp; “Why are you in such a good mood, anyway?”
“I don’t know. Well, I think I do know.”
“Could you enlighten me?”
“Okay. Are you ready for this?”
“I’m ready for anything.”
“Life isn’t that bad.”
“Oh, that’s deep.”
“I didn’t say it was deep. But think about it. It could be a lot worse. You feel better now than when your mom died, don’t you?”
“Well, yeah, I guess. I’m glad it’s over.”
“And if you were given the chance to go back during that period of mourning, you wouldn’t go, would you?”
“Not for anything.”
“Then you have to tell yourself life is better. It gets a little better each day.”
“But that doesn’t make it ‘Not that bad.’ It’s still bad.”
“What’s bad about it?”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about it.”
Connor bent the page down in his book and sat it on the coffee table. “You’re about ready to graduate high school. You’re about ready to become an adult. Free. You should feel so free right now.”
“Funny. I don’t really.”
“Why not?”
“Because, it just doesn’t matter. Adulthood isn’t freedom. It’s just another trap. I won’t have to go to school or anything but I’m going to have to start doing a whole lot of other things I don’t want to do.”
“Like what?”
“Like work.”
“But everybody has to work. Come on, I’ll get you a job at the bookstore.”
“Yeah, working with my dad, that’ll be cool.”
“I’ll schedule us on completely opposite shifts. Maybe then it won’t feel like you’re working with your dad.”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what I want.”
“And you might not know what you want for a very long time.”
“I thought I knew what I wanted.”
“Ah, yes, you wanted the girl. Well, let me tell you something . . . and I mean no disrespect for your mother but we met in high school and things were never pretty. You know that. But I really thought she was the one. And there is a part of me that has always regretted being that blind. I’m not saying she was a horrible person or anything. She just wasn’t right for me. And I knew that. Deep down I knew that. And, in a way, I feel guilty because that kept us from both being happy. If I had just told her early on, if I had not tried to fool myself, then we could have both moved on much earlier. But it took a little maturity to realize we were all wrong together. Of course, if we had went our separate ways earlier, then we wouldn’t have had you. That’s the silver lining. That’s the fate part of it. That we were not brought together out of true love. We were brought together to bring you into the world.”
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