“Does this scare you?” Chelsea asked. Her throat tried to close around the words, but they slipped out anyway. She shut her eyes, and her lips rolled together nervously. “Me—do I scare you?”
A gentle sweep of Daisy’s hand against her hip led to her thumb dancing around the piercing hooked through Chelsea’s navel. “Aren’t you scared of me?” Daisy asked.
“Of course not,” she said, lying as believably as she always had.
I’m terrified of you.
A thick, black eyebrow arched high on Daisy’s forehead, reminding Chelsea where she came from, who she ran with, and that magic could be powerful and violent and nerve-wracking. She slid closer, her thighs sweeping over Chelsea’s waist, her hands smoothing along Chelsea’s wrists, her body pressing down until they were flush together. Daisy’s movements were wraith-like and shadowed: a cat walking along a fence, a snake slithering across a pair of shoes, a leopard surveying a doe from above.
But Chelsea wasn’t a deer and she’d feared too many things for too long to let Daisy get the better of her. Daisy gasped when her back hit the mattress. Chelsea’s hands clamped around her wrists. She flipped them over, so her hips were between Daisy’s thighs, her nose was against Daisy’s nose.
“You’re a beautiful woman, Daisy Yuen,” Chelsea whispered, because it was all she could think about, was all she’d wanted to say for weeks, and it was the only thing she could muster. “But I’m not scared of you.”
“I’m not scared of you, either. And if you think for one second that because I cried in front of you, you’re some Daisy whisperer, you’re wrong, you get that? Wrong. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself and I can deal with my shit on my own and—”
“Do you ever stop talking?” Chelsea’s grip on Daisy’s wrists tightened. Her hair fell over one shoulder to pool on the comforter. She lowered one hand to Daisy’s ribcage and pressed her fingers there. Daisy squirmed, eyes wide. Oh. “You’re ticklish.”
“I’m not,” Daisy blurted. She strained against Chelsea’s hands. “Chelsea,” she whispered, “don’t, don’t—”
Chelsea’s fingers danced over Daisy’s ribcage until Daisy was kicking and howling. Her laughter was stunted at first, hiccupped and strained, and then she gave up, laughing and giggling, until her voice cut through, “Okay, okay,” Daisy begged, “Chelsea, s-stop!”
Daisy kissed her, and Chelsea stopped. Her hips lifted off the mattress, seeking the weight of Chelsea above her. She flexed her hands, balled them into fists, and tried to push against Chelsea’s tight hold. Their lips met again and again, pressing and pulling, parting for air and deepening in a pattern of smooth movements: teeth in Chelsea’s bottom lip; the tip of Daisy’s tongue riding indentions her incisors left behind; breath cut off by long intermissions of open, raw kissing, the kind of kissing teenagers perfected and movie-makers turned into love scenes.
Daisy snapped against Chelsea’s lips, demanding in a haughty breath, “Let me go.”
Chelsea let her go.
Instantly Chelsea felt hands on her hips, her waist, and the curve of her lower back. Palms smoothed along bone, wrists bent, and Chelsea thought she might feel the ghosts of Daisy’s pulse vibrating against her ribcage on either side.
“You still owe me ice cream,” Daisy said.
“I’ll buy your damn ice cream today if you want,” Chelsea said breathlessly against Daisy’s cheekbone.
Teeth and lips danced against Chelsea’s pulse, right below her ear. Chills coursed down her legs, and she closed her mouth, halting a whimper as Daisy chewed on her, surely leaving a mark that Chelsea would savor while she covered it with foundation.
“I can’t promise I won’t still be mad at you for ditching me.” Daisy’s thumbs dug between two ribs, and Chelsea had to stop to catch her breath.
Thoughts stampeded. Chelsea tried to put them in order, but the only things she could focus on were Daisy’s swollen lips and the color of her cheeks—new-sunburn pink, fresh lilies, rosewater. Everything outside her focal point said, you’re on call at the hospital, the boys are awake, she is too much for you, she is too good for you, she is otherworldly, you have to go to work, why are we fighting, you have to stay right here, she is so much.
“Why are we fighting?” Chelsea asked.
Daisy grinned, all fangs and darkness. “This isn’t flirting?”
Before Chelsea could answer, footsteps sounded outside the bedroom, and a delicate one-knuckled knock rapped.
“You two up?” Shannon asked from the hallway. “Coffee’s on; we’re taking a shower.”
“Chelsea’s totally getting back at me right now,” Aiden shouted. The pipes groaned and howled as the shower came to life.
“She’s not; I would know!” Daisy erupted into a fit of laughter that Chelsea tried to smother with both hands, so one of her fingers got bit.
“Ow, my god, are you an animal? Don’t bite me!” Her accent was thick and shrill, causing heat to crawl across the bridge of her nose. Chelsea yanked her hand back and flopped over onto the other side of the bed, successfully removing herself before Daisy could sink her teeth in anywhere else. “Little vampire bat,” Chelsea added, trying to sound softer, and leaned over to kiss Daisy one more time.
The door swung open. Daisy almost fell off the bed when she tried to sit up.
A towel snug around his waist and water dripping off his shoulders, Aiden heaved a sigh and rummaged through the top dresser drawer.
“You didn’t even dry off,” Chelsea hissed.
He raked his gaze across the two women and shrugged one shoulder. “I’m not done showering.”
“Then what’re you doing in here?”
“It’s my room,” he said matter-of-factly, “and I need provisions.” Aiden flashed a grin, snatched whatever he needed from the drawer, and stalked back to the bathroom, but not before throwing a playful, “You guys can lock the door, you know,” over his shoulder.
Daisy eyed Chelsea skeptically from her side of the bed. Everything came down to Daisy’s eyes, and her collarbones, and the delicate curve of her waist, covered by a too-big band T-shirt and a pair of gym shorts.
“I have to go to work,” Chelsea said. “Ice cream tonight?”
Daisy chewed on her bottom lip. “Yeah, okay. You’ll meet me there?”
“I’ll meet you there,” Chelsea repeated.
Daisy rolled up the bottom of her shirt, and Chelsea traced the skin there, ivory stretched tight over bone and muscle.
“What we talked about last night…” Daisy whispered. “It’ll stay between us, right?” Her rough voice vibrated through Chelsea’s entire being.
“I promise.” Chelsea said.
Daisy smiled gently and nodded, “See you tonight then.”
Chelsea left the room before the idea of staying with Daisy got the better of her.
13
After a successful ice cream date followed by a walk down Main beach, Chelsea and Daisy went their separate ways. Chelsea didn’t have the courage to ask about their conversation last night, and Daisy didn’t mention it. They kissed chastely on the mouth, both clearly trying not to spook the other, and texted non-stop for the next three days.
Daisy Yuen 6/20 11:15 p.m.
What do you think about when you cant sleep
Chelsea Cavanaugh 6/20 11:17 p.m.
Being in Georgia. I don’t know whether I want to go back or not.
Daisy Yuen 6/20 11:18 p.m.
You should do what makes you happy
That night Chelsea thought about the things that made her happy. She thought about Daisy first, which didn’t surprise her until she thought about what came second, her career, and then third, Shannon and Aiden, because Shannon wasn’t just Shannon anymore, Daisy’s laugh and her eyes when she smiled, the stables back home. But Chelsea didn’t type any of those things, because some of
them didn’t matter anymore. She just sent a text that said yeah, you’re right.
The laptop on her nightstand was open to her e-mail inbox. Chelsea glanced at it, gripped her phone tighter, and debated telling Daisy the truth. Three unread messages floated at the top of the list. They were bold and terrible, titled Re: Update, Re: Rose Road, and Re: Answer.
Chelsea’s truth was strange and disfigured. It lurked inside her, hiding behind bones, refusing to be seen.
Nothing was more unbecoming of a Cavanaugh than cowardice.
She opened the e-mail labeled Re: Update.
It’s quite clear you’ve made your decision then.
There’ve been a lot of questions, Chelsea. The least you could do is give us an answer.
Chelsea deleted the e-mail before she got to her mother’s signature, followed by a phone number and a website, as if Chelsea was a client, a patient, or a professional, and not her daughter. She hovered over the next e-mail, the one labeled Re: Rose Road. Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. She almost clicked on it. Almost. But she closed the window, opened the video player, and prompted the Bride of Frankenstein to load. She fiddled with her phone while the opening credits played.
Chelsea Cavanaugh 6/20 11:29 p.m.
Have you ever been?
Daisy Yuen 6/20 11:30 p.m.
To Georgia? No
Chelsea Cavanaugh 6/20 11:30 p.m.
It’s really beautiful. I bet you’d enjoy it.
Daisy Yuen 6/20 11:31 p.m.
I like Cali
Chelsea Cavanaugh 6/20 11:33 p.m.
Me too. Just sayin.
Three dots undulated where Daisy typed. They stopped. Started again. Stopped.
Daisy Yuen 6/20 11:37 p.m.
Goodnight Charm School
Chelsea wanted to tell Daisy that she was staying. She wanted to tell the truth, but the truth was a messy, buried thing, and Chelsea didn’t have the courage to admit it.
You ran. Her mother’s voice crept into the back of her mind. You ran like a scared dog.
Chelsea Cavanaugh 6/20 11:38 p.m.
Goodnight Miss Daisy
She opened another text bubble. Shannon. She closed it. She opened another. Aiden. She closed that one too.
It was close to midnight. Chelsea was alone in a hotel room, listening to the ocean shush and sing outside the window, and she couldn’t decide if home was a place or a person, or if she’d ever known it at all.
On the last day of June, Daisy picked Chelsea up from the Inn by Main beach. They drove down the Pacific Coast Highway, over winding hilltops, and stopped at antique shops to look at jewelry and coffee shops for pastries. As the morning bled into afternoon, Daisy cut through Laguna Canyon to get back into town and parked at the curb outside a brightly colored apartment complex.
“Will you text the boys and tell them to meet us here?” Daisy pulled her keys from the ignition and shoved them into her purse.
“Where’s here?” Chelsea asked. Her thumbs were poised over her cell phone.
Daisy smiled and said, “The Hollow.”
Chelsea looked into the heart of The Hollow, and things from another time stared back. Rabbits looked on curiously from the tree line, insects with dainty watercolor wings flew between branches, butterflies fluttered alongside bumblebees, a tree harboring memories like lost souls loomed in the center of it all, a chunk of time recycled, a moment relived again and again.
The Hollow was a place for many things—secrets and flight, ocean air and ubiquitous melancholy. It was a thing kept apart from everything else, a channel between realities—what once was battling with what is now.
“When did you find this place?” Chelsea looked up the trunk of the center tree, watching ants crawl through song lyrics that stretched up and up.
Daisy shook her head. “I didn’t,” she said. “Aiden did.”
It all made sense—this place and the people who visited it. It was theirs, and so it was magic.
Her fingers traced over carvings, lyrics that told stories of broken hearts and lonely kids. Daisy’s name was scrawled next to a V and an A—the rest was gone, scratched away. Aiden’s name stood out above a cluster of lyrics stained by remnants of dark liquid. Blood, Chelsea thought it, but she didn’t say it.
“It’s so weird being back in this treehouse,” Daisy said. She climbed the rope ladder that led to the landing with the tire swing. The holes in her black tights stretched, fraying open on the back of her knees and peeling apart on her calves. A charcoal romper clung to her waist; the straps on her shoulders dropped over the tops of her arms. Chelsea wondered how she climbed in those pleather platform boots. “We used to take shelter here, party here, just be here. It was our place, you know?”
“I think the whole town was yours,” Chelsea said. Her fingers dusted Aiden’s name, Daisy’s, another set of lyrics, Jon, Vance, carvings by names she didn’t know and probably never would. It seemed like flipping through a scrapbook, but more intimate, like flipping through a diary and seeing pictures instead of words. “We had places in Milford, but I usually stayed with the horses, or we went into the woods to the lake down the road from Shannon’s house. We used to drive and drive until the streetlights ended and all we could see was stars. We’d sit in the bed of Shannon’s truck and talk about our futures, about nothin’.”
Daisy’s boots made thick thuds against the deck. She hopped on the tire; the rope groaned and hummed, rubbing against the branch as she swung back and forth. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Course you can.”
“Why didn’t you report your dad?”
Chelsea wasn’t sure if it surprised her or not. It didn’t seem surprising, just unwelcomed. Her heart didn’t speed up or slow down, but she did inhale a great breath, taking in the scent of summer and honeysuckles, dry heat and metal. The answer manifested itself to her—even after all these years, Chelsea Cavanaugh didn’t have the courage to say it out loud.
“You don’t have to answer,” Daisy said. Her low, raspy voice made Chelsea think of dark places and endless pools. “There doesn’t have to be an answer, honestly.”
“I wish I had one,” Chelsea admitted. She looked up at the tire and found Daisy looped through it with her legs dangling and her face angled toward her, catching the afternoon light. “I think I was scared of what would happen. Part of me thought I deserved it, and another part of me knew it was wrong. I took classes in college—psychology courses,” she explained, circling her hand in the air, “to try and make sense of it. To get into my own head. Never did find a reason; just made me mad at myself.”
“How bad was it?”
“Bad enough.”
“We don’t have to talk about it.”
Chelsea heard the curiosity. She felt the silent pull.
Chelsea Cavanaugh, damaged goods. The label didn’t match the woman.
She climbed up the rope ladder, hopped from one tree to the next, and sat on the deck across from Daisy. She rolled the edge of her long dress in her hands, exposing shin and ankle, which she saw Daisy notice.
“It started with my mama,” Chelsea said, easing the words out. “I don’t know when; I just know that it was before me. The first time he slapped me I was six. I’d made a mess and, when he told me clean it up, I threw a tantrum. He gave me a good slap, right here,” she poked her left cheek. “Mama told him not to do it again, and he didn’t. I started middle school, you know, young and reckless and crazy for attention.” The words started to mesh. They grew hot and then cold in her mouth, heavy on her tongue, salty and sour. Chelsea stared at the buckles that lined Daisy’s boots and listened to The Hollow whisper in breezes and rustles and chirps. “I failed an exam in the seventh grade. He slapped me again, but this time my mother didn’t say anything. I’d seen the bruises when she got out of the shower, on her arms and legs and stomach. I knew
what my father was, but she ignored it, so I did too.
“I met Shannon in the eighth grade,” Chelsea whispered. Her mouth split into a mournful grin. “He was the sheriff’s son. He was so cute.” She laughed, and Daisy did too. “We went on homework dates to the library; we got sodas from the cafe in town and shared hamburgers. I made the cheerleading team in high school; he played football. It was perfect.”
“And?” Daisy waited to meet Chelsea’s gaze.
“I came home late one night. I remember exactly how late too—twenty-one minutes past ten. My daddy hit me with his fist, not his palm. Naturally, I had to call in sick to school the next day. Shannon came by to bring me my books. That’s the first time he saw any bruises.”
“What’d Shannon do?” Daisy’s dark eyes widened. She chewed on her lip and tipped her head. One hand stretched out and her fingertips settled on Chelsea’s knee.
“Oh,” Chelsea laughed outright, loud enough to scare a bird off the branch next to them. “He wanted to tell Lloyd, but I begged him not to. Told him I could take care of myself; told him I was fine; told him my daddy didn’t mean it; told him I’d never forgive him if he told. The list goes on. It went from beggin’ to threatenin’. By senior year I’d been accepted to college and Shannon was leavin’. The whole ordeal had turned me nasty and made me afraid of everything.” She exhaled sharply. “I still think Shannon said something to him. He’ll deny it to this day, but I think he did. It was August, hot like this, when Shannon left.” She held her palms open in the sunlight. “And I refused to drive him to the airport. He came by my house. I wouldn’t see him, still thought if I didn’t acknowledge it, it wouldn’t happen. I looked out my window and saw him talking to my dad. Now, I know Shannon Wurther, I know that boy inside and out…” Chelsea’s voice lowered into a serious growl. “… and he was givin’ my dad a talkin’ to. I could feel it.”
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