“Not of Dylan, of me. You’re afraid of needing someone. You’re afraid of being nailed down—not only to this town, but to another human being. You’re so scared of missing out on adventure, that you’re ignoring the one right here in front of you.”
My teeth press into my bottom lip as I absorb his words. I shake my head, but I know that they’re true, because they hurt. I’ve been proud and independent, trying to prove that I can take care of myself. But I’ve also been worried that needing someone would make me weak, that staying in one place too long would make me grow roots. Now I realize I do have roots, but not to this town, to Bennie. And Preston. Like the sculpture, I am a part of him, no matter where that is.
“Stay, Wren.”
Tears finally escape and run down my cheeks. I feel the air cool my face as Preston watches and waits.
“I shouldn’t.”
“Stay,” he repeats.
His plea is just a whisper between us. It is the first time he’s asked me for anything, and suddenly, I can’t find the strength to deny him. Preston recognizes my resignation, pulls my bag from my shoulder, and throws it over his own. He takes my hand and pulls me inside.
I feel defeated and relieved at the same time. These two emotions war inside me, and all I can focus on is Preston’s hand in mine. At the top of the stairs, he wraps me in a hug and squeezes so tight it lifts me off the ground. He places four kisses on top of my head, and I close my eyes to stay in this moment just a little longer.
“Give me a chance to be what you need,” he says.
My fingers curl into his back, pulling him closer, but it’s never close enough. I do need him. In this moment, Preston is all I need.
I lock my hands around his neck and hop up. He catches my thighs and wraps them around his waist as I attack his mouth. He tastes like sweet mint. Preston fumbles with the door, finally getting it open and moving us inside. He presses my back against the wall and grinds his hips into me.
“Yes,” I say. “Preston, I do need you.”
His lips move to my chin, across my jaw, and down to my neck. His warm tongue slides over my pulse point before gently biting down. I whimper and bring his face back to mine, pushing my tongue inside his mouth again. Our kiss is heated and messy with clashing teeth and a consuming greed for the other’s taste.
When we come up for air, Preston sets me down on my feet. Our panting breaths meet in the space between us. He reaches behind his head, grabs the collar, and pulls his T-shirt off. It lands on the floor silently. The rise and fall of his chest, each curve and dip of skin and muscle has me mesmerized.
Preston’s fingers go to the button of his jeans, and this snaps me out of my ogling. I rip my shirt off and unhook my bra. My boots are next, and then it’s a struggle to get my skinny jeans pushed to the ground. Preston’s jeans hit the floor, and I’m distracted by the sight of him in those gray boxer briefs. I try to step toward him and forget that my jeans are still wrapped around my ankles.
I let out a shriek as I fall, and Preston catches me against his chest.
“Damn these jeans,” I mumble, finally pulling free of them.
Preston grins at my clumsiness.
“So, this is it.” He runs his hands over my shoulders and down my arms, leaving goose bumps in their wake.
“This is it,” I answer. “Do you need a drink or something?”
Preston looks at the space above my head, as if pondering my question. “No.”
“Good,” I answer with a smile.
Suddenly, his face scrunches up, eyes shut tight. “Shit!”
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t have any protection.”
“Shit,” I repeat. I place my hands on his waist and lean into his chest. “Wait! Bennie has condoms in her room. Remember?”
“Because that’s not embarrassing.”
“She’s not home. She’s at The Haystack. I’ll just go get them and come back.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I place a kiss on Preston’s chest and retrieve his T-shirt from the floor, pulling it over my head. “I’ll be right back.”
My body is buzzing, an electric current racing through my insides. Though my emotions are everywhere, I know that I want this. I want him. I slip out of Preston’s door and into Bennie’s apartment wearing nothing but my underwear and his oversize T-shirt.
“Ben?” I call out to make sure she’s not home. No answer. I crack open her bedroom door and am not surprised to find it hasn’t changed since the last time I saw it. I go to her nightstand and find nothing but a bag of weed and rolling papers.
“Ha! I knew it.” I laugh out loud. “Where would condoms be?” I enter her bathroom and pull the medicine cabinet open. There are bottles and bottles of prescription medications lining each shelf.
“What the hell?” I say to myself.
My head is spinning, and I can’t seem to make sense of any of it. I scoop all of the bottles into the sink and load them up using the bottom of Preston’s shirt. I drop them all onto her bed; the rattling of pills against plastic sounds like rain. Most of the bottles seem to be full and have been prescribed in the last few months. So, she has all these meds, and she’s not taking them?
As I read the label of each bottle, I try to comprehend what this means. What are they all for? I recognize the names of a couple of painkillers, but that’s it. When I’ve looked through all of them, I spot a book shoved under one of Bennie’s pillows.
Thinking it’s one of her kinky erotic novels, I smile and pull it out. My eyes read over the title again and again. My brain failing to accept what’s written. I feel the air leave my lungs, and all of a sudden, I’m drowning. I can’t feel the bed or the floor beneath my feet. My head is spinning.
“I don’t…” I read the title again, forcing myself to say it out loud. “A Cancer Answer: Holistic Breast Cancer Management.”
I slide to the floor and clutch the book to my chest. “Cancer?”
Tears blur my vision, and I can’t see anything. Every little hint since I arrived home now seems so glaringly obvious. She’s too thin and pale. She sleeps all the time. She was going to church and drinking heavily, lying about spending time with Laney. Her trip to the hospital. This giant truth sits on my chest, and I can’t breathe.
“Wren?” It’s Preston. He’s wearing his jeans and nothing else. Seeing me on the floor, he rushes to my side. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
I hold the book up toward him and point at it. “Cancer. Bennie has cancer.”
Preston lets out a deep sigh and sits on the floor beside me. He pulls me into his lap and rubs large sweeping circles on my back. The warmth of his skin against mine soothes me until I can calm my breathing.
“Now you see why I couldn’t let you leave?”
A flash of rage burns red behind my closed eyes, a sudden jolt to my brain. I push away from Preston and stare up into his worried face.
“You knew?” I ask.
“Bennie asked me not to tell you.”
I jump from his lap, stumbling. I scramble to my feet and throw the book across the room.
“You fucking knew, and you didn’t tell me?”
Preston stands and approaches like I’m a wild animal, his hands raised in front of him, palms pointing at me.
“She said she would tell you,” he insists.
“How bad is it?” I yell. He looks at his feet and back at my face. “How bad? Tell me!”
“She refused chemo. She’s dying, Wren.”
I let out a wail that doesn’t reach my own ears. My head spins, my knees give out, and I hit the floor hard. Preston reaches for me, trying to coax me back into his arms. The feel of his hands breaks me.
“Don’t fucking touch me! You knew, and you didn’t tell me! How could you do that, Preston?” The anger is shredding me from the inside out. I want to give in to the pain and let it take me.
“Wren, I…I wanted to. It wasn’t my place. Bennie begged me not to say anything. She was very specific.
She made me promise, Wren.” His normally deep voice is strained and faltering. I can’t hear anymore.
“Get out!” I scream.
“Wren. I’m sorry,” he pleads. I don’t even look at him.
“Go, Preston!”
“Please,” he begs. I barely hear it above the whirring and pounding in my head. The fury inside me is the only thing I feel. I need him gone.
“GO!”
I press my cheek to the floor and let the sobs pour out of me. I don’t see him, but I can tell when he’s gone. All the light is absent, all the comfort disappeared. I’m left with my tears and feelings of betrayal. They are all I have, so I cling to them.
I’ve chased her sunset
Across the world
And now it is night
A punishment
By my own doing
Justified in my
Hell of darkness
No longer in orbit
The air too thin
The space too vast
I flounder out of control
Spiraling, spinning
Until I am too dizzy
To recognize
Myself
- Preston
Chapter Twenty
If You’re Feeling Sinister
Tears have painted my face and dried. I feel glued to the floor, and if I move, I might crumble into a million pieces. The sound of the front door opening and closing makes me jump. Slow, deliberate footsteps, too soft to be Preston’s, approach. Finally, I open my eyes to see Bennie’s hemp sandals.
“I’m sorry,” she says. Her voice is soft and placating, and I don’t like it. I close my eyes and try to wish this moment away. When I open them, she’s taking a seat in front of me on the floor, her gauzy skirt settling around her.
“I was diagnosed less than a year ago. Stage four. I didn’t want chemo, Wren. Pumping all those poisons into my body just seemed wrong. I filled the prescriptions and never took them.”
“Why?” I try to say, but my voice fails. I swallow and push myself from the floor. Sitting up, I lean against the side of her bed and try again. “Why?”
“You know me, kid. I don’t want that. I tried to fight it with diet and holistic treatments. It helped with the symptoms for a while. But a week ago, they said it’s gotten so much worse. The cancer has spread to my lymph nodes and my lungs.”
New tears fall, and I pull my bottom lip between my teeth to keep it from trembling. “Why didn’t you do the damn chemo, Bennie? Why can’t you do it now?”
She lays her hand on my knee. “It’s too late, sweetheart.”
I shake my head until I feel dizzy. “No, no, no. It’s not too late. I don’t accept that.”
“I’m afraid it is. They have no idea how much time I have left, but it’s not much. I can feel it, you know? I can feel it taking over my body.”
I let out a sob and throw myself at her. Bennie wraps me in her thin arms and shushes my crying.
“Why didn’t you tell me, Ben? Why did you do that?”
“I didn’t want you to feel guilty for leaving. And I didn’t want to stop you from leaving again, not with cancer. If you stayed in Crowley, I wanted it to be because you wanted to. Not because you felt trapped by your dying sister.”
There’s a lump in my throat, an aching in my chest. My whole body trembles from trying to hold it together. Bennie takes my face in her hands and swipes her thumbs under my eyes. She gives me a smile that only doubles my pain.
“You’re my everything, Bennie. I can’t lose you.”
“You will lose me. And you will survive it. You will go on and do great things with your life, kid. I just know it.”
We sit in the quiet of her room. Bennie soothes me as I get my sniffles under control. When I can finally breathe again, I bombard her with questions about her sickness, her symptoms, and what we can expect. Bennie is patient, answering everything she can. I hear her words, but my brain is slow to process their meaning. All I can focus on is that my sister is dying. My Bennie.
When I zone out, Bennie rests her hand on my knee and gives me a shake.
“I’m listening. I swear I am.”
“I know you are. But it’s a lot of information at one time.”
“Do Mom and Dad know?”
Bennie looks up at the ceiling with a sigh. “Yes.”
I try not to feel betrayed by this. I’ve been gone, and she had no one. Still the sting feels sharp in my chest.
Bennie chuckles and meets my eyes. “It was a moment of weakness. I thought about dying with all that anger and resentment still in me and decided I didn’t want to carry that burden anymore.”
“How’d it go? When you told them.”
“As expected. There was lots of praying. Of course, that was after Mother recited all the passages about the misled and asking for forgiveness.”
“Of course,” I say. “Do you feel at peace with them now? Did it help?”
“Yes. I feel at peace with a lot of things now,” Bennie answers. She runs her index finger across my cheek, wiping away a stray tear.
“I know you were lying about Laney,” I say.
She nods and takes a deep breath, blowing it out toward the ceiling. “I was trying some experimental natural treatments, but it’s no longer necessary.”
Those words cause a new ache in my heart, but I push it down to be strong for her. I look at the clock on her nightstand and realize it’s earlier than I thought.
“You came home early.”
“Preston came to get me at The Haystack. He told me what happened and brought me back here.” I pull my knees up and wrap my arms around them, hiding my face in the space between. “He’s so worried about you, Wren.”
“I don’t care.”
“You can lie to yourself, but don’t lie to me. I know you care. I feel like Preston is the first thing you’ve cared about in a long time.”
“He should have told me,” I insist.
“I asked him not to.”
I shake my head. “He should have told me.”
“I put him in a tough position. It’s my fault. Please talk to him when you’re feeling up to it.” I don’t promise anything. “Come on. Let’s get you to bed.”
I allow Bennie to pull me up and guide me to my room. She tucks me in to bed and retrieves a wet washcloth from the bathroom. Wiping my face, Bennie hums and smiles down at me. I feel like a kid again with her taking care of me. It shouldn’t be this way. I should be taking care of her.
“Good night, Wren.”
“Good night, Bennie. I love you.”
“I love you, too. Catch you on the flip side.”
The door clicks closed, and I take a deep breath, exhaling in a slow, measured sigh. I know nothing of cancer, but I know Bennie. I know that when she says she won’t do chemotherapy, she means it. While I want to rage and thrash against that decision, it would do no good. Still, something in me wants to fight for my sister.
I stare at my ceiling for hours, feeling numb and pained at the same time. Nirvana’s “All Apologies” comes through my wall from Preston’s apartment, and I know it’s for me. I sing along, letting my anger and hurt consume me. Finally, I close my eyes and drift off to sleep.
…
Wednesday morning, I’m exhausted—muscles ache and my head is pounding. The truth from last night rushes me, and it feels like a punch to the gut all over again. My morning routine is slow, purposely putting off seeing Bennie and Preston in the light of day. I force myself through a shower, brushing my teeth, getting dressed, and eating breakfast without one thought about my actions. I am on autopilot.
I stand at the bottom of the stairs for a few minutes. I can hear the music playing in the store. It’s something light and airy, something I don’t recognize. I hear the door chime twice while I’m standing in the shadows like a coward. There is some shuffling in the storage closet, and I step away from the door, pressing myself to the opposite wall. I can hear heavy footsteps and the moving of boxes. I know
it’s Preston, and I can’t make myself face him yet.
When I hear the sound of the swinging door, I enter the closet and push through to the store. There are two customers browsing the stacks. Preston is unloading boxes on the first aisle. I don’t look at him, but in my periphery I can tell he stops what he’s doing to watch me. I grab a small chair from the furniture section and carry it up to the front register. I don’t meet Bennie’s eyes, either, when I slide behind the front counter and drop the chair right next to hers.
“Good morning, Wren,” Bennie offers. I give her a weak smile. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to hang out with you until you get tired of me.”
“I’ll never get tired of you.”
“Then I’ll never leave.”
Bennie sighs, closes her book, and sweeps my bangs to the side of my forehead. She doesn’t complain about my new place next to her. She simply stands and pats me on the shoulder when she gets up to help a customer. Even though I see Preston moving around the store, I keep my eyes contained to our area behind the register. It’s safe in here. He gives me my space all morning, which is more than I expect. I’m grateful for it.
“What’s this music?” I ask.
She cocks her head and listens for a few seconds. “Oh! This is Belle and Sebastian from ‘96. I’m currently obsessed with this album.”
Bennie and I reminisce about the old days, growing up in Crowley and resenting our parents. We tell the same stories from different points of view and somehow understand each other more.
“You remember that one time I was supposed to sing a solo in the church choir?” Bennie asks, flipping through her magazine.
“Yeah. But you got sick. You wouldn’t let anyone even come check on you.”
Bennie chuckles and looks up at me, her eyes dancing. “I wasn’t really sick.”
“What? Are you serious? I thought Mom was going to have a stroke that day. She ran around the house praying for you to get better and praying to find a replacement singer. Like it was the end of the world or something. It was a nightmare. She made me audition, Bennie!”
“So sorry, kid.”
“What was so important that you skipped out on your big solo, the highlight of your sad small-town existence?”
Chaos and Control Page 20