by AJ Brooks
“Do not mock the weapons of the gods, Cassius. For you never know the power they hold.” Her voice is stern and I’ve offended her. Not wise.
She spins the sword again returning it to the small knife form.
I swallow hard and take it from her. I’ve overstayed my welcome and our normal level of tension twists to an uncomfortable tightness.
“It was nice to see you again, Mother.” I stand awkwardly and move to the entrance.
“Lovely to see you, son. Come back again soon.” She smiles and I turn to leave shaking my head.
I adjust my grip on the knife as the necklace dangles from my fingers.
I’m involving myself in something far beyond my responsibilities, but every time I blink I see her face. Broken. Vulnerable. Confused.
I have an intense desire to save her, but I already did that. I already saved her once and this feels different. Less like she needs saving and more like she's going to need help.
PART II
It takes more than the strength of a god to move the sun
just to make her smile,
London, England
1788
His heart was heavy, not so much from grief or sorrow but guilt. He touched her face as she rambled through plans and nervously plucked long grass stems from the ground.
“Lena, my dearest love, you must slow down. I’m not following.” He rubbed his thumb carefully over her flushed cheeks and tucked a strand of chestnut hair behind her ear.
“Oh, Cassius. I’m so happy, I can’t contain it. Father said he would approve our marriage. Mother still hopes to pawn me off to the Duke, but why on earth would he want someone like me.” Her voice was breathy and Cassius smiled, raising one eyebrow.
“And why on earth would he not? You are the most beautiful girl I’ve ever known. And you’ve met my mother.” He winks at her and her blush deepens into her smooth young face, full of hopes and promises of the future. For him he still felt the heaviness of that meeting with his mother when he finally convinced her to see Helena in the spinning room of the Fates, as she would never permit a mortal into her own home. The meeting where his mother told them that their only option was for Cassius to choose mortality. When the Fates agreed to re-spin his thread but not hers. When his mother dismissed his request to make Helena a goddess with a wave of her hand and shake of her head.
That is not a process you want to put her through, my dear son. If it were easy to become a god, than everyone would be one. If I turned every mortal man I found handsome into a god, I’d be overwhelmed with suitors. This choice is yours and yours alone. If you love her then choose her.
“What you should say, sir, is that he should not want me because he could not want me as his bride more than you.” She laughed and leaned forward through the grass to press her lips to his, pulling him from his painful thoughts. Like so many times before, he was overcome with desire for her, but not like with other mortals in his past. There burned a desire in his chest for more. More of what he was uncertain, but new to the kiss that time was the dread. The uncertainty of his conscience. The fear of his choice.
“I should take you as my bride now and we should live all of eternity together on a deserted island in a place where it never rains.” Cassius said between deep kisses and giggles from his lover.
“But I can’t live all eternity. You know that, Cassius. You will settle for taking me as your bride and growing old and weak with me. We will die together in a little country cottage exactly as in love as we are this minute.” She smiled at him but her pale blue eyes flickered with an uncertainty as clear as the sky even though she was careful not to direct her gaze directly on him. The air became thick and heavy like his heart and he rolled onto his back away from her.
“You are going to choose mortality, are you not? You have spoken to your mother as you said you would?” Her voice had lost all its joyful teasing as the sadness in her words ate away at him.
“I have not yet made up my mind, Lena. This is a heavy and life altering decision. You are asking me to give up my status. My life. You are asking me to die for you.” His words were meant to show her the graveness of her request.
She could not join him in immortality. He could not bear to watch her die, but he had not yet come to terms with his own imminent death should he choose her. Mortals didn’t live long enough… His life would be so short. A blink.
Lena’s eyes filled with disappointed tears. “I asked nothing of you, Cassius. This was the option we were given. I assumed you would choose…” Her sob choked out her words.
“I have not chosen yet. Please don’t cry. I am afraid to die, that is all. But I love you, Lena. I love you with all my heart.” He tried to pull her to him but she moved away.
“I would die for you in a heartbeat, Cassius. I would live lifetimes of pain to be with you in the end. I would suffer to the ends of the earth to feel for a moment what I feel with you right now. Tell me you don’t feel the same?” Tears, thick and wet, ran down her cheeks and something happened within him. A shift within. A splitting sound. A crack through his heart as he embraced his guilt, his shame, but all he could do was look down.
“I am not yet ready to die.”
XIII
Zarah
Light pinches at the inside of my eyes as I blink over and over. I slept in my apartment last night. I wasn’t supposed to sleep here, just drop by to get my stuff. The dream scrapes at my heart as I push away the haze. I hate how real my dreams feel. How horribly heart-breaking. Love stories aren’t supposed to end with the guy saying—sorry, baby. You’re not enough.
Crap. My stuff, which is sitting by the door because I didn’t mean to stay here, and…
Oh. A lead ball starts to eat at my insides. Cassius. I sit up so fast my head spins and scan around the partitioned area that’s my room. Nothing.
“Hello?” My words echo in the empty space. No one. “Cassius?”
My fingers start to shake as I step slowly around the room dividers. Half of me wants my paintings to be stretched across the space like they were last night because that would mean that he was real. Or it would be closer to me believing that he was real. And the other half doesn’t want to deal with the rush of emotions that came when I saw them all laid out. But at least then I wasn’t alone.
Or maybe I was.
My gut drops when I see my paintings stacked in two even stacks with the light blue splattered drop cloth laid over them. Exactly like I leave them. The painting I thought I did last night isn’t on the easel drying like it should be... My pallet is clean. My brushes are clean. My fingernails have splatters of the grey-brown I used for the buildings I’m sure I painted... I don’t get it. My skin itches and my body quakes as I begin to feel the familiar craving for escape.
The first tear slides down my cheek as I realize how fully I’m losing my grip on reality. When I don’t know how much of my life is real and how much is in my head, I need to talk to Sue.
I shove on my boots, lacing them up as my eyes burn. I open the locked front door. The ladder is here, just like Mr. Conroy left it for me.
I am definitely losing it. I’m more afraid of crazy than I am of death and for a brief second I stare at the concrete below wondering if a one-story fall would end everything. But then I think of Crystal in the hospital and how she probably needs me, and I grab my duffel and start down the ladder resigned to continue forward like I always do.
Mr. Conroy tries to say something, but I can’t stop to listen.
“This morning, okay?” he hollers after me. “And then it’ll be all done!”
I have no idea what he’s talking about. I should go see my mom, but the hope right now is that Sue might be able to help me find my reality again.
< - - - >
Sue pulls me into a giant hug as I step into her office. Her wide body always makes me feel a bit like I’m being swallowed, but she’s kind, so it’s okay.
“I hope you didn’t have to rearrange or anything…for me.”.
“I was happy to. It’s been too long, and since you’re never one to ask for help, so I’m assuming it’s important.” She tucks a lock of short graying hair behind an ear.
“I…” I’m not sure where to start.
“Don’t worry about it making sense, we’ll sort that out later. Right now I need you to tell me what brought you here. Without your eyeliner.” She smirks.
I run my hands over my cheeks and under my eyes, suddenly feeling naked. Like I’m Batman only I showed up in tighty-whities instead of my Batman suit. I clutch my knees to my chest as I try not to think about what I look like with no liner.
“Zarah?”
“Right.” I take in a deep breath and tell myself again that she can only help if I’m honest. So I start with Crystal and the things I felt in the alleyway and tell her about Max because that makes me seem less crazy. And then I tell her about Cassius. How I’ve painted him before and how warm he feels and how sure I am that he can’t be real. How I thought I painted last night, but how the picture is gone.
Sue absorbs everything for a minute, folding her legs in front of her as she tucks her feet onto the opposite end of the couch from where I’m sitting.
“This boy… This man… I’ve seen his portrait before, correct?” she asks.
“Yeah. He’s one of the ones I showed you.”
“And when things were really bad at your dad’s house, and you’d finally find an escape, you told me that you’d close your eyes and let yourself fall into a world with this man. Yes?”
I nod. When Dad was in a particularly foul mood, or when he had too many friends over, or when I was past the point of good high and into misery territory... As soon as my brain caught up with me enough to think, or as soon as I was alone, I was with him. He held me night after night for months as I cried myself to sleep in my closet. As my body shook coming down from the coke or heroin or whatever I was on. My mystery Monet was in my mind. I knew that. Of course. Which means that it’s even more confusing he’s here now because when he stood behind me last night, and not only the feeling but the warmth of him crashed over me—he felt real. He’s Cassius, not Monet. I’m Zarah, not Venia.
“It’s been almost two years since I’ve seen him, though. I thought I was getting better,” I choke out.
“I think you’re fine. I think that your brain is helping you cope with this devastating thing with your mother, and I think that you needed him. You needed to be part of that world you made for yourself last night.”
“It doesn’t…” I sigh. “I can’t function like a human being when this kind of thing happens. With him it’s not like being curled into a ball and letting my brain wander somewhere else. I was standing and talking and…touching… And it wasn’t dark. That’s so completely different.”
“I have a few ideas for medications for you, but we need to wait until your mom’s up and about again, okay? It can’t be just you looking for side-effects. You need someone else. In the meantime, I’m going to give you a phone.”
I blink. “I’m sorry, what?”
“We get phones donated for battered women, but I think that in your case, it’s still perfectly warranted.”
“What do I…?”
“I’ll program in my number, and I need you to call me if you see this person again. Tell me where you are. I don’t want you to get hurt because you’re seeing things that aren’t there.” She purses her lips as she watches me.
“Yeah. Okay.” I feel stupid, but what else am I supposed to say?
“Checking back into the clinic is a good option, Zarah. For a little while.” She lowers her head. “We both know you left earlier than I would have liked.”
I close my eyes and concentrate on breathing. “Not now. Please. It’s just the last few days I’ve seen things. I’ve been doing so good.”
Sue nods, and this is why I liked her from the first. She lets me decide. “I wish you had more than your mom. I’ll be glad when your mom’s home again.”
“If she comes home,” I say because it’s all I’ve got. Crystal’s in the hospital, and I have no idea what her condition is. I stand up and walk for her door. “If she doesn’t then I’ll be in touch.”
“Try to be positive, Zarah. It will help. And don’t forget your phone. Angela at the front desk will hand it over.”
I let out a resigned sigh. I’m not sure what angle I have to look at this to see anything positive. But I don’t say that. “Thanks.”
< - - - >
I’m afraid to go to the hospital. Afraid to go home. Afraid of everything, which is the last thing I need. I need strength. I squeeze my eyes and try to remember Max’s phone number. The one that got washed off my hand in the shower. It doesn’t come to me, but his address is still firmly planted. I finger the phone and almost call Taylor, but realize she’s in the middle of Legislative Systems, and I’m not because I should be at the hospital.
At least I got a shower. I walk slowly toward where Max’s apartment is, and the streets get a little nicer with each block. Without a doubt, Max is real. I punched him and watched him bleed and picked rocks out of his arm and talked to him at the hospital. This could work. Be a place for a bit of distraction. A bit of reality. I’m in desperate need of reality.
Now that I’m actually standing in front of his apartment, I feel stupid. I barely know him. Barely. I adjust my duffel and it brushes against the door frame.
“Pizza!” a chorus chants from inside before a short, freckled guy answers the door.
“Oh. Sorry.” I back up. “I must have screwed up the numbers or…”
There’s scrambling behind the door, and a few ow’s and get-offs before Max’s face appears over the top of shorty.
“Zarah?” He takes a deep breath in, probably trying not to look winded when I’m sure he is.
“I’m interrupting. Sorry.” I back up another step, and he half jumps over the guy staring at me open-mouthed from Max’s doorway.
“No, no, no, no…” He glances over his shoulder, and the freckled guy backs into the apartment, closing the door behind him. “You’re not interrupting. I mean….” He runs a hand over his hair. “Is your mom…?”
“Same I guess. I’ve been afraid to check.” I’m not ready to know.
He nods once and his face furrows in a sort of confused understanding.
“And your granddad?”
“Oh.” Max waves a hand. “He’s fine. Routine heart stuff, and yeah… We’re expecting pizza any minute so you should totally stay. If…” He sighs. “You’re welcome to stay. Call your friend. She can come too. That’s fine. You know.”
He seems to do enough talking for both of us, so I stay silent.
“But I’m warning you that these guys are…” He presses his lips together as his eyes wander from mine. Maybe looking for words.
“I’m sure I can handle it.” I smirk finally shaking off some of my edginess.
He points to the faint shadow under his eye. “I’m sure you can.”
< - - - >
Max doesn’t know that groups of people bring back a slew of bad memories. I find a small chair, and pull my knees up. Aside from a few sideways glances from his friends, I’m ignored. It feels... Well, my shoulders finally relax so it feels okay.
All four guys say the line, “These are not the droids you’re looking for.” At the same time, with the same expression and mimicking the guy in the movie.
I’m trying to figure out why I’m here instead of with Taylor. She would have been the obvious choice. But my legs led me here, and as the guys argue the finer points of the force as Darth Vader slides his light saber thing into the old guy’s robes, I think I chose well. This is distracting, at the very least.
Two boxes of pizza and four hours of Star Wars later, I’m sunk deep into Max’s couch, and the three friends who stared, but tried not to stare, are finally leaving. Max’s place is filled with gaming stuff and computers like my place is filled with art. Something about the mess for the sake of something h
e’s into makes me smile. Maybe because it reminds me of Taylor—something about bright colors fits her, so in the chaos of her room, that’s the theme. My theme would be paint and my broken brain.
Slipping my new phone from my pocket, I check the time. Finally. I call Taylor who answers with a voice full of uncertainty.
“Hello…?”
“It’s Zarah.”
“Oh.” There’s still confusion.
“Long story. I have a phone. I need a ride. Maybe a place to crash.” Simple seems best in this moment—especially with Max watching me.
“Yeah. Okay. Text me the addy, and I’ll be there in a few.”
“Who was that?” Max asks, his voice a few notes higher than normal.
I blink slowly. Taylor is actually pretty huge in my life, and I’m not sure how to answer his very simple question for a moment. “Taylor is the girl you owe coffee to.”
He shifts in his seat, rubbing his hands on his thighs.
“You have lots of friends,” I say. “Taylor shouldn’t make you nervous.” Or maybe she should…
“The guys?” he asks. “They’re not… I mean… We hang, but they’re not…”
“Girls?” I offer.
“Ever think you two are scary?” he offers with a forced smile.
I shrug, but I try to be at least a little scary. “She’ll be here soon, I bet.”
There’s a need to sort out why he felt like home in the park, and even on the day when he bought my painting, but now feels like a stranger again.
Our eyes lock for a moment, but not in a noticing kind of way, more in a—I’m trying to get a read on you kind of way.
But I don’t really need more people to muddy the waters in my head so I cross the room and pretend I need to double-check my bag. I slide open the zipper, and a fleck of gold catches my eye.
My fingers are pulled, stretching my arm, and I grasp the metal chain, sliding my other hand to the bottom where two small charms rest against each other. Now it’s not only my fingers, but something in my chest tugging at the foreign piece of jewelry. There’s a pulsing warmth, and I can’t take my eyes off of it.