by W Winters
Caroline’s expression falters.
“I think your mama would love it, Emmy,” Caroline says, forcing that false smile to her lips. She’s worked for our family since just before I got sick. I know all her tells and that smile she’s plastered on her face is only there to hide the truth. She hates my mother, but I don’t know why.
“She’s sick too,” I whisper defensively. “That’s why she’s not here.” The excuse falls flat, just like it does every time.
“She’s not sick like you. She’s just in pain,” Miss Caroline corrects me.
Those in the most pain, cause pain. My mother told me that once. It was a while ago and she said that’s why she doesn’t see me very much. She doesn’t want to hurt me. I know it kills her inside to know what’s happening to me. “Pain is a sickness, isn’t it?” I ask Caroline.
The false smile wavers as she reaches down to pick up the pair of shoes. “Your first pair of heels,” she states and pretends she didn’t hear me. She does that sometimes. She doesn’t answer me when I ask questions. I know they’re insignificant, but I have no one else to talk to. Some days I wonder if I’ve spoken when she does that.
I only know I have when I hear her sniffle. They don’t like to see me like this, frail and losing weight and muscle like I am. No one does. I’m not just sick; I’m dying. That’s what the doctors say.
Smoothing the ruby red silk fabric with my hand, I turn to the mirror thinking, Jake will like me in this dress. He won’t mind seeing me sick. He doesn’t cry when I tell him I’m invincible, not like Mama and not like Miss Caroline.
Jake thinks I’m pretty. He thinks I’m sweet.
“Soup, Emmy,” Caroline calls out and I can hear the spoon clinking against the porcelain.
“Is it- “
Before I can finish, Miss Caroline nods and says, “Of course it is. I had to make your favorite for today. Drink up, baby, you need to be strong.”
“I already am strong,” I tell her with a smile, feeling the excitement of tonight. “Haven’t I told you? I’m invincible.”
The story grips me as the pages turn. A young boy and a sick girl, falling in love even though they know it won’t last. I can’t help but to think it’s not that simple. I hate her mother and I like Miss Caroline, but I feel sorry for Emmy. It’s funny how they feel so real when I curl up under the blanket and let the night disappear in between the pages of The Coverless Book.
Lines of a dark blue ink run along the pages. And with every line, I add it to the list in my notepad.
I’m invincible.
Those in the most pain, cause pain.
I don’t feel sick when he looks at me like that; I can only feel cherished with his gaze on me.
Agony is meaningless; only love can relate.
There is no pattern. No reason to think there’s a hidden message lying inside. But I do. I can’t help but to hope that I’m missing something. Anything. I just want my sister to tell me something.
Or at least I did. Days ago.
Before that night with Jase. The night everything changed. Somehow, he took my fight away, but with it, there’s relief.
It’s been two days and he hasn’t messaged me, and I haven’t messaged him either.
I don’t know how it happened, but everything feels different now.
With every thrust against his bedroom wall, he forced the air from my lungs. He took it, he made it his. The air, my body… and more.
Forgiveness and understanding can do something to a person. Especially when you don’t feel worthy of it.
When I stepped out of that bathroom, not knowing what the hell I was going to do or what the hell I was thinking when I cuffed him, I wouldn’t have fathomed he’d be there facing me.
What did I think would happen even if I did get a name from him?
That somehow he would let me out of his gilded cage after he admitted what he lied about? That he wouldn’t hold it against me that I’d cuffed him up and threatened him?
I don’t know what the hell I was thinking. I’ve never been sorrier for hurting someone. I can’t believe I did that.
There will be consequences, I remember Jase’s words last night. Just before I fell asleep, he told me the night wasn’t forgiven wholly, until there were consequences.
And I accept it. Whatever those consequences may be.
I don’t know what happened to make me think I could, and that I should, lay a knife to his skin.
The only way I can justify it, is that I think it happened for a reason.
I think we were meant to have that moment. The moment when he kissed me, and he made it feel okay to let go. He made me feel like if I was with him, everything would be the way it should be.
He made me feel like I wasn’t as broken as I thought I was.
And I gave him everything I had to give. Even if it’s not much.
I would give him everything and anything from this day forward.
His forgiveness and touch are worth more than I’ll ever have.
Ping. My phone goes off with a text message, followed by another.
Are you okay?
How are you feeling?
Two different texts, from two different people. And I’m grateful for the distraction.
One’s from Laura and one’s from Jase.
I’m feeling good, how are you? I text them both the same thing. I don’t even realize it at first.
I just haven’t heard from you. Anything new? Laura writes back first.
I write a few words and delete them. Write some more and delete those too. I finally settle on, Maybe. I’ll know more when we go out this weekend.
My heart does this little pitter-patter thing and my head tells it that it’s naïve.
The three dots at the bottom left of the screen tell me she’s writing something, but before she can finish, Jase messages.
I was hoping to see you tonight. But things came up. Tomorrow.
He doesn’t ask. He tells.
I debate on what to say, focusing on the first part and then the second. He was hoping to see me. The butterflies Emmy feels … I feel them too. They kind of scare me. Everything that’s happening scares me.
Before I can respond to him, Laura writes back.
What’s new? I can’t take the suspense. You know I thrive on instant gratification.
Shifting on the sofa, I pull the blanket up my lap, hating the draft coming from the old window and focusing on that rather than the butterflies.
I pick up my mug and take a swig of it; the decaf tea is lukewarm, but still satisfying.
I don’t know exactly what it is yet, I tell Laura. But when I do, I’ll let you know.
I press send and then realize I sent it to the wrong fucking person. The mug slams down onto the table when I realize, but thankfully my tea’s almost gone so none of it splashes out.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” I mutter under my breath, feeling my heart race.
Sorry, I meant that for someone else. See you tomorrow. I type out the response quickly, before Jase can respond. My heart’s a damn war drum as I copy and paste what I sent him to send to Laura.
“Fuck a duck,” I say out loud, letting my head fall back on the sofa. I am … a mess. A living, breathing mess.
Omg that’s so exciting! Tell me everything! Laura writes immediately.
You don’t know what “what” is? What is “what?” And who are you talking to? Jase writes back. Fuck, he knows. It doesn’t take a genius to know what I’m talking about.
“Shit, shit, shit,” is all I can think and say as I stare at his message.
Rubbing the stress away from my forehead, I decide they can get the same message again.
I’m heading to bed. Sorry, we’ll talk later. As soon as the text is sent, I toss the phone on the other side of the sofa and stare at it as it goes off. Again and again. Taunting me every time. And with each one, I wonder if it’s Jase, or Laura.
Fuck both of those conversations. It’s late, and I’m obviously not with
it. I’m tired, but I haven’t been able to sleep. They can wait. Everything can wait.
Rubbing my eyes, and ignoring the sick feeling I have inside, I finally get up off the sofa and wonder if I should grab another cup of tea, or just pass out like I said I was going to do.
My mind won’t stop with all the questions though. So sleeping is nonexistent.
I don’t know what we are. Jase and me. I don’t know where this is going. And I don’t know how I’ll be all right if I don’t have Jase in my life. I owe him a debt, and the hours are numbered. It will come to an end. I’m fully aware of that, and it’s terrifying.
Sleep doesn’t come easy for me and with that thought in mind, I pick up the small bottle of pills from my purse. The handwriting on the back merely says, All you need is one.
I can add assault and theft to my résumé after what happened two nights ago.
Before I left Jase’s home, I swiped the bottle of sleeping pills from his medicine cabinet. I don’t know if he knows yet, or what he’ll do when he finds out, but he can add them to my tab.
This goes against everything I know; everything I’ve ever done. Both the stealing and taking the drugs. They’re only sleeping pills, I remind myself. And I desperately need sleep. Holding the pill up, I see it’s a gel capsule with liquid inside. Just like an Advil.
But everything about this week is more than morally ambiguous. And everything has changed.
The phone pings again and I check to see what they said after getting a glass of water and a single pill.
Laura wrote back a novel. Text after text demanding I give her every detail. To which I reply, I still love you! I’ll tell you all of it soon!
And Jase wrote back, Sleep well. To which I reply, You too. And feel far too much just from being able to tell him goodnight.
It’s so cold here. At first I don’t know where I am. Sleep came too easily. I remember feeling my entire body lift as if I’d become weightless, right before falling so deeply into darkness. Even now I can remember it, as if I could touch it and relive it. Although I know it’s already passed.
I fell and fell, but it didn’t feel like falling. Everything else was moving around me until I landed in this room. A small room with dirty white walls. There’s a radiator in the corner with a thick coat of paint, or maybe many coats of paint. It’s white too, like the walls. The thin wooden boards on the floor are old and they don’t like me walking across them. They tell me I don’t belong here. They tell me to go back.
But I hear the ripping.
Something is being torn behind the old chair. It’s a tufted chair, and maybe it was once expensive, but faded fabric is being torn down the back of it.
Rip, another tear and I hear something else. The sound of a muffled sob. A shuddered breath and the sound of gentle rocking. Just behind the chair.
I take another step, and a freezing prick dances along every inch of my skin. It’s so cold it hurts, like an ice pick stabbing me everywhere.
It doesn’t matter though. Nothing does. Because I see her.
She’s there, Jenny’s there. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, rocking back and forth with a book in her hand. The Coverless Book.
“Jenny,” I cry out her name and try to go to her, but the chair doesn’t let me; its torn fabric holds me where I am, making a vine around my ankles. My upper body tumbles forward, falling onto the back of the chair. “Jenny!” I scream as I reach out to her. But I can’t reach her, and she can’t hear me.
Her hair is so dirty, long and stringy now. The tears on my cheek turn to ice.
“Jenny,” I whisper, but her name is lost in the cold air as I try to move from where I am. How is it holding me back? Let me go! She’s my sister! She’s here!
I fight against it all, but my hips are now tied down as well. I can’t move to her; I can’t even feel my legs. Please, let me go. I have to go to her!
The book falls, and the sound whips my eyes to her once again as Jenny covers her face to cry. Her arm has a marking, is it a quote? A tattoo?
What is it?
Her shoulders shake as tears stream down her cheeks and I tell her not to cry. I tell her it’s okay, that I’m here. Her wide, dark eyes look up at me. Her pale skin is nearly as white as the fog from her breath.
It’s so cold here.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she says, staring straight into my eyes. Both pain and chills consume me.
“Come with me,” I beg her, licking my chapped lips and I swear ice coats them after. “Come with me, Jenny!” I scream, feeling the bite of a chill deep in my lungs, and she only tilts her head as if she doesn’t understand.
The torturous feeling of being trapped makes me scream a wretched cry. And Jenny only stares at me.
“I just wanted them to be okay,” she tells me as if she’s apologizing. “Someone needs to be okay.”
“Who?” I beg her for an answer. “Who did this to you? Where are you?”
Her voice cracks and she tells me repeatedly, “You shouldn’t be here.” Over and over in the same way, all while she shakes her head and rocks. “You shouldn’t be here.”
Darkness descends, like a storm brewing inside of the small room. “Jenny, come with me!” I scream again, “Jenny, come with me!” as the room stretches, tearing her away from me. No!
“Don’t believe them,” she whispers and I hear it as if she’s next to me. As if she’s whispered it into my ear.
“Don’t believe the lies. They’ll all tell you lies.”
Even when she’s gone and there’s only darkness left, she tells me, “Don’t believe your heart; it lies to you too.”
Jase
“What happened?” I ask her the second I shut her front door. I’ve only just gotten here, intent on implementing consequences, and I’m already changing my mind.
Her eyes are bloodshot, and her skin is pale. Hugging her knees into her chest, she’s seated on her sofa, staring at nothing.
“Nothing,” she’s quick to tell me. “I didn’t think you’d be here in the morning. I thought you’d come at night,” she adds and then wipes under her eyes as she tosses the blanket to the side of the sofa.
“I don’t like it when I ask a question and you lie to me,” I speak as I walk into the living room. Not a single light is on and the curtains are shut tight. It’s too dark.
That gets her attention, and a hint of the girl I know shows herself when she answers smartly, “Oh, it’s not the best feeling, is it?”
The sarcastic response leaves her easily, and she watches me as I narrow my gaze at her. From bad to worse, the air changes.
“Something happened from the time you left me to just now.” I speak clearly, with no room for argument and Beth crosses her arms, staring just past me for a moment before looking me in the eyes.
She’s in nothing but a sleepshirt that’s rumpled, and dark circles are present under her eyes. Even still, she’s beautiful, the kind of beautiful I want to hold on to.
“Are you going to tell me?” I ask her, not breaking our stare.
Time ticks by and I think she’s going to keep it from me, but finally she looks to the kitchen and then back at me. “Over coffee,” she tells me.
She turns toward the kitchen like she’s going to walk there, but then pauses and looks over her shoulder. “You coming?” she asks, and I follow. Watching every detail, noticing the way her movements lag, the way she sniffs after a long exhale, like she’s been crying. The way she leans against the counter after putting the coffee grinds in the pot, like she can barely stand on her own.
“What the fuck happened?” I ask her and lean against her refrigerator. Standing across from her, we’re only feet apart but it feels like so much farther away. I should know everything that happens. I’ll correct that mistake immediately.
“Where do we stand on the debt?” she asks and then clears her throat as the coffee machine rumbles to life.
“I wrote it down; don’t have it with me.” I give her a bullshit a
nswer and ask again, but harder this time, “What happened?”
Lifting up her head to look me in the eyes, her lips pull down and she tells me in a tight voice, “I wasn’t sleeping… not at all since Jenny…” She leaves the remainder unspoken. “So I took those pills you had.” She crosses her arms, looking down at the coffee pot and licking her lower lip before telling me, “I’m sorry. It was shitty of me and I don’t know why I’m doing so many shitty things, to be honest.”
Her arms unfold and she rests her elbows on the counter, like she’s talking to the coffee pot instead of me. Her fingers graze her hairline as she keeps going. “That drug doesn’t work; I’ll tell you that.” As she speaks her voice is dampened, although she tries to keep it even. “I had the most awful dream, but it felt so real.” I take a tentative step forward, getting closer to her, but am careful to keep far enough back so she won’t feel threatened.
She reminds me of a caged animal backed into a corner. One who’s given up and given in, but still frightened and not ashamed to admit it. One who would still try to hurt you, and you’d be the one to blame, because it warned you so.
“It was so real, Jase,” she whispers and before I can ask what her dream was, she tells me. “Jenny was there, ripping the cover off the book.” She turns around to face what little of the living room she can see from this angle. Her hand falls to her side as she peeks up at me.
A deep well of emotions burns in her gaze, enrapturing me and refusing to let me go. “She said I didn’t belong there and she wouldn’t come back with me.” She has to whisper her words, her voice is so fragile. Like she really believed it happened.
“I’m sorry I stole from you, and I’m sorry I even took it. I don’t know what’s happening to me.” Bringing the heels of her hands up to her cheeks she wipes at the stray tears and that’s when I hold her, rocking her in my arms and shushing her.
“I hate crying… why am I crying?” Her frustration shows as she holds on to the pain, still not having learned to let it go.
The coffee pot stops, and I can’t hear anything. She’s stiff in my arms, not crying, but not getting better either.