This must be how a mouse felt, knowing that, at every turn, something, somewhere, was planning its demise. The life of the hunted. Fear and vigilance. Vigilance and fear. No wonder the poor things scampered when horror came swooping down out of nowhere in the form of a hawk.
She had always imagined, foolishly, that her life would literally come to an abrupt and screeching halt if she saw him again. That it would be the beginning of an epoch as cold and unaccommodating as an ice age. That there would be warnings.
Life did not stop; life went on, like a relentless tide, dragging Val along in the current against her will. She did not stay in bed, with all the doors and windows locked and the curtains drawn, moribund and paranoid, like a rodent playing dead.
She continued going to classes, though her brain was incapable of absorbing information. She continued seeing Jade, though her heart wasn't in it. She continued living life as if nothing was wrong at all, and living tissue grew and formed around the gangrenous canker of her soul.
She was Schrödinger's cat, both alive and dead. During this period Val received the first “C” she'd ever gotten since junior high. Then another. Then a “D.” Her low grades made her feel chagrined but there was nothing she could do. Fear dulled her mind. She was unable to study and had difficulty concentrating. Such things were too large for the focal pinpoint of her mind's eye; the center would not hold.
When Val wasn't trying to study, she slept. Sometimes deeply—so deeply that, once, when the fire alarm went off, Val hadn't even twitched, and Mary had lectured her so severely that Val had lost her temper and shouted at her to shut up—and other times shivering awake in the middle of the night with wide-eyed insomnia.
When she was neither sleeping nor studying, which wasn't often, she went out with Jade, who Mary now considered Val's boyfriend. They had now been seeing each other, exclusively, for several weeks.
“He's not my boyfriend,” Val said, the first time Mary brought this up. She was at her computer, typing up an essay due tomorrow. Her response was close to automatic. “We're just friends.”
“Have you seen the way that boy looks at you?” No, she hadn't. The world she lived in was a oneway mirror; she was but a passive observer, invisible, unseen, unseeing. Jade was just an NPC. She didn't attribute to him any actual thoughts and emotions.
“Val,” Mary tried again, her voice stern, “Jade is a nice guy. I don't want to see him get hurt. If you don't feel the same way about him, if you're just leading him on, you need to tell him that. I've seen too many nice guys get shafted because a girl can't get over some jerk.”
“I know,” Val said, because she did know. How many times had she told herself the same thing? How much simpler would her life be if it had been a nice boy, a sweet boy, whom she had initially fallen for? “Don't you think I know that?”
“I really wonder sometimes, Val—and I hate that. Because I want to respect you. But girl, you make it mighty hard sometimes.”
Dozens of retorts came to mind but Val could not voice a single one. She's right, that insidious voice whispered. You know she's right.
Point made, Mary slipped out the door to go to dinner with her friends. She did not invite Val. She did not even say goodbye.
Mary had never really gotten angry with her before, not even when Val had shouted at her that one time, but after that particular conversation the black girl was cold to her for several days and Val could not feel the least bit angry or frustrated back because she knew she deserved it and she couldn't bring herself to care.
All she could think about was the fear.
She did wonder if Mary had said something to Jade. Val knew the two of them talked sometimes and hung out without her, but it had never bothered her or made her jealous. She had never considered herself the jealous type, and couldn't understand the girls who freaked when they saw their boyfriends chilling with other girls. Why? It just wasn't a big deal. She certainly didn't mind.
What she did mind was having people betray her confidences behind her back and then leaving her out of the loop. As if they considered themselves more capable of solving her problems than she was. And maybe Jade and Mary had talked after all, because shortly after that disastrous conversation, Jade called her up on the phone.
Val was initially annoyed. They did not have a date scheduled for that day and he had woken her up from a nap. For once, she hadn't been having any nightmares. Val wondered, with irritation, what it was he wanted. She hoped he didn't want her to meet him someplace tonight. Not when she was so tired.
“Val?” He sounded nervous, for him. An unexpected lapse in confidence. Her resolve softened, and decayed. She recognized that meekness because it was often present in her own voice. “How are you?”
“Fine.” The lie came quickly. “You?” He ignored the perfunctory follow-up, choosing instead to get right to the point. “I've been thinking… about, well, a lot of things. About our relationship.”
Val froze and tried to speak but could not. He's breaking up with me.
The relief that thought brought frightened her. Maybe not feeling jealousy was normal, but this definitely wasn't.
I never knew I could be so cold .
“Val? Are you still there?”
“Yes,” she said weakly.
“You see, I'd like to take it to another level and I'm not quite sure you'd be into that.” He paused, measuring the silence. “I'd rather discuss this in person, in private. If you wouldn't mind.”
“Okay,” said Val.
“Okay?” he repeated.
“Yes, fine.”
Ice is supposed to numb, to freeze.
“Look, let's meet up at Cloverridge Park. We'll talk it over there. We could even make it a picnic— bring food and stuff. Sound good?”
“Yes.”
I'm too cold.
“Six o' clock tonight?”
But I'm not cold enough. Val looked at her clock.
That gave her a little under two hours to get ready. Assuming she didn't have other plans. None came immediately to mind, but her thoughts had become lazy, intangible swirls, slipping away into wisps of vapor the moment they were in her grasp. “Yes.”
“See you then.”
“Uh-huh.”
She was never enough.
She was incomplete.
I am fog.
▪▫▪▫▪▫▪ She brought the two cans of soda she had stolen from the residential meetings, and two hoagies purchased last minute from the Student Union's Coffee Shack.
Cloverridge Field was right across from the SU. It was a short walk, not nearly long enough to think over all the things she feared that she was going to have to say.
Jade was already there. He had spread an old blanket out on the damp grass. It looked like it had been in a car recently, full of wrinkles and lint balls and mysterious brown stains. Coffee? Blood? “Hey,” he said, looking up at her. “You get here all right?”
She looked away from the stains. “Yes.” “You're monosyllabic tonight.”
“I'm tired.” She plopped down and nearly squished the sandwiches in their little paper bag. She remembered them just in time and offered him the larger of the two. “Hoagie?”
He stared at it blankly for a moment before setting it aside. “Thanks for coming out to see me on such short notice.”
Remembering her earlier resentment, Val flushed. “Um…yeah, of course.”
“I guess I wanted to talk about where we're headed as a couple.”
A sinking, elevator-like feeling rode her gut. “Uhhuh?”
“I'm very…physical in the way I show affection.” This was true. He was always trying to hold her hand, kiss her, touching her when she didn't expect it. It reminded her of James, which made her jump, and then made her feel guilty for it.
“We've been going out for a month now,” he was saying, “I'd like to be able to, er, you know. Kiss you —and more, maybe—without you always flinching away.”
“I'm sorry,” she said automatica
lly. “Don't apologize. It's not your fault. I'd just like to know why—if you can tell me—and whether it's me, or if it's something I'm doing, or if you just don't like me.” The words came out all in a rush, as if he was afraid he wouldn't get them out if he didn't speak quickly enough. “Which would be okay,” he added, after an uncomfortable pause. “I'd just…like to know.”
“I like you,” she said, wondering if the words were true even as they left her mouth. She was telling so many lies she didn't half know the truth herself anymore.
“Then what's wrong?” he persisted gently. Why did people insist on paving their conversations with such moral pitfalls? “Jade, I—”
Why did he have to look at her like that?
She snapped open her can of Coke and took a swig. “I need to tell you something.”
“Okay.”
“Something…terrible. Really, really terrible.” He blinked. “What is it? What's wrong?” “There's a man out there who—wants to kill me.”
The supportive smile dropped from his face, revealing incredulity and—well, it was almost a sort of anger. For a moment she was certain that he had talked this over with Mary, that the two of them had been worrying over her like a pair of gossiping old ladies. Just as quickly, that certainty faded, and the defensiveness crept back in on furtive legs as he said, “Kill you?”
“Yes."
Tears began to form in her eyes. She blinked them away impatiently, knowing they made her look weak and manipulative.
“It's true. I swear. My name—my name isn't really Valerie Klein. I had to change it.”
“What, like the witness protection program?” Val shook her head. “No, in court. But I did have to change it. He tried to kill me before. I had to escape. I couldn't leave any traces. But now he's found me again.”
“If this is a joke—”
“It's not a joke.”
“—it's pretty sick—”
“It's not a joke.” She was almost shouting now. She didn't care. “He's psychotic. Brilliant, but insane. And twisted. And sadistic. And cruel.”
“Jesus fuck. Even if that's true—how the hell did you meet this guy? Did you have a run-in with the mob?”
“No. God, no. Nothing like…that. He seems so normal. He's a grandmaster, and…an artist,” she added, after a moment. She wasn't sure why. The modifier seemed redundant. Unnecessary. Did his hobbies matter? “He went to my high school.”
“Fuck. I can't believe this.”
“You probably hate me now.” “What?” He stared at her. “No—no, I don't hate you. But—well—how did this happen? Why haven't you gone to the police?”
“That would only make him more determined.” Jade didn't seem to grasp this. He shook his head. “But it's the police. As in…the police. He'd have to be crazy to keep—”
“Exactly. He is crazy. If I went to the police he would take it as a challenge. He doesn't think like a normal person; he doesn't think like you.”
“Obviously not.” “Everything's a game with him. Something to be lost—or won. Including me. He tried to win me. And when that failed, he tried to destroy me.” Glimpsing his face, she added, “I'm so sorry.” She laid a hand on his arm. “Please…forgive me.”
“I'm not mad at you.” He looked dazed. “Well, you should be. I'm a terrible person. I know I should be locked up somewhere I can't do any harm. Because the people around me always seem to be getting hurt. But— I'm too selfish to be alone.”
“That's a terrible thing to say about yourself.” “It's what people think.”
“Nobody thinks that.”
She pulled away before his fingers could brush her arm. “They do. They've told me. I know.” They think I should kill myself to put me out of their misery.
“You need to talk to the cops.” “ No, Jade. You don't know what he's capable of. He fooled an entire jury into thinking that he was sane and I was crazy. They dropped all charges against him, even. He's so persuasive.”
She was still crying. The tears rendered his face into a compassionate blur. Val fisted her eyes viciously, rubbing the salt deeper, and wiped her damp hands on her jeans. She stared at a yellow dandelion poking its head out of a patch of clover and sighed. “I've almost forgotten what it's like not being frightened every day, all the time.”
Tentatively, he reached out again—this time to touch her face. She flinched.
“Val, I wouldn't hurt you. I'd never hurt you, or anyone. But especially not you.”
She closed her eyes as he ran his fingers down her cheek, drying her tears. Gavin had touched her like that—but there had been a proprietary air to his caresses that was absent in Jade's. A lack of strength. Gavin always gave her the vague feeling that he was holding back something terrible. Something that could be released at any moment. Jade had nothing to hide.
…Did he?
“Why especially me?”
“Because I like you.”
“Why?”
“Lots of reasons.”
His hand cupped the back of her neck. Her shoulders tightened instinctively, bracing for the bruising grip at her throat. But Jade didn't grab her. He stroked her back, gently kneading the knots of stress that had snarled up her spine. And she was so relieved, so bewildered that she burst into tears.
His hand froze just below the back of her bra and he said softly, “What did he do to you?” His touch remained gentle, but his voice could have cut diamond.
Val squeezed her eyes shut and said nothing. “Please. Talk to me. I want to help you. I can't do that if you shut me out. I don't want to hurt you. I don't want to make it worse.”
He was so tame. So eager to please. So completely unlike the grandmaster.
“Why are you being so nice to me?” “Because—if what you're saying is true—then— it's not your fault. It's terrible. Horrible. But it's not your fault.”
She looked at his handsome, worried face and felt an eerie calm descend upon her as she realized that she had no fears or doubts that he would do a thing beyond what she permitted.
This knowledge of her own power elicited new emotions, heady and strange in the sheer force of their intensity. Val leaned up into his touch and kissed him.
It was the first time they had ever kissed. Perplexed, he kissed her back and brushed a light butterfly kiss on her forehead before pulling away. “Let's get you home,” he said, after a pause, “it's getting la—what are you doing?”
She lowered her hands from her shirtfront. “I thought…” “What?” Jade laughed; it was an agonized sound. “What did you think?”
“I thought you wanted me.”
He flushed a very interesting shade of scarlet. “Of course I do.”
“Then what?” “For starters?” He looked around. The field was mostly empty at this time of night, but there were a few stragglers. “Apart from the fact that anyone could see? You're not thinking clearly; you're wounded.”
“He didn't rape me.” Her voice sounded uneven, the ugly word a blunt weapon in her mouth. Jade winced. “That isn't what I was talking about.” It began to annoy her, how calm and placating he was being. “Then I don't understand.”
“There's more than one way to hurt someone. Sexually, physically—emotionally.”
Val gritted her teeth until they ached down to the roots and said, “I'm not wounded.” “I'd feel like I was taking advantage of you.” “What if that's what I want?”
He laughed uneasily. “Don't put me in that position. I'm not one of those guys who carries around condoms in his wallet. I like you. I don't want to fuck this up. I really thought that we were just going to mppphhh.”
This is what I want.
It resounded weakly through her body. This is what I want.
…Isn't it?
Jade kissed her, gently and sweetly, clearly with experience. James had always been clumsy—and he'll never have the chance to get any better, her brain jumped in—and Gavin, well, he had been something else entirely, something unclassifiable.
/> Don't think about that. Don't think about any of that. Val let her eyes slip closed as his hand began to trace circles at her hip. He broke the kiss and looked at her seriously, just as she had begun to lose herself. “I hope you're doing this because you want this, and not because you think I want this.”
Again, she felt that flicker of irritation. Jade grinned a little. His eyes were still hesitant. “Tell me if you want me to stop.” He teased one of the buttons on her shirt from its hole, spreading his fingers along the edge to loosen her collar. “At any time. Please.”
“I trust you.”
“That's a lot of responsibility to put on a man.” He smiled then, a real smile that made him twice as attractive, and he lowered his head to nibble at her throat. Val twined her fingers through his hair and stared unseeingly at the stars.
This is what I want. She gasped when his teeth scratched against her skin, arching her back, and, thinking he'd hurt her, he whispered, “I'm sorry,” and brushed a soft, apologetic kiss where he had bitten her before placing another on her mouth.
Because women weren't supposed to feel pleasure. They were supposed to feel only indifference or, if they were innocent enough, pain. The very act of lovemaking seemed to require a cold and sterile surgical precision: a minor procedure performed without anesthetic because the discomfort wasn't worth the cost.
Val felt ill suddenly, and pulled away. Jade had loosened his own shirt the better to breathe, and she stared at the downy reddish curls on his chest. The same color hers was—or used to be. He saw her looking and flushed again. “As they say,” he mumbled, “the carpet matches the drapes.”
The cold made her shiver, despite her coat. “Will you hold me?”
“You are too sweet.” He laced his fingers with hers. “Of course I will.” “Not like that.” She slid his hand down, breaking contact for a moment, and wrapped his fingers around her wrist. “Like this.”
A strange look crossed his face. “Is that comfortable for you?” “Mm.” She leaned back, with him on top of her, and he gently raised her arms over her head, pinning them against the grass as he snuggled against her, the long bars of the shadows caging them both in.
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