The Hummingbirds

by Ross McMeekin

  But why had he stayed? Of all the places in the world, here, instead of alone in the rainforests of the South Pacific with his camera, where his heart yearned to go?

  His sobbing slowed. He knew. He knew. There was something about his mother, Grant, and Sybil that he hadn’t understood until now. This need to shine brighter than other people. This need to fill more space than others. To be important. Powerful. To rise above convention. To transcend any definition of normal. To be more than just a human being.

  It was an escape.

  Why had his mother allowed people to call her the Prophetess? Why hadn’t she just let them call her by her real name? Why had she felt the need to inhabit her message, to become a symbol, rather than to stay in this world with him?

  An escape.

  Sybil. Grant. This whole town. This whole world. What was being accomplished?

  Escape.

  There was no one left to fool, here in the ocean, alone and on the verge of dying. His being here, wasn’t it for the same reasons as them? He was no different. Trying for some sort of secret glory, not through accomplishment, but through severe self-discipline. Had he not stood upon his own private pedestal and looked down at Bryce and April and the rest of them and felt pride that at least he wasn’t them?

  An escape, not from the world, but from the fact that he missed her, and couldn’t bear to face it.

  He sobbed.

  He was the same. They were all the same. Everyone.

  But that no longer mattered. He closed his eyes. Any insights now were meaningless. He would soon be gone, and there’d be no place to spend their gold. He’d leave, and if he was lucky, join her in a place where any knowledge of this world was beside the point. His muscles were so tired and he felt a warmth in his body that could be nothing less than a stage of hypothermia. The salt of the air, a breath of wind on his face—they conjured a feeling similar to making out with that girl in summer camp all those years ago.

  He opened his eyes and saw a satellite blinking across the horizon. Impressive, but not when compared to the millions of bright and dim stars and who knew what else behind it, all those unthinkable miles away, nor his cold, miraculous skin sending message after message to his brain. And his heart, still beating without permission.

  He smiled. Shivered. Death was here. What else could he do but smile? He closed his eyes.

  NINETEEN

  Late that morning, Sybil slid the plastic key through the scanner and strolled through the hotel suite. She felt such clarity. Cocaine and wine and not giving a fuck did that to a person. She finally, at long last, understood the world. And once a person understands the world, they’ll understand who they’ll never be.

  She flipped on the overhead lights and dropped the satchel on the bed, then lay down and stared at the ceiling. The garish wallpaper was a strain of yellow similar to the backdrop behind Helen in the video. Who could have predicted that Helen would have been this particular kind of inspiration? And Ezra’s mother? As Ezra’d said, it was uncanny, but more so than he could have ever known.

  She struggled up from the bed and stumbled to the bathroom, satchel in hand. There was nothing left to lose. Marriage? Check. Career? Check. Lover? Check.

  Beauty? She looked in the mirror; her face was pale and her eyes had a pinkish sheen. It was not difficult to imagine the skeleton beneath. Beauty, what her fame was built on, the only reason people had ever cared, was on its way out. She punched the mirror, which barely budged, and rubbed her knuckles.

  The fake lemon smell of industrial cleaner hit her nose. She closed her eyes and for a moment felt as though she was swimming in the ocean, swells passing her by. She shook it off and unzipped the suitcase, removing an extra-large box of D batteries and a hacksaw. She set them both on the rim of the bathtub.

  Before checking into the hotel, she’d driven through the city and seen it as she’d never seen it before. Dry. Cracked. Thirsty. Pleas for help scrawled on van windows. Wash me.

  She’d found a hardware store with a faded sign. The clerk clearly knew who she was; she could see it in his smirk, his silence. She didn’t belong there, any more than she belonged in that mansion.

  Hah! She didn’t belong anywhere, except on billboards, centerfolds, and screens. No one wanted her around, except when they were alone, having sex with themselves. She was the opposite of platonic, and when she tried to be otherwise, was met with disdain, if not anger.

  Hudson and Ezra never loved her. They were only living out in real life the fantasies of millions of other men and women both distracted and comforted by an ideal. In that way, she realized, she was platonic—a puppet whose ideal form was cast in shadow on a wall, to be yearned for and enjoyed without any semblance of relationship.

  Hacksaw. Batteries. Their weight so thrilling in her hands. This is what defiance felt like.

  She tore at the plastic edges of the battery pack, but it was sealed together with a sharp stamped edge. She held the pack sideways on the sink and with the saw scraped her way through, until there was a large enough gap that she could peel the plastic apart. A few of the batteries spilled out and pooled in the sink while the rest stayed snug in the package. She fingered the first fat cylinder and laid it sideways on the granite countertop of the sink.

  But she’d forgotten her phone. She walked into the bedroom and plucked it from the nightstand. The plan was to stream this live. She would pin back her hair and with her rouge brush apply the acidic powder to her cheeks. Then wait. Viewers wouldn’t know what was happening. They would watch it work in real time, eating its way through her cheeks, her chin, her nose, her forehead. Not her eyes, though. They’d be a perfectly clear, unblemished reminder of what had surrounded them before.

  In a way, she was just intending to speed up the violence that time had planned to do all along. She’d be a living reminder of that fact. Instead of trying to look young, like everyone else, she’d do the opposite. Instead of slowly fading, she would brand herself into the American consciousness. The real world wouldn’t let her show on film what she felt in real life, so she’d perform it, live, for everyone. They’d see and never forget the reality that Helen felt, and she felt, and would soon feel in full.

  She took her phone and propped it against a stack of rectangle bars of soap, camera facing her. She removed her clothes. Dimmed the lights. Gripped the hacksaw and pressed its sharp, tiny teeth into one of the smooth batteries. They sunk into the soft plastic. She pushed and felt the blade saw against the metallic insides. Then she lost the grip and the blade jumped and the battery rattled into the basin of the sink.

  Her hands were shaking. She looked up into the mirror and saw a single drop of blood slowly descend from her nostril, followed by a trail of more. The drip crested over the edge of her lips and down into her mouth. She licked it and tasted the salt. She tried to pick up the saw again, press the blade down, but the thick shell of the battery again slipped on the porcelain.

  “Fuck me.” She sat down on the edge of the bathtub and put her head between her knees. An image came into her mind—that of the monk burning himself—brought on by the story Ezra had told about her mother’s self-immolation. What had Ezra said about her? She wanted the world to know her pain. She wanted the world to know her. But instead of expressing that to one person at a time, and growing closer, she’d pushed them away and chosen the opposite: infamy.

  It occurred to Sybil that she was choosing something similar. She felt guilty. Ashamed. She tried to banish the feelings, but that only made her feel disoriented, like a stranger to herself. When she wiped her nose and mouth with the back of her hand, it smeared with blood and snot.

  The camera, tilted up against the soap, ready to record, now scared her. What would people say? A desperate cry for attention. A grab at fame when she felt it slipping away. An abomination to use the suffering of Helen, who’d been scarred against her will, as inspiration.

  There was, she realized, some truth to that.

  Truth that Grant wou
ld dismiss. He’d say this was simply turning suffering into a commodity. No big deal. This was simply what artists did, and should do, as a service to humankind, because those truly suffering inevitably had neither the time, resources, nor talent to fashion their experiences into art. She realized that in a way, he was also right.

  Art was never pure. Hadn’t ever been. Even cave drawings from thousands of years before made audiences swoon, and as a result, relationships and goods were won.

  The bathroom spun, but her thoughts felt more than clear.

  Yes, she’d told herself this was purely a statement, even performance art, but what about those delusions of grandeur she’d imagined: the news, the documentaries . . . the question why did she do it on everyone’s lips. A sudden burst of fame. A resurrection through suffering. This was a power grab as much as a statement. Self-preservation as much as self-immolation.

  But trading fame for infamy would have the same result. Her new pedestal would become even more of a cage than her beauty. A year from now, the same question would remain. Even ten years from now. Why did she do it? There’d be no other part left to play, only this symbol.

  As she sat there on the edge of the bathtub, in the suite in one of the nicest hotels in Tinseltown, she imagined the years ahead of her. If she decided not to go through with it—which, to be honest, was all but decided—she’d have to embrace the slow fade, less beauty, less fame. Less attention from the paparazzi, from the Internet, from everyone.

  But who knew? Perhaps in place of her career, she’d find what she had with Ezra: love. Real connection. What she wanted. A belonging not based on looks or achievement. What Helen had, before it all became too much—having so much taken in an instant, instead of over time, or by choice. Yes, she owed Helen and her family, but not for the reasons she’d first assumed.

  It was time to come to terms with the fact that the life she’d hoped for was no longer possible. She needed to accept that and move on. Trust that other possibilities would arise, and that what she lost would be replaced by something different, perhaps not better, but maybe, just maybe, good.

  She took a few Kleenex, wiped her face, and gazed into the mirror.

  She gathered the batteries and threw them, one by one, into the garbage. She chuckled. It occurred to her that she didn’t even know whether they could have done the job.

  TWENTY

  Ezra heard gentle beeps and the whoosh of recycled air. The light was dim through the cracks in the drapes. He blinked and saw a tall vase of bright carnations. Beside them, Maria, wearing dark-purple scrubs. He wondered whether she was a ghost, whether he was too. His headache didn’t feel as though it was from the afterlife, and neither did the look of her eyes: a little dark and bothered, but caring. His head was still swimming; probably if he tried to stand he would fall. “What happened?”

  “Welcome back.” She stood and flipped on the lights, which at first felt blinding.

  He didn’t know quite what to think. He searched his memory. The boat? The swim? Had he dreamed those? Or had he passed out somewhere downtown after—oh God—the movie theater. He closed his eyes. Those memories felt like a dream, but so did Maria. He now wished she were just an anonymous staff person. “Are you my doctor?”

  “Physician’s assistant. And nope, I work a few floors up. Shift ended a couple hours ago. One of the nurses tipped me off you were here. You’ve been in the news.”

  “Hah,” he said, but by the look on her face, she might not be kidding. He didn’t want to know, at least not yet. He felt so tired. And thirsty. He glanced over and saw that the teal hospital breakfast tray on the side table was empty, except for a few crumbs on the plastic plate and an unused straw next to the plastic cup.

  “Hope you don’t mind that I ate,” she said. “I was hungry and you were out. I can get you more.”

  “Maybe some water?” He reached for it and realized there were loose harnesses holding down his arms and legs, along with IVs stuck into the pit of his elbow.

  “You’re strapped in,” she said. “Until you can prove to the psychologist that going for a swim alone in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night wasn’t, well.”

  They were worried he’d tried to commit suicide. “Where did I come to shore?”

  “Luma.” She picked up the water and fit the straw to his mouth.

  He felt marginally embarrassed being fed, but drank, nearly draining the tinted plastic cup. He then closed his eyes. He’d drifted all the way south to Luma. Public, insanely popular, easy to access—no one would assume he hadn’t swum out from there as well—nothing to tie him to Grant’s place. “The last couple of days seem like someone else’s life.”

  “Try again. You’ve been laying here for almost four days.” Her look told him she wasn’t kidding. “The records say a lifeguard was out running with his dog at four in the morning and found you lying just below the tide line. Negligible heartbeat. Low temperature. Dehydrated. Another hour and you would have died.”

  So his memories were all true. Everything. He remembered nothing after deciding to float. How did he get to shore? How did he hold on to his jeans? Had he, in some state of oblivion, turned over and begun swimming again? Had the current swept him onto shore? “So how did I survive . . . ?”

  She shrugged. “You tell me. I don’t even know what the heck you were doing.”

  There was a gap. He hadn’t had one before. As crazy as it sounded, it unnerved him more than being locked down in the hospital, on IVs. He’d existed without being conscious of existing, not just during the time in the water but the last three days. Every move, every word, every thought had been so tightly governed, and now, a gap—at precisely the moment when it could have proved what he most wanted to know.

  She smiled. “Don’t worry about all of that now. Just worry about getting better. How are you feeling? Are you in pain?” And with her voice the image of April, at Bryce’s apartment, wearing only Bryce’s T-shirt, popped into his mind. He glanced down at Maria’s hands. There was no ring.

  She held up her empty fingers for him. “I understand you already know.”

  He searched her face for pain, but found none. And she was working, covering a shift, at most four days after finding out. “I’m sorry. I would have—”

  “—Really, it’s fine.” She crossed her arms.

  It occurred to him how many times throughout his life he’d said it’s fine when the truth was the opposite. He suspected she didn’t mean it, either.

  “No,” she said. “It is. Really. We had our doubts. Even him asking me . . . it was a surprise. I know how it looked at the restaurant. ‘Yay, true love!’” She took a deep breath and turned her back to him. “I wanted it to be that way. But it wasn’t real. A part of me just wanted it to be. That’s something I’m guilty of a lot.”

  “You’re not alone in that.” Ezra shook his head. “Anyway, I’m sorry. I had no idea.”

  She stood up, eyes wide. “Really? I figured you knew all this. I figured that’s why you left us at the diner.”

  “Honestly, I didn’t know.”

  She studied him. He could feel it in her gaze, the question: then why did you leave?

  “Bryce could see the end and was afraid. He’s a fearful guy and hides it well. And April, well, you’ve seen how they are together.”

  Ezra nodded, more as a reflex than anything else. He’d seen none of it, and even when he scoured his memory, trying to piece it together from evidence, no. He’d missed it completely. “Both of you seemed genuine.”

  “We can be good at seeming.” She walked over to the sink and refilled his water. She wiped something off the counter, crossed her arms, and shrugged. “Well, then this will be news as well. No offense, but April going after you wasn’t just pure, unbridled attraction. Let’s just say you’re not her first, and she got what she was after in the end.”

  He blinked. The whole time he’d been worried about taking advantage of April when she had been taking advantage of him. He’d
been so concerned with his own actions he’d completely misjudged hers. And Bryce’s. Shit, everyone’s. He’d assumed simplicity in everyone but himself. All that self-loathing had disguised his own arrogance.

  She smiled and shook her head, eyes now reaching for the corner of the room. “I just stuck around for some reason. But look at me. You’re strapped to a gurney and I’m the one unloading on you.”

  It occurred to him that this world might not be as lonely as he’d thought. He smiled, but doing so triggered something in his jaw that made his head hurt more. Coughing overtook him and he began to retch. He tried to bring his hand to his mouth but couldn’t, and he felt phlegm running down his lips. She nabbed a few paper towels from the dispenser and wiped his mouth.

  “I’m disgusting,” he said.

  “I’ve seen much worse.” She dabbed at his mouth and his chin.

  The way her eyes studied him, trying to find anything else that needed to be cleaned up, brought up emotions he wasn’t expecting. “Thank you,” he said as she wiped the spit from his robe and threw away the towels.

  She sat back down and wheeled the chair next to the bed. She reached out and took his hand, which was warm and soft. He found himself trying to find an ulterior motive to her holding his hand. He wondered what that was about—this desire to dismiss a caring gesture from a friend as manipulative. He’d missed so much lately, so much that was apparently obvious to people he trusted and respected, like Maria.

  “So tell me what happened. If you’re feeling up to it, of course.”

  He tried, but the fatigue clouded his mind. He found he could talk somewhat clearly about Sybil and Grant, but when it came to himself and his past, he struggled to find words. “Of course, there’s more. There’s just so much I’ve never told you. Never really told anyone.”