“I’m not sure. But I love Vivaldi—the concertos.”
“Ah!” he says. “Yes. Vivaldi.”
He is looking at the store, and he notices Junky on the counter.
“That’s Junky,” I say. “We’re in books.”
“Hi, Junky,” he says.
Junky raises his head and actually meows, jumping off the counter, moving toward Lewis’ legs. I am surprised because Junky is not like that with everyone. It makes me think Junky knows something about Lewis that I don’t, and I take it as a good sign.
“I was wondering if you wanted to do something sometime?” he asks. “Dinner or movie…or something? Maybe a walk around the park?”
I get the biggest smile on my face. I nod eagerly, a little too eagerly maybe. “I would love to,” I say.
He blushes again. It was not a wasted trip for him, and I can see he’s relieved. We are going to be giddy after he leaves, both of us. He will start skipping down the street, and I will shelve the books with a gladdened heart, a big smile, and a new outlook on life.
But instead of all that, I catch a glimpse of something happening on the street and frown. My eyes go wide in some strange, terrifying way. The unexpected is happening. Everything I’ve just thought, felt, and experienced with Lewis, is being washed away by what’s happening outside.
A screech of breaks sounds. Someone screams. A loud crash of grinding metal twists the air. Another scream sounds. This is all very sudden. Lewis snaps his head toward the window. Even Junky is startled.
The moment has transformed again. There will be no skipping, no gladdened heart. A beige trench coat sails through the air; a knit hat goes flying. Something akin to dread clutches my chest. Someone has just been hit by a car. Lewis turns immediately, the color draining from his face, and he exits the store, running into the street. I go to the phone and call 911. Everything is moving very fast. My head is reeling. When I’m done, I hurry outside. Traffic has stopped. I see broken glass, a black boot, and drops of blood scattered here and there. On the ground, I can just make out the shape of the bum who grabbed my hand on Monday and told me I must go home again. It is the same man, no question. The smell of stale alcohol is very strong coming from the bum. My eyes grow wide. Shouts and ramblings from passersby trying to help fill the air, but I can’t make out any of it. Silence fills the world. I can’t hear anything. I stare, riveted to the spot outside the bookstore, hands going to my face. The laughter of a little girl who is me, but somehow isn’t resounds in my head. My world collapses. Darkness comes from all around, and I am tingling all over as I hit the pavement.
~
“Rayleigh? Rayleigh? Are you okay?”
My head is swimming. I have dreamed all of this. That’s what I’m going to tell myself. That is the best way to deal with it. It’s all a dream; I will not go mad.
“Rayleigh?”
I open my eyes. My head hurts. Something warm coats the back of my head. Lewis is kneeling over me, cradling me.
“You’re bleeding,” he says.
Is that laughter in my brain, the space between my ears? Where is she anyway? Who is she? That is the vital question, the one haunting me.
Haunting you.
My eyes flutter. Everything around me is fuzzy.
“Hi,” I manage. I realize this is a pretty funny thing to say under the circumstances, but Lewis is not smiling. He has a very worried expression on his face. The wail of sirens makes my headache worse. People dispersing, some still linger, watching the scene.
“Are you okay?” he asks. “Stupid question.”
I try to nod. I don’t think I have to go to a doctor. “I must have fainted,” I say.
“Can you stand up?”
I take his arm, and he helps me stand. My legs are made of jelly, and I collapse again, but Lewis has my arm, and he prevents me from falling over. I can’t feel my legs, and I don’t understand anything. What just happened?
“Is he dead?” I ask.
I can see it in his eyes. They are sorrowful. He nods a single time, and I think this is way too eerily reminiscent of how his wife was killed. The omen must be scaring the hell out of him.
I close my eyes, trying to get rid of the headache penetrating my skull. I open my eyes and look at him. “Hell of a way to start a relationship,” I say.
He actually manages to smile at that, and somehow, I do, too.
“Come on,” he says. “Let’s get you inside.”
I nod, and he is still holding my arm, which is good, because the feeling hasn’t come back into my legs. We manage to get slowly back to the store and inside. I reach around the cash register and grab my purse, looking for some Ibuprofen. I find a packet with two tablets, swallowing them with a glass of water that I get from the back room.
“Do you need to go to the hospital?” Lewis asks.
I shake my head. “I think I’ll be okay. I don’t have brain damage yet.”
“I’m sorry, Rayleigh,” he says.
“For what?” I ask him.
“I don’t know,” he says. “Seemed like the right thing to say.”
Something is troubling him, much like something is troubling me. I am very scared for him suddenly because I don’t know what’s going to happen. Have I put him in danger—more so than myself? Is Lacey in trouble, my parents? I think about Pug again.
“Will you stay with me for a while?” I ask.
He nods. “I planned on it,” he says. “Maybe you should take the rest of the day off.”
I nod, and think, didn’t I just do that? How am I supposed to get any business if I keep closing the store?
He asks if he can check the back of my head, and I nod. He is very gentle. “A little blood, but it’s stopped already.”
I look at the flowers and wish that anything else besides the accident had happened. It has certainly tarnished our day.
“Do you still want to see me?” I ask.
A confused look crosses his face. “Why wouldn’t I want to see you?”
I shrug. “Horror girl with bad omens. It’s a sign.”
He smiles. “I love horror stories and dark girls,” he says. “And I don’t believe in omens.”
Lewis, if this were a hockey game, scores a beautiful goal. A goal-scorer’s goal. Top shelf. Twisted-wrister, curl-and drag…
Whatever…
~
Lewis stays with me for the rest of the day. I am grateful for his company. Life is not turning into the beautiful thing I’d hoped for. Romance and princes taking me into paradise fail to exist because Lewis is better than all of those things.
The Ibuprofen doesn’t help. My headache is getting worse, and I wonder what more I can do.
I decide to close up shop early. I leave Junky at the store again, not wanting him to look at something over my shoulder only he can see. Lewis drives me home.
“Would you like to come up?”
“I don’t want to leave you alone,” he says. “So, yes.”
“Are you always so sincere?” I ask.
“Only to pretty ladies in distress,” he says.
“Damsels, I think is the word you’re looking for.”
I smile and we get out of the car. He walks me up to 37.
“I have to warn you,” I say.
He raises his eyebrows. “Oh?”
“My apartment isn’t as cute and girly as you might think.”
“I didn’t know you were a girl,” he says, smiling.
I laugh and put the key in the lock, opening the door. He steps in after me. We walk in, and I shut the door, and I can see he’s amused looking at the skull in the corner with the candle in it, the books piled everywhere on the shelves.
“Horror girl,” I say.
“I would agree. What got you into that?”
I shrug, not really knowing the answer. “I don’t know. Life in the basement,” I say. “I used to stay up late watching scary movies when I was a kid. It just sort of took hold of me.”
He nods
, not repulsed, but amused. I think he actually likes that about me. What a surprise!
“Would you like a drink?” I ask.
“Sure,” he says, putting his hands in his pockets. He surveys the apartment, nodding here and there, scanning books. I go to the kitchen and make us a drink. This is not going to help my headache, but maybe it won’t make it any worse. Always an excuse to drink, I think, and walk back in handing him a rum and Coke. There’s still plenty left.
“Thank you,” he says, taking a sip.
“I should thank you, Lewis. If you hadn’t been there today, I’m not sure what I would have done.”
He shrugs, not knowing what to say. I think about telling him everything I’ve told Lacey. Of course, he still doesn’t know why the bum affected me so much; he has no idea who he really was. I think about telling him, but refrain. He probably thinks I’m crazy enough as it is. But then, why would he be here? Who are you, Lewis, mysterious stranger? Why am I falling for you so fast? Where did you come from?
“I did what anyone else would’ve done,” he says.
The more I experience, the more I realize my life doesn’t make any sense. I see blood in my mouth, hear voices, see people dying, have them make premonitions, and here I am in my apartment with a gentleman, and I am falling in love with him. I don’t know how that’s possible, but it’s happening. What a stupid life! What does it mean? Is this something just to get me excited until the rug is pulled out from underneath me? Is it going to end in chaos? I have no idea. Home again? What home? I’m home now.
Aren’t I?
~
My life is empty, and I think about how choppy my thoughts have been. I am going nowhere. Carmilla, do you hear that? Life is unexpected, and I have no place to turn. Life…
Bury your face in his chest and cry. Be a woman because you are stronger than that. Take his arms and wrap them around you. Lean into him and kiss him hard.
I always thought Carmilla was against me. She has never meant any good. She is not only my alter ego; she is my evil twin. Or is it vice-versa?
Spinning chaos…my realm of madness. How do I describe this temptation in my soul, this lifeless, yet life-giving movement?
You are eternity. I cannot breathe without you.
“Are you going to be okay?” Lewis asks.
I am looking at him with my puppy dog eyes: big, round, and dark.
I am seeing you through the eyes of a girl. Do you know how much I need you? Life, spinning crazy, irrelevant, so meaningful? I understand. I am mad without you.
I reach out and take his hand, and I realize this feeling in my brain is soft…like Ricky Bradford. It’s the same. Ricky Bradford gave me so much. Why can’t I remember him lately? I used to think about him all the time.
“The time and place is now,” I say.
Or do I? Why would I say that? It doesn’t make sense, and I think about Lacey.
The world has disappeared. Around me, everything is gone. I’m standing on emptiness, but I am with Lewis, and he is all that I can see. Lewis is life and shadow. I have been waiting my whole life for him.
Where have I gone, and what is this fantasy? I realize, in several days—no more than a week (or is it longer?) has passed since I saw the girl on the street—and that I don’t understand what parts of my life are real or imaginary anymore.
There is no life in this body…
So, I think, what the hell? If it gets any worse, let it. If it gets better, then that’s okay, too. I have a remedy for every nightmare. This is my passion, my life-giving essence. I am a woman to behold. I am Rayleigh Dear. Awesome and angelic. Powerful and extreme. I am honey and water, sugar and candy. I am sunshine, stardust, and wonder. I am budding with life, full of magma.
“Lewis,” I say. “Stay with me. Be with me now because I don’t think I can handle being alone.”
He does not smile. He does not frown. Lewis is looking through my eyes. He sees my every thought. He knows my emotion. He knows everything about me because I don’t have to tell. He knows why I’m going crazy even, and he loves me anyway. That is what he tells me in his look. That is what we both understand. Something else is here. He is voicing my thoughts in his head and sending them back to me.
“I’ve waited for this,” he says. “What man does not want to rescue a damsel in distress?”
Do I really hear this? And why am I surprised when I do? Has he not said and done everything I’ve ever dreamed of?
I don’t quite imagine it like this. I am going crazy because my hope was gone only seconds before, and now I know nothing can stop me, not with Lewis. I am powerful on my own, but I am more powerful with him.
“Light, you will go away with me into the dark,” he says.
I reach out and encircle his midsection with my arms. I put my head against his chest. His arms go up around me. One hand is touching my head, stroking it. I am his precious daughter then—the girl he never had.
“How come you never had kids?” he says.
I feel tears coming. Because I don’t want this to be unreal. I want this to be very real and beautiful and magical. I want this to be the only real thing in my life right now. And I’m afraid it’s not. I never met the right guy. I never thought after thirty that I would. I never thought much of anything, Lewis, and that is why I love you now.
I have always dreamed of having a little girl. I have dreamed of everything...
The tears are coming now. And I don’t understand, but I understand too well.
“How come you didn’t?” I say.
“We tried,” he says. “I seem to be a little…dysfunctional. It’s a little embarrassing.”
My heart swells. My throat is clamped, and I am choking back on emotion. I squeeze my eyes shut and embrace him harder. His chest under my cheek is firm and strong, his chin and hand against my head, cradling my maddened brain. Drops of wet fall on my raven black locks. He’s crying. That’s what it is, and again, the world has dropped away from us. We are the only things in existence. We are miraculous and divine. We shed tears for humanity. We are inescapable.
I wonder how this life can get any crazier. I wonder who we all are and why it has to be this way. I wander my way toward nothing at all, and I am living in a world that doesn’t exist. I am locked in a world of stars and creativity. This doesn’t have to be the end of things. It can be the beginning of every beautiful thing. I have heard and dreamed of things being obtained through impossibility. There is no hectic playground to run through in my glamorous attire. I cost a million dollars! I can’t wait for spring!
In the beginning, there was Rayleigh Angelica Thorn. There is Lewis Malcolm Chase—an extraordinary individual with all the right things to say. He is not a figment of my imagination. He, too, is stardust, sunshine, and wonder. The story has no beginning and no end. It never did. It simply goes on forever. There is justice in that, no matter what happens. No matter how tragic or sad, how it looks in the end is always good.
“Lewis,” I say. “Are you real? Do we begin now or end?”
“We do both,” he says. “You think too much. You just need to let go. Figure that we’re still here, and that I found you. I knew right away when your father asked me to dinner…I knew my life was going to change.”
“How could you know that?” I say. “I didn’t know.”
“But you know now,” he says.
I want him now more than ever. I want his skin against mine. I want to be beautiful to him in every way. I am not a reward or a gift. I am his passion, his inspiration, and drive. I live for him, and he lives for me. I am his eternal bride. He is my companion of the cosmos. Eternity cannot be measured between us because we are eternity. There is no nightmare that believes in me. I do not believe in it anymore. You are my paramour. You are magic ink.
I tell him this:
“You are magic ink,” I say to him.
“Watch me appear,” he says.
“I don’t want another day to start. I don’t want to eat another
meal, see anyone else. I want only this moment here with you. I want this to be eternity—this moment—now.”
He kisses the top of my head, taking one lock and brushing it behind my ear as gently as possible. The sensation sends shivers through my body. His chest heaves with every breath. He wipes tears from his eyes. He is a silent weeper. He makes no sound except for the occasional sniffle. He’s the kind of man who looks absolutely normal when he cries, only he is wiping wet from his cheeks. He wants to be closer to me than anyone else, and he is. And I am closer. We are together and closer. This is the magic I’ve been waiting for. This is real. This is not imagined. Through the hell and horror, I wonder how that’s possible. But I have been looking for it. I know that now. He wishes he could live inside my skin, be in my brain, and know every thought and emotion, and I wish I could do the same. I want to take this slow and savor every extraordinary second. I want life to be on pause forever.
I pull away and look deeply into his eyes. I see myself in him. And I know and understand more in that moment than I have understood anything in my life.
“I am not really such a horror girl,” I say, and finally he smiles.
“I know,” he says. “But I like you anyway.”
I close my eyes and put my lips to his. I am still holding him, and he is still holding me. I have to get on my tippy-toes to make sure it’s not awkward for him. He leans in, and I feel the warmth of his face and lips. I can still feel the pressure of his lips on mine. Even when we part, when he is not with me. When he is playing the piano, I will still feel the pressure of his lips. It is a feeling I’ll always have, a sensation where I can simply close my eyes and return to again and again. Much like magic words. He is always with me.
I am swirling, but not in chaos. A sensation of electricity, vibrancy, and current surrounds us. His heart is beating fast. Mine is doing the same. We are with each other, making it powerful. Carmilla is not here, no ghost of a child. An empty space occupies where they used to be.
I want to be inside and under, against, around, and wedged within his skin, his mind, his imagination, belief, and philosophies.
He pulls away from me and says, “I never thought that not breathing would feel so good.”
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