by Nina Malkin
The question is, as his loose-limbed strut and mock-drunk reels grow increasingly reckless: Does he?
XLVII
Think about it. I am. Sin comes crashing back into this world to find the girl he loves in someone else’s arms. Days later he discovers himself doomed by a pledge he can’t recall making. Every minute since his return has been dredged in disappointment and pinioned by madness. Do acrobatics without a net really seem such a strange choice for him now?
Could he be so unhappy that flouting fate above jagged rocks and roaring water appears to be a viable option?
I flash on our friends. All they see is Sin being Sin—and they’re digging it. Sin the daredevil, adding to his repertoire of risk. But what do they really know—nothing. What do they really care—nothing. The only true empathy I get right now feels like a bug in my ear as I catch Antonia watching, veiled terror in her storm-horizon eyes. Of course, she would be afraid.
On her side of the fissure, she had Sin on lock through infinity.
But here, might he be fallible, might he be able to escape her—through death? Icky, that she and I should share a fear—but then again, we share a love. Initially, then, Antonia’s anxiety heightens mine; only now, all at once, with a ragged, unbidden laugh—my breath shaking free of my throat—I lose it.
Sinclair Youngblood Powers loves life. Not eternal life, immortal life, reasonable facsimile of life—but real life. If life is what he’s got right now, he’ll live it to the limit, yes. But trifle with it, abuse it, take it for granted? Never. If Sin is alive, he is blessed, and no one knows it more than he. So I laugh with relief and I laugh with assurance as my boy cartwheels the length of the rail to dismount right in front of me.
“There’s a series of lesser falls yonder,” he announces to all, not the least bit winded by his extra-extra exertions. “If anyone should care to forge on.”
I care to. You bet I do. “Sounds cool,” I say. Murmurs of assent ensue, though some a bit hesitant. Duck in particular looks like he’s had enough activity for one day. And Antonia, well, if she had her way, she and Sin would be sitting on a blanket in the field, alone. But we all go along—pausing only when Sin slips under the rail to divert from the main trail.
“A shortcut,” he says.
There’s minimal debate about whether or not to continue, but I’m right behind Sin, and ultimately they are too. The path we take is rugged and even steeper—plus I’m sure elements of overgrowth are poison ivy, poison oak, or poison something.
Concentration keeps us quiet as we make our way, each to our own thoughts, though when mine wander to the one absent from this expedition, I realize Marsh must be musing the same sad way, and Duck, too. Crane. The collective mood lightens when we hear a lilting gurgle in three-part harmony. Before us, our reward: a trio of smaller cascades that strike my fancy as the sirens myth, singing while brushing their hair.
Across from these falls, a wide, flat expanse of rock—shaded and sheltered from view. We gather there and marvel, still not saying much; some splendor defies language. Anything I could tell Sin—how amazing this all is, how much I appreciate his bringing us here—isn’t necessary. He knows. Glancing toward him, I find his eyes already on me.
“There’s more,” he says quietly after a while.
“I believe I’ll stay,” Duck says dreamily, prone on the stone, cheek pillowed on beefy biceps. “I’m explored out.”
“That might be wise.” Sin’s gaze sweeps off and down. “This next bit is somewhat tricky.”
“I’ll stay too.” Marsh is stretched out next to Duck, still hypnotized by the sparkling spill. “But you’ll come around this way to get us, right?”
“Of course,” Sin assures her.
Which is when a weird thing happens. Here’s Pen and Tosh, all set to join us, and then they don’t. Do I see Pen tug Tosh’s belt loop? Do I watch them exchange a flurry of silent communiqués? Maybe, or maybe I imagine it—but they’re not coming.
As to the persistent gray mouse in the pink espadrilles? I don’t know. I don’t pay attention. The trek begins with a slight upward grade, and then, suddenly, there’s a sheer drop. For Sin it’s like stepping off a box. For me, stepping off a skyscraper. He leaps down and looks up at me. My look says no way. So he takes a moment to survey the rock wall, patting and plumbing it.
“Aha, yes, this will work” I hear him say with confidence.
“Dice, come here. I’ve found a couple of chinks.” Skeptically I near the rim. “A couple of what?”
“A ladder. Of sorts. Listen to me, this is what I want you to do . . .”
The instructions are so simple. Support myself with my upper-body strength while dangling my entire lower body off the edge of the earth. Then fit my toe into this small indentation he’s spied. After which he’ll direct my other leg toward the next notch, and so on, until he can reach up and guide me the rest of the way. There is of course no way this will ever happen. Unless I trust him completely. Which I do. Lo and behold, I’m down.
I turn around and we are close. We are alone. We are breath on breath. And he knows why I’ve come with him—that it has nothing to do with yet another collection of hidden waterfalls.
He knows I would come with him anywhere. Even places he wouldn’t want me to enter, to wit the mysterious void that kept us apart for six months. He also knows what will transpire next—and so do I. He is going to look at me, and then he is going to say my name, and then he is going to take me . . . take me . . . take me back.
Except . . . “It’s not much further,” he says, his voice so hoarse, so low. “There is a place . . . I want you to see . . .” When he takes my hand, I feel like we’re already there. Then we actually come upon it. Eden. Has to be. We’ve gone deep to the bottom of a canyon, falls on either side, each one with a slightly different cadence, a slightly different song. Ferns and mosses feed on the stone, while vines and ivy tangle and sway like euphoric folk dancers. At our feet a brook flows merrily and yet travels nowhere—since this, after all, is paradise. There’s nowhere else to go.
For a moment we stand, existing for each other. Only this, only us. Sin lets go of my hand to cup my face, and then he is kissing me. We are lost and found, and nothing—time, space, imperative, eternity—can keep us apart.
XLVIII
One of these days, I’m going to get dressed. I mean dressed: Starting with stockings, two of them—forget tights, I’m talking the kind that clip onto garters. Over the undies, some sort of snug, silken slip. Followed by a dress, or possibly a suit and blouse—either way there will be buttons involved, a plethora.
Certainly a zipper, at least one. And a belt. Maybe even a bow, at the throat or at the back. The shoes will also require a closing mechanism, laced up or ankle strapped—no pump, no loafer, no mule. The rationale for all this fastidious layering and fastening? An interview or audition? Dinner at the poshest place to commemorate some milestone or achievement? No.
The sole purpose in getting dressed is to be undressed, by him, slowly, for however long it takes.
Of course I intend to return the favor. For he will also be dressed. As in dressed. Each item fitting superbly, the sum of the parts giving me a small gasp at the sight of him. Then, passion balanced by patience, I’ll attend to necktie knot and cuff link cross, buttons, buckle, shirtfront, fly. Employ deft digits, one article at a time, kneeling when necessary, circling him as is my pleasure, relishing the task, leisurely but not lazily, all the way to completion.
Will I go first, keeping everything on till he’s entirely undone? Or vice versa, submit to my own delicious undoing and then take to him wearing only a smile and some earrings?
Or maybe we’ll take turns, call-and-response disrobing, piece by piece by tossed-aside piece.
Or maybe not. Maybe neither of us will ever deign to put clothes on again. We’ll live in the haven of the canyon, and if by chance I ever come upon the soft bit of fabric he now guides gently over my belly, my breasts, my face, and away, I’l
l view the faded artifact and wonder what one did with such a thing.
In fact, as he observes me briefly against the sumptuous natural backdrop, my entire past wavers, recedes—here and now is all there is.
Closing on me for another kiss, Sin finds between my breasts another man’s talisman. His fingers curl around the warm silver circle. The clasp imprints the skin where the base of my neck meets my uppermost vertebra. There’s pressure as he looks from his fist to my soul, and for a second I think he’ll break the chain, send Saint Michael into the churning current.
Then he releases the amulet—conceding, I guess, that there’s evil he cannot protect me from. He mustn’t let his ego interfere with anything that might keep me from harm.
So now he returns to tender, finding places to kiss as uncharted as our idyll. The off-center peak of my hairline, the contours of my suprasternal notch. I’m exploring, too, across terrain that shivers and hardens and swells. As to language—
explanations, propositions, defenses—it’s as obsolete as my discarded T-shirt. The only sounds that matter are the rushing water, the rustling of creatures in league with our love, our own breath and sighs.
Except what’s that? A terrible sound that begins from above and comes toward us at speed. So we separate, look up. Crashing through the brush, bouncing off the crags, plummeting, unstoppable, down the steep canyon wall, too fast to see beyond a blur. Until it hits the bottom. Then we do see, all too well.
Antonia has landed facedown in the rocky brook bed. Clearly, she is broken. Utterly still. Shattered limbs at impossible angles.
The brisk current is the only thing that moves, Sin and I staring frozen at the contorted body.
“I should . . . collect her,” he says finally, and we both draw to the bank. He steps into the stream and lifts her with the effort of picking up a dish rag. She is limp in his arms, her neck in his elbow crook, her arms and legs cold cooked noodles. As he carries her past me, I see sightless, gelid whites in her head, irises sunken far into her skull. Antonia is dead.
But we already knew that. And those darned dead, they don’t die twice. So it should come as no surprised when the jerks and jolts begin, rebooting whatever diabolical impulses keep Antonia animate on this side of existence. Her arms lock around Sin with a spasm, eyeballs falling into place. “Oh, Sinclair . . .” Her voice like tin, her will like iron. “I do love you so.”
I find my T-shirt and pull it back on as Sin sets Antonia back to her feet. The look the dead girl gives me turns my blood to gasoline.
It’s a killer climb up the canyon. There are moments I want to stop, and I do stop. Then I keep on going. Concentration is key—if I lose my grip on an outcropping or trip on a root, I’ll take a tumble, and unlike Antonia, I won’t get up. Which is exactly what she wants.
I don’t know how much Antonia saw of Sin and me on the bank, but it changed her, penetrating the glassine surface of her insanity, reaching its squishy, vulnerable core and smacking it, hard. I’m not some bimbo on the picnic grounds she can scare away with a stunt. For the first time, Antonia actually perceives me as a viable rival. The look she gave me by the river’s edge—the dull, dead, impenetrable stare, lead-based paint on a weapon of mass destruction—cannot be misconstrued.
So I’m careful, very careful, as I pick my way out of paradise.
I pause to catch my breath and regain my game face. Because the truth is, I’m afraid. And I can’t let Antonia see that.
It’s not till we hook back up with the others and head toward the field that I notice she’s changed physically, too. Always sort of clumsy, now thanks to the fall, she lumbers with a stiff lurch, her pelvis out of whack, the left shoulder slightly higher than the right, her spinal column askew so it looks like she’s craning to hear something. I flash on her staggering along to “Here Comes the Bride” and it sparks a giggle. Antonia sends her awful eyes my way, but I keep my composure, fear masked by mirth. My own step, lighter and unencumbered, allows me to sail past her.
Soon as we’re in the car, heading back to Swoon, Marsh and Duck pounce.
“Start talking,” Marsh says. “What happened? Between you and Sin . . . and her.”
Duck doesn’t even bother turning on the radio. “And don’t leave anything out,” he says. “We’re just dying to know!” Dying. Unfortunate word choice, but I get the point. Only how to tell them? What happened? Nothing but everything.
The most wonderful thing that could possibly happen—and the most terrifying. I’m crazy in love; I’m scared out of my wits.
I lean between the two front seats and look from one friend to the other—can they read the messed-up message in my eyes?
“The good news is,” I start, “Sin and I . . . we sort of . . .kissed and made up.”
Marsh gives a little yelp. “You kissed! Does that mean you’re back together?”
Does it? I don’t know. “Well, we were interrupted—that’s the bad news. Our eighteenth-century interloper got a peek, and it didn’t sit very well with her.” I lean back in my seat. “I don’t want to be alarmist, but I need to figure a way out of all this, fast. Because there’s no doubt in my mind: Antonia intends to kill me.”
XLIX
A fireworks display is set for nine on the Swoon village green.
Macy’s has nothing to worry about—I went last year; it’s no big deal. In fact, I think I’ll pass. I like to go, “Ooh!” as much as the next person, but noise and crowds are just what my nerves don’t need right now. Better devote time alone to the latest tweak in the freak show of my life: How to thwart Antonia Forsythe’s plans to do me in.
Which means stop thinking like myself and start thinking like a psycho. Obvious methods—your shooting, your stabbing, your strangulation—are out; surely it would irk Sin if she came at me with those. It’s got to look like an accident. Pinch of undetectable poison in my Cocoa Puffs, perhaps? This notion occurs just as I’m pecking at picnic leftovers. Had Antonia been alone with this stuff? Watch me lose my appetite, then wander out to the porch. Daisy Lane is dead, the falling night serene.
Sitting on the glider, I gaze toward the Leonard house. My cousin seemed psyched about the fireworks, and that makes me glad. Pen’s gained new enthusiasm in general lately, which I chalk up to her anarchist phase actually paying off. At times it seems put on, but I think it’s helping her deal with her issues—including her behavior during Sin’s seductive tenure last fall.
No way could she regain her perky naïveté, but she’s moving forward to discover herself, develop herself, grow up.
As if musing can summon, guess whose headlamps cast their beacon on my driveway. For a moment the car goes dark, then Pen and Tosh debark. Talk about an unlikely twosome. Must be some band business that cannot wait.
“No pyrotechnics for you kids?”
“Seen one crossette, seen ’em all,” Pen says, throwing Tosh a glance. “We wanted to talk to you, if you’ve got a sec.” Uh-oh. Am I mangling lyrics again? Does my stage presence need an extreme makeover? “Sure,” I say. “What about?” Tentatively they check each other. Then, not tentatively, Pen says, “This,” hooking Tosh at the neck and planting a big, fat, juicy one right on his ripe-plum lips. Sliding his arms around her waist, he pulls her in for emphasis. Fireworks? They’re igniting their own.
Then they quit and turn to me.
Some psychic, huh—I never saw it coming. “Uh . . . whoa.” And they say, “Yeah.” Together.
The corners of my mouth shoot up. “Interesting,” I say.
Once she would have been coy; Pen is now candid. “You’re cool with this?”
“Completely,” I say. Because I am. Shocked, sure, what with how Pen trashed the guy from the get. As to Tosh and me, that couldn’t have gone far before fizzling; we’re too much alike to click beyond friends. What I see in them is beautiful. Hope, faith, trust—the trinity in action. They are clearly so into each other; how could I have missed it?
“Good, because we were . . . I was a little wo
rried,” Pen says.
“Tosh told me you two almost . . . more than almost . . . and if you thought . . . because I’ve done some shitty things . . .”
“Pen, please.” I get up and hug her. Then I hug Tosh. Then I hug them both. Hand to heart, I say, “I am utterly ecstatic for you guys.” Yeah, except for the tiny twinge that envies how easy it is for them. All they have to do to be in love is to fall in love.
I sit back heavily on the swing. “Just keep the sickening PDA to a minimum.”
“Definitely.” Pen posts next to Tosh on the porch rail.
“Although, back at you,” she says, leering. “According to Duck, you and Sin are making some PG-13 progress.”
“Oh, that’s true. Sin and me, we’re good. Except for the fact that his bride-to-be wants to murder me.”
“What?” She plops down at my side. “Spill!” Guess Duck didn’t want to bear bad news. Best as I can, I give her the gist. “So I have to be vigilant,” I sum up. “Let’s call it added incentive to figure out how to beat her.” Frustration seeps from me with a sigh. “Sin’s running a ploy of his own. He thinks if she gets a taste of what being with him is really like, she’ll get over him. That’s what all his showing off was about today.”
Pen pfff s. “Right, like that’ll work. Antonia will nuke the nearest organic object, and buh-bye bimbos.” She gets it—that’s a comfort.
“You probably shouldn’t be alone with her, Dice,” Tosh says.
My cousin concurs. “I can come around in the morning when Marsh is at the stables.”