[2014] Ten Below Zero

by Whitney Barbetti

  “You must be Parker.” His words were like a power-packed punch to the heart. “Your name is written on my notebook.” My eyes opened, not without difficulty, and I finally met his eyes. The ice blue irises shined back at me. Eyes that belonged to another person, maybe even another soul. I looked down at the journal in my hands and kept running my fingers over my name. Maybe he had leaked a bit of his soul into these pages. “It’s also written on my chest.”

  I nodded.

  “They say that’s bad luck,” he continued.

  I shrugged and met his eyes. “I had a part of you tattooed on me too.” His eyes lit up with that.

  I suddenly doubted myself. Could I do this? Could I start anew with this Everett? There was such calm between us at this moment, a calm that had never been present in our interactions before. I’d always been a ball of coiled fear, ready to run at a moment’s notice. And after, I’d always been on guard around him, animosity thick in our every conversation.

  “Don’t.” His voice was soft, but his words were firm.

  I let out a heavy breath, releasing some of pressure on my heart. I looked into his eyes again. “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t run.” He narrowed his eyes, as if trying to compel me to stay with the force of his gaze.

  I choked back a sob. He’d said those words to me so many times. Before I could say anything, he spoke again.

  “You’re not wearing the right shoes anyway.”

  The sound that came from my mouth was half sob, half laugh. My heart simultaneously ached and swelled. Could my Everett, my dark, funny, intense Everett, still exist without the memory of when we met? I had one true test. I lifted my eyes to his again. He was staring at me, but I didn’t itch under his gaze this time. I ached for it, I relished it.

  I leaned forward. “It’s rude to stare.”

  One side of his lips lifted up in a smile. I sent up silent prayer to hear the words I hoped to hear.

  God listened. Everett was still my Everett.

  “I never claimed to be anything else.”

  Epilogue

  10 months later

  It was probably a dumb idea. I knew that. But it was worth trying. Or, that’s what I told myself when I landed in Denver and waited in baggage claim for him after an early morning flight from California.

  I looked around, looked at the people mulling around, waiting for baggage and hugging their loved ones. I ached a little bit. I ached all the time. I missed the Everett that lived in my memories. The Everett that lived now was in so many ways the same Everett. He still said rude things just to make me laugh. But he was confused a lot. I tried not to push him. I stuck around through his first round of chemo before heading home to California. Everett stayed in Texas, with his sister. She took him to his chemo appointments and to the gym as often as possible. The surgery had weakened him, but he was practically back to normal. His memory of me was still absent, and that stung a little bit. Especially when he remembered his life before me.

  He’d called me from Texas a few weeks after the surgery and asked me if I knew Charlotte. His memory had left off being with her. I tried not to make gagging sounds in the phone, so all I said was, “Trust me, you don’t like Charlotte.”

  Everett, to his credit, was committed to me. In the only way he really could be. He called or texted me daily. He asked me questions and I did my best to answer him. He read the notebook where he’d written things done, so he knew a lot of things about me that the Everett pre-surgery had known. He’d made comments on the picture he drew of me on the first page, the one of my profile, my head back, my lips slightly open. I’d laughed when he made the comments, saying how ‘hot’ it was. Once in a while, I flew out to Texas to visit him, but there was still emotional distance between us.

  To be clear: we hadn’t kissed. I knew Everett wanted to. But he seemed to respecting whatever it was that was holding me back. And the only thing holding me back was his memory. I was desperate for him to remember. I wanted that look he’d given me, the look with feeling. I wanted it more than anything. And I was still holding onto a shred of hope that he’d remember someday.

  And that’s why I was sitting in baggage claim after claiming my keys from the rental car company. My eyes searched the crowd for him. His hair had grown out again, though he kept it shorter than it’d been when we first met.

  I missed the long hair. I missed a lot of things. And I tried my damnedest to push it from my head, to focus on what was important. Everett was alive. And he was strong. And he’d listened to me, when I’d made my emotional plea before leaving him in New Orleans.

  So when I saw him emerge through the doors into baggage claim, my heart skipped a beat. And I walked towards him, my heart in my throat and my eyes shining.

  “Parker,” he said, holding his arms out. I went into his arms. This was my favorite place. He still felt the same to me, even if he didn’t feel the same for me. “You haven’t been hugged enough.” It was something he’d read in the journal, but each time he said it, a fresh wave of tears started.

  I pulled away first. “I have the keys to our Jeep. You ready?”

  He angled his head towards the baggage carousel. “I just need to grab one bag.”

  “Oh, of course,” I said, motioning him along. When he walked away, I missed Everett the asshole.

  Everett had written a lot about me in the journal. But he didn’t write about Picketwire Canyon or our tattoos. I wasn’t sure why. He’d written about the Four Corners, about meeting Mira in Colorado, about how I’d kissed him with feeling in Texas. But it was as if an entire chunk of the journal was missing. He’d left his descriptions of each time we’d had sex, which was embarrassing for Everett to tell me about. It felt like a stranger was reading about our more intimate scenes. But I tried hard. I tried to accept Everett now. I tried not to mourn the Everett who remembered me. But it hurt.

  Everett and I met up with the caravan for our trip through the canyon. We stopped at the petroglyphs first. I watched Everett look at them, waiting to see if he made the same comments the first time. He didn’t. He just nodded and we returned to the vehicle, my heart a little heavier in my chest.

  When we stopped for the arch, my heart started thundering. I grabbed my camera and walked around the car to Everett. “Let’s go,” I said impatiently. I reached for his hand instinctually and he clasped it. We looked at each other and our hands for a second. Everett scrunched his brow. It was the first time we’d held hands since I’d left him in New Orleans. But it felt right, right with the moment. So I tugged him, pulled him along with me.

  As expected, everyone clambered up to the arch but I pulled Everett to the view that meant so much to me. “Don’t look at the arch,” I said.

  “You’re so bossy sometimes,” he muttered.

  “Get over it,” I muttered back. This was off to a great start – with Everett calling me bossy and my temper short. “See this?” I asked, gesturing towards the valley in the canyon, the river that cut through it. “This is the Purgatoire River.”

  “Purgatoire.” Everett tasted the word and looked at me with confusion. “Like purgatory?”

  He was screwing up my speech. It was very Everett of him. “Yes. The Spanish explorers came through here first and their men had a rough time, so they called it a version of ‘The River of Lost Souls in Purgatory’. And French explorers came through and renamed it the Purgatoire River, their name for purgatory. And then Americans butchered the pronunciation so they call this the Picketwire Canyonlands.”

  “Slow down, Parker,” Everett said, looking at me like I’d grown three heads. “I didn’t know I’d be getting a history lesson.”

  I gritted my teeth. I wanted to yell, “You imparted all that knowledge on me, asshole!” but I kept my mouth shut and breathed in through my nose. “Everyone comes here to look at the arch,” I continued, using my thumb to gesture behind us. “But I like this view myself.”

  Everett looked back at the arch and then at the view in fro
nt of us. “I agree. I’d rather look at this than the arch.” I wasn’t getting what I wanted from him. I grabbed his hand again. He looked down at our clasped hands and up at me.

  “What is purgatory to you?”

  Everett studied me a minute, opened his mouth to say something but then closed it. Something was working its way behind his eyes. “A place to cleanse your soul before being admitted to Heaven.”

  My heart leapt. “Yes,” I said animatedly. “One last stop before forever.”

  Everett was staring at me. I couldn’t read his expression, but I wanted to continue. “Come,” I said, pulling him up to the arch. Everett jumped up on the ledge below the arch first and reached his hands for me, helping me up.

  “Hey,” I called to a person that was taking photos of the view. “Can you take a photo of us?”

  The older woman in her khaki hat nodded and took the camera I tossed down to her. I blew out a breath and turned my head to Everett. I wrapped an arm around him and took his hand and pulled it on my lap, clasping it firmly in mine. My blood roared in my ears. My heart thudded painfully in my chest. I put my lips to his ear. “Everett, look out. Over the canyon, at the river. Look at all of it. Look at this view as this woman takes a photo of us.” I squeezed his hand. “Everyone who sees this photo will see us, underneath this arch. But when you look at the photo,” I swallowed emotion. “When you look at this photo, remember the canyon, the water, and all the beauty in front of us.” I blew out a breath. “When you look at this photo, remember looking out at purgatory with me. While everyone else was looking at the arch, we were looking at that.” And then I closed my eyes. A tear slipped, reminding me of how I’d felt when Everett had said those words to me. The fact that I’d felt at all. One year ago, we’d sat on this ledge together and I’d fallen in love with Everett. I ached for that moment. I mourned it. I mourned the Everett who’d taught me to live.

  The hand in mine on my lap squeezed once. Then again. Then once more.

  Three times.

  I opened my eyes and saw Everett staring at me. His eyes were red, but soft. And his brow was furrowed. “Parker,” he said, with recognition. With feeling.

  “Everett,” I said back. His name was strangled with fresh tears. Tears on top of tears. He touched my hair, slid a hand down my face, looking at me as if seeing me for the first time in forever, and then he cradled my face and kissed me.

  It’d been a year since I’d felt his lips on mine. I’d thought about testing it after his surgery, to see if kissing me would reignite his memories. But I’d waited, stubbornly, hoping against all hope that he’d remember. That I’d kiss the Everett I’d fallen in love with.

  I knew, from the way his lips pressed mine and by the feel of his thumb on my cheek, that this was that Everett.

  I pulled back first and put my hands on his face. “You remember?” I asked on a choked sob, hardly able to see him through the tears.

  He nodded, his thumbs on my chin. “Parker,” he said again.

  I brought my hands up to his wrists and squeezed. “I’m so happy,” I said, laughing and crying from relief.

  “You’re laughing,” he said, tilting his head to the side. “It sounds so weird.”

  I laughed and squeezed his wrists again. “You’re still an asshole.”

  “I am,” he confirmed. He blew out a breath, eyes wincing. “It’s coming back to me so quickly. I can hardly keep up.”

  “It’s okay,” I said, wrapping my arms around his upper back. His arms wrapped around me and he hugged me, tightly.

  “I’m so sorry,” he muffled against my hair. He ran a hand down my hair, a move that was as familiar as it was deeply comforting.

  “Don’t be. Oh, Everett.” I couldn’t stop crying. “I’m so glad you’re back. I’ve missed you.”

  Understatement of the year.

  He held me while our hearts beat, for several minutes at least. Suddenly, as if a particular memory returned, his hand touched my ribs, where my Purgatoire tattoo was. “Why did you wait so long to bring me here?” he asked.

  “I wanted you to be well enough to come.”

  He shook his head. “Did you get the box?”

  My mind went to the box, the one still sitting in the corner of my bedroom, unopened. “Yes,” I said, “but I didn’t open it.”

  “Why?” he asked. “No wait,” he said, holding up a hand. “I get it. But in the box are the Picketwire Canyon pages from my journal. And the photos.”

  “Photos, as in plural?”

  “I took a lot of photos of you, when you weren’t looking. I asked Bridget to send that box to you. I hoped you’d understand the reason, and bring me here in case it would trigger my memory.”

  “Huh,” I said. “I feel kind of bad I never opened it.”

  “You could have saved yourself all this heartache, all this pain.” He brushed my hair from my face.

  “I don’t mind the pain so much,” I said. “I’ve found pleasure in the pain.”

  Everett smiled at me. “Good. It’s good to feel.” His fingers tugged on my hair. I smiled, a real smile.

  “Smiles suit you. You should wear them more often.”

  “You suit me.”

  Everett hopped down from the ledge and put his hands up to catch me, as he had the first time. He pulled me to him for a hug. I clung tightly to him, thankful for the gift. Thankful for the Purgatoire River. Thankful for a text message that was sent to the wrong number. Thankful to feel, to be healed and broken at the same time by Everett.

  “You’re cold,” he murmured. It was early June and early in the day, so I did have a slight chill.

  “Ten below zero?” I asked.

  “Nah,” he said, pulling back and kissing my forehead. “Colder than that.”

  I laughed, pressing into him, into this kiss. Relishing this connection.

  Everett pulled back and stared into my eyes, the way he had before. His hands clasped mine.

  “Are you in love with me yet?”

  I smiled. “Unfortunately. Are you in love with me?”

  In answer, his hands squeezed mine. Three times. With each squeeze, he mouthed three words. “I. Love. You.”

  THE END

  Bonus Scene

  Everett’s POV – the Picketwire Canyonlands

  We were standing directly next to one another as I pointed out the petroglyphs. A few times, I looked over at Parker, watched her take it in. I wanted to peek inside her mind, to see what she was thinking.

  She’d asked me earlier, at the gas station, how I was feeling. I’d told her I didn’t know. It was true, to some degree. More accurate was that I didn’t have words for this. In the span of a few days, she’d become someone I felt complex things for. All of that had come to a head the night before, when she’d cleaned my wounds in the bathroom of the hotel. And later, when I’d had the nightmare of the man that knocked Parker down. I’d stupidly tried distancing myself from her earlier that morning, pissed to be feeling anything for her.

  And so I’d continued being an asshole earlier this morning, telling her to kiss me like she meant it. I was selfish, there was no other way to explain it. I pushed her and pulled her, ignored her and overwhelmed her. I knew I confused her, but I didn’t give a damn. I wanted her to feel. It was as simple as that.

  She turned to look at me, her eyes searching. I almost said something before one of the tour guides interrupted my thoughts, tore my eyes away from staring at her. “Now, you can find petroglyphs in many national parks around the country. Take the Grand Canyon for instance, has anyone been there?”

  I hesitated only a second, glancing quickly at Parker. My lips curved as I spoke. “We were there a couple days ago.” I felt her eyes on me.

  The tour guide nodded, encouraging me to continue. “Did you explore it?” he asked.

  I looked back at her, looking forward to what was about to happen. I aimed a thumb at her. “No. Parker called it a big hole in the ground, so we didn’t stick around.”


  Like I expected, her eyes shot to mine, wide eyed with shock. I couldn’t help but smile back. She self-consciously looked around, before she turned back to me and glared. “You’re an asshole, Everett,” she said, her cheeks coloring the most beautiful shade of red. My arm moved of its own volition, wrapping around her shoulders and pulling her closer to me.

  “Do you love me yet?” I whispered, my breath at her ear. I felt my heart thud in my chest and the words I’d spoken became weighted as I realized what I wanted her answer to be. Shock pooled in my veins then, but I didn't let go.

  She shoved away from me, muttering “Definitely not,” as she walked back down to the car.

  The thud in my chest became a punch, a solid one. I winced a little, not expecting my body’s reaction to her answer. I knew I was an asshole. Part of my reason for being an asshole was because it was easier to be one, to keep people at arm’s length. I was dying. I had to deal with the disappointment my mother and sister felt every time I told them I was taking this final journey.

  But the bigger reason I was an asshole was the cancer. The surgery years earlier had removed the tumor and my tact. Gone was the Everett that had been the life of every party. In his place was me, this person who spoke harshly, sometimes by choice and other times because it was in my nature.

  The funny thing was that with my mother and my sister, I was very mindful of how I spoke. Careful not to hurt. But with Parker? I didn’t censor myself as much. I very much wanted to hurt her. To know that I could, because then she’d have to admit that she too was feeling whatever it was that was building between us. If I could hurt her, pull her from her tomb of indifference, then she was feeling something. And not just something, but something for me.

  When we reached the stopping point for the arch, I collected my thoughts as I grabbed the camera from my backpack in the backseat. Parker went ahead of me, with the group up to the arch. I watched her for a moment, so completely committed to keeping her thoughts locked inside that head of hers that I nearly forgot what my mission was.