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 Posted: Thu Oct 25, 2018 1:29 pm
 The Sweetest Thing: Catching Up
He sat on a metal bench long heated by the full sun, cooled only by the dip in the late afternoon temperatures. Rhedefre’s knees were dirty from sliding in the dirt of baseball diamond, his curls wet on the nape of his neck and beneath his ballcap from sweat. Mid-fall baseball was a singular pleasure of life, he thought; baseball under red and brown and yellow leaves, with a tinge of chill in the air, with a breeze that cooled sweat and gave new breath to breathless lungs. He took a long drink from a plastic water bottle and set it down by his feet.
He leaned back and tilted his face to the sun, eyes closed, his arms spread in a T over the bench’s backing. He relaxed into the gentle caress of the rays, his shoulders sinking.
“Cesc?”
His eyes opened. He turned his head and dropped one arm from the bench as he straightened unconsciously.
The girl who’d spoken his name stood a few paces away, her posture uncertain. She had dark hair pulled into a bun, wearing an oversized sweater with thumbholes. She licked her bottom lip and swallowed.
“You probably don’t remember me,” she began. “I used to go to the, uhm, to Vermillion—“
“You don’t have to reintroduce yourself, Jackie,” Cesc interrupted. He half-stood but she held out a hand that arrested his movement.
“No, it’s—“ She stopped, laughing self-consciously. “I mean, yes, I am Jackie. It’s nice that you remember me. I just meant, you don’t have to get up.” She pulled at the hem of her sweater in a gesture that felt strangely nostalgic to Rhedefre. “I just… wasn’t sure that was you.”
“You haven’t seen me in a long time,” concluded Cesc.
“I haven’t. The last time, uhm…” Jackie pulled a face, squinting one eye almost to closing. “I’m sorry about that last time. If you remember it, I mean.”
Rhedefre pulled himself up, laughing. “I do remember it, yes. Don’t apologize. I made things awkward.”
“No, I made things awkward,” said Jackie. “It was dumb of me. But, like… the last time, I thought maybe I was misremembering you, you know? Like… more chest… than I remembered. But when I saw you now, I just…” She waved at his legs, her breath hitching as words continued to spill out of her. “It’s just, I just realized you must’ve done something to get those, or grew, or whatever.”
“I won them in a bet,” replied Cesc, tapping his knees. “Second-hand, but still good.”
Jackie laughed in spite of herself, and some of the tension dropped from her posture.
“I knew it was you,” she said. “That there wasn’t another guy with pink hair and antlers who likes baseball.”
“That’s a rather detailed description,” agreed Cesc. “What are you doing these days?”
“Just, like, making the rounds,” she said. “Making old acquaintances uncomfortable, I guess, is what I’m doing now?”
Cesc nodded gravely—and then broke into a grin. He slid down the bench and motioned for her to sit.
“No, really,” he insisted. “What are you up to now?”
Jackie hesitated for a moment and then sat. She set down her backpack and looked at him, her eyes on his face for a beat longer than polite conversation would have allowed. Cesc was, by now, used to this from those who had not seen him in some time. He himself would not have said he was so changed—he did not look at pictures of himself in his Freihood, so he had only his own memories to guess at, but he would have said that, minus some shallow changes, he was rather the same as ever he’d been.
Jackie would not have agreed with this internal monologue. There was stubble she did not recognize, sure, but also an easiness to that long-legged posture, and something in the glint of the good-natured eyes she did not know from the eager earnestness she’d once known. She felt dwarfed as she sat beside him, like she could have tucked comfortably into his chest under the crook of his arm. The old feelings seeing him blew the dust from never had never quite had that compulsion.
“Sorry,” she said, breaking the silence. “You just look a little different.”
“I’m a lot taller.”
Jackie smiled. “That, too, yeah.”
“I asked, what’ve you been up to?”
“That’s right! I’m sorry, that’s so rude of me.”
“Not at all. You look different, too. Didn’t gain any limbs, or anything, but still.” Cesc smiled. “Grown up, I guess.”
“That’s how I’d put it,” she said. “Grown up! I was trying to think of what to say.”
Cesc laughed. “You could have just said I was uglier.”
Jackie laughed again, but this time a flush accompanied the sound, and she dropped her eyes to the ground. Sucking in a breath, she shifted gears: “I’m at Gambino U, actually, going to graduate this year.”
“Good for you!” said Cesc. “Major?”
“Psychology and education. I want to teach, I think.”
“That’s a great calling.”
“For sure.” Jackie fidgeted. “What about you? What’re you up to?”
“Still work at the bakery. And I take the legs out for some baseball now and then, keep ‘em in working order,” replied Rhedefre. He tapped one thumb against his thigh and drew a breath before continuing: “I’m actually taking some courses at Gambino U myself, believe it or not.”
“Oh, no way! You’re also at GU? What’re you taking? I can’t believe I’ve never seen you around.”
“Me, too. Criminology stuff, mostly. It’s also at night, so that might be why. I help out the PD with missing persons stuff sometimes. Thinking about making it official sometime.” Cesc nodded slowly, reaching at his ankles for his water bottle.
“Wow.” Jackie sat back and looked at him again, but the expression in her eyes changed. “I wouldn’t have guessed that for you, if I’m honest.”
“From when I was a kid making marshmallow pies and entertaining your brother with puppets? Me, too, really.” Cesc took a drink of his water and gave a quiet breath of a laugh. She watched him, her fingers tangling.
“That’s really cool. So… if I’m ever in trouble, I can call you?” she asked with a teasing smile.
“Sure,” Cesc looked up at her as he set down the bottle, gold earnest eyes peeking up from beneath the brim of his ball cap. “By name. I’d insist.”
Jackie broke the gaze. She smiled at the hem of her sweatshirt. “You know, I think—I think you are pretty much the same guy I knew in high school.”
“The exact same,” Cesc corrected.
“No.” Jackie shook her head. “Definitely not the exact same.”
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Posted: Fri Oct 26, 2018 4:22 pm
The Sweetest Thing: Who We Are Now
“You do this every day?” Jackie puffed as she climbed the trail, half-bent over, trying to lurch herself forward without sliding her backpack over her head. Beside her, Cesc walked at what she would call a maddeningly slow pace, his hands infuriatingly in the pockets of his black Nike Dry-Fit half-zip. They walked in the dappled shade of the midmorning, and although the parking lot was not so far away, Jackie already longed to see the cushy inside of her car once more. She’d accepted an invitation to hike without considering the difference in their fitness levels and she was beginning to regret her alacrity.
“Not every day,” Cesc was replying. “When I’ve got the time, I try to come into the woods. I think it’s good for me.”
“I mean, obviously.” Jackie tried to speak evenly, hiding the pace at which her breath was coming into her lungs. She squinted at his easy pace and reached a floppy hand across the space between them to poke his firm side. “Obviously it’s good for you. Can I just say that I never, ever would have guessed you’d become a jock like this.”
“Being in nature is good for everyone! Take your own pace,” Cesc laughed, half-turning toward her, away from her fingers. “And I’ve always been a jock. You just knew me when I was a lot scrawnier.”
“It’s bullshit you’re walking so slow,” she groaned.
“I’m walking at a perfectly reasonable hiking pace. If you need to slow down, you should,” he replied magnanimously.
“Your legs are way longer than mine,” Jackie said. “That’s so unfair.”
“Hey, I didn’t choose them,” said her companion with a shrug.
“Oh, that’s right, you won them in a bet.”
“Horrible gremlin I won them from. I told him not to make them too long.” Cesc turned back toward the trail as it winded around a bend. “Told him with the antlers, it’d just look funny.”
“You do look hilarious,” Jackie laughed, slowing another pace. She succumbed, pressing a hand to the center of her chest, and stopped. The air seemed colder here than it had by the beach, or as she’d gotten out of the car. She swung her backpack around to get a drink of water; Cesc stopped with her and waited, shifting his weight and looking around as she drank.
She waited for his rejoinder, but he was scanning the treetops as if he was looking for something. There was a strange seriousness in his face that pulled his features; the elasticity of his good humor evaporated starkly for that moment.
Jackie watched him as she took another few swallows. His face was different now, she thought, but not so different. It must, she thought, be hard for him to keep that everlasting geniality in his face the way that had seemed effortless back then—that was time doing its own, wasn’t it? She wondered if he traced the contours of her own changes, that her own cheeks were thinner, her eyes brighter, her body also more formed now than it had been then. She’d gone from an awkward child unsure of herself to something she was proud of when she looked into a mirror. Five years were enough to make their changes.
“You know, it’s just really funny,” she said, a note of nostalgia in her voice. “You—when I first met you, you had this thick accent and your, um, what’s it—your words were all jumbled. Syntax. Do you remember?”
“Sorry?” Cesc’s eyes dropped from the treetops to her face. The sharpness was gone so suddenly, her heart beat double.
“I was talking about your voice. Your language.”
“That’s right.” Rhedefre smiled. He put on an accent then, thick and Spanish: “I was to talk like this, un-understanding, yes?”
Jackie smiled, and something old and forgotten fluttered in her chest. “That’s right!” There was delight in her voice. “I—I kind of miss it, honestly.”
“I am sorry then, seniorita,” said Rhedefre in the same voice, a grin playing at the corners of his mouth. The accent faded as he spoke, mid-sentence, as though it were evaporating from his tongue: “But it was that I learned this language, and much of your accent as well.”
“It’s alright. I mean, I’m sure it’s nice for you, anyway,” said Jackie. “To not sound so foreign, and to have… you know…” She gestured to his knees. Cesc laughed and looked down, lifting his sneakered toes as if just noticing them.
“It is nice! All of it. I can’t lie. I don’t miss rummaging around for the right word. I don’t miss floating. Running is much better than floating,” he said. He paused then, considering. “But flying—flying’s still the best.”
“You still have your wings?” She eyed the flatness of his back.
“Of course I do,” he scoffed, as if the invisibility of what he hid was obvious. As he spoke, they unfurled from what seemed to be nowhere, massive and glittering and then immediately gone again. Jackie took a half-step backward and stiffened, her fingers tightening around her water bottle until they were fully disintegrated into the sunlight.
“That’s another nice thing about growing,” he said. “Get a lot of new tricks.”
“That’s…” she began but did not attempt to finish, shaking her head. There was something… disappointing, she decided, about his ability to hide his specialness in those ways. If he dyed his hair, hid his ears and his antlers, wouldn’t he just be normal? That didn’t sound like Cesc, not the Cesc she’d known back then. He’d been proud of himself back then, hadn’t he? Legs and hidden wings and the faded accent… who was trying to scrub Rhedefre of himself?
She replaced her water bottle in her bag and started to walk again, leaving the conversation and her surprise behind her in the trail. He went beside her again, silent as she was, his hands in his pockets and eyes lifted once more.
The path stretched in front of them but they didn’t speak, not for a long moment, not even when a few other hikers passed them laughing and chatting, a dog leaping around their legs. Jackie waited for them to pass with a tight-lipped smile and then continued again, stepping over a tree trunk and gingerly into the mud.
“It’s weird,” she said at last, deciding on her angle. “I forget sometimes. I mean, I even did back then, when I was a kid. That you’re… magic, or whatever. But it’s what makes you, you, right?”
“Mm.” Cesc lifted his shoulders. “I don’t know. Everyone’s just… everyone, aren’t they?” He grinned at his inelegance, wetting his lips. “I mean, it feels like everyone’s got their weird s**t. I guess I know too many Raevans, but I’ve just gotten really… inured? Is that the word? Like, I have a friend who tells me he fought a vampire and I’m like ‘yeah, I know, sounds good.’”
Jackie laughed despite herself. “A VAMPIRE.”
“I wish I were lying.”
“A VAMPIRE!” Jackie’s voice hitched with mirth. “I mean, I know they’re supposed to be around Gaia, but, oh, stop it. You… you guys have really special lives.”
Cesc’s mouth quirked, a quick tension in his jaw. “I bet most of us would trade it.”
“No way.” Jackie shook her head. Her smile slipped. “Stop it. For my part-time job and going to school and hoping I got all my cluster classes so I can graduate and start paying off my debt? The most interesting thing to happen to me in the last three years is when a guy at work ordered 150 sweaters instead of 15.”
“Hey, I have a part time job, too, and I bet the sweater thing was hilarious.”
“Well… actually, it was pretty funny, so bad example. But it’s not vampires, it’s not magic. You should be proud of your lives, even if they’re not that normal,” Jackie pressed, but as she stole a look at Rhedefre, she found him silent, his eyes on the trail, scanning the woods. Was it too much for one of their first conversations? She longed to shake him, to push further—I liked it when you were scrawnier and unapologetically pink and floating and winged—but she stopped herself, reminded herself how long it had been since they were friends, actually, truly friends. She shifted gears.
“A guy did take me out on a date and then Venmo-requested me the money for my drinks when I didn’t put out, does that count? That’s as interesting as my life gets.”
“Holy s**t,” Cesc laughed and turned his head back toward her. “Did you pay it?”
“I did. Is that bad?”
“No way. But ******** that guy.”
“I mean, I didn’t, which was the problem, apparently?”
Cesc’s lips split into a smile and his shoulders shifted to face her as he walked half-sideways. Jackie’s smile began to grow; she hadn’t fully ******** things up, at least. “Geezus. That’s some nonsense. I hope you’re dating better people now.”
She lifted her eyebrows and tightened her lips. “Not, like, NOW, per se… in general, I’ve had some luck, but not too much luck.” She paused. “How about you?”
It came out less casually than she intended, and out of the corner of her eye she saw his head tilt slightly. Studiously, she avoided his gaze, trying to look interested in the bark of a tree they passed.
“I have a girlfriend, yeah,” he said. His voice was even. “Her name is Ulla.”
“Of course you do,” she murmured.
“Sorry?”
“I said, of course you do,” Jackie repeated, louder and with a smile. “I mean, and of course she’s named Ulla, because she should be named something like Adelphus, queen of the mermaids, or something like that.”
“I tried to get Adelphus’ number, but she’s dating Poseidon now,” quipped Cesc. He lifted an eyebrow at her, taking his hands out of his pockets. “I don’t really know why that’s an ‘of course’, though.”
“Because obviously girls are going to line up now,” teased Jackie. “We’re all suckers for long legs and huge…” She eyed him. “…antlers.”
Cesc broke into a laugh, shaking his head and adjusting the ballcap on his head. “Alright! Well, you’re definitely more outgoing than you used to be.”
“Well, I had the confidence of a doormat in high school.” Jackie shrugged. “It took me a long time to get here, but I like where I am. Who I am, I guess.”
“That’s great,” said Rhedefre. His long fingers tugged at the zipper of his shirt, and Jackie saw something like approval in his eyes as he looked over at her. “It does take a while to get there, but it’s worth it, yeah?”
You should be there, too, she thought about saying. Instead, she said: “So show me this Ulla.”
“Sure,” said her companion, pulling his phone out of his pocket and unlocking it. A moment later, he pulled up a picture and handed her the phone, but everything was done while walking, with a disengagement Jackie wasn’t sure a boyfriend should have when showing off his girlfriend. He didn’t stop to see her reaction when she took the device, seemingly expecting her to glance and keep walking as well.
But Jackie did stop, and she did look with curious eyes at the girl in the picture. Tall and long-legged was this Ulla, with the curves of a beauty queen (a beauty queen with Spanx and push-up, Jackie snorted inwardly), a slicked-back platinum-white ponytail and the deep, blemish-free grey-purple skin of a dark elf. She wore makeup that enhanced her pout and fake black lashes to frame her eyes, and her nails were manicured into perfect claws with no chips, no breaks.
Jackie looked at Ulla and bit down the desire to say to Cesc’s broad wingless back, to the pink curls peeking from under the ballcap that hid the rest of his hair, to the easy striding ribbon-free legs: Of course.
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Posted: Mon Oct 29, 2018 2:06 pm
The Sweetest Thing: Plans
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Posted: Mon Oct 29, 2018 4:35 pm
The Sweetest Thing: Desolation Pass
“I hope you’re not afraid of heights,” said Rhedefre, looking over at Jackie with a half-grin. “Because this hike is called Desolation Pass—“ he elongated the ‘s’ sound at the end of the word, like a snake— “not Path.”
Jackie flushed at her earlier mistake. The path, which hitherto had been fairly flat, started to pitch upward, and Jackie realized then that while she’d checked for fairly short hikes by distance, she hadn’t bothered to check elevation. She didn’t know why she’d thought that having done one hike meant she was totally in shape to do others—she was still out of breath, her feet already hurt, and her thighs seized with terror at the idea of having to climb the distance she’d already agreed (not agreed, SUGGESTED!) to do.
Cesc gave her a merciful glance. “We can do something else.”
“No way,” said Jackie, shaking her head. “I saw pictures of this one! It’s supposed to be awesome, right?”
It wasn’t a lie. She had seen pictures on the website, pictures of couples and hipster hikers with manbuns and loose muscle tees standing at the edge of a slender cliff-side arch, high above the preserve trees, holding hands and doing yoga poses. Truth be told, it just made it all the more embarrassing that she hadn’t realized what a climb it was. She’d assumed, novice that she was, that all hikes were just hikes—you just walked and walked and ended up somewhere, didn’t you?—of varying lengths. She hadn’t realized that some, alas, went up.
“It is awesome!” said Rhedefre, and there was a note of pride in his voice that she kept for herself. “I think you’ll like the view on top. But it’ll get you if you’re scared of heights.”
“Well, I’m not,” said Jackie. “And you could probably catch me if I fell, anyway, right?”
Rhedefre laughed. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, ah?”
The day was unseasonably warm, which was nice in one sense because it meant her lungs didn’t ache with every breath she took. But then their strides became longer and stronger, and Jackie began to wish it had been colder as blood circulated through her limbs and sweat started to dampen her clothes.
Worse still, it was all up. She hated walking in front of people, especially on an incline. Thoughts would flood her head—what were things looking like back there? Was anything jiggling? Had her shirt crept up behind her little backpack, glamorously showcasing her back fat and muffin top? Would the person behind her be flooded with images of her chafing thighs smushing against each other as she walked, or the rhythm of her butt flooping from side to side? If she was sweating, would they be downwind of her sweat? It was a crash-course in self-consciousness.
But blessedly, joyously, the path was wide enough to admit two, and Cesc was walking beside her in a pace that matched hers—and he was sweating, too!
“Hotter than I thought it was going to be up here,” he said to her in uneven breath, yanking off his hoodie to reveal a shorter half-zip beneath. His neck was soon wet with sweat, a line of it sneaking from the nape of his neck, from wet curls, to the back collar of his shirt. He unzipped the half-zip slightly, revealing a sliver of collarbone beneath.
“You are human after all!” Jackie gasped cheerily, taking a moment to pause and rest with her hands on her thighs. She caught her breath and pointed at him. “You get out of breath and sweat, too!”
“What?” Cesc began to laugh breathily. He was still standing straight, waiting for her, his hands on his hips as his chest rose and fell. “This hike is pretty hard!”
“Why did you let me choose it?!” she demanded, giggling and heaving and feeling as though she’d never get enough air, trying not to look at the way the path continued to wind ahead of them. “I told you I thought my buttcheeks would make it! Geezus, Cesc, they’re in the ICU!”
“You’re going to hate yourself tomorrow,” said Cesc. His cheeks were rosy and he busied himself with stuffing his hoodie into the drawstring backpack he’d brought with him. He pulled out a water bottle and drank. “Your buttcheeks will, at least.”
“Damn them!” she cried, straightening at last. “I hate this. Why did I do this?”
“You hate it now,” Cesc assured her. “And maybe tomorrow—but not when we get to the top. I promise you that.”
“Ok, ok, okaaaaaaaaay,” Jackie said, trailing him for a moment and then jogging to catch up. “I want to get a picture up there, though. Like the website ones!”
“Those are terrible.”
“They’re Instagram-worthy!”
Cesc shook his head, smiling. He hadn’t worn a hat today, Jackie noticed then, and the morning light wove itself into the unrulier threads of his hair and lit his eyelashes. He turned his gaze toward her and she felt keenly aware of the warmth on her skin, on her cheeks.
“I’ll take one of you,” he said. “Choose your yoga pose and I’ll do it, how about that?”
“You don’t want to take a selfie together?” she teased.
“No part of me wants a selfie on top of Desolation Pass,” he replied. “Zero. Zero part of me.”
Jackie laughed. “Fine. You’re one of those people. The ‘too good for social media’ people.”
“I’m not too good for social media,” Cesc protested. “I have an Instagram.”
“Oo! Look at you! Do you post gym selfies?”
He shook his head with a smile. “I have a friend who does plenty of that for me. I could never compete.”
“I bet you do. Ulla?”
“Not my girlfriend, no.”
“Where is she this morning, anyway?” Jackie needled. “I could’ve gotten one of those snuggly couples pics of you guys atop Desolation Pass. Or is that also a no-go?”
“Nonstarter,” replied Rhedefre. “She’s working.”
“Responsible of her! What does she do?”
“She’s a lawyer,” said Cesc. One of his brows was cocked as he looked at her from the corner of his eye. “Why are you so interested in her?”
“Because she seems interesting,” replied Jackie.
“Got a crush?”
“I’m sure plenty of guys do, but she’s not really my type,” said Jackie, adjusting her backpack, avoiding Cesc’s gaze. He seemed ready to say something else, but didn’t, and it was to her to continue the conversation: “I’m sorry if it bugs you. I’m just curious about your life. You used to be this guy who hung out at a bakery and did really cool bakes and played with kids and I miss a few years and you’re… all grown up, a jock with a girlfriend who loves nature.”
“I always loved nature,” corrected Rhedefre. There was something wry in his expression as he turned toward her. “Jackie, you came to the bakery while I was at work all the time—I didn’t hang out there, I work there. I bake cool bakes because people order cool bakes, not because it’s my favorite thing to do.”
She swallowed, ignoring the pain in her thighs as she struggled to keep up with him; consciously or unconsciously, he was walking a touch faster. “No, I know that. I’m just saying, I don’t know … I’m just trying to get the whole picture.”
“Alright. That’s fair,” said Cesc. “I like nature and Ulla’s a lawyer; I still bake plenty and I babysit now and then for friends with kids.”
“Ok.”
“What about you? You don’t take Noah around anymore, I’m guessing, because he’s too old for that, and you’re an education major at GU.”
“That’s pretty much the gist of it!” said Jackie.
“And you pay the Venmo requests of douchebags who couldn’t hit it.”
“You’ve basically got the entire picture here.”
Cesc slowed to a stop and looked at her, a slight shake in his head. He began to laugh as she straightened and even posed, putting her hands in a V beneath her chin.
“That’s me~!” she sang.
“You’re something else, Jackie,” he murmured, putting a hand to his mouth and dropping it again. “You know that?”
“I’m sorry to pry,” she said earnestly. “I didn’t think I was, but I don’t want to make you uncomfortable or anything.” By asking about your girlfriend, she thought. Why should that make him uncomfortable? He didn’t like the topic much, she noticed—he deflected around it, didn’t gush, didn’t embrace it. Where was the shy smile she’d expected, the glow in his words when he said her name? He was stiffness and discomfort in the name Ulla.
But not in mine, her brain whispered.
When he’d said it, just now… there’d been warmth there. The syllables felt right in his mouth. He’d lost so much of his accent but now and then, at the slurred tip of a ‘J’, she could hear it as it used to be, when it thrilled her as a high-schooler…
She shivered, once, despite the heat.
--
“We’re here,” Cesc said a half-hour later, a few paces ahead of her. He stood at the edge of the thinning trees, waiting for her, a lopsided smile on his face, his hands on the strings of his backpack, his posture straight. The sun spotlit the pathway as it yawned open and stretched, the whole of the preserve below.
It was a staggering sight, and Jackie’s heart quickened as she stepped into the clearing. They were at the end of the hike—their path arched over the treetops below in a slim curve. It narrowed 20 feet ahead to be enough for one brave person but certainly not two, to go across the arch and deep into the woods, maybe another 100 feet away. It seemed impossible that a stone curve, with nothing beneath it, could exist the way it did—a suspension bridge without anything suspending it, held together by ancient rock and pressure. Her palms and feet were slick with sweat thinking about crossing it, but there was a rope and a sign warning hikers not to attempt it. This small approachable stretch, lonely and cut off and barren, certainly deserved its name: Desolation Pass.
There was no fence anywhere but on the archway—anyone could walk right up to the edge of the clearing and look at the sheer cliff drop and the trees below, to feel their toes right up against nothingness. Her heart beat quick and she took a few steps forward, still 10 feet or so from the cliff. She swallowed drily.
The view below made her dizzy. The treetops were so far they seemed like… like… like broccoli, her brain decided on, like little twigs with moss on them in a diorama. It seemed fake, impossible, to be looking down on so much with her feet still on land.
“This is…” she said shakily, and Cesc came up beside her, a hand on her shoulder.
“Are you ok?” he asked, gentle. “You said you weren’t afraid of heights.”
“I’m not,” she assured him, taking a quick breath. She composed herself, passing a palm across her forehead and pressing the backs of her hands to her cheeks. She could not take her eyes off the drop. “I’m not, I promise. It’s just … it’s a lot prettier than I expected.”
He laughed at that, taking a step away and setting his backpack down. He rummaged through, looking for his phone.
A strange thought crossed her mind—a picture of Cesc, his wings forward, beating, powerful, soaring into the expanse. It was nothing to him, the fall, wasn’t that true?
“I can take a picture of you,” he was saying, “if you want.”
“Anyway,” she continued dreamily, not quite listening to him, “if I fell, you could… you could catch me, couldn’t you?”
She peered over the edge. Her feet shuffled as she took an inelegant step forward, toward the cliff face. She was tangled in them, wobbling—
”DON’T—“
In an instant, there was movement—Cesc jerking forward and gripping her side, whirling her around, his fingers strong and warm against her waist. His other hand was on her shoulder, his face suddenly close, so close. His eyes were wide and wild, his skin white, and she could smell his scent, clean sweat and fresh air and laundry.
She gasped and caught her balance against him, one hand fumbled against his chest, beneath the flap of the half-zip, against an expanse of jagged and rough skin on his collarbone. She tilted her head up to him, her mouth hanging open: “I’m sorry, I—“
“Don’t you ever—ever—” He could barely form the sentence, his voice ragged. She could feel the quickquick beat of his heart beneath her hand, thudding against his chest. The light had caught in his eyes—she’d never seen them so close—gold and living and moving, like the roiling surface of the sun. He dragged her two steps further from the cliff drop and then let her go abruptly.
His wings were out, splayed and at attention. The dissolved again, disappeared into the air, as he turned away from her.
He’d been ready, she thought numbly, just in case…
“Don’t you ever do that again.” His voice was stern.
“I didn’t mean to,” said Jackie, small, her hands curled together over her chest. “Really.”
“Don’t—“ said Cesc. He gathered his backpack and slung it over his shoulder, the picture forgotten. His jaw was tight. She noticed a tremble in his hands.
“What was that?” she heard herself say, pointing to her own collarbone. “On your chest—what was that?”
“It’s a scar,” he said, starting back toward the path’s exit. He turned toward her, his mouth tight, and took a half-step forward. There was a jerky restraint in his movements. “Jackie. That wasn’t funny.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I honestly—I slipped.”
“Don’t,” he said again. His eyes found hers and locked, intense and angry. She felt her own heart rate rising, rising, so fast she felt as though she could melt into the ground and stay there. Her cheeks burned. Her steps felt like jello as she went behind him, her feet numb. She took a brief look behind her, at the strange impossible distance of the trees, at the specks that were birds flying to roost within them.
“I’m sorry,” she repeated, hurrying behind Cesc to the safety of the forest path.
And yet, there was a small, whispering, giddy part of her inside that wasn’t.
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Posted: Sat Nov 03, 2018 10:45 pm
The Sweetest Thing: Hell(a)
Jackie was walking with her feet dragging, her head down as she thumbed through her social media. She was aware somewhere deep inside her brain that anyone in a hurry walking behind her probably wished for her death, but, she told herself, those people were jerks and could stand to learn patience. Patience with a girl who hadn’t gotten a text to go hiking in a few days now, who’d typed an apology several times over but deleted it every time, who hadn’t gotten an invitation—well, the invitation she’d wanted—to go out on Halloween.
While her friends had sent her snaps and videos of them in slutty costumes (nurses, rabbits, pirate wenches), she’d opted for something more low-key, something she could’ve bailed on if… something else had turned up.
Well. She’d planned poorly. Something else never had turned up, and while she’d had a perfectly serviceable night at her local bar with some tried-and-trues, she hadn’t gotten what she’d wanted.
Jackie huffed at herself. That sounded so desperate, didn’t it? But it wasn’t like that, she assured her wounded pride. She wasn’t fishing for a man with a girlfriend. What she wanted wasn’t anything untoward, anything weird or grabby. All she’d hoped for was a glimpse into another world, another type of life. What did a Raevan, or Raevans, or…or dark elves for that matter, do on Halloween? Did they even dress up? Did they need to? And was that a weird thing to speculate, or ask? She wanted to know how magic celebrated magical holidays. That’s what she wanted. Just to know. Just to see.
She checked her texts again, just in case she’d missed anything (just a ‘k’ from Angela, ugh, Angela) and shook her head. She was passing a strip of shops and restaurants on the strip, patios usually full but now shut down for the late autumn chill. There were a few people huddled under heaters still eating, willing to scarf down their meals in order to have a little more space than the crowded interiors to some of the spots. Jackie eyed them critically: who wanted to sacrifice the warmth of their food for an empty table?
Her eyes went down the line at those suckers, from restaurant to restaurant as she passed them, until…
Jackie’s eyes almost bugged out of her head. Across the street, two shops down, there was a familiar shape sitting outside under his own heater, dressed in a hoodie and ballcap, bent over his own phone and a bowl. The hair that peeked under the hat was darker than she’d expected (a trick of the light?) but the antlers were a dead giveaway. She jogged a few steps forward in eagerness and then stopped abruptly in a bike lane—what was she going to say? Was she going to seem like a stalker, just hopping up on him like this? He hadn’t reached out and WHOA!
Her indecision caused a bicyclist speeding past to wobble around her, yelling: “HEY!”
Cesc’s head shot up and he turned in his chair toward the noise. His eyes rounded as he noticed her, his brows coming together.
“Jackie?” He called.
Jackie stayed frozen for a moment. Why had she put it out into the universe that she wanted to see him? The universe had provided, and it provided this, this moment where he stared and she stared and the bicyclist went on his merry way, unimpeded. She hoped bitterly that there would be a rock in his path soon.
“Heyyyyy…” she said, lifting a hand. She hustled out of the bike lane and onto the sidewalk beside the restaurant. “Sorry. That guy, uh, I guess he didn’t really see me.”
“I guess he didn’t,” Cesc agreed.
There was a pause that lasted a little longer than Jackie would have liked. Cesc looked around to the door of the restaurant and then back up at her and hesitated, his lips parting but no words coming out. Jackie, likewise, cast about for pleasantries and couldn’t find them; she walked a few steps forward to save him having to crane his neck—but then, impulsively, opened the patio gate and leapt into the seat next to him.
“Hey, uhm,” she said breathlessly. The words spilled out of her in a mad rush, as if they only had one breath to come out in. “I don’t mean to intrude or anything, but I just—I saw you just now and I thought I had to come over and just—just say it, I’m really sorry about the other day. I honestly didn’t mean to do anything stupid up there, I would never put you in that position and I’m so, so sorry it made you uncomfortable and mad—like, I know you’re not just… a helicopter or whatever to swoop in and save people and I sure wouldn’t risk my life to find out. You know? I’m sorry I was being weird. I hope you can forgive me.”
It was mostly the truth, she thought to herself. She did want him to forgive her. She was sorry to have made him angry with her. And she did not mean to play with her own wellbeing. But try as she might in the past few days, she could not feel regret for it, not truly contrite for having caused the worry on his face and his hand on her waist and the feel of his heartbeat, heightened for her, under her palm. She wanted to regret it. She did. But regret had not come.
But as she spoke, Jackie could see a slope return to his shoulders, his fingers unbend around his phone. He breathed, his gaze became less direct. By the end of her speech, he was bobbing his head slowly to her.
“Thank you,” he said, the syllables slow. “You don’t really need my, uh, forgiveness then, you know. I’m sorry I misunderstood and got so mad.” A slow, amicable smile sprouted on his lips. “I know you’re not crazy. I shouldn’t have assumed something like that.”
“No way. I mean, I said that you could catch me like seventy times, so I get it. It’s not safe to be that close to the edge and… I’m just… I’m probably just going to stay away from those kinds of hikes from now on,” she said. Her anxiety left her in a stream that dissipated as quickly as his smile grew, leaving her chest light enough to float.
“Maybe a good call. I don’t want to worry about you getting happy feet while I’m not there to get pissed at you,” said Cesc, looking down at his meal and sloshing a spoon through what, to Jackie, looked like purple sludge.
Jackie smiled. “Yeah, no cliff dancing for me.”
He grinned at her and ate a bite of his purple… soup thing. It drew her attention, for the first time, that he was, in fact, eating at this restaurant, the name of which was emblazoned in white paint and thin letters on the reclaimed wood that made the side of the building: Green City Veg. And not only that, he was eating beside an empty chair that was not actually totally empty, but rather dressed with a small light brown purse.
Reality outside of the fortuitous sight of him was starting to filter in, filling in the blanks as to why, instance, why he was stuck eating purple sludge and had not asked her to join him.
He was not alone.
“But, uh…” Jackie said, starting to rise from the table. “Really, thanks for talking to me. I can leave you to your, uhm, purple stuff.”
“No, no,” Cesc said, lifting a hand. “It’s really ok.”
“I didn’t actually mean to interrupt or anything—“
“Hi?”
A woman’s voice broke into the conversation, coming from the direction of the patio door. Jackie half-winced as she looked up to see a dark elf clad in fabulous workout gear, pink sneakers and splashy white and blue marble-patterned leggings, a strappy, flowing top and a pink furry vest. Her white hair was pulled taut into a ponytail that seemed to cascade for miles and miles over her back. And although her tone had been friendly enough, all Jackie could hear was: game over.
“Ulla, hey,” Cesc sat up straight again in his chair, looking up at the woman with a smile that seemed tighter at the corners than it had been a moment before. “This is Jackie.”
“Oh, gosh, sit down,” said the elf, motioning to the chair Jackie was still half-bent over. She reached out a hand just as Jackie’s butt hit the seat. From her periphery, Jackie could see Cesc’s shoulders straighten again, his hand lifting unsurely to his mouth, then half-extending, then settling back down onto his knee.
“Jackie! The girl who tried to jump off a cliff?” said Ulla with a smile. Jackie took her hand mechanically and opened her mouth, but Ulla continued: “We haven’t officially met! I’m Hella.”
Cesc groaned.
Jackie let go of Ulla’s hand as if she’d been burned, whipping her head toward Cesc. Blood rushed to her face. “You told her about that!?”
“I did not,” bit Rhedefre, his brows coming down as he looked at his girlfriend. His face, too, was starting to redden. “Ulla, she came here to apologize for the hike. Misunderstanding.”
Ulla sank into her own seat with a laugh. “That’s right, he didn’t tell me. I was snoopervising his texts when you sent it. Really, I thought it was hilarious. Autocorrect, right?” Her dark eyes traced over Jackie’s face with something like satisfaction with what she found there. Jackie’s flush became deeper, and her embarrassment began to sour in her chest. “I’m glad you didn’t try to jump off a cliff. Cesc plays hero too often for my tastes, anyway.”
Jackie noticed the slight shake of Rhedefre’s head from the corner of her eye. His hand was covering his mouth, and there was embarrassed resignation in his posture. Oh, God.
“Well, I’m not an idiot,” she told Ulla. “I tripped.”
“That’s too bad,” replied Ulla. “Hiking boots are a great investment, if you’re thinking about going out more, though.” She smiled at Cesc. “We had to pick him out some a while back—he likes Keens, maybe you’d like them, too? Good brand. Very grippy.”
Cesc busied himself spooning another mouthful of his meal into his mouth.
“Sounds great,” said Jackie. “But like I told Cesc, I’m not doing vertical hikes for a while after this.”
“Yeah, I could see that,” said Ulla, looking over at Cesc’s bowl. “Babe, you’ve been babying that acai for like ten years now. If you don’t like it, we can just try to get it changed to something else.”
Cesc shook his head. “It’s fine.”
“You never want to cause a fuss. Just tell them you didn’t like it.”
Cesc stared at his girlfriend—his girlfriend, Jackie thought—with a flat expression, and did not answer. Really? he seemed to telegraph to her. In lieu of words, he took a spoonful and jammed it in his mouth and smiled winsomely. Ulla smacked his shoulder and shook her head.
“When you guys dated, was he like this?” She asked Jackie with a lift of her shoulders. “So stubborn.”
“We, uh, never dated,” corrected Jackie, willing the blood to leave her face, shifting her weight on her seat. She was fighting the compulsion to reach over and grab the bowl from Cesc and throw it Ulla’s smug face, her expression intolerable with that new bit of information. “But when I knew him, uh, I don’t remember him ever eating bowls of whatever that is.”
“It’s acai. Super good for you. He’s a vegetarian,” rattled Ulla without much interest, waving an easy hand. She straightened, sliding a look at Cesc, who was eating with greater speed than earlier. “Anyway, about the hiking thing. It’s probably a good call for both of you. It’s not good for Cesc to go into that preserve.”
“Holy s**t,” Cesc started to laugh a shaky laugh with his mouth half-full, swallowing before he continued. “Ulla, really? It’s fine.”
Ulla’s eyes narrowed. “I really don’t think it is.”
“It’s good for me,” he said, setting his spoon down into an empty bowl. He wiped his mouth with a napkin and crumpled it with one hand. “I promise.”
“What’s wrong with going into the preserve?” interjected Jackie. She felt more passion on the subject than she might have an hour earlier, suddenly glorying in the beauty of nature in the autumn. “Hiking is awesome and the views at the preserve are amazing. It’s not like the trails are that dangerous. They’re all marked.”
“Well, he almost died in there once,” Ulla broke in, her eyes still trained on Cesc.
The first vowel of it’s fine came out of Cesc’s mouth one last time, but he broke it off there and shook his head, looking at down at his lap. Jackie’s head whipped toward him, her eyes wide.
Died. He’d almost died?
“What?!”
“Yeah,” intoned Ulla. “He did.”
“Cesc, what the hell? Did you fall on a trail?”
“That was over a year ago,” said Cesc, his eyes looking up at Jackie with a sheepish sort of apology in his gaze. “I’m fine.”
Breath hitched in Jackie’s throat. “Is that where…” She motioned to her collarbone, unable to ask the question.
Ulla caught the gesture with sharp eyes.
“Showing off your scar, babe?” she asked.
“Ohmygod, seriously? I just saw it on the last hike,” sneered Jackie. Her patience was fast evaporating—Cesc had nearly died on the preserve and this b***h was worried he was showing too much flesh? It was a scar, not his full naked body, for ******** sake!
“Ok!” Cesc broke in, holding up a hand. “I unzipped my half-zip on the last hike. I go into the preserve all the time and it is fine. I am not dead, I did not die in the preserve, and it—what happened—wasn’t because I’m a shitty hiker. Are we good? Are we all good?”
Jackie would not have described any part of herself as good in that moment, staring at Cesc without comprehension. A thousand questions flew to her mind, a thousand images with them. Had he fallen? He had wings—how could he have fallen? Had he broken something, fallen onto brush, been stabbed or scraped by falling rocks or trees—or avalanche—or something else? That ******** preserve! How had it happened?
And why, for the love of all that was holy, did he come back and decide to spend all his free time with this horrible mess of a woman?
“Alright, babe,” Ulla sighed. “We’re good.”
She leaned across the table and kissed his cheek, gentle, and put her hand to the back of his neck. He was still stiff, still looked at her with disapproval, but he relented so far as to lean closer to her, to let his expression fall from annoyance to mild glum embarrassment.
Ulla stood. “Well, s**t. I’m late for my lash appointment, so I’m going to go.” She smiled at Jackie, wide and bright. “Gotta keep myself hella, after all. You guys chat about something better to do than hike, yeah?”
“Super great to meet you,” lied Jackie.
“Bye, babe,” said the dark elf, kissing Cesc again. He opened his mouth and made a sound but she silenced him with a swing of her purse over her shoulder and let herself out the side gate, waving behind her. “Bye, Jackie! I guess I’ll catch you at dinner!”
Cesc watched her go and groaned into cupped hands. "I guess I'll fly home!" he mumbled, scrubbing his eyes for a moment before looking at Jackie with a lopsided smile, all apologies.
“That was so incredibly ******** uncomfortable,” he told her.
“No s**t!” Jackie began to laugh, unsteady. She watched Ulla walk to her car and let herself in and drive away, her fingers waggling out the side window. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have sat down.”
Cesc watched her and sighed and shook his head. “No, don’t—she’s not usually that—well, I mean, she is usually that forthright, but she’s not usually trying to…” He paused and shook his head again. “Nevermind.”
“Cesc…” Jackie pushed aside the swell of vitriol she wanted to spout about Ulla, words like Barbie doll and unbelievable b***h catching in her throat, burning in bile. There was something more important she needed to say, something more important she needed to know. Her fingertips remembered the rough knotting of skin at his collarbone and she needed, she had to ask: “What happened to you?”
His eyes met hers. There was stone behind gold, willfully misunderstanding her. He half-smiled, trying to lighten the expression on her face. “When?”
She scooted forward to the edge of her chair and reached across the space between them, touching the hem of his collar.
Rhedefre leaned away from her as her fingers grazed him.
“I got hurt,” he said, simple. “In the preserve.”
“I know, I heard her,” she pressed. “But how?”
Cesc shook his head, dropping his eyes. “Jackie,” he breathed, the corner of his mouth tipping upward. “You may not believe this, but I don’t actually like reliving it.”
Her hand fell back to her side.
“I’m sorry,” she said. She looked at his face, at the impenetrable stubbornness she found there, and hated herself for agreeing with Ulla on that score—but it was his decision to tell her or not to, and he’d chosen not to. It was fair, although curiosity burned her, and the feeling of disappointment (for him, and not for her) that he’d chosen instead to confide in a woman like Ulla. She wished for some tremor in his façade, something that would encourage her to press forward, to assure him of her steadiness and support, but he gave her nothing.
“What’d you do for Halloween?” he asked her instead, dropping the subject and the gravity it held with it altogether, and she was forced to try to float to his level.
But she tried. She smiled. “I went as a moose. I had a big onesie with a hood and, uh, antlers…” Jackie laughed. “Is that weird when someone tells you they had antlers on a costume?”
“Not at all,” grinned Cesc. “We’re not all blessed.”
“Well, I mean, obviously not!” She fished out her phone and found a selfie, turning it toward him. “I had the advantage of being super comfortable.”
“Good for you!” said her companion. “I went as Brandon Flowers from the Killers to a karaoke party.” He took off his ballcap, showing faded dark streaks in his pink hair, grimacing as he ruffled his fingers through it. “I thought the dye would wash out way easier.”
Jackie’s smile became broader and truer. She reached out her hand to help him ruffle his hair, putting the body back into his hair after the hat flattened it. “You should never dye this,” she proclaimed. “Your hair’s too soft and you could really mess it up.”
“It’s not a habit,” Cesc argued. “It was just for the holiday, and it’s not permanent.”
“Well, just, still,” Jackie said, parting a clump of waves. He moved gently back from under her touch, the strands falling from her fingers onto his forehead. “I like the pink.”
There was a distant sort of seriousness to his tone when he replied: “I know.”
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Posted: Fri Nov 30, 2018 1:17 pm
Hella Cool
Cesc let himself into Ulla’s apartment with a jangle of keys. In the hours since lunch, his annoyance faded, then rose again, then faded at last into a niggling feeling in the lines of his brow and the tilt of his mouth.
It was a feeling like an itchy sweater, like too-dry skin. It reminded him of how he’d felt a few years ago, before—before legs, before self-confidence, before perspective. The feeling of being caught in the crossfires of other people’s desires and claims, with his own somewhere muddled by the tug and pull.
Ulla’s apartment—clean and lavish and broad, with white granite countertops and black wood and high-end finishes, so unlike his own space of worn wood and second-hand—still managed to feel a little foreign after over a year of dating, and although Cesc had keys and an open invitation to stay over, he couldn’t help but believe that, even to Ulla, the space had never warmed or felt like home. She elected to stay with him more times than he stayed with her.
She was lounging now on the clean lines of her white rectangular couch with the electric fire on, her slim feet encased in furry slippers. Her legs were crossed, and in lieu of a proper hello, she waggled one foot at him and kept her attention on her phone.
It was a tactic, he knew. Her eyes didn’t trace, her fingers didn’t scroll—Ulla was just trying not to look at him, to break the silence or bring up topics she didn’t care to discuss with him.
Cesc lowered himself down beside her with a sigh, and he clapped one hand gently onto her thigh.
She looked up at him, a smile suddenly blooming on her face as though she’d just noticed his entrance. “Hey babe,” she cooed, switching strategies, and she leaned up to kiss him.
Cesc leaned back away from the kiss, fixing her with a critical eye. “Ulla,” he said, evenly. “That was very rude today.”
She dropped the artifice with a heave of her chest and straightened on the couch, setting her phone on the arm of the sofa. The cheeriness from her voice soured into annoyance. “You inviting someone to our breakfast date and not telling me?” she said, returning his gaze with a flat one of her own. “Yeah, it really was.”
“I did not invite her. She saw me walking down the strip,” answered Cesc. “That’s what people who live in Gambino do. They walk down the strip.”
Ulla snorted. “I don’t believe you.”
“You want to see my phone?” Cesc offered, pulling it out of his pocket and holding it out to his girlfriend. He knew, by now, the bend her jealousy took.
“I do, actually.”
She snatched it from his hand and unlocked his phone herself, hungrily diving through his call log and his and Jackie’s text conversation—which, even she had to admit, was tame and short. And like every time her jealousy got the best of her rationality, the eager consumption of his innocence came with an immediate crash of contrition. She handed his phone back, a flush rising in her cheeks.
“Ok,” she admitted. “You didn’t invite her.”
“You need to trust me.” Cesc’s tone was gentle, but there was an undercurrent—she couldn’t hear, but she could feel—of impatience beneath. She avoided the steady disappointment in his gaze and put both her hands on the back of her neck, slouching into the couch.
“I know,” she moaned. “I’m sorry. I do trust you, I do. You’ve never…”
“If it really bothers you this much, I’ll stop seeing her,” said Rhedefre, lifting his shoulders. “It’s not worth it.”
“No—“ The word shot out of Ulla’s mouth and she straightened immediately on the couch, half-standing and tucking her legs beneath her. The flush deepened on her cheeks, and she shook her head quickly: “No, I really don’t want that. I know I overreacted. I feel like an idiot.”
Cesc gave her an indulgent half-smile, his brow crooked. “I don’t want you to say that to be nice. You’re acting really threatened.”
“I’m not threatened by Horseface,” she snorted.
“Geezus, Ulla.” The good humor sailed out of Cesc’s face like she’d blown it away.
Ulla held up a hand and then balled it into a fist, screwing her eyes shut. “I’m sorry! You’re right. I don’t know what’s wrong with me on this. I’m being mean and rude and not-nice to this girl.”
“Those are all kind of the same thing,” Cesc pointed out. “All true, though.”
“I know. I should be nicer to her. There’s no reason not to be,” admitted Ulla. She tapped her fingers on her thigh, over and over, frowning to herself. She seemed to be searching for something internally, and Rhedefre did not interrupt in the moments it took her to find her words: “I don’t think like I’m gonna come home and you’re going to be letting her have a ride or whatever. It’s not that. I just don’t understand why you’re so… eager about hanging out with her. It just feels like that’s what it is. You like seeing her more than I’m comfortable with.”
Cesc nodded shallowly at this assessment, his hands on his knees. He chewed on it for a long moment, his mouth pinned in at the corners. “It’s not like that, Ulla. It’s because, back when I knew her better, we left things… awkward. I don’t like leaving things awkward. Felt like I got a chance to make things right, I guess.”
“What did you need to make right? I thought you told me she just bailed on you when you didn’t want to date her.”
Cesc inclined his head. “That’s essentially true, yeah,” he said. “But…”
Ulla sighed deeply. “You just want to be friends with everyone.”
Rhedefre let out a surprised laugh. “I do. I do want to be friends with everyone. Why is that a bad thing? That would be awesome.”
His girlfriend shook her head, her brows low but her mouth half-quirked, fond but exasperated. “Ok, but hear me out… what if you...” She held out a finger for him to wait, then tapped him on the thigh with each syllable: “don’t be friends with everyone?”
“Ulla, I’m not friends with everyone,” replied Cesc easily, leaning back into her decorated throw pillows. “I mean, I barely have an eighth of Gambino on the ol’ friends list. I’m not even close to being friends with everyone. It’s a long-term goal.”
She laughed and rolled her eyes, smacking his leg with the back of her hand. “You know what I mean.”
“I do.” The levity in Cesc’s expression fell, his mouth straightening. “Ulla, plenty of people don’t like me. That’s fine. I didn’t get stabbed twice because people liked me. I get it.” He shook his head, opening his palms. “But this… this was different. It just felt wrong.”
“Well…” Ulla paused, considering. She looked over at Cesc, the clarity in his expression, the earnestness of his desire, and she sighed. “I just don’t want you hanging out with someone who’s pining over you.”
He straightened at that, half-rolling his eyes in self-conscious discomfort, but his memory conjured not Jackie, but another face, with sweet curved lips and blind eyes he had not seen now in over a year—the delicacy of hidden emotion and the way it had sunk claws into his heart to say no, the way he’d convinced himself, it’s ok, it’s ok, it’s ok to keep seeing her, that’s what friendship was, even if it fed those feelings, even if it heightened his own shame at willfully ignoring them.
“I don’t want that either,” he admitted sourly. “Tried that. It didn’t work for me.”
Ulla’s hand went from his thigh to his shoulder, her thumb stroking the fabric of his shirt. Gently, she prompted: “If you can set some healthy boundaries, I don’t see anything wrong, actually.” She smiled, small. “Just as long as she knows how you feel, and what you want, I’m fine with it.”
Cesc tilted his head toward her, returning her smile. “Yeah,” he replied. “I’m good with healthy boundaries.”
“Good.” She leaned into him, her head on his shoulder, her hand sliding down to his hand, fingers interlacing. “I understand, though,” she said against his chest. “You’re easy to pine over. You’re craveable.”
Cesc laughed, the sound rumbling in his chest. “I’m not a piece of meat, Ulla,” he said with mocked displeasure.
“You’re kind of a piece of meat,” she challenged.
“Gross.”
“Gotta sink my teeth into this delicious steak—“ she chanted, curling closer with a laugh, releasing his fingers to throw her arms around his neck and kiss his cheek. He laughed again.
“Very gross,” he amended.
They both laughed then, and Ulla pushed him against the firm cushions of the couch, coaxing him to lie so that she could lie atop him, her fingers on his collarbone, her lips on his neck. She said nothing for a moment, allowing her fingertips to find the rough skin beneath the collar of his shirt.
“Stop going into the preserve,” she said suddenly, quietly, pleadingly.
Cesc’s fingers found hers, squeezing gently and leading them away from his scar. He craned his neck to kiss her forehead.
“No,” he replied.
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Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2018 7:16 pm
Flashback: Spring 2017
There’s something left.
Cesc’s eyes opened into darkness. He went from sound sleep to full wakefulness in what felt like a single moment, disoriented but alert. His ears swiveled. There was no sound, no strangeness, nothing that felt wrong.
He’d had training, at this point, to know how wrong felt. He’d become a master—convincing himself he’d woken up because it was too hot, too cold, that his bed was uncomfortable. At avoiding nightmares and sweat and his heart beating too fast. At saying his nausea came from eating something off, not feeling something off.
And he’d moved past that. He’d surrendered to the discomfort. Dissected it in hour-long sessions with a therapist, given himself permission to feel it, license to lean into the pain.
So he knew, at last, that this wasn’t that.
This was something in his bloodstream, rushing in his veins. Something the discomfort had covered for weeks, maybe months, maybe more.
There’s something left.
He sat up in bed, curling his knees to his chest. There was no sweat on his brow, his neck. He was cold and dry. Cesc frowned gently, probing the feeling.
It answered, gentle and quiet, in the voice of a shy child.
----
Cesc didn’t give himself time to think. If he thought, he’d over-think. He’d creak open the gates to everything that would stop him, breathtaking fear that seized his heartbeat until it fluttered as wild as a captured bird. Nausea that twisted in his throat, that he couldn’t swallow down or over.
No—He moved with mechanical certainty; he dressed, he left a note, he exited the bakery.
He caught the first ferry. His fists encircled the white guardrail as though trying to strangle it, his knuckles bloodless. He wouldn’t think, no. He would just go.
The verdant landscape grew closer as the ferry cleaved through the restless water. He could see it now, the quiet and pristine place he’d once loved; the fertile soil of so many nightmares.
But he didn’t linger on that, not even on the reality of the vision before him, the trees and the trails and the dirt.
Rhede went, for the first time since that time, to the preserve.
He put one foot in front of the other as he exited the parking lot, He was cold despite the late summer humidity. The sun was rising, and Cesc took that as enough indication that he should enter—the signs claimed the park opened at sunup, and with the dawn’s support, he could
do this
couldn’t he?
Words bubbled in his brain, but he cut them all off at ‘what if—‘. He instead listened to the sound of his feet against dirt and stone, the rhythm of walking, the cycle of his own breath. The preserve was quiet.
There were campsites with brightly-colored tents in alcoves he didn’t recognize, but the knowledge that someone was nearby sleeping gave him another drop of peace. It was as though parts of the preserve had been civilized in his absence, the fear gone from the place in other hearts if not his own. He calmed his breath if it started to come quick, yawned to open his throat if it began to constrict.
He didn’t stray from the marked trail. He didn’t have to leave it to reach that quiet, pleading voice that nagged in his head, that had woken him too early. It had been patient enough these few months. It would not last much longer if he did not come.
Cesc put his hands into his pockets to keep his fingers from trembling. When he reached a fork in the trail, he hesitated but stepped across a boundary:
Here’s where it started, he heard himself whisper inwardly.
The incisive quietness stalled him. Cesc stopped, turning back toward the trail, then facing the wilderness.
Here was where it started.
He breathed in, quiet. One hand found the scar on his collarbone and then slipped lower to his heart, closing over the fabric there. His heartbeat was still slow, still measured, but he could feel the cold panic starting to grow at his fingertips. Here was where he’d grabbed Lorin and run from the hunter—no, no, from Azucar—the first time. Here was where Lorin had inadvertently poisoned him, where they’d fallen…
A fog was starting to settle around his senses, suffocating him.
Cesc grit his teeth, shaking his head roughly.
No—that’s not what he wanted. It was—it was the same moment and yet that was not the beginning for the thing that called him here. It had been the end for that thing. That thing he’d left behind.
He took an unsure step, wobbling forward. He frowned over the growing swell of emotions in his chest that muddled his powers’ ability to see where the lost items were. He pushed them down, promising himself: I’ll let you feel this. Just give me a second here, let me do this. Then I’ll let you feel what you need to.’
His feet slid on the wet dirt as the topography of the forest sloped downward. This had been so much easier when he’d had nothing but wings, hadn’t it? Now he had to grip onto tree branches and steady his feet, find purchase on the decomposed leaves of last autumn. He half-walked and half-skated to a mantle of tree branches and the epicenter of the lost thing’s calls.
Cesc smiled and let go of the branches, finding solid purchase with his feet and kneeling in the dirt. There was a lot on top of it, soil and leaves and twigs, but it was in remarkable condition for what it was worth—a disposable camera, halfway through its film, that Lorin had dropped when they’d made their mad dash away from the hunt—from Azucar. The film was, Cesc thought, probably not in the very most excellent condition, but its desperation to be found showed it was, at least, not wholly gone.
And that meant…
He skittered forward, back up the hill by baby steps, one hand full of the camera, his knees scraping against the ground. He could hear another thing now, too, more faint than the camera had been. But he knew it had to be here, too, left behind.
There!
He knelt, digging in the ground until dirt became thick and solid mud, until his hands hit what he was looking for. Cesc pulled the second object, Lorin’s forgotten hat, out of the ground.
He sat back onto his heels. A soft laugh bubbled from his chest, even as his eyes began to well. It was in sorry shape, the hat, its once-beautiful knit saturated with dirt, its friendly pompom now hen-picked and small. But all the same, it wanted to be rescued, to be returned, just as the camera had.
Cesc looked around, at the morning light trying to filter through thick clouds and tree cover, onto them. It was dark, with steam-thick gloom, here. It was not a place these objects might ever wish to decompose, left behind.
He sat fully down onto the dirt. He put the hat and camera onto his chest and then allowed himself to lay, his head on a pillow of mud, his dirty hands on his stomach. He looked at the tree branches above his head, the crisscrossing fingers that seemed to reach down for him.
He could have decomposed here himself, couldn’t he? Or was that even how Raevans died?
The clouds moved above him. A beetle scurried onto a tree trunk in his peripheral vision. He could see birds alighting from nests, rodents jumping from branch to branch. The forest was full of life, life that did not stop, that continued and endured and endured and endured.
Cesc blinked. A hot tear streamed from the corner of his eye, across his cheekbone, into his hair.
You can feel it all now, he told himself, gentle, firm.
But the rush of emotions didn’t come. No other tears followed the first.
He pulled himself up to sitting, one hand ruffling clumps of dirt from the waves at the back of his head. He set his elbows on his knees and held his wrists in either hand and watched the movement of the forest for another moment.
Once, he’d run for his life here. Now, he could sit.
Nothing was coming for him.
Nothing was left behind.
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Posted: Tue Feb 19, 2019 4:49 pm
The Sweetest Thing: Improper Imagination
He’d nearly died in there were words that she’d heard and now could not unhear. Jackie turned them around in her own mouth, chewed on them, swallowed them. She pushed them away in her head but could not keep them at bay for long: he nearly died in there, Cesc had, in the preserve where she had gone with him, where he’d displayed nothing but ease.
But had that been true? It wasn’t; he was uneasy when she’d fumbled, when she’d gotten near the edge. He’d held her then, firm-handed but not sure, his eyes wild. She understood it now, at least, partly.
How had it happened? Jackie couldn’t ask again, she knew. He’d shrugged it off because it had been years (years, he said? Or just one?) ago, long enough that he wanted to forget it. But for her, the trauma was fresh and new, the news was unsettling as though it had happened yesterday. It itched. She longed to know what happened, why, how.
Morbidly, she could see him, stretched on the ground beneath the shadow of trees, his eyes shut. What was hurt? He said it wasn’t from hiking, she knew that. He couldn’t have broken a leg or slipped off the path.
Cesc’s eyes, golden and livid and frightened, were fresh in her mind. He was frightened, that was right—frightened that she would fall. Perhaps his wings—nonexistent and yet, he’d promised, still there—had failed him. Perhaps he’d fallen through no fault of his own, like they’d shorted out like electricity, and left him to tumble through branches onto the forest floor below.
She flinched at the sound of snapping wood in her head. No—Cesc could not go back into that preserve, not with such a thing hanging over his head. That must’ve been how it happened, how he’d ended up with a scar on his collarbone, how he’d ended up with a girlfriend adamant he not hike anymore.
No—no, she couldn’t agree with Ulla. Jackie shook her head. No, uniting with her against Cesc was anathema to her.
And where had Ulla been through this? Jackie thought angrily. She could not bring herself to see her charitably. She was uncaring. She was such a goddamn…
Jackie frowned and bit off her thoughts. Her heartbeat quickened, the blood hot in her veins and in her cheeks as she thought of the other words out of Ulla’s mouth: I’m Hella, she’d said so sweetly…
No. She couldn’t share the same opinions as Ulla where Cesc was concerned. If he wanted to go into the preserve, she’d go with him. She was a novice, but she’d watch him. She’d keep him safe. She’d think of, she’d find ways. He wouldn’t… not again, he wouldn’t…
She pictured herself with him in the forest that day, his arms and legs a tangle as he crashed through trees, herself running down the path, sliding off the trail and coming to him as he fell. She could see herself, out of breath but reaching him, pulling him from a low branch and settling him on the ground: I’m here, Cesc, I’ve got you—you’re alright now, I promise. The heave of his chest, the flutter of half-closed eyes. His torn lips, his jaw as he nodded, yes, yes, he knew he was safe.
Ulla hadn’t done that for him, she thought viciously.
A sober moment stopped her, shocked her, forced her to shove the imagery away with disgust.
Neither did I.
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