Chapter 11

Chapter

Eleven

AWAKE, SLEEPER

While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.

Leonardo da Vinci

T he day they buried him, I stayed at home in bed and slept. Sleep was my black dress of mourning, my forfeiting of a goodbye— sleep was my own little prelude to death.

Maybe that's why they called a grave a final resting place. A bed you lie in and never get up from again. Sounded peaceful, sounded nice, sounded like a fate fit for me and not the man currently in the ground.

A casket like a bed.

A headstone like a headboard.

Death where I should be and not him.

Clutching lilacs in my hands, I knelt at the deep lettering inscribed in the stone, selfishly wishing I could forget again. No one visited cemeteries at twilight, even the wintry breeze stilled, the trees watched on in dark gloom, and I was alone amongst the dead.

Alone amongst the dead and wishing I were one of them. Envious of their peace. Wishing I could trade places with the man whose grave I leaned against. You know where you have to go. You know what you have to do . Mare's words echoed in my soul.

I closed my eyes, and instead of immediately greeting sleep, I allowed the hole in my heart to open. Allowed it to spill out in tears on my cheeks as I remembered. Feeling Mare's gaze on me as I did so, I let it all back in, I went back to that night. The cavern in my soul imploded with pain. Sorrow threatened to swallow me whole as I allowed myself to feel it, to let the pain, loss, and regret shatter through me. It was a horrific nightmare made of everything in real life. Instead of fighting it, pushing it down, distracting myself with sleep or television or fantasy worlds, I opened my soul's door, and the phantom knives of anguish swept in like an ocean's wave. Letting myself drown, weep, and mourn— I remembered. I remembered it all.

HALLOWEEN 3 MONTHS AGO

My platform, lace-up boots were not fit for running through a pumpkin maze. I knew he was here, felt his presence as if he were hiding and about to?—

"Boo!" I screamed and punched his chest wildly as he picked me up and spun me around. "What's a pretty girl like you doing out here all alone on Halloween?"

Laughing, I wiggled into a nice snuggle against his broad chest. "Picking you up early, idiot."

He held a hand to his chest. "Here I am, volunteering my time to help set up this maze for the young children and community to enjoy and my own girlfriend calls me an idiot? I'm hurt."

"Yeah, right," I kissed his cheek. "We also have to pick up my dad from the airport and take him home before we stupidly go to not one, but two of your parties."

"About that…" He rubbed the back of his neck, his black hair tousling in the cool October breeze. "More like six parties."

"Six Halloween parties! God, how do you have so many friends?"

He shrugged. "Look at me, charm and good looks, I'm popular."

I punched him in the arm, and he yelped before tickling me and throwing me over his shoulder, marching us to my car. He pulled a backpack from the bed of his truck before unzipping it on my hood. Holding a ghost-face mask to his face he said in a low tone. "Trick or Treat?"

Crossing my arms I rolled my eyes and tried not to smile. "Is that your costume?"

"One of them."

"A dress change for each party?" I giggled. "You are such a drama king."

He pulled out a cape and wrapped it around his broad shoulders, doing a twirl. "You know I've always had a thing for costumes and theatrics."

That he did. We met in high school a few years prior. He was somehow a star soccer player and star actor in theater. Really, that made him sound like he must be a jerk, but he wasn't. My boyfriend was the kindest, most charming, most beautiful soul you'd ever meet. The whole school loved him, hell, the whole town loved him. He graduated a year before me, and instead of moving away to attend any number of the Ivy League universities he'd been accepted into, he stayed put and went to community college to wait for me to graduate and figure out what I wanted to do. I never asked him to. I never deserved his watchful eye and loving attention; he gave it freely. Everyone in town must have been perplexed as to why he chose me and not a popular cheerleader, or just any girl that smiled and talked more. But for some reason, Mare King seemed smitten by me, and I was hopelessly in love with him, too. I was twenty, he was twenty-two, and we had our whole lives to figure everything out. To learn each other.

He stopped his fanfare and grabbed my wrist, pulling it up for his inspection. "This is new."

I tried to pull my arm away in embarrassment. "It's nothing."

Jiggling my arm, he smiled that devastatingly handsome smirk. "Not nothing, it's beautiful." With his other hand, he thumbed each charm on my bracelet. "Bottlecaps… a bottle cap charm bracelet? This is brilliant, Lilac."

I loved his nickname for me. Somehow, he took Lucy and made it sparkle.

I shrugged, but the compliment sent my heart soaring. Making jewelry out of found things like bottle caps, clothespins, and paperclips had been a hobby of mine for a few years. He always noticed when I tried wearing one of my new creations and awed over it, even if my jump rings were flimsy and my placements uneven. Mare was my biggest fan. I was just an average bottle cap, but he saw something special in me.

He cocked his head before planting a soft kiss on my lips, and the red maple leaves fluttered around us in the hay of the pumpkin patch parking lot. "You've been drinking," I chided.

"Just a little pumpkin juice pre-game. You're my chauffeur tonight, my queen." He bowed and opened my door. "Shall we? A night of mischief and horror awaits on this All Hallow's Eve."

"Drama. King ." I repeated, but my cheeks hurt from smiling. He always made my cheeks hurt from smiling. I'd never won prom queen, or homecoming queen, even though to match his last name, he was crowned king every year. But he still called me his queen. Queen of what? I always wondered but never asked.

He got in behind me and started rifling through his bag of costumes, pulling out a hockey mask and trying it on.

"Why are you in the back?" I checked the time, we weren't late for once, and traffic was clear.

Mare pulled out a pirate hat, making me laugh again. "Your dad has a bad back, let him sit up front. Plus, I need to accessorize." He opened a hand mirror and put a finger over his eye before meeting my gaze in the rearview. "Like my contacts? They're purple."

A grin warmed my face. "Very mysterious."

We made it to the airport with time to spare. My dad gave my temple a kiss and shook Mare's hand from the passenger seat. He still smelt of bait and saltwater from his Florida fishing trip. A long cry from the twisting backroads of our New Hampshire hometown.

"It sure did get pretty up here while I was away. I love the Florida heat, but nothing compares to the foliage here in the fall," my dad marveled. "Thank you two again for delaying your Halloween party plans to give me a ride."

Mare fiddled with a plastic toy that lit up and made spaceship noises. "It's not a problem at all, sir. In fact, you should just come party with us, I've got plenty of costumes."

My dad laughed his deep belly laugh that made me realize I hadn't stopped smiling. I liked having both my dad and boyfriend together. We'd had horror movie marathons and campouts in woods. Every holiday for years now, it had been us three. Though Mare would never call him Steve, always sir, always so proper.

"You kids have fun; this old man needs to rest."

I winded down a steep mountain pass, the moon peeking out from over the black outline of trees. "These stupid platform boots," I cursed as my feet felt hot and wobbly in my leather shoes. These roads made me nervous. "I don't know how the cool goth kids do it."

My dad chuckled at my outfit and asked, "What are you supposed to be?"

The turn came out of nowhere, and so did the deer. Its eyes reflected as it stood eerily still. Screaming, I turned too sharp, in the wrong direction. Mare noticed and lunged forward to grab the steering wheel to correct my mistake, but it was too late.

My rickety, back-heavy station wagon slid sideways over the mountain. The tragedy came in flashes of panic. My dad's head hit the dash, blood rushed from his nose, and he went limp, arms flailing as the car rotated again, and again.

Mare grabbed my seatbelt from behind and pulled it tight as if he could protect me with his strength. "It's going to be okay, Lucy. Just breathe," he called out from behind me. How he could remain so calm as my mistake plummeted us to our death, I'd never reconcile.

The car slammed into something and finally came to an angled stop. Shaking, I cried hysterically, looking around at the shattered windows, the deflated airbags, and tree branches protruding into my battered car like skeleton arms in the night.

Mare was behind me, in my ear, his voice low and steady as I sobbed. "Lucy, you need to crawl through your window right now."

I looked over at my dad, his head resting on the airbag like a pillow as red trickled down. "No," I shook, crying uncontrollably. "My dad, you have to get my dad out first."

Mare sucked in a breath, I couldn't turn to look at him, my neck hurt too bad to move. "If I do that, I need you to close your eyes. Can you do that? Can you keep your eyes closed tight for me, baby?"

I nodded, my hands slick with sweat or blood as I obeyed. There was something he didn't want me to see, and I was a coward who didn't want to see it either. Maybe if I had, maybe if I'd have been brave like Mare, I would have chosen something different. If I had, maybe everything would have been different.

But I was a coward who shut her eyes.

I felt my boyfriend's shoulder and body brush mine as he leaned over the center console, clicked open my dad's door, and somehow got him out of the car without getting himself out first. Why would he do that? Why wouldn't he just get out first and help us out? It didn't make sense, and my head was pounding so badly that I was seeing a flurry of different colors behind my eyelids.

"Don't leave me alone in here," I begged, finding Mare's arm when he slowly stationed his upper half next to me.

His voice was a soft purr. "I'll never leave you, ever. Open your eyes, Lilac."

I did, and I gazed into those stupid purple contacts. Almost forgetting where we were until I noticed the slash across his forehead. "Why aren't you getting out?" I asked.

"Listen to me." He pulled a knife from his pocket and began sawing at my seatbelt. "You need to do exactly as I say."

"Why?" I argued, panic seeping into my bones.

Mare removed my seatbelt and my body slumped forward— the car tilted back slightly and groaned in a way a car shouldn't groan.

"The car is balancing in a very precarious position right now. We have to play its game right. Now, I'm going to hold your hand and you're going to crawl out your window. We can't open your door, there's a tree right next to you."

"We're on a cliff, aren't we?" I asked in terror. "We're dangling off a cliff?"

Mare took my hand. "You're going to be okay, Lilac." The car groaned and tilted back. "Come on, now," he urged.

"My feet are stuck. It's these stupid boots." I cried as Mare took his knife and quickly ran it over the laces, allowing me to wiggle my bare feet free.

He shoved his hands under my arms and guided me toward the window. My neck ached, my head was dizzy, blood and sweat dripped from my back and temple. With a rough final push from my boyfriend, I landed chest-first onto gravelly dirt. I turned in panic, to see him in the back seat, leaning over the center console to make sure I was safe… as the back of my car dangled over a sharp, miles-high cliff. I lunged forward, but Mare shook his head.

"No, Lilac, don't you dare. Only two bodies were making it out of the car tonight, and I'm glad the right ones did." He gave a half smile like this was some stupid performance, or some soccer game, not like it was the end of his life.

"Mare." I dropped to my knees and reached for him. "I—I can't?—"

"I'll find you," he said, pulling out the flask from his jeans and taking a final sip. "Fall asleep and wait for me, Lilac."

With a final groan and snap, the car fell backward, and I screamed. My palms brushed a hot tire as the vehicle plummeted off the cliff, violently crashing into rocks in the worst sound I'd ever heard. A sound that would forever haunt me. A night I would be so devastated over that I'd block it from my mind entirely. Choosing instead to sleep, to die little deaths every night… and Mare kept his promise. Of course he did… he found me somehow. Only in my sorrow, I forgot. I tuned him out, blocked out the accident, and wished it all away like a movie I clicked away with the press of a remote controller. Music drowned out the thoughts, audiobooks played new stories in my mind instead of the ones my therapist fought for me to revisit, and sleep… sleep was everything.

I'd forgotten.

But Mare never did.

Mare remembered.

AFTER

Blue lights illuminated the scene as a police officer's walkie-talkie beeped. He didn't say anything, just looked me over and waved firefighters and EMTs over. They carried me away as I fought against them, kicking, screaming, begging to be left alone.

"Let me jump off the cliff after him," I pleaded. "Let me go be with him," I cried.

Under the bright lights of the compact ambulance, they strapped me to a bed, sticking a needle into the top of my hand. The feeling of cold water swept through my veins and my eyelids got heavy— spearing me into a sleep I didn't ask for. Violently slamming me into a tranquility I didn't deserve.

The days that followed left me in my pink daisy-quilted childhood bed. Sam fussed over me and my dad. On day five, my dad hobbled in on crutches, knocking at my doorframe. I pulled a pillow over my head and pretended to be asleep. I didn't want to see him, didn't want to speak to him. It wasn't his fault, what happened, or Sam's, but that didn't mean I wouldn't blame them.

I blamed them.

I blamed myself.

My thoughts tore me apart until I wanted to set fire to my room, my bed, and my life. So, one day, with my bones still weary and my head still aching, I attached my headphones to my ears and blasted metal music— gloriously realizing it made the thoughts disappear.

Then I found a crappy apartment I could afford, packed a duffle bag, and moved in without ever even saying goodbye to my dad. Did I even have a dad anymore? Or did he go over the cliff, too?

What a wonderful thing to not know.

Sam found me, of course, and wormed her way into looking after me, smothering me with attention. Through my sister, my dad forced me into therapy, and all of them together set up a manageable routine for me. I kept my grocery store job, ignoring the pitying glances of my co-workers and the town by cranking the volume on my audiobooks.

Most people played along.

No one forced me to talk.

Nothing ever happened.

Nothing ever happened.

Nothing ever happened.

And then I would have nightmares… and he would be there.

Mare never made me talk either— he only loved me, and scared, me, and fucked me, and slapped me, and kissed me, and hurt me— and inched me closer and closer to the truth with each night he haunted me. Not-so-gently shoving me toward facing my trauma. Forcing me with ghost face masks, knives, lakes, and spaceships in the sky.

Mare always had a flare for drama.

It was his final performance, and he played his parts as he danced through scene to scene in nightmares built for me.