30.
The bedroom is vacated. Sheets tucked into the corners of the mattress in neat slices, blanket on top folded back by six inches at the head, pillows plump and stacked two deep, lamp off, drawers of the dresser emptied and hollow, no note, not a single trace. Like a scout's promise, the bedroom left better than it was found originally. I walk through the space, trail my fingertip over the side table no dust, peer out the window at the view of the street, the watery light of morning, the sun still attempting to shine through the thick layer of milky white clouds, the asphalt below, overnight street lights still lit, the sparkling dew on the grass, an early morning runner tugging a reluctant dog, not too old not too young. I'm not surprised to find the room in its current state but the reality of it still manages to reverberate around inside my chest, now a hollow thing, bouncing off my ribs and landing with a clatter in my gut. Empty. Gone. Alone.
I'm on hands and knees, peering beneath the bed frame, checking even this shadowy abyss for something forgotten: one sock, a bobby pin, a hair tie. There is nothing but dust bunnies that float into my nose when I inhale, three quick sneezes burst into the carpet. I am wearing Carlisle's button down. It is one size too large, baggy. My jeans are the ripped pair I've always owned, the back left pocket formed to my collapsible wallet, my driver's license John Doe, three singles, a K-Mart saver card, a next drink free voucher for a bar up in Seattle, the kind with a neon sign and sandpaper walls, cork and fliers and sticky wooden seats, the faint smell of smoke and rust and decay. Esme finds me while I'm still on my knees, rubbing the dust from my nose, eyes watering, hair in disarray.
She knocks on the door with her knuckles, three apologetic raps.
"Everything okay in here?" she asks. "I know you've never slept in the bed. I've changed the sheets."
I know she's changed the sheets. It's obvious, just like everything else. This space has been anesthetized, turned into some homogenous showroom, untouched by human hands. By Tanya's hands. The smell of her, gone. Her hair. Her clothes. If I could, I would bottle her perfume and–no. There is nothing left here but the irritating scent of manufactured flowers flowing chemically from the air freshener plugged into the wall, its plastic shell molded into a tulip-like structure, the light shining beneath it as weak as the struggling sun outside.
"Everything's fine," I mumble, ashamed already, thinking of when they found me in the police station, hands scraped raw, blood and gravel intermingling on my palms, pop rocks of pain. My life line spliced in half by a wayward pebble lodged deep into the flesh. Esme's emotion breaking free, the dam bursts and out comes all that water in a rush, unleashed in a chaotic fury, all that pressure held back. I long to comfort her now, prove no reason for fear or concern or worry. Still, she walks on eggshells around me, worried she'll say the wrong thing or mention the wrong person and I'll flee and this whole wretched process will start over.
"If you need anything…" she begins to say.
"I know. I'm fine," I cut her off, the familiar script repeated, a syndication television show. A sick day spent in bed with nothing else to watch. Mind-numbing, repetitive comfort. She backs away from the door, disappearing down the hall. I go back to my search, lifting up the comforter experimentally, peering inside. It smells of jasmine and something synthetic and cloying. As the day grows warmer, the clouds and fog outside begin to burn off. I part the window, let some air in, the breeze still cool despite the coming heat. Though I am back with Carlisle and Esme, though I am in their home, safe, sheltered, warm, cared-for, I do not feel at home. I feel like a foreign intruder, a virus in a strange land ready to infect the nearest host. I am aching inside my own skin, desperate to be anywhere. To be nowhere. To be anyone. To be no one.
I push up the window even further, finagle the protective screen off of its enclosure. Leaning my body halfway out into the open air, I listen to the sounds. A bird chirping his song and waiting for a response. The wind rustling through leaves, an inhale and an exhale, the steady cadence of early-morning sleep. A lawn mower in the distance, the groan and whir as it angrily comes to life. A child's playful scream. The good kind of scream, the one without fear or pain. And, even further way, the cars and trucks on the highway, constant and unending, like white noise, so consistent that, if I weren't listening for it, if I weren't searching for it, I wouldn't even notice its tenor, its desperately yearning call.
x
It's raining after I leave the coffee shop. Coming down hard, in sheets, relentless. I can't seem to remember where I've parked Carlisle's pickup. Each street looks the same as the last and I find myself walking in circles, around and around and around city blocks like the turn of a merry go round, all that's missing is the artfully disconcerting song. It seems strange that the human body can go from so warm to so cold in such rapid succession. There I was, encompassed in the heat of the store room, Bella before me, her face so open and expectant, brown eyes wide, cheeks flushed, one arm across her chest and the other braced against the metal shelving unconsciously as if for support. How all of the words came out of me, an upheaval, so quickly I couldn't even hear them, couldn't remember them after they'd been spoken.
I searched the empty air between us for those words, for the ones she was responding to. It was like having an immediate and impenetrable bout of short-term memory loss. What have I said? What have I done? My hands before me, they are real, her body when I hold her tight, that is real, her arms around me, those are real. And yet? And yet?
I shiver, cold rainwater dripping down the bare skin of my back, dropping into the open crevice at my neck between the cuff of my flannel and the fine hairs that need a trim. Bella's fingers in my scalp, a gentle scratch, she snip of the metal scissors. The downy hair on her forearms, the way they stood straight up within the staticky sheets. Her eyes flickering in sleep. How thin her eyelids must be! Only a hair's breadth of skin! But a centimeter! I rub my own eyes, sluice the water from them, falling from above and within. I wander aimlessly, circling and circling and circling until I run straight into the pickup, waiting in my path all along, right on the dotted line. I throw myself into the driver's seat, turn on the heat, hunker down. I'm sodden, completely drenched through, my clothing heavy, my jean jacket sopping wet. The windshield wipers work on overdrive, throwing the rain away as quickly as it falls, puddles growing wider as I watch, the tires of other vehicles delving into their deepest portions, spraying the excess onto the sidewalk. I'm driving on autopilot back to Esme and Carlisle's home.
When I arrive, there is a light on in the kitchen. I hear the television, the cold, authoritative voice of a news anchor.
"Carlisle, is that you?" Esme calls, distracted. There's a tinkle of glasses removed from cabinetry, the exultant pop and woosh of a cork from a wine bottle. I launch myself up the stairs, taking the steps two at a time, my boots leaving wet footprints on the pristine carpet, the remnants of a ghost.
This time, the room is different. Sheets still rumpled. It smells of her, of us. The window is closed, nick nacks on top of the dresser, her clothes inside. On a whim, I slide the drawers open, peer at the stacked shirts, shorts, jeans, socks, underwear. The thin cotton fabric, soft to the touch. I feel outside of my body, floating slightly above the floor, hovering, examining, an anthropologist noting every aspect of a foreign species, their rituals and their artifacts, leaving no stone unturned. In my jeans pocket is her wedding ring, the metal band she rid herself of so effectively and efficiently, entry hole exit wound no bullet. I stare at myself in the mirror above the dresser, hardly recognizing the person staring back at me. The being inside my skin, nameless and ageless, John to Andrew to Michael to John to Sam to Tucson to John. To Edward.
There is a storm outside! There is a storm!
Esme in the doorway, her face drawn.
"Edward," she says, hand on her chest, a picture of surprise. "I'm sorry. I thought you were Carlisle."
I turn to her.
"I'm not Edward," I reply impulsively. She looks confused, but instead of addressing my statement changes tack.
"You're all wet, you need a towel." She turns to leave and I stop her, hand on her wrist.
"Wait," I say. She flinches. I know my touch must be freezing, her skin feels so hot.
"What is it?" she asks. I open my mouth to speak, her body half-turned toward me, on her way to grab me a towel, to care for me, to protect me yet again. Her selfless gesture so familiar, so second-nature, a simple part of who she was born to be. I pull her against me, even though I'm wet, even though my clothes press into her dry ones and leave splotches of their own, a mini contagion. I forget how small she is, smaller than me, the top of her head beneath my chin, even. She accepts my hug without question or complaint.
"Sit here," she says, patting my hand, depositing me on the edge of the bed. "I'll make tea."
She leaves and I open the window, wind and rain swirling outside, wayward drops flying in and landing on the dresser, the carpet. Despite the sounds of the splatter, the rumbling clouds above, the distant thunder growing nearer. Despite the storm rattling inside my own chest, the tumult of my heartbeat, the cacophony of my breathing echoing the window's trembling shutters. Despite my brain screaming at me, screaming at me, to go back the way I came, to grovel on my knees, to take back what I said, to beg to be her more. Despite all of that noise, I hear beneath it the steady consistency of a distant highway, cars and trucks and motorcycle and SUVs and campervans and trailers, all of them moving forward and backward, towards and away, wandering endless and purposeful, the tires that carry it all, the rumble of wheels on road.
x
asha! make an account so i can respond to you LOL