"I let it fall, my heart…."
Smarting from Puck's latest attack of the means and unwilling to stuff herself into a borrowed bathing suit and join Marlene, Bekka, and Maggie in the jacuzzi – plus the contents of Bekka's parents' liquor cabinet as well as the blunts Marlene smuggled in her handbag - Josie groggily opened her eyes from where she'd dozed off in a deck chair under a blanket beside the smoldering chimenea overlooking muddy Lake Augua Clara, snow falling all around her. She shook her head. Was she hearing things?
"...As it fell, you rose to claim it…"
No, Josie wasn't, but where was the music coming from? Lizzo blasted out of the house's sound system empowering the entire WORLD through hair flipping and something-something-something or other about doing your nails. The nearest McMansion was half a mile away –so why was Adele's song so clear?
So, why did Josie want to see where it was coming from?
Mechanically, she rose, blanket dropping to the snow dusted redwood decking, eyes scanning the harsh gray surface of the lake, dingy ice spreading out from under the overpriced faux Irish castle's back deck.
You need to get out of here.
"Hey, Joooooo-Joooooooo! Where ya go-in'?" Bekka's nasal question went unanswered as without warning Josie walked slowly past the jacuzzi towards the stairs that led to the water and onto the ice. "Too good not to get waaaaaaaasted with usssssssssSSSS?"
"You break through? Not my problem, heeheeheehee!" Marlene giggle-honked through the mist now filling Josie's head, totally baked and not caring who knew it or that an off duty cop was demolishing a bathroom less than 100 feet away.
"It was dark and I was over…"
"Yeah, you fall through? Not OUR prooooooblem!" Bekka's squeal was lost into the roar of drums and pianos and all manner of fine things spiraling up and around Josie as she set one foot after the other on the dirty ice, snow sifting down around her, slowly falling into the gray void rising towards her. Adele's voice, stretched thin as an overstretched violin string, screeched across Josie's mind as she softly landed in a puff of quickly melting snow in a field of poppies which stretched endlessly around her into hard blue infinity— Hurry!
Something shimmered white among red. Josie squinted, white became a blonde in brown corduroy suit pants and a clean, white shirt with a popped collar.
"…until you kissed my lips and you saved me…"
The androgynous blonde bowed, tipping their top hat by its curled brim, hatband as red as the poppies surrounding them, blue suspenders sapphire in the invisible sun… follow me out of here, before m'Dad gets ya!
"What?" Josie said, puzzled, her voice echoing all around them as, "My hands, they were strong, but my knees were far too weak…" swirled around her on the drowsy, poppy-scented wind.
The blonde turned, striding with amazing speed, poppies slapping like waves of bright blood against her trouser legs. Come ON, explain LATER!
Legs faster on the uptake than her head, Josie ran after the blonde, stumbling on the loose bones of fallen men hidden beneath the scarlet blooms towards the bloody horizon.
Hurry! Please! He ain't a kind man!
The blonde stopped, so that they crashed together, Josie's overalls and baggy sweater now a pastel pink ballgown fit for an heiress, weighed down with strange khaki-colored straps, like something Uncle Mike once wore as a Marine, only canvas with tarnished brass buckles. Her hair, free of its orange head scarf, blossomed outwards, a black rose draped in pearls and golden chains.
"To stand in your arms…crackle, our two shadows, s-s-s-s…. without falling to your feet."
Josie found herself being led through a waltz to Adele, or was it some sultry-voiced woman with a Germanic accent languidly singing about someone named Lili Marleen? Blondie's arm around her waist, guiding her, red paper flowers springing around them in bursts of loose teeth and empty brass shell casings.
Dance with me. He can't find us as long as ya dance with me. Jus'don't look down.
Josie looked down anyway, tiles flickered in and out, mingling with dead grass and poppies and children's drawings swirling beneath her heavily booted feet as Adele and Lili jostled for space…
No! He'll see you!
"…but there's a side to you, that I never knew, never knew crackle— crackle pop our two shadows, looked like one… pop, sssss… never knew… never knew…""
Looking up at the sky, ignoring the invisible battle around them, silver wires against the blue, Josie laughed, a princess in Blondie's arms.
One and two and three and four and….
Stop it, don't look!
Their feet, metronomes, heartbeats in the wind the black and white tiles hypnotic...
"...And the games you'd play, s-s-s-s-s sh-sh-she knows your (gurgle) steps…you'd always win, always win…"
Oh, now you've done it, Uncle Seb sees us - take m'hands!
Blondie's eyes were wide, as if about to weep...
"But I'll set fire! To the rain!"
Josie felt the black and white tiles underfoot give way, wildflowers and children's drawings bleeding together like magic marker in a downpour.
Take m' hands!
"Watch it pour as I touch your face!" Or was it, "But she long forgot me"?
Distracted, Josie didn't hear, Why won't you take m'hands?
Sinking in slow motion, eyes weeping, face a blank mask, Blondie reached for Josie with torn and bloody hands, nails so many sharp needles dipped in blood - shaking her head with a gasp, too late, Josie caught them, holding on tight despite the hydrolic goo of an animatronic leaking onto her dress, her face, her hair, shimmery pink nails gouging crescents in Blondie's vinyl skin as she felt herself being sucked downwards, the field of poppies a spiraling blur laced with silver, so much water going down the drain— NO!
Blondie fell to her knees, trying to yank Josie from the gluttonous earth, to drag her to the surface where she'd be safe, soaking her feet in a dishpan with Aunt Raina massaging protein conditioner into her curls in their tiny bathroom, talking about stupid things like Fugo's bad boy haircut or the dumb meme Clawdeen showed her at lunch, not sucked into the grave….
"...Well it burned while I cried 'cause I heard them screamin' out your name…"
Don't let go, please! Ya have t'keep holdin' on, don't let him take you away!
Josie screamed, pulled steadily by the ground down and away from Blondie's, the buckles and straps wrapped around her tightening as silver wires jangled around them mockingly.
"...Your name!"
"Help!" Josie screamed as Blondie's face fell away in a tangle of silver wires, broken bones and torn paper poppies rattling around her chin…
"...When I lay with you, feel you here forever…"
Blondie stared down at the cracked black and white tiles strewn with faded confetti and streamers where Josie's hands had once been, eyes weeping black mascara. Lili Marleen wailing in triumph: "But she long forgot me, and should I suffer, who will stand by the crackle-hisssssssssssss" as the wind between the worlds thundered around Josie so that—