I'm kind of jumping around with the Ben flashbacks…not too much…but if you start to get confused just look at the dates? I'm glad that those of you who are reading this like the story, I wasn't sure how well it would go over.
Jondy stared at the makeshift bathtub and rolled her eyes. Max had claimed she was starting to smell, but she didn't really care. She pulled off her clothes, always aware of Syl's eyes that were watching her. Most likely taking note of the many scars and the way you could almost see her bones through the pale skin.
She slipped into the torrid water and sighs as the warmth of the water rushes over her body and soothes the pain. Flashes of Ben's hands on her body and the way they would cuddle run through her mind. And pain is mind numbing. Her eyes and face are full of sorrow as she wonders what it would be like to not exist. She takes a deep breath and submerges her head under the waterline. She stays under until she sees Syl bend over the tub.
Jondy squeezes some soap into her hands and she grimaces at just how sickly she looks, at how skinny she had become. The whole thought of bathing was becoming tiresome. She sped up the process and was soon pulling herself out of the water. She wrapped the sheet Syl had brought in around her body.
"I'll leave you to get dressed." Syl dropped a bag by a mirror she hadn't noticed before.
Jondy wondered if that had been the plan. She wanted to avoid it, but it's like a drug. What you know id bad for you, you want it more. And looking at herself in the mirror would either be satisfying, to know that yes, she was dieing or it would scare her. Scare her so much that her own body and mind would turn on her to get better.
She was in front of the mirror and she hadn't even realized she was moving. Her eyes instantly squeezed shut as she let the sheet fall. The cool air hit her skin but that was the least of her worries. She ran her hands through what was left of her hair, maybe it would help, but she wasn't counting on it. A deep breath was taken and her eyes snapped open.
Her bottom lip was turning red from how hard she was biting down on it. Her eyes drunk everything in with anguish. It was no wonder she was in pain all the time. Her skin looked so wax like and paper thin that she was afraid to touch it, for fear the it would tear. Her bones protruded from her body and if you looked at them just right you could almost see the muscle deteriorating. Her eyes were about to analyze her hair, before she caught site of her face.
Her eyes, once so alive and dancing with mischief and curiosity were dull. They begged, wished, and pleaded for something, anything that would tell them that life would come back to this body. And suddenly it was as if the room had become cold. So cold that she swore that she could see her breath materializing and in them she saw his eyes. His own green eyes staring back at her.
"Ben…please." Her voiced floated up and into the air like a melancholy song. Yearning for his touch, his voice, and the man. "I just need someone to listen to me…really listen to me Ben…"
Her words seem to blow the image from her eyes and she is left alone, again. In her mind he has never stopped leaving her and her memories are nothing more then a way to punish her.
Jondy grabbed the bag of clothes and pulled on the sweatpants and red long-sleeved shirt. She pulled the socks on, enjoying them for a few moments before turning her attention back to the mirror. Before she knew what was happening, she held a large discarded board in her hands. Lydecker would have been disappointed to know that it was almost too heavy for her. A she screamed. A long deep scream full of complete and utter anguish and despair as she lifted the board above her head. Syl and Max came running into the room, but not in time.
"Why did you leave?" She screamed as the board came down and the mirror was broken into a thousand pieces just as she was. The three of them stood in the silence that followed. Jondy crying, Max and Syl in shock and staring at the shards of the mirror.
Jondy turned and looked at the two of them. They seemed scared. Like she was some kind of monster that was on the very edge of sanity. And maybe she was, but she felt like saying something. "I'm sorry for who I am, who I've become, and who I'm letting myself be. My life is not in my hands anymore. I can't control myself anymore. My life was flipped upside down when he walked out that door. I can't BE without him."
She held up her hands when they started walking towards her. She leaned against the wall and stared at them. Zane and Krit, who had been standing just outside the door, inched their way through the door and stood behind Max and Syl. They were all confused. She was nothing but a roller coaster of emotions and insults.
Jondy shook her head. "I'm tired."
And the four of them didn't say anything as she walked past them. What could they say?
San Francisco, CA :: 2016 July 17
She wasn't even fully awake and her hands were already searching for him. Crawling their way up the bed, over the pillow, and tangling in the soft locks of his hair. He was lying on his stomach, his face turned towards her, with his hands under the pillow. She imaged it was the way children would sleep.
The slender fingers slid down from his hair and started to trace over his eyes brows, down his nose, along his jaw. Memorizing him. If he was anything like Zack, he wouldn't be staying long. Ben woke when her fingers rubbed against his lips, wondering what they would feel like on hers.
He kissed them and smiled when she jumped back with a laugh. "What time is it?"
"It's almost three in the morning." Jondy cuddled up to his side and breathed in his clean smell. "I could get used to waking up like this."
Ben turned so that he could wrap his arms around her and yawned. "Or falling asleep like this."
Jondy giggled and kissed the underside of his chin. "You should sing me to sleep. Remember when you used to do that back at Manticore?"
Ben groaned. "It was more like humming and Zack woke up once…that was terrible."
Jondy attempted to get closer to him but her body was already flush with hers. "Yes…and he about killed both of us and you couldn't sing to me for almost three weeks…"
Ben moved her so that his lips were near her ear. "Down here in the atmosphere, garbage and city lights. You've gone to save your tired soul. You've gone to save our lives. I turned on the radio, to find you on satellite. I'm waiting for this sky to fall, I'm waiting for a sign and all we are, is all so far!"
Jondy almost cried. The times back at Manticore when he would sing her to sleep had been one of the things that she had missed the most. She would have gone back to Manticore to hear him sing just one more time. It was worth the weight to hear him singing actual words.
"Hope you remember me, when you're homesick, and need a change. I miss your shaved hair. I miss the way you taste.
I know you'll come back someday, on a bed of nails I'll wait. I'm praying that you don't burn out, or fade away. And all we are, is all so far! You're falling back to me, the star that I can see yeah. I know you're out there, somewhere out there. You're falling out of reach, defying gravity yeah. I know you're out there, somewhere out there." Ben smoothed back her hair from her ear when he felt her tears through his thin cotton shirt. "Shh…Jon, everything is okay now…it's going to be okay. We're together now…"
Max stared down at Jondy as she smiled in sleep. She had heard about people smiling while they slept but she had never actually seen it, or seen it done by someone so deserving. If only she would smile when she was awake. Jondy was always the one to get in trouble for giggling or laughing while at Manticore. Max had always thought that if anyone were to be happy while they were out of Manticore it would be Jondy. Her smile and those blue-green eyes had a way of lighting up a room.
Max looked down when Jondy's hands flew out and clutched at the sheets. She sat up and breathed heavily. Max sat back causing the chair to creak and Jondy's head flew to her. "What are you doing?"
"I was just watching you Jon."
Jondy sighed deeply and dropped back down onto the bed. "Don't call me Jon."
"Are you okay?"
Jondy closed her eyes. "You never fail to amaze me. Who really asks a fucking drug addict if they're okay?"
"I just…you had a nightmare…"
"It wasn't a nightmare, it was a memory. It was a dream, something I can never get back." Jondy licked her lips. "Everything is always just out of our reach, isn't it?"
Her words were full of truth. She thought of everything that had and was happening with her and Logan. "It seems that way sometimes."
"Do you think there will ever be a day when we will be happy…" Jondy surprised Max when she turned and faced her. "I mean where we can be happy and not have to worry about when it will be taken away?"
Max shrugged. "I like to think so."
"I imagine that is what heaven is like." Jondy's brow furrowed in thought and it made Max smile. "I imagine it to be like waking up in bed. Cuddling up to the person you love and you're so warm it's almost suffocating. All your senses would be alive…"
Max closed her eyes and imagined herself waking up next to Logan. "And no matter what you do you'll never be close enough."
Jondy smiled. "Yeah…I imagine that is what heaven is."
Lyrics are from Our Lady Peace "Somewhere out there."
