Pretty
"Why would you do something like this, Ephram?"
"I don't know. It seemed easier than everything else."
Amy didn't know what to say to that. It *was* easier than everything else. Except for now, because now he had to live in the wake of it for probably the rest of his life. She took his hand and turned his wrist up toward her.
"You know, if you were serious, you'd slit your wrists. You'd bleed out before anyone could find you."
Ephram actually smiled. "I've got this thing about blood." He said.
Amy took her careful, pink, pretty fingernail and ran it up the inside of his forearm. "You cut like that. Right on the vein, if you mean business. Because if you do that, even if they did find you it'd be much harder to close up the veins than if you did it Hollywood style: across, like this." She slid the edge of the nail across his wrist the other way, from side to side, gently and slowly. "See, you'd have to sew up the whole vein if you go vertically, and the blood would come out really fast. If you go from side to side they can just suture it up in no time, because it's just this little cut in the vein, and it wouldn't bleed very much, so I guess if you really wanted to fucking die ..." she trailed off and started crying.
Ephraim hugged her softly, basically just put his arms around her shoulders and allowed her to lean on him.
"I never realized that a wholesome girl like you knew so much about suicide." He muttered in her ear.
"My dad's a doctor." She sobbed.
"So's mine. I still had to wing it."
"Oh, Ephram!" she exclaimed, sobbing, hugging him tighter. "Are you crazy?" But it was odd, the way she asked it. Not rhetorically. She asked it like a perfectly rational question. She asked it like she wanted to know.
"I think that's the general consensuses." He muttered, barely listening.
"Why would you do something like this?"
"You've got no idea how easy it seems once you've made the decision. All you've got to do is swallow some pills. I've done that a million times. My dad is The Great Dr. Brown, after all."
Ephram said all this in a subdued, quiet, comforting tone and never got upset. He seemed tired. Despite the situation, to Amy, Ephraim seemed to be the smartest, wisest, oldest creature in the universe for that moment, and just from the way he was talking, there was a moment where she believed he was perfectly right. About everything. That she was selfish for being glad he'd failed at his attempt.
Amy climbed carefully up onto the bed with him and put her arms around him, terribly careful not to interfere with the IV s stuck into his wrists.
"Jesus, would you look at this." Ephram said, in that same matter-of-fact, wise voice as he put his arm around her. "All I've ever wanted, and all I had to do was kill myself."
"I'm not really all you ever wanted, am I?" Amy asked calmly, in a little girl's you-don't-*really*-love-me-do-you voice, her head on his chest.
"For the last year or so; yeah, you are."
"I love you, Ephram."
"Hm, you're not just saying that because I'm suicidal, are you?"
He said it in a mocking, meaningless tone of voice that made her think he didn't take her seriously, and even if he did it didn't matter, because he didn't care about the old things he used to care about.
"I really love you, Ephram." She said, without looking up, closing her eyes.
"Well. That's good." He said, and he brushed a strand of blonde hair off her face. She leaned up and kissed him. His lips were hot and chapped and unresponsive, and hers were tight and needy, and the meeting of the two lasted for almost ten seconds, just pressed against each other. Amy pulled back calmly. "Now is when I wake up and realize that your kissing me was actually my Dad giving me CPR." Ephram joked, but he didn't seemed amazed or in awe, or even happy. Amy giggled once and kissed his cheek.
"Its just me." She said.
"Colin?" he asked blankly.
"Colin and I are going to break up soon." She said, and although she sounded sad, she sounded at peace with it in a way the Ephram never believed she could be.
"And then you're going to date me." He stated.
"Yes." She said.
"And you'll still think that once we both get to school, and there's Colin with those pretty brown eyes and there's Paige and her "Dark Man" references and Wilmer and his dating tips and there's ballet and snow and homework and piano and doctors and time? Will you still be in love with me then?" Again, there was no anger or sadness or careing in his voice.
"Yes." She said with candor, sounding as if she were falling asleep.
"Okay then." Ephram said, closing his eyes.
When he opened them again a moment later, he was in the empty hospital room, the undertones of his pulse beeping away like a taunting criticism right in tune with the little spiky green line on the little black box next to his bed, and his bed residing only one person. The little fantasy was over, and Ephram was alone with the air, something he'd hoped never to wake up to again. Breathing. Air. The combination of the two.
The room was blue with the lack of real light and early morning. He'd probably woken the town up with his little exploit. Or maybe not; maybe everyone was sleeping in their beds, and his Dad was sitting in the waiting room with a cup of coffee and his thoughts; a terrifying combination. And Delia. Delia would be out there too. And she'd want to come inside. Maybe he would let her. He wouldn't let his father. Because he knew what he'd get from his father, and the thoughts frightened him.
The idea that he would think it was his fault (which it was) was terrible. Well, no ... it wasn't. What he knew his father's reaction would be was the terrible thing. Yes, his father could yell and scream, but there were other things he did that were much worse. When Dad thought something was his fault, he would drop into the same kind of state he'd been in after Mom died. One of Ephraim's friends (in New York), after meeting his father, had said blatantly that she thought he looked like a sad puppy dog. This idea was silly to Ephram, but when he thought about it, he wasn't all that surprised that was the way other people saw him.
His friend had meant it in an almost endearing way, he knew, but another time he'd over heard one of the Everwood women discussing his father in the office while Ephram had been waiting. She obviously hadn't realized Ephram was near by, and she said something along the lines of "that man has the saddest eyes I've ever seen." He realized that she was right, and Ephram could tell she hadn't meant it endearingly. That was pity; in it's purest, sickest form.
Women in Everwood were delightful at pity. Pity and gossip and stupidity, and it made him so sad with want for New York women; women wearing red lipstick and walking in the rain and sitting up late on fire escapes and looking at you blankly as you walk by on the street, as though they'd seen you before, and being so intriguingly beautiful that you still don't look away. He never realized how much he'd miss things like that before they were gone.
Suddenly, Amy came around the corner, and he saw her through the blinds over the glass. She cracked opened the door, they met eyes and he looked away. She stepped inside and stood there, lit by the hallway behind her for a moment, looking like some wonderful creature made of cream and light, untouched like the snow that's so white it wakes you in the morning.
Amy was no New York woman. She was something new ... something different. Ephram wouldn't look up.
"Why would you do something like this, Ephraim?" she finally said, and somehow, without even thinking, he knew exactly what to say. Suddenly, Ephraim knew exactly what to say for the rest of their meeting.
"I don't know. It seemed easier than everything else." He said, feeling like he was repeating himself. The intense de-jah-vu was hitting hard and he spoke the script right out of his fantasy.
Amy took his right hand and turned his wrist up toward the ceiling, examining it carefully with soft eyes, exactly as she had in his dream.
"You know, if you were serious, you'd slit your wrists. You'd bleed out before anyone could find you." She said quietly.
Ephram smiled slightly, just like in his dream.
"I've got this thing about blood."
Amy took her careful, pink, pretty fingernail and ran it up the inside of his forearm. "You cut like that. Right on the vein, if you mean business. Because if you do that, even if they did find you it'd be much harder to close up the veins than if you did it Hollywood style: across, like this." She slid the edge of the nail across his wrist the other way, from side to side, gently and slowly. "See, you'd have to sew up the whole vein if you go vertically, and the blood would come out really fast. If you go from side to side they can just suture it up in no time, because it's just this little cut in the vein, and it wouldn't bleed very much, so I guess if you really wanted to fucking die--"
"I never realized that a wholesome girl like you knew so much about suicide." Ephraim recited his line and waited for her response.
Amy pushed away from him quickly, stark tears standing in her eyes. "I've thought about it too, Ephram!" she suddenly exclaimed, and it wasn't part of the dream anymore. "Of course I've thought about it! Everyone thinks about it! Everyone! You think you're so goddamned special? You think everyone hasn't sat staring at the ingredients in a bottle of Ibuprofen, or taken a blade out of an old razor, just to see if they could? You think *everyone* hasn't done that at least once? You think you're *dad* hasn't?"
Ephram was surprised by this unpleasant turn of events. There was no climbing into the bed, no kiss ... why had he even dreamed it. Well, everything else had lined up so well, until now.
"But he didn't do it, and neither did I. I sucked it up and kept on going, and now look! Look! Things are working out. I thought you were braver than this. I always thought you were the bravest boy I ever knew."
Ephram felt anger boiling in his stomach. How could she be angry at him? He had every right to be mad at her, and she was the one yelling. She didn't understand how things were, she couldn't! If she did, she wouldn't be ...
"Oh, that's right, your boyfriend got in a little tussle after a drink or two and fell out of a car. Big fucking deal. He was alive; you had hope, you had my father. Shit Amy, you had him more than I did. Ever." Ephram said, and he could hear that undertone of his pulse picking up, and that line spiking quicker. "You have got no idea what it's really like to lose someone, okay. Losing your only parent and being left with someone who doesn't know you or love you or want to. It's like there's nothing *there*! There's just nothing *there* to want to be around for anymore. You feel so lonely and isolated and displaced, like sometime everyone you knew left, or changed, and you're the only one staying behind, you're the only one the same, and you want to be with them, where ever they went, because they seem happy, and you're not, and you don't know why. And if you're not happy yet, will you ever be?" He looked up at her and looked back down again, speaking quietly, angrily. "Pretty little Amy, almost too pretty, just about too perfect. You've never felt it. Trust me. You'd get swallowed up too."
Amy was quick to return with strong, anger-less words. "Ephram, everybody knows about what you lost, but you're whole family lost, too. I don't see you're father chugging down Aspirin."
"Well, no, that would be unhealthy."
"Why would you do something like this, Ephram?"
"I don't know. It seemed easier than everything else."
Amy didn't know what to say to that. It *was* easier than everything else. Except for now, because now he had to live in the wake of it for probably the rest of his life. She took his hand and turned his wrist up toward her.
"You know, if you were serious, you'd slit your wrists. You'd bleed out before anyone could find you."
Ephram actually smiled. "I've got this thing about blood." He said.
Amy took her careful, pink, pretty fingernail and ran it up the inside of his forearm. "You cut like that. Right on the vein, if you mean business. Because if you do that, even if they did find you it'd be much harder to close up the veins than if you did it Hollywood style: across, like this." She slid the edge of the nail across his wrist the other way, from side to side, gently and slowly. "See, you'd have to sew up the whole vein if you go vertically, and the blood would come out really fast. If you go from side to side they can just suture it up in no time, because it's just this little cut in the vein, and it wouldn't bleed very much, so I guess if you really wanted to fucking die ..." she trailed off and started crying.
Ephraim hugged her softly, basically just put his arms around her shoulders and allowed her to lean on him.
"I never realized that a wholesome girl like you knew so much about suicide." He muttered in her ear.
"My dad's a doctor." She sobbed.
"So's mine. I still had to wing it."
"Oh, Ephram!" she exclaimed, sobbing, hugging him tighter. "Are you crazy?" But it was odd, the way she asked it. Not rhetorically. She asked it like a perfectly rational question. She asked it like she wanted to know.
"I think that's the general consensuses." He muttered, barely listening.
"Why would you do something like this?"
"You've got no idea how easy it seems once you've made the decision. All you've got to do is swallow some pills. I've done that a million times. My dad is The Great Dr. Brown, after all."
Ephram said all this in a subdued, quiet, comforting tone and never got upset. He seemed tired. Despite the situation, to Amy, Ephraim seemed to be the smartest, wisest, oldest creature in the universe for that moment, and just from the way he was talking, there was a moment where she believed he was perfectly right. About everything. That she was selfish for being glad he'd failed at his attempt.
Amy climbed carefully up onto the bed with him and put her arms around him, terribly careful not to interfere with the IV s stuck into his wrists.
"Jesus, would you look at this." Ephram said, in that same matter-of-fact, wise voice as he put his arm around her. "All I've ever wanted, and all I had to do was kill myself."
"I'm not really all you ever wanted, am I?" Amy asked calmly, in a little girl's you-don't-*really*-love-me-do-you voice, her head on his chest.
"For the last year or so; yeah, you are."
"I love you, Ephram."
"Hm, you're not just saying that because I'm suicidal, are you?"
He said it in a mocking, meaningless tone of voice that made her think he didn't take her seriously, and even if he did it didn't matter, because he didn't care about the old things he used to care about.
"I really love you, Ephram." She said, without looking up, closing her eyes.
"Well. That's good." He said, and he brushed a strand of blonde hair off her face. She leaned up and kissed him. His lips were hot and chapped and unresponsive, and hers were tight and needy, and the meeting of the two lasted for almost ten seconds, just pressed against each other. Amy pulled back calmly. "Now is when I wake up and realize that your kissing me was actually my Dad giving me CPR." Ephram joked, but he didn't seemed amazed or in awe, or even happy. Amy giggled once and kissed his cheek.
"Its just me." She said.
"Colin?" he asked blankly.
"Colin and I are going to break up soon." She said, and although she sounded sad, she sounded at peace with it in a way the Ephram never believed she could be.
"And then you're going to date me." He stated.
"Yes." She said.
"And you'll still think that once we both get to school, and there's Colin with those pretty brown eyes and there's Paige and her "Dark Man" references and Wilmer and his dating tips and there's ballet and snow and homework and piano and doctors and time? Will you still be in love with me then?" Again, there was no anger or sadness or careing in his voice.
"Yes." She said with candor, sounding as if she were falling asleep.
"Okay then." Ephram said, closing his eyes.
When he opened them again a moment later, he was in the empty hospital room, the undertones of his pulse beeping away like a taunting criticism right in tune with the little spiky green line on the little black box next to his bed, and his bed residing only one person. The little fantasy was over, and Ephram was alone with the air, something he'd hoped never to wake up to again. Breathing. Air. The combination of the two.
The room was blue with the lack of real light and early morning. He'd probably woken the town up with his little exploit. Or maybe not; maybe everyone was sleeping in their beds, and his Dad was sitting in the waiting room with a cup of coffee and his thoughts; a terrifying combination. And Delia. Delia would be out there too. And she'd want to come inside. Maybe he would let her. He wouldn't let his father. Because he knew what he'd get from his father, and the thoughts frightened him.
The idea that he would think it was his fault (which it was) was terrible. Well, no ... it wasn't. What he knew his father's reaction would be was the terrible thing. Yes, his father could yell and scream, but there were other things he did that were much worse. When Dad thought something was his fault, he would drop into the same kind of state he'd been in after Mom died. One of Ephraim's friends (in New York), after meeting his father, had said blatantly that she thought he looked like a sad puppy dog. This idea was silly to Ephram, but when he thought about it, he wasn't all that surprised that was the way other people saw him.
His friend had meant it in an almost endearing way, he knew, but another time he'd over heard one of the Everwood women discussing his father in the office while Ephram had been waiting. She obviously hadn't realized Ephram was near by, and she said something along the lines of "that man has the saddest eyes I've ever seen." He realized that she was right, and Ephram could tell she hadn't meant it endearingly. That was pity; in it's purest, sickest form.
Women in Everwood were delightful at pity. Pity and gossip and stupidity, and it made him so sad with want for New York women; women wearing red lipstick and walking in the rain and sitting up late on fire escapes and looking at you blankly as you walk by on the street, as though they'd seen you before, and being so intriguingly beautiful that you still don't look away. He never realized how much he'd miss things like that before they were gone.
Suddenly, Amy came around the corner, and he saw her through the blinds over the glass. She cracked opened the door, they met eyes and he looked away. She stepped inside and stood there, lit by the hallway behind her for a moment, looking like some wonderful creature made of cream and light, untouched like the snow that's so white it wakes you in the morning.
Amy was no New York woman. She was something new ... something different. Ephram wouldn't look up.
"Why would you do something like this, Ephraim?" she finally said, and somehow, without even thinking, he knew exactly what to say. Suddenly, Ephraim knew exactly what to say for the rest of their meeting.
"I don't know. It seemed easier than everything else." He said, feeling like he was repeating himself. The intense de-jah-vu was hitting hard and he spoke the script right out of his fantasy.
Amy took his right hand and turned his wrist up toward the ceiling, examining it carefully with soft eyes, exactly as she had in his dream.
"You know, if you were serious, you'd slit your wrists. You'd bleed out before anyone could find you." She said quietly.
Ephram smiled slightly, just like in his dream.
"I've got this thing about blood."
Amy took her careful, pink, pretty fingernail and ran it up the inside of his forearm. "You cut like that. Right on the vein, if you mean business. Because if you do that, even if they did find you it'd be much harder to close up the veins than if you did it Hollywood style: across, like this." She slid the edge of the nail across his wrist the other way, from side to side, gently and slowly. "See, you'd have to sew up the whole vein if you go vertically, and the blood would come out really fast. If you go from side to side they can just suture it up in no time, because it's just this little cut in the vein, and it wouldn't bleed very much, so I guess if you really wanted to fucking die--"
"I never realized that a wholesome girl like you knew so much about suicide." Ephraim recited his line and waited for her response.
Amy pushed away from him quickly, stark tears standing in her eyes. "I've thought about it too, Ephram!" she suddenly exclaimed, and it wasn't part of the dream anymore. "Of course I've thought about it! Everyone thinks about it! Everyone! You think you're so goddamned special? You think everyone hasn't sat staring at the ingredients in a bottle of Ibuprofen, or taken a blade out of an old razor, just to see if they could? You think *everyone* hasn't done that at least once? You think you're *dad* hasn't?"
Ephram was surprised by this unpleasant turn of events. There was no climbing into the bed, no kiss ... why had he even dreamed it. Well, everything else had lined up so well, until now.
"But he didn't do it, and neither did I. I sucked it up and kept on going, and now look! Look! Things are working out. I thought you were braver than this. I always thought you were the bravest boy I ever knew."
Ephram felt anger boiling in his stomach. How could she be angry at him? He had every right to be mad at her, and she was the one yelling. She didn't understand how things were, she couldn't! If she did, she wouldn't be ...
"Oh, that's right, your boyfriend got in a little tussle after a drink or two and fell out of a car. Big fucking deal. He was alive; you had hope, you had my father. Shit Amy, you had him more than I did. Ever." Ephram said, and he could hear that undertone of his pulse picking up, and that line spiking quicker. "You have got no idea what it's really like to lose someone, okay. Losing your only parent and being left with someone who doesn't know you or love you or want to. It's like there's nothing *there*! There's just nothing *there* to want to be around for anymore. You feel so lonely and isolated and displaced, like sometime everyone you knew left, or changed, and you're the only one staying behind, you're the only one the same, and you want to be with them, where ever they went, because they seem happy, and you're not, and you don't know why. And if you're not happy yet, will you ever be?" He looked up at her and looked back down again, speaking quietly, angrily. "Pretty little Amy, almost too pretty, just about too perfect. You've never felt it. Trust me. You'd get swallowed up too."
Amy was quick to return with strong, anger-less words. "Ephram, everybody knows about what you lost, but you're whole family lost, too. I don't see you're father chugging down Aspirin."
"Well, no, that would be unhealthy."