He was in my dream. It's been a while since I last dreamed of him. I almost forgot I dreamed of him until she brought it up. It came back to me like heavy patches of rain, quick thunderstorms that are gone as soon as you spot them. You remember the lightning; you don't remember when it started raining.
Enter the waterworks. No, I'm not going to cry. But I feel like I should continue the water analogy.
It's weird.
She read it. But I'm not mad.
Call it growing. Yes, me, growing. I was more surprised that I wasn't mad at her than being mad at her because she gets me mad over such stupid, trivial things. But this time I'm not mad. I think that's a good thing. I'm not sure if it's because I trust her more or because I trust myself more. Maybe it's both.
Oh, the tangled web we weave. I don't know what I mean by that. I am rambling now. Letting it flow. Letting it free. Free as a bird.
My mom told me to do that. She told me to let it go.
I'm trying.
Not there yet.
Going to stop rambling now. Going to stop writing in incomplete sentences now.
...
Current position: Sitting and staring
Chapter Fifteen
"Hello, Mrs. Eldritch! My mom told me to bring you these!"
Julie pushed a plate of chocolate chip cookies covered in translucent green saran wrap into Mrs. Eldritch's startled arms. She smiled widely, cheeks scrunching up, lips pulling tightly upward, and nostrils flaring. She couldn't help but stare enviously at the plate. She helped Mom bake these last night, but the entire batch was for Lane's family. The smell of baked goods was just too intoxicating.
Mrs. Eldritch played with the plastic covering with her thumb and pointer finger, pressing it tighter against the back of the ceramic plate. "Uh, thank you, Julie," she replied slowly, uncertainly. She shifted the plate and balanced it on the flat of one hand, freeing her other hand so she could brush her bangs to the side. "Are you here to see Lane today?" She looked back at Francis for a quick second before returning her attention to Julie.
Julie nodded. "We won't be long," she said. "Me and Francis gotta go to the beach for our science project. It's on shells. Lane was in our group but–" She zipped her mouth shut when she noticed the grimace on Mrs. Eldritch's face.
"Nice one," whispered Francis into her ear. Julie suppressed her desire to jab Francis's gut with her elbow.
Mrs. Eldritch wiped at the bottom lid of her eye and rubbed at the corners. She tried to discreetly hide her sniffle by clearing her throat, but Julie knew better.
"Well, go ahead," Mrs. Eldritch said, heels clicking on the linoleum as she walked over to the nightstand and placed the plate of cookies next to a vase of dying, drooping flowers. "I need to run down to the lobby and make a phone call. Take your time, kids." She gave them a watery smile before walking past them and darting down the hallway, one hand pulling out the slim cellphone she kept in the back pocket of her jeans.
Francis waited until he couldn't hear Mrs. Eldritch's scurried feet. "Good job, Julie. You made her cry."
"Did not!" she protested. She spun around on the balls of her feet, her long pigtails whipping around her head, and glared at the smug boy. "She was crying before she got here. Her eyes were already red and stuff. Don't get all defensive over your girlfriend."
It amused her how Francis's face flushed through three shades of red at what she said. "You're ... g-gross, Julie!" he finally stuttered out.
Julie poked him in the gut much to his annoyance. "Whatever, Flan-Flan. I see how you look at her." She smirked, her eyes alight with amusement. "You like Lane's mo-om, you like Lane's mo-om!" she sang.
Francis clutched the white poster in his right hand, bending one of its corners in his grip. "Shut up! Do not! He'll hear you!" he argued. "And stop calling me that!"
"Sheesh. So defensive," she teased again. She stuck her tongue out at Francis blew a raspberry at her. "Anyway ..."
Julie and Francis focused their attention on the hospital bed in front of them. The bed had metal railings, and the sheets were stiff and white. The ends that hung over the side fluttered whenever the salty air blew through the room from the open window. Julie, with her hands clasped together in front of her, stared at Lane's sleeping form. He looked so peaceful, his chest rising and falling slowly. His big ole ears were sticking out past his hair like always. Poor elf, she thought.
"He's still alive, right?" Francis murmured. She heard him take a step forward; the bottom corner of the poster dug into the back of her left calve.
She wondered that herself. Lane looked just too peaceful, and if the sleeping boy didn't let out a mix of a grunt and gargle from his open mouth, she would have assumed he was dead, too. Julie took a few tentative steps forward herself, standing next to the heart monitor hooked up to Lane's body. She turned her head, watching the green line make mountains out of plateaus.
Her eyes flicked back over toward Lane as she slowly walked over and knelt on the wooden stool next to his bed. He was wearing a white shirt today, his arms to his side and outside the sheets. His fingernails were long and dirty. She couldn't help but notice all the scratch marks on his forearms; Lane always got a bruise or scrape or cut whenever they went out to play. She looked at his eyes – well, eyelids. They were closed, of course. He had long eyelashes, thick and black and slightly curled. Like a baby doll, she thought. She reached out and brushed the hair off Lane's forehead like she would her dolls and was surprised at how hot Lane's skin was. It was sweaty almost. She didn't know why.
"He has such a flat nose," she commented as Francis walked over and stood next to her, pressing the poster between his stomach and the metal railing. "I ..." Julie reached over and tugged lightly on Lane's left earlobe. Francis stared at her, bewildered.
"I ... I always wanted to," she said quietly.
"Issues, Julie, you have them," he muttered back. Francis pulled his foot back, his sneaker squeaking on the floor, and leaned his weight against the bar. Something creaked from the pressure. His hair caught the sun, making his blond locks look transparent. "Well ... now what?"
Julie heard the joints in her knees crack as she rocked back and forth on the stool. Her hands tugged at the bottom of her pigtails before she wrapped them around her pointer fingers. "Teacher said we should talk to him like he was awake," she remarked, scrolling her eyes to the top of the ceiling. "Except, you know, he won't really respond and all. She says we should keep him up on everything that has been going on."
Francis nodded. "Right." He grinned. "Guess what, Dumbo! Julie got hit in the face with a ball when we played dodge ball two days ago!"
Julie gaped then added, "Well, Flan-Flan peed on himself yesterday!"
"I told you! The water fountain messed up and got my pants wet!"
"Right. Directly in one circular spot. Right."
"It was the water fountain!"
"Is that what they call 'peeing your pants' now?" Julie smiled at the growl emitted from Francis's throat. She motioned toward the poster, and Francis pulled it up, handing it to her. She held it up, peeking around the sides. "Class made this for you, Laney," she said cheerfully. "See? It says, 'Get well soon!' Sarah G. wrote the block letters, and everyone else wrote their own little message around it." She reached over and pointed at a message written in a red heart. "I wrote this one! I'll let you read it later when you wake up."
Francis stuck his finger down his throat and mock gagged as Julie continued. "Class misses you, Laney. We had an assembly three days ago, and the entire class thought how funny it would have been if you ran down the aisles making fart noises with your hands like last time." She lowered the poster and stared at Lane sadly. She felt her stomach start to twist and knot, a salty saliva building up that was painful to swallow back down. "Please get well soon."
"Yeah, Lane. Class ain't the same without me and you pokin' fun at Ms. Hall. And without you, Julie always knows it's me pulling on her pigtails."
"So that was you," she said quietly. She shook her head, her pigtails whipping her in the face. "But yeah, Laney. We ... miss you. Everyone does." She felt her legs started to shake, so she lowered herself, propping the poster against the stool. It felt like her organs were on overdrive; her stomach was crazily churning like she hadn't eaten in hours and her heart felt like it was going to thump, thump, thump out of her ribcage.
Julie met Lane like all of her classmates did: in class, years ago, when they were little. Classmates changed, as did teachers, but she and Lane were always in the same class. They were only five at the time, but she knew when she looked at his big, ole elf ears, messy hair, and goofy smile that she and him were going to be best friends. He used to chase her around the playground with a handful of earthworms, part because he was teasing and part because they were "so cool, Julie!" but the older they got, the more it reversed. She had no idea why. It wasn't like she was chasing him with a handful of earthworms or anything. She just wanted to play "house" is all.
She missed Laney. Laney is such a funny, funny boy, and he knows how to make her smile even when she's feeling so, so blue. Laney was infamous at school; he was that boy last year that refused to come off the stage during last year's spelling bee, stating that he was protesting the unfairness of spelling. "When would you ever need to spell 'rainbow'?" he argued.
He got a week's detention for that.
A year and a half ago, he hid underneath the jungle gym. It caused school wide panic because no one knew where he was for hours except her and Flan-Flan, but they kept their mouths shut because it was sort of funny. When they found him, he was covered in chocolate, and muffin wrappers were scattered around him. Apparently he crept into the lunchroom, grabbed a bunch of chocolate muffins from the cafeteria, and chowed down.
That was detention for two weeks, plus a parent-principal meeting.
A few months ago he tried to start a fad that consisted of wearing your clothes backward. (It came to a point that he wore sunglasses behind his head to see if he could trick people – and he did. He managed to fool the almost blind, always preoccupied Ms. Kutcher who was retiring this year. No one could figure out if she was really tricked or decided to play along. She did adore Lane.) He didn't get in trouble, but it went on his permanent record nonetheless.
What was especially memorable in her mind was half a year ago when he came up to her wearing a black button-up that was one size too big and dress pants that were one size too small, and his hair was combed down and gelled for once. It was spring, and it was wet and smelled of rain. She was wearing a black sleeveless dress with a flower in her hair (a white orchid because that was her mom's favorite). He came up to her and held her hand. She hadn't held his hand in a while; in fact, the last time was when they played "house" and they were husband and wife.
"Mom said you might need me," he said. He smiled, frowned, then smiled again, like he wasn't sure what face he should wear. "She says you'll be sad, and I don't like seeing my friends sad. She says you'll be sad for a long, long time."
She remembered gripping his hand tightly, and he squeezed her fingers back. "I miss her," she trembled out, tears streaming down her cheeks. Her legs were shaking; she swore she heard her bones rattle, like a stick against a picket fence. "I'm scared."
"I think that's okay," he replied. He held up his other hand that was clutching a dragonite plushie by the wing. "You can have Dragonite. Dad gave him to me when I was little. When I miss Dad, I talk to him and I feel better. Maybe he'll help you when you start missing your mom."
She took the stuffed toy with her free hand and pressed it against her body. The warm material felt good against her cold arms. "You're letting me have him?"
He nodded with a smile. He looked at what Julie was staring at earlier, a frame holding a picture of a woman with thick, brown hair and green, determined eyes. "Is this your mom?" he asked, blue eyes wide.
She nodded this time.
"You look like her," he said as he swung their hands back and forth. "She's pretty."
Tears rolled down her cheeks. She wasn't sure what she was crying for. She quickly wiped them away before Francis noticed.
"The uh ..." she heard Francis start, "the trainer's license test is coming up, Dumbo. We're preparing for it now in battle studies."
Laney was always excited whenever the trainer's license test was brought up – everyone was, really, but he freaked the freak out whenever Ms. Hall brought it up. That test was one step closer to being a pokémon trainer, and being a pokémon trainer was one step closer to leaving this smelly city and adventuring to ... goodness, wherever you wanted, really. Everyone in class had their own ideas of what type of trainer they wanted to be–coordinator, gym apprentice, ace trainer, bug catcher, whatever–but Lane was different.
"Dragon tamer," was his reply to the famous question. "Like Lance."
They tell him that being a dragon tamer is difficult. Finding a dragon type is hard, let alone catching one, and dragon-type apprenticeships are challenging programs to get into if you wanted to receive a dragon pokémon. They ask him what his backup is.
"I don't have one," he would say. "There's only one choice for me."
She turned her head and watched Francis fidget with a loose string on his t-shirt. "We haven't gotten that far in it," he said, his head lowered, "but I figure you'd wanna be there. I mean, it's all stuff we already know so far. So it's not like you're missing stuff."
A groan caught their attention. Julie snapped her head back to Lane and saw Lane's face screw up, nose wrinkling, upper lip curling. "Daaaark ..." he whispered. The muscles in his face relaxed.
It, this one-worded whisper, was ominous, sending a sensation of cactus needles pricking her along her spine. She reached out and ran a finger against Lane's forehead again, flicking up the bangs that stuck to it. He was definitely sweaty now, and she wasn't sure if it was the lighting but he looked paler. Julie brought her hand back and wiped her finger against her shorts. "Do you think ..." she began, trying to phrase her question properly, "do you think he's ... dreaming?" She turned her head where Francis stood only to find the spot empty. "Flan-Flan?"
Crunch. Julie quickly turned her head in the other direction and saw Francis munching on the cookies she brought for Lane's family. "Flan-Flan, that's for Laney!"
Francis took another huge bite from the chocolate chip cookie he held in his greedy hands, using his tongue to lick up the crumbs around his mouth. "It's not like he'll notice one cookie gone," he said, his mouth filled with balled up pieces of chewed food. He rolled his eyes and threw the rest of the cookie in his mouth, quickly chewing and swallowing it. "And I don't know. If he's asleep, probably. Can you even dream for that long?"
"I wonder what he's dreaming about," she said thoughtfully.
"What do elves usually dream about? The rush before Christmas?"
"Oh, shut up," she said angrily.
"Sheesh. Just kidding. Relax." Francis took his place next to Julie again. She watched as he reached into the pockets of his jeans and pulled out a rectangular piece of hard paper, slipping it underneath Lane's hand. It was the metallic dragonite card Francis got six days ago. "Here, Lane. Since you did do that dare–sort of–I guess you deserve it."
"How nice of you," Julie murmured. "I mean that."
"Yeah. Now wake up already."
. . .
Fuck.
He woke up, panicked. He couldn't feel his arms, couldn't move his legs. It was tough enough to wiggle his fingers back and forth; it felt like needles were prodding the tips. His breathing was shallow, his heart beating rapidly. He tried to lift his head; he found that he couldn't do it easily. He tried to wiggle his toes. They were cold within his socks, but at least he could move something. He gnashed his teeth in frustration.
He tried to say her name but found his throat dry and unable to let anything out besides a huff. Luckily, this caught her attention, and she scrambled over from the fire pit on her knees. She reached over toward her bag and grabbed a bottle of water from the side pocket before propping his head up on the top of her thighs, unscrewing the top of the bottle and letting water trickle slowly down his throat. The water felt so refreshing, so cool, that it felt like it was burning his insides. As he felt the water hit his stomach, he felt his limbs come back to life slowly but surely; the needle sensations were fading away, and while his muscles were still aching, he could at least move them more than an inch.
She pressed her hand lightly against her forehead and brushed it back through his hair. "How are you feeling?" she asked quietly.
He cleared his throat before replying, "Shitty. The sunlight ..." He wanted to say more, ask why he was feeling this way (did he sleepwalk through an adventure?), at least finish his sentence, but he was too breathless to continue.
Dawn looked up where the sunlight was streaming through the foliage, leaving striped patterns on the dirt floor below. She moved so that her head was blocking the light, casting Lucas's face in shadow. "Better?" she asked, placing the water bottle back on the floor.
He nodded slowly, the back of his head still aching.
"Good." Dawn reached over Lucas's head and straightened out the cover of his sleeping bag. "You slept for so long," she remarked, sitting back up. "It's noon. I called Eldritch on your phone. I hope you don't mind. I think it's better if we get off this island as soon as possible so we can get you help."
"No," he protested, trying to sit up, but a jolt of pain ricocheted up and down his back. He fell back down, his head falling on top of Dawn's thighs.
"Yes," she said, her eyes filled with worry. "Look at you. You can barely move. Besides, I couldn't reach Eldritch. I left a voice mail at nine, but he hasn't called me back yet."
"We haven't found anything yet." His voice cracked. He closed his eyes, brow furrowed. "We haven't found anything."
"You need help," she repeated. She gently placed Lucas's head back on the pillow and scurried to sit by his side instead of behind him, kicking up dirt and diluting the air around them with a brown dust. "You had a rough night."
Lucas opened his heavy eyelids, even though they were aching to be closed, and stared into the noon sky, a light blue dotted with heavy, white clouds. Even if he could barely move, his other senses were alive and kicking. He could hear the rolling of the sea, the screeches of the wingull. He could smell salt, the scent of wet grass, undistinguished plant life. "Last night ..." he murmured. "What happened last night?"
Dawn tucked a rogue strand of hair behind her ear. "You don't remember anything?"
It pained him to shake his head, so he uttered, "No."
Dawn sighed and kicked her legs out so she wasn't kneeling anymore, though the action coated her legs with dirt. She leaned back on her hands and stared up into the sky, watching the clouds slowly pass by. "Darkrai got you," she said.
What?
"What?" he asked incredulously. "What do you mean he got me?"
"I woke up last night. You were kicking around and shaking. That's probably why your body hurts so much. I thought you were just having a bad nightmare, so I tried to wake you up but you just ... wouldn't wake up." At this, she seemed to have drifted off, her eyes cast over. She shook her head and turned to face Lucas's bewildered face. "Then you started thrashing, and you kept muttering, 'Darkrai.' I had ... I had to pin"–she lifted her arms and stretched them out in front of her, fingers spread and squirming–"your arms and legs down so you wouldn't hurt yourself, and I kept trying to wake you up, but you just wouldn't and ..."
He noticed how shaky her voice got, tears on the verge. Using all his willpower, Lucas pulled his arms out of the covers, pressed his palms against the flannel lining of his sleeping bag, and slowly pushed himself up. His head was absolutely throbbing (it felt like it was pulsating energy) but he ignored this sensation, kicked down the butterfree in his stomach, and pulled Dawn into a hug. His nose pressed against the side of her neck. He smelled her hair; it smelled sweet, like watermelon, but had that metallic kiss the sun left when someone was outside for hours at a time. He felt her arms wrap around his aching back as she pressed her forehead against his shoulder.
"I ... I didn't know what to do," he heard her say even though her voice was muffled by his shirt and her long layers of hair. She pulled her head up, pressing her chin against the side of his neck. Her breath was hot on his skin. "I was scared for you. I thought you were gone."
"But I'm not," he added. "So something else happened, right?"
It kind of surprised him that she was the first to pull away from their embrace. Dawn wiped her cheeks then wiped her fingers on her skirt. "Yeah," she said. "Yeah. Somewhere in the middle of all that, I thought of using Myth. She knows Dream Eater, and I was getting desperate, so I asked her to use it. I knew it was dangerous but–"
"Myth?" he interrupted.
"My clefable," she confirmed.
"You used a pokémon named ... Myth to try and help me?"
She nodded.
He had to pause to let that information seep into his brain. A clefable named Myth tried to save you. A pokémon named Myth tried to save you. Myth tried to save you. Myth tried to save you. (The keyword in making him feel better was the word "tried" but it's still ... god, what's the word?)
"There's a word for this," he said out loud, pressing a hand against the side of his head. "I'm just not sure what."
Dawn let out a small laugh, twirling a finger around a long blade of grass. "Yeah, well. Tried. On one of her attempts, something shot back at her and knocked her off her feet, and I decided it was too dangerous for her."
"But not for me."
"I knew your hard head could take it." She grinned, tugging at the blade and pulling it out of the ground. She folded the blade in half and rolled it back and forth between her fingers. "And it did. Anyway, a minute after I called her back, something flew overhead, stopped, and like that"–she snapped her fingers–"it disappeared." She nodded her head toward the fire pit. "See all these feathers? Whatever it was released them when it flew off."
Lucas took a look at the open campsite. Bordered by the thick, gnarled trunks of olive trees on all sides (and probably some other trees that Lucas couldn't identify off the top of his head), the campsite was a haven, blocking the heavy sea winds and the ocean and its unpredictable waves. The ground was hard, yet the dirt was easy to kick up and knock into your shoes, and the grass was long, spiky, and sticky. He had been in worse. In his dazed state, he made out the feathers that decorated the area, caught in the brush and littering the ground like tired confetti. Most of them were dirty, browned with the dirt, but he could make out the dim blues, pinks, and yellows. He caught on quickly.
"Cresselia?" he asked.
"I think. Like I said, it was gone as soon as it came, but the feathers match her colors, no? When the feathers fell, swirling, twirling, glowing under the light of the moon in a hazy, hazy dream like a soft rain–"
"Can you stop speaking like you're writing fan fiction?"
"–you calmed down," she finished, glaring at the boy. "You stopped shaking and murmuring about darkrai and stuff, and you woke up."
"I did?" He scratched the side of his nose. "I don't remember."
"Mhm!" She nodded, beaming. "You told me you were worried for me because you saw me crying."
He racked his brain, trying to remember. "Wait. No, I didn't. I asked why you were sitting on me. Good try, though."
She sighed, curling her right leg up so her knee was in the air. "A girl can try, no?" Dawn winked at him as he rolled his eyes. "But after that, you fell back asleep, and I watched over you. I figured you were just sleeping a regular sleep since you didn't murmur or freak the heckles out anymore. Jump nine hours into the future and here we are."
Lucas focused his attention on the girl. God, she looked tired. It was kind of eerie, actually, with how heavy the bags under her eyes were and how messy her usually straight, glossy hair was. He recognized it. She was doing the girl version of what he did to demonstrate that he wasn't tired. He saw how she tried to fight back these signs by applying makeup on her cheeks and under her eyes and constantly fussing with her hair by pulling it over her shoulders, then throwing it behind her shoulders, then pulling it over her shoulders, then throwing it back. Her hat was pulled lower than usual, probably containing tangled strands that she couldn't brush out without the help of a comb. Her clothes were dirty. Despite how much of a hot mess she looked, she tried to combat it by putting on a tired smile and widening her usually gleaming blue eyes, putting on an appearance of looking awake. She reminded him of him, and he felt bad. Sort of.
"You didn't ... you didn't stay up the entire night, did you?" he had to ask, feeling the urge to nervously fidget with the brim of his beret. When he reached up, he realized he didn't have it on and went on panic mode to find it, his body protesting against the sudden twists. He found it placed near his open backpack.
His open backpack.
His openbackpack.
As he reached over, his joints screaming, and grabbed his hat, throwing it on his head, Dawn answered, "Sort of. I caught a few moments of sleep here and there, and I slept between six and eight, but for the most part I watched you. Worried, you know." She smiled, but it soon faded away from something genuine to something alarmed when Lucas reached for his backpack, looked at its contents, snapped his head to the left, and noticed the red cover of his notebook sitting so neatly besides her bag. She exhaled nervously, upper lip curling slightly.
Whatever he felt for Dawn less than a minute ago was soon replaced with ... nothing. Nothing. He felt nothing. Nothing toward her, anyway. He felt more nervous for himself than anything. "You ... you read my notebook?" he said slowly, confusingly, alarmingly. He felt tempted to crawl over, grab it, and pull it back into the safety of his arms, but his legs were still too numb to move. So he stared at it, the cover bright under the glare of the sun, willing it to fly back toward him. But even if his head was radiating some unknown energy, apparently this energy was not telekinetic. His notebook–his records, his life, his data, his personal thought for crying out loud–was out there, exposed to nature, exposed to public, exposed to ... her.
"I ..." He watched as her face clenched, eyes narrowing, cheeks scrunching up, brow wrinkling, like she was staring directly into a fire (for all intents and purposes, and because today he felt like making fun of fan fiction, let's say he, too, was fire–rather, a metaphor for it–hot, and glowing, and sort of smelly, and the creator of destruction but the bringer of new life, and, at times, random, because, well, who decided to drop a random thought in the middle of someone else's dialogue here? Only certain fan fiction authors). "I ... I don't know what to say," she said.
"That's a first." He snorted.
"I didn't read a lot," she argued. "I only tried to read what I wanted to figure out about you."
"What?" He tried to keep his tone flat, tried to slow down his beating heart. "Team Galactic? Cyrus? My childhood?"
"Kind of." She crawled over to her bag, dirtying her knees, and swiped the notebook from the ground. She brought it back to him where he greedily grabbed it and placed it on his lap, pinning the cover shut between his fingers.
"Then what?"
She took his flat tone as aggression and turned her head, looking at the twisted trunks instead of his face. "Barry," she addressed the trees.
Barry?
"Barry?" he repeated out loud.
"Like ... I know you don't want to talk about Cyrus, or Team Galactic, or even your championship, and I can respect that because I know those were really difficult moments in your life." Dawn bowed her head, drawing swirls in the dirt. "But when I asked about Barry a few days ago, you seemed eager to talk about him, but then you sort of ... cut off and changed the subject."
It dawned on him that he dreamed of Barry.
"And he was your friend, yeah?"
Barry died in his dream.
"So ... yeah."
And he didn't do anything.
"Lucas?"
He couldn't do anything.
"Lucas?"
What was he supposed to do?
"LUCAS?"
"What?" he finally snapped, startling Dawn. He felt bad immediately after, bringing up a hand and wiping at the back of his neck, trying to ignore the jabs of pain that ran up and down and pricked up the hairs on his arm. "Sorry."
"No, I'm sorry. I had no right to read your notebook. I shouldn't have. If it helps, I didn't read anything past the first few pages, and all you talked about was what you were having for lunch or dinner for the most part. It's just ..." She paused and slowly turned her head to face Lucas again, wary. "He was your closest friend. You two looked so close, but it feels like ... like you're not friends anymore. And that makes me sad. Is that true? Are you not friends anymore?"
Lucas had written pages upon pages about Barry; Dawn hadn't looked far enough. He tried to reason it out, tried to logically draw conclusions, tried to piece together information, and he understood to an extent, but it still hurt nonetheless. He had to keep reminding himself that he understood, that it was for the best, that being friends with him–and let's keep that vague–would eventually shred them apart like tissue paper in a tornado, but it still angered him. Fucking dammit.
Betrayed isn't the right word; Lucas didn't feel betrayed. He understood. He understood. God, he understood. It bothered him that he understood. He didn't understand a lot of things, but he was sure of this one thing, and that mere fact was what drove him crazy because Barry ... Barry was the one that was supposed to say, "Fuck it," and stick around because that's Barry. Barry plays by his own rules, his own time, his own beat of the drum. Since when did he obey what other people told him to do? Especially Lucas. Especially shy, little Lucas with a scarf too long that the ends dragged on the floor and who relied on Barry when they were younger to talk to the shop clerk. He had only seen Barry bewildered three times in his life: once when Rowan let him keep his chimchar, another when Lake Valor blew up, and the other when Lucas told him that it would be better if they parted ways for a while. Barry's eyes were wide, and bright, and gold, and confused as Lucas said this, and Lucas's were hardened into cold, blue stones by then, and Barry, no, Barry looked anything but hurt. He understood, too, and fuck he hated that he understood, because they were supposed to be friends. That's what it said in the time capsule they buried when they were nine years-old, that even when shit hit the fan (or whatever the nine year-old equivalent of that word is) they would stick together. Because that's what friends do.
But he understood. Things are better that way. Lucas is good at taking hits–he's a durable guy and all according to Arceus knows how many people–and he would take the hits so his friend wouldn't have to suffer anymore. Barry didn't deserve what happened to him. Barry told him that he grew from his experience after that fateful day when Lake Valor blew up and he fought the bitch, but he knew the kid was having nightmares from it. He would take the hits for everyone, even if he hated it, because he hated seeing anyone suffer. That's him. That's Lucas. He's that guy. That guy with the vengeance against Team Galactic. That guy who would one day take down Cynthia's long run as champion. That guy who is so responsible, so determined, and smart, and brilliant, and strong-willed, and repetitive, and, at times, random (because here we are again, breaking dialogue with another person to spill into an emotional mess of emotion) that he would do anything, even flatten mountains if someone requested it, because he hated disappointing others, especially himself. And shit he'd be damned if he brought his desires, his lust for pleasing, onto someone else's shoulders, even if it meant sacrificing one of the few things that made him happy.
"We're ... something," he muttered, "but I don't know what that means."
"When was the last you talked to him?"
"Years." Lucas placed his notebook on his belly and collapsed back on top of his sleeping bag, letting his bones creak and relax. He wiggled his fingers on the fabric, touching the balls of cotton. "Years," he repeated. "I hear about him, and I guess he hears about me too, but we haven't talked in a while." The sleeping bag was absorbing the sun, so he kicked off the cover and let the sun bleed into his jeans, his socks, his shirt, his self. He squinted.
"Why?"
"Because."
"Because why?"
"Because I said."
"You should contact him again," she said so simply. Oh, if only it were that simple.
"Maybe."
"Do you miss him?"
"Sometimes."
"You were close to him, yeah?"
"Yeah."
"So, yeah! Contact him again! Maybe he'll remember me. Maybe all three of us can hang out."
Barry called him after the Lake Valor scandal and before their fall out, asked if he had Dawn's number because she was "seriously cute." He told him he didn't. He really did, but he kept it to himself. He didn't know why.
"Maybe," he said.
Dawn curled her legs into her body and hugged her legs against her chest. She rested her chin on top of her dry knees. "So what is it?" she tried to pry again. "You just drifted apart?"
"Okay," he said.
"Okay what?"
"Okay to your question."
"Okay ..."
"Okay."
He could tell she was annoyed with his vagueness, and it wasn't like he was trying to purposely annoy her or purposely be vague, but it is what it is. That's it. They were vague. Barry and him were just not close anymore, bordering between strangers and acquaintances, because that is for the best, that is what is good for the both of them, that is how Barry can achieve his goals and Lucas his, undisturbed and having one less thing to worry about. That is, he deemed, sacrifice.
(Months ago, he felt selfish–the exact opposite of sacrifice–by giving up this close friendship just so he wouldn't bring Barry pain, humiliation, or whatever. After all, friendship takes two people, but he had to dismiss those thoughts. Barry is better off without him. Everyone is. No, he didn't mean it in a depressing sort of way, a cry for attention because, really, everyone is better off leaving him to clean up other people's messes. He just hated seeing Barry, anyone really, in pain, be hurt, even if they do find some good in it. He stated once he worked better alone, and it's true. The less people he had to worry about, the better. It worked the same for the friends who wouldn't be hit by the misfire of his responsibilities. Barry understood this, though, because that's what friends do: they understand and they stick together through these understandings, and he, too, was willing to sacrifice. Let's keep it vague. Hims and hers are vague. Names make things more real.)
"I couldn't help myself," she began. "I was really curious. I hope you're not mad at me. I won't read it again."
He wasn't.
"I'm not," he said. "I understand."
Understanding is what friends do.
Let's keep it vague. Let's keep "it" vague.
She turned her head and gave him one of those smiles that made his stomach churn like he was hungry. Or maybe he really was hungry. It had been hours since his last meal. Something vibrated next to his leg. His phone. He ignored it.
"Did you dream?" she asked.
"What?"
"Did you dream?"
Barry died in his dream.
"Why?" he asked.
"It is rumored that darkrai sustains energy that comes off nightmares. So did you dream?"
Yes.
"Probably," he answered.
"Can you remember any?"
The vibration died. Barry died in his dream.
Lucas screwed his face up, trying to think. "You were in it."
She raised an eyebrow. "Yeah? What was I doing?"
Me.
"I don't remember," he said. "But I remember you were in it. Don't think it was anything bad."
It was, but in a different sense of the word.
The vibration kicked up again, and he ignored it.
"What else?" she asked.
Cyrus.
"Nothing," he replied.
"All you dreamed about was me?"
Okay.
"Okay," he said.
The vibration died.
"I don't know if I should be flattered or not," she said. "But I won't pry. I understand now."
Because that's what friends do.
He sat back up, back screaming, and grinned. Even grinning was painful, but she deserved a grin. The phone rang again. He picked it up with achy fingers, stiff joints creaking like rusty hinges, and held the phone to his left ear. He sat up at the sound of the speaker's voice, gruff and aged with sea water. In distraction, in habit, he flipped his notebook open to the last page he written on, pulling a pencil out of his right pocket. He started to scribble. He had no idea what, but he let it bleed out.
"Hey, Eldritch. It's nice to hear from you."
. . .
Interesting.
Arguably, you were a difficult case.
My child, you do not understand how long it took for me to find something?
Did you think you could get away that easily, child?
And did you think you could flit through these dreams with no repercussion?
Remarkable specimen, you humans.
Knowledgeable in some senses but still so lost.
Roaming the dark.
Aimless. Disorientated.
I understand now, child. And this time, there is no escape.
You.
Are.
Mine.