Mirage(31)

I have the strongest urge to pull his face closer. Even as I’m wondering why, I’m tilting my head and brazenly grazing his lips with mine. When I open my eyes, his are narrowed, perplexed. His dancing has slowed to a sway. I press against him and kiss him again. His mouth is stiff, unresponsive to my lips. The walls of our teeth clank together awkwardly.

Joe recoils, stunned. “You meant that!” he yells over the music. “Why would you do that?” There is accusation in his voice, in his eyes, which flash with anger and confusion.

“I don’t know.” I shrug. I really don’t. But the feeling was so strong, I had to obey it. “Because . . . because I love you!” I yell over the music.

His head cocks to the side. “I love you, too, but it doesn’t mean I want your tongue in my mouth. Jesus, Ryan!” Joe takes a couple of steps away but stops when he realizes I’m following him. He holds up his hand. “You’re going to mess with my man magnetism.” He shimmies a couple of feet away and melts into the mob of bodies glowing neon from the swirling lights.

Keep moving. By myself. Like an idiot. Dancing will keep me from feeling stupid and rejected. What I did was impulsive, but I followed an uncontrolled inner drive. I try to make sense of it. From the moment I woke up in the hospital, Joe was the one who made me feel some peace, belonging. He loves me. I love him. It seemed natural to show it, I tell myself. But the urge was beyond my consciousness. I keep dancing to forget the look on his face when I kissed him. I’m sticky with sweat and embarrassment.

The music thumps in my head, but I can still hear her voice as if we’re alone in a dark cave. Stupid bitch.

An enormous disco ball rotates above the dancers. Blackness curls its fingers around my vision for a moment before letting go. Leaning forward, hands on my knees, I wait for it to pass. When I can focus, eyes are everywhere I look, swirling on the floor, ceiling, walls, spinning on the sweaty skin of other people. Everyone is tattooed with the eyes of Death.

“Hey!” snaps a girl when I grab her shoulder to steady my wobbly legs. The face is even behind my eyelids. I can’t shut it out by closing my eyes like before. This, whatever this is, is getting worse. My body rebels, shakes violently; the saddle slips sideways even without medication. I don’t have a hold on myself; I could fly out of this body into the darkness right here in the middle of this pulsing nightclub.

Louder than the music, I hear her laughing.





Seventeen


MY KNEES AND HANDS slam into the gritty dance floor. It’s an enormous effort to keep from passing out. Someone steps on my fingers. I force my eyes open. Her reflection, my reflection, sweeps over the floor in circles, over the shoes around me, over my hands as I try to push myself to standing.

This kind of thing can’t happen, especially not in public. They’ll size me for a crazy suit for sure. I crouch self-protectively with cold hands around my knees.

Swimming out of quicksand would be easier, but I finally manage to make it to my feet. I’ve done it. I’m stronger than she is. But my victory is short-lived. Joe sees me and begins his own swim against the crowd to reach me. He slides my arm over his shoulder and half drags me out into the tepid air of the night.

“This is all my fault,” he says, putting me into the car. “You weren’t ready.”

I slump in my seat. “Am I ever going to feel normal?”

He squeezes my thigh. “It’s okay. It was my grand dumbassery to push you. You’ll come around.”

Maybe this is what they mean by the phrase bleeding heart. My heart bleeds to hear Joe’s longing. He shouldn’t blame himself. He just wants his best friend back.

“What happened in there anyway?” he asks. “You looked like you were going to faint. Were you seeing things again?”

I rub my hands over my nearly bare scalp and hide my lie with a smile. “No. A little dizziness. It’s been a big day.” We’re silent during the drive home. What is there to say, anyway? How I don’t know who I am, and how no one else does either?

Joe motions toward my house when we pull in the drive. “Whoa. What’s going on here?” The headlights illuminate my grandmother stooped over in front of the house. With one hand she is using the wall of the house to guide her as she walks the perimeter. Her other arm is swaying back and forth rhythmically, as if she’s sprinkling seeds on the ground. Her dress snags on a cactus, and she impatiently tugs it away, ripping the hem.

“Does she normally garden at night?” Joe asks.

“Gran does a lot of weird things, but from the looks of it, I don’t think she’s gardening.”

My mother is clearly trying to coax her inside. She motions for help when she sees us running over, but soon her face morphs into baffled shock. “What in God’s name have you done to your hair?”

Realizing Joe’s mother’s scarf is gone, I open my mouth to answer.

“Never mind. Help me get your grandmother in the house,” she says, as if we have superpowers or are supposed to jump Gran and manhandle her inside. I see now that it’s not seeds Gran is sprinkling along the edges of the stucco walls but grains of white rice.

“Why are you throwing rice on the house, Gran?”

“Is there even an answer that will make sense?” Joe whispers. “I think it’s a little late in the season for rice planting.”