A Lily in the Light(26)
Andre was waiting with the car. He handed two bags to each of them and slammed the trunk shut.
“I’ll be up in a minute,” he mumbled, his voice thick and gruff. He’d been crying too. Esme shivered in her sweatshirt while everyone orbited each other, boxed into their own private worlds, swirling with unnamable emotions. They were looking at each other through glass cages at the zoo or aquarium tanks, together and not. What were they now, she asked, studying how they paced and fretted. Madeline was a horseshoe crab, dragging along the bottom of her tank. Nick was a betta fish, fine alone but ready to attack a mirror. Nothing had changed in two weeks. No news. Her parents were the worst. They were fish who’d forgotten how to swim.
The grocery bags cut into her hands and left red, hot marks on her skin. Her mother was upstairs. She’d be back in her bed again soon if she wasn’t already or locked in the trailer. Everyone else would tiptoe around, clock ticking, refrigerator humming, listening to TV sounds filtering through the walls, smelling other people’s food cooking, the squeal of the 7 train. She couldn’t move. She’d suffocate if she went back upstairs. The wind blew down her collar. Her throat was tight, covered in a thousand pressing hands, smothering the delicate bones in her neck. She opened her mouth and screamed.
It was a shrill sound. It echoed against buildings on either side of the street. She ran out of air, then filled her lungs and started again. Short screams, louder, punching the world in shrill bursts. Her throat was raw, and the effort doubled her over. The driver’s door burst open, and her father ran out, calling her name but too afraid to touch her. Madeline watched from the doorway, openmouthed. Esme didn’t care. She screamed, standing in the exhaust plume while the car idled. Her father stopped asking what was wrong and held his head in his hands, walking in small circles. It was almost funny, them staring and staring while pigeons flew overhead, disgusting birds with stupid purple-pearl eyes, molting feathers and shitting on the sidewalk. Something white flashed on the stoop. She pressed her eyes shut and started a new scream.
Nick’s hands were on her shoulders now, shaking hard. Her brain bounced against the bones that held it, and her voice faltered. She tried to shrug him off, but he held her shoulders tighter. His fingers dug into her skin.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he yelled into the wave of a scream. “Knock it off.”
Esme stopped screaming. She stared at her brother. Would he hurt her? If he’d shaken Lily’s little shoulders as hard as he’d just shaken hers, Lily would have snapped. Nick didn’t look like a kid anymore. He looked more like a man now, lanky and stretched, stubble blistering his cheeks and chin like a rash under his purple-green eye. Everything was changing. His grip loosened, but his hands stayed in place, the only warm spot on her body.
“Stop it,” he said. How long had it been since he’d looked at her so intently? He wasn’t trying to hurt her. It was his boy way of soothing her. She’d broken his glass box. If they were in aquarium tanks, water would flood the street, and slimy sea things would flop in puddles. She forgot about the grocery bags and wrapped her arms around him because he couldn’t be bad, not her brother. He wasn’t a betta fish after all. She hugged her untouchable teenage brother, breathing in his smell: Irish Spring soap, Head & Shoulders, and sweat. She was done, but when Nick led her toward the house, the screaming feeling came back.
“I’m not going in there,” she said. Red bricks hovered over her. The windows stared down like eyes. Esme wanted to throw things at its cold, boxy face. Tears prickled the backs of her eyes. This building had seen everything happen and just kept standing. The blinds in Birdman’s apartment flicked, and rage bubbled in her chest. He’d been watching the whole thing.
“I’m not going back in,” she said again, convinced.
“Let’s take a walk,” Nick said. The first tears spilled over. She didn’t want to pass the signs with Lily’s face on telephone poles, curled up from water and wind, or see people who’d smile sadly and ask if there was any news. She didn’t want to be here. She’d light a match if she could and set the whole place on fire just to watch it disappear and fly away like a firebird.
“Why don’t you get in, and I’ll drive us around?”
Her father’s voice startled her. She was trapped between them now, her father and her brother. The building loomed from its hole in the sidewalk. She’d broken one box and created another. Her chest heaved, short, quick breaths that felt like choking.
“We’ll go wherever you want.” The pleading in Andre’s voice made it harder to breathe. Where would she go? She felt panicked with choices.
There was an empty space where Madeline had been. She was probably upstairs, telling her mother everything like a good little snitch. Lava pooled in Esme’s chest. Only when Madeline reappeared a few seconds later, she was carrying Esme’s dance bag. It looked out of place on Madeline’s shoulder, confused. Don’t touch that, she wanted to scream, but Madeline looked determined. She pushed the bag into Esme’s hands and turned to Andre.
“Her class starts at four o’clock. If you leave now, she’ll make it.” The bag flopped unevenly in Esme’s hands, like a dead cat. She hadn’t been to class in two weeks. Everyone had pointe shoes. Dance was something she’d done once but couldn’t remember anything about.