Page 3 of His Custody

“What? Is she getting in your way?”

“She doesn’t do anything. She just sits there. She doesn’t say anything, she won’t look at anyone. She won’t eat, she won’t sleep. She’s like a ghost. The only person she seems to realize exists is you.”

“What do you want from her? She lost everything. Her life is a level of uncertain right now that you can’t comprehend. Give her a break. It hasn’t even been a month. She’ll get better.”

She wanted to get up off the couch, walk over and interrupt their arguing.I’m not going to get better. Nothing will ever be better. It doesn’t matter where I am because everywhere is horrible.

But the idea of moving that far, of making words come out of her mouth in a way that made sense? Thinking about it was exhausting. Doing it might kill her. She’d stay here, let them work it out.

Everything made her tired, made her ache. Sometimes she hurt so badly she had a hard time distinguishing between what was actual physical pain like from the gash on her arm that still smarted and what was heartache. Heartache was a stupid word. Her whole body hurt and she was so slow. She wished she were dead. At least that would hurt less. And she could be with Gavin. And her mom and dad. And Aunt Emily and Uncle Arvid, who’d been like second parents to her even though they weren’t related by blood at all.

Her eyes watered, and the hot salty tears burned away some of the icy numbness she’d felt since she’d woken up and Jasper had told her everyone was dead. She hadn’t cried. She’d said “I know,” and she’d barely said another word since. She’d let herself be suspended in the icy block of nothing-matters-anymore, because it didn’t.

Sometimes she thought about talking, deliberated on it like some kind of major undertaking, and then decided not to because it was too much for her. What was she supposed to say?

But those stupid tears. They said something was real. Not everything inside her had died, had been frozen out there in that big, empty ocean. That the waves that didn’t seem so cold at first hadn’t sucked every emotion, every thought, everything from her.

For the past month, she’d felt like a walking corpse. Jasper told her they’d sedated her when they’d first brought her in, but the drugs were long gone. She couldn’t tell the difference. If Jasper took her hand, she would stand up. If he led her to the car, she would follow. If he tucked her into bed, she would close her eyes. But aside from following the most basic instructions, she had nothing to offer.

The doctor, the social worker, the grief counselor; they all talked at her, poked and prodded. And she suffered their attentions, let them go through the motions, check off the boxes on the forms they had to fill out. There were a lot of forms.

At the funeral a couple of weeks ago, she’d gone through the motions. Ada, Jasper’s housekeeper, had helped her dress and done her hair. Jasper had steered her through gauntlets of flashing bulbs and crowds of people offering their condolences, kept her folded under his arm and warded them off.

Her family and the Anderssons were wealthy enough they attracted the occasional media attention. Usually just at fundraisers and big events, but a tragedy of this magnitude was big news. Reporting on rich people suffering misfortunes of this scale apparently sold papers, or got clicks, or whatever it was media outlets wanted. Never had it occurred to her to hate the people who would take their pictures when they went to events and parties—her parents had always told her to keep her distance while still being friendly, so that’s what she’d done.

She’d stood by the crypts and watched as people walked by, their emotions pouring out of them while hers lay at the bottom of the ocean somewhere with the boat. The only feeling she’d had was hatred for those strangers standing there with their cameras, capturing what should have been grief. The photographers and the press had made her feel like she was doing death wrong and that had infuriated her. Not enough to burn away the coldness though. No, the rage had stayed trapped behind her frozen feelings.

She closed her eyes and the tears pushed against her lids, so hot they burned, ate at her flesh. Maybe if she cried, she’d melt. Melting away into nothingness had a certain appeal so she blinked and a tear escaped down her cheek. It set fire to her skin and she welcomed the scalding sensation, the track of fire searing her flesh.

It was hard to say if it was better or worse than the numbness. At least it was different. Different was a form of better right? That was the kind of nonsensical thing Gavin would say if he were here. If he were trying to cheer her up. He’d call her Tiki, try to make her laugh, and she would so he’d feel better. She hated it when Gavin felt bad, it gnawed at her heart.

He’d feel terrible, if he could see her like this. Maybe he could.

That was the thought that started the flood, the tears she hadn’t allowed to fall. Within seconds, the little balls of fire were rolling down her cheeks unchecked and great heaving sobs ripped at her throat. The sounds coming out of her scared her. People weren’t supposed to sound like that.

But she barely felt like people. She felt like a ball of pain and hurt covered with a slick, smooth icy ball of numbness, but the agony was bursting through. She couldn’t stop it anymore, so she let it come. It would destroy her and that was fine. She wanted to be destroyed, and she was already halfway there. The tears could finish off the rest.

There were hands on her then. People were trying to talk to her, and she turned toward the familiar granite of Jasper’s voice, clawed at it with her hands until she wasn’t sitting on the couch anymore. She was surrounded by his hard warmth but the comfort hurt so much she couldn’t bear it. So she pushed and fought, wailed, and tore at anything in her reach.

“Keyne. Keyne, sweetheart...”

Her fingers dug into wool and silk and cotton and muscle and bone. She couldn’t tell if it was hers or not, but then it didn’t matter because her hands weren’t her own anymore to control. They’d been caught, trapped and steered behind her, pressed into her back as she struggled and a hand wrapped around her neck, the base of her skull, and pushed her against that hot, hard living wall. Being contained that way felt if not better, at least safer.

“C’mon, Keyne, breathe.”

When she was a kid, she and Gavin had been horsing around on the swing set in her backyard. She’d fallen off the monkey bars, flat on her back, and hadn’t been able to breathe. If someone asked her now, she’d say the wind had gotten knocked out of her, but then she didn’t know what had happened. Gavin had stood there, staring, as she clawed at her chest and throat, leaving scratches that would last for days, his sweet face wild with panic, his lanky body frozen.

It had been Jasper who’d come running, grabbed her hands and pressed them to the sides of her head. She’d had to stop thrashing because he was holding her down. When she did, the coil of panic that had been choking her loosened. He’d told her, “Breathe, Keyne,” and there hadn’t been any other choice. It had seemed like the most obvious thing in the world.

And then she’d been able to—a welcome breath sucked through lips that had started tingling. By then their parents had reached her, her mother gathering her up into her arms, letting her rest against the boney comfort of her shoulder.

The adults had coddled and pet her, but when she looked beyond them, it was Jasper she saw, pale and scrubbing a hand over his face and into his close-cropped blond hair.

If Jasper was telling her to breathe, there was a good reason for it, so she did.

***

It felt good to sit down. He’d finally gotten Keyne settled enough that she could speak a few actual words. She hadn’t lasted long before she told him she was tired but she hadn’t been sleeping. Did he have something that could help her sleep? He’d retrieved the sleeping pills Dr. Ettleson had prescribed, pocketing them after she’d downed one with a glass of water. He didn’t think Keyne was suicidal, but she was sure as hell grieving and he wasn’t taking any chances with her.

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