Page 14 of The Significance of Moving On

We can still defeat it? I can’t help it, I spin, launching myself into his arms to bury my face against the crook of his neck while he wraps his arms tight around my waist. Not that I gave him much choice. Up on tiptoes, I cry like a fool. He got it and he doesn’t even know he got it. But Casey stands stalwart letting me soak his shirtagain.

“What’s wrong now?” Kelsey’s voice floats on the wind behind me. He swats her words away. And I know it’s time, because I’ve wasted enough of it.

The thing is, he’s soft and warm, Casey has this calming effect on me that no one else ever has—not even Tom. I don’t want to pull away. And he’s not pushing. That’s another thing about Casey; he never pushes, just lets me deal as I’m comfortable. But it is time. I know it’s time.

Although excruciating, I peel from his warmth, drying my eyes with the hem of the thin cotton V neck Casey loaned me. I never gave it back because he never asked for it. That and a pair of cut off jean shorts seemed like proper clean away your life attire, even though Kelsey cut them rather short for my taste. The fringe doesn’t even hit mid-thigh. Not that I can’t pull it off, just feeling a little exposed. She looks similar except replace the V neck with a purple tank and we have a winner. Casey has on cargo shorts, tan ones, and a faded blue Detroit Tigers T-shirt. We look every bit a motley moving crew.

After a long inhale and longer exhale, I put one foot in front of the next, moving toward the snarling mouth of the beast. The sound of a car skidding breaks the hold the beast has over me and I turn, as do the others.

Demetrius slams the door on his rusted silver Chevy pick-up. “Am I late?” he asks.

“Wow. Thanks for coming, brother.” Casey walks over to him, his hand outstretched for this half hug, high five-ish greeting guys do.

Demetrius nods at me but beams at Kelsey. Now I get it. His help will be welcome no matter his reasons for showing up today.

But now it’s time to pull up my big girl panties and do this.I can do this. I can do this. The hope is that if I say the words enough times, I’ll start to believe in them. Head high, up the front steps. Onto the porch. Unlocking the deadbolt. Metaphorical sword drawn, I push through the doorway, straight into the belly of the beast. It’s an emotional assault from all sides. Because everything is the same. Same as the night the world ended. Same as every night before that.

The walls we’d painted the happiest shade of Lemon Chiffon. I remember the color name because we picked it out together. How could someone be that depressed surrounded by so much happy yellow? On the right side of the foyer, above the antique marble-topped table fit snuggly against the wall, hangsmy favorite picture Tom ever took, a black and white taken up at the outskirts of Indian River. It’s this little place in the absolute middle of nowhere. We’d stay in one of the little cabins on the property.

He and I vacationed there every summer, even when my dad was still alive. Quiet—private. Like no one else existed. I think I was eight when he took the picture. We were on the shore watching a beaver damming a small offshoot of the river when a mother duck waddled into frame and began bathing her little ducklings. He captured it all. And I’m happy within the memory. For a few fleeting moments, I’m happy.

Crazy how automatic reactions can be. My mind knows exactly what I don’t want to see, but like a train wreck, drops my gaze down to the photo resting on the table right below the happy picture. Another black and white. He took brilliant colors—but Tom’s black and whites are extraordinary and won him numerous awards. It’s me. It’s him. God, I remember that day as if it just happened. It was right after dad died. We both look like we’d been crying. He’s kissing my cheek. Although photography was his job, this one picture had nothing to do with work. Tom titled it ‘Rock’. It hung in one of his gallery shows once, but he never put a price on it. Said it was ours, only ours.

I crush the frame against my breast, hugging it like if I squeeze hard enough, long enough, somehow my hugs and love will be enough—my own Frankenstein’s monster reanimated—where we can forget this nasty hiccup and enjoy our summer together. Is that too much to ask? Is it? Is it, Tom? I start shaking again. “You coward. You God damn coward.” As I scream the words, I squeeze the frame too tightly; the glass cracks from the pressure. I am the glass. We’ve fused, become one, and I feel it, the slicing pain of our merger.

“Ohshit,” Kelsey screams. I whip my head toward her, eyes fixed on my chest. The white shirt disappears, engulfed by rapidly spreading red. “Al. Casey. Oh, my God.”

And seeing her reaction, the fear in her eyes has me shaking even harder, so hard it actually feels like a seizure. She tries to wrangle the picture from my arms, but I need it, to hold on to. Can’t she see that? I need it to hold on to.

Casey comes running up my side seemingly out of nowhere and he makes a grab for the frame. His muscles tighten and strain as he unfurls my arms from my monster, but his touch is gentle, extremely gentle.

“Is she all right?” I hear Demetrius behind me.

“She will be. You two stay, get this knocked out. I’ll take care of her. C’mon, Tally. Walk with me.”

I hear his words but can’t process them.Walk? What is walk?Not waiting on me to react any longer, he scoops me up and carries me to the bathroom off the kitchen. The house still has electricity, still has running water. All that’s missing is my brother.

Casey’s hands rip open the shirt exposing my bleeding, crimson soaked bosom. He riffles through the pullout drawers below the sink until he finds an old shaving kit, or grooming kit. I recognize the leather case, it belonged to our dad. When I return my attention back to Casey, he’s biting his bottom lip, brow furrowed in concentration as he extracts the shards of glass embedded in my skin, dropping the pieces into the sink. Then he cleans the wound with cotton balls and peroxide he found in the medicine cabinet.

Once the glass is gone, the bleeding eases. “Don’t think you’ll need stitches,” he says, taping a large gauze bandage over the cuts. His knuckle brushes against my skin. The sensation makes me feel alive. I want to hold onto that feeling, to rid myself of the decay Tom’s death has brought.

Without any forethought I lean in and press my lips to his. His eyes widen, but very quickly he falls to the power of the kiss, even kissing me back.

Yes, dear lord, Casey—his fingers grip my shoulders in my mind to pull me closer, but he pushes me away breaking the connection. The current between us dies at my lips. There’s no acknowledgement of what just happened between us. I could’ve imagined it from his reaction, or non-reaction.

“I’m going to find you a shirt.” He leaves me sitting on the edge of the toilet seat wondering if I didn’t just screw myself.

Dark circles aging my face by years pool beneath the empty eyes staring back in the mirror. People used to tell me my eyes were my selling point. But now I can’t find them. Hollow sockets. Maybe I had it wrong, the picture wasn’t the monster. The picture was Dr. Frankenstein. I’m the monster. Reanimated. I’m the monster.

I let the water run cold, as icy as the veins running to my monstrous heart, and splash handful after handful on my face, finally turning off the faucet.

Casey stands in the doorway. I see him through the mirror, too.

He hands off a shirt, an old tank top from my room. The white ribbing fits a bit snugger than I normally wear my shirts, but it fits. Casey regards me for a moment then leaves. The one person never uncomfortable to be with me, I just made uncomfortable.

Chapter Eight

We spend the day cleaning out separate rooms. I keep to myself, alone in one room, while the others tackle the remainders together. That’s how it should be because I don’t think I’m rational enough to be a part of the group. Still, there’s a piece of me which aches when I hear Kelsey and Demetrius joking. Then there’s Kelsey’s boisterous laughter, and lastly—this is the one that hurts the most—Casey’s jubilant laughter. He’s with them.

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