Page 6 of The Deer and the Dragon
It was the night I’d ended my ability to see him.
I had stumbled home from a night of partying. I’d been living in a basement apartment in a seedy neighborhood that Caliban, my parents, my friends, and anyone with a mouth had told me to run from. Still, it was all I could afford unless I was willing to live with roommates, and I was not. I’d fallen down the outdoor staircase that reeked of piss, twisting an ankle and limping into the apartment. I’d slammed the door and secured the deadbolt, gritting my teeth against pain and regret in equal waves.
I’d been served shot after shot at a bar of something blue that tasted like cotton candy. I’d danced to the worst pop songs on the top forty station, been tongue-fucked by the starting pitcher on the college team in the single-stall, all-gender bathroom, and gotten in the car with someone too drunk to be driving. I was exhausted but, like many other naive idiots in their early twenties who had no concept of sugar and its role in hangovers, had been deeply committed to mixing my vodka with cherry-flavored energy drinks. The uppers and downers vibrated through me as the world wobbled. I slammed my palm into the textured apartment wall, searching for an outlet that gremlins must have snatchedwhile I was clubbing. I sank to the floor, succumbing to the linoleum.
“Do you want me to turn on the light?” Caliban had asked, setting a bottle of water beside me.
I’d been having a good night. A great night, even, save for the twisted ankle. This was exactly how one was meant to celebrate major milestones. I was living the dream.
At least, I’d convinced myself I was having was fun until I heard his voice. The moment his silken words washed over me, the carefree facade cracked. What followed were not pretty, lady-like tears but the heartbroken sobs of the lost. I pulled my knees to my chest.
“Help me get to the shower,” I’d slurred.
And he had. I didn’t remember when a candle had been lit in the bathroom, or when he’d gotten me out of my dress. His ghost-white shape was an anchor in my swimming vision, rooting me to the present as I slow-blinked at him. He’d left the curtain open, soaking my bathroom floor in water so that the small orange flame might cast friendlier shadows than the ones that haunted me. I scarcely remembered the soothing touch of his fingers raking back my hair as I puked or the steadying presence that had held me as I’d cried on the bathtub floor. I’d been too wasted to appreciate how my cheek had felt against his bare chest. The spinning walls hadn’t permitted me to savor the moments as he’d washed my regrets away with soap and hot water.
“You’re not having fun” was all he’d said. I didn’t want to see the solemn expression that accompanied his words. He was so beautiful when he smiled. His crooked grins over white teeth, his snowy shock of hair, the winks he’d throw my way with bright, gray eyes that scalded me like a brand, electrifying every part of me. Tonight, I knew that looking at him would mean seeing resolute strength in the set of his jaw, that disappointment would pinch his brows, that there would be no smirk, no cavalier joking, no playful moments that would plant seeds within me, growing into a garden that blossomed only for him.
I’d cried into his arms so hard I’d nearly thrown my back out.
“It’s your fault,” I’d sobbed through the whirlpool of coke and alcohol.
His fingers had moved against my hair as he listened. I’d coughed on the shower water, choking on the pounding droplets as I continued, “I drink to forget the fucked-up shit I imagine at home. I don’t have friends because I just want to be here. I cancel on plans, bail on dates, rush out because there’s something better for me in the dark. I refuse to live with anyone in case you visit. I hook up with strangers to try to pound out the memory of how it feels when you…” My voice had broken. “You’re not real. I can’t keep playing this game. I need to get help. I can’t be like my mom…like my grandma… I can’t do this. I’m never going to be able to move forward with my life if I keep living in this fantasy.”
His arms tightened around me. His low voice was gentle but firm. “Love…”
“I don’t want to be in love with you,” I’d cried, squeezing my eyes tightly shut as I buried my face against him. I meant it. This pathetic, maladaptive daydream was destroying me. My wet hair plastered to my face and stuck to his chest. My tears, the shower water, the churning, twirling room had smothered me as I fought to get out everything I’d needed to say.
He’d kissed the crown of my head as he continued to run his fingers along it, stroking it with calm, steadying shushes. He’d brushed his lips against my hair that night under the running water just as he kissed it now.
My heart cracked as I looked down on the events of that night as if little more than a phantom floating above an ethereally beautiful man chipped from the stars themselves, arms around the wasted slivers of a twenty-one-year-old, candlelight flickering in the bathroom, steam filling the space, hot, angry bullets of shower water soaking them both as that version of me sobbed.
The kiss pulled me out of the memory, dragging me into the present. I was halfway through my twenty-sixth year again, between silken sheets, overlooking the river. My exhale contained the weight of the world.
“You’d said I wasn’t real and that you didn’t want to see me again,” he recalled. It wasn’t an accusation. Just a calm, quiet fact.
“I was drunk,” I said.
“In vino veritas.”
“And I haven’t seen you since,” I responded to the black nothingness. “That was the night that made me move, you know. To try to change my life. A week later—”
“I know,” he said, and he did.
Nearly six years had passed, and it was still one of the worst nights of my life. My eyes spiked with tears as I shoved the visions aside. Regret had coiled in me like a sleeping snake. It had slithered throughout me whenever he’d visited for five and a half fucking years. I’d hated myself for those words.
“You should know by now, Love” came his soothing voice as his lips brushed against my ear. “Our word is bond. We’re very literal.”
I twisted my sheets between my fingers, remembering the perfect mouth, the sharp teeth, the twitch of a smile that used to accompany his words. I wondered why he’d usedwe, but I supposed he meant the two of us. And he was right. “Five goddamn years without your face…but you didn’t stay away.”
He ran a thumb from my ear along my jaw, cupping my chin from behind as he said, “You told me you weren’t going to see me anymore. You said nothing about staying away. And with everything going on, you’re as much my escape as I am yours, Love. Neither of us wants this to end.”
I remained curled on my side, back to him. This was part of why he only came at night these days. He knew that it was easier for me to deal with the empty space in the dark—to cling to whatever semblance of hope or deniability—whenshadows cloaked the room than it was to speak to an empty room in the light of day. My vision unfocused, lost to the budding trees that lined the river. If I’d still lived in the countryside, it would have been too dark to see the way the branches quivered in the overcast night. Instead, low-lying clouds captured the muted, honey-colored city lights, holding the night in an auburn glow.
“I do,” I said quietly. My declaration spread between us like smoke filling a room.
Caliban went deathly still behind me.
I closed my eyes against the silhouetted cottonwoods and oaks as I said, “I won’t have a shot at a normal life unless you’re gone.”
