Page 120 of Sombra
Twenty-Two
Kim - Coloring
Shane drives my hollow body to the Madrid airport in his rented car. I couldn’t identify where my heart is. Or my spirit. But the empty physical shell that is evidence of my existence is leaving.
What just happened?
As we driveto Madrid, my hastily-packed luggage in back, I stay awake. Unlike my arrival. The scenery is new to me, because I never saw it before, although it’s so blurry I’m missing a lot. Because I’m tired. So tired.
I think I’ve done everything wrong.
Shane changed his ticket and got me one (thank you lucrative accounting-firm internship). And we’re headed back to Des Moines via New York.
While Shane fiddles with the radio, trying to find something to listen to and not liking any of the Spanish music, my heart hurts at all of it, because it all reminds me of Tavo. Then I remind myself I don’t have a heart. I packed it up and it’s buried in my luggage somewhere.
I don’t know who to believe. What to believe. My eyes or my heart.
“How are they going to take it?”Shane asks.
He’s talking about me leaving school, I think. Or is he talking about how his parents will take his coming out? Or how my parents will take me being pregnant?
“I don’t know,” I say, too exhausted to sort this out.
He’s got to marry her. He has to save his family.
I’ve seen him kiss her. Now I’ve seen her naked, cuffed to his bed.
But he was tellingme the truth? Or was he? He was?
I don’t know.
Doing my best to be a human being who is capable of communication with another, I say, “Maybe they’ll take it better than you think.” I’m gambling on Shane talking about himself.
“My parents?” He shakes his head. “Have you ever heard them? You have to have. They hate anything having to do with homosexuals. Having me as their son?”His eyes water. “They’re going to disown me. They’re going to hate me—”
“I’ve known your parents almost as long as you have.” That earns me a little smile. “They love you. But you’re not going to be free until you tell them.”
Unlike me. I’m not ready to tell a soul.
I’m not entirely aware of how we return the car. Get our tickets. Board the plane. It happens, though, becauseI’m in a plane staring vacantly ahead. I can’t sleep or read or watch a movie. I’m just gone.
Mentally. Physically. Literally.
I can’t stop seeing Sonia’s naked body around Tavo.
Shane jostles me mid-flight, and I temporarily get out of vapor lock to notice that he’s found a sort of peace. He’s not fidgeting or playing on the phone. Just watching the movie.
While I’vebeen exploring my own dark corners, he’s had some time to explore his, too. And maybe he found himself.
Shane sleeps while I stay awake and unaware.
The bright lightsof Applebee’s shine down on my laminated menu. I’m perusing the dinner choices, but after livingin Granada, everything’s unappetizing. Food that’s assembled, not grown or cooked or baked from scratch. Nothing like the real, vibrant cuisine of Spain. I’m sure if I ordered fruit or a salad, it would be made of hardy produce, the kind that can survive days in a truck or in a store, not the ephemeral strawberries and thin-skinned cucumbers of Andalucía. Not the eggs you buy by theeach,insteadof by the dozen, from the person who gathers them that morning.
I’m not just missing the food, though. (Or Tavo, since I’m shunting thoughts of him to the side until I can handle them, which will likely be never.) I’m missing my anonymity, because I’m sitting in the spotlight, and my unicorn hair hasn’t gone over too well with my parents.
When my mom saw me at the airport, she tooka step back. Then she reached out, pulled a tendril, raised an eyebrow, and said, “This is cute.”
Cute as innotcute.
