Page 103 of Safety Net
The ride back to Tinsel took longer because the rain picked up once again. This time, it became a full-on storm, and Lucas became a timid driver.
"Is it too much to ask you to pick up the pace to a steady, I don't know, twenty-five miles per hour?" I sat in the front this time, obsessively watching the clock. It was almost 3 AM. We had to stop at Celeste's aunt's because I had no way of gettinginto the playhouse without a key. I'd texted Ellis, who was thankfully up. He was a night owl who liked me enough to push off his sleep a bit longer and pass off a set of keys.
"You alright for one more stop?" I asked, wary when Lucas swerved around a pothole that couldn't have been larger than a mixing bowl.
"Yeah." His knuckles were white from his iron grip on the wheel, gaze never straying from the torrential downpour.
I wanted to offer to drive, but I still wasn’t entirely sober, and there was no chance in hell he'd let me bend the rideshare rules.
By the time we reached Celeste's aunt's house, I’d concluded I was not taking the quick nap I thought might be on the horizon once everything was unloaded. And I was okay with that because every time I thought about how Celeste looked when I confessed I hadn't done what I promised, I felt like throwing up.
"Celeste's going to be so nervous about this.” Ellis answered the door, dressed in all-black and tugging on a pair of sneakers.
"I just need the keys," I said.
"I'm coming with you. This musical means a lot to me, too. Plus, I really like you for Celeste. You challenge her without being overbearing. She needs that. And you're very close to fucking it up. I'll feel guilty till the end of time if I don't do something to help."
I sighed. Even though I was still adamant about fixing this on my own, every minute that went by felt like a crushing weight. I had to be smart about this if I really wanted to finish in time. If I didn’t complete this task, it wouldn't matter whether I did it alone or not. Celeste's trust in me would plummet. And who knew how long it'd take to get it back. Or if I'd ever get it back.
"I'm going to see this through," I promised. "And not just today. Because losing Celeste isn't something I'll ever be able to live with."
Ellis smiled and clapped my shoulder. "Let's make sure it doesn't happen."
The rain finally stopped once we got to the playhouse. It was still dark outside while we unloaded everything. At night, the playhouse felt eerie and smelled stale. The moment we placed the last display on the stage, I slipped into autopilot. Lucas wished us good luck, leaving Ellis and me exhausted on our own.
"Let's catch our breath for a second." Ellis practically crawled to a chair in the audience, resting his head back onto the cushion and closing his eyes.
"You rest a bit," I offered. He'd started huffing and puffing on our third trip to the car. By the fifth, I knew he wouldn't have enough energy for the mountain we had to climb.
"How are you not knocked out?" Ellis asked with his eyes closed.
"I've got a pretty consistent third wind."
"Huh?"
"If I'm focused on something, I don't just have a second wind, but a third." I clicked a few pieces into place, just as Aaron shown me.
"Lucky."
"Very. It's twenty percent genetics," I said. "Eighty percent Celeste. I keep imagining a scenario where I did everything right. And it's constant fuel. Like trying to push myself onto a different timeline. A preferred timeline. A place where I'm not so dead set on ruining everything before it’s begun."
"I love ruining things. Self-sabotage is my favorite hobby. My therapist says it's a coping skill from being expected to deliver a perfect routine before my brain developed. What about you?" Ellis asked around with a yawn.
"I don't have a therapist," I said. "Yet."
That would be going on my list of high priorities. No more managing my emotions with only mystery novels…even though it didn't seem like the worst way to cope.
"No, why self-sabotage? You figure it out yet?"
I opened the box of screws and sat down on the cold, dusty stage as I sorted them. "My parents told me I wasn't worth it. From what I can remember, it was a joke. But it stuck."
"Damn, sorry," Ellis said, voice quiet with sympathy. "It's the little stuff sometimes. Things people don't mean anything by."
"Tell me about it." I nodded, thinking about what had happened and how I hadn't even remembered what my parents had said until talking to Celeste. She'd broken that spell. When she asked for my help, she'd expected more from me. She'd trusted me to deliver. She believed.
A stab of pain shot through my chest, and I picked up the pace. Ellis' soft snore and the scraping of wood against the floor were the only things left to keep me company. I stuffed all the doubts into the depths of my mind, replacing them with the reminder Celeste had believed. Hopefully, that meant somewhere deep down, I could pull this off.
My hands were dry from paint, my arms ached from rearranging, and my legs were ready to give out from dragging myself past my threshold. I hopped off the stage to get a better look at how the lights shone down on set. The sun came up a couple of hours ago. Warm light stretched in from underneath the entrance door, trying to wake the dark theatre.
