Page 68 of Julien (Confessions 2)

The bar was located a little ways from the kitchen, but just as he’d suspected, he’d managed to locate something to dull the ache that had now spread from his heart to encompass his entire body.

As he got the blue cap off the vodka and went to put it down on the counter, his hand knocked one of the glasses on the shiny surface and it fell off, bounced on the hardwood, cracked, and then landed on the thousand-dollar rug.

Julien stared at it.

He knew he should pick it up—he’d always been taught to respect other people’s belongings, and this house, that glass, and that rug were certainly not his. But since no one was actually there to give a fuck, he left it exactly where it was.

He raised the bottle to his lips and took a long swig, and as he swallowed back the clear liquid, he held on to the bar for support. Not because he was drunk—this was his first drink since last Friday at The Popped Cherry. He held on because his legs felt like rubber, as if a light breeze might knock them out from under him.

That had everything to do with the lack of oxygen to his muscles right now, and that had everything to do with the fact he was back in this room, staring at that door, and he was finding it difficult to fucking breathe.

He needed to get out of there. He needed to take the bottle and get the fuck out of that room…now.

As he snagged it in his fist, he walked around the counter, his anger festering inside him like an ugly disease as he headed out the door and down toward the end of the house that his room was in.

He still couldn’t believe his parents weren’t there. There was no note, no message as to where the hell they’d gone. Just an empty mansion on the top of an overpriced hill. Fucking brilliant, he thought, and took another swig.

Did they actually think he liked coming there? To a house where he could hear and see her everywhere? It was bad enough just being himself most days, let alone visiting this place, and that room, and they couldn’t even be bothered to show up for her. Must be nice.

As he went, he took another swig of the fiery liquid and enjoyed the burn as it slid down and heated his gut, and as he walked past one of the many guest rooms, he came to the wall that had once showcased nothing but family photos.

From bad haircuts to worse, and everything in between, he and Jacquelyn had always hated taking their friends past this particular wall because it was what they referred to as “the wall of shame.” That, however, had changed.

Not the photo wall, but the photos that now hung there.

Julien stepped in front of the images that were displayed in a variety of different frames at all different levels, and as he stared at the beautiful face smiling and laughing out of all of them, he raised the bottle of vodka to his lips and took another long gulp.

Jacquelyn.

Every photograph that now hung upon that wall was of Jacquelyn. It, like the house itself, had become a shrine to the one who could no longer set foot inside it.

Julien ran his fingers over the one closest to him. It was of Jacquelyn standing by their old Christmas tree back in France, and she was wearing a bright red coat with a hood that matched. There was snow all over it from when they’d been running around outside, and she was laughing, her eyes sparkling with joy.

She was thirteen years old in that picture. He knew that because he had been standing right beside her when it had been taken—even though he was now nowhere to be found now.

As his eyes began to blur, Julien touched the long strands of her hair which fell down over her coat.

“You’re everywhere, ma petite poulette. Everywhere, but nowhere at all…” Julien shut his eyes as a tear escaped and rolled down his cheek, his body no longer able to contain his grief.

She was trapped here. Forever enshrined in a castle that now felt more like a tomb—an empty, sad tomb.

He brought the bottle up to his lips and took another sip, and when he lowered it by his side, a soft, lilting laugh filled his mind and he whirled around, half expecting to see her there, in the place where her laughter had once filled the halls. But non, now it merely haunted them.

He walked by the rest of the images without another glance. Unable to look her in the eye. Unable to see himself cut from her life. Cut from theirs. Then he made his way further along the corridor until he reached a door he knew well.

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