I was seven, and I’d never heard a song in another language before. I didn’t know what any of the words meant, or why my eyes filled up with tears. I swiped them away, angry with myself. But I could feel the whole world in that song. All the tsunamis washing away cities on the news, and monsoon seasons, and the children in those700 Clubsegments with distended bellies and emaciated faces. I could see my sisters: Iris pressed to the rear window of the car with her face all wet, and Moody biting down on the ear of her stuffed pink bunny so she wouldn’t scream as we were all separated.
When I finish singing, I feel exposed, the guitar unable to hide my nakedness.Did you hear it?I ask Edison with my silence.My life story. I’ve just told you.I’ve just taken him deep down into the part of myself that frightens me.
Suddenly, looking at him takes effort, and I worry that I’ll see rejection in his eyes. I make myself face him. He blinks at me, leaning back in the pew, and when he finally speaks, he says, “Wow.”
A piece of hair slips over my shoulder, and I use the guitar pick to tuck it back.
In the rear of the room, a group of women has stopped cleaning up the snacks to watch me.
“You have a gift, honey,” Jeannie says, pressing her hand against her heart.
Precious few things are given to us in this life. True love and money and a bit of attention are hard to come by. I didn’t even have a mother. If there’s something that was given to you for nothing, you’d better take it and use it any chance you get. It may be your only way to survive.
Jeannie senses what exists between Edison and me. She looks between us, smiling, her eyebrows raised. She’s an excellent wingman, telling him my little story about what brings me to Rainwood.
“How long have you been here?” Edison asks as I lay my guitar back into its case. His voice is perfect. He’s considerate, not too loud, aware that we’re in a church and that I’ve just shared something intimate with him. He’s patient, and I’m glad I didn’t run into him at the Safeway. He doesn’t want a girl who smells like candy and flutters her lashes at him. He’s sensitive. He observes me with care; he holds this moment we’ve just shared in both hands and inspects all the shades and cracks of it.
“Only a couple of days,” I say. “Haven’t learned where anything is yet.”
“Where are you staying?”
“A rental off West Rock Road,” I say. My chest is cold and then hot.
“You know what’s good to eat around here is Still’s,” Jeannie says. I’d managed to completely forget that she was still here. She gives me a good-natured wink before she turns and grabs the trash can to finish cleaning up. I’ve known her for an hour, but already she’s bestowing something precious on me.Here you go, she’s saying.You need each other. Don’t hurt him.
When Edison first goes missing, nobody will know that he’s dead but me. Hope is that powerful thing that bonds communities like these. I’ll come to the church, frantic that he didn’t meet me for breakfast and his car’s not at his place. I’ll still be hearing his final breath in my head, a lone chord of a secret song, and I’ll see that violent flash of life in his eyes. He’ll be the most alive in that final moment because he’ll know that it’s his last.
Jeannie will comfort me. As the days pass, she and the congregation will help me comb through the desert for him. When I’mexhausted and weak and my limbs are rubbery with grief, I’ll drop on the side of the road and sob. Jeannie will hold me and we’ll love him together. We’ll remember him, and in some very dark place she isn’t yet ready to face, Jeannie will know, like I will, that he’s gone.
Edison smiles at me, scratching uncertainly at the back of his head. “Still’s is only good if you like a lot of grease after your Sunday service.”
The girls he’s dated have all been vegetarians, petite like the little sparrow who kissed him at the door. They’ve gone running with him and done anything he wanted in bed, and as confident as he is, he struggled to keep up with their energy. He hid his vices—greasy food, an occasional beer—to be the perfect man for them. He’s tired of competing.
“I’m starving,” I say. “Give me all the grease.”
He laughs and it’s fucking music. “Where’s your car?” he says. “You can follow me out.”
—
MOODY AND I PASSEDStill’s on our way into town yesterday. Moody thought it was a consignment shop until I pointed out the patio tables folded against the wall. It’s a small square building in the middle of nowhere, and the parking lot is full. In small towns, everyone pools together in places like this.
Edison pulls into a space and I get the one right beside him. He looks over and smiles at me, and we’re in on some sly little secret. I know where we are, but I’ll pretend that I’m lost without him to guide me through this desert. We’re two miles from the diner and three miles from the subdivision where Edison will be buried.
“Hi,” I say when I step out of the car, and I marvel that I’m speaking to him. I’m using such an ordinary word to greet him, when justhours ago he was the world’s greatest mystery to me. Now he smiles and lets me walk beside him as we navigate the crowd.
It defies physics that so many people are able to fit into this small space. I wish Jeannie had suggested something less crowded.
A mother hurries past us, corralling three small children in the perimeter of her outstretched arms. Edison takes my elbow and gently pulls me out of the way. My legs ache with longing, and I pretend to observe something on my shoe so that he doesn’t see the goofy smile overtaking my face.
When it’s our turn at the front of the line, he asks me what I want, and I shrug. I am easygoing and whatever he needs me to be. “You pick,” I say. “I trust you.”
As promised, the food is pure grease. By the time we find a patio table outside, the oil from the fries has made the paper plate translucent.
It’s gotten hotter now that the sun is higher in the sky. I shrug out of my cardigan and drape it across the back of the chair. He doesn’t look at my shoulders. He’s polite, not distant, but cautious in the way that people are around strangers.
When we have sex, it’ll be like a confession. We’ll breathe hard and stumble across the room and knock over the nightstand while we’re clawing at our clothes. He’ll throw me on the bed. He’ll grab my wrists and hold them up over my head, and his eyes will be dark and animal. I’ll say his name over and over. He’ll know and I’ll know that this is how it has to be, that we have been waiting all this time to find each other.
Killing him will be just the same. I’ll make it slow, but it will never be slow enough, because if I had my way, it would last forever. The dark depth in those beautiful eyes when he looks at me and sees what I am. His hands digging into my skin. The life and the desperation andthe pleading. “I’m not Jade Johnson,” I’ll say. “I’m Sissy.” After months of hiding my name, it’ll be a relief to say, and I’ll make him say it too. I’ll ask him if he loves me, and he’ll say he does because he’ll do anything when I’m the one who decides how long he gets to breathe.
