“You’ve always looked at me like you can see things that no one else does.”
Time seems to stop. We’re alone up here, suspended like we’re half in the sky and half off the ground. Trapped between two worlds. Haven’t we always been?
She draws a circle on her knee just like she did on the tabletop earlier. “I feel like every insult and every comment, it was all meant to find my weak spots. It did. Forever. It’s stayed with me all this time. I can’t even count how many people called my mom a whore. They’d stop and say things like their dad was lonely because their parents were divorced, was my mom available to come over and cheer him up? They’d ask James right to his face if he ever wanted to have a threesome with me andmy mom, because she’d sure as shit do it. She didn’t have an age limit. She didn’t have any limits.”
“What the fuck?” How did I notknowthis? “Are you serious? Who said that?” Anger fizzles in me, as red hot as those fireworks that will be lighting up the sky shortly.
“I’m not giving you names.”
“Who? I’ll find them. If they’re not here anymore, I can still make them suffer.”
“That’s exactly why I won’t tell you.” Esme lifts one shoulder in a dainty shrug, but it doesn’t disguise her pain. “Their names don’t matter. Maybe you’re right. It’s so long ago. I’m just trying to get you to understand why I could never move on. Why I don’t want to walk around here and be Esme Bly, daughter of a slut. Daughter of a man everyone knew was a drunk. And now Esme Bly, the woman everyone knew would go nowhere, separated, and back with her tail tucked between her legs.”
“That isnottrue! I will knock anyone who says that right the fuck out.”
“Yeah. Women? Kids? Seniors? You’re going to punch them too?” It was mostly them who said it.
“Fuck, no! I’m not gonna knock them out, but I could hack them. I could give them dirty viruses they’d have to deal with. Their tech would never be the same.”
She shakes her head sadly. “James never defended me. Half the time, he’d just laugh. I don’t know why he was even with me, but I was so desperate to hold onto him that I thought if I had one good thing in my life, one thing that meant something and was going somewhere, then I’d be okay. I thought that’swhat love was. Learning. Growing. Standing beside the person you chose because they were yours and you were theirs. I should have known better.” She tilts her face up to the stars, eyes glistening. “Look at my parents. In a way, James and I were just like them. Staying. Lost. Angry. Helpless. Stuck.”
“Our parents are just people too.” I want to try to say that with more positivity or perspective, but even I can hear my own lack of conviction. “They’re older, but Grandpa always said that age doesn’t equal wisdom. I’m not trying to excuse a single thing, but everyone is just trying to make it through life that is as hard and unfamiliar to them as it is to us.”
Esme snorts, but then she unfurls her legs and sighs. “They’re supposed to know better. They’re supposed to be able to offer a shred of guidance and shelter and support. That’s all I ever wanted. Not that I didn’t have it. I did, with Reg.”
“I know. It would have been nice to have it from your parents too.”
Before I can say anything more, an explosion of color bursts into the sky above our heads. The test firework. I hold my breath and very slowly release it. Another firework shoots up, this one screaming and sizzling when it explodes into a twinkling green formation. I glance at the screens between us once, before I risk flicking my eyes to Esme. She’s leaning back on her hands, her dress spread out to cover her legs, but she kicked her sandals off earlier and her bare toes face the sky.
Another burst shoots into the night, this one like a comet with a fiery tail. It blasts open, a golden and white flower unfurling against a bruised purple backdrop.
I want to tell her, as silver and red, green, and white paint the sky and light up Esme’s gorgeous face, that I belongto her. She could never properly leave me because I was always hers. I’m not a hot science major, but if you simplify quantum entanglement and apply it to us, I know that we’ll always be linked.
“I feel like I abandoned you,” she breathes, her face a mask of agony. “Have I ruined everything?”
I suck in a breath so big that I almost choke on the warm night air as it slides down my throat. She’s so beautiful in every way. Her face flashes with pops of color, her dark eyes mirroring the purples and reds. The whites light us both up for just a flash.
I finally find my voice, scraping words past my raw throat and cracked open heart. “No. You might have thought you wanted something, and now you don’t. You’re waking up and coming alive again. You’re young. Smart. Healthy. Beautiful. Kind. You’ll be fine. You’ll leave here and you’ll find the job you were meant to have, the place you were always meant to be, and you’ll find your people. It will make all of this look like—”
“Wasted time.”
“Like it was all worth it,” I finish for her.
I’m tearing my heart out, but Grandpa once told me to always do what you believe is right. It might hurt. It might even tear you limb from fucking limb. It might make it hurt to breathe, leave you with a thousand sleepless nights. It might punch you full of holes, but in the end, even if it’s not entirely worth it, at least you can stand on conviction.
I used to wonder if Grandpa was wrong about some of that. He was human too.
“Those are nice thoughts,” Esme mumbles.
There hasn’t been a fireworks flash for a while. Are they over? Or just gearing up for the grand finale? I don’t hear anyone shouting, no distant clapping carrying in echoes on the breeze, no car horns honking.
“You’ll find someone who worships you.”
I might have been able to be the better man when I was in high school and things were different, but it nearly kills me to put that out there now. I want it, but I also want that person to be me. I want to be more than the wrong fit, or the right guy at the wrong time. I want to be Esme’s forever. I want to be the one she looks at and immediately brightens, no matter how bad the shitstorm is that she’s standing in. I want to be her best friend, but I also want to be more than that. I want to be her everything.
I continue, “They’ll care more about your happiness, even if making you happy kills them.” My breath is a torn thing, my lungs punched full of holes. I might as well have just rolled all over blades and barbed wire. I’m bleeding out from a thousand punctures. Inside. Outside.
“I do have some happy memories,” she whispers into the darkness.
