Escape (23 page)

She swung her arm down with anger and nearly fell over. Ed caught her and then pulled his hands away as quickly as possible once she'd regained her balance.

“I have no idea what you're talking about,” Ed complained. “You're not making any sense.”

“You're goddamn right you have no idea what I'm talking about. You're goddamn right! I'm so
sick
of the way she treats you, Ed. So sick of it! I've been watching it happen since I
came
to this stupid apartment. And now she tells me I don't know what I'm talking about
again
.
Oh, I'm
sorry
. Am I just too ‘disgustingly drunk' to know what I'm talking about? No! I know what I'm talking about, Ed! Believe me, I know what I'm talking about!”

“Wait, wait, what do you mean,
now
she tells you? Is Gaia
here
now?”

“Yes, she's here!” she slurred viciously. “She's here giving me more of her stupid attitude! I thought she and I were getting better, Ed. I thought we were really starting to become—”

“Where?” Ed felt his chest nearly close up with excitement and confusion. “How long has she been here?”

“How the hell should I know? Why don't you ask her yourself?”

“Where is she?”

“In her
stupid
little maid's room down the hall.” Tatiana waved her hand behind her and continued with her
out-of-control drunken tirade.
She seemed to be talking to herself at this point. In fact, she seemed to have been talking to herself the entire time. “I don't know why I put up with her attitude, I really don't. I don't deserve that I don't deserve. . .”

But Ed had stopped listening completely. His head darted up, and he gazed across the crowded living room at the dark hallway.

Maid's room? Did she just rant something about a maid's room? What maid's room?

Ed pushed his way through the crowd and into the hallway as the music pounded in his ears and the screams
went on and on. He was still not even sure if there was actual meaning to any of Tatiana's stumbling rant.

He stepped into the hallway and had walked a few steps when he realized that there was a painted-over doorway that he had never really noticed in the hall before. And there was a light shining through under the door.

“Gaia. . . ?” He pushed open the door, assuming he had simply found a closet.

But he hadn't found a closet. What he had found was a very bad dream. A kind of
living nightmare
that left him completely paralyzed and unable to breathe.

He had found Gaia. She was, in fact, there. And he had also found a boy. A boy who looked just exactly. . . like Sam Moon. It was hard to tell, though. Because his face was slightly obscured. . . what with Gaia's head being nestled so lovingly on his shoulder.

Gaia and this boy—who looked so very much like a boy who was supposed to be dead—both turned toward Ed at the exact same time, ripping their hands away from each other's bodies. And they stared at him, speechless. Just as he was speechless. With dumbfounded shock on their faces. Just as there was dumbfounded shock on his face.

For a moment it was almost as if they were playing some kind of children's mirroring game. But that moment passed away quickly. And Ed woke up to the fact that whatever he was witnessing—however surreal and impossible their romantic embrace might have
seemed. . . it was not in fact surreal. And it was not in fact impossible. And it was most definitely not a game. It was real. It was disgustingly,
heart-crushingly real.

Ed turned away from the ghost of Sam Moon and burrowed his unabashedly sad eyes into Gaia's paralytic stare. There were a thousand things that he could have said. And a thousand more things that he wanted to say. Anything to help revive his flat-lining heart—to administer some kind of CPR to his slaughtered ego and his overloaded brain. But before anyone in the dusty little room was able to muster a word, Tatiana came bounding in, using Ed as a bumper to break her stride.

“Oh God,” she whimpered, catching her breath. “I'm sorry. I'm so drunk. I just realized what I. . . I'm so drunk, I didn't even. . .” Tatiana leaned back against the door. It actually looked like she might just be about to pass out. “You're right, Gaia. I think I am disgustingly drunk. It just came out when I was. . . Our secret. I'm sorry.”

Ed stared at Tatiana for a moment more and then turned his head slowly back to Gaia. The look on Gaia's face was indescribable now. Anger, pain, and helpless regret all mixed together and heated up to a boil. And she
still
couldn't utter a word. But Ed could certainly understand why she would be so upset. Tatiana had, after all, accidentally revealed “their secret.”

Ed decided that words wouldn't do him any good, either. He decided that words were, in fact, an utter waste of his time.
All he needed were his legs.
Which, thank God, he had now. His legs were the one thing in this world he had left. And he used them. He used them to run as fast and as hard as he had ever run.

Sadistic Blow

GAIA TURNED TO TATIANA ONCE MORE.
She gazed at her tragically, pathetically drunken, pitiful face. She indulged briefly in visions of beating Tatiana to a bloody pulp and dragging her by her hair back to Russia. But that passed rather quickly.

Because it was really herself that she wanted to beat to a bloody pulp. She was the one she wanted to punish. For building this horrible mess of misunderstandings piece by piece. For telling just enough stupid secrets and lies to end up in this situation. Whoever Gaia had been trying to protect, the lies were still her fault. Tatiana was just the messenger.

So she put all her rage toward Tatiana aside, and she forgot about the pointless remainder of her good-byes to Sam, and she ran. She ran after Ed because it was all she could think to do. Because it was all she wanted to do.

Down the stairs, out the front door, and down onto the street. She spotted Ed headed toward Park
Avenue—spotted his back, actually, down half a block from her and still running.

“Ed! Ed, wait! Wait!”

Ed slowed down and turned around, his entire body obscured in the dark shadows of the towering buildings. He stood his ground, not taking a single step toward her, only staring from afar.

Gaia took a few steps toward him.

“Don't,” he called to her. “Stay there, Gaia. Just stay there.”

Gaia honored his request and stayed put. She had already let him down in so many ways, she felt compelled to do anything he asked of her.

“Alone,” he called to her. She could hear his voice quavering slightly. If she had been able to see his eyes, she had a feeling
she might have seen tears.
“You said you had to do this
alone
, Gaia. . . .”

“Ed, I swear to God, this is not what it looks—”

“Shut up. Please. . . just shut up.” She watched as his head dropped down in silhouette. “I'm wondering how many things you've told me were lies.”

“Ed, no—”

“That's what I'm wondering,” he said, pretending she hadn't even tried to speak. “That's what happens when you find out about one lie, Gaia. You doubt everything else the person has ever said. But you probably know that already. You've been lied to so many times. But not by me, Gaia. Never by me.”

Gaia felt her chest give way to a
sudden rush
of tears. They shouldn't have been a surprise, but somehow they were.

“Ed,” she uttered aimlessly. She didn't even have any words prepared to follow his name. She just wanted to say his name. To connect to him somehow again.

“I'm wondering. . . I'm wondering where you really were tonight. I'm wondering if there's anything really wrong with your father.”

“Of course there—”

“I'm wondering if Sam has anything to do with why you've been so distant with me half the time. . . that whole time after our first night together. . . and every time after that. I'm wondering if that was Sam on the cell phone last night while we were on our
big date
. . . .” Ed laughed bitterly. “I'm wondering if that even
was
Sam upstairs. I'm wondering if you were
lying
when you told me he had
died
. Is that possible? Could you possibly lie about something like that?”

“Ed,
no
, don't be—”

“Ridiculous?” he scoffed. “This is all ridiculous, Gaia. All of it. You and Sam?
Ridiculous
. Me and you?
Ridiculous
. You and anybody? Utterly ridiculous. You know what, Gaia? You're right. You've been right this whole time. You
are
supposed to be alone. I wish to God I had just listened to you. You were
born
to be alone. Or maybe you were
born
to be with the apparently undead Sam Moon, I don't really know. But I
know you're not supposed to be with me, Gaia. I do know that much.”

“No. . .” Useless one-syllable words were all she could manage now. “Ed, listen—”

“Hold on!” Ed interrupted coldly. “Dead man walking. . . .”

Gaia had no idea what Ed was talking about until she heard the footsteps behind her. She turned around and realized that Sam was now leaving her building. He glanced at Gaia for a moment and then turned away. Who knew why? Maybe because now he hated her, too. Maybe because he was trying to respect her dying relationship with Ed. She didn't even care right now. She simply watched as he got into the car with Dmitri and drove off toward the park.

As she turned back toward Ed, she realized that a huge group of
gossip-hungry rejects
had gathered in front of her front door. Just to revel in someone else's pain, as they all loved so much to do. Many of them were complete strangers. And of course there was Megan and Tammie and all the FOHs. Of course Jake wouldn't want to miss this, either. And of course Tatiana was nowhere in sight. She wouldn't dare show her idiotic face right now.

Gaia turned back to Ed, just like she was turning to face a bullet. A public execution of sorts. She couldn't even manage another word. There was no point now.

“You see this distance here,” Ed called to her, slowly
regressing into a full monotone. “From now on, I think we should maintain this approximate distance from each other at all times. I don't think we need any kind of court order or anything; we'll just stick with the honor system on this one. Because I trust you, Gaia. I
trust
you.”

With that last
sadistic blow,
Ed turned around and began to walk—moving at a cold and steady pace, farther and farther into the shadows.

Gaia couldn't feel herself crying now. She could only note the tears pouring down her face. She turned around to go home, only to come up against the captivated faces of her drunken audience.

She stared at all of them for a moment, examining each of their clueless, disgusting faces. And then she let it rip.

“GO HOME!” she howled, frightening the daylights out of every one of them. “Get the hell out of my house!”

The entire crowd dispersed in seconds, running every which way to escape Gaia's wrath. Even her doorman ducked for cover back inside the building.

But one person remained. Gaia couldn't believe it. She could not believe that he could be such cruel and obnoxious asshole that he would actually stay behind just to witness a few more delicious seconds of Gaia's suffering.

“Jake. . . I swear to God. . .” Now she could hear her own voice quavering. She was running on emotional fumes. Complete breakdown no more than a few minutes
away. “If you do not clear out of here in ten seconds. . . if you say one harsh word to me. . . or give me one proud chuckle or one half of that disgusting hideous grin. . . I will crack your skull so wide open—”

“Look, you seemed so upset. I just wanted to be sure you were okay,” Jake said, standing in her doorway with his hands sitting deep in his pockets. Now she could only stare at him. His unexpected kindness was making her dizzy and a little bit nauseous. She wasn't altogether sure that she wasn't about to faint.

“Are you?” he asked, checking her eyes. “Are you okay?”

Gaia was trying to come up with an answer to this question when her cell phone suddenly buzzed inside her pocket.

Cell phone? Now? Why the hell would Sam be calling me now? He just left two minutes ago. . . .

Unless. . . maybe Dmitri had already given Sam some pertinent piece of information on their way back to his house? Maybe Sam was trying to do her the incredible service of reminding her that no matter what kind of stinking hole her life was becoming, her father's life was still much more important. The search for her father was the one and only thing that mattered—the reason that this apocalypse of a day could still be worth something.

Gaia pulled the phone out of her pocket and looked down at the flashing green display. Sam hadn't called her. He'd sent her a text message:

Don't be sad. Just received some new information. Meet me at the Ukrainian church on Eleventh Street. Tomorrow. 8:00
A.M
.

Gaia stuffed the phone back in her pocket.

Thank you, Sam. Thank you for keeping me alive tonight. I will see you in the morning.

“Was that Ed?” Jake asked.

“Jake. . . go home, okay? Just go home.”

Jake gave Gaia one last look. He shook his head slightly with a sardonic smile, and then he turned away and started down the street toward the park.

“And thanks,” she heard herself say. She hadn't exactly planned to say it.

He turned his head back over his shoulder with his hands still in his pockets, and he smiled. He looked like some
goddamn blue jeans ad
you'd see on a subway poster or at a bus stop. But at least his smile wasn't quite so repulsive this time.