In This Life (30 page)

“No,” I joked. “We have to go in so I can ravish you before dinner.”

“Hmm.” She stood on her toes and kissed me.

I kissed her back with no intention of easing my hold on her and spun her around so that she was facing the sky. “Here, you look at the sunset while I continue to do this,” I whispered as I wrapped myself around her and kissed her like my life depended on it. I pulled her backwards, guiding her with my arms and making sure that I didn’t trip her with my big feet, and we slowly stepped into the living room.

“Anna.” We pulled apart in an instant to find Maggie sitting demurely on the couch, an overnight bag sitting neatly on the floor next to her feet.

“Mags! Hi! What a nice surprise!” She ran towards her friend with outstretched arms.

Silence. Not a word from Maggie as her eyes avoided Anna’s.

Both women stopped short of touching and Anna’s look turned to one of horror. She snapped her head towards me then quickly covered her mouth in a distinct gasp. “Oh my God! Oh my God! It’s Mikey! What happened to Mikey?”

I started to make my way towards her but she placed both hands up to stop me from moving forward.

“Anna, it’s not him. Mikey is fine.” Maggie’s voice shook, she kept wringing her hands over and over again.

“Is it my dad?” Anna asked, distressed and afraid. “Did he have a relapse?” She dug her heels in and stayed rooted to the very same spot.

Maggie shook her head and reluctantly forced out her words. “It’s Dante.”

A sigh of relief escaped from her lips. “Dante? He’s in Germany on business. Is he here? Did he come back?” She bounced around the living room to see whether Maggie had brought anyone else with her. She couldn’t stay still, her shoulders moved up and down repeatedly.

“Anna. Please sit,” Maggie begged with tears in her eyes.

“No, I’m okay. Tell me. Is Dante here?” She crossed her arms tightly over her chest. Her hands were shaking; her strong and stable surgeon’s hands quivered in perfect accord with the rhythm of her words.

“He was on the way here, to see you.”

“Well, he’s not here yet.” She shot me a look of confusion, her mouth gaping open. “Did you know? Did he tell you he was coming?”

I shook my head vigorously, defensively. “No, I had no i—”

She glared at me, her eyes narrowing, her lips pressed tight. And then she turned to Maggie. “Where is he, Maggie?”

I ran across the room towards her, but she once again held up her hands and ordered me to back away.

“Spark. Please listen to me!” she sobbed. “There was—” She took a deep breath and then spewed the words out so rapidly that they disappeared into thin air. “A plane crash. In the Khao mountains about 200 miles from here. No survivors.”

Anna lost her balance and fell on the floor. “No.” She swatted her hand in the air. Once, twice, before bringing both hands to her face. “No!”

“Spark,” Maggie said, “I’m so sorry.”

She let out a laugh. Sinister, hostile almost. “What’s Dante doing on a plane? What are you talking about? This isn’t funny, Maggie!”

As Maggie attempted to step forward, Anna backed away. Maggie’s voice shook, tears began to stream down her face. “Two days ago, he called to tell me that he was coming after you. Said he left you a message, asking you to wait for him.”

Anna squeezed her eyes shut and clawed at her cheeks. “What? What the fuck are you talking about?!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. “Will somebody please tell me what in God’s fucking name we are talking about?!”

“Blue,” I said as I rushed towards her. She tried to fight me off, but I held her down and covered her with my body. She sat on the floor and started to sob uncontrollably before letting out a bloodcurdling wail. It was piercing, penetrating. I would have died for her if only to take away her pain.

She pointed a finger towards the air as if telling us all to give her a minute. “No, wait. Wait, wait. No. This isn’t making sense. Just, just. No, wait. I don’t want to—”

Maggie quickened her pace and knelt down in front of Anna. “Veronica called me. She told me the news. His family has flown out here, they’re staying at a hotel closer to the crash site.”

“No!” she insisted through her sobs. “That’s impossible! He’s been in Germany!”

Her mind had kicked into utmost denial; it simply couldn’t fathom this news. The strength of my embrace did nothing to mitigate the violent trembling of her body.

Maggie addressed her quietly. She changed her tone, approaching Anna like a child, and it seemed to work better. “Sparky, listen to me, okay? Just absorb it all, and if you have questions, I’ll try to answer them as best as I can.”

Anna nodded her head while her body took in shallow, jagged breaths, her tears continuing to pour down her cheeks.

“It wasn’t planned. He decided to come here to talk you into going back with him. He said that he was stupid not to fight for you. That he would make you see how good you were for each other.” Maggie had to stop for a brief moment as Anna’s howls reached a deafening crescendo. “It was all over the evening news, Spark. When they confirmed that there were no survivors, it became a recovery mission and not a rescue mission. Yes, he was in Germany for almost two months.”

And here’s where I lost her. Or she lost herself.

She flew up on her feet with a force so strong that she knocked both me and Maggie on our behinds. She stood up, straight and tall, articulating her words through her sobs.

“He’s a survivor, Maggie! Why the hell would they give up on finding him? He’s alive! I know he is, I know he’s somewhere just waiting for them to find him! He’s out there somewhere! They need to find him!”

Maggie remained silent.

“What?! Answer me, dammit! What?”

“He’s gone!” Maggie began to cry. “Anna, please! Please listen to me. We have to go home and wait for word. I’m here to take you home!”

She hugged herself with her arms and rocked back and forth. “I have to go. I have to go. I have to go,” she chanted over and over again. “Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go. Where’s my suitcase? Let’s go, let’s go. Maggie, I’m asking you to help me get ready. Let’s go.” She heaved a deep breath and vomited onto the floor. I stood up and ran to the bathroom to retrieve some paper towels, covering the soiled ground and hastening back towards her.

“Here it is again. This is fucking bullshit. Why did I allow myself to fall for this? This is insane! I want to be with Dante! This is fucking insane!”

I held her in my arms and led her towards the bed. “Anna, please, relax. Let me get you something to calm you down. We won’t accomplish anything tonight. Your flight is booked for the morning. In the meantime, please relax, you’re of no use to him if you’re not well. You’ll be on your way home in no time.” I stroked her head as she wept into my chest. She dug her nails into my back.

Cling to me, I thought. Cling to me because I will get you through this.

“Gray, he called me from Germany, right? You saw my phone. He called me from Germany. He was there. In Germany. Germany.”

“Yes, baby, yes.” I held her tightly. “He did call.”

“Let’s go. Let’s go. Let’s go,” she continued to chant.

“Yes, my love. We’re going tomorrow. We’ll take you to Dante.”

“Okay. Okay. Okay. I have to. I have to go.” She sat on the edge of the bed, swaying from side to side, muttering, whimpering, moaning. “I have to go. Home. Please Lord. I have to be with Dante.”

I LONGED TO
give paradise a proper goodbye. The warm breeze, the golden sun, the bright red moon, the bottomless ocean. I wanted to take my time and bid her farewell; after all, it was only fitting to be filled with gratitude for the land that had given her to me. And so in the early hours of the morning, before the rise of the sun and the disappearance of the tide, I tied up my shoelaces for the last time and ran carelessly along the beach. I hadn’t slept at all the night before. I held Anna through her tears and stood guard until the medication took over. I was grateful to her friend Afihsa for anticipating her reaction to the news by sending a few sleeping aids through Maggie to help Anna through the night.

The villa was still dark as I noiselessly let myself in, knowing full well that we still had two more hours before leaving for our flight. I was caught by surprise to find Anna sitting in the shadows wearing jeans and a blazer, surrounded by neatly lined up suitcases.

“Blue?” I whispered as I headed over to the lamp to turn the light on.

She raised her hands to shield her eyes. “No. Please don’t turn the light on. It’s better this way. It’s better that I can’t see you clearly,” she said.

“See me? Why?” I asked as I took a seat on the chair directly across from her. “I can get ready in a few minutes. Let me just jump into the shower real quick.”

“No. Maggie is waiting outside. We’re taking an earlier flight. I just wanted to say goodbye.”

“Goodbye?” My heart fell out of my chest. I knew then what it felt like to be dying. “I’m coming with you.”

I saw the outline of her head shaking. “This is wrong. All wrong. I shouldn’t have—” She caught her breath. “I need you to do this for me. I need you to stay. I need you to go back to your God. Go and become a priest. Pray for my mother and for Dante. Beseech Him, cut a deal with Him, ask your God to save him, make him come back.”

She wasn’t making any sense. Bring him back to life? Make him come back?

“Blue, please listen to me. I know you’re upset. But I don’t even have to go back to St. Joe’s when we get home. I can stay with you. We can pray together, get through this together. We can—”

“No! Listen to me! No, we can’t! Dante is mine. And I will not share him with you. You bring death with you wherever you go. When I met you, I lost my mother. Now I’m being punished. God is punishing me for taking you away from Him. He’s paying me back for ruining you. He’s angry at me for taking His Adam from the Garden. He’s shaming me into admitting my sins by taking Dante in your place!”

I tried to find her. I desperately tried to find her through the warmth in her voice, by the way she squinted her eyes when she thought too much, by the slight upturn of her mouth when she was trying to make a point. But she just wasn’t there. Her movements were mechanical and robotic. Her hands sat in her lap the whole time, her legs crossed together.

“Please, Blue, no. That’s not it at all. We can get through this together. I know that you said no promises. But I’m making you this promise. For now and forever, I will love only you. I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I can love no one else on heaven and earth the way that I love you. I will die for you, I will kill my soul for you. God has nothing to forgive. What we have, it’s nothing to be ashamed of.” I leaned over to touch her hands, but she pulled them away from me.

“If you truly love me,” she cried, “you will go back to your God and pray for His mercy. Pray for Dante. Ask God to give him back to me.”

Dante is gone. Nothing can ever bring him back.

“This is not the way, Anna.”

“You. You were never mine. You were always His.”

“You don’t mean that,” I said gently.

“It doesn’t matter what I mean. It no longer counts. What matters is that I’m giving you back to your church so you can spend your life praying for us. Your God will listen to you. And when we find him,” her voice grew louder, more certain, “and we will find him—when we find Dante, I will promise to stay with him forever.”

She scooted herself to the end of the couch and stood up to leave. I threw myself on the floor, dropped down to my knees, and clasped my hands into a praying position. I didn’t care that I was crying, I didn’t care that I was shamelessly imploring her to stay.

“I worship you and only you. You are my madness, my sanity, my darkness and my light. I will never know one without the other. I don’t want to live if it isn’t a life with you. Please, Anna, please. I’m begging you, don’t leave me.”

Slowly she placed the seahorse who saw forever in its eyes in the palm of my hand before leaning over and lightly brushing back the hair on my head.

“A relationship based on death and loss can never survive. Jude. I can never be with you in this life, but I will hope for the next. Live for the next, Jude. Live for the next life.”

And then she was gone.

I wish I could tell you that our story ended with the joy of the lanterns or with our whispered promises in the dark of the night. But instead it ended here. In the silence of daybreak surrounded by nothing but suitcases and empty dreams, and memories that would one day fade with time.

This is where it ended. This is where I died.