2020

Saturday

The red color that was entering laboriously under his eyelids was warm and brought some strange dancing letters. It was frequent that Barry dreamed of those letters and, with George, they had tried some hypnotherapy to fill the dull hours between missions, attempted to retrieve memories of those mysterious letters and see if they formed words. The enigma was still ongoing. Barry suspected his friend, the famous Robortor, to have synesthesia, meaning, when senses overlapped. George, as his real name was, had sometimes mentioned that in his mind, numbers had colors and calendars shapes, steps like a flight of stairs.

Barry looked at the letters, saw that they were dripping red and dark purple. They had some microscopic mouths that showed some canines on the side. He didn’t enjoy them, that time. Something in their dance was hurting his eyes, there was some torment in their minute movements, some sharp pixels and lagging that made the whole thing look like the opening credits of a horror movie.

He opened his eyes at once and fought for breath for a second, realizing he was still in Ms White’s bed. Her bedroom. He was lying in front of her huge moon painting, framed in gold, surmounted by a plastic bird sculpture that she had nailed to the wall above her condemned fireplace. “Barry” he heard her on the side, tilted his head, “don’t be afraid, you are at my apartment, remember? I am Eugenie White, and you’ve been here now, for some hours, everything is okay” He understood she was trying to avoid a panic. How could he have told her that nothing about her bedroom walls, nothing about the lavender smell here, was actually unknown to him? He hoped that no slumber would rock him far enough from self control that the confession would ever escape his lips.

He turned his head to see her, I am Eugenie White, and did his best to smile, “I re mem ber” he said. The words exploded in his abdomen, his voice so low but, inside, thundering and echoing and the words bouncing against his ribs. He brought his hand on his stomach, winced, “oh man”

She grabbed his other hand and patted it like a little muffin top, “I hope you’ve recharged a bit, Barry, I gave you some benzodiazepine, you were under for some six hours”

“Benzozi… benzala”

“There is no need whatsoever for you to repeat that name. It’s just some drugs”

“Thank you” he whispered. She looked ghastly and completely wrung out from everything she had been through, but she was still so lovely. Her messy hair created a light halo around her beautiful face, her cheeks still red from the action, the ample tee-shirt she was wearing was too large and had not seen an iron for a million years, the breezy opening of it giving space to her neck and the start of her round shoulders. Within his anguish, he found another little smile climb out of him. He was in simple adoration for her, like he had been before only, this time, he had her for himself, so near, outside the classroom, ridden of her illustrations of valleys and moutains, notebooks, thermometers, rain charts, board markers, strict academic directions. Was it worth getting gunned down? he thought. “No-ho” he chuckled, embarrassed by his own thinking.

“What”

“Nothing, ah fuuck”

She brushed the hair back from his forehead, his skin was sticky, said, “you’re not out of the woods yet, Barry. There are a lot of painful hours ahead”

“I can see that” It was atrocious. He thought back about the little teeth of the red and violet letters of his last dream. Something similar and vicious was chewing at him, masticating the middle of his body furiously, throbbing more vividly down his left side.

“I’m here, you’re not alone, okay?” she yawned, brought her hand to her mouth, “sorry I haven’t slept for a while”

“For… how long” Speaking hurt, he saw. Hearing hurt. His earlobes and his hair hurt too.

“For a very long time like, since Friday morning” she sneered, then shook her head, “it’s okay, don’t worry about that, I will sleep later”

“Thank you Ms W White” He had no idea what day they were now.

“We can still, you know.. drop you off at a clinic”

“No” he closed his eyes, pushed his hand stronger against his stomach, “no nono, no hospital. Don’t worry I cccan… handle it” He filled his cheeks with air, released it slowly. Some nice molecules of oxygen. The warmth and dampness of Ms White’s palm and the lightness of her fingers on his other hand. He focused on those things.

“It would be nice if you could sleep again, but I can’t give you anything for the next hour”

“I’m too wired, I … have a lot of ele… ctricity in my head now”

“Really?” she asked, a little interested

“Yes it’s very funky” some new sweat beads started dripping down his chest and flanks, “is that the moon” he lifted his chin towards the large painting in front of him. Ms White nodded, “you are a ff fan of the moon?” he asked her.

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“I kind of hate the moon, I’d say. She likes to see me suffer”

That was interesting, “then hmhmm why dyou h… have her por… por por—”

“Portrait? Flattery I suppose” she laughed shyly, “Barry don’t speak, just relax”

“It’s okay it d d ddistracts me like” he sighed, “like at school at lunch”

“At school at lunch?” she frowned, unsure she had heard well

Why do I do that to myself, he wondered, “I used to visit you on the bench to pass the time”

“You are telling me this as if I don’t remember”

“You remember?” he tried not to sound so eager.

“Those things are hard to forget” His eyes closed, he heard that sentence from her, relished within it, basked in the reassurance of it. “You little motherf— goofball” Ms White half-scowled, half-grinned, “stop laughing, you’re moving too much” she gently pushed down on his shoulder. She smelled like dish soap, sanitizer and coffee.

Maybe it was still Saturday, but Barry had the feeling it was already Sunday, “you… you don’t f ffind it amusing”

“Today I will make an exception” she said, “and find it extremely amusing”

“I want to ttturn on my side, can you help me”

“No moving, Barry, I said no m—”

“Please, it’s killing me, this… position”

“Alright alright” she sighed and got up, “lean forward, come on, like that” She had difficulty rising, just like before, at the end of the school day, when it was the last hour and she was finished instructing the students on a task and distributing her papers, and finally sat down at her desk, and a student raised their hands asking for a pencil or an eraser. Those moments, when she was tediously lifting herself back up, the feet of her chair scraping the floor in a strident sound, she seemed to be pulling an entire bag of stones with her. There was a theory out there that teaching was a profession which turned people old early, which would explain the plethora of grey shiny hair Ms White already possessed.

Barry pushed on his elbow, bent down, huffing and puffing, “damn damn da—” he closed his eyes, focused on her guiding movements, and at last he tilted on the side, “dammit”

“I told you” a little exasperated, she forcefully punched the pillow under its head, to readjust it and make it puffy again, “better now?”

“Not really”

“There is no position that’s going to make your pain better, Barry. Close your eyes and breathe, Barry, in through your nose”

“O… kay”

“Don’t talk for a minute, just breathe, and then out through your mouth, like this” she demonstrated, and they breathed together for a moment. “Now, breathe in for three seconds, out for three seconds, can you do that? I’m going to count”

“It helps” he lied after a couple breaths, he had the vague feeling she was trying to shut him up.

“See?” she seemed satisfied with herself and he owed it to her to humor her, “I know what I’m talking about”

“Yeah”

“Yeah”

“Have you ever seen Avatar?”

She thought about it, “the Last Airbender?”

He snorted, regretted it, shook his head in desolation, “no, the movie with the blue people”

“Aah, the Smurfs!”

Barry closed his eyes patiently, and yet grateful that Ms White hadn’t lost any of her entertainment potential during their years apart. Although she worked with teenagers every day, she was seriously lagging behind some recent pop culture events, “it’s a movie with mind-blowing graphics, by James Cameron, you know th—”

“Oh I love James Cameron! He did Titanic, you know”

“Your favorite movie”

“And” Ms White’s doe eyes narrowed and the suspicion inside them made Barry shiver, oh shit, he thought, “how the hell would you know that”

“You.. said it in class like… a million times” he feigned to be bored to death, while a pang of fire blasted inside his stomach.

“I doubt it really”

“Francesca told me”

Ms White smiled warmly, “your little girlfriend, I remember her very well, she was a darling, with beautiful hair”

“Whatever, we dated for like one day and a h h half”

“Why would she tell you that though”

“For uh… Saint N… Saint Patr… Shark Week I mean Secret Santa. She wanted to make you a Titanic gift”

“Which she didn’t”

“Yeah she” Barry twitched under another spasm, shook his head, “was broke”

“That story makes no sense”

“I must be… the drugs I mean… the withdrawal of them”

“Let’s watch it.”

“Titanic?”

“No-ho” she exclaimed, “I don’t wish to torture you more than needed, I mean Avatar. I will rent it and bring my laptop here and we can watch it, it will help time go faster until your next nap”

As the download took forever and the film buffered for an extended amount of time, the pain surged and gurgled and expanded inside his abdomen, forcing him to shrink into a ball in a countering and containing move. His feet kicked underneath the thick blanket and his face crumpled like a little raisin under the sun. His limbs felt like they were made of barbwire strings, that the bed was a burning cauldron trying to fuse him into a block of fire and anguish. Ms White sighed and crouched on the floor next to the bed, slid one hand under his elbow and started scratching it with affection, “I’m here Barry” she said, “just hang on for one more half hour, come on, breathe”

“Just—” he opened his eyes and threw them up at her, “promise you will stay with me”

She receptioned his burning eyes and something emotional lowered her gigantic eyebrows, “of course Barry, I’m not going anywhere”

“Can you… sit with me on the bed”

“Of… course” she repeated, paused for a second without letting go of his stare, “it’s no problem Barry” Clumsily, she paced around the bed and precociously sat on the other side of him, as if they were getting ready for a slumber party. He could sense the uncertainty of her movements, the reservations.

When she leaned against the wall in her back on the pillow neighbor to his, Barry presented her the palm of his hand, “hold my hand please”

“Yes Barry” she did, rubbed it encouragingly again, “see, I’m here, you’re not alone”

“If you tell anyone of this, I will—”

“I know Barry” he could hear the smile in her voice.

“I will have to make up something terrible about you”

“Makes sense”

“I will say—”

“Barry shut the fuck up. Movie’s starting”

He closed his eyes again, on two very hot tears. Inside his heart, he felt content. When he heard the opening song of the movie, with the chanting voice and the drums, Barry thought that he had actually done pretty well.