The desertion table

The Barry she had let in the apartment that night, she knew, was a special kind of him. He was wild, and unhinged, and he was in pain. Once she locked the front door behind Joe leaving, she returned to the kitchen and thought about doing the dishes. “Plates in the sink” she had sung merrily as if they were all closing a lovely dinner and bidding one another goodnight, stomachs full of food and hearts full of cheer. It was not that.

You know what, actually? I will do the dishes. She started doing them furiously, with the tap gushing down the water and the temperature at the maximum and soon, she became surrounded by a cloud of vapor. Barry had changed chairs and re-acquired his throne in the house, and he was watching her in silence, pretending to be apprehensive about it. There wasn’t a drop of apprehension in him, she knew, only grand design, and inestimable success. I think you miss me punishing you.

“So that was your guy?” he asked

“Was, indeed” she replied

“What do you mean”

“He’s not going to be my guy for much longer after tonight, I’m afraid”

“What no! Nonsense. I thought that went well” Barry was nonchalantly using his old paper tissue to make a pile of the last crumbs from the pizza.

Eugenie’s anger was angry itself, “OF COURSE of course you did” she tried not to raise her voice, “everything went well for you”

“For me?”

She should be careful, she knew, as he already had the upper hand, the angle of surprise and total shock. Shock and awe, that was often Barry’s strategy. But she couldn’t contain it anymore, you know what? Let’s have that for dessert. She pointed a finger at him followed by three little soap bubbles from the sink, “YOU KNEW that I had a date tonight, from Darlene” she said

“No I didn’t” Barry shook his head clearly meaning that yes, he knew.

“Aand, you show up here, and make those crazy revelations to Joe about me”

“It just came out of me” she watched him pretending he had been overcome by a possession of facts waiting to explode in the open, like it was destiny, like the universe was speaking to him “I was so tired after my long public transportation journey you know, I didn’t think it through”

“JUST LIKE when you didn’t think through appearing on my fucking balcony, originally”

“Wow, just calm down” he raised his left hand in a gesture of hopeless appeasement, “I thought that you told Joe those things”

Eugenie grabbed a plate that had been drying in the sink from a week ago and decided to wash it again too, “and why would I tell Joe OR ANYONE that I am a person who is involved with the secret society of vigilantes of this town, WHY would I tell him that I am implicated in some major shootings, why?” she didn’t leave him the space to comment, went on, “I thought I managed to get something back into my life, some normalcy, with a normal guy, but NOO, I can’t have those things, those nice things, because YOU decided to invade my existence two and a half years ago and now I am living this double life” she inhaled sharply, ready for another burst, “I thought I recaptured this little control and then you, YOU, ban it from me!” Just like that memory, Mormor, Grandma, you can be such a bitch sometimes, stealing that memory from me. You showed it to me and then hid it again. BITCH.

She knew it would be wiser to gradually escalate into her true emotions, not let them blow up at once, or simply give Barry too much material to use against her, but the hot water on her hands was getting to her head. She positioned some plates on the drying board, begin to work on the glasses, “You planned it all along, all this crap” She wasn’t actually sure at all that he had planned it all along, which was way worse, “and now I feel guilty about leaving the Team, I feel—”

“You were going to leave the Team?” Barry had not computed two and two, apparently

“I am going to leave the Team because I shouldn’t be part of the Team, or part of anything, I wish to have my own title and my own valuable things worth preserving from—” she wavered the impact of her words to come

“From what?”

“YOUR MADNESS” she barked on top of the white noise of the water pouring from the faucet. Another night with sounds covered with water, “now Joe thinks that you are the Bolt!”

“He thinks that but he can’t prove it”

“WHY did you come here?” she dried the glass a third time.

“I came to apologize”

“Convenient!”

“Sometimes the truth is convenient. Plus you told me we didn’t need to let each other know when we’d be home, it was more breathable like this”

“Uuuu super convenient!”

“I’m saying” he said brazenly

“But you haven’t been at this apartment for three weeks and”

“Uh, hello! I was in a hospital, pretty busy if you ask me”

“I mean and now you choose this specific Saturday night to show up and without even telling me about it”

“Because I thought on a Saturday night you would be awake and reactive and not like” he looked down, circled some imaginary shape on the floor with his hand, “asleep, exhausted or something from your job”

“You make it sound like I’m either working or sleeping”

“No-oh” Barry hesitated, scratched his forehead, “obviously I know that you have many other things, like, such as”

“Did Darlene tell you I had a date?”

“NOO” he reiterated

The glass in her hand kept going from wet to dry and wet again and drying once more, “Barry, I already don’t have much going on because I spend a lot of goddamn time with your Team” she decided to stop holding back, “running after you and making sure that you don’t die every day”

“THAT AGAIN” She knew she had gone far and that they were pretty much shortly resume their ferocious cul-de-sac of an argument, and that Barry would soon be launched, but she was craving it. He suddenly rose up from his chair, bouncing against an affront that he could no longer take sitting down. Let’s have it, she thought again. Let’s have that for dessert, “YOU stuck around” he accused her, his voice hoarse, “no one asked you”

“Actually Marlene asked me” she retorted, “I said ‘hey’ you guys, you guys take care of Barry, I’m gonna bail, and Marlene was like” Eugenie changed her tone to supplicant, secretly asked Uberwoman to forgive her, “noo, you gotta stay with Barry he needs you, you’re his spirit animal, meow meow”

“Oh my God” Barry was appalled, “Marlene didn’t say that you were my spirit animal, I will NOT believe that”

“Actually she might have said something WORSE”

Barry attempted to step forward and place his fists on his hips in a menacing position but his right hand was definitely stuck inside the large pocket of his hoodie, so he staggered, lost his balance, “Perhaps you have forgotten that I saved your life and that it’s how things became rather sticky”

“Actually I have forgotten”

“That’s a LIE” he flinched and subtly lost a bit of altitude.

“It seems difficult for you to go around and be a superhero without getting stabbed or shot by five bullets and—”

“Five bullets WHAT” he exclaimed, outraged, “it was not FIVE bullets come on it was like” he had to think for a nanosecond, “three bullets”

Eugenie gave up on the last glass and threw it into the sink, where it landed with fracas “for goodness’ sake, I’m talking about a total number of bullets!”

“I don’t know if you have noticed but my job is d dangerous aand” Barry stopped himself, drew a ragged breath. His skin was becoming damp and white, his movements were tight, “it’s not like ‘oh I’m gonna teach students the layers of the earth today why not’ or sticking stamps on some envelopes”

Now, let it all out, the truth, she thought, “even Ivan called you a bullet blanket, and then he winked at me”

“OH LORD” Barry gasped, opened his mouth wide, suddenly huffing for breath, “take it… take it back”

“No” she spat, savoring the short advantage she might have, shook her head at him, “I cannot take it back, because I have seen too much of it”

“Take it back, that’s n nnasty”

“Nasty? I’m the one who has to sponge your blood every time and resuscitate you every time and sow you back together into one piece again every time”

“So na nasty” he gazed through her, his expression puzzled and saddened, some dark circles having appeared under his eyes like dug by a large paintbrush.

“You’re okay, Barry?” She raised one eyebrow at him.

He threw a theatrically unsettled look at her, “oh, you are concerned now that you will have ttto ssponge my bblood” With his left hand, he grabbed the corner of the table and held himself against it, while his right shoulder rolled painfully inside its socket, “sponge me and sow mme” Barry went crossed-eye for a second, his face glistening with a new touch of sweat under the light he had destroyed multiple times and glued back together, “so you can hhave your litt—”

“Oookay” Eugenie sighed patiently, wiped her hands on her pants and stepped carefully towards him. Slowly, she thought, cautiously. She thought, this is my life, why do I fight it, took one more step, on her guards. It was Scorpio season after all. “Barry?” she growled, fatigued

She heard Mormor, you had your say, but it doesn’t change anything, little doll of mine. My little snow angel. She found it scandalous, that an old lady who didn’t even follow her on Facebook or reply to her Christmas and Easter emails knew so much about her beyond death. “Barry” she said again, “you need to calm down” My little chicken, like your aunt.

Barry grimaced and pulled himself up straight, “I’m just tired bbecause I didn’t ssleep well last night”

“Okay just sit down, take it easy for a while, just sit” she opened the chair for him, took position herself on the one in front of it.

Gauging her with even greater suspicion, Barry eyed the manoeuvre in advance and clenched his jaws and went for it, dropped his butt heavily on the chair, “No need to… wwatch me like that” he fumed, “I’m just dizzy, okay? I’m okay I can still… argue”

She allowed herself a few heartbeats in the silence, very much aware that she was now in risky territory. The type of Barry she had in front of her, entangled in a mix of belligerence and exposure, was the hardest to handle. He would try anything to get the last word and to make her pay for what she had just done, and she would have to be very protective of her energy, not let him claim victory on her core feelings.

Why was she going along with it? Why was she going along with anything, actually? “We don’t have to continue arguing” she rubbed the bridge of her nose, “I think it was enough for today” then glanced down at her wrist pretending she was wearing a watch, “it’s late”

“Wow” he gazed down, his brow shiny with perspiration, “very impressive your.. time reading skills”

“Right” she sneered childishly, “like you measuring the wind with your wet thumb”

She doubted he would ever play the sickly card in order to get out of his being cornered by her, since showing himself unsteady and wobbly was never part of Barry’s bag of guises, the reason being the astronomical size of the ego he possessed. Following his manipulative skills was impossible and yet she knew that it was a pretty arduous job for him to track her own mind games. They were at such an equal level of jesting that sometimes, she felt the wallpapers were going to undulate and fall down, torn into shreds by the force in the air.

He falsely apologized: “sorry for ruining your dinner” She said nothing “it was tasty though” he added.

“Don’t worry about it” she sighed again, brushed some cat hair off the collar of his jumper, “I was just surprised, and Joe was surprised, but… he’s a nice guy, he will forgive me” He will never forgive me, she guessed.

“Yes, as he should”

Fuck you she thought, “thanks Barry”

“You weren’t going to sleep with him, were you”

“I would never” she lied

“Good” he nodded, “cause you have to act hard to get, you know? Otherwise, guys lose interest”

She squinted at him, but it seemed that this was actually authentic friendly advice from relationship expert, Barry Masquevert, “Oh wow, I have lived more than forty years and I never knew that” she meant to trigger him but he missed it, clicked his tongue as he was very happy with himself, “Barry why do you keep your right hand in your pocket?”

He wiped the sweat off his forehead, “Why oh well it’s my new style like, laid-back”

“I’m thinking it’s because your arm doesn’t work very well”

“No, you’re right, my arm doesn’t work very well at all, actually my whole right side feels like cotton candy. I’m afraid I will never recover”

Eugenie scanned the fake-ass vulnerability in Barry’s eyes. When he was poking at her defenses with that act, chewing something invisible in his mouth with his tormented pride all crumpled under his chin, his attractiveness was catapulted into the stratosphere. One had to be in absolute control in front of such display, forget that they had ever had raging hormones during adolescence. It was like watching your favorite movie star from high school days hang his wet socks on a drying line saying ‘I only own five pairs of socks, not even one for the weekend’ but not in real life, no, no. In a movie. In a work of fiction. “But you will recover” she said as flatly as she could, “you are a—”

“Don’t say tough cookie please” he massaged his temple under the unbearable thought

“… a mighty motherfucker”

“It’s my bolting hand”

“You can bolt with the other hand”

“You don’t know anything about bolting, Eugenie”

Her name in his mouth, spoken low and unpleasantly, electrified her. She swallowed hard and repressed a shudder, “you came here because you heard from Darlene I had a date, right?”

Time for the kind of honesty that hid ulterior motives of a dishonest nature, which Barry was very good at, “yes maybe” he smiled with fabricated discomposure, “I’m sorry I don’t know, I just wanted to make sure you weren’t hanging out with a douche bag or something like, kind of like, your father would do before prom”

“My fath—” she smothered a gasp. What were his ulterior motives? One could ask oneself. They could be as long aiming as getting some commitment back from her, and as immediate as just getting in her pants.

“I mean” he tried to elaborate, “not like your father-father okay? More like a big brother”

“A big broth—”

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“I’m just being protective that’s all” Barry wriggled on his butt, acting like he was sitting in a pile of ants. It was not his discomfort that prompted his wriggling, it was the excitement out of his own sadism. Catastrophizing her with his words for his amusement had always been one of his most cherished pass-times.

So Eugenie opted for an open heart, spoke softly, kindly, “Barry, you could just not do any of those things and just let me be, right? Let me fly like a bird into the sky” It was a bold play. Putting herself out there while he was bantering hard and his feet were no longer touching the ground and there was suffering inside his body. But she was tired.

She admitted her mistake when she saw him tremble with repulsion, then he hooked his eyes onto hers with a response that she could clearly read at the bottom of them: I will NEVER let you fly like a bird into the sky. “Cause you’re looking for love right now?” he asked in the same manner as if he was asking if she ever ate her own vomit.

She maintained her desire for sincerity, corrected him: “I’m looking for something meaningful in my life, yes”

“But you have us I mean” he cleared his throat, “the Team, by US” he wiped his nose with his sleeve, “I mean the Team of course” he didn’t and he did mean that, as Barry’s superpower was bolting but also, also, fake-lying. And fake-lying, on the contrary to logical belief, didn’t always mean speaking the truth. Up, down, up down. By sitting on a chair in a darkened place in front of him, she had accepted the challenge of this exchange. She was still accepting it. It reminded her of a line from one of her favorite science-fiction books, Ender’s Game: ‘Perhaps the enemy’s gate is down’

She felt her nostrils flare, “You are forgiven, Barry”

“What?”

“I’m releasing you of your guilt”

“But I humiliated you” he sounded sincerely confused, permitting her a temporary lucky draw.

“You humiliated yourself. For me, you got me a way out of the Team”

“Is that really what you want” Barry’s incredulity was piling bars of frowns on his forehead

I’m looking for something that is not dangerous, hazardous, perilous”

“That’s boring” he dismissed her efforts entirely

“Coming from you, because you are addicted to adrenaline” she pet the top of his left hand like it was the little face of a chihuahua, “but you should know by now, that I am addicted to hygge” She sounded the word hijj like he usually did to piss her off and insult her culture.

Barry smiled at her with a fondness dancing at the center of his eyes that was so brutal and unexpected that it almost startled her, “I think you are afraid to see the real things” he said. His curled upper lip and the flawless structure of the pointy teeth inside his mouth made this genuine reaction of his like an arrow to the heart. Most people would give up by now.

“The real thing” she said, forcing herself to inhale some casual air

“That you and I, we are alike, we are adventurers, rebels”

She shook her head, “Barry, you believe this because you are so self-centered, it is hard for you to comprehend that the whole world doesn’t feel the same as you, you keep thinking if you ignore what people are saying and force them into your actions, they will—”

“That’s a load of—” He cut her off

She interrupted him in turn, “you are so unable to see anything outside of yourself that you haven’t even taken the time to know me, understand me” she juggled some invisible oranges with her hands to make him measure the gravity of her words, which left him unimpressed.

He looked at her from very down, somewhere very dark, “Oh I know you” he said in half a smile and with utmost seriousness, now located somewhere near the top of his game.

“Don’t quote Avatar”

“I wasn’t going to” He didn’t look away, his stare meant exterminate. The confidence in Barry had never been any sort of a disguise for actual low self-esteem, she knew, since she had watched him evolve as a little student in her ranks. He was not using it to mask insecurities or to put up a front. He had known that he was very handsome for a very long time and he had learned how to add a lot of other things to it very smoothly, without any difficulties. He appeared in the day like the sun was shining on him in the middle of the crowd and in the night like the darkness was challenging him to shine even brighter. And he was continually flourishing within it. The opposite of a vicious cycle, called a fruitful cycle.

And yet, Eugenie was so accustomed to fighting Barry on that terrain, “just because you’re looking at me in a creepy way and speaking so mysteriously, it’s not making it true”

“It’s not?” he laughed generously, “dammit, I am in the place the eye does not see”

“Barry” she laughed too but glared at him with admonition. The hot head inside her was consuming itself with anger and desire and frustration and hunger for the truth. Was Barry right? Girl, he’s just hanging out right now, he’s not saying anything, he’s just— She needed to find something to say very soon though, or she was at risk of sharing the silence with Barry, eyes searching for eyes, and she was way too wary for that.

Thankfully, he didn’t seem ready for it either, “you are still saying that you don’t remember when I was lying on the ground and you jumped on me to protect me from like, hundreds of bullets”

“I don’t want to talk about that” she forced herself to smile at him, timidly. From a hidden corner of herself, she wished to appeal to his mercy, which was something he didn’t easily knew.

“I’m sorry I’m just—”

“It’s a well-known phenomenon, Barry, there is nothing crazy about it. It’s called sideration. When someone is under too much stress, then they forget. Like a small amnesia”

“I can tell you the story if you wish”

“The story?”

“Of everything you have forgotten” His face was relaxed now, his stare back to unwavering

“Hmm” she squealed with amplified panic. She had had a glimpse of it, gifted from Mormor’s ghost hands, and it had vanished again. Now she thought it was, perhaps, for the best.

“Everything that sideration has taken from you” he grinned like a puppy

“I think sideration is meant to take things from you that you don’t want to remember”

“But there are some nice things to take from such dark episodes”

“Nice things?” she knew very well what he meant but she would never confess it

“Well” he sat back and tried to stretch but realized the move was too audacious in his current state, “anyway, since we didn’t die, thanks to me saving your life and then, you, right after that, saving mine, well” he paused and threw her a manufactured look of uncertainty, hoping she would react, “well it usually uh” Her prowess at keeping a straight face in front of his attitude sometimes made her proud of herself, “well often, it can make you feel more alive, afterwards”

“Ahh, I see” she chuckled, “that’s some teenage bullshit”

“Because old people do… what exactly, after they escape death?”

“Oh my god, I didn’t say teenagers versus old people! I mean adults”

He sighed heavily, “you and your compartments. You literally used to spend your days with teenagers”

“For money!” she objected “For a salary for a monthly payment you empty cocon—”

“Listen” he smiled brighter and hurled his hand forward to put a finger on her lips

“Noo” she pushed it away and backed off, spoke like a teacher, “don’t touch my mouth, don’t touch my face don’t—”

“Wait listen” he giggled, “okay I promise I’m not shushing you” he placed his index finger on his own lips. And there was the eye lock. It required no effort or focus on her part to maintain his stare, and he didn’t seem under duress either. It was just like changing position on a comfortable chair. On the opposite plane of comparison, it was rather difficult to get out of it. She was aware that time was now out of her reach and that there had been instances where they had forgotten to exit the lock above their cold coffees in the kitchen of Hobbes’ lab and people had been disturbed by that.

But there, an entity, which was probably the truest Barry she knew, was located. His eyes were blank, his face emotionless, but the pupils were swaying back and forth with the message: it doesn’t have to be a dessert, it can be something else; it can be the beginning. He said some less crude things to her there, too, that he didn’t use metaphors, or false truths, but real words, she knew that he was more tender, more kind, and she also knew that she was replying all sorts of things but she could never know what things.

“I’m listening” she finally pulled herself out of the lock, blowing and panting. She didn’t know how long it had been, as nothing around her had changed. It was still nighttime.

“Yeah, so” Barry leaned over, unbothered, used his clumsy left hand to scratch hers, “so at the train station, when I got shot for the third damn time” he sighed loudly to shake off his irritation, “anyway it—”

“For the fifth time in your life” she interjected

“Why does it matter” he emitted a bored groan, “whenever you bump your little toe on the corner of the door or the foot of the table, I’m not like, saying, ‘you’ve hit your toe fifty-two times since your birth’, I don’t know wh—"

“You would if hitting my toe almost cost me my life every time”

“Stop with this nonsense, Eugenie. Anyway at that key moment, I knew that I was probably going to die and” he lifted his head towards her and she felt herself sit further away from him, “I was so depressed”

“That’s pretty depressing” she agreed

“And when I saw your face” he went on, captivated by the sound of his own voice, “I was so happy. Because that’s all I wanted, to see your face again before I died”

“I’m going to make you some chamomile, you’re drunk”

“I didn’t drink anything, I’m on way too many different painkillers for that”

“I’m going to have a cigarette”

As she attempted to get up from her seat, he snatched her hand in his with surprising strength. She looked down at it reproachfully but he continued, “and then when you were on top of me shielding me from all the bullets falling from the sky, I asked you to kiss me, and you did”

“That is NOT true!” she yelped, she said, she hoped, “Barry, go to sleep, okay? It’s been a long day for you, I can see that”

“You hate it ‘cause it’ true”

“That is not true”

“But you don’t remember it”

“That doesn’t sound like something I would do”

“But you said you don’t remember it” he spelled it for her like she was the slowest student in the crowd.

“No one’s recorded it” she said, suddenly aware of the bump in her spine, straightening it, trying to appear as detached as possible.

“I recorded it” he leaned more, “right here” Barry tapped his finger against his forehead

“Give me your right hand, NOW” she howled

“Uugh what”

She presented the palm of her own hand up. Barry sniffled emphatically and again attempted to shrug, winced with displeasure. He took a couple of minutes to dig his hand out of his pocket and when he landed it into hers, it was moist and hot.

She grabbed his right hand, brought it closer to her, rubbed her fingers on his forearm, feeling some little bumps under the thick bandages that it was rolled into. She tugged at it while pushing against his shoulder. He bit his lip, demoralized by the process but trying to continue looking tough. There, on the top part of his chest, under the clavicle bone, two more projectiles had pierced him through and through at the velocity of three thousand kilometers per hour, smashing four of his ribs and deflating his lung. She tried to imagine what it was like, for an individual used to high speeds such as Barry was, to stand there in the path of the metal bite, watch it travel on the same plane, bracing for collision. Bracing for destruction.

“Does it hurt, your arm?” she asked.

“No”

“No?”

“No, only when I’m breathing”

“Come onn” they scoffed amply, shaking their heads at their silliness and the surrealism of their circumstances. She nodded positively, said: “let me see, make a fist” and Barry obeyed; she closed her hand on it and forced against his arm. He held on to the motion rockily but she was impressed, “not bad! Now, extend your fingers, like that” she demonstrated with her own, “squeeze. Now, lift a little bit?” she raised his arm in the air but he stole it back from her.

“Aiille, holy sh— Eugenie, no need to—”

“It’s not bad, it’s not bad. Now, give me a high five, come on!”

Barry lifted his arm again, this time a bit higher, presenting her with his middle finger. She gasped and buried it in her hand, and they laughed again at each other, wide-mouthed and without a sound, like two kids hunched at the back of a bus.

Their faces were very near. Barry’s eyes were the softest eyes and the darkest eyes. The familiar and darker even shine at the bottom of them gave Eugenie some chills dropping one after the other down her spine. They were round chills, the size of pumpkins. A smell-memory filled up her nose, from the very recent past, smoke, burned hair, blood. She held her breath to hold on to it, but it faded. He looked so exhausted, but so alive. She quivered. How were Barry’s eyes the color of that little puddle where swimming pool attendees dipped and rinsed their feet before entering the main basin? She was still mesmerized by them and horrified by them.

“Did I really kiss you there?” she asked out of sudden irrepressible curiosity and regretted it immediately

Now he let two seconds go by quietly and then embraced his triumph: “Eugenie!” Barry roared, “I was bleeding out and melting into the ground! You really believe I had time to think about making out?” Just like that, he had won the whole thing.

She whimpered and shook her head, conceding to him that he was the victor, “I was kidding, of course” Eugenie lied and readied herself to get up from her chair, defeated, but he gently deposited both of his hands on top of her shoulders.

“Wait, I want to keep looking into your eyes” His tone had switched to something else

“No”

“Please”

“What are you looking for in my eyes” she feigned to be uninterested. She wasn’t skilled enough to produce a fake yawn, she deplored.

“Confirmation that you really forgot everything that happened at the train station”

She embraced the stillness of their face to face again but didn’t stop speaking. Embarrassment and solitude filled her heart, “you don’t believe me?”

“I wish I didn’t believe you” Barry said somberly. On her sleeve, his right hand was trembling, his fingernails gripping the fabric of her sweatshirt like he was clinging to her.

“Why is it so important to you? Aren’t you glad for me that I don’t have memories of this scarring event?”

“No” he said frankly, “I don’t give a shit about that” Then he closed his eyes and leaned forward to kiss her, but she had anticipated that move for a while now, so she snapped her head back and avoided it with adroitness.

“BARRY” she scolded him

“Wow” he chuckled and raised his left hand in rendition, “alright alright, I just wanted to ch—”

“No shenanigans. You want to talk about something that’s important to you, that’s okay with me, but there is no need to add anything completely bananas”

“No shenanigans” he promised, his cheeks going from ghostly white to bright red. Something resembling real powerlessness circled around the features of his face.

“Why does it matter to you so much” she pressed his hand encouragingly, simultaneously trying to chase the thought from her brain that his lips were so pretty to kiss, and banishing the memory of actually enjoying that kind of activity a lot.

Barry looked down, sniffled loudly, “I hoped that we would… share, like, I don’t know, this moment”

“Share the burden of it?”

“The everything of it” he corrected her. Ironically, he had discontinued looking into her eyes.

“You look sad, Barry” she brushed the messy hair that had stuck on his forehead with her itchy finger.

“It’s just” he swallowed hard under a cramp inside his chest, closed his eyes, kept his head down, “it was so… pessimistic. All of it. When I landed at the bottom of the stairway, there, and when I tried to grab the trash bin lid, and those motherfuckers shot me like a rabbit, I wanted to say—”

“You wanted to say?”

He slowly lifted his head up she saw his eyes were wet. Not surprising: having knocked her down at their argument and shamed her again, he had created the space to be real, “I wanted to say to you that I was sorry, that all your efforts had been in vain, all the energy you spent saving me the first t—" his voice broke in a shocking splash of emotion. Eugenie pressed herself to remain quiet. “So” Barry inhaled deeply, composed himself, “when all of a sudden, you appeared on top of me there, I felt like the universe was granting me that little bubble to… say those things to you”

She nodded with compassion. Barry went on: “and then now, you don’t even remember” he accused her once more.

“I’m sorry” she was not really sorry, was not really upset at the phantom of her grandmother for blocking her memory. Seeing the damage on Barry’s body was devastating enough. Waking up from obliviousness above him inside Alphonse’s van, with his shirt blackened by blood, his stare vacant, bright flashy red gushing from the corners of his mouth, the air wheezing from his breath, tumbling inside his lung, all this was impressive enough “Did you say those things to me, then, when we… when we… when we caught up, back there?”

“Under the trash bin lid?” he smiled through the tears gathering at the lower line of his eyes

“Yes, there” she smiled back at him with tenderness, simply because there wasn’t any resentment she was able to hold on to when it came to Barry.

“With my eyes, I hope I said everything I wanted to say. You asked me to bolt, remember?”

“Bolt?”

“Yes” he chuckled, brushed a round tear from his cheek before it went down, “I couldn’t bolt, I couldn’t… move my ass”

“I don’t remember” she reiterated.

“I thought you’d have survived if you just let them finish me off without intervening” he let another tear fall freely, this time, “I was horrified that you put yourself in that position to rescue me. Of course my mind was also blown, fuck! So badass, Eugenie”

“I must have been possessed by something”

“And if you were going to be there, we might as well have this moment”

“That’s… beautiful”

“You’re mocking me”

“No!” she protested lazily, “I just don’t really know what to say. It’s really nice that you can romanticize those things I guess that I… envy you? Yes and no, at the same time”

“It’s not romanticized, it’s just what death makes people feel like” he paused, “you know, valuing those few seconds. It’s like, stolen seconds” he said, impressed with himself.

“I would know, I imagine, if I remembered”

“Voila”

“Barry let’s go to sleep, let’s go. Let’s watch a horror movie or something. I am super tired”

He let her change into her pajamas in the bedroom then met up with her in the bathroom, started brushing his teeth while she was combing her hair. Eugenie could understand Barry, his current need to process everything he had recently been through. She struggled to regret her words though, pointing out to him that he was nicknamed a bullet blanket, and she knew that she would not take that comment back. She too, needed to process things. She opened the bottom drawer under the bathroom sink and handed him a pair of sweat pants.

“Your Team will not be freaking out and looking for you?”

“No” he spat the water from his mouth into the sink, “Darlene knows I’m here”

Eugenie frowned, “splendid, more gossip ahead”

“Those people are bored, believe me” Getting into the pajama bottoms took him a few tries but he succeeded, “if you could just stop watching me while I’m s sstruggling” he held himself up straight against the towel hook, closed his eyes and sighed heavily, “I feel like I have a broom up my butt”

“You are… a poet. Come on, sit on the bathtub, I will help you with your hoodie”

“I’m not changing altitude again” instead, he bent his knee on the bathtub, still clinging to the washbasin, “I am an independent man and” he bit down in some persistent pang of anguish, used his shaky right hand to pull down the sleeve of his hooded shirt but he got his neck stuck into the collar. He re-emerged, darting her an accusatory look “alright, just this time, I accept your assistance”

“Yes. You look pale, sleepy, beaten up”

“There’s no need to impress me with all your adjectives”

She unzipped him and removed his left hand from his sleeve, proceeded to his right side with caution, “give me your five fingers, heere, out of the sleeve”

“Aille daamn fuck it”

“It’s all good, look”

“Eugenie, it’s so freaking cold here, I know you have a phobia of radiators, but think about Terence, think about your cat”

“Stop talking my ear off, Barry, please?” she crouched at the bottom of the bathroom drawers and retrieved one of his old baggy jumpers. It smelled like lemon soap, which Barry had always used instead of laundry for some unknown reasons. She shoved his head into the collar, messing up his hair even more. Barry looking like he had just overslept and gotten out of bed, his eyes red from some hard tears, staring at her like a frightened baby sloth, was another Barry altogether. Something about the depression swelling in his stare about needing her help for basic tasks, being at her mercy, made him surprisingly attractive. What the hell is wrong with me? Eugenie asked herself, trying to blink the thoughts away.

You spend your day with teenagers, he had said.

‘Cause I am still a fucking teenager, it seems, she conceded, dejected. Even worst, I’m an emo teenager.

She gently grabbed his right arm, folded it and aimed at the hole in the jumper, “slide into the sleeve now”

“I was searching for this jumper at the base aiille fuuck fuck it”

“It was here! This whole time”

“It’s really painful”

“Yeah” Eugenie said politely and stood up

“And then, then” his voice quivered again, “when I woke up, you weren’t even there”

“Barryy” she rolled her eyes, pulled on his left elbow to help him up. He towered her in the small bathroom, “tell me the story” she rephrased, “but do it while still traveling to your pillow, I’m too exhausted for this”

“My pillow? Can we share pillows”

“That’s okay with me” Eugenie thought, I will take some sleeping pills, no worries. Then thought, maybe I will force one of those pills down Barry’s throat

“At the clinic, you weren’t there” he insisted, “you told me to not be afraid when I fell asleep in the operation room, and that you’d see me on the other side, but then, you weren’t there”

“I’m sorry I was too busy hiding in the restrooms to cry”

“Be serious” Absent-mindedly, he accepted her helping hand to lower himself on the big bed comforter. He sat and cringed, stuck his left hand under his arm to hold himself “Be serious” he groaned, unable to rotate on his butt to face her as she was walking around, “what do you have to say for yourself’

Eugenie paced along the bed, now in hyper focused mode, retrieved the laptop that was sitting on the fireplace, scratched the chin of Terence the cat who was sleeping inside his fluffy bean house, “wow, you think I’m kidding. Well, sorry, I was too busy being so burned out after I watched you die with my own eyes”

“And you sponged me and you”

“I resuscitated you. With the help of Marlene, otherwise, you wouldn’t be here”

“How” he squinted in disbelief

“It’s called CPR”

Barry scratched his nose, uneasy, “so dramatic”

“DRAMATIC” Eugenie threw the laptop on the bouncy comforter, “Barry, if you continue like this, I’m going to lose my shit”

He nodded and got started on aligning between pillow and blanket, a mission that would take him a while.

“We are not cuddling, you hear me” she sat very slowly, as far from him as possible, grabbed her cushion and deposited it on her lap as an extra barrier of protection, “it’s a sleepover and I’m only sharing my pillows with you because I have a lot of pity for you”

“Pity’s as good as anything else”

“Tomorrow if you want to stay over longer, you will sleep in your bed”

“Of course” he finally slid his socks under the blanket, “wait, are you taking your sleep medication right now?” he eyed the pills in her hand and the bottle of water in her other hand

“Yes, that is what I am doing”

“But you will fall asleep during the movie!”

“Exactly”