Chapter Twenty One

She Sensed It

Veda

I heard Antony's car pull up and his footfalls on the front step. Did his appearance mean Pearl had found my books?

He rapped on the door frame with his knuckles and bounced on the balls of his feet.

Angry and eager to confront him, I opened the door. He was different. Was it his sunglasses? Had his jaw always been so square? One thing was for sure, he was using more product in his hair than usual and it looked good on him. Was there an extra steak of blond in there too? It looked natural.

He clicked his tongue against his teeth and smiled. “How have you been, Veda?”

For some reason, the greeting felt pointedly intimate. Like we had once been so close that it was natural for me to tell him anything and everything. That had never been true.

“I'm surviving,” I drawled, trying to put him in his place with only the tone of my voice.

“Can I come in?”

I stepped aside to make room for him and as he came through, the scent of his cologne almost undid me. Though I had never openly admitted it to anyone, I had a particular weakness for men's cologne, aftershave, deodorant, body spray, and anything of the like. Even if the stuff wasn't meant to be a woman’s undoing, for me, it was like slamming down hard liquor. It went straight to my head.

There was no reasonable place to sit down in the living room, so I led him in there, breathing him in all the way. He sat on the floor and stretched out his jean-clad legs. I hadn't even known he owned pants that clung to his body like that. Antony's color was navy, so the jeans and the shirt he wore went along those lines. It made his eyes look bluer.

I sat down and as was my habit, I picked up my wool and needles started their slow clicking between my fingers. This way, I didn't have to look at him.

However, this didn't stop me from hearing him. “Veda. Veda. Veda. How far have we gone wrong?”

I raised my eyebrows in mock surprise.

“All this time,” he continued. “We've been together and not together. Don't you see how wrong that is?”

“Not particularly.” Still, I refused to look at him.

Then slowly, like a tadpole losing its tail, his voice began to change. The tones containing friendship dropped from hearing. “Do you remember when we were little? We were playing Snow White and you were pretending to be dead? Everyone thought that you were dead. You were so good at breathing so little that your chest wouldn't rise or fall. You didn't flutter an eyelash, not even when I shook you. The cousins became so scared they ran to get an adult and you and I were left alone. I knew you were fine, so I put my cheek under your nose to feel your breath.”

By this point, his voice had completely lapsed into the new voice. It was a voice I recognized, but couldn't place.

I stopped knitting.

Going on, he said, “You quit breathing completely. I should have backed off, but I didn't. I wanted to force you to breathe, so I could catch you at your game, but you didn't. You held your breath until you fainted rather than appear alive.”

I remembered that. If only I could remember who owned the voice he was using. I trusted that voice, but why? Why did I trust a voice I couldn't identify?

Antony went on. “I learned something about you that day, Veda.”

Something was wrong with me. I picked up my needles and started knitting furiously. “What was that?”

“That you are special.” He changed his position. He was no longer sitting on the floor with his legs out. He was on his hands and knees and he was inching his way closer to me. His scent was getting thicker. “You are not like the little girl who pretends to be Snow White so she can be kissed. You pretend to be Snow White so you can be dead.”

“Shut up!” I snapped, getting up and moving away from him. “You don't understand.”

At first, he didn't say anything, but picked up the yarn and moved it carefully to the side. Still, on his knees, he continued. “Who could understand better than me? I've been here our entire lives. How many times have I held you?”

I didn't know. Every member of my family was always hugging me or trying to hug me, no matter how awkward I claimed it was.

“You never once felt my closeness or my love.” It wasn't a question. It was a statement.

I glared at him.

“It's okay,” he said in his new voice. “You can't feel it.” He got up and moved to the front door. Once there, he leaned against the wall and gave me an entire room's worth of space away from him. “If you let me love you, you wouldn't have to care about me in return. I know you can't love me. I know you can only feel things on the outside and not on the inside. If you pretend to care, I'll know that's the best you can do. I'll love you and worship you. In exchange, you can have me for whatever you want.”

“What do you mean?”

“Most of the time, you don't want to be touched. Sometimes you do. You don't feel things the way other people feel them. Like when it's cold, and you want to be held forever because you can't get the chill out of your body. I'll do what you want. I'm here on the other side of the room now, because that's what you want.”

What he said was true. How could my books have taught him so much about me?

“Antony,” I said, actually struggling to find my voice. “I have already told you that I don't want to be involved with you romantically. We're cousins.”

“You don't want to have children, so why does it matter if we’re cousins?”

I hated those words. I hated them because they were true, but he had no right to throw them in my face. My indignation helped me rebut him. “I also don't want to be in a romantic relationship. I don't want to give anyone that sort of access to my body.”

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“Lies. You can feel more than you think you can,” he said. “Look out the window. Pretend it isn't July. You know July is only a passing phase here in the Gateway to the North. Summer is something we feel for a short time, but we all know it can't last. We will enjoy three months of good weather for nine months of bad. Look out the window. Out there, the leaves on the trees are a passing fancy. Looking beyond, you can see what they will look like in two months. The leaves will go and there will be nothing left for the trees but the bark and the bones.” Antony ground his teeth.

“Please stop talking. You're hurting me,” I whispered.

“Then let me in,” he pleaded. “Acknowledge that I understand you and I'll stop.”

“No,” I said, scraping together my courage. “You're not special. You know what everyone knows, but they have the grace not to rub it in my face. Knowing this much about me isn't reaching my gooey center.”

“There's snow, and it's falling,” he continued, even though I asked him to stop. “It falls flake by flake and each one of those flakes is different, like a unique memory of a tragedy. December 17, the year you were seven. Don't you remember? January 29, the year you were twelve. June 26, this year, and the letter you got from your mother? A new memory all yours to treasure? Did anyone share that hideous moment with you? Was there even one person with you?”

“June.”

“You don't want her,” he almost spat.

“Perhaps not,” I acknowledged, “but what makes you think you would fill each and every one of the holes inside me? You haven't got enough fingers. You forget all the times you yourself could have been there for me and were not. What makes you think you are deserving of my trust?”

“I was a child,” he spoke in the voice and it came a little clearer. I was so close to recognizing it. “I can prove myself.”

I didn't answer. I was so close to identifying the voice. I tried to think, but his words were confusing me. Antony did not normally talk about snowflakes or pretending to be dead. The voice he used was like the one I used when I wrote my books. Then the truth assaulted me. He had learned to speak in my voice, but not just any voice I used. Through my books he had learned to speak in the voice I used inside my head.

I was so horrified that I couldn't talk. I just stared at him and tried to think of the thing that would hurt him the most. For someone I was willing to spend my entire life taking care of, I found a way to twist the knife frightfully fast.

“Like snow,” I breathed. “Do you know who really reminds me of snow? Salinger. He's not like you. Maybe it's because he's not exactly a white boy that he comes off so magical. Like a person who is partly made of snow. The first time I saw him get out of a taxi in the rain, he brushed it off like he was used to far worse, and our rain was like a blessing from heaven like the rainwater in the bowl you broke. Right from that first moment, he seemed so strong. Maybe that was why I didn't turn him down when he wanted to date me, even though it meant an immediate lynching from the cousins. I had to have him all to myself, to look into his dark eyes and imagine what the night that never ends is like, where he comes from. I wonder what the wind there is like. I bet it rips across your skin so hard, you forget how to feel, so you can only feel brave. He makes me feel like I could give him everything, and he would give me courage.”

“Everything?” Anthony suddenly fumed. His voice returned to normal and all his old bitterness came with it.

“Yes. I said he is made of snow, so we're the same. I feel a closeness with him I've never felt before like he could be everything to me. So, instead of loving my mother, I'll love him. Instead of loving you...”

“You'll love him?” Antony spat.

“Exactly. I'm glad you understand so well. Now hurry back to Pearl before you ruin things with her. After looking in my crystal ball, I think you two might have a glorious future, provided you don't screw it up chasing something that could never be yours.”

At that moment, he screamed. It was the worst sound I had ever heard. It wasn't his scream, it was mine. And it was agony. I knew how I would have to feel inside to make a sound like that. I had made that sound before. It was when I read the letter from my mother on my graduation night. No one heard it. I was alone and it was the end. Antony couldn't know that sound. Yet, he was making it. I covered my ears with my palms, but it didn't stop the noise from coming in. It was like he was shoving needles in my head while he towered over me screaming like a heart had been ripped in two.

It wasn't his heart that was breaking, I told myself. It was a sound he had taught himself. It couldn't be a true reflection of his feelings. He had been happy with Pearl. He had been the boyfriend he always wished to be for me. Hadn’t they been happy together?

He wasn't stopping to breathe in. His fingers gripped my wrists, pulling my hands away from my ears. He was pressing his forehead against mine. I fought him, but I was losing.

Then, suddenly, I was saved. Someone had come up behind Antony and was hitting his back with a red umbrella. “Get off her!” someone shrieked, even louder than Antony. When he didn't move, she hit him over the head and then butted him across the cheek with the crooked end. It was Fair Isle's black head behind that shriek. She was wearing enormous combat boots and she kicked him over and over. “Shut your mouth. Shut your mouth. Shut your mouth,” she chanted as he stared up at her in shock and shame. His voice lost volume and eventually, it trailed off into nothing.

I didn't take my hands away from my ears as I watched her.

She kicked him until he was huddled against the wall. Then she battered him across the cheek with the umbrella again, chanting all the while. Dropping to her knees, she put her palm to Antony's forehead. She whispered something. “Get going,” she sneered down at him.

He scrambled to his feet, tripped through the door and down the steps. Only when I saw him off the property through the lacy front window did I let my hands drop from my ears. My palms were red with blood.

Fair Isle saw the blood trickling down my forearms. “You're bleeding like a pig,” she commented as she went to fetch a dishtowel from the kitchen. “It's probably not as bad as it looks. Head injuries always bleed like this. Hey, can you hear me?”

I nodded, though her voice sounded distant and small.

“You're all right,” she declared, while she let me blot the blood.

“Thank you,” I mumbled. “I… didn't have the strength to… deal with him.”

“Of course, you didn't. You're putting too much of your magic in places you shouldn't.”

It was then that I noticed she didn't have any of her piercings in. They were all gone. She almost looked like a different person. Maybe like a person who wasn't pissed off with everything, which was odd since she had just kicked the hell out of Antony. However, her cheeks were flushed and her usually paste-like skin was alive with color. What happened to her?

“I know what he was doing,” she said crossly, though it was unclear who exactly she was cross with. “He was using your voice. I thought I heard you screaming. Actually, I thought you were reading Salinger's new book and having a bad experience. I came in here to try to snap you out of it.” She brushed off her clothes like she was trying to wipe the disgust off. “I have to get to Pearl's. She needs to know what Antony tried to do to you.”

“What was he trying to do to me? It felt like he was trying to override my senses. He looked different when he came in. He smelled different. He talked...”

“Like you,” Fair Isle finished for me. “He was trying to replace the voice in your head with his voice so he could turn you into his slave. He'd say something and you would think it was your own idea and do it. It's a type of mind control. I had no idea he was powerful enough to give it a try.” She tapped the discarded bloody dishtowel with the toe of her boot. “But he used too much power. He must have wanted you too much. I don't think someone speaking with your voice is supposed to make you bleed. Try not to worry. He won't come back. I bound him with a spell before he left. I doubt he'll be able to break it.”

As far as I knew, Fair Isle had never been strong enough to adequately complete a spell, but now I questioned what I knew about her. The piercings were gone and the chanting she had used on Antony had been effective. Maybe it would hold up.

“Call June and Hattie. They need to watch you until you can get your strength up. I've got to get to Pearl's.”

“Can't I come?”

“Get a clue. Your presence would complete her humiliation,” Fair Isle said, looking like she wanted to hit me as much as she had hit Antony. “Call June and Hattie. If he comes back, you can make a circle of three witches. Besides,” she said as she opened the front door. “I may come back with Pearl. She may want to talk to you.”

After Fair Isle left, I felt tired. I tried to text June, but the screen on my phone was too fuzzy for me to type properly. It was my eyes and not my phone on the fritz. I was dizzy and let my body fall. The cold hardwood on my cheek felt awesome.