Unclear & Focused
Hero drives for a while, stopping at a fast-food place to get us all greasy cheeseburgers, salty fries, and fizzy sodas. Taylor sings “Somewhere over the rainbow” out loud and talks about rainbows nonstop: the color, the size, the texture, when they appear, when they leave, how they form. The conversation about rainbows lasts for what seems like forever. I guess it’s not really a conversation if Taylor is the only one conversing. I would find her enthusiasm and optimistic outlook on life annoying if she wasn’t so sweet and if I didn’t love that song myself. Tyler used to sing the exact same song to me almost every night.
Hero devours his food and mostly hers too. I pick over my burger and chew on a few salty fries, but I don’t have much of an appetite.
He pulls up into a dirt yard with a brown shotgun house. Rollerblades, big bouncy balls, a red tricycle, a light blue inflatable pool among other things are scattered around the front. This house is in the Parker District, a sketchy side of town where most of the crimes occur. I don’t even know her and I don’t want her to get out of the car, it’s just not safe here.
“Well, this is me,” Taylor announces quietly.
“Let me walk you to the door,” Hero says just as quietly.
She looks at him for a brief moment and then nods, twisting her neck to glance at me. I can’t tell what her eye color is. They could be green, hazel, or blue. But that doesn’t matter. The shape of her eyes is hypnotizing. They’re wide, almost doll-like and almond-shaped. So pretty, like everything else about her. Her loose curly hair frames her round face perfectly. From what I can see, her skin is clear, smooth and a deep-golden brown. Taylor might be Italian, or Latin, maybe a beautiful combination of both. “Nice to meet you, Isabel.” She smiles at me, tender and sinecure. “Sorry about throwing you in the car, but Hero is kinda important to me. You know?”
I nod and Hero jerks his head. “Kinda important?” he repeats as if the words are completely foreign to him.
She smiles and laughs. “I mean, super important. I don’t want him to get in any trouble. Rex is trouble, for everyone.” She pauses and puts a hand on Hero’s cheek. I think he blushes a little. “Hero has been through a lot. He doesn’t need more negative things in his life.”
My eyes shift from Taylor to Hero in sudden awareness. She’s in love with him. Taylor ran all the way to the eastside of town to Rex’s house just to make sure Hero didn’t get into “trouble.” The run might have only been four miles, but still. It’s dark and she lives in a not-so safe area.
“I understand, won’t happen again. Well, at least on my part,” I say, grinning back at her.
“Thank you,” she whispers gratefully.
They both glide out the car. They laugh and murmur to one another as they approach the steps towards her small porch. She fishes out a key on a long chain from her pocket. Hero digs into his pocket as well and pulls out his wallet. He takes what I assume is cash and tries to hand it to her. She shoves his hand away, saying something I can’t hear or make out. He shakes his head, taking a step forward with his outreached hand towards her. She shakes her head, too. His head dips down and his free hand pinches the bridge of his nose. Taylor wraps her arms around Hero and gives him the tightest embrace I’ve ever seen. Hero hugs her back, sneaking the wad of cash in her back pocket of her jeans.
He eases out the hug, kisses her on her forehead and waves, turning his back to her as he makes his way down the steps.
She bites her lip and sags against the door to watch him leave. Her eyes flicker over to me and I tense.
She smiles and gives her head a slight shake, waving sheepishly.
I wave back and watch her unlock the door, open it and disappear into the dark house.
Hero jogs to the car and around the hood as it begins to rain.
“She loves you,” I whisper when he glides back into the car.
Hero starts the engine, looks over his shoulder and reverses out of the dirt yard, effectively ignoring me completely.
“She’s such a nice girl. Taylor shouldn’t be living here.”
His jaw tenses as he puts the car back in gear. “Where do you want to go, Falcon’s?”
“No,” I mumble, looking out the raindrop-splattered window. Clasps of thunder begin to rumble and shake the ground. I flinch a few times. Thunderstorms always give me the worse anxiety. I hated them ever since I can remember.
“I’m heading to Hunter’s to crash.”
“Perfect,” I say, “is there room for one more?”
Hero shrugs, indifferent. “He’s not there, so it wouldn’t hurt.”
“Where is he?”
“Hunter has been getting help outside of town.”
“Help?” I repeat, confused.
“Professional help. He’s seeing a psychiatrist and taking anger management classes. He told me what happened between you two, and it really messed him up. Hunter doesn’t want to hurt you; he’s just extreme in everything he does. He has been like that forever. That’s just Hunter.”
“I know he doesn’t want to hurt me,” I admit, closing my eyes and pressing my forehead to the chilled window, squeezing my wounded hand together to feel the throb of pain. “When will he be back?”
“I don’t know, maybe sometime late Sunday. You’ll be gone by then.”
The rest of the drive to Hunter’s house is quiet, only filled with the sounds of howling wind, ear-shattering thunder, and pouring rain. The yellow and white illuminating lights from the town fade and then disappear entirely as Hero drives through the thick, dark forest. A perfect rectangular two story house made of glass, stone, and dark wood comes into view. The house is so spectacularly clear you can see right through it. The winding pebble pathway to the massive oak front door cuts exactly through the large yard with brilliant LED bulbs glowing on either side. His house looks like it belongs here, as if it’s a part of nature’s original design, an immaculate crystal shooting up from the dirt and ferns.
Hero and I slam the doors of his car shut and run up to the yard to the opening of the deep porch. He inserts the key into the lock and pushes open the door, gesturing for me to go in first. I scurry inside the dark space, stepping out of my drenched, soggy boots.
Hero flips the lights in the vast living room on; he scratches his head and looks at me. “Well, you know where everything is. I’m goin’ to bed.”
I nod. “Thanks.”
Hero nods too and then jogs up the spiral staircase. I hear a door shut shortly after. Wandering around the living room, I take in some of the pictures on the bookshelves and white mantel of the stacked stone fireplace. Some of them are of his baby sister, Naya. I think she’s around Tyler’s age. She looks so very different from all of them. Naya’s hair is far from blond, it’s long and dark, the color of coal. Her eyes are smoky emerald green, and her skin is creamy brown like mine. She’s smiling and has her arm thrown over Hero and Hunter in almost in every photo. Other pictures are of Hunter’s friends from campus and his mother, Grace, with her timeless beauty and sophistication. Hunter and Hero are exact replicas of their mother: golden hair, fair skin, pale eyes, absurdly attractive in every way. But even with all that beauty she’s still an ice queen. Grace is a conservative, religious woman that will gladly destroy and degrade you to prove a point. Grace never cared for my family much; we were everything she despises.
My eyes roam over more walls, hoping to see a picture of us somewhere. We took a lot of pictures when we were together, when we were friends. But in the end there are no photos of me and Hunter. So I don’t understand the ping of disappointment that stings so badly. I clearly don’t belong in his life.
With sluggish feet, I wander up the stairs and into Hunter’s spacious room. Pawing through his chest of drawers, I find one of his large T-shirts, shimmy out of the mirror dress and toss Hunter’s shirt over my head. Sweeping the covers back, I lie in Hunter’s bed. His scent wraps around me in a weird protective and comforting shield. My chest becomes tight.
***
Hero
Listening to my iPod, I take a few swigs of moonshine. It only takes a little to get shitfaced. Too much is swimming close to death. The clear liquor burns my mouth and sears my throat and chest. The warmth spreads quickly, ebbing away the icy numbness. Setting the bottle down, I bury my face in the soft pillows and hope sleep takes me before the nightmares of old memories do. Isabel is not the only one broken and hurting. I loved Tyler, not in the same way he loved me, but I loved him. He was more than a friend and less than a lover. We grew up together and played house when Isabel and Hunter made us. We were their children. Tyler was fragile and that’s what made him unbelievably beautiful to me.
He was troubled and shattered. I wanted to protect him from the world, wanted to fight anyone who caused him distress and many times did. We were planning to travel the world together with Lark. It was something all three of us looked forward to. We were set to leave right after graduation, so I don’t understand why he would go through with suicide. He had my number. Tyler knew rain or shine, day or night, that I would be there for him. He fucking knew. After everything we’ve been through I know deep down within the depths of my heart, hundred percent assured that he knew I had his damn back. He was hurting, I was hurting. We were in hell together.
But he didn’t call. He didn’t tell me what was bothering him. The last week of his life he isolated himself. He didn’t want to be around me at all. I should’ve picked up the signs, caught on faster. Maybe he would still be alive if I did my duty in such. Tyler loved being in my space and in my life, shit he was my life. Outside of him there was little to no rays of hope. We hung out every day. He introduced me to Taylor Cruz our freshman year of high school. She’s quiet and pretty and dressed like shit, that’s all I knew. Tyler told me he’d been friends with her since sixth grade. I thought that was strange considering I knew almost everything about Tyler and never once did he mention Taylor before. She’s nice though. I think she has a thing for me, or had a thing for me. I didn’t pounce on the opportunity when I had the chance because I was too concerned about Tyler’s feelings. I knew he loved me in a way I could never love him. I’m just not wired that way. He liked boys. I don’t. But what we had was bigger than that. I didn’t ask Taylor to be mine because I didn’t want to hurt him.
I don’t know why Hunter and I share this unhealthy fascination with delicate souls that go down the road of self-destruction. We want to save them and in the end be their everything, their world. I don’t know what made Hunter pull the stick from his ass and finally get involved with Isabel again. I just hope he realizes how fucking lucky he is to have her breathing and fight for her, even when it seems like he’s fighting a losing battle. He should fight for her until his heart stops beating. I would fight for Tyler like that. I did fight for Tyler like that. Hunter is too complicated. He should just stake his claim.
Isabel is attractive and she doesn’t have an inkling of how beautiful she really is. Tragic. It’s torment every time I look at her. She looks so much like Tyler, it’s like she’s the girl version of him. Pure fucking agony. I have some kind of longing and connection towards her because of the resemblance. I want to comfort her, stroke her hair and whisper reassurances in her ear and then another part of me wants nothing to do with her, an entirely different part of me wants to hate her. She’s like a walking reminder of my biggest failure in life.
I can’t live up to my fucking name.
I turn the volume up on my iPod and take more sips from the lethal liquid. My eyes drift to the window and I watch a sea of raindrops splash and crash down until blackness takes over.
***
Isabel
The thunder crackles and harsh white lightning bolts flash across the sky. The rain is heavy and isn’t letting up, transforming the outside into a water world. Scooting out the bed, I make my way down the long wooden corridor to Hero’s room. I can’t sleep, maybe he is still awake.
The door is ajar, but when I step inside the dark room, Hero is passed out on top of the bed, fully clothed, his long limbs sprawled out and taking up most of the space. His eyes are closed, his mouth slightly open, earbuds plugged into his ears, Nirvana blasting from the speakers. For a moment, I just admire the beauty that is him: tousled hair, thick lashes that curl upwards, full, kissable lips that are too similar to Hunter’s, the cutest nose, and a strong jaw line. Every single detail about Hero is appealing in a very unnatural way. No human has the right to be that attractive.
My fingers rake through his soft hair.
He groans and turns over.
I drop my hand and tiptoe back out the room, not having the heart to wake him.
Hunter’s walk-in closet is the perfect place to hide from the raging storm, no windows. There’s a forestry draft inside here, puffs of white swirl from my mouth when my breath hits the air. It’s like an ice box. Unhooking one of his jackets from the hanger, I slip it on and zip it all the way up to my neck and then lie down on the soft carpeted floor, balling into the fetal position, hoping to gain some kind of warmth.
I don’t know whether I really fall asleep, but curiosity strikes me when I hear strange animal-like moaning.