THEY DON'T LAUGH AT ME.

    “same thing we’re both after, man. vengeance. only difference is i got a backseat driver who likes to take the wheel every now and again, and he ain’t much of a team player. but neither are you. now, i’ve seen all i need to see — i know you don’t feel a damn thing for the lives you take, and that’s fine. for whatever reason, you passed. that means this can go one of two ways — you walk, right here ‘n now, or we do this together. we both know how much blood’s gonna be spilled tonight — up to you whether or not some of it’s yours.”

       “hell,  we’ve all been there,  right?  we’ve all had that moment,  man,  that moment where it just goes in slow motion  —  people talk about adrenaline,  how it,  uh,  how it  speeds things up,  but that ain’t always true.  it slows down ‘n you can see it,  y’know,  see where it went wrong,  ‘n that stays with you.  she’ll get past it,  man.  she will.”

     she does forget.  sometimes,  forgetting is easy.  losing sight of herself,  or losing herself altogether,  in the chaos of survival.  the knife had gotten stuck;  that was the mistake.  it had caught deep in bone and dead tissue,  wouldn’t come loose when she’d pulled,  and that’s when she’d felt the jolting snag of hands from behind.  that was the mistake,  but a mistake is all it takes.  just one.  most days,  she doesn’t feel helpless.  most days she can reflect on what she’s capable of and find enough strength in it to keep going.  some days,  like today,  the weight of doubt and second guesses is almost unbearable.

     his apology gives her enough pause to turn back around.  whatever exhaustion she’s feeling is mirrored in his face,  tenfold,  and she doesn’t shut him down;  wouldn’t have the heart for that,  even if she’d wanted to.  came out pretty bad,  huh?  “not your finest work,”  she starts.  a quip,  but a gentle one.  she hesitates,  then steps close enough to cup his cheek in her palm,  thumbs the edge of his bruised eye;  tender,  much like the way she’s looking at him.  letting go of all that frustration is a natural ebb when he does this.  “we were both scared.  i shouldn’t have taken it out on you.  just because it wasn’t my fault doesn’t mean that it was yours,  either,  or  —  or anybody’s,  for that matter,  so let’s just  …  let’s not.”  her palm moves to his chest.  stops of its own accord,  laid flat,  over his heart.  “shit happens.  and for whatever it’s worth,  frank  —  i’m sorry,  too.”

     Her touch consumes him.  It reminds him that he’s here,  that  they’re  here,  they’re alive and they’re breathing,  and that’s all that matters.  It reminds him of how fleeting that is.  How they could be here one minute and  gone  the next,  and Frank doesn’t get to decide when that time will come to pass.  He doesn’t get to decide the day,  the minute,  the second  ––  that  one second  where everything changes and one of them is left here while the other is somewhere else.  Somewhere dark and desolate and cold.  Mortality has always been cruel in that way.

       “—  close call,  huh.  thought that’s what it was.  she’s just gotta work through that on her own,  man,  she’s gotta make peace with it.  whether,  uh,  whether y’ chew her out or keep tellin’ her it ain’t her fault,  that’s just  —  that’s just somethin’ she’s gotta do herself.”

the softest palms that never want to touch you until after a bottle of wine.  /  “just braid your hair if you won’t brush it, at least, you useless girl.”  /  pulling on your skirt with one hand as you shuffle away.  /  “you’ll get it done before the day is up.”  /  guilt that isn’t yours to have.  /  it’s a crooked game, but it’s the only one in town.  /  chains.  /  “how could you do this to me?”  /  the sharp sting of guilt.  /  you feel something even though you’re paid to do the opposite.  /  the family you never had.  /  falling backwards through time.  /  quicksand.  /  drowning, but you don’t save yourself.  /  “you’re getting better.”  /  “they smile like a snake.”  /  you’re the stars and the sky.  /  there’s a part of you that couldn’t stay away even if you were forced to.  /  they are your wings, there’s no doubt there.  /  “let’s take off somewhere. let’s fly.”  /  you edge a bit too close to the sun.  /  another ghost to take your place after every stumble.  /  deep roots in the ground slashed open in the sun.

rock candy melting in water.  /  waves rise and leave the foam behind.  /  the precipice you call home has a tip you’ll reach eventually.  /  happiness is the best front a man can take.  /  “i’ve never seen someone as beautiful as you before.”  /  you disagree; they’re more beautiful.  /  discomfort at the tiniest of touches.  /  the sky opens up when you see them. / rain comes down.  /  poppy fields.  /  your sanity hanging by a thread.  /  “oh god, what have you done?”  /  roommates weren’t supposed to be the smartest ones of all.  /  they’ve got a devil on their shoulder and an angel in their mind.  /  you try to help, but it only got worse.  /  now they’re dead, it’s all your fault.  /  adam & eve in the garden.  /  a temptress in crisp button-downs.  /  “fuck, you’ve gone off the deep end, haven’t you?”  /  they lie so perfectly you almost forget yourself.  /  the spark that lit the kindling on your funeral pyre.  /  sugar and spice and a taste for the dark side.

yves saint laurent.  /  black opium on your pillow, a scented cloud drifting behind you like a cape.  /  crisp green apples piled up on the table.  /  your shoes are sharp, but your wit is even sharper. / what a pretty one, they say.  /  you laugh without humor. / a soft, hollow spot sits in your chest.  /  there’s a place you’ll never leave no matter who tries to stop you.  /  the seat of power fits like a glove. / heavy is the head that wears the crown.  /  you share a space, but not a mind. / they think you are weak; you are, maybe.  /  “what are you going to do with all of these pills?”  /  an empty bird’s nest.  /  broken pencil tips. / there’s an empty paper in front of you that you’ll never fill.  /  “we want you to succeed. i hope you can grasp that.”  /  “they weren’t there when it happened.”

          “ – uh,” so, she’s a little taken aback. a little. for all his gruff and strength and take on the world, he’s horrible at hiding when he worries and right now isn’t different. the subject of the worry is. she isn’t karen, ‘retta, the nerd and his family; she’s deanna. her head cocks, eyes narrowing for a second like she’s waiting for a punchline that won’t drop. “i’m fine. we’ve all just been … sitting for a li’l too long and it’s only a matter of time before shit goes south. y’know when you get a feeling that something’s just around the corner? i thought it’d go away with the whole barn fiasco – it didn’t.”

     dutton.  the name rings a bell,  but it’s a faint one.  something she can’t place.  not that it matters;  if he was involved in the massacre,  and frank found him,  then he’s dead.  the simplicity of that conclusion should rattle her and doesn’t.  which,  somehow,  rattles her more.  because a part of her,  despite her best efforts,  has sunk into a state of numbness.  of desensitization.  after the shock comes the calm,  deceptive as the eye of a storm.  she’s lost so many pieces of herself that she wonders if it’s even possible to stitch them back together.

     one day,  she’ll tell him everything.  she’ll tell him about her brother.  about the chain of events like a domino effect when she’d come upon the union allied pension file and woken up covered in daniel fisher’s blood.  she’ll tell him how it felt to have a paralytic drug coursing through her system the night she took a life;  tell him about the seven rounds she’d fired into james wesley because she would not be swayed,  wouldn’t be cowed by intimidation or threats.  a story for another time.

     she has to believe that they  have  time.  that it’s not borrowed,  even though all evidence points to the contrary.

     "…  yeah.  yeah,  um  …  his car,  his music.  sometimes it still doesn’t feel right,  to even drive around in that thing,  like it didn’t feel right when ellison gave me his old office.  but i  —  i know that he wouldn’t mind.  he was a good man.”  talking about it hurts,  but it’s supposed to hurt.  it isn’t supposed to be easy:  great or small,  loss never is.

     he asks her how she holds on,  how she doesn’t break,  and there are two things that come to mind even as the breath catches in her throat.  first,  she could ask him the same.  second,  she never said that she didn’t break.  “is there another choice?”  she ventures it quietly,  and when she looks at him she can see every shade of every bruise.  count every eyelash,  catch the flecks of green in his eyes.  “there are days that i am  barely  holding on.  that it’s just  —  it is  paper thin,  you know,  and i  —  i think that i cannot do it for one more goddamn second.  but i have to.  because if i don’t,  then i’m just  …  hiding,  burying my head in the sand,  and if i do that then all of the worst things about this city,  all of the  —  the darkness,  and the violence,  it wins.  it wins,  and what are we left with?”

     Another time,  another day that isn’t like today.  Today is just them and the quiet comfort of just being near her,  of having her there and being there himself,  because  there  isn’t always where Frank thinks it is;  sometimes it’s there but not,  like standing at the crosswalk between a busy intersection,  inside your body and outside of it at the same time.  Sometimes it’s a place that isn’t a place  ––  just the  memory  of one cycling over and over on loop.  Today,  it isn’t.  Today is her and where  she  is.  Today is the sound of Karen’s voice when she talks about Ben,  about Ellison giving her his office.  About how he was a good man.  He believes her.

     “Yeah.  I don’t doubt that.”  If Ben was anything like her,  then he was more than a good man.

     It doesn’t feel right.  Frank understands.  It doesn’t feel right to drive around in that thing,  to listen to his tapes and sit in his office.  It doesn’t feel right,  being  alive  when he isn’t.  That’s everything she told him in not so many words,  and he doesn’t know how to say that it never will feel that way again.  It may feel  better,  but never  right,  and she has to find ways to keep living with that.  Maybe just like that,  just that simple.  Tell her that.

     Tell her that so she doesn’t let every resting moment remind her of that loss.  Every moment where Ben might have been there,  might have been sitting across the table from her at a coffee shop,  might have been walking there at her side.  He went through these motions with Maria.  He went through a period just like that,  where  everything  in the city reminded him of her,  of his baby girl and his little man,  all the things that they liked,  that they would stop and look at,  the things that they would say.  He went through that,  and he’s  still  waiting for the wheel to stop turning.  This is why the words die in his throat when he tries to tell her.  They die there because he isn’t sure just how much of it is true,  and how much he just wants to be true.  Will it ever feel better?

       “might’ve,  uh  —  might’a walked by for some of it.  you good,  man?”