Chapter Twenty-One
It becomes obvious that I am not the only one in a spiral of self-destruction about half way through my second week with Annabelle. I come home to find her lying in my bed with bloody arms and an empty bottle of vodka. The razor she used is still sticking out of her skin. I try not to panic, but it is hard seeing her arms slit to ribbons and a bloody straight razor still planted in her flesh. She has so little flesh as it is. She begs me not to call 911, promises to never do it again and we bandage her up.
Once we have cleaned her up with rubbing alcohol and cloth bandages, she kisses me. The next thing I know we are back in my bed, blood and all. I never understand how we get to this point.
One night, I wake up and see her sitting on the windowsill, the window open and a cigarette in her mouth. She takes a slow drag and just stares.
"Bellie, what are you doing?" I ask, sleepily.
"Thinking about jumping." she says, nonchalantly.
"Jumping where?" I ask, sitting up slowly.
"Into the wide open blue of the sky. I'm so tired of it all." She takes another drag off of her cigarette before flicking the butt out the window.
I get up and go to her, holding her in the waning moonlight. She never looks at me, always staring into the night sky.
"Come back to bed, love." I say, softly. I gently pull her away from the window. "Come back to bed."
She comes off of the windowsill and obediently lies down. She lets me pull the covers over her and tuck her in, before ensconcing myself as well. She lets me hold her tightly, she doesn't resist, but she isn't there. Not mentally. She is thinking. Always far away from me, no matter how hard I try to keep her near.
I wonder sometimes if she is thinking of her dead son, the one she gave birth to when she was still a child herself. She hasn't spoken of it since that day in the kitchen. She never speaks of herself. She never seems to want more from me than my body and my incessant rambling. For the first time, in a long time, I want more than just sex from someone. I want to be able to talk with her on more than just which positions we've tried or me just talking to fill the silence. I realize I'm falling in love with a broken porcelain doll. Against my will and she doesn't even notice.
We are sitting on the floor, playing chess on the coffee table. Snuggles is curled up on the couch watching our battle of wits. She moves slowly, decidedly. I move too quickly and without thought. She laughs, easily and without pain, when she wins. I don't see her happy like this often, her eyes sparkling like diamonds. I smile and reset the board.
When she loses, she is furious and she wipes all the pieces off the board in a fit. The cat, frightened by her erratic behaviour, leaps off the couch and runs off. She throws the board on the floor and storms out of the apartment. I follow her, not even bothering to put on shoes.
"It's just a game, Bellie! What the hell are you doing?" I shout, slamming the door behind me and tripping down the stairs after her.
"It's never just a game!" She shouts over her shoulder. She keeps walking, barefoot and trying to light her cigarette.
"What the hell are you talking about?" I cry, trying to catch up. She pulls up short, abruptly stopping, and staring at me, her eyes wide in fear and anguish.
"My mind is slipping." she says, a tear rolling down her face and blue smoke drifting up and away from her mouth.
"Honey, come back inside. Your mind isn't slipping. Its just a game. A game, honey. We don't have to play anymore if you don't want to." I finally reach her and wrap my arms around her shoulders. She is trembling, even though it isn't cold, and her cigarette dangles from her fingers. She allows me to lead her back to the apartment, but we don't talk for the rest of the day.
She drifts in and out of this world only she sees. I watch her light another cigarette, but she quickly puts it out again. She hates smoking, she says. Its a dirty habit that she can't quite get rid of. She's not even sure why she started it in the first place. Then she looks off into the distance, a horizon only she knows.
I know this isn't going to end well, but I want it to work. I want to help her, though I can't even help myself. I care about her, enough to try harder than I ever did with Jahan or Adam or even David.
"I love you." I blurt, one day after we have finished having sex. She smiles at me, a wistful glance at my face, and lights a cigarette.
"I will love you too." she says, quietly, and takes a drag of smoke. We don't talk about it again.
We go to the theatre often. We sit through three different versions of the same Shakespeare play, just for the hell of it. We never eat at our apartments. We always go out to eat. We never talk on the phone or really talk at all for that matter. Sometimes she screams in her sleep and I can't wake her. All I can do is hold her closely, rocking her gently. What happened to her?
We are almost complete strangers even after a month and a half of dating.
"My son was named Sebastian Alexandre. A rather austere name for a malformed and deceased infant. It almost sounds as if he was a prince in some beautiful European country long ago. I suppose that is what I wanted for him. Of course, what does a thirteen year old child know about babies?"
I blink, once, twice. She hasn't spoken of her son since that first day in the kitchen, it feels so long ago now. I don't press her to speak further. She is staring through space. It is as if I don't exist and she is merely speaking to the air or herself. She comes out of it after a moment, a sad smile spreading across her face.
"Do you want to talk about him? Or anything in particular?" I say, a little hesitantly.
"No. Yes. Someday, maybe." She smiles that sad smile again, kisses me and lights another cigarette. She sits with her arms resting on her knees, smoking. Her hair is pulled back into a messy ponytail, her lavender tank top and white boy shorts hiding nothing. I know that we won't speak further about Sebastian. She may never speak of him again for all I know.
Some days she is fine. We make love, we slow dance in the kitchen, we go out to the movies and read bad webcomics. We cook, but we never eat what we make, and play with the cat. We play scrabble. Sometimes she knits while I play air cello to a Metallica cover. On these days she practically lives at my place and I don't care. We hold hands everywhere we go and its a sweeter romance than I've ever had.
On her bad days I usually can't get a hold of her. She locks herself up in her apartment. I worry because she won't answer her phone. If she does come over, she is withdrawn. We have sex, but it is frenzied. Like she is trying to exorcise a demon with every orgasm. If she even has an orgasm. Half the time she dissolves into tears before we can finish and I hold her, shaking and sobbing.
Her nightmares start to come every night. On nights that she has these nightmares, if she wakes up from screaming, she will curl up in the bathtub until I am able to coax her back to bed. Once back in bed she tries to seduce me. This never works. As soon as I begin to give in she will break down and begin to cry again.
I try to encourage her to get counseling. But I feel hypocritical doing so. I am not as self-destructive, but I could probably use a therapist myself.
We have been together three months now. Her spiral dipping deeper and deeper below a range I can handle. I don't know her, I can't figure her out. I try and all I do is make things worse. We stop having sex after one incident where she began screaming as if I was raping her. This seems to help for a while, but then she begins pushing for it.
I come home from the book store late. I don't even think about why the door is locked when I find I have to unlock it. When I come in, I set my bag on the couch and kick off my shoes. Annabelle and Snuggles are nowhere to be found.
"Bellie?" I call. "I'm home, honey. Where are you?"
I pull off my shirt, depositing it in the washer as I pass it. Maybe Annabelle had a moment and decided to leave? Sometimes I come home and she is gone. Often she has returned to her place to water her plants or to just get away. I usually don't question it. Its just that everything is eerily quiet and I am still unnerved by the lack of cat and girlfriend.
"Annabelle? Are you here babe?"
I hear a slight scratching noise coming from the bathroom and a distressed meowing. I open the door and Snuggles rushes out. When I look over I see that Annabelle has hung herself in the shower. I hesitate only a moment before I am struggling to lift her while trying to loosen the noose around her pale throat. I can't get her down. I panic and try to find a pair of scissors or anything that I can use to cut the rope. I eventually get her down and begin CPR. I don't get any response. I call 911 and continue trying CPR. All to no avail really.
The paramedics arrive and they take her in a body bag, pronounced dead at the scene.
I sit, slumped in the bathtub, staring at the frayed pieces of rope. The EMTs ask if I am okay, they take my blood pressure and try to coax me out of the tub. The police try to be kind as they ask me questions. I am catatonic. I can't think, let alone speak. They ask if I noticed a suicide note somewhere. They ask if they need to escort me to the hospital. Is there someone they can call?
They find a note. All it says is "You're pretty damn good as you are."
Once I have assured them that I am fine, once I have gone down to the station to answer questions, once I have come home to my empty apartment, I find more notes. There are notes tucked into my pajama drawer. The majority of them say "I love you. I'm sorry." There is a longer one, folded in half with a small red heart on it. In her spidery handwriting is my name.
"You said you loved me once," it says. "I said I would love you. And I do. More than I suppose I was willing to admit. I can't continue. So many times I think of jumping from the tallest building and all my, so-called, beauty being splashed against the pavement like copious amounts of red paint. I can't live without Sebastian. I can't live without that poor deformed infant that never saw the sunshine. I can't live with how he was conceived. Don't cry for me. Don't worry. Don't change. You're pretty damn good as you are. I love you. I'm sorry."
Against her wishes, I cry. I cry for this girl that I never got a real chance to know. A young woman that I was slowly falling in love with. A young woman that took her life for reasons that I will never fully understand.
When no family comes to claim her, I dip way into my savings to give her a proper funeral. My mother and Brad help me pay and plan it, not knowing all the details. They don't ask me any questions, out of respect I think. A few people come, no one that I know. She is buried in a small cemetery just outside of town with no real ceremony. The funeral home reverend says a few words regarding shepherds and the valley of Death. He speaks of not being afraid. He speaks of the arms of God wrapping about her to cradle her close.
Once everyone is gone, and I am left standing by her freshly filled grave, I collapse. I cry like I've never cried before. Not as I cried at my father's funeral or my grandparents'. Not when David left me. Not when Liam practically raped me. Not when I ruined everything with Jahan. I cry because I have let her down. I couldn't save her, no matter how I might've tried. I can't save myself, why would I ever think I could save her?
I'm not sure how long I kneel by her grave, wishing I could've done more than I did. A hand suddenly, gently, rests on my shoulder. I look up and into the eyes of my Korean gentleman. Jae, I think.
"Do you need a ride home?" he asks. He doesn't try to flirt and he doesn't smile. He is wearing a three piece suit and a vivid tie. I don't even wonder why he is there. Though part of me suspects that I should wonder how he always shows up when I need him most.
"Yes." I say, wiping away a few stray tears and holding the rest in. He helps me stand up, I wipe off the dirt and grass from my knees. He puts an arm around my shoulders as he leads me to his car.
We don't talk during the car ride back to my apartment. I don't even ask how he knows where I live. I just stare out the window, watching the scenery blur and blend like fruit in a blender. Some of the blurring is from tears. Every once in a while, Jae will reach out and pat my knee. I don't look at him, I can't look at him.
When we get to my apartment, he walks me to the door. I unlock the door and stare into the emptiness. I can't cross the threshold. I am afraid that I will find Annabelle dead in my shower. Or her ghost wandering about the house, smoking her cigarettes. In fact, I haven't spent the night here since she died. I have stayed mostly with Mom and Noah, twice with Clark, once with Anna and once with Kevin. Snuggles isn't even here to welcome me. After I was steady enough to drive I took him with me to my mother's. He is probably busy catching a plump mouse or bird now that he is able to frolic outside.
"What's wrong?" asks Jae, gently placing a hand on the small of my back.
"I can't go in." I say, still staring straight ahead. "What if she is in there? What if her ghost is wandering in her tank top and boy shorts, smoking those fancy French cigarettes she loves so much? What if her final thoughts are written out in my pajamas? What if she blue in the bathtub? I can't face her."
I pull the door closed and re-lock it. I turn to Jae and drop the key in his hand. His hand closes on it, briefly, before slipping it into his trouser pocket. He holds his hand out to me and I take it. I allow him to lead me back down the stairs and back to his car. When we get to his car I stop so that he stops as well, turning to look at me. I kiss him, impetuously. This is how I've learned to deal with my problems. With sex and a new boy/girlfriend. With alcohol and random strangers who become lovers who become nothing.
I try to undo his trouser button, but he stops me. He doesn't shove me off, instead trying to gently disentangle me. I resist and kiss him harder. He has no recourse but to push me away.
"This isn't going to help." he says, quietly, as I collapse against him. "Sex isn't a magic medicine you can use to cure every ailment."
"What does it matter?" I ask, getting mascara and snot on his black jacket. "Nothing matters now. I just need it. I'm a whore, after all."
He grabs my shoulders and pushes me back so that I am looking into his eyes.
"You are not a whore. You are confused and lost. You can't keep doing this to yourself. When are you going to realize you can't keep doing this?"
"When I'm dead, like the young woman I buried today." I shake him off and begin walking toward a bus stop. He follows me, like I knew he would. He hasn't figured out that I am not worth the saving yet. He will.
"Will you just listen, for just a moment?" he calls. I stop and turn to face him.
"What do you want to say?"
"Talk to me. Let me in, for just a moment. What can it hurt if you reveal something of yourself to a stranger?"
"There is nothing to talk about."
"There is so much to talk about, you are just in denial." I watch him clench and un-clench his fists. I wonder, momentarily, if he wants to hit me.
"I can't." I leave him standing there. I don't look back, but get on the bus and stare out the window, crying for a dead girl.
