Falling into Us Read online

“And my dad has a world of anger and demons hidden away in his soul. ” Jason’s voice was surprisingly soft, his words poetic. “He got injured playing his first pro game, and it ended his career. The only thing he ever wanted to do was play pro ball, and he couldn’t anymore. He had to go crawling back to his parents here in Michigan, and his dad was worse on him than Dad is on me. He ended up joining the police force and moved up pretty fast, but then the Gulf War happened and he saw his chance to be something. He joined the Army and did two tours in Iraq. He was a grunt with no college degree or training. He saw some heavy shit, Becca. Some really awful shit. He did some really awful shit, all on Uncle Sam’s orders. It…scarred him, on the inside. He has his reasons, too, is my point. Doesn’t make it okay. ”

  I was silent for a long time, listening to a different song on the radio and watching the salt-sprinkle of stars across the black-cloth sky. “How do you know so much about what your dad went through?”

  Jason answered around a mouthful of chip. “He drinks a lot. When he’s had enough, sometimes he talks to me instead of laying into me. Tells me stories like I was one of his buddies from his unit. ” He swallowed and stared up at the sky. “I hate those stories. Rather get hit. ”

  I shivered then, as a gust of wind blew and cut through my sweater. Jason planted his palms on the lip of the truck bed and hefted himself out to the ground, leaned into the truck, and snagged his sweatshirt. I watched him hesitate, then grab his camera bag. He jumped back into the bed, climbing on the rear tire, and tucked his sweatshirt around my shoulders. It was heavy, warm, and smelled exactly like Jason.

  He lifted the camera bag and then glanced at me, a smirk on his face. “You wanted to see a photograph I took?” I nodded eagerly. “Then you gotta trade me. I’ll show you one of my photos if you show me something you wrote. ”

  I swallowed hard. “That’s—that’s…I’m not sure. I’ve never showed anyone my writing. No one. It’s my journal. ”

  Jason nodded, gesturing with the bag. “That’s how my photos are for me. They’re private. Only for me, because I enjoy it. No one even knows I do it, not even Kyle. It’s like a journal for me, too. I’m no good with words, so I use pictures instead. ”

  “Why would you keep something like that a secret?” I asked. “It’s not like it’s embarrassing. It’s cool. It’s artistic. ”

  His face darkened. “You don’t know my dad. I told you, he’s not a nice guy. For one thing, I’m only allowed to do schoolwork and football. Working out, homework, practice, that’s it. He’s drunk or passed out now, so he doesn’t care what I do or where I am as long as I don’t get arrested and make a big spectacle or some shit. He’s the captain of the police force, so I have to be careful. He won’t bail me out, won’t get me off the hook. He’ll kick the shit out of me if I ever so much as get stopped by one of his men. They’re scared of him, too, so they won’t dare go against him, either. ”

  “What’s that got to do with photography? It’s just pictures. ”

  He unwrapped the second ham sandwich and another can of Coke. “Well, that’s the second part. Anything that even remotely smacks of art is for fags. His word, not mine. On top of being a plain mean-ass drunk, he’s a bigot. Hates pretty much anyone who’s not him. If he even knew I had a camera, he’d put me in the f**kin’ hospital. Musical instrument? No way. Painting? Hell no. I love taking photos, though. I love capturing something in the lens and making something else totally different from it. ”

  He opened his bag and lifted the camera from it, turned it on, and touched a few buttons so the display showed his previously taken photos. He scrolled through them a ways, then turned it to me.

  I took the camera gingerly, afraid of handling something that was so important to him, and so hideously expensive. The photograph he’d shown me was breathtaking. It was of a bumblebee, taken in the act of the bee landing on a daisy. It was from up close, so close you could see the wings blurring and the individual hairs on the fat yellow and black body. The sunlight was refracted off the insect’s bulbous, multi-faceted eyes, the daisy sharp and bright yellow, the sky a blue blur beyond. It was like something out of National Geographic, stunning in its clarity and focus and use of color. The bumblebee looked like an alien creature, made mammoth and impossible.

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  “Jason…oh, my god. This is incredible. You could sell this to a magazine, I swear to god. ” I breathed in and examined the photo again, amazed at the way he’d framed it with the flower in the center, taking most of the space, with the bee near the top, caught in the act of hovering downward.

  He grinned, and seemed oddly shy for the first time since I’d known him. “Thanks. I got stung about six times trying to get that shot. There were a bunch of big, fat bees flying around a field. ” He pointed out beyond the tree, to the field beneath us. “Right out there, actually. There must have been a nest or something. Anyway, I followed these bees around for hours, taking picture after picture. I must have taken a couple hundred before I got that one. ”

  “Can I see some more?” I asked, excited now.

  He lifted an eyebrow at me. “Nuh-uh. Now it’s your turn. ”

  I felt my hands trembling. I knew if I spoke it would come out all jittery and full of blocks, so I just sucked in a breath, reached into my purse, and pulled out my journal. It was a spiral-bound, unlined sketch pad, a piece of brown paper Meijer bag cut out and wrapped around the outside covers. On the front cover, I’d used a Sharpie to copy an inscription of a poem in Arabic:

  ??? ????? ????

  ??? ???? ?????

  ????

  ??? ????? ??????

  “What’s that say?” Jason asked.

  I hesitated, breathing several times and reciting the words in my mind before I said them out loud. “It says, ‘I am not alone—the truth is I befriended my loneliness. ’” I traced the lines with my forefinger before opening the cover and flipping a few pages idly, looking for the perfect poem to show Jason. “It’s by an Arab poet named Abboud al Jabiri. It’s actually part of a longer poem, but that’s the part I like the most. ”

  “Was he from, like, a long time ago?”

  I shook my head. “No, he’s alive and living in Jordan, still writing. My mom is a pediatrician, but she’s always loved poetry. On top of her medical degree, she has a second minor in Arabic poetry. She kind of turned me on to it, I guess. ”

  “That’s pretty cool,” Jason said. “So what’s your dad do?”

  “He’s in real estate. He owns several industrial properties, plus he does commercial real estate sales. ” I glanced at him as I chewed and swallowed. “What about you? You told me about your dad. What about your mom?”

  He shrugged. “She doesn’t do shit. Works in a dental office three days a week, making copies and shit. Other than that, hides in her room gluing paper cut-outs into a book. ”

  I scrunched up my face, trying to figure out what he meant. “Scrapbooking?”

  He shrugged. “Yeah, whatever. Something like that. She’s got a ‘craft room. ’” He made air quotes around the phrase. “She spends all her time in there. Sleeps there, except when Dad makes her sleep with him for…you know. Mainly, she avoids both of us. Me because I take Dad’s shit instead of her, and him because he’s an ass**le. ”

  “What do you mean, you take his shit instead of her?”

  He snapped a chip between his fingers and ate both halves. “He used to beat on her, back till I was, like, three or four. Once I got old enough, I started jumping in. I hated seeing Mom cry, you know? She stood up for herself for a while. I remember that. Then she just got tired. Gave up. Let him do whatever he wanted, to me, to her. He wants the conflict, you know? He wants the fight. I started giving him that so he’d leave her alone, and now she sorta resents me for it, I think. Don’t know why, since I’m the one getting my ass beat instead of her. Whatever. Stupid bitch. ” The blasé tone in his voice was awful in its utter apat
hy.

  “Jason! She’s still your mother!” I couldn’t keep it from coming out.

  His eyes blazed green fire, but his voice never rose. “They may have biologically created me, Becca, but they’re not parents. ” He calmed and looked away, his voice growing thoughtful. “Parents love and protect. They shelter, they nurture. All that loving shit that I never got. My old man? He wasn’t loved, and he never figured out how to break the cycle. My mom has just spent so long being the victim that she doesn’t care anymore, so I get the brunt of his bullshit. ”

  I wasn’t sure what to say for a long time. Eventually, I thought of something. “Do you think you can break the cycle, Jason?”

  Jason stared down between his knees, crumbling chips into dust. “I have to, Becca. I will. My grandpa was an ass**le, and I’m pretty sure his dad was, too. ” His voice dropped to a whisper. “I’m scared it’s, like, a hereditary thing. What if I can’t be different? What if I’m just…genetically hard-wired to be an ass**le like my old man?”

  I took his hands in mine. “I don’t believe that. You already are different, Jason. We can choose who we want to be. ”

  “I hope so. ” He seemed so sad suddenly, and I wanted to find a way to cheer him up, change the subject, but I couldn’t think of anything.

  We had finished the sandwiches and were munching on chips as we talked, each of us having had two cans of soda. I remembered the bottle in my backpack and reached through the back window to grab the backpack, opened it, and pulled out the bottle. I set it on the blanket between us. Jason stared at it as if it were a venomous snake.

  “Where’d you get that?” he asked in the same too-calm voice he’d used before.

  “My brother gave it to me. He thought we should party it up, I guess. I don’t know. I don’t really drink much, but I figured what the hell, right?” I tried to sound casual, but I don’t think I succeeded.

  “I’m not sure I can drink that,” Jason said, in almost a whisper. “That’s…that’s what my dad drinks. It’s…the only way I’ve ever seen him after seven or eight at night, my whole life. Him, sitting in his leather armchair in front of SVU and Castle and Game of Thrones, and always with that motherfucking square bottle on the sidetable, a glass beside him. I watch, every night, as that bottle slowly empties, one glass at a time, until he’s meaner than a f**king viper, and twice as dangerous. ”

  His eyes were far away as he spoke, and I sat still and silent, listening intently.

  “I don’t have anything against drinking. Not everyone is like him. I’m not like him, when I drink. I just…I cannot, will not ever touch that shit. Ever. ” Jason stared at the bottle as if it were his father, raw hatred in his eyes. “Please put it away. I have some beer in the cooler, if you want to drink. ”

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  I moved quickly, shoving the bottle into the backpack and zipping it closed. “I’m sorry, Jason. I-I didn’t n-n-nnn-know. ” So much for changing the subject.

  His hands wrapped around my arms and pulled me closer to him, until our knees overlapped, tangled. “Of course you didn’t. Don’t be upset. Not for me. ”

  “But I am upset for you. You shouldn’t have to go through that. ”

  He twisted my shoulders, and I turned in place until my spine was nestled against his chest. Jason leaned back against the cab and wrapped his arms around my stomach beneath my br**sts, his knees drawn up next to my sides. I rested my arms on his knees and tilted my head back to lay it against his shoulder, and suddenly, between one breath and the next, I was completely contented. I felt safe. I could feel his heart thumping faintly, and his breath soughed gently onto my nape. I was entirely too aware of his body then, of his hands so close to my br**sts, his mouth which I could twist in place and kiss, if I were bold enough, his strong arms caging me perfectly. My heart hammered, and I had to focus on stillness so I didn’t panic. I wanted more, more touch, more of his heat, more of his strength. His nearness was intoxicating, and forbidden. I’d sneaked out of my house in the middle of the night, and now I was wrapped in the embrace of a boy. A man? I wasn’t sure. Was he a man yet? Was I woman, or a girl? We were stuck somewhere in between. Thoughts like these floated through my head, demanding answers but receiving none, because his proximity and his hardness were intoxicating.

  We breathed together in the cool night air, the sky a silver-bathed black above us. We didn’t need to speak, and that was an amazing thing in itself. The only sounds were our breathing and the wind rustling in the leaves, and a song playing from the radio, fading into a female DJ’s voice announcing the next song: “All right, that was Montgomery Gentry, going back a ways for that one. This next song is for all you late night lovers out there. It’s Gloriana, with ‘(Kissed You) Goodnight. ’”

  My heartbeat ratcheted up to a frantic patter as I listened to the words of the song, sung sweetly and inciting romance between us in the darkness and the cold of a stolen midnight date. I turned my head, leaned slightly sideways so my shoulder nudged the edge of the truck bed. Jason’s eyes were darkest green, glittering in the starlight and the pale luminous moon glow. I felt his heart pounding against his ribs and my side, and I knew he was going to kiss me then. I waited, breath bated, eyes locked on his, my hands clutching his knees for courage. I wasn’t afraid to kiss him; no, I was afraid I would be too impatient and kiss him first. Hunger for a second kiss was like desperation in my blood, thundering in my muscles and my heart and firing in my brain.

  “Is this okay?” he asked, his voice a soft whisper into the quiet.

  I smiled up at him. “Shut up and k-k-k…” I trailed off and closed my eyes, let the word float up and out, “…kiss me already. ”

  He closed the distance eagerly, covering my mouth with his, and the thunder of our hearts was a syncopated crash of need and nerves. I lost myself, and gloried in the welter of touch and taste—soft and wet and hot, soda and salt—and the soaring sound of my pulse in my ears, and music in the spaces between lip-touches—and I kissed you…goodnight.

  When we pulled apart, Jason’s eyes devoured mine. “Kissing you is…god, it’s amazing. ”

  “Then do it again. ” I was amazed by my boldness.

  So was he, but he lowered his lips to mine and kissed me again, deeper this time, mouths moving and tongues hesitantly touching and drifting. His palms were splayed on my stomach, and one drifted up my side, stopping at the lower swell of one breast. I lifted my hand and curled it around the back of his head, a move I’d seen in a movie, and knew then the power of my touch, the beauty of a kiss, the wonder of this intimacy. When my fingers caressed the buzzed hair above his nape, he kissed me harder, as if my hand there fueled the fire of his desire. Then his hand slid up just slightly, and his fingers were brushing the side of my breast, a hesitant touch, a quest, a question. I didn’t know the answer, the right response. I wanted more. I did. But…was it okay? Was that wrong? Was it too much, too soon? I liked the way his fingers felt, teasing the edge of propriety, the borderline of modesty. Did I dare encourage him to go further?

  He took my hesitation for a demurral, and his hand slid upward, away from temptation. I felt the loss of his touch on my breast like a pang of regret, and covered his hand with mine, stopping it near my underarm. Our kiss paused, and our eyes met. His green orbs searched mine, and then widened as I guided his hand down. His sweatshirt had fallen away as I leaned back into him, and his hand drifted up over the swell of my breast. Even through my sweater and my shirt and my bra, I felt the heat of his hand, the rough power in his touch, the gentility in the way he caressed me. No one had ever touched my breast before, and the thrill of it was like a drug in my system.

  My sweater was a button-up cardigan, and I reached up to flick open the first button, and then guided his hand across my body underneath the sweater to my opposite breast. His fingers curled around the weight of my breast, testing, touching, hesitant yet eager. I felt so bold, so daring, so…the word
that floated to mind was naughty, as childish as that word seemed. I shouldn’t be letting him touch me like this, much less encouraging it. But it was so thrilling, so intoxicating. I felt my pulse crashing as he explored my breast through two layers of cotton. I felt adult and womanly and worldly as he kneaded me, caressed me, kissed me.

  After an amount of time I couldn’t begin to measure, we pulled away, and his hand fell from my breast back to my stomach, closer to my hip this time.

  “You never read me a poem,” he whispered.

  My face heated. “You really want to hear one?” He nodded. “You won’t laugh?”

  “Not unless it’s supposed to be funny. ”

  “I don’t write funny poems,” I said, gathering my courage. “But you can’t tell anyone, and you can’t tease me about this. ”

  He frowned. “Would you tease me about my photography?”

  I shook my head. “Never. ”

  “Then why would I tease you about writing poetry?”

  I dug my notebook out of my purse and flipped through the pages, searching for the right one to read him. I found the perfect one, one that spoke to my current feelings, in a way.

  I knew I’d never be able to read it out loud without embarrassing myself, so I handed him the notebook and let him read it himself. I could see the words in my mind’s eye, feel them as he read them.

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  GHOSTKISS

  You’re not here, and I’m not there

  I’m a girl, alone in her room

  And you’re a myth

  A possible future

  A ghost of my desires to come

  I breathe slowly and close my eyes

  Tilt my face to the ceiling

  And wait for the kiss

  Of ghostly lips on flesh

  Dream mouth on real

  Fantasy tongue tasting mine

  Tantalizing and imagined

  Because I wonder

  What a kiss is

  How lips taste

  How a tongue feels

  Will I know what to do

  Without being shown?

  A more worrisome question arises

  One unique to me:

  Can you stutter, in a kiss?

  Can you fumble

  In the throes of desire?

  You’re just a ghost

  A neverknown fraction of what-if

  And you cannot teach me what I wish to know

  Until you become real

  And kiss me and kiss me and kiss me

  Jason glanced at me, then back at the page, amazement in his eyes. “God, Becca. That’s…I don’t even have words. Magical. That’s not just poetry, that’s word magic. ” He looked back at my notebook and seemed to be rereading. “How do you know how to make the perfect words go together? I know all these words on their own, but…but I could never put them all together like this, into a poem. ”

  I ducked my head, heat on my cheeks. “Thanks. I just…the words just come out. I think I write poetry because it’s a way for me to be coherent. Eloquent. I have to work to speak clearly. Every single sentence I speak takes effort to not stutter. Poetry? It’s just effortless. ” All the while he’d been talking about my poetry, I’d been scripting that speech, planning it out, forming the words in my head and practicing them. He started to flip the page, but I took the notebook from him, gently but firmly. “I’m sorry, but I’m not ready to let you just…peruse my private thoughts. Reading that is like reading my mind. I’m just—just—just n-not ready for that y-y-yet. ” I heaved in a deep breath to slow myself down.