Page 55 of Little Pieces of Light

Xander

A few days after the funeral, I trudged down to the Academy marina for row practice.

The season’s last regatta was coming up.

I couldn’t have cared less. But since Dean’s death, my body felt hijacked, alternating between shocked numbness and crippling grief.

Going to school full time no longer made any sense, but I could lose myself in the physical mechanics of rowing, even for an hour or two.

But as soon as I arrived at the dock where the coaches and the men’s eight were gathered, I realized just how slow my thinking had been. Rhett Calloway stood with Tucker, apart from the others but dressed in his workout gear, the same as the rest of us.

They both looked at me warily. I stared back, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. Then Orion was there, turning me away as Coach Daniels gathered us around.

Coach clapped his hands without enthusiasm, going through the motions.

“I know this is going to be a tough day. We’ve lost one of our own, and as hard as it is…

” He broke off, then cleared his throat.

“We have a season to finish, and I’d like to think that Dean would want us to finish strong. To make him proud.”

The icy cold numbness wrapped around me started to crack.

We all shuffled to the shell, and I climbed in at stroke seat.

The rest of the guys followed, Rhett taking his seat at the bow.

I gripped the oar in my hands, the rubber, textured handle digging into my palms. The boat gave a final sway—the cox taking his seat—and I raised my eyes, expecting to see Dean’s green ones looking back, that familiar grin on his face.

A wink and a smile and he’d murmur, “Give ’em hell, my friend. ”

A stranger stared back. One of the guys who rowed quads. It wasn’t Dean. It would never be Dean again.

And then the numbness broke off completely and fell away. Rhett Calloway was behind me, ready to row, his privilege sparing him from consequences. The whole team, this entire fucking school, needed the win more than it needed the truth.

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

I tossed the oar aside and climbed out of the boat. I sloshed through waist-deep water to the shore.

Coach Daniels held out a hand as I passed him. “Now, hold on, son…”

“Don’t fucking touch me.”

“Xander, wait,” Orion caught up to me, his eyes shining. “Talk to me…”

I spun around, and behind Orion was Rhett. A white-hot rage fell over me, and I surged forward with a splash of water.

“He killed Dean,” I said, my voice hollow.

Then the truth of it found me, and I wanted to scream.

I leveled a finger at Rhett, my voice rising.

“He sold him some poison with no fucking thought to the consequences, and we’re all just going to pretend like nothing happened? Business as fucking usual?”

“Now, hold on, man,” I heard Tucker say while Rhett bowed his head and looked away.

It took both Orion and Coach Daniels to hold me back, both speaking soothing words, my eyes blinded by tears. For a few moments, there was chaos, and then I stopped fighting.

“Get off me,” I snarled, and tore away from Orion and Coach. They made a wall between me and Rhett, but the rage had drained out, leaving only grief and disgust.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I demanded of the crew. The coaches. The whole fucking school. “Did he mean nothing to you? Whatever it takes, huh? Win at all costs. Put him back on the boat like nothing happened. As if Dean were never here at all.”

“Now, son—” Coach began.

“I’m not your son. I’m not on this team. I’m done. Done with this fucking place.”

I sloshed through the water up onto the shore, hollowed out by grief—that horrible sick feeling of nothingness. Absence. There had been someone there—a whole person—and now there wasn’t. Echoes of my mother’s abandonment. Of my father’s illness. And Emery…

And what was it all for? Opening myself up had been such a mistake.

I’d been better off as a loner with no friends.

Safer in science, studying the cold vastness of space, where all of this hurt was theoretically meaningless.

A Planck length of insignificance, 10 -35 in size, which is as close to nothing as you can get.

In the locker room, I changed, and then I drove away from Castle Hill Academy for the last time.

The Experiment was over. Result: complete and utter failure.

***

I drove home under a gray sky through the forest-like Bend and turned onto my street. A lone figure walked along the edge, dressed in pajamas. Bare feet. Hair askew.

“Oh, fuck.”

I pulled over and jumped out. “Dad. Hey, Dad…”

He looked up blearily, confused. “It seems I’ve lost my button. Have you seen my button?”

“Yeah,” I said thickly. “I know exactly where it is. Come with me and I’ll show you.”

I drove my father home and guided him to his bed.

“Sharon, Xander will be home soon,” he said as he laid his head on the pillow. “Let’s not fight, all right? I don’t want him to hear it. He’s so sensitive.”

I tucked him in, my heart heavy as I shut the door behind me. The time had come where what I could give my father and what he needed were diverging.

An hour later, I hung up the phone with Willow Glen Memory Care in Boston and set it on the kitchen table, strewn with invoices and bank statements.

My laptop was open to our savings account.

The idea of putting my father somewhere cheap was abhorrent.

Willow Glen wasn’t cheap, but they had space for him. Now I just had to pay for it.

I put my head in my hands as a soft knock came at the door.

Emery stood on my porch, the falling twilight lining her in copper and gold. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She looked as if she hadn’t slept in days.

“Hi,” she said in a watery voice.

“Hi.”

Her head bowed, and in two strides, I was holding her. She clung to me, her small body shaking with sobs.

“He killed himself,” she said into my sweater. “Grant. It wasn’t an accident. Jack told me, and now Jack’s gone too. He took his stuff, and he walked out and…”

Jesus, it doesn’t stop.

Emery’s words were lost in a flood of tears. I pulled her close, wishing I could somehow tuck her away inside my bones and keep her safe.

There is a way.

“Emery…”

She looked up at me. “I know this isn’t what you want. I don’t want it, either. Not like this. But now my dad’s talking about the new senator’s son. He’s older and wants to marry someone young and start having lots of babies right away.”

“Fucking hell…”

For a moment, I couldn’t see beyond the red haze that descended at the idea of another man touching her, using her, ignorant to all that she was— with her father’s blessing. But he couldn’t marry her off if she was already married.

I led her inside and sat with her on the couch.

“Where’s your dad?” she asked.

“Sleeping,” I said. “He sleeps a lot now, and whenever he wakes up, there’s less of him than there was before.”

“I’m so sorry, Xander.”

“He doesn’t want to leave this house. He throws a fit whenever I bring it up. He says he’s waiting for my mother to come back. I’m going to have to move him soon, and it’s going to be fucking awful.”

“I know,” she said. “You have to keep him close.”

“And you have to get away. You know that, right?”

She nodded and rested her head against my chest, and for a long while, we sat in the falling light. I’d thought she’d fallen asleep when she stirred.

“Your eulogy was beautiful.”

“I’m trying to live up to it,” I said. “Like you. You’re trying to see the best in your family. But Emery…”

“I know,” she said, curling into me. “But I’m scared, Xander.”

“Me too.” I stroked her hair. “Me too.”

***

The following Saturday, Orion and I met Emery and Harper at Providence City Hall. Rhode Island had no waiting period for a marriage license. We applied, were approved, and then waited our turn for a judge to officiate.

Emery wore a simple dress of pale pink, her hair flowing in soft waves around her shoulders.

Harper acted as her bridesmaid and witness.

Orion stood in for Dean, who would have been my best man.

Wracked by grief and guilt, he wouldn’t stop blaming himself for throwing that party.

Something had transpired between him and Harper, too, though neither would say what it was, nor even speak to each other.

The four of us passed heavy glances around at what had to be the most depressing wedding in a decade.

The officiate didn’t seem to notice. He said in a bored tone, “Do you, Emery, take Alexander Ford to be your lawfully wedded husband, to love and to cherish, all the days of your life?”

Emery’s eyes met mine—blue-green oceans of love and tears. “I do.”

“And do you, Alexander, take Emery Wallace to be your lawfully wedded wife, to love and to cherish, all the days of your life?”

“I do,” I said, and the worst part was, I meant it with all my fucking heart.

We had no rings. No vows beyond the boilerplate language, and soon, it was over.

“I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride.”

We moved closer, and I cupped her face in my hand, her tears spilling down to my fingers. I kissed Emery softly and she returned my kiss, pressing into it urgently before breaking away and crying into my suit jacket.

Back in Castle Hill, she and I drove to my house, where her car waited. It was not yet four in the afternoon. The days were getting longer, the light more golden.

“Do you have to go home?” I asked in a low voice.

“No,” she said. “Not yet.”

We reached for each other at the same time, with the same desperate urgency.

Bruising, devouring kisses, hands in hair and tugging at clothing.

We made it inside, to my loft, and stripped each other naked, leaving nothing but the locket around her neck, glinting gold against her skin.

We lay down together, and wordlessly, she reached into the nightstand for a condom.

She tore it open, then rolled onto her back and put it on me.

“Emery…”

She didn’t say a word but pulled at my shoulders until I was on top of her, then between her legs, then sinking inside her. The tight feel of her around me caused an automatic chain reaction of need—synapses firing and sensations flooding me, erasing my thinking mind.

Emery nodded as if answering some unspoken hesitation and lifted her hips to mine.

Christ, she was too beautiful. Too soft beneath me and wanting me; I could feel it in every touch, every breath.

Our bodies were entwined, entangled —one responding to the other in an instantaneous give and take.

I became delirious with her, and from that delirium, a sudden, primal need began to grow in me.

A need to take. To keep. To mark her as mine.

Our separation grew more imminent with every passing day, and my love for her was also entangled with a possessive greed.

The pain was too much. Too hard to take, and so I took her instead, as if I could impale her to my bed.

To shield her with my body from whatever cruel hand wanted to steal her away.

Emery cried out in ecstasy, her exquisite face contorted, riding the crest of the pleasure as if it were agony.

It is agony, I thought brokenly. To lose her…

“Now you,” she breathed.

She melted beneath me. Her eyes glassy and dark and heated with permission to take her until I was spent.

My body obeyed. I lost myself in her until I couldn’t hold on any longer.

I emptied myself into her, turned myself inside out for her.

Only her, this girl I’d loved from afar for seven years and loved right now with everything I had.

For a long while, we stayed locked together, breathing as one. Her fingers were in my hair, her arms wrapped around me, holding me. I felt melded to her so completely that it seemed impossible that we wouldn’t always have this.

This…

This was all I wanted. Her. Eighteen or eighty, I knew I’d never want anyone but Emery.

My wife…