Night Shifts Black(16)

"Before you know it, you realize the curtain has turned into a cement wall, and you couldn't escape the darkness even if you wanted to, but by now you don't care anymore. What's the point? There's nothing waiting for you on the other side, and even if there was, you're such a useless waste of space that you wouldn't dare to contaminate the world outside with your cancer anyway."



       
         
       
        

I stop, my eyes burning, my voice heavy in my throat.

"You feel like crying all the time but you rarely do. Depression isn't sadness; it's numbness. You don't have the energy for sadness. You can't sleep. You don't eat. You have no desire for the things you used to love, but it doesn't matter because you can't love anyway. You feel nothing, just a dull, heavy ache that makes it hard to breathe sometimes, let alone get up to start the search again. You fantasize about disappearing, just erasing your pointless existence and sparing the Earth from your toxic presence. By now you're so exhausted just from the effort of living that there's nothing left to live it."

I wipe my face now, the tears dripping down my cheeks. I had almost forgotten about Luke. I'd stopped talking to him somewhere along the way, lost again in the caverns of my own backstage nightmare. But when I remember, I don't give him a choice. Too many people had let me choose.

I lie down on the bed beside him and take his hand. I can tell the action has startled him, but he doesn't pull away. I squeeze, holding tight, warning him that he's crazy if he thinks I'm letting him do this alone. I don't expect him to respond. In fact, I hope he doesn't. I hear the soft sound of his breathing as he stares at the ceiling, my words disrupting the void around us.

"It's Depression, Luke," I whisper into the darkness. "And it's lying to you."



∞∞∞



"Did you ever try to kill yourself?" Luke asks finally, after a long silence. I had begun to wonder if he'd fallen asleep.

I consider his question for a moment. It's a simple question with a very complex answer.

"Consciously?" I ask, even though I know the answer.

"Yes. Did you knowingly try to kill yourself?"

"No," I answer honestly. "No, not on purpose."

My answer has an effect. "By accident then," he concludes, and I squeeze his hand again. I hadn't let go and I don't plan to.

"No, it wasn't an accident either. Somewhere in between."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning I made destructive choices to escape without caring where I was escaping to."

"You didn't try to kill yourself, but you didn't care if you did."

"Something like that."

"Drugs?"

"I picked fights."

"Picked fights?"

"With my dad, my boyfriend, strangers, whoever got near me. I wanted them to hurt me. I wanted them to hate me as much as I hated myself. I wanted them to punish me for existing." 

"And did they."

"Sometimes."

"Your boss at the grocery store?"

I quiet. "No. That was something else."

"I'm sorry. You don't have to talk about it."

"I know. I will one day, but not now."

It's his hand applying the pressure this time, and I'm relieved for a variety of reasons. I turn toward him and wrap my arm around his chest, pulling him close to me. "I know Depression, Luke, and I know you want to be alone, but I'm not going to let you. I can't make you let me in, but you're going to have to get used to the fact that I'll be here when you're ready."

He still hasn't moved, and I can see his eyebrows knit together in the dim light as he continues staring at the ceiling.

"I'm not who you think I am, Callie," he says after another pause. "If I let you in, you'd know I deserve my prison."





Day Seventeen: Part I.





I get the frantic call early in the morning, before I'm showered, dressed, or sufficiently roused by my cup of black tea. Definitely before I'm equipped for drama. It's Shauna, and if I don't get over to the café in the next five minutes, the cops will be involved.

My heart stops long before she confirms the disruption involves Luke, and I have my jeans and sneakers on by the time we end the call.

I can hear the yelling as I approach Jemma's. Evacuated patrons and random bystanders are huddled on the sidewalk, attempting to peer through the door, the windows, each other, with looks of fear and curiosity.

"Excuse me! Please! Let me through!" I cry, pushing past them.

I hear some curses, but also warnings as I plow forward. There's a crazy homeless guy in there. No, he's not homeless, just a café regular who's lost his mind. He's trying to rob the place.

I glance back in surprise at that one, I can't help myself. Still, I don't need more speculation, I need the truth, so I don't ask and continue my journey.

By the time I get through the crowd and into the café, there are only a few brave patrons left, mostly the regulars who have come to expect such erratic behavior from the weird chair guy who turned out to be someone important. The rest of the witnesses are staff members. Both Darryn and Shauna are on today. Lucky them.

"Why can't I have it? You have a hundred of them!" Luke cries. The Chair is firm in his grip. A table is overturned, a shocked audience curved around the scene. The manager has her hands up in surrender, using her managerial crisis training to try to calm the crazed guest. The problem is, he's not crazy.

"Luke!" I call, rushing toward the front of the circle.

His desperate eyes turn on me, rooting me several feet away.

"What are you doing?" I ask, forcing myself to take a step forward. He moves back. "They're going to call the police. They'll arrest you," I reason.

He shakes his head, eyes dark. "So what? They should."

I soften and cover more of the distance between us.

"You don't want that," I say.

"You know I do," he replies, the pain starting to replace the anger.

It hits me harder than I expect, the transformation, the bitter consequence of my attempt to reach him yesterday. My speech was supposed to be a cautionary tale, not an instruction manual.

"Luke … "

"Leave me alone, Callie!"

I shake my head. "No!"

"I said, leave!" he cries, swinging the chair in my direction. I duck away, surprised by the outburst, but not prepared to give up. His aim was too bad for him to have had any intention of hurting me. The others don't realize that, they don't know him well enough, and gasp at the new violence. I can see Ailee dialing the phone.



       
         
       
        

"Luke, please! This won't help you escape! You want to hide? How will you hide with the cameras and reporters? You really want another mugshot for the tabloids?"

That argument has an affect, and I can tell what I said means even more to him than I'd thought.

He glances around the room again, suddenly seeming startled, and drops the chair with a curse. Another string of expletives slips from his mouth as he locks his hands on his head in distress.

"We're sorry. So sorry!" I explain to the manager who's look is somewhere between fear and fury. "It won't happen again. You won't see him back here."

"I better not!" she hisses. "We will call the cops the second he touches the door."

I nod, completely understanding her position, and turn back to Luke. He's broken again. No longer a threat, just a terrified stranger staring at a chair.

"I need it, Callie," he whispers as I approach. His eyes search mine, willing me to understand, to help him. "Please, just explain it to them."

"I know, Luke. But it's not going to help you. It's not," I reply softly, taking his arm.

He shakes his head, angry tears in his eyes. "Please. Please!" he repeats, one last desperate appeal to the manager.

She glares at him, but waves her hand with a curse. "Fine, take the damn chair. Just get out of my restaurant and never come back!"

I'm still not sure it's a good idea for him to permanently possess the haunted object, but at the moment, it keeps him out of jail so I have no choice but to accept it.

He sighs with relief, and I see the visible change as a weight seems to lift from his shoulders. He picks up the chair and heads toward the door. I apologize profusely to every face I can't avoid and do my best to clear an awkward path.



∞∞∞



We walk back to his hotel. Him with his chair, me with my apologies to those we displace on the sidewalk as we march past. I don't know what to say to Luke, so I remain silent, focusing instead on making sure we arrive safely at our destination, still afraid the manager called the cops after all, and they'll be showing up any minute to take the crazy rock star into custody. I'm sure he's legally drunk, so the media would be merciless with that report. As it is, I'm almost certain bystander photos and recordings of his outburst are going to explode into the pop culture conversation anyway, fueling the thirst for celebrity blood with another tragic train wreck.

The Chair will be famous now, too.

I don't think Luke understands that yet. What he's done, the firestorm he's just exposed himself to hasn't registered, but it will soon, and I suck in my breath at what he'll face. The ghost chair will now be legend, encased in speculation, investigated with a rabid persistence that will scrape old wounds raw.