Elizabeth Miles - Eternity

“I know this is, like, so bad to say, but . . . ” After a suitable dramatic pause, Portia went on. “I always felt like he was a little bit perverted.”

“Like how?” Leaning back in his chair, Andy leaped at the chance to delve into the topic of perversion. Meanwhile, Em tried to ignore the irritation billowing in her chest. It was impossible not to listen.

“I think he . . . paid more attention to me . . . in class on the days I wore . . . low-cut shirts,” Portia said. “I bet I would have gotten an even better grade if I let him give me extra help, if you know what I mean. I think he was into that sort of thing.”

“Well, I hope you’d let me videotape it.” Andy smiled slyly. “That dude didn’t deserve such a hot piece of ass.”

Portia shifted uncomfortably. Oblivious, Andy continued, tilting his chair so it balanced on his two back legs. “Anyway, if he was really a creep then he probably had it coming.”

“ ‘Had it coming’?” Em interjected. “So he deserved to die?” She couldn’t help herself.

“No, obviously not ,” Andy said as he rolled his eyes. He looked to Portia for sympathy, but she hung her head low and pretended to be fascinated with her French worksheet. “What’s with you, anyways, Winters? You and Landon close or something?”

God, she hated people like that, who managed to turn everything upside down and make their own shitty comments seem totally natural. As if she were the one who was out of line. Her body tensed—including every muscle in her hand, which clutched at the pen so firmly that it shook.

“Maybe I hit a nerve?” he asked, tipping back and forth on his chair. He then went on to say something about always being misunderstood. Em wasn’t listening anymore. She could sense her temper starting to boil, and all she wanted was for Andy to stop talking. She wished something would happen to just make him shut up .

“Oh, shit!” Andy cried in a stupidly strangled voice as his chair wobbled out from underneath him. As he came down on the tile, there was a clang of metal against the floor and a loud thud as his head flew backward against the desk behind him.

“Oh my God,” Portia said, kneeling down on the floor and reaching for his head. “Andy, are you okay?”

“It’s nothing,” he said quickly. He propped himself up on an elbow and reached behind his head, but flinched immediately after touching it. When he drew his head back, there was a spot of blood.

“But you’re bleeding . . . ” Portia continued.

“What’s going on?” Ms. Oullette said as she came into the classroom. By now a handful of students had gotten out of their seats and formed a semicircle around Andy.

“I’m fine , guys. Really.” And aside from a tiny cut, he was mostly—except for the fact he was red with mortification.

“Well, fine or not, you’ll need to check in with the nurse,” Ms. Oullette said. Andy nodded and accepted Pete Nash’s hand, using it to pull himself off the floor.

“Ms. Oullette,” Pete called over his shoulder, “Andy probably needs someone to accompany him to the nurse’s office—like me, maybe. Who knows if he’s concussed or not?”

“Nice try, Mr. Nash,” she responded drily, “but you wouldn’t want to miss the pop quiz I was just about to administer.”

There were a bunch of exaggerated groans as Andy slunk out of the classroom. He looked at Em as he passed, and she stared back with wide, unblinking eyes. I did that, she thought, terrified. I hurt him. Just because I was angry.

Em could barely focus during the quiz; she wouldn’t be surprised if she’d completely failed it—but she didn’t even care. After turning it in she excused herself to go to the bathroom, slung her bag on her shoulder, and never came back.

When you combined all the money from last year’s summer gig at the YMCA day camp, plus her savings from occasional babysitting jobs here and there, Em had about three hundred dollars. She’d been hoping to put it toward a new laptop, but getting Crow out of jail was slightly more important. After raiding the Mason jar at the back of her closet (her “savings account”), Em sped to the police station with two hundred dollars in twenties, tens, fives, and singles.

“Thank you,” Crow mouthed as soon as she’d signed the paperwork and they brought him through the heavy sliding doors.

“Thank you, officers,” she said, praying that no one she knew would see her coming out of the Ascension Police Department with Crow at her side. “What is this?” she hissed as soon as they were back in her car. “What were you thinking? What happened?”

He reached over and put his hand on her arm. She’d never seen him so serious.

“I’m sorry, Em,” he said, and she could tell that he meant it. He was sober.  Tired. And his eyes were full of gratitude. “I don’t want you to . . . I went back. After you left, after your mom picked you up. I kept messing with that guy—the bouncer. I was so pissed off, Em. They called the cops on me, and I got arrested for disorderly conduct.”

Em shook her head slowly. “But that doesn’t make sense. Wouldn’t they have just let you out this morning?” She remembered the same had happened to Gabby’s brother, Sam, the night he turned twenty-one and started stripping drunk in a gas station parking lot. They’d taken him overnight and let him out the next morning; he reported back that he’d been thrown in a big cell with a bunch of other drunk people and a whole lot of vomit on the floor. Nothing too traumatic, though definitely impressionable enough to never do it again. But either way, there was no bail involved.

“Yeah, I just . . . I might have told an officer to fuck himself. . . . ”

“What?!”

“And then smiled at a judge the wrong way . . . ”

“You had to see a judge this morning?!”  This felt way out of her league.

“Listen, Em, it wasn’t that big of a deal. It’s just that I pissed off some cop and so he pulled up my record—and now that I’m eighteen they don’t cut me such a break. . . . ”

“Crow, stop.” She took in a deep breath, trying to form a coherent thought in her head. “It doesn’t matter how it happened, not really. I’m just . . . I’m really worried about you. You’re going off the rails. Drinking too much, getting into fights, getting arrested, telling off cops? All of this could’ve been avoided. Why couldn’t you just talk to me? Why the hell did you run off like that last night?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “It’s the darkness . . . these visions. They’re driving me crazy.” He rubbed his palms on the front of his jeans, his large hands shaking. It was torture—for both of them. As he did his best to deal with these visions, he only spiraled deeper—further and further away from her. She couldn’t withhold any information from Crow. Not anymore, not at this point.

“Can we go somewhere to talk?” she asked, looking around.

“Aren’t we talking now, princess?”

“I’m serious. Somewhere private.”

“My house?” he said quietly. “Let’s go get my car and meet back at my house.”

She looked at him skeptically. He tilted his head but she couldn’t read his expression. “No funny business,” she reminded him. It took a moment to realize what she’d committed to: She was going to Crow’s house. Alone.

At his split-level ranch, not far from Em’s street, Crow brought her up to his bedroom, a large space over the garage. “Sorry,” he said before opening the door. “It’s kind of a mess.”

And it was: an explosion of notebooks and guitars and guitar picks, jeans and empty cigarette cartons and black clothing and Dr Pepper cans. The rich and musty smell of candles and incense hung in the air. Nothing like JD’s room, she found herself thinking, before pushing the comparison from her mind.