The Elementals Read online

  19. As if we were starving

  But she wasn’t the only one who haunted me; when I got back up north I was missing John so much that my whole body—bones, joints, sinews, tissues, even weirdly my blood—ached with it.

  I was almost always swollen with wanting but no matter how long I touched myself I never quite found relief. It only exhausted me and made me miss him more. My fingers traced one of the marks that still showed on my lower belly. I hated them and, at the same time, hoped they would never fade.

  I did okay in school, using my studies as a way to block out everything else. I was going to be spending the summer in Berkeley, staying in the dorms again, taking a Shakespeare in film class and European art history and looking for signs of Jeni. I had made the decision a few months before, with the thought that I’d get to see John, and now I wondered if it was a bad idea. I had found no trace of my friend and any interaction with John had taken me more off-course. The incident at the house in Los Angeles had disturbed me; even if the explanations were true, there were so many things about John and his friends that I didn’t understand and I still couldn’t face them. But being back with my mom and dad wasn’t really an option, either. It had felt too strange to curl up in the bed where I’d been as a child, just down the hall from where my parents slept, half-listening for my mom’s moans even in my dreams. I missed her but I really missed the mommy I’d had before she got sick, even though I hated to admit it. The mommy who was always able to take care of me and who seemed invincible and who was never in pain. And I couldn’t help Jeni from Los Angeles, even if Kragen was somehow involved in what had happened. I decided that until I figured out what to do next I’d stay with the summer-school plan and just use some self-control when it came to the house in the hills, even though I could feel it singing to me every night.

  I might have been able to keep away from that singing siren house longer if Lauren hadn’t done what she did.

  * * *

  A few weeks after I got back I opened my drawer and found the underwear covered with dark red stains.

  When I looked closer I saw that the blood had to be fake, ketchup probably. But it brought tears to my eyes anyway and my heart started pounding like an animal’s under attack. Just the fact that Lauren had gone to the trouble of taking my underwear out, pouring anything on it and putting it back in made my whole body feel as red as the mark she’d left.

  Worst of all the blood reminded me, as blood always did—though I didn’t let myself acknowledge the thought—that whatever had happened to Jeni must probably have involved it in some way.

  I sat down on the bed, trying to figure out what to do. Then I picked up my phone and texted John.

  He wrote back right away.

  Come over. Do you want me to get you?

  Yes, I wrote.

  I met him in front of my dorm and he drove me to the house. We hardly spoke the whole way. I was afraid I’d start crying or screaming if I even looked over at him. When we got to the house I looked at it with almost the same relief and trepidation that I had felt when I had seen his face as he pulled up in the dark. Its windows were glowing, heavy-lidded eyes and its front door was open, pouring out music like a mouth. John took my hand and I let him; we walked inside and up to the room with the damask drapes and the carved bed. He shut and locked the door, flicked on the green shaded art nouveau lamps and came to sit with me on the mattress.

  “Talk to me, lady,” he said. “I was worried.”

  I had to resist the impulse to put my head in his lap. I wanted him to stroke my hair forever, feel his fingers moving through the strands, touching my scalp. I would have shaved off all my hair to feel him hold my head even more closely.

  “I still don’t get what happened at that house,” I hissed.

  I thought that by being away from him the intensity of my feelings would have dulled, but instead they seemed even sharper. John paused, tugging on a lock of his hair.

  “I know. I’m sorry. It’s really strange. I asked Eamon more about it but he just said he wanted to paint the image when he found it. He literally has hundreds of clippings of those things.”

  My body was studded with goose bumps in spite of the warmth of the room. “Those things! That was her!”

  “I’m sorry, Ariel. I’m sorry you’re in pain but none of us meant to hurt you. It was just a really horrible coincidence.”

  I wondered again if what had gone wrong was my own mind, warped by a tragedy that I did not understand. My sinuses prickled.

  “Are you upset about something else besides the painting?” he asked. “About what happened with us?” I couldn’t see his face but I knew I’d find the anxious expression if I looked up.

  “No,” I whispered. “Not that.”

  I felt his hand on my shoulder and my whole body relaxed. I hadn’t realized how much effort I’d been using to hold myself rigid, how much tension there was all the way down into my bones.

  “Ariel,” he said. “What happened to your friend must have been so scary. It’s going to haunt you for a while. But it gets easier. I promise. I’ve been there.” He hesitated and it was as if I could feel his thoughts forming before he spoke them. “I’ve been better just since I met you.”

  He stared off into the distance. I couldn’t help it; my hand reflexively reached up and played with the strands of hair at the nape of his neck. His hair was always so cool, no matter how hot everything else was.

  Then I let myself slide down so my head was in his lap. My cheek rested against the thick denim of his jeans as he stroked my hair.

  “Why did you want to talk to me tonight?” he asked.

  I drew my arms around his thighs and squeezed. I felt a tremor run through his body.

  “I fucking hate my roommate,” I said. “I’m sorry; I sound like such a baby but I hate her. She’s a total bitch and I can’t get away from her and I don’t know why she hates me so much.” I rambled on, not making sense, and he listened and made compassionate sounds.

  “You didn’t tell us,” he said when I had finally shut up.

  “I didn’t want to sound like an idiot. Like I do now! I didn’t want to bother you with it.” I thought, but only fleetingly, Why did he say you didn’t tell us instead of you didn’t tell me?

  “Look,” he said. “Humans are cruel. They just are. I don’t really get it but you have to accept it on some level and then just stay away from the ones that won’t stop. It’s like if you look at animals. They’re stuck with people most of the time; they have to put up with it. But if they are with someone cruel they find ways to shut it out.”

  I nodded, my cheek against his thigh, and he went on.

  “This sounds random, as they say, but it’s not … There was this llama I saw once, at a petting zoo. It was so beautiful and perfect with these little cleft hooves and these long eyelashes and beautiful, long legs. She looked a little like you, actually. And she was in this pen with flies buzzing around her feet so she had to keep lifting her knees. And people were trying to pet her and feed her and she was staring off into space, ignoring them, not getting near to them, making this sad, high-pitched sound. I wanted to set her free so badly. I felt sick about it. But I saw that she was protecting herself in her own way. At least I hope so.”

  I closed my eyes and saw the llama in my mind. John was holding a little girl in his arms, holding her out to see the creature.

  “Ariel.” The way he said my name, in his deep voice, with such urgency, delighted and startled me at the same time. He lifted me gently off his lap and held me against his chest. “I want you to know that Tania and Perry and I have already discussed this and we want you to stay here with us if you want to. There’s an extra room. You can move in whenever you want.”

  That was all I needed to melt the rest of the way. Any resistance was gone. “Thank you,” I whispered.

  He took my chin in his hand and brought my mouth to his. The sweet, salty warmth of the kiss flooded my entire body. I clung to him and we fe
d as if we were starving. My hands flickered over the breadth of his shoulder, down his back; there was a pool of dampness that had soaked through his shirt at the base of his spine. I held onto his hips, massaged his thighs. He moaned and his head went back a little. I kissed the cleft in his chin, his throat. My face was prickling with the scratch of his stubble. He rolled me over on my back and gently lifted my T-shirt up, kissing my belly, which convulsed with pleasure at the touch of his lips. It seemed as if my organs were right beneath the surface of his hands, that he could almost touch them.

  As he moved toward my breasts they ached the way I’d imagine a new mother’s felt and I forgot about the marks. If anything, I was glad to have a reminder of him on my body. He kissed my nipples, sucking gently with his lips, then using his whole mouth and his hands to massage the flesh. I arched up, offering him more. I felt energy crackling back and forth between us like lines of electricity. I gasped, louder than I’d meant to.

  “Are you okay?” he asked. “Ariel?”

  “Yes. Yes.”

  “Can I keep kissing you?”

  I put my fingers deep into the cool of his hair in answer, guiding his head lower down.

  He sighed, working his way over my belly to the patch of hair between my legs. I had always kept it natural until once when Lauren, who shaved almost everything off, had stared at me in disgust when I was changing. I’d started shaving then, although not as much as she did. I was glad that he’d be able to get to more of me, though, and I thought, I’m actually grateful to Lauren right now, and then I had to repress a laugh.

  “Does it tickle?”

  I took his face in my hands. “No, it doesn’t tickle. Don’t stop, please.”

  He put his head back down and ran his tongue lightly over the top and center of my opening. Raspberry Swirl, I thought, like the Tori song. I pressed up against him, everything that was me focused in that one part of my body that was now his. With one finger he delicately parted me and felt inside for the swollen inner wall while he continued to kiss …

  * * *

  The girl crouched at the edge of the cliff. She was shrouded in a dark cloak, her head bent so I couldn’t see her face. She was shivering. The sky was filled with stars like pieces of broken jewels and the sea below the precipice was like tatters and shreds of dark silk. The girl was weeping and her tears mixed with the drops of saltwater that the wind lashed against her cheeks.

  Then the girl was in the room with me and John. She sat in the corner and I could hear her weeping.

  I realized that she was a part of me, a lost part, the part that had left when Jeni did.

  I wanted her to come back—I stretched out my arms as John kissed and caressed me—but she shook her head.

  * * *

  Tears slid down my face and I tried to stifle a small sob. John stopped kissing me. He lay his cheek on my pelvis, then slid up and took me in his arms, held me until my breathing regulated and I snuggled closer against him.

  “How are you doing?”

  “Still scared.”

  “About Jeni?”

  I nodded against his chest.

  “I know.” He paused, stroking my hair. “Are you scared of this?”

  I shook my head.

  “Because you’re safe here,” he said. “Maybe we can help you look for her.”

  I sighed and buried my face into his neck. I was only eighteen years old but it felt like I had been waiting for John Graves for centuries. I had found him but the waiting was not over.

  * * *

  After we had dozed for a while we woke at what seemed like the same time. The candles he’d lit had almost burned down to nothing, their flames flaring defiantly in the last moments of their lives, but the lamps were still on, bathing the room in verdant light.

  John propped himself up on his elbow. His chest seemed paler than usual, almost glowing in the darkness. There was a vulnerability about it, especially at the center. He looked very thin suddenly in spite of the breadth.

  I felt the hardness in my throat that was the first sign of more tears and I tried to dry-swallow it down like a pill but it wouldn’t move.

  He sat up the rest of the way and gestured for me to come into his arms. I wriggled up and pressed my head on his chest. Our eyes met and I felt a tremble of emotion move through my body, from deep inside, out.

  And then Tania came through the door.

  She stood in the doorway, silhouetted by the light from the hallway. Her hair was combed back away from her face and she wore a long red satin slip trimmed in lace. The roses clambering over her shoulders looked almost real. I had never seen her so beautiful and I wanted her to leave and I wanted her to come and sit beside me.

  “Am I interrupting anything?” she asked. Her accent seemed slightly more noticeable than usual.

  “Yes,” said John but she entered anyway and one of my wishes came true; she sat next to us on the bed and flicked off one of the lamps so that the room darkened. Somehow this seemed odd to me—why did she want less light?

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I was feeling lonely. Perry went out.” Her natural pout was even more exaggerated.

  John pulled the sheet up over his stomach. “You can’t just walk in like that,” he said spikily.

  She ignored him and turned to me. “Sylph? Are you all right?” She stroked the side of my face with her soft hand. I felt myself leaning into her without meaning to. “Are you still upset about Eamon?”

  “Of course she is,” said John, the barbed tone of his voice catching on the air.

  “Tell me what you’re feeling, baby.” Tania tucked her feet up under her in a cross-legged position and watched me carefully. She had never called me that before. I realized for the first time that I was naked and I reached for my T-shirt and held it over my breasts.

  “It doesn’t make sense.”

  Tania touched my leg under the sheet. “That must have been terrible for you,” she said.

  “Tania…” John’s voice had a warning tone but she didn’t pay any attention.

  “I’m so sorry,” Tania went on, speaking just to me. “I think that when things happen like that it can do weird things to us. To our minds. It’s a kind of survival mechanism. That happened to me when…” She paused. “We’ve all had losses,” she went on, her eyes flicking sideways at John, who turned his face away. “I think when people leave it does things. Believe me, I know. You can even have actual visions of the eidolon. It’s very powerful.”

  “Eidolon?” Like on the flyer from the Halloween party.

  “It’s from Poe. The image of someone that appears to us after they die. A kind of ghost. Perhaps a psychological phenomenon. Though, some would argue, not.”

  “Are you saying I didn’t see her in the painting?”

  “No, I’m not saying that. Eamon could have seen her picture in the papers. But I’m just saying that the mind is a magician, too. Especially the truly artistic mind.”

  My mind, the artistic mind, like hers. How did she always know exactly what to say?

  She stroked my hair again. “Johnny? Did you ask Ariel if she wanted to come live here?”

  I was suddenly afraid he’d retract the invitation so I spoke quickly, too quickly. “He did. Thank you so much.”

  “And you’ll stay then? Dorms can be nasty. I was miserable until I met my kin here.”

  John reached out and held my wrist, right at the pulse. “She needs to think about it,” he said. “Right, Ariel.” It wasn’t exactly a question.

  I looked over my shoulder at him. His brow was creased with worry. If I lived with them I could have every sensual pleasure I had ever wanted. “I want to stay,” I said. “If it’s still okay with you.”

  “Of course it is,” she said. She stood up and smoothed silk slip over sharp hip bones. “Now I’ll give you two some privacy.”

  And she was gone.

  * * *

  After Tania left I fell asleep in John’s arms. We slept restlessly, heating up under t
he blankets, tossing them off, our bodies reaching for each other while we dreamed and then woke again. Arousal shimmered along the surface of our skins until it was overcome by fatigue and dissipated for a little while again.

  I fell asleep thinking, You are going to live here; you are going to be free.

  * * *

  The next evening we woke and John wrapped me in a blanket, lifted me in his arms and carried me into the bathroom. He had run a tub full of bubbles that smelled like lavender.

  “What time is it?” I asked, yawning.

  “Almost dinnertime.”

  “I slept all day.”

  He smiled. “You’re catching on to our schedule.”

  “It won’t work. I have to go to class. And finals.”

  “We have something that will help with that,” he said. “Besides, I won’t keep you up all night all the time.”

  He pushed his boxers down off his hips and stepped into the water, then lowered himself modestly beneath the bubbles. His eyes watched me closely. I put my arms over my breasts, turned my back to him and got in, too. I leaned back against his shins and closed my eyes. The room was filled with steam, smoking the mirrors. This was the bathroom where I’d gone when I’d first been looking for Jeni in the house. I could vaguely make out letters written with a finger on the glass. It looked like it said Diaspora.

  “What’s that? Are you guys trying to improve my vocabulary or something?”

  He smiled. “Tania might be. It’s one of her favorite words. She says she feels like she’s not quite human. Like we’re all part of this other race that’s been displaced and relocated.”

  “I get it,” I said. “Sometimes I feel like that.”

  “You’re one of us.”

  I sank back against him, sighed and closed my eyes. He soaped my shoulders and back and I put my feet up on the edge of the bath and studied my toes. Even they suddenly looked like sex to me. John moved his legs and put them around me so that I slipped back against his chest. I could feel his erection pressing; I tilted my mouth up and he bent over and kissed me with a succession of deep but light kisses, moving his mouth away slightly for breaths between them.