Beyond the end

I promise

When Brenda landed the asphyxiating heat wrapped her as soon as the airport doors opened. Xavier walked by her side silently. They had greeted each other quickly, they had said little and nothing. Xavier was grateful for Brenda's presence. He knew it was a sacrifice for her and would cause her pain however he felt that Dylan was one step away from a chass. A deep hole from which he would not have risen. Not this time.
It was an attempt. A necessary attempt.
And Brenda knew that too.
She walked next to him, her face slimming, her eyes over the horizon.
She had decided to tell Brandon the truth. To tell where she would go and why. She didn't want to lie to his brother. An hard discussion had arisen. Brandon's resentment towards Dylan was abnormal And deformed his voice. Something he couldn't overcome but rather something that that fraternal love dilated. It seemed like he would never find a solution. It was devastating.
"I have to get him sign the waiver of rights to the show," she had told him to look for an excuse. Brenda really had to do it. Maybe not at that time but she had to.
Brenda e Brandon left badly on the phone and shehad promised herself to go to Los Angeles as soon as possible. To be with his brother at Walsh's house. Only them. To show him that she was fine and that he had to stop worrying about her. Because they could keep the world out. They could keep the pain at bay and go over.
When they arrived at the house, Xavier smiled at her.
"He's in his room. He stays there during the day, we don't know where he's going at night."
Brenda made a faint nod of understanding. As he walked in the heat deserted courtyard he felt that he was making a serious mistake and that he would pay for it. Exactly as Brandon had told him.
Brenda greeted Isabel and accepted something to drink with ice to try to tidy up her mind. Give her breath.
Dylan was across the door. Wrapped in the dark. Dark outside. Dark inside.
When Brenda opened the door the room smelled closed.
She walked up to the window and pulled away the curtains. A blinding light Flooded the room and then opened the window. The scorching air coming from outside came in to take the place of the smell of sadness.
Brenda approached the shutters in an attempt to provide some freshness.
When she turned around Dylan looked at her with his eyes wide open. Almost scared. She didn't know if she was alive or dead and if she was really there or the result of hallucination.
"You're here."
"I'm here," she replied with a smile.
"I've been looking for you so much."
"I know."
"I didn't know where I could find you." He said in tears.
"I know" Brenda looked around. The room was a real mess. Dress everywhere. Traces of despair "what are you doing Dylan?"
"Are you going back to me?"
"I don't want to talk about this now. I am here to help you. To solve things between us."
"Are you going to stay with me?"
Brenda didn't answer
"I don't want you here now if when I'm fine you'll leave again."
Brenda smiled.
"Don't offend you, Dylan but you are not really entitled to claim, let's get up."
"To go where?"
"To the sea," Brenda told him.
The simplest thing, the one that belonged to them because Brenda didn't really know where to start and decided to start from the most familiar place.
Dylan put on a pair of sunglasses and bad ideas.
He hadn't slept. He could feel his bones in pieces. And he constantly thought Brenda wasn't really there. Maybe she was like the ghost of the past who came to pick him up to take him away.
They sat at a small kiosk facing the sea, four wooden tables, a hut of palm leaves.
Dylan dropped a couple of coins on the table.
The brackish air fully entered the lungs of both.
"Who made you come here?"
"Xavier was desperate."
He nodded to understanding "I don't have to have a good look".
"Well neither do I."
"It's not true you're always beautiful. The most beautiful." He smiled as soon as "how are you?" He asked her.
"It's been hard D I don't hide it from you and it's not over yet. I'm afraid. But if I can tell, staying away from you worked."
"It didn't work for me. Where do you live? I was in London and the apartment was empty."
"I prefer not to tell you D I don't want to hurt you but I don't want to hurt me either."
"Yeah" he sighed, "so why are you here?"
Brenda knew the answer well but preferred to look away and admire a peace she had not tasted with her eyes for a long time.
"This place is magnificent, I understand why you love it so much."
"I love you too." Dylan Said.
"Yes," she replied, looking back on him, "But there's something I can't do anymore."
"What?"
"Being that us possible"
"Yes, that's possible."
"It's too painful for me Dylan. You know I wouldn't tell you if it wasn't like that."
"Nothing happened."
"I don't want to talk about this"
He grabbed her hands and repeated the same phrase "nothing happened." He was teary " Brenda I love you, and only you, I know well that I hurt you badly in the past, but I've come a long way to get back to you, I don't know why neither you nor Brandon you don't believe me, but nothing happened. Without you I am nothing Brenda, and I have never been able to tell you.
"Maybe, maybe not Dylan. But how can you expect a person to live with this doubt?"
He took his hands off hers and for the first time realized that he had lost her and that it didn't matter if nothing had happened, because there would be a later time, and a series of times that Brenda would have to face This thing and didn't have the strength, maybe not even the will. He realized that it was his responsibility, it was just his fault.
"So what do you want?" Asked Dylan
"When I left for London, years ago, I promised you that I would come back and I didn't. When I known what condition you were in, I wanted to come back every day, but I didn't, I'm here to honor my promise. And I'm here because the two of us are special Dylan. I Know we are and We've always been. I think we changed our lives from the first moment we saw each other and it's this being soul mates. I'm here to give you the courage to live that you don't have and end my journey with you.
"Please Brenda no... please" he broke down.
"And you have to go home to your son. You are missing the best. You're doing to him what was done to you."
"I don't feel like it now."
"You have a child and you allow yourself to pretend he doesn't exist."
Dylan looked at her and understood exactly what she was referring to.
He didn't know what to answer her.
She hadn't thought of Sammy. This is the truth.
"You're so focused on what you lost Dylan, that you don't even realize what that child loses every day. After what happened Brandon disappeared from his life, you as well. "
Dylan didn't answer. He felt like crying. Running away was his specialty. He didn't want to deal with things.
"Why?"
"You will have to take care of your child as I can no longer take care of ours"
Dylan remained in tears, in silence then raised his head towards her.
"The night you'll have to lock me in the room and not open for any reason"
"What?" Brenda asked.
"In the night you'll have to lock me in the room and put up with my insults. My cries. You have to talk to me. Abstinence is an ugly beast. Only like this can I get out of it. Do you think you can do it?"
Dylan had given up. Somewhere inside him the awareness was triggered. The desire to go back up.
To come back.
"You'll have to lock me in that room, for as long as it takes, and you'll have to stay outside, I need to know you're there. Crises will be terrible. You will hear me cry. You won't have to open for any reason."
Brenda nodded. Her courage spilled everywhere around.
Three weeks later.
When Dylan landed at LAX there was no one waiting for him. A classic of his.
Throughout the return trip he had thought back to every day of the last weeks. He inside a room. Brenda out. Nights to talk. To swear. Kicking at door. He wanted alcohol if she couldn't have her. Brenda was curled up out there. She felt the pain. His discussions. His explanations.
One day she left. He felt better. She was no longer behind the door. She wanted the end Brenda. She had made that last sacrifice for him behind the promise that he would take care of his son as she could no longer take care of theirs. He had to. He owed it to her and that unborn son.
He rang at Kelly's door.
And when she saw him the girl burst into tears.
"I thought you wouldn't come back," she told him.
He found her out. Defatted in some way.
Dylan told her about Brenda, what she had done for him and Kelly listened with a lost and sad look. He told her about Minneapolis. About London. About Ecuador.
"she is gone Kel" he said her teary.
"I'm sorry Dylan" Kelly answered sadly.
"Sammy?"
"He's with Erin, come back soon," she smiled weakly.
"How are you?" Dylan asked
"Alone. No one called me, David e Donna avoid me. Sometimes I called Andrea but it seems that no one wants to spend time with me. I only saw Steve. After tomorrow there is the presentation of the book. I guess I deserve it."
"Kel, somewhere we have to start again," he looked at her out of her eye "Brandon?"
Kelly's eyes reddened , the tears started to come out "he disappeared. I tried to look for him at work but they didn't even let me in. He doesn't live with Steve anymore. He changed his phone number. He is avoiding everybody because of me. He didn't come to say goodbye to Clare. Nat says he doesn't see him. I know it's in Los Angeles."
"How do you know that?"
"From the credits of the CBS news" a laugh escaped her and also Dylan.
"He took his things and left," Kel continued and the voice broken.
Dylan felt sad for her, just as he was sad for himself.
"Brenda will never come back," he told him, "it's a certainty, and Brandon will never forgive us. We were alone Kel."
"Yeah."
"What I don't understand is why they're so sure of what happened. I can't explain it to myself."
"Maybe because we've given bad demonstrations in the past. Because we never took the responsability of what we done"
That sentence bent Kelly. It must have been the very long days. The hard work of putting on a mask every day. SHe began to cry, her crying became irrepressible. SHe was soobbing.
"Hei.." Dylan got up and ran to hug her "Hey.. don't do that."
Kelly leaned in his arms looking for a comfort she couldn't find. It was as if for the first time she saw someone who was not hostile to her. That he wasn't judging her.
"I'm pregnant Dylan," she suddenly took him out of tears, "and I don't want to raise these children alone."
Dylan thought back to Brenda and the promises he had made to her.
He tried to reach her wherever she was with thought.
"I promise you Bren, I love you," he thought.