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Chapter 22

Charlotte O'Brien

The good old days. That's what I wanted, right? The days when I lived with my disability rather than felt crushed under the weight it, when I spent my nights listening to my parents debate over the importance of maple or chocolate syrup on pancakes, rather than soak my pillows with my tears, and when both of my best friends sat at the lunch table rather than one disappearing with a huff and the other holding me so close I couldn't breathe. I wanted it to be normal again. And normal was laying on the floor of Ric's room while down below his sister squealed how unfair her mom was for not letting her get a tattoo, and hardcore rock music from Ric's stereo mixed with his mother's Abba songs from her old record player. I had done this whole charade a million times, spending the night when we were younger and waking up to the smells of blueberry muffins and peanut butter, but now the whole thing felt so off balance. It reminded me of the time my family decided to go whale watching on a sail boat down at the wharf, and we weren't even out of the harbor before I was hanging over the side of the boat, throwing up the picnic lunch my dad had painstakingly put together.

I sat in Ric's desk chair, my knees crossed and my hands gripping my thighs. What was wrong with me? Ric was working on his laptop on his floor; the click of his fingers against the keys could barely be heard over the typical racket of the Legrand household. The scents of his bedroom swirled around me: boy sweat, peppermint, spicy cologne, and sweet ice cream. The situation was so normal, so common place, I could almost tell you exactly how the night would go. His mother would offer us snacks, his sister would pound on the door, begging for the infernal noise of his "music" to stop, and his father would peep his head in to see if there was a respectable amount of space in between us. It was like clockwork, one event leading smoothly into another. There was no ripple, no tear in the fabric, except for me. Me and my presence.

Whenever I thought about it, my cheeks flamed up with heat, and it felt like there was pinpricks across my scalp. The presence had tugged at my hair, pulled off my glasses, and done something in my parents' office. By all accounts, it should have been seen as mischievous, but I knew it wasn't. My hand warmed when I remembered how its hand had slipped into mine to offer comfort when I couldn't handle the day anymore. It offered me peace and companionship, not annoyance or cruelty. It was changing me. The presence was what was different and what was wrong with me. I remembered the odd dreams I've been having lately, and something was tickling on the edge of my thoughts. The way Tyler listened to me and what he said about how the Darkness was like being blind, it was so familiar, and so kind. Then the tickling on the edge of my thoughts hit me like a pillowcase full of bricks, and I realized how oblivious I was.

Tyler was the presence.

The presence was Tyler.

Maybe I was changing because I was slipping into the holds of insanity, but at that moment I didn't care. I had never had an imaginary friend when I was a child, so maybe this was my chance. I turned my head to where I could feel his energy; he seemed to be looking at Ric's vast library of CDs, thousands of songs he had illegally downloaded, bought, or even produced himself with the guitar he got for his tenth birthday. "Tyler," I whispered, my voice barely louder than a breath as Ric continued to clack in the background. Ric paused for a moment, and I could imagine him trying to gather his thoughts. Tyler's energy didn't move.

I ducked my head, feeling like a complete dummy. Maybe I really was crazy and should be going straight home to ask my mother for a cup of tea and a hug. But if I was that crazy, a cup of tea and a hug wouldn't matter. "Tyler," I said a bit louder, my voice cracking on the last syllable.

There was a breath of a pause where nothing happened, the music stopped as the song changed, Ric stopped typing, and it felt like my heart paused mid-beat. Then the presence-Tyler-was all around me, his warmth like a heated blanket, surrounding me and filling me with happy thoughts. I laughed as he ran around me, momentarily forgetting who and where I was as the warmth caressed the backs of my hands, my cheeks, my hair. It felt like light, like I had stepped into sunshine after a frigid winter. This is what looking at the sun must feel like. It must be.