Paradise

FOUR

The next morning, I wake up suffocating, gasping, and wheezing, beads of sweat trickling down my face and hands feeling in my dimmed bedroom for something to hold on to. I don't know why I feel like I'm about to roll over and croak, shivers running over me like the extreme twist of a shower knob. First, I feel cold, then so hot that I actually stumble out of my bedroom and into the hall bathroom, turning on the shower and falling over.

The water is freezing cold, causing my eyes to tighten and goosebumps to appear on my skin.

It isn't enough though. I still don't feel...pure, manly, clean.

Still gasping, feeling like a hot iron had been shoved down my throat, I turn the knob for hot water, hot, blazing water.

This works.

It burns the monsters dancing circles upon my skin, sets fire to the battle scars, and drowns out the scream that escapes.

I stay in the shower, clothes soaked, brown hair hanging in my face, until I feel clean. Or at least as close to clean as possible. However, even when I step out, grabbing on to the sink for support and look in the mirror, I still see the claw marks. They decorate my face, across my left hazel eye, zig-zagging through my bruised lips and curving under my chin.

Someone screams, the voice scratchy like nails in my ears, and for a moment, I find myself thinking of the sun girl. Her smile stretching over her face like the sun on a Summer day, delicious and enviously perfect. I thought about what she'd said; that no one could make the decision. That the only person who had the authority to decide whether life was worth living was me.

I wonder what she would think if she had seen what happened the night before, heard the whoosh of balls rolling across the pool table, heard The Wolf growl, saw me set fire to my skin...

Would she think this was worth living or would she load the gun herself?

----------------------------------------------------

It takes the social worker two hours to realize something is wrong and when she does, disappointment oozes off her Southern Belle accent like honey off a beehive. Ms. Harley, who prefers to go by her first name of Elizabeth after a nasty divorce with her wife, goes by an unspoken motto; 'If they're not murdering you, everything's fine.' Pretty much how everyone thought in the system because no one cared unless you were dead on the floor in a bathroom and your school picture was on the news which, unfortunately happened to way too many kids I've known.

I don't tell Elizabeth about The Wolf. Not even when he finally stops doting hospitably to go to work, leaving us alone in the den itself. Elizabeth sat right on the grey IKEA sofa, nibbling off of The Wolf's chocolate chip cookies despite repeating several times she was breaking her smoothie diet, and I keep my silence.

Eventually, after eating nearly the entire plate of cookies on the coffee table, murmuring over and over again, "Oh dear, I shouldn't have," Elizabeth stands up and smooths the wrinkles on the hem of her plaid black pencil skirt. She rests a hand on my shoulder, obviously feigning her annoyance, and says what she always does. "Lucky, I'm here for you. Whatever you need, I'll be right there to help...now have you been taking your pills? You know you need to take them, Lucky, or your emotions will get all out of order. That might be why you feel so on edge."

She orders a fresh prescription of blue pills from the nearest CVS, promises to pick them up and deliver, and then orders me to take what I had left. Then with a final half-hearted hug, she saunters out of the beautiful, teal house, heels clicking loudly as she exits.

I always feel angry when Elizabeth comes over even though I shouldn't I be. It wasn't her fault that I couldn't speak up, the words rising and rising until they dissolved right on my tongue, or outspoken by something neutral like, "I guess I'm okay." It was like this with everyone, anyone who wanted to help, anyone who noticed something wrong, anyone who was obligated to care. I always got so close but then let it go, letting it fall so far away that I couldn't grasp the words again even if they were tangible.