Several hours later, Lisa had prepared a large dinner and everyone was present, including Helen, Celeste and Allen, who had left the house briefly to input his notes into his computer at the station, then showed up at the front door just before Lisa had set the chicken and the potatoes out on the table.
“Pass the…” Helen was interrupted mid-request by the boom of a thunder clap, “…corn, will you, Celeste?” she finished, holding her hands out to receive the bowl.
Just before Allen had arrived, a storm had gathered from out of nowhere and sped towards Ravenscourt, where it poured down incredible quantities of rain and banged out constantly-recurring thunder blasts.
Marc was surprised at how well and unceremoniously the meal seemed to be proceeding, and he wondered how long the simplicity of peace and lack of heated words would last.
The inner suspicion proved to be entirely true when Allen grinned and said, “I need a wine glass to tap on with my fork…Lisa, Ken, don’t you have any here?”
Lisa looked thrown. “No, there isn’t any wine glasses because we don't have any wine; Marc and Helen don’t drink.”
Allen was still grinning. “No matter, you can just get some later tonight.”
Ken glanced at Lisa. “Why?”
“Because over the course of the few months I’ve known you, you've all become like my family. I’m looking forward to the day when we declare to everyone that it’s true."
Marc looked at Celeste, then Lisa and Ken in turn, his face blanking.
He knew what was coming next.
“Helen and I are engaged,” he announced, the words falling like rocks into water.
For several moments, Marc couldn’t breathe, and he felt detached from his chair, as though watching the occurrences through a thick pane of glass.
He saw Lisa stand, cross the space between her and Helen, and hug her warmly. He saw Ken dip his head in acceptance and approval, smiling.
And as though he’d stepped out of his body, he saw himself, sitting at the table, looking like an idiot, his eyes locked on a non-existent point in space, blinking and hardly breathing.
He felt or saw (or maybe both) everything once again that he’d been through, from the violent fits between his mother and father, the screaming and crying, the divorce, then depression and how long he’d been trying to come to grips with it all. Every emotion, almost every thought and sensation zipped through his mind until he felt like a human powerhouse, thrumming with electricity.
“Marc?” Celeste touched his arm as she said his name. If she hadn’t, he probably wouldn’t even have heard her.
Marc startled slightly, then turned to look at her, so slowly that he felt every creak in his neck as he swiveled his face stiffly towards her.
“Are you okay…?” She asked, concern coloring her voice.
He still could hardly breathe; the leaden anvil had returned to its home on his chest and had fastened itself there with superglue. Nevertheless, Marc stood up, shaking his head over and over again, then walking up the stairs when he wished he could dash up them.
In the sanctuary of his room, he walked to the farthest wall, and slid down it, his back against the cold plaster, shaking with unreleased energy.
The lights were off, because he hadn’t bothered to flick them on, the only light at all coming from the crack he’d left in his open door.
Then the door was pushed open, and Celeste’s silhouette stood where blackness once had been. “Marc…” she said his name again, a whisper of breath on the air that was supercharged with the turbulence of the boy in the room, and with the electric power just outside the rain-drenched windows.
Marc glanced up; he was glad it was Celeste that stood there, not Lisa. He was so glad, because every time he saw his sister’s face lately, he felt like hitting her, and tonight, at the height of his emotions, he wondered if he may even do something worse than just slug her.
Celeste stepped into the black room hesitantly, kneeling on the floor with him.
“Life’s hard huh?” she asked weakly.
“You could say that,” Marc muttered hoarsely.
Celeste was willing to sit in the darkness, listening to the rain pattering against the window panes and the thunder blasting. The room was lit only by the occasional flashes of lightning that, when they came, turned everything an instantaneous white, and Marc would see the profile of Celeste’s face standing out in stark contrast and high relief.
“Do you want to talk about it?” she murmured.
“No. Not now,” Marc answered, looking up at her almost pleadingly; he felt the annoying expression on his face. “I just want to sleep and forget about this whole mess, I think.”
Celeste didn’t say anything, just stood up and walked out of the door, pulling it closed behind her, and looking over her shoulder only once.
Marc sighed when he realized he didn’t even want to crawl into bed. So he let himself topple over and he lay sprawled on the floor, staring at the ceiling.
Marc certainly didn’t expect any sleep, knowing that his mysterious insomnia would run rampant on a night like this, so instead, he did something totally unexpected: he broke down and cried, the noise of his weeping lost in the driving wind and rain.
