Back for You (Watty Awards 2012)

Chapter 12

I could tell right away that this wasn’t the real Jason. This wasn’t my Jason. This Jason was a mess. He was disheveled, rumpled, unshaven and looked like he hadn’t slept in days. Even from where I stood I could see the dark circles hanging low under his eyes. I shuddered and froze: he already looked dead.

         There was almost no energy left in me. The hours of dusting, investigating, my outburst in the library, and my conversation with Arthur had drained most of what I had. But with every ounce of what I had left, I ran to him.

         “ARTHUR!” I barely recognized the voice that came out of me. I barely felt I like I was touching the ground. Jason’s body whipped around to face me, and his tired face contorted into a horrific, familiar smirk. His mouth opened, but it wasn’t Jason’s voice that came out. It was Arthur’s.

         “You’re too late, Remi. This sap’s already made his mind up. Can’t say I blame him—have you looked at him lately?” Arthur threw Jason’s arms up and looked down at the wrinkled, scrawny mess that Jason had become. He laughed. “We wrote a nice little note and everything. You even got a mention!” The grin returned. It made me sick to see Arthur’s expressions on Jason’s face.

         “Get out of his body! Arthur, I will never be with you. Do you hear me?” I was trying to be calm, I really was. Keeping my voice steady at that moment was the hardest thing I’d ever done. I had never tried to rationalize with a psycho before. Not for something this important. Arthur shrugged Jason’s shoulders and grinned, and within another second Arthur’s form appeared beside Jason.

         Jason turned back toward the side of the bridge and I watched his chest heave with a deep sigh. His body was trembling but I watched him start to fish around in his jacket pockets. One by one he started pulling out debris and setting it on the narrow hand railing: a few crumpled receipts, a few guitar picks, some pocket lint. But then he pulled out something else. A small, black, velvet box.

         I watched his hands shake harder as he gripped in his palm so tightly that I thought it would get crushed. When he finally let go, I froze. My mouth and throat were completely dry as I realized what was in the box.

         “Jason…” I heard the word slip out of my mouth. Jason had tears in his eyes as he opened the little box. He had some difficulty with his hands shaking, but with some fumbling it was open. The ring was small, simple, and absolutely gorgeous.

         “Remi,” he choked. My eyes went wide. Inside I was a rush of emotions. I was ecstatic at what the ring meant. I was touched that he’d brought it here, to such a special place for us. Bursting at the fact that he wanted me, with all my flaws, forever. But I was terrified about why he’d brought it. Sick to my stomach that he planned for this to be the last night of his life.

         Out of the corner of my eye I saw Arthur grinning, leaning against a steel girder. Jason set the open box on the railing and took a step back. His chest was heaving faster now and I realized he was bracing himself. He shrugged off his coat and folded it neatly, placing it over the railing. His eyes were closed. This was it.

         I felt dizzy. Time seemed to go faster as I heard Arthur laughing, watched Jason’s shoulders rise and fall as he had the last moments of his life. My whole body felt like someone had lit me on fire and there was a horrible, distracting buzzing filling my head. It got so bad that I held my hands over my ears, desperate for anything to make it stop. The world was spinning around me; Arthur’s laughing, Jason’s sobbing, and the buzzing filled my head and got louder by the second. And then, it peaked.

         “JASON!” The scream left my throat. Raw, loud, and shriller than any noise I had ever made. I felt the echo of it bounce off the hills surrounding us and opened my eyes.