Inevitable, page 5
I hopped into the doorway of the bus, leaning against the side and crossing my arms. You should’ve seen the look on Nathan’s face when he thought I was going to leave him there like that after what we just went through. His muscles constricted like he was going to have a heart attack. The least I could do was bring him along, right?
“So you coming?” I inquired, picking at the rubber as though it really didn’t matter to me either way. And now Nathan had a new set of choices before him. Would he really blow off everything he had to do to follow a strangely alluring young woman to destinations unknown? Considering his fragile emotional state, I had a hunch he might just go for it.
“What am I getting myself into now?” he reeled, following after me. I continued up the steps into the bus, starting down the aisle and sliding into one of the few remaining empty seats. Nathan sat next to me, his hip and leg touching mine ever so slightly. He was a fair bit larger than I was, taking up a good portion of the seat, but somehow I didn’t seem to mind being crunched against the window as long as it was next to him.
“Where is this bus going anyway?” he burst, on the edge of bewilderment.
“I guess we’ll just have to wait and find out,” I replied as it took off and joined traffic.
I didn’t talk for a while, instead choosing to watch the buildings go by and try to figure out how he was responding to me. Every now and then I’d sense him looking at me or my reflection in the glass. As long as he was doing that, I could trust he wasn’t worrying over Sasha or his family’s bills. I would take him as far away from those things as I possibly could.
“Are you still cold from being exposed? I could lend you my jacket,” he offered, and I finally shifted to face him. My elbow on the windowsill, I twirled a lock of hair in my fingers.
“That’s so sweet of you, but I’m not concerned about it. This body isn’t really mine anyway,” I quibbled.
“What does that mean?” he chuckled, completely absorbed in the ridiculousness of it.
“You’ll just have to use your imagination.”
Pursing his lips, he fought gently against my teasing. I went back to staring at the seat in front of us, much preferring to listen to him squirming with the mystery of it beside me.
“Come on, you have to tell me something!” he begged. “One more stop and we’ll be out of town. Do you know me somehow, or one of my friends maybe? What were you really doing in the bushes by the government office? How did you know that woman was going to throw away her clothes? Where are we going anyway?”
I just shook my head. These weren’t the kinds of questions I wanted to hear. He was focusing on all the wrong things.
“I don’t have to tell you anything, Nathan,” I said sternly. “I don’t know what you think this is, but I’m heading somewhere, and I don’t really know who you are or why you’re here. So forgive me if I don’t divulge any personal information.”
Crossing my arms, I went back to staring out the window.
“But, Apoxy, you asked me to come with you!” he argued, and I answered without looking back.
“I did, and now you’re here. So why does it have to be more than that? Right now, we’re just going somewhere, and there’s no reason to think about what came before or what’s going to come after. If that’s too much for you, we’re coming up to the next stop.”
This bus started to slow down, meaning Nathan’s chance to get off had come. He sighed, acquiescing. I knew he was just having trouble letting go of the need to figure out what was going on. I wouldn’t hold it against him.
“No, it’s fine. I could use a break from everything. Seems like it’s just been one bad turn after another, and even when I try and make things better for my sister and grandmother it never seems to stay good for long.”
I gave him a probing look, trying to figure out what he meant. The strain he was under was obvious, but there was something else hidden just underneath I couldn’t pin down. Maybe it was disappointment that he hadn’t done better for them.
“Tell me about your sister.” That’s all it took for Nathan to light up. He almost blushed as he flipped through his thoughts of her. No matter which ones he chose, they all seemed to cheer him up.
“Cammie is really one of a kind,” he began, nodding thoughtfully. “Sharp as a tack, a memory like a computer, and fierce when it comes to her convictions and what she believes in. You can just tell she has a bright future in front of her, that she’s going to do something important. I just wish I could do more to get her there, and if I’m the reason she gets held back I’ll never be able to live with myself. It’s safe to say she got all the brains in our family.”
“Oh yeah? And what did you get?” I asked.
Nathan rolled his eyes and leaned back in his seat.
“My stomach is like a bottomless pit,” he shrugged.
“That has its advantages too!” I laughed.
“Yeah, I could put a Chinese buffet out of business in one trip. But I try to use my powers for good instead of evil,” he reassured.
We kept talking as the bus moved along. I tried to keep the topics of conversation light and cheerful. He’d ask about me now and then, but let’s just say I wasn’t very forthcoming with the details. The buildings became sparser as we moved away from the city.
“Wow, we’re pretty far out here, aren’t we?” he gaped, watching the trees go by through the window as he leaned over me. “Do you live around here?”
“No, I don’t,” I answered.
“So you live back in the city?”
“I don’t live there either.”
“So you don’t live in the city and you don’t live outside of it…that doesn’t make sense. You have to live somewhere. Where is it?” he pried with a smile.
“I hate to break this to you, but I don’t live anywhere because I’m not alive,” I confessed with a shake of the head, sending the blonde hair attached to it swaying back and forth.
“You love teasing me, don’t you?” He was tickled, and I was glad for it, because I’d much rather be mysterious than lie to him about what I was. Right now, some attention from a down-to-Earth girl would be far more enchanting than a spirit from infinity meddling in his life.
“Oh look! We’re just about here!” I said, sending Nathan’s eyes toward the window, where he viewed an unbroken chain of trees. Confused, he turned his attention back to me.
“Where are we?” he wondered.
“I don’t know…here,” I answered to the best of my knowledge.
“Those aren’t even your clothes. You obviously don’t have any money,” he concluded. “How are you expecting to pay for the bus?”
Pretending to worry, I glanced down at our feet as the bus came to a harsh stop. He did the same, and together we watched a twenty-dollar bill slide under our seat and get lodged between his feet.
“Looks like it’s our lucky day!” I grinned. He picked up the bill and marveled at it in his hand.
“This is unbelievable! Do you have any idea how rare it is to find money on the floor of a bus? If anybody else had seen this there’d be a riot!”
“Maybe you need to ride the buses out of town more often. They work a little differently. Come on, let’s go,” I urged him, but he couldn’t let go of it even as we moved toward the front and paid for our trip.
The bus had stopped at a small grocery store that doubled as a bus station in a one-streetlight town. There were a few houses here and there, but mostly sparse woods still covered the bulk of the land. The bus pulled away, leaving us behind.
“I think we got off at the wrong stop,” Nathan concluded, uncertainty all over his face.
“No, we didn’t. Come on.” I took his hand to pull him along, which seemed to get his attention real quick. Considering the hard labor he did, his hand had some roughness to it, but it still felt warm. When he pulled even to me, I let it go, not wanting to give him too many ideas.
We didn’t have far to go. We passed the grocery store and a thick section of trees that had shed most of their leaves when we came to a small grove in the woods. Immediately, the sound of children laughing hit our ears, and I turned to watch Nathan’s reaction because I knew how thrilled he would be.
It wasn’t even a park, just a clearing in the trees where a handful of eight-year-olds were playing. They’d dragged a trampoline out here and were leaping from it onto a ten-foot-high pile of leaves that they’d raked together. Completely delighted, these boys and girls flung themselves into the massive pile, swimming away just before the next one hit.
The scene appealed to all of Nathan’s boyish enthusiasm. It was the pure fun of youth that got to him, and he appeared moved by something so innocently astonishing and simple.
“That looks so dangerous…and so awesome!” he cheered.
“I think your turn is coming up next!” I urged him, and together we jogged over to join the children in their Sunday afternoon games. As good-natured kids so often do, they welcomed us into their group, doubly excited that “big people” wanted to play with them.
“Go ahead!” one boy called to Nathan when the last of his friends had cleared from the trampoline.
“If you insist,” he acquiesced, kicking off his shoes and socks and setting his feet in the orange and red leaves. Reveling in the moment, he climbed onto the trampoline and hopped out to the middle. These kids must’ve spent all morning raking together leaves, and there were just a sea of them stretching out in front of Nathan.
This wasn’t a small trampoline, and Nathan was not a small guy, so it wasn’t hard for him at all to gain some serious altitude. The kids were holding the sides of the trampoline as he soared in the air above them. He had the most delighted smile plastered on his face.
“Whoa!” all the kids called in unison as Nathan launched himself toward the leaves. He soared through the air, spreading his arms and legs wide before he collided face first against the huge fluffy mass. He was laughing and sinking and rolling around.
“You next!” another one of the kids called to me.
“Me? But I don’t know how. I think you’d better show me,” I suggested, allowing the kids to take another run before I climbed up myself. The springy mesh felt cool beneath my feet before it sent me shooting into the air. For a second, I felt weightless, which is what it feels like to be suspended above time. Everyone watched me as I propelled myself forward into the colorful heap of leaves. They held me when I fell into them, brushing against me everywhere. There were so many sensations running through this body, and they all felt thrilling.
“Hey, you’ve got something in your hair,” Nathan noticed, reaching for a leaf stuck near the side of my head. While he removed it, I felt his fingers softly pressing against me, and I have to admit that felt nice too.
“What are your names?” one little girl asked. She had on a puffy pink jacket, and Nathan kneeled down beside her.
“My name’s Nathan, and her name is Apoxy.”
“She’s pretty,” the girl observed, making me blush. Nathan didn’t seem inclined to argue.
“That’s sweet of you to say. You’re very pretty too. What’s your name?” I asked.
“Vanessa,” she squeaked before sensing an opening and diving onto the trampoline to take another turn. We jumped and jumped until our legs were sore and we had bits of leaves coming out of our ears. It never seemed to get old, especially to the kids who started leaping in all the funniest poses.
“Wait!” I called to Nathan as he was about to take another jump.
“What?” he asked, but I was already climbing onto the trampoline to join him. Soon both of us were bouncing up and down just inches apart, letting gravity work its magic against us. Our hair whipped around but we managed to find each other’s eyes, and it made me so happy to see how carefree Nathan seemed.
“Ok, ready? One…Two…Three!”
We flew through the air together, landing in the soft bank of leaves. We fell on our sides, and soon we were motionless, giggling side by side, entranced in each other. He looked so handsome and I couldn’t look away from him. But for everything I saw in him, I had a good hunch about what he saw in me.
Have you ever watched someone fall in love with you? It’s almost impossible to detect because it’s not any specific action or movement. It’s almost the absence of movement, when that feeling just washes over him and all of a sudden he begins to exude love. That’s what I saw in Nathan in that moment, while we waded in a pile of colorful leaves.
I thought he was going to kiss me when he craned his neck the tiniest bit and his eyelids started to appear so heavy, but the kids had other plans.
“Oomph!” we groaned together as a pair of kids smacked into us, their flailing bodies sprawled on top of us. How foolish we were to have a moment when we were right in the line of fire and there were children waiting behind us.
We climbed out of the leaves, still wondering what might have happened if we hadn’t been interrupted, when one of the boys started acting up on the trampoline. He’d lost control of himself and was jumping higher than he could handle.
“I’m gonna do a flip!” he crowed, and before anyone could do anything he was spinning head over heels in the air. But he wasn’t moving forward enough to make the leaves, and it looked like he would crash into the metal edge of the trampoline. His hands reached out at the last second, catching the bar and swinging him over onto the ground. Shocked, he just held himself there for a moment, wheezing.
“You got lucky there, but let’s not try that again,” Nathan said to him, though he was looking at me when he said it. It made me nervous to wonder if he knew I had been involved. Luckily for me, I was saved by the sound of a bell ringing from the house across the street.
“Pumpkin carving!” the kids cheered, abandoning the leaves and rushing for a house covered in Halloween decorations. Vanessa was pushing Nathan’s back to make sure he came. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she liked him. Soon we were at a long picnic table in the backyard when one of the kid’s mothers emerged.
“Looks like you made a few friends. How nice. There’s more than enough pumpkins for everyone!”
The mother gestured over to the side of the house where they had their very own pumpkin patch. Vines and big orange pumpkins were taking over the lawn, but the day to fight back against them had finally come. We all started crawling through the patch, hacking through the thick stalks and hauling the pumpkins back to the table. One kid wanted one that was so big Nathan and I had to carry it together.
Soon I was sitting in front of a modest pumpkin, wondering how best to rip out its insides. It’s funny how I know what lots of things are, but using them or doing them is a little beyond my experience. I tried to just copy what the kids were doing, cutting a hole in the top, but Nathan must’ve been observing me pretty closely because he came over to help.
“Here, just like this. Cut at an angle so the lid doesn’t fall inside.”
“Thank you,” I said, a little embarrassed that I needed a demonstration and yet secretly pleased that he had given me one. The day seemed to be going so well, which wasn’t a surprise to me at all, but it was still nice to watch it happen.
The kids were busy burying their arms inside the pumpkins to scoop out the innards. A massive pile of pumpkin slop collected on the center of the picnic table. Nathan looked hard at work, almost ready to begin to carve a face into the side. He looked a bit too serious for my liking though, and I had to come up with a way to change that. All of a sudden a little bit of pumpkin filling smacked into his cheek.
The kids started laughing immediately, and Nathan just gawked in disbelief. He quickly reached into his pumpkin to pull out more of the orange insides and fling them at me.
“Ahh!” I squealed, trying in vain to block them. Ok, maybe I let him hit me, but that’s half the fun. The kids didn’t hesitate to dig their hands into the pile of goop and soon there were pumpkin bits flying every which way. Pumpkin seeds, juice, and guts coated us all in minutes. It was so funny and we couldn’t stop laughing.
Soon we were all attacking Nathan, and he tried desperately to fight us all off. Some of the kids were using their pumpkins as shields, and the one child who already had a face in his set it on his head as a helmet.
“What’s going on here?” the mother gasped when she exited the home’s back door. Everyone froze, though it was clear everyone was guilty. “Who started this?”
“It was your son!” I accused, and the kid went pale.
“Good boy!” the mother laughed, putting us all at ease. She snickered light-heartedly before saying she’d go back inside and try to find some towels.
We sat back down to continue our carving, and while I was cutting out some eyes I happened to catch Nathan glancing at me now and then. Whenever I’d look at him, he’d quickly look away as though it had all been an accident.
All of the pumpkins turned out beautifully. They were ghoulish and scary and so artful. It was just getting dark when it came time for us to leave, allowing us to get a glimpse of what they’d look like in the dark with a candle inside. We’d cleaned up as best we could, though we both had spots on our clothes and smelled powerfully of pumpkin.
Waving goodbye to the kids, we thanked them for playing and wished them a great Halloween tomorrow and a good haul of candy. They were all sad to see us go, but we had to get a move on if we were going to catch the bus I knew was coming. It pulled up right as soon as we returned to the grocery store. Hopping on, we took our seats and started our trip back to the city.
We were quiet for a while, exhausted but pleased. I knew this day would be the perfect way to impress him, and to be honest I enjoyed it as well. Plus it hadn’t ended in disaster, which surprised me, even though I knew it would happen eventually. I’d been walking a fine line, trying to make him happy without leading him on, but by the way he looked at me I knew I’d crossed it. That must be the disaster that waited for us ahead, the moment when he realizes he could never have me because I don’t exist.
