Ten Years After: The Lost Girl and the History Book (CK)

[Izulde]

"He's dead."

[Poli]

There goes the neighborhood.

[Wolfpack]

"He's dead, Jim."

How can you consider yourself to be a Star Trek fan and not get this right?...wait, this isn't a Star Trek thread?

[Izulde]

Poli:

Wolfpack: Never did care for Star Trek and actually not a fan of space settings in general, with the exception of Star Wars and the Young Astronauts series of books.

Edit: Or whatever series that is where the young astronauts go to colonize Mars.

[Celeval]

So will this have a CK component as well?

[Izulde]

Originally Posted by Celeval

So will this have a CK component as well?

Yep.

[Cap Ologist]

Will it be written faster than one sentence per week?

[Izulde]

Originally Posted by Cap Ologist

Will it be written faster than one sentence per week?

Maybe. I've just been busier than expected lately.

[Izulde]

"What? Who's dead?"

"Bobby Schwarzwald. Caveman. He killed himself. Shot himself in the chest."

I scream, scream with the pain, the shock that shoots through me. No! No, this can't be real! Not Bobby!

"Becky, calm down! It'll be okay, just calm down."

But I can't. Not right away. It takes me a few minutes of shaking and sobbing and I'm still dizzy with disbelief as I cling to his voice over the phone.

"Why? Did he... leave a note or anything?"

"I don't know. All I know is what happened. Look, do you have anyone nearby you can talk to?"

"No. I... It's a long story. Can... Can you come?"

He hesitates, a pause that slashes across my heart, ripping open the old wounds, but I'm in too much shock to notice it outside of the stinging.

"We'll be there on the next flight."

"No! Please, don't bring her! I can't face her right now! Not after..."

He sighs and I squeeze my eyes, trying to hold back the snuffles of another set of tears.

"Look, here's what I'll do. We're both coming, but I'll arrange it so that you don't see her until the funeral. I'm sorry, but that's all I can do."

"Thank you, Nick", I hiccup.

"I'll call you when our plane lands."

I drop the phone after we hang up, run to the bathroom and vomit in the toilet just before passing out on the cold, white floor.

[Cap Ologist]

get your ass writing

[Izulde]

Originally Posted by Cap Ologist

get your ass writing

Patience.

[Izulde]

I wake up to the feeling of acid in my mouth. The kind of sick aftertaste from vomiting that makes your throat gross and your teeth feel like they'll never be clean again.

With still unseeing eyes, I reach up and flush the toilet, feeling the cooling, airy mist spraying up from the bowl to refresh my face as fresh water rushes in where the blobby blotches of my breakfast banana floated however long ago.

I don't know how much time's passed and I'm still in a fog as I slump against the porcelain of the clawfoot tub, one of the few things in this old house that doesn't frighten me at night.

And that's when I remember again.

That Bobby's dead.

I groan and force myself to get up, make myself half-stumble, half-crawl through my kitchen, the dining room, until I throw myself onto the threadbare brown carpet.

The fabric's grainy firmness is soothing in a way that I can't explain. Maybe it's because it lets me know that there's still something solid, something real in this world that isn't too hot or too cold, too light or too dark. It's the happy medium.

I lay there for a while, shoving away the thoughts, the memories of Bobby. Think instead about what absolute shit my life has been since college. Think about how I damned near cost Nick all his happiness.

I need to see him. To touch him, even if it's just to hug him or shake his head. I'm in a desert and he's the oasis that saves me.

But can't think about him too much or it hurts just as bad as thinking about B..Caveman. Yes, I'll try to think of him as Caveman. The asshole. The fucking rapist. He -deserves- to be dead.

I feel a little better, thinking that, enough to haul myself up into a chair and curl, ball-like into it.

The other girls in my life are all having happy lives after they graduated. Grad school for some, babies and marriage or marriage and babies or just babies or just marriage or others. Or they're doing something they love.

What have I done these last six years?

Nothing. Not a god damned thing worth mentioning, that's what.

But I can't just sit here. I've got to get ready.

Nick's coming. He's coming to rescue me from myself.

[Izulde]

I spend the next day giving the dusty, dirty house a scrubbing like it has seen in years, dusting, vacuuming, washing the old wallpaper, brushing out the toilet and so on.

To be honest, there isn't that much to do. I don't have much in this house, only a small pair of bookshelves to hold my books and DVDs, a modest TV, a couch, a chair or two, a battered dining table I got from the Salvation Army and the furnishings that were here when I moved in.

The truth is, I don't even need this two-story, as I only use the first floor. But it was on the market for cheap and nobody wanted to buy it because a woman was murdered in the upstairs bedroom about 15 years ago. Some people say it's haunted by her ghost and sometimes, late at night, I think I hear her moaning and wailing.

It scares me, but not enough to move.

I pass the night before Nick's due to arrive spending time with Little Nick, the whirr of him and my own moans and cries overpowering any spectral presence. My body grows warm and flushed, then hot before I tumble over the edge into an oblivion of pleasure and pain, crying out with my release as I imagine Nick taking me, loving me again as he did before. It's happy, but tinged with sorrow because it's not him in me and Little Nick can only be a weak substitute for the reality of him in me, on me as I once knew, his own groans echoing off the walls of my room in the sorority house.

He calls me when his plane lands and says he'll be there later that night. I wanted to meet him at the airport but he refused because Melody was with him, and... no, I don't want to think about that, so I won't.

I take a long, hot bath and dress in a clinging, sheer black silk robe as I wait for him to arrive. It's pretty, appropriate for mourning because of its color, but also stimulating I hope, because of its transparency. I want him to want me and so I go braless, letting my breasts be only partially concealed by the fabric.

The waiting after his call is unbearable, the minutes dragging insufferably by as I pace in the living room.

And then, finally, the doorbell rings.

I rush to open it and there he is.

He's grown more handsome than ever before. He's put on weight, but it looks like muscle, because even the loose-fitting white button-down shirt and the black, neatly pressed slacks can't hide how toned he's gotten.

He smiles at me with such sadness, such tenderness, that I can't stop myself.

As he's in the middle of saying hello, I rush forward, throw my arms about his neck and kiss him hard on the lips, thrilling to the smoky taste of his lips.

"Oh, Nick... I've missed you so much!"

[Izulde]

I feel his hands on my shoulders and for a brief, dreamy moment I think he's going to kiss me back.

But then he's pushing me away, his voice as firm as his hands.

"No, Becky. No."

I stumble back, nearly tripping over my feet and just stare at him.

He sighs and looks at the thin carpet between us.

"Look, it took a lot for me just to convince Melody to let me stop by here."

Anger surges through me and I'm glaring at him now.

"What?! Nick Hunter, are you even a man anymore?! Or has she cut off your balls?!"

He levels me with a hard look and I shrink back in spite of myself.

"Come off it, Becky. You can't blame her. Not after the crap you pulled. If I were her, I wouldn't want me coming over here either."

"I was just a 20 year old girl! I wasn't even old enough to drink!"

"And you're a 30 year old woman now, throwing yourself at a married man! What's wrong with you? You don't even seem upset that Caveman killed himself."

"...I need a glass of water."

I whirl around and stomp out to the kitchen, hoping that he'll be there when I get back. Not that I would blame him if he left. It was a terrible thing I did, after all.

Out in the kitchen, I pour myself a glass of water and set it on the counter, just staring at it.

Nick and Melody's wedding was an amazing event. The Baron's in Theta Sigma Phi too, apparently, so fraternity members from all across the world flew in to attend the ceremony. And that's not even counting all the rich, the famous and the nobility there.

As you can imagine, Drake's girlfriend was absolutely beside herself with delight, especially when Melody asked her to be one of her bridesmaids. I was one, too.

Only I wasn't just a bridesmaid. I was her maid of honor.

"You're the only friend I had in college", Melody told me over $20 coffees. "To tell you the truth, I'd feel pretty ashamed if I didn't have any of girls from the university in my party. It'd make it look like I couldn't find friends there, that I was an outcast."

I don't know why I accepted, but I did. Maybe because Melody really was a friend of mine, one of the few non-sorority girlfriends I had, so I understood where she was coming from. Maybe, too, because Melody's one of those girls that even women can't say no to, no matter of how jealous of her we might be.

Drake's girlfriend and I were the only ones of the bridesmaids who weren't the daughter of Count so and so or Important Family such and such. Like I said, Drake's girl was absolutely thrilled and we honestly all had great fun planning together. Melody loosened up too, around us and showed a side of her that was warm and friendly, a side that I don't think too many people know about.

And then I had to go and ruin it all.

It was a splendid cathedral the ceremony was in, a church at least 800 years old, in a seaside city in Italy. Even now, in this crumbling house, I take a breath as I think about the beauty of the Gothic architecture, the immensity of the altar and the mass of gorgeously and handsomely dressed people filling the pews.

Drake was the best man, of course and a lot of other fraternity guys were Nick's other groomsmen. His parents were so proud and the Baron was happy too, happy because his daughter was happy and even Mrs. Suchet was telling everyone that Nick was, "a fine young man, who really knows how to talk to people the right way."

Some archbishop whose name I've long since forgotten administered the service and despite the beauty, despite the wonder and fairy tale quality of it all, my stomach churned and my throat burned with acid jealousy. -I- wanted to be the one standing beside Nick, -I- wanted to be the girl wearing the lovely 15th century wedding dress. -I- wanted to be the one he was love in with.

And I guess that's why, when the archbishop asked if there was any objection, I spoke up.

In front of everyone there, I said the words that will live on forever, become the punchline of stories for years and centuries after.

"I object!" And when all eyes were on upon me, I said the words I still privately regret, late at night, when the ghost moans and my heart breaks again and again.

"I'm pregnant.. and it's Nick's."

The uproar that followed was absolutely horrible, the din of surprise and anger so heated and thick I wouldn't have been surprised to look at the altar and see hellsmoke and Satan's laughing form there instead of the cross.

Melody whipped around and gave me a look of such hatred that for a moment, I wished I'd fallen dead on the spot. I didn't even see Nick's face and couldn't look at him even if I was able to. I was too trapped by the frozen fury in her eyes.

It was all a lie of course and the truth was eventually found out. They married officially a few months after that, but from what I hear, a lot of the joy had gone out of it.

All because of me.

My eyes mist over with tears and I find myself sniffling and wiping my nose as I pick up the glass of water.

I know it was a horrible thing to do, to betray my friend like that as her maid of honor and to embarass her on her wedding day and embarass the man I love, too, but I couldn't help it.

I couldn't stand to lose him.

I found out later, when Nick called me to inform me that they were married, that she'd known that he slept with me. Something about their being completely honest with each other that I didn't pay much attention to because darts of pain were stabbing themselves again and again in my heart, in my head, in my entire body.

We hadn't spoken since then, though I dreamt about and longed for him every waking hour after that. When he called to tell me about Bobby, that was the first I'd heard from him in nine and a half years.

Forcing myself to be calm again, I walk out to the living room with hesitant, fearful footsteps.

I don't let out a breath again until I see he's still standing there, leaning against the door, his lips grimly set.

"I don't think it'd be a good idea for you to go the funeral, Becky."

"I don't care. I'm going anyway. If it's me bothering you that you're concerned about, don't worry. I won't even speak to you if that's what you want."

His face sags and he lets out a sigh, closing his eyes.

"Please, don't be like this. Tell me, what's been going on with you? I mean, it's been a long time since we've seen each other."

Like I didn't know that already, I want to shoot back at him, but instead I take a sip of water and shrug.

"I'm an assistant manager at T.G.I.Friday's. After you graduated, I got really depressed and my grades slipped spring semester to the point where I lost my scholarship. I needed money for school then, so I started waitressing there. I liked the job and the people okay and didn't really have anything else come up after I graduated, so I stayed there and worked my way up. It's not bad. I like my co-workers and it pays the bills."

He nods, those beautiful green eyes of his searching my face. Other men might ask if I was happy, if I was seeing anyone and so on, but not Nick. He can read people and he can read me, finding the answers he might want without even having to ask.

"Well, I better get back. Louie wants me to read a story to him."

Another jab at my heart. A reminder I don't want.

"You named him Louie?"

Nick smiles, a smile that's all the more hurtful for how gentle and loving it is.

"Louis, actually. He's the oldest. Then there's Nicholas, Jr. who everybody calls Nicky. And then our youngest is our daughter, Alix."

I can only nod and he nods back, saying that he'll see me at the funeral if I go.

It isn't until he's gone and the door's shut that I throw myself on the floor, wailing with grief while the water spills out of the glass, seeping into my robe and making the blackness cold.

Chilly.

Like death.

[Cap Ologist]

nice work so far, keep it up

[Izulde]

Originally Posted by Cap Ologist

nice work so far, keep it up

Thanks. Although I can't promise the speed of updates, this story will go on.

[Izulde]

It's quiet, like churches and chapels usually are. White walls, oak pews that gleam from careful scrubbing, tall, softly glowing candles at the plain altar with a single cross for decoration.

It's pretty, in a simple way.

Nick said I couldn't attend the funeral, but he didn't say anything about the wake and so here I am, in a drab black dress that shows nothing.

On TV, there's always lots and lots of black. I don't know how it is anywhere else, but here, in the Midwest, there's a lot of different colors. Chubby men and boys wearing long-sleeve dress shirts of dark blue or maroon or something else sufficiently somber, yet still weirdly eye-catching. Women wearing blouses and pants, none of them pretty, either in dress or body. A few of them still have some bits of young beauty in their bloated faces and triple chins, but you have to look closely.

I'm sitting in a corner in a back pew, doing my best not to be noticed. It's easy to do, because everyone's in little clumps, talking in low voices about what a tragedy it is or about the weather or their jobs. Small talk, thin talk that doesn't mean anything because they don't want to be here. Don't want to have to take time out of a beautiful fall Saturday afternoon to pay respects to a bastard nobody liked.

It's strange that they're having services in a Christian chapel. Bobby wasn't Christian and hated Christianity, as he told me one night...

You see, he used to get stoned with his fraternity brothers, get all high and excited and then he'd come looking for me. I'd take care of him with my hand or my mouth and he'd settle down then. He never did the same for me and refused to put it in me until that night he raped me. The asshole used me and used me and used me and like a dope, I kept giving him what he wanted, because I thought I loved him.

Anyway, after I finished, he usually wanted to talk and I remember one time he said, "Gandhi said Christianity was a good idea, but Gandhi was a liar and a hypocrite in a lot of ways. Nobody's a saint, Becky."

"So you think we're all sinners, then?" I asked.

I remember he looked at me, all thin arms and hairy, potbellied stomach, and laughed in the strangest way. It was a real laugh, but disturbing too, in a way I can't explain.

"No. There's no sin. Religion's a lie, too. The only truth there is that everyone's self-interested. Good, evil, love, hate... they're all just different ways of people trying to inflate their own egos and make themselves look and feel good."

I didn't answer him, because I didn't know what to say. He was unlike any other boy I'd ever known and maybe that's part of the reason why I kept letting him come back. Partly too, perhaps, because he evidently never told anyone about the things I'd do for him. Nobody ever mentioned it to me and nobody teased me about it like people normally do when they find out you're intimate with someone else.

Even now, I'm not sure whether to be glad he kept quiet or angry because he never publicly acknowledged me.

I stare up at the coffin, cherry wood and more beautiful than he deserves. I haven't gone up yet and looked at him, but I need to. It's the reason I came here, after all. To see him one last time, to know that for once and all, the man I hate most is dead.

I stand up and join the short line. I don't know where Nick is, though I saw Melody a while ago, breathtaking in a turquoise and black ensemble. She didn't see me and I of course wasn't even going to think about talking to her.

The people in front of me have their looks and murmur their muffled, useless goodbyes before they shuffle off. I don't know if his parents are here or anything like that. I'm sure they are, but I haven't bothered to find out, because I don't care for one and for two, I don't know what they look like.

I step up to the coffin and look in. He's dressed in a finely tailored black three piece suit with a preposterously bright and cheerful red, white and blue tri-color tie. I'm wondering why that tie when I remember that he spent a semester in Paris. He talked about it a lot his last semester before he graduated. Said he missed it and if he had the opportunity, he'd move there.

Now he never will.

It's a thought that makes me smile as I lean in and whisper, "You fucking prick... I'm glad you killed yourself and I hope you're rotting in hell right now. May all the demons in it rape you again and again until you bleed and scream like I did. Goodbye, Bobby."

I straighten up and turn around. There's some people starting to come down, including a woman with greying, curly hair who looks a little like Bobby, talking to... Nick.

My stomach's churning, the McDonald's I had for breakfast threatening to come up again. Nick's so handsome, so calm as he talks to the woman. I want to run up to him and kiss him like when he came to my door.

I...I can't hold in it... I'm going to throw up...

I whirl around, lean into the coffin and puke two sausage biscuits and a hash brown on Bobby's cold, clammy enbalmed face before passing out.

[Cap Ologist]

bout time.

[Izulde]

Originally Posted by Cap Ologist

bout time.

Thanks.

Though honestly, I'm not sure if I'll manage to finish this one. Writing 1st person with a female character, even one I think I know pretty well by now, is difficult since I'm so out of practice with it... and I've been getting burnt out on writing narrative dynasties.

[Izulde]

I awaken to the flicker of candlelight and the sweet smell of incense.

The room's dark and I can't make out any details, even with the illumination of the candles.

"Ah good. You're awake."

I hear the shuffle of feet and my eyes shutter against the sudden influx of light as a switch is flicked on.

When my eyes open again, I see him standing there.

No, not Nick.

Pudgy, serenely smiling Father Domingez in his clerical garb. I haven't seen him since the last time I went to church, about ten years ago now.

"Hello, Becky."

I slowly sit up, blinking. As I gradually get used to the light and being awake, a small shock shoots through me.

"I'm in my old room..."

My old room at the sorority house. Not the one I had during my last few years, but the larger one used for groups of pledges who want to stay in the house during their noviate period. There's the familiar three bunk beds, the desks and the old, oddly comforting grey couch, which I discover I'm presently lying on.

The priest smiles and nods, interlacing his fat fingers on his protruding stomach.

"Yes. You've been asleep for about 12 hours now. It's about 1 o clock in the morning. Did you rest well?"

I'm still not fully with it and the incense isn't making things any easier. Seeing him here, being in this room again.. it's all so strange. Surreal, like a dream.

"I guess so. I mean, I must have if I don't remember anything, right?" I pause and bite my lip, "Is Bobby.. you know...?"

"He's fine. You caused quite a stir when you upchucked on him, but the funeral director was able to get him cleaned up and he was buried good as new."

"Too bad. It would've served the bastard right to wear vomit for all eternity."

Father Domingez chuckles, looking for all the world like a brown Buddha as he sits there on the room's only chair, "There are worse desecrations, you know. For example, King Louis the Great of Italy had his body thrown in the sea by his own son and to this day, his body has not been recovered. At least Bobby's whereabouts will always be known."

I shrug, irritation cutting through my confused haze.

"It's more than he deserves. What am I doing here anyway?"

He smiles again, patting my hand.

"Resting up, of course. That and the house was closer than your house, so it was more expedient. You'll have to go home tomorrow though, so you can pack and get ready."

Shock replaces irritation and I bolt up, all cloudiness gone.

"What?! What are you talking about?"

"You're going on a trip."

"What trip? I don't have any plans to go anywhere and I don't have the money. Besides, I can't afford to miss work."

Father Domingez simply smiles and squeezes my hand.

"Don't worry about work or the money. It's all been arranged. You're going on the Paradise Pearl, one of the best cruise ships on the ocean. You'll get the chance to see Europe and your job will still be here when you come back. Your tickets and passport have already been arranged as well, so you don't need to worry about them."

I snatch my hand away and just stare at him.

"But why? And who's paying for it?"

"You are suffering from a sickness of the spirit, Becky. Your soul is ill and you can not get better by being here. You need to go somewhere new, to experience something different and be restored to health. Someplace where you have no attachments, no memories to haunt you and you can be born again. As for who's paying, I'm not allowed to say."

"Why can't I just go to Korea? I've never been there and I think I could find myself again or whatever better by being in my ancestral homeland. Besides, I've got family there."

He chuckles as he blows out the incense and snuffs out the candles, white and grey smoke now mingling in the air.

"Because you need someplace that's entirely new. Besides, we've been in contact with your grandmother and she agrees that you need to be wholly on your own. In Korea, you'd rely too much on her and the rest of your family there."

I sigh and slump back onto the couch.

"I guess I don't have a choice, do I?"

"You always have a choice, Becky."

I lay there, thinking a moment. It -would- be nice to travel. I've never been anywhere outside of this state, even, so the idea of going to a whole new continent, of seeing the ocean in real life, is more exciting than I'm going to admit to my old confessor. And maybe he's right. Maybe it would do me some good to get away from it all. From Bobby. From Nick. From my haunted house. From my empty life. From everything.

"All right... I'll go. When do I leave and how long will I be gone?"

"Your plane to New York leaves in three days. As for how long you'll be gone, that's something only you can decide. If and when you decide to come back here, though, as I said, you'll be able to get your old job back. Your manager promised us that."

I'm still wondering who this we and us is, though I have a few suspicions. But Father Domingez isn't going to tell me and I've got enough unknowns awaiting me to think about.

"All right. I'll go home tomorrow and start packing."

"Good."

[rjolley]

Interesting turn for the story. I was wondering where you were going to take this.

[Cap Ologist]

Yeah, I feel a CK part being added soon.

[Izulde]

rjolley: Yeah, I think things will stay hopefully interesting.

Cap Ologoist: Perhaps. Perhaps not.