Obscura Burning (13 page)

“Someone who’s going to quote the Bible at me?”

Her gray eyes meet mine. “You think this has been easy on us? On your father?”

“No.”

“Because it hasn’t. You’ve heard the rumors, the speculation about who started the fire.”

I’d never even considered my parents might be dealing with the fallout from that. God, I really am an asshole.

“I don’t think you appreciate…” Mom struggles with the words, wipes her nose, and regains composure. “Maybe it was an accident, but seeing you hurt like that put us through hell, Kyle. Hell.”

She’s going through hell? As if me getting burned was a walk in goddamn Armadillo Park. Hell is getting beaten up by your dad every night because your mom works the night shift. Hell is feeling less of a human being for liking boys. Hell is being suffocated by the guilt of cheating on someone you love. Hell is second- and third-degree burns, new dressings, needles and nurses, morphine, and a split fucking reality that makes you wish you were dead. That’s hell for you, Mom
.
But I bite back my words and swallow the vitriol burning on my tongue.

“Your father and I are trying to keep it together the best we can. So when you go and complicate matters further, forgive us for wanting to try and help you at a time in your life when you desperately seem to need it.”

The awkward silence is punctuated by the ticking clock. I can’t bear to meet Mom’s gaze. There’s too much disappointment in her eyes.

“You can’t fix me, Mom.”

“Only you can do that.”

“So you’re saying I’m broken and need fixing?”

She hesitates. “I think you need some help.”

“I’ve got friends.”

“Shira? This new girl, Mya, who you barely know? They might have good intentions, Kyle, but that’s not the help you need.”

“How would you know?”

“I was eighteen once.”

“Yeah?” I tug my fingers through my hair. “I’ll bet you were char-grilled and gay on top of it?”

“Don’t be belligerent.” Mom’s lips straighten into a thin line, the look that generally precedes disciplinary action. She sighs and hangs her head, studying the dregs in her teacup.

“I don’t know how to talk to you anymore. I thought maybe the reverend could help you, listen if nothing else, and offer advice the way we can’t.”

“My friends listen.”

“Do as you please then. You’re eighteen, an adult. Sort yourself out.” Mom throws her cup into the sink, shattering porcelain. I’ve never seen my mom like this.

“I’m sorry,” I say, not quite sure if I mean it yet.

She just looks at me. From her expression, it’s clear Mom doesn’t believe me.

I try again. “I am sorry. I’ll go with you on Sunday. I’ll speak to the reverend.”

Mom’s lips twitch. “As you wish, Kyle.”

“Thanks for the tea,” I say.

“You’re welcome.” Her tone is flat; she sounds deflated, exhausted.

“Think I’ll go for a run.” Fresh air and open spaces. I need to get out before I say something I’ll regret. Mom nods.

“Don’t be late for dinner.”

I bolt out of the kitchen. Home’s never felt so claustrophobic and unfriendly. Breathing in the evening air helps clear my head, only the pain in my chest is still there. Why’s it so complicated? Never thought I’d want to hurt my mom, but maybe I do.

I don’t get too far, only halfway down the street, when the air thickens. I’m running through a wet blanket that turns to cold darkness. The absence of light, of life. In that other world I guess I must be dead, and that comes as a relief.

Chapter Twelve

Lost between worlds

Sticky darkness. I can’t open my eyes. It’s so cold, but it’s the silence that’s intolerable. I’m floating…then I’m falling.

Orange pajamas and steel bars. I’m in prison, just like my comic book hero. Black lines on white paper. So much easier when things are black-and-white, but my vision’s stained orange, as if flames seared my eyes, leaving behind a ghost-fire stain.

Flames lick around the edges of my cell, liquid fire pouring down the walls.

“Help, please!” I scream and bang against the bars. Jerking the gate, I manage to bend the bars. My hair’s singed, the heat at my back unbearable, smoke filling my lungs as I wrench open the gate.

Danny’s there. He shoves me back into the cell and shuts the gate, locks it, and wags his finger at me disapprovingly. He stinks of gasoline and burning tea leaves.

Shira’s screams echo in my head, growing louder, until the cacophony drives me to my knees and the flames wash over me.

Voices call my name, but they’re too far away.

Dust and ashes, sizzle pop flames. My body burns, my hands torrid fists of red and yellow. Exquisite and excruciating. I am on fire.

Chapter Thirteen

Danny’s dead

I’ve felt it so many times, that sensation of falling just before I wake up with a jolt in bed. That’s what it feels like, tumbling out of the darkness back into the light. I’m on all fours in the dust. My nose is bleeding again and the pounding in my head is excruciating. I can barely breathe, doubled over on the curb outside my house. Only it’s dark now. I check my watch. Still Sunday.

My shirt’s soaked with sweat and my body feels like it just ran a marathon, so I guess I did go running after all, although I don’t remember anything except that wasteland of cold and Danny’s wagging finger.

I vomit more blood into my neighbor’s bushes, then stagger home.

Dad’s watching TV, Mom’s cooking dinner.

“Get cleaned up. Dinner’ll be ready in ten,” Mom says, sounding tired.

“Thanks.” I head for my room past the lounge. “Hey Dad.”

“Hey,” he mumbles without looking away from the screen.

Undressing requires far more effort than it should. Every inch of me aches. Cool shower water helps, but I still wince with every movement.

Clean and feeling less like a corpse, I’m about to head down to dinner when my phone rings.

“Hey, I found something.” It’s Mya.

“About Langley?”

“That too, but something way cooler. Can you come over tonight?”

“Sure. See you in an hour?”

“Don’t forget to bring your book, Scarface.” She hangs up.

I head into the kitchen expecting verbal ordnance from both parents. They ignore me instead, and dinner passes in stilted politeness.
Please pass the salt, Kyle. Would you like more salad, Dad?

No comment about the morning’s conversation or my confab with Mom. They don’t object when I tell them I’m going out.

Mya’s dad answers when I knock.

“You must be Kyle.” He shakes my hand, meets my eye. “You can call me Sal.”

“Thank you, Mr.…Sal.”

He chuckles and lets me in. Mya takes after her dad, lean but muscular with sunshine blond hair. Her dad must have some German or Danish blood in his Latino concoction.

“Hey, Scarface,” Mya calls from her room. “Come on in.”

“Hope you have a nicer name for her.” He winks before disappearing into the lounge. The TV’s on, crackling with static thanks to Obscura.

“Did you bring your book?” she asks as I step into her bedroom. The same ethereal music is playing.

I join her on the floor where she’s already ensconced with papers and her dad’s laptop. She’s scribbled a rough timeline across the page, starting April 6 and labelled
Kyle’s Bad Day 1
.

“Did I have any good days?”

“You tell me. Here, look at this.”

She turns the laptop for me to see. A wall of text. I stare uncomprehendingly.

“It’s a paper on rifts in the multiverse.” She scrolls up to the title page.

“Um, the rift in the what?”

“Multiverse.” She says it like it’s common knowledge.

“And this paper explains something about my problem?”

“A lot, actually.” She offers me an open can of soda. “But what I find most disturbing is that A, Professor Cruz, the author of this paper and former research associate of one auspicious Professor Langley, has since been excommunicated from the scientific community; and B, by his estimations, you’re gonna die.”

I choke on the soda, bubbles burning the back of my nose. “What?”

Turning to face me, Mya sighs. “This guy, Prof. Cruz, was into some pretty weird-ass stuff. He believed that a cosmic event could bring about a rift in the multiverse. His far-out theories didn’t go down too well at Princeton. There’s even an article by Langley denouncing Cruz’s speculations as the ravings of a paranoid scientist gone mad.”

“I meant about me dying.”

“Oh.” Her eyes sparkle. “I’m getting there. So this Prof. Cruz—”

“The paranoid scientist gone mad?”

“Just shut up and listen.” She glares at me, and I close my mouth. “So Cruz predicts an event for 2012, tying into all this Mayan mythology stuff about fourth worlds and the start of a new age, et cetera.” She twirls a hand in the air dramatically. “He also reckons that if a person could travel between realities,
shift
as you call it, then they’d be subjected to enormous physical strain and wouldn’t be able to sustain it.”

“Is that why I’m peeing blood and getting headaches?” While somewhat relieved to know I’m not going crazy and that there may actually be a scientific explanation for the weirdness.

“You’re peeing blood? That’s serious, Kyle.”

“Whatever, better than being dead.” Is it?

“You shifted?”

“Yup.”

“And?” Her gaze is way too intense.

“I think I might not be alive.”

“Really?” She lets out the breath she was holding. “What’s it like?”

“No cherubs sitting on clouds with harps, that’s for sure. No hellfire either. Can we talk about something else?”

“You might be the only person in the history of humanity to actually experience death and be able to talk about it, and you…don’t want to?”

“It’s cold and dark and really unpleasant. Is that what you want to hear?”

“That’s it?”

“Darkness. Empty, ice-cold darkness. You expected something else?” I could’ve been gentler, but she’s grating on my nerves.

“Well…” She swallows. “I was just wondering…Benny and all.”

Now I feel like a right dick again. “I’m sorry, Mya. Maybe I’m just unconscious or something. Or maybe it’s the suicide realm. I honestly don’t know.”

“Forget it.” She takes a swig from the can. “Moving on… I’m no expert, but it’s pretty obvious that Obscura is the cosmic event this Cruz is talking about. I think we need to see this guy.”

“A professor from Princeton? You got money for the plane ticket?” I sound incredulous.

“That’s the thing. He lives just outside of Albuquerque.”

“From New Jersey to New Mexico?”

“He’s retired.”

“Seems a little too convenient.”

“Do not question our good fortune. Just be thankful it’s only a three-hour drive instead of a three-hour plane trip.”

“So you want to go out and see this guy?” While I don’t relish the idea of talking about my life to a complete stranger, I’d like to know what the hell’s going on.

“Tomorrow. Dad says we can take his car. It’s got AC.”

“You told your dad?”

“Only asked if I could borrow his car. Relax.”

“So we’re just going to arrive on his doorstep and expect him to talk to us?” The room feels far too warm, even with the fan going. Stifling. I gulp down more soda.

“I think it might be tricky trying to explain this over the phone, don’t you?” Mya says.

There are worse ways to spend a Monday than road-tripping with Mya to the city. “I guess. What the hell, let’s go.”

“I think he could help you.”

“Yeah, hopefully before the shifting kills me.” It’s easier to joke than think too hard about the reality of my predicament.

“This is serious, you know.”

“Oh, I know. I’m the one who keeps bleeding.”

She tucks a strand of hair behind my ear.

“Danny used to do that,” I say.

“He doesn’t anymore?” she asks, turning her attention back to the laptop.

“Ah, I guess he still does.”

“You could stay here tonight, if you wanted. That way we can leave early in the morning.” Mya nods toward her bed.

“Your dad’s OK with that?” Home is the last place I want to be.

“Yeah, well, his daughter’s virtue is pretty safe considering you’re gay.”

“You told him?” Anger warms my face. This girl is taking over my whole life.

“Shouldn’t I have?” She stares at me, eyebrows raised. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

“Yeah, but…”

“But what?”

“I’m not sure I’m ready for the whole town to know.”

“Chill, Scarface, my dad’s cool. You think he’ll put up posters around town or something?”

“No…”

“Then there’s no problem, is there?”

I shrug, but I’m still prickly and uncomfortable. Mya doesn’t get it; how could she? She’s pretty and perfect and only has to endure Coyote’s Luck during the holidays. I’m stuck in this messed-up meat suit and now I’ll get branded for liking boys. I wouldn’t mind swapping skins with Mya, just for a day.

Two hours later, we crawl into her bed. I’m in boxers and T-shirt, she’s in this skimpy little nightie. How many guys wouldn’t dream of being this close to Mya, with her long legs and C-cups? All I can think about is how very different she feels and smells from Danny. I should’ve made things right with him before popping the pills, but now I might never get a chance to say all the things I meant to.

Mya snuggles against my chest.

“Tell me the story.” She reaches for my sketchbook on her nightstand and opens it up to the first page of the comic.

“You really want to hear it?”

“I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.”

“I haven’t worked out what goes in each box, so you’re just getting an overview.”

“Fine, go for it.”

She’s asleep before I’ve finished the second page, my hero pleading not guilty, ending up in prison anyway. I leave the book on her bedside table and switch off the light. Mya stays curled up under my arm, puffing sleepy breaths into my shirt. She feels different from Shira too, smells like lemon and strawberry where Shira is all patchouli and desert dust.