Everlong: (Book One of the Everlong Trilogy) (17 page)

I decided I'd text him in the morning, tell him I had to go to the doctors or something. Maybe I should've made it up to him by inviting him to the party on Friday night, but I wasn't sure I was ready for that. I didn't know if I wanted the two sides of my life to merge like that. I liked it the way it was; separate, at least then I could control what each side knew about me. Besides, it was going to be hell anyway, so why would I put Sam through that when I could bear it on my own?

I stood outside the counselling building, the next morning, and texted Sam. I told him that I was okay, but I'd be in later because I'd had to go to the doctors so, hopefully, he wouldn't worry about me being missing. It was still grey outside; the drizzle had given way to showers, and people hurried by, hunched under their umbrellas. I watched, from under the porch, as a sharp gust of wind stole a Batman umbrella off a small boy. It rolled down the street like tumble weed in an old western.

From outside, the counselling building looked like an average detached house. It was only the blue and white plaque for OCS, Oakwood Counselling Services, and the posters for pregnancy help and crisis services that distinguished it from any other house in the tree-lined suburban street. I pressed the doorbell and waited, my hood over my face in case anyone saw me.

A woman with a grey bob and glasses perched high on her head, opened the front door.

'Hi,' she said, 'can I help you?'

'Yes, I've got an appointment at nine,' I said.

'What's the name?'

'Evelyn, Evelyn Anderson.'

'Oh, hi Evelyn,' she said, stepping forward with her hand extended in greeting, 'Pleased to meet you.'

I took her hand, but her handshake was loose.

'Please come in and take a seat, I'll be with you in a short while.'

I followed her inside and took a seat in the waiting room. The room was bright with a big bay window that flooded the room with light even on such a grey morning, but a dark feeling hung in the air, in the ripped wallpaper and the dog-eared posters. On the coffee table in the middle of the room, women's magazines were piled up, dating from about two centuries ago, but still spewing out the same old crap; "How Karina lost two dress sizes in a week", "Suzy shows her cellulite on boozy girls' holiday", some footballer's wife called Tallulah had had her breasts enlarged and someone called Alex had been caught having an affair.

I removed my hood and started fiddling with the strap on my bag, my legs bouncing up and down of their own accord. I wanted to run. I felt dirty. Like I had a dirty little secret. Well, I did have a dirty little secret didn't I?

'Evelyn Anderson?' said the same woman who'd let me in, 'if you'd like to follow me? I'm ready for you now.'

The woman took me down a corridor and into a smaller room at the back of the house. It had two red leather sofas sat facing each other like a pair of lips, a small wooden coffee table in the middle like a misshapen tongue, and in the corner of the room sat a small desk piled high with files and a computer that looked like it belonged in the Prehistoric era.

'Please sit down Evelyn,' said the woman, pointing at the farthest sofa.

I sat down, clutching my bag on my lap.

The woman put a box of tissues beside me before perching on the end of the opposite sofa. That didn't fill me with confidence.

'Hi Evelyn,' she said, reaching out, over the coffee table, to shake my hand again.

I took it. It was cold, her hold still insubstantial. My Gran always told me not to trust people with loose handshakes. 'Hi,' I said, more to the floor.

'My names Grace Harlow,' she said, taking her glasses off her head and placing them over her eyes, 'and I'm your counsellor. So, I see you've been referred here by the GP?'

I nodded.

She picked up the cardboard file next to her on the sofa and opened it, quickly scanning over it with her eyes. 'Okay, so let me just confirm your address?'

A file. A handful of paper, pieces of my life. 'Thirty-three Oakwood Road.'

'Okay, date of birth?'

'Seventh of November, nineteen-ninety-five.'

Grace Harlow shut the file and looked at me, from over the top of her glasses. Her eyes were grey, like the weather outside. 'So, this is a session led by you. You can use this forty-five minutes to talk about whatever you like, whatever's bothering you or getting you down. If you want to rant at me that's also fine, okay?' she asked, tilting her head in a show of empathy.

But her empathy was lost on me in the cold and drab space. Why would I talk to her? Why would I spew my guts out to a stranger?

She adjusted the red cardigan draped over her shoulders and leaned back in the chair, waiting for me to speak.

But I couldn't.

My words wouldn't leave me, they were mine, and mine alone. I didn't trust her with them.

'I know this is hard,' she said, after a few minutes of silence, 'and it's perfectly okay if you just want this time to sit and think and be quiet, but it can be really helpful to talk about things.'

Still I couldn't speak. I didn't trust her, in her flowery blouse with her loose handshake.

She crossed her legs. 'So, you've been feeling depressed?'

I nodded.

'How long have you been on the tablets now?'

'About two weeks.'

'And are they starting to work would you say? Are you feeling any better?'

No. I feel like everything is too loud. 'Yes.'

'Well that's a good start. The tablets won't take it away, but they'll take the edge off, allow you to try and tackle the root issues behind the depression.'

I nodded.

Grace Harlow un-crossed her legs. 'What about inviting your mother to the next session? Sometimes-'

'No,' I said, a little too forcefully. Damn. I'd given her more information than I had wanted to.

Grace Harlow tilted her head again and looked at me. I turned away.

'Do you get on with your mother?'

I shook my head. Grace sat there, waiting for my confessions to come tumbling out. But they didn't.

'What about your dad?'

'He's dead.'

'Oh. Okay, so how do you feel about that?'

No. I didn't trust her. I wasn't going to say anymore. This stuff was off-limits.

'Do you miss your father?'

I sat still as stone. Still off-limits.

'Do you have any friends, anyone else you can talk to?'

Off-limits.

'What about Grandparents?'

No. I didn't want to tell her anything. The stranger with a grey bob and flowery blouse. Why was I even here? It wasn't like anyone was making me come here. I stood up. 'Sorry, I can't do this.'

'That's okay. I told you, you don't have to tell me anything-'

'I've got to go...too stuffy in here.'

'Okay, take my card,' said Grace standing up, holding out her business card, 'ring me when you've evened out a bit more. At any time, whenever you need to talk.'

I took the card and fled from the nondescript house, feeling more empowered than I ever had. I would talk when I wanted to.

Josh

I'd been wallowing in self-pity for days, not daring to leave the apartment in case I was tempted to follow Evie again. I had to stay away, for my own sake as well as hers. What had I been thinking, trying to get her to see me?

Staying inside my prison, waiting for Death to summon me again, was preferable to that torture. I could feel the axe swinging ever closer to my neck, the release of death not far away. I would just wait it out until She'd decided I'd served my purpose.

And that would be sooner, rather than later, because without Evie, what was the point? I wasn't going to do anything else for Death, I would refuse her and She would have to finish me.

Death didn't know me. She never had.

I was lying on my bed, drowning my sorrows with another bottle of absinthe. There was something about the green liquid that spoke to me like an old friend, promising me that I would forget my troubles.

But it's honeyed tongue had lied to me.

It hadn't worked.

My misery still clasped onto my ankles and wouldn't let go, despite how much I drank. Instead, it felt as though the absinthe was nourishing my troubles, helping them to grow stronger and more alive with every mouthful.

At some point I fell asleep, the drink letting my mind to wander into its darkest recesses, allowing me to dream.

I was lying half dead in a ditch, maggots crawling across my skin, eating me alive. A ripe full moon hung in the sky above me, obscured now and again by curtains of clouds that shut out the light, leaving me in complete darkness for minutes at a time. I was terrified of the dark, of the not knowing what was out there in the shadows, lurking with the wolves that howled and whined. I felt something wriggling around in my cheek. I reached up to touch, my arm half-eaten and bloodied. I screamed, a scream that seemed to last for an eternity - a scream so loud that it probably could've been heard in Hell - and my face exploded. A black fly burst from my cheek, and extended its silvery wings to fly.

I woke up, drenched in sweat, I could feel the damp bed sheets clinging to my back. Slowly I opened my eyes and shuddered in terror; Death was sitting next to me on the bed, her pale hand resting on my cheek.

She sighed, 'Oh, Josh.'

I shunted the empty absinthe bottle off my chest and onto the other side of the bed. 'What do you want?' I asked, pulling myself up into a sitting position.

Death ran her tongue over her blood red lips, and She let her hand fall onto my naked chest, 'You're a clever boy, you work it out.'

I pulled the white sheet up to my abdomen to cover my nakedness. She looked like She wanted to eat me. 'What if I don't want to?'

'Or maybe you're not as clever as I thought,' She said, her jaw clenching.

'Why don't you just leave me alone? I've had enough, just get it over with because I'm not doing whatever it is you want me to do. I'm out.' I grabbed the sheet in my hand and jumped off the other side of the bed. I quickly found some jeans and pulled them on. 'I'm done.'

'You still haven't grasped how this works, have you?'

I turned around to bite back, but She was standing right in front of me, taking me off guard.

'You don't get to decide when it's over, my love,' She said, cupping my chin in Her hand.

'I'm not doing it,' I said, staring straight into the black pools of her eyes.

'Ah, is baby throwing a tantrum because he can't get what he wants?'

'I'm done. I want to die, just get it over with.'

Death laughed in my face. 'And that is definitely not something that you get to decide.' She removed Her hand from my chin, letting her fingers wander down my neck and onto my shoulders.

Suddenly She was at the back of me, Her one arm around my neck, a fistful of my hair wrapped tightly in her other hand. 'How would you like to go?' She whispered into my ear, pulling my head to the side. 'Quickly? I could snap your neck in a second. No?'

I remained still, my mind still woozy from the alcohol.

She let my hair go. 'Or, I could run you through with this.' From out of nowhere, She had my angelic dagger, Heaven's Will (that I use to sever the souls of the dead from their bodies) at my throat. 'But if I did that, I would make sure you died a slow and painful death, forcing you to watch as the blood drips away from you, drop by drop, with your life.'

'Do it!' I said, jabbing my neck into the tip of the knife. I felt a trickle of warm blood dribbling down my skin.

She pulled the knife away from my throat and ran her tongue over my bloodied neck. She threw me forward, and I fell heavily to my knees, pain erupting through me as my wings burst from my back. Death grabbed my head and pushed me hard on to the floor. I was unable to move as She climbed on top of me, hissing like some feral cat. She sat astride me, as if I were a dragon, or a griffin, She were taking for a ride.

'The way I'd prefer to do it,' She said, leaning forward, and spitting the words into my ear, 'is by plucking these wings straight from your back.'

She clamped her hands onto either wing, digging her sharp claws into them and yanking them brutally in the wrong direction. My mind flashed back to the first time She had plucked my wings; terror uncoiled within me, but I would not let Her see it.

'DO IT!' I screamed, 'I WANT TO DIE!'

The pain immediately disappeared, along with my wings, and the air stilled, like nothing had ever happened. And yet, I knew it had, because I could feel the memory of it haunting my insides.

Death remained on my back. I could hear her panting hard, trying to regain control, desperate to restrain her anger. After a few moments of silence, She dismounted. 'Get up!' She ordered.

I didn't move. I couldn't move. I lay prostrate on the ground, praying for death.

She grabbed a handful of my hair and hoisted me off the floor. Once I was on my feet, She spun me around to face Her.