Pulse: When Gravity Fails (Pulse Science Fiction Series Book 1) (5 page)

8

Holden Grayson – Alberton Elementary School, West Memphis, Arkansas

Holden Grayson stared at the grass on the hill above the playground. He was next to the monkey bars as kids swung across hand over hand behind him. He held onto the post and stared at the hill.

The wind was blowing from the front of the school toward the teacher’s parking lot. The grass seemed to disobey the wind. It folded back and pointed defiantly at the sky. A few blades broke free of the Earth and even with the wind pushing at their sides they twisted and launched themselves upward into the sky. Holden watched until the sun dazzled his eyes and he lost the rebellious sky grass.

Holden Grayson tried his best to obey as often as he could. It was harder since his mother and father split. Parents were supposed to stay together swaying with the wind like the grass on the hillside in a pattern that made sense. But sometimes they pulled loose and flew apart in ways that made no sense at all. Holden understood how wind worked, but he did not understand how his parents worked now. Sometimes their rules for him were different from each other and they were hard to follow. One was pushing while the other was pulling. And sometimes they switched.

Holden was eight and that was old enough to notice when things weren’t right. His brother Grant was four and didn’t really remember the world before their parents split. He also did not remember dad’s trouble with anger and taking the pills that made him sick. They thought Holden did not know, but he remembered and the sadness from remembering pushed at his insides and pulled at his heart.

One of the kids on the diamond at the far end of the playground gave the red kickball a ringing boot high over the heads of the kids scattered through the infield. Something about that rubbery ping sound reminded Holden of the playground. All play was contained in that sound of a sneaker kicking a ball. Holden turned to watch it float and hang in the air. It was one heck of a kick, but the ball was getting tricky and floating instead of falling. Holden watched it spin on its own invisible axis in the air like some angry, red planet. The other kids ran under it waiting for it to fall. From their perspective, it was a high hanging kick. They were not seeing the dark magic Holden saw in its refusal to fall. The kicker was almost home with his fists raised in double pumping victory. The ball drifted down slowly and stubbornly to the hands of the defensive players.

Holden looked back at the kids navigating the monkey bars. Their feet swung up and the kids hung by their hands almost horizontal with their legs defying weight and gravity.

A kid on the sidewalk beside the wall of the school flicked a marble. It bounced off a cat’s eye and hopped up off the concrete. The green glass orb hovered in the air with the kid staring, his jaw unhinged. At least someone else was seeing it too. That was something.

Something was strange on the playground today. It was the sort of thing that adults either praised kids from their imagination for telling or scolded them for making up fibs.

“Push and pull.” Holden whispered.

He felt light and barely connected to the ground himself. Holden gripped the support of the monkey bars tighter trying to keep himself earthbound. He might run along hopping like he was on the Moon and then one, great leap could send him flying over the Moon like the cow in the nursery rhyme.

Holden looked for more evidence of the disobedient world and spotted his mother leaning on the fence next to the front parking lot. Uncle Carter’s car was behind her. Carter was probably inside. They might have already picked up Grant from daycare. They were going camping as a family, Mom had said. She meant everyone except Dad. Uncle Carter was Dad’s friend and worked with him at the firehouse saving people from burning. Now Carter was acting more like mom’s friend and less like Dad’s friend.

“Pushing Dad and pulling Mom.”

His mom waved and Holden waved back. His hand still felt too light in the strange air of the playground. Holden kept his grip on the monkey bar pole.

He saw his father at the other end of the front fence of the playground. His dad was waving thinking Holden had been waving at him. This was normally Dad’s weekend, but they had switched for the camping trip, Mom had said. She might not have told Dad since they almost never talked.

They had not seen each other yet, so they were both smiling. They didn’t know yet that there needed to be a push/pull like they usually did with each other. It was weird seeing them both smiling together at the same time. It felt fragile like the moment could float away at any time.

Holden let go of the playground equipment and hoped for the best. “Pulling me. Pushing each other.”

Holden ran toward the fence. He did not fly away from the Earth like he feared, but he felt lighter and faster than normal. Maybe the magic on the playground wasn’t all bad.

Mom and Dad both moved toward the center not noticing each other. They were still smiling. It was like they were still together except that Dad wasn’t sick anymore and mom wasn’t angry at him. The playground was magic. Holden ran faster to try to outrun the pushing force that normally built between them.

They saw each other. The smiles faded. They were both talking at once. The lightness left as the strange magic faded around Holden. He felt his weight return and marbles, and children, and kick balls dropped with normal gravity again.

His feet and body felt heavy as he slammed into the chain link fence. It raddled with a harsh hiss. Mom and Dad came together on both sides of Holden on the opposite side of the fence, but he felt the strong push between them.

9

Sean Grayson and Tabitha Grayson – Alberton Elementary School, West Memphis, Arkansas

Tabitha said, “Holden, go wait in the car with your brother and Carter. I’ll be there in a moment.”

“I need my school bag,” Holden said.

“We got it.” Tabitha was staring at Sean as she spoke. “I already checked you out. Everything is in the car.”

Sean felt heat in his cheeks. He glanced at Jenny in the passenger seat of his car. He looked over and saw Carter in the driver’s seat of his own car. Carter looked away as soon as Sean spotted him. Grant waved from the backseat and Sean waved back. “This is my weekend, Tabby.”

Tabitha sighed. “I sent you an e-mail. I left you three voice messages. We switch weekends all the time. I need you to respond to me though.”

“I was working. So was Carter. If he knew about it, he could have said something.”

Tabitha shook her head. “It’s not Carter’s job to pass messages between us.”

“It’s not his job to pretend to be raising my sons and taking them on trips on my weekend either.”

Tabitha sucked in a deep breath and pointed at Sean’s chest. She stopped and looked at Holden still staring over the fence at them. “Holden? Car.”

Holden looked at his father. “Dad?”

Sean sighed and said, “Do what your mother says, son. We’re talking. I’ll see you when you get back from your trip.”

“Are you sure, Dad?”

I’m anything but sure. I’m not sure about one thing in this world anymore including whether gravity holds us to the ground. How would you like to hear that from your crazy father, son?
Sean saw Holden staring into his eyes and he felt broken inside. “I’m sure. Tell Carter I said, hello. Okay?”

Holden left them at the fence and walked toward the gate. “Okay, Dad. See you after the trip.”

Holden had run to the fence, but he walked with his head down toward the gate. The difference was not lost on Sean.

“So, he asks your permission to do what I say?” Tabitha took hold of the fence and turned away.

In profile, Sean could see her jaw working and the muscles flexing as she chewed on nothing. Sean had seen that a lot in the years where he was hiding his addiction, the stretch when he was caught, but still pretending he was hiding it, and in the final days where he was justifying it and Tabitha was backed into a corner holding onto the kids with one hand and the house with the other as Sean destroyed himself and everything around him. He equated that flexing jaw with the terror of a woman feeling like everything would fly away at any moment. He was surprised she didn’t leave sooner.

Sean looked toward the car and made eye contact with Jenny. She looked concerned. He turned his head away from her gaze the way Carter had done when he met Sean’s gaze. Sean did not like looks of concern. They reminded him of secrets getting discovered. Looks of concern reminded him of lying and hiding. They brought up memories of being less of a man than he was supposed to be. The looks made him feel like he was inflated – only a man on the outside, but full of empty air inside.

Sean thought about floating through the halls during the fire and wondered if his mind was coming apart from the damage of past drug abuse and unresolved guilt. He had told no one about the moment in the fire yet. He was back to lies and secrets again. That was a tougher addiction to beat than the pills.

Tabitha stopped clenching her jaw and shook her head. “Classic.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“He still worships you and puts the weight of everything that went wrong on my shoulders.”

“Who? Holden? What are you talking about, Tabby?”

“Grant too now. You are the fun daddy and I am the every day rule keeper mommy. I guess nothing has really changed on that, so I should be used to it by now.”

Sean shook his head. “What does this have to do with anything? Are you trying to punish me for everything in the past with a surprise canceling of my weekend? Is that it?”

“No, I tried to call.”

“Then, why are you throwing this in my face because of your miscommunication? I couldn’t check my phone while I had a burning building falling in around me as I ran out with a hurt kid in my arms. Things have been busy. You heard about the earthquake?”

“Yes, I heard. Of course I did. That’s not what I’m saying.”

“I almost died,” Sean said. “Carter had to pull me out while everything was coming down.”

“Not the first time for that either.” Tabitha was back to clenching her jaw.

“You never get tired of throwing the past up in my face even when it is irrelevant to why we are standing here now.”

“That’s exactly why we are standing here passing the kids back and forth when we live a couple blocks from each other. And you are best friends with my boyfriend.”

“That nonsense is far from my fault, Tabby. That’s on you.” Sean glanced at Carter’s car again. Holden and Grant were pulling back and forth between some toy in the back seat. The blue sky obscured them to where they were just shapes – almost not there at all. They were fighting hard enough to shake the car from side to side, but Carter said nothing and just stared out the window away from Sean like the trees beyond the playground were the most interesting things in the world – like at any moment they might jump out of the dirt and start dancing for him, if he just kept watching. Sean said, “And it’s on him.”

“I’m sure your frat of friendly firemen are giving him hell for it.”

Sean took a deep breath. “Yeah, the guys get a little put off when one of their own thinks its okay to take up with someone else’s wife. There is kind of an unwritten code against that sort of thing, you can imagine.”

“I’m not your wife, Sean. I don’t belong to you.”

“No. I don’t think that you are or that you do, Tabby. I can only go with the plan we have, not the changed plan that never gets to me.”

She blinked and tears leaked from her rapidly reddening eyes. She was a fast crier. It came on her suddenly. Even the few times it wasn’t his fault, Sean felt tightness in his chest when her tears erupted. She would get the looks of concern from passing strangers and he would get the angry looks of a man that deserved to be accused. Often, he did deserve it and that made it worse.

For now, he did not want her returning to the car looking upset. He could care less what Carter thought of it, but he did not want the boys to see mommy upset because of Daddy again.

There was no fixing it though. If Sean knew the first thing about keeping her from being upset, they wouldn’t be standing here now.

Sean said, “Holden isn’t choosing me over you. He did what you said. He was just confused because of the miscommunication. That’s all. They’re good kids. They love you. They talk about you the whole time they are with me.”

She cried harder. Sean nodded.
Yeah, I’m terrible at this
, he thought.

Tabitha wiped at her face with the back of her hand. “They do the same to me about you only I have to hear it longer.”

“I can’t help that.”

“I’m just so mad at you.”

“I can’t help that either.”

“No, I mean, I’m mad at you for getting better.”

Sean huffed and shrugged. “Well, I suppose I could relapse or die. I came close this morning … to dying, I mean.”

She shook her head. “That’s not what I’m saying. You pulled your life together and became a better person – started treating people better. Jenny gets the better you. I stuck by you and fought all those years until I was broken and slinked out a couple blocks away with the kids. She gets the version of you that I always hoped you would be, Sean, but I couldn’t last any longer. She gets that and Carter gets me still broken and wrung out from it all. You are on the upswing and I’m still flattened by it. Carter gets the shell of a woman and Jenny gets Sean Grayson whole again. It makes me angry that you couldn’t be that while we were still together and I was still whole.”

Sean blinked on tears now and looked toward the ground. “I’m still a shell of a man, Tabby; I just look real from the outside.”

Tabitha reached a hand out toward his chest. It shocked him and he stumbled back a step before she made contact. She dropped her hand back to her side. “I’m sorry for the mix-up. We’ll work out the switch after we get back from camping at Black Fork. I’m sure the boys will forget the camping trip and talk about whatever adventure you take them on.”

She was smiling, but it was tight and uncomfortable. Sean took another step back. “You’re not supposed to camp up in Black Fork. It’s only for hiking.”

“Don’t start, Sean.” She turned away and walked toward Carter’s car with her head down.

Sean whispered. “I’m not starting.”

But she was too far away to hear. He turned his back and leaned both hands on the playground fence. He took several deep breaths feeling like he was the one wrung out now.

A car door opened behind him. “Sean?”

He turned his head and Jenny stood beside the open passenger door. The look of concern on her face made him feel heavy and tired. He held up one finger. “Everything is fine. Give me just a minute.”

“What happened? Is this not your weekend?”

He shook his head. “I’ll explain in a minute. Give me just a minute.”

She nodded and sat back in the passenger’s seat of Sean’s car with her door still open. He stared for a moment longer.
No, this is certainly not my weekend. If you knew what ride you were signing up for, would you have still gotten in my car, Jenny?

He turned away and looked out over the playground.

“Hey, Firefighter Sean.” A kid Sean didn’t recognize was waving and Sean waved back.

Sean and Carter had done fire safety programs at Holden’s school for years – even back before Carter was with Tabitha.

One of the teachers waved and Sean waved back. He was thankful she didn’t come over. She probably saw the exchange and wanted no part of it. West Memphis wasn’t so big that people didn’t know which conversations to avoid between exes. People knew which men were in the process of burning their lives down around them even if they didn’t know every dirty detail yet.

He heard an engine rev and turned in time to watch Carter drive away with the family that Sean had pushed away.

Motion in the corner of his eye caught his attention and he looked back over the playground. Blades of grass twisted and danced in the air as they fell slowly back to the ground. It was only a couple at first, but then the falling grass rained down on the playground like confetti. The teachers and students stopped and looked up at the sky. Sean stared up at the sun, but saw nothing in the empty sky that could explain the falling grass. He had not been watching and had missed how the dance of the grass had begun. Maybe Carter was wise to keep his eyes on the trees.