The Shattered Genesis (Eternity) (34 page)

             
“I know. And I will be.”

XXX

             
Elijah was not keen to suspicion but Maura realized immediately that things had changed between James and I. She had always told me that I would
never find love with a boy my own age and yet her disapproval of James was resounding. Sure, she liked him as a person. He made her laugh when the rest of us could not even get her to smile. But the idea of him and I was not one she could tolerate.

             
“It is
like it's always nighttime. Do you think it will be that way on Pangea?” I asked her randomly as we sat in front of the large window in the Atrium. It was particularly quiet in there that day, as many people were crowded around the televisions in the recr
eation room. Some were betting on a football game that had long since passed in real time. Others were engaged in a “chick-flick marathon.” I was not quite sure what that meant, but Violet insisted on going, saying she needed her spirits to be boosted by t
he idealism presented in all of the films. Though it was a line that I would have used to explain my presence at that estrogen-charged soiree, I couldn’t help but shake my head slightly at how young she still was. If she had matured, she would not need tha
t assurance from films that led girls to believe in princes and happy endings.

             
The cuteness was too exhausting to think about for long periods of time.

             
“I don’t know,” Maura replied, “Maybe you should have gone with Violet.”

             
“Why? Am I bothering you by
sitting here quietly?”

             
“No. I just think that maybe you’d see in those movies how it is supposed to be.”

             
For the first time since I had sat on the couch across from her, I noticed a glass of some copper-colored liquid that I knew to be liquor. Fantastic.
..

             
“Do you think I’m blind, Brynna?” She narrowed her eyes at me. “Do you think I’m stupid? I realize that you believe yourself to be the smartest person still alive and maybe you are. But that does not mean that the rest of us are so stupid that we don’t
see what is going on.”

             
“And what, dare I ask, is going on?” I asked after getting up to pour a drink of my own. “What exactly are you hinting at?”

             
“I know about you and James.”

             
“Oh?” I asked icily. After taking a gulp from my glass, I felt the liquid b
urning my throat all the way down before detonating inside of my stomach. It felt spectacular under the circumstances.

             
“Yes.” Maura replied defiantly.

             
“Is this the part where I am supposed to confess all? You are expecting some small revelation but I wil
l end up supplying several gory details you never expected. Is that what is supposed to happen now, Maura?”

             
“I want you to be honest right now. I want you to tell me everything.”

             
“You never answered my question.”

             
“You asked several. I would ask you whic
h one you would like me to answer first, but I was the first one to ask a question, so you’ll answer mine.”

             
“You never asked a question. You suggested something that is untrue in every sense.”

             
“Are you really going to lie to me? Isn’t that below you? You
have always been overly blunt about everything, almost to a point of mercilessness. Now you’re going to start lying? Is that to protect me or to protect yourself?”

             
“I have not given you any reason to believe that I am lying. But if I were, I can assure y
ou that it would not be for your benefit. Nor would it be for my own. As I have not lied thus far in this conversation, I should not even be saying that. But if I were beating around the bush, as they say, it would be because what you are asking is none of
your damn business. So why don’t you finish your drink and pass out before you say something that you will regret as you nurse your hangover tomorrow morning? I do not want to have to deal with your pathetic apologies. They always involve tears and you kn
ow how that sickens me.”

             
I will admit that calling her out on her drinking was overly cruel. But for her to assume that my business was her business was ridiculous, in plain words. The woman had raised me to the best of her ability and then spurned me wit
hout warning as though I had never existed. Plus, in our joint past, there was one huge issue that was irreversible and irreparable. That is not exaggeration.

             
She slammed her glass down on the table and I stared at her, unfazed by her anger’s sudden rise.
She was giving me exactly what I wanted. She was giving me weakness to prey on.

             
“I show the slightest bit of concern for you and you insult me.”

             
“I didn’t insult you. I spoke truthfully. I suppose that the truth does hurt. Let me make it a little bit mo
re uncomfortable.” I leaned forward and exhaled smoke from my newly lighted cigarette in her direction. “You are a drunk. When you are intoxicated, you say unkind things. They do not hurt me because
nothing
hurts me. But they do irritate me.”

             
“What? Are
you waiting for me to say that you’re a heartless bitch who left her parents to die?’

             
“Do you see what I mean?” I asked with a slight smile.

             
“I have been thinking it but I haven’t said it! And now you’re just going to go start screwing James? Why do you
insist on self-destructing, Brynna Claire? He will destroy you! Have I taught you
nothing
?
”

             
“You have taught me next to nothing. I possess the worst of you, Maura. All of your goodness was given to the other three. You and I both know that. Isn’t that why
we don’t see eye to eye?” I blew smoke towards the ceiling. I watched it billow upwards, almost glimmering against the black backdrop whisking by outside of the ceiling window. “Whatever James and I choose to do is our decision. I am twenty-two years old
and fully capable…”

             
“And he is, what? Forty? Forty-two? Forty-five? You might think you are mature. I do not
believe  that you are as mature as you think you are. In your heart, I don't think you believe it, either.”

             
“That statement was completely redund
ant...” I interrupted her with an amused grin on my face.

             
“He will be the end of you, Brynna.”

             
“I would give you the benefit of the doubt by saying that I believe all of this is coming from a good place. It is coming from concern. But then, every last in
stinct I possess is telling me that this entire conversation is malicious.”

             
“It is not malicious!” She exclaimed in a rage that the situation did not warrant. “I care for you! I force myself to care for you even though you are so cruel! You are so heartle
ss! I do not understand you at all, but I force myself to care because I’ve had you since you were a child! But please, do not think that I am so blind that I don’t see what you are! How you could do that to your father, I will never know!”

             
Checkmate. My
grin only grew in width and my eyes gleamed with vicious triumph.

             
“Oh, so this is about him?” I asked with a derisive chuckle. “Everything is about him, isn’t it? Are you really so pathetic that you still love him after what he did to you? Aren’t you the
one that told me to show them no weakness? No mercy? And yet here you are, some twenty years later, still wailing about the one that got away.”

             
“Do you see what I mean? You have no heart. If you can say something like that, then you have no heart.” Her vo
ice was on the verge of breaking now but I saw a deep anger in her eyes that was stronger than her need to cry.

             
“Maybe I don’t.” I shrugged, still smiling slightly, “You want to know about James and me? We are taking it a day at a time but yes, there is s
omething there. Is that what you are upset about? I was supposed to be a failure like you. But now, I am more intelligent, I am prettier and the man I want also wants me. That’s the trifecta of one-up-manship in this particular case, is it not?”

             
In a blur
, she leaned forward, brought her hand back and went to slap me across the face. I was used to those furious, drunken spasms. I had even grown used to the cutting remarks she made while intoxicated. The things she said to me over the years were some of the
cruelest I had ever heard. In those words, I found my own malice, my own dark inclination to hurt people.

             
I grabbed her wrist without even looking in the direction her hand was coming from. I held it hard in my hand, feeling my eyes flash over to that bl
ood red color of inescapable wrath. I wanted to hit her. I wanted to choke her. I wanted to cause her as much pain as I could. But there was affection for her, even if it was so complicated that contemplating its strength was like attempting to complete a
math problem without actually seeing the numbers. So when she cried out in pain, I released my grip.

             
“And now… Now I don’t even know what you are.” I grimaced when tears began to run down her face.  “I think you’re possessed, Brynna. I think you always ha
ve been.”

             
Her tantrum had drained whatever energy was left. The alcohol had numbed her enough that she could sleep. I knew that she was ready to lose consciousness, having ushered her to her room and gotten her safely tucked away in bed so many times befo
re.

             
“You have always been evil.”

             
“Yes, I know.”

             
I put her arm around my neck and walked her slowly out of the room. While we were on the stairs, she stumbled over her feet several times, forcing me to practically carry her. When her legs finally gave ou
t, I lifted her with one arm and walked the rest of the way as she muttered over and over again how sadistically twisted I was.

             
“It is the devil. If I believed…”

             
“Just shut up and go to sleep.” I snapped as I laid her down in bed. I covered her up with
the thin blanket and sat down across from her on Violet's bed. I knew that she and Violet fell asleep every night clasping hands across the space between them. Perhaps in her inebriated state, she believed that I was my sister, though we looked nothing ali
ke. Maura's eyes were fixed on mine when she reached out for my hand. I stared at her before scoffing in condescending disbelief. How she could expect my
comfort after all she had said, I did not know.

             
“Brynna...”

             
In her voice, I heard a soft, tremulous
plea. She needed my support, for whatever reason. She needed a moment of compassion from me. At first, I refused her request. Then, with a roll of my eyes and a muttered expletive, I reached out to link her fingers with mine.

             
Just before she passed out, s
he looked up at me and whispered:

             
“I should have smothered you in your crib.”

             
I watched her eyes close as her body dropped into a heavy, unshakable sleep. I nodded slightly to myself, bemused by the fact that I had nothing to say. Even if I did, she was
away in some dreamless world where I, mercifully, did not exist. After some time draped in a thoughtful silence, I found a suitable response.

             
“Yes. Perhaps you should have.”

             
I felt arms wrapping around me and I jumped, whipped around and threw myself on
top of the person I believed was attacking me. I looked down to find that it was James, looking more brilliant than ever in my eyes that had flashed white.

             
“Should I have said something?” He asked quickly as he held his hands up in surrender. “I should
have said something.”

             
I let out the breath I was holding and laid my head down on his chest. A peculiar but dreamily comforting wave of warmth passed all throughout my body when his arms came up to hold me. After his lips pressed to the top of my head, I
closed my eyes, inhaled deeply the scent of his cologne, and become steadily more hypnotized on the sound of his beating heart.