The Struggle (The Things We Can't Change Book 2) (13 page)

Ezekiel

36

It isn’t until I’m walking home, halfway through the two-mile trek, that I come down from the high and realize what’s going on, become aware of it all; the small, half-smile on my lips, the way I remember something Evie said and give a little huff of laughter, realize what’s going on inside me.

Feelings.

I’m aware of my heartbeat speeding up as I start to put a name to what is happening inside me. It’s attraction, caring, empathy. For Evangeline Parker. The girl who practically had a hand in Cindy’s death. The girl who is even more messed up than I am, and that’s really saying something. The girl who actually let herself become trapped in an abusive relationship for two whole years.

My skin begins to crawl, feels as though its shrinking and becoming too small for my body as I start to realize just how much I’m feeling, how strong the emotions are inside me. I don’t want them. I don’t want to feel, don’t want to care. And on top of that, there’s a strong, incredulous case of guilt; how can I become friends, even be friendly toward, someone who had a hand in my sister’s death, no matter how indirectly?

I’m breathing heavily now, and not from my walking. I look down at my hands and they’re trembling. Shit.
Shit
. My heart is pounding. I can hear it in my ears and it’s a deafening sound, and again I want to reach inside myself and rip it out, have it just be
gone
so I don’t have to feel like this anymore, don’t have to worry about keeping my distance, about going through all the loss and grief again. I have to get it out. I have to find a way to channel it out of me, get my cool head back, and learn not to care what happens to Evie Parker or anyone else in this world. If I can just get it all
out,
then I can keep my distance, just like I was doing before.

I’m passing under the bridge and I have to stop, lean against a brick wall as the feelings take over and burn up my insides. For a moment, it’s all white hot and blindingly strong, stealing away my breath and causing me to double over and clutch my middle in pain, even though the hurt is all in my mind. Just like when I saw Evie grabbing her ribs, I know emotional pain can hurt worse than physical.

I cry out, a scream of frustration that I’m glad no one is around to hear. Out. I’ve got to get it all out. Got to escape this, keep only Cindy on my mind, focus only on her and her memory.
Out
of me, need it out of my body.

I reach out to the wall of the bridge to steady myself, my skin scraping across the rough, uneven bricks and steel. The slight bit of pain seems to bring me back to reality, distract me for just a moment from my inner turmoil, and I look at my hand, then at the entire wall of the bridge. It’s
my
bridge, the one I used to tag with Cameron when he wanted a cheap thrill without being the one to break the law.

It’s covered in paint, mostly big words that Cameron would tell me to paint for no apparent reason, but there are other things too, swirling patterns that were made during mindless rages, a few shaded faces of nameless people, even a train tunnel that looks so realistic, you might be worried the train in the distance is about to barrel into you. They all bear my mark, my signature, an elaborate Z braided with a Q, usually small, but always there.

The urge to paint overwhelms me. To release it all, to let it all flow into my fingers and out of my body and onto some other canvas, where it will stay trapped and I can view it with cool detachment. On a wall, a canvas, someone’s house, just not
in
me. My fingers are violently shaking now, trembling like an alcoholic or druggie going through withdrawal—which is what I may as well be. It’s been three weeks since I’ve painted, three months since I last drew. I need to do something, satisfy the urge and get the feelings out.

Before I realize it, I’m casting around in the bushes for a discarded can of spray paint, for a fucking Sharpie, anything that will make a mark on the bridge. I can’t find anything, and just as I’m kicking a bush in disgust I realize it’s for the best, remember that I’m on the thinnest ice I’ve ever tread in my life and I can’t deface anything. There’s only one alternative, and I only think about it for a moment before I’m off, running the rest of the way to the apartment.

As I push open the door, my mind seems to have separated into two different people, both of them arguing violently with one another.
Don’t do this, you don’t need to do this. Just let yourself feel, work through it, don’t betray Cindy, don’t break your vow. Don’t do it, Zeke!
I ignore that voice, beat it down as I pound up the stairs and enter my bedroom.

I lay down flat on the floor and reach with one hand to scrabble around underneath the bed. Finally, I locate the strap and pull out the backpack, along with a dozen dust bunnies. Ignoring the under-the-bed detritus that coats the black polyester, I sling it over my shoulder and head back downstairs.

Luckily, my dad is home, and when I tell him where I want to go, he tosses me his keys with a grunt and minimal hesitation. I catch the keys and then I’m trying hard to stay calm enough to drive sanely. The last thing I need right now is to be pulled over.

The trip seems to last forever, go on endlessly, but finally I’m pulling into a parking spot and slowly removing the keys from the ignition. I stare at the building, suddenly unsure. And then grief, plain and simple, just pure grief, slams into me with the force of a jackhammer.

Shit.
Fuck,
I miss Cindy. Miss her teasing. Miss coming home to her every day, miss her smile, miss watching her dance. I even miss the way she always begged me to draw and how I had to drive her all over Columbus all the time. Pushing people away means loneliness, something that never bothered me, something I had never realized or noticed until Cindy was gone. She’d loved me unconditionally, stubbornly, sweetly. Just as I had loved her without reservation, without putting up a guard, without feeling the need to expel the emotion. And now she was gone; forever, no going back, just permanently gone. Always gone, unable to return. Stolen, just as all good things in my life are taken away from me.

It’s the grief, needing to expel some of it, handle and deal with it, gain a bit of a clear head, that forces me out of the car. The rush of adrenaline, of nerves and, might as well admit it,
fear
, helps me to deal, just like always. I push the door open, hearing the familiar chime of bells, and walk fully into the dance studio.

Jenny Hunt is here, leading a dance lesson. Our eyes meet and she falters for just a moment, and then quickly looks away. Madame Bella is at the door of the office, but as soon as she lays eyes on me, she makes a beeline in my direction.

“Ezekiel,” she breaths, reaching out to clasp one of my hands in both of hers. She studies me for a long moment, and I know she sees the dampness around my eyes, that I’m on the verge of tears like a fucking child. She moves closer and enfolds her skinny ballerina arms around me. She squeezes me so tightly my lungs expel all their air in a long
whoosh
.

Even though I hate people in my personal space, I allow it, because I know we both loved Cindy and we both miss her. Finally, Madame Bella steps back, blinking rapidly and discreetly wiping at her own eyes.

“Anything I can do for you?” she asks, clearly striving for normalcy. “Anything at all?”

“Um, yeah,” I say, and have to clear my throat a couple of times to erase the hoarse note in my voice and banish the huge lump that has appeared there. “Do you… Can… Could I just sit in here? For a little while?”

“Of
course
,” she replies fiercely. “Of course, Ezekiel. Anytime. For as long as you want. Go right ahead.”

I nod and she heads back to the office while I sit in a chair at the back of the room. I stay still for a long moment, just taking it all in. Watching the girls twirl and leap on the dance floor. One of them has darker skin and if I squint hard enough, I can almost imagine its Cindy.

Bittersweet torture.

Finally, I stop watching and focus on the dusty backpack at my feet. Slowly, with the utmost care, I unzip the top. At once, the scents hit me; the wood of sharpened pencils, acidic tang of markers, and the pleasant mustiness of recycled sketch paper. I close my eyes and savor it, even though my hands are still trembling, wanting to grab the pencils and let everything flow out through them.

I find one of my old sketchpads, one that isn’t completely full, though most of the ones in this bag are. Then I rifle through the pencil box until I find my favorite kind of pencil, a charcoal based one that has no wood. I sharpen it with the utmost precision, then break off the pointy tip and blunt the end on a scrap of paper so it’s not too sharp. Then I stare at the page, and I can’t bring myself to do it.

I wanted to come here and be reminded of Cindy. To think about her, mourn her, and to draw her once again. To get all the feelings over Evie, and now Cindy, out of me. And yet now that it comes right down to it, I can’t draw her. I can’t draw Cindy. It hurts too much. That’s what I tell myself at first, and then slowly, the real reason surfaces, ugly and horrible. I try to avoid it, don’t want to voice it, don’t want to think it, but it comes anyway.

I can’t remember the exact shape of her lips. How high her forehead was, the right way to shade in her cheekbones.

I’m forgetting her.

The thought comes in a flash, and I recoil from it – literally.
No.
She is—was—my little sister. I stared at that face for eleven years. I saw it every day. Watched it grow, mature, light up with laughter or drip with tears over our mom. I can’t be forgetting it already. Not in just two months.

And yet I am. I can close my eyes and see it, of course. I’ll always
know
what she looked like. But the finite details, the ones I need to draw her face accurately, to make it alive, like the thickness of her eyelashes or the tilt of her chin, are fading. As an artist, this is a severe blow. As a brother, it’s devastating.

You’re an idiot!
I rail at myself.
Just like Dad always says! A selfish bastard. You couldn’t have spent a few more minutes looking at your sister’s face, instead of dicking around with Cameron, could you? Stupid, stupid, stupid!

I’m blinking hard to hold back the tears, but this time, they’re tears of rage. And this time, it’s rage at myself. I’m shaking yet again, too hot in my own skin, fighting to stay calm but I can’t get my shit together. I can’t shed the tingly, stomach-dropping self-disgust, the loathing for myself that is taking over.

I get rid of it the only way I know how. Mindlessly, half-blind from tears, I put my pencil to paper and draw.

When I’m done, though, I don’t feel any better, hate myself any less. Because it isn’t Cindy’s face looking back up at me.

It’s Evie’s.

I drive home in a blind panic. I keep tossing looks over at the backpack on the passenger seat, as though I’m afraid of it, that it will explode. I
am
afraid of it. I’m afraid Cindy will appear, that she somehow knows. Knows I’ve betrayed her, that I’m forgetting her and that she’s no longer the last person I drew. I’ve betrayed her memory, broken my stupid vow yet again, because I’m weak.

Tears are still falling down my cheeks when I get home. I’m still vibrantly furious with myself. Evie and her stupid, magnetizing eyes and glorious hair, always begging to be drawn. And I finally caved, because I’m a weak, spineless, selfish screw-up.

I quickly run up the stairs to my room, avoiding a run-in with my dad. I slam my door closed behind me but it doesn’t ease the anger.

I’m gasping for air, shaking, crying. Overwhelmed, consumed. I throw the backpack across the room, grunting at the effort. It hits, even chips the paint, but still, not enough. I give a deep growl of frustration and stalk over to the bag. I snatch it up from the floor and tear it open, and suddenly everything inside is flying all over my room; sketchpads landing with their pages bent, random bits of paper floating in the air, pencil sharpeners and rulers
thunking
against the floor, and finally the big plastic box of pencils, landing on its corner and spilling open all over the floor.

I descend on the pencils in a blind rage, grabbing up three at once and snapping them in half. I throw away the pieces and take a sketchbook next, tearing out the pages, ripping them into tiny pieces and throwing them to the ground. I don’t even recognize myself; I’ve never let myself go before, never let my anger take over me, and yet here I am, screaming, shouting at myself as I destroy everything I own related to drawing. I snap the rest of the pencils, crinkle up all the paper, crack the rulers and destroy everything I can to the fullest extent, repeating over and over inside my head,
never, never, NEVER AGAIN!

My room is a wreck by the time I run out of steam. I can hardly see the floor amid the mess, and I finally collapse in the middle of it. My arms are around my middle, my feet tucked up, because I’m
feeling,
feeling everything, the guilt and the grief and the anger, and it
hurts.
Shit, it hurts. It takes my breath away. I’m still crying, can’t fucking stop crying.