"Pretty girls like you get lost in these woods all the time, Alexa."
On the night of Sebastián's annual Beginning of Summer Bash, amiable and adventurous Melody Tryniski went missing. What might have appeared as a juvenile escapade - a casual incide...
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CHRISTOPHER IS HIDDEN IN the shadows.
He's almost invisible in that little corner. Flashes of him appear to me every time he flickers his platinum lighter, the soft flame it emits providing a moment of clarity before it dies down. There's this clicking sound fighting to be heard among the roaring wind, the representation of his struggle to light the cigarette that's trapped between his teeth.
While he is being swallowed by the shadows, I'm paralyzed next to the diner's entrance. The wind whistles a soft tune as it breezes through my loose curls — its icy fingers tracing my skin until I feel nothing but cold. It's a coldness you can feel in your bones, the ominous promise of things worst to come. Levittown's darkness has a life of its own — the wind is its voice, the woods are its eyes, the riverbank is its stomach and the citizens are its poisonous heart.
The darkness is all around us, consuming us with sinister thoughts and vicious actions. There's no escaping it. Right now, it sings to me. Maybe it's just me, but I don't understand what it wants. Perhaps it's here for anyone who is inside this diner. Maybe that's why I don't understand it tonight.
Your mother supported a serial killer for months. She was by his side when he was planning his escape, fucked him after he fucked a dead body. Does that mean you're like your mother just because you're her daughter?
The poison of Micah's words settles in. Am I like my mother? I shake the thought away - its poison leaving traces behind - and walk quietly toward Christopher.
For a moment, I'm pink and orange and blue and yellow. The blinding lights coming from inside the diner bathe me with innocence, before I get swallowed by the shadows that now consume Christopher. There's almost a division between the darkness that comes from outside and the brightness that's inside — as if there's some kind of secret pact between them, where they swear to never touch each other. The comfort of the diner protects, while the darkness from outside corrupts.
We're agreeing to this unknown danger as we stand side by side. But, despite the uncertainty that only the unknown can provide, I feel safe.
Not that that's any consolation. As soon as my bare shoulder brushes against the soft fabric of his crop-top, he flinches away. Away from my touch, away from me. It's as if I'm poison to him. My chest tightens as I gulp down the pain that inevitably comes from his rejection. We're back to being strangers. What changed in a matter of minutes?
Christopher continues to flicker the lighter until he finally lights his cigarette. The smoke emitting from it billows all around us as it comes out of his nostrils and mouth. It makes the houses that align in the distance look foggy, but they've always been barely perceptible from this side of town.
