Letters From The Ledge (22 page)

“Brendan?”

His head shot around at the sound of her voice and stopped his heart momentarily. “What are you doing here?”

Sarah looked from the stone marker to the box to the flowers and back to Brendan’s face. “Oh my God! What happened to your face?” She knelt down in front of him and reached out gingerly to touch the bruises.

Brendan’s heart was spinning in circles. She shouldn’t be here. This was his place, with Tess. He pulled away from her touch. “Why are you here, Sarah?” It came out angrier than he’d intended, and he kicked himself for being harsh.

She backed up off of her knees and put some distance between them. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know this was a private cemetery.”

“It’s not, I just–” He put the hat and the glasses back on. “This is the last place I expected to see you.”

She turned and pointed behind her. “My little brother is buried here. I come to see him every year on his birthday.” She stared openly at the box. “My grandmother owns a family plot here and… I was just leaving but I thought it looked like you from the back.”

Brendan kept quiet.

“I–I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you. I’ll leave you alone.”

She turned and walked away and he let her. He leaned back against the tree and closed his eyes until the sound of wind and rustling papers got his attention. The box top was still off. A breeze had picked up some of its contents and they were blowing away. Brendan jumped to his feet and ran after them, carefully placing them back in the box and putting the lid on it. When he sat down again something felt different. It was as if Tess was mocking him from the grave. He could almost hear her voice in his head saying, “You’ll run after papers left by a dead girl and let the live one get away? Are you crazy or just stupid?”

It hit him like a two-by-four to the head. He’d come for her permission, what he hadn’t expected was to actually get it. The same voice kept prodding him. “Well go on–go after her!”

He smiled down at the grave marker and winked. “Thanks Tess!” He grabbed up the box and the camera and took off at a run. He left the flowers lying on the ground.

"Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony."

- The Matrix

His best guess was that she’d have to take the subway, but he couldn’t be sure. He ran out the gates and had to guess which station to try.

“Hey Peggy!” He stopped in front of her cart and put his hands on his knees to catch his breath. “Cute girl, jeans and a little red jacket with a–” He made a motion with his hand that circled his neck “–scarf…thingy.”

Peggy smiled. “Now that’s the spirit!” She pointed west and he took off again.

“Thanks Peggy!”

“Go get ‘em tiger!”

He waved behind him, hiking the box up under his arm better as he ran. The camera was still slung around his neck, and the first time it whacked him in the ribs he saw stars. He grabbed onto it and held it steady the rest of the way. At the entrance to the subway, he took the stairs two at a time, and jumped the last three at the bottom, landing hard on the concrete. It took a minute to catch his breath. The jarring hurt worse than he’d anticipated, but he stilled his breath and focused on the pain and willed back the desire it created.

He entered the station with his eyes peeled. It was amazing how much faster you could find something if you told your mind to only look for the color red. He spotted her jacket easily. She was standing on the platform, waiting for the next train, arms wrapped around her middle as if she was trying to hold her insides together. Had she learned nothing from their walk around Manhattan?

He walked up behind her and waited for her to notice. When she did, he took off the hat and glasses and waited, watching her eyes float across the surface of the bruises. She almost looked hurt by association.

“I’m sorry.” His words came whispering out and she didn’t respond. “I shouldn’t have acted like that, I just–” He looked down at the box and thought about Tess.

“Was that her grave?”

“Yes.”

“Do you go there often?”

Brendan licked his lips. He didn’t want to talk about Tess, but supposed it was inevitable. “Every Saturday.”

Sarah nodded her understanding. She was still holding herself, watching the ground and jiggling one leg nervously. The train whistle blew and she glanced in the direction it came from.

Brendan stepped forward, took her chin in his hand and tipped her face up to meet his. Her mouth was just as he’d remembered it, soft and willing. He lost himself there while the train blew in to the station, its brakes squealing loud against the beating of his heart.

She pulled away. “That’s my train.”

“Only if you want it to be.”

She looked into his face and smiled. “No. Not really.”

He slid his camera around to the back and pulled her into him. There was always another train. He threaded his fingers through her hair and poured into her everything he’d been holding inside.

When she slid her arms around his waist he cringed slightly.

“My God. You really are hurt, aren’t you?”

Brendan backed up a bit. “It’s getting better.”

Fear was carved in deep grooves along her temples. "What happened?" She reached up and tried to touch the swollen eye but Brendan pulled back.

"Please don’t touch it."

"Who did this to you?"

He grabbed hold of her hands and pleaded with his eyes. "I really…really don’t want to talk about it. Not now. I’m sorry."

Sarah studied him for a minute. "It’s ok." Her eyes were rimmed with tears but she held firm. "Maybe some day, when you’re ready, you’ll tell me."

His smile quietly betrayed the harsh reality of his face. "Thanks for understanding."

"What are friends for?"

"That’s a very good question." He stroked his chin with his thumb and forefinger. "Are they for–" Brendan winked his good eye and scrunched up his mouth "Kissing swollen, grotesque looking guys with nice smiles? By any chance?"

She leaned in and gently kissed his lips.

"Hmm. Maybe I should get someone to beat me up more often."

She pouted. "Don’t say that.”

He turned away and put his hat and glasses back on. "What do you say we go for a walk? I know a deli near the cemetery that makes great sub sandwiches.”

“Are you asking me on a date?”

“I don’t know. Would you like it if I did?”

“Yes.”

He took her hand and threaded his fingers through hers. “Then this is definitely a date.”

They walked hand in hand for a couple of blocks to the deli. Her touch seemed to breathe life into his exhausting search for answers. They grabbed sandwiches and sodas and went back to the cemetery. Peggy nodded her approval on their way by and snuck a pink rose into his free hand, relay-style.

Brendan laughed and Sarah looked up. “What’s so funny?”

He shrugged. “Do you mind if we eat in here? It’s the only grass around.”

“No. I don’t mind. Cemeteries don’t bother me. Besides, it makes for a great story. Bet you haven’t taken many first dates here, have you?”

He looked at her and simply said. “Nope. Not one.” He pulled out the rose and presented it to her. “But I’m glad you’re the first.”

Her smile was simple and genuine and it melted his heart. She wasn’t dark and beautiful like Tess, but there was something about her that defied logic and flew in the face of all his reasoning. He didn’t know why. It just had to be her.

“Thank you. It’s beautiful, but where did you get–” She looked down the path toward the street vendor’s cart.

Brendan tried to hide his embarrassment in another shrug. “We’re old friends.”

“So I see.”

They sat down on the grass and she proceeded to harvest all the peperoncini from her sandwich.

“Note to self: next time, hold the peppers.”

She crinkled up her nose. “Sorry. I’m kind of high maintenance when it comes to food.”

“That’s ok. I’m kind of high maintenance when it comes to everything else. But I can eat just about anything!” Brendan took an enormous bite of his sandwich trying to be funny. It hurt like hell, opening his mouth that wide.

The box sat between them like an armed guard, and in some strange way Brendan was sorry he’d brought it–not that he could have known he’d see her–and at the cemetery, of all places. Still, it loomed unnecessarily large, like a dark cloud hanging low over their heads, threatening rain.

Sarah looked tentative. “Did she make it for you?”

Brendan nodded, looking down at the box. “Sort of.”

“It doesn’t bother me, you know.”

“What doesn’t?”

“That you loved her.”

Brendan nearly choked on his bite of sandwich.

“I’m just saying–it’s ok.”

Her eyes were strong and sure, her smile gentle and understanding. He’d never known her kind of peace, and it drew him like quicksand. He started to lose his footing, but looking at Tess’s box pulled him back to the edge. What was he holding onto? The past was dead. Tess was dead. And besides, he’d never felt this deeply about Tess. Theirs had been camaraderie–a shared pain that fed itself in the dark places but couldn’t breathe life into the light.

She hesitated as she watched him. “I do need you to know something though.”

“What’s that?”

Brendan wasn’t prepared for what came next.

“I can’t…
be
with you while you’re still in love with her. My heart’s just not wired that way.”

He stopped chewing altogether and swallowed what was left in his mouth.

“I really like you Brendan, but I don’t want to get in the way.”

“In the way of what?”

“In the way of your journey; your healing.”

Brendan tried to smile, but he didn’t like where this was going. “Someone’s been reading too much of The Alchemist.”

She laughed. “Well, you were right about Fatima. I do like her. But this is
me
talking. I can see you’re grieving Brendan, and–” She looked at the bruises on his face. “–there’s still a lot I don’t know about you. A lot you’re not willing to share with me yet.”

Tess’ pain was over, but his was still very much alive. It was all so convoluted. She was right. He had no idea where grief ended and attraction began, and he had no business getting involved with her while that was the case.

His mind reeled and twisted on itself, dark images flashing and interspersing with faces–Sarah, Tess, Nate, his father, and back again. “Look, I–”

She put a finger up to his mouth. “Just let me finish.”

Brendan closed his mouth and had to fight against the urge to kiss her again to stop her from talking–to stop her somehow from continuing to state the obvious.

“We’re just not there yet, and I’m ok with just being your friend for a while until you figure it out. Or maybe–” She looked down at the ground. “–Maybe we can’t be friends for a while so you can figure it out.”

“Sarah–”

She looked out away from him. “I’m leaving in a few weeks anyway.”

“What? Where?”

“I’m going to Newfoundland.”

He blinked back his surprise. “Newfoundland?” He said the word as if it were some made-up place that people didn’t actually visit. “Really? As in–Canada?”

“Yes.” She smiled. “As in Canada.”

“Wh–why? What’s up there?”

“My aunt. I’ve been going there every summer for as long as I can remember. She owns a small restaurant in Brigus. I help her out during the summers.”

“But you’ll be back, right?”

Sarah sighed audibly. “You’re graduating Brendan. You’re heading to Europe, and I’m starting to think…that this was a bad idea.” She was holding back tears and his heart just about exploded.

“Stop it. Stop talking like that.”

“Why? You know I’m right, Brendan.”

He pushed the box out of the way and in one deliberate motion moved in toward her. “This isn’t nothing.” He took her face in his hands and kissed her. She struggled momentarily and then relented. He felt her mouth relax and find its rhythm as his kiss intensified. He kept trying to pull her into him so that she wouldn’t let go.

All at once she put her hands up against his chest and pushed him back. “Please stop. I don’t want it like this.”

He was breathing heavily. “Tell me you don’t feel that.”

“Of course I can feel it! I’m not dead, Brendan.” She looked in the direction of Tess’s grave and hesitated. “But if we’re falling over the edge of this thing, I don’t want to fall all by myself and then find out at the bottom that you never let go.”

Her words landed with a deafening thud. Tess couldn’t feel a thing anymore, and yet he was clinging to her as if she was still alive; could still save him from himself.

“Remember I told you about that guy I saw who almost jumped off his balcony?”

He blinked at her. “Yeah.”

“Well, it was the weirdest thing. I woke up in the middle of the night one night from a really strange dream, and I looked out my window. I saw him out there. He was out on the ledge, just like always, but he was laying down, and he started to fall.”

Brendan’s heart stopped momentarily. He leaned forward ever so slightly. “Wh- what happened next?”

She smiled sheepishly. “You’re going to think I’m crazy. Maybe I was still dreaming, I don’t even know.”

Brendan’s jaw twitched but otherwise he made no further movements. He was pinned to grass by the weight of what she was about to say.

“I saw what looked like–I don’t know, angels? They didn’t have wings or anything, they were just floating in the air. But they were huge, like bouncers at a bar or something, with these huge arms.” She motioned with her hands pulled out several inches from her own bicep.

“And?”

She blew her breath out all at once and finished abruptly. “And they picked him up, and put him back on the ledge.”

His eyes started to twitch along with his jaw and he lowered his head, trying to process the information. That couldn’t have been real. He’d convinced himself it was a drug-induced hallucination.

“I told you you’d think I was crazy. You’re laughing at me, aren’t you?”

He looked up, serious, searching her face. “No. I don’t think you’re crazy.”

A bright red that rivaled her jacket had crept into her cheeks. “Well, anyway, whether it was a dream or not I think …I think he just wasn’t ready to fall.”

Brendan’s throat closed off, and he couldn’t have swallowed the blue pill even if one had been offered to him. He was absolutely certain this was one rabbit hole he didn’t want to go down.

Her face was earnest. “You know, like these people who have out of body experiences, and they die but then they come back because it’s not time yet and they still have stuff left to do on the earth?”

He nodded dumbly.

“Well, maybe it just wasn’t his time. And maybe I needed to see that in my dream or whatever, so that I could understand a little better about timing.”

He smiled weakly and tried to push the words through the constriction in his throat. “Sounds logical to me.”

She got up onto her knees and laid her hand across his leg. “Thank you for lunch. It’s been a most interesting date.”

When she leaned over to kiss his cheek, he turned into her mouth instead and kissed her as gently as he knew how. He felt a strange need to protect her; as if he could somehow keep her from breaking.

Her eyes were full and ready to spill over. “I really have to go. Please just let me.” She started to turn away but then stood frozen. “I just want you to know something.”

Brendan looked up without speaking.

“I believe in you.”

Such a simple statement, but it hit him like a train, throwing him back so that he physically had to jolt upright. She walked away and left him sitting there, heart pounding in his chest. When the red of her jacket had faded into the distance he reached into his pocket with shaking hands and pulled out a joint. Laying back on the grass, he looked up at the sky and joined Tess in the clouds.