Even If Saving You Sends Me to Heaven

Mara and Zane watched movies in Zane’s room all day. Danny and I had not choice but to do the same, sitting next to each other on the floor. We slipped into the previous understood silence, something we’d seemed to agree upon without speaking about it.

In the afternoon, I felt Zane’s mind wandering away from the subject of the dramatic movie. Although Mara was practically in his lap, he wasn’t thinking about her.

I watched him intently while his mind formulated thoughts about the afternoon before. He knew for sure he hadn’t gotten out of bed, but still he’s somehow found a glass of water and medicine to take. It never even occurred to him that his sister or uncle would’ve helped him, so he was puzzled as to how it had happened.

He also remembered being half asleep and feeling a gentle, soothing pressure on his forehead before Mara had shown up.

Still wondering, Zane considered that he could’ve dreamed it all. This theory crashed and burned when he glanced at his nightstand and saw the evidence still there: his glass. I grinned in pleasure, indescribably happy that he’d noted something off, and I didn’t know why.

Zane’s gaze moved from the glass and – for less than a second – met my eyes. He noted something out of place that he thought was beautiful, but when he looked away he forgot all about it. I continued to study his face, wanting him to look at me and actually see me, but after a while I felt someone else staring at me.

Danny was giving me that same weird, intrigued look he’d given me before. He was only a couple feet away. As if it wasn’t already uncomfortable enough, he didn’t look away when I looked at him. Part of me wanted to ask him what was up, but the other part of me didn’t really want to know. His gaze made me feel embarrassed and invaded, so I looked away.

A few minutes later when I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye, he was still gazing at me. I felt too close to him, but somehow not as uncomfortable. There was something familiar about him. Maybe he just reminded me of myself.

When Mara was getting ready, I faced Danny once more. His strange look was almost gone. He was cheerful again with only a shadow of doubt in his eyes.

“Are you okay?” I asked him, trying to be gentle.

He laughed and stood up, stretching out his dark wings in a magnificently intimidating manner. “Sure,” he dismissed, following Mara out of Zane’s room. As a final note, he called over his shoulder, “But are you?”

I stood idle for minutes, but I never did understand what he meant. When I finally spun around, I found Zane lying in bed. He was trying to sleep, but not succeeding. This time his headache wasn’t keeping him up, although it was definitely still present. But this time he was thinking too much to sleep.

I sat next to him in bed to be closer. Staring at the ceiling, he thought of his beautiful girlfriend. He couldn’t deny to himself that he loved her. This scared him to death. He was terrified that he could lose her. He knew she was the only important thing in his life, and he didn’t like to be that dependent on her. He worried it would scare her away.

He didn’t love anything or anyone else, but he admitted to himself that he would probably love anyone kind enough to love him back. But no one did love him back except for Mara. He felt that if no one loved him, he wouldn’t be able to live.

“No!” I wanted to shout at him. “There’s always someone worth living for: yourself!” But I couldn’t tell him. Besides, it was unbelievably hypocritical coming from my lips.

Finally Zane could take his sleeplessness no longer. He shoved his covers away and got out of bed. When he tiptoed past Samantha’s room, he saw that he TV was on, but she was asleep. He knew they hated each other, but he wished it could be different. He wished they could get along. At least he had Mara to love him. Samantha had no one.

On the other hand, Zane’s uncle barely crossed his mind when he padded his room. Zane remembered to shut off the house’s alarm system before opening the sliding glass door to the backyard.

The moonlight lit the small lake in the backyard. Zane made his way to towards the edge of the water, the damp grass squishing under his bare feet. The spring air was cooler than he’d expected. He wished he’d put a shirt on, but he didn’t want to turn back.

I was forced to follow him to the rowboat tied to an old wooden dock. When I stepped in, it didn’t shift under my weight like it had for him.

While I sat down, Zane untied the rope and pushed off. Rowing rhythmically to the center of the lake, Zane thought about how his mom had taken him to a friend’s lake house on his fifth birthday. With mild surprise, he realized his eighteenth birthday was in only a week on May 15th. He knew his birthday would only be acknowledged by Mara and his closest friends.

When he got to the center of the lake, he sat lower in the boat and looked up at the stars. More than once he looked around, as if he thought someone was in the boat with him. Eventually he sighed and dismissed the feeling that he was not alone.