Give Me a Break

I’m lost and that’s putting it lightly. Both literally and figuratively, I’m walking between full leaves gleaming in the sunrise light, not sure where I am, knowing where I’m going. Anywhere. Away. Someplace far and gone and absent from people and the world. No more talking or listening. No more Brendon or Jon. Just me lost in my mind where the waterfall in the distance sounds like bones cracking on wooden edges.

I’m just a walking cliche, aren’t I? Boy blames self for friend’s death; leads to downward spiral of self destructive behavior. Cliche. So much of it. I always hated cliche, being average and expected. Spencer and I never were. We were special, god dammit. The vodka bottle sloshing in my hand tells me so. Special, so fucking special.

I take a drink, feel the burn rushing down my throat like needles and shining razor blades, and start to cough like a first time smoker, spitting out drops of water-clear vodka and the chewed up inside of the cheek I’ve been nibbling on. My mouth tastes like blood and lighter fluid. My vision’s a swirling merry go-round, nothing in focus, the pictures blurred smears of rainbow colors. I wobble on the ground, soft and wet, the dirt moist and wrapping around my sinking hands, the fingers curled into the soil, bugs crawling everywhere. Fallen leaves everywhere. Earth and dying life all around me, choking out the air, filling it with too much oxygen.

Too much. Remembering how to breathe. Trying to stay conscious when there’s earth coming up to hit my shoulder. My eyes, I can’t tell if they’re open or if I’m imagining the world, the green leaves hovering over me, thin protection from a hot sun, bugs swirling around me, nipping at exposed skin. Paradise twisted into carnivores, creatures I can’t see biting at my arms. The world smells too sweet. Smells like Brendon after a shower where the floral shampoo still hugs at his neck. No calming scent of coffee.

But I wanted to leave them anyway. Rose up early just to sneak away, to head off where nightmares and Spencer’s face wasn’t in everything, where I couldn’t still taste Brendon sucking at my tongue. Just like my father aren’t I? Drowning out my pains in tsunamis of alcohol that leave me retching out the empty objects of my stomach, nothing left but air and acid. Birds swarm in the trees around me, attracted by the strange smell and too wary to come closer. The strange new animal in the forest, a dying creature curled up on the ground. It can’t fly, can it?

How did I get here? Therapy didn’t help. Flying to Hawaii didn’t help. At least bitterness made life less painful. Sarcasm hid so much. I should have stayed with it, jumped off the building, pulled Spencer’s memory down with me. I start to crawl forward, towards the sound of crashing water, my throat begging for something that doesn’t sting and scald. My knees shake, digging into the dirt, sinking deeper with extended pause, too weak, too dizzy to move with any sort of speed. Birds continue to watch me, heads tilted, curious.

“What are you doing, Ryan?” Spencer questions, leaning against a rock six feet down the path I’m following, arms crossed, haughtiness dripping from him. Smug bastard.
“I’m thirsty.”
“No you’re not. That’s not what you’re doing.” He watches me crawl past, unflinching in his attention as he stands up to follow me.
“You’re dead.”
“Doesn’t change the fact that I’m here.”
“I’m crazy.”
“We all are.”
“Who’s Jon?” The question stings. Spencer kept something from me. I’ve known it since the beach, since Jon talked of him like Spencer was important, like Jon was important.
“He’s the boy you met on the plane.”
“Don’t lie to me, Spence.”
“I’m not, Ry. It’s how you know him.”
“How do you know him?”
“He worked at the Starbucks near our apartment.” The lingering scent of coffee, present on his clothes and neck and under his fingers. Starbucks coffee.
“Did you fuck him?”
“Oh, repeatedly.” Spencer chuckles, reaching down to hold my shoulder as my stomach heaves, more clear acid gushing out my throat to drip in thick lines from my lips. “God, you’re such a light weight.”
“I can still drink you under the table.” I hiss out across a burning tongue, smirking.
“You wish.”

Spencer helps me to my feet, curved arms wrapping across my bony frame, his hands warm against my freezing back. He feels solid, feels real. My mind’s collapsing around me, the world still spinning, but slower, the picture more focused and concise. Spencer’s long hair brushes along my ear as he pulls me closer, stubble sprouting along the edges of his jaw. His hair was shorter when he died, less wild, more controlled. There’s no tie clutching at his neck, no button up dress shirt. Loose jeans and a plaid jacket, gray band t from work. Relaxed Spencer. Dead Spencer. He seems happy.

“What happened?” I ask as we stumble forward.
“With Jon?” I nod. “You started having problems, drinking, snorting coke when you thought I wasn’t looking, cheating on Keltie-”
“I didn’t-”
“Don’t lie to me, Ry.” He echos as we reach the waterfall.

He places me near the edge, sitting beside me and taking off his shoes. I lower my hand into the water, the coolness a relief. My mind steadies, calms. The world stops its wobbling, regains its gravity, and I dip my face into the flow, the water clear and refreshing. Spencer lifts me back up, keeping me from slipping in before helping my shoes off. We sit in silence for a moment, our bare feet glowing white in the stream and eventually Spencer continues, drawing swirls on the rock with a wet hand.

“I told Jon we couldn’t keep it up. You needed me to be there whenever something went wrong. I found you passed out on the couch one afternoon and told Jon we needed to break up right after I got you cleaned up. I’m not blaming you,” he says quickly as a pained look crosses my face. “You were infinitely more important, but I asked that he keep an eye on you if you ever came in. I guess he took that a little farther than I expected. I never thought he’d follow you to Hawaii. I guess he took the request to heart.”

Spencer reaches around me, slips the thin jacket off my shoulder, the elbows coated in a thick layer of mud and plant remains, and starts working the buttons of my shirt, popping the pearls through the slits with long fingers accustomed to the motion. I watch him, unmoving, as he glides if off and runs a calming hand along the exposed skin of my shoulder blade, feels the tremble at his warm touch. I’d forgotten how his hands felt.

“Don’t fuck him though, ok? You’d break Brendon’s heart and dead or not, he’s still mine,” Spencer jokes, taking off his jacket and shirt before attempting the zipper on his pants.
“What are you doing?” I ask as he gets them off and stands up, pale with his feminine hips inches from my face.

His pink boxers make me smile. He’s still Spencer. Even dead and a piece of my imagination, he can’t escape his oddities.

“I’m going for a swim,” he proudly declares, inching closer to the water. “I recommend, as your personal therapist, that you accompany me. Might do you some good.”
“I doubt it.”
“Well, how about this? If it doesn’t, you can drown yourself. I’ll even hold you under.”

He smiles at me, teeth white and eyes sparkling. I missed his smile, the way it illuminated his whole face, every piece of his reflecting it. It takes me longer than I’m used to to get my pants off and the water’s a little cold, but I get in, thin arms covered in goosebumps. Spencer swims up behind me, holds my shoulders, and rubs his hands along the skin, heating it up, his chin at the base of my neck.

“I don’t blame you, Ryan.”
“I blame myself.”
“Accidents happen.”
“I killed you.”
“Gravity killed me.”

He runs a hand through my hair, pulling me closer, tighter, into his arms. I feel his breath on my collarbone and the his eyes lashes on my neck, familiar sensations I’ve known since pre-puberty, since the first night I ran to his house and curled into his bed, tearful, afraid, begging for protection. Spencer, my rock, the rock that slapped sense into me when I lost myself to apathy. What would have been if he hadn’t fallen? We could have done so much, been so much. I could have helped Keltie rather than let her abuse herself to deal with my depression. I could have not broken Brendon, could have learned to be his friend, to be Jon’s.

“Thinking on what could have been does not change what actually is, Ry.”
“I’m so sorry.” I force the words out, my voice cracking on the end. Spencer clutches at my head, brings my eyes to his.
“It’s not your fault, Ry. No, listen to me. Don’t give me that look. It’s. Not. Your. Fault. I don’t blame you and no one does. What happened was mostly my fault. You know, I never looked where I was going. It finally came back to bite me in the ass.” He laughs and the faintest hint of a smirk curls the corner of my mouth. “You’re so much more than this, Ry. You’re so much stronger. I know you. I’ve known you all of my life. You can’t close off because of me and this. It’s just...not you. You can let people in, Ry. They won’t let you down like I did.”
“You didn’t-”
“Yes, I did. I hurt you. I hit you. I promised I never would and I did anyway. Brendon would never do that to you.”
“Brendon?” Spencer breaks into laughter as I gaze at him, confused.
“Don’t tell me you can’t see it? He’s loved you since the first time I introduced you two.” Spencer’s laughter echoed across the water, so alive, so everything I remember. “I can’t believe how blind you are sometimes.”
“But Keltie...”
“We both know you don’t love her, Ry.”
“But you were so mad at me that day!” I yell. This doesn’t make sense. Any of it. Keltie caused the fight, helped cause the fall, helped kill Spencer, all for her, because I supposedly loved her.
“I wasn’t mad at you for not loving Keltie!” Spencer laughs as if it’s all a particularly hilarious game. “I was mad because you didn’t care. Love her or not, she was someone who really cared about you and you shouldn’t treat people the way you do, Ry. The way you treated her, the way you treat Brendon and Jon, it’s not okay and I know you know it.”
“They don’t care about me. They only cared about you.”
“Brendon bought you a plane ticket from Chicago to Hawaii and has spent the last couple days trailing after you like a beaten puppy. Jon basically stalks you.”
“That’s because of you.”
“Do you think people can’t care about you just to care about you?”
“You’re the only one who ever did. Everyone else wants something.”
“Ryan, come on. You’re smarter than that. I know you are.”

Spencer smiles at me, his blue eyes sparkling off the water’s light, everything in his face smoother, brushed over. His smiles come easy. His laughs fall out like pebbles. Death seems so uplifting. It suits Spencer. Maybe it’d suit me.

“You always gave me too much credit,” I whisper, falling back into his arms, his chest rising and falling against mine. Matching heartbeats. Matching heartache.

“No, I didn’t, Ry.” Spencer wraps his fingers around my hair. “How many people do we know that could have handled everything we’ve been through?”
“But you left. You promised you’d never go away!” The tears sting as they soak through my eyelids, hot like fire.
“I know and I’m so so sorry I couldn’t be what you needed. I tried so hard, Ry, and I’m so sorry I couldn’t do it. Please, please understand I didn’t mean to leave you. I never would have if I’d been given the choice.”
“...I’m sorry, Spence.”

The shaking starts in my chest before spreading through me, sobs harsh against bare flesh where my crying can’t be muffled under clothes and false pretenses. Spencer kisses my hair, my ear, my shoulder, presses his face into mine until I can hear his heartbeat pulsing in his neck and the sobbing only grows stronger, rougher, less controlled. He leads me back to the rocks and carries me into the sun. I cant see through my tears as he lies beside me.

Weeks of holding it down, of regret and denial and guilt, come gushing out of me in tsunami waves against Spencer’s arms. He clutches at my hand, runs his fingers across my face, soothing, calming, everything I’d denied the chance for other people to give me. Lying in the sun, I cry for hours, Spencer the only steadying object in my lost world, the only thing I can focus on when the sobs cause my mind to tilt. He kisses my hair, soft lips on water streaked curls. Gentle. Always gentle.

“It’s not your fault Ryan...It’s not your fault.”