Whispers

Rae looked in the mirror, smoothing down the skirt of her black dress. It was pale against her milk collarbones, covering her smooth arms in long sleeves. Her hair was pulled out of her face in an elegant bun, a flush of pink on her cheeks and light eyeliner making her eyes seem wider than usual. She pulled on a thick coat over the dress to keep her warm.

Once she left the house and arrived at the church, she knew that she would become a single black counterpart of many. She would fade into the black sea, a name in a mass. Only a few people would understand her significance there.

Downstairs Harry sat on the couch. His hands were clasped in his lap as he stared at them. He hadn’t said much all day, insisting that he was just in his thoughts. Rae had never had such a hard time talking to him, but he was locked tie, refusing to say a word.

Discovering him on the couch, Rae walked up behind him, stroking his hair with her hand. He leaned into her hand slightly, but said nothing and remained sitting. She continue to stroke his hair, running her fingers through it gently until he sighed, pressing his hands on his thighs. He stood, looking at her.

“Come on,” she murmured, stretching her hand out to him. He took it, completely hiding her small hand in his huge one, lacing his fingers with her. Despite the temperature outside, his hands were warm. “I’ll be over soon.”

Outside was cold, but the sun was shining, beating down on the earth. It seemed all wrong that there was not a cloud inside, that the sky was blue ad not grey. It reminded Rae that life would not paint a sad canvas just because she and Harry felt sad. Life felt for no one, stopped for no one and wept for no one. It was cruel and harshly fair.

Edward’s service was being held at a small church. It was white with high, strained glass windows, the colors refracting rainbows on onto the rich, red carpet. Small wooden pews lined the church, smelling like ancient oak. Bibles and lyric books were tucked into the back of the pews, neat and dusted.

Rae sat in the second row in between Liam and Niall. Louis and Zayn were another row back, quiet and collected. Harry and his family were sitting in front of her, both know and unknown to her. Edward’s brother and sister were there as well as Harry’s own mother. His parents were deceased.

Everything was quiet save for the pastor beginning his opening. A cough or two made Rae flinch as she remained still, the pastor going over pleasantries and brief overview of Edward’s life.

Edward’s brother and sister spoke together, bringing little laughter to the room as they talked about their childhood. Rae had never even seen them before, had no idea that they even existed. But she smiled at the appropriate times, and even chuckled once or twice.

When they finished, Rae leaned forward. She squeezed Harry’s shoulder when it was his turn to speak. “Love you.”

He didn’t say anything but he nodded in response.

As Harry walked to the front of the church to a podium standing above and behind the closed casket, Rae began bouncing her leg in a steady rhythm, nervous for Harry. A hand on her knee made her snap out of it, looking to her left to where Niall had placed a hand on her knee, giving her a pat. She offered him a smile, stilling her leg.

Harry cleared is throat awkwardly, tossing his curls to the side. “Hello,” he started, scratching his head. “When I was originally asked to speak, I didn’t want to. I think we can all agree I’m not the best at speaking, unless you count when I was the narrator in my grade school for the three little pigs play.

Everyone laughed. Rae smiled, watching Harry. He seemed to fade into a sort of comfortable state of speech, his shoulders unwinding. He gripped the sides of the podium, leaning forward. He had pulled something from his coat pocket, placing it on flat. “I want to um, read something that my girlfriend discovered when helping me with my father’s things. I think that it explains him better than I have ever been able to, and when thinking about what to say, this seemed to make the most sense.”

“Harry will never be the same, young boy who would constantly check to see if I was home, if the light in the study was on. Truth be told, many times I was not in fact home. I set a timer on the light, because I wanted him to sleep, I wanted him to find comfort and be at peace. I could not give him more than that, I am afraid.”

“My dad was a man who was busy,” Harry murmured. He looked up. Rae’s eyes connected with his and she gave him a smile, nodding her head. She smiled back at her. “but if there was one thing he was good at, it was subconsciously making sure that others were alright. I never knew my dad the way I should maybe, but what my dad left me is all I need to know. I would like to end with something that F. Scott Fitzgerald said in my favorite book, The Great Gatsby, something that I never considered. He wrote, ‘Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead.’ I think that’s what we’ve learned today.”

Rae used the back of her hand to wipe tears from her face. Even when talking about death, Harry related himself to The Great Gatsby. You could take the boy out the book but not the book out the boy. “That’s all. Thanks for listening.”

Harry sat back down as someone else went to speak. Rae leaned forward in her pew, putting her hand on his shoulder. He reached is hand back and locked fingers with her, holding hands in an awkward position, but keeping their hands together. She sat on the edge of her seat until the end of the funeral, never once removing her grasp from his.

*

The buzzing of the phone woke Rae. She felt around her bed for it, worried that it was Harry calling her so early in the morning. When she found it, she answered, eyes still closed, early morning voice croaking, “Hello?”

“You didn’t tell me on our date that Harry’s father passed.”

Rae opened her eyes. “It wasn’t your business, goodbye.”

“Rae.” She hesitated. Leon calling her was new, and she decided that she was changing her number that very day. She refused to deal with this. She had to start cutting him off, to start fighting back. “Next time something like that happens to him, you’re going to tell me.”

“No,” she growled, sitting up in bed. “What I’m going to tell you is to leave us alone. What I’m going to tell you is that you have absolutely nothing to do with Harry’s life. What I’m going to tell you is I’m done with you. You will not call me, you will not bother me, you will not come near me. I will build up every ounce of evidence I have for a restraining order, and I will keep you away from me.”

There was silence on the line. “In the end, when you’re asking yourself why, just remember something: you did this.”

The line went dead. Rae hung up the phone, taking deep breaths. Something in the way that he had ended the phone call disturbed her. The thought that she would ever be asking Leon ‘why’ struck her to her core. That meant that he was done with his strange game of appear and disappear. He was over screwing with her head. He wanted to exact revenge for some mental reason.

For a long time Rae considered Leon crazy. She thought that maybe he was just bored, that he had nothing better to do than to stalk her, than to bother her. But as she began to look at the real picture, she began to wonder if maybe he wasn’t crazy, maybe in his eyes, she had really done something to him. She had some how taken away something that she didn’t understand from him and he wanted it back more than anything.

To Rae it made no sense. Then again, the heart of the spited was hard to understand.

Without telling anyone, Rae took herself to the store that day. She changed her phone number, the company asking no questions. When she had her new phone, she put in her contacts and sent them messages, letting them know that she had switched her numbers. When asked why, she simply told them her phone had taken a nasty spill.

It was Rae’s first step to fighting back. The second step was taking herself to a gym, signing up and paying for a self defense class. They gave her a plastic card with her membership number on it and wished her a nice day. She accepted it with a smile, putting the card in her wallet and feeling lighter, knowing that she was doing something.

The last step that Rae took was calling a company and setting up an appointment to get a new alarm system set in her house. They cheerfully made an appointment for a Monday morning where someone would install the system and walk her through how to use it.

Later that night, Rae sat down on her couch, popping in a movie with Trystan. She informed Trys that they were getting a new alarm, and the blonde agreed that it was a good idea, not pressing the matter further. And instead of worrying about Leon’s phone call, Rae enjoyed watching When In Rome with her best friend and a cup of tea.