Collide Read online

  Citrus.

  Oranges.

  Dark.

  Chapter 21

  “No. No, no, no, no!” I stumbled forward two steps, my hands still covered in suds from the sink I’d left behind. “Oh, damn it, no.”

  Darkness. I blinked rapidly, my eyes adjusting. The smell of oranges had faded, replaced by the faint hint of heat and chlorine and motor exhaust—familiar scents. I was back in the world my mind had created for me so I could be close to Johnny.

  But I didn’t need this now. I had him for real. In my real life. Clenching my fists, I gritted my teeth and concentrated on going back.

  Nothing.

  I was standing in the side yard of Johnny’s town house. From the splashing and laughter I could hear from around the corner, there was a poolside party going on. Maybe they were filming another movie. I didn’t much care. I wanted out of here, back to consciousness. Back to my own time.

  I let myself into the kitchen, expecting to find Johnny and coming across Ed instead. He was slumped at the kitchen table, a cigarette in one hand and an ashtray full of butts in front of him. Also, a bottle of vodka, almost empty. And next to that, a rolled cloth pouch with a syringe on it.

  “Emm. Emma. Emmaline. Emm,” he said, not slurring, though his eyes looked red and bloodshot.

  He stank, even from across the room. I winced. “Ed. Where is everyone?”

  “Swimming. Skinny-dipping. Fucking.” His laugh chilled me. “Getting high. Where are they always? What are they always doing? You looking for Johnny, right? He’s waiting for you.”

  “What do you mean, waiting for me?”

  “Johnny says you’re coming.” Ed waved his cigarette and smoke wafted toward me. “Johnny says he’s waiting for you. You’ll show up. You always do. He’s a little drunk, a little high, but he’s not fucking. Why isn’t he fucking, Emm? Because he’s waiting for you.”

  I frowned and hugged myself, though the kitchen was as sticky-hot as it had always been every other time my mind had brought me here. “Thanks for letting me know. Where is he? Upstairs?”

  “He’s out by the pool. Paul is taking pictures of him. Naked,” Ed added with another chilling laugh that rose the hairs on the back of my neck. “Showing off his ass again. I told you, they’re drunk and high.”

  “And not fucking. I get it.” I ran some cold water in the sink and scooped a handful, then splashed my face.

  It looked like I was going to have to ride this out, that was all. I almost didn’t want to find Johnny here. Somewhere, my mother was talking to me about cleaning wipes. I couldn’t do what I’d always done in this place, not knowing she was waiting for me to answer her. Maybe even getting concerned, saying my name, shaking my shoulder. I couldn’t fuck Johnny in front of my mother, even if she wasn’t really there and I wasn’t really here.

  “You wanna know what Johnny says about you, Emmaline?”

  I looked at Ed. Now I noticed he had a pen and a leather-bound notebook in front of him. It hadn’t been there before. All these details, tiny details, making my brain fuzzy.

  “What does he say?”

  “He says you ain’t real. That you’re not a real girl, you’re made up. Maybe we’re all imagining you, I said, but he said not that. Just that you come from someplace else. Is that right, Emmaline? You come from some other place?”

  “Yeah, Ed. I do,” I answered, tired. “And I’d like to go back to it.”

  His laugh guttered into a wheeze, and he drew in another breath of smoke. “Good luck with that. Don’t we all want to go on to another place?”

  The counter dug into my back as I leaned against it. From outside came the sound of more laughter. Quite the party going on. It sounded like fun. More fun than this bizarre and tilted conversation with a man who’d slit his wrists and eventually drown himself in that very pool.

  “He says you’re from the future.”

  “What?” This startled me into standing upright. “Johnny says that?”

  “He says you told him.”

  I blinked, then paced the linoleum floor. “That’s just crazy.”

  “Yeah. That’s what Johnny says. Says he must be fucking crazy. That we all are. We should all end up in the fucking nuthouse, right? All of us. Johnny says you told him you made us all up. So lemme ask you something, Emmaline. If you made me up, why’d you make me such a fucking mess?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know what to say to that.” Was it a lie to say he was right? What happened when your hallucinations learned that’s what they were?

  “Just tell me if it’s true, that’s all.” Ed took a long drink from the bottle and toyed for a moment with the syringe, but didn’t, thank God, use it. “I just want to know if I’m real. Or not real.”

  “You are…real,” I said, hesitating. “I mean, you’re a real person, Ed. But this isn’t real. This is just in my head. This conversation isn’t real.”

  “Tonight’s the night,” Ed said suddenly with a jerk of his chin toward the calendar.

  “For what?”

  “Making me real, I guess.” He nodded as though this made sense, which was more than it did for me. He drank again, finishing the final swallows while the bottle gurgled. “So, who do I blame for all this shit?”

  “I don’t know. Me?” I spread my fingers. “You could blame me.”

  He looked up at me with bleary eyes and a crooked smile. “I could, I guess. But I don’t think I will. You know I wrote a poem about you?”

  I shuddered. “No. I didn’t know.”

  “I did.” He pulled his notebook toward him, cleared his throat and read aloud.

  She walks in night,

  A beauty.

  Single, tiny steps on bare toes, shoes left behind.

  Puppet-master, girl-made-woman, she comes and goes.

  She makes us, and she breaks us, too. Spinning her dreams,

  She is what she becomes. She can be anything she wants to be.

  Emmaline.

  I was no more able to appreciate poetry than I could art, but that didn’t sound very good. It sounded sort of pretentious and self-important, the sort of poem Goth kids would read aloud to one another while they refreshed their eyeliner and discussed the layers of meaning. People would make blog posts about it, quoting, without knowing what it really meant.

  “It doesn’t mean anything,” I said sourly.

  “No?” Ed sounded surprised and looked it over, running his finger over the words. “You’re right. Doesn’t mean a fucking thing.”

  Because he didn’t write it. My fugue brain did. And because I wasn’t a poet, the poem sucked. That was the truth of all of this. I was the puppet-master, pulling the strings. Making and breaking everything here. And I wanted to be done with making.

  I wanted to break all of it.

  So, I did.

  Bright light. The sound of murmuring voices. I blinked, wincing, something soft beneath my head and something sharp stinging the back of my hand. A weight on the other, fingers held tight.

  “Hey,” Johnny said softly from beside the bed. “You’re awake.”

  “What?” I struggled to get up, the smell of hospital rushing in all around me. Choking.

  The sting on my hand was an IV, and Johnny shushed me. I quieted at once, sinking back onto the pillows. I was still wearing what I’d had on at the dinner party, so at least I hadn’t been here long enough for them to strip me down and put a hospital gown on me. My throat was dry, and before I could ask, Johnny had a plastic cup of water for me, with a straw.

  I sipped. “What happened? Where are my parents and everyone else?”

  “Your mom and dad are probably in the waiting room. The others went home. Jen wanted to stay, but I convinced her boyfriend to take her home. I’ll call her, tell her you’re okay.”

  “Shit,” I muttered. “Am I? I went dark, didn’t I?”

  “Yeah, babe, you did.”

  “How long this time?”

  “It’s been about three hours. Your mo