“Fine,” she says quietly as she rises to her feet. With one last, forlorn glance at her smashed laptop, the dark-haired girl moves to turn off the light that illuminates her room. She turns on a smaller reading lamp before crawling into bed and adjusting her remaining pillow. Positioning herself close to the edge of the bed, she looks down on me from above.
For a long time, she gazes at me, and there is a strange look in her glassy eyes. Their blue is so pale and almost transparent, like I could see right through and read her secret, innermost thoughts as they dance across her brain. I try. Carefully and methodically, I search her eyes to better understand the mind of this mysterious girl whose life is becoming closely entangled with mine.
All I see is pain. Pain and scars that are so overwhelming they almost consume her existence. Pain and despair that so many people have abandoned and harmed her in her short lifetime, which doesn’t feel quite so short. Pain and tiredness for it to all be over, and for things to finally be calm and better.
I keep searching until I find something else. Rebellion. A tiny glint of rebellion against everything that has ever given her pain. Rebellion against misfortune and all the failings of humanity that have led her here and everywhere else she should have never been. Strength. Impossible strength and dogged determination to survive anything life throws at her—and everything life takes away.
She can’t even help it. She doesn’t even try. She just needs to survive.
Am I really seeing all this in her, or is it just my imagination running wild? Do her strangely clear eyes have the effect of a mirror, and am I just seeing bits of my own soul reflected back at me? Can a person ever look at someone else and see anything other than the qualities and feelings they recognize as their own? I am mesmerized and puzzled by her, and held completely spellbound.
Until she blinks. The spell is lifted, and I am free.
“Thanks,” she whispers as she turns to look at the ceiling. “I feel better that you’re here.”
Warmth washes over me at her words. A tiny bit of pride swells in my chest to know that I’m helping at all. I wish I could help more and take away all of her pain. Maybe over time, if I stay beside her and try to lift some of her burden, she will start to feel like she isn’t so alone.
I won’t give her any empty words and promises. I will only show her that I am here, by consistently being here. I will make sure that I am close whenever she needs me, until she knows that no matter what, I always will be. She needs someone like that in her life—someone consistent and reliable, who cares unconditionally. I know because I need someone like that. Everyone needs someone like that.
For starters, your mother or father is supposed to be the person who cares about you. Ideally, both. Maybe, if you’re really lucky, an aunt or an uncle, too. Grandparents. Siblings. Eventually, friends.
But we haven’t been so lucky.
Lying here on the floor, I can see the silhouette of Scarlett’s face in the dark. She has a sharp, beaklike nose that is both regal and predatory. The curve of her chin is soft and feminine, yet it juts out proudly with stubbornness, even as she rests. It suddenly occurs to me that she knows how special she is. She knows her own worth, and she values her own intelligence. She has healthy self-esteem, and a strong sense of her own identity, but she is unsure of her place in the world.
Looking up at her like this makes me feel like she is a princess, and I am her loyal knight, standing guard over her. This thought gives me a bittersweet smile. I wish I had a younger sister to play games like that with. But it’s too late now. Scarlett and I are no longer children. The time for make believe and building castles in the sand is gone.
When children are born into good families, with good parents, they can afford to stay children for as long as possible, well into adulthood. They rarely learn the meaning of hard work and independence. But when children have no parents, or have shitty parents, they quickly learn to fend for themselves. They are forced to grow up sooner, and be adults while the actual adults are absent or uncaring.
In some ways, I wonder if losing my parents improved me as a person. I might have been an eternal child if they were still around. But now, I know that I cannot afford to build castles in the sand that will be washed away with the tides. I cannot afford to build forts out of sheets and pillows. I cannot afford to waste time.
I need to build something that lasts. I need to build towers that stretch to the sky. I need to build houses that won’t burn down. I need to build a life for myself, because I don’t have someone else’s life to piggyback on.
Staring at Scarlett, I wonder if she feels this way, too. I wonder if she can understand the drive and desperation inside me to establish a foothold here. I think she does.
We barely know each other, but somehow, we need each other.
“Cole!” Scarlett says softly. “Can you keep it down?”
“I didn’t say anything,” I tell her with confusion.
“You’re thinking loud enough to wake up the neighborhood. Why don’t you try to get
