Читать книгу Grim anthology - Christine Johnson - Страница 7
ОглавлениеFIGMENT
by Jeri Smith-Ready
It begins, as always, in darkness.
I awake in transit, amid the clamor of voices and the clatter of trucks. Then a steady jet-engine roar lulls me to the edge of sleep.
If I’m waking, it means that someone believes in me again. Maybe it’s the man, woman, boy or girl I’ll soon befriend. Maybe it’s a person close to them. Or maybe it’s only my ex-friend’s employee who took this padded envelope I’ve been trapped inside and put it on a plane.
All that matters is that someone, somewhere, believes.
* * *
A woman’s soft footsteps accompany what I hope is the final leg of my journey. Her hands hold my envelope level before her, not swinging casually at the end of her arm the way the deliveryman carried me. It reminds me of the way Gordon’s butler used to deliver his vodka and pills on a silver tray.
“No more tears,” she murmurs. “He wasn’t worth it.”
But I’m not crying. I never cry.
She sniffles, then takes a deep, slow breath. “No more tears,” she repeats.
Ah, you weren’t talking to me. Never mind. If she can’t hear my thoughts, that means she’s not the one I’m meant for.
She stops and knocks on heavy wood—a door, likely. I hear the muffled voice of a young man, a begrudging beckoning over the strum of guitar.
Hinges creak. The guitar grows louder, doesn’t pause while the woman who carries me stands still at what must be a seldom-crossed threshold.
“Eli, your father is dead.”
The guitar doesn’t stop, but it hits a sour note. Then Eli continues to play, picking up where he left off. “So?”
“He left you this.”
The guitar is set aside with a soft gong. Eli takes my envelope and squeezes it, crushing my face. “It’s soft. Is it a big fat wad of cash?” he asks with a mixture of harshness and hope.
“Just open it.”
Eli tears the sealing strip, letting in the first light I’ve glimpsed in...I won’t know how long until I see a calendar.
“What the hell?” He clamps the envelope shut, smothering the light. “Mom, is this a joke?”
Pull me out. Please don’t let me stay in here.
“There’s a story behind it,” his mother says. “It’s rather interesting, actually. Your father—”
“What did the others get?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“Never mind, I’ll look it up online. It’ll be in the news. One-hit wonder Gordon Wylde, 45, dies of— What did he die of?”
“A boating accident. They said it was instant. He didn’t suffer.”
“Good for him.” Eli’s voice cracks, causing me to wonder how far past puberty he is. His hands are large and strong, squeezing me tighter than ever, so perhaps the voice-crack is...sadness? Anger? I wouldn’t know.
“Eli, if you want to talk, I’m here.”
“I know you are,” he snaps. Then his voice softens. “Thanks, Mom. I’m sorry—I mean, if you’re upset he’s gone.”
“Not really.” She gives a wistful laugh. “Your father’s always been gone.” Her footsteps come closer, then a kiss, muted, laid upon hair instead of skin. “I’ve got a roast in the oven, but how about pizza tonight instead?”
“That’d be cool. Thanks.”
She retreats and closes the door. Eli takes a deep breath—as would I, had I lungs—and pulls me out of the envelope.
Amber eyes examine me, the same color as the streaks in his disheveled black hair. Eli pulls in his lower lip, brushes his tongue over the silver ring there. He could be as young as sixteen, but the piercing makes me think he’s closer to eighteen. “I don’t get it,” he mutters. “I do not get it.”
Eli tosses me on the bed—faceup, luckily. The ceiling features a wood-and-green-metal fan, currently off, as well as a poster of a brunette girl with wide blue eyes. The right edge is torn, the poster ripped in half to eliminate her partner. At the bottom it reads “she &” in a whimsical cursive hand.
He pulls a note from the envelope, the folded sheet of paper I’ve been lying on for...a long time, I think. I don’t remember how long, or even what form I’ve taken. It must be the same form as when I was Gordon’s friend, because vessels contain our spirits until they disintegrate (the vessels, that is). I never forget disintegration.
I am eternal. I can never die, only sleep. My kind has existed since humans first drew pictures on cave walls and told stories around campfires. We were born at the dawn of imagination.
“Call Tyler,” Eli says in a flat voice. It sounds like a command, but not, I hope, for me.
A tinny male voice emits from a cell phone speaker. “Eli! What’s up, bro?”
Eli picks me up and stares into my eyes, his own turned dark with loathing.
“My father left me a cat.”
* * *
I’m four inches long. My plush fake fur is black, except for my paws, which are white. My eyes are stitched yellow-thread rings surrounding felt black centers. Their perfect roundness makes me look perpetually astonished.
All of this I’d forgotten, because when no one holds you for...years?...you lose sense of your shape.
All of this I remember, because Eli has thrown me against the wall and I’ve landed, fortuitously, in front of a full-length mirror.
My puffy white forepaws extend forward, like I’m asking for double fist bumps, or worse, protecting myself. But nothing can hurt me, aside from being ignored.
Eli is ignoring me. In the mirror I see him sitting cross-legged on the double bed, his back turned. The fan is on low now, its wood-and-metal arms making lazy circles, casting hazy shadows on the ceiling and the girl in the poster.
I examine what details I can, to determine Eli’s state of living. His dresser and nightstand are basic pale wood, IKEA-ish. The boots sticking out from under the bed appear to be Timberland knockoffs. His jeans and black T-shirt are threadbare and distressed, but that might be the style still (or again). Through the floor I hear his mother in the kitchen, opening the oven door, then letting the door crash shut. A two-story house, then. Eli and his mother seem neither rich nor poor.
My gaze sweeps the walls for a calendar. I’m used to lying dormant for years between allies, but not knowing how many years is unsettling. Eli’s father crammed me into that envelope in 1997, when the world was throwing itself at his feet. He thought he didn’t need me anymore. I wonder how that worked out.
Some months or years later, Gordon opened the envelope, but only to add the note, which Eli read to his friend Tyler over the phone.
“My dear Elias,
Of all my sons, I’ve given you the least in life, so in death I give you the most.
This wee kitty has been more than a good-luck charm to me. It’s been a friend, perhaps the most loyal one I’ve ever had. I advise you to keep it at your side at all times if you want to succeed. And when (not if, but when) you find that success, do not make my arrogant mistake and cast the cat aside. Give credit where credit is due.
Your father,
Gordon Wylde”
Tyler laughed his ass off, naturally, and then Eli threw me across the room, where I wait, neither patiently nor impatiently, since I do not feel.
I do have opinions, however, an important one of which is forming now: Eli has more musical genius in that pouty lower lip than his father had in his entire body. His voice needs no enhancing, and his playing needs no amplification. He could most likely make hundreds a day busking in a subway station. God only knows what a decent record label could do for him.
But he needs more than talent. He needs me. Not just to set him on the path to greatness, but to keep him there. When inevitable misfortunes beset him, he must believe he’s destined. He must believe that luck is on his side.
First, however, he must believe in me.
Eli draws in a sudden hiss of pain between his teeth, then shakes out his hand. He’s played too long.
Sucking the pad of his right thumb, he turns and slides off the bed. For a moment I wonder what it would be like to unfold long legs so effortlessly—or to move at all. He lays the guitar in its case and starts to close the lid.
Eli, wait.
He hesitates but doesn’t look at me.
You can’t hear my words yet, I tell him, but you can feel what I want. Please, put me inside. It all starts there.
Eli snatches me up by one ear, then drops me facedown in the compartment in the guitar case’s neck. “There, Dad. Happy?”
He slams the lid shut and flips the latches. But instead of shoving the guitar case back under the bed where he got it, he lays his hand over the place where I am, pressing this end of the case against the floor. The carpet gives a little.
All it takes is a little belief to bring me to life.
Thank you, Eli.
His breathing stops. A soft suction pop marks his sore thumb coming out of his mouth.
I’m inside the case. But don’t worry, I won’t suffocate. I don’t breathe.
Eli’s whimper has a question mark at the end.
Yes, I’m real. Sort of. I used to know your father. If he bequeathed me to you, it means that you were important to him. Or that I was not. In any case, we’re together now.
“What the—” The latches rattle as he fumbles to open them. The lid lifts, letting in light.
Eli doesn’t pick me up. I wish I could see his expression, but I’m still facedown and can’t turn over.
He tugs my tail. “I’m going insane.”
On the contrary, you have a normal, healthy imagination. That’s what keeps me alive.
He lets out a curse and slams the guitar case shut again. A few moments later, he speaks in hushed tones, but not to me.
“Ty, have you had any, like, weird thoughts since Saturday night?”
The phone speaker is loud enough—and my cat ears sensitive enough—that I can hear the reply. “What kind of weird thoughts?”
“I don’t know. Hallucinations?”
“It was just a little weed. You didn’t even smoke any.”
“I know, but even secondhand, I definitely felt the effects.”
“Are you saying you’re seeing things?”
“Hearing things,” Eli corrects.
“It was a loud concert. My ears were ringing afterward.”
“This isn’t a ringing.”
“What is it?”
Eli pauses. “Nothing. I guess it is sort of like a ringing. I gotta go. Mom’s calling me for dinner.”
His mom’s not calling him for dinner, but after hanging up, Eli stalks from the room, shouting her name.
I hope she has answers.
* * *
“So you’re from Cleveland?” Eli has propped me up on his other pillow so that I can see him, but he doesn’t look at me as we talk. He sits against his headboard beside me, arms crossed, legs straight out, looking stunned.
Not originally, but that was where my essence was encapsulated in this temporary form. The musician who gave me to your father was from there. He was in a band called Raise an Axe. Ever heard of them?
“No.”
That’s because they had only one heavy-metal hit in the late eighties, off their self-titled album, Raise an Axe. Can you guess the song name?
“‘Raise an Axe’?”
Very good. That singer abandoned his band to embark on a solo career. He also abandoned me. When he realized his mistake, it was too late. I had no luck left for him.
Eli groans. “This is so bizarre.” He sweeps both palms over his wavy dark hair, holding it back against his scalp. Under all those tumbling locks, he has a pronounced widow’s peak, just like his father. “So who are you?”
A figment.
“That’s your name?”
It’s what I am.
“Like a figment of my imagination?”
I give the vocal equivalent of a shrug. A bit redundant, since by definition a figment is something that exists only in the imagination.
Heels together, Eli taps his bare feet against each other. “Like an imaginary friend.”
Precisely.
“I thought only little kids had imaginary friends.”
They’re not the only ones who need them.
“I’ve got plenty of friends.”
Friends or fleas? His father’s penthouse had been overrun with bloodsucking sycophants, people who only loved him for his money and fame.
Eli pulls his knees to his chest and rests his chin on them. “What I mean is, I’m not lonely or anything.”
I decide not to challenge this assertion. May I ask, what became of your father’s career once he left Boyz on the Korner?
Eli scoffs. “Nothing. He never had another hit like BotK had with ‘Ready, Set, Dance.’ Because he basically sucked. People realized that after he hit twenty-one and wasn’t adorable anymore.” He looks at me quickly. “Wait. Was that when he put you away?”
That’s when I entered the envelope, yes.
“Wow.” He shakes his head hard. “This can’t be real.”
You need to redefine “real.”
“Obviously. So why are you here?”
To help you succeed in life by bringing you good luck. You need the right people in the right place in the right mood. I can make that happen. Your talent will do the rest.
Eli gives me a sideways, suspicious look. “What’s in it for you?”
If I help you, you’ll believe in me, and I get to keep existing. I remember my image in the mirror. Also, I’d very much like some clothes.
* * *
Eli, it turns out, used to play with dolls when he was a boy. I don’t judge.
“If anyone sees me doing this, I’ll have my man card permanently revoked,” he says as he buttons my sparkly blue shirt.
So I won’t be meeting your friends?
“No, you’re staying here.”
But unless I’m in your presence, I can’t influence the thoughts of others around you in your favor.
He looks up from the box of doll clothes, horrified. “Other people can hear you?”
Not in words, the way you can. They can sense my desires and be swayed by them, but only if they’ve seen me and acknowledged my existence.
I catch sight of the doll sneakers he’s picked out of the box.
Please, no pink.
“So you are a boy. I wondered, since you don’t have any—you know.” He flips up my shirttail. “Anything to cover.”
Technically, I’m neither a boy nor a girl. I can be whichever you prefer.
He narrows his eyes. “What do you mean, ‘prefer’?”
In a friend.
“Oh. Well, a human for starters.”
You have no pets?
“Just fish. I’m allergic.”
And I’m relieved. Some dogs chew stuffed animals, and some cats hump them. Humiliating in either case.
Eli rummages through the box, which appears to have all sorts of doll clothes jumbled together in one mass. “If you’re an imaginary friend, why don’t you look human? Why are you trapped in this stuffed cat?”
Figments need a physical vessel so their friends can take them places. Or leave us behind, if you like.
“Us?” He casts a wary gaze around his room. “There’s more than one of you here?”
No, you only get one. But there are others of my kind in the world. There always have been.
“Huh. Hey, here’s a cool hat.” Eli holds it up with a flourish. It has three points and a giant purple feather, like one of the Three Musketeers.
Yes! Put that on my head. Now.
He laughs. “You like the bling, huh?”
I love the bling.
“Pimp my cat.” He tugs the hat down over my ears, then tilts it sideways. “Figment’s got swag, yo.”
Is that what you wish to call me?
“Or Fig for short. Is that okay?”
You may call me whatever you like. I hide my next thought from him: just don’t ever put me away.
“Well, Fig, guess what? You’re getting yourself some fine-ass boots.”
* * *
Over the past week, Eli has learned to entertain me. When he’s downstairs with his mother, he sets me on the windowsill or in front of his aquarium so I have something to watch. He leaves on the radio, which teaches me about current events and the latest musical trends.
When he leaves the house he brings me with him, buried deep in his messenger bag to school, or tucked into his guitar case to band practice, which double as makeout sessions with his girlfriend, Vanessa. He hasn’t gotten up the nerve to introduce me to anyone yet, so I have influence on nobody but him.
Just before history class on my third day of school, a girl behind Eli whispers his name. His chair creaks as he turns to her.
“Sorry about your dad,” she says. “I heard on the news.”
I expect him to growl “It doesn’t matter” or “whatever,” as he has to every other sympathizer. Instead he just says, “Thanks, Lyra.”
“I know what it’s like. I mean, I don’t have a famous father, but—”
“Semifamous.”
“Well. Anyway, I never knew my mom. She left right after I was born.”
He shifts in his chair again, perhaps turning all the way round. “That probably sucks more than not knowing your dad.”
“If they left, they probably weren’t worth knowing, right? At least, that’s what I tell myself every birthday.”
“Seriously. I never got a birthday or Christmas card. Just some child-support money in a bank account, but not as much as you’d think. Not with two other sons to take care of.” Eli lowers his voice until I can barely hear it. “When he died, he left the oldest one a house and the middle one a car.”
“What did you get?”
He pauses for a long moment. If I had breath, I would hold it. But he finally says, “Nothing.”
The bell rings and the teacher clops across the floor in what sound like platform heels. I can feel the vibrations from here.
She begins the lecture, on the French Revolution, a topic I know well, since I’ve heard it in classrooms ever since a few years after the event itself. The facts remain the same, but the perspective changes as the centuries pass.
I wish you’d bring me out in class just once, I tell Eli. You’d get much better grades, or at least I could keep the teacher from calling on you.
He gives the bag a slight kick to shut me up. Since I feel no pain, it doesn’t work.
For the record, girls think I’m cute.
No response.
Perhaps you could bring me out at band practice today, when you see what’s-her-name. The one who treats you like an imbecile. She’d find it charming, you carrying a tiny stuffed cat with a feather hat and silver boots in your guitar case.
No response.
Tap the bag once for no, twice for yes.
Eli gives a heavy sigh, shifts his feet beneath the desk next to my bag. For a long moment, nothing happens. Then finally, I feel a single tap. Followed by another.
* * *
“Oh, my God, he’s adorbs!” Vanessa squeezes my belly and shakes me from side to side, making my hat’s feather flop against my head. “Where did you get him?”
I appreciate that she refers to me as “him” instead of “it,” but her tone is a bit patronizing. She’s a year older than Eli, a fact she points out as often as possible.
Sitting on the basement couch with his arm around Vanessa’s shoulders, Eli says, “My father left him to me as a good-luck charm. Isn’t that hilarious?”
“Aww.” She strokes his cheek with the backs of her black-lacquered fingernails, then kisses him softly. “Are you sad you never got to meet him?”
“Not really,” he replies, but gives me a nervous glance.
Liar.
Eli opens his mouth to tell me to shut up, but catches himself in time.
Vanessa tugs my shirtsleeve. “Did he come dressed like this?”
“Of course. Where would I get doll clothes?”
I don’t bother repeating my call of “liar.”
“Eli, come on.” Behind me, Jules, the drummer, taps his sticks together.
Eli reaches for me, then pulls his hand back. “Take good care of him, okay?”
“I will.” Vanessa kisses me right between the eyes. My opinion of her is softening somewhat.
Eli takes his guitar and joins Jules and the other boy, Tyler, who fancies himself a lead singer but often seems more fascinated with his collection of unusual instruments.
As they play, Vanessa dances me atop her bare knee in time to the music. During a slow ballad, she rests me on her shoulder, my feet tucked into her long blond hair streaked with green and blue. At the end of each song, she waves me in the air, cheering with exaggerated enthusiasm. The boys scowl at her silliness, but it’s the most fun I’ve had since I reawakened.
The tunes are intricate for a songwriter of Eli’s age, but sadly, he’s the only one who seems capable of playing them. When they take a break, I seize the opportunity to speak to him.
You should go solo. You’re too good for these poseurs.
Eli doesn’t glare at me. Instead the corner of his mouth tugs into a sad frown. He knows I’m right, but he loves his friends.
Also the band name, Trending Frenzy? What does that even mean?
“Long story,” he says under his breath.
After the break, it takes Trending Frenzy a full hour to rehearse three more songs. Tyler keeps trying to change the key to take it up to his singing range and make it easier to play, but it sounds like crap when they do that. Even Tyler recognizes this truth, once I’ve sent this mental message to him ten or eleven times.
Eventually Vanessa gets bored and lies down on the couch, cuddling me close. She presses me to her chest, blocking my eyes and ears. It’s just as well—Eli is growing tired of my running commentary, and the band’s playing is growing ever unruly. I let myself zone out to the sound of Vanessa’s slow, rhythmic heartbeat.
“That’s all I can take,” Eli says finally. “I’m gonna grab a soda. You guys want anything?”
They grumble a response I can’t hear, then his footsteps ascend the staircase over my head.
“Lucky cat,” says a soft voice close to the couch.
Vanessa stirs, then gives a low laugh. “Jules. Where’s Eli?”
“Upstairs. Tyler’s in the bathroom.” He leans in, and her heart starts to race. “So I thought I’d come do this.”
Uh-oh.
They kiss, loud and wet, and her hand leaves me to move to him. I’m flipped on my back, looking up at their chins. Their mouths move like they’re starving.
Then Jules’s hand displaces me. For a moment I teeter on the edge of the sofa, long enough to see him reach down her shirt. Then his elbow tips me off the side, and I tumble onto the floor. I focus on the frayed brown fabric of the couch skirt and think to Vanessa with all my might, What about Eli?
She pulls away from Jules. “I can’t do this to him. His dad just died.”
“So? He didn’t even know the guy. He makes fun of that stupid ‘Ready, Set, Dance’ song all the time.” Jules leans in again, making a slurping sound against what I assume is Vanessa’s neck.
“Stop.” She pushes him away, and this time he relents, letting both hands fall onto his knees. “Eli’s been different since it happened,” she says. “If you can’t see that, you’re a shitty friend.”
“I’ve been hooking up with you for a month. I’m already a shitty friend.”
Down the basement hallway, a door opens, letting out the liquid sound of a flushing toilet. Jules hurries to stand up and move away from the couch. “Hey, Ty, wanna play some Ping-Pong? Loser buys pizza.”
“Nah, I gotta get out of here before I stab Eli with one of your drumsticks. One more ‘Why can’t you sing it the way I wrote it?’ and I’m going solo.”
“If you do that, then Eli’ll go solo, too. I don’t want to see you guys competing.”
“Plus, you’ll be out of a gig, right?”
“You think that’s all I care about?” Jules laughs. “You wound me, man. I’ll see you Friday.”
Vanessa calls goodbye to him as he goes up the stairs. Then she picks me up from the floor. “Aww, sorry, little guy.” She dusts off my tail and the front of my shirt. “Ty, you need a roadie to carry out your million instruments?”
“Very funny, but no. I’m leaving my guitar here. Eli said he’d adjust the bridge for me. Intonation is totally out of whack.”
He’s the talented one.
“He’s the talented one, you know,” Vanessa says.
“And you’re the slutty one,” Tyler answers. “Eli finds out about you and Jules, that’s the end of the band.”
“Why do you care? You just said you wanted to—”
“Shh.”
Eli is coming down the stairs. “You’re leaving?” he asks Tyler, his voice devoid of disappointment.
“Yep. Friday practice still on?”
I wouldn’t commit if I were you.
Eli commits, despite my warning. Ah, well, I suppose band breakups, like all breakups, are best done in person.
Vanessa sets me on the coffee table in front of the couch, propped up against a stack of books. Then she straightens my clothes and gives me an indulgent smile.
You don’t deserve him.
Her smile fades, then she moves over to give Eli room on the couch. He picks up Tyler’s Fender and starts to tune it, but keeps glancing between Vanessa and me.
I’m not the one you should be jealous of.
She slides her hand up his thigh. “I have to leave in about half an hour, so...can you do that later?”
Eli sets Tyler’s guitar aside, then pulls her into his arms, kissing her, tangling his fingers in her hair. I wonder if her heart is beating as fast as it did when Jules kissed her.
I clear my throat, figuratively. I’m sitting right here. Do you mind?
Eli opens one eye to look at me, then extends his middle finger ever so slightly in my direction, below her arm, where she couldn’t see it even if her eyes were open.
There’s something you should know about her before you—
She tears off his T-shirt, then Eli leans back to lie on the sofa, pulling her on top of him. Things progress faster.
This is your last chance before I blurt out a hard truth. Trust me, you don’t want to hear it in front of her. I’m warning you.
Her sweater comes off, then the camisole beneath it.
Vanessa’s been cheating on you with Jules.
Eli’s hands go still on her bare waist, his thumb tracing beneath the edge of her bra. She doesn’t notice at first, too busy kissing or maybe biting his neck.
“Stop,” he whispers.
“What’s wrong?” she asks, her blond hair hanging like a veil between us, so I can’t see his face.
“It’s not— I—um. I just remembered I have to be somewhere.”
“Now? Where?”
Coward. Don’t drag this out. I saw them kissing. More than kissing. You know I’m telling the truth, don’t you? You’ve suspected for a while.
“I just— I need you to go. I’ll call you later. I’m sorry.”
Why are you apologizing to her?
Vanessa doesn’t budge. “I don’t understand.” She clutches his arm harder, her voice taut with fear.
I turn my attention to her. He knows about you and Jules. Go now. Now!
Vanessa lifts her head, like she’s hearing her name shouted from far away. “Okay. But call me?”
“I will,” he says. “Promise.”
She grabs her sweater from the back of the couch and yanks it over her head. “I guess I’ll be early for work instead of late for once. My boss’ll die of surprise.” Vanessa picks up her bag, leans over for a quick kiss, then runs up the stairs.
Eli lies there on his back for a second, hands covering his face. The black tattoo on his upper arm twitches, a bare tree with birds rising from its branches.
Sorry.
He lets his hands fall to his side with a thud. “Sorry? Do you know what you just interrupted? Or are all figments celibate?”
It depends on the imagination that sustains us. I’ve taken some interesting forms in the past. For instance—
“I don’t want to know.” Eli taps his fingers against his ribs. “What do I do?”
Break up with her. What choice do you have?
“I could pretend I don’t know. Then everything stays the same. Otherwise I lose her and Jules. Tyler, too, probably, because I’ll have to break up the band. They’re my only friends.”
I doubt that’s true, and if it is, then you need to make better friends.
“I know.” Eli turns on his side to face me. “But even bad friends are better than being alone.”
He suddenly looks years younger. I have to make him feel better. It’s what I do.
I promise you this, Eli, right here and now: you’ll never be alone again.
* * *
After dinner, Eli paces his bedroom floor, clutching his Magic 8 Ball. “Should I break up with Vanessa and the band?” He flips the ball. “‘Outlook good.’ Does that mean yes or no?”
That sounds definitively yes.
“But not as definitive as Yes.” He shakes the ball hard and repeats the question. “‘Reply hazy, try again.’ You know what? I don’t trust this for big decisions. I’ll ask the cookie.” He sets down the ball and shoves his hand into his jar of fortune-cookie fortunes, a jar that looks like a giant ceramic Oreo.
He reads the first slip. “‘The secret to good friends is no secret to you.’ I don’t know what that means.”
It means time to man up and clear your life of douchebags.
He tilts his head at me. “You’re starting to sound less proper.”
And you’re starting to sound less smart. End it now.
After another half hour of my cajoling, Eli breaks up with Vanessa via text. She doesn’t reply. No begging, crying, threatening. Deep down she knows why he’s ended it, because I told her. She’ll chalk it up to intuition.
At bedtime, rather than setting me on the nightstand or in his guitar case, Eli takes off my hat and boots, wraps me in the blue silk cami Vanessa left behind and holds me close as he lies down to sleep. I fit perfectly under his chin.
This is something new, this...cuddling. Even when I belonged to women, I was in unhuggable forms, such as a crystal elephant or a carved wooden Woman of Willendorf fertility statue. Maybe if I’d ever been a child’s figment, I’d have experienced this closeness, this neediness. For the first time, I’m more than an advisor and miracle worker. I’m a friend.
Eli sleeps fitfully, and soon I tumble out of his arms and onto the floor. I’ve never spoken to him in his sleep, but he needs settling.
Wake up and write. You’ll feel better.
He comes awake with a sharp breath, then without a word, slips out of bed and crosses to his desk, the direction I’m facing. He lifts his Magic 8 Ball from atop a stack of notebooks, takes the top pad, then sets down the worthless prediction device.
On the way back to the bed, he accidentally steps on my face. “Sorry, Fig!” Eli picks me up, unwraps the camisole from around my torso and brings both to the bed with him.
Do you need my help?
He shakes his head and pulls the cap off the pen with his teeth. “This is one thing I do best on my own.”
* * *
Pen in one hand, Vanessa’s cami in the other, Eli scribbles furiously for the next four hours, frowning and crossing out as many lines as he writes. Just after 3:00 a.m. he pulls out his guitar and plays a series of chords—softly, so as not to wake his mom.
The next day at school, he returns Vanessa’s shirt, wrinkles ironed out. She takes it without a word, or at least none that I can hear from inside his bag.
In history class, he sets me on the corner of his desk, facing forward. “Good-luck charm for the exam,” he explains to Lyra.
“Let me see.”
He spins me to face him and Lyra. Instead of gushing over my cute widdle boots and hat, she takes a good long look at me. “That expression,” she says finally. “Like the whole world is amazing.”
It’s just the way the manufacturer shaped my eyes. The world is most definitely not amazing.
Eli gives me a skeptical smile.
But maybe she is, I add.
* * *
Friday afternoon, Eli meets Tyler and Jules for burgers at Five Guys before band practice. I’m left in the bag, of course, on the seat of the booth. His so-called friends sit across from him.
“I’m leaving the band,” he tells them when their food’s arrived.
“Aw, man.” Tyler pounds the bottom of a ketchup bottle. “Why now, when we’re finally getting good?”
“I don’t think we’re getting good, but that’s not the main reason. My main reason is that Jules here can’t keep his hands off my girlfriend.”
“What?” Jules stammers. “How do you know?”
“I knew this would happen,” Tyler says. “I told her to knock it off.”
“Wait, how did you know?” Jules asks him.
“I have eyes. Eyes that saw you feeling her up in the school parking lot last week.”
“Tyler, you knew and didn’t tell me?” Eli says. “I thought you were my best friend.”
“I didn’t want to make you mad.”
He didn’t want you to break up the band, I tell Eli. He wanted to do it himself.
“Well, I’m twice as mad now.”
“I can see that.” Tyler pounds the ketchup bottle again. “What is with this stuff? It’s stuck.”
“Eli, I’m sorry, man. I really am.” Jules sounds sincere.
He’s not sorry.
“It’s my fault,” he continues with a full mouth. “You shouldn’t blame Vanessa. I’ll stay away from her, I swear.”
“It’s too late for that.”
“I’m just saying, it’s over with us. So you might as well keep her.”
“Keep her?” Eli’s voice rises above the din of the crowd. “She’s a girl, not a doll!”
Tyler snorts. “Well, you’d know, wouldn’t you?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Eli’s voice is colder than I’ve ever heard it.
“You’ve gotten a little too attached to that stuffed cat your loser dad gave you.”
“I’m not attached.”
“Oh, really? Then let me have it for a week.” Tyler sets down the bottle hard on the table. “It’s the least you can do, Mr. I’m Too Talented for My Band.”
“Why would you even want him?” Eli’s voice turns hot with anger again.
“It’s a ‘him’ now? Is he your new best friend? Is that why you don’t need me anymore?”
Jules breaks in. “Take it easy, Ty. Eli didn’t say we weren’t still friends. The band stuff is just business.”
“‘Business’?” Ty says. “This is your fault, Jules! It wasn’t business when you had your hand inside Vanessa’s shirt.”
Eli’s silverware hits the table with a clatter. A fork or knife bounces onto the booth seat beside my bag. “Screw you guys both.”
Suddenly I’m lifted, bag and all. He’s walking fast toward the door, faster than he’s ever headed to class. The corner of his calculus textbook digs into my stomach with every step, and I’m very glad I have no pain nerves.
A door creaks open, and Eli says, “I’m sorry. Excuse me. Sorry.”
“It’s okay, but what...” The girl’s familiar voice fades as Eli keeps going.
We stop suddenly, and a car door handle rattles. Eli curses. He tears open the bag, letting in bright sunlight I can’t blink away.
Your keys aren’t in here. I didn’t hear them jangle.
“Looking for these?” Tyler says behind us.
Now I hear them jangle.
“Give me my keys,” Eli demands.
“I’ll trade you.” Tyler laughs. “The keys for the kitty.”
“Why do you want him so much?”
He doesn’t want me. He wants to destroy me to hurt you, because you hurt him.
Eli lunges, and now it’s Jules’s turn to laugh, though more nervously than Tyler did. “We’re just messin’ with you. Come on, our burgers are getting cold. Give Ty the stupid doll for two seconds so he’ll stop being a dick. Or give it to me, whatever.”
Eli drops the bag on the ground. “Haven’t I given you enough? My songs, my time, my girlfriend?”
“Vanessa wasn’t your girlfriend—she was just a regular hookup. You know what she called you? Her favorite charity.”
There’s a smack of bone against bone, and Jules cries out. Then a thud and the sound of denim skidding over blacktop.
Suddenly, I’m pulled out into the brightness. By Tyler.
“How do you like him now, dude?” He rips off my hat and boots. “Nothing better than a naked p—”
Tyler buckles over with an “oof!” He clutches me against his stomach, groaning. Something in bright blue leather—a gloved fist? A booted foot?—flashes past me, up into his chin. Released from his grip, I fall to the pavement, rolling to rest faceup.
Appearing above me are wide blue eyes, like those belonging to the girl on Eli’s ceiling. Lyra scoops me up and stuffs me into her bag. There’s candy in here. Watermelon flavored, I think.
Tyler cries out again, higher-pitched this time.
“Let go of the keys,” Lyra says. Her body rocks forward, and Tyler shrieks louder. “Sorry, does that hurt? You know what would hurt worse? If you didn’t let go of the keys and my foot accidentally broke all your fingers.” She bends over, and the bag on her back rises. “If you ever want to play that stupid ukulele again, you know what to do.”
A sharp jangle, then Lyra says, “Thank you.”
I can’t hear much over the rush and jostle of her bag, which is soon dumped on the floor of Eli’s car (I recognize the smell).
“You okay?” she asks.
Not bad, but—
“I’ll be all right,” Eli answers.
Oh, she wasn’t talking to me. Sorry.
Lyra starts the engine. “I live around the block. We can go to my house and get some ice for your face, then you can bring me back to get my car later.”
“Thanks for rescuing us. I mean, rescuing me. I mean, rescuing Fig.”
“You named your stuffed cat after a fruit?”
Eli pauses. “It’s short for Figment.”
She laughs and backs out of the parking space so fast, a book in her bag smashes my legs. “Interesting, considering he actually exists.”
* * *
I sit on Lyra’s kitchen table, propped against the salt and pepper shakers. Eli holds an ice pack to his bruised left eye and another to his lower lip, where he was lucky not to have the ring pulled out. Popcorn is popping in the microwave.
“Okay, kitty, your turn.” Lyra enters the kitchen with a large plastic bin. “Time for some new clothes.”
Yes! I would pump my fist if I could.
Eli can’t hide his interest as she lifts the lid. “You have a separate compartment for each item of clothing? I’m in awe.”
“I was a little OCD when I was a kid, at least with the stuff that was important to me.” Lyra tucks a lock of her long dark hair behind her ear in a self-conscious gesture. “It’s been years since I even looked at my dolls, much less dressed them up.”
Eli puts down one of his ice packs and pulls out an orange boa. “Isn’t this from one of the Bratz girls?”
“Yeah, I owned, like, ten of those. So you must have a sister, huh?”
He holds the boa up in front of me.
Too much.
“I don’t have a sister,” Eli says without meeting her eyes.
She pauses in her search, then smiles. “You played with dolls? That’s so cool.”
He shrugs like it’s nothing, but the skin around his visible eye loosens in relief. “That’s one of the advantages to being dad-free: no one to force me to play with trucks or try out for football.” He places the boa back in the bin. “Mom didn’t care, though I think she was confused when I turned out straight.”
Lyra laughs. “I’m glad you turned out— I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with— I mean, I’m glad for my sake. Ugh, can we just pretend I didn’t say any of that?” She lifts a pair of golden slippers. “Fig must have new boots, if nothing else.”
And you thought you’d be alone if you ditched your fake friends. Ask her to hang out.
Eli picks up the other ice pack, but before pressing it to his mouth, he says, “What are you doing tomorrow night?”
* * *
Over the next six months, Eli plays a series of successful solo gigs, he and Lyra get serious, and he graduates magna cum laude. I play a role in all of these fortunate events, but only a developmental one. Mostly it’s his doing. Mostly.
During the summer between high school and college, Eli ramps up his appearance schedule, and after each performance, a music journalist or blogger sits him down for an interview. They ask the expected questions about his one-hit-wonder of a father, how Eli will avoid the same trap of overconfidence, how he’ll stay down-to-earth despite drowning in contract offers, each bigger than the last.
He always answers, “My friends keep me humble. They remind me that success doesn’t come from my efforts alone. Some of it’s luck, of course, and I feel very lucky right now.”
But each time he says it with less conviction. When they start asking about me, his “good-luck charm,” Eli gets antsy.
These days, we don’t talk much.
One night, after a standing-room-only concert at a local nightclub, a reporter with a different sort of angle wants to talk to Eli.
“Hi.” The lady is about thirty years old and carries a bag that screams organic living. “I’m doing a story about good-luck charms and successful performers—musicians, sports stars, that sort of thing. The article is called ‘Beyond Rabbit’s Feet.’” She sinks into a chair and signals the waitress. “Your little cat is quite the legend.”
“It is?” Eli glances over to the chair next to him, where I’m sitting atop his guitar case.
You just called me “it.” Not cool.
The reporter smiles at me. “So I’ve done some digging...”
“Great,” he mutters, reaching for his Coke.
“It is my job.” She flips a page in her notepad. “Turns out, your father was also known for carrying around a cat-shaped good-luck charm when he was with Boyz on the Korner.” She points her pen at me. “Is this the same one? Did he give it to you?”
Eli just sips his Coke and stares at her impassively, saying nothing.
She reaches into her bag. “I have pictures, if that would help.”
“Don’t bother.” Standing quickly, almost knocking his chair over, he sweeps me up and crams me into his inside jacket pocket. “For the record, yes, the cat was my father’s, but it’s just a gimmick. My girlfriend likes holding it during shows. It gives her something to do with her hands when she gets nervous for me.”
“If it’s just a gimmick, then why is it insured for over a hundred thousand—”
“I have to go. Good night.”
Her protestation fades behind us as Eli stalks out of the club.
Once we’re outside where it’s quiet, I ask him, Am I really a gimmick to you now?
He pulls out his phone to pretend he’s talking to someone else instead of the bulge in his coat. “Fig, I think next time you should stay home.”
* * *
I do stay home for the following gig, perched on his windowsill, angled so that I can also see the aquarium. As frustrated as Eli is with my influence over his life, he still takes the time for small kindnesses.
Just after 2:00 a.m., he pulls into the driveway. I can feel the slam of car doors from up here. Soon the stairs, then the floorboards shake with his footsteps.
The bedroom door jerks open. Eli dumps his guitar case on the bed, then paces, hands on his hips, shoulders lowered in defeat.
How’d it go? I ask, though I can guess.
“It sucked.” He sinks onto the edge of the bed. “I suck.”
You do not suck. That’s one thing I know for sure about you.
“Maybe you know, but I’ll never know. Not as long as...” He raises his head from his hands to stare at me. A look I recognize all too well comes into his eyes.
No...
He gets up and crosses the room toward me, slowly, as if I’ll bite. I wish I could bite.
“I have to do this.” Eli picks me up with the gentlest of touches, but I can feel the fury in his bones.
Don’t put me away. You’ll regret it.
“No, Fig, I won’t. Not in the long run.” He slides me into the envelope his dad sent me in. “I have to make things happen for myself. I don’t even know whether people like me because they want to, or because you’re making them.”
Fine. Let me stay here in your room. Just don’t put me away. Please. Don’t be like your father.
“I’m not like him. You were the one who told me I could succeed on my own. He needed luck, but I don’t.” Eli staples my envelope shut, as if I could escape.
I’ll miss you if you put me away. I’ll be miserable and lonely.
“No,” he whispers, on the verge of tears. “Figments feel nothing, remember?”
I’ve become more than a figment with you. I thought we were friends!
“I’ve given up friends before, when they’ve hurt me.”
But I’m still your Fig. I lower my thought-voice to a whisper. I’ll always be your Fig.
Eli’s hands begin to shake, but I still hear him clearly. “No matter what?”
The toes of my boots bend against the interior of the envelope, and my paws reach out, forever. No matter what.
* * *
In a box in the attic, I lie upon something soft—clothes, I imagine—and wait for Eli to return. Because he still believes in me, I can still feel him. Sometimes I hear him downstairs in his room, playing the song I woke him to write, the song that could make him huge.
It’s cold up here. My cat ears pick up the scrabble of insects and mice, creeping about in what must be an ideal home. My plush body conforms to the shape of whatever I lie upon, the way my soul (if I have one) conforms to the shape of whomever I—well, serve is the wrong word, but it’s better than love.
When Eli moves away—to college or stardom—I begin to fade. It takes months, maybe years. Time loses meaning. My senses dull. I forget who I am.
It ends, as always, in darkness.
Epilogue
A veiled light meets my eyes.
“There you are,” a woman whispers. “Just where he said you’d be.”
A slight rip of paper, then I’m tugged out to see her. Familiar, I think, but...was her hair always that gray?
She stands, crosses the attic, then carries me down creaky stairs, clutching me to her side.
We enter a living room, where the television is on, playing the Grammy Awards. “My friends were going to come over to celebrate,” the woman says, “but I told them I was sick. Eli wanted to make sure you saw, so I figured it should just be you and me.”
Eli...I know the name. Was I once his? Were we each other’s?
I don’t think she can hear me. She sets me on a coffee table, propped against a stack of magazines.
Wait! Was that his face on the cover?
She definitely can’t hear me, and I can’t turn to face the magazines. I strain to see out of the corner of my eye, but these eyes don’t seem to have corners.
“Coming up next,” says the voice on TV, “Grammy nominee for Best New Artist—Eli Wylde!”
Eli...
When they return from commercial break, he’s there onstage, just him and his guitar. His age shocks me—I expected to see a twenty-year-old Best New Artist, but this man’s closer to thirty. It took him thirteen years to reach this height without me, but he reached it, with the song I made him write.
When he wins, his acceptance speech is full of names I don’t recognize. The only name I know is Lyra, whom he refers to as his “oldest friend.” I feel so displaced by this; at our last time together, she was his newest friend.
Finally Eli looks straight at the camera. “Last of all, I’d like to thank my father, Gordon Wylde. We never met in person, but he gave me the most important, most real gift I’ve ever received.” He leans in close to the mic and speaks in a near whisper, holding up his award. “Fig, I’m bringing home a new pair of boots.”
* * * * *
