The Siren

Everyone's likes eggs. You do too, right? Scrambled with a nice toast at the side? Or sunny-side-up with bacon? By now you are probably done with my stupid questions and my irritating pauses, but I have a point here, believe me. Because you are eating perfection whenever you are eating eggs. I'm kidding you not. My father grew up in a farm. He experienced the country life until he had to move abroad to study. He explained to me once how farmers check eggs before selling them. They put the eggs under a strong light and they look at the developing embryo to know if it's ready to eat or not. They call the technique candling. My dad explained to me it was called this way since in the beginning farmers checked eggs under candle lights. Can you imagine that? Studying egg after egg, checking for every small imperfection in its shells, staring at it until the light deemed it perfect or not. I used to think that babies should be observed like eggs when they are born. As if we could put them under a strong light and be able to see the imperfections in them. I wouldn't be able to pass a candling test right now. Someone would have a look at my dead heart and toss me away. By now I'm sure I'm not right. There's this heavy sadness in my body that's eating my bones. The heaviness is settling in my body slowly, until all I can do is sleep.

I'm not sure how long I've slept when I finally wake up in the middle of the night. It takes me a while to recognize my new bedroom. It's a nice bedroom. Big with pale, naked walls waiting to be covered with all the memories I make in this place. Cora's words, not mine. Don't you know me by now? I like the naked walls. They are blank and so it's my mind at three in the morning. I read the hour in the clock at my night table and sigh. Jet lag sucks and so does the fact I'm suddenly very hungry. I study my new bedroom for a moment, trying to decide if I should get up and look for something to eat or just keep sleeping. Sleeping is so tempting that I almost close my eyes and go back to my limbo dreams, but for some inexplicable reason I keep blinking while studying the four-poster bed that I'm currently resting on. I'm softly snuggled under a white comforter and there are several pillows around me. Cora said she bought everything new for me. The bed, the pillows, the comforter, the clock, the night table and the cute lamps to read. She remembered I like to read and offered me her kindle, but she blushed when she admitted she only likes reading romantic novels and that I might prefer to stay out of her digital library. She wasn't kidding. Her kindle library is full of book's covers with naked men, sexy couples making out and BDSM shit I don't even want to start psychoanalyzing. I toss and move on the bed until my growling stomach beats me and I get up the bed and walk over the soft carpet without shoes.

I'm wearing the only change of clothes I've bought with me. They are my dad's. If I'm totally honest with you- and I promise, I always am- I haven't washed his t-shirt. It still carries around his smell. A mix between old books and sandalwood, that's how my dad always smelled. It's a huge t-shirt with the Princeton University logo in it's front. It's also a very old t-shirt, from when my dad used to be a student at Princeton. I'm wearing his boxers too. They look huge on me, but I don't care. They are...were his. Shit, I need to start talking about them in the past. They are not here anymore. I need to get used to it, regardless how painful the acceptance of their death is. I ignore the pain in my middle and blame it on skipping too many meals. I can't remember the last time I ate. Was it two days ago? Three? I grimace, but I can't remember when was the last time I felt as hungry as I' am right then. So I move in the dark halls, trying to guide myself in the huge house that I would call my own for the next couple of months before I go to college.

My bedroom is at the top floor and it's the last on the hall of the east wing. Cora's and Jasper's bedroom is on the west wing, closer to the stairs and Ivy's room. I walk on my bare feet, familiarizing myself with the sound of the wood floor, creaking under my weight. Sounds make places familiar, don't you think? You start to expect your place to sound in a certain way. My home was always very quiet, like in a library, or a class room during a test. In the absence of sound I would pay attention to all the little noises that would bombard the sacred muteness of my home. The fridge would sound loud whenever it was making ice, the wind would rattle the kitchen's windows and make them sound hollow and fragile. And my steps would sound so silent, camouflaged under the thick carpets covering the floors. But these wooden floors are not silent. They creak, they thunder, they speak a thousand of stories. I pass the boy's room. Earlier Cora explained to me that I would be sharing the east wing with Maddox and Emrick. I was so tired that I didn't pay attention to my aunt, but now I stop, looking at the closed doors with a frown. Their doors were in front of each other. To my left was Maddox's bedroom and to my right Emrick's. Their lights were off and no sound were coming from under the doors. It was a school day, I imagined they would be sleeping.

I walked to the stairs and slowly made my way down to the kitchen. There were too many options inside the fridge. Honestly, I've never seen so much food in one single space. These people ate like animals. I used to eat a lot too, back when I was a little girl and a lot happier. I had one of those miraculous metabolisms that could process four-course meals in a space of minutes and not gain a pound. Now? Let's just say I was surprised I was hungry in the first place. I was still checking my options, trying to decide between a vanilla pudding or a bowl of cereals when I heard a muffled sound that made me look over my shoulder. I waited a second in silence, feeling the fridge's cold air in my face before another sound made me move aside. What was that? A whimper? I walked slowly through the dark house, trying to guide myself by following the strange sounds coming from the garage. There was a light coming from underneath the hall door. I paused with my hand in the handle, before opening the garage and peeking inside.

Have you ever stepped in a very tall building and looked down? You know you are not afraid of heights and still your stomach plummets and your hands get sweaty. It's because you know. Inherently, inwardly, unconsciously you know that you are in danger. One wrong step and you could be gone. That's exactly what I felt when I opened that door. At first my eyes couldn't understand what I was seeing. It was dark, the only light came from one simple light bulb hanging from the roof. And then there was the garage. It was a dark place that had been furnished as a man cave. The walls were covered with football team posters, beer logos, a pool table and huge TV screens. There was a big carpet in the center of the room and a long L-shaped couch where my eyes zeroed. I knew I shouldn't look, but one glimpse at Maddox fucking a girl from behind and I couldn't make myself look away. Their bodies were facing me and even if I could see the girl's back and her long curtain of black hair, I couldn't see her face. Which made her faceless, just a shadow, the receiver of an angered god's wrath.

Maddox looked like an angry god. His muscular body was tensed, his arms cordoned in veins while he gripped the girl by her hips and rammed his cock inside of her. I could only see him. The girl became invisible. Maddox. I could only see his life force, the maddening cadency of his strong thighs, his beating heart, so alive, so...powerful. I haven't really seen him earlier in the day. Now I could see him. All of him. His tanned skin was covered in a thousand of glass droplets made of his sweat. His skin shined under the tremulous light, basking him in all his glory. His brown hair was short and thick, styled in a buzzcut that gave him a roguish air. He had a firm layer of stubble growing in his face and a pair of heavy eyebrows that couldn't hide the fierceness of his greenish-grey eyes. I saw him grip the girl's hair in a hand, riding her harder, faster. For the first time I realized what had been the sounds that had made me come to the garage. It had been the clapping of their bodies, rocketing against each other. And then the girl's moans, the words she was whimpering to Maddox.

"Please...please...let me look at you..." she moaned, clawing the couch with her hands and pushing her ass back, so Maddox could fuck it harder. I could see his cock. I've never seen a dick before and now I couldn't un-see it. It was...magnificent, big and proud, with a wide crown that glistened under a condom. She spoke again, words that I couldn't understand, "...let me look at you."

"Fuck no. Shut up and take it," he groaned, tightening his hold on her black hair and making her cry in complete ecstasy. And then she was coming, I could see it, in the way that she trembled and how her nipples tightened. My eyes moved back to Maddox and I gasped, holding a hand against my mouth when I realized he was looking at me. The girl cried and convulsed, coming hard, and still he wasn't looking at her. He squinted, probably trying to see me through the dark coming from the hall and then he smirked, zeroing his eyes on me and keeping them there. I saw him push his hips harder until I couldn't see his cock at all. He moved like a machine, fast and hard, a piston drilling itself, pushing and pushing. The girl moved then, trying to look back, but Maddox held her by her neck, keeping her looking ahead. I saw her look forward and scared that she could see me I backed off and run back to the stairs. I didn't stop running until I make it back to my room and locked the door behind me. I turned around and waited, staring at the back of my door as if the devil itself could push it open and come for me. But nothing happened. A minute passed by, and then another one, and then I heard the sound of an engine igniting. I rushed to my window and looked down, to the street. There was a Challenger Hellcat turning around the corner and somehow I knew it was his car, it screamed Maddox. Powerful, dark, fast. I looked at the Hellcat until it disappeared at the end of the street. Only then I sighed and closed my eyes in relief.

Then I put my hand over my chest and frowned.

There, almost unreachable to my ears I could hear my heart. Drip, drip, drip. Could you hear it too? That was the sound of the iceberg defrosting in my chest and all I could think was Maddox. He was a sugarcoated biohazard weapon to my senses. He was a razor-sharp dagger to my heart. He was the hook, line and sinker to my soul and I was not in a right place to start processing the wholeness of him. I needed to stay away from Maddox from now on. I made it to my bed in shaky legs and pushed my body down the covers until all of me was safely hidden in the darkness. I closed my eyes, but the first thing that came to my mind was the memory of Maddox's body screwing that girl. Angry I turned on Cora's kindle and made myself read one of her books until I fell asleep again.

Waking up in the morning was especially hard lately. My body wouldn't comply, not matter how much I told myself I needed to get up and move. It had been the same every morning since the Incident. I woke up the day of my parent's funeral and my body didn't stir. It laid spineless and cold on my bed, like the corpse of a dead amphibious. Today was no different. I heard the house waking up with the small sounds of life. First the strong steps of Jasper going downstairs and making coffee, then Cora's lighter movements. The sound of toilet, water running down a sink. Ivy's yawns, her giggles. Then the sounds of the boys, heavier and stronger than Jasper's. It smelled like food again this morning. I wondered if it was usual for these people to eat so much? Did they share breakfast every morning? Was that normal? I couldn't know. My upbringing wasn't what you would call normal. My mom used to have long periods of depression when she wouldn't move from the bed. My father would assist her, stay with her, provide for her every need. He would cook one daily meal for us then, usually dinner and nothing more. Don't think I'm complaining, cause I'm not. There were happy moments too, when mom felt fine and she would make pancakes for all of us and work on the backyard. I smiled at the memories, trying to capture the elusive smile in my lips with my fingers.

"Just stay there," I whispered to my smile, before it escaped, disappearing in the coldness of my throat. My heart was freezing again and its cold smoke was oozing a feezing fog down my veins and up my throat. I could see my veins under my skin. They were bluish today. Violet blood. I was falling asleep again when I heard Maddox's heavy steps. I recognized the heavy cadence of his steps from a couple of hours ago, when I heard him return to his bedroom after dropping the girl he had been fucking. By now my ears tingled at the sound of his steps. They were heavier than Emrick's and Jasper's, and faster, as if he were a small tornado that couldn't help but move fast and destroy things in its way. He stopped by his door, and lingered by the hall, were the floor creaked the most.

"Maddox?" asked Cora softly, in a whisper, probably to not wake me up. I pushed my left ear out of the covers and listened like a cat, half asleep, half not giving a shit.

"Is she not going to school?" he asked harshly, judgmental, angrily. I frowned, tensing. Why did he care if I went to school or not? That was none of his fucking business. I pushed the covers down, all the way to my cold chest and waited for what Cora had to say. She sighed, dropping her voice an octave.

"She will go whenever she feels ready," she said and I smiled again. Twice in a day! I was making progress. But I had to smile. Cora was a Windsworth woman after all, she knew all about our darkness and our need for space. When she said I would go whenever I was ready she meant I had all the rights to not go if I didn't feel like going. She understood. She didn't need to say it, but she understood.

"She is never going to feel ready. Not if you keep pampering her. I call it like I see it Cora, and she is just a selfish brat calling for attention," he said louder, probably speaking a lot more harshly to wake me up. I pushed the cover away and sat on the bed with my legs crossed. The coldness in my blood had warmed a little. How dared he? I was not even going to analyze all the reasons I had to do whatever I wanted. I was grieving. I was dying. I've experimented pain for so long that I couldn't even remember the last time I've ever been genuinely happy. And then what had happened with my parents...no, Maddox had no rights to say those things about me. I hated his guts. I hated him more than I hated sunny days, and loud laughs and happy endings. I hated him more than what I hated leaving a bed and starting a day. I hated the life that emanated from his pores. I just plainly hated the color of his eyes for being the first thing I've thought about when I woke up that morning.

"Maddox, please let her be. She is grieving right now, she doesn't need you antagonizing her," said Cora calmly, speaking from experience. She knew things that only the both of us knew. She knew I've been battling my mother's depression since the day I was born. She knew I wasn't only grieving. I was also resting for the first time in my life. My bones were so tired after fighting for so long that I wouldn't be able to get up that bed even if Maddox dared me to do it. I heard the floor groan under Cora's weight, as if she was moving closer to Maddox, "Give her some time to mend her wounds."

"Time doesn't fix shit," he said cuttingly and then he walked away, leaving me with a frown in my forehead. First of all, that dude needed to back the fuck up. He didn't know a single thing about me and was too fast to judge and think poorly about me. Secondly, I hated him for waking me up and making me get up from that perfectly warm bed. Seriously, I loved warm beds. They were up in my list of places where I wanted to push my body into. The other places were the 9 ¾ platform at King's Cross train station and the other one place was Ryan Gosling's arms. I lifted my legs from the mattress and pushed them down. They were so heavy. I knew it was all in my head. I weighted only a hundred of pounds, there was no way I was as heavy as the chemical disbalance in my brain assured me I was. But moving drained me, it really did. It took me ages to get to my private bathroom and push my body under the shower. The water was scorching hot, but it slowly warmed my insides until I could move easily. Slowly I took the soap in my hands and lathered my body, washing the memory of the last couple of days from my skin. Then I washed my hair. It was longer than what I remembered. I seriously needed a haircut. I considered shaving my legs for a second and then I decided I was way too tired to take care of myself so hard.

When I was ready to get out I opened the glass door of the shower and halted, checking my reflection in the mirror. I was skinnier. My breast bones were sticking out and I could see my ribcage protruding underneath my skin. I've never taken care of my body. I never exercised. I didn't do small routines after waking up or before showering like some girls liked to do. I'd always been tall for a girl and skinny, but now I was starting to disappear under my skin and the thought scared me. I studied my face. It still looked pale and small.

I have an oval face that was eclipsed by my big lips. They are big, alright? Emrick wasn't kidding when he said I have a big mouth. They are red, and plump. My lower lip has a line in the middle that makes my mouth look always open. I heard boys saying I had the best pair of lips in my old school, but I don't know about that. I've never been kissed and suddenly I wondered how it would feel to have Maddox kissing my big lips. Did he like my big mouth? Did he find it vulgar or tempting? I shook my head, tearing my aquamarine eyes from the mirror and focusing in drying myself with a towel.

But there is no point ignoring the memories of what I saw at the garage. Every time I close my eyes all I can see is Maddox fucking that faceless girl. Why didn't he kiss her? Why he didn't let her see his face? Was that something he usually did? Fuck them senselessly and toss them away. I feel myself warm at the memories. My pink nipples harden and I feel weird between my legs. Awake. Sensitive. I blush and move back to the bedroom, pushing Maddox's memories away and focusing in the mechanical routine of covering my body. I dress in the same clothes I used the day before. Jeans, a sweater and my boots. The clothes are starting to smell. I need a haircut. I need to start living. But not yet. Just...not yet. I can still live in my limbo dreams. Half here, half in the middle of nowhere.

A couple of minutes later I find Cora in the kitchen and she offers me to go with her to the nearest mall so I can cut my hair and buy some clothes. I nod. I blink, I breath. I absorb. I can pretend I'm here with the living for a while longer.