Chapter 16 Verity
SIXTEEN
Verity
For days I’ve been floating on air. Propelled by some powerful force that kept me euphoric and in constant motion. A dervish. A spinning top, the world a blur around me.
Outside Monk’s apartment door, I’m finally still.
What I’ve lost comes into sharp focus and I wait for the pain to hit.
I know this breakup is a deep wound, bleeding all over my feet, but I can’t feel it.
It’s like someone injected novocaine into my heart, and instead of the agony, there’s a blessed numbness that makes this unnatural joy possible.
I’m the clown with the smile painted on her face.
I couldn’t stop grinning if I wanted to.
Even knowing I just lost the man I love, the best thing that has ever happened to me, there is somehow a pep in my step.
That buzz beneath my skin and in my ears grows more prominent, the noise of an army of bees.
I don’t know how long I stand there, listening for an indication that Monk has changed his mind. That any minute the door will be flung open because, realizing his mistake, he’s coming after me. And he’d find me right here waiting.
And waiting.
And waiting.
But he never comes. The door doesn’t open, and slowly I accept that it won’t.
My heart is heavy, but my feet still have wings.
If the depression I experienced in California was a weighted blanket I could never crawl from under, in contrast this feels like I’ve swallowed helium and keep rising, unable to find anything solid beneath my feet.
My heart is racing, the pulse at my neck and wrists like mallets beating the head of a drum.
The blood in my veins is spiked with accelerant.
I can’t slow down. My steps, at first dogged, dragging, quicken until I’m running.
The heels hinder me, so I kick them off, heedless of how the rough cobblestones along the arboretum’s path tear at the soles of my feet.
The halter at my neck loosens as I pick up speed and it falls to my waist.
The cool night air feels good on my naked breasts. I’m so damn hot. I run faster, willing the wind to cool me, but perspiration dots my forehead and rivulets of sweat run down my naked spine.
“So hot,” I mumble, fiddling with the zipper of my dress, not stopping, but stumbling as I kick out of it.
I leave it in the grass and regain my footing, racing past the darkened cafeteria and the desolate student center.
The glow of a faint light from the fine arts building brings me to a halt.
I stand at the steps, panting, back bowed, hands on my knees, and wearing only my thong.
I suddenly know how to cool the sweltering heat of my body, the lava scalding my brain.
If I put out the fire, I’ll stop burning.
It makes such perfect sense, I can’t believe I didn’t understand before.
That was why I’ve been drawn to this sculpture over and over and over.
It’s the source, the heart of my heat. If I can’t extinguish that flame, I’ll combust. I find a rock in the grass and trip up the steps.
Unhesitatingly, I hit the glass door with the rock until it shatters.
Thrusting my arm through the jagged glass, I reach in and turn the knob.
Glass scrapes along the skin of my forearm, leaving thin trails of blood behind, but I barely feel it. I’m so close nothing could stop me now.
Ignoring the red flashing light in the ceiling and the squawk of the alarm, I run into the exhibit hall.
A strip of LED lights strung overhead illuminate the copper piece, igniting its flame.
I press my palms to the protective glass encasing the prized art.
It cools my palms, and I instantly know this is right.
This is the only way to smother the flame burning under my skin, seething in my belly, and roaring in my chest. I pound on the panes, but they’re too thick.
They don’t budge. Desperate, I scan the sparse exhibit hall for anything I can use to crack the glass.
A small marble bust sits on a display table a few feet away.
I grab it and throw it with all my strength.
The case shatters, and the glass splinters into a million shards on the floor.
Sobbing in relief, I move close. It doesn’t matter that I’m stepping on glass with my bare feet.
I can’t feel anything but the heat. The overwhelming heat that licks from my toes all the way to the top of my head.
I’m so hot my eyes must be bleeding flames and my hair is on fire.
“Freeze!”
The shout briefly draws my attention away from Flame. Two campus police officers stand at the door, guns drawn. I’m unfazed and take another step across the sea of glass to reach the sculpture.
“Ma’am,” one of the officers says. “On your knees, hands behind your head.”
I stare, not into his eyes, but down the barrel of his gun.
“I have to do this,” I whisper. My fingers tremble and my feet burn everywhere the glass penetrates my soft flesh.
One of them surges forward and tackles me to the ground.
“No!” I shout, and squirm, my eyes fixed on Flame. “Put it out! Put it out!”
He grabs a handful of my hair to keep me still. I scream, wrestling against his hold.
One of them laughs. “We got us a wild one.”
I loosen my arm and thrust my elbow into his eye. He drops me and growls, “She’s crazy.”
He wrenches my arms behind my back, pressing my naked chest into the cold marble floor.
I’m on my stomach and his knee is in my back and the cuffs are on my wrists and I’m still burning up.
My thoughts spin, a murky centrifuge. And my brain is a frothy, rabid beast. I bite the hand that restrains me.
“Stupid bitch!” the officer says, shaking his hand. “You’re spending the night behind bars for that.”
“Put it out,” I sob, tears flowing hot and salty into my lips. “The fire, put it out.”
“There’s no fire, ma’am,” the officer says. “But you are under arrest. You have the right to remain—”
“What is going on here?”
I lift my head and, through a scrim of tears, see Dr. Garrison standing at the entrance of the exhibit hall. Her hair, always elegant, is hidden beneath a scarf, and a trench coat covers her silk pajamas.
“Oh, my God. Verity,” she says, her wide eyes roaming over my nearly naked body. “Get those cuffs off her.”
“She’s unruly,” the officer says, dragging me to stand. “I’ll have a black eye tomorrow. The cuffs aren’t coming off.”
Dr. Garrison rushes over, peels off her coat, and settles it around my shoulders to cover my breasts.
“Verity,” she says softly, lifting my chin. “Honey, look at me.”
“Put it out,” I sob, rocking back and forth. “Put it out. You have to put it out. It’s burning.”
“Put what out?” she asks, her brows knit into a frown.
“The flame.” I jerk my head toward the sculpture. “Will you put it out?”
“The Brody piece?” Her eyes narrow and she searches my face. “You want me to put out the fire?”
“Yes!” I strain against the cuffs, twisting so hard the coat falls from my shoulders and I’m exposed again, my naked chest heaving.
“Pleasehelppleasehelppleasehelppleasehelp. You have to. I can’t keep this up.
The fire is spreading and my hair is on fire and my skin is blistered and I think I have heartburn and every time I try to breathe, my throat is on fire.
It’s like when you have a sore throat. You know?
But a million times worse. Imagine fire in your throat.
In your mouth. Your teeth burn. I don’t know why.
I know you think I’m crazy, but I’m not.
I-I-I just understand it now. I didn’t understand all this time why I was always drawn to the fire, but now I get it because it’sthekeyit’sthekeyit’sthekey!
And I was sent here to put the flame out and if I don’t do it no one can and I won’t be the only one burning up.
Oh, no. You’ll be next. Don’t you get it?
It’s not just me. It’s you, too, but I have to put it out.
If I don’t, the whole world could burn to the ground.
I don’t know how I know, but I know. It wasn’t a voice or anything like that.
It was inside. The knowledge of it was inside my head.
You get it? In my head. And it was only revealed to me tonight because the fire was about to rage out of control.
The whole campus could burn. I was just the first victim, but it wants us all.
It wants you and it wants the faculty and the staff and… Monk.”
The words, pouring out of me incessantly like vomiting a volcano, falter on his name. I choke on tears and ashes.
“Monk,” I sob, letting my head fall forward and my shoulders slump and my hands hang limp in the cuffs cutting into my wrists. “Don’t let it burn Monk. Please. You have to help me. Please help me put the fire out.”
“Oh, Verity, honey,” Dr. Garrison whispers, her eyes glazed with tears. “I’ll help you. Of course I will.”