6. River
river
. . .
the wall
At dinner last night, I overheard one of the other artists complaining about sharing a wall with Dan. Given her personality, I’d assumed she was embellishing for the sake of attention.
I understand now.
For the last hour, I’ve been lying on my bed, listening to literally everything going on next door through the shoddiest wall in existence. I’m talking paper-thin, fake-wood paneling and zero soundproofing.
My initial hope was to catch a nap before dinner, but for whatever reason, I have yet to reach for my noise-canceling headphones. Morbid curiosity, probably.
The longer I listen, the more confirmation I have that Rue St. James is fucking nuts.
She talks to herself a lot—like a concerning amount. When I first heard her muttering and occasionally laughing, I thought she must be on a phone call, but then she actually called my sister. On speaker, no less.
That, at least, was entertaining. With a deadpan, fatalistic air, Rue told Ivy about arriving and running for the nearest bathroom, only to realize after a harrowing exorcism that the toilet wouldn’t flush.
While trying not to panic, she attempted to fix the issue by scooping water from the sink into the empty tank by hand, which didn’t solve anything and resulted in a soaking wet T-shirt.
I had to bite a pillow to keep from laughing along with my sister.
Rue eventually gave up and went searching for someone to inform. She found Claudia waiting for her outside the Lodge, but when she told her what happened, PAC’s eccentric founder laughed like she was joking, then swept her on a tour.
As her recounting neared our meeting at the pool, I’d braced myself to hear what a jerk I was. But to my surprise, Rue said I’d been happy to see her and seemed, quote unquote, totally great.
Ivy was thrilled by the news.
Other than Rue being chaotic as hell, I have no idea why she lied.
But whatever the reason, I’m relieved she did.
Ivy and boundaries don’t normally coexist, especially when it comes to our family.
I have no doubt she’ll convey everything Rue said to our parents, toilet fiasco included.
Had Rue told the truth about my reaction to seeing her, I’d have been inundated with texts within the hour.
There was a time I would have been elated to be the recipient of my parents’ focus. Their care, questions, and advice. Even their worry.
But I’m not a kid anymore.
The last time I needed them, truly needed them, I was seventeen. At the time, their primary focus was Wilder, who was strung out on drugs and hiding it from everyone. Whatever energy my parents had left went to Olive and Ivy, who, thanks to puberty, had devolved into rabid animals.
I don’t begrudge my parents for overlooking me back then. It’s not their fault. I’d played the role of their only relatively stable child my entire life. They couldn’t see what I didn’t show them—what I didn’t know how to show them.
Feeling like a side character in my family was nothing new, but that was the last time I let it bother me.
I love my parents, and I know they love me. But I don’t need them worrying about me. I don’t need their help. Their advice. Their meddling.
I don’t need them anymore.
Rue’s call with Ivy ended a few minutes ago, and now I’m listening to her sing one of my brother’s songs. She’s belting it out off-key, most of the lyrics garbled because she doesn’t know the words. Coming from a family of singers with perfect pitch, the auditory assault is excruciating.
Adding insult to injury, her performance is accompanied by arrhythmic thumps as she opens and closes every drawer in her bedroom and bathroom.
When she finally shuts up, I sigh and close my eyes, willing sleep to take me swiftly.
Then her shower turns on, and it sounds like a fucking train running through the walls.
With an aggrieved groan, I sit up and swing my legs off the bed. If this is what I’ll be forced to cope with every day, I’m not going to last a week, much less six.
Unfortunately for my sanity, the resolve I felt at the pool still holds.
I don’t want to leave.
Rubbing my temples, I attempt to think over the sound of a hurricane contained by old pipes. A torturously long minute later, my thoughts finally clear enough for a solution to surface.
I’ve only been to my assigned studio space once, when Claudia showed it to me on the day I arrived. It’s not far from here, down a nearby path and isolated in its own small clearing.
At first glance, the wooden shack looked about as sturdy as the backyard fort my dad built when we were kids, which lasted all of a week before Wilder’s foot went through the floor and my mom demanded it be torn down.
The inside of the studio was a nice surprise, though—far bigger than it appeared from outside, with finished walls and flooring, insulation, electricity, and two screened windows.
If memory serves, there was also a half bath and a mini fridge.
All I need to do is convince Kirk to hook me up with an inflatable mattress. Hell, a sleeping bag would suffice. I’ll toss a tarp over the canvases and boxes of supplies so I don’t have to look at them.
If I can sleep in my studio, I’ll only need to come back here to shower. And since I’m staunchly anti-group activities, that means I’ll only see Rue at meals in the Lodge. Or I can ask about taking my meals to go. Avoid her completely. If I’m lucky, it’ll be like she’s not here at all.
At the thought, at least 40 percent of my stress drains away. When guilt sees the opening and tries to weasel its way in, I force it back. This isn’t solely about what I want. Whether Rue knows it or not, I’m protecting her too.
From the moment we first met at Wilder and Eva’s wedding, Rue and I have had a weird dynamic. Charged. Barbed. While we’re generally more teasing than toxic, it’s still problematic—at least for me. Whenever she’s around, I invariably find myself doing or saying stupid shit.
Today, however, was a new low for me. Bottom rung of the decency ladder; certified-asshole behavior.
Remembering my outrageous accusation that my parents were paying her to be here, I cringe in shame.
Her anger was beyond justified. But what haunts me most—and for the worst reasons—is how tears turned her irises a stunning indigo.
The color was so textured and rich; for the first time in months, I felt a spark of artistic curiosity.
I still feel it now, an itch beneath my skin that moves every time I try to scratch it.
Can I capture that color on canvas? Can I capture her?
The questions prompt another line of thinking. One that stirs a different and far more dangerous speculation.
There was a time when I imagined doing a lot of things to Rue, including making her cry. But not those kinds of tears. Never those. Only the sobbing-my-name, I-can’t-come-again kind.
Would tears of passion also turn her eyes indigo? Or would they take on a different hue? Perhaps cobalt or navy?
The itch of curiosity becomes a familiar, tingling heat: want and need. I scowl at my lap as my shorts get tighter, somewhat surprised but mostly annoyed. With my body. With myself.
I haven’t entertained these kinds of thoughts about Rue in years. Not since the day she slammed a door, both physically and metaphorically, on anything ever happening between us.
I thought her rejection cured me. That my inconvenient desire had been put to rest once and for all.
Apparently not.