Chapter 14 Sparklers and Sparks #4
"Oh yes," she replied gravely. "Wonderful, magical antique. Only those with the gift can read its face," she said, and then kissed Tilly's cheek. "Now, I am off to see the wizard."
"What?" Tilly asked in a whispered shock, looking around them as though Crystal's declaration could gather them an unwanted audience. "Are you serious? Are there wizards?"
Crystal's light blue eyes twinkled and crinkled, and her delicate nose scrunched in a childlike way that belied her mysterious age.
"Just a turn of phrase, darling. Just witches and vampires as far as I know. Magic in the hands of men," she visibly shivered at the thought.
Tilly laughed.
"You have a lovely night. And you," her voice rose as she speared the chief with a pointed look, "take care of our Tilly."
"I do not need taking care of." She scoffed. It came out awkward and scratchy.
The chief tilted his head once, and Crystal smiled widely before giving a fluttering wave of her hand and a graceful exit.
If only those with the gift could read the clock, had Mrs. Ling also had magic?
"Tilly," the chief started.
Her phone buzzed on the table, stopping him from whatever was about to come out of his mouth. They both looked down and, seeing Ronnie's name, a shock of annoyance ran through her. And something else she couldn't name when she looked up to the chief's eyes, boring into her.
There was a question-not visible on his face, but she felt it between them.
She wanted to answer it, to tell him she wasn't interested in Ronnie, but why would she need to tell him that?
She knew, though she ignored it. His eyes dipped to her mouth, for one breath-holding moment, and then he looked away, breaking what felt like a physical connection.
Whatever camaraderie they'd built, whatever softness had befallen the chief was gone in a moment.
"I'm going to go use the restroom," she said, in a sudden rush of disappointment.
He nodded.
As she walked away, phone burning in her hand, she felt an odd chasm, like something was growing and gaping with every step she took away from the tent. It took everything inside of her not to look back.
She was overwhelmed with feelings of annoyance, anger, confusion, and some less identifiable things. Itching, gaping, maybe a little sparkle. And all of it was marbling through her like different colors of paint in a shoebox painting, mixing and bumping, making a mess.
Her fingers itched. She felt a rise in her blood pressure.
She found restrooms with no line and when she closed herself into one of the stalls she leaned back against the plastic door and let out a long breath.
She hadn't felt this out of control in years.
Not since that morning.
Her closed eyes squeezed harder at the memory.
Frantically shoving her way into the coat closet. The smell of old wood and closeted winter coats that hadn't breathed in months. The darkness, but for one strip of yellow light at the door's bottom. Her heartbeat rattled and rumbled.
His threats set her heartbeat racing.
The sadness of betrayal.
The feeling of being weighed and found wanting.
The absolute jarring realization that she was not enough.
She sat there, knees pulled up against a tender chest that ached, and lay her head full of voices there, hoping to quiet one of them so that she could find a reality to hold onto.
She remembered that clamoring inside of her; reality and truth going to battle with anxiety and lies.
She had found a moment of bravery and used it to confront him about his betrayal. She'd found out about the other woman two months before, the crumpling sensation making her feel hollow. She didn't eat much, couldn't find the hunger. She lost so much weight that she was a wisp of herself.
In more than just her figure.
And what did he notice? Not her haunted eyes, or the way that she looked at him. He didn't notice that she'd stopped talking, only answering the handful of mundane questions that didn't matter.
Are we out of maple syrup?
Why haven't you made the bed in a few weeks?
Why does the sponge smell musty?
But it was when he was looking at his phone, her eyes studying him with his broad shoulders and height, something he carried like a trophy.
His light brown hair was receding and had been since a year prior, something he had started taking care with in the way he styled it. He looked impressive in his uniform.
Firefighter. Protector. White knight.
A true disguise.
And as she studied him, with tilted head and eyesight clear, she understood something; he didn't love her. And not only because he betrayed her with one of her friends.
He didn't love her in the way he never asked her questions about herself. He stopped looking at her. There had been a time when his laughing, interested eyes looked into hers, and it had been a kind of connection she was too young to realize was deeply intentional.
He stopped touching her in those absent ways that lovers do. Reaching for a hand, brushing hair off a shoulder, tugging them into a solid side, a casual sweet bump of a hip, a smile.
He didn't see her and he didn't look for her.
"What came first?" she had asked. That truth now taking the lead. Her usual anxious self that would have hedged and carefully cracked open the door to a difficult conversation had been shoved aside.
"Hmm?" he mumbled without looking up from his phone.
"I asked you what came first. Finding another woman and then you stopped looking at me? Or you stopped looking at me and then started looking for someone else?"
He looked up then.
Dark flash of eyes.
The clench of a weak jaw.
Bravery was such an interesting moment. Because a brave person knew walking into dangerous situations that they could walk away unscathed or running for their life.
But here she was now, after having rebuilt herself from that scalding moment of bravery that shoved her into a life she hadn't quite been prepared for. A life her heart needed to beat freely again.
And she was hiding in a bathroom stall.
She wasn't this woman anymore.
She straightened her shoulders, washed her hands, and left the bathroom with the shaky hope that she would be okay.
Then a sudden crash shot through her. Her steps faltered. A hand was pressed to her chest as that feeling intensified and then suddenly darkness cloaked her bones and she had a hard time catching her breath.
"Ah, Tilly Nguyen," a low feminine voice said.
She frowned as her head felt a rumble inside of her. What was this?
Then a strong hand lay on her shoulder, that darkness doubled and she looked up into Astra's dark eyes.
"Let's have a chat."