Kat placed her hand in his palm and let him lead her up the stairs and along the corridor. He came to a stop outside the third door down from their room and put his hand on the knob. He turned it and pushed the door open. It creaked loudly, as though it hadn’t been used for a long time. Kat was hit with a rush of cold air and a musty, aged smell.
With only the flashlight and the intermittent glimpse of the moon through the storm clouds, it was hard to see much. The small room was decorated with dark wallpaper, interrupted only by posters of cars and baseball players. A corkboard hung by the closet, covered in drawings and ticket stubs. White dust sheets hid the furniture, and the small bed was unmade with the mattress bare and unused. Kat turned to face Carter, who was looking at her patiently.
“This was your room,” she stated.
He moved the flashlight over the walls, pausing on a picture of a Triumph. They both remained quiet until Carter placed his arm around her shoulders and guided her to the bed, where she sat down. He ran his hand through her hair once before he moved over to the closet. He mumbled and cursed when he opened it and started to pull out boxes of different sizes. He rifled through them slowly until he pulled out a small book held together with a rubber band.
He stood and moved back toward the bed, sitting down next to her with a long breath. He placed the book on Kat’s now crossed legs, staring at it as though it would jump up and attack him. Kat moved her hand to Carter’s right knee and gave it a reassuring squeeze.
Carter scratched his chin with the side of his thumb. “This is kind of a— It’s a diary,” he stuttered. “It sounds stupid, I know, but after …” He paused. “I just think it’ll explain things better.”
“You want me to read it?”
He laughed humorlessly. “Yeah, I— Fuck, Kat, I don’t know.”
His nervousness was troubling. “Okay.”
With tense fingers, she pulled the rubber band off the book while Carter opened the small bedroom window and sparked a cigarette. Kat placed the rubber band on the bed and opened the front cover.
What she saw made her blink in astonishment and suck in a quick breath of shock.
Her head snapped up to Carter who shrugged apologetically. Stuck untidily on the first yellowing page was an article reporting the death of one Senator Daniel Lane. There was a black-and-white picture of him and Kat’s mother taken on the day of his election. He was so happy and so handsome. Eva looked beautiful, too. She smiled a smile that Kat hadn’t seen in a long time. Kat’s heart clenched with yearning for the mother who’d told her daughter she could be anything she wanted.
Kat’s eyes skimmed the article, knowing what she would find, the details she would read. Words jumped out at her in the flashlight beam: “horrifying,” “distraught,” “brain hemorrhage,” “police shot two suspects.” She swallowed hard and let her fingertips slide over her daddy’s face.
Gingerly, making sure she didn’t damage the paper, Kat turned the page. There were more articles detailing the funeral, the foundation set up in her father’s honor, and the events Eva had attended in Daniel’s memory. In each grainy picture of her mother, Kat noticed how she aged. The beauty and radiance so noticeable in the first picture had all but disappeared.
Her eyes pricked with tears. As they moved over the article, she realized that every time her own name appeared, it was either underlined or circled. It was the same on all the articles, including the first.
Silently she continued through the book, glancing at the articles he’d collected. She stopped when she came to a page covered in spidery handwriting. The first date was a month after Kat’s father had died.
I dreamed of her again. Every time I close my eyes, she’s there. She haunts me and I don’t know why. Ever since that night, she’s been inside my brain. I wish I could scoop her out like Gran used to do with the chocolate ice cream out of the freezer, but then … I think maybe I would miss her.
Two weeks later:
I smelled her today. I was with Max and we walked past a fruit stall. Peaches. Sweet peaches. Her hair smelled of peaches. I bought some. Max called me a freak. I think he’s right.
Two days later:
I am crazy. I know I am. I saw her. I know I did. But it’s impossible.
Christmas:
Dad and I argued. He called me ungrateful. I called him a prick. He found my smokes. I lay on my bed and closed my eyes and I saw her and smelled her hair again. Fucking crazy, right? It calmed me down. I think that if I helped her that night then maybe she wouldn’t mind that I use her this way. Maybe she wouldn’t care. Maybe she doesn’t even remember me.
Kat continued to read. The passages were small, no more than five lines each, but gargantuan in their significance. The hand that covered her open, disbelieving mouth became wet with tears. At the same time, the bed moved with Carter’s weight. He wrapped his arms around his knees. He was uncharacteristically still at her side.
New Year:
I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano,
A stage where every man must play a part,
And mine a sad one.
February:
In Belmont is a lady richly left,
And she is fair, fairer than that word,
Of wondrous virtues.