Renascence

Authors Note:

First, thank you to all those who have shown their support these last few months. Your comments, emails and votes drove me to finish this chapter. I can't get into details of the reason for the delay, but I can say that if you'd known my reasons, you would forgive me.

The first passage of this chapter was inspired by the writings of my very talented and very dear friend, Lun. Thank you for lending me your intellectual property for the spirit of this story.

Hope you all enjoy this story. This is not the last chapter. More to come.

Cheers,

Nora

—

Renascence

Noun:

The revival of something that has been dormant.

—

There are two ways in which the body speaks, and one of them is in complete silence.

Open your mouth and talk, listen to how your voice sounds, hear what people hear when you form your syllables. This is where you can tell lies, where you can conceal, where you can make something out of nothing. This is where lies freedom, this is where lies opportunity, this is where lies all the lies you want to tell. Suppress the truth that cages you, speak the lies that free you—and do it because you can.

Because the second language is spoken through the eyes, and here you have no power, here you cannot do anything. Even the blind speak here, even the blind have emotion in their eyes. Here are where thoughts linger, here are where truths are told, here are where lies dissolve. And while the words here are spoken in silence, they are loudest of them all.

—

Gabe is the physical manifestation of dreams, and I am the physical manifestation of chaos.

I thought about him while I worked on the homework he'd assigned, writing words, writing thoughts, writing everything loud in my mind until it became silence on paper. From the roots embedded in my brain, the words flowed like a river, cutting through the rock until it was smooth, until my words became clear enough to make sense. I was pushing myself to weave together a creative writing paper on inspiration.

Inspiration stems from all sorts of places, at least that's what Gabe had said. He'd glanced at me as if he was telling me personally, knowing that I needed to hear it. Inspiration didn't have to come from the good places; it could come from the bad, from the ugly, from the places where broken dreams and broken windshield glass resided. Inspiration, like art, didn't have to be beautiful. It just had to be enough to make you feel something.

Except it's hard to feel anything these days. All I feel is this numbness, this emptiness that gets deeper and deeper, swallowing me whole, plunging me into the darkness. All I think about is Napa, of the entire life I'd had over there. It came in snippets of random things, like the way Dad used to play the piano on rainy days, his fingers moving like spiders, and Emma's voice, pure and clear, singing along with the notes, belting out all the lyrics that I could never seem to remember. Marta, the housekeeper that practically raised me, praising me for the B I got while Dad gave Emma a high-five for the A+ on a math test. The trails out behind the vineyards where Emma and I sometimes snuck a ride on our neighbor's horses (with their permission, of course), riding until our thighs got sore and our hands blistered from the reins. Mom's laugh, so fucking loud, the kind that practically echoed in the big house, the kind that always startled strangers because of just how truly

loud

it actually was. The annual fall festival where everyone, the employees, the neighbors, our friends, all of us, got together to participate in stomping all the grapes that didn't make the cut. It was just for fun since it ended up becoming fertilizer afterwards, but Dad insisted that we keep up the age-old tradition. Emma had been there, smiling and smiling, so goddamn happy all the time.

Then all of it—Dad, the vineyard, the horse trails, Marta, grape stomping, Mom's larger-than-life laugh, Emma—all of it was just fucking gone. And it made me empty, so fucking empty that I felt like I was drowning in it, like I'd died a long time ago and all that was left was a shell that went through all the motions of being human, like I was my own puppet master, twisting and pulling all the strings to pretend that I was still a real girl.

I did it for Mom, this whole being alive thing, just so she wouldn't have to be alone. I wasn't entirely sure if she could survive any more loss than she already has. I masked all my emptiness by getting up, going to school, and coming home to show her that I was still there, still somehow functioning even though I carried my numbness inside of me like a dark secret.

Then along came Gabe.

Gabe with his wry smiles. Hair just a couple brushes away from looking neat. Crisp shirts and dark slacks and thin ties and black leather shoes. Long sleeves, hiding the stories told by scars that looked healed, but underneath the skin probably still hurt where the heart was. Knuckles that jutted out on a hand that was slender and long, hidden in pockets, buried away from the world to hide the physical proof that his brother had died and he'd survived. The mind that was intuitive and methodical when it worked, eyes that read fast, brows that sometimes furrowed in that cute way that made me want to just squeeze him around the middle, to feel his warmth, to feel his arms close around me again. Hazel eyes that darkened when impassioned, and then softened, melting like chocolate when thoughtful, kind, generous. The way our raw kisses tasted, the way fire had filled my veins, the fragile heart of mine that he cracked open, finding out exactly what made it tick in that way that watches do.

And this was how I got the lunatic courage to let myself want him. Because around Gabe, around him and all the beautiful and ugly things that tore us apart and pieced us back together, I could

feel.

He took all my numbness in his capable hands and stripped it off my skin, showing me that sometimes, being vulnerable was what could make you strong. He was the thunderstorm, challenging the rain, saying

I will not let you fall.

So I wrote about him. About the thunderstorm that inspired me. I poured myself into my homework assignment, writing page after page in metaphors, telling our story without using any names, telling him how it hurt so badly to want him, but how it hurt so much worse to pretend not to. Paragraph after paragraph, I told him that I saw him, that I knew that he was beautiful, but that I also saw other things: the way his brilliant mind worked, the way he could move people, the way he could

inspire.

After seeing him, really seeing him, I knew that beauty was the very least of him.

And so, inspiration—

It's you, Gabe. It has always, and will always, be you.

I finished the paper, signed it, dated it, spelled out some more words with those same 26 characters until you could tell that it was mine. I wrote to the dream with my chaos. I hoped he could decipher my meaning.

—

"Drop me from the AP Spanish class. Ms. Hanley, excuse my French—uh, Spanish, whatever—but I

hablas

the shit out of it. It's a waste of my time to drive all the way over there. "

Ms. Hanley had her chin perched on her hand, watching me with an expression of mild amusement. Her wild curly red hair was down today in soft ringlets, and her makeup was much better suited to her face. She looked like a normal person, even though I knew she was weird—and I kind of suspected that she knew she was weird too. But she looked pretty.

"Well," she said, looking down at my schedule. "I guess I could drop you from the class. It really would have helped to bring up your GPA, but you technically don't need to take the class to be eligible to take the AP exam. That still leaves you empty for first period. What to do, what to do..." She tapped her fingertips on her desk, looking up at the ceiling while thinking. I wondered if she knew how animated she looked, almost like she was a cartoon character brought to life in the form of one very strange human woman.

"You could be a teacher's aid," she said, her face brightening. "I already know someone who'd probably love one."

Oh, hell no.

I should have just kept driving over to the sister school for AP Spanish. I'd lasted all of one class before I'd realized that it'd be a complete waste of my time. I spoke Spanish fluently. I'd spoken it my whole life with Marta, the seasonal laborers in the vineyard, my friends at school and Dad who'd learned it out of necessity long before I was even born. Then the last three years of honors Spanish had helped me figure out proper sentence structure and grammar. I spoke Spanish without having to convert the words from English in my brain. Which meant that yeah, I was fucking fluent.

"Uh, how about Mr. Young?" I offered meekly.

"Oh, no," she said, waving off my suggestion. "He already has an aid. I have someone in mind that would probably be really grateful for some extra help. I'll give you a hint: he's new," she said with a playful smile that gave me the sudden urge to strangle her.

"Can't I just have another free period?"

"You can't have two in a row. You already have second period off."

"Put me back in one of the classes that you dropped me from then."

"Can't, honey. You really don't need them. You already have the credits."

Okay, whatever. I'd just have to be his aid for two days. I could work with that. I'd have to.

"So which teacher?" I asked.

"Don't act like you don't already know," she said with a laugh. "I'll send you down there with a note. I just need him to sign your schedule for his approval."

"What,

now?"

"Second period is only halfway over. Now's as good a time as any. Hold on, I'll print you a new schedule and write you a note for Mr. Hart."

I stood up and shifted my weight from one foot to the other. My head was buzzing now. I kept wondering what Gabe would say, if he would think that this was somehow my idea, that perhaps I was being a bold little bitch again, initiating where I wasn't supposed to. The thought alone brought memories rushing back—kisses, moans, hands everywhere, shaky breaths, a bra unsnapped with one expert hand, a shirt unbuttoned, and a tender, soft gaze that still made my heart squeeze.

You're going to ruin me.

We can't do this again.

His words rang in my ears, reminding me of my place. I shouldn't be thinking about that day. The familiar guilt made me feel hollow, draining me until I felt that emptiness again. I remembered what Dad had said about it being my fault, and those words had taken everything bad that had ever happened to us, to

anyone

and made it my fault, all mine. I'd barely been hanging on by a thread when Dad had snipped it, tossing me right into the darkness, leaving me to search for my ribs, counting them so I could put on a brave face for Mom.

I'd run that red light on that intersection close to home, the one that was always empty, the one we'd driven by a thousand times as kids and had encountered another vehicle only a handful of times. I hadn't thought anything about it, laughing about something Emma had said, turning up the volume of the radio to drown her out, telling her shut up, I love this song. I'd been looking at her when I'd crossed into the intersection, and for one split second I'd caught the sudden surprise in her eyes when she'd peered past my shoulder. She'd seen it coming, but I hadn't.

I hadn't seen any of this coming.

I said nothing when Ms. Hanley handed me her note. Don't get me wrong, I wanted nothing more than to start each morning with Gabe's face to greet me, that smile, the easy way he talked, relaxed yet confident, but then I remembered how I'd just barely been able to convince him to keep from spilling our secrets and ruining his life. He thought it'd be the right thing to do, but turning himself in wouldn't have erased anything we'd done.

Had my actions destroyed his perception of himself? Gabe was a good person, wholesome, principled, impassioned—the type of man that wouldn't be caught dead undressing his eighteen year old student in his car. Maybe I'd brought out the worst in him with a heated kiss. He'd never really stood a chance. Lunatic cockteases are pretty hard to resist.

I shouldn't be around him. I couldn't say it with my lips ever again, but I could do nothing about my eyes. They pleaded with him, begging for more, speaking that language of loneliness that only we could ever understand. We both knew that soul-crushing heaviness of loss, him losing his brother, me losing Emma—and then us, losing ourselves. But I don't think either of us could have prepared ourselves for this other unexpected loss: losing each other.

I walked the halls and had a fleeting memory of Gabe's thundering footsteps, how he'd somehow made all the empty space his own, how he'd commanded the halls as I'd followed behind him like a moth to a flame. I was still drawn to him, walking in a trance, trying to push thoughts of want and need out of my brain when I approached his classroom door.

It felt like a hundred pair of eyes turned to me when I let myself in, but I didn't really care. I looked only for the amber, my heart expanding in the center of my chest when those eyes found mine, looking at me, into me.

"Grace," he said, getting out of his seat.

I didn't—

couldn't

—say anything. I'd frozen from the sight of him. After a morning in a strange classroom in another town and then a cramped office with Ms. Handley, I'd felt so out of place, existing only in dead space, but there was no dead space here, only Gabe and his commanding presence, and here—here, I could belong.

"Keep working," he said to the class. "I'll be right outside."

I stepped back out into the hall and leaned against a locker. The schedule and the note were in my hand, fluttering pathetically. Our death sentence, mine and Gabe's.

"Hey," he said, closing the door behind him. "Are you okay?"

I realized right then that he'd assumed I'd run to him because I needed him. It made my heart warm that he'd walked out of class without any care of how it looked—all because he wanted to be there for me. He really was very good at this whole friendship thing. It made me feel worse for having to come down here and throw him back into the chaos that we'd barely gotten ourselves out of.

"Don't worry, I'm fine. Here," I said, passing him the note and the schedule. "It wasn't my fault. I couldn't get out of it."

His eyes moved quickly as he read.

"Got a pen?" he asked.

"You're actually going to sign off on this?"

"Of course I am."

"Why?"

"It'll be good for you, that's why."

"I could list a hundred different reasons why this would be a terrible fucking idea, but it doesn't really matter. I'm only doing this until Friday," I said, crossing my arms uncomfortably. "I found out I have enough credits to graduate early."

I gave him a moment to process what I'd told him. I was expecting a sigh of relief, maybe a smile because he'd been yapping about graduating for about as long as I've known him, but instead all I saw was another one of his cryptic, unreadable expressions.

"I can't let you do that," he finally said. Before I could even respond, he took me by my shoulders and turned me around, unzipping my backpack and then digging around, probably for a pen. I heard it click and a moment later he was passing me back a signed schedule.

"I-I don't get it," I said, making a face. "I thought this was what you wanted."

"I want to see you succeed, not give up."

"How is

this

giving up? I don't fucking understand you."

"If you graduate now you'll give up and just stop living, Grace."

"You don't need to put me on suicide watch. I'm not going to off myself," I said dryly.

"That's not what I meant, Grace," he said gently. "I just... I don't trust you on your own yet. You haven't reacquainted yourself with being present in the world."

"I don't know what you're talking about," I said stubbornly. I wasn't giving in. I hated coming to this piece of shit school.

"I think you do," he said, looking unamused. "I know you. I was you. I didn't leave my house for almost a year after I graduated. I gave up, just like I know you will. I can't let you, Grace. I

won't

let you."

It shouldn't have surprised me that he'd see right through me, that he'd read the tiredness in my eyes and know that all I wanted to do was sleep away the rest of my life, but this was Gabe, the one person in this entire universe who'd learned to read me like a book, flipping through all the chapters of me until he'd mastered me, figuring out just how to analyze me.

I fucking hated it.

"This isn't—it's none of your business," I said, stumbling through my own words. "I can't do this anymore. I can't—I just can't."

"You can," he said, motioning for me to follow him back into his classroom. "You will."

I wanted to argue, but I'd already wasted too much of his time in the hallway. He had a class to teach. I reluctantly followed in behind him, chewing my bottom lip out of nervous habit. I couldn't fight the need to be around him. He made me feel so whole, grounding me to this earth, chasing away the pain from my bones. This was exactly why I needed to stay away from him.

"For those of you that don't know, this is Grace," Gabe was saying a moment later to the class, probably knowing full well that nobody gave a shit. "Let's all give a warm welcome to our new T.A. Don't be shy if you have any questions regarding your assignments. Grace can answer them if I'm not available."

There was only one familiar face in the class. Charlie with her pink hair, greeting me with a lift of her hand. A few other girls stared, their eyes narrowed. It took me a moment to realize that they were probably annoyed that they hadn't thought to apply to be Gabe's T.A. first. I would have gladly given the title to any of them, but at the moment I was feeling a little smug. Fuck them. Fuck all of them.

Gabe slid a stack of papers to the center of his desk and gestured for me to take his seat. "Mark the spelling and grammar mistakes," he said, handing me a red pen. I tried to ignore the thought that I was taking

his

seat, just the way I had

his

phone number, the way I'd been in

his

car, the way I'd kissed

his

lips and almost ruined

his

fucking life.

I spent the rest of the period going over last night's homework assignments, flipping through the essays from his first and second period classes. The fact that an alarming number of them were written so poorly that they'd hardly be discernible from papers written by second graders didn't shock me in the least. Kids from small towns are notoriously stupid. Everything about this place was a cliche.

Two students came up to ask me questions. I had to explain what an oxymoron was to an actual moron, and then I broke down exactly what textual organization was and the importance of it to someone who wasn't exactly a moron, just clueless. It seemed almost criminal that these kids had made it all the way to their senior year without understanding even the basic constructs of the English language. I spoke better Spanish than they did their own first fucking language. I had to remind myself at some point that I was acting really full of myself. Nobody likes a pretentious bitch, but I guess I don't give a shit because I don't like anybody either. Gabe did maybe, but I had a feeling that he liked a lot of my shitty qualities.

When the bell rang, I bolted like a scared chihuahua. I knew that Gabe was dying to talk. I'd seen it in the charged looks he'd kept giving me, but I'd always looked away, afraid again that my eyes would speak the words I didn't want to say. I needed to give him time to process the situation, to see the sense in letting me go. I didn't belong in this school, and no matter how much it hurt to admit it, I didn't belong in his life either.