Katie
Another letter came to me a few days after the museum.
K –
You and I hold history. Speak to me.
̴ L
I sighed at the paper and pressed it to my chest. For someone mocking my romantic tendencies, Levi had his own, although he was still a mystery to me. Shortly after our stolen moment near the gorgeous miniature castle, Levi told Professor Erickson he needed to leave. Something about AJ. He hadn’t said anything to me, other than collecting his sleeping bag next to mine and excusing himself to tend to AJ’s needs. I couldn’t fault him for the care of his child, I only wish he had more words for me. Then again, I didn’t know how to describe what he’d done to me. That nip at my neck destroyed me, unleashing something I didn’t know I held within myself. I became unhinged, ready to tackle him to the museum floor and make him kiss me.
Penelope teased that she’d tap her own vein and let a hot vampire take his pleasure from her if the opportunity ever arose. In the dark of the museum, I felt that same way. Amongst the history of those long dead, I felt more alive than I’d ever felt, until he left. Then my heart ridiculed me for wanting more from him, and admonished me for thinking I could be anything other than a schoolgirl with a crush on an unobtainable man—rock star syndrome or something. I cursed myself for my romantic notions and glittery dreams, for an imagination too ripe for its own good, but then I’d stared at this note and wondered what I was missing.
The night at the museum was like a dance, a masquerade. Not that I had experience with such a fantastical party, but the back and forth was clear. Levi and I gravitated toward one another in the group, and then we’d catch the other staring, and separate. We’d come near one another again until our hands bumped or shoulders tapped, and then one of us would turn in a different direction, avoiding the other. I thought I wouldn’t survive the night, hyperaware of his every movement, yet separated by an unspoken distance. And then he crossed the hall and set his sleeping bag next to mine. When he read the book I was reading, dirty story time abound. Hot and bothered and out of control myself, Levi was apparently at the end of some hypothetical rope because he nearly dragged me down the stairs to the basement where he kissed me madly against the castle exhibit. That night I dreamed of living in such a place, with Levi as my prince, and woke to curse myself. My imagination got the best of me.
* * *
My phone rang during class, startling me.
“Katie?” His voice sounded distant, garbled and weak.
“Levi? Are you drunk?” I whispered as I stepped out of the classroom. I never answered my phone during class. In fact, I normally turned it off, but I must have forgotten.
His silence answered the question.
“Levi, where’s AJ?” Muted crying filled the background as I paced the tiled hallway.
“He’s crying, Katie. Make him stop crying.” His voice faltered. “I can’t help him.” My heart leapt then crashed to my feet. Panic seized me at the urgency in Levi’s voice.
“Just…can you come home?” He choked as if catching the error in his words.
“Levi…” I don’t know why I hesitated.
“Katie, please.” Desperation filled his voice, and I nodded before remembering he couldn’t see me. Then the phone went dead. I called back, but the lack of answer didn’t surprise me, it terrified me. My eyes drifted back to the classroom. I apologized to my professor while I noisily slunk from the room after gathering my bag and computer from the back desk. It felt like I took the longest cab ride in history, every stoplight turning red, every vehicle cutting us off before we finally reached Levi’s street. I was ready to burst from the yellow cab and run the rest of the way. It might have been faster.
Racing up the stairs, I found the door to the second floor already ajar, as if waiting for me. AJ squalled, and I took the steps two at a time to find Levi sitting on the floor, propped up under the bay window. His hands cupped his head, his shoulders slumped forward as his elbows balanced on his knees. A prosthetic leg was on display below his right knee. Shock wasn’t the word to describe my reaction. I had no idea, since I hadn’t seen his leg before. I fell to my knees, my hand hovering over his fiberglass shin.
“What is it?” I exhaled.
Levi’s hands slipped to his ears. He didn’t look up at me.
“Make him stop,” he mumbled, and I pressed upward, running for AJ. His sweet little face bright red. His cries rough from the strain. His eyes closed in emotional pain.
“Shh, baby boy.” Cradling this innocent babe, I was caught between sympathy for AJ and fury at Levi. AJ tried to fight me, arms flailing and feet kicking. He needed a clean diaper. First mission accomplished, I swaddled him snugly in a blanket as if he were a newborn. Lifting him again, I pressed his little head against my shoulder and paced the room a few times, working a path over the worn hardwood floors before his cries settled to hiccups. I rubbed his blanket-covered back and cooed soothing words. Finally, I sat in the glider chair in his room. Pushing off the floor, we slid back and forth until his sounds subsided and he relaxed against me. He shuddered in his sleep, which startled me, but his lip puckered as he drifted off to haunted dreams, probably of his father letting him scream.
Finally, laying AJ in his crib, I felt slightly guilty at releasing him, but I needed to give Levi a piece of my mind before I kicked his ass. When I walked into the living room, the first thing I saw was the bottle next to him. A green glass container, nearly half empty, of Irish whiskey. His prosthetic leg lay flat on the wood floor. His other leg raised, holding up his elbow. With his forehead pressed in his hand, he was asleep sitting upright…or passed out. Slowly, I slipped my body next to his, hoping he might take comfort in my nearness. I nudged Levi, intent on waking him and then decided to let him sleep as I listened to his restless breathing. He shifted his weight and his head eventually fell to my lap. My hand hesitated over his skull. My anger slowly cooled. I struggled again with thoughts to wake him, but as he nuzzled against my leg, my heart pinched with a desire to comfort him instead. What horrors filled his head? I risked stroking over his hair, combing my nails down his scalp. I can’t say how much time passed, but I drifted into a foggy daze with dull memories of things I didn’t wish to recall when his voice startled me.
“I’m a terrible father.” My nails stopped scratching through his short hair, but his hand rose and pressed over my fingers, encouraging me to continue. I should have answered him. I didn’t disagree, but honestly, was he a terrible father? He was drunk in the middle of the afternoon, with his infant child in the other room. Yes. My first response was unequivocally, yes. But then I thought of Levi’s situation. Alone, without the mother of his child. I didn’t know if he had friends. I considered the thought twice before I realized he’d called me of all people. As for family, I remembered briefly he didn’t have any. An older brother, maybe. Once he left for the military, I don’t recall any mention of Levi Walker again, until I saw him on that fateful night of his father’s funeral.
“I don’t think that’s true.” I tried to sound confident in my answer. No, he wasn’t a bad father, just alone, frustrated maybe, definitely making huge mistakes, but he was human and he was trying to do the right thing.
“I can fight a squad of militants, but I can’t take care of one freaking baby.” He shifted his face and scratched his nose against my thigh, over my jeans, before righting himself again to rest his cheek on my leg. If I thought it possible, I would guess he was crying, but Levi had an edge to him that didn’t include tears.
“Maybe I should give AJ to someone. Someone more responsible, more capable. Someone who will know what to do.” His voice faltered, his words disconcerting. The tears entered my eyes instead.
“I don’t think you mean that.” My scratching increased, a cold fear filling my blood.
“I’m no good at being a father,” he whispered, the sound lazy. My hand froze on his head. I didn’t want to believe him, but his words chilled me. My stomach rumbled with a wave of bile, threatening to erupt at the thought of him ditching his child.
“My mother left me.” My voice shook as I spoke. I never shared the intimate details of a past nearly twenty years old, and yet, still raw. Especially each time I saw toddlers with loving mothers. Levi’s head shifted and he rolled to his back, looking up at me, but I ignored his glare. His eyes drilled a hole in my chin, willing me to peer down at him, but I couldn’t.
“I was only two…”
An alarm had been beeping for what seemed like an endless amount of time. I sat on the comfy bed of my parents with my ears covered. I’d been watching television next to my sleeping mother for two shows of my favorite purple dinosaur. The noise incessantly buzzing.
“Mommy, Mommy, Mommy,” I said gently. She didn’t like to be woken, but the noise was too much for me. She might yell at me. It frightened me when she yelled. I’d cry, which would make her angrier, but I was hungry. The cereal was in the lower cabinet since my dad caught me on the counter one morning. My parents had gotten into a big screaming match. I didn’t like that. I could get the cereal myself, but not the milk. The refrigerator was too difficult to open for my tiny arms. It made my dad laugh when I struggled to pull the large handle. Little feet would slide against the floor despite my tugging.
“Mommy,” I said louder. She rolled her head and muttered, “Five more minutes, Katie.” Her voice was gruff. Her hand shot out from under the pillow and hit the clock again. She was tired, I assumed. She went out often, after my dad came home and before I went to bed. She’d return in the early hours of the morning, sometimes waking me up. Daddy had been in college at the time. He had an internship coming up the year after he graduated. It hadn’t been ideal that I was born, I’d been told.
“Katie, I said, five more minutes,” she grumbled into the pillow, suffocating what sounded like a scream.
“It’s was five minutes, five minutes ago,” I whined. A new episode of the singing purple dinosaur was about to begin.
“Fine,” my mom growled and begrudgingly rolled out of bed.
I imagine my mother stumbling to the kitchen in a fog of sleepy confusion, much like I do when I’m woken too early. She dramatically tugged open the cereal cabinet. She slammed the cabinet door after removing a bowl. She pulled too hard on the refrigerator door and it shook. She slapped the bowl in front of me.
I flinched. I’m sure I did. Loud noises made me start.
Pouring milk, the cereal spilled out with a splash. I started to cry. I could sense her anger.
“Stop crying, Katie,” she urged. “Stop crying.” She swore. I’d heard the words before and only knew they were bad because my dad would correct her. He’d say she shouldn’t use those words in front of me. Her voice rose as she told me to stop crying again.
The sobs came harder. My little body shook as I tried to control them. The struggle to suppress the tears was an unwinnable battle. A slap came across my face. The sting imprinted on my tiny cheek.
“I said. Stop. It,” she yelled at me, her hands on my shoulders.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled between heaping gulps for air.
“Just shut up.” She shook me. “Stop crying. Stop talking,” she screamed in my face, the face that stung from her hand then her words. And so, I did what she asked. I stopped talking, for years.
The memory roared back at me, real and raw. I could feel the sting on my cheek as if it were yesterday. Cool tears slid down my hot face. At two years old, I hardly remembered the strike, but bruises developed and the doctor surmised I’d been struck. This portion of the story was told to me years later. The instant I heard it, the sting returned, the memory real, the notion unbelievable. I’d come to Chicago hoping for answers. All I found were dead ends.