Apocalyptic Montessa and Nuclear Lulu: A tale of Atomic Love (14 page)

Montessa stood up. Helped Lu to his feet. Brushed her hair out with her fingers and made a face.

“I’m a mess, Lu. I’m sorry that you don’t ever get to see me prettied up.”

He laughed, but she didn’t. She was thinking of missed opportunities. Of things they would never see. Never have a home of their own, never have children. Something inside her ached for that, but then she remembered her own childhood and the ache suddenly went away.

“You’re beautiful to me. My wild wife. You’re just right, and I love you for exactly who you are. I have a surprise for you today.”

The oil of tiredness fell from her eyes. They were
pale and ghostly, shining and wonderful.

“You do? What is it?”

“We’re about two hours away. I’ll tell you when we get there.”

“Lu! You’re teasing me.”

He smiled, and she kissed him. He kissed her back.

“Think of it as a wedding gift, Montessa. Something that only I can give. Are you ready? We’ll head out, grab some breakfast. Switch cars and finish the trip. And then it will be something amazing.”

“Let’s enjoy one last walk by the sea, first. I’ve never been there in the morning.”

They held hands like any other young lovers. Dipped their toes in the freezing waves and talked about Lu’s insatiable thirst for coffee and the way he had wanted to be an artist as a child.

“But my pictures kept starting on fire. I didn’t understand it. And I would get so angry. Working so hard on something, and then it would burn to ash in my hands.”

He didn’t want to say it was the earliest allegory to his life, that it would always be this way. He didn’t want to say that the first time this had happened
, his mother had fainted and his father called him a demon.

He didn’t want to say these things, but Montessa peeked into his head and knew. As she also knew that he was grateful that she could see these things inside of him, without words. That she knew he was like a decapitated copperhead that would strike and lash out at his own tail, chewing on his own meat in a frenzy of hurt. But Montessa kept him safe, somehow. Her love was enough to keep his venom at bay, or at least, not turned onto himself.

They walked from the sea.

“This will be our last time here, won’t it?” Montessa asked.

Lu didn’t say anything, but they knew the answer. Knew this was the place of their wedding, and both wished it would be their burial.

“I started to fall in love with you when you told me you’d feed my body to the sea,” Montessa said and laughed. She held his hand tighter. Held it to her heart, which beat with power and passion and blood, beat for the first time in her life, it felt.

“I know how strange that is, Lu, but it seemed like such a kindness. Such a gift. There was so much going on in your soul, such a decency you didn’t want to acknowledge.”

“I do love you,” he said, and his voice was rough. The words didn’t come easy, even though he felt they should.

“I love you, too.”

The found
a car outside one of the rental houses. Started it up, hopped in. Drove away without looking back. Montessa missed the scent of the ocean, the shrieking of the birds. She treasured it in her heart, in her mind.

She leaned back in the passenger seat, her feet on the dash, playing with the thread around her ring finger. She wondered about Lu, why his jaw was set in such a way. Wondered about her surprise. Wondered what it would feel like to die, when it eventually happened.

She sucked in her breath so hard that it hurt.

“What?” Lu asked her.

“Nothing, baby.”

“You sure?”

“Of course.”

She wanted to live. She wanted to live. She wanted to live.

“You look sad.”

She turned and her smile was a soft thing, she could feel it.

“How can I be sad? I only want to be with you.”

He took her hand, kissed her fingers. She swallo
wed hard and looked at the sky.

~

They pulled into a dirty area not far from Portland. It smelled like sewers and alcohol. Meth and urine. Montessa’s heart sank just looking around.

“Okay?” Lu asked.

“Yes, but what are we doing here?”

He parked the car in an alley, turned it off. For a second Montessa was afraid, the fear rising in her throat, her bones and flesh and muscle bunching
together in anticipation of attack.

Lu reached for her, and she flinched.

He pulled his hand away.

“What’s going on, baby?”

She shook her head.

“I don’t know. I’m scared. I can’t even tell you why. I just have this overwhelming sense of…”

She gestured with her hands, but it didn’t help.

“May I?” Lu asked and held out his hands.

She nodded, and he slid one to her cheek, forced her to look at him.

“I won’t hurt you. Do you know that?”

She nodded again, and he kissed her. Took both of her hands and held them.

“You know how my daddy said I was a demon.”

“Yes.”

“And your mama said you were special.”

“Do you think I’m a demon, too?”

He laughed, so sweetly and loud and with such mirth that it hurt her feelings, took her back. She pulled her hands away, wrapped her arms around herself. She was a little girl hiding in the closet, then. Hiding under the bed. Behind the Rhododendron bushes. Too small, too helpless.

“Baby, no. I don’t think you’re a demon. I’m not laughing at you. The idea of it…you’re too sweet. Too kind. If anything, I wonder if you’re an angel.”

“An angel?”

He sighed, took her hand back.

“There has to be balance in all things. People live. People die. If I’m a demon, you’re my angel. Doing a kindness. Using your talents to better serve the world. To clean up the refuse.”

“The man we killed. To steal his car. He didn’t do anything wrong. I’ve sort of been feeling bad about that,” she said.

Lu shrugged.

“You don’t know that. Maybe he was a liar. A cheater. Maybe he hurt little kids on the side. Maybe he was chosen because he needed to go. To be removed.” He looked at her, and his dark eyes were intense. She watched the flames dancing in them. One touch on his too-warm skin and she could ignite him, she knew. Burn them both up. Go down in a firestorm of glory.

“What are you saying?” she asked.

“I’m saying to use what you’ve been given. To think of it as a gift. To think of yourself as an avenging angel, if you need. But that’s why I brought you here.”

She looked around the dank alley again. It smelled strongly of mold, and the dark clouds caused the light to be misty and mysterious.

“An alley.”

“Yep.”

“This is my wedding present.”

“It certainly is.”

“All right.”

She opened the car door, stepped out. Ran her palms down the thighs of her jeans.

“You’re nervous,” Lu said. He walked around and kissed her hair.

“I am. I don’t know why. It’s going to the very bottom of my soul. If I still have a soul. Do you think we still have souls?”

“I do.”

He put his arm around her, walked her down the alley. She tried not to make eye contact with anybody there. The sorrow was too much. The desperation.

“Hey,” a young man said. He held out a trembling hand, his arms tattooed with tracks, his face full of sores. “Hey.”

It reminded Montessa of childhood. Her mouth tasted bitter.

“It’s like when I was a kid, too,” Lu said. Montessa looked at him and he shrugged his good shoulder. “I don’t have to be a mind-reader to know what you’re thinking.”

Through the alley. Down a narrow set of stairs. They stood in a doorway.

Lu put his hands on Montessa’s shoulders, whispered into her ear.

“Are you ready, love?”

“R-ready for what?”

“Remember that you’re strong.”

He used his elbow, broke the window next to the grimy door. Reached in and unlocked it. Walked inside.

“Come,” he said and held his hand out to Montessa. She took it, stepped forward. Her
bloody Keds crunched on the pieces of glass.

The smell. It hit home, took her back, back, back to when she was young and afraid and hurt in so many
ways, bone and flesh and the soft secret places. She clapped her hand over her mouth, trying not to throw up. Lu watched her with intense, quiet eyes.

“It’s okay, baby. I’m here.”

“The smell.”

“What about it?”

“That brand of cigarettes. Cheap beer and that awful cologne.”

She went white, whiter than white, whiter than her complexion should have allowed her to go. She gasped, grabbed Lu’s hand. Staggered a bit, her head spinning.

He held her. Steadied her. Loved her and whispered to her. Thought at her with all of his might.

“I know how it feels, sweetheart. I can’t smell tea leaves and incense without going right back to my father. To how scared I was, how much I hate him. It’s been years, but I still
feel it. He’s dead and I feel it. But knowing he’s dead? It makes it so much better.”

She looked at him, terrified. Her mouth curled like a wilting flower, like a dying thing, and he watched her heart, her soul, leaving through her mouth, through her eyes.

“No,” he said and shook her. “No. You’re not going to disappear. You’re going to do this.”

“Is he here?”

“Yes.”

“How did you find him?”

“I looked.”

He kissed her again, held her trembling body to his own. Felt the bones, so fragile. Her skin, so easily torn. Knew she was going to face a monster, a real demon. The one who started it all.

“I’m with you, baby. My Apocalyptic Montessa. I’m right here with you. Okay?”

“Okay.”

He took the First Kill knife and moved it in front of her face, reflecting the dull light that came in through the broken window. Her eyes locked with his in a beautiful, perfect moment. The ground shuddered, and The Breeze That Wasn’t blew her hair around. He held out his palm and a flame danced above it.

“You can do this. We can do this. It’s a cleansing, angel. Take the knife.”

He ran his tongue down it and handed it to her. She grasped it, squeezed his hand, and took it from him. Ran her pink tongue down the blade as well.

Her face changed, then. Became something more than what it already was. The pain and doubt and fear pushed its way to the surface, through her pores, and away from her body. There was just rage. And hate. Brutality and an absolute absence of sympathy.

She didn’t look like his Montessa at all. She was a stone goddess. Something viral. So much power and strength that she was the best predator of all, top of the food chain. He was her servant. He was her equal. He was her god, and she was everything to him. Everything. All.

No use for creeping. Montessa was surprised that the shattering glass hadn’t brought her father to the door, but a few more steps into the dark, hopeless house and she saw why. He was passed out on a mattress on the floor. Drunk. High. Dead. Whatever.

No, not dead. His chest rose and fell, and the obscenity of watching him breathe, of watching him trap the air and pull it, screaming, into his mouth and shoving it into his filthy wet lungs, made her turn away. She set her jaw. Settled her stomach. Looked back at the man who was a monster to her.

“He looks so old,” she said and frowned. His face was lined. His hair had turned gray. His body was soft and fat where she remembered it being mean and hard.

“And he seems smaller.” She gestured at him with the knife. “He used to be so big. So tall. The room shook when he moved. But this guy?”

Her father turned over in his sleep and Montessa jerked, flinched. Cringed, and then hated herself for it. Hated herself and hated this beast that wore the meat suit of a man.

“What are you going to do?” Lu asked. He sat on the ground, crossing his legs and looking calm, but his fingers tapped. Tapped the floor and plucked at his clothes. He was so angry, so wound up he wanted to scream, wanted to take the knife from Montessa and plunge it into the old man’s eyes, into his cheeks, into his groin over and over and over. To neuter him. Make him docile. There’s no threat, darling, your father is standing over there in the corner with a chain around his neck. Look, he just stands there and moans. Can’t see a thing without eyes. Can’t say anything without a tongue. He’s useless. Lame. Maimed. He’s something to laugh at, to throw food at, mock. Don’t you want to mock your daddy, baby? After all he did to you? Don’t you?

“I want to do it quick.”

Lu stared at her.

“Quick? Are you serious? You have him here, Montessa. He’s right here. Helpless. Think of how he hurt you, what he did to you! You can make him suffer. Make him
suffer.
”