Ruby Red Marionette

thirtyone | love

I wanted the night to end the way it always did.

I wanted all of us to go our separate ways, to run off to our own homes. I wanted to wake up the next morning with almost no recollection of the nights before, and if I did remember anything, it would be general, vague components instead of individual details. But that didn't happen. The night didn't end that way.

The night didn't end at all.

Tyler expressed that he had never seen messages wrapped in plastic bags fall out of windows, and thus he was too scared to go home after witnessing it for the first time. I told him that there was nowhere else for him to go, but Isaiah said that if he was really that terrified he could just come home with us. When we reached the point of our journey where Yvette usually turned left and took the back street to go home, I slowed down and prepared to say goodbye to her, but she passed her turn and kept going. For a moment I thought that she was so shaken up by what happened that she forgot where to go, but when the others didn't point out to her that she missed her street, I realized that it wasn't a mistake. She hadn't forgotten where to go, but had in fact decided that she was going to come home with us.

Well if she was coming along, the whole crew might as well be there.

I called Batul and told her that she needed to come to Isaiah's place. I couldn't exactly explain to her what had happened, so the element of surprise was the only reason why she woke herself up and got dressed to meet us. She was standing outside of the condo by the time we arrived.

"How'd you get here so fast?" Tyler asked her.

"I knew that whatever happened to you guys probably scared the shit out of Tyler, so I had to get here before you had a heart attack."

The wide alertness of Tyler's eyes and the speed at which he fiddled with his fingers like his hands were an instrument confirmed Batul's statements without him having to speak.

As usual, on the way upstairs Yvette, Tyler, Isaiah and Batul got into an argument about something. Tyler was the center of the debate, and these little episodes of bickering happened so often that it got difficult to keep track of what they were about. By the time we reached the top of the stairs Tyler had tripped over one step and was still leaned over the railing, recovering from his dramatic injury.

"Why are you holding your stomach if you hurt your ankle?" Batul asked him.

"Pain spreads, you idiot." He moaned.

"Geneva, take the keys and go inside. I need to check the mail." Isaiah turned to me, pulled the mail key off the bunch, and gave me the rest. The arguing started again as soon as I turned my back, and I imagined what the neighbors must be thinking about the group of idiots who just walked in.

When I unlocked the door and went inside, though, I wasn't thinking about the neighbors. Not them, not Tyler, not anybody. I couldn't. All I could see was what was in front of me.

And it was nothing.

There was nothing inside. The couches, the two chairs that were inside of the kitchen, the watch Isaiah left on the counter, all of the food in the fridge, the pillow from Isaiah's uncle, the computer and its desk, and the stereo were all gone. Even the Christmas decorations that we put up were ripped down from the walls and destroyed. I stood in the middle of the living room, afraid to even look at what they took from the bedroom. The only thing that seemed to be left was me, and a cold, bitter air coming through the open windows.

Batul was the first to walk in after me. I was too consumed in shock and fear and some other overwhelming, exhausting emotion that I couldn't quite figure out (confusion, maybe?) to register her reaction or that of the others who walked in. I could see them from the corner of my eye, walking slowly through the condo like it was an art museum. But I couldn't hear them—the sound I heard in my ears was like trying to hear someone when underwater. Everything sounded muffled and far away.