The Art of Gravity

NOAH ANDREWS

I didn't stay for dinner at Toby's.

I came up with an excuse when his mother had asked me to stay. She looked as thin and as vulnerable as ever, her eyes darting left and right as if she was waiting to be attacked. She tried to hide it though, and I thought her to be smart for that. She knew how the world worked. She tried her best not to limp, and I tried my best not to ask the question that had been engraving itself into my mind.

I left that house with Toby's eyes burning into my back. I think I did the right thing, saying no. He'd just tell me to stop pushing, even though he knew I wouldn't.

I felt torn for some reason. I felt like I wasn't in my own body, like I was hovering above everything that happened in my life, just observing. I wanted to push more, demand to know what had happened to him, to his family.

I wanted to know why there were so many burns and bruises on his arms. Did fighting cause burns? Was that legal?

I didn't know. I didn't know anything. I was scared, actually. I was slowly falling down a pit of despair. Maybe, he was right. I shouldn't have pried. I was going to get hurt, that was unavoidable.

But, for Tobias, I don't think I really cared if I got hurt. He mattered more to me than that.

•. •. •.

I'm awake.

My eyes are closed, but I know where I am. I'm in my room, in my bed, but my mind is somewhere else.

I can hear screams, crying, the sense of pain. It's the same every night. There's always a little boy, battered and beaten. His mother matching his appearance, both of them are crying, dying.

The boy's covered in bruises, all along his arm, across his chest. His mother's thin wrists were decorated with black and blue, and... red.

They cry for help, but I know I can not help them. Both their faces are non-existent, featureless.

"I don't wanna hurt you, Noah." The boy says, his voice familiar. He starts to grow taller, his shoulders broader. His hair is down to his shoulders, though his featureless face remains.

I don't answer him because I can't. There is no dream me. I'm not dreaming because I'm awake. His voice starts to echo, and I can still hear his mother's sobs.

"This is what he does to us, Noah. This is our life. I don't want you involved. You'll get hurt."

I don't understand. The scene is clear in my mind, but I can hear the wind blowing in from my window. I feel conscious, but also as if I am floating. 

"Noah, don't you remember? You used to ask me where I got my scars from. I'd tell you I got in a fight with dinosaurs, and you'd always frown and ask me if I wanted you to kiss them so that they'd feel better."

I do remember, but I can not fathom who this is. I remembered what happened, just not who it happened with.

"You said I was brave. I was not brave. I was a coward. But I will be. Someday, I'll kill him. I'll make him hurt like we did, Noah. And then I'll take you away with me. We'll go somewhere together."

He's never said things like this before. This... whatever it is never goes on for this long. Suddenly, he's standing over me. I can't move, but I clench my fists, and I can still feel the bedsheets tangle in my fingers.

Eyes dark as night, hard as coal appear and stare into my soul. Slowly, his face starts to take shape, his skin tanner, lips fuller, taking on a  cool peach color, until I recognize him.

Toby smiles softly, teeth blinding me, "I never wanna hurt you, Noah."

And then, I open my eyes. I don't scream, I don't move. I am awake and I did not dream. It's happened before, but never this way. It was the main cause behind my inability to sleep. Haunted by the same terrible scene over and over again, I had gotten used to the deprivation of sleep.

But now, I understood things. What I experienced was not a dream, as I had always known. It was not a nightmare either.

It was simply a memory.

A terrible, disgusting, inevitable memory.