Bedfellows

10:45 p.m. 

It’s one of the last true things I remember—I'm certain they were only dreams in the beginning. Somewhere, there was a shift. The line blurred, the snow fell, the dream became flesh. The snow keeps falling, even now. It won't let up before it has buried both of us in this little house. I need to know why you did it. Writing it down is the best way I can make sense of everything. I'll start at the beginning. The day we met. I should clarify—I met what was left of you. 

It was just after sunrise. Usual hike through the forest. Down to the river that skirted the back property line. There, I'd hook up with the trail system that would take me over the river and up to the falls, then to the bridge where I met you. What the locals call "stick season" on the Iron Range was in full swing. Tourists had gone back to Minneapolis, or wherever they came from. The towns were quieter once the trees were bare. Other than the pink and amber rays of a yawning sun, green was the only color to grace the landscape under the gray skies of early November. The pines, spruces, and cedars are too stubborn to surrender their color. 

I’d seen something in the distance. A heap of trash was my first thought, dumped carelessly over the bridge and onto the rocks below. As I got closer, I was sure that the heap in the riverbed was a person. But the shape was wrong. Out of joint, motionless. I made my way down to the riverbank, stepping sideways down the steep hill. I steadied myself against the trees until I reached the water. 

You'd been dead for hours.  Your hand. It was too cold. You'd been exposed to the early morning temperatures for a few hours by the time I came along. At least that's what the coroner said, when the deputy sheriff came by a few days later. You'd been laying there all that time—of course your hand was cold. But it was more than that. Your hand was stiff. Unyielding. Like marble.  

I think some essence of you lingered, finding refuge in my hand.  It traveled. I lingered. It found and then stitched itself to the darkest parts of me. I told myself I was brave for getting in the river. Dutiful, standing vigil until rescue arrived. I perched on a rock; knees pulled to my chest, shivering for over an hour.  My eyes never left you. I needed to see. You needed a witness. By the time I left, only your broken shell was left, and you followed me home in mine. 

It was the first of November. Did that have something to do with it? You died when it was still Halloween; the one night of the year when the dead were said to be especially restless. You're rather full of life, for a dead person. It's like you didn’t want to die. But that doesn't make sense—you chose to jump. 

11:30 p.m. 

I've always wondered if God grants mercy to those who commit suicide. I hope so. Seems like people who want to stop living because of a lack of mercy in their lives. The thought of a merciless God makes me restless, so I get up and add more wood to the fire. I'm chilled, despite the fire and the quilt wrapped around my shoulders. This house is everything I wanted, but it's also old and poorly insulated. I tuck my legs underneath me, but I can't get comfortable. Like you, I'm restless. One of many things we've got in common. 

I've written too much on the wrong thing—how I found you and where. Everything up to this point has been background information. I'll start with your first visit.  

It was the night the deputy visited me, two weeks after we met. He told me how long you'd been in the river, and that they found your car pulled alongside the road before the bridge. He told me that a note was found, and you were out of state. That's all I know about you. All I could think about was how I didn't see your face. I thought your long dark hair hid your face.   Dark, thick, far longer than my own. Then I stood up and saw you—truly saw you. Splayed across that rock, you were face-down. But I got it wrong—you were on your back. A gust of wind, colder this time, lifted your hair enough for me to see your swollen, crooked neck—it had snapped in the fall. 

That's what I kept seeing every time my eyes closed that night. Your bent, bruised neck. Maybe in the morning, I'd pack a suitcase, drive to Minneapolis, and go on holiday—leaving this river and its dead behind me. I was thinking about a beach on some island in the Pacific when I slid carelessly into a dream. 

My toes deep into warm, soft sand, the sun on my shoulders. The smell of salt-water waves as they crashed ashore. Somewhere in this haze, the sound of a door creaking on its hinges. Each creak brings a biting gust of wind. The white sand and crystal blue waters drain of all color and warmth. All that remains are two fire-red orbs, burning fiercely from within the folds of oblivion. 

I jerked awake, scanning the room which was exactly as it should have been. Except my closet door was wide open, and those two eye-shaped orbs were now glaring at me from within the recesses of my closet. My body became impossibly heavy. I wanted nothing more than to run out of the room. But I couldn't even blink. My bones turned to lead. All the shadows in the dark corners of the room were pulled into that closet and slowly took shape around those red, unblinking eyes. Out stepped a figure that floated above me, nose-to-nose. It reeked of ash and sulfur. It held me there for what felt like hours, vanishing when I was finally able to blink. What I saw resembled a shadow, but only if a shadow can be as dark as oblivion and just as devoid of warmth. Night came, and I was exhausted. I had high hopes of a dreamless, easy sleep on my way upstairs on the second night. 

But you hurt me that night. 

12:36 a.m. 

I keep the lamp on. The fire still crackles, but the flames have dimmed. I'm no longer scared like I was on the first night. Or the second. But the thought of turning off only the light and being left in darkness still gives me pause. I hold my breath, waiting. Nothing. Meanwhile, the wind picks up speed, and the windows of this old house begin to rattle. It's not so much a howl now as it is a drawn-out scream. I go to the window to see how much snow had fallen since the sun set and the darkness came. I see a snow drift has reached the top of the first-floor window. Nothing else. Just a wall of snow. I am well and truly buried now. 

A light dusting of snow came in the afternoon of the second night. The first of the season, and it stuck. It was supposed to snow through the night, and it did. I was in bed and couldn't sleep. The closet made me paranoid enough to where I moved my dresser in front of it before I'd gotten into bed. I could still smell sulfur and ash from the night before, and sleep wasn't coming as easily as I'd hoped. I decided that a bath would do me good. Being up to my chin in steaming water was exactly what I needed. I swung my feet over the bed. 

And you were waiting. That's when you grabbed me, firmly with both hands. The fingernails felt like razors, slicing into my calves as I was pulled off the bed. My knees hit the wood floor. You were angry and that made you strong. You pulled me under and screamed in my face; all the while your hair covered your face. Your breath was putrid, smelling of rot and river.  

I woke up on the floor when the morning light started filtering through the curtains. I wanted it to be a dream, but I couldn't ignore the claw marks you left behind, five deep gashes on each leg.  

That's when I knew you'd followed me home. 

1:00 a.m. 

I don't know what I was expecting on the third night, but it wasn't coming down from the bedroom for some hot cocoa only to see you waiting at the kitchen table. Your hands, less mottled than the night before, were wrapped around the mug, absorbing imaginary heat. I kept still with my hand in the cupboard, hovering as I watched you. If you were watching me, I'm not sure how. You sat in the chair, facing the table, but your head was still wrong. Backwards from how it should be. I decided all at once to finally pick a mug and make the cocoa. Then I sat opposite you, drinking it. A gargling sound came from behind you where your mouth would have been. I don't know what I was thinking, pouring some cocoa into your empty glass. I'd like to think it was kindness. A couple of grunts from you told me you were grateful. You tried. Your movements were jerky. You spilled most of it in your lap, so I refilled your mug and mine. 

You seemed to really like the marshmallows for some reason. 

1:20 a.m. 

More wood on the fire. The fire picks up and I think about dusting the lamp now that I can see its shade more clearly, but now I make my way into the kitchen. Hot cocoa seems perfect right now. Once I'm away from the fire, I can feel the cold seeping into my bones again and the quilt scratches against my neck. I linger in the doorway on my way out, thinking about the third night when I found you at the table.  

Your injuries started to heal by the fourth night when you joined me in the library. Your head was starting to turn the right way around. You dragged your broken feet across the hardwood floor, and you shivered. It was the coldest day so far. You made sounds again. Not a gurgle or a grunt. A whimpering. You were so cold, so pitiful. 

So, I built a fire and put the same quilt I wear now around your shoulders.  

Another sound. 

Like a sigh of relief. 

1:26 p.m. 

A little over half an hour maybe, and you'll be here. Will you talk tonight? Would you be able to answer some of my questions? 

What is your name? 

You were almost a person by the fifth night. You were moving better, like someone who is recovering from a car crash might move, stiff and sore. I found you in the laundry room looking for something to wear. You kept stopping and flexing your hands like you were trying to get used to them again. You still wore the same clothes on the day I met you. I found some fleece pajamas, but you struggled with that sweater. I took a pair of shears and cut it from you. You stood there naked and shivering, making sounds that had the shape of words. I put my robe over your shoulders and led you to the bathroom instead. I turned on the shower, handed you some clean towels, and gave you some privacy. After, you needed help getting the sweatshirt over your head. I dressed you as carefully and as gently as I did with my grandmother after the stroke. I put socks on your feet, the grippy kind you see in hospitals and psychiatric wards. 

I took your old clothes and tossed them in the trash. They smelled of decay and something underneath. Ash, maybe? You were sitting by the fire the night before. 

1:42 a.m. 

I'm almost there. All that's left is last night. I can't honestly remember the last time I had that much fun. I wasn't always so isolated. I had someone once, long ago. When he still loved me; I used to feel everything with such boundless intensity. With him, my world had color. I imagine when I step outside in the morning; how the world before me would be nothing but white. White is too pure a color—clean, like a blank sheet of paper that waits for a pen; too promising. My world these days feels more gray than white. That's a consequence I should have thought of before I— 

Last night was fun. I needed that. I think you did too. 

I noticed the smell of rot coming from the trash the morning after your shower. I burned your clothes in the barrel outside that morning. You surprised me at the door that night. You knew the Northern Lights were out and wanted me to see. I'd lived here longer than you'd had years on this earth, and I've never seen them like I did last night. Columns of light shifted from green to purple and yellow, dancing across the sky. The snow crunched beneath our boots as we stood side-by-side, heads right-side-on, looking up and absorbing the colors. You laughed. Genuine, unmistakable, human laughter. It startled me, then I joined in, wheezing. Your laugh sounded so much like my own, which made me double over and collapse into the snow. Once I was there on the ground, I figured why the hell not? Then there we were; in my yard at two o'clock in the morning making snow angels under a sky of ever-shifting colors. There was a moment when I looked over and I saw your face. You had my old hat on, the woolen one with the freakishly large red pom on the top. Your hair was out of your face, finally. I looked over in the dark. Your features were blurry, blending together and then changing again. Like your face was oil floating on top of water, reflecting the colors playing over our heads. 

Inside, you made us cocoa and ate the marshmallows straight from the bag in between sips. It was good to see you eat, to drink. Those same hands that wrapped themselves around an empty mug looking for warmth that night in the kitchen, were the same hands that covered me with the quilt after I had fallen asleep.  

I hadn't slept since you were a shadow reeking of ash and sulfur.  

2:15 a.m. 

Any minute now. The wind has stopped, and I'm sure it's stopped snowing.  

2:40 a.m. 

This feels wrong. 

2:56 a.m. 

Just realized—it's been exactly a month since I've met you. Wouldn't it be nice to celebrate that somehow? 

2:58 a.m. 

Still not here. The wind has started howling again. It sounds like a woman's scream being played on repeat. I don't know what I'd do if you just— 

She's here. Her face is clearer, sharper. She takes me my hand and it's warm and as real as my own hand. Up the stairs. She's humming. A lullaby. God, I am so tired. Is that my ring on her hand? The one he gave me. I can't tell. My eyes are heavy.  

In the bathroom now. It's dark. The light goes on. I look at my face in the mirror. How long has it been since I looked in a mirror? I don't recognize my face. Foreign. I look old and tired. 

 I am old, and I am tired.  

How long has it been since I brushed my hair? 

The brush is already in her hand. I see the ring. She's behind me, brushing my hair. I want to ask about the ring. I open my mouth and she— 

Shhhhhh.  

Still humming, still brushing my hair. She's gentle. I look at my hands. I see grime underneath my nails. It's not grime though, is it? It's blood. Dried brown deep under my nails. The scratch marks on my legs ache. My hands shake. I look at my own face in the mirror. I try to look at her, behind me. She bends down to put the brush on the counter and then up again. Behind me. In the mirror. Hands resting on my shoulders. I finally see it. After all this time waiting, I see her face. I scream. My God, I see her face! It's— 

You don't have to worry anymore.  

She's turned me around. Our foreheads rest against each other. I want to scream, fight, and run away. But my head sinks onto her shoulder and I'm crying. 

You can let it all go now. That's it. Just let it all out. 

We stand eye-to-eye, and it's my face I see reflected in hers. The same image without a mirror.  

"What's happening to me?" 

It's been so long since I've heard my own voice. It cracks. I'd locked myself away in this cabin long before the snow fell. Long before I met— 

....you?  

She understands and leads me to my bed. I don't fight. She turns down the covers and I crawl in. She leaves and brings me cocoa. Extra marshmallows, just how I like it.  

The snow stopped. It's cold upstairs. I pat the bed beside me. She joins me and we're under the covers together.  

"Your name." 

 My voice sounds so small. 

She pulls the covers over my shoulder. Brushes the hair from my eyes, then from hers. Still long, dark, and flowing. A deep breath. A sad smile. 

Don’t you see?  

The wind finally stopped screaming. 

You’re the only you I know.