Chapter 6

A Chapter by mappingthenight

“You coming?” Seb inquired from the threshold of his bedroom. He was turned so that he was partially in each room, legs straddling the invisible line between. His head was resting on the frame, his eyes skimming across my face, and without waiting for a response he pushed himself up and away, retreating.

I looked down at my hands, unsure of myself. Maybe he was finally ready to talk. I hadn’t brought her up, hadn’t really prodded Seb to talk to me about anything. He would talk when he was ready, not before. And while some people need the pressure to open up, I sensed that Seb wasn’t one of them. I at least wasn’t going to push him, not yet.

“What took you so long, ya damn senior citizen,” he jibed, patting the empty space next to him. I smiled, more at the fact he was initiating banter with me than anything else.

“Seemed to have misplaced my walker. Took an extra minute,” I shot back, sliding under the covers next to him. He was propped up, leaning against the headboard while I had completely laid down, staring at the ceiling overhead.

“So, why all the lighthouses?”

I didn’t move, just slowly turned my head so I could stare up at him. I wanted to see the question on his lips and he just returned my stare, good-naturedly awaiting my answer. I guess one of us didn't mind prodding.

I thought a moment, trying to form a coherent response when my mind was whirring like a bee’s nest. “Well, what’s the purpose of a lighthouse? They warn people of danger, they protect them from rocky shores and the chance of complete ruin. They are a map in the night.” Before I knew it, I was rambling on and on, almost manic in my obsession. “They’re a light to orient oneself while succumbed to darkness. They’re steady, fixed points. They give people hope and they are something to let people know they aren’t lost. Something that let me know I was never lost,” I finished quietly.

I said this all to my hands, sometimes slowly drawing circles across my skin, sometimes tracing the webbed creases that littered my palm. And other times rubbing my thumb into the surface, trying to massage the anxiety away.

I risked a glimpse up at Seb and saw that he was captivated by the movement, his watchfulness unwavering from my hands. He slowly raised his steady gaze to my eyes, and I saw something there. A certain understanding; he read between my lines and filled the holes I had purposely created. Because I never really answered his question of ‘why’, and now I didn’t need to. He knew. Knew they were because of Ev.

Reaching for my hands, which I had unwillingly forced to rest still across my stomach, he picked one up and slowly turned it over, palm facing him. He examined it, like a grocer searching for the flawless peach, inspecting for perfection. He used his fingers to open my hand completely, tracing each finger with one of his own. It was relaxing, yet with a sinking stomach I found myself considering what I’d just done. My one hope for this whole trip was to make sure Seb knew happiness was possible, that he would get over her and his relationship with her wouldn’t ever be the pinnacle of his happiness. And with one small conversation with no overt ties or relevance to his relationship, I revealed that I was a fraud, pretending to be a lighthouse when I was actually still rowing the same boat, in the same waters, as he.

“Remember the night I called you?” He went on, not waiting for a reply, “You told me, ‘we’re in this together, Seb,’ and I’ll be damned if that isn’t something I hold us to, Jillian.”

He rolled over, turned off the lamp, and settled into the bed, never letting go of my hand.

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© 2015 mappingthenight

Author's Note

Just a short one - let me know what you guys think :)

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Reviews

Christian N. C.

Nice symbolism! I like how Jill has something that has meaning to her, the lighthouse. Something she has to explain. I feel like we all have something like that, even if we don't realize it.