Time for another friendly reminder about the flashbacks. Don't let them sneak up on you!
Thanks again to Nancy and Carol.
PART FIVE
*~Ellie~*
***
I was sitting across from the chess game Dad had abandoned when Mom came home from work.
“Hi, Ellie,” she greeted me. “Where’s Dad?”
“Forest fire in California,” I grumbled. “He left an hour ago and still hasn’t come back.”
“What are you still doing here anyway?” she asked, checking her watch. “I thought you were supposed to be going over to Sarah’s to get ready for the school dance.”
“I was,” I told Mom shortly. “But then I realized that it was a stupid idea.” I was acting like a typical moody teenager, I realized. But somehow I didn’t really care at that moment. Mom dumped her bag on the floor, and came to sit beside me.
“Why didn’t you go?” she probed softly.
“Because we were supposed to be getting ready for the dance,” I snapped. “That means we’d be doing our hair and nails and makeup and stuff. And I can’t let anyone do anything to me. What if they wanted to file my nails, and then the file broke? Or if they tried to use a curling iron? It doesn’t work on my hair anymore. And the worst of all would be if someone wanted to cut my hair. The scissors would break, and how would I explain that?”
“You cut each other’s hair?” Mom frowned disapprovingly.
“Mom!”
“Sorry, sweetie,” she apologized. “I know this must be hard for you to have to give up some of those things.”
“I guess,” I shrugged. Couldn’t she tell that I wanted to be left alone in my misery?
“But you can still spend time with your friends,” she told me. “I’m sure you can come up with a good excuse for not getting you hair cut or anything else like that.”
“You mean I should lie to them.”
“Well…”
“Is that all we ever do in this family? Lie to people?”
“Oh, Ellie. I know this is hard on you.” She stroked my hair. “But I know you’re old enough to understand why this is so important to keep a secret.”
“Yeah. I know,” I admitted.
“Look, it’s just after 6:30 right now,” she told me. “I’ll drive you over to Sarah’s in about an hour, which will give you enough time to go to the dance together. You can get ready here so you don’t have to deal with anything else yet, okay?”
“Okay,” I found myself agreeing.
“And I bet that we would even have time to finish this poor little chess game here. I can already see what Dad was planning on doing, and I bet I can turn this game around in a few moves. What do you say?”
***
* * *
I grimaced as I sank the needle into my skin once again. Although Uncle Brad said the Kryptonite alloy worked the same way that a regular needle did for an average human, I still didn’t really enjoy the pinching sensation, or the slight tenderness the puncture spot had after I removed the needle.
I was alone in the lab today. Aunt Lucy and Uncle Brad had gone to a conference together, which gave me the perfect opportunity to really dig deep to find out what could be causing my problem. Although they usually didn’t hover over me in our shared lab space, there’s no way I would be able to keep the nature of my tests hidden from them. And I still wasn’t quite ready to explain why I was testing myself for red Kryptonite poisoning. I had drawn several vials of blood within the last hour or so, but I didn’t seem to be any closer to finding an answer. My blood looked and reacted the way it always did.
I heard Jay knock and enter the lab, but I didn’t turn away from my microscope yet. By use of a camera and a lead shielded box, I was able to expose a blood sample to a chunk of Kryptonite, and I was now watching the reaction. Turning around at this point might mean missing something important.
“I didn’t know you planned on stopping by today,” I commented. I watched as the cells on the slide started to disintegrate under the presence of the Kryptonite like they always did. Nothing to explain what was happening to me.
“Surprise visit,” he replied. I smelled coffee, and I turned around and reached for the cup he was offering me.
“Did you put-”
“I think about a third of the cup is sugar.”
“Thanks.” I gave him a quick peck.
“My pleasure. So what’s the latest science project, Dr. Frankenstein?”
“Oh, I’m just trying to work on finding out what’s going on with… um, you know.” I took a mouthful of hot coffee to cover up the discomfort I felt. It was one thing to have the issue brought up any time we were in danger getting carried away physically, but now it was starting to over take our daily conversation.
“So any breakthroughs yet?”
“No,” I confessed reluctantly. He waited expectantly for me to expand, so I continued. “Dr. Klein had thought it might have something to do with red Kryptonite. One of the times my dad was exposed to it, his powers behaved erratically.” I took another sip of coffee, gathering my thoughts. “But the problem is that we don’t really have a definitive test for red K. Green K’s pretty easy to tell, but the red stuff can be a lot more hidden. The only thing that we’ve really found over the years is that green Kryptonite can act as a sort of antidote for red Kryptonite in certain circumstances.”
“Well, you obviously can’t just expose yourself to a chunk just to see if it happens to make a difference,” Jay told me.
I chewed my lip guiltily. “Well… I sort of already did. The very first time it happened, I popped open the sample we have here for a few seconds.”
“Ellie!”
“I had to Jay! I hate this situation that we’re in right now. I had to try something to stop it.” Although I thought my feelings were a lot more severe than that, I wasn’t anxious to tell him too much. It would only put more stress on us.
”But that doesn’t mean you should put yourself at risk,” he told me. “Look, I know this isn’t exactly an ideal situation, and of course I want to find a solution too, but there’s no rush for one. We can take our time.”
I shook my head. “Jay, you keep saying that, but I know this isn’t exactly what you expected when we started dating.”
“I expected to be dating you,” he countered. “And that’s what really counts in this whole thing.”
“Smooth line, mister.” I couldn’t help but smile at it.
“I do what I can,” he shrugged, stepping closer to me, and pulling me towards him.
“See, you seem to have gotten this thing down pat. But whenever I do something I end up screwing it up,” I told him, backing away from his embrace.
“Then maybe…” he pulled me close to him again, taking my coffee cup from my hand, “you shouldn’t do anything.” He came in closer still, and his breath tickled my lips, and my breath caught in anticipation. “You should let someone else do something for you for a change. Just relax… And let me take care of everything.”
Finally, he kissed me. And just like he suggested, I let him take care of everything. This time I wasn’t going to even touch him. I would do nothing to jeopardize what was… Wow, that was good. Jay had a special knack for this thing that all former boyfriends had lacked. Dimly, I realized that I had wrapped my arms around him unconsciously. That wouldn’t do, I told myself firmly. I released him from my hold.
He fell four feet, smacking the back of his head on the countertop as he crashed to the ground. It was only then that I realized that we had been floating. Jay’s neck snapped forward as a result of the blow, and he swore loudly. I dropped down to the ground and rushed over to him.
“Jay, are you okay? How badly are you hurt? Can you move?” He pushed himself into a sitting position, answering my last question. We both saw the steady trickle of blood run down his head and drip onto the floor.
“I need a compress,” he told me, his forehead pinched in pain.
“What?” I was hardly thinking clearly, and his words were nothing more than garble to me.
“A compress,” he repeated with impatience. “Something to press against my head to stop the bleeding.”
“Oh. Um, here,” I snatched a clean towel from the cupboard and held it out for him. He grabbed it and pressed it against his head. I watched in horror as it quickly became saturated. “There’s so much blood,” I whispered in shock. That my fault. How could I have done that to him?
“Head wounds bleed heavily,” he informed me tersely. “I know it looks serious, but I’m not about to die of blood loss or anything.”
Right. I knew that. I am a scientist, after all. Scientists know things like basic human anatomy and physiology and-
“I need another towel, Ellie.”
“Right.” I grabbed another, and offered it to him. I wanted to be able to help him out more than this, but I hardly had the courage to look at him, let alone touch him. Jay placed the new towel on top of the old one and held it in place firmly. We didn’t talk. Jay just sat there trying to stop the bleeding and I just stood there helplessly watching him. He seemed to be so focused on his task that I was afraid to speak. What must he think of me? Finally, he lifted his head to look at me.
“So that was interesting,” he said.
“Jay-” I choked on his name.
“I think I’ll be okay, Ellie. I’ve got a splitting headache, but I don’t think I’m concussed. You might want to check that out to be sure.”
I swallowed nervously. How could I use my powers on him after what had just happened? “Jay, I… I dropped you.”
“Yeah, I know that, Ellie,” he replied shortly. “It was an accident, I realize that. But right now what I really care about is taking care of this head wound. Can you help me or not?”
“Yes. I… I can.”
“Good. I think this might’ve stopped bleeding, so you need to take a look at the cut and see if it needs stitches or not.”
“Okay.” I took a few tentative steps towards him and he lifted the bloody towels away from his wound. I sucked air through my teeth when I saw the gaping cut on his scalp.
“How bad is it?”
“It’s pretty bad.”
“Okay.” He exhaled heavily, thinking. “I’m pretty decent with this kind of thing and I think it’d be easier to deal with it ourselves than run off to the ER. Personally, I’m not really feeling up to a trip, no matter how short you can make it. If you can get me a mirror and a-”
“No! Jay… You don’t have to do that. I’ve done it before too.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah. I’ll just collect what I need.” I tried to project confidence, but inside I wanted to curl up in a corner and never come out. Right now, the last thing I wanted to be doing was sewing up the injury I had created. What I really wanted was to find out how much Jay hated me at this point and whether or not he could ever trust me again. But he seemed determined to take care of his wound right now and there was no way I was going to let him stitch it up himself.
Although I didn’t really do any medical stuff in my research, this was the unofficial hospital for my family, so we had plenty of medical supplies on hand. I returned shortly with the needle and thread, gloves, Tylenol, antiseptic fluid, and an ice pack. From the way Jay was talking, I guessed that he had done this before, probably in much cruder circumstances. Although he had probably gone without it, some kind of anesthesia wouldn’t hurt to num the wound. I guess he agreed because when he saw the small syringe he grinned.
“I see you brought the good stuff,” he told me. “The next time I crack my head open, I’ll make sure that you’re around.”
And that was all I needed to push me over the edge.
“Are you trying to be funny?” I snapped. “Because personally, I don’t really find that amusing.”
“Ellie, I’m just trying to lighten the mood-”
“Oh, so making jokes in bad taste is going to cover up the fact that I *dropped* you in the middle of kissing you? Is it going to make us forget what just happened, or how that made either of us feel?”
“Ellie, what is there to discuss? It was an accident. End of story.”
“No! Not end of story! This is important, okay? It’s not something we can just brush off. And I can’t just ignore it while we play doctor together!”
“How can you even think about sitting around discussing our feelings while I have a giant gash in my head?” Jay asked angrily.
“How can *you* think about anything else when we obviously need to discuss what happened?”
We glared at each other, having obviously reached a stalemate. Jay was the first to cave.
“Fine! Do you think you can talk and stitch at the same time?” he asked condescendingly.
“I think I can manage,” I told him stiffly.
“Okay.”
“Good.”
“Great.”
“Yeah. Really excellent.” Wanting to put our inane conversation to an end, I shoved the bottle of Tylenol in his hand and snapped on the latex gloves. Jay’s breath caught as I swabbed the wound, but he didn’t protest. I guess that wouldn’t be manly enough or something. I carefully inserted the syringe into his skin, and administered the anesthetic. “Is that okay?” I asked, gently prodding the cut.
“It’s good. I can’t feel anything.”
“I’ll start putting the stitches in, then.”
“Okay.” Then, to my pleasure, he took the initiative in our talk. “Look, Ellie, I meant what I said earlier. There’s no way you should blame yourself for this. It was an accident.”
“Jay, I’ve never dropped anyone before. Ever. That kind of thing doesn’t just happen.”
“Of course it doesn’t. It was an accident. Just like what happened before with us.”
“No, it’s different,” I explained. “The other stuff was different. It was a matter of not having control. This… is just downright clumsiness.” This time scared me much more than the lack of control. Maybe it was the clumsiness thing. Or maybe it was the large wound that I was now stitching up that acted as physical evidence.
“Ellie, I didn’t know we were that high up, and I’m guessing you didn’t either. There’s no way you would’ve let go if you had known.”
“No, I wouldn’t have.”
“Exactly. It wasn’t clumsiness, it just was just not being fully aware. So I guess I can take pride in being such a good kisser that I can distract you that much.”
“You like that idea, don’t you?” I shoved the remaining guilt I still felt into the back of my mind.
“You bet I would. Are you saying you’ll give me the bragging rights?”
“In your dreams,” I replied, snipping the last thread. I gave the wound one more swipe of antiseptic for good measure, and then placed gauze over it. “But I don’t know what to do about this, Jay,” I confessed. “It seems that any time we spend alone ends up going in this direction. But the last thing I want to do is stop spending time with you.”
“Then we won’t spend as much time alone, for the time being. We’ll go on double dates and stuff. At least until you can put that amazing head of yours to use to find out the solution to this whole thing.”
I placed the ice pack on his head, and he groaned gratefully. I realized that he must’ve been in a lot more pain than he let on.
“Jay, I have no idea how you’ve stuck with this,” I told him. “Any other guy I know would’ve run for the hills at this point.”
“You can’t get rid of me this easily, Ellie. Nice try, though.”
“I need to clean this up,” I told him, swallowing when I saw the amount of blood staining the floor. “But it’ll only take a minute, and then I want to take you home, okay?”
“That’d be great. I took a cab over and I’m not really keen on going through that ride with the headache I have right now.”
He was still comfortable with flying, even though it had only been a few minutes since I had dropped him while in the air. How did he manage to put this much trust in me? And why was it that I kept breaking it? They were questions that kept running through my mind as I scrubbed the blood from the floor, and with every single scrub, I came up empty.
