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‘I love you. Good-by. Because I love you.’
Todd’s breath hitches as he read the words, and he feels tears pool in the corners of his eyes. At least, he thinks they’re tears. He furiously blinks them back and closes the copy of The Awakening that he is reading for tomorrow morning’s American Naturalism class. Crying in the dorm laundry room is the last thing he wants to do tonight. Someone’s washing clothes. They might walk in at any minute.
Damn you, Kate Chopin… Todd thinks bitterly, biting his lip and dabbing away the tears with his fingers.
He closes his eyes, inhales deeply, and tries to focus on the incessant hum of the washing machine in the background. That, he thinks, should help calm him down. He needs to finish the book, after all. It’s against his principles not to. Besides, it’s not as though he’s expecting a pleasant ending anyway.
Of course Robert was going to leave. He’s too much of a gentleman to soil Edna’s reputation…
Sighing, Todd reopens the book on his lap. There are only a few pages left, and he is eager to finish them; that way he can get a shower and go to sleep early. He yawns once before refocusing his eyes on the words in front of him.
Several pages pass uneventfully. Until:
“‘Thank you,’ said Edna. ‘But, do you know, I have a notion to go down to the beach and take a good wash, and even a little swim before dinner?’”
Todd shuts the book again, and clenches its spine in his hands until his knuckles whiten. He thinks he knows where this is going- at least, he’s fairly sure, and the growing discomfort in his gut suggests that perhaps it’s time to stop reading. Still, he has principles, damnit, and if he doesn’t finish the book, he’ll find out what happens tomorrow in class anyway.
Hands shaking, he clenches his jaw, and flips the pages back to where he left off.
Instantly, he knows he shouldn’t have.
Edna is walking to the beach now, thinking nothing matters, not her children, not Robert. She takes off her clothes and walks into the water…
“Oh God,” Todd whispers hoarsely, jerking his gaze away from the pages in front of him. He feels his heart thumping in his chest, and suddenly, he’s not picturing Edna Pontellier anymore, but another person entirely.
He can’t help but wonder- Was this how Neil had felt?
The thought brings on a wave of nausea; he clutches his knees to his chest and bites his lip forcefully in an attempt to suppress the acid bubbling in his throat. A metallic taste washes over his tongue, and he realizes he’s drawn blood. The washing machine’s hum feels like distant memory, overpowered by his spiraling thoughts and pounding heartbeat. He closes his eyes, buries his head in his knees, and tries to steady his breathing.
It will be okay. It will be okay.
He’s almost certain it won’t be- at all. But after a few seconds, the trembling abates ever so slightly, and he returns his attention to the book:
‘She went on and on […] her arms and legs were growing tired […]’
A surge of tears dribble down his cheeks onto the pages. He no longer has the will to suppress them, but fortunately, the barbaric yawp of agony in his mind comes out as only a sharp whimper on his lips.
Neil, he thinks. Get the fuck out of the ocean.
But it’s too late for that. He knows it’s too late. It’s been almost a year.
He looks back down at the book through bleary eyes, and Edna’s thoughts disturb him more by the second.
How Mademoiselle Reisz would have laughed, perhaps sneered if she knew. “And you call yourself an artist! What pretensions, Madame! The artist must possess the courageous soul that dares and defies!”’
Visions of Neil acting- of Neil happy, seize Todd’s imagination:
Chaste kisses. The two of them curled up together on Neil’s bed. Running lines by the docks. An elated Neil, giddy, eyes alight, jumping up and down, reveling in the prospect of living dozens of exciting lives…
But he only got seventeen years of one, Todd thinks, choking back a sob. He slams the book shut, hands shaking. He’s not going to finish it. There’s no point. He’s read enough- experienced enough- to know what will happen.
But those last words still pierce his thoughts.
‘The courageous soul that dares and defies’…
Why, he thinks bitterly, gritting his teeth, did you not dare to defy your father, Neil?
But he knows why; he remembers the sort of person Thomas Perry was… well, is.
Cruel. Bullying. Manipulative.
Todd’s throat burns, he can feel a throbbing headache coming on, and he can’t shake the horrible, constricted feeling in his chest. Charlie’s words from that ice cold, god-awful morning ring in his ears:
“Neil’s dead.”
Dead.
He stares, trance-like, at the spinning washer for a moment, until a rush of dizziness brings him back to reality. The acrid taste still hasn’t left his throat, and that can only mean one thing; he’s about to be sick. Tentatively, he gets up from his seat at the window, his legs weak and shaky, the way they might feel from a long car ride, but worse. Much worse.
The bathroom is far down the hall; he knows he won’t make it. So, he does the only other thing he can think to do- he stumbles to the far end of the laundry room, retches into a tiny wastebasket, and watches his vomit dribble over the stack of plastic candy wrappers he assumes were picked out of someone’s pants pockets earlier that day.
A few seconds pass and his stomach settles; he sits up, huddles against the wall, and buries his face in his knees. Because he knows he’s about to cry, and doesn’t give a damn that the laundry room is a public place anymore.
Until he hears footsteps.
Shit, he thinks, catching his breath and trying to suppress a sob. Someone’s come to take care of their washing.
“Hello?”
The voice is soft, tentative.
They can probably tell by the smell that someone’s puked in here, Todd thinks bitterly. Detergent can only mask so much.
Nervously, he gets back up, and steadies himself on the edge of the closest washing machine. A girl with wavy, shoulder length brown hair stands in the doorway, clutching an empty laundry hamper; he apprehensively meets her gaze.
“Hi.”
He says it softly, hoarsely, and is painfully conscious of the sour taste still lingering in his mouth.
“Are you alright?” she asks, her eyes soft with concern. “You aren’t drunk, are you? It’s 9 PM on a weeknight, but I know shit can happen…”
Todd shakes his head and wipes tears from his eyes.
“I’m not drunk,” he says, his voice quivering.
The girl nods in understanding, then wagers another guess.
“Food poisoning, then? The cafeteria chicken can be a bit suspect…”
“No,” Todd says, a rueful laugh escaping his lips- “nineteenth-century literature. It’s worse than alcohol… or undercooked chicken.”
He glances over at the abandoned copy of The Awakening on the windowsill; the girl, he figures, probably thinks he’s senile, but at this point, he’s beyond caring.
She’ll just go back to her laundry now.
He glances down at the floor and shuffles his feet uncomfortably. Then he looks up, desperately hoping that the girl is now unloading the washing machine and paying him no notice.
He’s wrong. Of course he’s wrong.
She’s standing by the window, thumbing through the pages of that goddamned book.
“I remember reading this,” she says quietly, putting the book back down on the ledge. “Last year. American Naturalist lit, right?”
Todd nods.
“I hated it,” she continues, still looking down at the book. “Especially the end. It was awful. When I was thirteen, my aunt… well—”
The girl sniffles and bites her lip as she turns to look back up at Todd. He understands all too well what must be running through her head.
This is the last thing I expected from this encounter, he thinks, before mustering up the nerve to speak. He takes a deep, but shaky breath.
“M-my last high school roommate,” he chokes. “Less than a year ago.”
They stand in silence for a moment, before the girl murmurs-
“Christ. I’m so sorry. It’s miserable, believe me, I know.”
“Yeah,” Todd mutters bitterly. “A-and just when you think you’re hurting l-less, you vomit in a dorm laundry room.”
“These things happen,” the girl says, reassuringly. “It’s a process. Now—” she looks over at the bin and back at Todd- “do you want some Pepto-Bismol? I always keep some in my room for emergencies.”
“Yes, definitely,” he responds, nodding. He’s no stranger to the pink stuff at this point- it tastes dreadful and sickly sweet, but it helps his nausea. Meeks, he recalls, made him take it a lot last spring- any time he felt sick. But before he can keep dwelling on dismal memories from his final semester at Hellton, the girl says-
“I’ll be right back, then. And I’ll help you clean up, too.”
Todd nods gratefully.
“Thanks.”
The girl gives him a watery smile and walks towards the door. Just as she’s about to leave, though, she turns around in the doorway.
“I’m Catherine, by the way,” she says. “I’m a sophomore- studying history.”
Todd walks back over to the window to grab his book before looking up to meet her gaze.
“I’m Todd,” he responds. “Freshman. English and Journalism.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Todd,” Catherine says with a grin, leaning on the edge of the doorway.
“It’s nice to meet you, too,” Todd answers, clutching the book to his chest.
Catherine disappears down the hallway, and Todd breathes a sigh of relief. He’s glad for the few minutes’ reprieve, and is beyond thankful to have finally met someone else who understands what he’s going through. He looks down at the book in his hands, eyes welling with tears. There’s no way he’s going to Naturalist Lit tomorrow morning, and he knows it.
‘Well, Neil,” he says aloud, a wry smile crossing his lips, “I hope you’re happy with yourself. You’re feeding my rebellious streak—again.”
Then he drops the book on the floor next to the window, sits back down on the ledge, and cries.