The Truths We Make (House of Poe #1)

23. Rusted Brakes

Rusted Brakes

Summer, 8 years before

“ T here you are!” Oliver yells as he jogs over to me in the yard.

I’m standing in the sliver of a dying sunbeam that’s somehow found its way through the leaves of the trees, book tucked to my chest, reading. He’s closer, or faster, than I realize because before I’m finished with my sentence, he has me two feet off the ground, the book casually tossed to the side. I laugh at the breathlessness of floating. I spread my arms out as if I’m taking flight.

He smiles, wide enough to see the one crooked tooth he can be self-conscious about, but refuses to get fixed. Wide enough that it could suck the air from the skies and leave us all gasping in its wake. He gives into my whimsy and twirls me around. The loose ponytail I haphazardly had thrown up falls out immediately. I laugh again as hair flings into my mouth.

“Ok! OK! Put me down,” I squeal.

It feels good. Normal. Happy. The weight we usually have between us has been suspended in time. With Paxton gone on a summer trip with his fraternity brothers, and my mother in New York, there’s been very little to remind us that what we’re doing is foolish. In lieu of living in the world we’ve known; we’ve created a new one .

“Not on your life, Darkness,” he says, the words pulled deep and thick from his chest.

He lowers me just enough that our lips are even before devouring them. He floats between nipping and sucking, pulling me further into his mouth and into the abyss. Which is why I take too long to remember that we’re standing in the middle of the yard, where anyone can come upon us, and come to my senses. I pull back and wrap my arms around him in an embrace that could be mistaken for any of the ones we’ve shared our whole lives.

“Oliver, we have to be more careful,” I whisper in his ear.

A small shiver runs through him, and he squeezes tighter. “Why?”

I huff at the nonsense. He knows why. We may have created our own reality to live in for the summer, but Alexander and Madeline have not . I don’t know what kind of chaos it would bring if they saw us together, but I know Madeline would put a stop to it any way that she needed to.

“Your parents…” I mutter.

He laughs as if I’m silly. A worrier in no need of worry. But we both know I’m right. I wiggle, trying to make him put me down, losing the helium of joy that had been lifting me up. But his arms are steel.

“They’re gone. Alexander has whisked Madeline away for the weekend on a romantic end of season jaunt. For the next few days, it’s just the two of us in this big ol’ house.”

His smile is still wide and my impulsive traitor of a heart mirrors him instantly. His cheeks gloat in triumph before he tilts me back into another round of kisses. These are less sweet. Less carefree. And more hungry . Our tongues are anticipating the night to come, leaving our bodies no choice but to be desperate for the dark. They’re filled with promises and oaths and reassurances that everything is falling into place.

“Hey—” a voice calls in greeting before fading away into a cough.

My blood freezes. I push at Oliver, but he either doesn’t hear the person who’s walked up to us, or he doesn’t care. I turn my face to catch Paxton’s disapproving wince.

“Hey Paxton.” I struggle to get down, ready to have my feet firmly back on dirt before having this conversation. “Oliver, put me down.”

He does as I ask, but his arm doesn’t move from around my waist. I try to sidestep him, but he moves with me, like water clinging to my skin. I’m frustrated that he’s decided this is the time to take a stand and embarrassed to be caught red-handed .

The boys just stare, the blissful quiet of a beautiful day turning into a long stretch of awkward breathing. I look from one to the other, unsure if I should be the one to break when neither is aware I exist right now. Thankfully, Oliver turns to me before I say something that will only make whatever is happening worse. He brushes my hair away from my face, gliding the pads of his fingers across my cheek, currently heating from knowing Paxton is watching.

“Would you be okay to go inside and wait for me? I think the conversation my brother has for me right now is best given privately,” Oliver says before he leans down and whispers just for me to hear, “and I don’t want the perfect bubble we’re in to pop just yet.”

He kisses my ear as he stands back up and I’m left reeling, divided by want and distress. There’s nothing I am more desperate to have than one more day, one more hour, of our love story. To enjoy the little time we have left in it. I want the last real secret we’ve kept from each other to be shared tonight. I want that fated moment we’ve been promised since the second I walked up Dellbrook’s path.

But I also want the look on Paxton’s face to vanish. I want the next time he sees me not to be in disappointment like it is now. I want him to know that nothing needs change between us. That I can love him as I always have. That we’re family, regardless of what happens with Oliver and me. Yet, no matter how much I want this encounter to be wiped from our ledgers, I know that it’s here, and that somehow, nothing will ever be the same.

So, instead of begging for his forgiveness, which already feels lost, I kiss Oliver full on the mouth and make my way to the house. I don’t see them again until I’m well hidden inside, looking out the second-story window where I can catch the corner of the spot they’re standing in. The hall I’m in is murky, the descending sun already well past this part of the house. A place I’m sure they cannot look up and see me spying.

There’s exasperation in Paxton’s gestures. He’s solid and unflinching in the face of Oliver’s neglect for his words, but taunts him with points and shoulder shoves. Oliver does not move. Does not react. He says few words, but his glare is stone, punctuated with a determination I know so well. I will not relent , it says. For Paxton is the fury born in a wildfire, but Oliver, Oliver is the ember.

They do not yell and still I know their words are not kindness. My heart bleeds for them being at odds over me. The disapproval threatens to engulf my happiness and drag me back to the truth of my situation. It isn’t forever, Paxton. Soon it’ll be over, and everything will end anyway. I want to scream it at him. The only thing that stops me is knowing that the second those words leave my lips, they become true. They ruin whatever time I have left.

I stay at the window and watch them as minutes tick by. Finally, Oliver puts his hands up, mouth moving in finality before he walks back toward the house. My feet yearn to meet him, to ask what’s happened, or just to forget it did, for a little while longer. But my heart tells me to stay.

Paxton watches Oliver’s retreat before his head slices up to the window I’m staring out of. My guilt leaps into my throat, making me choke on being caught again , but I stay still. He cannot see you ; I say to myself, trying to calm the nerves. His eyes narrow as if he’s heard me and finds me as ridiculous as a child. I’ve seen that look a hundred times and never has it cut this deep.

“He’ll come around.” Oliver’s voice is deep, unsure, but solid, taking my attention from his brother.

He wants to believe it. Even if we all feel that the ground beneath our feet has shifted irrevocably. I look back to where I saw Paxton last, but he’s gone. My hand lifts to the window, a small wave goodbye that only we can see instead of the person it’s meant for. I leave my hand there and flutter my eyes back to Oliver.

“Is that what he said?” I ask. I know it isn’t. He knows, I know it isn’t. Still, he nods.

“In not so many words. To while away forbidden things! My heart would feel to be a crime, ” he says, each syllable lulling me back into our dreamworld.

“Oliver August Poe. Are you trying to seduce me with your great-great-how many greats-grandfather’s words?” I laugh. He takes several steps towards me until we’re sharing every breath.

“Maybe. Is it working?” he asks, head tilted down to allow him space to nibble at my neck. At the feel of his lips on my skin, I forget Paxton. I forget the cliff we’re running a million miles toward. I forget myself and instead lean into whoever this boy in front of me needs me to be.

“Mmm,” I hum, already losing the words in anticipation of his hands. He kisses me one last time in the hollow of my throat, the soft pop of it lingering between us, before grabbing my hand and pulling me further into the house.

“Come. There’s something I want to show you,” he says in trepidation.

As if I might not follow. My curiosity spikes, and I’m pushing him forward, eager to see what he might have hidden. Every time I think I know the Poes, there’s always a new mystery to solve. It’s my favorite thing about loving them.

He stops at the door to his room, looking over at me shyly through dark lashes. I haven’t been inside since puberty hit us and made things like closed doors and dark rooms less than honorable. Instead, we hung out in dens and libraries, or occasionally, my room in the house staff’s quarters, where being alone for too long was impossible. Even now, we hadn’t dared grace this hall where Paxton and his parents’ rooms were also located.

“It’s locked,” he tells me.

“So, get the key,” I urge in ambition. He chuckles, head shaking at the bounce of my heels.

“You don’t even know if what I’m going to show you is good. What if it’s something weird or terrible?”

He’s earnest, nervous, which forces me to calm. I know there is nothing that’ll change tonight. If Paxton showing up didn’t force us to give up our hearts early, cutting this off before the end of summer as planned, nothing will. I am desperate for Oliver to know the truth of how I feel and wipe the nerves from his features. I take his hands in mine.

“When we were eight, you showed me the taxidermy. At nine, you pulled me into the catacombs of your family’s graveyard and urged me to bring your skull collection to school. At thirteen you forced me to listen to your first horror story, in the dead of night, causing me to dream about murderous brambles and weapon wielding ghosts. And at seventeen, you read me a love poem that likened rotting flowers to desire. There is nothing your morbid little heart can hold that I would shy away from. And weird? Do you know where the word derives from?”

I expect his ‘no’. I feel it in my bones and as soon as his head confirms it, the electricity between us intensifies. Every second up until now, I’ve always felt one step behind. But standing in front of this midnight hued door, Oliver Poe’s hands wrapped in mine and his attention on my every word, I am the most powerful I will ever be.

“It comes from the Old English noun, wyrd, which means fate.” I pause, letting it sink in, knowing he’s thinking about Edgar and our first moment like this almost ten years ago. “Now, if you opening that door shows me our fate, I promise I will not run.”

Oliver once told me that his famous ancestor believed fate did not have to be begged for. That it would just be. And Oliver said we have to embrace every ending, to accept our next beginning. Remembering that now emboldens me to stay perfectly still. To allow Oliver the chance to take everything I’m giving and open that door, or to run from it. I will not beg or barter or steal his choice.

Making when he grabs me and crushes our limbs together in a breathless kiss, even more satisfying. Fate, it seems, has found us. Together.

He pulls back, now just as excited as I am, to get it open. His hands work the keys and riddles to get in, going slowly so I can remember. He wants you to come back here. I try not to let my inner thoughts cloud what’s happening in case I’m wrong.

The door finally opens, and I am encased in the deepest part of the ocean. Dark blue walls and furniture only delineated by gold greet us. It’s my favorite color. My favorite element. My favorite time of night. He’s encapsulated everything I aspire to be with a color. It catches my breath, and I cannot remember if this is who I’ve always been, or who I adapted to be, because it’s who Oliver is. I can feel him watching me wander around, eyes wide.

“It’s a… lot, I know. It is your favorite color, though,” he says offhandedly.

As if his words don’t rip at pieces of me. Don’t try to pull down the illusion we’ve been weaving and tell me what’s happening is real. It’s too close to the truth of us. And I can’t take the blurred edges of our double existences right now.

“What is this on your shelves?” I ask, ignoring his words and walking over to the safe space of books instead. “Austen and Dickenson stories mixed in with your Edgar poetry? Oliver! Madeline would have a stroke,” I say, my hand fluttering to my heart to accentuate my shock.

He comes up behind me, happy to leave whatever I need to, to rest, and wraps his arms around my waist, swaying me with the movement.

“You know, I’m a writer. A poet. And I say that anything can be a poem.” His voice is husky and confident. Exactly how it should be. How it’s always been.

“Is that so?” I ask right back.

“Mmm. Yes. Anything can be a poem when tasted on the lips of a poet,” he drags out the word anything, then punctuates his proclamation with a kiss on my ear, the thick echo of it making me laugh in a completely unhumorous way.

I don’t let him distract me further, though. We came in here for more than flesh, and I’m determined to get answers before we get lost in it .

“Show me,” I whisper.

I know he wants to believe, I mean the other, that I’m playing a game we’re both bound to lose. I squeeze his arms to pull him out of the lust the moment has run in to, so he knows I mean something profoundly less flirtatious.

“Right,” he sighs, resigned.

He lets me go. I turn to watch him shuffle through some papers and journals stacked around his desk. There are dozens, along with scrap papers littered in every spare spot on the wall and floor. Old quill pens and ink pots are placed around the room. Pens and pencils strewn, always within reaching distance. Typewriters stacked haphazardly. So that if, at any time, Oliver had a thought, he had a place to jot it down.

“You know, they have computers and recorders and phones to put your notes in, right?” I ask good humoredly. I already know what he’ll say, but I can’t help but needle him.

“You can’t write , really write, on any of those. You know that, Eve. And that you think technology can help with any emotional endeavor, one that really captures the heart… I would swear you didn’t grow up in this house, same as me.”

He’s joking. It’s an old game we have. With every new gadget or evolution the world sees, Oliver’s dislike grows. To that end, the entire Poe family has a dismissal towards technology. At least in using it in creative spaces. Or social media. But his words open something up in me. A memory, or just the memory of a feeling. I didn’t grow up in this house, same as you. I was an outsider.

I don’t say it out loud. I find every strength I have to keep it from showing on my face. Later, I can remember this part. Can use it as a reminder of why I’m in New York and why he hasn’t called and why I’ll never be a Poe. Later it can all crash down.

Thankfully, he doesn’t see or feel anything off. He finds what he must be looking for and gestures for us to sit on the bed as he brings the sheet over with us. He waits for me to get settled before handing it over, a large sigh escaping as he does.

It’s a yellow dyed piece of parchment. Expensive and creamy. The writing is in navy blue cursive, pristine, and carefully placed. Every word plucked out of Oliver’s mind. Delicately scrawled. I scrunch my nose in confusion.

“Just… read it,” he says.

“Okay,” I croak .

And I do.

Darkness in Truth They say that darkness causes your senses to sharpen like when I see the prism of your golden eyes dilate as they travel down the plains of my chest as we swim. Or, how I imagine the taste of your salt will sting my tongue leaving me parched for you as my teeth bite down on the softness where your throat and collarbone meet. We collide in the burnt embers between shadows unable to pull apart where I end and you begin our senses so heightened as to know this is more than just lust. You are the thread tying together our two dying stars, alone and in love infinitely with darkness.

I don’t know what to say, unsure of what this means. When you ask a poet about love or destiny, you forget any opinion you had on it before you'd heard their voice. And I’m not sure I’m ready to let go of the dream just yet.

“Oliver?” I ask, too scared to want an answer.

“What if… what if we didn’t just have the summer? Maybe we don’t end in August. What if I could give you September?” he breathes.

“Oliver.” I interrupt, knowing I cannot let him give me this much hope.

“And your birthday. Christmas. We must see December like this, Darkness. And January… I bet January with you would be even better.” He’s pleading and I can feel the tears pricking my eyes at what I have to do.

“What about Madeline? And Paxton? What about our lives? You know this will never work.” I beg him to understand, but he doesn’t relent.

“No, Eve. What I know is that all the books on my desk are filled with poems just like this. All about you. What I KNOW is that I have loved you all my life. I could come to New York. We can figure everything out as we go,” he says, picking up confidence with every word. The idea grows. Maybe we can figure it out. He cups my face and looks at me as if our future is fathomless .

“My whole being craves the night, begs me for it. Even during the day, the sunlight cannot persuade it. And you are the only thing that has ever satisfied that want. The single piece of the dream I'm allowed to have. The one cure to being Poe. You are the beautiful inky darkness my soul needs, Eve.” He prays to me as if I am an altar for his sins. And that I alone can absolve him.

“Oliver…” I start, standing on the cusp of the tallest branch on the tree, unsure if I’m going to fall or fly. “From the moment I met you, my heart shattered. I knew how much I loved you then and how devastating it would be when I lost you.” I suck in a breath and pause, unsure of what I know I’ll say next. “Still, I could never stop the inevitable. You have me for as many days as you’ll give,” I whisper back, unwilling to shatter the glass of our future with words louder than a heartbeat.

“Every day. Always,” he breathes, fanning kisses over my cheeks, as he rolls us both back into his bed. “I love you, Evangeline Pierce.”

“I love you, Oliver Poe.” I say, gasping at the tender joy I feel.

This time, the words are a foundation instead of a folly. A truth we’ve made in the face of a lie. And I cannot be beholden to the page when the poet finally makes me a poem.