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(EARTH)
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ALICE COULD NOT PLACE herself when she awoke. Then she realized she was in Abel’s flat and the thought shocked her wide awake instantly. Abel — who was the worst offender when it came to those who had ripped her off and taken advantage of her. She hated to imagine why she was there, lying on a couch in his lounge. It seemed to be night-time for all was dark and quiet. She was not alone though, because as she sat up a voice asked, “Still can’t sleep huh?”
“Abel,” she said flatly. “What are you...what am I doing here?”
“Yes, good question. I have to admit I was a little surprised you called me considering I haven’t heard from you in weeks.” The bitterness in his tone made her wince. She hated having people upset with her but Abel had caused her so much grief she had just taken to avoiding him. He was a rich junkie, though fast running out of money and always keen to take advantage of those around him. He was particularly adept at laying the responsibility for all his woes on anyone but himself.
“What did I say to you again?” she tried to sound nonchalant.
He looked at her suspiciously then shrugged. “Something about your old man getting worse, trying to hit you or something...”
That was right, she recalled. Four days before they left for Kainnan, her father had lost it completely and hit her. But she had certainly not come to Abel’s afterwards. Perhaps being here now meant she had to resolve something to do with Abel...but what?
Whatever it was, she decided, she would rather work it out at a distance. She got off the couch and started looking for her shoes. She was still in the stunning orange dress, her hair still clipped up with the sparkling sapphires, though when she caught a glimpse of herself in Abel’s mirror, they had lost their shine and she looked exhausted.
Behind her reflection, Abel was looking at her speculatively. “Where are you going?” he asked quietly, catching her eye in the mirror. She wasn’t fooled by his calm tone — it usually preceded trouble. “There are some things we need to talk about.”
Before she could formulate a response, his mobile rang. He held out one hand in an unspoken command to wait while he answered it, his voice snappy. But as soon as the caller spoke, his whole demeanor changed, becoming deferential. He caught her watching him, lowered his voice and moved to another room so she could not hear him.
She watched him go with relief, reminded of when she had first met him. She had been at a posh party with Noah, and Abel was one of the host’s rich relatives. She had been so impressed by him then, his bravado and swagger, the way he did not seem to care what anyone thought of him.
Now she realized not only did he truly not care about anyone except himself, he was also arrogant, manipulative and cruel. Why had it taken her so long to see that?
She needed to get away from him. She scanned the room quickly for anything she’d brought with her. It looked like she had just come as she was, so she headed for the door — then reconsidered. Just because Abel was rude and selfish, she did not have to be as well. She crossed instead to the room he was in, putting her hand to the door then stopped cold, listening.
“The haul will be worth the risk,” Abel was saying. “I’m telling you they’re wealthier than you know...” A lengthy pause, then, “It’s settled? Tonight then? I’ve got everything ready...yes, see you then...”
Realizing he was finishing up, Alice moved away from the door hastily. She grabbed the nearest thing she saw, a bottle of moisturizer, and began rubbing the lotion into her hands. When he came out, she asked innocently, “I hope you don’t mind me borrowing this? Listen I have to go, Dad’s going to get madder if I don’t make an appearance soon.”
For a few scary moments she thought he wasn’t going to let her leave, then he nodded, “Yeah, I’m pretty busy today too. I’ll come see you tomorrow.”
She wanted to say, “Please don’t,” but instead she smiled, said, “Sure,” then, mercifully, escaped.
Everything seemed duller as she hurried home. Maybe because life here seemed so ordinary now. No danger and no excitement. Instead friends that used her, a father that hit her, a generally absent mother, no boyfriend...only Noah, her study and her art. How had it come to this?
She let herself in through the front door of her home cautiously. Her heart was pounding as she listened hard for signs of occupancy. The usual relief sank in as the silence told her no one was there. Her father was probably out drinking or visiting friends. Who knew where her mother was these days.
She was still in the beautiful orange dress untangling the blue clips from her hair when the doorbell rang. She opened the door expecting a courier or meter reader and froze with shock at the sight of the man standing there. It was Jacob. Jacob with his tousled blond hair, cheeky blue eyes and gorgeous smile. It had been many years since she had opened the door to him like this, back when they had been neighbors and hung out all the time. She had loved him then but not in the way she did now, not with this deep longing she seemed completely unable to shake no matter how hard she tried.
To be fair he looked equally surprised to see her, resplendent in an evening dress and makeup first thing in the morning, and stumbled over his greeting. “Alice, hi...I’m sorry...I didn’t mean to interrupt you in the middle of...um...”
“It’s okay. I just got home,” she replied, then realized how that sounded. “I mean, ahhh, I...look, it’s a long story. What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to ask you a favor actually. I know I really have no right to do this. I mean we never really see each other these days...but I just didn’t know who else to ask.”
Listening, Alice’s heart sank. For a brief moment she had hoped he was there because he wanted to see her. But it seemed that once more there was another person in her life with an agenda. Resigned she nodded, “Okay, what is it?”
“Mum’s having a major birthday celebration tonight and the caterers have pulled out. I have some other people lined up, but I need someone who’s good at décor and I know you were always amazing at that.”
He was referring to the themed dinner parties they used to host when they were twelve. He would pick and research a country and bring her what he had found. Then she would design a menu and decorations based on his research; he would get the funds to buy everything from his extremely wealthy parents and together they would create it. They decided to invite their siblings and a few other neighborhood kids and hosted them at his house in one of the excess, unused rooms. As the parties rapidly became a raving success, they figured they could actually make money from them and started charging. The kids still came and didn’t mind paying because it was their parents’ money anyway. When Jacob’s mum eventually found out about the ‘fee’ however, she had shut it down.
Alice said, “I haven’t done anything like that in a really long time. I don’t know if I would do a very good job of it...”
“I would be helping you. We could create it together — just like old times.” He was smiling cheekily at her.
She studied him, hoping she was hiding how she felt. It was not really in her nature to say no, mostly because she did not like letting people down. But for the first time in a long while she was sorely tempted to shut the door on him and never see him again. She just felt too weary, too disheartened to be around him. Once upon a time she had dreamed he might like her one day — he had always been so attentive to her when they saw each other. Now she felt done. He probably had someone else anyway...and before she could stop the words, they spilled right out of her mouth, “Do you have a girlfriend at the moment?”
Immediately she wished she could retract the words. Yet there they were, hanging in the air between them. As she watched, a change came over his face, the smile disappeared and he looked steadily at her, “No, I don’t. I haven’t been with anyone in months. Why?”
It was like Alice’s mouth suddenly had a life of its own. She ignored his question to ask another, “Why not? Why don’t you have a girlfriend?”
This time he took a step towards her, a strange look on his face. “Because...because there’s someone I like very, very much and I’ve been waiting for them to notice that for a very, very long time...”
Just like that all the hope left Alice. It wasn’t surprising he liked someone else; she was too late. She turned away but he put his hand on her arm, exclaiming, “Wait!” Behind him, a car turned into their drive.
“My dad’s home, you have to leave...where do I need to be tonight and when?”
“My place at five o’clock. But I don’t mind seeing your dad...”
“But he will mind seeing you,” she muttered. “Please, you have to go. Things haven’t been too good lately, please leave.” With some effort, she managed to get him out onto the doorstep, said hastily, “I’ll see you soon,” and shut the door in his puzzled face.
She was too late. She watched Jacob leave and when she turned away from the window her father was already standing behind her, watching her. “What was he doing here?” he asked, his voice deceptively calm.
“Oh, that was just Jacob, remember him? He just came to say hi,” she lied.
“What are you doing in that dress?” he moved menacingly closer. Panicking, she tried to work out if he had been drinking because he was always worse to deal with if he had.
“I was trying it on for that ball coming up...” she lied again.
“No daughter of mine will be wearing something without sleeves that could fall down at any moment.” His voice still sounded calm but as he took another step towards her, she smelt the alcohol.
“That’s okay. I can wear something else,” she offered quickly.
“Where did you get it from?”
Alice thought rapidly and lied once more, “Katerina. She’s a new friend from university.”
They faced off for a few moments as Alice prayed he would leave it alone. But he kept going, changing tack. “That Abel boy has been phoning for you.” He opened his fist and to Alice’s surprise, there in his palm was her mobile phone.
Before she could consider the wisdom of it, she asked, “Why do you have my phone?”
This time the pretense of calm vanished from her father completely. He roared his next words at her so loudly she instinctively glanced out the window to make sure Jacob had definitely gone. “Just checking up on my whore of a daughter!”
A dozen thoughts raced through her brain — how should she respond? But the familiar one swam strongly to the surface as it always did — appease.
“I’m sorry Daddy. I’ll tell him not to ring again. I have before but he doesn’t listen to me...”
“I’ll pay him a visit then,” he snapped, starting for the front door.
She said quickly, hoping her father didn’t know any different, “I think he’s away.”
But Abel’s texts had clearly indicated otherwise because her father said, “You’re lying to me, again!” His calmness was more intimidating than his usual rage as he approached, standing over her, hand half raised. She drew a deep breath and waited for it; for him to hit her again. She had read somewhere that once someone started using violence on another it was only a matter of time before they did it again, because the psychological barrier stopping them had now been breached.
Yet he did not do it this time. Instead, even though she was far too old for it, he grounded her, sending her to her room for the rest of the day. She heard his car start up after a few minutes and watched him tear out of their driveway from her window.
It was nice to be left alone. She enjoyed the first few hours. She lay down for a while although she didn’t sleep. She wasn’t tired enough. When she got hungry, she snuck downstairs to hastily make something to eat, constantly checking for her father’s car returning.
She found her phone lying on the kitchen bench and decided to text Noah to see what happened. Unsurprisingly, he did not respond. Back in her room she read a while, worked on some sketches, even pulled out old photos of herself, Noah and her parents back when her father was kinder.
Not that he had ever been much of a father. When he was home there had always been tension and conflict. First it was between her parents, then later between him and Noah, who usually chose to stand his ground rather than back down. It had all been so unpleasant for Alice that as a six-year-old she had decided to try something different: saying nothing, pleasing everyone, getting everything right. Indeed, she still vividly remembered that moment when she had adopted the need to please.
Lying on her bed thinking about it honestly for the first time ever, she admitted that it had never worked. Not really. It did not solve any problems. Sometimes it delayed them or pushed them under the rug for a while but eventually they always popped back up.
It was exhausting, this life she had created for herself. Trying to fix things, especially people, was exhausting. Knowing it didn’t really make a difference; that the same problems would just come up again a week or a month later was both exhausting and depressing.
If she was honest with herself — and she figured that was what she was meant to be doing — she had had enough of wearing herself out trying to keep others happy. Surely it was time to take better care of herself?
As soon as the relief of that idea hit however, guilt followed close on its heels. Being around Christians the last few years had only reinforced the idea that life was all about taking care of others, regardless of how hard that was and, by implication, regardless of how much you suffered in the process. There were even Scriptures to back it up like the old ‘love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and love your neighbor...’
At this point a thought struck her. She practically leapt for her Bible to find the verse. And there it was staring straight at her. The last part of the sentence that she had never really paid attention to before; “...love your neighbor as yourself...”
Stunned, she sat back trying to think through the implications of this. That one little word ‘as’ could potentially change the whole meaning of life for her. For surely if she was to love her neighbor as she loved herself, then that meant taking care of herself too. Not loving others more than she cared for herself and not loving them less either, but finding a balance between the two.
If this was true then, she reasoned, it meant that she could not let people like Abel or even her father keep using and misjudging and pushing her around. She had to tell them what was and wasn’t okay with her; she needed to set boundaries with them and start protecting herself. This was exactly what Noah had been saying to her for ages now — if only she had listened to him.
