If I Could Reach the Other Side

It’s so quiet it's almost creepy, but that's a dead country town for you. Not scared of ghosts, are you?

I scoff. You know I don’t believe in any of that.

Aw, you don’t believe in anything. I got another trick in me, that’ll show you.

You would shuffle the deck in a delicate riffle, deft hands working a movement designed to please only me.

How about it? Pick a card?

My fingers, flushed red at the tips with winter’s bite, absent-mindedly trace the buttons of the camera. A polaroid, vintage. The one you found in the antiques store, and bought with your allowance as my birthday gift.

No thanks. No more tricks.

I was never able to understand them. Your latest one makes no sense.

“Got your ticket, kid?”

I produce my pass from my pocket, frozen stiff by the cold weather. With a quiet, hideous sound, the driver rips it in two pieces. He returns one half, the side on the right of the tearaway line.

“Pick a seat. Whichever.”

The remainder of the ticket fills the span of my palm.

What’s the word again? ‘Souvenir’? At any rate, you should keep it as a reminder. Not many places still use these, you know.

You always say our backwater hometown is one in a million.

The bus is near full, and I wasn’t the last one boarding. I squeeze myself into a space in the rear, muttering apologies to the elderly woman in the neighbouring seat. She’s in your usual spot, but on the way back, I’ll give up the window view.

I unzip my backpack and pull out the photo album, two years worth of your smiles. I stopped recording them last summer, after your first street performance.

I’m a teen prodigy! You think Dad will come to my next show?

I remember saying: You don’t need your deadbeat dad, I’ll be at every one.

You haven’t held any performances since, but I’m coming to get you soon.

I slip the ticket into an empty plastic sleeve, leaving the album splayed open on my lap. There’s a picture in here of us when we were young, that my eldest sister took. It’s my favourite, our miniature selves suspended in the amber tones of a sepia photograph.

Ankle-deep in water the colour of your eyes, you threw your arms open to the sky. Still high with youth, the sound of your laughter was beautiful.

I love the beach! When I’m big, I’m gonna do a show here on the sea. Let’s come again, just you an’ me an’ nobody else.

Like we’d agreed all those years ago, I’ll meet you there.

Against my thigh, my phone buzzes: You’re being stupid. Big sis is gonna get so mad at you. Please come home. Please.

Little brother of mine, ever a critic. Your first trick hadn’t impressed him. With quaking fingers, I text back, ‘the world isn’t that scary’, and switch on aeroplane mode. They probably know where I’m going, and that’s already too much. If they cared like they say, they’d be here too. But their sentiments are lukewarm.

With the beginning of a long drive, the bus sputters at first. It tries its hardest to peel itself from the curb, baulking as it goes. It belches a black cloud of exhaust that rises past the windows. Eventually, the whirring smoothes, and the streetlights peter out as the stretches of dark road grow longer. It’s hypnotic. My eyelids feel heavy.

Bit quick to tap out, don’t you think?

You’re a tease, but so affectionate. You’d sigh—fond, exasperated—and lend me your shoulder.

You’re not here tonight. But I’ll rest, so I can give you my best greeting.

xxx

“Hey, kid. Time for you to hop off.”

I wake as if I’d never slept, my body disagrees. My neck twinges unnaturally, my mouth is dry as sandpaper. I’ve always hated road trips.

Morning, sleeping beauty! Where to next, with this shiny new licence of mine?

Though, the ones with you weren’t so bad.

“It’s your stop.”

“But my stop is the last one.”

“This is the last one. Keep your ticket and take the next one back if it ain’t right.”

The ticket is useless now, I thought. But if the driver is the one saying so, it must still be valid.

“Oh… okay.”

Hastily, I shove the ticket in my pocket and stuff the rest in my backpack, swinging it over my shoulder. By now, the bus is mostly empty. A few remain, their bodies hunched or limbs askew. As I slink through the aisle, I wonder if they’re crying, or if the faint whimpering is my imagination.

The breeze is cool and tastes of salt. It tousles my hair and kisses my cheeks, bringing to mind memories of ice-creams and picnics. The skies are a perfect blue, spotted with clumps of white cloud. Summer.

“Um,”

The driver pushes me down the last step. I stagger forward, ankle-deep in rocky shoals.

“You heard what I said. Tick. Et.” he grouses, the doors hiss closed.

The expanse is vast and empty, save for the solitary bus stop. I stay by the signpost, watching as the bus trundles toward the unending horizon.

I think… I must’ve boarded the wrong one.

Ahaha, geez! You can be such an airhead sometimes. Don’t worry, you’re smart. You’ll handle it.

My grades have never been good, but you’d say those kinds of things—cute lies in exchange for private grins, the sort reserved just for you. But you’re not here, you left. When my sister had mentioned it, I’d laughed. It’s not that funny anymore, this trick of yours.

You said you’d be at my photo exhibition, I said I’d come get you. You said we’d go together, I said that’s all I wanted.

I really can’t understand you, or why you had to play this nasty prank now.

I want to hate you.

Hey, calm down. I promise, I promise, I promise–

I don’t know what any of your promises mean. Compared to the waterscape stretching, stretching, stretching before my eyes, they can’t have meant much.

The straps are chafing, so I lift my feet to remove my sandals. They dangle from my fingers as I inspect the timetable—a lonely, beaten pair of two. There are no timestamps. The route is a straight line. Hopeless.

You’re not, are you? You’re a fighter.

I glance into the distance. The breeze runs from the direction opposite where I came.

Along with my bag, I leave my sandals on the bench at the bus stop. Wearing a plain tee and shorts, I trek barefoot. The sun glints off the titanium ring wrapped around my pinkie. The polaroid remains a reassuring weight. The ring is yours. The camera’s mine.

Even if I can’t comprehend the swears you made to me, I know the swears I made to you.

The night of your first street performance, we ran away together. On the park’s fence, you rambled unintelligibly, swinging your legs. On the point of your index, you spun your licence by its corner. Like your playing deck, you had it with you always. Compact into a flat, laminate piece of card, it was the control you had over your life manifest. You could go anywhere, do anything, as long as you never lost it.

You had to cling to it with all your might, or your drunken father would seize it with his greasy, wretched hands.

My next show, you said, I want you to be my assistant. Wouldn’t that be fun?

You talked often of possibilities; what you wanted to do, how you wanted to do them. Half were real, half were daydreams.

Sure, I’ll even let you cut me in half with a saw.

What? I’d never do that!

I couldn’t help but laugh. Then what d’you mean?

I meant for my special stuff! Like the magician from that show, who disappeared himself. His assistant was an actor, they did all this cool junk in the process of finding him. Great showmanship. I was invested.

Half were real, half were daydreams.

Okay. When you master a vanishing trick, I’ll be your assistant.

Then I’ll make sure it’s the best trick, won’t I?

I would’ve preferred it stay a daydream.

I pause. The bus stop is a faraway smudge. It’s pretty. Uncapping my camera, I gingerly lift it to the eyeline.

Click.

I’m not as cool as your heroes. You beheld me like I was the stars incarnate, but I’m really just a selfish, indolent passerby. A thief, taking all the world’s magic and perpetuating it forever, in a photographic museum. Nothing but fancy paper, in the end. An entire album can’t keep you safe.

The polaroid image shivers into existence. An abandoned checkpoint, pressed stark against an unbound sky.

It’s not of you, this one. I don’t know what to make of that.

I love this picture. I love your pictures.

The first time you said that to me, it was a whisper, made soft by your stifled sobs. Under the veil of night, you told me there was a third part: it was a three-sentence set. You never finished it. Your throat was hoarse with tears.

I don’t know why you cried. I don't even believe you did. Your secrets were—are—innumerable.

I keep walking. I walk for what feels like forever. The clouds pass overhead, casting fluffy shadows on the water’s surface. There is nothing here to keep me company except my reflection, distorted by warbling ripples.

You’re not here, are you?

The stone gives way to sand. The sand gives way to slopes. The slopes run steeper. Teal shallows turn to sapphire depths. I misjudge, and, fumbling with my camera, I grapple desperately with the strength in my toes. In an impact that jars my skull, I land on my elbow, but my polaroid is untouched, held high over my head. Victory.

Beneath the glittering waves, there’s no ground. A never-ending ocean trench of improbable scale: impassable, unless I swim.

To be honest, I hate the water. I hate road trips. I hate, in general. I tend to hate more than love. But you loved to love, you loved to hope. You loved to chip at hearts, until you carved a you-shaped space there. You were radiant, so bright. Mouth sealed shut, I never spoke up when I was hating, lest my egotistical self drench you black.

These truths, as late as they came, are vain and ugly. You knew them, I’m sure you did. You knew everything about me.

If I had told you the sea frightens me, you would’ve said,

You can’t swim anyway. Don’t try it. You’ll drown.

If you had told me driving frightened you, I would’ve said,

Then don’t go with him. You can’t let your father in that car.

But you didn’t. Neither did I.

I want to rip the camera from my neck. I want to scream. I want to plunge headfirst, I want to be swallowed by the indeterminable. Instead, I curl in, unfeeling, cold. Like you, the day your car crashed with you in it. The day after your last performance. 

I miss you.

Even if I swam to the edge of this infinite sea, you wouldn’t be there.

“Hey, you dropped your ticket.”

You were beautiful in life. You’re beautiful in death. As you pass me that stupid slip of paper, torn in half and soaked through, you offer a sweet, melancholy smile. Stunning. You’re magical. You’re everything. You’re a daydream.

“You look so sad,” the ghost murmurs. “It doesn’t suit you. I’ll be there, like I promised. I swear. Please, don’t cry.”

You would say that, if you were here. But this is only a ghost with your face. With your scent, your touch. A memory, a blameless memory.

“Go home,” begs the ghost, “You can’t be here.”

You lead me by the hand back to the bus stop. Sapphire depths turn to teal shallows. The slopes give way to sand. The sand gives way to stone. We wait on the bench, and you shuffle the photographs I thought had scattered to the wind when I fell. One by one, you sift through them.

“They’re all from here. How many did you take?”

I don’t answer. Humans don’t talk to ghosts.

You continue nonchalantly, “You should enter them in your exhibit.”

I was going to enter the photos I took of you. Those, at least, are real.

“I know what you’re thinking. Don’t even consider it. It’s such a waste of your prodigal talents. You’re amazing.”

You could never be a waste. You’re worth a million mes and more.

You settle on a picture I’d taken of my distorted reflection. I stare down at my feet, the laps from my ankles warp it even now. My most accurate self-portrait.

“I love this picture,” your voice drops fondly, wistfully. “I loved your pictures, you know. I loved you. I’m sorry I never said so.”

I knew. Your secrets were my secrets. I knew everything about you.

From the direction of the deep sea comes a low humming. The smoker’s cough of a bus, returning from its voyage.

“Got your ticket?”

Your eyes glisten. Your expression wobbles. I want to hear you laugh, but I couldn’t tell a joke if it killed me. Not now, not soon. Maybe in the future, when the fragments of you—on my pinkie, in that album, on this bench—aren’t choking me speechless.

The bus pulls up to the curb. You sling my backpack over my shoulder. I take two of the steps and desist. Trembling, I spit up the rock in my throat. I can’t go silent. I wasn’t allowed to say it before. My best goodbye.

“               ”

Mercifully hushed, the doors close. The other passengers are gone. It seems they also mastered the final vanishing act.

From the window, I catch sight of you, on a sandbank in the far, far, far beyond.

I raise my camera and snap a photo.

xxx

I wake as if I never slept. The ticket is gone from the plastic sleeve.

xxx

I came home two days later for my exhibition.

My older sister was furious; she stormed around the house cussing. She howled, where were you! I told her I’d ridden the overnight bus to the coast and back. Having guessed as much, she drew me into a hug so tight my spine realigned.

Truthfully, I would’ve liked to stay at the beach an hour more. I’d remained there until dawn broke, bursting the night with spokes of orange and gold. I left eventually, when the rashes from my winter boots began to itch.

My younger brother clung to my leg, blowing his nose on my trousers. Blubbering, he tried to nurse the bruise blooming from my elbow. I wouldn’t let him. When I tried to leave for the venue, he wailed piteously.

“Don’t be a dummy,” my sister chided, “we’re going together.”

Attending my own exhibition seems egotistical. You would huff, maybe prod me in the ribs for being a hypocrite. You’d be right, of course. I love being here. I love watching schools of people, meandering, hovering like enamoured fish. I trail after my siblings, who linger in the hall. The crowd is at its thickest; I suppose the polaroid line is the most popular. When I’d petitioned for the change, the panel organisers had readily agreed, dabbing wetly at their eyes and cooing about nostalgia. I ought to thank them for humouring my last-minute request.

The hallway is made up of familiar pictures I’d found in my bag, long after I arrived at the beach.

“Oh,” my sister breathes, pausing at the photograph in the middle.

She doesn’t say anything more. It’s too personal for her.

This one’s my favourite. Unlike the others, it isn’t embellished with frames and flares. It’s just a polaroid: plain, unlabelled.

You smile at me, real and tender. Jagged, with your perfect imperfections.

Watching from that distant shore.