Kaleidoscope

ten

“But that’s okay, we’re all a little broken.” - m.l.

They were about to leave the aquarium when it happened.

“Jesse?” Asked Kat, turning back to where he’d frozen in place.

Jesse didn’t answer. Green. The tiles on the floor of the gift shop were green. Bright lime green, so intense it almost blinded him. The glow of the lightbulbs glittered against it like sunlight.

The images came rushing back to him. They flipped through his mind like a slide show. When he was young, Jesse had danced on this floor. He’d watched his mother make pancakes while she stood on it in her yoga pants and a T-shirt. There had been a radio in the kitchen that she’d used most mornings, but sometimes, when she was feeling whimsical, she would make music on her own, humming and singing as she cooked or read or helped Jesse with his homework. When she was having one of her bad spells, his mother would crouch on the smooth tiles, lean against the kitchen cabinets, and groan quietly. She would murmur things Jesse couldn’t understand, hugging him close to her like a child clings to its teddy bear. She’d stand up after what felt like hours, still holding him. Jesse would ask her if she was all right, and she’d tell him he had made her better. She would smile. She’d smiled so often before it had all gone wrong.

It had all gone wrong.

The pancakes started to burn on the stove. She would lie on the bright green floor, still groaning in the way Jesse recognized. But when he went to her, she would push him away. When he asked her if she was all right, she would turn her face to the wall. Some mornings, he would come downstairs to find her shaky and sweating. Throwing up on the floor. Crying. Some mornings, he would come downstairs to find the kitchen silent and dead.

Some mornings, he would come downstairs to find his mother dead.

And all the things he tried to cling to turned into nothing.

“Jesse. Jesse. What’s wrong?”

Nothing.

“Stop saying that, Jesse, please - “

Nothing.

Someone took hold of his arm. Voices rang in Jesse’s ears. He couldn’t focus on what they were saying long enough to understand the words.

Then it was quiet, and Kat was pulling him away from the lime green tiles, back into the deep velvet blue of the aquarium.

❀

“I’m sorry.”

They were sitting in front of the jellyfish tank. Wispy, glowing shapes floated around them like lanterns in the dark.

“Don’t say that,” said Kat. “It’s okay, Jesse. It’s okay to be upset sometimes.”

If only she knew. “I’m still sorry,” he said. “I really - I wrecked it for you.”

“No, you didn’t.”

He didn’t say anything. Instead, he stared at the jellyfish. They were so graceful, so delicate, turning in the water like dancers drunk on silence. They looked like the pale, soft wisps lifted from the corpses of dandelions and blown away by the wind. Make a wish, Jesse. As if the fleeting beauty of a wish could make all the pain, all the ugliness disappear. He tried to laugh, but all that came out was a croak, a sound like he’d been wounded.

“You didn’t wreck anything,” Kat repeated. “I’m glad you’re with me. Truly, Jesse. I don’t like it when you’re sad, but even when you’re sad, I - I still like you.”

Neither of them said anything for a while.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay.”