Saving Elijah

Gabby. She was clearly willing to engage with him in cruel displays like the one we had all just witnessed, but I wanted nothing to do with it anymore. Any of it.
    I got up and left, taking Julie with me.

    *    *    *

    Seth called the dorm later that night. I hung up on him. He called the next day. I told the girl who answered the phone to tell him I didn't want to talk to him. He sent roses. He wrote me a letter, said he was sorry, said he loved me. Julie said he wasn't capable of love. "I was totally wrong about him."
    I held out for a whole week, then I received what I mistook for a love poem:

    Barroom intoxication is no companion
next to Dinah in my room.
Booze, reefer, others
who are not you,
who are nothing but jesters,
donning cap and bells
Nothing but fools and jokers,
next to Dinah in my room.
Beauty pale as a bride's veil.
My mouth thirsts for you there,
Dinah, I am as dry as ale
without you.
I forsake all spirits but you now.
Let me drink you (and only you).
Intoxicate me, Dinah.
Together we will drink forever,
Eternity for two.

    *    *    *

    We left D.C. on the motorcycle about noon that Saturday, heading into Virginia, on a cold winter day. He kept bearing down on the accelerator. I was utterly terrified, he always drove fast, but never this fast. I kept begging him to slow down, he kept making whooping and howling noises, hypnotized by the speed, or by the danger, or perhaps both. "What a rush." He wasn't wearing a helmet. He never did. "What's the point if you can't feel the wind in your hair?" he said. And, when I insisted on wearing one: "What're you practicing for, middle age?"
    Around two, he finally stopped next to a reservoir and lit a joint. I didn't want to smoke pot with him anymore, I just wanted to go home and never see him again. But I'd suddenly realized that I was afraid of how he might react to that, so I told him I felt sick. He agreed to head home, and we got back on the bike as soon as he finished his joint.
    We were somewhere near Reston when I saw a truck approaching in the distance, battling over the crest of an oncoming hill. I looked at the speedometer, which was hovering around 100. Did he think he could survive anything!
    "Slow down!" I screamed.
    He took his eyes off the road, looked around. "Pray, Dinah. Pray for your life."
    "Slow down!" I screamed. But my voice was swallowed by the wind, the roar of the bike engine, and the engine of the truck coming closer, closer. I did pray. Please, let me live through this, God. I'll do anything. Please.
    And then the behemoth was upon us, huge, bearing down.
    Seth swerved to the right. I heard the screech of a skid. In the silence that followed I seemed to be floating, soaring soundless through the cool air.
    The next moment or the next hour, I lay breathless in the dirt at the side of the road, tall trees rising over the asphalt, a gothic arch of bare-branched trees, the motorcycle on its side near me. I moved my legs, my arms. Everything worked. Everything hurt.
    I took off my helmet, looked over for Seth. He was lying flat on his back a few feet away, his face turned toward the sky, his eyes closed.
    "Seth?" I struggled to all fours and crawled toward him. A pool of blood, dark and thick, was widening around his head. "Seth?"

fourteen
    After the hospital elevator doors closed with the ghost inside, I returned to the NAR with Sam. Kate was sitting next to Elijah. She was singing.

    And some folks thought 'twas a dream they'd dreamed
Of sailing that beautiful sea—

    She stopped singing as I walked in. "Maybe he'd wake up if I played my flute for him, Mom." Sam looked at me, as if he expected me to know how to comfort her. As if I should want to.
    "Katie." I put my hand on her back. I couldn't bring myself to tell her everything would be all right, wouldn't be starry-eyed and unrealistic, like Sam. I needed to be prepared, to run in place just to keep up, yet I could barely move my limbs. I sat down in the chair next to the bed and held my daughter, tried (and failed) not to cry. All the while thoughts and questions spiraled through my mind, stabbing at me like polished blades. Should I have told the police Seth had been jealous and angry toward fay, rather than tell myself lies about its relevance? Was my son sick because I was lacking in character, after all? Had I been something more sinister than young and foolish back then? Worse, had surviving that motorcycle crash used up my ration of God's mercy?
    "Mom!" Kate