Peace in Paradise

I first noticed Chrissy in our eighth grade English class when we were asked to write something honoring soldiers for Veteran's Day. He had moved into the district a couple weeks before and when he introduced himself said he was a foster kid from Kansas. I didn't pay much attention until he got to the front of the class and began singing a poem, and I realized how beautiful he was.

No one wants to be a hero

But the quota's always met

Parents beg their child 'Don't leave, or

At least remember what we've said.'

Children grow up to see the real world

And what it means to be free

As they stand up with their fists curled

Asking of God, "Why me?"

Why must I go and try to free them?

This will steal away my soul.

But with so many working for evil and

So few that want us whole,

I must go.

I must go.

Like everyone, I wanted to be friends with Christian but it became clear that he only associated with whoever was coolest at the time. The football and cheerleading captains saw a lot of Chrissy and when Caitlin won a statewide debate contest she was sitting at his lunch table too. I knew he was way out of my league but that didn't keep the principal trumpet from secretly watching the fourth chair clarinet player look at fashion magazines behind the music stand with the fifth chair girl during rehearsal.

Our freshman year in the high school marching band we were changing to leave for our contest in Owasso when Andy and David came up to me.

"Hey Rachel," Andy said unsurely. "Can you make Christian change in the girls' bathroom? Last weekend he was being weird."

David offered a weak smiled, "I think we have quite the exhibitionist on our hands." I noticed their barely masked discomfort and agreed.

I finally convinced Christian to come to the girls' bathroom with me. He had held a venomous grudge against me since the beginning of the school year because I went to the band director and convinced him to not let Chrissy try out for the color guard. The whole band adored Christian but I knew what some of the other students at school might think and Chrissy would never let someone like me follow him around to keep him from getting beaten up.

The girls swarmed Christian when he came into the bathroom with his garment bag. They started comparing the long johns we had to wear under our uniforms since this contest is always cold (I don't know how Chrissy managed to find a pair with rainbows and unicorns on them). Everyone was happily talking but I didn't participate as I noticed something on Chrissy's body. Along his thighs I caught four tiny dark bruises, not the large and purple ones I hid, but more like pinch marks. I inconspicuously traced his body and froze when I saw three small spots of puffy white skin on his left hip. I don't know how I figured this but I knew they came from cigarette butts.

We finished out the fall and soon settled into the next semester of class without the constant demands of marching season.

"We're going to do a segment on the ACT English test." Mrs. Hamilton told the class as she came in with a stack of workbooks. "I checked your records and most of you haven't taken it before, but the spring semester of your freshman years is not too early to start. I noticed Ms. Livingston has already taken it a couple of times and scored high enough to get a full ride at OU."

At the end of class a couple of kids passed by me with "That's so cool!" or "How did you score that high?" but I was waiting to see if my work would pay off. I'd made a name for myself in band by making three honor groups and moving up to second chair. The band director was saying I could make All State next year and even the seniors were admitting that I was one of the top candidates for drum major even though I was only a freshman.

None of that mattered to me. I had finally succeeded enough to bring Chrissy to my side. I was talking to a group of upperclassmen percussionists at lunch when I felt my arm lifted and placed around someone's shoulders. I looked down to find Christian looking up at me, his platinum blonde hair falling around his face, and normally blue-green eyes now shining purple from the contacts he was always stealing from one of the junior flute players. But Chrissy was here now, and I was going to keep him safe. I wouldn't let anyone hurt him anymore.

That April I was named drum major and the uproar began when I was appointed to center podium as the head drum major. The band director turned all student leadership over to me and charged me to plan the summer training camps. We graduated a lot of good players in May and needed to compensate if we wanted to make finals again in the fall. Four weeks out of the summer I held Clarinet Camp, justifying it with both section leaders having graduated, but truly doing it to get Christian out of his house and harm's way.

By the end of the summer I was so sick of clarinet players (besides Christian) I was about to snap. I was kidding around with a tuba player about the clarinet marching style when Christian, ever the defensive one, charged up and smacked me across the face.

"Ow. You caught me chewing on my cheek," I complained, sticking my finger to touch the inside of my cheek and drawing out blood.

"You keep insulting your most loyal section in the band and I'll give you something to bleed for R.A.Livingston!" I could practically see the fury radiating off of Chrissy as he stomped back across the room, ignoring my playful, "I can't wait!" I laughed, if only Christian would stay with me till we were adults. We could get married and he would learn to hit me right.

Christian and I stayed together through the marching season, though no less than ten people a week approached to tell me my boyfriend was cheating on me with (insert athletic star here).

One night at home I pulled Dad out to the back porch and spoke with him about possibly adopting Christian, a topic I had touched on with Mom earlier in the week and received bad results. As Dad went back inside Mom came out and gave me a look that said she had been listening. She walked up to me and shoved. Losing my footing I stumbled back to slam against one of the pillars on our porch. I sunk down to the cement but never broke eye contact with her. The strength in my defiance made her fume even more. She was going to hit her breaking point sometime soon if I didn't watch it.

"You should quit your bitching at Mom, you stupid," Andrew snapped at me upstairs in our bathroom later that night.

I lifted my shirt and showed him the large red mark on my hip. I made my voice weaker, begging him to hold and protect me like an older brother should. "Mom hurt me."

"Duh, 'cause you keep being a retard." Andrew stormed past me into his room.

"Rache, come help with the dishes," Mom hollered from downstairs. I came and dried the dishes quietly, hoping to keep the silence so she would relax.

"I don't understand." Mom paused in the washing and sighed. She was trying to make her voice sound gentle but my blood still froze. "I don't understand how you think that with all the things I am doing for you and all the stress on me because of you, that your dad and I would want another child."

I tried to keep drying the platter in my hands. Keep it cool, I told myself and took a deep breath. "I just thought that since you and Dad were better than all my friends' parents then maybe you could make another kid more successful, like Andrew and me."

The water stopped. I had said something wrong. I immediately shuffled to the end of the counter. My mom took a deep breath and looked at me, "I do so much for you; I haven't done anything for myself in so long because of you and your brother."

I leaned forward to set the dish down, "We didn't ask you to do that."

She slapped me across the face. I staggered back in shock, not realizing she had been in reach of me. My mother shouted, "What happened to my sweet little girl?" I gasped as a bowl slammed into my forehead. Covering my face I stumbled back into the wall. A plate hit me in the stomach and I crumpled to lie across the kitchen floor as she screamed, "I want my sweet Rachel back!"

I separated myself from the pain, blocking out her hysterics and the dishes hitting my body and shattering on the floor. I was getting better at not letting her affect me, and in my strength I forced out, "Stop it, Dad is the one who is supposed to hit me."

The next day I was heading back to the band room after hanging signs advertising the contest this weekend when I recognized Chrissy's giggles floating down the hallway. I caught "You're a dirty little whore aren't you?" from a foreign voice and more of Chrissy's giggles as my blood began to boil. I rounded the corner to find Christian rubbing up against the team linebacker.

I charged forward and yanked Christian away from him, my boyfriend emitting an "Aww, Rachie…"

"Hey Fuckface, shouldn't you be at practice?" I bit at the football player as he made some crack about 'taking a break'. I fixed him with my glare, "Why don't you go knock yourself up, hermaphrodite?"

"But Rachie, he's not a –"

"Come on Christian we're leaving."

I drug him to the exit by the band room and insisted on walking him home. A few steps outside the door Christian took my hand and began chattering about the newly formed poetry club, the linebacker already long forgotten. Chrissy didn't know which of his two hundred and twenty poems to put in the anthology the club was making.

"Chrissy, do you want to come over and play Nintendo for a while?" I asked, hoping to extend his stay to dinner and spending the night, therefore keeping him safe from his house at least one day.

"I can't, my dad wants me home by four," He answered, swinging our hands as we walked in the shade of the large church by the school.

"…But doesn't he hurt you?" I all but whispered.

"I actually like it," Chrissy remarked to my surprise. We stopped on the far side of the church with the most shade and Chrissy nudged me against the wall and leaned in close. "This dad is like my last foster dad. He sticks his penis in me."

I stared at him in disbelief, "What? But how, you're a boy…"

Christian looked at me like I was crazy. "You know how, silly! My new daddy's different though because he ties me up too. It's like a game."

I pulled him into a hug, trying to be gentle but failing in my overwhelming frustration. "Can't you tell DHS? They'll get you new parents." I thought back to last night with Mom and the dishes. I thought about every parent that was turning a blind eye to this.

"Rachie, I've been through nine families! Don't make me move again," Chrissy whined. He leaned back and slipped a hand down to slide across my flat abdomen. "I wish you were a man, then I'd be with you only, I promise."

I dropped him off, ignoring the sweet, "Daddy, I'm home!" issuing from the house. As I made my way home I willed time to fast forward. In just two more years and Christian would be nearly eighteen. If he could hold onto his sanity until then, I would work and pay for him to get a therapist and go to college with me and everything would be fine.

The football season flew by with little time for class or sleep between sectionals, editing and arranging marching music, washing uniforms, cleaning instruments, tutoring freshmen (and some upperclassmen) in their classes, and walking the underclassmen to and from school whose parents worked and couldn't take them. My dad succeeded in not drinking for two whole months and attended daily AA meetings. I was excited about the chance to who see who my father was without the alcohol. However his sobriety jitters distanced him even more from our family, making Mom insane if she wasn't before. As a trumpet player, I'd landed drum major at just the right time. Anyone can wave a baton with a busted lip.

The day of state contest came and we gave it our all for the most important competition of the season. The enthusiastic freshmen (plus Christian) all came running and screaming back to the buses when they posted that we made the cut for finals. They ended up swarming the same place when all they could find was me in the back of a bus fighting unconsciousness from exhaustion. The upperclassmen we all off having sex somewhere.

We drew first for finals, as always, and again as always, it started to rain. One of the clarinet freshmen asked me about keeping her reed dry in the rain and I said "If it feels like you're going to squeak, stop playing. The only time the audience hears the claries anyway is when they squeak."

With that Christian stomped up and slapped me. I was in such a strange mood that day that the sudden tiny stinging on my face and the taste of blood on my tongue made me laugh. He'd caught me chewing on the inside of my cheek again, blast.

We performed in finals and the band filed into the stadium to watch the other finalists. Chrissy decided he wanted to sit with me so we grabbed my blankets from the bus and climbed up to the furthest corner on the away side of the stadium. He at first protested to us sitting by ourselves and not being able to hear the bands well but I was in desperate need of some silence and the serenity that only came when Christian was near me.

Soon I had Chrissy all bundled up and snuggled close. We spent a few performances pointing out conducting style or the poor freshman that was late on the hip switch. I leaned back against the wall of the stands when Christian pushed closer to me and laid his head against my chest.

"I need to sleep before massing, will you sing to me Rachie?"

I clasped my arms around him and tried to think of a suitable song.

"Starlight surrounds you, love, as you reach for my hand.

I searched and found you, love, in this war-torn land."

"It sounds more like a love song than a lullaby to me," Christian lifted his head. "Aren't there supposed to be unicorns and princesses and stuff?"

I scowled at him, "Are you going to let me sing my song?"

"Yes, sorry." Chrissy snuggled close again.

"Starlight surrounds you, love, as you reach for my hand.

I searched and found you, love, in this war-torn land.

You came and freed me, love, your heart is made to soothe.

I've tried to hide you, love, save you from the truth.

Be still now, dream, my love, dream of distant skies.

One day you'll find, my love, peace in Paradise."

I sat and watched the rest of the bands as Chrissy slept. I waited for the stadium to clear in preparation for the massing of the bands before carrying him down. I deposited him in my seat on the bus and shooed everyone out so he could rest. Christian missed the massing of the bands, but by how heavily he was sleeping I wondered how many nights he had been kept awake at his house.

Halfway through the ride home Christian stirred against me and asked if I would sing him that song again. I started humming it softly and gently stroking his hair.

For the first time I didn't stay to help unload the buses and instead hitched a ride from Courtney since neither my parents nor Christian's came to pick us up.

I carried Chrissy into my house, thinking my folks were guaranteed to know about the contest and not be angry at our late entry. I somehow managed to slip off his jeans and tucked him into my bed in his long johns. He woke up a little when I came back from brushing my teeth and gave me a look I had never seen before; it was insecure and almost sad. I slipped into bed and wrapped my arms around him, waiting for his soft breathing to even out before myself succumbing to sleep.

The next couple days of school were filled with happiness at our victory on Saturday. I had expected Christian to be the leader of the joyous celebrations but instead he was very uncharacteristically quiet and moody. He came and sat at my table during lunch instead of finding the popular crowd, causing me to be suspicious and worried.

That Thursday I was sitting next to him at lunch, just watching him when he turned to me and looked me in the eyes and said, "I think… I think I need to go."

I wasn't sure what he was talking about but I put my hand on top of his, ignored by the rest of the table. "Wherever it is, I'm coming with you."

Christian gave me a scared look and all of a sudden the world around me stopped as I realized what he meant and what I had just committed to, what my Christian was going to do.

That night after my parents left I knelt on the kitchen floor with Christian, me sitting cross legged with him scooting onto my lap. His thin fingers clicked the box knife open as I turned my wrists up on his knees.

"I'll do you first and then me," he said.

I nodded and buried my head in the crook of his neck, trying to hide my fear of what was about to take place. When Christian's tiny hand touched my wrist I tensed up and visibly jerked in his grasp. I barely felt the sting of my flesh slicing from the extreme adrenaline pumping in my veins. I registered him setting my right hand down and taking my left. I heard my heart pumping in my ears and was already getting dizzy from not breathing.

I heard Christian say something like, "Remember to hold me," so I tightened my arms around his waist and pushed my forehead deeper in his shoulder as blackness crept into my vision from the sides. I tried to hold on but my previously undiagnosed anemia had me passed out only a few seconds later.

I awoke in a sitting position somewhere in Mercy hospital with my parents on either side of me. I couldn't focus my eyes at first but my head leaned forward and I saw my wrists bandaged and an IV in my right arm. My dad said "Welcome back, kiddo," and ran his fingers through my hair. I looked over at my mom and saw tears in her eyes. She looked at me and bit out between sobs,

"Rache, how could you do this to us?"

"Everything's alright," my dad cut her off as he continued to stroke my hair and gave her a glance that said to drop it. "The doctor gave you some stitches and is going to show us how to take care of them once you are fully awake."

I stared down at my hands, thinking it odd that I felt like I was supposed to be here for some reason. Then like a knife stabbing my chest I remembered Christian.

"Chrissy! The boy who was with me, did he make it?" I all but shouted at my dad.

He didn't answer and I felt my mom tentatively put a hand on my shoulder and say, "He didn't make it, honey."

"He died?"

"Yes," my mother sobbed and I leaned back into my hospital bed again.

You made it. I thought. Chrissy, you did it. You're free, sweetheart.

In the coming days I sluggishly milled about my room, my parents explaining to the teachers that my friend's death had really affected me and I couldn't come to school. The hazy feeling that lingered for the first day or so kept me from any significant thought, but on the second day back home I thought about my last moments with him.

I wondered what the paramedics must have thought when they came to our house after my parents got home. I wondered if a doctor lifted Christian off the kitchen floor and held him like they wanted him to live. I wondered if someone did that for me. My cuts were only just past the skin; it was obvious that Christian hadn't wanted to kill me. I realized that he had just wanted someone there with him, and in my weakness I couldn't even grant him that, so my angel passed out of this world cold and alone.

When it hit me that Chrissy was actually gone I spent the evening curled up on my bedroom floor, too empty to even cry. The only redemption I could eventually find was in my scholarship to college. If I could break away and go to school, I would find a way to stop all of this, this horrible destructive process children are forced into. If anything, Christian and I are strong. If I could break away, I vowed to devise a plan to save the children still here from this kind of madness and pain.

I whispered into the darkness of my room, "If you'll find the ones I missed, the ones I can't get to in time and protect them, Chrissy, I'll find the kids that are lost here and help them. I'll find the kids that are like you."

I lay there for a long time, wondering where my departed friend had gone, "I miss you."

And with that I pushed myself up off the floor.