Kimber Read online

  KIMBER

  KIMBER

  Sarah Denier

  This book is a work of fiction. The similarity to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. Characters, names, places and incidents are product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Copyright © 2012 by Sarah Denier

  All Rights Reserved

  ISBN-13: 978-0615684567 (Little Bridge Publishing, LLC)

  ISBN-10: 0615684564

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means be it, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

  Published by

  Little Bridge Publishing, LLC

  Edited by: Rosemary Virgil

  Cover image by: Sarah Denier

  Cover design by: Ron Bercume

  www.ronbercume.com

  First edition September 2012

  The author acknowledges the copyrighted or trademarked status and trademark owners of the following watermarks mentioned in this work of fiction: Paramore, Shania Twain, BMW, Ford, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Harry Potter, Draco Malfoy, Nike, Tylenol, Ibuprofen, Indermil, Vicodin, Penicillin, Google, Elie Saab, Bob Marley, The Big Bang Theory, Learjet, Hilton,

  AKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Dreams live behind my eyes where no one else can see. Somehow, this one escaped.

  First and foremost I would personally like to thank each and every person to whom my book now belongs. I look forward to experiencing Kimber’s journey with you and the endless possibilities the future holds.

  To my friend and editor Rosemary Virgil. Thank you for the brainstorms, the honesty, the wisdom and the endless hours. Your encouragement helped me to discover myself as a writer. There are fewer places I’d rather be than at your dining table.

  To Ron Bercume. Thank you for taking a dream from my hand and passing it out to the world and for your artistic designs to both the cover and website. Find Ron Bercume the graphic designer, marketing strategist and disability activist at www.ronbercume.com.

  A special thank you to my friend and cover model Casey McKinney for portraying KIMBER so beautifully and to Carissa Boland and Alexandria for assisting in the shoot.

  For my mother Bridget

  (4-10-59 to 12-8-88)

  Though physically you are not with me, I feel your everlasting presence. Until the day I see you again, all my love.

  “Sometimes only one person is missing and the whole world seems depopulated.”

  Alphonse De Lamartine

  Chapter One

  I SIT AT my kitchen table and stare out the french doors that lead to the backyard. Outside the rain pours down by the buckets. With hurricane season reaching its end, mid fall in Florida does little to shift the weather.

  As lightning crawls across the night, piercing the swollen sky, thunder roars and rumbles shaking the earth below it. It’s picturesque. As if Mother Nature herself cries the tears I can no longer produce.

  My skin feels like it’s vibrating. I’m devoid of direction and see no purpose in anything. I cannot produce coherent thoughts and if I could, they would end up being dark and threatening, like all the others. I cannot contemplate the day to come. I do not wish to think of the jagged way my heart has torn.

  I have not eaten much in the past few days, sleep is not calling my name and everyone I know has been smothering me with concern. I wish I could shut it all away. Go into hiding and pray for some sort of a redo time warp to take the past four months away.

  A soft knock at the front door shakes me from my dejection. There is no need for me to answer it. I know who it is. He has a key.

  Leo comes through the front door soaking wet. Beads of water trickle off his short dirty blond hair as he runs his hand through it. The shirt and jeans Leo wears are three shades darker from the rain.

  These days Leo is my only saving grace. The only one who holds me to reality. It used to be just the thought of Leo would give me a happy, weightless stir of butterflies, kind of feeling. Seeing him now, it does nothing to kill the pain possessing me.

  Born in New Zealand, Leo moved to the states when he was eleven. He doesn’t have much of an accent. He took private lessons and dropped it once he realized how cruel kids can be. Every now and again though it comes out when he’s mad or in certain things he says, like when he calls me aroha, the Maori word for love. Sometimes he’ll do it just for me and it drives me crazy, or used to.

  Leo is a classic, good looking and easy on the eyes, type of guy. He is six foot two, lean and muscular thanks to his love for sports. His lips are made of the softest clouds. The stubble on his square jaw could make him look older than nineteen but he doesn’t take advantage of it. Then there are his eyes. His gorgeous eyes are the most electric hazel mixture I have ever seen. I can always tell what mood he is in by their color. Green when he is happy. Bright blue when he is sad. Foggy gray when he is angry. Tonight as he takes the chair next to mine, his eyes are a swirled mixture of bluish gray.

  “How you doing?” His voice is low and dry.

  I give him a sideways glance. It’s a stupid question and he knows it.

  “I dropped it all off. It’ll all be set up when you…we arrive tomorrow.” Leo reaches across the table capturing my hands in his. He squeezes them softly.

  “There’s no way. I just can’t do it.” Tears form puddles in my eyes. “If I just knew why.” My throat tightens with anger. I’ve run through every why and how thousands of times. However, no answer will suffice. No piece of knowledge can make my mother’s murder seem any less than heart wrenching.

  On the verge of turning eighteen, I graduated high school and wanted to start my enrollment at the University of Florida a semester late. My mother was less than happy but I struck a deal with her. She agreed I could postpone my first semester on one condition. I had to take an internship in Tampa at the State Attorney’s office where my mother worked as a Defense Attorney.

  It was not a bad job. I liked doing the data entry, sorting the mail and making lunch runs. The real plus for me was being able to see my mother more. Her job always had a way of keeping her in the office. I know our lack of time together ate away at her but I understood. She was living her dream. A dream that provided the nicer things in life for the both of us. She had dominated her field with such fortitude there was a list of people begging for her representation.

  Four months ago everything changed. Thursday July Third was my day off. My mother came into my room to give me a quick kiss on the head and a, “See ya later kiddo.” It was the last time I saw her face or heard her voice. Three weeks later, she was discovered in a ravine off Interstate Four in Tampa, twenty-eight miles from home.

  Detective Muller, the lead investigator, did not dare ask me to identify her body. Leo had been brave enough to do that for me. I gave a DNA sample for a positive identification but I didn’t need to wait several weeks to get an answer. I knew the body found was my mother. I felt it in my gut.

  “Come on. You need sleep.” Leo says now standing.

  “I need so many things.” I push away from the table. “Can you stay tonight?” I ask as I start up the stairs with Leo behind me.

  “Um, tonight isn’t good for me.”

  I stop at my bedroom door and turn to him. “Why?”

  “You know why.” He retorts.

  I do know why but I preferred to forget. Leo and I have a long past together. If you ask either one of us, we have an even longer future ahead. We met not long after Leo moved from New Zealand to Florida. It was the summer of sixth grade and our connection was instantaneous. I played it cool and tried to rationalize but I fell just as hard and as fast as Leo had f
allen for me.

  By the beginning of ninth grade, the inescapable attraction between us had become palpable and when he finally kissed me, I became addicted. We never labeled ourselves publicly as boyfriend/girlfriend. The title seemed superficial and temporary. Besides, our relationship was obvious through our inability to be apart. I simply referred to him as he was, my Leo. Nothing in the past four years had changed that, until recently.

  A few months ago, I put the flawlessness of our relationship to the test. After my mother was taken from me my world shattered. Anger and grief grew inside me until I exploded and pushed everyone away, including Leo. Like any other self respecting guy with pride, Leo didn’t grovel at my feet or act like an injured puppy dog. I had asked for space and even though distance between us was not really what I wanted, Leo had given it. I just needed room to fall apart. I didn’t want to drag anyone else down with me or feel suffocated.

  I gave no thought on how to pull myself back together.

  Technically, we are no longer a couple but that doesn’t mean things between us are over. It never really would be with Leo and I. I know that no matter how empty I might feel inside it will always be Leo’s love my heart asks for.

  I come out of my bathroom dressed in a lightweight pink pajama set and walk over to where Leo sits on the corner of my bed.

  “I stopped by Amber’s and gave her the spare key. She’ll be here in the morning to go with you in the limo.”

  My muscles tense with anger. “You said you’d be going with me! Now you’re not?”

  “There’s something I’ve got to take care of.”

  My temper is not a hard thing to trigger these days. Life had taught me a lesson in skepticism and suspicion and I took notes. What was coming out of Leo’s mouth was textbook shadiness.

  “Don’t you dare tell me you won’t even be there tomorrow. I could care less if no one shows up. In fact, I’d prefer it. But you’re the one person I can’t do this without.”

  “I don’t define who you are Kimber. No matter who is there tomorrow no one will be in the place you are. No one will feel what you will. In that you’re alone.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” I snap.

  “What I’m saying is that no one can give you closure. You have to find it yourself. I’ll do all I can for you. I always will. But I can’t guide you through something I haven’t experienced.” Heavily, Leo sighs. “It kills me to see you in so much pain, sick with grief and here I am kept at a distance. I don’t know what you want from me anymore. Being with you, without actually being with you, it feels unnatural.” His eyes come to meet mine.

  I have no strength to fight him nor do I want to. I sigh and sit down on the bed next to him.

  “Everything is turned around. I can’t think half the time. The pain I feel is unrelenting. You’re the only light I see in all my darkness. You’re the only memory I have of the way it used to be. My only hope of a happier time to come. You define me because now, you’re the biggest part of me. If you’re trying to pull away from me now because I put us on hold—”

  “No.” He interrupts.

  “Then what?”

  I can see the hurt in Leo through his bright blue eyes. I know he is keeping something from me.

  “I’ll be there.” His lips form a smile. It’s not genuine. It gives me an odd feeling of something else bad to come. I hope he knows I cannot survive anymore. “I’ll stay ‘til you fall asleep. Lie down.”

  I do as told and place myself on the bed next to him, resting my head against his chest.

  “Leo.” I whisper in the dark.

  “Hmm.”

  “Please don’t leave me.” I plea with sincerity.

  Leo kisses my head as he runs his hand up my arm to find my face. “Ouch!” I cry out and grab my head feeling as though thousands of tiny needles are giving me electric shocks. I know I am lying on the bed but I feel the weirdest sensation as if I am falling backwards unable to hold onto anything.

  My eyes closed, I see quick visions coming at me like a TV rapidly surfing through channels. It starts when I am a small child, when my parents were still together. I see flashes of family trips to the zoo. Our winter vacation to Vermont. Suddenly it fast forwards two years later, after my father had abandoned my mother and I. I see my mother and me shopping for school clothes, eating Chinese at the dinner table and sleepovers with friends.

  As I lay helpless in my own body unable to move or fight against what holds me captive, I surrender and watch my life unfold before my eyes.

  The last thing I see in this vision is me lying on my bed, in the dark, alone. I cannot find Leo. He should be right next to me but I cannot see him.

  With a sense of urgency, I fight harder to wake. I fight harder to pull myself out but it’s useless. I’m frightened, trapped and as the image of me alone slowly fades to black, I make one last effort to struggle free. I will my eyes to open. Nothing happens. All I can think to do is call out to him not knowing if he will hear me. I force the air into my lungs. Whether it is only in my head or not I scream out to Leo.

  Seconds pass without any response. Just before I give up and prepare for whatever it is taking me I hear his soft voice covered in sympathy.

  “Please forgive me, aroha. I can’t. I’m sorry.” He whispers in my ear.

  Just as I slip away into a deep slumber and everything fades to black, I feel something I have not felt for the past four months…PEACE!

  Chapter Two

  “KIMBER. BABE. YOU have to get up now. It’s time.”

  I open my eyes to the sun shining through my bedroom window. It portrays a false vision of happiness. I have been drained of happiness. I wish the sky held the feral storm from last night. The day does not deserve the tranquility it portrays.

  Amber clears her throat, reminding me I am not alone. Her aqua blue eyes puddle with tears. I’m doomed. If my best friend cannot hold herself together, how am I going to make it through the day? She looks absorbed in the black she wears, a color that swallows her smooth pale complexion. Her straight blond hair, tucked behind her ears, falls against her shoulders. Her lips, holding the only trace of makeup, shimmer like pink champagne.

  Then I realize something. “How did you get in here?” I mumble.

  “Spare key.” Her soft voice sings.

  Had I actually had the brain capacity of a normally person, I would not have asked. Amber always had my spare key and I hers. After twelve years of friendship, we practically lived the same life. We shared clothes, secrets and parents. Her mom had walked out on her like my dad walked out on me. We tried to hook our parents up with each other but they were content as friends. We alternated weekend sleepovers and in an unconventional kind of way, we made our own family.

  She wipes a tear from under her eye. “I’m going to let you get up and get ready. The limo will be here in a couple hours.”

  “Yeah, ok.” I reply as I sit up.

  Before leaving my room, Amber takes my hand and places it in hers. Her smile succumbs to sadness. “I love you. I know it’s not head lining news, but today,” she shrugs her shoulders, “you should just know.” Amber is no Edgar Allan Poe when it comes to words but I get what she’s saying. With a false countenance I nod. She stands and closes the door behind her as she leaves.

  Bathroom, teeth, shower, hair, closet. I’ve done the routine a thousand times before. Today it’s all foreign. I place my feet on the floor and lose my thoughts in the beige carpet below them. My mind turns in to an empty void and images fade into a blur. For the last four months, I have endured the icy grip of grief and succumbed to its will. My heart, dead and barren, merely decorates the emptiness.

  I shove myself from the bed and make my way to the shower. I stand under the cascade of water. It’s warm and penetrates down to the chill buried in my bones. My muscles respond to the heat, loosening and relaxing under the cascade of water.

  For six whole minutes, I’m just any other girl taking a shower. For six whole
minutes, my mind wonders away. It takes six minutes for eighteen years of memories to hunt me down. A guttural noise escapes from my lips. Exasperated by fate, I lean against the shower wall. My legs become flimsy as insurmountable amounts of agony imprint against my soul. With no energy to fight, I falter and collapse on the shower floor. I hug my knees against my chest as I rock back and forth. As the water rains down upon me, I lose all sense of myself. I holler to a God I’m sure has forsaken me. My pleading and begging bring me to volatile state. Creating the destruction I have been caused becomes my ambition.

  I stand and slam my hands against the shower walls, throw the shampoo and conditioner bottles, grab the temperature handles as tight as I can and try to rip them free. Against my best attempts, they stay in tacked. I twist the water off, exit the shower and continue my rain of fury. Nothing escapes my grasp. I slam my blow dryer to the tile floor pleased with the pieces it breaks into. In one swift glide of my arm, I clear the countertop of its litter. I turn to the silver towel holder mounted above the toilet. I grunt, pull and yank with every ounce of vigor I possess. When it finally gives, taking a small piece of drywall off with it, I stumble backwards. By the time I catch my breath I am worn out and depleted of power.

  It’s by accident that I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. It turns my stomach. I am frail, much thinner than I remember and sickly pale. Through my wet nakedness, I despise the girl looking back at me, no life in her dull daunting eyes.

  “Kimber what’s going on in there? Are you ok?” Amber asks twisting the locked doorknob.

  I take a step back and thrust the towel holder towards the wan smile the image wears on my face. The impact sprays shards of glass towards me as I cover my head.

  “Kimber!” Amber yells pounding and kicking on the door.