Embracing It

Mark rode at a gallop, laughing with the unguarded glee usually reserved for children or the mentally handicapped. The Alabama heat was thick enough that he felt like he was riding through pudding as the mare flicked between trees, but he didn't care - it was home. Some part of his brain knew that this wasn't right, that there was no jolly white mare in his world, but he ignored it. He ducked under a treebranch, and it smacked off his suede cowboy hat, letting shoulder-length black hair fly out behind him.1

"Shit!" he chuckled, swinging the horse around.2

"Calm down, Sunshine, I've got it!" A girl called as she ran into sight on a chipper brown horse, waving his hat in the air. It was like looking at a slightly more effiminate mirror image of himself, the grin and bright blue eyes taking up her entire pixielike face.3

"Thank you, darlin'!" he called, waiting for her to toss his hat like a Frisbee before catching it and settling it back atop his head.4

"You never could avoid those damn trees," she teased, her own Southern drawl thick and sweet as honey as she pulled up next to him and they sped up to jump a creek before slowing to a walk. 5

"Yeah, I know," he laughed. "But I didn't get knocked off this time." 6

"Good thing. I'd hate to have to pull your winded ass up here now. It was one thing when you were eight, but..." she shook her head at the prospect, giggling. He stuck his tongue out.7

"You can bite me," he retorted, then shook his head. "Good times, good times." They rode on in silence, and between the tree trunks, Mark saw his parents' grand plantation house in the distance. He sighed as they passed into the clearing, and looked back over at the girl with a small, sad smile.8

"I wish I didn't know that you weren't really here," he sighed. She reached over and gave his shoulder an affectionate shove.9

"No, you don't. It's like that Mark Doty poem you always loved: 'Bless you. You came back, so I could see you / once more, plainly, so I could rest against you / without thinking this happiness lessened anything, / without thinking you were alive again.' You would have hated me if it was any other way," she pointed out, leaning in until her face filled his vision. "You hate pretenders," she whispered, pulling back and situating herself. The horses, and the woods, were gone. They were back in his room, simple powder blue walls and a tiwn bed with a no-frills navy comforter they were both lounging on. He was on his side, and she rested comfortably against him, back nestled in his hips as her feet traced lazy circles in the air. He absent-mindedly toyed with her chin-length hair.10

"I liked this cut on you a lot," he commented. She smiled, and nodded.11

"I know. And dad didn't, which made it all the better," she pointed out with a wicked grin. Mark couldn't help but smile - she'd gotten away with everything.12

"God, Lisbeth, I miss you so much sometimes. I haven't been back here, did you know that?" She nodded.13

"Sure didn't pick up that Yankee accent around here. You know, here are a lot of things you never picked up on around here," she commented, sitting up and turning to face him. With a start that almost tore him awake, Mark realised he was naked, and grabbed his pillow to cover himself.14

"What the hell, Lisbeth?!" he gasped as he realised that she, too, was unclothed. She grinned her patented Chesire-cat grin.15

"I told you. I'm through pretending," she explained, leaning towards him with a half-open mouth. He grabbed her forearms, holding her away.16

"You're my sister!"17

"So?!" she demanded, face turning stormy. Mark just blinked at her.18

"So, it's wrong!"19

"Funny," his father's voice came from the doorway. "We thought you didn't have any standards anymore. Put your damn clothes on!" Mark glanced at his father, wearing the suit he'd last seen him in, and scrambled to his feet as his mother stumbled into the doorway, clad in that simple black dress he'd left her in.20

"Oh, Frank!" she gasped, and broke out into tears, throwing her arms around her husband. Mark glanced into the mirror on his dresser and saw a drag queen staring back, garish makeup over a hideous pink dress. The room faded to that reflection. Mark watched as Lisbeth came up behind him, her clothes tattered rags on a bony frame, and placed rotting hands on his shoulders. Her cornbread and iced tea voice was the cool, accentless creation his had become as she pressed bare bone against his ear, dried ligament popping as she quoted,21

"Why so difficult remembering the actual look / of you?"22