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hands,
and it was explosive. She hurled the phone at the
wall with a crack and shatter. That felt so
good that she picked up the little, wooden chair and
threw it too. Next, a plastic cup, and the alarm
clock was torn from the wall socket.
    Anything
she could get her hands on.
    She sobbed, and ripped the comforter
off the bed, and then the pillows, and the sheets.
Anything to feel her muscles stretch,
to feel her fists clench.
    And then Jack's
arms were around her, but she fought his embrace.
She hadn't heard him come into the room.
She hadn't heard him shout her name.
     
     
    “Amy!” He said, pleading with her. Any
more of this and she was going to break something other
than the objects she'd hurled around the room.
    The broken room,
he could deal with. A broken Amy,
he wasn't so sure.
    “I want to hit something,” she sobbed.
The rage was physical and reverberated off her
body.
    “Then hit me,” Jack
offered.
    “No!” she cried, unable to calm
down.
    He pulled her tighter to his chest, but
still she resisted. She stomped her feet and her fists
clenched and unclenched. He picked her up, with difficulty, and
took her to the bathroom. She sobbed uncontrollably. The
sounds coming out of her were more animal-like than
human.
    “What...
the hell... are... you doing?” she screamed in
between sobs.
    He pulled her down to the floor of the
bathtub with him and held her to his chest, making sure the
shower's spray landed on her face as he smoothed her hair
back.
    “I got you,” he urged her, bringing her
as close to his body as he could.
    Slowly, her shudders became muted and
far between. But she still cried.
    “You're sneakers,” she said after a
while. “They're getting wet. They are wet.”
    “They'll dry.”
    “What if they get moldy?” she
sobbed again.
    “I don't
think that's how it works,” he assured
her.
    She started to shiver from her cold,
wet clothes.
    They were too big for the
tub. Well, he was too big for the tub. She sat
between his thighs and his chin rested on the top of her head. His
arms lay across her chest, and her hands held his
forearms. She'd shifted her face into his chest, so the
water wasn't hitting her as much.
    He never wanted to leave the bathtub,
which is why he knew they had to leave
the bathtub. He pulled her away from his body.
“Let's get out before you get sick.”
    She nodded and stood, a final shudder
rippling through her body. He drew a towel around her shoulders and
took one for himself as well. She stole sidelong glances of him and
squeezed the water out of her hair. He, on the other hand, stared
right at her. He thought she'd calmed down,
but it was hard to say.
    He stood as he removed his sneakers.
“I'm going to leave these here to dry. Okay?”
    She nodded.
    “You're not going to throw them around
or anything, right?”
    She laughed first,
but then tears were streaming down her face
again.
    “Too soon? Come on, don't cry.
I was kidding.”
    “I know,” she said, exiting the
bathroom.
    “Why don't you lie down for a little?”
he suggested, emerging from the bathroom behind
her.
    To be honest, he thought he needed
to lie down for a little too. They surveyed the
damage in the room together. The phone and the alarm
clock were the only things broken. He'd buy his
roommate a new alarm clock.
    “Jack...”
    “Don't say it,” he
warned.
    “Jack, I'm sorry.”
    “Don't apologize; rest.”
    She nodded, and he left her room to
give her privacy.
    The door closed with an audible thud
behind him. He hadn't wanted to leave her alone,
but it was the right thing to do. He wouldn't rest,
but would instead sit in the living room and think.
    He fought the urge to blame himself.
He wasn't one hundred percent sure he had a
handle on the context of the phone call, but one
thing was clear: her family was not
well. He'd gone through enough therapy
to know and