Forever Mark

by Jessyca Thibault

  I shrugged my shoulders. “That’s cool,” I added.

  Kellen laughed. “I see right through that shrug, Carson. You care. I know you do.”

  How? How was he so sure of that when I wasn’t even sure of that?

  “Anyways,” Kellen said. “There’s just one thing left to do – write a letter to someone that’s hurt you.”

  I pointed to my computer. “I should write to that place and tell them they’re application is hurting my self-esteem.”

  “Ha ha,” Kellen said. “I wouldn’t write ‘funny’ down as a quality that best describes you.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I have an excellent sense of humor,” I said. “I’m dating you, aren’t I?”

  “Damn, don’t hold back,” Kellen said, grinning. “But seriously, I was thinking… maybe you could write a letter to your dad.”

  I could feel the walls of my throat close in on each other. “My father’s, um… dead,” I managed to squeeze out.

  “I know,” Kellen said. “But the letter isn’t really for him, it’s for you. It’s for you to get out all of the anger you have towards him.”

  There wasn’t a piece of paper big enough for that.

  “I’ll think about it,” I said. I wanted to get as far away from that topic as possible.

  “I’m sorry for bringing it up,” Kellen said sympathetically. “I didn’t want to make you upset. We don’t have to talk about your dad anymore.”

  “Thanks.”

  I was such a fake. I was a fake, I was a phony, and I was a fraud. There I was sitting and lying to Kellen’s face and he was the one that apologized to me. I made myself sick.

  “Do you want to take a break?” Kellen asked. “We can do something fun – no college stuff, no family stuff, no lists.”

  “That sounds perfect,” I said. A break from everything was exactly what I needed. Maybe a change of scenery would bring my confidence back up so I could tell Kellen what I really wanted to tell him. Because in that moment I was about as ready to say “I love you” as I was to jump into a pool of sharks.

  Actually, right then I was a little more ready to take on the sharks.

  “Cool,” Kellen said, smiling at me. He leaned over and kissed my forehead.

  There he went again, being so wonderful.

  “I just have to run to the bathroom and then we’ll get out of here,” he said.

  As Kellen walked out of the room I took a deep breath. I was grateful for a minute alone so I could pull myself together. I needed to just file my father in that little corner in the very back of my mind where I usually kept him. Today was about Kellen and I and I’d be damned if I let that sorry excuse of a parent screw it up.

  I heard the lock on the front door click and I turned. I frowned as my mom walked into the living room. That was weird. She had said she’d be at the bakery late today.

  “Don’t talk to me like that,” she said, shutting the door.

  “I haven’t even said anything.” Under my breath I added, “God, why not wait five seconds before you start in on me.”

  My mom turned at the sound of my voice and I saw that she was on the phone. Oops, guess I wasn’t the one getting told off this time.

  I turned around and shut my computer down. It was none of my business who else my mom yelled at. Better them than me, right?

  “Do not talk to me about your rights,” my mom practically spit out as she walked across the room.

  Dang, somebody had made her mad. I could practically hear the venom dripping out of her mouth. She didn’t even use that tone with me. I’d only ever heard one person bring my mom to that point, that point where she sounded like she might stab a knife right through said person’s face.

  “Stop yelling. It is not my fault she didn’t answer her phone. Can you blame her?”

  I looked over at my mom, who was looking back at me. Was this about me? I picked my phone up off the coffee table. I’d had it on silent ever since Kellen got there. Three missed calls. One from my mom and two from –

  “Julian, I came home, okay? But it’s up to her whether or not she wants to talk to you.”

  My father, who was very much alive.

  Of course Kellen had chosen to come out of the bathroom right then, at the exact moment that my life exploded into a billion pieces. There were fragments of my childhood strewn across the floor, remnants of my teen years splashed on the walls. Oh look, there was the chip in the kitchen tiling from when my father had ripped the telephone out of the wall and smashed it against the floor because I’d called him stupid. And over there was the faded stain on the wall, a souvenir from the time he’d thrown that bowl of spaghetti during one of his drunken rages – that same bowl that had been haunting my dreams for years.

  Everywhere I looked there was another bad memory. Everything that I’d buried deep inside, all the skeletons I’d hidden away – they’d all come out. And they looked ten times scarier. The chip in the floor was widening into a fissure before my eyes. The stain was turning into a black hole that was threatening to swallow me up.

  “Carson?” I heard Kellen ask from a distance. “Are you okay?”

  The room was spinning and I felt like I was drowning. Why did this have to happen today?

  “Julian, you’re upsetting her. She doesn’t want to talk.”

  I had to get out of there.

  “Prove it? I’m sorry, would you prefer a video of your daughter hyperventilating on the couch or will a picture suffice?”

  No. Daughter. Not daughter.

  I got up from the couch and stumbled around the coffee table. I saw Kellen step towards me but I waved him away. I had no idea how I was going to make my way up the stairs, but my gut was telling me that’s where I had to go. Maybe my gut wanted me to slip, tumble down the stairs, and break my neck. It sounded like something my gut would want.

  “No, I’m not telling her that,” my mom said. Then I heard her sigh. “Carson, your father would like me to tell you that if you don’t get on the phone he’s going to come here in person.”

  That did it. That’s what snapped me back to reality. I balled my hands into fists at my sides, my nails digging into my skin. My vision went red. I spun around and walked towards my mother, grabbing her phone from her ear.

  “Fuck off,” were the only words I said to my father.

  Chapter 40

  In the Silent Noise

  The silence is deafening

  All I can hear is the static fuzz

  Bouncing around my eardrums

  All the words that aren’t being spoken

  The things that aren’t being said

  Everything screams

  In the silent noise

  Everything is loud

  In the silent noise

  The lack of sound is too much

  But not enough

  All at the same time

  And I can’t comprehend how this can be

  I just want the silence

  To be quiet, peaceful

  I just want the silence to shut up

  I wondered how long you could keep yourself locked in a bathroom before everyone forgot you existed.

  Five minutes and forty-two seconds went by and Kellen was still knocking on the door so I was assuming it took more than five minutes and forty-two seconds.

  I was too angry to do anything but sit there and count the time. Every few seconds though, Kellen knocked on the door and threw my counting off, which just pissed me off. It shouldn’t have pissed me off – I mean, this wasn’t Kellen’s fault – but it did. Everything pissed me off and I literally felt my blood boiling beneath my skin.

  That was one of the reasons I couldn’t leave the bathroom. I was afraid if I did I’d start tearing the walls down. I’d already thrown my mom’s cell phone across the kitchen. I’d stayed in the room long enough to watch it hit the refrigerator and then I was gone. I think it was safe to say my mom’s phone probably didn’t work anymore. She couldn’t be too happ
y about that but I hadn’t heard her start screaming so either she was too in shock or she was actually relieved that my outburst got my father to shut up. Maybe she’d been planning on burning the phone anyways, like how she’d burned his clothes after he left. Maybe she was waiting to yell at me, waiting until I’d had time to get out of the danger zone. She knew at the moment I was a loose cannon.

  Kellen didn’t know this though – he couldn’t know this. He didn’t understand the genes I was born with, the blood that ran through my veins.

  I was my father’s daughter.

  And that was scary, which is why I had to keep myself in this bathroom, safely away from everyone.

  But if that boy knocked on the door one more time I thought I might rip the whole thing off its hinges.

  I clutched my hands to the side of my head, covering my ears. I just wanted to block everything out, but it didn’t work. Nothing worked. Nothing could stop the thoughts zooming through my head.

  Why did my father call? What could he possibly have to say to me? What was so important that he had my mom drive all the way home to get me? And why did it have to be today of all days, a day when Kellen was over?

  I knew my father’s threat was empty. He never had any intention of coming over here. He’d just been trying to intimidate me. Controlling through fear – that was dear old dad’s specialty. And that right there got my blood boiling again. The fact that that man – that total deadbeat – thought he had the right to control me, the right to demand respect because, what? He was around for a few seconds to sign my birth certificate when I screamed my way onto this planet? Sorry, buddy, but a phony title didn’t get you respect. Not in my book.

  Give him a few minutes and he’d probably be so wasted that he completely forgot the phone call. That was his other specialty – boozing the memories away. If only we could all forget.

  The thoughts wouldn’t stop. The knocking wouldn’t stop. I could feel myself cracking. I was going to lose it. Tears began streaming down my face, which made me angrier. I was sure my father would love this. Whether he remembered the call or not, he’d take great pleasure in knowing that he was the one that broke me.

  Something snapped. It was happening. All at once it was happening and before I could do anything to stop myself, I was up on my feet and flinging the door open.

  “Go away!” I screamed.

  I vaguely made out the outline of Kellen standing in front of me, but I couldn’t get a clear picture of him. There were too many tears and too much rage clouding my vision.

  “Carson, I just want to talk!”

  He didn’t sound mad. Why didn’t he sound mad? That just made me even angrier.

  “What part of ‘go away’ makes you think I want to talk?” I yelled, pushing past Kellen and heading for my room.

  I went to slam the door in his face, but there was no door because my mom had taken the stupid thing down so I wouldn’t slam doors, so Kellen was free to follow me in. I walked over to my window, then walked away. I paced back and forth in my room, not sure of where to go or what to do. I wanted something sharp. I needed something to take some of this pain out of me. I needed Kellen to leave so I could find something to make this all go away. But he didn’t seem to be going anywhere. He walked over to me and I started to back away, but then his hands were on my shoulders. I looked down, avoiding his eyes. I felt like if I really looked at him he might actually pull me out of it and I didn’t know if that’s what I wanted this time.

  Kellen took his hand and gently stroked my cheek. “Carson,” he said. “Please talk to me.”

  I pulled away and turned around. I wanted to stay mad. I needed to stay mad. The alternative wasn’t a road I wanted to go down.

  “I thought you said your father was dead,” I heard him say behind me.

  “He is dead,” I said, my voice void of emotion. “To me anyways.”

  “We said no more secrets.”

  “I know!” I shouted, spinning around. “Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I’m already beating myself up about that? I wanted to tell you, okay. The timing just wasn’t right. There isn’t exactly a smooth segue to ‘Hey, guess what, my father’s actually not dead I just wish he was.’”

  Kellen just stared at me for a second. “I’m not trying to punish you, Carson. I just want you to talk to me,” he said. “I don’t want you to shut down on me.”

  “Talk about what?” I asked. “So my father called for the first time in years. So? I don’t even care, okay. Just drop it.”

  “Why do you always do that?” Kellen asked. For the first time since I came out of the bathroom I could hear frustration in his voice.

  Good. An argument. That was what I needed.

  “Always do what?” I spat back. Part of me wondered why I was egging Kellen on. Was I trying to drive a wedge between us?

  Maybe.

  But why?

  “Downplay your feelings,” Kellen said, his voice rising. “Why can’t you just admit that you’re hurt and then we can figure out how to fix things?”

  “Because I’m not hurt!” I yelled back. “And there’s nothing to fix! Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not some broken toy for you to put back together.”

  “I never said you were.”

  “Then stop acting like I’m going to shatter into a million pieces. I don’t want to cry over a person that never gave a shit about me,” I yelled, wiping my face furiously. I hated my stupid eyeballs for contradicting me.

  Kellen’s face softened, which just made me more upset. He probably thought I was some fragile little girl.

  “Being vulnerable doesn’t make you weak. It makes you human. It makes you real, Carson.”

  I waited until the tears stopped flowing. I wiped my face one last time. “Then I guess I’m not real.”

  “You know, you’re only hurting yourself more by not saying how you feel. People won’t know that they’re hurting you unless you tell them and they can’t try to make things right unless you give them the chance.”

  I laughed. It was a harsh and cold laugh. “My father did not call to make things right.”

  “You never know. I would listen to what he has to say.”

  “Well I’m not you,” I said, glaring at him. “And that’s easy for you to say. Your father is dead.”

  I knew I stepped over a line. Trampled over it and threw it to a pack of wolves was more like it. I could see the pain all over his face, the shock that I’d said something like that.

  “Wow,” he said. “That’s real nice, Carson. I didn’t think you were like that.”

  “Well maybe that’s your problem. Have you ever considered that maybe I really am just a major bitch? Maybe there isn’t more to me than that. Maybe what you see is exactly what you get.”

  “I never saw you as a major bitch, Carson.’

  “Then maybe you need to get your eyes checked.”

  “Look, I get that you’re mad,” Kellen said. “But you’re not mad at me. You’re mad at your dad. So stop taking it out on me.” He took the Happy List out of his pocket. “I was here for you, okay. I was here for you for all of this. Let me be here for you now.”

  I knew he was trying to be patient, trying to be calm, but I wished he wouldn’t. I felt more of a release when I wasn’t the only one who was letting their anger take over. I knew I was acting irrationally and I knew I wasn’t making sense, but I didn’t want Kellen to point that out. I didn’t want him to say he was there for me. I wanted a screaming match.

  “Right about now I am mad at you. And would you stop with this stupid list,” I said. I walked across the room and took the list from Kellen. I crumpled it into a ball and threw it across the room. “I don’t care about that list.”

  I saw the patience fade away again and I got this twisted sense of victory. Then all of a sudden all of the control he’d been trying to keep – even when he was frustrated the control was still there – went right out the window. Kellen took his baseball cap off and threw i
t across the room. It hit the wall above my bed.

  “God, Carson. Why do you have to act like such a – ”

  “Like such a what?” I yelled.

  “Nothing, I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “Yes, you did,” I said. “Act like such a what, Kellen? An asshole? Well guess what, maybe I am an asshole. But guess what, so are you. We’re both assholes. But you know what the difference is between us? I’m upfront about the fact that I’m an asshole. I don’t claim to be anything else. You do though. You pretend to be nice but really you’re just as much of an asshole as me. Actually, you’re worse. I don’t make people believe I care about them when I don’t. You do and I was stupid enough to fall for it.”

  I was trying to drive a wedge between us and I finally realized why. It was because that was what I did.

  I destroyed things before they could destroy me.

  “Are you really going back to that?” Kellen asked, shaking his head. “Carson, how long are you going to punish me for that? I apologized about what happened with Kinsley and I told you it was nothing. But I never pretended with you. Can’t you see how crazy I am about you?” He took a step towards me. “I love you, damn it. Even though you make it so difficult, I still love you, Carson. What more do you want?”

  I wanted to be able to stop – stop arguing, stop pushing Kellen away, stop all of this. But I couldn’t stop. It was my instinct to fight, to bring out my claws when I felt backed into a corner. It was how I’d had to live my life. How could I just be expected to stop now?

  “I don’t want anything from you. Or anyone else.” I knew I was lying and I heard a small voice in my head telling me to just say it.