Forever and Never

by Ella Fields

  I sighed. “Not going to happen.”

  Dash rolled his eyes. “Figured.”

  They were all leaving soon. Summer was ending. Within two weeks, every one of them would leave town and start the next chapter in their lives.

  I looked at my own next chapter and felt not an ounce of regret for not being able to join them. None of that anger, the injustice and terror I’d felt all those months ago lingered.

  Lily was my next chapter, and I wouldn’t let her down.

  “I can watch her.”

  I looked at Raven, finding he’d meant what he said. “Why?”

  He shoved his hand through his long dark hair. “So you can get out, remember what it is to live again.”

  “I’m living just fine.” I got up, taking Lily from Jackson when she began to fuss. Her head nuzzled into my neck as she grunted, her little legs bunching.

  “What is she doing?” Dash asked, eyes wide.

  “Probably pooping,” I said, kissing her head and inhaling her scent deep into my lungs.

  Jackson and Raven laughed, smacking Dash’s shoulder as they got up, and he continued to sit there, staring at my daughter like she was E fucking T.

  “The door’s that way, Dash, if you’d like to give her some privacy.”

  He blinked. “It’s about to stink real bad up in here, isn’t it?”

  I just laughed, then laughed harder as he slinked out the door before Raven and Jackson.

  The Escalade took off down the street, its black paint glinting, the envelope in my hand heavy. I’d already counted it. Fifty thousand for a car that wasn’t even six months old, but it would be enough to buy a cheaper car while the rest would go a long way in padding my bank account over the next few years while I finished my apprenticeship.

  Boyd had a friend who was selling a 1970s model Datsun, so I quickly sent him a text to tell him the Escalade was gone, and that I’d need it as soon as possible. It had its problems but still ran, and there was nothing I couldn’t fix during my breaks at work.

  Kicking my work boots off, I opened the door, excited to lay eyes on my baby girl.

  Done with school, Annika watched her during the day while I worked, but it was becoming more and more common for me to come home and find Lily asleep in Mom’s arms in her bed and Annika nowhere to be found.

  She’d come home from wherever she’d been, and we’d argue about how my mom needed to sleep during the day because she worked all fucking night, and about how Annika needed a social life or she was going to go insane.

  Around and around it went.

  Mom was off work tonight, so I wasn’t surprised to see her sitting on the couch, giving Lily a bottle as she read one of her books.

  Smiling at them, I pressed a kiss to both their heads and then traipsed into my room to stash the cash away inside a lockbox I kept hidden under a floorboard beneath my bed.

  I picked up a onesie, a burp cloth, and a dirty bottle, taking them to the laundry room and kitchen. Mom called my name.

  “One second.” I rinsed the bottle in hot water, left it to soak in the sink, then dried my hands on the towel while leaning against the entryway to the living room. “What’s up?”

  Mom didn’t even take her eyes off the page she was reading. “She’s gone, Lars.”

  The towel became a dead weight in my hands, falling to the floor. “What?”

  She said nothing else. She didn’t need to say who she was.

  Annika’s room was empty. Save for a few packs of wet wipes and discarded baby clothes on the end of the bed, any trace of her was gone.

  Rubbing my face, I slouched back against the door, feeling the handle dig into my lower back. Of course, I thought bitterly. Of fucking course.

  “There’s a note,” Mom said, coming to stand beside me with Lily on her hip.

  I took the envelope she held out and ripped it open, fury and fear shaking my hands as my eyes skimmed her pretty, blunt words.

  I’m sorry, Lars.

  I have to go.

  How many times could someone’s world fall apart before it became something completely unrecognizable? I was too afraid to count.

  “College.” I shook my head. “She’s gone to college.”

  “She told me some time ago that she’d been accepted into Dartmouth.” Mom shushed Lily when she squawked. “I should’ve heard the words she didn’t say.”

  I nodded. “She never said she wasn’t going.”

  Mom sighed. “Baby, I’m sorry. I never—”

  I raised my hand, straightening from the door. “I love you, Mom, but I don’t need to hear that shit right now.”

  She nodded, her eyes glassing as she patted my cheek. “Why don’t you head out tonight and go see your friends?”

  I took Lily from her, tucking her as close to my chest as feasibly possible, and headed to my room. “They’re all gone now.”

  Daphne

  Social media was one way to realize you could leave a life that wasn’t supposed to be yours behind, but if you chose to, you could still be an onlooker.

  I watched as she grew from a tiny newborn swaddled on Lars’s chest to a chubby infant, nestled in the crook of Annika’s hip while she smiled at the camera.

  Was Lars’s phone being used? Glenda’s? Or one of Annika’s friends?

  After a month at school had passed, and I barely remembered how I’d gotten to class, let alone what I was studying, I contemplated deleting all forms of social media from my phone. Yet I still hadn’t been able to bring myself to.

  “You need to go,” I told the guy who’d just rolled off me. I didn’t know his name, but that didn’t matter last night or this morning. And really, it didn’t matter much now either.

  He was still out of breath, panting and sweating beside me as I shut my thighs. “You don’t wanna grab some breakfast or something? The bacon and egg rolls are fucking awesome.”

  My stomach grumbled, but I pulled my duvet higher. I’d purchased a new one for college, black with gold specks dusting it. The color was growing on me. “No thanks.”

  The girl I was before this whole mess happened, before I made it happen, was still somewhere inside me. She just needed a little coaxing to come out of hiding. If that meant frat parties and willing males, then so be it.

  I was desperate enough to admit that I was. Desperate to move on, to heal, and to find myself again.

  Though trying to remember who I once had been was harder than I thought it’d be. Especially when that sinking feeling took hold, one that laughed and cackled and mocked, hinting that maybe, just maybe, I’d never really known who I was and what I’d wanted, after all. That maybe, I’d been finding her, but I’d left what I’d found in pieces on my bed back in Magnolia Cove.

  Pieces I refused to reclaim.

  The guy stood and shucked on his jeans, his long blond hair hanging around his shoulders and falling into his face as he zipped his fly. He grabbed his T-shirt, then shoved a hand through his hair as he grinned a deep dimpled smile at me.

  His teeth were imperfect but in an endearing way. His face was too angular, but in a way that screamed guitarist. Which was what had sealed the deal in the alcohol-infested frat kitchen.

  Biting blue eyes narrowed on my face before shifting around my room. “You like the Stones?”

  I glanced up at the Wild Horses lyrics I’d printed and scattered over a canvas of ripped up letters. One of my favorite things I’d created out of sheer insanity over summer break. “Yeah,” I rasped, my voice drained from lack of sleep.

  After glancing at the framed picture I kept beside my bed, the one Lars drew for me what felt like a lifetime ago, he nodded. “Right. Well, you’re fucking banging. So I hope there’s no regrets on your end.” He scraped a hand through his hair, his flat stomach shifting. “I’d love to fuck you again.”

  A shut down urged to spill free, but I held it back and grinned.

  With a chuckle, he winked, and murmured, “Later, beautiful. I hope.” The door shut behind hi
m, and I released a huge breath before throwing the duvet off and getting my things ready for a shower.

  I had a lunch date with my dad, and seeing as he was still being dragged through court by my desperate mother, hungover or not, I wasn’t flaking on him.

  I dressed in a violet button-down dress, slipped my feet into a pair of white heels, then quickly finished packing my overnight bag.

  I’d been home once already since starting college, but I’d told Dad I wasn’t coming home again until Mom had moved out. She’d taken her sweet time, but she was finally gone and apparently leasing a small villa across town.

  I stopped for coffee and gas, and heard my phone beep as I climbed back into my car.

  Dad: So sorry, got called in. Emergency. Dinner? I’ll cook.

  I laughed, then typed out a message.

  Me: No thanks. I’ll grab some things on my way and do it myself.

  Dad: Hmm. Let’s just order in.

  I rolled my eyes and set my phone down, thinking it was probably better we do just that. Especially due to my lack of sleep. I didn’t like my chances of still being on my feet for longer than a few more hours.

  Deciding I’d at least grab some dessert, I pulled into the tiny shopping village on the outskirts of the cove, sliding my sunglasses into my still damp hair as I hurried inside.

  Basket in hand, I grabbed some strawberries and grapes to snack on, as well as some yogurt, then skipped the other aisles, heading straight for the ice cream.

  I hadn’t been able to eat Ben and Jerry’s for months, but that ended today.

  I grabbed two tubs and dumped them in the basket, my breath sailing out of me, deflating my chest completely, when I turned and almost ran into a stroller.

  “Shit, sorry.” I straightened and went to smile down at the kid, and then my heart plummeted to the marked floor.

  Pink rosy cheeks, chocolate brown eyes, a full head of medium brown hair, and a gummy smile stared back at me.

  Lily tried to shove her foot into her mouth. Meanwhile, I was trying to force my heart back down my throat.

  Seeing the maroon Vans and the denim jeans wrapped around the ankles above them, I stumbled back a step without daring to look at him.

  His low laugh stalked me as I turned and fled up the aisle. “That’s right, do what you do best. Run the fuck away.”

  His words were a wall of drying concrete sliding in front of me, gluing my feet to the floor.

  I spun back, tears burning my nose and eyes, and glared at him. Yet the intensity dripped away. My anger, hurt, that fucking guilt—all of it slipped away as I took in his somber dark eyes. As I beheld that resolute cut to his jaw and his broad, tense, muscular frame. His hair was shorter on the sides now but still had length to the top, the thick brown strands standing to the side.

  Longing flooded, fierce and hungry, as I took a few steps toward him, and swallowed.

  His stubble covered jaw tightened, and he looked down at Lily when she squealed, her chubby legs in the air.

  Watching her, I felt the coldest parts of me warm, and couldn’t help but say, “She’s so beautiful.”

  There were a million other things I wanted to say. Where was Annika? Were they together? Had they even tried? Did Lily sleep well or was he constantly tired? Was she healthy? She looked it to me, but I knew virtually nothing about babies. Only that I never wanted one bursting out of my hoochie. Ever.

  Lars said nothing, but when I went to touch her, my hand reaching and my smile growing impossibly huge while Lily gurgled to me, he turned around and stalked off.

  “Lars,” I called, walking after him. “Wait.”

  He didn’t. He continued on as if I hadn’t said anything. As if I hadn’t laid everything down just to call his name.

  As if he didn’t even care at all.

  That wasn’t true, though. Judging by the way he’d stared at me, he did care. Possibly too much. Possibly with more hatred than anything that resembled love.

  Though it should’ve, it didn’t deter me. If anything, it fueled me enough to drive to his house after I’d dropped off my bag of groceries at home.

  Inside my car, I steeled myself, berated myself, and argued with myself.

  Why was I even here?

  But I knew why.

  I still loved him. I was beginning to think I would carry that love with me for the rest of my days. Maybe we never would’ve worked out, and it wasn’t in the cards for us. That didn’t mean I could ignore that intrinsic part of me that needed to know he was okay.

  It’d been months. He had to be okay. Only, there was a quiet hum that reverberated off him that sang a different tune.

  Friends. I pondered whether it could be possible for people like us to be friends. Our volatile history suggested otherwise, but staring at his house, at the old car in his drive with no sign of the one I’d bought for him, had me muttering, “To hell with history.”

  I wouldn’t be able to head back to school until I knew he was okay. Not now that I’d seen him. Seen the darkness that lined the bottom of his depthless eyes, and the rigid, tense set to his body. It radiated off him in waves that would exhaust someone just to stand next to him.

  I knocked, light and swift on the door, but there was no answer.

  I could hear Lily screaming inside, and as I went to knock once more, I decided that now was probably a bad time. Being a Saturday, he’d probably been at work all morning, too.

  I took the steps down to his driveway, Lily’s wails growing louder behind me.

  And then I raced back up them and let myself inside.

  He was pacing the house, his groceries abandoned on the dining table, some probably melting.

  “What the fuck, Daphne?” he said, flinching and stilling when he saw me standing there. Lily wailed again, her tiny fists trying to squeeze into her mouth as Lars tried to give her the bottle she didn’t want to take. “Do you always make a habit of walking into random guys’ houses?”

  “Come now.” I smirked. “You’re not just any random guy,” I said, wincing as he tried to give Lily the bottle again. “She doesn’t want it,” I said. “Here.” Wanting to hold her, I stretched out my arms. “Let me try.”

  A gruff burst of laughter lit his eyes. “And what would you know? You’re not her mom, you’re sure as shit not my girlfriend, and you’re not even fucking welcome here.” I did my best not to flinch as my chest cracked wide open, and he waved at the door, turning for the kitchen. “So do us both a favor by seeing yourself out.”

  “Where is her mom?” No answer. “Lars?” My eyes roamed, and when he still refused to answer me, I went to the spare room, rocks filling my stomach as I opened the door and found it empty.

  The bed remained and so did the orange bedding, tucked tight to the single mattress. There was a lamp on the nightstand, a pen, and some baby things against the far wall, but nothing of Annika remained.

  Lars’s voice hit my back and my heart. “Gone. As you should be.”

  Spinning around, I grappled for something to say.

  Everyone had left. Everyone.

  Including me.

  The only remaining constants in his life were Glenda and Lily. Lily who was finally settling against his chest, her head snug beneath his chin and her fist in her mouth as her eyes struggled to stay open.

  As if he could read that knowledge on my face, Lars backed up a step, a caustic laugh rolling out from deep in his chest. “No, you don’t get to come here and look at me like that. You don’t get to be here at all. Go, Daphne. I mean it.”

  I tilted my head. “Look at you like what?”

  “Like you give a fuck. We both know you don’t. You forfeited that right when you fucked my sperm donor.”

  “I never fucked him.” A pointless admission but it came out anyway.

  Lars wiped a hand over his chin, and I saw a glimpse of black beneath his Henley sleeve. A tattoo. “I’m not doing this with you. Please,” he rasped, sounding drained. “Please, just leave.” He moved to his r
oom, where I assumed Lily’s crib was.

  It was the defeat in his voice that had me acquiescing and wiping a rogue tear from my cheek.

  Being there was insane. Was I fucking crazy? Certifiable, probably. Not to mention stupid. So stupid.

  A rattling breath left me, and I stopped in the doorway to peer over my shoulder, wanting one last look at this place. At the space where I’d lost and found myself.

  Another tear fell when I blinked at Lars, who was leaning over the dining table, his shoulders hunched and his head hanging low between them.

  Lars

  Was I too harsh?

  Absolutely.

  Did I care?

  Absolutely fucking not.

  The last thing I needed was Daphne barreling back into my life only to destroy it all over again.

  It wouldn’t just affect me now. I had another person to consider before I ever thought about letting another woman into my life, and it sure as shit wouldn’t be one who consistently made it her mission to taunt, tempt, and terrorize my heart.

  In fact, given my track record, I was better off to continue as I was, stealing a quick fuck when I could, and I was content to do so.

  Boyd’s steel cap boots appeared in my line of vision. “Mackillop is coming by at two to pick up.”

  I pushed with my feet, rolling out from beneath the undercarriage of Mackillop’s Audi. “He needs a new timing belt.”

  Boyd cursed up a storm. “When did you find this out?”

  “About two minutes ago,” I said, thumb twisting the rungs on my wrench. “I need to piss, so I’ll call him.”

  Boyd looked grateful, scrubbing his chest-long beard as he nodded, then walked back to the truck he’d been working on.

  Mackillop was the town priest, and he was a stickler when it came to money and his precious fucking car. Over half the people in this town needed to wise up to the fact that if they wanted to keep buying expensive as hell European cars, then they’d better be prepared for the expensive as hell upkeep too.