“Please…leave…I can’t…do this anymore.”
My parents try to comfort me again, but it just makes things worse. Eventually, Jackson manages to push them out of the door.
“If you ask if I’m okay, I’m going to scream,” I warn him when he turns off the lights.
He nods and sits down in my mom’s chair, taking my hand in his. I want to push him away, but I don’t.
6
Jackson
When we give her space…
I’ve always thought that the coffee in a hospital would come from a vending machine, along with stale M&M’s that crack in two halves as soon as I bite down on them even a little bit.
But when I head downstairs to get Harley some tea, I am pleasantly surprised to find a beautiful Starbucks with a quirky green couch and plenty of millennials glued to their laptops at the bar.
It’s almost as if this place is in West Village rather than a hospital.
I get behind two young doctors who look like they’ve worked a thirty-hour shift. When one of them grabs her latte, she laughs and says that she needs to have this put into an IV drip.
The other one asks for a green tea and mentions that too much caffeine makes her jittery.
I see Harley’s parents sitting by the window at the far end of the coffee shop and they wave me over.
I gesture that I have to get my drink first and secretly hope that it takes as long as possible.
It’s not that I don’t want to see them or talk to them.
It’s that I don’t really know how much I should or shouldn’t say about the true nature of Harley’s condition.
I know that she did not tell them about the baby and I don’t feel like it’s my place to tell them.
Yet, I have grown close to them throughout everything that we have been through. And that makes me feel like by not telling them the truth that I am lying.
I order an espresso, two shots.
Since I’m going to drink it with them, I decide to order her tea when I’m about to head back up.
“Thanks for coming,” I say, sitting down at the end of a square table. Harold and Leslie are sitting across from one another, nursing their drinks.
“Thank you for telling us. And for the flight, of course,” Harold says.
A half-eaten croissant rests in the middle of the table. Leslie offers me some, but Harold asks if he can get me my own. I decline both offers.
“It’s the least I could do.”
“No, the least you could’ve done is not bother calling us at all, not booking us on a private plane leaving an hour after the call,” Harold points out. It sounds like a joke, but I don’t think it is.
“You are Harley’s parents and I consider you…family.”
The word takes me by as much of a surprise as it seems to take them.
Leslie wipes her eye with the back of her hand, placing her other on mine and giving it a small squeeze.
Unsure as to what we should talk about besides the reason why we are here, I ask them about work.
“Busy as always,” Leslie says. “The police department doesn’t exactly run itself.”
“I’m glad you were able to get time off to come here.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“What about you, Harold?”
“The kids are keeping me busy.”
“You’re back to teaching?”
“Retirement isn’t exactly my thing. There was an opening for a substitute. It was only supposed to last a week but the teacher is having some personal problems so I’ll be filling in for her until next year.”
“Are you happy to be busy?”
“Of course. Besides, it’s not like I have much to come back to. My new wife here tends to work over eighty hours a week.”
Leslie smiles at him and I can feel the love that emanates from both of them.
“So, what about the ranch? Any plans yet?”
“Oh my God, of course!” Leslie says excitedly. “We had plans drawn up and we’re going to build it to look just like the old house. An exact replica.”
“Wow, that’s…brave.”
Perhaps, there’s a better word for it but one doesn’t come to mind.
A long time ago, they lost everything they ever loved there.
It wasn’t the physical house that they had lost.
No, that fire also took their youngest child, their marriage, and even a relationship with their older child.
Not everyone would pick at those wounds again in their position. But Leslie and Harold are stronger than they may even know.
They dared to take a chance on each other again and through this love they were able to reconnect with Harley.
And now, they are rebuilding their dream once again.
“Thank you for that, Jackson. Thank you very much,” Harold says. “It means a lot that you see what we are doing.”
The conversation drifts to other topics including my work and the weather. It seems as though we will talk about just about anything, except Harley.
Finally, Harold broaches the subject and I repeat what I told them on speakerphone when I first called.
I go over the scene in as much detail as I can, mainly for Leslie’s sake.
I know that she is looking at this as a law enforcement officer with many years of experience.
So, the more I tell her, the more useful she can be.
“Can you describe the man on the bike?” Leslie asks me. She had already asked this question in a few different ways before but I answer it again without a tinge of annoyance.
“Slender or thin. He was wearing all black clothing. His face was covered in a ski mask. Black also. I only saw him get on the bike so I didn’t get a good look when he was right there.”
“Do you think it was Parker?”
“He looks like the man who I saw, but I can’t say for sure. What I do know for sure is that he was behind this.”
“How do you know?” Leslie asks.
“He’s the one who has been stalking her. Who else would it be?”
“But why did he kill Martin?” Harold asks.
7
Jackson
When I explain…
I stare at him. I have no answer to that. I didn’t know the answer when Leslie asked me this earlier.
I didn’t know the answer when Detective Richardson and the other detectives who had taken my statement asked me. All I can do is make a supposition.
“Maybe he was trying to kill Harley and missed. Maybe he wanted to kill Martin as some sort of threat. I have no idea.”
Both sound reasonable, but ridiculous at the same time. This is a man who has been obsessed with Harley for years.
Why kill her now?
The kidnapping at least made sense.
“But why would he want her dead?” I ask Leslie who just shakes her head.
“The reason why stalkers are so dangerous is that they do not understand or care about people’s boundaries. If you tell a normal person that you do not want them in your life then they accept that and walk away. But a stalker doesn’t. And Parker has been given a lot of chances throughout all this time. Mostly by the system.”
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“Law enforcement needs to learn to take stalking more seriously. Parker was stalking someone who was originally a stranger who then morphed into this bigger than life person for him. But there are many different types of stalking. Stalking is very common in domestic abuse situations,” Leslie explains.
“Like an ex-husband?” Harold asks.
“Everyone jokes about stalking their exes on the internet, and that is one mild form of it. But some people start to take it too far. They follow their exes or their current spouses. They trespass boundaries like taking their phone without their permission. Check up on them all the time. It’s a very common thing and it can easily get out of control.”
Harold and I nod as we listen.
“So, why do you think this hap
pened?” I ask after a moment. “Why did he kill Martin?”
She doesn’t answer at first.
When she finally looks up at me, our eyes meet and I see fear in hers. It takes me aback because I’ve never seen her this way before. She’s not outwardly scared. She isn’t shaking.
She is cowering in fear. Her shoulders are straight across, broadened as if in defiance.
But somewhere behind the strong police officer facade there is real fear within her.
“I think it was a threat. He likes to play games and he likes to challenge himself,” she says quietly. “I don’t think he aimed the gun at Harley at all, I think he aimed his bike at her. And by killing Martin, he wanted to send her a message.”
“What kind of message?” Harold asks.
“That he’s still around, watching. Lurking. He doesn’t want her to forget about him.”
When she says that, my body reacts as if its ejected itself from its seat.
I rise up so fast that my knee collides with the table, nearly knocking the coffee cups onto the floor. I walk out into the hallway for some air and space.
Luckily, the foyer out front is vacant and I have some space to meander. I clench my jaw and ball up my fists until they physically hurt.
When will there be the end of this?
How much more must she endure?
The initial faith that I had in the police department and the FBI is all but gone. They are either useless or just don’t give a shit.
No, it’s time to take this into my own hands. I will forever blame myself for letting this happen to my child but I will not allow anything more to happen to my wife.
The word wife stops me mid-step.
Of course, she’s not my wife. She’s barely my girlfriend, and yet there doesn’t seem to be a more appropriate word for how I feel about her.
One day she will be my wife, but until that happens, she will be safe. I will make sure of it.
“Jackson!” Harold calls my name, walking up to me. “Look what they’re saying online.”
He hands me his phone and I read the headline and skim the article that follows. Isolated phrases jump out at me.
* * *
Recluse Billionaire of New York’s bodyguard shot in the head
* * *
Jackson Ludlow loses unborn child in attack
* * *
Minetta founder’s bodyguard and unborn child killed by bicycle messenger assassin
* * *
When I look away from the phone, Harley’s parents stand before me looking for an explanation.
I open my mouth but no words come out.
“What do they mean by unborn child?” Harold asks quietly, taking the phone away from me.
I could lie.
I could tell them that they are mistaken.
That the papers often get stuff wrong. But to what end? What would be the point?
Harley didn’t tell them about the baby yet, but she probably would at some point.
“Harley was pregnant,” I say slowly, feeling the weight of each word in my mouth.
“Why didn’t you…tell us?” Leslie asks.
“I didn’t know for a while. I had a business thing going on and it put Harley in danger so I thought it would be best if we took a break.”
It’s hard to know where to begin and end with what happened right before I found out about the pregnancy but I decide to include as much as possible.
“Then she found out that she was pregnant and because we were apart, I didn’t know.”
“Why didn’t she tell us?” Leslie turns to Harold.
“She was just trying to figure out what to do. It was still really early. She was all alone.”
“So, what happened then?”
I decide to gloss over the whole sneaking into her apartment part and acting like the ex-boyfriend stalker who doesn’t know how to respect boundaries.
“She took me back and we were looking forward to having this baby and starting our family.”
Leslie starts to cry, collapsing into Harold’s arms. I take a few steps back to give them some space.
Their grief overwhelms the room and I know that we are not going to talk anymore for a while.
Without saying another word, I turn around and walk away.
When I order Harley’s tea from the barista, I dread going back up to her room and telling her about what just happened.
This was her story to tell, not mine and not the papers’.
8
Harley
When I’m alone…
Being alone in the dark isn’t as comforting as I thought that it would be. When my parents and Jackson were all cramped into this tiny room, their energy suffocated me.
But now that they are gone, it is my energy that makes it difficult to breathe. In the darkness, the thoughts of everything that I lost are more real.
There is nothing holding them back from flooding my mind.
There is nothing pushing them away. There is nothing giving me perspective about what the future might be other than utter despair.
I use the remote on my bed to turn on the small light above me. It’s a reading light that puts out the luminescence of a candle - comforting and cozy.
I sit up a bit in bed and pick up my phone. I don’t bother with news or emails or anything overstimulating.
I need something to take my mind out of this room. I click on the Kindle app and scroll through numerous books, all in various stages of read through. Some I’ve only gotten through ten percent, but others I’ve read through completely. None of them seem that appealing at this moment.
Most are uplifting and full of joy, which is not something I want to read right now. Right now I want to read about pain and hate.
The kind of story that I yearn for is one with a happy ending but also with plenty of drama and obstacles for the characters to overcome.
If they don’t fight to be together, if they don’t endure the worst that life throws at them, what’s the fucking point?
I don’t see what I want in my library, so I go to Facebook.
Scrolling through my feed, I see books by authors I don’t know.
One ad in particular draws my attention and I click on the book and buy it immediately.
The writer has me from the first page and I quickly lose myself in the story.
The wonderful thing about reading is that it allows you to escape. It’s a lot like writing, but writing is harder.
You make up the characters and the words and sometimes you get stuck, unsure of where to take the people next.
It’s not really the same with reading. A good book grabs you by the hand, pulls you in, and doesn’t let you go.
You think about it all the time until you finish it.
And even then, you often want to go back right away and read it all over again. I know. I’m one of those obsessive readers that I am now trying to write for.
With each page that I click through, the darkness that I felt starts to subside.
It’s not that I don’t feel the pain so much, it’s just that the pain is getting overridden by other thoughts.
Instead of losing myself down a rabbit hole of my own emotions and regrets, I suddenly have something else to think about. And that’s enough for now.
A knock on the door startles me, pulling me away from my phone and forcing me into reality.
“Come in,” I say. Luckily, it’s Jackson and not my parents.
It’s not that I don’t want to see them, it’s just that the fact that I haven’t told them about the pregnancy is weighing on me.
It’s a secret that I have to tell but it’s also one that I don’t feel like I have the strength to reveal right now.
“Thanks for the tea. Took you long enough,” I say, jokingly.
“I ran into your parents downstairs and we talked for a bit.”
“I’m glad.”
“So…how are you?”
I shrug. There’s no way to really answer
that question and I know that he knows that.
“Just trying to think about something else, you know?” I gesture to the phone.
“Yes, I do.”
I take a sip of the mint green tea and savor the feeling of its warmth in my mouth.
He doesn’t say anything for a bit and just stares into space somewhere above me.
That’s when I suddenly realize that it wasn’t just me who lost the baby. I’ve known this before, of course, but not really known it.
I didn’t know it in my bone marrow, at the very center of my being.
“I am sorry,” I whisper. Jackson looks at me, surprised. “I am sorry for your loss.”
I reach my arms up to him and he glides into them. I wrap my arms around him and we hold each other for a while.
Tears start to flow and I hear his thick sobs echoing against my body.
He was there for me when I needed space and darkness and now, I’m here for him when he needs comfort.
He lifts his legs up onto the bed and I move over to make some room. Minutes tick by and we stay there, pressing our bodies against each other’s.
We mourn our child and the future as it could’ve been.
A loud knock startles both of us. Before we can say ‘come in,’ the door swings open and my parents come in.
“Oh, sorry,” my dad says quickly.
“It’s fine,” Jackson says, climbing off me. My mom flips on the big light, and I shield my eyes.
“Um, Harley—” Jackson starts to say. I look over at him, he looks scared. His eyes won’t meet mine. I can tell that he’s hiding something.
“Yeah?”
“I should’ve told you right away, but everything has been happening so fast.”
I wait for him to continue.
9
Tangled up in Love Page 3