The One That Ran Away

by Hildred Billings

Jess stared into the swirling abyss of her fresh drink. “Huh?”

  “With this Shannon girl. What happened that was so bad? Something you absolutely could not forgive her for?”

  “It’s not that I can’t forgive her,” Jess muttered. “More like it would be a really stupid idea to forgive her. I don’t want to be set back like that. I moved on, okay?” She smacked her hand against her forehead. “I moved on!”

  “Clearly.”

  “You wanna know what happened?” Jess sipped her drink. This one had way more rum than the last one. “You know why looking at her is one of the most painful things in the world?”

  Amanda exchanged looks with the bartender, a young man who hung around a little too close, as if this were the juiciest story he had heard all week. I don’t care if he hears it. I want the whole world to know what it’s like to get your heart ripped out and stomped on by a woman with the power to ruin you. “Sure,” Amanda said. “Lay it all on me.”

  Jess collected her thoughts before letting them slip free from her lips.

  ***

  Memory #15

  I didn’t see Shannon for over a month. Not until early December, when everyone geared up for finals.

  After she stood me up that night in October, I wasn’t in a hurry to meet her again. She had become a woman I needed to admire only from afar. A crazy beauty who had the power to stomp on my heart if I let her. Considering how busy I was in real life, I couldn’t let that happen.

  She would never want me as much as I wanted her. She would never look at me with awe the way I beheld her. It was the curse of a silly baby lesbian falling in love with a girl destined to break a butch’s heart. Ha! I say that like I was a butch. God knew I tried, but I looked too silly to be taken seriously. Short hair and flannel was as far as I could go without making myself laugh at my reflection.

  Every time I thought of Shannon, I laughed. Not for the same reasons.

  Sometimes you have to laugh to stave off the tears, you know?

  I didn’t care if she left me a note the next day saying she wanted to make it up to me. I knew it was a lie. She would stand me up again, or cancel on me, or make fun of me in that notorious “gotcha!” moment we all fear. I was tired of being a slave to my hopes for her. I needed to let go, preferably before graduation, when I knew I would never see her again.

  If there’s anything I’ve learned in my years of amateur divination, however, it’s that the universe finds a way to bring you back to the person you’re meant to see.

  As usual, it was happenstance. I found her smoking a cigarette near the fountain where I watched her run off with a man old enough to be her father. She caught sight of me as I walked by, and with a grin the size of my obsession for her, flagged me down in such a way that I couldn’t ignore her without it being blatantly obvious.

  Besides, my stupid common sense told me that if she wanted to talk to me that badly, then it must be fate.

  “Hey!” Shannon greeted, as if we were old pals who hadn’t seen each other in weeks. “There you are! I’ve been wondering what happened to you!”

  I fell into the trap she laid. I don’t think she knew she was laying a trap. Back then, I thought it all carefully orchestrated on her behalf, but now I know it was mere coincidence. A crazy chance that unfolded because either the universe is real and wanted me to have something, or because life really is stranger than fiction.

  Two days later, I was at her apartment door, fussing with my button-up and hoping my hair didn’t look stupid. She promised me nobody else would be there that night. A feat, since she had three roommates.

  She was the only one there. That was my second surprise. The first? That she answered her door, let alone with a smile on her face.

  To this day, I couldn’t tell you what we talked about. I was too aware of where I was, who I was with, and what it meant to be in Shannon’s home. You have to understand. For those two years we lived in the same dorm, I always knew which room was hers from the outside, because she had these bright, futuristic lights hanging up on her wall. I used to stare at them as I walked across the quad in front of our building, wondering what she was doing, who she was with, or if she was home. Would I ever have a chance with her?

  Would I ever see what the inside of that room was like?

  She didn’t have the lights anymore, but she suggested we hang out in her private bedroom after one of her roommates came home unexpectedly. That girl, whom I did not know, went into her room and wasn’t seen for the rest of the evening. Yet that was still enough for Shannon to invite me into her room.

  I don’t know what I expected. I barely knew what was happening. One moment I was walking toward Shannon Parker’s apartment, and the next thing I knew, I was in her room, sitting on the edge of her bed and staring at band posters that suggested we had more in common than I ever anticipated.

  I wanted to talk about our similar tastes in rock music. I wanted to compliment her lavender-themed bedroom set. God, did I ever want to make a joke about her bras hanging up to dry over her closet door.

  To this day, I’m not sure what’s real. I feel like I’ve made up most of that night. From the invitation, to how happy she was to host me, to suggesting we have our cocktails while watching a popular movie on her little TV on her dresser while we huddled beneath her blanket on her bed…

  My heart beat so hard that night. Is it any wonder that I couldn’t stop staring at her? Smelling her, when she was so close? Even the faint scent of tobacco beneath her shampoo and perfume wasn’t enough to deter me from getting closer to her. I knew it was a bad idea. Only heartbreak came with a woman like her. Even if she wanted me back, what would we do after graduation? Would it be enough to say I got a kiss from her? Would that placate me to my dying day, whether I ended up with another woman or not?

  I don’t remember what movie we watched that night. I was so absorbed in her presence that I didn’t dare commit any extraneous details to my memory. What did I commit to my memory instead? The texture of her fluffy hair as it brushed against my cheek. The light body of her baggy shirt as it fell effortlessly against her skin. The kick of her naked legs as she acted like a girl on the phone. The slit of her eyes in the dim light of her room, optimized for movie watching. The heat of her fingers as they tenderly wrapped around mine, my heart racing, my loins aching, my brain screaming that this was a dream and I was about to wake up.

  Her lips on mine. I don’t know who kissed who first. Was it possible that we followed through on the same idea at the same time?

  No… I wasn’t kissing Shannon Parker. Shannon Parker was kissing me!

  Suppose it’s possible that I had amassed enough karma to make my greatest dream come true. And, damn, if this was Shannon’s grand idea of “making it up to me,” then I wondered what she would do if she ever stood me up at our inevitable wedding.

  Do you know why I don’t remember what movie we watched that night? The real reason? Here’s a hint: I was too busy watching the undulations of her body as she succumbed to my haphazard seductions.

  I wanted to do everything with her. Kiss her whole body. Give her pleasure that I had yet to give any other woman. Find out what it was like to be on top of her – and to have her on top of me.

  What if I say we did that? All of that? What if I claim to have tasted her body and invited her into mine?

  It was the most normal thing in the world. Making love to Shannon, that is. For two years I had pined after her, wanted her, imagined what she would look like naked or wearing my clothes. I wanted to be the one thrusting between her legs and to be the one feeling her thrusts come for me. Our limbs, our bodies were meant to be intertwined. I wanted a portrait of us in the most ridiculous positions, searching for meaning, finding it in each other.

  I wanted to hear her come.

  Me? I’m easy. I was easier back then. Assuring my pleasure was like asking the heavens to rain, let alone at that time of year. While the blissful raindrops hit her window, my fingers hit her in pl
aces I don’t think anyone, man or woman, had ever before. I didn’t know a woman could be so beautiful. Not even her. Shannon had the body of a fallen angel: perfect, divine, and forbidden.

  God hadn’t wasted a single second on her. There were no afterthoughts to the curve of her spine or the heft of her thighs. Every inch of her was a piece of nirvana. Her lips were so soft that I worried I ruined them whenever I kissed them with the desperation of a young, horny woman.

  I knew it was her first time with a girl. I wanted it to be special. Perfect. Unforgettable. Even if we didn’t end up together for the rest of our lives, I wanted her to search out other women to be with, based on how good it had felt with me.

  My ego was huge. It still wasn’t as big as my need for her.

  I don’t think anyone could really understand how much she meant to me. I had already made myself an utter fool so many times, yet I was willing to do it again, again, again. If she wanted to step on me to reach the loftiest heights, then I would prostrate myself and beg her to place her foot on the back on my head. If she strung me along with those coy looks and haughty airs I had come to love, she could have any other lovers she wanted. I would dedicate my heart and soul to Shannon Parker, but I didn’t care if she never felt the same way about me – as long as I got to be with her.

  I left a piece of my soul in that room that night. I left a piece of who I was in the depths of her body, and I prayed to God it would take root and stay with her forever.

  ***

  Rain was soon to fall in downtown Portland. Jess stepped out of a café on the inner Eastside and sniffed the air, wondering how long she had before the raindrops came. I can’t feel rain and not think of that night. It was all she could think about ever since she told Amanda how far things had gone with Shannon.

  Jess was frozen on the sidewalk. The memories surged into her for the hundredth time in the past month. She remembered when she didn’t used to think about it so much. When she had solidly moved on from the mind games Shannon played with her senior year of college.

  Normally, Jess would hop the bus at the stop only a few blocks away. It conveniently took her straight home to her studio apartment in outer Southwest, and it wasn’t like she would be riding a bike around there anytime soon. Yay. Another fun memory to have when I need it least. Except she didn’t go straight to that bus stop. Instead, she headed toward the Burnside bridge, because she had too much energy and wanted to burn some of it by crossing a damned bridge on foot. She didn’t care if it rained on her. She didn’t give a shit if the loud buses and cars crossing the bridge during rush hour overstimulated her. She barely heard them as she trudged against the bridge, walking into wind and a light flurry of sprinkling rain.

  Someone slightly bumped into her on their way by. Jess had her headphones on and kept her head pointed down against the wind. The only reason she knew who bypassed her was because of that electric touch sparking between them.

  “Oh. My. God.” Jess wanted to laugh, but the wind drowned her out. The rain now pattering against the top of her head almost put out the last of her life’s fires. “You have got to be kidding me. What the fuck.”

  Shannon pulled down the scarf wrapped around her face. “What in the world? What are you doing here? On this bridge? Right now?”

  Jess couldn’t hold back the laughter anymore. She let it fly free, like a bird tossed into the oncoming storm. “You know,” she said over the wind and rain, “sometimes I think there really must be some force at work out there. It’s the only explanation for how we keep bumping into each other, even when I don’t want to see you!”

  Rain slicked off Shannon’s jacket. Jess wasn’t privileged enough to have a rain jacket. The water instead seeped straight into her sweater and the button-up beneath. “That explains why you haven’t returned my messages,” Shannon said with a smile. How could she smile at a time like this?

  “You’re right. Because I blocked you.”

  “Well, that’s rude.”

  “Would you shut up?” Jess slapped her hand against the railing, the waters of the Willamette River trembling with the winds. She couldn’t see where the rain went from that high up. “Why do you keep torturing me like this?”

  Shannon matched Jess’s laughter with her own. “Oh, yeah, I’m totally doing this on purpose. You think I knew where you were today? Honestly, Jess, I could throw the same thing back at you, only about college. Weren’t you stalking me back then?”

  “As if!”

  “Same principle applies, then.” Shannon shrugged. “Must be fate, huh?”

  “You’re so nonchalant about it now. What about back in college, when you flaked out on me after fucking me?”

  Shannon appeared shocked that Jess would bring that up here, now, on a bridge in the middle of Portland, a city they never had in common – until they did. “That was a long time ago. Why is it so strange that I might want to try again?”

  So she admitted it? “When did you get the grand idea to try again with me? Before or after your most recent boyfriend dumped you?”

  “It’s not like that.” Shannon brushed her wet bangs out of her eyes. Her hair had lost most of its luster when it became wet. Was this what she looked like in her most natural state? Jess thought she had witnessed it when Shannon was naked in her own bed. No. This was it. Take away the appeal of her hair, and… damnit. She was still perfect. Only now she looked like the prettiest wet kitty to hop down from her perch to taunt Jess.

  How dare she?

  “Then what is it like?” Jess asked.

  “I dunno, Jess. You tell me.”

  “I’m the one who got dumped, you bitch!”

  Shannon stepped back with a gasp. Was she going to do it? Deny that she had dumped Jess? I never thought we were a real couple, but you fucked me over like we were. Jess knew her fair share of romantic rejection. If she was lucky enough to make it to a date, then the date usually ended with rejection. You were one of the only people to make me feel acceptable. Men had the power to make Jess feel desirable for a night. Women could validate her for the rest of her life with one well-timed kiss.

  The most influential woman in Jess’s love life looked away, crestfallen. The wind kicked up again, tangling her formerly feathery hair. Wet kitty? More like drowned rat.

  “You’re right,” she said over the sound of rain. “What I did is inexcusable. In my defense, though… I wasn’t ready for something like that. I was barely ready to face who I was.”

  “Who the hell were you back then?”

  Shannon’s eyes slightly widened before she pointed her head down again. “Selfish. I ran away because I was too selfish to understand what I was doing to you. I didn’t… I didn’t mean to hurt you, okay?” Her desperate visage begged Jess to believe her. Perhaps, even, to forgive her. “You were always so nice to me. I never met anyone who wanted to get to know me like you did. I was so used to people being, you know… people.” Shannon sighed. Her jacket was soaked through. Rain fell down her cheeks like tears. Likewise, Jess’s water-laden jeans grew heavy against her legs. “Men wanted to sleep with me. The kind of women I attracted as friends were … the worst! I always felt so pointless! I ran away because I didn’t know how to handle someone genuinely interested in me.”

  Jess snorted the rainwater dripping down her nose. “Honestly?” she said, in utter disbelief that she was about to brand herself with the very thing Shannon hated most. “I also just wanted to fuck you.”

  Any spark left in Shannon’s demeanor disappeared. Her mouth dropped open, fingers uncurling and revealing the handfuls of rainwater that had accumulated in the past minute.

  They were both soaked. They were both about to jump off the bridge. What did landing in the river matter when they were already so wet?

  “I got over you.”

  Jess turned. It was her chance to run.

  A significant part of her wanted Shannon to chase after her, to call her names, to beg her to stay and to make this right. That’s what I wanted to
do eight years ago. I wanted so badly to hunt you down on the other side of the earth and make you understand how fated this was. No, fate didn’t exist. There were no messages written in the stars. She was the first one to say that astrology was nothing more than an excuse to get introspective and to psychoanalyze one’s self. No shit! Jess was great at that! Almost like it was built into being a Libra or something!

  “Jess!”

  Her name came like a blade to the back. Jess walked faster, face first in the rain, before she could bleed out and become Shannon’s next victim – yet again.

  “Are you kidding me right now?”

  Don’t think about her. Don’t acknowledge her. Jess closed her eyes. A bus flew by, splashing her with muddy water and transforming the already noisy air into a cacophony of deafening sounds. Cars honked as traffic grew thicker. The wind grew and grew until it blew with the power of Jess’s pain. Don’t think about how good it felt to love her. Remember how much it hurt when she disappeared.

  The much younger, more naïve version of Jess Mills was convinced that getting one kiss – let alone one night in bed – would be enough to sate her for the rest of her life. It had been thrilling enough to know Shannon’s name, to hear the name Jess on her lips when they crossed paths, to lock eyes and share tiny pieces of their souls in electrified instances. A life of adventure was contained in their short conversations about nothing. Shannon Parker was a sexual awakening. She wasn’t the love of someone’s life.

  That was it. That was what had scared Shannon enough to make her run away.

  You didn’t sense truth and honesty within me, Shan. Jess held back her tears, not that anyone would know the difference between them and the rain on her face. You sensed more of the same. I would’ve treated you like those guys and gals in your life. You had no choice. You had to run.

  Like Jess had to run now.

  “Jess!”

  That was the thing about fate. It dictated that Jess was so out of shape that she ran out of breath at the end of the bridge, while a smoker like Shannon powered across the arch and caught up to her within ten seconds. She’s coming after me. She loves me. She wants me. She’s sorry.