And I couldn’t fucking stop.
She swept her lips across mine. “Talk to me… please, Jared… I’m here.”
I clung to her a little harder, my tongue darting out to wet my lips, my voice ragged. “I was so reckless, Aly… so fucking reckless. Just a stupid punk kid.”
Just like the assholes I constantly beat down in juvie, ungrateful for everything they’d been given.
Mindless.
Shameful.
Unforgivable.
That hatred flared, thrashed as it clamored through my spirit.
Deep inside, that warning system was blaring, a merciless siren that could never be silenced. It was shouting at me to shut my mouth before it was too late. Before I couldn’t take it back.
But with Aly, it was already far too late.
My eyes dropped closed, and I grated out the words “I was so excited that morning.” My body jerked as I completely freed the memories I’d suppressed for so long. It was kind of shocking how I could still remember exactly the way I felt. But after so many years, it was there, like this glaring reminder that promised I had no chance. “I thought I was on top of the world.”
I tucked my chin to take in Aly’s expectant eyes. They just watched me, comprehending too much. With a shaky hand, I reached out and fused myself to her, winding a lock of her hair around my finger. I turned my attention to the motion, fixed on it, as if holding Aly this way could somehow keep her from slipping away.
“I remember her coming up behind me while I stood at the mirror getting ready for school that morning. She’d wrapped her arms around my waist and told me it didn’t matter how old I got, I would always be her baby. The whole week before I turned sixteen, whenever I walked into the room, she’d stop what she was doing to take me in. Her gaze would drift over me like she saw something fading away. She just kept saying she couldn’t believe how quickly time had passed.”
And I’d never suspected time was getting ready to end.
My tone hardened. “She picked me up after school in that fucking car my dad had promised me as long as I got good grades and stayed out of trouble.”
Saliva pooled in the back of my throat. I swallowed hard, lines denting my brow as I got lost in that day.
“She drove me there, telling me stories the entire way.” I flinched, remembering how soft, how sweet, her voice had always been. “She kept peering out the windshield up at the sky. She had this look on her face, Aly… almost like she was a little bit sad. She told me that day felt almost exactly the same as the day I’d been born. That the sky was blue and the air was cool.”
I remembered it so clearly.
“I was so anxious for you to come,” she said, her somber eyes brimming with affection. “I kept thinking you were going to be born early because I was huge.” She laughed, slanting a knowing smile over at me. “But your grandma told me not to worry, I’d know when it was time. Your dad and I were sitting outside when I felt you, and I knew I was going to meet you that day. It feels just like yesterday.”
A ragged breath wheezed into my lungs. Aly’s fingers trembled along my jaw, her touch overwhelming amid the sickness clawing at my spirit, surging up, pressing down.
“She took me to my driver’s test. Afterward I walked out of that building with my license thinking I was the coolest fucking thing in the world.”
Revulsion boiled under the surface of my skin. Searing. Burning. Blackening.
“She tossed the keys at me, and she said, ‘I think these belong to you.’” I almost sneered. I’d never forget the pride that had filled her voice.
Aly exhaled, shaky and hard, her attention jumping all over my face like she had no idea where to look, and still I continued. “When we got in the car, she said she wanted to take me out to eat… to celebrate… just the two of us. But all I cared about was myself, Aly. All I cared about was the party your brother had planned for me and the fucking girl I was supposed to meet up with there. I lied to her… ” The word cracked, and my finger twisted tighter in her hair.
If I’d just slowed down… if I had taken one goddamned hour and given it to her, then I wouldn’t have taken it all.
“I told her I had a big project that was due on Monday and I had to go to this girl’s house to work on it when I knew I was going to be spending the night partying with my friends.”
I could so clearly feel it, the way my chest had felt so full. Like I was in control. Like nothing could touch me. Indestructible.
I’d never thought of myself as a bad kid. I mean, I was no angel, but I’d always hated when I disappointed my mom and dad.
But I’d been wrong. I’d been selfish. The worst kind of fool.
“I was in such a hurry, and she kept telling me to slow down. We were almost home. I knew I should stop… that the truck was too close… but I just gunned the engine and turned left across the intersection.”
A tremor rolled down the length of Aly’s body, and silent tears dripped unchecked down her face. Gripping her face between my hands, I forced her to look at me.
“She was screaming, Aly, fucking screaming at me to stop and I went anyway because all I wanted to do was get home so I could go back out.” My throat felt like gravel, and beneath the girl, I shook, the horror of that moment so clear, so vivid. Just like every night, it was like I could reach out and stop it. But I could never change what I’d done.
“That truck hit us so hard,” I said, my voice low and rough. “Everything was so loud… God, Aly, it was so loud.”
I could still hear it – piercing – the sound of metal shearing as my entire world was ripped apart.
“It was like I was weightless or something, but everything was heavy at the same time. Then we were jolted into this suffocating standstill. It was so quiet… too quiet.” I sucked in a breath through my gritted teeth, reliving the pain of that moment. “I hurt everywhere, and I couldn’t even make sense of why. Then I heard her moan.” I forced the words out over the panic that bubbled up in my throat. “But it was my name, Aly… she was fucking saying my name, fucking crying for me.”
My heart thundered, and my hands constricted on Aly’s face. Her tears seeped into the webs of my fingers. She placed her hand over one of mine, holding me close. “It’s okay,” she murmured. Drawing my hand back, she kissed across my knuckles. “It’s okay.”
And I could feel it, the tears locked up inside that could never be shed, the ball of unspent sorrow that had burdened me for all of this condemned life. Agitation curled with it and sent a rush of anger surging through my veins. “When I looked at her… ” My voice shook. “She was staring at me with this shocked horror, like she didn’t know what’d happened any more than I did.” I drew in a faltered breath. “But then I saw the blood. It was running down one side of her head and cutting across her face… but her shirt… it was soaked. God, I wanted to reach for her so bad, to help her, but I couldn’t move my arms. I could hear the sirens… they were coming… but she was breathing all funny. I was so scared, Aly… and I wanted to cry but I couldn’t… .”
I could never forget it, could never outrun it, the way she’d struggled to speak, my name ragged on her lips.
“Jared… ” She shuddered as she tried to smile, her face so sad when she promised me, “It’ll be okay.”
“It’ll be okay,” Aly whispered frantically, breaking free to kiss the rose at my chest, her fingers digging into my skin, promising again, “It’ll be okay.”
I grasped her by the outside of her shoulders. “It’s not okay, Aly. Don’t you get that? It’s never gonna be okay. I killed my mom. I sat there and watched her die.”
“No, Jared – ”
Anger raged. I shook her. “Don’t.”
I knew she’d do this. I knew she’d try to convince me of things that weren’t true. “What do you want from me, Aly? I keep telling you I don’t have anything for you. I can’t be what you want me to be.”
Aly shook her head. Wetness soaked her face, pieces of her hair stick
ing to her cheeks, her green eyes desperate. “You are what I want, Jared. You’re everything. Don’t you understand that?”
My fingers dug into her arms. “No.”
She started crying harder, little choked sounds hiccuping from her throat. She clung to me, hot tears dripping onto my chest as she battled to get closer while I pushed her away.
“I love you, Jared.”
And there it was.
What I could never give and what I could never receive. The reason I should have fucking run that first night when I’d opened my eyes to find her green ones starting back at me. Because I’d felt it then, the shift in my wasted world.
I took my mom’s life and now I owed mine. A penance. My payment.
I don’t get to have this.
My hands clenched, fingertips burrowing into her soft flesh. “No, you don’t, Aly. You feel something that’s not real. You and I have both been hanging on to something that isn’t really there.”
I knew I’d do this. I knew I’d fucking take and ruin and destroy. I could see it clearly on her face.
“No, Jared, no… can’t you feel this?” She wrestled to free my hand and pressed it over her heart. Erratic, her heart thundered under my palm. “You feel it. I know you do.”
“Just stop, Aly.” The words raked from my throat as a plea. “Just stop.”
I did it.
I ruined the good.
“Yes… I do… I love you,” Aly choked over the words again, forcing my hand closer to her heart. “I know you can feel it.” She stared down at me, begging, “Tell me you love me, too.”
“No.” I ripped my hand away and grabbed her by both wrists, restraining her. “No, Aly. You’re wrong. I warned you. I fucking warned you.”
Aly thrashed, jerking free. Determined, she forced my arms down, her mouth back at my chest as she begged through her whisper, “You don’t understand… I love you, Jared. Oh my God, I love you so much… Please tell me you love me. Please.”
And I let her… I let her pin me down as she sobbed. The sound of it constricted every fucking cell in my body, as if each cell were compressed so tight there was nothing they could do but implode. My back arched as Aly covered me whole.
Because I wanted to. I wanted to love her. But that was impossible.
I don’t get to have this.
“Stop,” I cried, taking her back by the shoulders. I shook her hard. “Just fucking stop,” I shouted. The words fell as a vicious plea from my mouth because I couldn’t handle one more second of this torture.
The crash at Aly’s door came without warning. The entire room shook, the impact vibrating along the walls. It took little for the thin wood to begin to splinter and crack.
Aly gasped, and her eyes widened with fear.
With the second kick, it busted open, flying back where it banged against the wall.
I was still clutching her, pinned under her body with the two of us wearing nothing but our underwear, when Christopher appeared in the doorway, vibrating with hostility. He pointed at me. “You’re dead, you sick bastard.”
He launched across the room, his face contorted in rage.
Aly screamed, lying over me like shield. “Christopher, don’t!”
Her voice didn’t penetrate his wrath. He was screaming his insults, maligning my name – as if there’d been anything left to malign. Every word he spoke was the truth. “You really think you’d ever be good enough for her? For my little sister?” I saw it all written there, the disgust lining his face. The hatred that I’d already known he would feel.
I destroyed everything I touched.
And I welcomed it, willed his assault because I deserved whatever beating he could give.
What I wasn’t prepared for was Christopher yanking Aly off me and shoving her aside. He threw her back so fucking hard, his attack unwarranted and fierce as he directed some of the hatred I’d earned at her. Like he somehow didn’t know how perfect she was, this girl that was the only good thing I knew.
Aly flew off her bed. The crack of her skull against the bookshelf reverberated through the room. She cried out, clutching the back of her head in her hands.
“Are you fucking stupid, Aly?” He spat the words at her like she was garbage while she lay curled on her side, crying. “You’re really sleeping with this piece of shit?”
Aly whimpered, “Please, Christopher, you don’t understand.” Her voice was rough, tortured. Her hand fluttered out toward Christopher, a silent entreaty.
The tips of her fingers were covered with blood.
Fury rose in me like a tempest. Red colored my vision. I was blinded by it. The only thing I could see was what he had done.
He hurt her.
Jerking up, I dove for him, ramming him in the stomach with my shoulder. He grunted and stumbled back. Aly’s cries rose from where she lay, an unwilling participant in all this shit, her cries taunting my ears.
He hurt her.
Christopher sneered. “Come on, you piece of shit.”
My fist collided with soft flesh. The blow resonated around the room as pain exploded in my hand. Blood spurted from his nose and streaked in webbed lines down over his mouth.
The walls closed in and the red glowed.
So much blood… so much fucking blood. I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t stop it. The girl cried.
My fists landed again and again, ragged breaths ripped from my lungs, skin tearing under the rage leaking from my hands.
He fucking hurt her.
He hurt her.
I hurt her.
“Jared, oh my God, please stop.” She’d jumped on my back, begging, trying to haul me away from her brother, who lay crumpled on the floor, his arms shielding his face while the blows continued to land with incoherent violence against his stomach and arms and sides, any fucking flesh I could find.
“Stop!” she was screaming, and screaming, and finally her pleas broke through. “You’re hurting him… stop.” The last she begged in my ear in a muted whisper. Her breath rushed across my face, invaded my senses, took me over.
In horror, I staggered back with my hands fisted in my hair.
And everything hurt. My hands. My heart. This blackened soul.
Aly slowly slid down my back, never let go as she found footing on the floor and wrapped herself around my waist. She buried her face in the small of my back. Pleading hands locked to my stomach, clinging to me as if I were something other than the piece of shit her brother knew I was. As if I were something more than ruin.
But this was the only thing I knew.
I stared down at my oldest friend as he climbed to his hands and knees, his head hanging. Blood dripped steadily from his face onto the floor. He pulled up his shirt and wiped his face, his back heaving as he tried to catch his breath. He cocked his head up.
He no longer appeared angry. He just looked like he felt sorry for me. “Just go, Jared. Get out and don’t come back.”
I began to back away, raising my hands in surrender. Because I was already gone.
From behind, Aly’s arms tightened. “No.”
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled into the disordered air spinning through the room. I didn’t even fucking know who I was apologizing to. I guessed both of them. No doubt, I’d done both of them wrong.
“Nnnnn… no. Jared, no. Please stay.” Aly fought to hold on to me, but I wrestled away from the desperate hands clinging to my hips. I turned around to face the girl who’d become my refuge. A moment’s respite in the life that had become my death sentence. Everything I’d never wanted to see shone up at me… love and heartbreak and belief in what could never be.
“I’m sorry,” I said again. Because I really fucking was. I bunched her hands together and pressed them tightly between mine because I didn’t want to let go. Then I gently nudged her back. “I’m so sorry, Aly, but you know I can’t stay here.”
Leaving her standing there, I ran out into main room and pulled on a pair of jeans, a tee, and my boots. It both crushed an
d relieved me that she didn’t follow.
It took me all of five seconds to pack my things.
The only things that mattered I was leaving behind.
I slung my bag over my shoulder and hit the door. My feet pounded on the concrete stairs.
I was halfway across the lot when Aly’s fractured voice pelted me from behind. “Jared, don’t leave. Please… don’t leave me.”
The sound broke against my ears, pain lacerating me deep. I fucking couldn’t stand listening to her cry, especially knowing I’d caused it. Tentatively, I chanced glancing behind me to find the girl who’d shaken something loose inside me. I really had been a fool to think she wouldn’t follow.
Come to Me Quietly (Closer to You) Page 26