Follow Me Back

by A. Meredith Walters

  “Do you know where Maxx is?” Lisa asked, snapping my attention away from Evan and April and back firmly into awkward territory.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, and I hated the way my voice trembled, no matter how hard I tried to control it.

  “He hasn’t been to group since before you left. You guys seemed tight, we just thought he may have said something to you.” Twyla eyed me closely. Her benign words barely concealed a deeper skepticism.

  Maxx hadn’t been back to group.

  I wasn’t surprised by the news, but it added to my unease. His whereabouts were proving to be more than a little concerning. His apartment was unlived in. He hadn’t been back to group. He had essentially disappeared.

  Where the hell was Maxx? I squared my shoulders and gave them an insincere smile, not about to tip them off to my inner turmoil.

  “I barely know Maxx. Why would I know where he is?” I lied with effort. My words sounded fake, even to me. I was a shitty liar. And I was pretty sure Twyla and Lisa weren’t fooled in the slightest.

  “Okay, well, if you see him, tell him we were asking about him. I owe him a cup of coffee,” Lisa said, and I wanted to scratch her stupid eyes out. The irrational, jealous harpy inside reared her ugly head. I wanted to ask about this so-called owed cup of coffee. I wanted to grab handfuls of her hair and force her to tell me exactly how well she knew my ex-boyfriend.

  Instead I shrugged, trying too hard to come off unconcerned.

  “I don’t think I’ll see him,” I stated. I sounded irritated and defensive and way too obvious. If I had any sense of pride and self-preservation, I’d shut up and never utter Maxx Demelo’s name again.

  So why did my traitorous heart thump his name wildly in my chest?

  Maxx. Maxx. Maxx.

  Lisa and Twyla traded a loaded look. “Okay, well, never mind, then. We must have been mistaken,” Lisa replied shortly, a smile as fake as my own plastered on her face. Twyla wiggled her fingers in my direction as the two walked away.

  I let out a breath and looked up at the overcast sky.

  Maxx, where are you?

  Damn it! I hated that I was worried so much. I wished I could shut down and turn off the way I had always been able to do before.

  But I knew I wouldn’t stop worrying or wondering. Maxx, even though he was absent from my life, was the most pressing thing on my mind.

  What else was new?

  “Aubrey, what are you doing here?” a voice asked with more than a hint of accusation.

  Kristie Hinkle stopped in front of me. I hadn’t seen Kristie since our horrific meeting in which I was rightfully accused of my crimes. She looked less than thrilled to see me, but her professionalism stopped her from telling me to get lost.

  “I was just walking by,” I explained.

  “You’re not supposed to be interacting with group members,” she stated, as though needing to remind me of what I was and wasn’t supposed to be doing.

  When I had first started co-facilitating the support group, I had admired Kristie. She had been eager to help me learn the ropes. But as time wore on I found her to be judgmental and unsympathetic to human failings. Particularly mine.

  “I’m not interacting with anyone, Kristie. I was walking home when Twyla and Lisa asked me where I’ve been. I didn’t have a chance to really explain my personal issues,” I said, not able to suppress the thinly veiled sarcasm.

  Kristie made a choking noise in the back of her throat that could have been a snort or a cough; I wasn’t really sure. I wanted to roll my eyes but thought better of it. There was no sense in adding more fuel to an already smoldering fire. Kristie shook her head and walked down the steps of the psychology building and started to pass by me. She stopped just before walking away and looked at me over her shoulder.

  “Just remember that any infractions will be reported to Dr. Lowell and the Counseling Department. I don’t think either of us wants to be in that position again,” Kristie said, her voice firm and gruff, though I detected a note of regret on her face before she looked away. I opened my mouth to shoot back a response, but changed my mind.

  “Have a good evening,” Kristie said tightly, starting to walk away.

  Then, as if possessed by the devil, my mouth opened again and words poured out that were the absolute worst I could have said in that moment: “Has Maxx not been coming to group?”

  Kristie’s shoulders went rigid, and her dull brown eyes flashed with disapproval. Why oh why had I asked her that question? Where was my common sense when I needed it?

  But I couldn’t help it. I needed something . . . anything that would give an indication to Maxx’s whereabouts.

  “Aubrey, that is extremely inappropriate for you to ask.” Kristie’s mouth turned down in censure. But my concern for Maxx outweighed any sense of pride or self-preservation.

  “I’m not trying to be inappropriate. It’s just, he had an incident a few weeks ago, and I was just worried . . .” I trailed off, feeling like a complete ass.

  “I’m more than aware of Maxx’s incident. As to his current treatment, that is none of your business,” Kristie said archly.

  “So, he is in treatment?” I couldn’t help but ask, latching on to that tiny shred of information that it was obvious Kristie hadn’t meant to give me. Was that where he had gone? Was that the explanation for his sudden disappearance? And if he had, what did that mean for Maxx? For me? For the ultimatum I had given him?

  Kristie shook her head, then turned and walked quickly toward the parking lot. Even though Kristie’s opinion of me shouldn’t have mattered, I felt ashamed as I slowly walked back toward my apartment. Even more, I hated the mad flutter of hope that Kristie’s admission had unleashed.

  But I couldn’t ignore it. Old habits die hard, I supposed. Once it had taken root, the thought wouldn’t leave: there was a chance Maxx was out there somewhere, doing the very thing I had wanted him to. Putting himself back together.

  My steps quickened and I broke into a sprint.

  My words to Maxx during that last fateful phone call weeks before flashed wildly through my frantic brain: Get your shit together, Maxx. And do it for yourself, and for no one else. And then maybe I can learn to trust you again, trust myself to be with you.

  If Maxx was in rehab, that meant he had heard me. He had taken what I said and decided to live it.

  What did that mean?

  Why did it have to mean anything?

  Suddenly I was running hard and fast, as though chased by the thoughts that seemed to dog my steps.

  I burst through the door of my apartment, my face flushed, my breathing erratic. I needed the calm of my own space in order to sort out my spinning thoughts.

  “Whoa! Where’s the fire?” Brooks asked, coming from the kitchen.

  I frowned. “What are you doing here?” I didn’t mean to sound rude. But I couldn’t deal with Brooks. Not now. Not with uneasy questions about Maxx on my mind.

  Renee appeared behind him, a bag of carrot sticks and a jar of dip in her hands. She took one look at my face and knew something was up.

  “Okay, well, can we rain-check on the movie, Brooks? I can tell Aubrey isn’t really up to it. You look exhausted, sweetie,” Renee cooed, dropping the carrots and dip on the coffee table and crossing the room to where I was standing, feeling completely overwhelmed.

  Brooks peered at me in his analytical way. “What happened, Aubrey?” he asked, thankfully keeping his distance. I knew I couldn’t handle any physical contact from him right now.

  “Nothing, I’m fine. Just extremely tired. I’m not really in the mood for company right now, Brooks. No offense,” I said, grimacing.

  Brooks looked as though he wanted to argue with me, but he grabbed his car keys, and with a strained smile, walked out the door with a promise to call me later.

  “Okay, the testosterone is gone, now tell me what the hell happened to make you look as though you have seen a ghost,” Renee demanded, taking me by the arm and leading me to
the couch.

  I covered my face with my hands. “It’s so freaking stupid,” I groaned, feeling silly for my over-the-top reaction. “I ran into some people from the support group,” I began.

  “That had to have been awkward,” Renee deduced, and I nodded.

  “Yeah, it wasn’t what you would describe as . . . comfortable,” I admitted, biting my bottom lip. “Then Kristie came out and pretty much chewed me a new one for ‘interacting’ with the group members,” I said, rolling my eyes. I was happy to feel anger replacing embarrassment.

  “That’s ridiculous! It’s not like you were hanging out with them or anything,” Renee reasoned, and I threw my hands in the air in exasperation.

  “I know,” I said quietly.

  Renee sighed. “But that’s not why you look like that. What else happened?” she asked.

  I ran my hands through my long blond hair, pulling slightly until I felt a sharp tug at my scalp. Somehow the bite of pain cleared my head.

  “I think Maxx went to rehab,” I said finally after a period of silence.

  Renee didn’t say anything. She dropped her eyes to her hands, which were folded in her lap.

  “He hasn’t been back to the support group since being in the hospital,” I continued in a whisper.

  “So . . .” Renee began.

  “And he hasn’t been home in weeks,” I said in a rush, not making eye contact with my friend.

  Renee frowned. “And you would know that how?”

  “Because I went to his apartment,” I told her quietly, my face suddenly hot.

  I sounded like a stalker.

  Or worse . . . an absolute idiot.

  Renee cleared her throat and thankfully chose not to address my mortified confession.

  “So you think that because he’s not in group and hasn’t been home that he’s in rehab? There are other possibilities, you know, Aubrey. Possibilities that are just as likely and not so pink and rosy,” Renee pointed out.

  “Yeah, I know. But it was something Kristie said. Something about Maxx’s treatment not being any of my business.”

  “And she’s right,” Renee replied gently.

  “No! Don’t you get it! If it’s not my business, then that means he’s in treatment! He’s doing the very thing I wanted him to!” My voice rose, and frustrated tears stung my eyes.

  I was getting entirely too worked up, and I knew it. Renee shook her head. “So what if he’s in rehab? What would that change?”

  “Everything,” I let out on a breath, admitting the thing that I would never be able to voice to anyone else.

  Renee frowned again, two thin lines forming between her eyebrows. “How does Maxx being in rehab change anything, Aubrey?”

  I twisted my fingers together over and over, not sure I could admit what lay in my heart.

  “I don’t know!” I agonized, covering my face with my hands. I was confused. I was angry. I was irritatingly hopeful.

  I was a freaking mess.

  Renee gently pulled my hands away from my face and gave them a squeeze. The naked sympathy on her face curdled my gut. I knew what she was thinking.

  That I was dancing back toward that place I had only just left behind. That seeing me losing my head over the man I had sworn to have nothing to do with only proved how incapable I was of letting him go.

  Was she right?

  Damn it, yes, she was.

  “What if I told you Devon was getting help for his anger? That he was in counseling? Would that automatically erase all of the things he did to me? Does it change the fact that together, we were dysfunctional and unhealthy?” Renee asked quietly.

  “The situations are completely different,” I countered sharply. Why was I being so defensive? What was I trying to convince her of ? Or was I trying to convince myself that hearing the news that Maxx might be in rehab could quite possibly open that door again.

  What was wrong with me?

  “Are they? Because three months ago, I know what your answer would have been. You would never have let me hold on to the unrealistic possibility that the man who hurt me so badly would change. This isn’t a romance novel, Aubrey. Love can’t make things all better. No matter how much we want it to.” Renee’s face was wet and her lips quivered.

  “You spent the last year watching me lose myself in a relationship that almost destroyed me. I didn’t see the damage my love for Devon was inflicting. But now that I’m on the other side of it, it’s easy to see those same mistakes in someone else. Aubrey, Maxx loves you. I have no doubt. But he is not someone you can depend on. At least not right now. You made the right choice when you walked away. You almost lost everything, and now your focus needs to be on you and fixing what went wrong in your life.”

  I needed her realism. Her heavy dose of common sense. It was the medicine I had to swallow no matter how bitter the taste.

  “Don’t think about Maxx and what he’s doing. You can’t. You have to think only about you,” Renee said firmly.

  I knew she was right. Of course she was. But I had to admit that it still hurt to hear. And it didn’t dissolve the shame I felt for allowing myself, for one brief, insane moment, to fall back into the chaos only Maxx could create.

  I thought about how out of control I had felt as I watched Maxx lose himself to the drugs. I had isolated myself by being so wrapped up in his dysfunction. But I had been happy to drown in him, because he was all that I wanted.

  And look where it got me. I wouldn’t be that girl again. I needed a decisive break. I knew, deep down, that I had been holding on to the painful hope that Maxx would come back a changed man and sweep me off my feet.

  It suddenly hit me that I had been waiting for the crumbs of confirmation that Maxx was getting help. I had been inadvertently living in a delusional fairy tale with a warped happily-ever-after. But what I really needed was to let him go before I lost myself all over again. I grabbed my keys and rattled them in my hand, feeling agitated.

  “I need to get out of here for a bit. Clear my head. I’ll be back later,” I explained, not making eye contact.

  I needed to get my head together. To cleanse Maxx from my system before I suffocated.

  “Do you want some company?” she asked, getting to her feet.

  I shook my head.

  “I’ll be fine. I just have some processing to do,” I told her.

  Renee’s lips twitched into a shadow of a smile. She was upset for me, and I wished I could tell her she needn’t be. That I would be all right.

  “Is that your clinical opinion?” she joked.

  “Absolutely,” I said softly.

  I couldn’t tell her I was all right. But I would be able to soon.

  I would make sure of it.

  chapter

  five

  aubrey

  ever since I had gotten my driver’s license, taking to the open road had been my surefire way of getting myself together. Whether it was a bad grade, a fight with a friend, or dealing with the death of my much-loved younger sister, I would get behind the wheel of my car and drive for hours. Often with no particular destination in mind.

  I took the unfamiliar curves of the backcountry road with ease. I loved the feel of the cold wind whipping through my hair, my music blasting through the speakers. My mind wandering to the topics that were at any other time off-limits. My parents. Jayme.

  “Come on, Aubrey! Let me come with you!” Jayme wrapped her arms around my neck and hugged me, a clear attempt at manipulation that she knew I could never refuse.

  I had just gotten my license earlier in the day, and as a reward Dad had given me the keys to his car, saying that I could go take a ride around town. I was excited. This would be my first time in the car without one of my parents. I felt like such a grown-up. I was taking that first, decisive step toward adulthood. I was buzzing on it. And Jayme was just as excited about my new license as I was. We had always celebrated in each other’s successes, and this was no different. Though I knew it had just as much to do wi
th the fact that her days of riding the bus to school were now over.

  I grinned at my baby sister, never able to deny her anything. I wagged my finger in her face. “If you want to ride in the car with me, there will be rules, Jay,” I warned teasingly.

  Jayme rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah, no R and B or rap, I got it,” she said, beating me to the punch. Our differing music tastes was one of the few points of contention between us.

  I chuckled. “Okay, well, as long as we’re clear about that.”

  “Woo-hoo! Let’s go! Maybe we can stop for ice cream!” Jayme squealed, grabbing me by the hand and pulling me out the door.

  I found myself smiling at the memory. The awaiting ache of grief was ever present, but it couldn’t erase the joy that I felt at remembering my sister. It felt amazing. I found that I didn’t want to force myself to forget about Jayme. I wanted to remember her. And the hole in my heart began to mend . . . just a little bit.

  Then I thought of Maxx. The joy disappeared, and the hole in my chest ripped open all over again. I tried to shift my thoughts to the dark side of Maxx, to the club. To the addiction that owned him. It was important to remind myself that letting him back in was dangerous.

  Compulsion had been a fixture in the underground club scene since the midnineties. The stories and rumors about it had become the stuff of urban legend. The main allure was the sense of mystery—it was never in the same location twice.

  And that is where Maxx had come in. When I was first introduced to the club scene months before, I hadn’t realized that Maxx was the mysterious “X,” whose intricate street art left randomly all over the city provided the clues to the club’s location each weekend.

  Find the art, and you find Compulsion. The details were wrapped within the painting that was unlike anything I had ever seen. Maxx’s alter ego had created a reputation for himself, not only with his intense artwork but as the man to see if you were looking for a particular type of diversion.

  And while he was slinging drugs and defacing buildings, I had been completely oblivious that my Maxx was actually the dangerous and volatile X.