Heart on a Shoestring

by Marilyn Grey

  “Why do you have so much money?”

  “Good at saving, I guess.”

  “What did you do for a living?”

  He closed his eyes and sucked in a lot of air, then let it go.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing,” he said. “Just something about that word. Living.”

  I shrugged and put my marshmallow into the fire beside his. “You know roasting marshmallows is an art, right?”

  “Everything is an art to you.”

  I smiled. “You want to hold it a little higher than the fire. Not right in the flames. Then turn it real slow like this.” I twisted the stick. “That way it cooks evenly all throughout. At the end, it will be super gooey inside and crunchy outside. Delicious, I tell ya.” I pretended not to notice his sudden expression of doom and figured I’d change the subject back to me. “So why’d you do that to my clothes?”

  “I can tell you’re a lot like me,” he said. “I hide behind a boring life and you hide behind a colorful life, but fact is, we’re both hiding.”

  “I’m not hiding from anything. This is just who I am.”

  He looked into my eyes and held contact until I glanced down.

  “You are beautiful,” he said. “The green hair doesn’t flatter your natural beauty.”

  “You don’t understand me.” I sandwiched my marshmallow between the chocolate and graham crackers. “I’m not trying to be a natural beauty. I’m just doing what I enjoy.” I took a bite and waited for him to have some sort of sarcastic response, but he didn’t. “Some guys happen to think green hair is more beautiful than the normal colors, you know.”

  “Yes. Something I can’t fathom.”

  “One of the many reasons I can’t fathom being with you.”

  He didn’t flinch. Not even the slightest hint of irritation. Surprising. Actually made me feel bad for saying it. Normally he bantered with me, almost in a playful way.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  He nodded, telling me with his eyes that it was okay, but his mind remained somewhere else. Some distant place. A place I wanted to know. “What do my clothes have to do with hiding, anyway?”

  “Just thought it would help you.”

  “How?”

  “Sometimes we don’t realize we’re drowning.” His shoulders dropped as he spread his legs out in front of him. A thin veil of melancholy colored his face. “Sometimes we need someone to help us see the chains stuck to our feet. All these chains.” He breathed deep. “They keep us from swimming back to oxygen. Maybe I was wrong, maybe you don’t do all of this because you’re like me. Maybe you’re better. Maybe you’re strong, fun, happy.” He rubbed his clean-shaven face. “Maybe I’m the negative one who sees everything the wrong way, but I figured we all have something keeping us away from real life. Some sort of temptation to drown in a river and rot at the bottom. I assumed that clothes and hair and all this pointless stuff”—he waved his hand up and down me—“was the stuff you hide behind. The stuff that keeps you from facing reality, but I’m willing to admit that I’m wrong.”

  I stared through the fire. To the tree behind it, surrounded by flowers. The light casted a beautiful golden hue on everything around us, including his face. I looked back to the tree and thought of the seed I planted in the backyard with my brother. We watered the seed every day together. Every day until I became a teenager and made the biggest mistake of my life. The one thing I regret more than anything else. Poor Max. I’ll never forget his face. Every day he watered the seed, but it never grew. He still watered the exact spot every day after. Couldn’t speak. Couldn’t even go on the potty. But he believed that if he kept watering and shining his flashlight on that mound of dirt, that a tree would grow. I didn’t have the heart to tell him it wouldn’t. I didn’t have a heart at all, really. It died the day I chose popularity over love.

  Maybe Derek was right about me, but I didn’t see chains. All I wanted was to be someone different. Someone I wanted to be. I spent way too much of my life trying to please others and failing myself in the process, but maybe I leaned on my clothes too much. And all those bottles of hair dye. Who am I? I wondered, not entirely happy that he caused me to wonder. I pulled the two journals out of my purse and pondered which one to use.

  “Well,” I said. “Blank pages or the pages I’ve always known.”

  Derek looked up.

  I stuffed my worn journal into my bag and opened to the first page of the blank spiral-bound. A blank page. A new world waiting to be unraveled in letters. I waited, thought for a minute, then pressed my pen to the paper. Here goes….

  Ch. 8 | Derek

  It’s more likely that people will forever deny who they really are than go on the dark and lonely battle of discovering the places they fear, the places tucked inside their soul that even they have yet to meet. I knew that. Knew it well. I avoided myself like Pinocchio avoided the truth. And whether Miranda wanted to admit it or not, something caused her to become attached to her persona. Or should I say lack of persona. Various Madonna-like reinventions. But never really truly herself. I wanted to help her and I knew my motivations weren’t selfless. I thought if I helped her see the light maybe I’d find it too. Saving her would save me.

  But she had more stubborn fuel than a cowboys untamed horse. No breaking her in. If so, she didn’t let on. I hadn’t seen her so quiet until I introduced her to my little corner of the earth. I liked seeing her think and process things, but she never shared her thoughts. Only when she felt sorry for me. At least it seemed that way.

  She tucked herself under the blankets and curled up into fetal position. I zipped up the tent and said, “Goodnight.”

  “You’re not sleeping in here?”

  “It’s all yours.”

  She unzipped and looked at me. “But I’m a little worried about bugs and snakes and stuff.”

  “That’s why you’re in the tent and I’m out here.”

  “But what if they climb inside?”

  “Just sleep. If a snake comes I will be attacked before you.”

  She laughed. “How reassuring.”

  “Get some sleep.”

  “I guess I can try.”

  She zipped the tent back up and rustled inside. I rolled up a few clumps of weeds and formed a pillow, then stared at the strands of wisteria hanging above me. No stars. Just wisteria glistening in flakes of moonlight. Every plant around me had meaning. One day I hoped for the courage to tell someone. Maybe Miranda. Someone who wouldn’t shriek and run off. Not sure how anyone could love me if I didn’t love myself, but the heart can only take so much loneliness before it wilts up and dies.

  Alone.

  I wondered how the old man was doing. Seemed like he’d be okay, but you never know how the heart will jump back to life after trauma like that. I sometimes wondered what would be more painful. Dying of a broken heart emotionally or physically. After experiencing the emotional I think I’d take the physical brokenness.

  I imagined my heart spread all over the place. So many shredded remnants of a once-beating organ.

  Shredded.

  The images haunted me. I could barely sleep most nights without waking up in horror. The nightmare that I was David Bennett again. A horrible, heartless man so cold and far from love.

  A man I never imagined becoming and now I couldn’t forget. And I tried like you wouldn’t believe. Things like that don’t walk out of your life. They’re tattooed so deep in the skin you’ll never be able to get rid of them.

  A cool breeze swept across me and carried his name on its wings.

  Owen.

  At least that’s what I imagined his name to be. I fell asleep with his name on my mind and woke up when I dreamt of Ashleigh’s final threats. The pattern repeated until daybreak when Miranda’s sleepy eyes looked at me with gentleness. I never imagined spending so much time with someone like her. My friends were so different. Ashleigh was a thousand times the opposite of Miranda. My entire life was something Miranda would’ve de
spised. Just like I did. Underneath. Took me too long to realize it. Too many mistakes later.

  “You slept on weeds?” she said as she stretched her arms and back.

  I nodded, trying not to notice her curves.

  “So. How long are we staying here and what are we going to do?”

  “I didn’t plan that far ahead.” I sat up. “Can’t believe you’re not pissed at me for sailing your wardrobe away.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Who said I’m not?”

  “My ex would’ve been throwing stuff and trying to rip my hair out. Are you more internal or something?”

  “Your ex sounds nice.” She looked around. “What’s for breakfast?”

  I walked to the tent, grabbed my bag, and handed her a carton of eggs. She shrugged her shoulders, looking for the kitchen. I laughed and opened the grill to reveal a cast iron skillet underneath.

  “You want me to cook eggs on that?” she said. “Looks gross.”

  “I’ve seen you put gum in your mouth after it fell on the pavement and you’re worried about a cast iron skillet?”

  “Well, how do I start the grill?”

  “I will.” I lit a fire and took the eggs. “And I will even cook for you.”

  She reached for the coconut oil by the grill. “Can I use some of this on my hair?”

  “Your hair?”

  “My hair.”

  I handed it to her and watched her lather a small amount in her hands, then rub it into the ends of her hair. She looked at me with that “what?” look in her eyes. Minding my own business, I focused on the eggs. When I finished frying them I gave her three on a paper plate. She took the plate, mouthed “thank you,” and slipped out of the wisteria haven. A few minutes later she came back with the empty plate.

  “Looks like it might rain,” she said. “You have a mosquito on your arm.”

  I looked down and blew it away. It came back immediately, this time on my hand. I blew it away again.

  “You know it’s going to keep coming back unless you kill it, right?”

  I winced and turned my face from her eyes. She followed me in a circle, forcing our eyes to meet. I sat down.

  “You alright?” she said, scooting close to me.

  I nodded as another mosquito landed on my arm. She raised her arm. I jerked away. She slapped my knee instead.

  “Are you okay?” Some sliver of gentleness washed over her tone. Her entire body actually. She squeezed my hand as I held back anger. Tear-soaked anger. Blood-soaked anger. David Bennett. I hated him. Despised him with every bit of passion in me. And he was me. “He was me.”

  “Who was?” Her sweet voice carried me back from the storm. Back to Derek Rhodes. The man I couldn’t figure out how to be. The man I wished to be, but how? After everything I did? When I looked in the mirror I saw David Bennett, which is why I didn’t look into them until my hair and beard made him disappear.

  “Okay, so you brought me to a strange island thing and tossed my clothes into the abyss. You wanted to know why I wasn’t cracking your skull open with the cast-iron after such things. Well, here goes.” She squeezed my hand again, let go, and stood. “My dad was never the kind of dad who sat his little girl on his lap. I’m the only girl out of four boys. So you’d think maybe the man would’ve had some kind of soft spot for a little girl with pig tails and big eyes.” She paced as she spoke so fast I could barely take it all in. “I can’t tell you how many times I wanted to sit on his lap and read a story. Or just sit there. He pushed me away when I tried to. Said his legs hurt. My butt was too bony. He was tired. My head blocked the television. He couldn’t reach the remote. Endless excuses. So I tried to get his attention. I tried to twirl around and dance in front of the television. He didn’t like that, so I assumed he didn’t like dance. Well, he must like what’s always on the television. Football. So I collected football cards, played sports with the boys, had absolutely no girl friends, and immersed myself in boydom. Hoping maybe he’d come outside and play catch with me or watch me score the winning touch-down because no boy could keep up with my fast sprint. Let’s just say he never came outside. He never noticed me. So I shifted my attention to kids at school. I tried to be popular. Changed my hair. Changed my clothes. Changed my taste in movies, music, you name it, all for the sake of having someone, somewhere notice me.”

  She exhaled and looked at me. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to heal hearts. Only how to break them.

  “I made the biggest and worst decision of my life because of my desire to be popular and the person I need forgiveness from can’t speak.” She tried to hold herself together, but I could see that her glue was pretty weak. “So, the reason, I guess, I’ve been so into changing my appearance is because for once in my life I am doing whatever I want to do in that moment.”

  I cleared my throat and chose my words with caution. “Please grab the cast iron if what I’m about to say offends you.”

  She smiled and sat beside me. Her shoulder touched mine and sent a shiver down my arms. A girl’s touch hadn’t had that effect on me since tenth grade.

  “So?” she said.

  “So ... your dad obviously had some issues, but why let that define who you are today?”

  “I’m not. That’s my point. I do all of this for myself. To be what I want and not what everyone else wants.”

  “I don’t believe it.” This time I squeezed her hand. “If you weren’t seeking approval from others you wouldn’t get so upset when I challenged the things you do and like.”

  She stared at our hands. I did too. In a strange silent moment that could’ve been romantic had she not been on the verge of an emotional meltdown or breakthrough. I have to admit, I was a little worried it would be a meltdown.

  “When I saw those clothes float away I wasn’t angry,” she said. “I was scared. An odd depressed feeling. Maybe that turned into a protest against you and what you did, but mostly because I don’t know who I am without that stuff. It’s like the person I am is many people and without all of those people I’m nothing.”

  “So you live in a constant state of rebellion. Now you don’t even know what the hell you’re rebelling against, do you?”

  “I didn’t even know I was rebelling.”

  “Your dad didn’t notice you, so you sought it at school. I’m assuming you’ve had your heart broken and each time you rebelled against that particular Miranda in hopes of finding a version of you that people liked. Right now you are rebelling against it all. You didn’t find what you were looking for so you gave up and instead of looking inward to find out who you really are, you reverted back to outward expression to rebel against the old you.”

  “Wow. Pretty fly for a white guy.”

  “Am I right?” I breathed in. “I know I am because I have the same illness. I just go into hiding.”

  “Awww. It’s like you’re a turtle and I’m a lizard.”

  “Huh?”

  “The Adventures of Turtle and Lizzy.” She laughed. “You hide in your shell and I hide by changing my colors.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh, and that means she succeeded in something no person ever had before. “You are the first person who has ever made me laugh when it was the absolute last thing I wanted to do.”

  Ch. 9 | Miranda

  Derek and I reclined against a tree and talked until drops of rain landed on our noses. We shifted gears and spoke of childhood memories and favorite movies. Not the deep stuff. Not the painful images my heart wanted to forget. I wanted to tell him everything. Right there in the middle of nowhere. No one to hear. No one besides him. I didn’t trust anyone with my heart. Not after every relationship I pursued ended up an unrequited love story. Only two people knew my regret. Matt and Gavin. I spilled my heart to them a year after it happened. They were older. Wiser. And I needed to vent. Gavin told me to tell Max that I was sorry and allow myself to move on. Matt repeated. And I obeyed. Trouble is, Autism speaks in ways I didn’t understand. Max couldn’t give me forgi
veness. He couldn’t tell me he was okay. He couldn’t tell me that I didn’t crush his dreams and that he really, really was okay.

  He didn’t have a voice.

  “You alright?” Derek cracked my memories and peeled back reality. “You look like you’re out there somewhere.”

  “You’re not telling me everything,” I said. “And I won’t force you, because I want you to come to the point I’m at now.”

  He shifted his weight to the left and pulled his knee to his chest, then raked his head where his former hair used to be.

  I continued, “I trust you.”

  He avoided my eyes.

  I looked down too. “I’ve trusted few people with my heart, so tread lightly. I told you my brother Max and I wanted to plant something together, but we never did. See”—I steadied myself on a low tree branch—“I wanted to fit in. I was the type of girl who sat at pep rally’s and high school football games pining over boys who never knew my name. I wrote poems about them. Cried in my car to Radiohead’s Creep about them. I practiced writing my name with their last names. Knew their class schedule by heart and where they stood before the bells rang.” I stopped, inhaled as much air as possible, and looked at the grey clouds before I continued. “Finally, my chance had come. I did something dumb. I called this guy randomly from my friends house, blocked my number, and told him I wouldn’t reveal my identity until he guessed who I was. I’d call him every night at eight and give him one clue each night. To my surprise, he loved our conversations and seemed as excited as I was. Then one day I messed up. I was relaying a story and accidentally said my name. A few nights later he figured out my identity. It was so awkward after that. He stopped calling. I thought we’d fall in love and it would be magical. The unknown girl gets the popular guy. The Taylor Swift song comes to life.”