The chair had started to grow hard under my ass by the time Jude returned, holding two chocolate milks and wearing a stony look.
“Here,” he said, thrusting one toward me. I remembered his penchant for chocolate milk, and accepted it gratefully.
“Where’d you get this?”
He shrugged. “One of the nurses here knows me well and grabbed them for me from the kitchen.”
It was the most he’d spoken to me all day, and I think he realized it too because right away he closed down and looked at me like he wasn’t sure why he had said so much to me. “Hungry?” he asked, and we were back to who we’d been last night—Jude asking if I was hungry even if he knew I wasn’t, because he wanted me to eat. I thought of how I’d thrown up in the bathroom and nodded, even though I wasn’t hungry. Not in the least. “There’s this little taco truck around the corner this time of day—let me buy you lunch.”
He didn’t wait for me to answer and turned to leave. I followed him out of the waiting area, down elevators and hallways until we were in the parking lot. Everything with him was so quiet, like he was saving his words for the right moment. Street tacos sounded safe—he wouldn’t bombard me with the things he wanted to say when there was an audience.
As we approached the taco truck my stomach rumbled from the smell alone. The smell of grilled onions and peppers made my mouth water. Jude bought me lunch and we sat on the curb as we ate, sauce dribbling down our chins and napkins being rumpled and tossed into the trash.
“When do you want to go back home?”
I swallowed the grilled steak and felt a pinch in my stomach from the amount of food I was digesting. “I don’t know.”
We both knew why. Colin was dying and it was just a waiting game at this point. I wouldn’t leave before the funeral, but I wasn’t planning on staying more than an hour after that.
“What do you want to do while you’re here? I can take you anywhere.”
“Don’t you have work?” I picked at the lettuce on my taco and chewed one strip thoughtfully.
“I can work from anywhere.”
I glanced sideways at him. “I wanted to visit my grandfather while I was here. I haven’t seen him in two years.”
“Okay. I can drive you up there tomorrow, if you’d like, depending.”
I didn’t need him to clarify what it depended on. I tipped my head back and let the sun warm my face. It felt cruel that Jude and I were sitting out here on a curb, eating tacos in the sunshine, while Colin wasted away in a bed that would be his last one, in a room filled by artificial light, greeted day in and day out by people whose sole job was to keep you comfortable until you met the end. I wanted to be grateful, to not take this moment for granted. “I’d like that, Jude.” I smiled at him, something genuine and warm.
“Just promise me something,” he said, and I knew it was heavy, what he was asking me.
“What should I promise?”
His eyes burned beneath his irises. “Don’t look at me like that unless you’re ready.”
Chapter Fifteen
The next morning, Jude visited Colin at the hospital but shook his head at me when I was going to go in after him. “It’s not a good day for him,” he said with an arm holding me to stop me.
I stared at his arm for a moment, feeling a little annoyed that Jude was blocking my way. “I want to see him, just in case.”
“Trista.” I stopped pushing against his arm and tilted my head up so that our eyes met. His beautiful brown eyes looked at me with a depth of sadness that I couldn’t echo, and I wondered what was wrong with me. “He doesn’t want to see you today.”
I ran my tongue over my teeth as I contemplated that. “But, what if?”
“What ifs are unfounded fears, Trista. This isn’t about you—this isn’t about what you want. This is about him, and what he wants. He’s going to be gone soon.” I watched as he swallowed that word and he placed his hands on my forearms. “And he doesn’t want your last memory of him to be the him he is today. Okay?”
Dying was lonely, guilty business. That’s what I’d learned in the thirty-six hours since I’d been faced with it so close to me. I wanted to see Colin, but only if he wanted to see me. So I agreed and followed Jude out of the hospital, where we then embarked on the road trip to Wyoming for the night, so that I could see my grandfather in the morning.
The ride up was mostly quiet until we reached the Wyoming border, when I just couldn’t stand the silence any longer. “What have you been doing in the year since I last saw you?”
Jude seemed surprised that I’d come out and asked that, but it was the only way I could think to ask him what plagued me—did he have someone else?
The thing with Jude had caused a weakness I couldn’t shake. And I knew, to some degree, he was affected by what we couldn’t seem to figure out. But I’d asked him to wait for me. And I suddenly, desperately, wanted to know if he had.
“After I saw you in Maine, I took on a few sponsorship jobs.” He ran a hand over the steering wheel and kept his eyes focused on the road. “So I went to Greece and the United Kingdom for a bit. Then I did a few National Park jaunts.”
“Yellowstone?” It seemed important, somehow, to know the answer.
“No.” It came out flat, like I shouldn’t have asked. But whatever Jude’s stony, silent disposition, he didn’t make me feel stupid for asking. Mostly he made me feel like there were several more words that he condensed down to one. “I went to Montana and Alaska and Arizona.”
“I’ve never been to any of those states.” I’d been to a lot since leaving Wyoming years ago, but only just to pass through on my way to Maine.
“Alaska is absolutely breathtaking. I mean, you can’t beat it anywhere else in this country.” This was my way of getting through to Jude, to ask him about things that did not involve us and all our hurt.
“I want to go someday.” I didn’t mean to say it aloud, but once the words poured out I saw the tick in his jaw. I knew, because Jude was giving and selfless and too fucking good for me, that he was thinking, I could take you, but we couldn’t make those kinds of promises to one another, not right now. There was too much left unsaid for us to keep brushing it under the rug.
“What else have you been doing?” I asked, wanting to bring back talkative Jude. “Climbed any new mountains?”
“I have. Mostly this side of the country, but I’m looking to venture east.”
“Where?”
“New England, perhaps.”
I wondered if he meant Maine. So I asked him.
“Depends,” he answered, and once again I knew what he meant by that. “But I really want to get over to Iceland this year, maybe in the spring or so.”
“Iceland?”
“I’ve seen most of Europe at this point; I’d like to see the parts that aren’t as traveled as the others.”
I understood that about Jude, his desire to see things fewer people had. He looked for the good in everyone, the good in every place, and I admired that about him because it was probably the one reason he still talked to me, despite my issues.
“Enough about me,” he said, interrupting my thoughts. “What have you been doing since I last saw you.”
Guilt washed over me. I knew he wanted me to be honest about the things I didn’t want to tell him. “I’m still working at the inn. Still driving my piece-of-shit car.”
“Chasing waves?”
I laughed. “Not quite. You seem to remember our time differently than I do. That insinuates I surf. Which I can’t.”
I saw the slightest curl of a smile light his lips. “Didn’t know if you’d practiced in the year since I saw you.”
“Well, considering the beach water temp can drop to the thirties in the winter—and since I still have all my limbs, I haven’t practiced at all. The inn has been remodeling rooms left and right, so that’s taken up most of my time.”
“It’s a nice place. Homey feeling, which is probably part of the reason it’s so suc
cessful during the peak months.”
It did have a homey feel. It’s why I’d stayed on as long as I had. “Well,” I began, hoping courage would make my voice not as shaky as it felt, “you’re welcome back anytime.”
I watched as his knuckles tightened on the steering wheel, but his face remained straight, facing the road so I couldn’t determine how he was feeling. But I’d meant it.
“Maybe I will.” And just like that, talk of what would happen for us after this slithered away. “I’m going to Louisiana in a couple weeks.”
Another place I’d never been, but wanted to go. “For work?”
“For fun, actually.”
It shouldn’t have bothered me that he chose to go to Louisiana for fun instead of going to Maine. Rationally, I understood that I never had a say over where he spent his time. I never took vacations away from the inn, but if I did, I might go back to Colorado. Back to Jude. If nothing else but for a taste of yesterday.
We rode mostly in silence the rest of the way, exchanging only the words that were necessary when we stopped at rest areas or gas stations to fill up. The last time Jude spoke to me in the car was around dinnertime, when he asked if I was ready to stop for dinner and a room for the night. When I nodded, realizing we were just twenty minutes from grandpa’s home, Jude took the first exit. By the time we pulled into the parking lot for the motel, I froze as I stared up at the sign.
It was the same motel I’d stopped at to heal from Doug’s violence, before I’d moved to Maine. The blinking neon sign in the window was the same, with a bulb behind the n still dark. The cheap patio chairs were the same. Even the crowd hanging outside the motel by the front office seemed the same, with leering looks and cheap cigarettes. Their conversation grew louder as we exited the car and I paid for the room, even after Jude had tried to pay himself. I knew it probably sounded contradictory, but while I was okay with Jude buying me lunch the day before, I wasn’t okay with him paying for our motel room for the night, especially when this trip was my idea and Jude was coming along as . . . what? Some kind of moral support?
Even the room was the same as the one I’d stayed in before. I didn’t remember the number to know if it was exactly the same, but the linens and the tube TV hadn’t been updated from the last time I’d stayed here.
“You all right?”
Startled, I jumped from the spot I’d stood in since putting my bag on the floor and looking around the room. “Yeah.” But my tone wasn’t convincing. He dropped his backpack on the bed and turned to me.
“Mind if I shower?”
I shook my head and sank to the bed closest to the window, grabbing the remote from the nightstand and turning it on. The pipes made a racket when he turned the faucet on, so I turned the volume up higher on the TV just as a text message pinged from my phone.
Charlotte: Whatcha up to?
I debated replying to her. Not because I didn’t want to talk to her, but because the longer I was away from her, the more I realized how toxic her influence had been. But that didn’t mean I stopped caring for her.
Me: Fine. We’re in a motel in Wyoming. Going to see my gramps tomorrow.
Charlotte: Two questions. Who is we and are you seeing mommy dearest, too?
The first question was something I didn’t want to address at the moment, because Charlotte might have made assumptions. It hadn’t even crossed my mind to get two separate hotel rooms because we’d stayed in the same apartment the last two nights. But the second part of the question was a valid one, one I hadn’t thought about until we’d pulled into the parking lot. I hadn’t kept in touch with her after changing my number, only getting the occasional update from my grandpa, who got most of his information from gossip. Which meant the information wasn’t often good.
Me: Maybe. Not sure.
Charlotte: If you do, kick that dipshit right in the dick.
Charlotte: Don’t think I didn’t notice you ignored my question of defining who -we- entailed.
I sighed and flopped on my back just as I heard the sound of something falling in the shower. From what I remembered, the shower had felt cramped to me and Jude had several inches, both horizontally and vertically, on me. Figuring I was safe to talk with her, I called her instead of talking about this over text message.
“I was waiting for you to call me,” she said immediately upon answering. “What’s up? I can feel your weirdness through osmosis.”
I looked toward the bathroom again, but the water was still running. “I’m here with Jude—” I heard her catch her breath and quickly added, “but it’s not what you think.”
“Oooh—Jude, the something else,” she said, and her glee practically vibrated through the phone. “What do you think I think? Because I think being in a motel with your ex-boyfriend means sex and other shenanigans.”
Of course Charlotte would think that. “It’s not like that though. He offered to take me, and I think he’s more or less babysitting me. That’s why he’s with me.” I shook my head, regretting my choice of wording. “He’s not with me, with me. Just along for the ride.”
“All sorts of innuendos,” Charlotte said, and I could practically see her, rocking back on her bed with glee. “Have you made a move?”
Charlotte didn’t get it. Her relationships were usually disposable, but sometimes they’d return for seconds. The problem was that the scraps she left were never worth a damn, but she tried anyway. “You don’t understand Jude.” I sighed, and in my head I added or me. Jude wasn’t someone I could climb over and lose the last two years of sadness in. “I can’t get a good read on him though; he’s so stoic and quiet, which is a new side of him I haven’t seen before.”
“He’s so yummy,” she said, making the ‘so’ especially dramatic. “If you don’t take him back, someone else will.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. Charlotte really didn’t get it. I could blame that on the fact that she never saw me in a relationship before, but also her immaturity played a part in her ambivalence toward the feelings of others. “I don’t think he’ll have someone else just because he can’t have me.”
“Why can’t he have you?”
Because he doesn’t want me, not like this. Part of me was suddenly angry with Charlotte then, because it was Charlotte’s influence that had inspired me to become a little bit like her. But then it was Doug’s stupid fucking echo—and my mom’s echo—that lived in my head: fat and worthless. That and my weak resolve made me someone easily influenced into making a bad decision like falling into bulimia.
“Because it’s complicated,” I told her instead, hearing the sharpness in my own voice as I said it.
“Everybody says that,” she said on a dramatic sigh. “It’s complicated,” she mimicked me in a high-pitched voice. “Then uncomplicate it. Get on top of him and lose yourself for a minute. God knows you could use a lay.”
“He’s not just someone to fuck, Charlotte.” I was so wrapped up in my anger with Charlotte reducing Jude to someone he wasn’t that I didn’t realize the shower had stopped and by the time I said ‘fuck,’ Jude had stepped out of the bathroom and into the motel room with just some sweatpants on. I couldn’t tell by the look on his face whether he had heard me or not—or how much he had heard if he had at all—and I wished I’d stuck to texting her instead. “I gotta go, Char.” And then I hung up on her, despite her protests.
“Ah,” Jude said, holding the towel between his hands as he alternated between running it over his hair and then running one hand over it after. “Charlotte.” He gave me a meaningful look. “Your friend from the inn.”
“She was just checking in,” I explained, trying to gauge his demeanor so I could figure out whether he heard much of the conversation or not. I hoped he hadn’t heard my last line to her before I saw him, because I wasn’t sure how I’d explain that to him. “How was your shower?” I would not objectify him, I told myself. Ex-boyfriend or not, I shouldn’t have looked over the lines on his chest, the curves of muscle and the w
ay the black ink on the left side of his chest wrapped around his body.
But then he lifted his arm, raising one of his pectorals, and I totally objectified him. He was still the most beautifully built man I’d ever seen, and after living two years in a beach town, I’d seen a lot. “Want to get dinner?”
“Sure.” I stood from the bed and stretched. His eyes fell to my stomach, but he frowned slightly. I yanked my shirt down and grabbed my purse. “There’s a burger place just down the road a ways.” I didn’t want to venture too far into town lest I saw my mom, so staying in the area was absolutely preferable.
The burger place was somewhere I’d gone with Colin many times throughout high school, a fact I didn’t dwell too much on because I was here with Jude. I didn’t want to compare him to Colin, but there really wasn’t a comparison. It was hard to reconcile the Colin I’d come to know in the last few years with the Colin I’d met in school, but I knew they were the same living, breathing person.
Jude ordered a burger with lots of guacamole and I ordered French fries, eating each slowly and carefully. The entire time, Jude watched me chew my food. I knew he waited for me to excuse myself to the restroom.
I knew that I had a careless way of approaching bulimia. Because I knew, I truly knew, its impact upon my body and the negative effects. But I also knew that I could read a hundred articles and several books on battling bulimia and not a single one would change the feeling I held deep within myself, of my own self-loathing. There were healthier ways to lose weight. I was so rational about it that I knew saying ‘healthier’ wasn’t even accurate because—bottom line—nothing about bulimia was remotely healthy. To compare it to going to a gym and working out wasn’t about which was healthier but which was the only healthy choice.
But my carelessness meant that I didn’t purge every meal, just some of them. And I didn’t troll pro-thin forum boards, looking for, as they called it, thinspiration. I did it because it was the easiest way to lose weight, and the only way I felt in control. So much in my life had been out of my control. Deciding what I kept in my body was the littlest thing I had power over. Just because it slid past my lips didn’t mean I needed to keep it.
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