by J. Daniels
Quick rushes of air burst past my lips. My mouth quickly growing dry with each passing second. My legs kick out, removing the rest of the sheet when my skin begins to burn beneath the surface.
People say things they don’t mean when they’re distressed. Having my dad bail on me could’ve loosened my tongue, leaking words of desperation from my mouth.
I was unraveling at the diner. I was breaking down in the hotel room. Reed was gentle, trying to hold me together.
I almost sobbed when I came. I told him I loved him.
People say things they don’t mean when they’re distressed.
I’ve never said one word to Reed I didn’t mean. Last night was no exception.
“It’s okay.”
He didn’t say it back. He didn’t say anything. My heart slowly pulsed against his back as I held him, as he drifted to sleep turned away from me. As I waited and waited for that moment to hit him. Fear kept him silent, or maybe that wasn’t it at all. Maybe he doesn’t love me. Maybe he can’t. Maybe . . .
“No one will ever love you the way I do. No one.”
I squeeze my eyes shut. “No,” I whisper, pushing the unwanted voice out of my head, but it grows louder, seeping into every crevice of my soul. Mocking me with the truth I’m too scared to admit.
“No one will want you.”
I violently shake my head. Rocco’s face materializes behind my eyes, his merciless smirk twisting across his mouth as he laughs at me. I can almost hear it above the rushing in my ears, above the cruel words. Above my doubt.
Throwing myself out of bed, I grab my clothes and quickly dress, my hands shaking as I step into the bathroom. Amber light flickers on above my head. The door shuts behind me and I want to collapse against it, but I don’t. I dampen a washcloth and rub it over my face, underneath my hair, to the back of my neck. I rinse out my mouth. Bracing my hands on the sink, I stare at my reflection. Long minutes pass as I study my face.
I was unraveling at the diner. I was breaking down in the hotel room. But I don’t believe I’ve ever looked this broken. The chipped fragments of my heart are cutting me, slowly bleeding me out, draining the light from my eyes.
I chose to love a man who can’t love me. Who will never love me.
Movement in the room pulls my gaze from the mirror. I step up to the door and listen.
He’s dressing, the sound of fabric dragging across skin. I hear shuffling, then all too quickly the door opens and I’m facing Reed.
“Hey, hi,” he quickly utters, startled. He looks half asleep. He clears his throat, looking past me. His eyes shifting nervously. “Need to use the bathroom. We gotta get going. It’s almost ten.”
Tears gather in my eyes and I blink them away. What was I expecting? He can’t do this. He warned me himself.
“Yeah,” I reply, padding out into the room. The door shuts behind me and I’m left alone.
I wait for Reed out by his truck.
It’s no longer raining. The sky a kaleidoscope of blues and soft pinks. I stand in a shallow puddle, watching the mud squeeze out from under my boots. Growing impatient, and realizing I can’t have Reed help me into his truck anymore, I test the handle to see if it’s unlocked.
My hand falls to my side. I heave a deep breath just as a clicking sound pops the small tab up behind the window. Reed saunters purposely toward me over my shoulder. I tug the handle and climb inside, tumbling against the seat, quickly fastening the harness as he reaches my door.
His brow knits together as he stares up at me. “You good?”
God, how do I even answer that?
Nodding, I rest back against the seat, my eyes trained ahead. “Fine.” Tension makes my stomach clench. I feel nauseous. I pray I don’t puke all over the dark leather interior.
My vocabulary diminishes to one word responses the entire trip home, not that there’s ample conversation flowing between us. Reed is deathly quiet for the most part, only asking me if I want to listen to music, if I’m hungry, and if I want him to stop. I can’t eat. I wouldn’t be able to stomach it. I give him my answers while I stare out the window, never turning my head.
Two and a half hours feels like a lifetime. I bite my cheek when I feel the threat of tears, the pain distracting me, harnessing my focus on the metallic taste coating my tongue. I can’t cry. Not yet. Not when I still need to let go of him.
Reed pulls into the driveway and shifts into park. I have so much to say, but so little is needed.
He breaks the silence first as I’m shoving the harness off my shoulders.
“I’m going to head over to Ben’s to finish up the deck. I’m fucking wiped, so, I’ll probably just crash after.”
Our eyes lock. My arms suddenly feel heavier, my limbs sticking to the seat.
That’s all he has to say to me. Indeed, so little is needed.
I turn away and tug on the door handle. “Thank you for what you said to my dad, and for helping me through that. That meant a lot to me.”
“Of course,” he replies easily. No stammer to his words.
I turn around after climbing out of the truck.
His eyes search my face, so strange in color, then shift to the clock on the dash. “I should go. Get started so I’m not trying to hammer down shit at night. That didn’t work out so well for me before.”
His words are like a hand pushing me away. This is it. Just go.
“Okay. Yeah, sorry.” My voice catches, but I hide it with a quick cough.
I step back after closing the door, my eyes following his truck as he backs out of the driveway. Dust hovers an inch above the dirt road behind him, settling after a few minutes.
Yeah, I stand there for minutes, thinking he’ll actually come back. Believing he’ll realize he forgot to tell me he loves me too.
Hope is a funny thing. Even when you think you have none, it refuses to lie down quietly. In the darkest moments of my life, I’ve always had hope. Why would I expect any different now?
The house is empty, the curtains pulled, keeping out the vibrant sky. Hattie and Danny are gone, most likely at the bar. I pack like a hurricane ripping through the house. Bed made, quilt neatly tucked in at the corners, leaving it just like I first saw it weeks ago.
With a heavy mind, I sit on the edge of the mattress and pull the cash I’ve made working at McGill’s out of the drawer. I roughly flatten out the bills.
A little over three hundred dollars. That’s a couple nights in a hotel, some food, not much. If I burn through that, I’ll have nothing. I know where having nothing leads me. I can’t live in my car again, but I can’t stay here. I can’t be this close to Reed and let him go.
I’ll continue to love him in Ruxton. I might forget I ever met him somewhere else.
I have one option that keeps me from losing everything I have. One option I can at least build on until I find something else.
I grab a piece of paper and a pen out of the office and carry it into the kitchen. My duffle waits for me by the front door.
What do I say to people who gave me so much when I only wanted to know them?
Tears wet the paper as my hand moves with an energy I didn’t think I had anymore. I tell them how grateful I am for everything, how I’ll never forget them. I thank them for their kindness and love. Lifting my pen, I gather my explanation for my swift departure. I don’t want them to worry. They have to understand, this has nothing to do with them.
Under my name, I ask them to tell Reed goodbye for me. To tell him I’m sorry and that I’ll miss him, even when I don’t want to. I leave my note for them on the table underneath the corner of a placement. Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I turn it off and set it on top of my goodbye.
Once again, time is my enemy. Eight hours in the car, two stops for gas, and one food break happens in a blur of headlights and highways. I’m back in front of that same house I left only weeks ago before my hands stop shaking. Or maybe I’m just now beginning to tremble.
The strap of my duffle digs into m
y shoulder as I walk up the stone steps. My fist hits the door, my head lowers when it opens. A familiar hand caresses my cheek.
“Knew you’d be back. Fuckin’ knew it.”
I wince at his voice, at the way his fingers linger on my skin as if he has any right to touch me. Leaning away from his hand, I wait for him to move out of the doorway. He takes great pleasure in this, me, needing him, crawling back so quickly.
I’ve survived this before. I can do it again until I find something else.
With an elaborate sweep of his hand, he gestures for me to walk inside.
“Thank you.”
He takes great pleasure in that as well. My gratitude, lifting the corners of his mouth into the most deceiving smile I’ve ever seen.
I’m sure the devil smiles too. I’m sure it’s just as alluring.
He leans against the wall, picking at his teeth with a toothpick. “How’d the whole family thing turn out?” he asks behind me as I make my way toward the bedroom.
I stop almost to the door, my hand flattening against the wall. Slipping my fingers underneath the strap of the duffle, I pull my shoulders back and move with purpose.
Rocco finds my strength amusing, his cruel chuckle rumbling in the air like a storm in the distance, seeping into the bedroom after I collapse onto the bed.
I cry into the pillow, thinking about Reed and how sweet his laugh sounds.
Reed
BETH.
My hand reaches out, searching blinding for her warmth. Cool sheet fills my palm.
She’s not here.
No, of course she isn’t. Why would she be?
I did exactly what I told her I was going to do last night. What I needed to do. After finishing the last cosmetic details on Ben’s deck, I came home and crashed. I needed time to process everything. She needed time too. She was obviously still reeling from the shit with her dad.
My brave girl. She looked so small sitting next to me.
My mind wouldn’t go quiet, even at Ben’s while I was focused. I figured a full night’s sleep would help, but I was restless all night.
Beth.
At 11:30 p.m., I debated driving over to her aunt’s to see her. At a little past two, I palmed my phone and stared at the picture she saved as my wallpaper. A selfie taken of her and I, our faces squeezed together.
God, I was in love with her.
I was in love, and I was terrified, but fuck, I was so lost in love I didn’t want to be apart even while I came to terms with it. I forced myself to put my phone down and close my eyes. She didn’t need me waking her up at odd hours in the night. I would let her sleep, I would hopefully get some myself.
My soul missed her, my body craved her. Sleep evaded me.
“I love you . . . I love you.”
She nearly sobbed those words. All I wanted to do was say them.
Turning my head, I watch the pale light from the window dance along the carpet. I don’t need to look at the clock to know it’s still too fucking early. My alarm hasn’t sounded yet, but I can’t lie here anymore. I can’t ignore this strange loss settling over me any longer.
I shower and dress urgently after finally noting the time. Just enough to go see Beth, tell her everything I’m feeling, then bolt it to work. I’ll probably wake her up at this hour. She’ll look all sleep-rumpled and soft against the sheets. Leaving her might be a challenge.
As I’m grabbing a travel mug for my coffee, my phone rings from the bedroom. Puzzled, I run back up the stairs. It’s barely after five. No one calls me this early.
Beth Davis, from McGill’s flashes across my screen.
A familiar heat warms my chest, spreads down my spine. I’m suddenly wide awake.
“Hey, I was just coming over to see you. You’re up early.” My steps feel lighter as I advance back down the hallway. “God, Beth, I . . .”
“Reed, is she with you? P-Please tell me she’s there.”
I halt, not quite at the opening to the kitchen, recognizing the voice instantly. “Hattie? Hey, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“Beth,” she strains through a whimper. “Is she with you?”
I glance around me, confused, suddenly expecting Beth to jump out from behind something. “No,” I answer curiously, brushing a wet strand of hair off my forehead. “Why?”
“Oh, no,” she whispers. “Oh, no, no, no.”
Her voice sounds miles away. Worry plagues me, spreading in my veins like an infection. Coffee forgotten, I swipe my keys off the counter and head outside to my truck. I’m sprinting, my boots kicking up gravel.
“Hattie, what’s going on? Where’s Beth?”
She mumbles something I can’t understand, her voice breaking between fragile cries. Trapping the phone between my ear and shoulder, I start the truck and peel out onto the road.
“Hattie! Where is she?” I ask again when I don’t get an answer, my voice more demanding. My skin growing hot at the base of my neck.
She cries harder, sobbing now, breaking down completely. “She l-left. She went b-back ,” she wails, gasping for air.
Panic pollutes my mind. I break out in a cold sweat.
“What?” My response sticks to my tongue, struggling to roll past my lips as the world blurs in front of me. I blink heavily, solidly training on the road ahead. My hand violently shifts gears.
She went back? Why would she leave? What the fuck?
I search my memory for an explanation, something I obviously missed.
Images of Beth poison me with guilt. I looked at her yesterday, but did I really see her? Her sorrowed expression in the morning when I opened the bathroom door, the way she kept her head down, or turned away from me in the truck on the drive home. She was so small, so quiet.
How could I have been so blind?
“I love you . . . I love you.”
Three words, three simple words. The ones she nearly sobbed the night before, the ones I couldn’t seem to repeat. She wasn’t dealing with the shit that happened with her dad. She wouldn’t leave because of him. He wasn’t here.
It was me.
I told her I would never hurt her. I told her I could only give her so much of me, when in reality I never had a choice. I loved her, and I never said it. She left thinking I never will.
I blow through a red-light, heading for the nearest road that takes me to the highway. “Hattie, where was Beth before she moved here? Where in Louisville? Do you have an address?”
Hattie whimpers, quietly murmuring practiced words, as if she’s reading them off something. She isn’t hearing me. I can’t make anything out over the noise of the engine.
“Hattie.” I try for her attention again. Frustration flares to life in my veins. My blood runs hot. Realizing I’m wasting my time trying to get any information from her over the phone, I veer off onto a side road, heading to my original destination.
“I’m coming over, okay? I’m almost there,” I tell her.
Her voice never pauses, never reacts to mine, but it does grow softer as the one in my head dominates for attention, reminding me over and over again why this has happened.
Why this is all my fault.
I feel sick when I don’t see Beth’s car parked in the driveway. I hate that fucking car, knowing she lived in it, but I would give anything to see it right now. I send a short text to my dad before I get out of the truck, telling him I won’t be in today. Speaking to him would lead to being lectured about how reckless I’m being with my sick leave. The opinion of a man who’s never missed a day’s work.
The front door is unlocked, and I announce my presence quietly as I step inside. I don’t have time to knock and wait to be let in. I’m hours away from Beth. This is about getting the information I need and getting on the road.
A soft light from the kitchen draws me down the hallway. No voices.
Hattie looks up from the kitchen table when I enter, a piece of paper in her hand, her face flushed and wet with tears. The phone with the black floral case sits in front
of her.
I disconnected our call shortly after I told Hattie I was on my way. I couldn’t stand hearing and not understanding her at the same time. Knowing she was on Beth’s phone, and that Beth was now without one.
I move further into the room, ready to ask for an address.
“I was hoping she was at your house. That she changed her mind,” Hattie whispers, her eyes drifting to the paper. “We got home late from the bar last night. Her car was gone, but we figured she was still with you, so we went to bed. I didn’t find her note telling us goodbye until this morning.” Our eyes lock. She pushes away from the table, standing. “Reed, we can’t let her go back to that man. I don’t know what happened between you two, or if this is just because of the stuff with her dad, which I feel so horrible about, but she can’t go back there. Not there. He was awful to her.” Her face falls apart in tears. A hand covers her mouth, muffling her sobs.
He was awful to her? HE.
I stare at Hattie as every muscle in my body locks up at once. As the conversations with Beth about her life in Kentucky flood my mind with snapshots of information.
Her mom dying. Beth homeless, living in her car. Until . . .
I was so absorbed in her absence, in the address I needed to pry from Hattie, I didn’t consider who Beth was going back to.
The guy she was with before me. The stranger who took her in. The one she didn’t seem keen on discussing.
“Nobody. Just this guy I met. It doesn’t matter.”
She couldn’t satisfy me with an answer quick enough on the phone. Then a day later, in my arms, she was vague again.
“Relationships change. There’s really nothing more to it.”
Fuck. FUCK. What didn’t she tell me? I understood her reserve as a sad moment in her life she didn’t want to dwell on. I could tell she was uncomfortable discussing it. I didn’t want to pry. I didn’t want to sound desperate to know her.
This is all my fault.
And God, I was desperate, to anything involving her. I was sated and starved at the same time.
My nostrils flare in time with the heavy expansion of my chest. I begin to pace. “What did he do to her? Who is this guy? Fuck!” My hands tug my hair. “Fuck, Hattie! Did he hurt Beth? My Beth? Who the fuck is he?”