“What the hell are you talking about?” I blustered, feeling unreasonably annoyed by his recollection.
“It was September third the first time I saw you drinking it and I asked you why you had coffee when it was so hot out. You told me to fuck off.”
For some reason, his words made me flush in embarrassment. His memory sounded about right. I had had very little patience for Flynn’s idiosyncrasies in the beginning of our acquaintance. He had irritated me and thrown me off balance and I had reacted in the only way I had ever been able to…with nastiness.
“How the hell to do you remember stuff like that?” I bit out, flustered. Flynn shrugged but didn’t bother to answer. The door opened behind his back and a woman shoved passed us as we blocked the entrance. She harrumphed under her breath with an irritated expelling of breath.
“Is there a problem?” I asked coldly and the woman’s eyes widened for a moment before scurrying off toward the counter. I had that affect on people.
I turned back to Flynn who had finally lifted his eyes and watched me steadily. He stared at me as though he were studying me. His intense gaze had always made me uncomfortable. I had never been sure how to handle his intense scrutiny and I didn’t know how to handle it now.
I turned my face away, breaking our eye contact. Flynn Hendrick was the only person to ever make me back away. I never hid or ran from conflict. I faced things head on and bulldozed my way through them with an aggressive and self-destructive force.
But Flynn made me retreat.
“I’ve seen you at the community college. Do you go there?” Flynn asked, his voice hovering and halting as he spoke. His inflections were typically off.
“Yeah. I do,” I told him, not offering details.
Flynn frowned. Fine lines at the corner of his eyes crinkled his skin and I found myself watching his face in fascination. I had always found his reactions to be different and oddly interesting. And while he had clearly schooled himself on appropriate emotions over the years, he still came across as stilted and awkward.
“I saw you outside my studio. You were watching me.” I flushed again and this time with mortification. I didn’t know how to respond to his forthright observation but I also felt relief that he wasn’t aware of how often I had looked for him in the past few weeks.
“So?” I mumbled, eyeing the door behind his back, ready to make my quick getaway.
“You used to do that a lot. Watch me draw. I liked it,” Flynn said, his lips turning up into a small smile. He didn’t know how to be anything but honest and not for the first time, I found that refreshing.
“Yeah I did,” I admitted, trying to control the twitch in my lips that threatened to curve up into a full-blown smile.
“You can come by and watch me. It would be nice. That way you can look without standing in the hallway,” Flynn suggested and I grimaced.
“It was just the one time. I saw you and was curious about what you were doing there. That’s it,” I lied, shuffling my weight from one leg to the other. I was aware that we were standing in the middle of the coffee shop and were obviously the most interesting thing these people had seen for quite a while. And no amount of glares would make them look away.
“I use the art studio three times a week. I couldn’t bring a lot of my supplies with me so I’m using their kiln,” he said as though that explained anything.
“Okay,” I replied. I wanted to ask him why he had moved back. I had thought that out of all the places in the world he could live, Wellsburg, West Virginia would be the last place he’d end up.
I wanted to know about his art and what he was working on. I was curious about what he had done with his life in the six years since I had seen him last. I wanted to know if he hated me and blamed me as I suspected he did.
But I didn’t ask any of those things. I could never give voice to the fascination that I always had for Freaky Flynn Hendrick. I couldn’t acknowledge in any way that he intrigued me. Or that standing in front of him after all this time reminded me of things I was only too happy to leave in the past.
“I could get you another coffee,” Flynn said suddenly, startling me out of my thoughts. His habit of changing topics was just as disconcerting as it always was. I needed to take notes if I was hoping to keep up with him.
I looked down at my brown stained shirt and shook my head. “That’s all right. I think I’ve had my fill of coffee for one day,” I told him dryly.
Anyone else would have looked ashamed for dumping coffee on an innocent person. Anyone else would have picked up on my irritation and overall discomfort and not pressed for further conversation. But Flynn wasn’t like anyone else. He was clueless and socially maladjusted and right now he was being a huge pain in my ass.
“You like your coffee. I’ll get you another one. Or here, take mine,” he insisted holding out his to go cup and I crunched my teeth together hard enough to break enamel.
“I don’t want a fucking coffee, Flynn! So back off!” My voice rose. The whispering in the coffee shop went up a notch.
Flynn cocked his head to one side, his hair obscuring his eyes. “You’re mad,” he deduced.
“I’m not mad. I just don’t want any damn coffee. Look, this has been swell, but I’ve got to get to work.” I moved around him, careful not to brush against him.
“I’d like it if you could come by the studio and sit with me sometime,” he said before I could leave.
I should have left it. I should have ignored him and kept on moving. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. I had to end this before I allowed anything resembling friendship to infiltrate our non-relationship. I was not going to repeat past mistakes.
I pivoted on my foot and turned to face him again. His eyes met mine and then skittered away nervously.
“Why would I do that, Flynn?” I demanded. He didn’t say anything. But I pressed on, making sure I communicated exactly what I needed him to hear.
“Why would I want to spend time with you? It’s been six years since I’ve seen you and truthfully I could have gone another six quite easily.” My heart slammed into my ribcage and I felt a strange twisting in my gut as I threw my words at him like knives.
He didn’t look at me. He stared resolutely at the floor and I wasn’t entirely sure he heard me at all. He closed in on himself and that annoying twinge manifested as guilt.
I let out a frustrated breath and turned around, my back to Flynn and pushed through the coffee shop door and out into the humid, August heat.
I stood there a moment, looking up and down the quiet and desolate street, my chest painfully tight.
I wanted to look over my shoulder, back into the coffee shop. The urge to turn around was overwhelming. But I wouldn’t let myself. I denied myself the right to look again on the man I had just torn down as easily as I had done six years ago.
But it was for the best.
If there was one thing I knew it was that Flynn and I only brought each other pain.
And I had learned that the past was best left behind us.
-Ellie-
I was drunk.
I had just lost the contents of my stomach along the side of Shane’s Chevy Challenger, which stopped all efforts on his part to put his hands down my pants.
“Fucking hell, Ellie!” he screamed, pulling the over on the side of the backcountry road to have a look at the damage.
“You pinstriped his car, Ells!” Dania cackled from the back seat. The sweet smell of the joint between her lips wafted my way and I waved the smoke out of my face. My throat started to constrict and mouth began to water.
I was going to puke again.
I shoved the passenger side door open and collapsed on my knees as I heaved again. My head was pounding and my stomach clenched in a vice. Why had I agreed to a shoot out with Stu? Why had I thought it a good idea to slam back six shots of Evan Williams?
I collapsed into the gravel, my face an inch from the pile of vomit I had just expelled.
“Come on, Ellie! We�
��re already late!” Reggie yelled. I groaned and rolled my face into the dirt.
Welcome to a typical Saturday night, full of bad alcohol and shitty choices.
“Pick her up, Shane and get her back in the car!” Dania said and I knew she was annoyed. I was ruining her night. She had plans to meet up with a guy named Brock at the field party we were heading to. She was wearing her fuck me red shoes and slut on a mission halter-top.
Reggie and Stu were trying to be discrete as they felt each other up beside a stoned Dania and I was once again drunk and trying to fend off the unwanted advances of Shane.
My life was stuck on an endless loop and I wanted desperately to hit the fast forward button.
“She sure as fuck ain’t gettin’ in my car if she’s gonna barf again,” Shane grumbled, the driver’s side door slamming shut as he got back in, leaving me sprawled out on the side of the road.
“She’s a hot mess. Leave her ass here,” Stu suggested. Clearly he wasn’t aiming to become my BFF anytime soon.
“We can’t leave her here. Get out and pick her up, Shane!” Dania demanded, her voice heavy and thick from the weed she had smoked.
I heard a car door open and hands lift me up in a less than gentle manner. I was shoved unceremoniously back into the front seat and the door slammed, catching my hair.
“Oww,” I moaned, trying to move my head. My scalp was on fire as my hair pulled taut against my skin. I fumbled for the door handle and whimpered as I tried to move my head.
“My hair,” I slurred.
Dania leaned over the back of the seat and rubbed my head. “Your hair looks beautiful,” she giggled. Shane pulled back out onto the road, my head knocking into the window as he swerved. I grabbed the hunk of trapped hair at the base of my skull and gave it a vicious yank. It came loose, leaving a good portion stuck in the door.
My scalp burned and I felt sick again but I swallowed down the bile that filled my mouth and closed my eyes. Dania and Reggie were laughing in the back seat; smoke filled the car as they lit up another joint. They passed it to Shane who took it and sucked it between his thin lips.
He held it out for me to take but I shook my head.
“It’ll stop you from getting sick again,” Dania urged, rubbing the back of my head. There were times, even when she was high and acting stupid, that I could remember why she was my friend. For all of her faults, there was a streak of gentleness that made her almost bearable.
And I made sure to notice it when I saw it. I didn’t miss the way she rubbed her protruding belly when she thought no one was looking. I recognized the soft, dreamy expression on her face when she talked about the baby she was carrying, even as she tried to deny she felt anything.
And she looked after me. When I hadn’t been able to take care of myself, she was there. And she was the one person in my life who had never turned her back on me. She was all I had.
I leaned into the soft pressure of her fingers against the back of my skull. Shane leaned over, one hand still on the steering wheel, the other pressing the smoking roach to my mouth.
“Suck it like a cock, Ells,” he leered and I would have rolled my eyes if I didn’t feel like I was going to puke again.
I smacked his hand away. Even if he didn’t care about passing our random drug tests, I sure as hell did. I rolled the window down so I could breathe in some fresh air.
It helped. After a few minutes my stomach started to feel better.
Shane pulled into a field a few minutes later and our motley crew lumbered out in a giant heap. Reggie and Stu disappeared only moments after arriving. Dania, after giving me a quick kiss on the cheek, ran over to a guy who was sat in a lawn chair by the bonfire.
Shane, who had clearly been turned off by my outstanding version of The Exorcist, left me by myself on the outskirts of the party.
And then I was alone.
I was always freaking alone.
I leaned against Shane’s car and watched people I had known most of my life drinking, laughing, and enjoying themselves. It seemed so shallow and useless. My head was buzzing and I was a long way from being sober but the dope in my system was making me entirely too introspective.
The scene in front of me was like a frozen moment in time. Unchanging. The same thing every weekend. The same shitty beer and out of date music. The same people getting lucky in the back somebody’s van while the rest of the party got wasted. I could see Chris Donald’s fashioning a beer bong by cutting off the bottom of a milk jug and attaching it to a long piece of plastic tubing. I had seen him do this exact same thing a thousand times before. And I knew that in fifteen minutes he’d be passed out on the ground.
I watched Shelly Clements lift her shirt and show everyone her newest nipple piercing. Her tits, while a bit saggier than they had been in high school, were still large enough to get the guys’ attention.
Each of these people carried on, as if nothing else existed. There was a great big world outside the boundaries of Wellsburg, West Virginia, but no one seemed particularly eager to see it. And my friends and I fit right into this stagnant purgatory. Here I was, drunk and hating it. Sneering disparagingly but unwilling to turn that judgment on myself.
I turned away from the party and headed toward the thick growth of trees at the edge of the field. I could barely stand upright and fell down several times but I kept moving forward.
I disappeared into the brush and headed north. I knew these woods like the back of my hand and if I continued for a half a mile, I’d find the road. I would walk back to town. In my fuzzy, alcohol soaked mind, trekking the ten miles back to Wellsburg beat hanging out with the high school rejects.
Branches snagged at my clothes and my legs were getting scratched raw by brambles. A gnat flew into my mouth and lodged itself in the back of my throat, making me gag.
The farther I walked, the clearer my head became. The weed had started to wear off and my head was throbbing.
I broke through the trees expecting to find the main road and was surprised to find myself at the edge of a very familiar piece of property.
The moon was full and lit up the manicured yard in front of me. A house stood off in the distance, surrounded by a group of out buildings that I remembered all too well.
I blinked at the uneasy sense of déjà vu. In my mind’s eye I didn’t see the freshly painted structure with bright blue shutters. I didn’t see the repaired shed at the edge of the long driveway.
I flashed back in time and all I could see was smoke and flames.
I felt dizzy and my eyes filled with sudden tears that took me by surprise.
Not being able to stop myself, I started walking across the lawn. I was like a woman possessed and I felt like I was trapped in a time warp, marching the same path I had done on that particular night all those years ago.
I could swear I still smelled the scent of burning wood and I thought I was going to be sick again.
The grass tickled my feet by my thin flip-flops. I wanted to leave. I wanted to run far, far away. But my traitorous legs kept on going.
I stopped at the steps leading up to the house. I ran my hand along the obviously new bannister, recalling when I had watched it crumble into ash. My hands shook as I touched the new wood, cool beneath my fingers.
I looked up at the dark windows and wondered who lived there now. I wondered if they loved it as much as I had. For a brief moment in time this had been my sanctuary. I had been happy here. Well, as happy as a girl like me ever could be.
I heard a noise behind me and I dropped my hand from the banister as I stumbled backwards. I was trespassing and the last thing I needed was another run in with the local police department.
I hurried around the side of the house and hid behind one of the buildings that like the house had been recently painted. I could still smell the fumes heavy in the humid air.
“I can see you.” A voice rose up out of the darkness and I jumped. I couldn’t help my reaction. His sudden appearance freaked me out.
<
br /> I pressed myself against the side of the building, feeling foolish for being there in the first place. Why hadn’t I left as soon as I had realized where I was? What had compelled me to venture onto the property in the first place?
“What are you doing here?” he asked me and I could barely make out the black silhouette in the moonlight.
“I didn’t mean to. I was trying to find the road,” I excused, annoyed that my voice sounded breathless and weak in my ears.
Being here after all this time was doing crazy things to my head and my heart. And seeing him now, when my memories of this place were making me feel uncharacteristically vulnerable, was almost too much.
Flynn walked into a swath of light that filtered out from the back of the house and regarded me steadily.
“The road is over there,” he pointed back toward the trees in the direction I had just come from.
I laughed nervously. “Yeah I know. I had forgotten this place was here,” I answered lamely. It was a lie of course. Maybe subconsciously this is where I had been heading all along. Maybe I wanted to come here.
Because I could never forget this place, no matter how much I wanted to.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded roughly, trying to hide my growing sense of unease.
Flynn’s hands clenched together in front of him as he looked up at the large, white farmhouse. “I live here,” he said shortly.
My stomach dropped to my feet at his statement. He was living here?
“I thought it had been sold…” I began.
“No, I took it off the market last year after my mom died,” Flynn said and I heard emotion in his voice for the first time.
Then I registered what he had said and I felt an uncomfortable familiar crush of feeling.
“I’m sorry, Flynn,” I told him sincerely. Because I was. I recognized the look of grief on his face as surely as if it had been my own. I wasn’t one to empathize. It was almost impossible for me to identify with the emotions of others, but it had always been different with Flynn.
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