“I don’t know…just…I don’t know, I just get this feeling sometimes,” he said, truly miserable now.
“That’s just how Sam is!” she said, raising her voice. “She’s just like that. She flirts with everyone! She teases, she makes dirty jokes, she’s off-cookie, or whatever the hell they call it. I’ve seen her flirt with Dr. Willard, it doesn’t mean she wants to sleep with him!”
“Just forget I said anything,” he said, tossing his game controller, and jumping up to turn off the TV.
“Oh, sure. Your best friend is a hoe bag and I think she’s coming on to me…never mind,” Chloe mimicked.
“So did you flip out on her when she said I was a controlling abusive boyfriend, or whatever the fuck she put in your head?” Seth snapped, whirling to face her.
“Because I obviously can’t think for myself, Sam had to put that idea into my head, because I’m too trusting and stupid to think that on my own,” Chloe shot back.
“Wow,” Seth said, taking a step backwards. He held up his hands in a mock gesture of surrender. “If that’s what YOU think…wow.”
“Wow,” Chloe repeated, lowering her voice again. “wow…I’m crazy, huh?”
“Clo…” he warned.
“You think that’s crazy? You want to know what the big secret is? You think I tell Sam everything? You want to know all my secrets? I AM crazy, Seth. They put me in a goddamn institution, because I’m crazy. Certifiably nuts. Sam knows that. I hear voices, they tell me things. Even before I got here, I heard them. I told Sam that that’s why they locked me up. My mom thought I was crazy, and she had them commit me. But that’s not all…no. I attacked someone. Can you believe it? Shy, stupid, trusting, blushing Chloe…listening to the voices and I attacked someone. Sam doesn’t even know that! Just like with George, there were voices, and writing on the walls, and moving things, and seeing things out of the corner of my eye, and then my mom brought someone home. Right after my Dad died. She brings home this guy and all of a sudden he’s trying to fit himself in like the missing piece of the puzzle. Picking us up from school, family game night, bringing home a pizza, asking me all kinds of questions, trying to get close. He wanted me to tell him about the voices. I don’t know how he knew, but they didn’t like him. They said he was one of the bad ones. He was going to hurt us. He was going to try and stop me from figuring it out-”
“Bad ones?” he repeated. Chloe waved him off.
“He came over when everyone was out, said he needed to talk to me. I was in my room. He wanted to talk to me…said he knew that I could hear them, that he heard them too. He wanted to know what they wanted…what they were trying to do…and I could barely hear him…a voice told me to run, the rest were all saying stop him! End him! Yelling so loud I couldn’t think, couldn’t reason…and he knew…he knew I heard them, and he put his hands on me. He had my shoulders and he was shaking me, shaking me, and I…I…pushed him, and he fell. And I picked up the big vase by the door, and I hit him on the head, again and again and again. And there was blood, Seth. I thought I hurt him real bad, and I stopped. He kicked out and got me in the shin, and then he was up and he slapped me, and when I was down, he kicked me again, and I curled up, and I covered my head, and I could still hear them. They were still telling me to fight back, but he was gone. He called the police. They came and my Mom came and she was so mad. They said it was assault, and he was bleeding and I wasn’t. And then she put me away, and they told me I was angry, that I attacked him because I thought he was trying to replace my Dad. I had to sit through therapies and sessions and group time, and she was so angry. He never came back around after that, and she was so angry.”
“Oh my God, Clo,” he whispered.
“I just wanted to start over,” she continued. “just wanted to be some place where people wouldn’t look at me like I was a nut, because somehow, everyone knew. I thought…I thought if I came up here, I wouldn’t run into anyone…I could start over. I could be normal, but then…”
“Clo,” he said quietly, dropping to one knee in front of her and putting his hands on her arms. “I get it…okay? He tried to hurt you, didn’t he? He came over when no one was home and he came into your room, and he was going to hurt you, wasn’t he?”
“He knew. After everything happened, he said I had just attacked him, out of the blue, but damn it, I know what I know! He asked about the voices. Nobody believed me! He asked what they were telling me. Sam knows. Sam knows what it’s like when no one believes you, when everyone thinks it’s your fault.”
“Jesus, Clo. I don’t even know what to say,” he admitted quietly.
Looking down at his hurt expression, at his wide hazel eyes, trying to express something, maybe sympathy, she realized her error. It sounded crazy, didn’t it? He was realizing the depth of her sickness, that she wasn’t a normal, shy girl. He was all compassion now, but soon…soon he would stop returning her calls, soon he would find a reason to be busy when she wanted to do something…and you couldn’t blame him, really. Who wanted that in their life?
“I don’t feel good,” she said quickly. “I gotta…I gotta go or something, I don’t- I’m not okay, I need to-”
“I love you,” he said.
“I don’t understand,” she said, breathing through her nose, fighting nausea.
“I love you. I know it’s not the best time, or the best place, or whatever. I wanted to tell you so many times. I thought…I thought it would scare you off… I thought I should wait until you said it first. I wanted it to be special, I wanted it to be perfect. I wanted to know for sure, that you’d say it back…but it doesn’t matter now. I love you. I’m not going anywhere. We’re going to fix this. We’re going to get through this. We’ll move. We’ll go somewhere else. Clo, we can transfer, we can go to another dorm, we can go to another college. We can go home to Marquette and go to Northern, we can go south…we’ll go out-of-state. Tell me what you want to do, we’ll do it.”
“No!” she cut him off. “No! I’m not going to let you ruin your life. You’ve got your family, and you’re almost finished with school, and there’s the hockey team, and all your friends, and…and…No! I’m a fucking plague. I ruin everything I touch! What’s wrong with you?? Don’t you know when to give up?”
“Tell me what to do then,” he demanded, tightening his grip on her shoulders, “Tell me how to help, what I should do.”
“Why now?” She asked raising her voice. “You never once said you loved me, even on the Isle, with the northern lights, when it was just us. Why now? Because, like you said, you don’t know what else to say! You can’t really love me, Seth! You’re just…just this really, really nice guy, and you’re worried about me and I know you want to help, so you think…you think that if you say that, if you say you love me, it’ll help me somehow. You’d ruin yourself because you’re too nice, and you’re going to tie yourself to something that’s…that’s sick. That‘s-”
“I love you,” he spoke over her. He held her shoulders so tightly his grip seemed to penetrate her skin, latch on to her very bones.
“You never said so before,” she mumbled, refusing to meet his eyes. “I made you feel sorry for me.”
“Everything I have ever done, has been to prove it to you,” he said. “The way I’ve taken everything so slow with you. I never pushed, I never wanted to make you uncomfortable. Think about it, Clo. You think I didn’t want to sleep with you? You think I didn’t want to be with you constantly? I never said it, because you didn’t. Every time I took a step forward, you took a step back. So I waited. You think what Sam said didn’t occur to me? It did! Sometimes I felt like I was forcing you to be in a relationship you didn’t want to be in. I felt like an asshole sometimes, Clo, I swear to God, I did. I felt like there were times when, if given the choice, you’d ‘ve run…but you were too meek to tell me to fuck off-”
“You thought I was weak?” Chloe did feel weak, like she had been slammed to the ground.
“Meek, Chloe…meek. And yes,
I did, I do!” he let go of her abruptly and began massaging his forehead. “You never said you love me…Christ Clo, I’m pouring my heart out here, and you still haven’t.”
“I love you,” she said mechanically.
“Oh, God…” he moaned.
“What?” she asked quickly. “What else can I say?”
“Nothing,” he turned his back to her. “Just…I’m done, Clo…okay? I’m done talking right now. I’m tired. I’m angry. I’m frustrated. Just go. I’m going to say a bunch of shit I don’t mean, so go.”
And he meant it. He stood up and kicked a stack of games cartridges angrily, they flew across the room and hit the wall at different points, raining down loudly. Chloe sat frozen in her chair. For a moment she thought he was going to say something else, maybe that he was sorry, maybe that he didn’t mean it. But he was done. He was done with her. When he turned back to face her, she almost didn’t recognize him. His expression was pleading, his eyes seemed to be asking her for something, but she didn’t know what. He had asked her to leave, hadn’t he? He had asked her to ‘just go’.
“Awww, Clo…” he said, his voice breaking.
“No,” she said still frozen, forcing her face into the practiced mask. “I get it. It’s better this way. I’m going. You’re done, I’m done. We understand each other, and I’m leaving.”
She stood up. He looked crumpled…hurt. What the hell? She was doing what he wanted, wasn’t she? He was done. He wanted her to go, she was going. It had to be guilt. He was breaking up with her, the crazy girl, and he felt guilty that he was hurting her more. That had to be it!
“I’m fine,” she assured him briskly. I’m not fine! I love you, I love you, I love you! I love you a thousand times, I love you more than I love anything! Don’t break up with me! A voice cried inside. Chloe clenched her fists and stood, biting her lip to keep the weak-voiced traitor mute. She marched across the floor and shut the door behind her as quietly as she could. Shut the door against Seth’s tired and hurt red-rimmed eyes and his crossed arms. Shut the door on the relationship that had meant more to her then she could ever remember anything ever meaning before.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Chloe balanced on the last step of the bus stairwell for a moment before leaping over the pool of grey slurry, hoping to hit the scraped and salted sidewalk. But if there was one centimeter of ice on the cement, she would find it, and find it she did. The heel of one foot hit and slid, shooting upward, throwing her completely off balance. She stumbled forward, wind-milling her arms for balance, while around her, other students on their way to and from class snickered. Chloe was able to run herself into a balanced position.
“Smooth!” an anonymous voice called after her.
Chloe shrugged and slowed back down to a walk, heading for the front doors of Kirkbride Hall. Her backpack was so heavy it was wearing a sore spot into her shoulder.
“Clo! Wait up,” Sam called.
Chloe turned and walked backwards a few steps. Sam was crossing the parking lot, leaping over slush puddles as she hurried to catch up.
“Hey!” she called, while still a few paces away.
“Hey,” Chloe answered.
“How was, ummm…?” Sam asked.
“Freshman Comp? It sucked, thanks for asking,” Chloe replied.
“Yeah, inorganic chemistry is a joke too,” Sam said angrily. “English is not the professor’s first language, and I don’t think it’s even his second or third because I can’t understand a word he’s saying!”
Chloe turned and kept on towards the main doors, Sam fell into step next to her.
“So listen,” Sam began. “He called again this morning.”
“What’d he say?” Chloe asked without emotion.
“Same thing. If you want to talk, he’s around,” Sam parroted.
Chloe didn’t say anything.
“Truth be told,” Sam continued. “I’m surprised he’s not been down banging on the door, and he’s only called what…twice?”
“Three times,” Chloe corrected. “Not that I’m keeping count or anything.”
“But like I said, he lives a couple of doors down, how hard would it be for him to get up, walk a few steps, and knock on the door?” Sam demanded, angry on Chloe’s behalf.
“I don’t know, Sam. I don’t know much about guys, to be honest, but I’m going to guess that when I accused him of being a controlling, overbearing jerk, it may have made him a bit reticent to come down and bang on my door like a controlling, overbearing…jerk,” Chloe explained.
“Yeah, that’s probably true,” Sam admitted. “I am starting to feel just a little bit bad for him though. I mean, you really need to talk to him, you need to figure out where you guys stand.”
Chloe caught the door as another student exited and held it open for Sam.
“Yeah, I should, but I don’t want to deal with it right now. So I’m not going to,” Chloe said.
“What do you think he wants to do?” Sam pushed.
“I don’t know. He either wants to make sure we have a clean break…or he wants to patch things up,” Chloe answered.
“Well that narrows it down,” Sam said sarcastically. “Don’t you want to know what he wants to do about it?”
“Not really. I don’t think either one is going to be a very good thing. If he wants to make sure we’re broken up, I think it’s going to hurt me real bad. I think I’m going to be a mess, for a long time. And if he wants to stay together? Almost as bad, because I’ll know that I’m going to be a tumor on his brain for as long as he wants to keep me there, which I can’t imagine will be that long anyways,” Chloe said.
“You’re a right little ray of sunshine today,” Sam snorted. “But I’m just going to say this once, and not harp on it after this. It’s not fair to him to keep him dangling, while you sit around thinking about what you want to do. And it’s going to be worse for you in the long run. Think about it. How are you going to feel if you don’t talk to him for another week, and then you see him making out with some girl at a party, or better yet, see a girl coming out of his room one morning?”
“He’s not that kind of guy,” Chloe said, trudging up the stairs behind Sam.
“They’re all that kind of guy,” Sam muttered. “Forget it! What do you think about getting some girls from the floor together and hitting the Eat tonight?”
“I think maybe your family needs to stage another intervention, because your first one didn’t seem to take,” Chloe said in mock seriousness.
“Hardy-har-har-har,” Sam said and gave her the finger.
“No, I’m hitting the library tonight. Willard emailed me last night to ask when to set up our first meeting for the semester, and I get the feeling that he thinks we’ve been plowing right along since he’s been gone. I want to get another two boxes down at least,” Chloe excused herself, digging in her pocket for the room key.
“Come out, have a couple of drinks,” Sam pushed. “You’ll feel better I promise.”
“You go,” Chloe said, “have one for me.”
“You want help?” Sam asked, cringing as she waited for the answer, probably afraid the answer might be yes. Chloe pushed open the door and swung the heavy bag off her shoulder and onto the floor.
“Nah.”
“I was kind of hoping we’d be able to weasel out of the TA thing this semester,” Sam admitted.
“I thought you were all gung ho about figuring out the mystery of Abraham’s Men and the Kirkbride Hall ghost,” Chloe smirked.
“I was. I am…I mean. It’s just…have you noticed that stuff seems to have stopped happening? Things aren’t disappearing and turning up other places, the lights don’t go on and off, there’s nothing writing all over the walls anymore…kind of like whatever was doing it just…gave up,” Sam said.
Both girls stood still and listened, almost as if the question were an invitation for the activities to resume. Nothing happened.
“Yeah. I don’t think he’s gone though,�
�� Chloe said.
“I guess I’ve just got a short attention span,” Sam grinned, “By the way, I’ve got just enough time to grab some lunch before I head back out for the afternoon. You want to hit the caf with me?”
“Nah, I’m not hungry,” Chloe said, and dragged her bag by one strap over to the desk. Plopping down in the chair, she unzipped it and started hauling out the heavy textbooks, stacking them on the desk top.
“You’re moping,” Sam decided.
“Not moping, just not hungry, Sam!” she corrected angrily.
“Bite my head off then,” Sam said defensively.
“Sorry,” Chloe‘s voice was completely unapologetic.
Sam gave a disgusted snort and left. Chloe waited until she was sure Sam was halfway to the caf, and then slid open her desk drawer to pull out a blank sheet of paper. She placed it in the center of her desk and stared at it awhile. Then she picked up her pen and began:
Dear Seth, she wrote. I want to first say, that I love you very much and-
Chloe dropped the pen and crumpled the page angrily. That was a horrible way to start. It sounded desperate or stupid or something. She ripped another sheet out of the drawer and tried again.
Dear Seth, I’m sorry I haven’t returned your calls. I don’t really know what to say, or I would have. I wish I hadn’t told you all that stuff. I don’t know if I’m more worried that you’ll want to make up because you feel sorry for me or if you’ll want to stay broken up because you know what a psycho I am.
She paused to reread what she had written, and then crumpled that sheet up as well. No good, she decided. Another sheet and another try, she began again.
Dear Seth, Can we forget all that stuff I said the last time we talked? Just pretend it never happened, and be together again? Because I love you.
Chloe groaned at her own stupidity and ripped the page in half before wadding the pieces up into yet another paper ball. She swept the pile off the desk and into the trash, and dropped her head down onto her crossed arms.
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