So Twisted

by Melissa Marino

  No. I didn’t want to. Not after seeing her face and knowing I couldn’t live the rest of my life without seeing it again.

  Things didn’t need to be complicated. Not after realizing the role I played in things not working out. Not after the awful things I said to her.

  Not after seeing the pain in her eyes, hearing her tell me it could never work between us again, and not telling her I didn’t need to be her lover or her boyfriend, I just needed her in my life.

  Not after leaving her right after making love, leaving her to think that was all I wanted or had ever wanted from her.

  It didn’t have to be perfect. I only wanted us to be.

  I ran back to my car and raced back to her apartment. There was no rehearsing as I had done earlier, no thoughts of exactly what would happen. It just needed to be authentic. It needed to be honest, complete, me.

  Before I had another thought about what I was doing, I was at her door, praying she would open for me. The light footsteps on the other side of the door let me know someone was coming.

  Then she was there.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, concerned.

  “Blueberries,” I blurted out. “They stain my teeth.”

  “What?”

  “You asked me once, you wanted to know why I picked the blueberries out of my blueberry muffin. They stain my teeth, but I still like the blueberry taste.”

  She continued to look at me, a mixture of concern and confusion.

  “I spent a semester abroad in France and I got arrested for streaking across the Fountain of Versailles.” I paused to gauge her expression, but it was still too cryptic for me to discern. “I’ve never told anyone that.”

  “Aaron…”

  “I lost my virginity to Mandy Fernberg when I was sixteen in the backseat of my father’s BMW. Also, I was so messed up after Lexie left, I was on antianxiety medication for years.”

  Her eyebrows lifted, a sad smile lifting the sides of her mouth. “Mickey Mouse pancakes.”

  “Huh?” I asked confused.

  “That first morning when I made Mickey Mouse pancakes for breakfast. I saw a prescription bottle in the cabinet, but never saw it again.”

  “I moved it,” he whispered. “I stopped taking it soon after and I was going to tell you, but I had, I have, so many other things to tell you.”

  She pressed her lips together tightly and shook her head. “What are you doing, Aaron?”

  “What I should have done when I first came here. What I should have done months ago.”

  “What are you doing?” she repeated slowly.

  “I don’t want to leave tonight, Callie, without you knowing, without telling you, how I feel.”

  “But…look…”

  I reached across the open doorway and took hold of her wrist. “We don’t have to forget about everything and pretend like nothing happened. We both messed up, but we can both make it better. I don’t want anything else but you. I don’t want you to be my nanny. You don’t even need to be my girlfriend. I just want…to get to know you. I want to take you on a date, on many dates, and I want to know you, and I want you to know me. Remember that day at Wildberry? When you mentioned your dad for the first time? I promised myself I’d ask more questions, learn more about who you were, but I didn’t. I told myself I would explain to you all about Lexie and what her leaving did to me. But I was so wrapped in who we were, where we were headed, and I thought we’d have time. I always thought there would be an endless amount of time. I took that for granted and I’m so fucking sorry.”

  Tears pooled in her eyes and she attempted to shake her head no, but stopped.

  “Please. It wasn’t our imagination. I want this. I want us, and I want us to get there together, how we should have gotten there to begin with.” My hand still gripped her wrist, unable to let go. “Please let me in,” I pleaded.

  She let out a small cry, tears rolling down her perfect face. After a deep breath, she took a step back. I waited for the door to slam shut, but in true Callie fashion, she surprised me once again.

  She stepped out of the doorway and held the door wide open for me. A tiny smile lifted the corner of her mouth slightly. “Okay, I’ll let you in,” she whispered.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  CALLIE—

  I couldn’t shut the door, shut him out, knowing I’d regret it for the rest of my life if I did.

  I couldn’t pretend that what I felt from him was an illusion or that it was wrong. I couldn’t want him and not want him at the same time.

  I couldn’t tell him I wouldn’t forgive him when I wanted the same forgiveness from him. I couldn’t.

  So, I let him in.

  I’d never seen him look so vulnerable, yet as honest as he did in that moment. It was as if the raindrops soaking his skin and clothes had washed his entire facade away and what was left was just him. Just Aaron. His eyes were different than they had been just an hour prior when he left me. They were clear and open, looking at me, actually looking at me, and they looked relieved.

  “Can we sit down?” he asked.

  I nodded and followed him to the couch. I sat at one end, grabbing the throw blanket that was hanging across the back of the couch, and he sat at the other. After I wrapped myself up in the blanket, I fiddled with the yarn at the end and focused on anything but him.

  “Callie?” he whispered.

  “Yes,” I replied, avoiding his gaze.

  “What are you thinking?”

  I sighed deeply. “I’m thinking…that…we, everything, is really messed up. We messed up.”

  “I suppose we did, but I have to be honest.” He paused for a moment before continuing. “Callie, can you please look at me?”

  While it was probably the polite thing to do, I knew that looking anywhere in the vicinity of his eyes, his face, was usually my downfall.

  Or the dropping of my pants.

  It was how, like I’d just told him, we really messed up. We let the sex guide us and somewhere along the line we fell in love. Unfortunately, communicating with me in any other way besides in bed was something we never completely established.

  It was the way we said hello and ultimately the way we said good-bye.

  Or so I thought.

  “Calliope?”

  “I’m scared, Aaron. So much has happened and I don’t know how we can fix it,” I said.

  “Neither do I, but I’m willing to try.” He paused and looked down. “Are you?”

  How did I explain to him that, yes, I wanted to try to fix us, but I was scared out of my mind. I was starting a brand-new life, a life in which I wouldn’t have to be dependent on anyone for the first time, and that meant I wanted to wipe the slate clean of all my screwups of the past. While I didn’t want to consider what we had a screwup, I knew all the lying and deception weren’t some of my proudest accomplishments.

  “I don’t know,” I answered honestly.

  “I understand. I really do, because even though I don’t know how to make this better, I know I want to try. I know because I can’t imagine living any more of my life without you in it.”

  He paused to gauge my reaction, which I’m sure looked something like I had gone a few rounds with Mike Tyson. I was tired, beat down, and my head was just swimming with confusion. After a nod of my head to let him know I was listening, he continued.

  “I came here tonight to tell you that, to tell you so much, but I messed up. Again. Seeing you, after not for so long, and thinking you might be with someone else, that I was too late, made me lose my entire reason for coming here in the first place. Then…I don’t know…we…just…”

  “Fucked?”

  “Well, yeah,” he chuckled sadly. “Although I didn’t want it to seem so crude.”

  “Well, let’s call a spade a spade, right?”

  “I know that’s how it looks, but I’m telling you the truth. I didn’t come over just to do that. You have to believe that.”

  We were quiet for a minutes, allowing e
verything to sink in.

  “I was waiting to not trust you,” he said, not waiting for me to answer his question. “I mean, I didn’t realize at the time I was doing it, but in retrospect, and talking with Diane, I was able to…”

  “Wait,” I interrupted. “Who is Diane?”

  So help me God, if he has another girlfriend or a new nanny he’s banging, I’ll grab the closest thing I can find and beat him until he is stuttering like a crack addict on a bumpy L route.

  “Diane is…she’s a therapist I’ve been seeing,” he replied nervously.

  “You’re seeing a therapist?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wow,” I said.

  He shifted uncomfortably while wringing his hands together roughly. “Does that make you uneasy?”

  “No, it’s surprising, but it doesn’t make me uneasy.”

  He nodded. “I can see that. No one was more shocked than I was that I was actually doing it, but my dad gave me a good verbal ass-kicking and…”

  “Your dad? I mean, sorry to keep interrupting you, but…your dad was the one who told you to go to therapy?”

  “Strange, right? Yeah, I mean, he pointed out what a fuckup I was being, and for the first time ever, I listened and realized he was right.”

  “So, does that mean he knows about what happened between us?”

  “He didn’t at first, but yes, he does know. Everything.”

  I almost wanted to laugh out loud at the irony. Daniel, who had put up such a fuss and caused so much stress, was the voice of reason.

  “Do you feel like talking about some things helped?” I asked.

  He took his time responding. “Yes,” he answered.

  I wanted to ask him what he learned or how it helped. I wanted to know what he told this Diane person about me and what she said about me in turn. I wanted to be angry that it took an outside person to get some shit through his thick head, but in the same breath, I wanted to praise him for not wallowing and for taking charge.

  “What are you thinking?” he asked.

  “I’m thinking…wondering…if I’ll ever understand you.”

  He looked sad, so totally defeated. “It hurts me, more than you know, that you feel that way.”

  “I’m sorry. I…”

  “No, let me finish. Callie, I have to be accountable for my role in all this. I could point fingers and say it was all your fault, but that wouldn’t be fair because I know the truth. The truth is, I wanted you the same way you wanted me, and it scared the shit out of me. I was so scared of losing you, to realize you wouldn’t want me anymore, that I didn’t want to consider anything else.” He paused and took a deep breath. “I never should have hired you. I knew there was something between us that first day, that first minute, we met. I should have thanked you for your time, and before you left, I should have asked you for your number and asked you out to dinner.”

  I’d known it would be difficult to hold tears at bay, but it was impossible after what he’d just said. It was shocking and honest, and if there was going to be any part of us that healed permanently, I’d need to be as truthful. Funny thing was, I believed I had already been honest with myself, convinced with the new job and moving out, that I was almost over him. After tonight, I knew nothing was further from the truth. Lying to myself was so much worse than lying to him or anyone else. It was time to lay it all out on the table.

  “Can we agree,” I choked through tears, “we were both wrong? I mean, there’s no way to get past all the bullshit without each of us admitting things.”

  “Yes,” he said. He shifted his body toward me and slid closer, but not close enough to touch me.

  “I never felt like I was living, really living, until I was with you, and it scared the shit out of me. Here you were, this amazingly brilliant, beautiful man and then there was me. I never felt I would measure up. I was this young twit who had no business being with you in any real sense…in any real kind of relationship. I didn’t want you to know how freaked out I was, so I went to Abel and told him everything I should have been telling you. How I felt about you and how the pushing and eagerness to get married freaked me out. It all happened too fast and I know I should’ve said so. That is all on me. My voice was lost among all the confusion, and it shouldn’t have been. I’ve had to stand tall for a lot of things in my life, and this was the one time I went silent. I won’t, I can’t, do that ever again.”

  “There was too much for anyone to deal with coming into a relationship with me. Delilah, Lexie, my dad, but you handled it all the best you could, better than I did myself.” He stopped and hung his head. “Fuck. I never wanted you to feel, never ever, you weren’t what I wanted, that you didn’t measure up in some way.”

  We sat quietly for a while, well, semi-quietly. I was a sniffling, sobbing mess, but in an attempt to try and hide it, I was snorting up the most disgusting sound imaginable. It was as if we were comforting each other, understanding, without touching.

  It was a first for us.

  “How’s Delilah?” I asked.

  The corners of his mouth lifted up into a smile, the same familiar smile he always had when he heard his daughter’s name. “She misses you. The phone calls and pancakes help. Thank you for that, by the way.”

  “I’ve enjoyed doing it. I miss her a lot, too.”

  “Well, that leads me to the biggest apology I have to make to you,” he said sadly. I saw tears pool in his eyes, and it was enough to make me start sobbing all over again. “Making you leave the way I did, so abruptly, without discussion and especially without letting you see Delilah, is the most reprehensible thing I’ve ever done in my life.”

  I drew in a sharp breath, both from remembering all the pain his actions caused me and also from how much he had been beating himself up over it. I wasn’t ready to just say, “Oh…it’s all right. I understand,” because I didn’t. If we were talking about true honesty, I wasn’t going to appease him to make him feel better, no matter how horrible he felt.

  He didn’t wait for me to make him feel better, though.

  “I know she’s told you, but she started ballet lessons,” he said. “It’s the most adorable thing ever. She gets such a serious look of concentration, and she tries so hard, but coordination is really not her thing.”

  “So cute,” I replied, wiping my nose on my blanket.

  “It is.” His eyes were thoughtful and he bit down on his lower lip. “Would you like to, maybe, come see her dance, with me, or you can meet me at the studio?”

  “Well, I think…”

  “I mean, you can think about it and let me know. You can call or e-mail or whatever. It’s not like you have to decide right now because I know there are a lot of things to consider, and after this evening, I wouldn’t blame you if you couldn’t or wouldn’t.”

  “Yes, I would like to go. I’d love to see her,” I answered.

  He breathed a sigh of relief and inched himself closer to me once again, close enough for our legs to be bumping. I looked down at where we were touching, feeling the same heat and energy I always had whenever he was close. It made me want more, to feel more of him, to remember how good it used to be, but for the first time, I thought with my head and not my heart. Or my lady parts.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  I nodded. “I’m okay. Just so much to think about.”

  “I get that.”

  I was scared to go where I was about to go, but he had to know how I felt. If there was any hope at all, he had to understand. If he didn’t, then I’d walk away knowing I was honest and true to myself.

  “I’m not ready to be with you again, Aaron. I’m not sure I ever will be,” I said.

  “I understand,” he replied. He frowned. “I know the damage is done.”

  “I wasn’t done with what I was saying.”

  “Oh, sorry. Go ahead.”

  “I’m not sure what the future holds. I’m about to start a whole new life. Graduation, new job, new apartment, and for the first
time, I’m going to be standing on my own.” I stopped briefly to choose my next words carefully. “I’m not sure how the real us would be together. We’ve been putting up a facade for so long…”

  “Callie, please,” he pleaded. “This is…painful…I get it. It’s too late. I get…”

  “Can you shut up for a second and let me finish?” I snapped. It was time for me to be me.

  “Sorry,” he said, embarrassed.

  I raised my eyebrows to let him know I was serious about him letting me finish my thoughts. “I can’t forget about the past and I have no idea what will happen in the future, but what I do know is what I felt for you wasn’t my imagination. I felt real emotions and real pain, and I did not imagine it. I’d be stupid to deny that because, while I might be a total bubble brain about some shit, I know what is between you and me doesn’t happen every day. So, I want to know you. The real you, and I want you to know the real me.”

  He had the slightest hint of a smile. “Really?”

  “Yeah, really.”

  He reached out to me, but stopped short of hugging me. “Can I?” he asked.

  Remembering my downfalls—his touch, his smell—and how I usually lost control of any sense being close to those things, I was apprehensive. However, if it was time to start new, baby steps were going to have to be made.

  “Yes,” I replied softly.

  He smiled before wrapping his arms around my waist and bringing me into him. A breath of relief, or maybe optimism, left his lips and warmed the side of my neck. I settled into his body, laying my head on his shoulder and just let him…hold me. All questions wouldn’t be answered in one night, all wrongs not made right, but in that moment, it was the start of something new.

  He rested his forehead against mine and we sat, quiet and still…until the front door slammed.

  And the screaming started.

  “What the fuck is he doing here?” Evelyn yelled.

  Aaron and I pulled away from each other quickly, like two teenagers caught making out by our parents. Evelyn pounded into the living room, standing before us with her hands on her hips.

  “Are you going to say anything?” she repeated. “What the hell is going on?”