To Have
M.L. Pennock
Copyright © 2015 M.L. Pennock
Cover design by Amanda Crans-Gentile
Cover photo of Brockport, NY © Jess Buttery Photography
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.
This book is a work of fiction. Any similarities to real people, living or dead, is purely coincidental. All characters and events in this work are figments of the author’s overactive imagination.
For Josie and Charlie
You’re the reasons I breathe.
Table of Contents
Prologue: Stella
Chapter One: Stella
Chapter Two: Brian
Chapter Three: Stella
Chapter Four: Brian
Chapter Five: Stella
Chapter Six: Stella
Chapter Seven: Brian
Chapter Eight: Stella
Chapter Nine: Brian
Chapter Ten: Stella
Chapter Eleven:Brian
Chapter Twelve: Stella
Chapter Thirteen: Brian
Chapter Fourteen: Stella
Chapter Fifteen: Brian
Chapter Sixteen: Stella
Chapter Seventeen: Brian
Chapter Eighteen: Stella
Chapter Nineteen: Brian
Chapter Twenty: Stella
Chapter Twenty-One: Brian
Chapter Twenty-Two: Stella
Chapter Twenty-Three: Brian
Chapter Twenty-Four: Stella
Chapter Twenty-Five: Brian
Chapter Twenty-Six: Stella
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Brian
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Stella
Chapter Twenty-Nine: Brian
Chapter Thirty: Stella
Chapter Thirty-One: Brian
Chapter Thirty-Two: Stella
Chapter Thirty-Three: Brian
Chapter Thirty-Four: Stella
Chapter Thirty-Five: Brian
Chapter Thirty-Six: Stella
Chapter Thirty-Seven: Stella
Chapter Thirty-Eight: Brian
Chapter Thirty-Nine: Stella
Chapter Forty: Brian
Chapter Forty-One: Stella
Epilogue: Stephanie
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Prologue
Stella
“It’ll hurt. It’s going to be painful, girls, but it’s worth it. You’ll hear a lot as you grow up that whatever doesn’t kill you, will make you stronger,” Nana says to me and Steph. “Always ... always come out stronger.”
She’s talking about love, I can hear it in her voice, and it’s something neither Steph nor I have any real clue about. I mean, we’re not even out of high school yet ... hell, Steph’s barely through junior high and I just turned 17, so really the idea of true love and being in love and understanding love is largely lost on us. Mostly lost on her. At least that’s what “adults” would have us believe.
I’ve found it.
I think.
"I know what you’re thinking, Stella. I'm sorry, sweetheart,” she says, eyeing me cautiously and seeing right through me like she always does. “But, you're bound to get your heart broke at least once more. It happens to the best of us. This boy now, he’s not the one. Deep down you know that. You're fortunate, though.”
How fortunate could I really be if Keith isn’t “the one”? I’m practically planning my life with him — the pictures of wedding dresses and flowers taped to notebook paper, a list of songs for the disc jockey all written out. I’ve drawn hearts next to the really important ones. The ones I’ll dance to with him and my dad.
All those thoughts evaporate when she says, “Your first love was always a determined boy. He’ll find his way back to you. Give it time, Stellie. Give him time."
Slipping into my thoughts, I pull my legs up tight to my chest and rest my head on my knees as I watch the wind rustling the leaves of the maple trees shading my grandmother’s house. Breathing deeply, the scent of cinnamon heavy on the air, I close my eyes and open my heart ... and I see him.
It’s not the one I’ve promised everything to, handed my heart over to so willingly; it scares me just a little how I could still feel so deeply for him. For Brian.
“Nana, how can you be sure he’ll come back?” I’m not sure why I ask. I’ve never questioned her feelings before, but this time she’s piqued my interest. Something just feels different.
She’s picking at an old wound, one that took a long time for my heart to finally heal from. The scab is fresh enough a scar hasn’t had time to form despite all the years between the injury and now.
In an instant, all that healing comes undone.
“He was made for you, Stella.” She says it confidently. “That child was picked from the stars just for you.”
Stella
Chapter One
My meeting was canceled. I came home early.
The look on his face when he walks into the room draws the conclusion for me. He wasn’t expecting to see me.
“Where are you going? I didn’t think you had any meetings out of town this week.”
“I don’t,” he says.
I eye the cell phone in his hand as it plays a ringtone I’ve heard before. It’s one I’ve been hearing more frequently.
“So, where are you going, then?”
The unmistakable notes of fear weave through the uncharacteristic anger I hear in my voice; it’s like smoke clinging to the curtains after the toaster malfunctions.
The luggage set, a gift from my sister for our wedding, sits by the front door and I stand my ground right next to it hoping he might give me an answer. I’m silently urging him; just give me an answer.
I count the suitcases and realize every piece of clothing he owns is likely inside those fancy canvas boxes.
My entire life is packed in those bags. Probably folded neatly.
He likes his T-shirts tri-folded. That’s how I’ve been folding them since college.
I shake the thought away. Take a deep breath. Try to make it make sense.
“Tell me what’s going on. You’re going somewhere. Where are you going, Keith?” I say it calmly, genuinely interested.
I say it like I have my wits about me; that’s the furthest thing from the truth.
“I met someone,” he says, giving me a pitying look. He pities me?
My mouth drops. I feel the air leave my lungs, but can’t remember how to pull it back in.
“You what?”
He shakes his head and says quietly, “I don’t expect you to understand right now, but I’m in love with someone else.”
Rage. I feel it coursing through my veins, pumping wildly beneath my flesh. I want to slap his face, shake him violently, give him a swift kick to the balls, and lock him in the basement until he comes to his senses.
He’s making a bed he has to lie in.
Lies. He’s been lying to me.
And I feel the cold rush of panic wash over me.
“I’m sorry,” he says, reaching for the doorknob.
It’s all he says before opening the door and walking away from everything we’ve built together.
I wonder if she knows how he likes his T-shirts folded?
***
My sister answers on the third ring, happily distracted and finishing a conversation with someone in the background. Someone should just hit me with a bus or throw me in front of a herd of bulls on their way to pasture.
Stephanie still hasn’t bothered to say hello and I
have no patience left to listen to her conversation with someone else, especially someone as chipper as this person. I hear a lull in the conversation — “Steph, I need you.”
That’s all it takes to get her attention, thank God.
“Stellie, what’s wrong?”
It’s been our code since we were kids. Not a very good one, and not exactly cryptic, but still it’s our code for “there’s something more important to deal with than choosing which nail polish to wear to the dance and which suit to wear to the interview.” And I feel the pain hit me in the chest again.
“He left.” Two words. That’s as simple as it is.
I’m met with silence, the unmistakable sound of a hand brushing over the mouthpiece of a telephone, the muffled voices as my sister excuses herself.
“Stell? What do you mean he left?” she whispers into the phone.
“My meeting was canceled so, I came home from the office between interviews and his car was in the driveway. I came in the house and the luggage was stacked by the front door.” What isn’t she getting? He left. That kind of sums it up.
My voice is way too calm. This isn’t how people react when the love of their life walks out without a good reason and some high end couples therapy.
She’s still quiet.
“Steph! Wake the fuck up! My husband literally just packed his bags, told me he didn’t love me and walked out on me.”
There’s the hysteria. I’m yelling, finally. I’m a rational thinker and this is rational. Right? I’m supposed to be pissed off.
“Why?” I hear the pain in my sister’s voice, in that single word. Keith has been like a big brother to her since we were kids. This is going to hurt her, too, and she’s way more volatile than I am when she’s been wronged.
I take a deep breath. I take another deep breath. I take one more ... and continue.
I was going to try to rationalize it all, but not knowing all the intricate details, his whys, his reasons for packing those bags, made it entirely too heartbreaking to attempt rationale ... I just couldn’t fathom what was happening, but I wanted there to be a reason. A rational one, apparently.
“He wouldn’t tell me anything other than he was in love with someone else. Steph, he left. He packed his clothes and deodorant and the cologne I bought him for our anniversary and he walked away,” my voice catches and I sob my words into the phone to my sister. My shoulders shake violently as I try to hold my emotions back, but I just can’t. I finally let them roam free. The tears and the anger seep out and run down my face.
It’s been only a few hours, I tell myself, maybe he’ll come back because this can’t really be happening.
“I don’t know what I did. Wasn’t I good enough?” I yell into the phone between gasping breaths as the panic, the fear of being alone, grips me.
“Stella?” She attempts to get my attention. “Stell? Take a deep breath.”
Breathe in, and out. Repeat. It feels like my chest is going to explode. I know it’s my heart breaking into pieces and crumbling.
“I want to die. This is going to kill me, Stephie. This will be what breaks me.”
Breathe in. Breathe out.
“You’re stronger than you think. This is not going to break you,” she says in that reassuring tone, the one we both seem to have inherited from our mom. “Tell me he at least told you who this whore is he says he fell in love with, because I’m going to hunt that bitch down and let her know she messed with the wrong set of sisters.”
I listen to the words coming out of her mouth and wonder how I was lucky enough to have her land in our family. It’s hard to believe she’s my little sister. Isn’t this how older brothers are supposed to react to their sister’s lying, cheating husband walking out on a 20-year relationship? I guess that’s not the case in our family, at least not where Steph is concerned.
Nope.
Little sister, big heart, bigger mouth. And she has a wicked right hook that goes with all of it.
Plus, we don’t have an older brother. It’s just us.
“Keith didn’t mention her name, but I have an idea,” I say. The pieces are starting to become glaringly obvious the longer I sit here on the stairs, staring at the closed front door in front of me. The signs I’ve missed. The nights I’ve spent alone. “He’s taken a few business trips in the last couple months with the same coworker.”
I choke on the words. I try to swallow, the bile slowly rising to the back of my throat. I’m going to be sick.
Brian
Chapter Two
“Mom, I’m thinking about moving back to New York.” I’m standing in my parent’s kitchen, cup of coffee in hand as I casually lean against one of the counters.
This feels like it’s going to be a difficult conversation to have.
I’m not spontaneous. I’m logical and critical and a planner.
This is the first time I’ve bothered to mention the idea to anyone other than Greg, though, and I’ve already contacted a realtor and started shopping for a house. In Brockport. I haven’t been back to the small college town since I started my freshman year at Syracuse. I just got in my car one day and got lost, leaving Central New York behind for a few hours. I wound my way through Rochester and felt the tension of being an undergrad in a strange city leave me as soon as I started passing nothing but cow pastures, corn fields, and apple orchards.
It was fall and there was one thing I knew for sure. This was home. I’d arrived home, to the hustle and bustle of country life for a single afternoon, and for more than five years I’ve thought about nothing but going back. Now that I’ve said something to my mom, I’m kind of panicking. Saying it to her makes it real.
She’s staring at me wide-eyed. Oh, God, I’m going to break her heart. I was gone for college, came back for a few years, and now she’s going to be sad again.
“Back to Syracuse?” she asks, a glint in her eyes that tells me she wouldn’t believe me if I said yes so don’t even think about lying.
So I don’t.
“Actually, I’m looking for a place in Brockport. Greg and I have been talking about going into business and we think a small college town would be the best setting,” I say in a rush trying to answer the questions I know are rattling around in her brain. I take a sip of my coffee, liquid courage of the morning variety. “We’ve been talking about opening a café since we finished grad school, but, you know, that fear of the unknown kind of kept me from taking that leap.”
“Brockport?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Do you want me to ask Jenny and Dale if they know of any places in town for rent?” A smile splits her face and I feel the uncertainty release the muscles in my neck. I haven’t heard my mom talk about Mr. and Mrs. Barbieri in years, so it puts me at ease that she’s still got connections back home, even though “home” was only our home for a handful of years when I was a kid.
“I didn’t realize you still kept in touch with them, but, yeah, if you wouldn’t mind asking her for me that would be great.” I lean forward and plant a kiss on my mom’s cheek. “You’re not upset that I’ll probably leave? I mean, this time it wouldn’t be for just a few years and home on break, Mom, we’re talking I’m going to uproot my life and go north again ... where it gets really cold and snow is a thing we drive in, not call in the National Guard to handle.”
It’s a conversation we’ve never had — the way I balked as a child when Dad’s job transferred him to Tennessee and I was forced to leave behind the only girl I ever wanted to spend time with.
Stella Barbieri was it for me. I was five when we met, but still, for a five year old I was determined she was going to have my babies someday.
Then Dad got word they needed him to drop everything and come to Nashville. Mom held off telling me and Tommy until she had to, thinking she could rip the bandage off our childhood and we’d forget the pain with time and distance.
I never forgot that kind of pain. Stella had just turned nine when I found out we were moving.
Two nine year olds made a lot of promises we didn’t even know we’d fail to keep because to us, keeping promises was just something you did.
“I know you always loved it there. The Erie Canal right there to walk along, the atmosphere, the way the seasons changed. Come on, Brian, you can’t hide love like that from your mother, no matter how long it’s been since you’ve seen her or talked to her.” She winks at me and pats me on the back as she walks out the door, calling back, “I’ll send an email to Jenny and see what she can find for you.”
I’m going home.
Stella
Chapter Three
Four months later
He was trouble from the first time I saw him. He wasn’t safe. Keith Wells was a bad boy to the core and my mom had tried to tell me not to get involved, but he was new at school and I was twelve. What twelve-year-old wants to listen to their mother when they say not to do something?
We became friends within a few weeks of him moving to town and when we’d hang out it was like I found the new Yin to my Yang. Keith was in Mrs. Meyers’ sixth grade class with me and his family had just moved in down the street, so I felt I should help him out. Being the new kid couldn’t have been easy, not that I would really know. I’ve lived here all my life and everyone knows everyone else in this small town, but still I could assume.
After all, I was twelve, not a complete idiot.
We’d walk to school together, then he started sitting with me and my friends at lunch. Eventually, we were hanging out on the weekend ... and then holding hands.
“Steph, remember the first time Mom saw Keith holding my hand?” I stop trimming the rose bush in front of me and laugh at the memory of us snuggled on the couch under a blanket in front of the television on a rainy Saturday. We were just barely teenagers.
“You’re laughing. Must be a good memory — was that when Mom and I walked in on you guys watching movies? I remember her freaking out because you were covered with a blanket, but I had no idea why,” Stephanie says, licking the frosting off her spoon. “If we’d all been older, she probably would have thought something more was going on under that blanket.”
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