I take a step towards him, wary. What if he touches me and I fall apart, confess before I’m ready? Confess with so many people to witness as he breaks my heart in return?
He hugs me, and I immediately start melting into him, leaving myself vulnerable to whatever might come.
“I want you to remember something,” he says, kissing me on top of my head. “You can trust me. I promise.”
♦ ♦ ♦
Nina is the one to let us back in through the locked cafeteria doors. She is also the one, later, to tell me how Marissa lost it when she saw Luke embrace me, and started raving at her table, her voice growing loud enough to carry, telling whoever would listen how she and Evan had been hooking up for a month, so who cares?
Anyway, poor Beth. Sort of.
I don’t notice any stares when Luke and I walk back into the cafeteria together, maybe because people have stopped looking, or maybe because I’ve stopped looking at them. There’s a good chance we made the switch to old news the instant the rumors about the head cheerleader and the punk rocker freak started spreading from table to table. It doesn’t really matter, either way, because my mind is on Luke and on what I have to tell him.
The remaining hours of school and those that immediately follow pass too quickly, and night finds me at home, in my room, listening again to the CD Luke gave me. I play it all the way through, to The Cure’s “This Twilight Garden” at the end.
After the song finishes, I sit in the quiet, and everything slows down until I find my moment of strength. I can’t carry my secret any further, and even if I could, Luke deserves the truth.
Thirty-One
Never Been Surer
Ileave my room, and my house, and I walk to Luke’s. I stand below his window, the light from his lamp casting a pale-yellow rectangular glow across the frozen lawn. There’s no way to climb up, and I don’t want to go to the door, so I find a small pebble, toss it at the window pane and miss, toss another and miss. I get frustrated, and my accuracy improves. Two stones find their mark before I hear the window open.
“Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, who is already sick and pale with grief that thou her, uh…maid art far more fair than she.”
There’s silence, and I think I’ve absolutely, unquestionably lost my mind. What in the name of all that is unholy possessed me to come here and start quoting Shakespeare?
Then, “So, I get to be Juliet?” slips through the silence in a deep, familiar voice.
“Anything, as long as you come down.”
Luke’s head and shoulders emerge into the moonlight.
“Not that way,” I say, terrified he’s going to climb out.
“I’m just trying to tell you not to go anywhere. Stay right there, okay?”
I nod up at him, and he disappears again into darkness.
He meets me in the yard, hands me a heavy sweatshirt that I pull on over the one I’m already wearing. His is warm and Luke-scented, and it makes me feel like I’m wrapped in his hug as we walk together up his driveway, side by side. How many times have we traveled this same ground together over the years?
We follow the road to the forest’s entrance, take the widest path, then a narrower and a narrower one. I led him this way, once, on my eighth birthday, the day we met. Neither of us leads this time; we both know the way.
Luke breaks the silence as we get closer. “Do you know if it’s still standing?”
“I haven’t been there since the last time we went together as kids.”
“Do you remember when that was?”
“No,” I say. “I don’t.”
“Can you remember the last time we went out to play at all?” he asks, and my stomach sinks.
“No.”
“I don’t, either. That sucks.”
It does, and it could happen again. Maybe that’s what he’s trying to say, or at least what he’s thinking. Things are better, but they could still go either way. Distance knows how to create its own momentum.
I reach out and take hold of Luke’s arm, to stop him from continuing along the path. When he turns to me, the truth I’ve held onto for so long finally leaves my mouth. “I took photos.”
Luke doesn’t say anything, and I realize I’ve made a mistake, in the telling. I’ve made it sound so small, when it’s massive, and nearly a decade old.
“The photographs were of my dad and your mom, together—embracing, kissing—and my mom found them. That’s how the affair was discovered.”
He still doesn’t speak.
“I did it, Luke. I made your mom leave. I ruined everything.”
“You didn’t.” His voice is quiet, but the words sound strong. Too certain.
“I’m telling you, I rode my bike to the shopping center on the other side of town, even though I wasn’t allowed to ride that far, and I saw them together. I took photos and got them developed and hid them in my drawer, photos I never should have taken in the first place. I was the one. Me.”
“No, Layla.”
“Yes.” I step closer to Luke, look up into his face, because he doesn’t seem to be hearing me, even though I’m right here. “Why don’t you understand what I’m saying? I took photographs. I made my own mom witness that moment between her best friend and her husband. I made it real for her.”
He winces, but holds out his hand. “Come here,” he says, and I let my fingers touch his. He threads his through mine, holds on. “I know,” he says.
“About what? I’m confused.”
“I know about the photographs. I’ve known for a long time.”
“You know?”
“I saw them, years after my mom left. My dad had them in his drawer, and when I saw them, I knew you were the one who took them. Layla, I know your style better than anyone. You caught the whole experience in those shots. They would have been beautiful, if they’d been photos of strangers.”
“So, you’ve hated me all this time?” My mind spins off along a new path, trying to make sense of things within this unforeseen context. Has he been plotting revenge? Intending to hurt me?
“Of course not. I was mad when I found the photos, mad enough to want to hate you, and I was hurt. Really, really hurt. You’d seen them, you’d known, you could’ve warned me of what was coming. Later, after the initial pain faded, I realized it wasn’t your fault—none of it was.”
I start to protest. Every one of my cells is interwoven with my guilt, and I’m not about to let it go.
He speaks over me. “Listen, if it helps, I think my mom would’ve left, either way. I believe that. I think she was looking for a reason to go, to get away from my dad. I think she felt trapped in her life. Maybe that’s why the affair happened in the first place. It was a way out, an end to things.”
“No.” I shake my head. “My dad—I told you—he’s done this repeatedly.”
“I know, and it takes two; I realize all of that. I’m just trying to show you something you don’t seem to see: there weren’t three people involved in that affair.”
I stare at him, robbed of speech, but he’s not finished.
“I think I get why you took the photos,” he says, watching my face. “You were young. It must’ve been a shock.”
I nod, and the story spills out of me. “I went to buy you a welcome-home present, because you were away at football camp, and when I stopped in the parking lot to take a drink before riding home, I saw them behind the restaurant. It wasn’t like I followed them there or suspected anything was going on between the two of them, before that. I didn’t even know who the couple was, or why they’d caught my eye, but by the time I zoomed in with my camera and clicked the shutter the first time, I knew it was wrong, even if I didn’t really understand what I was seeing.”
“So, why didn’t you tell me about it—what you’d seen, or the photos you’d taken?”
“Because you’d hate me. Don’t you understand? When I saw them together and I took those photos, I became complicit. I kept our parents’ secret and betrayed it, later, when the
photographs were found. I was guilty both ways.”
“Layla, you were ten.”
“It doesn’t matter. I was old enough to know the difference between right and wrong, and what they were doing was wrong. Me too, though, and I knew you’d hate me for my part in it. You must hate me.” It sounds like I’m trying to will the idea to life, and maybe I am. I deserve to be hated for this; I’ve always known so.
“Will you please listen to me? I don’t hate you. I couldn’t. But I can’t understand why you didn’t tell me the truth, even after all this time, and especially after everything that happened between us once we got lost in the mountains.”
“Because, Luke: your mom left.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“I know, but back then, when I took the photos, I wanted to hide from the truth, and I wanted to protect you from it, too. Then my mom found the pictures, and everything blew up. Both our families broke, and your mom left…and if she could leave you, anyone could leave anyone. I kept waiting for my parents to go, or for your dad to disappear and take you far away from me. Your mom’s leaving made this thing real, this thing where people who were supposed to stay, went away, instead. So, I knew I would lose you if I told you what I’d done. I would’ve lost you then, and I’m going to lose you now. I know I am.”
Luke tries to pull me closer, but I resist. “Not then,” he says. “Not now.”
“Maybe not this minute, but it’ll happen,” I tell him. I’ve never been surer of anything.
“Layla, are you trying to make me leave? Because I’m telling you I don’t want to go. And it’s not about that head-game BS Marissa was pulling on me. You were right, she was manipulating me, and I let it happen, because I didn’t want to be the one who left someone behind. But this is different. With you and me, I’m here because I want to be. Why won’t you let me stay?”
“Because: they’re right.”
“Who is?”
It’s hard to breathe, but the words have been hiding inside me, doing damage, and I have to force them out. “At school, when they call me Daddy’s Little Girl. I idolized him when I was little, but everything about him was a lie…so I told myself I wouldn’t be like him, but I am. I’m becoming just like him.”
“Not everything was a lie. He loved you, I know he did. Besides, you’re nothing like him.”
“I am. I never told you about the affair pictures I’d taken, and then I never told you about the pregnancy test, and—”
“You did tell me about those things, eventually. You are right now, and you would have, about the test.” He starts to say more, but I speak over him.
“Luke, after the accident, you told me you’d broken up with Marissa—I don’t think you remember.”
“I don’t, but okay.”
“I just wanted you to know that. I knew you weren’t cheating, when we were together.”
He nods, watching my face.
“I’m not like him in that way. Except”—now I want to stop talking, but can’t—“Except, even if you had been with her, I don’t think that would have stopped me.”
His face stays unchanged, unreadable. He’s waiting for the rest.
“And it’s not because I knew your relationship was bad for you. I did, but…it’s because I wanted you, and I don’t just mean physically. I wanted all of it with you—our old closeness, and more—and I don’t think I cared if that meant anyone else got hurt.” I try to swallow, but it doesn’t happen. “So, how does that make me any different from him?”
He’s quiet, and then the only answer he gives is, “I don’t know.”
How can he not? One of us has to. He’s made everything better so far, and I’m counting on him to fix me.
“But, that means—”
“What does it mean?” he asks.
“It means I’m not good enough for you. It means everyone who’s ever thought that was right.”
“No, it doesn’t. It only means you’re human, imperfect—just like me and everybody else. Don’t you think I know who you are, by now?”
He reaches out and takes my hand, slowly threading his fingers through mine. He starts walking again, and I go with him, along the quiet, empty paths, toward our tree house. When we find the right spot, we look up to see stars shining where flooring should be.
“It’s gone.” My voice is almost normal again.
“Mostly. I wonder if time wrecked it, or other people.”
“But it was supposed to be full of magic, remember? Untouchable.”
Luke holds my gaze. “I guess nothing is.”
“Including us.”
He gives a little nod, his eyes on mine.
“I want you to know I would never go behind your back,” I tell him. “I’m not like my dad in some ways.”
“I know,” he says. “I trust you. And I need you to understand I could never leave my kid.”
“I do. So, I guess that means we’re not our parents.”
“And we get to make our own mistakes,” Luke says. He smiles at me and kisses me softly, standing under the place where our tree house once was.
I draw back all at once, the need to speak become urgent. “There’s one more thing I haven’t told you.”
His face goes quiet again, like he’s bracing for another shock. After everything I’ve already shared, I don’t blame him for being afraid.
I take a breath, and when I speak, my voice is strong. “I love you.”
The silence clings to him; he holds very still. “Finally,” he says.
“Finally?”
He nods. “Yes: finally.”
“Okay. I get it. And it’s fine and everything. Maybe someday, you’ll…”
“Oh. No, I love you. I absolutely love you. I’ve just been waiting—hoping, I guess—that you’d figure out you love me, too.”
“You love me, Luke?”
“Layla, I love you.”
“You do.”
“I do.”
Thirty-Two
Footing, Found
“I
do, Layls. Absolutely. How about you?”
“Luke, you know I do.”
Just over seven years have passed, and we’re back in the same spot, the place where our tree house used to be, the place where this life of ours found its footing the first time around, and then, again, later.
We’ve already explained this once to Nina—why this particular location is so important to us—but she’s still complaining about catching her fishnet tights on rogue branches. I warned her, before we came, that her gothed-out minister’s getup might not be suitable for the cross-woods journey, but she claimed it was a necessity. Ambiance, she said. Besides, she has a date later, to celebrate the completion of her online ordination, and who has time to change?
Josie’s here, too. No complaints, all smiles. She just got engaged, to Luke’s best friend from college, no less. He—Ian—is also here, serving as Best Man, while Josie takes photographs and mental notes. I think she’ll plan a more traditional wedding, closer to the one Luke and I will share tomorrow. We’ll repeat a more official version of this ceremony in front of additional friends, and clusters of family, including my mom and Jared, who’ve been living together since I first left for art school, and my dad, his second wife and younger two children—my half-sisters, who are actually pretty adorable, and who I’ve enjoyed having in my life for the last six and four years, respectively. Luke’s parents will be at tomorrow’s wedding, too. Neither have remarried, and although they’ll never be close, they seem to have settled on some kind of truce, which has made things easier for all of us.
“Congratulations, Lucas Jonathon and Layla Marie,” Nina says, with a flourish of her hand and a delicate curtsy, “you two are hitched. For real, I swear.”
Luke draws me closer. “I am,” he says, with a smile and a gentle shake of his head, “so in love with you.”
I kiss him until Nina tells me to get myself under control.
Before we leave the woods, I
dig a small, wrapped package from Nina’s bag and pull Luke away from the group.
“Happy Secret Wedding Day.” I hand him a lovesick CD mix that I’ve been putting together for a while.
“You made this for me?” His blue-gray eyes shine, and I catch a glimpse of my Lucas, the way he looked that first day in the tree house, the day I’d asked if he had a best friend.
“Nope,” I say. “I didn’t make it for anyone. But you were on my mind whenever I added a song.”
He kisses me and the warmth in his smile reminds me that even though I’ve promised I wouldn’t play photographer for either of our weddings, I have to have just one shot of him that’s all mine. “Be right back,” I tell him, and as soon as I’ve retrieved my camera from Josie, I say, “I need a photo, Luke.” It’s my standard request, and he turns to me, smiling, expecting this.
Just before I click the shutter release, his smile softens and he opens his palm. Ruby-colored beads catch the sunlight. A pair of pomegranate seeds, arils.
I take the picture and smile at him as I lower the camera. “Only two this time?”
Last summer, during the long weekend when he took me away to a little cabin in the woods, he’d had a dozen in his palm. “Twelve,” he’d said. “Enough for every month, through all the years. Will you be with me, Layla? Always?”
Luke comes to me, holding up one of the seeds. “One for you and one for me.”
“Always?” I ask, opening my mouth for him to place the little jewel on my tongue.
“And forever,” he says, and I give him a pomegranate seed of his own.
Tomorrow, plenty of others will share our day, but today is all about us, courtesy of our best friends. This ceremony, secluded from most and sacred in its own way, is part of our journey, the one we began as eight year olds, meeting on a summertime street.
♦ ♦ ♦
People tend to ask photographers about their favorite photos. It’s a significant question, because the magic of cameras means photographed images get to possess a power all their own.
When I was a kid, I probably would have chosen dozens of pictures as my favorites, from among whichever prints Lucas and I had pooled our money to develop that month. Once I got a little older and life became complicated, I tangled myself up in all those old favorites and spent my days living through photo albums, training my view upon the past. When I continued to grow, but life hadn’t done much improving, I refused to continue looking at the past, but became paralyzed by a future I could never quite bring into focus. Too many details had been lost from its whole.
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