I looked up from the pile of tiny bits of cardboard sitting on the table in front of us to find Amy's blue eyes glaring at me under a furrowed brow. My confusion must have been evident because after a moment she looked up at the ceiling, as if asking for patience before returning her gaze to mine.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" She enunciated each word as though I were hard of hearing. "You've been a zombified version of yourself for weeks. You've been skipping out on our coffee dates, and when you do show up, all I get is one-word answers and your empty gaze out the window. Judging by the circles under your eyes, you're obviously exhausted. If I wasn't so freaked out by your personality transplant, I'd tell you how shitty you look."
I attempted a smirk, which felt as awkward on my face as it probably looked, based on Amy's horrified expression. I would've acted indignant if she weren't absolutely right. I'd been a virtual recluse for the past two months, since the last time I'd seen Truman. I shuddered at the thought of him and returned to the task of destroying my cup, but Amy wasn't going to be put off this time.
"Jessa, you know I love you." Her concern was evident in her soft tone.
I stared at the bits of white cardboard and waited for her to finish. I knew what was coming; the demand that I confess my sins before I drove her mad with curiosity about why I'd become a shell of my former self. When she stayed silent, I looked up. The sympathy reflected back at me pixilated into a million images of her face as my eyes filled with tears.
She didn't know what happened, she couldn't. If she did, it still wouldn't make a difference. She was with me all the way, always had been. My heart swelled with gratitude at the locker gods that had put us next to each other our freshman year of high school and gave me a friend for life.
At the sight of my tears, she leaned forward, her curly brown hair falling over her shoulder. Sympathy morphed into panic on her delicate face as she stared back, blue eyes wide. "You are freaking me out right now. What the hell happened? Are you sick or something?"
A lone tear escaped before I swiped at it with my palm. I looked around the quiet coffee shop, grateful that Wi-Fi had made patrons oblivious to my near-nervous breakdown, as they studied their phones and laptops.
I looked at my fingers, knotted together in my lap. "God, Amy, I've wanted to tell you a thousand times..."
In fact, I'd avoided her for that very reason; because she shouldn't have been the first to know, and I could never hide much from her.
"Tell me what? Whatever it is, I'll help you through it."
I laughed, the sound humorless. "I wish you could, but this one is all on me, Aim. I fucked up, and I can't change it or fix it, and when Nick finds out I'm going to lose him. I'm going to lose everything that matters to me." My chin trembled as I tried, unsuccessfully, to hold back tears.
Amy leaned away in her chair as I met her gaze, and I could see the truth begin to dawn on her, her mouth dropping open in silent exclamation. "No way." She shook her head. "It's not possible. You couldn't have. You don't have it in you to do that."
I nodded, silently contradicting her. She didn't know who yet, but she was going to figure it out in a hurry. She continued to shake her head before she met my eyes again. "All right, hold on. Let's back the fuck up a second here and start from the beginning."
I stared at her. Maybe I should tell her everything. Nick deserved to know first, but he also deserved to hear my best version. Maybe practicing telling the truth to her would help me perfect my delivery. If I could say it the right way, Nick might believe me when I told him it was the biggest mistake of my life.
"Truman." It's all I could say for a moment, but it was enough.
Amy gasped but stayed still, waiting for the rest.
I inhaled, felt air fill my lungs, but I still couldn't get enough oxygen. Amy would never disown me, but I was terrified. Whatever she thought, Nick's reaction would be worse. "The last time I saw him, he was bad. I've never seen him like that before. It was as if something had already died inside of him. I shouldn't have been surprised when he told me he was actually planning to kill himself, but I was. I spent hours trying to convince him not to, but he wouldn't budge, and when I saw that he had made up his mind, I wanted to remind him of what was good in life, give him a reason to live. I panicked...and I—I kissed him."
Amy waited, her eyes working over my features as she seemed to digest what I'd said. After a moment she laughed.
"Girl, you had me scared for a second! Shit, a kiss is nothing. Well, I mean it's not nothing nothing, but it's understandable, considering the circumstances. Jesus, he was on the verge of suicide, and you freaked. A kiss is a totally forgivable offense. Certainly not a deal breaker. Nick won't be happy, but he'll understand, honey." Amy shook her head as she smiled, taking a sip of her coffee. She held the cup in salute to me as she grinned. "For a second there I thought you were going to tell me he got in your pants."
I stared at her, each word from her mouth driving me deeper into that dark pit of despair I'd been living in for two months.
"He got in my pants." The words came out much calmer than I felt.
Amy's head shot up as she pinned me with incredulous eyes for the second time in fifteen minutes. Her mouth opened and closed, once, twice, before thin lips pressed together. She shook her head, and I waited for her condemnation. Instead, she surprised me as only Amy could do.
"Goddammit. I knew having that motherfucker back in your life was going to go badly."
I let my head drop into my waiting palms, gripping my hair until it hurt.
"What are you going to do?"
"I don't know." If anyone could sound more miserable, I wasn't sure how it would be possible.
"You're going to tell Nick, right?"
"I don't know." I repeated. "I didn't sleep with him. I, he, we...touched."
I risked a look at her and was reassured by her neutral expression. I wasn't shocking her anymore. Maybe it wasn't as bad as I thought? The guilty pang in my gut said, yes, it was still bad. I dropped my head back down.
"I want to tell Nick. God, I do. It's killing me to keep this from him. I'm not sure what good it'll do to confess, and I'm terrified the downside will be worse than taking my punishment and living with it. I feel selfish if I tell him, and the same if I don't."
Amy traced the rim of her coffee cup with her finger before looking at me, her eyes full of sympathy. "I won't tell you what to do, but I know you, and keeping this to yourself has already changed you. I can't imagine Nick hasn't noticed. If you decide not to talk, you better be prepared to bury this shit deep, girl, and get back to being yourself in a hurry. Otherwise the decision to save what you have with him will be out of your hands."
"I don't even know where I would start. After it happened, I freaked and left. I didn't even say goodbye. I was so ashamed."
Amy gripped my hand, squeezing tight.
"It's been two months and I have no idea what happened to him. All I can assume is he's still alive, since Leo would've gotten in touch, otherwise."
Not knowing anything beyond that was torture. Was he still planning to kill himself? Had I made things even worse for him when I left the way I did? The thought I had ruined my own life and pushed Truman that much closer to ending his cut a path through my soul.
"Yeah, we'd know if he'd offed himself." Amy stared out the window. "That man has been nothing but trouble for you. He was always all take, no give."
Her nostrils flared in agitation as she met my eyes. "And now, here we are again. Twenty years later, and he's managed to fuck up your life once more."
I shook my head. "I get what you're saying, but you can't let me off the hook like that."
"Yes, I can. You've never had your head on straight when it comes to Truman. From the very beginning, you've been blind to the reality of what he does to you. I don't know what it is, but the guy should have a tat on his forehead labeled 'bad decision.'"
"I'm a grownup. I wasn't drugged. I kissed him...everything w
as of my own volition." Was I really going to say the same words to Nick? Saying them to Amy tasted like poison on my tongue.
Amy shook her head. "He said the one thing guaranteed to totally freak you out. And when that happened, he took advantage. Jesus. It's emotional blackmail! He had to know how you'd react. After what happened with his dad, it's a real threat. The history of that family is one hundred percent tragic."
She gripped my hand again, squeezing to the point of pain, her head tilted in sympathy. "His confession was bound to result in exactly what happened, and that's at least half his fault. The thing is, Truman has resources. He's not alienated from his family. He didn't have to rely so heavily on you to fix it. I believe you when you say he's depressed. But I have to wonder if some of this was about getting you back."
I looked at her hand, solid over mine, as Truman's words echoed in my mind. I'd never believe he'd manufactured the whole depressive episode. Had he seen an opportunity and taken it? It'd been a year of flirtatious emails, innuendoes, and awkward declarations of love leading up to that moment. Suddenly, I felt like a fool.
Amy shook her head. "All the shit he pulled with those stupid Facebook posts."
I looked at her, surprised, as she narrowed her eyes at me.
"Yes I saw his 'I love you Jess' posts. My guess is he was sending even more privately. If he was saying that much on a public website, he had to be fucking with your head in person, too. All of it conveniently led to one pivotal conversation that made you so upset you made a really stupid, desperate move. To save his life."
She leaned back, as if she were a lawyer and had nailed her final point in the closing statement of a murder trial.
I leaned back, too, overwhelmed with my conflicting thoughts and feelings. "Aim, you didn't see him, the state of his house, the dresser lined with medications. I went to appointments with him. He is definitely depressed. This wasn't some long game for him."
Amy sighed. "I'm not saying he's not depressed. In fact, it makes a ton of sense now, looking back at all the drinking and drugging he did back in college. I'm sure that was all part of how he was trying to cope at the time. But you can't deny the other facts. Truman wanted, still wants, you back. When you kissed him, he should've stopped you. He should've been a man and had enough respect for you to tell you to go home to your husband and leave him to handle his own shit. But he didn't. To me, that says a lot."
Amy's eyes widened at the clock on the wall. "Oh, fuck! I'm late. I have to pick up Henry. His car's in the shop, and then he has a fundraiser tonight that he's been working on for months. Dammit! I would totally skip it, but I promised, and it's important to him. Jesus Christ, what shitty timing," she muttered, as she pulled on her jacket, real remorse in her eyes.
I nodded before she bent down to hug me. Watching her walk to her car in the parking lot, I knew she was right. I needed to forget about what happened with Truman. I needed to forget him, period. The trouble was, I thought of him more now than I ever had.
I sat up, cheeks hot with irritation. I'd fallen into this maelstrom of bullshit again, but I wasn't going to let it bring me low, not like it had twenty years ago. This time I was going to decide how this played out. I stood up, slinging my purse over my shoulder as I walked out the doors of the café. I needed to talk to my husband, tonight, then I needed to find a way to cut the emotional ties that had twisted between Truman and I over the years, before there was nothing left of me for anyone to hold onto.
***
"You look beautiful. And distracted."
Nick's comment drew my attention back to him from where I'd been making wet circles on the linen tablecloth with the condensation from my water glass. His eyes were affectionate, but I could hear the concern in his voice. I managed a small smile before I had to look away, swallowing the knot of anxiety that had built up throughout dinner.
When I'd decided I couldn't keep him in the dark any longer, dinner at a nice restaurant seemed like a great way to prepare. Now, the few bites I'd managed to choke down were sitting like lead in my stomach. What the hell had I been thinking? A decadent meal was not going to change the ugliness of what I needed to confess.
Instead, the tension between Nick and I only intensified, as I'd remained unusually quiet throughout the evening. Anyone looking at us would assume we were either on an awkward first date or the verge of divorce. The fork fell from my fingers at the thought, clanging loudly and drawing attention from fellow diners around us.
"You OK, sweetness? You've been pretty quiet lately, and you've hardly touched your food." Nick reached across the table to entwine his fingers with mine, his expression so tender I had to bite my lip to stem the tears. The thought I had put the beauty of what was sitting in front of me in jeopardy made me sick. I squeezed his hand and held on, hoping I could keep my shit together until we got home.
"I'm OK, babe." Liar. "But, there is something I want to tell you."
Nick's smile was shaky. "Well, those are words I'm pretty sure no man wants to hear from his wife."
His smile faded quickly. "I hope whatever it is, it explains what's been going on with you over the last couple of months." His lips turned up in a lopsided grin at my surprised expression. "Yeah baby, I've noticed. Figured you'd tell me when you were ready. It's about trying to get pregnant again, isn't it? Look, I know the miscarriage was hard, but—"
"Jessa? Is that you?"
I'd started to shake my head in answer to Nick's question when we were interrupted. I looked up into familiar amber eyes, silently cursing her colossally bad timing.
"Darcy. How are you?" The words came automatically as I shuttered my expression. Even after all these years, on instinct, I knew not to show her a hint of weakness. The gleam in her eyes reminded me nothing had changed; my old frenemy from high school would take advantage of whatever she could in order to get a leg up on her perceived competition.
She smiled, looking from me to Nick before I jerked back to attention. "Oh, sorry. This is my husband, Nick. Honey, this is Darcy Schmidt, an old friend of mine from high school."
Old, indeed. The years hadn't been especially kind to her. She'd been a cold-hearted beauty when we were younger. Now she looked like an overly made-up, former beauty who was trying too hard to look like a twenty-something.
She still preferred the standard 'smoky eye' with heavy black eyeliner and shadow. At her age it was a less appealing look, considering the bags and dark circles. Her brightly colored tank top was snug over obvious implants, nipples jutting out from under the fabric in a bid for attention. Her body was slightly heavier, likely the result of the three children I'd heard she'd had, via three different men.
Still, I had to hand it to her, she was in pretty good shape. She didn't look half as miserable on the outside as I guessed she felt on the inside, based on the barely concealed sneer warping her lips. Some things never changed.
Nick caught my eye. He'd heard a few tales about Darcy. None of them flattering. He probably couldn't remember the details, but the way he held my gaze told me he knew not to invite her to sit down and join us for drinks. I shifted in my seat. I didn't want to shoot the shit with her, not on a good day, but I really didn't at this particular moment.
Darcy extended her hand toward Nick, and I fought the primal urge to bite it. I didn't want her touching a single millimeter of skin on my husband.
"It's such a pleasure to meet you!" She held onto his hand while she continued to talk. "I remember seeing you at the reunion banquet last year but didn't have the chance to properly introduce myself."
I almost snorted. I'd avoided her, casually but efficiently during the reunion, because of this very scenario. I could smell the wine on her breath from where I was sitting. She was steady on her feet, though. So, not drunk enough she'd be obnoxious, but probably working a good buzz and ready to flirt with my man. As I watched her lick her lips in a way that was anything but subtle, I wanted to roll my eyes at her audacity.
I started to stand. Fuck the ch
eck. We'd pay for our dinner on the way out at the register by the bar. "We were just leav—"
Darcy turned her attention to me. "Jessa, seeing you reminds me of something." She tapped her chin with a painted fingernail, feigning thought. The hackles on the back of my neck rose. I'd seen that look, usually right before she embarrassed someone with dirt she'd dug up on them.
I wasn't going to wait for whatever bomb she was about to drop. Probably some humiliating story about someone we both knew, information that person certainly would not want spread around. It was Darcy's favorite hobby in high school. Judging by the look on her face, it still was.
I pulled my jacket on. "Sorry we can't stay and chat, but we really do need to be going."
She inhaled sharply, her finger in the air, pointing at the ceiling. "I remember now!" She paused long enough to grin.
This time I did roll my eyes. I didn't have time for her hateful gossip about other people. "Darc—"
"How is Truman Miller?"
My mouth went dry as I realized the reason for her unexpected glee at seeing me. What the hell did she know? I wouldn't have to wait long to find out. She nodded, as though she and I had come to some kind of an understanding. I'd unceremoniously dumped her evil ass as my friend in high school, and this was payback.
I feigned a nonchalance I most definitely did not feel and hoped Nick bought it. "I guess he's OK, Darcy. I haven't seen him in a while, so I really wouldn't know."
My guess was, she did know and was more than happy to share. God, was I going to get the news that Truman had gone through with his threat and killed himself? From Darcy fucking Schmidt? I swallowed hard. If there were any justice in the world, this whole conversation would end immediately.
"That's right. I guess it's been a couple of months now since I saw you leaving his house that night. Or should I say, very early morning?"
My eyes darted to Nick's, but he was already looking at me. In fact, I think he'd been looking at me the whole conversation because I couldn't remember him moving an inch. He kept his expression neutral, friendly even, but the twitch in his cheek told me a different story. I quickly looked back to Darcy.
I Fell In: A mostly true story about lust, redemption, and true love. Page 21