by L. C. Morgan
“Will you be needing a ride this time?”
He smiled around the rim then wiped his mouth. Setting the empty glass down, he slid it to the back of the counter and rapped on the wood with his knuckles. “No, I will not.”
“You need me to call you a cab?”
“Already have. Straight outta this place.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yep.”
“Where ya headed? Someplace warm, I hope?”
He huffed a laugh. “Hasn’t been warm up in Canada since The Great Fire of ninety-eight.”
“Canada? You’re going back home?”
“Sure am. Soon as Junior here gets me that drink.” His voice rose to get the bartender’s attention. “I suggest you go home, too. This place isn’t good for people like us.”
I wanted to be offended and had an urge to ask him what he meant by people like us, but I understood what he was saying. I had turned into my worst self since moving to Clallam, and I thought about going back to Chicago more and more each day.
The bartender set a another glass on the counter in front of Russell. He downed it then stood, tossing a few bills on the bar before putting on his coat. He patted me on the shoulder.
“You go on home, now. Ya hear?”
I nodded, and he headed for the door, leaving me to wonder if he had been talking about the bar or Chicago this whole time.
Tossing my order in the trash, I did as he said. I couldn’t remember the drive to the house. Couldn’t feel my fingers as they mixed up the hot chocolate I stepped outside to drink on the porch swing. I barely registered the sight of the bay or the sound of the waves hitting the side of the cliff.
But I was still going to miss them.
*
The restaurant I brought Alyssa and Sonia to had a certain romantic ambiance. I wasn’t expecting it to be so intimate with its low hanging chandeliers and such dim lighting. But then again, perhaps it was the perfect place for what I was about to tell them.
Or not.
“I’m going home,” I said, placing my elbows on the table and waiting for the fallout.
With a forkful of pasta at her open mouth, Sonia froze.
Alyssa looked at me as if I were crazy. “But we just got here. You haven’t taken one bite of your garlic bread. That’s very unlike you. Are you feeling okay?”
“No. That’s not what I mean.”
“Then what do you mean?” Sonia asked, dropping her fork with a clank.
My eyes widened. “I mean I’m going home.” I hesitated. “Back to Chicago.”
“What!” they both yelled at the same time.
I ducked my head, scanning the room for any sign of a disturbance. But nobody was paying attention to the three crazy girls in the back, thank God.
“Yeah. My last day’s tomorrow. I start next week,” I said to my plate, wanting to sink down in my seat to hide under the table. But I held my ground. I was doing this. This was what I wanted to do. That was final.
“And when exactly were you planning on telling us this?”
“I just did.”
“Well, how long have you known about it?”
“They called a couple days ago.”
Alyssa gave me a knowing look. “Mmhm.”
“They’re desperate for teachers right now. I applied when I graduated but they wanted someone with experience.” I shrugged a shoulder. “Now I have it.”
Man, did I have it.
“Is this really what you want, or is this you running away from your problems?” She intentionally left out “with Coll” at the end. “Because they’re just going to follow you wherever you go, you know.”
Somehow, I highly doubted it. I doubted my problems would even notice I was gone. They hardly noticed when I was there to begin with.
“It’s not just that. I miss home. I miss my friends.”
“We’re your friends,” Sonia said, sounding like I just sat on and squished her heart. It made me feel awful.
“You know what I mean. I’ll miss you guys, too. But I have to go back right now. I just have to.” It felt like the right thing to do. The only thing to do. I was going insane sitting around eating my life away. The city had great distractions. Lots of museums and gyms. I was in desperate need of getting back to a gym.
Alyssa looked irate staring me down out of the corner of her eye. Sonia just looked utterly pathetic and sad, hunkering down into the corner of the booth.
“Gotta do what you gotta do, I guess.” Alyssa reluctantly gave me her blessing, and I nodded.
No longer hungry, we picked at our meals in silence, avoiding eye contact for the remainder of the ruined dinner date.
I couldn’t get back to the house fast enough to finish packing. I had a nine a.m. flight out of cloud-covered Clallam. A wide-smiling Amber was going to be picking me up in the land of the living where they didn’t go on month-long fishing excursions. The boys were just as immature, but at least I couldn’t be crushed by any of them. Not anymore. I knew what I was getting myself into in Chicago. Business suits and baseball caps. Everything I was already used to. I’d bet that was why I had been so attracted to Coll. I just wasn’t used to someone like him.
Yeah. That was it. Unfamiliarity.
I didn’t believe it myself as I was thinking it. No matter how much I tried to deny it, something about Coll had been different. I couldn’t explain it because it couldn’t be explained. The man put my finger in his mouth on our first meeting, for Christ’s sake. Who did that?
The more I thought about him the more pissed off I got, coming up with all these things I should’ve said to him that night.
I was a red, heaving mess, sweating all over when there was a knock at the door. My stomach turned until I remembered Coll had left the day after our little one-sided chat. If it wasn’t him, that only left two other people it could be. Opening the door to the sad faces of Sonia and Alyssa, we all started crying, simultaneously going in for a three-way hug goodbye.
*
Baggage claim in Chicago was like a pig trough at meal time. I had forgotten how busy and loud it could be and usually was. Everywhere. Something I used to be able to drown out and ignore. But not so much anymore.
After spotting my luggage on the third go-around, I was finally able to push through the crowd and grab it. I had to suppress a strong urge to throw an elbow into some old lady’s throat, which really wasn’t like me. Seemed I’d brought home a few anger issues along with the box of salt water taffy.
The sound of someone yelling my name across the terminal caught my attention. The crowd parted, and I took off for my best friend in the whole wide world.
Amber had a wide smile on her face just like I’d imagined she would. Her hair had grown out into a long, shoulder-length bob. A much better look for her than the horrific pageboy cut she’d gotten for some stupid guy.
Then again, maybe it was us who were the stupid ones.
“Oh my God. Get over here,” Amber said as she pulled me in for a snug hug. “I know we just saw each other over Christmas, but I missed you.”
Now, Amber I believed.
“I missed you, too. A lot.”
“A lot. A lot.”
We giggled, squeezing each other a bit tighter before letting go and heading for the car.
Amber talked about herself and what was new in her life off and on during the ride to her apartment. I was pretty sure it was to keep me from focusing on myself. She spit off facts and fun little tidbits she thought I would find interesting but really didn’t. Bless her heart.
“And I’m setting us both up on a blind date.”
“What? Amber, no. No! You of all people should know that I don’t feel like meeting anybody new right now.”
“Oh, calm down, would ya? It’s a blind date with a book.”
“A what?”
She nodded. “Yeah. At the library. It’s kind of like a book club where someone picks out a book and you have to read it, then we all discuss it at the next meeting.
It’s got a new lounge area with sofas and bean bags and you can drink your cappuccino there. Sounds heavenly, doesn’t it?”
I had to admit, lounging around on a bean bag chair with a cappuccino in one hand and a book in the other did sound kind of nice.
“I guess that would be okay. But next time lead with that, would ya?”
Amber smiled at the road ahead. “Yes, ma’am.”
Once we made it back to her apartment, she helped me unload the bags I’d brought with me on the plane. The rest of my stuff I’d shipped, and it would be here any day now.
It meant a lot to me that Amber was letting me stay in her spare bedroom, AKA the couch, until I could find my own place. I’d considered staying with my parents, but I’d just tried that during my last visit. While staying in my childhood bedroom had been nostalgic, the novelty of the holidays had long worn off. It would have been too real for me to even think about trying to handle my mom’s questions at a time like this.
Amber’s healthy eating habits really helped me over the multiple humps of caffeine withdrawal. Three days junk food free and I was feeling a whole hell of a lot better. On the fourth day I joined Amber’s gym, which was conveniently just two blocks away. I was exercising on my way to exercise. It was great. It was perfect. Until the first day of school.
I’d heard horror stories of teaching curriculums in big cities versus smaller, more condensed ones. My class size doubled along with my anxiety. Testing, testing, and more testing consumed my days and took away from very important socially integrating activities for the kids. The parents seemed to know more about their child’s academic needs than I did, which made me look incompetent upon lazy upon uncaring. All of which I was not. But there was no telling them that this late in the game.
All the stress went to my upper back and shoulders. Sleeping on Amber’s lumpy couch wasn’t helping the situation. On more than one occasion I had to run away from the vending machines, which now took credit cards. Credit cards!
The whole entire universe was ganging up on me. I blamed Alyssa, who jokingly threatened she was going to put a hex on all things Chicago if I left. Said she’d make me come crawling back if it “kilt” her to do so.
I had to admit the thought was tempting. Things seemed to have been a lot easier back there in Clallam. Easier. Boring. At least, that was how I was remembering it. I missed the easy. I missed the kids. Especially Kaylee. I wondered if she was still there. If she was still with her foster family. I hoped to hell she was and I wasn’t just another person who had abandoned her. The thought made me want to sob like she had the day I announced I was leaving for another job. The whole thing broke my heart.
If I did go back, I didn’t necessarily have to move back into the rental. I could find an apartment. One not overlooking the water. All I had to do was stay updated on the boat schedules and steer clear of the only bar in town. It was that simple.
I was looking up flights when Amber walked into the room.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking up flights back to Seattle.”
“Oh. Did you get some time off to go out there and pick up your car? Maybe I could go with you. We’ll make a trip out of it on the way back. Stop at a few of the Seven Wonders. It’ll be fun.”
“Yeah, that would be fun. Only I sold my car, remember?”
“Oh, yeah. So wait. Then why are you looking up tickets to Seattle? You’re not thinking of going back to Clallam, are you?”
“Not thinking. No. Decided.”
“Hailey.”
“What?”
“You’ve only been here a month and three days. Give it time. You’ll adjust. Things will get better.”
“Will they?”
Amber gave me a look somewhere between sympathy and exasperation. “I promise.” She sat down on the couch beside me to pat my hand. “Look, you can take the bed tonight, okay? Get a good night’s sleep, and we’ll go to a museum tomorrow, walk around downtown like we used to, something to get your mind off things. Sound good?”
I nodded, hoping it would help but doubting it just the same. Part of the problem was it was still too cold and snowy to spend much time outside. What I needed was the sun. I needed to wait it out until spring when I could wear jumpers and flip flops, stroll through the park and walk by the water, go to the zoo—something Clallam didn’t even have.
After changing into my fleece pajamas, I climbed into Amber’s bed with no guilt whatsoever. I slept like a baby on Benadryl. Woke refreshed and ready for the day. Maybe all I really needed was a bed with a Tempur-Pedic mattress.
The sun was pretty warm that day, so we got away with wearing just our sweaters. We hit up the Art Institute first, Ferris Bueller style, then grabbed a quick lunch at the Shake Shack before heading over to the aquarium. All was going really well until I got a good look at some sockeye salmon and started wondering if Coll had realized I was gone, if he cared. Hell, if he was even still alive to care.
The thought made me nauseous, but I pressed on. Smiling through the pain. Pushing through the remainder of the school year until it was finally warm enough for those jumpers and flip flops I’d been longing for.
By the first day of summer I had moved into my own place, gained the respect of my coworkers and the majority of my students’ parents.
Chicago didn’t seem so scary anymore. I had hardly thought about the time I’d spent in Clallam the last few months. It no longer hurt to think about Coll. I only seemed to remember the good times, like when he’d made me smile.
It was the very day I considered myself cured of the first crush I ever collapsed under that I received his letter.
Chapter Seventeen
The envelope looked worn and felt rough in my hands. Backing up, my knees hit the couch and I sat down, turning it over to look at the front.
My new address had been written over the old address, an indication he hadn’t known I was gone when he first wrote me. It must have been while he was still out at sea. Before he even came home in February.
My fingers itched to open it, to see what he had to say for himself. But time had passed. I had moved on. He had said enough the last time I saw him. I didn’t care to hear any more.
Tossing the letter onto the coffee table, I stood and grabbed my purse, heading out to meet with Amber for dinner as planned.
*
“What’s up with you?” Amber asked, turning my attention from the waterfront view.
Stabbing a cherry tomato, I brought it up to my lips. “Nothing,” I said then took a bite, slowly chewing. If my mouth was full, I couldn’t answer any questions.
I had kept pretty quiet about what happened with Coll back in Clallam. Amber knew the basics. Not the whole story, mostly due to my own embarrassment. But one night I’d had too much to drink, and it all came spilling out in a drunken ramble. Since then, Amber learned when it was safe to push and when it wasn’t. She knew it wasn’t safe to push right now.
“So, I was thinking we could go to a museum this weekend.”
“We went to one last weekend.”
“I know, but there’s a new body exhibit. I figured we could go and I could invite Mark along. It would give us something to talk about. Something more up his alley.”
Mark was a super nice guy Amber had been seeing. He was a doctor and fashion illiterate. They only had so much to sit and talk about. It was cute how hard Amber was trying to make it work with him.
“Yeah, okay. We can do that. Sounds like a lot of fun.”
I grinned and beared through the rest of dinner, trying not to let on how annoyed I was that I couldn’t stop thinking about that stupid letter.
Who did Coll think he was writing after the way he’d treated me? A coward for sure. If it was to explain things, there was no need. If it was to apologize, he could save it. If it was to say he was wrong, well, I didn’t want to know. It would be too easy to forgive him.
*
“Alyssa and Ethan? Are you kidding me? Are you seriou
s?”
“As a heart attack,” Sonia said then laughed. “They’ve been going at it pretty hot and heavy for the last couple months.”
I shook my head, smiling at the wall. “I can’t believe she didn’t tell me.”
“Well, ya know.”
My smile faded. “Yeah, I know.”
Even though Alyssa had accepted my going back home, she still saw it as some sort of abandonment. We talked, but not as often as we used to.
As Sonia filled me in on all the things I’d been missing out on, I glanced down at the letter still lying on my coffee table.
“Hey, you didn’t happen to give my new address out to anybody, did you?” I interrupted, knowing full well if anybody had, it was Alyssa just to spite me.
“No, never. Why? You getting letters from bill collectors?”
“Something like that.”
Not wanting to go into any more detail, I hurried off the phone with an excuse of having to meet Amber. While that was true, I didn’t have to leave for another hour. It would have been less torturous to sit there staring at the letter I refused to read than to have to make up stories about why bill collectors would be trying to contact me.
I passed the time by pacing in and out of rooms and opening and closing the refrigerator door.
Have a worry? Stuff your face.
I wasn’t even hungry. It was just that food always seemed to make everything better. Eating was my first instinct.
Since I no longer stored any junk food in the apartment, I grabbed my purse and headed for the closest store. I needed some chocolate and a Diet Coke, dammit. And this time I wasn’t going to deny myself.
*
The museum was packed to the stacks, which only exacerbated my anxiousness. I must have snuck at least two Hershey Kisses for every muscle on display.
The drink was harder to sneak but not impossible. I took every opportunity to take a sip. Like it was a lifeline or something.
When we stopped for dinner later that evening, I ordered a plate of loaded potato skins, which I ate all of before downing an entire twelve-ounce burger and a plate of fries.