“Trystessa, don’t be ridiculous! We wanted you to come here and for you to have a place in this home that is yours. We want you to be happy. And at least if you can’t be happy anywhere else, then at least you can be happy in your room.” Kimber looked like she had anticipated my qualms. She knew she was doing way more than she had to, and she was happy to do it. To make me happy.
“Well than, thank you. I love it. It couldn’t be any more perfect.” I took a deep breath and looked around the room again, my room. “And please, call me Trystie.”
“No problem. Would you like to start unpacking now, or would you like to wait for tomorrow?”
“I think I will wait until tomorrow, if you don’t mind. I am kind of tired and it is late, I guess. Is that okay?”
“Okay, Trystie. When you get up tomorrow just let me know and I will get the rest of your things up here and you can get yourself settled.” Justin said happily. “Jayson brought up your luggage from the plane. So make yourself comfortable, get settled in and help yourself to whatever you’d like. We’ll be at the other end of the hall, last door on the right, if you need anything. I’m wiped, so I’m off to bed. See you in the morning.” Justin finished with a smile and walked out.
Kimber came up to me and gave me a quick hug, but seemed a little unsure if she was doing the right thing. As she pulled away, she smiled and said, “We are so glad you’re here. Have a good night.”
“Thanks,” I said, and she was gone.
Once they were gone, I got out my luggage bag and found my favorite clothes to sleep in, one of my dads vintage tees and a pair of cut off sweats. Everything I needed was already in the bathroom. So I went in and brushed my teeth and washed my face. When I came out, I was all ready to fall into that big fluffy bed. All I needed was my iPod. I rummaged through my carry on and finally found it, hidden. As I was zipping up the bag again, I got a glimpse of my mom’s book. I stared at it for a minute, my stomach tightening with every second. There was no way I could leave it there and go to bed. So I grabbed it and put it on my nightstand after giving it a kiss. Now that my stomach was all in knots again, I put on my ear phones and lay back, a tear escaping down my cheek as I closed my eyes. Hoping the music would sooth my nerves and ease some pain. Maybe keep the nightmare away. The music played on and on, until the knots loosened and my mind slipped away into sleep.
Jayson didn’t wait until I called him to come by the next day. In fact he barely waited until I was awake. As I walked down stairs in the morning, trying to remember where the kitchen was, I heard the front door open and Jayson’s voice echo through the halls. “Good morning Justin, Kimber. Is Trystie up yet?”
“Good morning Jayson. No, I don’t think she is. We just got up ourselves. You’re an early riser, huh?”
“Yeah, I um… I guess so. Do you mind if I wait for her?”
“No, not at all. Have a seat. Would you like some breakfast?”
“Sure,” he said happily. I heard the scrapping of a chair and heard the shuffling of plates.
I started to work my way down the steps when I realized, I just woke up! I was wearing my ratty old pajamas, no makeup on and my hair was in a messy scrunch on the top of my head. Why do I even care? Normally, I guess I would, but Jayson’s the one that came over this early when I didn’t even get the chance to call yet. I don’t care what they think. I humphed to myself and continued down the stairs and found my way into the kitchen.
“Good morning, Kimber. Good morning, Justin.” I purposely ignored Jayson sitting at the table. I walked right passed him, asking Kimber where the glasses were and got myself some orange juice. I took a big sip as I walked over to the table and sat down, facing away from Jayson.
“Good morning, Trystie.” Jayson said a little shyly. He may have gotten my hint. He was pushing his luck a little bit. I did appreciate his help last night, but I don’t like feeling like I don’t have a choice. I told him I would call him if I wanted his help or company, and here he is before I was even awake. But the puppy dog eyes he was giving me when I looked up at him were a little hard to ignore and I couldn’t resist the smile that crept onto my face.
“Good morning, Jayson.” I took a quick sip of my orange juice and noticed his expression had changed, he was happy again. “Jayson, do you mind doing me a favor?”
He looked up at me with a face that showed he was eager to do anything. “Sure,” he said “What can I do you for?”
“I’m glad you’re here, but next time, can you give me a heads up? At least make sure I am awake first.”
He flinched. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t call because I didn’t want to wake Justin and…” I looked at Jayson and raised my eyebrows. “Okay,” he said. “I see your point. Next time, call first. Got it.”
Kimber interrupted at that point. It was a good place to jump in. The look on Jayson’s face was heart breaking. “Speaking of calling first, we got you a present. It’s kind of a house warming present.” She put the food she was holding down on the table in front of us, and took off into the other room. I shrugged my shoulders and grabbed a hand full of bacon. Before I could finish one slice she was back with a little leather pouch and another one of her famous smiles.
“Here you go.” She gave it to me and saw the apprehension in my face. “Trystie, I don’t want to hear it or even see that look on your face. It’s nothing big, just something that I think will make things easier for you here.”
I looked down at the little pouch, now in my hands, and sighed. There didn’t look any way for me to get around them giving me things. I definitely didn’t want them to thinking that they needed to give me things. As much as I wanted to be at my home with my parents, they were definitely making it hard for me to be unhappy here. And I guess that was the whole point, right?
So I slowly untied the knotted string at the top of the pouch and tipped it over, to unload the contents out into my hand. What came out was a brand new cell phone. It was a lot better than the one I had back home. It was without a doubt an expensive phone, but I knew they wouldn’t let me complain. It was pointless. I looked back up at both Justin and Kimber, put my best smile across my face and thanked them. They wouldn’t let me say anything more. I would have complained about the necessity of a phone, the money the phone cost, not to mention the monthly bills. These are all things I am used to thinking about, but they didn’t care.
“The phone is already loaded with the important numbers you will need here. The house number, our work and cell phone numbers, Jayson’s home number and the neighbors right in front of us, the Fives. So now it’s all yours to do with it what you want.”
“Thank you,” I felt the need to say again. Why were they doing so much? All this isn’t necessary.
I ate the rest of my breakfast in silence and let Jayson do all the talking, again. He is kind of funny. It’s like he needs to fill all the dead air. I wonder if he is capable of being quiet, I thought to myself. I caught myself giggling a little and looked up at Jayson to see if he noticed. Apparently not, he was still talking to Justin. Something about the football team this year, but I wasn’t sure.
After breakfast, I went back up to my room, Jayson bounding up the steps behind me. I had a lot of work to do today, a good amount to unpack and things to find places for. But first, I needed a shower.
When we got in front of my bedroom door, I turned around. Jayson had so much momentum from racing up the stairs after me that when I unexpectedly stopped, he almost smacked into me, managing to stop only a few inches from me. His arm braced over my shoulder against my door. He looked down at me, his lip twitching into a smile.
I looked up at him, his face was so close to mine. Too close. “Um… Jayson?”
His chocolate eyes focused intently on mine. “Yes?” he answered.
“I really would like to take a shower before I, um… we get started. Would you mind going down stairs and asking Justin if he would bring the boxes up, so we can start when I’m out?”
It seemed like
forever before he backed up slightly, putting some space between us and letting me breathe, and answered my question. “Sure, no problem.”
I turned around and opened the door before he backed away any further. But when I turned back, he was gone.
I took a nice long shower. It felt so good, so relaxing. I didn’t care about what mess was waiting for me outside this room. Right now, I am happy. I said to myself. I am really easy to please, all I need is a nice hot shower and I can wash all my stresses away. Unfortunately, it wasn’t long lasting. Once I was out of my hot shower and toweled off, a rush of worries hit me like a flash flood. It completely knocked my heart down into my stomach, as I remembered why I was here and what was waiting for me behind my bathroom door.
I quickly got dressed in my favorite lowrise jeans and a yellow tee. I threw on some make-up and towel dried my long hair and walked out to face my new world.
Jayson was there, of course, waiting patiently on my bed. He always seemed to be in his element, never out of place or uncomfortable. I apologized for taking so long and he quickly waved away my apology. “I understand women.” was all he said.
I looked around the room and saw that all of my boxes were here, neatly piled up against the far wall. I groaned, loudly, while looking at them.
“I know, Trystie, but the faster we get started, the faster it will be over.” Jayson said as he put a comforting hand on my shoulder. As pushy as Jayson seemed, in the day that I’d known him, I thought to myself, I don’t deserve to have a friend like this. I’ve never had a friend that put their own crap aside to help deal with someone else’s. At that point, I was thankful for his generosity. I would have never asked anyone to help me deal with this mess before me.
I handled my few boxes of clothes, while Jayson unpacked all my books, pictures and CDs and any other knick knacks that some how got piled into my last room. Going through it now, it seemed silly to keep most of it. There weren’t that many boxes to begin with. Jayson definitely got the easy end. Seven of the ten boxes were full of clothes, so Jayson only had to deal with three boxes, mostly full of garbage, it seemed.
It would have taken me much longer without Jayson. As it was, it took us three long hours to put everything in its place. Thank God for Jayson. He kept my mind from wondering to the unpleasant things that usually plagued my thoughts. When my room was completely together and the empty boxes brought down to the trash, I thanked Jayson for all his help. I really did mean it. It was a lot easier having someone outside my heartache here to make things go quicker.
“You’re welcome!” he said with a little smile. “I knew you would need my help, even if you didn’t want to ask for it. I told you, I understand women.” He wiggled his eyebrows at me.
I shook my head and flopped back onto my bed, closing my eyes. I laid there for a minute, until I felt the side of my bed decompress. I squinted and saw that Jayson sat down next to me. He was just looking at me, expectantly. I could tell me wanted to say something, but he was holding back.
“Spit it out, Jayson.” I said, throwing my eyes open.
“Sorry, sorry!” He said, jumping up from the bed. “I just thought maybe… I wanted to ask if you would like to do something with me today. Maybe go for a ride and I could show you around the town.”
I smiled at him and waited. I knew there was more, but he said nothing more. “Is that all?”
He gave me a somewhat nervous smirk. “Well, no… Tomorrow is your first day of school and I wanted to know if you would like a ride in the morning? To school. Riding the bus sucks and it makes its route up here really early. If you don’t want to I understand, I just thought I’d ask.”
“That would be really nice Jayson, if it’s not an inconvenience for you.” Just thinking about needing to take a bus to school made me nauseous. Back at my old school, I never took the bus. I always had someone pick me up and bring me home. I would walk if I needed to. Anything besides the bus! “So, when are we leaving?”
“Well, school starts at 7:30, I’ll be here around 6:45. If that’s good for you.”
“Yeah, that’s fine. But I meant today, you wanted to take me for a drive around the town. When are we going?”
“Oh! Whenever you’re ready. We could go now if you don’t have anything else you need to do around here.” He looked excited. I wasn’t really all that interested in exploring the town, but I was even less interested in sitting here and thinking. I needed to keep myself busy so the black hole in the center of my chest didn’t consume the rest of my body.
I grabbed my bag and Jayson handed me my new cell phone before I walked out the bedroom door. I told Justin and Kimber where we were headed and they seemed happy that I wasn’t going to sit around and be depressed all day, which, I must admit, is what I would be doing if it weren’t for Jayson. I heard Justin mumble something to Kimber about “Jayson picking her up was a good idea”, or so it sounded like, as we walked out. The last thing I heard was “Not too late, school tomorrow!” as we walked out of the house.
We took his big truck all around the town. He showed me all the “hot spots” in town. Nothing great. All the kids seemed to hang out in the parking lot of a sandwich place or gather at hidden openings in the woods. There was really nothing in the town to see besides that. If you needed anything besides groceries, you were headed to a neighboring town for it. Not having a car in a town like this was going to be painful. I was going to need to find a way to get one, fast. I couldn’t rely on Jayson for everything, regardless if he offered it or not.
He finally dropped me off at home around eight o’clock. He reminded me again what time he would be here in the morning and took off down the long drive way disappearing in the dark. I walked in the front door and announced myself. I heard a faint yell from somewhere in the house, acknowledging my presence, then there was silence again. I saw that they had eaten dinner, but left me a plate on the table with a note that said, Just in case you’re hungry – J&K.
I didn’t even taste what they left me, I ate it so fast, and before I knew it, I was back in my room. It was still early, but I had nothing to do now. No friends to call, no where to go, so it was decided, the TV was going to be my best friend here in the woods, as pathetic as that may be. I flipped through the channels until I found MTV. It really didn’t matter what was on, as long as my mind stayed busy. I don’t know how long I watched, but I eventually fell asleep.
Chapter Three
It was still dark when my alarm went off in the morning. The little clock on my nightstand declared that it was five thirty. I got up and picked out a quick and simple outfit, another of my favorite dark lowrise jeans and a purple Ed Hardy tee and jumped into the shower. It was one of my favorite outfits. No matter what happened today I would at least feel comfortable in my own skin. I always got compliments when I wore it, it felt like one of the only times I wasn’t invisible at my old school. The purple of the shirt contrasted nicely with my long, dark, reddish brown, wavy hair and made my green eyes smolder. It was something that I felt totally secure in, and I would need it today, of all days.
I got dressed quickly, threw on my traditional simple make-up and towel dried my hair. Once I was semi-satisfied with my look, I went down stairs, backpack in hand, to get some breakfast.
“Good morning, Trystie. How was your night?”
“Morning, Justin. It was good. I hope I wasn’t home too late for you guys. You didn’t say what time so…”
“Not a problem, you were home way earlier than we thought. Would you like some cereal? The boxes are in the cabinet there,” he said pointing to a small cabinets above the fridge. “Go on and help yourself.”
I walked over and retrieving a box, poured myself a bowl. “Thanks again, Justin. You guys are great for doing all this.”
“Please, Trystie. Stop thanking us for everything. We wanted you here. We want to make you comfortable, to call this place your home, that’s all.” When he smiled at me, it was so comforting and I did, at least I knew I would, be
able to call this place home.
“I’m on my way out to work, would you like a ride down to the bus?”
“Oh, no thanks.” I said, taking my last bite of cereal. “Jayson is picking me up. He should be here in about ten minutes, I guess.” I cleaned up my mess, putting my dishes in the dishwasher.
“Sounds good,” he said pulling on his jacket and picking up his coffee. “I’ll see you later, than. Enjoy your first day. I want to hear all about it later.”
“Sure you do.” I said with a smile, and he walked out the front door.
A few minutes later, I heard a knock at the door. Jayson stick his head in. “You ready?” he said once he saw me.
“You know, you didn’t need to come to the door and get me. Beeping when you’re outside is fine.” I explained.
“Yeah, yeah,” he said in response. “Don’t forget a jacket; it’s kind of cold today.”
I grabbed my jacket that was hanging over the chair and ran out the door into the cold.
The school was quite a bit further than I thought. It took a good fifteen minutes to get there. It didn’t look like I would be walking if I couldn’t get a ride. It was also a lot bigger than I would have expected, for such a small town. We parked in a small lot to the far left of the school. Jayson called it the “over flow” lot. It’s for students who aren’t seniors yet that get special permission to drive to school. I didn’t ask any questions, I didn’t want to know how he got permission. Just as if he had read my mind, he turned to me and gave a smirk. Just like I thought, I didn’t want to know.
Jayson was kind enough to walk me to the main office and wait while I signed in and got my schedule. The secretary explained all my classes to me and gave me a map of the school, so I wouldn’t get lost. That was definitely a big fear, an irrational fear, but a fear all the same. Getting lost. I couldn’t get lost.
Jayson looked at my schedule as we left the office and showed me what classes we had together; first period English, second period History and we had the same lunch. He walked with me to my locker, in the same area as his and then together, walked to our first class. I couldn’t get over how beneficial it was knowing someone who seemed so… selfless. Honestly, in a school this big and in a new, strange place, I don’t know what I would have done without him. I would have gotten lost finding something as simple as my locker, that’s what.
Beautiful Nightmare Page 2