“Uh, guys?” I interrupted. “Can someone explain how their ‘very public break up’ has anything at all to do with me?”
“Apparently, people seem to be passing the word around that Kamdyn is interested in you, actually. Some people don’t believe it. Kamdyn and Samantha have been together for two years. Maybe he finally got tired of her shit and cut her loose, which I think is most likely. No offense to you of course. It’s just, Samantha is an insufferable bitch. How he could stand her for two years I will never understand.” Alex explained.
“Or maybe it is true, that he found someone else that he’s interested in, you.” Mike added.
“Trystie, the reason why this is such a big deal is because, well, Kamdyn didn’t ever date anyone from school. It wasn’t until we got to high school that he found Samantha that there was someone that was “good enough” for him.” Lauren tried to explain.
“Well, I don’t think that’s it. It just can’t have anything to do with me. I haven’t even talked to Kamdyn in weeks, since the party.” I told them. I was even more confused now then I had been while being yelled at. This type of thing just didn’t happen to me.
The bell rang before anyone could say anything further on the subject, which worked fine for me. I didn’t need to know what they thought. I knew this couldn’t be about me. Like I told them, Kamdyn and I hadn’t spoken since the party. I saw him in class, when he decided to come, but I got pretty good at pretending he wasn’t there. I needed to clear this up. The whole thing put a huge knot in my stomach. I had enough to worry about. This wasn’t helping my stress level. I decided, by the time I was walking down the hall to Algebra, I needed to talk to Kamdyn.
When I walked into class, Kamdyn was no where to be found. It was still early, I had a few minutes until the bell rang again so I put my books down on my desk and walked out into the hall. I leaned up against the opposite wall and peered up and down the hall waiting for a glimpse of the person I was looking for. He never showed. The bell rang, I looked up and down the hall one last time, then crossed the hall to class.
Jayson pulled up in front of my house and shut off the engine. I didn’t say anything for a minute. He just sat there, staring out the front windshield as the rain poured down in buckets around us.
“Can I ask you something, Trystie?” he finally spoke. The whole way home I could feel his tension, that there was something he needed to say.
“Sure, Jayson, anything. What’s on your mind?”
“Tell me what really happened at the party. You disappeared for a long time at the end. You said you went to the bathroom and there was a long line but…” He stopped, looking down. When he looked up again, he brought his eyes to my face. “People are saying that you were upstairs… with Kamdyn.”
“Jayson, I…” I quickly jumped into my defense mode, ready to sling any excuse in the way.
“I won’t get upset. I promise. I know that’s why you didn’t want to tell me in the first place. Since you first met him, you saw how much it upset me. The way he looked at you.
Looked at me?
“Jayson, you’re right. I should have told you that night. But I honestly thought you would take what did happen the wrong way, that maybe you wouldn’t believe me.” I couldn’t take my eyes off his face. I was just waiting for his expression to change. “You’re going to laugh probably.” I proceeded to explain the entire night from the moment I left his side, leaving out only a few details. Like Kamdyn’s warden act.
When I stopped, I just watched him carefully. He just sat there for a moment, searching my face. “That’s it?” he finally asked.
“I told you it was nothing. That’s it.”
“What did you talk about?”
I smiled. “Nosey!”
“I am just curious.” he said while he opened his door. He looked back at me as I rolled by eyes and we both ran to the front door.
No one was home, like always when I got in from school. Jayson stayed almost everyday, so I was never alone much. Which was good. As I sat in my room, while Jayson raided the fridge, I thought about Jayson and what Heather said. About being lucky to be with him. I knew it was stupid to think, but did Jayson think we were together? He did seem to act that way. When it came to Jayson and Kamdyn, I felt like the fire hydrant in between two dogs marking their territory.
When Jayson came back he made himself comfortable on my bed and turned on the TV. I reached for the remote and turned the TV off. He turned quickly over to me with confusion easily readable on his face.
“Will you explain something to me?” I asked as I sat up.
He followed in my example and lifted his back off my pillows, turning to face me. “Sure, if I can.”
I took a deep breath, than let it out slowly. “Explain why everyone thinks that this break up is my fault.”
He rolled his eyes. “Trystie? Do you own a mirror?
“You know I do.”
“Then I don’t understand why you need to ask.”
“Be serious, Jayson.”
“I am serious!” He sat up straighter and moved closer to me. “Why do you think people are always looking at you?”
“I don’t know, because I’m new?”
“Umm… no. Because you are beautiful! How do you not know that?” His hand reached up to touch my face. “You are the most gorgeous person I have even seen.”
“Jayson…Thank you,” I said as I felt the blood rush to my face. I didn’t know what else I could say. “I really don’t deserve to have a friend like you.” I added.
His hand moved from my face and placed both on my shoulders. “No,” he said looking down into my eyes. “I don’t deserve you as my friend. I’m lucky enough that you spend all your time with me. I feel like I keep you only to myself.”
“Well, you do.” I said with a big smile. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy your company.”
“I guess we have a good set up then.” He grinned back, a loving smile that filled me with nothing but happiness.
“But honestly, why?”
He sighed. “Kamdyn and Sam have been together for, I don’t know, it seems like forever, and before he met her and even during he has never really shown any interest in anyone else before. Now that I think about it, he doesn’t show all that much interest in Sam either. He has girls falling all over him everywhere he goes. Being that we have been friends basically since birth, I have been a witness to all of it. But in all that time, with all those nameless girls, not once did he show anyone of them anything more than a polite response.” He looked up at me, catching my gaze. “Then you came along and the second you met he got completely… weird.”
Dropping his eyes from mine, he shook his head and looked out the window. “Anyway, I wasn’t the only one who noticed.”
I rolled my eyes, even knowing he couldn’t see it, and fell against my pillows. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, grabbing the remote and flipping through the channels. “I didn’t notice anything.”
I didn’t look when I heard the grunt, not wanting to see what expression he was casting my way. It was bad enough I could feel his eyes on me, waiting for me to turn toward him, to argue. But as strong as the tingling on the back of my neck was, telling me to acknowledge him, I didn’t. I gave a quick rub to ease the sensation and continued flipping.
The rest of the day, while Jayson was here, he was unusually quiet. It’s so not like Jayson to be quiet, therefore, it was more than a little unnerving. Today, the air around us was tense, something so strong it felt nearly physical. I wanted to talk to him, but something told me that this moment wasn’t the right one. I needed to talk to Kamdyn first. Find out from him what exactly is going on. Only then would I have a higher hand in the conversation and valid proof to shut him up.
The rest of the week flew by, during which I hyper aware of all my surrounds. Besides the not so well hidden attempts at hiding their intriguing glances, stares and whispers through the halls and classes, I was constant
ly on the look out for Samantha on top of and needing to find Kamdyn. I looked everywhere during school and waited for him everyday before class. He never showed. I spotted him a couple of times on my way in to lunch, but every time I headed toward him, he jumped up and disappeared before I could reach him. I got a glimpse of him a few other times in the hall, but again he ended conversations and vanished from sight. I was beginning to think he was avoiding me. Yes, we was definitely avoiding me.
But that was good news. Right?
Chapter Six
The Saturday following my crazy week, I went out shopping with Lauren. We were out most of the day and for the first time since my life was flipped upside down, I felt like I was getting back to normal. I was shopping with a girlfriend and just talking about topics normal girls covered. We talked about school and gossip within our group of friends. The who’s dating who rumors and the available hot guys up for grabs. I wanted, badly, to talk about Kamdyn, but he wasn’t brought up. I actually think the whole topic was purposely avoided. In fact, no one seemed to talk about it, even at school. At least, not in front of me.
I listened intently as Lauren gave me the run down. It was almost like a wake up call, someone telling me I was still only a girl in high school. No traumatic life changing events, no leaving your home to go live with strangers. If only for a few hours, I didn’t feel so much older than I actually am, I felt like just a girl. A plain girl, still in high school. I finally felt like I was part of this new place I was living in. I had people who cared about me, and for the first time in a long time, I didn’t think about the past.
Finally, around six o’clock, Lauren dropped me off at home with throbbing feet. After Kimber insisted on examining everything I bought to “see what she can steal”, I went up to my room to relax. I went a little over board today with the shopping, it seemed. It used to be a weekly event with all my friends down south. We would all get together and go on a day trip to the closest outlet malls. So it’s been about two months. Two months since I gave my feet and my credit card a workout. I guess it was too long of a break because they were screaming at me.
I knew wasn’t going to hear from Jayson tonight. He told me earlier this week about a family birthday party today and, obviously, wouldn’t be home in time to do anything. It wasn’t a big deal. I was getting very used to always having him around, especially since I didn’t want to be alone, but he did need to go off and do things without me. So I put all my new clothes away and changed into my most comfortable lounging clothes, my cut off sweats and vintage tee, and plunked down on my bed.
The TV was on, but I wasn’t really watching it. It was more or less on just for the background noise, to keep the silence from creeping into my mind. For some reason I just wasn’t all that good at being alone anymore. Go figure.
I was looking intently out my window, watching twilight seep slowly into nightfall. Thinking about how twilight was my favorite time of the day, when day slowly turns into night. I watched as the beautiful colors streaked the sky from around the dark, blackened branches of the trees surrounding me. I watched as the darkness seeped out from around them and slowly consumed the light, swallowing it down and pushing far away. It was strange how most people didn’t like the dark, were actually afraid of the dark. I, on the other hand, loved that darkness. I welcome it. There is nothing mysterious about the daylight because you can see everything around you, there was nothing to uncover. But at night, everything is a mystery. You need to uncover everything because it is all bathed in a cloak of darkness until you can peel back the layers of dark to unveil what’s underneath.
Completely consumed by the swallowing darkness, out of the corner of my eye I saw something small whack against my window pane with a light ting. I sat up confused, and waited. Nothing happened. Intrigued, I slowly got up and walked over to the window. Nothing, only the dark line of the woods outside and the big tree whose branches brushed against my window panes in the wind at night. I glanced out again, saw nothing and walked away.
Restless now, I walked into the bathroom and brushed my teeth. There was no way to stay still now. My imagination isn’t that creative. I know that something was there. But if I looked and nothing was there, then how can I argue with myself. I mentally shook my head and finished brushing my teeth. I took a few deep breaths to settle my damaged nerves and walked back into my room, threw on my covers and closed my eyes.
Tink, tink, tink.
“Oh god, now I’m hearing things!” Without opening my eyes, I grabbed my pillow and pulled it over my head.
Tink, tink, tink.
I pulled my pillow down harder, muffling all sound.
“Trystie. Trystie, wake up.” The voice was like a whisper through the pillow, but I heard it and it sounded so familiar. I slowly pulled the pillow away from my face but kept my eyes tightly closed.
“I’m not sleeping.” I said frustrated, but more or less to myself. Maybe I was sleeping.
“Can you open your eyes and come to the window, please?”
Come to the window? My eyes flew open. I wasn’t dreaming. Someone was really outside. I sat up quickly, my attention flying to my big window. Someone was outside. Outside the second story window? I got up and tentatively walked over and opened it. It took me a second to find the person who was hanging around my second story window. Once my eyes adjusted to the surrounding darkness, I got a glimpse of someone just to the left of my window and knew exactly who it was. Kamdyn was crouched on a big branch in the tree outside.
“Kamdyn? What the hell are you doing?”
“I… umm… can you come outside, so we can talk?”
“I… Yeah, give me a minute. I’ll meet you in the front.” Swiping up my clothes I had just changed out of, I ran back into the bathroom. Emerging in record time I ran downstairs.
It was still early so Kimber was in the kitchen, making a late dinner. She looked up as I burst into the room.
I forced myself to take in deep calming breathes and calm down. “Kimber, I need to get some air. I’ll be back in a little while.”
“You don’t want dinner?”
“I already ate with Lauren. I’ve got my phone if you need me,” and I stepped out the door.
Closing the door behind me, I onto down the porch and headed toward the driveway. As I stepped off the bottom step, there was a shadow leaning against the edge of the house. Casually, like he waited there in the shadows everyday, Kamdyn pulled himself from the wall and walked toward me. As he came toward me, the porch light spilled onto his features and slowly thrust away the surrounding shadows. A sly, knowing smile appeared on his face.
Ignoring the jolt in my stomach, I propped my hands on my hips. “You know, there are easier ways to do this. Ever hear of a phone?” I said as he came to a stop a little too close in front of me.
“Yeah, but this was a lot more fun.” He let out a little laugh and my stomach cramped. “Will you walk with me?” he asked gesturing toward the driveway.
“Where are we going?” I asked as my feet, betraying my questions, started walking on their own.
“There’s a place up here where I love to go to. It’s right down the street, if you would let me take you there.”
“No offense, but why?” He didn’t answer me, didn’t even look in my direction as if I didn’t utter the words. I sighed, defeated. Curiosity would definitely kill the cat. “Can you tell me what this is about?”
“I told you, we need to talk.” He paused for a moment and I waited for him to continue, anxious to see why he would come seek me out after his more than obvious attempts at avoiding me over the last couple of weeks, that he needed to climb up the tree outside my window to get my attention. Why not?
“But do you mind waiting till we get there?” he said in almost a whisper. I said nothing, just kept walking.
We took a right at the end of my driveway and walked down the empty dark road in silence. We passed Jayson’s house and I couldn’t help but look to see if he was home, but no lights
were on.
“You know, I’ve been looking for you all over school this week. There are things we need to talk about.” I finally spoke, breaking the silence between us.
“Well, we will both get to say everything we need to in a few minutes.”
Then the silence resumed. A defining silence that I felt if I didn’t break it again soon, I would be swallowed whole and consumed by the darkness. Where the feeling came from I have no idea, but it was there. I pushed the feeling away the best I could and clenched my fists, feeling the bite of my nails digging in to my palms. The slight pain calmed me. Not completely, but enough.
Bringing myself back to the here and now, I noticed as we took another right further down the road and ended up surrounded by woods on either side. The roads in this area didn’t have street lights, so once we were encircled by woods, it was pitch black. A darkness so thick not even the moon could penetrate its essence. I couldn’t see more than a few inches in front of me. And it definitely didn’t help my coordination, so naturally, feeling the need building underneath my skin to embarrass myself, I tripped over something unseen in the street.
A prickle in my hand caught my attention and I realized Kamdyn had slid his hand into mine to help guide me along in the dark wilderness. I couldn’t pull it away.
“We’re taking this path right here.” he said suddenly, his voice booming in the deafening silence as he guided me to the right once again.
Once we were on the path, my eyes adjusted slightly to the darkness. Kamdyn led us down a very long trail deeper and deeper into the forest. After a while, I started getting nervous. What could possibly be out here in the middle of the woods that is that interesting? The thought of living surrounded by woods was scary enough for me, now someone I barely new was pulling me by hand deeper and deeper into this enclosing darkness.
Beautiful Nightmare Page 6