Reaching Rose (Hunter Hill University Book 3)

by Grider, J. P.

  I walk out the door and shake it off.

  On my way up Pompton Road, Holly's white Mercedes pulls up next to me. "Get the hell in."

  I do.

  "Why you walking? You could have just waited for me."

  "I told you. I needed to think. Besides, good thing I didn't stay. I might have taken Tabitha up on her offer."

  "What? No. You don't want Tabitha, she has major problems. Besides, you want Rose, don't you?"

  "Of course I do. I just meant for tonight."

  "Guys. You think with your dicks, I swear."

  "Make a left," I spit out.

  "Oh. You live up here?" she asks, making the turn.

  "Yup. The big house on the left."

  "Nice. The whole team lives here?"

  "Most of us. Thanks, Holly." I open the car door and get out.

  "No prob. Let me know how tomorrow goes."

  "'Kay. Bye."

  Tomorrow never goes.

  Saturday morning, I get a text.

  She's canceled.

  21

  ROSE

  I'm a chicken. I belong on Daddy's farm.

  I text Ben I'm not feeling well and will have to take a rain check. He knows it's a lie. His text back is a mere, "Okay."

  My heart is disappointed, my brain doesn't care. The thing about tonight? It would've been a date. If it went well, which I surmise it would have, we'd go on a second date. Soon, we'd be dating regularly. And besides all that what's-he-doing-with-who-at-school-without-me crap, dating leads to sex.

  The first time having sex with me would be Ben's last time having sex with me. Sure, there's the option of doing it in the dark, but when his hand explored my body, there'd be a huge chunk missing. Dark or not, his imagination would see what I don't want him to see.

  I'm not ready.

  Not now.

  ***

  Life on the farm is monotonous. Growing up, it was fun. School always came first, my mother made sure of that, but our chores had to get done. Since most of our friends' parents worked regular jobs and had no access to horses and cows and farm life, it was exciting for them to come over after school and ride - horses, tractors, whatever was ride-able. It made me proud. And once I went away to college, because I'd be away from it for chunks at a time, I treasured the weekends I'd come home to help Daddy.

  Now it's all I do.

  And it makes me sad.

  Since the day I canceled on him, Ben stopped texting me - I deserve it.

  Part of me wishes he would have fought harder, but why should he? He can have anyone he wants.

  Holly texts me a few times a week, but she's been too busy with school, work, and her relationship with Mick to get into any real conversation. Not that I'd open up. I don't do that anymore.

  I’m so bored that I pull my dancing leg out of the box again. I don’t know why, I just do. I start touching it. Again. It’s so foreign. With my hand, I bend the foot at the ankle...back and forth...side to side; it actually moves effortlessly, unlike the one I’m wearing, which is more rigid in its motions. I stare at it for God-knows how long, but that just makes me mad.

  Why? Why can’t things be simple? What’s Your purpose for doing this to me? I just don’t understand.

  I stare at this thing that’s now in my hands, and I curse it. Loudly. Then I put it back in its box. Again.

  ***

  The following week, at least, is the start of our busy time, so there's a disruption of our regular farming schedule, which makes it a little less dull and a little less boring. This Thursday is Thanksgiving, so Daddy is busy preparing our turkeys for the butchers. I'd forgotten how busy it gets at the end of November.

  Mom is watching me from the window. Every half hour or so, I look up at the house and see the curtains move.

  Yes, Mom, I'm okay.

  She worries too much. All I want though, is to be left alone. This is my life. It is what it is, and if I've accepted it, then Mom should too.

  "Why haven't you used your dancing leg yet?" she asks every chance she gets.

  "Because, Mom, it's not what I want anymore."

  "Then go back to school. You walk like everyone else. No one would even know."

  "Everyone will know, Mom. They've heard about the accident."

  "Then go to a different school. We can apply online."

  "Sam. Enough." Dad always ends the redundant conversation.

  ***

  "Rose," my mom says when I walk in the door, exhausted from bringing the last of this season's turkeys to the butcher. "After you take a shower, get dressed in something other than your pajamas for a change."

  "Why? I'm only gonna be helping you bake pies for tomorrow."

  "Yes, I know, but...well...we're having company for Thanksgiving and they're coming tonight."

  "Tonight? Who?"

  She sucks in a breath and I know right away I'm going to be pissed.

  "Who?"

  "Holly and her boyfriend."

  "And her boyfriend? Mom, why?"

  "And your friends Griffin and Cali and someone named Nathan."

  "Oh my God, Mom, why? I don't want to see them now."

  I storm up the stairs as best I can and slam my bedroom door behind me.

  Maybe if it were just Holly visiting I wouldn't be so upset, but she invited all of them. Why? Doesn't she get it? I want to be left alone.

  I text Holly and beg her not to come, then I detach my leg, go in the bathroom, and undress to take my shower. When I'm done, I slip on yoga pants and a baseball jersey and reattach my leg. Not bothering to dry my hair, I braid it wet, stick my phone in the waistband of my pants, and go downstairs, saying nothing to my mother while we slice and peel apples for the pies.

  "You look especially pretty tonight, Rosebud," my father says when he comes in.

  I mumble a quick "Thanks" but return to my brooding.

  Patti and Beth walk in from their two-day trip to Syracuse to pick up Terri.

  "Terri," my mother squeals. "Oh, I've missed you." They embrace in a long hug and then Terri looks at me.

  "Hi Ter," I say, smiling before I hug her.

  "How are you, Rose?" Her tone is full of pity and verging on condescension, with a hint of sarcasm.

  "Don't."

  "What?"

  "Don't talk to me like that. I'm fine."

  "I know," she says wide-eyed. "I just..."

  "Rose, she just hasn't seen you...since..."

  Since the accident, or at least since I entered rehab.

  "Still. I'm fine, Terri. Please treat me like normal."

  She nods.

  "Then why don't you act it?" Patti mutters.

  "What?" I spin around to face her.

  "You heard me."

  "Girls," my mother chides.

  "No, Mom, she's gotta know," Patti continues. "You mope around this house like your life is over instead of being grateful every day that you're still alive. My God, Rose, when you were lying in that hospital bed with all those machines and tubes sticking out of you...we thought you weren't gonna make it." Her voice breaks. "I thought I'd never get to talk to you again, and here you are, perfectly capable of talking and walking and going to school, and you can still be anything you friggin' want, but you sulk. And it's like you're dead anyway. Get over it already. So you have one leg. Big fucking deal. You're here. You're here, goddammit..." She can't finish because her tears have become too much.

  I look at everyone and they're all just staring at me, their eyes bubbling over.

  "You all feel this way?" I ask, barely breathing myself.

  Every single one of them nods. Even Terri, who hasn't been here to properly give her two cents.

  I huff.

  And dramatically, I puff. I want to scream. I want to blow my top. Has any one of them even come close to being in my shoes?

  With my two hands held up in defense, I shake my head and walk out, but not before grabbing my phone and the keys to my father's old truck.

  The gas tank
is empty and I have no money. I didn't even think to grab my driver's license. Because I'm in no position to run out of gas, I head up through a private trail in the woods not too far from my house and park, turning off the engine despite the cold.

  My mind is all over the place - what if this? Or what if that? I know that playing the what-if game is a dangerous road to travel, but I can't help but wish I could turn back the clock five and a half months.

  Then my thoughts go to Johnny. I don't know much about what happened to him, but I do know how he ended up. Yet he never let anyone see him down. Ben says it's the thought of his mother keeping him going, but I don't understand that kind of selflessness. All I think about anymore is myself. And why this had to happen to me. It's not who I want to be, it just is.

  I do the last thing I expect to do - I call Ben.

  "Hello."

  "Hi," I say much too quietly.

  "Rose? Are you okay?"

  From out of nowhere, I cry.

  "Rose. What's going on? Are you hurt?"

  Oh my God, I can't stop crying long enough to get the words out.

  "Are you home?" he asks.

  "No." My tongue mimics the word but it barely comes out.

  "Where are you, Rose?"

  I close my eyes and concentrate on breathing, while willing the tears away.

  "Rose." Ben's voice loses its urgency.

  "Mmm."

  "You good?"

  "How's..." I swallow what feels like glass in my throat. "How's Johnny?"

  "Johnny?"

  "Mmm."

  "He's...okay. I spoke with him last week, Rose, what's going on?"

  "No...no one understands."

  "Understands? Understands what?"

  "Me."

  "You. No one understands you?"

  I shake my head.

  "Rose, what don't they understand?"

  I hear him breathing and it's quite heavy.

  "That you're having a hard time adjusting to your new life? Because, honey, I understand. I understand completely. This changes your dream. I get it. I do. Is that what they don't understand?"

  I nod, even though he can’t see me.

  "Because I do. And it's okay to feel this way. It's okay, Rose. Do you hear me? It's okay."

  Silence consumes us for a couple minutes before Ben speaks again. "I’m only asking this as a friend, Rose, nothing more, but do you need me to come up? I'm in Haledon still, so I can be there in less than an hour."

  "No, no, that's okay, I'll be all right." My breath hitches, a belated effect from my sobbing. "Wait a minute. Are you alone? For Thanksgiving?"

  "I'm fine, Rose. I just want to know if you need me to come. If not, I'm good."

  "Oh."

  "Rose. Are you home?"

  "No."

  "Where are you?"

  "In the woods somewhere."

  "In the woods? Jesus Christ, Rose. You're alone?"

  "Yeah. But I'm in my dad's truck."

  "Go home, Rose. You can't sit in the woods, even if you are in a truck. Please go home."

  "Yeah."

  "Will you text me when you get there?"

  "Yeah."

  "Yeah? You promise."

  "I don't make promises. I don't believe in them anymore."

  "Rose. Text me when you get home, okay?"

  "Yeah."

  "Better yet, put me on speaker while you drive. This way I'll know you got home."

  I sniff some leftover tears.

  "Rose, you're not drinking, are you?"

  "I wouldn't...I wouldn't drink...and...drive."

  "You don't sound okay. Are you driving?"

  "No...the car is off."

  "Start the car, Rose. Am I on speaker?"

  I put the phone on speaker and lay it on the seat. "Yes." I do as he says and start the car, but all the crying has exhausted me and I feel like I'm going to fall asleep.

  "Now head home."

  I step on the gas and go forward in search of a wide enough space to turn around.

  "Are you on your way home?" Ben asks, intruding the silence.

  "I...I...no. There's nowhere to turn around."

  "Ro...Ca...Back."

  I can't hear him.

  "Rose...find a...out?"

  "You're breaking up."

  "Ro..."

  Stepping on the brake, I pick up the phone from the seat. No service and a blinking "Charge Battery" message. Instead of continuing forward, I try a k-turn right on the trail. As I put the truck in reverse, it dies. "No no no no no." I start it again, it goes. Thank God.

  I press on the gas, it dies again.

  Oh my God.

  I try one more time, but I'm on a slight incline and the truck won't start. Frantically, I search the glove compartment for a flashlight.

  Nothing.

  "Daddy," I call out in the dark. "Come on."

  Under the seat, in the cushions, under the dash. I search everywhere and find nothing to light my way back home. In the woods, it's pitch black. The light of the moon can't penetrate through the thick blanket of trees. I've traveled these trails so often in my past, but without a light, there's no way I'd make it home.

  Alone without even a coat to keep me warm, I lie across the seat and decide to sleep until the sun comes up.

  No sense in fighting the darkness.

  22

  BEN

  I drum my fingers on the steering wheel all the way up to Wantage. Rose has me worried sick. She's in the woods with no phone. Common sense tells me she found a place to turn around and she's home safely in her house. My gut tells me she never got home. My overactive imagination tells me she's lying in a ditch somewhere dead.

  Odds are, common sense has won, but what if?

  That's why I am racing up Route 23's two-lane highway at double the speed limit. Kudos to my Honda for breaking a hundred miles per hour.

  When I pull up, every light in the house is on, including the front porch light. My panic has me rapping on the door harder and faster than I should, especially since with my other hand, I'm ringing the doorbell.

  "I'm coming, I'm coming." The voice on the other side sounds just as panicked.

  "Ben," Rose's mother cries as she opens the door.

  Even before I ask, I know the answer, but I ask anyway. "Mrs. Duncan, I'm just making sure...is Rose here?"

  "No. No."

  We're bombarded at the door with the rest of Rose's family...and, "Holly?"

  "Ben?"

  "Do you know of any trails around here where Rose would go?" I ask quickly.

  "Trail?" the man, who I gather is Rose's father, asks. "Do you know where Rose is?"

  "She called me from some trail. Her phone died and...and I have this feeling."

  "Come with me, son." The man grabs a set of keys off a hook on the wall and leads me off the porch. "I'm Bruce, Rose's dad."

  "Ben, sir. Rose's friend."

  We get into a huge F350, and Mr. Duncan peels out of the driveway.

  "You sure she said trail?"

  "Yes. And she didn't have room to turn around. Then her phone went dead."

  "Hopefully she's where I think she is. We didn't know where she went. She wasn't answering her phone. I mean...we weren't worried at first, but then my wife saw her purse was still in her room and I knew there was no gas in the old Chevy. I don't know why she took that clunker and not this truck, or her mother's car, but..." He glances at me. "Sorry, I couldn't get a word in edgewise in the house with my wife yappin' it up. Sorry."

  "No need to apologize, sir."

  "Call me Bruce. Please."

  We turn up a dark road paved only with what seems to be huge rocks and small logs. Rose would have had to have taken a truck to pass through this. My car would never have made it.

  About two miles up the trail, we spot the truck. Both of us make a run for it, because from where we are parked, it looks like no one is inside. The doors are locked when we get there, but when Bruce shines his flashlight in the window,
we see Rose curled up on the seat, sleeping.

  Bruce bangs hard on the glass. "Rose," he yells. "Rose."

  The banging startles her awake, thank God, and she unlocks the driver's side door. "Daddy," she says when he opens it.

  I'm standing to his side and she doesn't see me yet.

  "What the hell, Rosebud?" He's half yelling, half laughing.

  "I'm sorry, Dad. I ran out of gas and my phone died. It was too dark to walk, so I...Ben? Ben, what are you doing here?"

  "Thank God he is here," Bruce answers instead. "He's the one who told us where to find you."

  "I'm sorry."

  "Come on, let's get you home. I'll come back in the morning to get the truck. No one'll be driving up here tonight."

  "Do people actually drive up here normally?" I ask as Bruce helps Rose out of the truck.

  "I'm good, Daddy," Rose says, climbing out of the truck herself.

  "Not normally," Bruce says in answer to my question. "Unless of course you're my daughter."

  I open the passenger-side door and Rose says, "I can't believe you came. Thank you."

  "I was worried."

  She hops up using her right leg and slides in to the middle of the bench. My hand not-so-accidentally grazes hers, but it's so cold, I reach for her other hand and hold both inside mine. "You're so cold."

  "Not too much." But I see her straining to keep her teeth from chattering.

  "Why, Rosebud?" her dad asks while backing his way off the trail. I like his nickname for her.

  "Ironically, I didn't want to run out of gas."

  "But you did."

  "That's why I said ironically, Dad."

  "Sorry they all ganged up on you before. I shouldn't have let it get that far."

  "It's okay."

  Her father keeps glancing our way after he's found a spot to turn around, and I can tell he wants to say more, but my presence is probably keeping him from it.

  "You warming up?" I ask Rose quietly.

  She nods and her fingers move inside my hands. I squeeze tighter, assuring her they're just fine where they are.

  "I still can't believe you came," she whispers, sounding amazed.

  Trying to keep my voice low, even though I know her father can hear me anyway, I say, "You call me, crying alone in the woods, and then your phone dies. That's a scene right out of a Stephen King novel. What did you expect me to do?"