“We’ve been together for two years. I’ve been patient with you, not pushing, but it’s like you don’t trust me and I’m sick of it. I’m sick of waiting. You can’t even just fucking try.”
“I did. I do try.”
He exhaled. “Everything’s always about you.”
“No it’s—”
“Fuck this. I’m over it.” He pulled on his clothes, still facing the window.
“Drew.”
He finally faced me, something gripped in his fist. He threw it at the headboard, the tiny box cracking against the wood and I flinched. He leaned over me in the dark, seething. But then he just shook his head.
“Do you know how many girls wish they were you right now?”
“What?”
“We’re done.”
Then he slipped out through the open window and I buried myself under the blankets, the pillow moist and sticking to my face until I finally fell asleep.
I looked at Dani. “And that’s why I’m ignoring him.”
“You mean why you’re hiding in your room and the library and the art room reading books on…” She picked one up. “Lucid Dreaming.”
“It’s research.”
“Or maybe you’re trying to get the wrong guy out of your head.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” I asked.
“It means I get to be the judgmental one for once.”
“I told you I’m ignoring him.”
“For now.”
“Like you haven’t done the same thing,” I said. “How many times did you and Dillon Hastings break up and get back together last summer?”
“And every time who was the one telling me what an idiot I was for getting back with such a jerk?” she said. “I could call you a hypocrite but I don’t.”
“Oh, thanks.”
“Well, you kind of are one.” Dani was quiet, picking at her thumbnail. Then she looked at me. “What is it with him?”
My stomach dropped. I didn’t know what to say. That I loved him because he smelled like rain after a game. That he’d grabbed my hand when everyone was looking. That even though he’d changed, even though we both had, there were still pieces of the boy I knew—soft careful pieces that were somehow more alluring the less he showed them. “He’s just…”
“Familiar?” Dani said.
I nodded. “I know I’m hard on you but I don’t mean to be.”
“It’s just easier to be honest with me than it is with yourself?”
“When did you get all intuitive?”
“When you got all mopey and clingy,” Dani said. “Threw off our whole balance.”
I laughed. “Is this how I sound?”
“Sometimes.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. Sometimes I need to hear it. Not twenty-four-seven,” she sighed. “But sometimes. I know I don’t always have the best taste in guys.”
“And apparently neither do I.”
“So why bother with him? I mean, why don’t you tell him it’s over? For good this time.”
I looked away. “I don’t know.”
But the truth was, I did know. Because for every girl in the history of girls there is always that one guy she can’t seem to shake. Even though she knows he’s not just bad for her but probably the worst thing.
The kind of guy who says all of the right things just as she was about to cut that last thread, writing him off for good. But then he slips back in somehow, she can never really remember. Not that it matters. She had one second of weakness, one second of fear and he tasted it. And he says he’s sorry and that’s it. He’s salvaged that one last thread just in time.
“He said he wants to be friends.”
Dani shook her head. “Bad idea.”
I was quiet.
“Right?” she said.
I stared at my hands. “Would it be?”
Friends. One word and I’d hesitated. I’d spent half a second too long mulling over that possibility when I should have been cutting him off. Because he’ll need that last thread, thin as it may be, to strangle me with later. That’s what they do. They cut you into pieces with lies and false apologies and those three little words that always manage to gut you in just the right way.
I couldn’t let Drew cut me open like that. Not again. Not now. But for some reason, I just couldn’t let myself cut him open either. So I did the only thing I could do. I ignored him. I buried him under my KLS and my mountains of homework and my unfinished sculpture and my unplanned campus visit to Emory and I left him there.
I thought maybe he’d slip deep enough to disappear. A part of me was afraid that he would. Maybe that’s why I couldn’t confront him—about Jessica, about that night in my room. Maybe that’s why I just couldn’t let him go. Not completely.
“I’ve tried that a few times,” Dani said. “Sort of explains the proverbial ping pong match I had going between Dillon and Josh last summer. We’d fight, break up, try to be friends, and after running into each other randomly at some party, we’d just start talking, things would feel brand new again even though we were probably fighting less than a week earlier. And then we’d get back together. Because the truth is, you can never be friends with an ex. Not just friends.”
“You think so?”
“I know so.” She laughed. “Now if I tell someone I still want to be friends, it really just means I’d like to keep them on speed dial in case I feel like making a booty call.”
“And do you?”
“Occasionally.” She shook her head. “But that’s not the point. The point is being friends with an ex is dangerous and Drew’s already dangerous enough as it is.” I felt her looking at me and I finally looked back. “He hurt you and I don’t like that.”
“And you think I do?”
“I think you’d rather hurt when you’re together than hurt when you’re not.”
I slumped against the bed, the book tumbling off my lap. “Why do we do this?”
“Because we’re afraid that there’s nothing better.”
“And when did we become our mothers?”
Dani shrugged. “I’m thinking around the time we got boobs. They sort of ruined everything.”
“Yeah, definitely not the keys to world domination like Felix thinks.”
“Maybe we should just swear off men.”
“Might as well. By the way my episodes have been happening so close together lately, it looks like I’ll be spending most of my time at some imaginary timeshare anyway.”
“At least now you’ll have a roommate,” Dani laughed.
I tried to think about that night under the stars, the way his face had looked staring up at the Milky Way. But all I could see was the way it had looked breaking out of those waves, how he’d fought against that first breath of air.
“For his sake, I hope not,” I said.
“And yours?”
I shrugged. “I deal. But him…I don’t know. I just get the feeling that he doesn’t belong there.”
“But you do?”
“It’s all mine. Every inch of that place is constructed from my memories.”
“Are you sure?”
“Everything. Every color. Every texture. Right down to the breeze blowing off the ocean. I remember it all.”
“Except for him.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, what if this isn’t about conspiracy theories or even KLS. What if this is about you?”
“What about me?”
“Your memories. What if he belongs there with them but the present just hasn’t caught up with them yet?”
Lights glimmered on the water, a twisted line of beer bottles already clanking on the bank. Trucks were parked near the waterline, beds and windows down, a different song blaring from each of them. I watched girls in bikinis dance in front of the headlights, the alcohol in their veins fighting the chill that was blowing off the water.
There was no springtime in Austin, summer taking hold as early as Fe
bruary. But something about the night smelled strangely like autumn.
I scanned the crowd that was still growing, waiting for Dani to be right and the boy to suddenly appear. Out of the darkness carrying firewood or from the backseat of someone’s car or on the arm of some girl whose straight hair actually looked attractive in this breeze.
I folded my arms, pulling my sweater tighter. Someone tugged on my elbow.
“I should have known you’d come to the lake in a parka,” Felix said.
“It’s not a parka.”
“I’m sorry, it’s a sweater. In eighty degree weather.”
“There’s a chill.”
“Yeah, and its name is Bryn. You know, if you’d be more comfortable standing over there with the astronomy club, go for it.”
I spotted some other kids from school parked near the dock a few yards away. They were setting up telescopes.
“Why are they here?”
“Some people are launching model rockets on the other side of the lake tonight,” Felix said. “Probably won’t be able to see a thing.” He popped the top on a can of orange soda before handing it to me.
“Thanks.”
“Maybe holding that can will give you something to do. This bonfire’s fuckin’ lame.”
I followed his gaze and caught sight of Matt biting the top off a beer bottle with his teeth before handing it to Dani. Felix just rolled his eyes.
“Anyone ever told you jealousy is really unattractive?” I asked.
“Anyone ever told you to mind your own business?”
“Jesus, you sound like Dani.”
His eyes widened. “Wait, she said something about me? What did she say?”
I let out a breath. “You two are impossible.”
“Bryn…” His eyes were pleading.
I gave in. “She said you’re a good guy.”
“She said…I’m a what?”
He tore the can of soda out of my grasp and chugged it.
“What’s your problem?”
“A good guy? Why didn’t she just take it one step further and say he’s like a brother to me?”
“Well, if it helps, you’re sort of like a brother to me.”
“You don’t get it.” He finished off the can and crumpled it in his fist.
“You know that’s not alcohol, right?”
“I don’t care,” he said. “I like the way it burns.” Then he stormed off.
When I realized my hands were empty I wandered over to the bed of someone’s truck, rummaging through the cooler, trying to look like I had something to do.
“Hey.”
I turned and Drew was holding out a root beer. My favorite. I examined his other hand and noticed a Corona.
“You started early.”
Drew glanced at the moon. “Sun’s down. Plus, I’m sort of at a party.”
I turned to walk away but was stopped by the waterline.
“You know you don’t have to run from me,” he said.
Yes. Yes, I do. “I’m not.”
“Then walk with me.”
Drew took a few steps west. I turned and headed east.
“Or I’ll walk with you.”
A horn blared and suddenly I was caught in the beam of headlights. I blinked against the light, stumbling, and Drew caught me by the arm. When my eyes finally adjusted I saw Jessica and her friends laughing in the front seat of her car.
“Don’t let her get to you.”
I shrugged out of Drew’s grasp. “She’s not.”
I kept walking and Drew kept following me.
“She hasn’t said anything…about me, has she?”
“Jessica?” I asked.
“You know she’s a liar.”
“I guess it takes one to know one.”
He let out a long breath. “Look, I’m just trying to warn you.”
“About someone you supposedly enjoy sleeping with on occasion.”
“Did she tell you that?”
I waved him off.
“You know that’s not true,” he said. “I can’t stand her.”
“Funny, since every time I turn around she’s standing next to you.”
“So you are watching me.” He grinned. “All that, she just wants people to see us together. It doesn’t mean anything. She only does it to try and make you jealous. But really she’s jealous of you. Always has been.”
“Right. Jessica Childress is jealous of me.”
He stepped in front of me. “Of course she is.” The way he said it almost made me feel like it was true. “Why do you always have to be so hard on yourself?”
“What?” I snapped.
Me? You. I thought about all of the times one touch or one word from him had made me second-guess every cell in my body.
But then he smiled. “Do you remember that time we drove up here when it was snowing?”
“You mean when the rain froze for about an hour and turned the highway to mush?”
“It was snow,” he said.
“I know you’ve never been anywhere up north, but trust me on this one, it wasn’t snow. You tried to make a snowball and ended up clobbering me with a handful of mud.”
“And then you chased me out into the lake.”
“And then you tripped,” I said.
“Actually, I sort of remember you pushing me.”
“Well, I sort of remember you tripping over your own feet and screaming like a little girl.”
“Well, I’m sorry but it was fucking freezing,” he laughed.
“I know. And you were soaked. I thought you were going to be so pissed.”
He wrinkled his nose. “What do you mean?”
“I…” I stopped.
“What?”
“I just thought it would set you off. Ruin the night.” Like it always did.
I thought if anyone understood the fragility of Drew’s temper, it would be him. But he was looking at me like I was describing a stranger.
“I don’t remember it ruining anything,” he said. “Well, except maybe my pants. We always had fun together.” The words trailed off like a question. When I didn’t answer him he skirted around the awkwardness and said, “You know I still have a scar from when we climbed that old water tower.”
It had been Drew’s idea. Most of our dates were. He’d discovered an abandoned water tower on the land his grandparent’s used for hunting and for some reason he thought it would be a good idea to climb to the very top with a sleeping bag and a bottle of cheap champagne.
I had to admit, it had been sort of romantic. Just the two of us watching the sun set over the trees. But then Drew downed the champagne and ended up pissing over the edge of the railing. I remembered the rusting ladder almost giving way under Drew’s weight on the way down, one of the spokes raking up through his palm.
He held it out, leading it into the moonlight. The raised skin was almost silver, the thin line cutting all the way up to his index finger. Suddenly my own was grazing the scar. It was smooth, his hand sweaty. Or maybe it was mine. He let out a sigh and I pulled away.
“Why do you do that?” he said, his voice low.
“Do what?”
“Stop yourself.”
“Because I have to.” I didn’t have the energy to lie.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me.” And apparently he didn’t have the energy to tell the truth. “We’ve been through a lot, Bryn. It’s always been the two of us. Always.” He sounded like his insides were all twisted. He sounded hurt.
I felt it too. Even though I didn’t want to. I felt it.
“Bryn…”
He inched closer and for the first time I noticed the trees. All around us. It was so dark that I couldn’t even tell Drew was standing next to me. I heard his lungs working but every time I blinked I saw something else.
“Bryn, I’m—”
“What’s that?” I stopped him.
I saw something moving in the shadows. Someone. Drew followed my voice and I almost reached for him
.
“I don’t see anything,” he said.
I searched for the lake in the dark and finally spotted the blurry reflection of headlights between the trunks of two trees. They blinked out, a dark silhouette moving in front of them.
“What was it?” Drew asked.
“I...” I pointed but then my hand fell limp.
The shadow seemed to stretch from the floor to the canopy and then the trees were swaying, their trunks bowed as it pushed its way toward us. I took off running and Drew followed behind. I couldn’t tell what was the night and what wasn’t but I could feel the air changing. Cold. Charged. Cinching us in.
The trunks groaning behind us made me tremble and I tripped over something in the dark. Drew pulled me back onto my feet and when I broke into a run I didn’t let go of his hand.
Suddenly there was a rip in the silence, flames sputtering close to the ground.
“Shit. What was that?” Drew huffed.
We ran through the trees, following the voices back to the rows of cars near the water. I saw the embers scattered across the mud, growing dim.
I finally stopped when I reached the lake, the trees rustling behind us with nothing more than the wind. I stared into them, trying to make out a face, a body, something.
“What happened?” Drew asked.
I narrowed my eyes, straining against the dark. Drew grabbed my arm.
“I just…” I tried to catch my breath. “The trees.”
“What about them?”
He gave me a strange look, waiting for some kind of answer. That’s when I realized that he hadn’t heard them almost snapping. He hadn’t seen what I’d seen.
“I thought I saw…” I swallowed, confused, “a mountain lion or something.”
I made my way over to Felix, Drew still following close behind.
“A mountain lion?” he said, reaching for me again. “Bryn…” He angled in close. “Are you okay?”
I shrugged away, still trying to put as much space between me and the trees as possible. “Yeah. I just…it startled me, that’s all.” He inhaled but before he could say anything else I nudged Felix’s arm. “What happened over here?”
“Fucking drunk idiots are trying to screw up the rocket launches across the lake.” Felix looked to me then Drew. He cocked an eyebrow. “Where’ve you two been?”
The Girl In Between series: Books 1-4 Page 12