Love Out of Order (Indigo Love Spectrum)

by Green, Nicole

  John and I were having the same fight. I felt like we had this fight every time we so much as spoke to each other. I couldn’t stand it. The only thing I could bear even less was the thought of losing him altogether. Even though we were fighting, at least he was there with me.

  “Denise. We shouldn’t have to try this hard. That’s all I said. And that’s all I meant,” John said. His voice sounded so tired, it hurt my heart to hear it.

  My eyes burned with tears. Tears of fatigue, frustration, anger. We were two tired, angry, jaded people.

  “This was supposed to help. All it’s done is bring us even closer to the edge,” I said with a humorless laugh, picking at the hem of my new navy blue skirt. How naïve of me to expect dinner to fix everything.

  “You accuse me of shutting you out. But you shut me out, too. You don’t even want me at your hearing.” He sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his gray polo.

  “It’s a closed hearing,” I muttered emptily.

  “Denise, you know you’re allowed to have some friends or family present,” he said in his quiet, testy tone. A tone I had grown to detest over the past few weeks.

  I shrugged moodily.

  “And you’re always getting on me for shrugging and not talking.”

  “I don’t want anyone there. I’m embarrassed. I’m ashamed,” I said through clenched teeth.

  “And you blame me for it. That’s the real reason you don’t want me there,” he said.

  “You don’t even like touching me anymore,” I said, standing up and walking into the living room. I was desperate to change the subject, and it was true. He’d barely touched me since the shower we’d taken together weeks before. I heard him get up and follow me.

  “What are you talking about? I kissed you hello.” “Our kisses are empty and sad now. They hurt me.” “Then why are you complaining? Sounds like you don’t want me to touch you.”

  “You know what I mean. I want you to—I want it to be like before. I want everything to be like—before,” I said, clenching my fist.

  “I want that, too.”

  “How can we fix it?”

  He looked down at his hands. “Dunno.”

  “C’mon. You haven’t even tried to make love to me since—since before. Maybe if we just—”

  “Denise,” John said softly, arresting my hand in its path down his chest with a single touch.

  “No?” I said.

  “No,” he said firmly. But I still heard the almost imperceptible crack in his voice.

  “It’s worth a try.” I didn’t even attempt to wipe away my tears.

  “If a kiss hurts, what do you think that would do to us?” he said as he gently wiped my tears away.

  “You doin’ it with someone else?” I avoided his horrible, painful question with a hateful one of my own.

  “How could you even—if I didn’t cheat on Sasha, how could I—Denise, you are just unbelievable.” He pulled away from me.

  “Then why don’t you want me?” I couldn’t stop. Why was I trying to make him angry?

  “I do. Badly. But this isn’t a good time for us to do that,” he said, taking a step back from me.

  “Huh? Not a good time? I inconvenience you, right, Archer? I’m just one big inconvenience to your life, aren’t I?” I screamed. I wanted him to show some emotion.

  “You know what? I’ve had enough.” I got an emotion, all right. He sounded thoroughly disgusted with me. “You keep pushing me, Denise, and you’re gonna get what you want. You’re gonna push me too far.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “Yeah. I gotta get outta here. This is just too much.” He grabbed his jacket off of the sofa with an angry jerk. And the next thing I knew, he was out the door, slamming it behind him.

  And I was about to find out, not that night but soon, that he really had.

  * * *

  That night, John and I had a really beautiful and very silent night together. I’ll always remember that night as the night I knew that no matter what happened, nobody could destroy our love. They could break us apart, but they couldn’t break that bond. I didn’t always let John know I knew that, though. And therein lay a huge problem for us.

  After I had thrown everything into the trash—dinner, centerpiece, and anything else I could get my furious hands on—I changed into a pair of old sweats and debated over whether I should throw away everything of Tia’s not in her room while I was in a mood to throw things away. Including people, apparently.

  I contemplated this over a half gallon of vanilla ice cream and half a pie I found in the refrigerator. The pie tasted a little rancid, but I didn’t care. I hoped I did get food poisoning. Maybe that would dull some of the more unbearable pain I felt in my heart. I don’t know how long I sat on the sofa like that, doing the thing I was becoming most expert at—feeling sorry for myself.

  I don’t know what time it was when I heard that knock at the door. I pushed the empty ice cream and pie containers aside, wondering who would dare intrude on my angry silence. I stared at the door, willing the persistent knocking to stop. Even if Tia was home—and I had no idea whether she was or not—I knew she would never answer that door. Even if she knew who it was. And this person was not gonna go away.

  I walked to the door grumbling, ready to cuss Astoria out if she was on the other side and half hoping she was because I wanted to cuss someone out. But, no such luck. I opened the door and stood there for a moment, too shocked to move. When I finally opened my mouth to speak, John’s fingers closed over it.

  “Sh. Don’t say anything. I just want to be with you tonight. I just want you. I only want us to be together. And we can’t seem to do that if we open our mouths,” he said.

  I could only nod. He walked in and closed the door behind him. I silently led the way to my room. After closing the door to my room, he pulled me to him and hugged me tightly. I breathed in deeply, needing to smell the clean scent of his cologne. I wanted to breathe him in; be surrounded by him. He gently pushed me back far enough so that he could remove his jacket and polo. He kicked off his shoes and pushed off his jeans. I grabbed him again immediately and pressed our bodies together. He sighed shakily into my hair before pulling back far enough to kiss my cheek.

  I took his hand in mine and we walked over to my bed. We sat on the edge for a moment, watching each other with wistful, love-torn eyes. We tried to say the things with our hands that we couldn’t say out loud. Hands on faces, necks, shoulders—hands over hearts. Fingertips between lips.

  We slid under the comforter and I pressed my back against his chest. His hand was still in mine. I brought it to my lips and let it rest there. He rested his chin on top of my head. I smiled faintly as I closed my eyes. My first smile in way too long.

  John loved me. He wanted me and needed me near him as much as I did him. There was no sound more beautiful than John’s even breathing. No better sensation than his chest moving in time with that breathing against my back. Except for maybe that of his warm breath against the back of my neck. I always wanted that. I wished his hand could stay at my lips. I wished he could hold me close in that bed forever. I knew that was the only place we were safe anymore. Oddly enough, I got the best sleep I’d gotten since we had returned to class following winter break.

  When I opened my eyes the next morning to the harsh blaring of my alarm clock and the unforgiving glare of the morning sun, he was gone. I wept bitterly after I hit the snooze button. I wept harder than I had in my entire life. I surprised myself with the new heights of despair I seemed to reach daily.

  * * *

  The Tau Gamma Chis, my arch nemeses, continued their reign of terror, adding even more joy to my daily life. The day before my hearing, later in the morning that I had wept alone in my bed—so utterly alone—they cornered me in the restroom. That was the day it was over for me and John. Two days before Valentine’s Day. Robbed of a Valentine’s present again. Although that was the last thing on my mind at the moment.

  I
came out of the stall and there they were. Fresh from hell. Cindy, Lacey, and Jess. And they looked liked a Cindy, a Lacey and a Jess, too. They all had blonde hair of various highlighted shades. They wore matching smirks, pearls, and cashmere.

  “What do you want now?” I said to the collective body. They were really all one person to me anyway.

  “You still haven’t gotten the message, have you?” said Cindy.

  “Hm?” I said, playing dumb. I was bringing it down to their level.

  “You stupid bitch. You still want to pretend like you have a chance with John and mess everything up for Sasha,” another one said. That one was probably Lacey.

  “I haven’t done anything to Sasha. She did it all to herself,” I said, beginning to put that all-too-familiar defensive front up.

  “Yeah. Whatever you want to tell yourself, but we’re here to let you know it’s time to stop playing around,” Probably Lacey said. “You can’t go messing with Sasha’s future. They’re supposed to be together. That’s just the way things work. I don’t know what you think you’re doing. But it has to stop.”

  “Yeah. This ends right here, right now,” Cindy said.

  “What are you going to do? Try to fight me?” I said incredulously. I turned to leave the restroom.

  One of them put a hand on my shoulder.

  “You’ve already taken all you can take. I’m about to be kicked out. Don’t deny it was you who did this. And get your hands off of me.”

  “Oh, no. Little miss gangster wants to fight us. What is that your kind calls this? Scrapping?” Cindy said with a smirk. They all burst out laughing; the same laugh.

  I was boiling inside. “You can shut your ignorant ass up right now.”

  “And if I don’t want to?” She raised a perfectly arched eyebrow.

  “I think you’ll want to,” I said. I wasn’t about to back down from that petty thing.

  “You wouldn’t touch me,” she said scornfully, looking at me as if I were dirty and not even worthy of the “honor” of doing so.

  “Oh, I’ll do more than touch you,” I said.

  “You better watch her. She probably has a knife,” one of the other two spoke up. “You know. They all carry some kind of weapon. For when the drug deal goes bad.”

  “You and your groupies need to get out of my face. Right now and from now on.”

  “I’ll press charges,” Maybe Cindy said. She looked scared.

  I smirked. “Whatever.” I set my laptop bag down on the floor under the sink. “You feeling froggy, then c’mon. Otherwise, stay out of my face.”

  “You just leave Sasha alone.”

  “I’m not bothering her.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “John’s a grown man. He does what he wants. And obviously what he wants is to be with me.”

  “No, it’s not. I don’t know what kind of spell you put on him, but—”

  “What? Now you think I know voodoo? I understand how you can be in the bottom of the class. But what I don’t know is how you even got in to law school.”

  “You shut your mouth.”

  I laughed. “I guess the same way your kind gets anything. What Daddy can’t get for you, you spread your legs for. So did Daddy pay your way in here? Or did you?”

  “Trailer trash!”

  “Hm. Trash describes you better than it does me,” I said. “Guess money can’t buy class.”

  “I’m gonna destroy you. I’m gonna show you your place since you can’t find it on your own.” She glowered at me and clenched her fists at her side. Her pearl necklace stood out against her red neck.

  “You don’t scare me. How many times do I have to tell you that? Hm. You’re slower than I thought.”

  “And no one’s denying anything. You can make this all go away, you know. You’re doing this to yourself. You really want to lose everything?”

  “You really think you’re going to get away with this, huh?” I said with a scoff. Inside, I was beginning to care less and less whether she did or not.

  “C’mon. She’s not worth it. Don’t worry. She’ll be finished after tomorrow. Pathetic loser. Has no idea what’s good for her,” one of them said, tossing back her blonde hair and glaring at me.

  I sneered right back.

  “Yeah. You know this isn’t going to last much longer anyway. John has to get bored with her soon,” the other one said, looking down her nose at me.

  I just kept staring straight at them. The two of them pulled Cindy out of the bathroom. I knew she wanted to see the end of me, and I had no idea how I was going to stop her. All I had was the truth—with no evidence to back it up. And I didn’t know if the fight was worth it anymore.

  My phone buzzed. I took it out of my pocket and flipped it open. A new text message from John. I snapped my phone shut and rubbed my forehead with shaking fingers. I couldn’t see how we could possibly make it. Everyone wanted us to fail. But he was wrong about me. At least I really hoped he was. I loved him so much. I couldn’t imagine being without him. Then again, I hadn’t really gotten to be with him all that much since all we did was fight. Maybe, sadly enough, he was right about me.

  Of course, John and I had a fight about my encounter with the Tau Gamma Chi triplets. It seemed as if all John and I did anymore was fight. Sasha and her army were definitely winning in that respect. John and I came out of Starbucks together. We met there after class to talk. I told him about what happened that afternoon. He remained almost silent the whole time. Despite the previous night, or maybe because of it, I thought John wasn’t trying hard enough. I was furious at him. Mostly because I was afraid to be furious at anyone else—including myself. Even the thought made me feel frighteningly helpless and hopeless.

  “What is it with you, John? Do you even care what happened?” I finally exploded after we reached his car.

  “What do you want me to do, Denise? What do you want me to say? It’s not like I can control them,” John said with an exasperated sigh.

  I rolled my eyes and put my hand on my hip. I stared at him, my mouth dropping open.

  “What?”

  “I am so tired of that line. You can’t keep hiding behind that. You’re not even going to take up for me? Sympathize with me?”

  “I tell Sasha to stop. Apparently, it makes her worse. I’ve stopped trying. I try to calm you down and you yell at me for belittling you and not caring about your feelings. So I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to do here,” John said. The tone of his voice was frustrated. Defeated. Tired. I refused to hear that at the time. I refused to hear anything coming out of his mouth.

  “Well, you’re just not doing enough.”

  “Fine. Blame me. Whatever. But I’m tired of hearing this. Can we just go home, go to bed, and start over tomorrow?”

  “You don’t even care. I could be out of school by tomorrow.”

  “I do. I’m sorry they hurt you. And I’m sorry it’s because of me. But you can’t just keep throwing this in my face, Denise,” John said. Even in the scant light, the nearest streetlight being several yards away, I saw his jaw clench.

  “What am I supposed to do? Your parents hate me. Your friends hate me—”

  “I can’t control my parents. How they feel has nothing to do with me. We’ve talked about the friend thing and why that’s weak for you to say. And while we’re talking about friends, how about that Astoria?”

  “What about her? She was certainly right about you. You only care about what you can get out of me. If you cared about me, you wouldn’t let those harpies do this.”

  “Get out of you? We hardly ever had sex! We don’t anymore at all now. Look at yourself for a minute. You are being so selfish. I can’t believe you are trying to put this all on me. I mean, I think I’ve been doing a pretty good job of taking your crap because I did feel like this was all my fault, but that stops now, Denise. You haven’t once asked how I feel. How this might be hard on me. I haven’t spoken to my parents in five weeks.”

  �
�Aha! I knew you cared more about them.”

  “They’re my parents, Denise. Of course I miss them. That doesn’t mean I agree with them. But you don’t even care about anything going on in my life. About how I might feel. It’s always gotta be about you.”

  “Well, you don’t have—”

  “What I don’t have is the patience for this nonsense anymore!” John banged his hand down on the hood of his car. He hit it so forcefully, I was surprised he didn’t leave a dent. For a moment, I was chilled, thinking that was how hard he wanted to hit me. But I quickly recovered.

  “I’m doing the best I can here.” I said.

  “Well, obviously your best isn’t good enough,” John said. His tone had become dangerously low, his expression impassive. That stung. He was becoming closed off to me. I could almost feel it.

  I knew then what was happening. Suddenly, my whole body went cold. And it had very little to do with the February night air. “So this is it? This is how we end?” I whispered. I could barely breathe.

  John wouldn’t look at me. He was staring down the street at nothing. “Yeah,” he said quietly. “This isn’t what I wanted, Denise. I know you think it is, but it’s not.”

  I had nothing else to say. I couldn’t even move. I watched. All I could do was watch. I wanted to respond to that asinine comment. Of course it was what he wanted. He was the one breaking up with me. I wanted to scream. I wanted to fight. I wanted to cry. But nothing would happen. I was useless. Vapid. I could do nothing. But watch.

  John slowly shook his head. He looked at me one last time. Anger. Disgust. Was that pain? Did he have the nerve to have pain in his eyes? And then he turned his back to me. He walked slowly around his car. And I stood there, just watching. I didn’t know what else to do. And even if I had, I’m not so sure I would have been capable of doing it.

  Pain. It started in my chest. Ice slowly spreading to my stomach, and down, down until I was completely frozen. I heard the engine start. Saw John reversing out of his spot. All I could do was watch him drive away. I couldn’t even wipe away the tears. I could only stare at the spot where John’s car had been moments before.