Boys Don't Cry

by Jennifer Melzer

  “I want to know about Gretchen’s friend.”

  He almost seems surprised I know that much. I never told him about the things Gretchen said to me that first night at the river lot, and I’m not going to tell him now. I want to know everything.

  “Randi,” he mutters, clears his throat and looks away with shame.

  “Was she your girlfriend?”

  “Not really, I mean… I guess she sort of was, but she shouldn’t have been.”

  “I can’t even begin to imagine what that means.”

  “She was Gretchen’s best friend.” The words are absent; as if he’s disconnected from the deepest part of himself in order to say them. “She had this massive crush on me, ever since seventh grade. Always putting little notes in my locker, trying to get my attention. She’d come and hang around at our soccer practices, baseball, come to all the games and try to get my attention, but I don’t know. She wasn’t ugly. She was actually really pretty, but I was never all that into her. She was always super… desperate. Like the notes she wrote me, even back that far… It was like she was unhinged. Looking for whatever attention she could get. She’d promise me blow jobs. Tell me I could fuck her any time I wanted to. And no matter how many times I laughed in her face, I seemed to be the only person she wanted it from.”

  “So how did she become your girlfriend?”

  “Gretchen and Cody started seeing each other middle of freshman year, and Gretchen kept trying to push us together. I don’t know, I guess she thought it’d be cute, the four of us going on double dates, sitting together at lunch, and no matter how many times I said no, Gretchen just kept pushing it.

  “I was a total prick, Tali. Ten times worse than I am now. Which I guess makes me pretty bad, right?”

  “What do you want me to say, Nate?”

  “Nothing.” He looks down again. “You don’t have to say anything.” Swallowing hard against a truth so difficult to share I can actually hear his throat tightening around the words, he goes on. “You know how it is when someone’s around all the time? You start taking advantage of them. I used to make her do shit for me. Run to the store to get me snacks. Take my books back to my locker. I could have asked her to do anything, and she would have done it without question.”

  I didn’t really know how it was, but I say nothing.

  “I had tons of girlfriends. Someone different every week. I was confident, arrogant. I could get anyone I wanted, and I usually did, but Randi didn’t care. She just kept hanging on, waiting for me to throw her the smallest scrap of attention, and when I did it’d tide her over for a while, but then I made the biggest mistake of my life. The summer between sophomore and junior year Cody’s mom went away to Cancun for a week with Frank. They left us alone in the house, even though she knew we couldn’t be trusted. She was always cool like that, though. The only thing she said before she left was that her house better still be standing when she came back, or there would be hell to pay. That’s like an open invitation to party when you’re sixteen. So that’s what we did.

  “At first it was just me and Cody, a couple of guys from school and a bottle of Jim Beam. Next thing I know there are people trolling in and out that we don’t even know. And they brought more alcohol. Pot. Other shit. We’d wake up still wasted, start drinking again to get rid of the headache before it could really start. I can’t even think about it now without feeling sick. I mean, it’s sort of disgusting, and I don’t know how we all managed to live through that week, but we did. We all did some super stupid shit, though.”

  “Like?”

  “I fucked Randi.” There’s a hint of regret in his tone, as if he wishes the man he is now could slip back in time and stop himself from making the biggest mistake of his life. “Not just once, but several times, and after that I really couldn’t get rid of her. I think in that twisted, wasted frame of mind some part of me thought if I threw her a bone, she’d back off. Find out I wasn’t what she really wanted. Next thing I know, she’s my girlfriend. I still don’t know how that officially became a thing, but there it was. Me and Randi, and seriously, Tali, you have no idea. I was the worst boyfriend in the world. I treated her like absolute garbage. Insulted her, made her feel stupid and ugly, told her she couldn’t do anything right. I stood her up, ignored her phone calls and texts, and the number of times I fucked around on her…” The lament deepens, his head shaking back and forth as if he can’t even relate anymore to the person he was. “I was cruelty. I was a bully. And she just… took it.”

  There’s no excusing the things he’s done, and I know that, but I can’t imagine taking that kind of abuse.

  For a long time he’s quiet, leaning back in the swing and folding his hands together in his lap as the chains groan softly with the movement of the swaying wood and the weight of him and his burden.

  “Senior year I dumped her right before prom. Made this huge, humiliating display in the cafeteria at lunch so there was no mistaking my meaning. Everyone saw it, not that they didn’t see how I treated her when we were together, but this was it. The big announcement. We were done.

  “I took this other girl I went out with sometimes to prom, and Randi shows up by herself. She’s not even dressed for the occasion, and when we first see her stagger through, most of us thought she was drunk. I ignored her at first, but making herself known was one of her areas of expertise. My date went to the bathroom, and Randi came over to talk to me. She’s all crying and desperate, begging me to just give her another chance. She keeps saying all she’s ever wanted was to make me happy, and if I’ll just let her…” Breath streams through his lips, long and unsatisfying. “I flipped out on her, shouted at her that she was mental because only someone crazy would cling like plastic wrap to a person who so obviously didn’t want her. The last thing I ever said to her was, ‘I don’t want you, you crazy fucking bitch. Why would anyone want you at all?’”

  I know this is going to end badly. I think I’ve known since the moment he started speaking, maybe even before that, when Gretchen was dropping hints at the river lot that first night. I can’t find my voice to ask him what happened to Randi, and for a long time neither of us says anything. It’s dusk, the sun dipping behind the houses so its light is muted and dusty, but I see his face clearly. There are tears in his eyes, his lashes damp and thick with them, but he doesn’t let them fall. Instead he blinks hard, wrinkles his nose and clears his throat.

  “Gretchen was the one who found her. Her and Cody spent the entire after-prom party arguing because she wouldn’t stop texting Randi. All day Saturday she’s calling her phone, but it just kept going to voicemail. She texted her and when she didn’t answer she tried calling Randi’s parents, but they were never really around all that much. No one answered the house phone, so she went over there. Randi’s car was in the driveway, but no one else was home. She let herself in and…” His lips disappear between his front teeth, eyes closing as he tilts his head back and says, “There was no cry for help. No threats or warnings. She didn’t even leave a note. She just…”

  “She…” My mouth feels dry and my heart is beating so fast. “She killed herself?”

  Nate nods, avoiding me as I gape at him. I can’t imagine what my expression looks like. A mixture of disbelief and sympathy. “Because of me. Because of the things I did to her.”

  “Nate…”

  “Two days later, I got a letter in the mail. Her suicide note.”

  “Oh, Nate…”

  He stands up, his hand disappearing into his back pocket, and when he pulls it out again there’s a folded envelope between his fingers. He holds it for a moment, as if he doesn’t want to let it go, and then he hands it to me.

  I want to ask if he’s sure, if he really wants me to read this, but his eyes say it all. This is it. Worse than any confession he could ever make. These are the words that will seal our fate.

  If I can read them and still see the boy I’ve fallen in love with when all is said and done…

  I reach out, m
y fingers brushing across his before I take it. The paper is thinned, the ink worn and smeared in some places, and every fold and crease that’s developed over the last year make it flimsy enough to fall apart if I peel it open. He swallows hard, nodding at me when I lift my eyes to his, so I open it carefully and scan rows of carefully considered penmanship, little hearts over her i’s, the crossing of every t a slashing flourish of the pen.

  All that remains of a single soul now rests in my shaking hands, and I don’t know if I can take her words into me. But I have to. He needs me to, and despite the things he’s done I realize this is what I’ve wanted from the start. This is how I take his pain away.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Dear Nate,

  You make me feel invisible, which is hilarious because according to you I’m so fat, no one could possibly miss me. And all my friends think I’m stupid for hanging onto you. I should believe them because you tell me how stupid I am all the time. How pathetic and needy and dumb I am. I’m cling wrap, sucking the life out of you.

  Maybe you’re right. Maybe I am pathetic. Maybe I’m even stupid. Maybe nothing I ever do will be right enough or good enough, so I’m done. You won’t have to worry about me anymore. I won’t ever bother you again.

  I hope you’re happy. I really do. It’s all I ever wanted for you, and maybe if I’m gone you can finally get everything you ever wanted.

  I don’t know why I love you, but I do. I wonder if you’ll even miss me.

  Randi

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Nate doesn’t sit back down while I’m reading. He stands in front of me, shaking. Tears streaming down his face, and when I lift my head to look at him it breaks my heart. Every bit of darkness inside him is laid bare. I know the things he’s done, and I understand why he was so afraid.

  But it changes nothing.

  “Nate,” I start.

  “She never understood what she did to make me hate her.” His voice cracks when he speaks. “All she ever wanted was to love me, for me to love her back, but no matter what she did, it was never good enough for me. And if she couldn’t have that, she didn’t want anything at all…”

  “You were…” I don’t even know what I’m about to say. That he was a stupid kid? That kids make mistakes? Words fail me.

  “I ruined her completely, Tali. Destroyed her just because I could. I never once thought about what I was doing to her. I never felt guilty about the way I treated her, not until it was too late. I killed her.”

  “No, you didn’t.”

  “I did. Maybe not with my hands, but…”

  “Nate, no. She made a choice, a terrible, awful choice…”

  “Because of me.”

  I drop the letter into the wicker chair when I stand and take him into my arms. I squeeze him, his body unmoving for the longest time, as if he doesn’t want to give into comfort, as if he doesn’t believe he deserves forgiveness or the love I have to give.

  And I do love him. I don’t think I’ve ever loved anyone the way I love the boy in my arms, and he needs to know that.

  “Nate, you made a mistake,” I whisper into his hair, my lips touching his ear.

  He melts into me, every part of him growing soft as he lets go of all the things he’s been holding onto, burying deep inside him for the last year.

  No one’s been there for him. He hasn’t shared this sorrow with anyone, not until me, and I know I can’t change his past. There is nothing I can do to make this go away, to fix him and make him better.

  All I can do is hold him, listen to him, tell him how much I love him.

  We’ve been out here on the porch for three hours. The sun’s long since set and the humidity broke a little, carrying a cooling breeze on the wind. Nate’s been talking through things, emotions and fears he tucked so deep down inside him for the last year, he didn’t even know how much they were ruining him. I just listen, and when he starts to cry I hold him. He’s cried more than once, for Randi, for the boy he never should have been, for the way he treated me.

  I rub my hand along his forearm, fingertips tracing across the ink there. His permanent reminder.

  “Deeds, not words,” it makes sense now.

  “Every day I see that on my arm, and I know I have to make the most of everything I do, and even then it’ll probably never be enough to atone. That it’ll be the things I do that make me a better man. Not the things I say, the excuses I make, the endless apologies… I just wish sometimes there was a way I could at least ask her to forgive me, but I’ll never get that.”

  “No.” I look down, leaning into him. “But you can forgive yourself. I know that might not seem like much, but it’s a start.”

  “Maybe, but sometimes it just seems so unfair that I’m still here, and she’s not. She wasn’t a bad person. She had a good heart, far better than I ever deserved.”

  “You have a good heart, too.”

  “Do I?” There’s disbelief in his eyes when he turns them over to look at my face. “A good heart wouldn’t have done the things I did to her. It wouldn’t have pushed you away. I wanted to let you in so many times, but I was so afraid of what you’d think of me when you learned the truth about who I really am. The things I’ve done.” After another long silence, he shakes his head and says, “Sorry.” He’s said that word so many times, I’ve lost count, but every time he says it he looks me in the eye so I know he really means it.

  “You don’t have to be sorry anymore. It’s okay.”

  “I’ll probably spend the rest of my life being sorry.”

  “No one should have to carry that kind of pain around.” Lifting his arm across the backs of my shoulders, I rest my head against his chest. He squeezes me tight, turning his face down and burying it in my hair, breathing me in.

  “I deserve so much worse. And I certainly don’t deserve you. The first time you smiled me, it felt like a punch in the gut. Like the universe was this cruel joke, waving something so perfect around in front of me, taunting me with it.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” I insist. “Life doesn’t work like that, Nate, and you can’t…” I let breath escape me in frustration, every self-help CD my father’s forced me to listen to on some long car trip spirals its wisdom through my brain, and I suddenly feel like that was the entire purpose of all that torment. “Nate, you can’t keep punishing yourself for things beyond your control.”

  “I was completely in control of the way I treated her.”

  “You were a kid. It doesn’t excuse the things you did, but kids do a lot of stupid things. You have to forgive yourself, not just for what you did to Randi, but what you’re doing to yourself every single day. What you’ve done to everyone else you’ve ever treated badly. You can’t change the past, but you are in control of your future. Being cruel to yourself now changes nothing at all.”

  “I know,” he sighs.

  “The only thing you can change is who you are from this moment forward. The person you become. That’s what matters.”

  “I want to be a better person.”

  “I think you already are, or you’re at least well on your way.”

  “A better person wouldn’t have pushed you away the way I did.”

  “You had your reasons, Nate. You were scared, but I have seen your heart, your kindness. It’s a beautiful thing.”

  “I still shouldn’t have pushed you away. Every time I thought about losing you, a part of me died inside. Can you ever forgive me? Give me another chance?”

  “I’m here now,” I tell him, then lower my voice when I add, “for a little while anyway.”

  “What do you mean for a little while? I know I was… I mean I hoped you’d be able to…”

  “It’s not what you think. I forgive you, Nate. I meant what I said earlier. I don’t hate you. Maybe it’s too soon, I don’t know, but I’m in love with you, which is why when you broke up with me I couldn’t imagine staying here and having to see you all the time, so… I made a really rash decision. One I’ve been sort of putting
off since the day we met. I’m leaving next month, going back to Austin.”

  He leans back in the swing, bringing me with him as he moves. Tipping his head into the wood, he stares at the ceiling above us and lets loose a long breath. “St. Edward’s.”

  “St. Edward’s,” I sigh and drag my tongue across my bottom lip. “Classes start August twenty-fourth, so…”

  “Wow.”

  “I know, I should have told you before, but it never seemed like the right time to bring it up. I was still undecided, mostly because I couldn’t stand the thought of leaving you, but then…”

  “You don’t owe me an explanation.”

  “I have to be there for orientation on the twentieth, so I’ll probably fly down the seventeenth.”

  “Damn.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “No, no, don’t… Don’t be sorry, Tali. I was just thinking about how we lost like an entire week because of me. I’m such an asshole.”

  “If you don’t stop saying that, I’m gonna start believing it’s true,” I warn him.

  “I know how much it meant to you getting accepted there. You had your whole life all figured out before I came along.” He laughs, uneasy with that realization.

  “Yeah, well, then there was you.”

  “Then there was me.”

  “I still want all the same things I wanted before. To go to St. Edward’s and intern at DigiSaurus, maybe get a job there after graduation, but now I want you, too, and I don’t know how I can have all those things, and keep you, too.”

  “You know I’m already yours, right? You couldn’t get rid of me now if you tried.”

  “Yeah, but what happens to us once I’m gone?” I wonder. There’s a tremor of fear in my voice, the weight of an eighteen-hundred mile gap that’ll stretch us to our limits. “When I’m not here to keep you in line?”

  “We figure it out.”

  He makes it sound so easy, and when I glance over at him skeptically, his eyes glimmer in the light of the car inching slowly down the street. The sadness is still there inside him, but it’s a little bit smaller, tempered with hope and light and a sudden willingness to let go of the darkness inside him one finger at a time.