by Amy Sparling
I sit in an uncomfortable airport chair in the noisiest terminal in the world while I wait for updates on my flight. Three hours pass and I feel like I’m going to lose my mind. I’m bored and tired and missing her so badly. That last part has nothing to do with anything except my fingers are itching to pick up my phone and call her again, to hear her voice.
But after I embarrassed myself last night, I’ve vowed not to do it again. For the hundredth time, I replay that conversation in my head. I can’t believe I did that. I just called her up and poured out my heart like some kind of pathetic crybaby. All of these worries and stresses are the types of thoughts I should keep to myself. I could maybe share them with my mom, but that’s it. I shouldn’t have unloaded all my emotional baggage on a girl I’m not even dating. Bella was nice enough about it, but she’s probably thinking I’m a pathetic loser now. I had hoped that seeing her face would make me feel better, but instead it just made everything worse. I miss her so much more now. I wish I had a time machine and could go back to that first day of summer when I first met her and just pause time and just stay in that day forever.
Several agonizing hours later, I’m finally boarding a plane to go back to Houston. I text my dad and tell him I’m headed home and he says he might be there a little bit but he’s pretty busy so as always, I’ll have our house to myself. I used to love being alone in our place, feeling like the whole luxurious condo was all mine. But when I finally get home in the evening and I step through the elevator onto our foyer, I realize this place is too drafty to be a real home. It’s all hard edges and cold surfaces and windows that look out over a bustling city that only cares about moving fast and making money.
Life isn’t like this in Roca Springs. The little Texas country town only has a population of a few hundred people, unlike the eight million that live in Houston. Things are slow and relaxed. There’s never any traffic and the people are nice. I spent most of my life here in the big city, thinking this is where I’m meant to be. But one summer in the country changed all of that.
I want to load up my bike and hit the local motocross park with Bella. I want to have ice cream at the park with her while we talk about anything except my career.
I don’t care for the Houston nightlife or getting pizza delivered or watching TV on Dad’s bigger-than-necessary television. I just want her.
I check the time. It’s eight in the evening. I could leave now and be at my mom’s house before the boys’ bedtime. I could be hanging out with Bella at the local diner tomorrow morning. I decide to call my mom.
“Hey, sweetie,” she says, her voice so much warmer and loving after I spent the summer with her. “What’s going on?”
“I just got back to Houston,” I say, dropping my suitcase on my bed. “I have three days until I go back and I was wondering if I could come stay with you guys?”
“Oh honey,” Mom says, and the tone of her voice makes my heart sick. “I would love that, but we’re not home right now. It’s me and Phil’s anniversary and we went to a cute little bed and breakfast in Fredericksburg to celebrate.”
“Where are the boys?” I ask. “You can send home the babysitter and I’ll watch them.”
“We brought them with us,” Mom says. “You’re welcome to go to the house, but you’ll be all alone.”
All alone. The very thing I’m trying to avoid. I swallow back my disappointment. “Nah, that’s okay. I’ll just stay in Houston. You guys have fun, okay? And happy anniversary.”
The next morning feels like every other day. I’m home in my own bed, but I’m still alone. There’s no sound of my brothers running through the house screaming and playing tag. There’s no coffee brewing from my mom and Phil who always wake up so early. It’s just me in this big empty condo, missing Bella so much it’s hard to breathe. I could call her again, but what would I say? She ended things with me the moment the carefree summer was over. If there was ever a chance we’d have found a way to stay together despite all the things that are going against us, it’s over now.
She ended things. She had my heart in her hands and she walked away.
We promised to stay friends, but that’s easier said than done. Friends just talk casually. Friends might hang out every so often. Friends don’t kiss. They don’t share their deepest secrets. I don’t want to be friends with Bella Castro.
I want to be everything with her.
I know that nothing beats a bad mood quite like the gym, so I get up in the morning and throw on some workout clothes and hit the closest gym for some sweat therapy. I leave my phone in my truck so I won’t be tempted to check it, even though that means I’m stuck listening to the pop music the gym plays over the speakers.
I do as many reps as I can on all of my favorite weight machines and then I hit the treadmill and I run until my legs feel like they’re going to give out. It’s still not enough to take away how much I miss her, but it helps. Now instead of a pain in my heart, the pain is radiating thoroughly my entire body in the form of exhausted muscles.
I still have half of the racing season to go, and I try to think positively about it I try to recall all the things I wanted back before I was a professional racer. If I can just get back those feelings and desires then I’ll be okay. It does feel better being home, so that helps a little.
And in two weeks, the national motocross race will be right here in Houston and I’ll be fulfilling a dream I’ve had since I was a little boy.
Racing professionally in my home town.
Everyone I know will show up to that, even my own father. My mom and her family will come. My cousins and friends from school. They’ll all be there in the NRG Stadium to support me. I might not be having that much fun lately, but the Houston race will be amazing.
I’ll invite Bella and I’ll give her a pit pass to come see me before the races.
I know it sounds silly, but maybe that will be the day she realizes she wants to be with me. As I relax in the sauna at my gym, the idea forms so clearly in my mind. I’ll work hard for two more weeks, and I’ll save up all of my energy and talent for the Houston race. Being in my own town, racing in my own stadium will prove that all of this hard work was worth it.
And if Bella doesn’t want me the way I want her by then, I will swallow my pride and give her up forever.
7
Bella
My dad always eats his French fries by the handful. He takes three or four at once and bites into them. It’s something I remember from when I was a little kid and now, even though my dad is on the tail end of forty, he still does it. I prefer to eat one fry at a time, so I guess I didn’t inherit that trait from him.
But my love of diner food is definitely shared with my dear old dad.
“So how’s school?” Dad asks as he reaches for another bundle of fries. “College life treating you okay?”
I nod. “It’s actually easier than I thought it would be. All of my teachers seem like they don’t really care about teaching.”
“It’ll get harder as it goes along,” Dad assures me. “Brent has had a hard time keeping his grades up this year.”
The conversation is totally boring, but my dad is the best, so I’m trying to make an effort to hang out with him more often. Now that I’m out of high school and I’m too old to go visit him on the weekends, my dad tries to make sure we see each other at least once every two weeks. We usually meet up here at the local diner, and I’m not complaining because they have the best cheeseburgers, fries, and shakes. In fact, everything they sell here is delicious. But lately it’s been hard to sit in these booths with my dad and chat about college and life and boring stuff.
I keep glancing over at that booth in the corner where I sat with Liam not too long ago. We’d had an amazing day together going to a Houston comic convention, and then we’d stopped here for food. It was in that shiny plastic diner booth that I realized my mom and Brent were panicking because they hadn’t heard from me in a while. That day had been amazing, but then it ended in hearta
che. It was the day that signaled the end of my summer fling.
I drag my eyes away from that booth and try to get back into the conversation. Dad is still talking about college and how he’s proud of me and yada yada. When Liam is on my mind, I can’t really focus on anything else. Maybe I should find another restaurant for these dinners with my dad. Somewhere far away, with no connection to the guy whose very name invokes a longing pain in my chest.
“Bella?”
I startle and realize my dad has just asked me a question and I was too busy daydreaming about Liam to hear him. This has been happening way too much lately.
Dad holds his cheeseburger and gives me a questioning look. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I say, smiling the fake smile I’ve gotten so used to pulling out when I’m trying to hide my pain. “What was the question again?”
I should be over him by now.
I.
Should.
Be.
Over.
Him.
By.
Now.
It’s October first for crying out loud. It’s been nearly three months since we severed the summer fling and agreed to be “just friends.” So why oh why am I having so much trouble with this?
Joe is still friendly to me in class, but ever since that day Liam video called me all stressed out about his career, I can’t seem to look at Joe the same. Sure, he’s still really cute and nice, but I can’t feel that spark anymore. We went out for coffee another time about a week after the first date, but it just didn’t feel right. I’ve been casually avoiding him lately, making up lies about being sick, or having to help a friend move. I know I should just tell Joe in a polite way that I’m not interested in dating him right now, but I can’t bring myself to do that just yet. The thing is, I want to like Joe. I want to move on and date someone new.
Every time I think I can move on, Liam will text me in a friendly, non-romantic way and all bets are off. Every time I see his name pop up on my phone, I can’t seem to like anyone else. I am not over him. It’s clear and simple.
And it sucks.
Halloween is my mom’s absolute favorite holiday. Forget Christmas, which is the reigning champion of holidays according to everyone else – my mom is obsessed with all things Halloween. She loves the black and purple decorations, the spooky fog machines and skeletons and fake tombstones for the front yard. She has a dozen Halloween CDs that play creepy crawly music and witch cackles. She is all about this holiday.
So when she asks me to help her take all the decorations down from the attic, I am happy to oblige. I’ve been spending all of my time either studying for college, visiting my dad, or riding my dirt bike at the local track. I can’t sit still. I have to be doing something each day or I will slip into a broken hearted depression over Liam.
It’s pathetic, I know.
He’s over me. He’s moved on. He’s a famous racer now. And if I have any chance of moving on too, I need to stay very busy so that thoughts of him can’t take over my mind.
This dusty attic is helping a lot with that task. I climb up the creaky ladder and sit on the edge of the attic floor with my feet hanging from the opening. Attics are creepy. Forget Halloween decorations, just make kids walk through your attic to have a good scare.
I lean over and shuffle out all of mom’s big plastic storage bins marked HALLOWEEN and gently slide them down to her. There are at least ten boxes of stuff, and then a few plastic garbage bags where she keeps her skeletons and blow up yard decorations.
My mom’s eyes are alight with excitement as we go through all the stuff. Every year she makes our front yard look like a haunted graveyard, with tombstones, fake spiderwebs, spooky lights and fog, and some pretty cool mechanical yard decorations.
The inside of the house isn’t forgotten, either. She switches out all the hand towels and kitchen décor with spooky alternatives, and our fireplace mantle gets a full Halloween makeover. There are fake crows and spiders and glitter covered skulls all over our house for the month. My favorite part of my mom’s Halloween obsession are the bowls of candy she keeps around the house. It’s not just Halloween night that we have candy around here. It’s a whole month affair. Since candy helps soothe my soul whenever I’m feeling down, I am one hundred percent on board with this part of my mom’s Halloween obsession. I plan on eating my way out of this broken heart.
After unpacking about a third of the house decorations, Mom and I move outside to take advantage of the remaining sunlight. I start assembling the broken, fake-blood-covered picket fence that gives our yard a creepy feel while Mom runs extension cords across the grass.
Kylie’s car pulls into the driveway, and I remember that I had invited her over to help us decorate. I wave at her from my place on the ground where I’m trying to get this wooden stake to bury into the grass. I should probably use a hammer instead of my fist, but whatever.
The mailman is walking by, his satchel of mail slung over his shoulders. “The yard is looking good,” he says to my mom.
“Thanks, Jerry,” Mom says. “I’m adding a few new things this year. Kylie, will you get the mail?”
“Sure thing,” Kylie says, reaching out and taking our mail from him. She flips through the mail, stopping on a blue envelope. “You got something,” she says, holding it out to me.
I quit messing with the wooden stake. It’s a hopeless situation anyway, without a hammer or a mallet. The ground is too hard since we haven’t had rain lately. I reach up and take the envelope. It’s a mess. All dirty and bent, and one edge of it is torn.
“What happened to it?” I say, turning it over. The envelope is addressed to me, and the return address is Liam’s. My heart fumbles at seeing his handwriting. Why would he send me a letter instead of calling or texting? I slide my finger into the tear and look inside the envelope.
“What is it?” Kylie asks.
I frown. “Nothing.”
I hold it open and shake it just to prove that nothing is inside.
“It looks like the post office destroyed it,” she says, taking the envelope for inspection. “Whatever was inside must have fallen out.”
“Weird.” I stand up and dust off my hands on my jeans.
“What do you think it was?” Kylie asks.
I shrug. “I don’t know but maybe this is a sign.”
Kylie quirks an eyebrow. “Yeah. It’s a sign that the post office sucks and we should complain.”
I shake my head. I glance at my mom, but she’s at the edge of the yard assembling a witch’s cauldron so I don’t think she can hear us. “No, maybe it’s just a sign that I should let him go. He sent me a letter but I didn’t get it and maybe that’s a good thing. I can’t keep sitting here every day pining over him.”
Kylie frowns. “You’re still pining over him?”
I give a halfhearted shrug and look at the ground. “I am seriously trying to like Joe, but my heart keeps going back to Liam.”
She puts a hand on my shoulder. “So call him and tell him how you feel.”
“No!”
Mom looks over at me and I smile and wave at her, acting like I didn’t just yell out the word no. I lower my voice. “No way. It’s over, Kylie. It’s totally over.”
“So what are you going to do about your missing letter?” she asks.
I take a deep breath and shove the torn envelope in my back pocket. “Nothing.”
8
Liam
I haven’t heard from Bella in two weeks. It can’t be a coincidence that the day I sent her two VIP tickets to my race in Houston is the day she decided to stop reaching out to me. Did I freak her out? We had always talked about how she’d come watch me race in Houston when the time came. Even friends would watch each other’s sporting events, right?
But it’s been two whole weeks and not a word from her. To say that I am completely crushed would be an understatement. I am destroyed. I can barely eat and barely pay attention on the track because I can’t stop thinking about her. I
put it all on the line in my letter, told her I miss her and I care about her and that this will be my one last ditch effort to keep her as my very own. I included two tickets to the races and two VIP passes. The VIP passes are so exclusive that each racer only gets four of them to hand out. I borrowed two more from Aiden so I could send a pass to my Mom, Phil, and the boys, and also send two to Bella. I wanted her to be able to bring Kylie with her.
I planned it all out and it was going to be amazing. And now I’m sitting here in my room, the night before the big race, and I’m absolutely terrified that she won’t show up.
But that’s the thing about love. It buries into you so deeply that even when all feels hopeless, there’s still this tiny little spark of hope inside you.
I know that not hearing from Bella in two weeks is a bad sign. But every so often I get this little thought, this little inkling of hope that says maybe she decided to surprise me. Maybe she got my tickets and she read my heartfelt letter and she felt the same way I do. Maybe she decided to show up and surprise me on race day and throw her arms around me and kiss me.
Maybe.
My mom calls me and I give her the address of a local Italian restaurant that I know they’ll love. Mom, Phil, and the boys came to Houston to watch me race tomorrow and they’re staying in a hotel near the stadium. My dad might actually show up, too. Last night he’d said he would try to clear his schedule. I didn’t give him a VIP pass though because I didn’t want there to be any awkwardness. To be honest, Phil is a better father figure than my own dad has ever been. I’m happy to have him and my mom join me in the VIP area tomorrow.
The races will take place in the evening in front of thousands of people, but during the day the racers have to meet with fans and sign autographs. There’s a special VIP tented area where only select people can come mingle with us before the races start. I know my little step brothers Matt and Dylan are going to love it. I can’t wait to show them everything and introduce them to Team Loco.