Fifty First Times: A New Adult Anthology

by J. Lynn

  He lays his hand on top of mine and closes his eyes. “Ask me something, Audrey. Anything.”

  My heart is flying, I can barely form words let alone think of something. Jack is here. Oh my God, Jack is here in front of me. I blurt out the first question that comes to my mind, “What color panties did I wear under my mother’s wedding dress?”

  “It’s your wedding dress now, isn’t it?” He smiles and opens his eyes again. “Light pink. With tiny white lace around the edges and a small pink bow in the front.”

  My purse falls from my shoulder into a puddle of slush from last week’s snow when I throw my arms around his neck. Jack easily lifts me off the ground. The block isn’t empty at all. It’s quite crowded and the two of us embracing in the middle of the sidewalk, both of us crying, causes a scene.

  Jack hails a cab while still holding on to me. He opens the door, setting me inside before grabbing my purse. My hands are in his, my eyes drinking in his presence.

  “I can’t believe you’re here,” I say. “I can’t believe it.”

  He shakes his head, the smile dropping from his face. “I had to see you, Audrey but that doesn’t mean I get to be in your life again after I left you for so long with no word . . .”

  I throw my head back and laugh. I can’t help it. “Are you serious, Jack? You are my life. You have been since the day I met you and even after you left . . .” I swipe more fallen tears from my cheeks and angle myself to face him. “I don’t know how you found me or what you’ve been through but we have forever to figure all that out, right? So can you kiss me now? I’ve waited two years for this.”

  He exhales, takes my face in his hands. His lips meet mine, and I’m whole again. Tonight, we’ll fall asleep in each other’s arms like our last night together, but this time daylight will give us a beginning instead of an end.

  About the Author

  JULIE CROSS is the international bestselling author of the Tempest series, a young adult science fiction trilogy which includes Tempest, Vortex, and the final installment, Timestorm (St. Martin’s Press). She’s also the author of the Letters to Nowhere series, a mature young adult romance set in the world of elite gymnastics, as well as several forthcoming young adult and new adult novels.

  Julie lives in Central Illinois with her husband and three children. She’s a former gymnast, longtime gymnastics fan, coach, and former gymnastics program director with the YMCA. She’s a lover of books, devouring several novels a week, especially in the young adult and new adult genres. Outside of reading and writing, Julie Cross is a committed—but not talented—long-distance runner, creator of imaginary beach vacations, Midwest bipolar weather survivor, expired CPR certification card holder, as well as a ponytail and gym shoe addict. You can find her online via Twitter, her personal Web site, e-mail, Facebook, or Goodreads.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

  A Little Too Scarred

  LISA DESROCHERS

  One

  “I’M COMING HOME for break on Saturday,” Rick says from the other end of the line.

  From the way my insides twist, you’d think he told me I was being redeployed. But that can’t happen. The army doesn’t want you anymore once you’re broken. I thought I’d have at least until summer before I’d have to face him. Before he’d know. Spring break never occurred to me.

  “Wow . . . that’s great . . . but I think we’re going on vacation.” I hear the shake in my voice and hope he doesn’t.

  “Shit, V.” His voice lowers and becomes a little rough around the edges. “I’m dying to see you. At least wait till Monday so we can get together over the weekend.”

  I swallow the lump in my throat and close my eyes. “Um . . . we have plane tickets, so . . .”

  It was stupid to stay in touch with him, but I was desperate for something that wasn’t defined by what happened on the road that day. I’d been so far away, and I guess I wasn’t thinking this far ahead—to what would happen when I got home.

  “I’ll make it worth your while,” he says, his voice a suggestive purr.

  My heart contracts and I feel the tug on my scar as my face twists into a cringe. I lift my hand and touch it, tracing my fingers over the thick cord that runs from my scalp, across where my right eye used to be, to the corner of my mouth.

  Behind me, my door clicks open, and anger rises inside me. She never knocks.

  “Hold on a sec,” I tell Rick and hit mute before he can answer.

  “Rene, sweetie? Dinner’s on the table,” Mom says from the door.

  She never used to call me sweetie. It’s like I’ve reverted back to babyhood in her eyes. I hate it. I hate that I need her help now. I hate that I basically am a baby, having to learn how to do everything all over again.

  Hate lives like a snake inside me, slithering around, poisoning everything to the point where I hate myself most of all.

  “I’m on the phone. I’ll be out in a minute.”

  I wait for the door to close. It doesn’t.

  “I said I’ll be right out, Mom.” I try not to sound as irritated as I feel, but it’s hard.

  She sighs. She sighs a lot. Maybe she always has and I just never noticed, but I hate that too. “Okay, Rene, but dinner’s getting cold. Don’t be too long.”

  “Hey,” I tell Rick when she’s gone. “I’ve got to go.”

  “When do you get back?” he says.

  “What?”

  “From vacation? I’m not heading back to school until a week from Sunday, so maybe we can do something Saturday night?”

  “Oh . . .” In the pause, I feel the worn denim of my jeans rip and realize I’ve twisted my thumb into a hole at the knee. “I don’t think we’re coming home until after that, but I’ll check.”

  “Okay. If it’s after, maybe you could come to San Jose and hang out.” His voice drops to that husky, almost-whisper again. “I’ve got to see you, V. I’m going crazy here.”

  And now I’m crying. “I’ll try.”

  “Try hard.”

  “Bye, Rick.” I hit end and stare at my phone. I know I have to end this, but it kills me to think about my life without him in it. He’s all I have that doesn’t suck.

  The stupid thing is, I never liked Rick in high school. He was two years ahead of me, and I only really knew him because he was dating Lexie, my older sister Katie’s best friend. We reconnected while I was in Afghanistan because it turned out a guy in my unit, Chris, was a friend of his from when he worked at Applebee’s summer before last. It was one of those “small world” moments that, at the time, seemed so funny—that in the middle of the fucking desert, we’d meet someone else who knew the same Rick Hamilton from Freemont, California. Because of that connection, Chris ended up being my best friend over there. The two of us would Skype Rick every Sunday. But then Rick began Skyping me at other times, and things changed. I started to like him. Then I started to really like him. We spent four months making all kinds of plans. I couldn’t wait to get home to see him.

  I just hadn’t planned on doing it via roadside bomb.

  My eyes were bandaged for two weeks, and it took me another week before I could make out anything at all. Even still, everything’s pretty blurry.

  My therapist told my parents to stop calling and to e-mail me instead. Considering all I really wanted was to curl up and die, she was hoping that would get me to at least try to improve. It sort of worked. Once she zoomed in to the point that each letter was about half an inch tall on the computer screen, I could start to make them out.

  The first thing I saw when she talked me into opening my inbox were e-mails from Rick. There were dozens of them. The first one was just to give me shit about missing our Wednesday Skype, but each one after that sounded a little more worried. When I got to the one that said, “God, V, please. Please tell me you’re okay. I’m dying here,” I decided to e-mail him back to tell him Chris was dead. I felt like he deserved to know. I hadn’t meant to stay
in touch after that, but when I got shipped back to Walter Reed a week later, he started calling every day, and I couldn’t make myself hang up. That was a month ago.

  He knows I was injured in the same attack that killed Chris, but I haven’t been honest with him about what those injuries are. I can’t really explain why I don’t want him to know, except that he feels like a piece of normal to me. He gives me a life outside surgeries and hospitals—something that’s just mine, untouched by all the death and destruction. We spend hours on the phone talking about everything and nothing. Sometimes we just hang on the line and listen to each other breathe. It doesn’t matter whether we’re talking or not. While we’re on the phone, I’m just Rene Vargas, not Rene the blind monster. There’s nothing I feel like I couldn’t say to him.

  Except the thing I’ve kept hidden.

  We know some of the same people, and I figured it wouldn’t be long before someone filled him in. Every day I’ve expected to hear the disgust in his voice when he says, “Shit, Vargas. Why the hell didn’t you tell me?” Or worse, he’ll just stop calling.

  But I guess after what happened between him and Lexie, none of our old friends are speaking to him.

  I pull myself up and head to the kitchen. For the first week I was home, I got up every night after my parents were asleep and felt my way around, memorizing the terrain. Groping my way around my own house while anyone is watching just feels too pathetic. Even still, there are a few things that trip me up, one being the leg of the table at the end of the hall. I cut the corner too close and kick it, stubbing my toe.

  “Fuck!” I growl before I can stop myself.

  “Rene?” Mom calls from the kitchen, panic in her voice. A second later, she’s got my arm. “Let me help you.”

  “I don’t need help,” I insist, shaking her off.

  “Rene!” Dad barks. “Watch your tone!”

  “It’s fine,” Mom says, and I want to tell her to shut up. It’s not fine. Nothing is fine.

  “No, it’s not,” he says, echoing my thoughts. “I don’t care what she’s been through. Nothing gives her the right to disrespect her mother.”

  Dad is the total opposite of Mom. According to him, when shit happens, you “pull yourself up by the bootstraps.” Which means he usually ends up pissed at both of us, Mom for babying me, and me for telling her to stop. His way might sound harsh, but I don’t want sympathy and I don’t want help. I may not be able to see Mom’s expression, but I know from her tone that she’s looking at me like I’m some pathetic thing.

  I push away from her and move as fast as I can through the living room to the kitchen. I ignore the hushed argument behind me as I slide into my seat. There’s a white plate on the dark tabletop, and a bowl of something just to my left.

  When Mom and Dad come in a minute later, I’m not sure what’s on my plate, but I’ve already served myself.

  “Oh, good job, sweetie,” she says like I’m in kindergarten. At least she’s stopped cutting my meat.

  I ignore her and we eat in strained silence—chicken in some kind of spicy sauce. When I’m done, I go to the sink and rinse my plate. When I set it on the counter, it clanks against another plate, and I’m not convinced at least one of them doesn’t break.

  And I hate myself a little more.

  “I’m going to bed,” I tell them on my way out of the kitchen so they’ll leave me alone.

  “Good night, sweetie!” Mom calls after me. “Don’t let the bedbugs bite!”

  Oh, God.

  I go through my bathroom routine, then change and climb into bed. I tug my Mac into my lap and type “plastic surgery for facial scarring” into the search window. For the hundredth time, I read the articles. The before and after shots aren’t all that helpful, because I can’t make out any detail, but all the testimonials say that they feel so much better about themselves.

  I want to feel better about myself. I want to be able to stand in front of Rick and have a face-to-face conversation without him gagging.

  But they won’t even start the process for another few months. And then there’s all the healing. I can’t put him off that long. I’d rather he thinks I’m a bitch than to know the truth. I need to end our little . . . whatever we’re doing.

  I close my laptop and shove it to the other side of my double bed, then cry silently into my pillow until I’m too exhausted to keep my eyes open.

  I JERK AWAKE with the explosion still ringing in my ears and hear the screams even after my eyes are open. I know where I am, of course, but it doesn’t change where my subconscious takes me when it’s in charge. Mom has brought me to my Monday, Wednesday, Friday psychiatric appointments religiously. They’re not helping.

  I wipe the sweat off my face with the hem of the sheet and pull myself up to a sitting position as my heart rate starts to slow and the adrenaline rush ebbs. It’s light out, but I have no idea what time it is. And, honestly, it doesn’t really matter. It’s Thursday, which means I have no appointments, and Rick won’t call till later.

  I drag myself through the shower and tug on some clothes, then towel dry my hair. It’s really just short black fringe, growing back from where they shaved my head when they put me back together.

  I grab my Mac and flick over to my audio book library, starting my current book where I left off. I press in my earbuds and lay back across my pillows. I’m just getting comfortable when a hand nudges my bent knee.

  I rip out an earbud. “What, Mom?”

  “You have a visitor.” She says it so softly, with a tinge of hope, but she may as well have dropped another bomb.

  My whole body gasps as I sit and spin to face the window, my hand reflexively flying to my face to cover my scars. “Mom! No! I don’t want to see anyone.”

  The hinges whine as the door swings wider.

  “V?”

  It’s the voice I dream about, when I’m not dreaming about explosions. The voice that makes me smile when I’m sure there’s no happiness left in the world. The voice I live for.

  And I die inside when I hear it.

  Two

  “WHAT ARE YOU doing here?” I ask, the words catching in my throat.

  “I had to see you, V. I couldn’t wait two more weeks.”

  I pray for the floor to open up and swallow me. “I’m . . . not feeling good. You need to go.”

  It’s not a lie. I’m going to throw up.

  Rick’s voice is closer when he speaks again. “I just needed to—”

  “Are you deaf?” I snap, panic cutting to my core. “I said go!”

  When he doesn’t, I lift my other hand to my face and cringe against my palms.

  “I’m sorry,” Mom says. “I’ll see you out.”

  For a long minute, there’s silence, but then Rick’s voice, so soft it hurts. “I know your computer camera’s not broken. I know you’re not telling me everything.”

  My cringe deepens when he calls me on my lie. That was my excuse when he wanted to go back to Skyping. A tear leaks over my lashes and I swallow the rest back.

  “Please.” He’s even closer, and I feel a sob claw up my throat. “Talk to me.”

  “I need you to go,” I say again, but it’s strangled. The sound of my anguish causes more tears to burn my eye. I press my face into my hands and hunch deeper, trying to vanish into myself, but I can’t contain the sob any longer. It escapes on a choked “Oh, God.”

  “I didn’t realize how much this would upset her. You really need to leave.” Mom’s voice is firm, but alarmed.

  “With all due respect, Mrs. Vargas, I think that’s the last thing I need to do.” There’s an edge to Rick’s words that softens the next second as he sits on the bed next to me. “Rene, I can handle whatever it is. Please. I want to help you.”

  At the sound of him using my first name, I’m flooded with despair. “Nobody can help me!” rips out of me on another sob.

  I hear him sigh. “Can I talk to her alone for a minute?”

  “You’re just upsetting her
,” Mom says, her worry now an audible shake in her voice. “You need to leave right now, before I call the police.”

  Acid burns in my throat as I lift my face. It’s done. He knows. There’s no point hiding anymore. I was going to end this when he called today anyway, and once he gets a look at me, I won’t have to worry about how. I blow out a shaky breath and lower my hands. “It’s okay, Mom.”

  “You’re sure?” she asks warily, panic still lacing her words.

  I bob a defeated nod.

  “I’ll be right outside,” she says, and then the door clicks closed.

  I close my eyes and take a deep breath before turning to face Rick. Not that I’d be able to see much with them open. What I really want to do is close my ears so I don’t hear the horrified gasp.

  I wait, but nothing happens.

  I open my eyes and he’s still there—blond hair, and a tanned face over a dark T-shirt.

  “Does it hurt?” he finally asks, his voice low. “Are you in pain?”

  My head shakes slightly before I even realize I’m responding. “Not really.” Not physical pain, anyway.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” There’s none of the disgust I imagined hearing when he said those words in my head.

  I lower my face into my hands again. “Because I’m repulsive.”

  I hear myself whimper softly as he gently coaxes a hand away from my face and grasps it tightly. He’s warm and solid. After nearly a year of only being able to talk, it’s amazing and terrifying to finally be able to touch him.

  “You’re not repulsive, V. You’re the same person you’ve always been. Just with a little . . . customization.”

  I blow out a laugh despite myself, sending spittle flying.

  “Thanks, but I already showered,” he says with a smile in his voice.

  I laugh again, not so wetly this time. But all of a sudden, tears are streaking my face.

  “Hey,” he says, “I’m a sensitive guy and all, but tears sort of freak me out.”