by Liz Crowe
“I didn’t…do…” But he had. God help him, he had. As sure as he was standing here, feeling as if his guts were emptying out through his pores. She lifted her beautiful, sunburned chin. The anger took over then, and he opened his mouth before his brain could slap a hand over it. “Fine. Go. I don’t fuckin’ care. God damned manipulative bitch.”
She stood a few minutes, hand on the top of her hat, her sunglasses back in place so he couldn’t see her eyes. She’d driven up here with him a few days ago in silence, hung around the other couples, speaking when spoken to but not much beyond that. The night before, their next-to-last night here in this idyllic paradise built by Trent Hettinger’s hard work—something he admired and hated at the same time—she’d slipped into his room, into his bed, into his arms, her skin smooth, smelling of sunscreen and lake water. He’d struggled to drag his brain awake, as he’d been double dosing himself to get through the nights without sliding back into the familiar with the only woman he believed understood him.
They’d had sex in silence, almost on autopilot. It had not been nice or romantic or lovely, anything other than a physical release. And when he’d finished, she’d slipped out from under him and stood, backlit by the massive shaft of moonlight hitting the wall of windows behind her. Brock recalled his breathless, sweaty need for her to come back to him. To curl into him. To hold him and protect him against the demons now railing at the ramparts of his psyche.
But she’d just stood there, naked, staring down at him as he’d caught his breath. “Caro,” he’d whispered.
“Shh.” She’d put her fingers to his lips, shook her head and snuck out of the room. This morning she wouldn’t even look at him, not that anyone noticed but him. And now, after another day of sun, swimming, not drinking anything but water, and staring at Caroline’s patrician profile, her bare shoulders and legs, his mouth watering in anticipation of what he’d do with her tonight.
“I hate you, Brock,” she whispered. A tear slid down her face. “And I think I finally figured that out. So, I’m leaving. Don’t call me. Please. Lose my number and forget about me, for both our sakes.”
He stared straight ahead, ignoring his now raging hard-on, as she touched his forehead as if in some kind of fucked-up blessing.
“Yeah? Well, it’s mutual. Get the hell out of here.”
This was their oldest argument. The one they always circled back around to, no matter how great the sex, or the parties, the booze, the drugs. This time, though, after years apart that he’d spent fighting physical, mental, emotional battles she would never understand only to find himself right back in the same old space, have the same damn argument, this felt final.
As it should. He didn’t deserve her. He didn’t deserve anything good. He was a useless, addicted, weak human being. And that was all he ever would be—toxic to anyone who cared about him.
He jumped up, yanked off his shirt and ran away from her, down the long flight of steps to the grass without a backward look or comment. Austin called his name but he ignored them all—them and their perfect lives, with their more perfect lovers and wives. Shit, even Elle and Ross had worked their shit out and were more lovey-dovey than any normal, grown couple had a right to be.
His feet hit the sand along this stretch of Lake Michigan and he ran, letting his legs and arms pump fast and still faster until his super-in-shape heart was pounding and he couldn’t catch a breath. He slowed, jogging some then walking, his head down, sucking in huge, hot breaths, until he stumbled and fell to his hands and knees.
He stood up so fast he got dizzy from the heat and exertion. Trent’s obnoxious mansion was far behind him. But he knew she was still standing there on that damn deck, watching him go, waiting for him to come back.
It was their usual old argument. She’d never leave him. Never go all the way to God damned D.C. She loved him. He needed her. They should get married. Yes, that was it. Get married. He could afford a whopper of an engagement ring. Girls loved whopper engagement rings, right?
He craved normalcy for himself. The sort of stability Caroline would provide was something he’d always yearned for. She’d prop him up and he’d support her in her dream to be a big shot book editor. He could afford it. Hell, he could afford for them to not work another day in their lives. But he’d do whatever she wanted. Anything. If she’d not leave.
Panic suffused his brain, slipping a cold hand down his spine. He sucked in a few breaths and took off toward the house, even faster this time, desperate to get to her, to drop to his knees and hold on to her legs and beg her in front of his brother and everybody to never leave him. His ears were ringing by the time he made it back to Trent’s boat dock. It was deserted. The sun was making its too-perfect way toward the horizon, promising yet another photo-worthy sunset.
“You’re too late,” he said, staring up at the open wall of doors along the deck. A sudden wind blew the diaphanous curtains in and out. He heard someone laugh, then someone else. A snippet of conversation hit his ears. His chest still heaving, his legs screaming in agony, he made his slow way across the grass and up the steps to the deck.
She’ll be sitting there. She always waited for me before. D.C., my ass. That was just her trying to force my hand or some shit.
But the deck was as empty as the boat dock and the yard.
“Caro?” His voice cracked. His throat was a desert wasteland, cracked and aching for water. The ants…the fucking ever-present insects, awoke at their usual time and began muttering around the base of his spine. He took a step toward the chairs where they’d fought, his heart skipping the odd beat, scaring him, until he realized that this was entirely of his own doing. He’d pushed her away, him with his bullshit about being friends, and only friends.
He could never only be her friend. He knew that now.
“Caro?” His voice broke as he shouted her name. He felt his legs buckle beneath him. Saw the deck rise to meet his knees first, then his hands. His face hurt. His throat ached. His skin crawled. “Fuck!” His voice echoed around, hitting his ears and reminding him that he was not alone here. That he had an audience.
“Fuck,” he said, this time to himself before jumping up and marching past the women gathered at the door, trying not to stare at him. There was no sign of Austin, Ross, or Trent. Trent’s teenaged daughter and her minions had decamped to some other lakefront mansion for the evening, thank Christ for small favors.
He lurched to the fridge and yanked it open, grabbing the first beer he saw. It was cool and innocuous in his palm. “Drink me,” it urged him. “Just one. You can do it. Don’t listen to all those doctors, therapists and other experts. You can drink me. And then another me. Fuck everybody else. This is your motherfucking life. Go on. Drink me, you God damned pussy!”
He shoved the neck of the bottle into the retro steel opener next to the fridge. The smell hit his lizard brain like the smell of a woman. He sucked in a breath and put the bottle to his lips.
“I don’t think so,” Austin said, prying the thing out of his hands and pouring it into the sink. Brock shivered in the hyper-cooled interior. His teeth chattered and his skin broke out in goosebumps.
“Fuck you, Mr. Perfect.” He grabbed another bottle, opened it and right when he was about to take his first, glorious gulp of alcohol in years, Austin took it and dumped it down the drain.
They played this game through four perfectly good beers, Austin pouring them out as if they were nothing more than water. The fifth time he reached for one, Austin grabbed his arm and dragged him from the fridge. Without even thinking, he swung, connecting in a satisfactory way with his twin brother’s jaw.
To his surprise, Austin just held on tighter, gripping his arms tight to his body, their faces level, their eyes locked. “I won’t let you do it, do you hear me? I will not lose you again.” Austin’s voice was calm. Drops of his spit sprayed Brock’s face. He tensed, struggled, knowing he was stronger, after all his workouts at the hands of his trainer-slash-torturer. But Austin didn’t budge. Brock felt
his brother’s legs against his. The soft fabric of his polo shirt against his bare stomach. He reared back and bunched his arm muscles, determined to spring free, grab some beers and hightail it down the beach.
Just a little party. I can handle it.
“Fuck. You,” he spat at Austin’s face.
“I’m not letting you go. I don’t care if we stand here all night.”
“Christ, fine.” He made himself relax. But Austin only tightened his grip.
“I love you, Brock. Stop trying so hard to prove how great you are, okay? Just be you.”
“Be me? Seriously? I suck. We all know that.”
“No, brother, we don’t.” Austin let him go so fast he stumbled forward, whamming his knees into the kitchen island cabinets. He caught himself, propping his hands on the huge expanse of dark granite countertop. Everything drained from him then—anger, frustration, energy, remorse. The urge to drink until he passed out. Everything…but resignation.
“I’ll never be normal,” he whispered down at the counter as if it could answer him.
“Normal is overrated.” Austin patted his back, rubbing between his shoulder blades, calming him. He didn’t fight it for a change, as his mind settled. “Here,” Austin said, handing him his evening pill cocktail and a glass of water. He looked at them both, knowing that they would both help and hurt. They would quell the marching ant army but would also leave him depleted, limp and with a shitty taste in his mouth.
“She left, didn’t she?” He took the pills and downed them, sucking back the water so fast it dripped out the sides of his mouth.
“Yeah, man. She did.”
“Good. She should go. She’s moving to D.C.”
“Oh, well, then. Good for her.”
“Yeah. Fucking great for her. Oh, Christ… Oh dear God…” He groaned and dropped to his heels, realizing what he’d done. That he’d kicked his last remaining anchor to Earth free, leaving him floating and utterly alone. Austin crouched beside him then pulled him all the way down so that they sat together, backs to the kitchen island, legs sprawled out toward the fridge. He draped an arm over Brock’s shaking shoulders and held him tight.
Brock realized at that moment that he’d been wrong. His one remaining anchor was here, in the form of a man he’d despised for his normalcy, his perfection, for so many years. He still had a hard time making small talk with him.
He closed his eyes as the pills entered his system, whooshing through his bloodstream, softening connections, dampening others, coating his brain with the usual evening blanket of pharma-induced peace. He sighed and leaned into Austin’s torso, letting a single tear escape before the drugs sent the ants scurrying to their hiding places. Tomorrow was another day to march, after all.
“Hey, Uncle Brock,” Evelyn’s voice broke through the kitchen silence. “Where are you? Somebody woke up from her nap super cranky and I can’t even…”
He opened his eyes and saw his brother’s wife crouched down, holding a teary-eyed, sweaty-looking toddler. As soon as she spotted him, she leaped into his arms. “Bock!” she yelped, wrapping her arms around his neck and clinging to him like a limpet. “Bock.” Her voice was muffled against his skin. He patted her back and let himself relax further.
“You okay down here for now?” Austin peered at him.
Brock nodded. “Yeah. And…thanks. Although that was a very serious beer foul earlier. You’ll have to pay a penalty.”
Austin chuckled, leaned in and kissed Rose’s cheek. When he pressed his lips to Brock’s forehead for a second before climbing out from under the overhanging granite counter, Brock flinched. Evelyn patted his leg and let Austin pull her to her feet. They wandered out, hand in hand, leaving him with the baby, who kept muttering “Bock” into his neck until she broke away, her smile lighting up her face, and his soul, at least for a few minutes. “Swim!”
He grinned and got up, tossing her over his shoulder, making her squeal in delight. The group was gathered, sipping water, reading books or tablets. “I’m sorry,” he declared to them as a whole. “Slipped. Caroline left. She…uh…had someplace better to be.”
“Bock!” the little girl demanded, tugging his chin around with her fingers. “’Ose want swims!”
“Does she always speak in exclamatory sentences?” he asked Evelyn as she brought out the funny-looking swimsuit, floaty combo thing.
“Yep,” she confirmed, pulling Rose out of Brock’s arms long enough to wiggle her into the contraption. “You okay with her for a while?”
“You okay with me with her for a while?”
She patted his cheek and put the happy toddler in his arms again. “I’m more than okay with it, Brock.”
“Thanks,” he said as he tossed Rose up onto his shoulder before heading out of the wide-open wall of doors, down the steps and toward the sand, his mind calm, his heart at peace, the ants at full parade rest.
Chapter Nine
“Hey. This seat taken?”
Kayla startled from her semi-trance, took her fingers from her hair and set the charcoal pencil down. “Um. No, I guess not.”
Brock smiled at her and slid his ever-present laptop onto the bar in front of the seat next to her. He made a show of leaning over her shoulder but she slapped the sketch book shut and glared at him. He backed away, hands up in mock surrender. “Sorry.”
She sipped her ginger ale, unwilling to acknowledge the strange little tingles running along her skin at his proximity. As he settled himself and spent an inordinate amount of time flirting with the cute and much-younger-than-her bartender who’d materialized in front of him, she stared straight ahead, focusing on the gleaming line of glasses on the shelves.
“I need a meeting,” she blurted out, her hands clutched together in her lap. “I’m guessing you might know where I could find one.”
He turned to her, his smile that odd combination of sweet and amused. “Where have you been going?”
“A place I don’t want to go anymore.”
“Okay. Well, mine’s at St. Francis, downtown.”
She unclenched her fingers and fiddled with her straw, swallowing the panic that was sneaking into her consciousness. When she felt a hand on her arm, she flinched, sending the half-empty glass of pale amber soda and ice flying down the bar before it rolled off and landed on the rubber mats without shattering.
“Shit,” she muttered, getting up and heading around to grab it. But Brock touched her arm again, firmer this time, his face neutral. “Please don’t,” she said, pulling away from him.
“Do you need a meeting now? I can find one for us. God knows there’s hardly an hour of any day I couldn’t use one.”
She shut her eyes then opened them. “Yes, actually. I could.”
When he turned back to his laptop, she took a few minutes to study his profile—strong jawline covered in a light-brown, close-trimmed beard, well-proportioned eyes and nose. It was a handsome face—but not too much so. She put her hands on the bar’s edge, gripping it tight, to keep from touching his jawline.
“I think he needs a friend,” she’d insisted to Trent several weeks ago.
“Got one,” he cried, startling her again. “Right here.” He pointed to the screen.
She squinted at the map, noting that it was in a community center, not far from her halfway house. She shook her head. “No, that’s where I was going. I can’t…go back there.”
“Why not?” He leaned forward, trying to catch her gaze. “What happened?”
She sighed and looked up at the ceiling. “There’s this woman there and she brings her kid. And it gets on my nerves.”
“Meetings aren’t supposed to include kids. I know of some that offer a sort of daycare, though.” He turned back to his screen. “You’re not so much into kids, are you?”
“No.” She didn’t move, but inside, she felt as if she could leap out of her skin, crawl down the bar, lie under the taps and drink until her stomach exploded. She scratched her nose with shaking fingers. “Shit.�
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“Tell you what, I’ll drive us over there. You’ve been skipping them. I know the signs. I see them in my own mirror sometimes.” His smile was so kind, so genuine. She hardened herself to it. “I’ll see this illicit kid for myself.” He pretended to look serious which made her smile.
“Fine.” She shoved her sketches and pencils into her backpack and shouldered it. “Let’s go then.”
He waved down the bar to the hovering cutie-pie who hadn’t taken her eyes off him the whole time he’d been sitting there, then tucked his laptop into a case and held out a hand, indicating she should walk ahead of him. She shook her head, nervous, panicky, and in need of something…anything…to soothe her nerves.
He shrugged and started toward the door, holding it open for her, same for the car door. She frowned at him as he meandered around the front of the car and got in. “You don’t have to try to impress me, you know.”
Without responding, he touched the ignition button and the powerful, expensive, German-made motor roared to life. “Nice car,” she said.
“Thanks.” He pulled out of the FitzPub parking lot and into the midday traffic, whistling under his breath.
“We’re gonna be late,” she said, hearing the petulance in her own voice as they waited out a long red light.
“You know as well as I do that it doesn’t matter.” He gunned the car through the intersection, wove through the three lanes of traffic and got them to the rundown community center with four minutes to spare.
“Again, trying to impress me…” She was desperate to sound normal, or at least something approaching it.
He grabbed his phone from its holder. “Nah. I’d try something else if I wanted to make an impression.” He winked at her. She blinked fast and fumbled with the door handle, spilling herself out onto the asphalt—right onto her hands and knees. Within a few seconds, she saw his shoes beneath her. A hand was on her elbow. She pulled away from him.
“I’m fine, Jesus. Spare me the hero moves already.” She drew herself up, trying to act more indignant than she felt.