Come to Me Recklessly

by A. L. Jackson

  All that time I had to sit and watch the guy I considered my brother, my best friend, lose himself. He tried to hurt himself in every way, his self-loathing evident for all to see. Before long, he was using. The only time he wanted anything to do with me was if I was up for going and getting high with him, but he’d gotten himself in much deeper than just smoking a bowl now and then. He’d done nothin’ but stare straight through me when I’d gotten up in his face, first threatening him, then pleading with him to stop.

  Every day he faded farther away.

  Did it make me a bastard that after all of this, after everything my family was going through, the hardest part was watching Samantha slip through my fingers?

  Her parents saw to it that she had zero contact with me.

  Being without her got harder and harder. I was trying to hold on, to find some kind of confidence in what we had, but every day I became more uncertain.

  Loneliness had become my constant partner, this hollowness I couldn’t shake. It made it hard to breathe, difficult to get out of bed. My grades sucked, and I was one missed day away from flunking out.

  Sad part? Not one fucking soul was there to notice.

  So here I sat at another lame party I didn’t want to be at, drowning in my very own personal pity party.

  From the corner of the room, my glazed-over gaze wandered the riot overtaking Marcus’ living room. Everyone was laughing, talking too loud, people making out, living like nothing mattered. This was the same house I’d brought Samantha to that fateful night, the night when upstairs I took the plunge, told her I loved her – and then everything fell apart.

  That hollowness throbbed.

  I lifted the bottle to my mouth.

  Why did it feel like she’d deserted me?

  I knew it wasn’t her fault, but it sure as hell didn’t feel like she was fighting for us. All she was doing was letting her parents win.

  Her sixteenth birthday had come and gone. That day, I’d never even seen her. Didn’t get to kiss her. Didn’t get to tell her how much I loved her and missed her and wanted her.

  I definitely didn’t get to make love to her, and that shit sucked.

  But I’d wait. I’d wait forever because that’s how much I loved her.

  Going to Samantha’s window at night was no longer an option. Her parents kept her under lock and key, and Samantha said trying to sneak by them wasn’t worth the risk. The only time I ever saw her was in those quick interludes at school, like when we’d sneak behind the cafeteria.

  But that was never enough, and I knew that, too, would soon be coming to an end when she moved across town and switched schools.

  Now the FOR SALE sign in their front yard boasted a SOLD sign beneath it. Only three weeks and we’d lose the little contact we had.

  It left all these broken, aching places vibrating inside of me.

  Hating life.

  Hating everyone.

  Especially Samantha’s parents.

  How could they do this to us?

  “There you are,” Jasmine purred. The stupid slut tried to crawl onto my lap.

  I pushed her off, didn’t give a fuck that she stumbled back and knocked into the wall. “Stay away from me,” I warned, knowing my voice was slurred and filled with all the loneliness that seemed magnified in my heart tonight.

  She laughed. “You sure that’s what you want? Looks like you could use some company.”

  I sure as hell could, but not from her. “Fuck you.”

  She laughed again. “Whatever. You let me know when you give up on that little tease of yours and decide you want someone who can take care of you.”

  I sneered. One side of her filthy mouth curled in satisfaction, before she sauntered away to join her pack of bitches at the other side of the room.

  I lifted the cheap bottle of tequila, chugged the quarter that remained, and let the darkness close in.

  Because all that perfect light dimmed, narrowing as it thinned, flickered as it threatened to completely blink out.

  God, how desperately did I miss it?

  The tortured sounds of my mother weeping echoed from behind her closed bedroom door. I stood on the other side of it at the end of the hall, reeling, my head spinning with the magnitude of what’d happened tonight.

  Three months ago when Jared had caused that accident, I’d thought it impossible for my life to get worse.

  I’d been wrong.

  How could he?

  I pressed my hand against the wall to hold myself up.

  How could he?

  Jared had been granted a second chance at life.

  And he’d tried to take it.

  From the depths of my soul, I knew it.

  The two deputies from the sheriff’s department who’d sat on our couch asking us questions had left fifteen minutes before, insinuating that my best friend was nothin’ more than a drug addict, a junkie after his next fix, breaking into the neighbors’ house, tying up the owner, and stealing his car. They were charging him with all these bullshit crimes instead of realizing he’d just been crying out for help.

  They’d found the car in flames in the lot where we used to play, the place that was so special to us growing up, where I’d taken Samantha just because I wanted to share a part of it with her.

  Somehow Jared was no longer in the car, and they’d found him on the ground beside it.

  Overdosing.

  I gripped my hair, swallowing down a wave of pain.

  They’d found a shit ton of heroin on him with all the paraphernalia to go along with it. Of course, I already knew about that, but like an idiot, I’d never said a word because I’d been trying to protect my friend. Even when he’d gotten busted at school a few days before, I’d tried to pretend like I didn’t know how bad it’d gotten.

  Now I’d give anything to go back and take the title of snitch to save him.

  Because when they mentioned the gun he’d stolen from the Ramirezes’ house, I knew.

  I fucking knew.

  Asshole was trying to take one more thing from me.

  How could he?

  How could this even happen?

  The overwhelming urge to punch something rose within me. To destroy something. My forehead dropped to the wall, and I panted against it as I listened to my mother’s torment on the other side, my dad trying to convince her of all this bullshit, telling her Jared had earned whatever he got. My hand fisted against the wall, and I wished I could break through it, push all my anger out, rid my body of all this insanity.

  But that anger only flared, this prowling hatred bounding through my spirit, filling me up and forcing everything else out.

  What happened to the God that Samantha believed in? The one I’d started to trust?

  Was he missing in all of this?

  Or did he just not exist?

  Because not one thing about this was fair or just.

  I sensed my little sister, Aly, slowly approaching from behind. Shaking, I turned around to look at her. I’d always thought of her as so young. Innocent. But there was a profound horror in her eyes, this deep sorrow of someone who understood. I wanted to go to her, hug her, tell her everything was going to be okay.

  But I knew it wasn’t going to be.

  Everything was ruined.

  Jared was getting sent away.

  Samantha was going away.

  And I was finally going to lose it all.

  I clutched Aly’s shoulder when I passed, hoping to give her some kind of comfort when I had none to give.

  “Christopher,” she pled, reaching for me.

  I said nothing, just shook off the hand that landed on my arm, fumbled to my room and grabbed my keys, and ran out the door.

  All I wanted was Samantha. For her to make it all go away.

  But I couldn’t have her, so instead, I headed out to one of those parties where I didn’t belong but that were the only places where I really felt welcome.

  And I tried to convince myself that I didn’t give a f
uck anymore.

  What good was it anyway? Caring? Wanting more?

  What bullshit.

  It took me all of half an hour to get shit faced. Good for me. I’d become a fucking pro.

  It took Jasmine even less time to start in.

  She crawled onto my lap, her disgusting hands all over my chest. Nausea rolled in my stomach, bile burning in my gut and rising in my throat.

  And everything hurt.

  My head.

  My heart.

  I tossed Jasmine off, stumbling as I staggered to my feet and outside, gasping for air.

  Marcus came up beside me, clapped me on the back, and like the fucking awesome friend he was, he gave me something foreign that I swallowed down, two little pills I so clearly needed. For two minutes I stood there trembling with remorse, knowing I was giving myself over to the same bullshit Jared had, but then this sensation came rushing in, coursing through my veins, clouding everything out.

  Everything except for Samantha.

  Samantha.

  I rubbed my hands over my face, trying to focus, realizing suddenly I was standing at the end of her street, my brain spinning when I ended up at her window.

  I shouldn’t have been all that shocked. My soul knew that was the only place I wanted to be.

  My vision blurred, and I struggled to stay upright, my knuckles begging at her window, rapping at the pane.

  A surge of grief tore through me, pressing through the numbness, tugging me in places I didn’t understand. It nearly brought me to my knees. I doubled over, feeling sick, all those threads of sanity being snipped away one by one.

  God, I almost wept when I saw Samantha’s face appear on the other side of her window, and I let that sanity go, no longer clinging to anything else, because she was the only thing I needed.

  Slowly, she cracked the window open an inch, and I shoved it wide, crawling over the windowsill and into Samantha’s arms.

  “Christopher.” My ears pulsed with her voice, but it sounded distant and fading.

  I needed her closer, wouldn’t let her go.

  “Samantha… oh my God, I need you. Fuck. Need you.”

  And her skin felt so good under my hands, like warmth and comfort.

  I’d gone without it for too long, and there was nothing I wanted more. Nothing could touch this despair except for her.

  Her mouth was even hotter, my tongue pressing in, searching for that balm, for a way back to what we’d been, before she’d been stolen from me.

  She was on the floor, and I was over her, on her, seeking. My hands were frantic, tearing through our barriers.

  I thought maybe I was dying, this suffocating suffering. Only Samantha could give me breath.

  “Samantha.” I felt her name whimpered from somewhere within, like a plea, a cry, and I struggled to get her closer.

  I could hear her calling me, too, this reflection of pain that echoed through her room. And that pain was palpable, tangible as it cut and clawed into my skin. Fear pounded through my chest, and somehow I knew it was hers. Her voice sliced through the haze, breaking through the tortured numbness.

  Something sharp.

  A vicious sting.

  My own fear clogged my throat, and I scrambled back, squinting to see her in the darkness of her room.

  She was curled into a ball, rocking. Rocking. Praying to her God to make me stop.

  Her top was torn wide open.

  And I wanted to cry when this awareness fell over me, this sickness when I realized what I’d nearly done. The top two buttons of my jeans were undone, and my fingers shook uncontrollably when I reached up to my face. Blood coated my fingertips from the deep scratches her nails had slashed across my cheek.

  What had I done?

  On my knees, I slid my hand along the carpeted floor in an appeal. “Samantha… please…”

  I wouldn’t have. I would have stopped.

  Wouldn’t I have?

  She flinched, curling up tighter. Her mouth shook, and she silently cried, her face turned toward the ceiling, like she couldn’t bear to look at me. I could barely hear her when she spoke. “Please, go.”

  I fumbled forward, keeping myself low, as if that could wipe out the disaster of my actions. “I just need you… please… listen… I wouldn’t have…”

  She choked, her voice an anguished whisper. “I don’t even recognize you anymore. Please… just go.”

  “You promised me… you promised me we’d make it.”

  She lolled her head in my direction. Her expression alone destroyed the last good thing in me. Because I knew it was done.

  “I trusted you,” she said, the words breaking as they scraped from her throat. “My parents were right to protect me from you.”

  I swallowed over the heartbreak. My chest burned with it, this fiery anger as I stared down at the one person who I always believed would have faith in me.

  Instead she looked away.

  I tried to climb to my feet but fell back to my knees. Like the cursed, I slid along the floor on my belly, grunted as I hoisted myself up and over the windowsill. I landed on the dirt ground with a hard thud.

  Two days had passed. Two days since Jared took those extra steps to ruin his life. Two days since I’d turned right around and ruined mine.

  Riddled with shame and bitterness, I sat back on Marcus’ couch and lifted the bottle to my mouth.

  No, I wasn’t getting so fucked-up that I could hurt anyone else. Not ever again. When I’d woken up the previous morning with my head splitting in two, I’d sworn never again. I’d never allow myself to lose that kind of control, my mind nonexistent in the abyss of all that blackness.

  But my heart was already broken, and the bottle I clutched in my hand worked just fine with that kind of pain. So I chased that numbness, the dulled sense of accepting that nothing mattered.

  Nothing mattered because there was nothing left to fight for, and I was giving in.

  Yesterday I’d tried. I’d sucked it up and made one last valiant attempt. With my heart lodged in my throat, I’d dialed Samantha’s home number.

  On the first ring, it’d chanted that three-beat chime, the one that warned I’d reached a number that had been disconnected.

  And now that’s all I wanted to be.

  Disconnected.

  To pull the plug on every one of these emotions wringing me tight.

  It hurt too bad, and I didn’t want to feel anything anymore.

  That afternoon, I’d sat in the quiet of my room and poured my heart onto paper, sifting through myself for the remnants of her light, dug deep for the few things left within me that I still cared about. I’d ended up with three letters.

  One was for Jared.

  One for Stewart.

  The other for her.

  I’d sealed them up in envelopes, same way I sealed off my hemorrhaging heart. I took two out to the mailbox and hid the other away.

  Now I sat on the couch, draining an entire bottle of Jack. I slumped back, and the empty bottle slipped from my fingers and hit the floor. Muddled faces floated through my vision, the party loud and obnoxious, but somehow I felt as if I was watching it from above.

  Detached.

  Hands slipped over my chest, a warm body pressing firm at my lap, a hot mouth on my neck.

  I groaned, and my cock reacted. My fingers dug into skin as a distorted pleasure reverberated through my body.

  She laughed, and the tip of her nail trailed down my chin to the neck of my shirt. She clutched it and tugged. “I told you one day you’d come to your senses.”

  I laughed in her face, an incredulous, crazed sound, because she couldn’t be further from the truth.

  I’d lost every last one of them, all except for the physical need to let it go, to give in and take the one thing within my reach that would let me feel good.

  Jasmine pulled me to my unstable feet.

  My parents were right to protect me from you.

  I let her lead me upstairs and into the dimly l
it room.

  How she knew I’d follow, I didn’t know. Maybe I was bleeding defeat.

  And I hated her as much as I always had. But I hated myself more.

  She kissed me and I kissed her back, but it didn’t feel anything like the kisses I gave Samantha. It felt empty, and the hollowness inside screamed out.

  It clashed with the nerves shooting across my skin where her hands touched me, rushing up and down, spurring the coil of lust that fisted in my stomach.

  Samantha left me.

  Numbly, I helped her undress me, watched idly when she stepped back and undressed herself. She pushed me back onto the floor, the same floor where Samantha had promised herself to me, where I’d told her I loved her and I’d given in to the delusion that somehow all of our firsts would belong to the other.

  But that was nothing but a stupid fantasy. I was never good enough for her. Somewhere inside, I’d always known it. Known I was only going to hurt her, and hurt her was exactly what I’d done.

  I didn’t stop Jasmine when she straddled my legs. She moaned my name when she lowered herself onto me.

  And it felt so wrong, but everything had gone wrong a long time ago.

  She rode me and I just lay there, wanting to erase every memory. Hate filled me up so full I wanted to vomit. Hate for Jasmine. Hate for myself. Hate for Jared for being so selfish.

  Most of all, I hated that Samantha had given up on us so easily.

  She’d said she loved me.

  She’d said we were forever.

  I’d fucked up… but I’d thought… I’d thought that’s what love was supposed to be about, finding a way through those faults, making them right and ensuring we never committed the same sins.

  Turned out what I’d done was unforgiveable.

  Or maybe she’d just never really cared all that much.

  I turned my gaze from Jasmine, couldn’t watch the victorious expression on her face.

  Instead I looked off into the distance and let the physical pleasure consume me.

  A destructive reprieve.

  Even still, I couldn’t rid my mind of Samantha’s perfect face. She was all I could see, that beautiful, sweet girl, all that blond hair and those blue eyes. A sad smile tugged at me when I thought of that mouth.