Heartache

by Danielle Allen

  Even as I told myself that, the email popped in my mind.

  Unless she didn’t lock up.

  Unless she was too mad to lock up.

  Unless she left the back door unlocked.

  Each thought made me even more uncomfortable. It was as if the harder I tried not to think about the mystery woman who somehow managed to get in and out of my house without detection, the more she flooded my mind. If she was able to do it the first time, what would be stopping her from doing it again?

  Following the steady tapping, I peeked around the corner into my kitchen.

  With her head in her hands, Bianca was sitting at the kitchen table. Her body language appeared as though she was crying, but I heard the soft sounds of her humming.

  Glancing over at the microwave, I saw that she had twenty-two seconds left for something she’d put inside.

  My eyes moved over Bianca’s form as it swayed subtly from side to side. With each breath she took, her shoulders lifted and dropped steadily. I couldn’t see her mouth, but her voice was quiet and raspy as she intermittently sang a lyric between bouts of humming.

  The microwaved beeped, but she didn’t hear it. She continued her humming and I continued watching her. She was an interesting subject. Although she barely moved, her body language said so much. Although she was barely singing, the off-key notes and bursts of sound conveyed so much intense emotion. And I felt overwhelmed by guilt.

  I walked over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. She must have sensed I was there because she didn’t jump.

  Looking up slowly, she pulled the earbuds out of her ear. “Hey Ro,” she said quietly, giving me a tight smile.

  Pulling her out of her chair, I wrapped my arms around her waist. The fleshiness of her body melded into mine as I hugged her tightly.

  “I’m sorry, B,” I murmured against her hair. “I shouldn’t have flipped like that. It was…dumb. I was being an ass.”

  Pulling away from me slightly, she looked up and into my eyes. “I’m not going to let you push me away.”

  I noticed that the intensity in her voice didn’t match the look in her eyes as she pulled out of my grasp completely. The bout of guilt I’d felt earlier was back with a vengeance.

  Tearing my eyes away from her, I took a seat at the table. I watched silently as she went to get her mug out of the microwave and then returned to sit with me. I couldn’t tell if she was still pissed or not, so I decided to wait her out.

  “Talk to me, Roman,” Bianca demanded softly.

  I sighed as the knot in my stomach wound itself tighter. Even though I’d known this was coming, it didn’t make it any easier. I knew what she wanted, but the thought of telling her was causing me to sweat.

  I can’t do this.

  “What do you want to know?” I choked out through gritted teeth.

  “What are you willing to tell me?”

  I ran my hands down the sides of my face. “It’s complicated, Bianca.” My skin prickled and warmed from my boiling blood. I could feel my blood pressure rising.

  “How about this? I tell you something I’ve never told you before and then you do the same.” She got up and walked over to the liquor cabinet. Finding the unopened bottle of Kahlua, Bianca sauntered back over to the table. “I’m going to need some alcohol for this,” she added, pouring the liquor into her hot chocolate.

  I raised my eyebrows at the amount she added, but I said nothing. If anything, I understood completely. If I decided to tell her what I had going on in my past, I was going to need alcohol as well.

  She took several small sips from her mug before bringing her eyes to me. “We could make a drinking game out of this.” She smiled cunningly from behind her mug. “You know you want some of this.”

  I licked my lips and winked.

  She spit droplets of hot chocolate all over the table as she choked on her drink and her laughter. Coughing, she got up from the table. “I was talking about the hot chocolate, perv!”

  I watched her make a second cup of hot chocolate as we threw insults and sexual innuendos back and forth and I felt at ease again. When she sat down and slid the mug in front of me, I smiled.

  “Thank you.” I took a sip. “It’s good.”

  “My parents are cold, manipulative people who never really wanted a child,” Bianca burst out.

  Here we go, I thought, watching her intently. I tried not to let my face reflect the surprise at her outburst. I took another sip of the hot liquid and nodded.

  “They don’t talk about it as much anymore, but they never wanted to have a child. They wanted to travel and just be jetsetters, I guess. They are rich on their own, but also, they both come from rich families. They always had the freedom to do whatever they wanted and a kid disrupted that more than they realized, I guess. I remember when I was eight, I overheard them arguing about the burdens of parenthood and how I was an inconvenience to their lifestyle. In public, they like to pretend they are the Huxtables. From their brownstone in New York to the fact that my father is a surgeon and my mother is an attorney, they have convinced themselves that they are the perfect parents. But the reality is, they are just two emotionally detached people who procreated when they shouldn’t have.”

  She paused briefly, holding my gaze. “My parents and I never bonded. They had a surrogate who carried me to term. I had a nanny from the time I was born until I finished middle school. I was sent to boarding school in upstate New York from the time I hit high school. Once I graduated from the Academy, I went to VCU and have seen them three times a year since. In all that time, instead of spending any time with me, they put large deposits of money into my bank account.”

  Her matter-of-fact tone of voice and clipped delivery made it seem as though she didn’t care, but I could read Bianca a little better than that. She was jaded.

  Putting my hand on top of hers, I said, “I’m sorry, B. That’s rough.”

  “We have no relationship,” she continued, looking at our hands as my thumb caressed her smooth skin. “And when we do see each other, which isn’t often, it’s forced. We have very distinct roles. I attend several pre-planned functions with them so they can show me off. As they put it, I am the product of all of their hard work. A disappointing product, but a product nonetheless. In return, they keep a steady stream of income in my bank account so that I can pursue my ‘passions’, as they call my career choice. I don’t even know if they know I want to be a curator. They just feel like I’m not living up to my potential. So…that’s it. That’s the extent of our relationship. When you see us together in public, you wouldn’t know there’s this much dysfunction. Over the years, we’ve perfected this lie.”

  “That’s crazy,” I breathed, shaking my head. I took a sip of the hot chocolate. I didn’t know what else to say.

  “Yeah, it is.” She shrugged. “But it is what it is. I survived them and I’m stronger for it, but because of that, I usually keep people at a distance. It only takes a few years of your parents’ emotional neglect to really make you keep your guard up and trust no one.”

  “I met them during your first semester as my teaching assistant. I wouldn’t have guessed.”

  She raised her eyebrows and nodded, taking a sip. “Yeah, I remember that. They liked you. They said that your talent justified your pursuit of art. It was both a compliment of you and a dig at me, but the point is, they liked you.” She smiled ruefully.

  “What kind of fucked up shit is that?” I asked, angrily. The fact that they tried to use me as a way to criticize Bianca made my blood boil.

  She shook her head dismissively.

  “Parents…am I right?” She joked, humorlessly.

  Lifting the mug, I could almost see the wheels turning in her head. She was about to change the focus of the conversation. I shifted my gaze from her to the bottom of my cup.

  “So if I seem weirdly intense about trust and friendships, it’s because my parents suck and the relationship everyone sees of us isn’t real. When I find people
that I care about, everything about the relationships have to be real.”

  I nodded, but all I really wanted was for the conversation to end. I didn’t want to lie to her. But I didn’t want to tell her the truth either. I understood her point of view completely, but that didn’t make the situation any easier for me.

  “Now it’s your turn,” Bianca started quietly. “Elizabeth? You said your parents…” She trailed off and looked at me. Her eyes begged me not to make her continue her sentence.

  I cleared my throat twice, unable to dislodge the anxiety that was strangling me. “Elizabeth and William raised me.” I paused, tapping my finger against the empty mug.

  “So they are your parents?” she prompted slowly as if she were talking to a child.

  I cleared my throat again as heat rose up my body. “They are my—I was adopted.”

  “Oh, okay.” She nodded as if she understood.

  She has no idea, I thought, watching her head bob up and down as she nodded encouragingly.

  When I didn’t continue, Bianca took another sip and waited. The seconds ticked by until she opened her mouth and, speaking in the quietest voice I’d ever heard her use, she asked, “Who died? Who—”

  “That’s enough,” I interrupted, not even waiting for her to ask whatever follow up questions she planned to ask. I felt suffocated by the look in her eyes and the weight of the past.

  “Roman, I’m not trying to—”

  “Pry?” I pushed my chair back from the table and stood up and walked across the kitchen. “No. I’m done. I’m not doing this anymore, Bianca.”

  Placing my empty mug in the sink, I stood with my back toward her. Gripping the counter, I tried to rein in my emotions. My breathing had become a little more labored and my muscles were tense.

  “Talk to me, Ro,” she pleaded in exasperation. “I need you to be real with me.”

  “There’s nothing more to talk about.”

  I heard her chair slide away from the table. “Do you think it was easy to tell you about my family?” Her voice teetered between hurt and anger. “I hate being pitied. I hate for anyone to feel sorry for me, but I told you because I wanted you to know. You’re my best friend and I wanted you to know!”

  “That’s the difference,” I uttered through clenched teeth. “You wanted me to know.”

  “Are you—?”

  “Just drop it! Drop it!” My voice came out louder and angrier than I intended. Too stubborn to turn around, I gripped the counter tighter.

  I anticipated hearing her yell back; Bianca was a yeller. So when the front door gently clicked closed, it took me by surprise. Taking a deep breath, I turned around.

  Argumentative Bianca. Screaming Bianca. Cursing Bianca. When she’s really mad, those were the personality types the world got to choose from. But Silent Bianca? I’d never met Silent Bianca before, I thought, resting my hands on top of my head.

  I heard the engine roaring and my stomach dropped. Somewhere deep in my subconscious, I knew I had fucked up.

  “Dammit,” I muttered, noticing the spare key sitting beside the empty mug.

  Yeah, she’s pissed, I realized as I wrapped my hand around the key.

  Double checking the doors and cutting out the lights, I jogged up the stairs. Pulling off my t-shirt, I flopped onto my bed. As mad as I’d been a few minutes before, the overwhelming feeling of guilt filled me. The tension in my body remained as I settled into the plush comforter. My muscles were tight and my head was throbbing. I felt like I was going to explode and I needed a release, but I pushed everything I was feeling back down.

  Looking for the remote on the bed, I felt my phone. Flipping it over, I saw that I had two missed calls and two text messages from Bianca. Viewing the timestamp, they were all sent before I heard her downstairs.

  Bianca Baker: Answer your phone. We need to talk.

  Bianca Baker: You didn’t answer when I called, but I know you’re back home. I’m coming in.

  If I would’ve checked my phone, I wouldn’t have thought it was an intruder, I thought, letting my mind slip back to the email I sent earlier.

  Without thinking, I opened the email application on my phone and saw that I had a new email. My heart thudded in my chest at the unknown. I didn’t know why seeing the email address with the capital ME between x’s and o’s made my stomach knot up, but it did. Taking a deep breath, I opened it.

  *****

  To: Roman

  From: xoxoMExoxo

  Subject: RE: The One?

  I noticed the question mark you added to the subject line. After I’m done with you, there won’t be any question as to how compatible we are, Roman.

  Let me tell you what I know for a fact: you’ve spent the last twenty-four hours thinking about me. You want to know who I am. More than that, you want to know how much I know. You want to know if I know that you can’t sleep sometimes because it hurts. You want to know if I know that when you close your eyes, the past is still there making its presence known. You want to know if anyone notices the hurt in your art. The answer is yes, to all of it. I know it. I see it. I notice it. Most importantly, I can relate. And if you want me to, I can take the pain away.

  I’ll see you soon.

  Me

  *****

  Who could this possibly be? I wondered, reading the email again to look for clues. The email was purposely teasing. It felt personal and removed at the same damn time. The woman who wrote the email knew me well enough to know that I’m haunted by my past, but beyond that, she called me on it.

  How much could she possibly know? I pondered, reading each sentence again. She definitely had my attention. If she knew as much as she led on, I couldn’t help but wonder what she planned to do with the information. A cocktail of guilt, anger, and intrigue ripped through my chest as I let out a frustrated grunt. Who the hell is this?!

  Picking up Bianca’s notebook, I reviewed the list of names. I could feel my curiosity consuming me. No one had ever held my attention like this. The only relationships I had with women were superficial. I didn’t want to hurt them so I let them know upfront that I wasn’t the relationship kind of guy. We talked about superficial things or work. Never anything deep. Never anything important. There would be no one who would be able to know the things she was insinuating she knew.

  So why do I feel like this?

  Reading the words, I was caught between being uneasy from the attention and being turned on by the attention to detail. I was caught between wanting to know what she knew and wanting to block out everything she said.

  But now that I’m really thinking about it, if anyone was going to know me well enough to get underneath my skin like this, it would have to be Bianca. She is the only one that knows me well enough to know that everything is not what it seems. She’s the only one that knows me. I can be myself with her, I thought, closing my eyes and sitting the notebook on my chest. Opening my eyes, I sat up and shook it off. I just can’t tell her anything about my past.

  I read the email four times before I checked the timestamp. The email was sent while I was downstairs with Bianca so there was no way it was her. Even though Bianca’s name wasn’t on the list and I didn’t really think it was her, I mentally took her off of the short list of suspects.

  I have to figure out who this is. I’ll figure this out and then I’ll call B tomorrow so we can work it out. I have to deal with one thing at a time and I need to figure out who this is. Trailing my finger over the list of names, I stopped on the most obvious choice. Hannah.

  Although Hannah didn’t know anything about me, she was always around. From the moment she’d moved into the neighborhood and run into me at the park, she’d made her presence known. From throwing herself at me at the park to trying to join my class to staring at me from up the street, Hannah would be the most likely to sneak into my house and write some creepy ass love note on my mirror. Hannah may have had her two friends here and they may have run interference and acted as a lookout, but Hannah would’v
e been the one to do this.

  Scratching Hannah’s two friends off of the list, I looked at the list of names again. Nodding to myself, things started clicking into place: Hannah was not only crazy enough to do it, she had access and opportunity and she didn’t take no for an answer.

  It has to be Hannah, I thought definitively. The emails are equal parts flirtatious and creepy. And true to her character, she doesn’t take no for an answer. Hearing no will only lead to her making a mistake. She’ll slip up and say something and then I can resolve my curiosity

  Hitting reply on the email, I decided to draw Hannah out.

  *****

  To: xoxoMExoxo

  From: Roman

  Subject: RE: RE: The One?

  You keep saying you know a lot about me, but what makes you think you know enough to determine you are “the one” for me? And what about you? You haven’t told me anything about yourself yet. I want to know who you are.

  *****

  Feeling satisfied with my plan to make her out herself, I hit send. I put my phone on top of the notebook and placed both on the nightstand. With a plan in place, I felt somewhat settled in solving the problem before me.

  Now on to the next thing, I thought, running my hands down my face. I’m not explaining myself to Bianca, but I do want to apologize for my actions tonight. I had just apologized and then I did the exact same thing. But why did she have to push? Why couldn’t she just leave well enough alone?

  As my thoughts wrestled with the events of the last twenty-four hours, I felt my stomach turn. The rollercoaster ride that was my life quickly shifted from the highs of meeting an art powerhouse and selling every painting in my showcase to the lows of fighting with my best friend and being forced to relive my past. It almost felt like for every good moment, I was being punished for what I did.

  Startling me, the phone vibrated noisily against the notebook paper. Not expecting it to be an email, my heart beat picked up at the sight of a new email in my inbox.

  *****