“Sure,” he said, in a distracted sort of way that made me believe he wasn’t really going to.
For twenty minutes, I leaned against the hood of my car. Twice I nearly left, talking myself out of this. I had no real plan for what I was going to say to him. Mostly, I just wanted to yell. Vent.
The front door of the office squeaked and I looked up. He was walking towards me, wearing a black t-shirt and jeans. He fiddled with his hair as he approached me, looking more at the ground than he did at me.
When he was right in front of me, he huffed. “What are you doing here, Kristen?”
I stood, my muscles tense. “Why do you think I’m here?”
“No idea,” he said with another huff, a shrug of his shoulders, pretending that he didn’t.
“Really?” I said. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“I don’t know what you want from me,” he said, looking distressed. “Nothing’s changed. I’m still not any good at this shit. It was a mistake for me to come by last night.”
“Nothing’s changed?” I said, my eyes narrowing. “I can’t stop thinking about you. I can’t get you out of my head,” I said in a sing-song patronizing voice. “You can’t say that shit. You can’t kiss me and sleep with me and then just leave.”
“I know!” he said, throwing his hands out. “I know I messed up. But I wasn’t lying when I said that I don’t want a relationship. This is all too much for me.”
“Bullshit,” I said. “Why are you so scared? What exactly do you think I’m gonna do to you?”
He sighed, trying to look hard and mean. But this was all an act. He had pain in his eyes, a looseness to his movements. This was some part he thought he had to play, some sacrifice he had to make. “Look,” he said, unable to make eye contact with me, “last night I was drunk and just hoped to get some action.”
I pushed him in the chest, hard. He stumbled, but didn’t react. “Liar!” I said. “You love me. I know you do!”
He held his hands up. “Alright!” he said. “I didn’t come over just to have sex with you. But I didn’t come over hoping to get back together either. Can we just let it go?”
Let it go? How could he be this way? He did love me. He hadn’t even bothered denying it. “Why do you do this?” I asked him. “Why do you keep pushing me away?”
His mouth worked. His jaw tightened. He looked me dead in the eyes. “You wanna know why?” he said. “I can’t even fucking bring you around my family without them all thinking that I stole you from someone. Stupid, fucking Trey. My own mother thinks I did. You think I want them to have another reason to look down on me?” His fists were clenched, making his forearms bulge.
“That’s it?” I said. “Wally, that’s so stupid. Who cares about them? About Trey? I’ll tell all of them—Trey’s a jerk and I broke up with him before you ever touched me.”
“It’s not just about Trey!” he bellowed, out of nowhere surprising both of us. He took a breath, attempting to calm himself. “Listen,” he said. “I’m busy. I can’t do this right now.”
Right now was all we had. I couldn’t believe it. Was he so obsessed with what his family thought of him that he was willing to sacrifice his own happiness? That wasn’t the Wally I knew. There was something else, some other factor here that he wasn’t telling me about. I think I already knew what it was.
“Wally,” I whispered. “I don’t care about your job or whether or not you have money. You made me happy. That’s all I cared about.”
“I can’t…” he started, looking down at his feet. “Kristen… you deserve better than me. I’m not cut out for this, alright? I’m just not.”
I felt like a fool, pleading with him, begging him to see how great we were. “You’re such an idiot,” I bit out. “I keep hoping that you’ll realize that, that you’ll see how stupid you’re being. But you don’t! You hold on to this crazy idea in your head. This self-loathing crap! I’ve held on for too long, Wally. I can’t anymore. I’m better than this.”
“I know,” he said. “I know that you are.” He actually sounded remorseful, so at odds with his words.
He hurt me too much. Always. Like he couldn’t help it. I couldn’t keep doing this. I really did have to let him go. Not just say that I was. I had to actually do it. Frustrated tears were in my eyes, and he couldn’t look at me for long, his guilt eating away at him. I kept hoping that he would say something else, but then a painful realization hit me…
He wasn’t going to. He was going to keep pushing me until I was so far out of his reach, he’d never have me again. Fine. If that’s what he wanted, then fine. “You can’t contact me anymore,” I said. “You can’t come around me. We can’t see each other. This has to be it, Wally. Do you understand that?”
I was trying to tell him, trying to make him see—this was his last chance.
“Yeah,” he said, tears filling his eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“Whatever,” I said and got in my car and drove away.
Chapter 38
I was a mess. A big, blubbery, pathetic mess. Not knowing what else to do, or where to go, I drove an hour to my parent’s house. I didn’t call and when I made it to their old, brick house I didn’t even know if they’d be there. It was Saturday afternoon and they tended to go on these wild excursions now that they were older with no children at home.
I made it to their road sometime after lunch. Their house was the only one on it, way out in the country. It was the house I’d grown up in, the only home I’d ever known until after college. Returning there brought me a little peace. The familiar landscape gave me strength.
As I turned the bend that led to their house, I saw my brother’s car. His two children were playing out in the yard, chasing my parent’s golden retriever around. This was poor timing. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see them, but not while I was like this.
My parents and brother, along with his wife, all eyed me with uncertainty as I stepped out of the car. Only my mother and father approached me. Malcolm merely waved from the front porch. “Aunt Kristen!” I heard his children yelling. I so wasn’t in the mood to entertain them.
“Hey, punkin,” my father said, wrapping an arm around me. As soon as he did, I started crying, full on into his chest. He tensed, mumbling something.
“Oh honey,” my mother said. “Oh, sweetie, come here. Come here, baby.”
Like a weak child, I went to her, not caring that this whole ordeal made me seem immature. Sometimes a girl needed her mother.
Keeping me away from the prying eyes of the rest of my family, she led me around to the back of the house, and brought me into her room. Once we were on her bed, I immediately leaned on her and cried some more. Her arm gave me sweet, loving pats and rubs.
“Shhh…” she said. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”
“Mom,” I finally managed to get out. “This hurts so bad. I hate it. I hate feeling this way.”
“I know,” she said.
She let me cry until I’d regained some of my composure. I wiped my eyes with the back of my hands, taking in deep breaths.
“Tell me what happened, sweetie.”
“Wally,” I said. “Wally happened.”
“Still?” she asked. “Oh, goodness. I guess I didn’t realize how you much you really cared about him.”
“It sucks,” I told her. “I’ve never felt this way about anyone before. Ever. I thought…I just thought…”
“What’s the problem?” she asked me sweetly. “I’ll help any way I can.”
I told her everything that had happened over the last few days. How I’d been feeling about him, how he saw me at the bar and then later showed up at my house. All that he’d said to me then and only a few hours ago. She listened patiently, letting me get everything out.
“And then I came straight here,” I said. “I’m such a mess, Mom. Just one big mess. He makes me crazy. I don’t even feel like me around him. I’m so desperate and needy.”
“Love will do that to you,
” she said. “In fact, sometimes the best loves do. They really get in there—stir things up. Change you.” She paused looking away, as if contemplating whether she wanted to tell me something. “I had a love like that once,” she said. “Before your father.” She smiled. It was sad, not quite reaching her eyes. “That was a long time ago, though.”
“Really?” I said. “Who was it?”
“A boy I met at college. It was the most intense love I’d ever felt.”
“What happened?”
“It just didn’t work out,” she shrugged, as if that was it. The most intense love of her life and it just hadn’t worked out. I bulged my eyes, wanting her to continue and she chuckled softly. “Well, after college we both just wanted different things. After a while, it became this cruel back and forth, neither one of us willing to end it. He wouldn’t bend. He couldn’t see things my way. I tried so hard with him, but he didn’t. So I left.”
“Did he try to win you back?”
“No,” she said. “He never did. I waited and waited. Wasted months. But he never called. He never came back. I know what you’re feeling, sweetie.” She turned, grabbing my hands. “If Wally loves you, if he honestly cares about you, he won’t let anything stand in the way. He’ll do what he has to do. I don’t know what the real issue between the two of you is, but it sounds to me like he’s his own worst enemy. He has some things he needs to work out on his own. You need to let him. But that doesn’t mean you have to wait around for him.”
Tenderly, she brushed some of my hair back from my face, tucking it behind my ear. “Let him,” she repeated. “Stop giving him these pieces of you. He throws them away, and right now, he doesn’t deserve them.”
“But I love him,” I said meekly, looking down at my hands. “How am I supposed to just stop loving him?”
“Time, sweetie,” she said. “Give it time. Either he’ll do right by you, or you’ll let this love go.”
For the rest of the day, I buried my emotions and spent time with my family. It was dark when I left. My house felt empty and quiet after being around them all day. Part of me wished that I could go and stay with them for a few weeks while I was still nursing these wounds.
No. I was stronger than that. I needed to get through this alone. I needed to pick myself up and dust off this destructive love.
Something took me over. It was like the talk with my mother and the sudden realization that Wally and I were probably never going to be together again hit me at once. Not thinking, just moving, I went to my closet. Some of his clothes, t-shirts mostly, hung there. I took them all and stuffed them into a trash bag. I went around my room grabbing anything that reminded me of him and threw it in there too. Movie stubs. Notes. A cheap bracelet he’d given me as a joke from one of those child vending machines.
In my nightstand drawer was a framed picture of us, but I pretended as if I didn’t know it was there, unwilling to part with it. The note he’d left me that morning was still crumbled and sitting on my living room floor. That went in the bag, too. When I’d cleared every room, I sat on my sofa and pulled out my phone.
All of our old text messages waited for me. A history of our relationship. How it started. How it progressed. How we fell hard for each other, but also how we’d ended. I swiped the screen, my finger hovering over the delete button.
Just one more look, I told myself. It wouldn’t help. I knew that, but I wanted to feel him. Just for a second.
I scrolled back months to when we were good, perfect. I relived a conversation we’d had about whether we’d ever be willing to taste shark meat. I read another mild argument about which Batman was better. I preferred Michael Keaton. He liked Christian Bale.
I saw the pieces of him, the words he left behind for me. Miss you, baby. Another, God, you’re so perfect for me. One early on in the relationship, I need to come over tonight. I have to see you. A playful one that said, My girl needs her Wally after I’d told him how bored I was. Pictures we’d sent back and forth to each other. Mostly ones of us together. Sitting on my back porch, him giving me a kiss on the cheek. On my couch. In his room. At Burns. In his crappy car. I shut off my phone and tossed it away.
I might not be able to delete the texts, but the bag was still sitting at my feet. Before I lost my nerve, I grabbed it and walked to my trashcan outside. I ran back up my stairs before I talked myself out of it.
My house was too quiet. I needed the television on to make me feel less alone, but the remote was nowhere to be found. I searched under cushions and throws. I looked under magazines and books. Finally, I got down on my hands and knees to search for it.
It was under my couch, and I was moving to get back up when I saw a reflection of light hit something at the very back, wedged up against the wall.
It was a disc. I knew that disc. My hands couldn’t quite reach it. I stood and moved the couch with a grunt. Along with a few hair ties and dust bunnies, the disc from my skydive stood waiting for me.
It leaned against the wall proudly, as if on display. I picked it up and moved the couch back with a hard nudge of my hip.
Punks’ Skydive the words said, Wally’s mess handwriting. I should throw this away, I thought. I was going to. I really was. But then I remembered what Wally had told me. Besides his and mine there were no other copies. Since I’d destroyed his, this was the last one.
Not letting myself think about it, I walked to my room and straight for my closet. At the very back of it, hidden and discreet was an old shoebox filled with junk. I stuffed the disc inside and vowed to forget that it was even there.
Chapter 39
Three months later…
Time, my mother had said. All I needed was time. Three months wasn’t a huge amount, but it had done what it needed to do. I didn’t think about him constantly. I didn’t see him in everything or everywhere. The everyday hurt and ache had faded weeks ago.
It was more of a dull pain now. A little twinge in my heart each time I happened to think of him. I hadn’t heard a word from him since that day at the hangar. No one had even mentioned him to me.
I was careful, avoiding places and activities that would trigger thoughts of him. That’s what we had to do when our hearts were broken. We had to bury it. We had to take a shovel and dig a hole deep within ourselves. Because if a piece, or even a slither, was allowed to roam free, all of the strength you’d gained could be lost in a fraction of a second.
So that’s what I did. I buried my love for him. I moved on.
I wasn’t seeing other people. There wasn’t any point to it. All of my attention was focused so hard on not loving Wally, that there wasn’t anything left to give anyone else.
The key was to stay busy, to focus on myself. I went for more walks, worked out, and tried to find hobbies. At work, Sheila and I were on the outs, only speaking to each other when we had to. It was strange. I didn’t hold any ill will towards her, but it felt like she had some type of jealous anger with me. I knew that it centered on Wally. Maybe there was more to their little fling then she let on, but I wasn’t about to ask. If there was, I didn’t want to know. She’d answer my questions with short, curt responses. She started calling in sick more. Everything I asked her to do was half-assed.
When I asked her what the problem was, she’d said, “Nothing,” and walked off. Instead of firing her, I was giving her the chance to get over whatever internal dilemma she was having.
My birthday came and went, a small dinner with only my family. I was starting to feel happy again, less empty. I’d made peace with it, and realized that one day he’d just be a man I’d been with. I might see him out and about, and it might sting a little, but there was nothing I could do about that. I thought it was over, done.
But the universe has a way of bringing you back to the people you are meant for.
I was at home doing some serious cleaning. Every room was being scrubbed and dusted top to bottom. I went through all of my junk and was putting it in piles, ready to give it away. I could have had
a garage sale, but I didn’t feel like going through the ordeal of it.
I was going through the coat closet in my living room, pulling boxes down, and searching through the contents when my phone started vibrating in my pocket. Distracted with the old junk, I put the phone to my ear.
“Hello,” I said.
“Kristen,” the voice said.
“Uh…yes. Who’s this?”
“Trey.” He cleared his throat. “Long time, huh?”
Why in the world would he be calling me? “Um, yeah,” I said and went to sit on the couch. “What do you…why…?”
“I know, I know,” he said. “Straight out of the blue. I, uh, talked to Wally yesterday.”
Wally. Hearing his name aloud sent a shockwave to my heart, but I tried to act like it hadn’t bothered me at all. “Oh, yeah? How’s he doing?” I wish I wouldn’t have asked. Knowing wasn’t going to help anything.
“He’s fine,” he rushed out. “Told me you two weren’t seeing each other anymore.”
“Wow,” I said. “That’s been months ago, Trey.”
“Well, we don’t exactly talk all the time. Not like we call and fill each other in on our lives.” He chuckled as if what he’d said had been amusing.
“Okay,” I said. “So that’s what you wanted to talk to me about?”
“What happened?” he asked. “You two seemed serious when I saw you last.”
The only time he’d ever seen us. If he didn’t know why we’d ended, then Wally hadn’t told him. I wasn’t going to either. Trey and I weren’t old friends catching up. There was some motive here.
“It just didn’t work out,” I said. “No big story to tell.”
“That’s what he said,” he chuckled again. He paused, I could hear his mouth opening and closing, the sound of smacking lips pushing through the speaker. “Can I just say something?” Without letting me respond, he continued. “I’m glad it didn’t. I know you must have seen something in him, but hell if I know what it was. I mean, I’m not jealous of him or anything, but my whole life he’s been this way. Taking shit away from me.”
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