Now and Then

by Brenda Rothert

  “Hey, girl,” Dani said as Emma got into her sleek black Volkswagen.

  “Love the car,” Emma said.

  “Thanks. It was an engagement present from Kyle.”

  “Wow. Maybe you can introduce me to some of his surgeon friends.”

  “You have a fine lawyer boyfriend, Em,” Dani said, rolling her eyes as she pulled out into traffic.

  “Not anymore.” Emma sighed.

  “What happened? Why didn’t you call me?”

  “I just … haven’t wanted to talk about it. We had a big fight, and he said we’re done.”

  “Em,” Dani said, squeezing her hand. “What did you fight about?”

  “He’s lied to me. I can’t trust someone who lies to me.”

  “Cole? That surprises me. What’s he lied about?”

  “Well, sleeping with Layla is the big thing. It’s bothered me from Day One, the way he minimizes her and says it was nothing between them.”

  “Did he specifically deny sleeping with her?” Dani asked.

  “Yes, when I confronted him about it. It was the first time I asked him directly. Usually when I start freaking out about him and Layla, he tells me they went out a few times, and it was nothing.”

  “Maybe it was nothing to him.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s a problem, too,” Emma said. “If sleeping with someone is nothing, he doesn’t respect women, and I’m not okay with that.”

  “But, Em, that was high school, and now it’s almost ten years later for him. A lot’s happened in his life since then. Maybe he means it’s not a big deal now, and there’s nothing wrong with that. I think you’re hung up on something stupid. Sorry if that’s mean, but I do.”

  “No.” Emma sighed with frustration. “It’s not mean. I just don’t know what to do.”

  “So he’s mad because he says it didn’t happen?”

  “Right,” Emma said. “And the lying is worse than him sleeping with her.”

  “How do you know he’s lying?”

  “Because I still remember Layla telling me the day after prom that she lost her virginity to him.”

  “Oh yeah, I remember,” Dani said. “You were really bummed. We ate so many cookies and candy bars that night that I actually threw up.”

  Emma smiled at the memory.

  “Thanks for coming tonight,” she said. “Lane drives me crazy.”

  Dani skillfully snagged a tight downtown parking spot and they went into the crowded bar, where Layla and Lane were waiting, howling with laughter.

  “Dani!” Layla called as they approached. “You look so hot! My God, what a transformation!”

  “Thanks,” Dani said.

  “Where the hell did you get that?” Lane screeched, reaching for Dani’s hand to gawk at her engagement ring. Emma had always found Lane, a very petite platinum blonde, to be overly dramatic.

  “I’m engaged,” Dani said simply, grinning.

  “Engaged?” Layla asked, stunned. “But you’re like 24! Where did you come up with a guy who can afford a rock like that?”

  “Geez, Layla!” Emma said, pulling Dani’s hand away from Lane. “Congratulate her and buy her a drink.”

  “Congratulations,” Layla said, choking a little on the word.

  “Thanks,” Dani said. “Em, I’ll go get us drinks. What’ll you have?”

  “Whatever.” Emma waved. “Thanks.”

  The catty laughs about high school antics from Layla and Lane were enough to make Emma want to get so drunk she thought it was funny, too. But she didn’t want to have a hangover, so she stopped at two and carried on a side conversation with Dani.

  Lane interrupted them, her pink drink sloshing onto the table as she waved it around wildly.

  “You guys!” she yelled. “I ran into Tyler Parkinson the other day at Ikea. He’s still fucking hot, but sadly, married. I took his virginity though, his wife will never have that!”

  “He was always hot,” Dani agreed. “Was he your first?”

  “Yep. Under the bleachers at the stadium.”

  “Probably better than my first time, with Chris Shaefer in his Mom’s minivan,” Dani said, laughing.

  “Eww!” Layla laughed. “Peyton Shaefer’s little brother?”

  Dani nodded, laughing with her.

  “You have no room to talk, Layla!” Lane said. “Remember your first experience -- with John Jeurgens? He jizzed on your purple prom dress and you bitched him out and stormed out of that party! Whose house were we at?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Layla laughed, covering her red face. “I can’t believe I did jerk’em Jeurgens!”

  Emma felt Dani’s glance, but she was unable to look away from her sister. The noise in the crowded bar had faded away, replaced by a vacuum that had sucked the air out of Emma’s lungs.

  “Layla,” she finally managed. “You told me you lost your virginity to Cole.”

  “She wishes!” Lane said, rolling her eyes. Layla shot her a death glare.

  “What?” Lane said, spilling more of her drink as she returned it to the table. “Everyone knew you only did jerk ‘em Jeurgens because Cole rejected you.”

  Layla flipped up her middle finger at Lane and drained her drink.

  “Layla,” Emma insisted. “Why did you say that?”

  “It was so long ago, Em, who knows?”

  “I know!” Lane said, raising her hand in the air obnoxiously. “Because she knew you had the hots for him and she wanted you to feel bad.”

  Emma’s face burned at hearing Layla had known about her crush, even all these years later.

  “Why would you want me to feel bad?” she asked, anger building inside her. Layla shrugged dismissively.

  “I was a bitch back then, Em,” she said.

  “Was?” Dani muttered.

  “Excuse me?” Layla said hotly.

  “I think you heard me,” Dani said, meeting her eyes.

  “Fuck you, Dani! You were a nothing loser then, and you still are.”

  “Layla!” Emma said, grabbing her purse as she jumped up from her seat. “What is your problem?”

  “It’s fine,” Dani said, also rising from her seat. “Let’s go drive home in the new car my surgeon fiancé just bought me and talk about the plans for my wedding in Hawaii. Layla, you stay here and relive your glory days, which have been over for a while now. Then let me know who the nothing loser is.”

  As she and Dani made their way to the front of the bar, part of Emma wanted to look over her shoulder to see if Layla was flying through the air to jump on Dani’s back. Layla wasn’t used to people standing up to her.

  “That was freaking awesome,” she said to Dani as they got in her car.

  “I know! I always wanted to tell her off when we were younger. That felt good!” Dani said.

  “Let’s go back to my place and make cookies and watch movies,” Emma said.

  “Maybe you can call Cole, too,” Dani said softly.

  “Yeah, I should. I want to. I miss him so much, even though it’s only been a few days.”

  “You have to call him, Em. I can just drop you off if you want.”

  “I’ll call him. I still want you to come up, though,” Emma said.

  The thought of hearing his voice made Emma’s heart pound as they drove in silence. He hadn’t lied. Something was up with his sister, but he was right, that had nothing to do with them. Things could go back to the way they were. It was what she wanted more than anything.

  Dani parked in front of Emma’s building, and when they reached the top of the third flight of stairs, Emma drew back with alarm. She reached for Dani’s arm, startled by the sight of a man sitting with his back against the door to her apartment. When she realized it was Cole, she exhaled with relief.

  “Hey,” he said softly. His long legs stretched into the hallway, and Emma’s heart raced at the sight of him. He wore faded jeans, a long-sleeve blue t-shirt that matched his eyes and a frayed Cubs baseball hat.

  “Hi,” she said, unable to contain
a small smile.

  “I’ll see you later, Em,” Dani said, dashing down the stairs. Cole rose from the floor as Emma fished her keys from her purse to unlock the door.

  “Can I come in?” Cole asked. His forlorn eyes melted her heart.

  “Of course,” she said, stepping inside.

  She waited for him to pull her into his arms in the powerful, affectionate way she had grown so fond of. It wouldn’t take more than a kiss for her to invite him to bed. The familiar sight of him was so sweet it melted her anger over their argument. She didn’t need all the answers. She just needed him.

  But Cole paced across the living room nervously, not looking at her.

  “Can we sit?” he asked. Emma walked to her couch and sat down, and Cole sat in front of her on the trunk that served as her coffee table, taking both of her hands in his own.

  “I’m sorry,” she blurted, tears blurring her vision. “I know you didn’t lie about Layla. I’m sorry I doubted you. And your sister … that’s none of my business. I miss you, Cole – you can’t imagine how much.”

  He held her gaze with a serious expression.

  “I miss you, too, Em. So much. I wasn’t looking for something like this to happen right now, but it did, and I … I want you to know I trust you.” He sighed deeply. “Shay--”

  “You don’t have to, baby,” she said, scooting forward to lean her forehead against his. “I do trust you. Tell me when you’re ready.”

  Cole squeezed her hands.

  “I’m ready,” he said. “Let me do this, okay?”

  Emma nodded silently, leaning back.

  “When I was 13 and Shay was 17, she started having problems. We lived in Wisconsin then. She was depressed and then she started hallucinating. It was awful. She would scream and cry and fight my parents when they tried to help her. They tried different doctors, but nothing seemed to help, and she tried to kill herself.”

  Emma clutched his hands as he spoke, feeling a deep sadness for the blond-haired, blue-eyed 13-year-old-boy who had gone through that.

  “It just got worse. She was so paranoid. She was sure the doctors were trying to kill her with the medication, so she would do anything to avoid taking it. When my parents would hold her down and force it into her, she’d make herself throw it up. Our lives were ruled by Shay’s moods, and they were very unpredictable and usually bad. My Mom woke up in the middle of the night once and Shay had a knife to her throat. They tried to cope, but my parents were stressed and worried all the time.”

  His shoulders dropped as he sighed, and Emma could see it was hard for him to talk about this. She wanted to offer words of comfort, but she stopped herself, not wanting to interrupt as Cole allowed her to see such an intimate part of himself.

  “So,” he said, looking up to meet her eyes, “Shay had inpatient and outpatient treatment. There were different diagnoses and different medicines, but nothing helped for more than a couple of weeks. And my Mom – she didn’t want anyone to know. She was so emphatic about it. She didn’t come out and say it, but I know she was embarrassed because she thought Shay’s problems made her look like a bad mother. She lied to the school, told them Shay had to be out because she had a blood disorder.”

  “Cole …” Emma said, squeezing his hands. She remembered the waify blonde she’d seen when the Marlowes had first moved in, and never again after that. Cole’s expression was grim, but he seemed resolved to finish what he needed to say.

  “When we were still in Wisconsin, we were at our next door neighbor’s house one day for a cookout, and my parents had left Shay in her room. They thought she was stable then, but she opened a window and climbed onto the roof and she was up there screaming and acting crazy – completely naked. A lot of our neighbors saw her. My Dad and I went to get her, but she jumped off the roof before we could get there. She was okay, but my Mom decided we were moving then. That’s why we came to Chicago.”

  “What was that like for you?” Emma asked, remembering the way Cole had captured her from first sight. She’d had no idea his family was suffering something so terrible.

  “It was hard,” he said, stroking a thumb across her wrist. “I was angry. I didn’t want to leave my friends. I was going to be the starting quarterback on the varsity football team, which was a pretty big deal for a sophomore. But there was no choice, so I tried to make the best of it.”

  “What happened to Shay?” Emma asked. “She was with you when you guys moved in, and your Mom said she went back to college.”

  “Right after we moved here, my Mom took her to a hospital in New York and finally got the right diagnosis. Shay’s schizophrenic.”

  Emma gasped unconsciously.

  “You mean, split personalities?” she asked.

  “No, but that’s what a lot of people think schizophrenia is.”

  “Sorry,” Emma said, embarrassed.

  “Don’t be sorry, Em. Ask me whatever you want.”

  “Did she ever get better?”

  “Yes and no,” Cole said, a cloud crossing his face. “The doctors got her pretty stabilized, but it never lasted. We’d bring her home and she’d be a mess again. She tried to kill herself a couple times and my Mom was just about out of her mind trying to protect Shay from herself.”

  Emma’s chest felt heavy as she wondered where Shay was. She didn’t want to ask, because she had a terrible feeling Cole had been keeping secrets about Shay because she’d committed suicide. She cringed at the way she had treated him for lying to her.

  “She didn’t kill herself,” Cole said softly, seeming to know what Emma was thinking. “She lives at an inpatient facility in Indianapolis.”

  “Do you see her?”

  Cole dropped his eyes, sighing heavily.

  “No. I haven’t seen her for a few years. It’s hard, you know? It wouldn’t take a shrink to see I have a lot of resentment toward her.”

  “Why?” Emma asked softly. Cole gave her a puzzled look.

  “Can’t you see why?” he asked.

  “Sure, but sometimes it feels good to say it out loud.”

  Cole gave her a tiny smile.

  “Everything’s always been about her,” he said bitterly. “My parents have fought over her, cried over her, spent a fortune on her. And she doesn’t even care. Do you know my parents missed the playoff game my senior year because they were at the hospital with her? She’d stolen her roommate’s medication stash and overdosed on it. And my Mom missed my college graduation because Shay had a violent episode at the hospital. There was always this thing hanging over us, even when she was away at the hospital. Always wondering, every time the phone rang, if she’d killed herself. I tried so hard to be the best, to make my parents happy and proud, but it was fucking impossible.”

  “Cole, I’m so sorry,” Emma said, pushing down the tears that threatened to fall. “I wish I could have been there for you then, more than you know.”

  “I’ve kept it all to myself for such a long time, and I don’t want it to poison me, Em. I don’t even talk to my parents about it. These past few days I’ve been so pissed at my Mom because the lies she created about my sister caused tension between you and me. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Shay sooner, but I didn’t know where things were going with us, and--”

  “Don’t apologize,” Emma said firmly, reaching up to his cheek. “I’m so sorry for doubting you. It was more about doubting myself, anyway. I keep waiting for you to realize you can have any woman you want. In some weird way, I think I wanted to sabotage things to save myself from heartbreak down the road.”

  “Em,” Cole said, his expression serious as he met her eyes, “You have to stop thinking that way. You’re not a teenager with a crush on an older boy anymore. You’re a beautiful, smart, incredible woman. I’m the lucky one, not you.”

  Emma smiled, flattered but unconvinced by his words.

  “Cole--” she started.

  “I love you,” he said, reaching his hands around her hips. “I’m in love with you, Em, a
nd I want us to be together.”

  She stared at him, too stunned to speak. It took a few seconds for his words to sink in, but when they did, she couldn’t keep her tears from falling. Every time she considered speaking, she stopped, replaying the sound of his words in her head instead.

  Cole looked at her imploringly, leaning forward and causing Emma to catch a hint of his scent.

  “Be with me,” he said. “I’ll never let you down. Just give me a chance to make you happy, baby. If you don’t love me now, I’ll do whatever--”

  “I do love you!” Emma blurted loudly. “Of course I love you! And of course I want to be with you.”

  Cole’s muscles relaxed as he sighed, looking relieved.

  “You weren’t sure?” she asked, confused. “How could you ever wonder if I’d want to be with you? I’m hopelessly in love with you, Cole.”

  “How could you ever wonder if I’d want to be with you?” he challenged playfully. “I’m hopelessly in love back.”

  Emma laughed loudly, overwhelmed with happiness. She reached for Cole, but he tightened his hold on her waist, keeping her back.

  “Listen,” he said earnestly, “We need to tell our families. I don’t want to hide it anymore. I’ll tell Layla with you if you want.”

  Emma sighed heavily.

  “You’re right. We do need to tell them. I think it’d be best if I tell Layla when we’re alone. We’re going out to dinner Friday night, I’ll tell her then. Hopefully she won’t beat my ass in a crowded restaurant.”

  Cole laughed, pulling her close in a hug.

  “It’ll be fine,” he said. “She knows I’m not interested in her. Why would she care if I’m interested in you?”

  “Oh, Cole,” Emma said, resting her head against his shoulder. “In a lot of ways, it all started with you. Layla always wanted me to know I couldn’t have anything she wanted. She knew about my crush on you and that’s why she lied to me about sleeping with you.”

  “But that was when you were teenagers,” he said, pressing his nose into her hair. “You’re adults now, and I’m sure she has the maturity to be happy you’re happy.”

  Emma smiled to herself, knowing Layla wouldn’t be happy. She wasn’t sure how bad her sister’s reaction would be, and she wasn’t looking forward to finding out.