by Ali Merci
“Do I?” he asked quietly. “Do I really?”
“What does that even mean?”
“What happened last night?” he asked, drilling his eyes into hers. “You said it went bad.”
He felt Carmen tense, felt her hands about to let go of his, but he grabbed them and held on. She’d warned him about her tendency to pull away from people and then to push them away too.
He had promised her, that day in his truck, to never let go, and this was him living up to that promise. This was Asa holding on even when Carmen was pulling away from him.
“It went bad, Asa,” she said, voice thick and trembling slightly. “It was horrible. I hated it. Is that what you wanted to hear me say?”
“I couldn’t sleep,” he told her, feeling the spark of frustration grow into a fire inside him. “I was so worried for you because I knew how Hunter made you feel at school. And knowing you were about to be sitting at a table with a whole family made up of people like him was driving me out of my mind. Because all that kept running through my head was me being safe at home while you were out there all alone—”
“I wasn’t alone,” Carmen said softly, running her thumb against the back of his palm in a comforting gesture. “I wasn’t alone, Asa. You had nothing to worry about, okay? I’m sorry if I scared you or—”
“I don’t want you to be sorry, Carmen!” Asa snapped, losing his composure, and he watched her flinch, surprise flickering in her eyes at his outburst. “I want you to understand where I’m coming from. Because all I wanted to do last night was wrap you in my arms and never let go. And when I finally do make it here the first thing after breakfast, I find that son of a—” Asa stopped his rant, grinding his teeth together and looking away with an unmistakeable glint of anger in his eyes.
“Is that what this is about?” Carmen mumbled. “Hunter?”
Asa let out a hollow laugh, noticing Carmen wince at the coldness in it. “I’m going to take a few wild guesses here, Carmen, so correct me if I’m wrong, all right?” He whipped his head towards her, mouth set in a grimace. “It was too early for Hunter to be paying you a visit, although why he’d even visit is beyond me. And then there were his clothes which looked wrinkled as heck. My conclusion? He slept in them. See, now all that I can think of is the fact that he stayed over. Am I getting anywhere? Or is my theory just batshit crazy?”
Carmen didn’t say anything at first and just watched him silently.
“Yes,” she finally said. “He stayed over last night.”
“And he was here because he came back with you from the dinner?”
“Yes,” she answered, eyes guarded as they observed Asa.
“So that’s why you don’t want to talk about last night with me?” Asa asked, unable to help the hurt from seeping into his voice. “Because you’d already talked it out with him? Because he was there for you?”
“Asa.” Carmen swallowed, her grip on his hands tightening. “Please. You need to understand. It was too late to call you or—”
“Bullshit,” he cut her off, anger and hurt dissolving into one and spreading throughout his body like wildfire. “I would have been there for you regardless of what time it was, you know that. I’d have run out of the house, jumped into my goddamn truck and made my way to you within a heartbeat. You know that, Carmen.”
He searched her face, her eyes for anything—anything at all. Some sort of clue, something that would give him an inkling of what was going through her mind right then. That goddamn beautiful masterpiece of a mind he’d fallen head over heels for, but a mind that he was beginning to realise he didn’t really know all that well.
And that terrified Asa. Because he’d given her every single inch of him, but she’d only ever allowed him a few stolen glances into her being.
There were times—rare, oddly intimate moments—where Asa found himself comparing Carmen’s existence to that of the moon, the way she was a beacon of light in all the dark places.
And it was ironic, really, that he’d never considered her to be a crescent, just that tiny sliver of her entirety, allowing only a fraction of her to be seen.
They’d been in pure bliss, tucked away in their own little world where they could pepper kisses on each other’s skin while they giggled with the euphoria of young love, where they could talk about binary pairs and how they would have each other no matter what.
But that was a sugar-coated world, tied up in a pretty little bow and now reality was crashing down on them—on him—and Asa was flailing around with no sense of direction.
Another heartstring yanked out.
“Asa.” Carmen broke the silence, her voice shaking now. “Just... Just listen, okay?”
Again, Asa laughed, no traces of humour whatsoever. “I’m always listening, Carmen,” he murmured, pulling his hands away from her grasp. “You just never do the talking.”
“I need him,” she whispered, as if scared to tell Asa that.
“And I need you,” he simply said.
“Okay, okay,” Carmen breathed out, relief evident in her tone and in the smile growing on her face. “That’s good. Because you do have me, okay? You do. Making place for Hunter in my life doesn’t take away the room for you.”
“See, that’s where I’m having trouble understanding things, Carmen.” Asa threw his hands in the air, rising up from his chair and kicking it back. “When did Hunter even come into this? Into us?”
“He doesn’t have to come between us, Asa!” Carmen stood up, too, shooting Asa a look of anguish. “He doesn’t have—”
“Let me ask you something, Carmen. What do you see when it comes to me? What comes to your mind when you think of us? Where do you think we’re going with this?”
“Forever,” the word spilled out of Carmen’s mouth, a freight train with no brakes. Asa noticed the surprise cross her face before she relaxed, as if accepting it. “Forever, Asa,” she told him softly. “That’s all I see with you and I. You can call me crazy if you want. You can try convincing me that this is puppy love or—”
“I won’t try convincing you that because this isn’t some passing cloud,” Asa’s voice didn’t waver, the sincerity ringing through his words and echoing off every syllable as his eyes burned into Carmen’s. “It’s different with us, and the two of us know that. Our perspectives, this kind of intensity—it comes with a certain level of maturity, not age. And I’m in for the long haul, Carmen. You’re a part of my life, okay? Which means that everything about you becomes a part of me too. And Hunter? I can’t see him anywhere in that life.”
“He’s my family, Asa.” Carmen bit her lip, eyes growing watery. “Please.”
“But you said I was your family too.” Asa’s voice broke, every ounce of anger fading away and the raw hurt rising to the surface. “That’s what you said, Carmen. Before you left for that dinner, you kissed me and you told me that I was family to you. You said that. Why would you say something like that to me if you never meant it?” How could Carmen claim that Asa was family and go ahead and welcome with open arms someone who’d broken him in indescribable ways?
A single drop escaped the pool of tears gathered at the corner of Carmen’s eyes, slipping down her cheek before she hastily wiped it away.
It hurt Asa to watch, but right now everything was hurting for him.
“I did mean it,” she said in a thick voice, as if it pained her to get the words out. “I meant every word I’ve ever said to you, Asa. You are family, and I do love you but I love Hunter too. I can’t help that.”
“How can you even say that?” Asa asked, his voice a mere whisper of disbelief. “He’s a monster. Do you know the kind of shit he’s done to people? The hearts he’s broken? The minds he’s messed around with? The way he mercilessly kicks someone below the belt at their most vulnerable point just so that he can see them break?”
Carmen closed her eyes, stumbling back a few steps as if she wanted to un-hear all that Asa just said.
“Things are different now,” she looked at him ple
adingly. “He’s different now—”
“And that’s supposed to change all the damage he’s already inflicted?”
“He’s trying, Asa!” Another tear trailed down her cheek, and he had to look away. “He knows he’s done wrong by me—”
“Done wrong by you?” Asa shot her an incredulous look, eyes hardening. “By you?” He chuckled darkly. “I cannot believe you right now,” he muttered under his breath. “Done wrong by you—”
“Asa, he just needs time—”
“Goddammit, Carmen!” Asa slammed his fist on the table, making the salt and pepper bottles rattle. “You were basically his sibling! No matter what he did to you, there was a part of him that knew this and held back from tormenting you to his fullest capabilities! But you know who got the brunt of it all? Me. Me. He ripped me apart, tore down my defences. God, he was ruthless. Every goddamn time I thought I’d gotten my shit together, every time I believed I’d grown another new layer of thicker skin, he would come along and burn it down to nothing. He made me feel like nothing. And do you know the one thing that has kept me going all these years in school? The fact that once I was done with high school, I was also going to be done with that horrible excuse of a human being. And you... Carmen, I don’t want to be done with you once senior year is over. I don’t want to be done with you when college is over. I don’t think I ever want to be done with you, but Hunter being back in your life—coming back as a sibling nonetheless—that’s not me getting rid of him. That’s him being a part of my life even after I leave this shitty town and all the shitty memories with it.”
“Asa,” Carmen choked out, the tears freely streaming down her face now.
The saddest part was that this was the most Asa had ever seen her react or reveal her genuine emotions. He wondered how much more there was to learn about her.
“Asa, please don’t make me choose,” she pleaded, shaking her head slowly as she tried furiously to stop the tears.
“I won’t do that to you, Carmen.” Asa smiled at her sadly. “I love you, remember?”
Something in Carmen’s expression broke, and for the first time ever, Asa saw a pure kind of vulnerability in her eyes. But it was too late. Too late.
Asa had been standing with that outstretched hand for a little too long now, and it was beginning to hurt. Perhaps it was about time he stopped waiting for her to take it because she didn’t look like she was about to do so anytime soon.
He looked away, his heart hurting as he uttered the next words. “I won’t make you choose,” he paused, letting the words hang in the tensed air between them, “but I need to be able to choose for myself. And a future with Hunter in it is not a life I want.”
“I love you,” Carmen blurted, her words shaking and tripping over each other like the tear tracks on her cheeks that kept colliding into one another. “I love you, Asa. I meant it the first time, I meant it yesterday, I mean it now and I’ll mean it tomorrow. Just…just stay, okay? We—”
“Why, Carmen?” He tilted his head, looking at her helplessly. “Give me a reason to stay. Because you won’t tell me why you want him back in your life all of a sudden. You won’t tell me what really happened at the dinner last night. You won’t tell me what’s wrong—what’s really wrong. You won’t talk about anything when it comes to you. You won’t let me all the way in!”
“It’s not easy!!” she screamed, her expression crumpling and a sob escaping her lips.
“It’s never easy!!” he yelled back, wanting to just reach into his chest and rip his heart out because oh god, it hurt it hurt it hurt.
It hurt too much. And he didn’t want to feel—not anymore.
“It wasn’t easy for me to let you in either, Carmen,” he said in a pained voice, feeling his own eyes prickle. “But I did because of the simple fact that I trusted you and that I love you. I wanted you to know me, to see my world.” His voice cracked towards the end, the rest of his words leaving his mouth in pure anguish. “And all I can think of right now is that you don’t want me to be a part of your world. That you’re not willing to let me know you.”
“It’s not like that, Asa.” She swallowed audibly, running a hand under her eyes messily. “It’s not you, it’s me.”
“Don’t give me that!” Asa retorted, wanting to shove his fist into the wall behind him and watch the pieces fall away as a hole formed over there—much like the one currently growing in the centre of his chest. “Don’t give me that “it’s not you, it’s me” bullshit. You can do better than that.”
“Fine, Asa,” Carmen spat back, her eyes flashing with something that Asa could only compare to a strike of lightening. “You want the truth? The truth was that it was Hunter I needed last night, and he was there.”
Her words were a jagged-edged knife being shoved into his chest—impossible to pull out without taking chunks of his heart with it. And God, was it tearing him apart brutally on the inside.
Asa opened his mouth to say something but had to close it again because there was this lump in his throat and he didn’t know why it was there but it felt like a thousand needles stabbing him, which was making it near impossible for him to speak.
“Wait,” Carmen mumbled, her tone losing its venom and staring at Asa with a frightened look in her eyes. “Wait. That wasn’t—I didn’t mean—that’s not what I meant, Asa. I’m so sorry, that’s not—”
“He broke you,” he told her with a slight tremble in his voice. “He broke you time and time again. He hurt you. He left you. And I was the one who stood by your side, Carmen. I was there to help you pick up the pieces. But he’s the one you turn to when you need someone?”
“He understands, Asa!” Carmen gestured desperately with her hands. “He knows what it’s like with that side of the family. He gets it—”
“—I want to understand too, Carmen!” Asa kicked the chair further away, a frustrated growl leaving his mouth. “I want to know how to be there for you. I want to know what brings you pain, what makes you upset. I want to be that safe place for you to fall into when the going gets rough. I want you—all of you. But if you can’t open up to me, if it’s him you’re going to keep turning to in times of need... Then, Carmen, I—I really don’t get what my role in this relationship is.”
“I just don’t want to lose you,” she said softly, silent tears spilling out the corner of her eyes uncontrollably.
“You’re shutting me out because you don’t want to lose me, but we’re in this position because you won’t let me in, Carmen. Why is that so hard for you to grasp?”
“Please.” She shook her head fervently, the raw fear in her eyes unmistakeable now. A part of her must have figured out how this was going to end, but Asa couldn’t backtrack. It was too little, too late. “I love you.”
“What’s that even supposed to mean anymore?” he asked, voice strained and lifeless now. “You say those three words like it’s an instant remedy. Like it can fix just about anything.”
“I’m saying it because it’s true.” She sniffled, eyes red and puffy, killing Asa a little more on the inside. “I do love you. Is that not enough?”
Asa didn’t respond right away, drawing in a deep breath and letting the air fill that aching, hollow cavity in the middle of his chest, right in the core of his entire being. And for one last time, he let reality punch him in the gut.
“No, Carmen,” he said quietly, the last remaining heartstring snapping into two and shattering whatever hope he’d been clutching onto. “It isn’t enough.”
He saw her recoil, backing away a few steps as if his words had physically knocked her off balance.
“How can you say that to me?” she whispered, looking at him with so much hurt in her eyes. He wanted to scrub, scratch and rip that look out of his memory for good.
“Because you say that you love me but you don’t live up to it.” He looked down at his feet, feeling the lump in his throat grow even more painful. “You say that you love me, but here you are, ready to welcome with open arms the
one person who’d made it his life’s mission to make mine hell.”
“Don’t say that.” She shut her eyes, as if it hurt too much for her to hear him say it. “Don’t say that I don’t mean it when I tell you that I love you.”
“Then prove me wrong, Carmen.” There was a sense of pleading in his tone. “Tell me you’ll let me in on what’s really going on with you.”
Carmen averted her gaze, focusing on the wall next to Asa. “I don’t know.”
I don’t know. I don’t know.
And those three words sealed the deal.
Because Carmen hadn’t said “I need time”. Or “I’m not ready”. She’d said “I don’t know” and those set of three words held another meaning entirely.
“Yeah, ‘I don’t know’ isn’t good enough for me,” he muttered, the fight in him draining away; Asa was done. “You could have asked for time and I’d have handed it to you without blinking an eye, but ‘I don’t know’ tells me you haven’t even considered letting me in and that just means we are always going to crash and burn, Carmen.”
Asa spared her one last glance, committing every single minute detail to memory—those long midnight locks of hair his fingers were going to ache to get tangled in, the stormy eyes his own ones were going to beg to look into, the ivory-toned skin his lips were going to miss caressing, the slender curve of her waist his hands were not going to cradle again.
And then Asa’s feet were carrying him out of the kitchen, every single step he took twisting that jagged blade further into the cavity in his chest.
His fingers wrapped around the doorknob once he’d reached the front door and was just about to open it when he heard footsteps behind him.
“That’s it, then?” Carmen asked bitterly, her voice sounding more broken and lost than ever. “You’re just going to give up on us? Walk out on me? Because you don’t like Hunter?”
“I didn’t storm out when I saw Hunter here, Carmen,” he told her matter-of-factly, no longer having the energy to navigate the swirl of emotions inside him, sticking with the nonchalance instead. “I stayed. I asked you why it was that you suddenly needed him again. I gave you the chance to tell me what was happening, and you didn’t take it. This isn’t just about him—it’s about us. Yeah, it may have started out with me not being happy about seeing him here, but it also hit me how much I don’t really know you.”