Chasing Stars

by Siler, Mercedes

  “Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

  “I got a lot of work to do. Bye, love you.” I end the call and immediately dial her number. Voicemail. Shit. I throw a charcoal pencil. Fucking shit.

  Chapter Forty-three

  Nikki

  Five more missed calls from Ares, two voicemails.

  I don’t want to deal with the heartache. I’ve dodged his calls all week. I delete his voicemails without listening to them so I don’t hear his voice.

  I just want to move on.

  It sucks I have to give up his mother too.

  I get into my car after midnight and I can hardly move my body is in so much pain. My meat is completely tenderized and my bones are exhausted.

  I work my legs slowly to slip off my boots. I roll my bloody socks gently, bending and flexing my toes. Today was my first day working as a go-go for Robert.

  There’s a knock on my window and I nearly jump out of my skin as I look over and see Chrystal, the only dancer I don’t mind so far.

  I roll down my window.

  “Hey,” she says, not nice but not mean either, “good job tonight. Here are some of the leftover tips. Buy yourself a couple gallons of whole milk and some dinner. When you get home, soak your feet in the cold milk. Get some moleskin to put on your heels and toes before work tomorrow. And some Bengay. Don’t be afraid to eat, the bigger your ass the better the tips.” She hands me a stack of bills. “You have pepper spray, right?”

  I nod. “Yeah.”

  “Good. See you tomorrow?”

  “Yeah.”

  She nods and walks away.

  I get all the stuff at a drug store and make my way back home, stopping at Burger King on the way.

  I take my clothes off and manage to pull on some old holey leggings and a big t-shirt. I fill the bathroom sink with the milk and sit on the counter to soak my feet and eat.

  I limp my way to my bed and collapse.

  ✽✽✽

  Kitchen smells enter my dreams and I open my eyes slowly. I’m so sore I can hardly move. I roll myself off the bed and crawl to the bathroom to do the morning bathroom routine and make my way to the kitchen, trying not to limp.

  “You’re a mess.” Natalie’s making breakfast. “Omelet?”

  I sit next to my brother. “Yes, please.”

  “How was your night?”

  “Amazing. Until I was done and had two hours left.” I lay my head on the bar.

  Natalie puts food in front of me with a smile. “You’re going to be late for the bus, mister,” she says to Dexter. “Go get your backpack and go. I want you to walk with Kyle down the street. Go to his house and you can walk with him.”

  He takes a last bite, runs to get his backpack, and takes off.

  Natalie comes and sits. “It was easy with the twins. They always had each other.” She sighs.

  “How is it having twins?” I stand creakily to get coffee.

  “I don’t know. I’ve never had any other experience. They started beating on each other when they were around nine months.” She smiles, sad. “I always feel bad for Ares.”

  “He’s a good kid.” I’m pissed at my treacherous heart. It still loves him so much.

  “I think so too. I like to see him talking to you.”

  I’m tired of all the energy I use to live.

  “Do you know anything about the girl he was seeing before he left?”

  “No, why?” My heart thumps. I’m not ready to lose her yet. I drink my coffee, burning myself. Shit.

  “Why would he not introduce her to me?”

  I shrug, casual. “Maybe he knew he was leaving and didn’t want to make it into anything in case things changed while he was away.” Because that’s what happened.

  She mulls it over. “I still want to meet her.”

  I pat her arm and wash my plate.

  “What does your boyfriend say about you dancing?”

  “What boyfriend?” I frown, heart thumping again.

  Now she raises her eyebrows. “Oh, well, I thought you said something about…”

  My brows knit and now I remember the attempted rape incident and body fluids. That was her son. “Oh. That guy.” I follow her into her study and set up my sewing machine. “I’m not a girlfriend sort of person. Because of my mom,” I admit. “But I guess I’ve had some people.” I never thought too much about that change. “And I guess I can now.”

  She’s looking at me with that face.

  “OMG, I’m a mother and fatherless person! I’ve done the best I could with myself! My moral code has come from my mother’s bipolar Catholicism and my Jewish last name, Persephone, Hip-hop and TV!” I burst, loving her but hating the mother look.

  “What are we going to do with you?” she asks, affectionate.

  Oh my God. “I don’t think I’m that bad.”

  “No. You’re a good girl. But no mother, even an adoptive one, wants to see their favorite girls screw up their hoohaws and make mistakes in the process.” She sits at her desk and looks at me while her computer boots up. “So the guy you were talking about is the guy you’re hung up on?” she asks.

  “Yeah. But I don’t know. I don’t know if I can even be anyone’s girlfriend or wife or mother. I’m damaged. Sometimes I think my mom was probably right. I can’t shake what she’s always said about me.”

  “But now’s your chance to be yourself, who you are. You should leave yourself room to become who you are going to be. I had to do the same for myself. Of course I had two little children and Marc was there to help, and it was him who helped me to see the importance of sorting through all the muck in my thoughts and my heart.”

  “Yeah. I know. That’s what everyone says.”

  She smiles. “I don’t think you have to worry about being a good wife and mother. I think you’ll do fine. You have a lot of love in your heart and that’s all you need. And it’s easy to love your kids.”

  “What if Ares brought someone like me home? Would you be as understanding?” I know dwelling on it is only hurting myself but I have no self-control. I break my own heart by even entertaining the idea of her love and acceptance even if I’ll never have the chance to be anything more to her than her daughter’s messed up best friend now. If that.

  She was right. The words thump in my heart on the beat. She was right she was right she was right.

  “I think if he brought someone like you home, I’d want to be absolutely sure he brought you home for the right reasons. I’d want to make sure he was thinking with the right parts, what with all the boobs and hips and sex. And the same for her. She’d need to know what she was getting into. He’s got that asshole disconnected from life streak and it can get irritating and misunderstood. But if he had someone like you it might be good because you are very connected and very human.” She shrugs, looking at photos on her super huge computer monitor.

  It seemed so genuine. And he seemed so good. But it could have been just the boobs and the hips and the sex. Maybe that’s why we never told anyone. Maybe he realized that he really couldn’t make the wrong choices after a lifetime of making the right ones.

  She was right she was right she was right.

  I go back to my iron. “Were you with Marc while you were married? Your kids have differing opinions.”

  She stops looking at her pictures and looks at me. “They worry about it?”

  “It’s like one of those unsaid things they’re afraid of knowing for real.” I don’t want to offend but I’m intensely curious.

  “Yes, I was married.” She turns back to the computer. “But in all fairness, my relationship with Marc was interrupted by my marriage.”

  “What happened?”

  She sits for a minute, thinking on where to start. “Well,” she begins, “Marc’s mom and dad were apart and he had been living with his dad. His mom got sick so his dad sent him to take care of her. He was thirteen and worldly. He traveled a lot with his dad in construction. I was fifteen and sheltered by my parents. His mother wa
s Nez Perce and his dad was Creole so my stupid friends always made fun of him. But I liked him because he was different and didn’t care what they said about him. I was drawn to him. I liked the way he talked. I knew he was totally in love with me which I thought was great. I was a lot like Persephone, I think,” she smiles, “self-centered and vain.”

  “You?”

  She grins. “He told me he was going to marry me and be the father of my children and I loved it. He had an optimistic view of life, said nice things to me, never said anything mean or hurtful.

  “By the time I got my boobs and was getting a lot of attention from boys, my dad decided me hanging out with Marc was bad for his image and arranged for me to marry Wesley. I fought him every day. I ran away and made a huge fuss. Marc told me to run away with him. His mom let me stay with them sometimes. She was a seamstress. She’d be sitting there, coughing blood into a hankie and keep sewing. She didn’t talk much but Marc would always go over to her when he came home to let her kiss him. I thought that was the sweetest thing.

  “Eventually my parents said if I didn’t comply they would never let me marry anyone. I thought they had power because I was young.

  “In the beginning I tried to make it work, but I was way too spirited to do it for long. Wesley was always so serious and quiet, and nothing I did would ever make him smile or talk to me. It was like being married to a brick wall and I hated him. I yelled and threw things and called him names and refused to do any wife things. For a while he ignored it; then he started drinking before he came home.”

  “What about Marc? What did he say?”

  “He told me I was Wesley’s wife and I should do what was expected of me. His mom died and he moved back with his dad for a while, right before I found out I was pregnant with the twins. He came and saw me at the hospital after they were born.” She shakes her head, tears in her eyes. “It was the worst thing ever to feel so undeserving of his love. I took everything from him. The babies looked like Wesley and I couldn’t have any more children because I hemorrhaged and they gave me a hysterectomy. I barely knew what was happening.

  “When he was eighteen his dad died and he came back to the reservation to live with his aunt, the babies were two or three. He’d come to visit and eventually one thing led to another. He had made up his mind I would eventually leave Wesley and we’d be happily ever after.

  “Ares was always quiet around Marc. I thought it was because he was shy but his dad realized he would ignore him when he was five or six and he didn’t like being ignored. I tried to get my parents to do something, and his parents. His dad talked to him, but Wesley turned them on me, telling them the neighbors had seen Marc hanging around,” she shakes her head again, “which they had.”

  “What happened?”

  “I left for a few days. I stayed with a cousin of mine, an actual whore who had customers all night. Marc was gone again, at school. So I went back to my drunk and angry husband and my babies and when I got back Ares’ ribs were all bruised and he was wheezing and he would walk around holding his arm. He wouldn’t talk to me or look into my eyes. I took him to the hospital and he had two cracked ribs and a hairline fracture in his upper arm.

  “I didn’t tell Marc about it for a long time because I was afraid of what he would do. And what Wesley would do and what would happen to my life. And I was afraid of my parents and what they could do to me. So stupid.” She lets out a disgusted breath.

  She presses her lips together, shaking her head. “I never saw him actually be abusive for sport, it was usually for non-compliance and while he was drunk. He never asked anything of Persephone so she never let him down. He and Ares never got along. He would try to hold him when he was a baby and he’d get so upset when he cried; he’d give him back to me and pick up Persephone. It upset him though because he was his boy. The rift just grew from there.”

  “How old were you?”

  “I was seventeen when they were born.”

  “Like my mom.”

  “I guess it was a good year, huh?” She smiles.

  “So when did you leave?”

  “I finally told Marc what Wesley did to Ares. He walked away from me. I thought it was over and I was devastated. I did what you did and locked myself away to scream and cry. I slept a lot. I stopped fighting. He finally came back about a month later and told me I needed to get my shit together, if not for myself or him, at least for the kids, and I figured he was right.

  “I got help from a shelter to find a job and put money away and get things out piece by piece until I was ready to leave. I told Wesley I was leaving with the kids and I said way too much because I was young and stupid and thought I had to make a point and we started fighting. Little Ares tried to step in and I think Wesley said something to him and Ares spit in his face and he snapped and pounded on him with no mercy. When he finally stopped the boy was a little crumpled body. I thought he was dead. I think Wesley did too. It scared him. He called the emergency services, actually, and rode with him to the hospital and never left his side. I got Persephone and our stuff, and Ares when he was released, and moved out.”

  I wonder if he would still break Ares’ heart for breaking mine or will he call it even in the end?

  “Marc has always treated the twins like they were his. He’s the love of my life. It’s brought me a lot of broken heart pain I let it all happen. That’s what I think is wonderful about you. Something happens to you and you fight and you learn and you build yourself back up. If it wasn’t for Marc, I don’t think I would have been able to leave.”

  Most of the time I feel like I’m trying to keep from drowning.

  It hurts to know that I’m going to have to leave this dream and figure my own stuff out before Ares gets home. It sucks. It breaks my heart that none of it was real. I thought it was. I knew it was. But she was right and the words play over and over in my mind.

  I never deserved all this anyway. It was never mine. A man? A caring family? A safe place? Months ago I was barely hanging on and it hurts. I’ve never been happier than I was thinking I had this.

  But it was never really mine and I told him as much.

  She was right. She was right. She was right.

  “Don’t make regrets.” She comes over and kisses me and walks to her dark room.

  Chapter Forty-four

  Nikki

  I pull my boots off, afraid of finding bloody nubs where my feet used to be. My feet hurt so bad I’m shivering just standing on them, on the verge of collapse. I turn on the bath and get out of my clothes. There are so many bath things to put in the water, I don’t even know where to start. I’ll just pick the purple one.

  My phone rings and I answer without thinking. “Hello?”

  “Nikki! You answered!”

  Damn.

  There’s a stab of pain in my heart as it thumps with betrayal.

  “Hi,” he says, soft and unsure.

  I ache like I knew it would if I heard his voice. “Hi.”

  “I talked to my mom. I’ve been trying to call you ever since.”

  I look at myself in the mirror. My hair is shorter and my face is pained. I let my gaze roam over the curve of my breasts, my hand on the soft swell of my belly, the long lines of my legs. I feel my belly flip-flop at the sound of his voice and my heart thumps in exhilaration. I hate my body for betraying me. I see my face and body in the mirror and I think I’m beautiful and those thoughts are at war with her words and me telling myself she was right so I look away. “So she told you about your sister?” I ask.

  “Yeah. Among other things. Is she okay? You don’t have to tell me details; I just want to know if she’s okay.”

  I close my eyes. “Yeah. She cried the whole way there but she was okay. I met your dad.”

  “I know. I heard. How’d it go?” His voice is tinged with irritation.

  “He was charming. And I know exactly how you’re going to look in twenty years and it’s not bad at all. Whoever catches you will be a very lucky lady.”
I bite my lip and close my eyes tight, trying to hide the pain. “Your mom gave me dinner to go. Best food I ever ate.”

  “I miss my mom’s cooking so much. I’ve gotten so fat since I’ve been here from takeout and energy drinks and pizza.” I can hear him take a breath. “Hey, listen, my mom told me she told you about Emma.”

  I grimace, feeling the hurt and not wanting to. “Yeah. That was a while ago. I’ve moved on.” But my heart hurts like it has been ripped open, blood everywhere.

  “‘Moved on?’ What does that mean?” he asks, edgy.

  “It means I don’t want to hear about it. I hope you’re happy. Congrats.”

  “No, I think you want to hear about it.”

  “I can assure you, I don’t.”

  “Oh my God, Nikki, listen to me! “Emma’s gross! She’s like if you mixed a BMX rider with a goth artist who believes in not being a sellout while living off her trust fund and my pizza. And she’s in love with my roommate’s girlfriend!” he says, heated. “I told my mom she was taking me around showing me where the good coffee and supply shops were. She drew her own conclusions because I don’t care enough about her to have filled my mom in on the details. She’s a total lesbian who is totally hot for my roommate’s German model girlfriend who barely speaks English and looks like she got hit in the mouth with a grenade. She’s in one of my classes. My mom wants a little romance in my life because she doesn’t know I already have it.”

  I’m crying now because I’m so glad but I try to be as silent about it as possible. I’m relieved but I’m sad and it sucks. I want to feel normal emotions.

  “Nikki, did you hear me? Are you there?”

  “Yeah.” I sink my teeth into the fleshy part of my thumb.

  “I’m sorry I haven’t called. Every time I look at your number, all I can think of is how much I wish you were here with me. I don’t want to hear your voice if I can’t touch you too.” There’s a pause. “I messed up. I’m sorry. Did I fuck everything up?”

  I want so badly to tell him I love him and I want to be his but my voice won’t let me put myself out there to be hurt. “We knew we couldn’t do the whole relationship thing. I’m good right now. I’ve been talking to lawyers and stuff about Dex and the house and the debt. I started a new job. Everything’s ok.”