by Sasha Hibbs
“Enough,” Mom said, standing up from the barstool. “Go to your room and don’t come downstairs unless you can talk civilly to me. I am your mother and you will respect me—”
“Kind of hard to take you serious when you’re drunk half the time,” I said, cutting her off.
Mom opened her mouth to speak, but the heated look on her face soon turned to one of hurt. She closed her lips and sat back down.
“Just go to your room,” she whispered in a defeated tone.
I ran upstairs to my bedroom and slammed the door so hard it rattled the pictures on my wall. I knew I hurt her, but she hurt me too. I wanted to lash out at her and my dad for making me feel like a prisoner. I was a good daughter. I bought into their belief that the worth of a person was determined by their credit score, having a mortgage, and being a member of the Country Club. I had a life plan for as long as I could remember, but in reflection, I knew now it was my parents’ plan. Not mine. I would excel in high school. Excel in college. Join corporate America or align myself with a husband whose pockets were lined with money from corporate America.
I had ridden that train without complaint until Mickey Costello derailed me. We collided in the most unexpected way. Through him, I felt like I was seeing for the first time. There was so much more to life than pretty things. With his family, there was warmth. There was a sense of togetherness that could persevere during the hard times. There was love that transcended gated communities and elegant brunches at the Country Club.
I was finished riding my parents’ train. They could cut me off for the rest of my life. I didn’t care. I made my mind up. Once I turned eighteen, I was going to face the world not on my own, but with Mickey. I didn’t need their money. I didn’t want their money. I only wanted Mickey.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
April 13
It’s hard not seeing you. I’m so happy you’re sticking it out in Mr. Romano’s class. I know how hard that is for you, but he’s a good teacher and I know how great a student you are … when you choose to be. I’m glad Sean is out of the hospital. I only hope that Daniel and Sean can find a way to move forward. My parents and I are … working through things. It’s hard. They mean well, they are just overprotective and I’m their only child. We’ve only got six weeks to wait this out and then it won’t matter what they want. We’ll both be eighteen. You’ve got a fight coming up this Friday. Be safe. I don’t want to find out you’ve been hurt or I might have to break out of my prison and come kiss away the bruises.
Your girl
I slid the letter I wrote the night before into Mickey’s locker. It was hard to follow the rigid schedule my parents designed to punish me, but it wouldn’t matter much longer. I loved them. Truly, I did. But my anger flared every time I thought about how they disregarded Mickey as being anything but trouble. That wasn’t the kind of person he was, but regardless of how much I tried to convince them, it only served to set their resolve to keep us apart even more.
I walked through the school exit toward my bus when a black Audi caught my attention from the corner of my eye. I stopped in my tracks as the driver emerged. It couldn’t be… Wearing sunglasses, Jay waved me over. I glanced over at the school bus. Students were still loading and I had roughly five minutes before it left, so I chanced walking over.
“I’ve tried your cell phone, and after five days of no responses, I thought I’d try to catch you here,” Jay said. I couldn’t see his eyes, but he looked nervous, fidgety.
“I’m glad to see you. I only have a few minutes before the bus leaves so—”
“I figured your parents took away your phone, but they took your car too?”
“Yep.”
“Let me drive you home. Surely they won’t get too mad at you for letting me do that.”
I hesitated for a few seconds, chewing on the inside of my jaw. I was going to roll the dice. They didn’t have a problem with Jay. His parents’ money was enough to overshadow the fact that he’d lied right along with me.
“Sure,” I said, sliding down into his car.
Once he pulled out onto the main road, he removed his sunglasses. Ugly blue bruises surrounded the edges of his eyes.
“Jay,” I choked out. “What happened to you?” A sick feeling snaked through me.
“I wanted to come see you, Autumn. I’m leaving to go live with my aunt in Delaware.”
“When?”
“I’m leaving in the morning,” he said.
“Jay, who did this to you?” I asked again, softly brushing my fingertips against the swelling and bruising that went from his temple down to his cheekbones.
He gave a sad laugh. “My dad.”
“I’m so sorry, Jay,” I said, my stomach turning at the thought of what Jay endured to acquire the injuries.
“Don’t be sorry for me,” Jay said, his voice growing distant. “I gave the police my statement … I identified the guys on my football team who did that to Sean.”
He didn’t have to say any more. I could see everything unfold before me. Jay told his parents the truth. His dad beat him up. Jay told the police the truth. Jay was being disowned. It killed me inside. Sean was physically branded. In the end, Jay would wear a symmetrical emotional scar from his parents.
“You did the right thing.”
“Did I?” Jay said bitterly. “I realized my parents were going to find out one way or another. I guess we’ll never know if I would’ve done the right thing for the right reasons. But it doesn’t matter now. My parents are letting me stay the night and my aunt agreed to take me in until I can finish school. My parents are letting me keep my car, I guess as severance pay for pretending to be the son they wanted for seventeen years.”
I was at a complete loss for words. Jay told me his parents would kick him out, but I don’t think I completely believed him. He was their son. I couldn’t wrap my head around such hatred outweighing the fact that Jay was their flesh and blood.
“Sean’s out of the hospital,” I said. A sad smile formed at his lips and it tore at my heart. I wanted to scream and scream for the both of them.
“I hope he’s … okay.”
“Can’t you stay here? You’re almost eighteen. You could get a job and finish school, find a small apartment—”
“There’s nothing left for me here.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “There’s me and there’s … Sean.”
“I deserve what I got, Autumn. I don’t deserve him, though. Even if he could forgive me for not protecting him, I’ll never forgive myself.” Tears welled up in his eyes.
“You’re being too hard on yourself, Jay. You were scared.”
“It doesn’t matter now. I only wanted to catch you before I left. I wanted to say good-bye.”
We were nearing my house.
“Pull over here,” I said, pointing to the curb where the bus would’ve stopped.
“I also wanted to make sure you were okay,” Jay said, putting the gear into park.
“I’m not allowed to see Mickey, but it won’t matter soon. I’m graduating in six weeks and will be eighteen. They can’t keep me a prisoner forever.”
“Excuse me? What are you talking about?” Jay said, turning sideways with an incredulous look.
“You heard me,” I said, somewhat confused at his change in demeanor.
“What exactly are you planning to do? Move out of your parents’ house? You and Mickey going to get an apartment? Move in with his mom? Because if he’s fighting in illegal boxing to help support his own family, do you think they can afford another mouth?”
I hadn’t really thought past turning eighteen. I just wanted out from underneath my parents’ rule so I could be with Mickey. “I’ll get a job. Go to college. I don’t know. It’ll work out somehow,” I said.
“Keep telling yourself that, Autumn,” Jay said, turning back around in his seat.
“We love each other, Jay. We’ll figure something out.”
“You think love can pay your rent? You
r car insurance? Your cell phone bill?”
“I don’t know! But I’m not giving up on him. We’ll make it work, find a way. Not everything is about money.” He was putting me on the defense. He sounded just like my parents, and it was making me angry.
“I wish you the best. Please take care of yourself, but remember one thing, Autumn,” he said as I got out of the car. “Everything is about money.”
Chapter Thirty
Jay’s words haunted me. I was so blinded by what I felt for Mickey that my mind had never once thought about the logistics of our situation. Would we live with his mom? Would Cecelia even let me? She’d always been nice to me, but manners toward someone and actually living with them were two different things. Could I work and go to college at the same time? I wouldn’t be the first person to do it. I started thinking about what bills and utilities cost. I had no clue. I’d never had to pay for anything in my life. I didn’t even know what my cell phone cost my parents. Or my car insurance. The list was endless. To date, I was the valedictorian. I was expecting full tuition scholarships to roll in any day. I could go to WVU. It was only an hour away. I could learn to live with less. I would do anything to be with Mickey. I would prove Jay wrong. I would prove all of them wrong.
****
Thursday morning, as soon as I got to school, I checked my locker, hoping for a letter from Mickey. As I turned the combination lock, my heart raced with each click. At the last number, I popped it open and held my breath. I let out a long sigh of relief at the folded note that had been stuffed in my locker. There was ten minutes left before the first bell rang. I quickly unfolded it.
April 14
I wrote this in a hurry. I’ve been going to class, but we’ll have to agree to disagree on the teacher. And, I like the idea of you coming to kiss away my bruises, but I have a better idea. Have Mary pick you up after school tomorrow.
You won’t be disappointed.
And yes, you ARE my girl.
I had an image in my mind of what Mickey looked and felt like while writing the letter. It brought a smile to my face. The days were hard apart, but receiving letters from him was bridging the gap. I obsessed over the neat penmanship, the way his cursive looped like calligraphy. I loved everything about him. The thought of receiving a new letter made the time apart more bearable. I was managing in all my classes while counting down the weeks until graduation. My heart raced at what Mickey had planned for tomorrow. It would be Friday. He’d have a fight that night. He wanted Mary to take me home. What for?
****
Things were still strained with my parents, but thankfully they were fine with Mary picking me up after school on Friday. It felt like an eternity before the final bell rang. Once it did, I jetted out the door. Mary was parked in the faculty parking lot. I slid down into her Buick and snapped my seatbelt in place.
“Thanks for picking me up, Mary,” I said, grinning from ear to ear. I felt so giddy it was hard to contain my excitement. My smile melted away as my happiness was met with a cynical glare.
With a sharply raised eyebrow she said, “I have to swing by my house and pick up my bowling gear. It will take me about fifteen minutes to get changed into my league clothes and grab my stuff. I have to pass your house on the way to the bowling alley.” She put the car into gear and began driving down the road. “Let me make something perfectly clear. I do not want to know a thing about what you do in the fifteen minutes I need to get ready, so I strongly suggest you keep things to yourself. I will not, under any circumstances, be dishonest with your parents.”
“So, does that mean Mick—”
“Not a word!” Mary said, cutting me off.
“Gotcha,” I confirmed.
There were so many things I knew about Mary. I knew she had been our housekeeper for as long as I could remember. She was an excellent cook. She had a keen sense of things and a knack for being able to see right through me. I knew she preferred white canvas tennis shoes with knee-high hose. I knew she had hair that fell below her bottom only because I watched her twist it up once. She always wore it in a tight bun. But as we pulled onto her road, it occurred to me there were so many things that I didn’t know about her on a personal level. Until she mentioned it, I had no idea she was in a bowling league. While I knew what part of town she lived in, I had never been in her house. Come to think of it, I had never been in her car. This was a woman who loved me despite my faults. The selfish person I had always been, sat in her car, realizing I never took the time to get to know who she was beyond our housekeeper.
After Mary slipped into her tiny white house, I leaned over to unbuckle my seatbelt. As I did, I heard my door open. I tilted my head and met Mickey’s gaze.
“There’s my girl,” Mickey said, reaching down to pull me out of Mary’s car.
I gripped his toned forearms as I stood to my full height. Touching him calmed my anxieties. I needed to take full advantage of the time we were stealing because I knew these moments were going to be few and far between. I wanted to freeze this moment and memorize the lines of his face, the jut of his chin, the small dimples that formed at the corners of his lips when he smiled.
“I’m so glad you’re going to class. I know how hard that is for you. I’m sorry about my dad overreacting. They just don’t understand. They want me to live in an elitist bubble my entire life—”
Mickey encircled my waist with his strong hands and drew me in close against him. His fingers grazed the small of my back as he lowered his head and kissed me. There was something urgent in his kiss, something he was trying to communicate. There was a feeling of desperation and longing in his touch, the way his lips brushed across mine. This was leading up to an intense moment, I could feel it build and build until I thought the wave of it would break against me. When he finally pulled away he gazed at me with a look of insecurity and gravity. Worry started to trail though me.
“What’s wrong, Mickey?”
He took a step back and shoved a hand through his thick, tousled hair. He glanced back and forth between me and the horizon. He opened his mouth to speak, and then shut it. I didn’t know how to help him. He grabbed both of my hands in his. He shook his head and seemed to gather his wits or courage, and then began to speak fervently.
“I’ve thought about you night and day since last week. I can’t stop thinking about Sean, what happened to him. Autumn, my dad died young. Life is too short. I don’t know what tomorrow holds, but I’ll wait for you. Always. I want you to understand that I’ve felt something for you much longer than you have me. And this weekend has put things in perspective for me. I want to make sure you understand what you’re getting into with me.”
“Mickey”—I removed my hands from his and cupped his face—“I want to be with you. I don’t care about anything else. I only want you.”
I watched the anxiety melt from his face.
“I heard what you said to me at the hospital. It’s been hard for me to think of anything else. But I want to make sure you understand I don’t have a trust fund. I have a family I have to take care of. I’ll always be responsible for them. I’m scared you might want things I can’t give you. Life is hard. It will always be hard, and I wonder if you can adjust to that.”
“I’m ready for whatever the future holds for us,” I said.
He gently broke away from me and pulled a small box out of his pocket. My heart beat wildly against my chest and I felt my eyes grow big and my head go dizzy. My knees were weak. What was happening?
He gently flipped the lid back and held the contents out for me to see.
“Mickey … is that what I think it is?” I barely heard myself say.
“We’re too young, Autumn, but I want you to take this ring and let it stand for a promise to each other that soon it will mean more,” he said, gently prying the thin gold and diamond studded ring out of the box. He held up my shaky hand and slid it down my ring finger. “It fits perfectly.”
“It’s beautiful,” I heard myself say in a breath
y whisper. The ring certainly wasn’t the most elegant I’d ever seen, but I knew what it cost Mickey and my heart trembled. I had a rush of emotions. A tsunami of apprehension mixed with love crashed against me. I felt like Mickey would interpret my silence as shock and to some degree he would’ve been right. But roots of anxiety, hope, and despair took hold and started to grow. It became a living thing and something I thought I had fantasized about for so long was now made real. And I didn’t know how I felt about that.
“You’re mine, Autumn. You’ll always be mine and I belong to you,” he said. I barely registered him grabbing me in a hug.
I heard him whisper words against my ear, words I’d hoped to hear reciprocated since I’d spoken them, and yet I felt a dark cloud hover over both of us as we clung to each other.
“I love you, Autumn.”
Chapter Thirty-One
My parents and I went through another mechanical weekend together. We had dinner at the Country Club Friday night once my dad got home from work. We passed Saturday in tension-filled silence. Went to church on Sunday and had brunch at the Country Club after. It was such an old routine. I was so sick of us passing our lives on a schedule that held no surprises.
I hid Mickey’s ring in my bedroom where I stashed my letters from him. My parents would kill me if they thought for one second we were still in contact. In between our strict regimen, my mind kept going back to Friday with Mickey in front of Mary’s house. I didn’t know how to filter through and process my feelings. There were moments of elation and equal moments of panic. I wanted time to pass so we might finally be free of my parents’ rules and I also wanted time to stand still for fear the perfect house I built in my mind for me and Mickey would come crumbling down. I didn’t know how to feel. I felt betrayed by myself. I had no one to talk to about what I was going through.
