Senior year, we were studying for winter finals when my peculiar moods progressed from bad to worse. I was twenty-one years old and on the verge of something awful. Ryan was draped across our couch, his long legs resting in Lauren’s lap. That’s how intertwined they were. Lauren’s flaming red hair fell all around her, and her pale vanilla hands were tickling his arm. Black-rimmed glasses framed her blue eyes.
Snow had fallen the night before, and the windows revealed a coat of white covering the street. Most everyone we knew was hunkered down for the day. Brian, Ryan’s teammate, came bolting through the doorway without knocking. The beefy linebacker was out of breath and at the mercy of his tears.
Oliver James is dead.
How could this be? Oliver and I had gone on a few dates! Finally, someone who had made me laugh! The disbelief made it impossible for me to react. Ryan jumped up from the sofa, leaving Lauren and her fiery hair to sink into the dull, lifeless beige. I thought he was coming for me. He went to Brian instead.
“He’s dead,” Brian repeated, reaching for the refrigerator, the dining room table, anything to stabilize him as he told us this shocking news. Oliver was a gifted tight end. He was young, healthy, and in his prime. “He killed himself,” said Brian. “He fucking hanged himself. The guys found him.”
My heart began to race at an unusual pace that signified bad stuff to come. The news alone was alarming and disturbing. The thought of Ollie gone sent me into a panic.
Lauren folded into Ryan, who had returned to the couch and scooped her in his lap, and it’s not as though Lauren was petite or small. She was medium build—not skinny but not fat. And when she curled herself in Ryan’s grasp, he rested his head on hers, and the two of them just bawled. No one could believe it. No one had seen it coming.
I watched them, aching for the comfort that was rightfully mine, that I thought I deserved.
Already I knew my insides were beginning to seep out. I was broken over the loss of someone so young, someone I had grown to like, but my sense had shifted from grieving to danger mode. Though this was likely the most terrifying threat, it had not been the first time I had fought off frightening thoughts. I was having an acute reaction that sabotaged me wholly. Fear had injected itself into my veins.
Ideas raced through my brain at an uncontrollable pace. One in particular crept up on me and hovered in my mental desk drawer for the days and weeks that followed Ollie’s death. Lauren, Ryan, and the others thought I had stopped eating and almost flunked my finals because I was distraught over what Oliver had done. They attributed my melancholy and disinterest in the usual parties and happy hours to stress. My parents thought that, coupled with being on the cusp of graduating and entering the real world, I was poised for the perfect storm. I knew better. Something infinitely worse had taken over and locked me in a personal prison. A sinister question almost wrecked me: What if I were to do what Ollie did?
Lauren was not about to abandon her roommate. She was the one who passed up sleeping beside Ryan, instead, choosing to curl around me until the shaking stopped and I fell asleep. It was her voice that coaxed me out of bed, convinced me to get dressed, and made it so I got to my exams. She gave up a lot for me.
And I thanked her by stealing the one thing, the one person, it would destroy her to lose.
So yes, it is her face that comes to me, and it comes to me often. Eyes that once sympathized with my struggles and made it so that taking a step each day was possible, a smile that told me she cared.
But that face changed over time, replaced with madness.
“Do you think I’m ready to see her?” I ask Jeannie, before changing my mind. “No, don’t tell me. I already know the answer.” She asks me what that answer is. “I don’t think anyone is fully prepared for a confrontation this big. Seventeen years is a long time, and what I did, well, facing Lauren could be a big part of my healing.”
Jeannie nods her head in agreement: “The interaction might assuage some of your guilt. And guilt is anger turned inward. You’ve held on to it for a long, long time. This could be a painful and rewarding lesson for you.”
I think about things and it feels doable, though Lauren’s face reappears again, as if she’s taken residency over Jeannie’s head, just past the desk and by the window. In her stare she is asking me all kinds of questions. Accusations that may sound confusing to someone else but that make complete sense to me. I feel defenseless and exposed. My nerves begin to sense the real danger ahead. I am traversing the darts she is throwing, shielding my face with my hands.
Jeannie interrupts Lauren’s attack: “What do you think was going on at the time that made it possible for you to go after Ryan? Understanding those actions will help you . . .”
“Jeannie, there’s no way that telling Lauren I had lower than low self-esteem, and took whatever I could get from anyone who would pay attention, will lessen her anger or help her forgive me.” I exhale, and loudly. “Maybe I’m not ready for this.”
“What stops you?”
My eyes rest on hers before I speak. My fingernails find my mouth. “I know I’ve been heading on the right track. This just makes me think there are too many things to uncover, and they all revolve around Ryan and Lauren. They always do. I know he loves me. I do. He’s the most loyal, honest man in the state . . . But what I did, to the two of them . . . It’s much worse than what you think. It’s much worse than bedding my best friend’s boyfriend.”
Most people would ask, “What could be worse than that?” Not Jeannie. She asks, “Abby, what’s going on here?”
I stand up from my favorite spot because my body is hot with fire. I need to stretch my legs and arms. I’ve seen ugly parts of me, but this one is the ugliest. Telling Jeannie can only help me defend myself from Lauren’s wrath. The words don’t come out of me as much as they slowly seep from a hidden reserve. And when I’m done, Jeannie nods her head and doesn’t judge.
My voice comes out in a quaver: “I was selfish and cruel. I played God, thinking I knew what was best for my two friends. I kept secrets. You’re right, though. This is something I need to face. As scary as it feels, this showdown, the aftermath, it has to free me. Maybe it will fix my marriage, maybe it won’t, but it’s something I have to do. I don’t see any other way.”
“Well, then, it’s settled. I’ll clear Lauren Sheppard’s visit.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
LAUREN
All I can think about on my way to Cold Creek is that Abby hadn’t told Ryan. It is racing through my brain in spiraling repetition, and I can’t shut it down. I can’t press stop. I am helpless in a loop that drowns out the sounds of NPR and a woman talking about problems with Obamacare.
She didn’t tell him.
I have called ahead of time to secure a spot on Abby’s visitor list. Yesterday’s storm brought in a front of colder weather, and the trees are noticeably bare. The bowed stems are bare and crooked, their jagged fingers branch into the bright sky.
Seeing Ryan was not how I’d pictured it. When he said my name, I was dragged back in time, feeling the whisper of his breath running up my neck. It was his fingers touching me again, leaving no part of me unexplored. At first I thought our college love would become worn and tired like that of all the other couples. It never happened to us. Even after years of his chapped lips on mine, I could never get enough of Ryan touching me. I had it. I had it all. It’s hard to shush the voice in my head that echoes his words: So why’d you have to leave? Why’d you have to ruin it?
I don’t know what I’m about to say to my friend Abby. For years I shouted words to her down shooting falls. The language of recrimination would hook on to the pluming cascades and gush into the earth below. The discharge would satisfy me for a time. It’s not that I hadn’t known that Abby had a crush on Ryan. He had that kindness about him. He always knew the right things to say. “Abby, that color looks good on you. Abby, come with us to Beech for the weekend. It’ll be fun.”
The three of us shared a lo
t at Davidson. So when I reminisced about college days, there was very little to remember without feeling cheated. The memory of the two of them stripped most of the good away. Some slipped through the current that flowed inside of me: Abby singing at the top of her lungs in the shower, Abby playing April Fool’s jokes on our friends, Abby reading to me from a study guide before an exam because I forgot to pick up a new supply of contact lenses and lost my glasses.
Ryan and I never submitted to Abby’s tantrums and pessimism. Crabby Abby. That’s not to say we weren’t sympathetic and aware of her fragility. By treating her as the adult she almost was, we thought we were giving her the skills she needed to grow up. Just like the rest of us.
She is waiting for me in the solarium. It is a brightly lit room enclosed in glass with long-range views from all angles. She is curled up on a cream-colored sofa with her legs tucked underneath. How I wish for clouds up above, something to refract the sun’s glow from our faces. Every blemish and flaw is captured in the light. We are bare and exposed and unable to hide what we know is about to brim to the surface.
I don’t bend over to greet her. There are no phony hugs to bridge the depth and distance of the betrayal. I notice at once that her hair has grown long and the bangs that once framed her forehead now brush against her face, revealing a softer look. Gone are the pounds of makeup she used to bury herself in, leaving a noticeable weightlessness. Her whole aura has transformed. But I know Abby better than anyone. Beneath the new facade, she is a mess inside. I can see it in her posture, how the worry cracks her eyes open. She’s not sure if she should smile or grit her teeth.
I fling my coat on the chair beside her and take a seat on the other side of the couch. There are residents and guests milling around the campus. Trees sway, birds squawk, but in our secluded bubble there is silence. My eyes fix on her so she has trouble turning away. I won’t make that mistake again.
Hers immediately brim with tears. “Lauren . . .”
It is jarring to see her after all these years. How sad for us that we will never experience a nostalgia-laced reunion. In a hushed voice, she asks if she can begin. I nod my head. I haven’t prepared a speech, and I can’t pluck the paragraphs from the falls. Seeing her makes me seethe inside, and it feels awful to kick her when she’s down.
“My counselor and I discussed your visit,” she begins, her hands knotted together, and her words flat and rehearsed. “There were dozens of layers to peel. I’m ready for this. It’s something I have to face and work through.
“The first few months were the worst. I saw you at every turn. I couldn’t move forward because you were always there pulling me back. The suspense, the doubts . . .” The wistful look in her eyes halts her words. She tries to find the strength to continue in the folds of her fingers but gives up, finding my eyes again. “We were so not grounded. He was waiting for you with a heavy heart. I was waiting for you to cut through mine.”
For years, I had imagined saying three words to her. Three words that would never undo the damage but would hold her accountable for what she’d done. I straighten my back and beat her first with my stare and then with my words. “How could you?”
She doesn’t back down. Maybe it is some form of self-punishment. She’s controlled when she asks, “Which part?” while everything else about her appears to crumble. I notice her fingernails are chewed to the quick. I let the pity wash over me until it emerges as rage.
Her lower lip trembles and she is half-crying, half-pleading. “I didn’t plan for that night to happen. You were gone. He was alone. God, he was distraught. None of us could reach you.” Her throat sounds clogged with regret.
“We drank . . .” she pushes on. “I’d never seen him so torn up inside . . . It was like we were on equal ground . . . Does that make sense? It’s not an excuse, but if you can see where I was coming from . . . Why I would do such a thing. I never got the attention you got. Not just from someone like Ryan. Anyone. The one guy I started to like killed himself!” Then she buries her face inside her hands before flapping them in the air.
“What I did was horrible,” she says, her shoulders softening with remorse. The shaking subsides, replaced with defeat, and I can tell the withheld secret has been torturous for her. Her sobs collide into each other. “Imagine how awful I had to feel about myself to do that to my best friend. I wasn’t thinking about that at the time. Ryan was paying attention to me. Someone was paying attention to me! There wasn’t any way I could stop myself.”
She reaches for the tissue box beside her and blows her nose into the feathery white. She is distraught, but she keeps on talking: “I didn’t like myself back then. I don’t like talking about that person. It was the last thing I shared with my counselors. You can’t possibly imagine the circus that has taken residence in my head. It’s much deeper than betrayal.”
I was friends with Abby for a reason. When others questioned me about our kinship, I said that I overlooked her faults because I knew how to find her strengths. Seeing her unravel now is tough to watch. I hover between reaching for her hand that has the Kleenex fisted in a ball, and slapping her.
And then I remember how much we meant to each other. How we laughed at the same stupid jokes and got what others could never understand. Abby never pretended to be someone she wasn’t. She had a great sense of humor. She didn’t require effort or excuses. When I needed her, she was the first one there. Even though her life was an encyclopedia of chaos, open for all to see, I missed having a friend like that. It is this insight that reaches down my throat and pulls out these words: “I can forgive you for that night.”
She is quiet, not sure how to trust what I’m saying, and I continue: “I can understand why it happened . . . the weaknesses in both of you. But I will never understand the other betrayal.”
She begins to cry, and my compassion is eating away at the tougher, useless feelings.
I was in Uganda shooting the Murchison Falls when the first message reached my cell. It was over a week old, and I was so shaken up that I dropped my phone into the water. It took three days to secure tickets, find my passport, and get to the States via South Africa, New York, and eventually Charlotte.
How could I have known that one month into my journey Ryan’s father would go to sleep and not wake up? They called it a heart attack. Blockages and carotid arteries aside, I knew better: the muscle was weakened by years without his wife. Living without someone you love. That’s a broken heart.
I should have left a message at his dad’s house. I should have kept calling until someone answered the phone, though, at the time, it seemed more important that I get to him. He had to feel my arms across the miles. He had to know I would have done anything to get to him.
I arrived at his parents’ house, fatigued and unshowered. Standing in front of the old colonial, the summer sun beating against my back, I had thought long and hard about the journey I had taken and decided that I wouldn’t go back: the program, the traveling, the waterfalls—all would have to wait. Ryan could come with me, or I could shoot falls in the United States. Somehow we would make it work. I already had a ring, so we would be together forever.
I quietly let myself in.
What greeted me was this: Abby and Ryan having sex on the family room couch. I was standing in the doorway, wearing the same clothes I’d traveled in for seventy-two hours. My hair was a mess, my eyes puffy from crying, and my best friend was on top of my boyfriend.
It was the back of his head. I could tell by the skin on the nape of his neck. He was thrust against the sofa and I blinked. No, this can’t be. I could have easily tiptoed out of there unnoticed by the two of them. Except I felt like I was going to be sick. My feet were frozen to the floor. Abby looked up and our eyes locked.
She didn’t stop. She didn’t get up. Were my eyes playing tricks on me? Opening and closing them again, I reached for my glasses, though they couldn’t help, not when I already had my contacts in. Abby was still glaring at me, her expression telling me what w
ords could not. I ran out the door without bothering to close it. I ran and ran and ran with what little strength I had left in my body, eventually escaping to my mom and dad’s house on Beech.
For two people who could always sense each other’s presence, I was shattered that Ryan had no idea of what had just happened. The promise of forever dissipated at the snap of a finger.
“You saw me there,” I whisper, holding back the emotion that had gripped me for years.
Regret spills down her cheeks while her body hunches downward. She is racked with defeat when she mouths, “I know.”
“Why didn’t you stop?” I cry out. “Why didn’t you tell him?”
She wrestles with this. She cowers. Her cheeks explode in red. “I was scared! I was scared I’d lose him!”
“You didn’t have him, Abby! You let him believe I didn’t love him, that I handed him over to you!”
“You could have done something,” she shot back. “You had every opportunity to contact him, to tell him you were there. Do you know what your silence did to him?”
My remorse turns me inward. I can’t face her or the accusation, so I focus my attention toward the stretch of open field behind her head. The velvety grass blankets the earth, and soon it will be covered in powdery white. The shuffling seasons never bothered me before, the winter’s frost, spring’s renewal, the blistering heat of summer, the shades of fall. Human temperament is much harder to follow.
“Lauren,” she says, with her arms reaching for me, “I’m so sorry I hurt you. I was wrong. So wrong. Please find it in your heart to forgive me. I’m begging you . . .”
I don’t know what I had expected. A fight? Denial? Abby’s culpability was something new, something I hadn’t prepared for. Did she expect me to her embrace her? “Do you realize what would’ve happened if you had told him?”
Where We Fall: A Novel Page 18
