Anything More Than Now (Sutton College #2)

by Rebecca Paula

  He brushes his hand over my head and leans forward so our foreheads touch. “It’s okay,” he says with a soft laugh. It’s rich, like the whiskey-depth to his eyes. I drown in both. “Let’s go inside and settle you in for the night.”

  “Thank you for driving me. And for inviting me. I’m not nice sometimes and I’m sorry.”

  Noah chuckles again. “You’re more honest when you’re waking up than when you’re drunk, Rea. I should let you fall asleep with me more often.”

  Luckily, I’m able to keep my mouth shut from admitting how much I’d like that. He jumps out before I can say anything else I wish I could keep to myself, and opens my door, helping me down. I slump against him, struck by how cold it is outside. There’s still snow on the ground, brilliant white starlight pierces the endless inky sky above.

  He grabs my bag and throws his arm around me, tucking me close to his chest. We walk in the dark to the back of a building. I close my eyes and rest against his chest as he fishes for keys in his pocket and jangles open the lock.

  I can’t see much because Noah navigates us through the dark, never turning on a light so I can get my bearings. He opens another door and helps me to a bed, covering me up as I crawl onto the mattress that smells of him, strangely of home, of something that’ll be there when I wake up. My face hits the soft pillow and I drift off to sleep again.

  Noah

  I’m glad Reagan fell asleep for most of the ride, it was easier to hide how nervous I was. I wish I knew why I invited her to come home with me for the weekend. I know she doesn’t have anyone to really share her time off with—she never talks about her family, never books a trip home. I’ve known this all the years I’ve known her but have done nothing. And now….

  I’m not even religious, but the idea of her having to spend the long Easter weekend by herself in the empty bungalow bothered me. And I had to get home, not only to see my father, but to take care of the rest of my family.

  The past I keep quiet.

  All the more reason to be nervous about keeping Reagan close while I come home where my secrets are buried or haunting me. At least the Noah at Sutton has a reputation I chose. Here in Splendid, Montana? Well, my past isn’t so hidden.

  I help Reagan into my bed at the rear of the general store my dad runs, peeling back the covers for her as she collapses onto my mattress. I sit on the edge and brush back her hair, fighting the urge to lean down and kiss her forehead, to tell her that for now, everything will be okay. I’m not an idiot, I get that’s she’s freaked out about graduation. I’m freaked out I’m never going to see that day, never mind what I’m going to do for the rest of my life if I do get to walk across that stage. I’m not my mother’s son, definitely not meant to make the ordinary beautiful.

  I don’t know what it means that Reagan decided to come with me for the weekend. We’re close to falling over that ledge like we experienced during our kiss in the library. That was whole and want and desire. That was the both of us finally exposing ourselves entirely without hiding, and I crave that abandon I felt during those few minutes. That was jumping out of a plane, not knowing if you had a parachute. It was reckless. It was everything.

  I gently pull off her glasses and set them on the stack of worn books I use as a bedside table. I find a pen over on my desk and write a short note telling her to text if she needs me, then slip out the door into the store, turning the corner to head upstairs where my dad lives now that he sold the family ranch.

  The door is cracked opened when I reach the top of the stairs, the TV blaring. The light from the ancient set flickers on and off in the small living-dining room-kitchen space he’s made for himself. Guilt stabs me in the gut. It always does when I see this is what my dad lives like now because of me. How different it all would be if we hadn’t been in that accident. How different it’d be if I wasn’t such an asshole for a son.

  He’s asleep, his head lolled to the side in a recliner I swear is older than him. My mom had reupholstered it not long before she died and I think I’ll have to bury him with it. I find the remote and click off the TV. The apartment goes black except for the digital clock above the stove. Our dog, Auggie, stretches his arthritic bones and wobbles up to his feet, slowly making his way toward me. I bend down and nuzzle his head as my dad stirs.

  “You’re home?” my dad asks through the dark.

  “Just got in.” I pat Auggie one more time before standing. I flick on the light in the kitchen so we can see each other. “Why don’t you head to bed?”

  “Did she come with you? Reagan, I mean.” He groans as he pulls himself out of the chair and shuffles into the kitchen, filling up a glass of water for himself. The sink is full of dirty dishes, the air is heavy with dust and the smell of leather.

  I nod, reaching above the top cabinet where he stashes his cigarettes. We’ve both quit, supposedly. I light one and crack open the fragile window above the sink, leaning against the counter.

  “You’re not going to bed?”

  I exhale, shaking my head. I don’t have words for what I need to do next. Each time it gets worse, each time it rips my heart out.

  “I tried asking Phil to stop serving her, tried to get someone to help, but it doesn’t matter. Jane came into the store last week and told me she’s drinking anything—mouthwash even. It’s bad, Noah.”

  He steps closer and pats my back. “I’ll make breakfast for you and Reagan in the morning. You do what you gotta do, son.”

  My dad flicks off the light, shuffles into his bedroom, and shuts the door. Auggie comes to sit next to me while I finish my cigarette in the dark, left alone with the ghosts that haunt me.

  *

  Splendid is a small town, nestled between national parks, a place where tourists get gas and food before moving on. The rest of us who are stuck here aren’t so lucky.

  I was married at sixteen, in and out of juvie, stealing cars and skipping school and punching anything or anyone who got in my way. My brother was the golden child, but then again, he stayed out of trouble and was set to go to college. My parents were hardworking and determined to keep me out of jail, but I didn’t make it easy.

  For a while, I just didn’t care. And when I had to marry Isla, I hated everything and everyone. I hated that there was absolutely nothing for me in Splendid. I resented being stuck, more so when everyone who didn’t want to give up on me eventually did. Noah Burke was a lost cause. I think I still am. It’s hard to define something that doesn’t exist anymore.

  I pull into the bar’s parking lot. The fluorescent Open sign flickers on and off. The red building leans to the left, snow weighing down the single story roof. The few small windows are fogged up. No one is here, no one except the regulars.

  I’ve repeated this scene more than I’d like to admit.

  I take a deep breath and get out of the truck, steeling myself for another scene, another moment where my stomach eats my heart. I push through the front door, nod to Phil the bartender, and scan the bar for Isla. A few men huddle over the worn bar, clutching their drinks as they try to stay upright on their stools. They make crude jokes to each other, fixated on the infomercial on the TV wedged into the dusty corner of the room.

  An elk head hangs on the opposite wall with some faded pictures, too far gone to see who they had been. It doesn’t matter anyway. The fluorescent lights flicker overhead as I search the few booths along the back wall. The last time I was here, she was with a few townie meth heads, half-passed out while they argued what to do with her. Tonight, her hand dangles over the side of the wooden booth, a few bracelets threatening to slip off her thin hands. I ignore the eyes on me as I walk over to where Isla is slumped over, a half-empty bottle of cheap vodka and an empty glass with melting ice on the table for one.

  Possessiveness stirs ugly in my belly. I never loved Isla, but to see her like this, to know I’m in Portland and she’s stuck in Splendid drinking herself to death, makes me mad and sad…and a whole mess of feelings I don’t have words for. Every
thing is delicate between us. It has to be after what happened. I constantly walk the line between what-if and maybe. I constantly wish it had been me who died in the accident.

  I sink to my haunches and run my fingers over the row of bracelets. They jingle like wind chimes to the sound of her shallow breath passing between her pale chapped lips. “Isla, it’s time to go home,” I say.

  She doesn’t answer, but I don’t expect her to. I crawl awkwardly into the booth and collect her things, then lift her in my arms. Isla is almost weightless—a skeleton in loose-fitting clothes. Her cheekbones have always been sharp, but now they’re blades on a thinning face, her eyes sunken, her once deep olive complexion yellowed.

  She slumps in my arms as I turn for the exit.

  “Next time, water it down or something, Phil. Stop being an asshole.”

  He shrugs, darting his eyes away from me in guilt. “She’s a paying customer.”

  “Do you see her?” I snap. “Not for much longer.” I regret it as soon as I say it. I guess that’s why I rush out the door instead of waiting for his answer, afraid to hear that I’m the asshole, that I’m the one who’s made her into what she’s become, that I broke her.

  Our futures died on the side of the road that day, but only one of us has managed to find a way to pretend we could survive the pain of it.

  *

  The truck warms up and I pull out as she softly cries in the corner of the cab. She won’t sit up, won’t talk to me. It’s the same every time, it’s our pathetic routine.

  Twenty minutes later, I pull up to her parents’ trailer at the reservation. It’s falling apart, the front door broken and ajar. They have a generator to warm it during the winter and I’ve offered every year to help out, to get her into rehab again, to find them a new place, but they want nothing to do with me.

  As soon as my headlights swing over the trailer, Bear starts his deep bark from inside. Unlike Auggie, this dog never was a fan of me. No one here is. The snow and gravel crunch underfoot as I carry her up the steps, skipping over the last one that’s rotten out.

  “What the fuck are you doing here?” her mother shouts from the recliner in the small living room. Some crime procedural is on TV, filling the room with a little light. A nearly empty beer bottle whizzes past me and smashes in the faux-wood paneling by the kitchen. The light above the sinks blinks, and I catch the shadow of Isla’s father rise out of the corner of my eye from his spot on the couch.

  I keep my head down and my mouth shut, and bring their daughter to her room, ignoring the sinking feeling that they don’t even ask about her. This is life with Isla now. She sneaks away or gets picked up by whoever. She’s an addict. And they’ve given up on trying to help her. They’ve all but buried her, judging by her empty room.

  In high school, this room was sacred. This room is where I had her, where I stripped her bare and we learned what it was to have sex. I can’t say we ever found love, but we found something stronger that brought us together.

  The lilac paint has faded, the ceiling has a leak that’s stained the corner near her closet. The rug has been stripped out to remove the smell of years of alcohol and vomit. Anything with a door has been removed, even her bookcase. There’s nothing for Isla but a mattress on the plywood floor now, the cold leaking through the cracked window.

  I lay her down and gather the blankets thrown around the room and bundle her up as she trembles, sobbing. I kneel down, wishing I could be a million miles away from this wreckage. In some ways, this is worse than the accident. At least I didn’t see that coming. This, this has been years in the making. It’s slow and painful to watch someone die at their own hand while you’re forced to stand by watch.

  “Go to sleep.” My voice borders on exhaustion and stress, a fine thread ready to snap. I want to scream at her to fight, I want to punch pretty much everything in my path, I want to apologize and for her to believe me that I want to bring back what we lost. But I can’t. So I stay quiet until her wiry fingers grasp my shirt. I bend, focused on how completely changed she’s become. A ghost isn’t the right word. She’s revenant, my own demon, a shadow of what I used to be.

  “I lost her too,” Isla slurs out.

  Those words wash over me and I’m left reeling, too distracted to stop and think, to act and maybe get my head out of my ass and wipe away her tears. I do nothing.

  I certainly see nothing when I step out of her room and close the door, only for her father’s fist to connect with my face.

  “You’ve killed our baby girl,” he yells. He shoves me against the wall and strikes me again, his wife joining in from behind. “You’ve ruined our lives. You killed them all.”

  I take it.

  I take every punch until I stumble out of the house and drive home, my face bloody and my left eye swollen shut.

  It’s all true anyway, me and these shadows of mine.

  Reagan

  It’s my superpower to be fine waking up in strange places. I’ve learned to sleep when and where I can. So it’s not the fact that I wake up in a strange room that startles me, but rather the sight of a bloodied Noah slumped against the wall, still wearing yesterday’s clothes.

  Instinctively, I want to throw my shoe at his face, to wake him up and even things out between us. The banter helps keep things from turning too serious. At least that’s what I keep telling myself. I keep thinking that maybe if we just stay as we were, if he stays Beau’s asshole friend, then my life won’t change. But it is changing and I can’t ignore that. I can’t when I’m waking up to Noah like this and my chest opens and some strange part of me I never knew existed wants to take care of him.

  “I walked into the door,” he grumbles, stretching out his legs and rolling his neck.

  I clutch the blankets around me, turn to my side, and nod. “Of course.”

  “And then I was attacked by a grizzly.”

  “Too bad he didn’t finish the job.” I can’t help it, the smile that spreads across his lips swells inside me and before I know it, I’m smiling too.

  The early morning sun filters through the plaid window curtain, filtering and bouncing off the wooden slat walls. The room is plain, furnished with the bed and desk, and more books than I’d expect.

  “You sleep okay?” he asks.

  I’m glad he’s talking because when it gets quiet between us, I think. I think that maybe I should get up and clean up his face, find him a fresh pair of clothes, and then kiss him until our mouths go numb.

  “Fine.” Before I can add any more to the stirring conversation, the room’s door flies open to a dog who limps along and licks Noah. The animal’s belly is rotund, his legs stiff, and his muzzle gray. With each wag of his tail, I can only imagine a young puppy with his russet fur and deep brown eyes.

  The dog makes his way to me next. I pull back from the edge of the bed, not sure what to do. Honestly, I’m not much of a pet person. Cecily is one thing. Cecily is a rabbit. I’ve had more than one dog turn on me, more than one try to bite me as I skipped fences and searched for a place to sleep for the night.

  “Auggie just wants to say hi,” Noah says, standing up. He stretches, walking up behind the dog, who is resting his face on the edge of the mattress, waiting for me to respond.

  My hand falters.

  “He’s fourteen, Rea. Auggie could only gum you to death if he decided to attack.” Noah pats his hand over the dog’s head and grins down at me.

  I don’t like that the black eye and bruised skin fits him. I don’t like the thought of a rougher Noah. I prefer the one who’s all bark and no bite. Much like Auggie.

  I pat the dog’s head a few times, hoping it’ll be enough to get him away from me. Instead, Auggie nuzzles closer and licks a wet strip up my face. It’s not pleasant, but it’s not exactly horrible, not when I hear myself giggle. That only eggs him on more and before I realize it, I’m rolling around bed, fighting off an arthritic dog in the middle of a giggle fit. Me. Reagan Landry. Giggling.

  I don’t know w
ho I am, but I’m not a girl who giggles. I’m not someone who rolls around in bed with a dog while a guy she may or may not really like watches over with this look that slays.

  “Ready for breakfast?” Noah asks.

  I continue to stare up at the ceiling as Auggie fumbles down to the floor. I swear the room is spinning as I slowly float into the reality that I slept in Noah’s bed, that I’m at his house, that we’re spending the weekend together. But before I can slip any further into that freak-out, a radio upstairs blares “Tiny Dancer.”

  “My dad plays it every morning like my mom used to.” Noah glances out the doorway.

  That sentence seems so small for something I’m guessing is a bigger story. I keep my mouth shut though and get up, following him out, surprised to find that I was sleeping in the back of a small general store.

  Light soaks in from large bay windows at the front of the store, the corners of each pane muddy with the buildup of dust. A small counter with a register sits over to the left. Everything about the small, cluttered aisles and low ceilings speak to a store that belongs back in the Great Depression. It doesn’t fit Noah at all, but then again, I’m discovering nothing really does.

  “When the snow starts melting and more Glacier opens up to visitors, it can get pretty busy here. In the meantime, it’s quiet.” He reaches out and gently holds my hand as he leads me upstairs.

  I don’t let go until the door opens and I spot a man in the kitchen with a ceramic mixing bowl in one hand. Auggie nudges past me and waddles into the middle of the small apartment and stretches out on the circular braided rug. Like downstairs, everything is brown—the wooden slat walls, the floors, even the old recliner. All except for the blue-and-green rug Auggie has claimed as his own with three slow circles and an ungraceful plop to the ground.

  Noah’s father turns around with a whisk in his hand, exhaustion straining his dark eyes. He doesn’t blink twice at Noah’s face, but he does smile as he looks toward me. He walks forward, his free hand outstretched. I spot his worn work boots, the soles uneven and the toe of each boot stained black. His jeans are wrinkled and his plaid button-down is tucked in, revealing a giant buckle on his belt that implies he must have been a rodeo star in another life.