I look down.
“I’m not trying to be mean, I promise. I just…that’s how they are. They’ll never blame anyone but you, even if it was partly their fault.”
She stays quiet for a moment before finishing. “My parents and I should have taken better care of her. She needed us, and we weren’t there. So she went to you.”
I should be offended, mad even, but I’m not. Just a little hurt. She’s right. I know what she means. She’s not trying to blame me. But she saw how crazy Valerie and I could be sometimes. Our relationship was toxic because we grew up with toxic families.
I nod. “I should probably get going then.”
She nods too. “And just so it’s clear, Carlos. I don’t blame you for my sister’s death. I don’t blame you at all. No one deserves to live with that kind of guilt. I know we should have…done better for her, but what happened was an accident. We couldn’t have prevented it.”
I nod one more time and leave. Maybe that’s what she tells herself so she can sleep at night, but I know it’s not the truth. Valerie died because of me. And instead of getting a little bit of closure today from her parents’ forgiveness, I truly accept that now.
The drive home is a giant blur. I clear my throat to get rid of the lump in my throat, and I blink the tears away.
I hate myself so much I can’t even comprehend it right now. The images of Valerie’s mom’s face and her dad’s…won’t leave me. They’re seared into my memory forever along with this pain of seeing how much they’re still hurting because of me.
About thirty minutes after I leave, Miranda texts me that she’s sorry. I throw the phone to the passenger seat. I should have known this was a bad idea. Of course Valerie’s parents still hate me.
They’ll always hate me. So I’ll never be able to move on. There’s no forgiveness in store for me. Just more regret.
I should have stayed away the first time I met them, about six months after I started dating Valerie. They caught us at her house way past when I should have been there. Not that I was allowed to be there.
They never liked me. I could tell they didn’t think I was good enough for their daughter.
They were right. I should have stayed away. I pound the steering wheel with my fist at the thought of that.
I can’t shake these feelings off of me. Before, the tides of regret and guilt came and went, and I could get past them, at least temporarily.
But this time, the regret and guilt don’t leave me. They haunt me constantly.
I stop seeing life pass me by. My eyes see, but I don’t really take in anything around me. Not the changing trees around me as spring begins or each passing day. I don’t do things like watch TV anymore. I stop running. I work as many hours as I possibly can so I don’t have to be home alone to think.
Because I don’t want to think. I just want to numb myself to the pain.
When I finally do get home from work, I can’t sleep. Not anymore. I toss and turn with nightmares, or I just lay there.
That night runs in my head over and over, like a movie that I can’t turn off. Our last night together.
The party. The drinks. The fight. The chase. Valerie dead.
Valerie’s dead body, her blood smeared inside her car instead of inside her body. And nothing I could do. Valerie in that black body bag and me worrying about how she’ll be able to breathe in there.
She won’t, a voice tells me.
It’s these kind of thoughts that make me get out of bed so fast one night I’m at the balcony before I know it, breathing hard with my shoulders and head over the rail, trying to catch my breath but not able to at all. I stay there for a while, the thought of the distance between my apartment’s balcony and the cement parking lot finally calming me.
Ten
I say yes when Marcos invites me to a party we both know will get too crazy. Because I need a distraction, and this is what I know will work.
So I get dressed and drive over there. It’s not far from my apartment. It’s at a house I’ve never been to, but I know the neighborhood. It’s already packed with cars when I get there, and I can hear the music before I even get to the party.
I don’t say no when Marcos gives me a drink. And then another. And then another. It’s been a while since I had a drink so I’m hazy and on the couch in no time.
And I finally feel better. Oh, so much better. I can finally let go of everything, if only for a while. So I drink some more, letting myself escape reality and finally talk to people. Talk to a girl.
I don’t know her, and I don’t want to know her. Not in any way more than one.
She’s leading me into a bedroom, and I’m falling back onto the bed. She’s taking off her shirt and then mine. And I forget everything.
I wake up with a pounding headache at about seven in the morning. I only know that because I find my phone under the bed. It has 2% battery.
“Crap,” I say. I have to get home. I’m lucky today is my day off. I’ll need it to recover from last night. I look for my clothes. They’re on the floor.
I look at the bed. She’s still there, asleep, her black hair sprawled all over the top of her pillow. I don’t even remember what she looks like. Nor do I want to.
I quietly finish putting on my clothes. My shoes are next. I check to make sure my phone is in my pocket, and I walk downstairs. There’s a handful of people asleep down here, but most of the cars are gone when I head outside.
I try to close my eyes as I walk to my car. The sun is already bright and shining, and it’s only making my headache worse. I had way too much to drink last night.
I sigh as I unlock my car and get in. I sit for a second. I should have known better than to get drunk and sleep with some random girl. I should have known better. I pull at my hair again.
I hardly remember what last night felt like, only that it felt good to forget. But now everything is back, and it’s worse. It’s like I’m sinking lower and lower, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. Even when I try to make it better, I’m getting closer to the black hole that is eating me alive.
A couple of weeks later, it’s my day off again, but this time I’m not getting drunk at a party with some random girl.
Instead, I’m leaving the movie theater at the mall. The movie had at least proven to be a good distraction from everything, for a couple of hours anyway. I’m on my own, which is how I prefer to be all the time now.
I haven’t hung out with Marcos anymore, even though he had invited me to another party. Not worth it.
I’m walking past the mall cafeteria when I see her, and I almost run into a lady and her kid because of it.
Ariana.
My ex. We didn’t leave off on very good terms, and it’s completely my fault. I did her wrong.
She’s in line about to order. She’s staring at the menu above her, fidgeting as she decides what she wants to eat.
I look around her. She’s on her own. I find myself walking over to her. My curiosity gets the best of me. I have to get a closer look at her and see how she’s been. She was the lucky one. She was smart enough to get away from me before I caused any real damage to her.
Besides what I did to her brother.
“Ariana,” I say more to myself than to her. But then I realize I’ve gotten way too close because she’s turning towards me. I think it’s more of a reflex than anything else. She sees me and realizes who I am.
Her breath catches for a second, and she quickly glances around before her eyes settle back on me. Her mouth is open, and her eyes are wide like a deer in headlights. Then she seems to compose herself and relax a little, maybe seeing I’m not here to cause any trouble.
“How’ve you been?” I ask. I almost want to smile. She looks healthier. She’s gained a little bit of weight, but she’s not overweight at all or anything. She looks good. Happy.
“Fine and you?” she asks. That’s when she takes a small step back, and I have no idea why. The smile that was about to form on my face disapp
ears, and I feel a pit in the bottom of my stomach. I know what she sees me as. The guy who hurt her. More importantly, the guy who hurt her brother.
“I’ve been thinking a lot about you and what I would say to you since…” I begin to say. It’s like I can’t even think right now. “And now that you’re here in front of me, I honestly don’t know what to say.”
I look at the ground and put my hands in my pockets.
“How is…everything?” she says a second later, and I finally look at her again.
I shrug. How I am doesn’t matter right now. There’s something else I want to ask her. “Do you regret…everything?” I look her in the eye as I ask, hoping for a straight answer.
Instead, I see her struggle to form the words to her response. I think I can guess what she’s trying to say. Maybe she’s trying to be nice. That’s Ariana. But she doesn’t have to try to lie to me. I know her too well for that.
“I thought so,” I mumble. “I know I’m not worth crap.”
“No,” Ariana says. “I mean, you—you’ve gone through a lot. Neither of us were ready. We both did stupid things.”
I nod. I should have never come up to her. That was stupid.
“We just weren’t right for each other.” She’s right about that. We weren’t. Just like everything else in my life. “The way things ended, I just wish—”
I wonder what she’s gonna say next, but someone interrupts us. Some guy about our age.
“You okay?” this guy asks her. I can tell right away that he must be Ariana’s boyfriend. He’s already staring me down. Please, I want to say.
Ariana says something and tries to step around him.
“What do you want?” her boyfriend asks me.
I give a small but sarcastic laugh and turn around to leave. Time to get out of here. But this guy makes the mistake of grabbing my shoulder as I’m trying to walk away.
“Lucas, no—” Ariana says.
“Get your hand off of me,” I warn him. This guy Lucas may be taller, but I know I can take him. I get in his face. Already, my breathing is faster, and I clench my teeth.
Then Ariana’s brother is there. Jimmy. I glance at him. He’s way taller than the last time I saw him. “Hey, what’s going on?”
That’s when I notice that his voice is the only sound in the cafeteria. I look around for a second. Everyone is stopped, staring.
No, I don’t need this. I can’t risk going back to jail. I take a small step back, and Jimmy steps in between us at the same time, separating us further.
“Come on, man,” he says to Ariana’s boyfriend. His back is to me. “Let’s go.”
I get one last look at Ariana before turning around and walking away. Another chance to say I’m sorry, to fix part of my past, and it’s gone.
Eleven
I can’t stop thinking about what happened at the mall with Ariana. I think about it the next day while I’m at work as I’m putting orders together.
I just can’t believe how so much has gone wrong in my life. I got a crummy family. My dad’s the only one who even remotely cares about anything besides himself. You can’t say that much about my mom, or even my brother. I can’t remember the last time I saw him. Maybe Christmas a few years ago. He doesn’t even come around for the holidays anymore, much less my birthday or anything like that.
My birthday’s coming up in a few weeks. The anniversary of Valerie’s death won’t be long after that. I wonder who I’ll spend my birthday with. Probably my dad. We can go out to eat, I guess.
Nothing much to celebrate. You’re supposed to celebrate another year of life, of health. But I don’t have much more than that to be happy about.
No one else to celebrate with. I remember how Valerie and I celebrated my last birthday.
We ditched school. Her parents had taken away her car keys because she was failing classes and had gotten in trouble at school for skipping.
But we didn’t care. I got to school, and she went up to the parking lot to meet me instead of going to first period. We went to breakfast at our favorite spot in town. Everyone went there for homemade-style biscuits in the morning, but by the time we got there, the morning rush was over, and it was just us and an elderly couple on the other side of the tiny diner-style restaurant.
Valerie kept staring at them, putting away the pen and purple journal she carried around all the time but never let me see. “You think that’ll be us one day?” She looked at me with a smile, waiting to see what I would say.
I had looked back at them myself. The guy looked more asleep than awake, and so the woman was mostly talking to herself and nagging at him to eat something.
“God, I hope not,” I’d said, and I wasn’t surprised when she hit me lightly on the shoulder.
“You’re horrible,” she said.
I remember just looking at her, wondering what it would be like to grow old with Valerie. To get married and have kids. And become an elderly couple. I would have killed for that chance, even if I’d never admit it.
I knew one day we’d just fall into place and not fight about dumb stuff anymore. We were teenagers, and a lot of the people our age were the same way. Breaking up one day and making up the next. But we always found our way back to each other. So I knew it had to last.
After breakfast, we went to my house, and we stayed in my room all day. We watched bad movies and laughed. We only left to go grab lunch and bring it back. Burgers, her favorite. And extra large fries and drinks. And more bad TV.
We took a long nap after that, and I dropped her off at her house minutes before her parents got home from work. Miranda totally saw her sneak in, but she hadn’t given us away. She shook her head as she opened the front door for Valerie, but I had seen her smile as she was shutting the door.
It’s still one of my favorite days ever, even if all of my memories of us together are now smeared with guilt.
“Hey, Carlos, help me out at the front for a minute, will you?” Gary calls. He’s the one who usually works the register, but the other guy had called in sick.
I had learned how to work the register as part of my training, but I’ve only rung up people a couple of times.
“How are you?” I ask the old guy waiting at the other counter. But I hardly look at him as I start scanning items.
He gives a grumble and takes out his wallet.
“Forty-seven dollars and twelve cents.”
He stops fidgeting to get a bill out from his wallet and looks at the screen in front of him.
“Forty-seven dollars? I thought those were on sale thirty percent off.” He’s looking between me and the screen with the total. I try not to sigh too hard. I call over to Gary. “Hey, Gary. Are these thirty percent off?”
He glances at me as he’s punching in numbers on his own register. “Oh. Yeah. They’re not ringing up on sale for some reason. Just give him the discount.”
I turn back to my register and fumble for a few seconds as I try to remember what buttons to push. I finally get it and update the total. Old guy grumbles again as he finally hands me the bill. I look at him for a second as I get the change out and hand it to him.
His face is set in a constant scowl. He shoves the loose change and bills in his pocket and walks away, leaving the receipt on the counter. I sigh again and throw it in the trash.
Damn. If you’re gonna be miserable, you don’t have to act like a jerk to everyone. I wonder what happened to him to make him so unhappy. I wonder what kind of guilt he’s living with. As I head back to the stockroom, I tell myself it’s not worth it to live like that.
I’m not getting as many hours at the auto parts shop, and I know that if I’m not careful, I won’t be able to afford all of the expenses of living on my own. And I’m not willing to give that up.
But mostly, I don’t want to be home. I need more hours away from everything.
So I’m driving to my dad’s auto shop in the middle of my day off hoping he needs some help around the place. I don’t know as much
as him, but I can learn or do some of the easier stuff. And it means getting to spend more time with him.
That’s another thing I’ve been feeling guilty about. And it’s something I can actually fix.
An ambulance, sirens blaring, roars past me, and by the time I get on the shoulder of the road, it’s well gone. I get back on the road.
I’m already dressed in an old t-shirt and jeans in case he lets me start right away. And if not, oh well.
When I pull into the garage, I see my dad’s sole employee standing outside, looking in the direction I just came in and then me. I don’t remember his name, but he just looks confused. And worried.
I park and get out, meaning to walk towards him. But he’s already jogging towards me.
“Carlos, your dad just got taken to the hospital. Did you see the ambulance?”
I nod and look back, but of course it’s already long gone.
“Wha—that was my dad?” I turn back towards him, demanding an answer.
“Yeah, man. I was about to go find your phone number or something. I think he had a heart attack. He just fell over and grabbed his chest like he couldn’t breathe. I tried to help him, but there was nothing I could do except call 911. I’m sorry.”
But I’m already getting in my car and flooring the gas as I back out of the garage’s driveway.
I hear a car screech in the background, but I don’t care where they’re going or who they are. This is more important.
It takes forever to get to to the hospital. I honk, I run red lights and stop signs, but I’m finally there. I turn off my emergency signal lights as I go into the parking lot.
I finally find a parking spot in the way back, but I run all the way up the hill of the parking lot to the front doors of the emergency room. I’m sweating and panting by the time I get to the front desk.
Letting Go (Changing Hearts Series Book 3) Page 5
