by Lily Paradis
Then
Now
I’M SITTING ON the floor in my apartment, waiting for my Catherine-approved furniture to arrive. Belongings are supposed to make this feel like a home. My home.
I’m looking at my hands.
They’re just hands.
I touch my lips.
They’re just lips.
They kiss, they speak, they smile, they frown, but they’re just lips. Another chunk of flesh all tied together by skin and muscle.
That’s all.
So, how is it that I can hurt so, so much when I’m just a bunch of flesh and bone?
No one has hit me. My body is fine.
It’s my soul that aches. It’s always been my soul.
But now, it’s my body that aches along with it. How can they coincide? How can science explain why my whole body hurts because it’s just that…it’s not whole.
The one person who would understand is the one person I can’t call.
Jesse.
I’ve sworn off Jesse. No good can come from him. From that. He and I are like two hurricanes colliding from separate bodies of water. We’re like oil and water, only someone put the oil on the bottom and then dumped the water in, so I’m forever trying to get over him while simultaneously going through him as the pieces of me try to connect on the other side.
Hayden can’t fix this.
Hayden is like patching up drywall with Spackle.
It’s not quite the same.
It’ll never be the same.
Now
HAYDEN’S HERE. HE’S sitting across from me, drinking coffee and looking at the newspaper. He’s here. He’s sharing my space.
His coffee cup is leaving a ring on my new table because he won’t use the coaster sitting right next to it, but I don’t care.
I don’t care about this table.
“The Times is hiring. You should apply. You’re good enough.”
I bury my head in my arms on the table and inhale the smell of my placemat.
Placemats were Catherine’s idea. If she didn’t pick them out for me, I wouldn’t have placemats.
Because I don’t care about this table.
He folds the newspaper up, and I hear him place it beside him.
“Tate, I need to ask you something.”
“Yes?”
I don’t lift my head, so my voice is muffled by the table.
“Every Fourth of July, my family has a gathering at Kyler Place.”
I lift my head to look at him. He’s worried, like I’m going to say no. I don’t even know what he’s going to ask yet, but he thinks I’m going to say no. Because it’s me he’s talking to.
“What’s that?” I know full well what Kyler Place is, but I pretend not to know because I know it will make him feel relieved.
“It’s a Rockefeller family estate. We have meetings there sometimes. After lunch, we’ll take a helicopter to the Hamptons house.”
“Okay.”
I wait for him to continue.
“I want you to come with me.”
“What does that mean?”
He mulls it over for a second because he doesn’t want to scare me. I’m a terrible person because I let him flounder even though I already know I’m going to say yes. I’m not sure for whose benefit I’m playing dumb.
“It means that I want you there as my date.”
“In front of your whole family?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
“You’ll come?” He looks like he might die of relief.
“I’ll come.”
His expression tells me he wants to lean across the table and kiss me, but if Hayden kisses me, I won’t be able to stop it. I have a bed now, so I can’t let him kiss me.
“What’s this key for?”
He picks up the gold piece of metal sitting on the table in a little porcelain dish shaped like a cat. I have no idea where it came from. I don’t even like cats.
“It’s for my mail.”
“Have you checked it?”
“No.”
“You should.”
“Who would be writing me?”
“I don’t know, but I think you should at least look.”
He stands up to get it for me, and he doesn’t shut the door. It clicks shut, but it’s not latched.
A minute later, he’s back with two things in his hands. He hands one poorly wrapped package to me first, and then a gilded envelope.
“Miss Tate Evaline Hale?”
He’s reading the name on the outside and I want to scream. It has to be from Lara or my sister. They know Hale isn’t my last name like it is Cece’s. I didn’t want to change it. She did. She abandoned Denny. I didn’t. I keep him with me wherever I go.
I put it down on the table and open the package first. The tape is so dirty, and the package is so crunched that I have to use a fork to cut through it.
“You could have used a knife,” Hayden tells me. “Or scissors.”
“I know. That’s a waste of time.”
I say that, but I know it wouldn’t be. I’m just anxious to get it open. I peel the box open, and several loose golf ball-sized stones fall out onto the floor. I’m sure it’s dented, and now, I don’t really care if Colin burns it with more cigarettes because those stones just made dents in my floor.
There’s a note jammed inside, and I pull it out to read the scrawled handwriting.
Pockets full of stones.
My heart falls to the floor and makes an even bigger dent than the rocks did.
I know from whom this package came. I don’t understand it, but only Jesse would send that note to me.
Hayden senses my discomfort and clears his throat as he rips open the gilded envelope—the one that’s addressed to someone other than me.
“Julian and Lara Hale are pleased to announce the engagement of their granddaughter, Cecelia May Hale, to Emmett Marcus Worthington III. The wedding will take place at the Hale Plantation on October first. Formal invitation to follow.”
This isn’t unexpected.
What I didn’t expect was such a short engagement. It’s quick but not quick enough for people to suspect Cece is pregnant. Lara wants her married off to a good Southern family.
I roll my eyes and take the invitation from Hayden’s hands. “I guess I get to return the favor.”
“What do you mean?” He seems to genuinely not know.
“Will you go to my sister’s wedding with me?”
“Of course,” he answers without thinking about it.
Here we are. We’re being domestic. We’re sharing space. We’re going to each other’s family events. This is what people who are attracted to each other do. I think.
He sits back down at the table and picks up the newspaper once more, but now, things are different.
I reach for his plate and take it over to the sink. I watch as he smiles to himself and picks up his coffee cup.
Yes, there’s a coffee ring on the table.
I’m in the void.
I don’t have a job yet, but here I am, wasting my money on beautiful things and beautiful food.
Some food is worth it.
Catherine holds the door open for me as we enter The Grey Dog. We both know exactly what we’re about to order even though she pretends to look at the menu like she’s going to branch out and have a salad instead of a sandwich.
“And what would you two like?”
The male employee behind the counter knows he’s good-looking. He’s more than good-looking. He’s charming.
We both tell him our orders, and he compliments our choices.
“Are you guys students?”
I know he’s using the student discount to talk to us longer because I’m well aware that when I’m with Catherine, we’re visually striking together.
“Yes,” I lie even though I’m not. It’s only a half lie because Catherine is. “We go to Columbia.”
“Wow, Columbia. What are you studying?”
“Catherine’s going to be a doctor,” I lie again. “And I’m studying to be a lawyer.”
If I’m going to make this up, I might as well aim high.
“Wow,” he says, looking genuinely impressed that we have brains, too. “I’m in med school actually.”
I can’t tell if he’s actually in med school or if he’s just playing along. I’m a good liar, so I decide this is just a coincidence, and this man is actually going to be McSteamy someday.
“What? Are you, like, best friends or something?” He looks between Catherine and me.
“Yes,” she says. “Since we were in fifth grade.”
“Fifth grade. That’s a long time. And you don’t hate each other yet?”
“Oh,” I reply dryly, “I hate her. I’m just here for the food and lodging.”
Catherine knows I’m kidding, but I think she’s slightly upset that I would even say those words even though I’m me.
“You’re an out-of-towner. Explains your Discover card. We don’t take that here.”
It’s true. No one in New York uses Discover.
“Charleston,” I say. I keep it at that.
“A Southern belle. I like that. I like you, Belle.”
Catherine laughs nervously and tells me with her eyes that I should wrap up the conversation. He seems to catch on, and I hand him a different card to swipe.
“I’ll come talk to you guys in a bit,” he says.
I can’t tell if he’s just saying that or if he actually will. Part of me wants him to because he’s beautiful, and he’s going to med school, but then I want to bite my tongue off because it’s like Lara has latched on to my soul.
Oh, plus I have a boyfriend.
Kind of.
Boyfriend.
That’s not the right term for Hayden.
He’s not a boyfriend.
He’s just not.
Boyfriends are what you have when you’re sixteen, and you don’t know what love is.
Casper was my boyfriend.
“Tate. Earth to Tate.”
Catherine’s snapping her fingers in front of my face like she’s done a thousand times before when I zone out. I have no idea how long I’ve been out for this time, but she’s leading me over to our little candlelit table.
She sits on the side with the bench, and I sit on the side with the chair. I know exactly what she’s about to do, so we both look around to see if anyone’s watching.
They aren’t.
She stands up ever so slightly, pulls the seat of the bench up, and grabs the first bottle that her fingers touch.
“Red,” she says, making a face.
“Oh, let’s just drink it. You can’t risk reaching in there again.”
We discovered that they keep their wine stashes in the benches. We watched an employee pull some out for stock a few years back when I was visiting her during undergrad, and we haven’t paid for wine since. No one has noticed thus far. If they did, we’d pay for it.
I hate the taste of red wine, but that’s why I love it.
Catherine pulls two wine glasses out of her purse, skillfully opens the bottle, and pours.
This is my favorite part.
The wine looks like blood.
So, I take a sip.
Then
THE LAST TIME I saw Jesse was at my high-school graduation. I walked across the stage, shook someone’s hand, and got my diploma. All I really cared about was getting out of Charleston and into Vanderbilt because I wouldn’t have to live with Lara anymore. I would be free.
She hadn’t taken my trust fund away after my stunt at cotillion, most likely because she knew I would become a disgrace to the Hale name if she didn’t allow me to go to the family alma mater.
She wasn’t at my graduation. Neither was Julian. Neither was Cece because they were all at her university graduation instead. That was what I got for having a sister who was four years older than me.
I didn’t care.
I didn’t want them there.
I only wanted one person. He was there for the thirty seconds it took me to walk across that stage, and then he was gone. I wasn’t sure if I’d seen him at all, except I felt him there.
He followed me to Vanderbilt.
I never knew why, but it was a problem when our strange magnetism started up again after a year apart.
“Guys, you’re going to have to stop me,” I told my roommates, Malin and Haley. “I’m probably going to try to run to his dorm or something.”
“You won’t,” Malin promised me. “That’s really weird anyway. He’s a baby compared to us. Don’t worry. There will be guys at this party, guys with trust funds bigger than ours.”
I didn’t care about trust funds.
I wanted Catherine. She would know what to say.
I didn’t know where Colin was. He would know what to do.
Oh, right, Catherine was in New York.
“Colin?” I just wanted to get to him. He’d make it all better.
Haley led me up the stairway in the Beta Phi house.
“He’s in here somewhere. We’ll find him.”
There was too much noise, and I wasn’t sure how I was this drunk. Nothing made sense.
Colin.
I needed Colin.
I left Haley and Malin in the kitchen with thousands of bottles on the counter. I bobbed my way up the staircase, weaving around people having conversations. My hair was too long, and I couldn’t see because it kept flopping over my eyes.
There were too many rooms. I kept looking for Colin, but I couldn’t find him. Finally, I decided to sit down in the middle of the hallway on the third floor because that seemed like my best option.
I didn’t want to be alone, but I needed my best friend. I screamed his name as loud as I could, and I felt my vocal cords crack. If they could bleed, I knew they would have after the sound that ripped from my body at that moment.
My eyelids started to droop shut, and I let my head lull. The sound started to return as people resumed their conversations around me. I had failed. I was going to die alone here in the middle of the Beta Phi hallway. I was only twenty. I didn’t deserve to die here. I guessed it didn’t matter. My parents died young, why couldn’t I?
I felt warm arms come around my shoulders and under my arms to hoist me up.
“Tate, what are you doing here?”
I squinted at Colin after he turned me around to face him.
“What did you take?”
I shook my head.
I didn’t care enough about myself to know what anyone had given me in hours past. I wasn’t even sure where I’d been, but I assumed I’d been to many other parties before this one since it was well past midnight.
“I’m going to die here, Colin. Just let me die.”
“Don’t be stupid. You’re not going to die.”
He picked me up and carried me to his room. Once again, everything went dark because my hair created an impermeable curtain around my face.
“This is so much worse than the peyote, Colin,” I mumbled as he set me down on his bed.
“I wouldn’t mind some peyote,” I thought I heard him say.
I snuggled into his pillow as he pulled the blankets over my body. I barely felt it, but I knew he was doing it because he was Colin. My Colin.
“I want Catherine,” I whined, pushing my hair back so that it wasn’t suffocating me any longer.
“Join the club,” he said before taking a swig of whatever was in his hand. “But she went to New York and left us here, so we’re shit out of luck.”
I pouted and grabbed his free hand. “If you don’t stay here with me, I’m going to go to him.”
He knew what I meant. “You’re a buzz kill, Tate McKenna.”
“I’m a buzzkill, Colin Conrad, but you love me.”
“But I love you.”
I heard him set his drink down as he stumbled on the bed beside me on top of all the blankets.
“Stay here, Tate,” he said, the war
ning tone in his voice crystal clear.
He knew me. He knew my body would take me there whether I wanted to or not, so he had to convince my mind to be stronger.
Too bad my mind wasn’t strong enough.
I awoke later to a quiet house, but the lights were still on. Colin was snoring beside me, his hands behind his neck.
Jesse.
I knew I wasn’t very drunk or high or whatever I was anymore, but I wasn’t in control.
Something pulled on my heartstrings and on every bone and muscle and cell in my body, and I had to go. I climbed over Colin and found my shoes. When had my shoes come off? And my sweater? Colin had folded it neatly on his desk chair. I pulled it on and shut the light off on my way out.
I walked out of the Beta Phi house and across campus, and then I found the dorm I knew he lived in.
I didn’t know which room it was, so I just stood there.
I stood there outside of his building like this was some kind of horror movie, and I stared. I stared at each window, wondering which one concealed him. I didn’t know how long I stood there, looking at the holes in the building that were covered by glass and blinds, when one of them moved.
One of the blinds was pulled to the side, and a face appeared, staring straight back at me.
I wasn’t sure whether I’d seen the ghost or if I was the ghost, but I ran.
I turned and ran, and I didn’t look back.
Now
The New York Times
The Bones by Tate E. McKenna
“Batter up!”
One of the McCallum boys was yelling far too loud. The children had explicitly been warned never to wander by the Evers Plantation. Too much history there. Too much left unknown. Nobody went near that old house, now covered in vines crawling in and out of the windows that someone had boarded up years before. The gates that had once kept out the Union Army now lay unnervingly ajar, leading to a winding road nearly grown over. A nightmare for any caretaker, if there were one. The only part of the house that was not broken down or completely overtaken by nature was the doorway. An empty white stone entrance led to a mausoleum. A solid door may as well be there. No one was brave enough to go near it. The darkness inside kept any living soul out.
