How to Keep Rolling After a Fall

by Karole Cozzo

  “Nikki?”

  My head snaps up, and I see my dad framed in the open doorway. Struggling to clear my throat, I swipe at my eyes and try to talk normally, which doesn’t really work. “What are you doing?”

  Slowly he walks toward me. “Forgot my wallet.”

  But instead of heading toward the kitchen to retrieve it, he comes closer still. He stares at me without saying a word. I can’t bring myself to meet his eyes, so eventually he asks, “What’s wrong?”

  “You don’t have to do this,” I mumble, rubbing my fist under my eyes to clear away some lingering tears. “I know you don’t want to.”

  He’s silent—he doesn’t correct me, and a shuddery breath escapes before I start crying again. “I’m just tired of things being broken,” I blubber. “I’m trying, but it’s like…”

  I don’t even know what it’s like, and I end up shaking my head uselessly.

  My dad still hasn’t moved or spoken, and when I follow his gaze, I see that he’s staring down at the same picture that made me cry—the one of me at age one, beaming from ear to ear as I take some of my first steps, assisted. It’s my dad standing behind me in the photo, holding my arms in the air, taking great care that I don’t fall down.

  In real time, my father’s teeth are clenched in a grimace, and his sharp inhalation of breath tells me he’s pained, too. “C’mere,” he instructs me gruffly, eyes still trained on the picture.

  I rise slowly, unsure, and he extends his arms stiffly.

  Once upon a time, my body instinctively melted into his bear hugs. It’s not like that now. The muscles in my back are tense and tight, and he struggles with positioning his hands around me.

  “We’re not broken,” he mumbles, somewhere near my ear. “These things … take time.”

  Then he pulls away and disappears, and the moment is over before it even barely began.

  The tension drains from my body, and I collapse back into the chair in an exhausted puddle. I never would have imagined that it would be easier with my mom. It’s not nearly as difficult or painful. Me and my dad … our bond was always the tightest, so why is it the hardest to repair?

  Maybe that is why, something inside me suggests.

  I look down at our picture a final time before closing the book.

  Baby steps.

  Hopefully, they’re taking us in the right direction, and eventually, no matter how long it takes, we’ll get back to a better place.

  * * *

  Despite its teary prelude, my actual birthday starts off pretty well. I sleep through my alarm, but when I finally make it down to the kitchen, I find my entire family gathered around the table. Eighteen candles are ablaze atop a cake, and they immediately break into “Happy Birthday” when they see me. The refrain is kind of subdued, and I think my mom might be singing around some tears, but they manage to get through it. Cake for breakfast on your birthday is a family tradition, and both my parents go to work late in the name of warm cake and cold milk. And my birthday.

  It occurs to me that maybe my dad was going to buy the eggs for my cake, even before we “talked,” and I smile at him across the table.

  At school, Mr. Myers pushes our history test back two days, which is a good thing, because I really didn’t study. And during our lunch date on the auditorium stage, Sam hands me a gift bag that contains a HATERS GONNA HATE shirt just like hers. “We can wear them under our uniforms. In secret. Like Clark Kent,” she suggests.

  I laugh. “You’re nuts.”

  Then she pulls out a cupcake and lights a candle with a concealed lighter before ordering me to make a wish and strumming along on her guitar as she sings me “Happy Birthday.”

  I pause a bit before making my wish, not wanting to waste it on something that’s probably not going to come true. He didn’t call or text last night. I’ve snuck to the bathroom to check my phone nearly a dozen times, and nothing today, either. But all the same, in my gut, I know I’m only wishing for one thing.

  I guess I’m on an extended sugar high from my breakfast cake and Sam’s treat, because I let her talk me into an impromptu duet during an improvisation exercise in theater class. It’s fun singing back and forth with her, and it feels good to be back up on a high school stage. Our routine’s actually pretty hilarious, and we nail the singing parts, too, and when we’re done, some kids are laughing and clapping along with us.

  And a few more hours pass, slowly. School lets out, and I go home. I try to distract myself by watching TV with Emma. Around six o’clock, I look at the blank face of my phone for the ninety-sixth time. It’s still blank, as blank as it’s been all day.

  I swallow my disappointment, trying to remind myself that it was a good day, one of the better days I’ve had in the past six months. There’s plenty I should be grateful for: family and forgiveness, a new friend, hope for the future—all the things I didn’t have at the start of the school year, just eight weeks ago.

  It’s wrong to feel so empty. I shake my head, thinking I’m expecting a lot, expecting a fairy tale. You mentioned the date once. He probably doesn’t even remember it’s your birthday.

  And he’s not exactly speaking to you, anyway.

  The smart thing would be to turn off my phone. End the misery. Maybe then I can go back to thinking about all the things I have, instead of the one big thing I’m missing. There’s a depressing sense of finality as I move my thumb toward the power button, ready to press it down.

  And in the second that my finger hangs in the balance, a message lights up my phone. At first I think I’m imagining it, wishing it into being. But I stare and stare, and the words don’t go anywhere, and the beat of my heart increases to a canter, then to a gallop as I make sense of the name on my screen and his words below.

  34th and Dune?

  Looking out my window, I find the setting sun almost ready to disappear below the horizon. Pax is at the beach?

  Feeling like I’m up against an invisible countdown, I dash down the stairs and search for my mom. There’s no time to walk, and she needs to let me take my car.

  She’s on the phone, and although I circle her like a nervous puppy, biting my nails, she just keeps talking. After five minutes, feeling as if I might explode, I finally grab my keys off the hook in the kitchen and dangle them in front of her face. I plead with my eyes. Please? I mouth silently. Please please please?

  “Hold on, Kate.” She covers the phone with her hand. “What is so important?”

  “Can I please take my car? Please? It’s just…”

  She raises an eyebrow knowingly. “It’s just … Pax?”

  “Yes.”

  “There seem to be a lot of dramatic requests to take your car as far as he’s concerned.”

  She still hasn’t said yes.

  “Mother. Please.”

  She must sense my desperation. “It’s a school night. Not too late.” Then she turns around and goes back to Kate.

  “Thank you! Thank you!” I whisper-scream, backing up toward the door, keys clenched in my fist. My hands are shaking as I shove the key into the ignition and shift into reverse, but once I’m on the road, I gun it. I’m at Thirty-Fourth and Dune in four minutes flat.

  But when the orange Element actually comes into sight, my foot finds the brake, trepidation taking over. I slowly approach the parking spots and align my car next to Pax’s, the only other one there on this cold fall night. Taking a deep breath, I climb out, looking toward the beach.

  I stuff my hands in the pocket of my jacket and pull it tight around my body as I descend the ramp to the sand. Then I take a minute to look at him, the dark silhouette against the setting sun, before slowly walking toward where he’s sitting in the sand. Glancing down at him from the corner of my eye, I see he’s bundled inside his hoodie, the hood pulled up around his face. He doesn’t look up at me when I approach.

  I drop down beside him, also staring out into the water. “Hey.”

  “Hey.”

  I sneak another glance, reli
eved to see that the circles under his eyes aren’t as prominent as they were yesterday. But that’s not to say he doesn’t look troubled.

  “You feeling okay today?” I ask, tracing circles in the sand with my fingers.

  “Yeah.” He clears his throat. “Passed out when I got home. Was pretty much useless until about an hour ago.” He sneaks a glance right back at me, like his words are some kind of explanation. “But I’m … doing okay now, I guess.”

  I nod. “When will you hear anything?”

  “The doctor called this afternoon, when I was sleeping. It’s not a tear. Just tendonitis. So no surgery.”

  “That’s good.”

  He screws up his face. “I probably made it worse by not taking a break from rugby when I first noticed it. So I have to do that now, which sucks. But it’s not forever, and it’s a hell of a lot better than surgery. They’re going to do some steroid injections, and then I just have to take it easy for a couple of weeks.”

  Pax’s hand is on the edge of his blanket, right next to mine, and it’s still my instinct to reach out and squeeze his at this good news. Instead, I dig my nails into the sand. “I’m glad it’s not a tear.” I try to look at him again, but it’s still too hard. “Thanks for letting me know.”

  He turns his head abruptly, surprising me, and I meet his eyes without meaning to. The unspoken question is obvious. Is this really what we’re here for?

  Pax’s gaze stays locked with mine. “My mom said … you were supposed to be somewhere else yesterday.” His pinkie moves toward mine, infinitesimally, before he pulls his hand back and closes it into a fist atop the sand. He swallows hard. “That was … I don’t…” He turns toward the ocean, and his chin falls to his chest. “You have no idea what it felt like when I looked up and saw you standing there, after such a shitty twenty-four hours.”

  The pain reannounces itself, an ache in my throat, a pressure in my chest. “I wanted to be there for you,” I admit. “Regardless of … anything.”

  Regardless of the fact that you don’t think there’s any sense in being more than friends. Regardless of the fact that it kills me to sit next to you and not be able to touch you.

  Pax shakes his head. “I didn’t even deserve it.” He lifts his head, his expression one of shame and regret. “After I was such a dick to you.”

  I inhale a quick, cold breath. This is what we’re here for.

  I consider how he hurt me, the way it cut when he said we should’ve just stayed friends, when he believed it enough to turn and leave me on the sidewalk. “Yeah. You were,” I tell him honestly.

  His neck muscles tighten at my words, Adam’s apple pressing against his skin.

  But he was a dick, and I can’t tell him otherwise. I can tell him the rest of the story, though.

  I raise my face toward the ocean, the wind blowing my hair back behind me. “Here’s the thing though, Pax.” I consider the other relationships in my life that have been in various states of disarray since the spring. My relationship with Taylor. My relationship with Haley. “Some relationships are easily broken. One mistake, one wrong move, destroys them beyond repair, regardless of regrets and apologies. Some relationships just don’t mean that much to begin with, even if you think they do.”

  Then I consider my other relationships—my relationship with my mother, my father. My relationship with Sam.

  I think about how it wasn’t even a choice to go sit in that waiting room or not. Regardless of how mad and hurt I was, I had to be there for him.

  “And some relationships are more than that,” I tell him. “They’re bigger than who’s right or wrong … bigger than anger, and hurt feelings, and disappointment.”

  I wait for Pax to look at me again, and I lift my shoulders. “I thought I knew what kind of relationship ours was. But … I’m not here by myself. And maybe we don’t want the same thing.”

  Pax inhales mightily. When he exhales, his breath trembles in the wind, like he’s terrified. But this time when his hand starts moving toward mine, he doesn’t pull it back. His pinkie reaches mine, and he allows it to stay.

  “I’m so sorry I hurt you,” he whispers. He winces and closes his eyes as he remembers. “Seeing you dancing with that guy, knowing I’ll never get to … It pushed me over an edge I didn’t even know I was sitting so close to.”

  He shakes his head. “Truth is, I couldn’t be your friend. It was bullshit. I said it that night because I had just realized exactly how far past that point I was. At the festival, when I could see how much you cared about me, how you were feeling things on my behalf, how you were becoming a part of me. It scared the shit out of me because I knew it meant I’d be asking things of you that most people don’t want to deal with. Even older people, who have been married for decades. So I tried to backtrack, but … I don’t … I can’t…” Pax trails off helplessly.

  I’m scared, but I twist my fingers through his and squeeze. “You don’t have to. You never did.”

  Pax looks at me a long time, all the questions and worries about what it means to take this risk written all over his face.

  “I don’t have a crystal ball, Pax,” I remind him, my voice serious. “But we’re not really all that different from any other couple out there, taking a chance on things. It’s not like anyone our age gets to know how it’s all going to turn out.” My gaze drifts toward the sand. “All I know is that I want a chance. I want a chance at us.”

  I chuckle. “You know, sometimes you’re so capable it’s easy to forget about the chair. I know I’ll have to work at remembering that challenges will always be there, and new ones might pop up even when we’re not expecting them. But it’s not just how physically strong you are, or how funny, or how good at your job, or how positive you are that makes me sometimes forget…”

  Salt covers my throat. “You stood up for me when no one else would, or could. You showed me that standing up for someone has nothing to do with being physically able to take a stand.” I shrug. “You want me to be realistic, and that’s fine. But I can’t help that I’ll always see you as a person who’s more capable than not.”

  Pax doesn’t say anything in response. Instead, he reaches toward the other end of his blanket, pulling something out from beneath it. “I hope you know how I see you,” he says. He hands me a misshapen item, clumsily wrapped in purple paper. The left side of his mouth lifts. “Don’t think I don’t know what today is. And I wish I could have done something more elaborate for you. But…”

  Slowly, I open his gift. It takes me a minute to figure out what it is, but I grin widely when I do. I have no idea where he found such a thing, but somewhere Pax found a French board for displaying pictures … a French board in the shape of a giant microphone, pink and bedazzled and everything.

  I love it. It’s so damn me.

  The board is so bright and shiny, at first I don’t see that he’s already tucked a single picture behind one of the elastic bands crisscrossing it. It’s a picture of me. I recognize my outfit, the microphone in my hand, the megawatt smile on my face. It’s from the night we were in the city; it’s me onstage.

  “You’ve had such a crap year,” he says softly. “Thought it was high time you started collecting some new memories.” Then Pax cocks his head and assesses me through narrowed eyes. “Hated when you used to hide under that stupid hat,” he grimaces. “Look how beautiful you are.”

  Looking at my image through Pax’s eyes, I decide I feel really beautiful. Without catcalls from strangers or jealous stares from other girls, without the applause of the crowd or affirmations on Facebook. He makes me feel beautiful from the inside out.

  “I love it,” I tell him, actually hugging the photo board to my chest. “And it’s a phenomenal present. But…”

  Pax looks at me, worry flickering in his eyes. “But…”

  Shaking my head, I tell him the truth. “It’s not the thing I really want today.” I stare into his eyes.

  Please Pax. Give me a chance. Give us a chance.
/>   “You really think we can do this?” he asks me, voice low and serious.

  “Yeah, Pax. I do.”

  And finally, finally he smiles, his full smile, his Pax smile. He even laughs out loud, a laugh that’s full of relief and happiness. Then he reaches up to push back one windblown curl, tucking it behind my ear. “So you wanna be my girlfriend or what?”

  “Silly question,” I tell him. “I already am.”

  The amusement disappears from his eyes as quickly as it showed up, his voice dropping to a whisper as he leans close. “Happy birthday, Nikki.”

  Then his lips meet mine, warm and comforting against the cold night air. I smile against his kiss, thrilled to learn that even though I’m eighteen and officially an adult, wishes you make over birthday candles still come true.

  Epilogue

  HALLOWEEN—ONE YEAR LATER …

  Eating a sixth mini pack of Milk Duds from my trick-or-treat stash, I stare down at the costume laid out on my bed. Am I really doing this?

  Last year, it was accomplishment enough to show up for the Ocean Isle Halloween parade as me, Nikki Baylor, without hiding my face beneath the brim of a hat, crossing my fingers that no one would call me out publicly. But this … this is a much bigger step.

  I’m supposed to meet Pax downtown in thirty minutes, and I really need to get moving. We’re going to watch my sister in the Halloween parade, marching with the middle school color guard, and then I’m going with him as his date to a party thrown by someone from the rugby team. But I find myself just standing there, eating box after yellow box of Milk Duds instead. I stare down at my costume some more. I square my shoulders and decide: Yes, I’m ready for this. Twenty minutes later, I walk out the door.

  Pax is waiting for me on the designated corner along the parade route, back from the gathering crowd. Feeling like I’m indeed flying, I run up to him when I see him, taking in his attire. He’s wearing a navy blue three-piece suit, light blue button-down, and plain red tie. His hair is pulled back from his face.