True North

by Allie Juliette Mousseau

  The set ended, but I didn’t want to come down, literally or figuratively.

  Jake slid his fingertips down the curve of my neck and over my shoulder and smiled before he helped me back to the floor.

  He looked around us uncomfortably. We were pretty much sardines in a can. Once we sat, he poured us a half glass each and downed his fast. “I’ll be back,” he said, taking off towards the bar or the bathroom.

  I wanted to ask him what it was like in Kabul, and what he thought, and how he thought of me when he heard the song. I wanted to know why, if he’d been thinking of me, hadn’t he written or called. Why had he acted like he couldn’t have cared less?

  The next band took over. Their thrash metal cut through my thoughts, making it impossible for me to hold onto one.

  When Jake came back to the table he didn’t look so good. It was warm in the building but not hot, but Jake had sweat beading across his forehead and his skin had a sickly pallor.

  “You feel okay?” I mouthed.

  He sort of shrugged with his hands.

  I tried asking again, almost screaming close to his ear. He nodded. But it was clear he wasn’t enjoying the music now or even paying attention to it. He also wasn’t paying attention to me; instead he kept a watchful eye on everyone else in the building as if he were studying them in some way. When people passed close to us he’d stiffen.

  This band sucked. Maybe he needed to go outside and get some air? I started to lean in to ask him if he wanted to step out when the band started up some death-screamo song that included machine gun sound effects.

  Without warning, Jake grabbed hold of my shoulders and threw me to the floor, his body on top of mine, and rolled us under the small table, knocking our chairs over in the process. A fierce panic and intense anger flashed in his eyes. His every muscle was tightly wound like a coil ready to spring. As he stared into my eyes, his expression rocketed fear through my gut. I didn’t know what to do or what the hell had just happened.

  I reached up and held his face, making him focus on me. Then I mouthed, “We’re okay,” and smiled as best as I could to reassure him.

  He closed his eyes as he worked to control his breathing. He still held me down.

  Finally, Nate, Caleb and Jules all ducked their heads under the table.

  “What the hell happened?” Caleb shouted at us.

  His voice startled Jake whose eyes snapped open.

  When he didn’t answer I yelled back, “I dropped my bracelet. Jake and I jumped down here”—at that second the music went silent—“to grab it.” My last three words were really loud in the silence just before the crowd started cheering for the band. The three of them looked at us like we were nuts but shrugged it off.

  Jake was shaking.

  “You want to go outside and get some fresh air?” I suggested.

  He nodded without lifting his eyes. “Yeah.”

  “Okay, let’s get out from under here first.” We pulled each other back to our seats. Standing made my bladder remind me how much I’d been drinking. “Just give me a second to use the bathroom,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”

  Somehow I made my way through the human herd and then waited for an empty stall.

  On my way back to the table some idiot grabbed my ass.

  I turned on him. “Hey! What the fuck?”

  “I’d love to fuck you. Where do you want to go?” The guy stood up to get closer to me while his buddies around the table were laughing and cheering him on.

  “Yeah right, dickhead.” I started to walk away, when he gripped my arm hard and yanked me back.

  “Come on, baby, don’t be so stuck up,” he crooned.

  “I’m not your baby. Now fuck off.” I tried to pull my arm free, but he wasn’t having it.

  He put more pressure on my arm and leaned into my face. He smelled sour and sweaty. “Feisty. I like when a girl puts up a fight.”

  “You’re sick. Let me go before I scream and you die.”

  He and his friends burst into laughter.

  One of them said, “She’s like sex-on-a-stick … my stick. I wonder if she’d party with all of us.”

  I brought my knee up, but douche-bag anticipated my move and blocked me with his arm. Before I could throw a punch, his fingers loosened their grip as Jake pulled one back until it snapped, making the guy scream.

  Jake let go of the finger and snapped his elbow into the creep’s nose. Blood spurted over the floor as the guy hit it, hard. His friends—about fifteen of them—stood up and threw their tables over. They were a group of hulking oil rig workers, definitely not from around here.

  Jake smiled like he was in his element. “Do it.”

  The first guy came at him, and Jake twisted him around and brought an elbow into his spine. As he threw the guy down, he caught the leg of another one of them in mid-kick. Jake pulled the guy’s leg straight then came down on it with some kind of martial arts move. The snap of bone was audible. The fourth guy got in a punch to Jake’s face before Jake pummeled him.

  That’s when the Calvary arrived. Nate, Caleb and Sam cut into the melee fast. Sam was laughing and shouted, “Now it’s a party!” as he took his swing.

  Nate and Caleb worked together like they’d done this before.

  Jules pulled me back. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  The bouncers started ripping everyone apart, but Jake wasn’t having it. He was fighting three of the guys, including the one who’d started it all. His face was disgusting, covered with blood, and his hand looked mangled. I assumed it was some issue of pride now for these idiots. That’s when the bouncer grabbed Jake. Not a great move; Jake was like an angry bull in a China shop. He tackled the bouncer. I didn’t even think he knew it was a bouncer; it was like he’d become a machine.

  Caleb was screaming at him. “JAKE, ENOUGH! IT’S OVER!”

  Jake finally seemed to hear him and slowed himself. Two of the bouncers grabbed him and pushed him off their co-worker.

  “FUCK, MAN! WHAT’S YOUR PROBLEM?” the bouncer shouted as he picked himself up off the floor and spit a wad of blood to the wood.

  Jake held up his hands. “They were nearly raping my date. I didn’t know who you were when you got into it.”

  “Yeah, Jake, we caught on,” the head bouncer stated. “Eject the assholes. You don’t get to treat the ladies in our town like that, you stupid fucks.”

  “He broke my nose and my fingers,” the guy who’d grabbed me moaned.

  “And he busted Eddie’s leg!” another shouted, indicating the man rolling and crying on the floor while holding his leg.

  “You’re lucky you got out with your lives, now get the fuck out! I won’t say it again.” The head bouncer looked like he was ready for them to make a stupid move.

  Meanwhile, the entire bar had formed a perimeter around us.

  The fifteen guys all grabbed their coats and stalked away. Most of them had just suffered minor injuries, but a few would be visiting the emergency room.

  “HELL, YEAH!” Sam shouted and plunged himself into the sea of people around us to a set of pretty blonde twins who were just waiting for him. He didn’t have a scratch on him.

  Caleb turned to Jake. “You okay?”

  “What do you think?” he snapped.

  Nate looked at me at the same time Caleb did. “Fine,” I answered without being asked.

  “I’m getting out of here,” Jake growled, and he tore towards the door.

  Caleb and Nate looked content to let him go, but I wasn’t.

  “Wait!” I called.

  He didn’t.

  I took off to catch up, which was ridiculous in the high heels I was wearing. I quickly pulled them off, held onto them and ran barefoot to stay behind him. He burst through the fire doors and into the alley.

  “JAKE! Please stop!” I shouted.

  “I can’t be in there anymore! I should have never come out!” he panted at me, pacing the alley back and forth like a caged animal.
>
  “Okay … we don’t need to stay here. We could just walk,” I tried.

  “You don’t belong with me, Liv,” he said. He held out his hand, and it was still shaking.

  “It’s just adrenaline from the fight,” I assured him. “It’ll pass.”

  “No it’s not, and I don’t know what I was thinking taking you out like this, trying to recreate something that happened a lifetime ago,” he snapped. “I’m not even that guy anymore. This isn’t even the fucking real world, Liv! This is like a magic land where guys work nine to five jobs and little girls like you don’t have to get your hands dirty and instead get to go to college.”

  I swallowed his words hard.

  “You don’t know fuck about me, and you wouldn’t want to.” He looked around the alley. “I almost killed that guy in there. I wanted to,” he seethed. “You get yourself back upstairs to Nate and have him take you home. You have a long drive back to school tomorrow.”

  “But …” I stammered. “I don’t want to leave you … here … now.”

  “But I want you to,” he said gruffly. “I don’t want to be with you, is that clear enough?”

  I couldn’t move.

  “I can’t leave you in this alley alone, dressed like that! Get your ass out of here!” he ordered.

  I felt hot tears fill my eyes. When I blinked they slid down my face. But he didn’t get any sweeter, and he certainly didn’t look sorry; instead he just screamed, “GO!”

  I startled, and then turned and ran up the stairs, trying not to let my tears turn to sobs.

  Nate dropped me off at our house and went back to the Norths for my backpack and stuff. As he backed his truck out of the driveway, I pushed open the front door to our small, empty house. The pain in my heart was replaced by rage. My mind kept spinning with all of the things I wished I’d said after Jake treated me so cruelly and thoughtlessly in the alley. First he acts like he loves me, then he protects me, then it’s like he hates me! Nothing like a bunch of bi-polar snaps to make you wonder, what the fuck?

  I hated myself for opening my heart so freaking fast after three years of nothing! I hated myself for falling for him and trusting him with such immediacy. I’d been ready to give myself to him.

  I sat on my bed and pulled my arms protectively around myself. I’d learned to survive with an absent father and without a mom, but it was when I was vulnerable and afraid that I missed my mom the most. A best friend is great, but she doesn’t replace a mother.

  There you go, Liv, a two-for-one agony. Enjoy the misery.

  I experienced her rejection all over again. If she’d died, there would be something to blame the pain on; but the reality that she was just simply able to abandon me so effortlessly … she didn’t love me. She didn’t love me enough to ever try, to ever call, to ever say she was sorry. She left nothing but emptiness and a hole so deep inside of me it could never be healed or filled. Only time allowed me to distance myself from the pain—but it never really alleviated it.

  I was jealous of people in the movies or in books whose mom or dad died. Their acute pain was monstrous I was sure, but when they got to acceptance, one thing they were still sure of was their parent’s love for them. They could visit a gravesite or talk to their parent, believing they could hear them from whatever other world people go to after they die. My insides would tangle up with jealousy at the thought. Isn’t that horrible? To wish my own mother had died?

  It had been years since she’d left us, and I still thought about her consciously almost every day, even if it was just for a moment.

  I would have given anything for my arms to be hers right now.

  Damn you, Jake! I should have closed myself off. I shouldn’t have let this happen. I drove here with the full intention of keeping myself guarded. Instead, like a small, featherless bird, I tried to fly from the nest, fell to the hard dirt below me and was crushed between the jaws of a powerful cat.

  The door downstairs slammed shut, startling me. Wondering what had gotten Nate worked up, I ran down to make sure he was okay. I stopped halfway down the stairs, surprised to see it wasn’t Nate, but our dad. My body involuntarily stiffened. Last time I’d seen or heard from him was when I’d gone away to school. He’d said goodbye and that was it. After the night I’d had, it would have been nice to run into my daddy’s arms for a hug, but he wasn’t that kind of dad and I didn’t feel like I could trust him anyway, so I kept my distance.

  “You don’t say hello to your dad, girl?” he slurred with an edge of annoyance or anger.

  I wished I’d stayed upstairs. I couldn’t handle this—not tonight. Dealing with him when he was mean and drunk was like trying to walk over eggshells without breaking or upsetting any of them. A knot formed in my chest and I tried hard to keep my voice steady. “Hello, Dad,” I replied softly.

  “What are you doing home from school? Did they kick you out?” He laughed at his little joke then added. “Of course not, you’re too … perfect.”

  I dropped my eyes to the brown carpeting that climbed the stairs and decided to just turn around and go back to my room. But before I could, my dad looked me up and down, and I remembered I was still dressed up for the evening.

  “Holy shit, girl! Are you part-timing as a prostitute?” he snarled and shot me a disgusted look. “Thought you were better than that … Miss High-and-Mighty. Get out of my sight.”

  I just stood there like an idiot, the knot in my chest tightening, threatening to strangle me completely. Dad didn’t give me another thought. Instead he stumbled to the couch and lay down. A second later, he was snoring.

  What a perfect ending to this night. I ran into my room, threw my clothes onto the floor and pulled on sweatpants and a t-shirt. Just a few hours ago, I had felt like a princess, now that was all very much erased.

  I pulled myself underneath my blanket and curled into a fetal position, feeling numb and wishing I could just forget everything.

  A little while later, the door to my room squealed a bit, and Nate came in, saying, “Hey, you okay?”

  “What do you think?” I bit back.

  “Can I come in?” he asked.

  “Whatever.”

  He sat quietly at the foot of my bed. Nate was sweet, but he wasn’t very good at dealing with heavy emotions. When Mom left and Dad went inside himself, Nate felt responsible for picking up the pieces and taking over parenting. He’d gotten into this habit of just sitting next to me. Sometimes—okay usually—he didn’t say anything; he’d just be there, you know? Sometimes it was enough. But tonight it made me ache for more.

  The crying started and wouldn’t stop. I couldn’t control it at all.

  Nate just lay beside me with his arm around me as I sobbed.

  Chapter 9

  “Empty”

  Ray LaMontagne

  When I woke up I was alone. The loneliness was acute, and I felt detached from my body. Guess a serious cathartic cry can do that.

  I brushed my teeth and showered, dressed and stuffed my shit into my backpack. I was grateful Nate had gone and gotten it for me last night.

  I laid out my keys, mp3 player and cell phone. I knew Jules would’ve texted me last night and, seeing that it was already ten a.m. probably this morning too. But she’d have to go by faith that I was okay ‘cause I couldn’t handle it yet—I didn’t want pity or sympathy or happy wishes.

  I scooped up my mp3 player, turned it on and flipped through my songs. I knew which one I was seeking out—the song I simultaneously loved and hated. It could either cause me dread or strange comfort, and today I needed the strange comfort. It was a folk song that my mom had listened to endlessly. When she left, my dad took up the mantle, playing it over and over, day and night, blasted as loud as the stereo could go as he drank himself numb and senseless day after day for months. Sometimes I used to blame the song for the loss of my dad too. When it was on I’d bury my head under as many pillows as I could to drown it out. As I got older, the words and music became my funeral song—my go
-to when the torment was too strong and I had no place to put it.

  I looked around my room. I wondered if it might be a good thing if I never came back here. I could start another life. It wouldn’t be fair to the people who loved me and who I loved but … fuck, my mom and dad did it—shut themselves off from whatever made them feel. Like a cancer, I could cut the Norths completely from my heart. That would include Jules, though. I pulled in a calculated breath. She’d always make me think of Jake, and when he moved on and eventually got married I would have to hear all about it. I’d have to come home for visits and see him with his wife—a wife that was not me—and his little kids—not mine—and remember everything: every crushed dream, every moment I’d believed with all of my heart we’d be together someday.

  It would be easy. I’d just stay at school. Too much work. Sorry, can’t come back now. Perfect excuse. Then, even though I’d planned to come back here to work for local therapists and schools, I could send my resume out all over the country. I’d never been to the east. Boston, I heard, was a beautiful city. I could let my relationship with the Norths slowly fade—it happened all the time with people anyway, right?

  I secured my North Face pack over my shoulder and went straight out of the empty house and to my car.

  Like the fool I was I’d almost expected a folded piece of paper in my car this morning from Jake—a song, a note.

  Nothing but an empty car.

  I took off down the road. When I got to the town’s center I noticed the yellow streamers and banners had all been taken down or were dangling haphazardly, worn from the wind and dew of the weekend. In the span of two days my life had spiraled into an absolute shit storm.

  Whatever, right? I had a five hour drive ahead of me with nothing but open road, blue skies and music. I threw my phone into the backseat so I wouldn’t be tempted to check calls or texts and let the distance swallow me.

  The next three weeks sucked. There’s no other way to describe them. You would have thought Jake’s rejection would have finally given me closure after all these years, but it didn’t; it only caused hurt that vacillated back and forth with consuming anger.