The end of a long bar with a bottle of tequila seemed a much better option.
I pushed my sunglasses down to cover my bleary eyes just as Braxton emerged from the pool house, heading back to whatever it was he was working on. Lucky me…looks like someone got a job with the city crew. A constant reminder of my high school days turned shitty was hardly what I wanted to be around all summer. Especially with the banner way mine started off.
Thankfully, the kids started to arrive in droves once seven-thirty rolled around. With plenty to occupy my attention, I forgot all about Braxton and the pain he’d caused me. Instead, I chirped my whistle at kids running on the concrete, tested the swimming skills of kids before letting them jump off the high dive, and rescued an eight-year-old who passed out in the pool because he hadn’t had anything to eat yet that day.
Once I got him out and to the office, I gave him the lunch I’d packed for myself and headed back to my station.
“Great save, Iz,” a voice called to me. I turned to see Braxton staring at me, a hesitant smile on his face. I gave a curt nod and kept walking. “I saw what you did for him—giving him your lunch. I’m about to head out to grab a bite now. Do you want me to pick something up for you?”
“Yeah,” I said, turning to face him. I could feel my ears burning with anger. “Your memory. That’d be super.”
“Izzy—”
“Maybe you’ve forgotten about what you did, Braxton, but, as you can see, I sure as hell haven’t. So, no, I don’t want you to get me food. I want you to go away.”
I stormed back to my station, breathing hard. The girl covering my area stared at me with wide eyes as I approached. She looked scared of me, which was smart given my mood at that moment.
“Thanks,” I muttered to her before she scampered off, probably wondering what in the hell was wrong with the perfect Isadora Lancaster—or maybe she’d already heard about Jason and me, which would have explained her behavior. Either way, it didn’t matter. Up until then, everyone in town thought my life was flawless, which was a joke. Somehow, in all the years we’d lived there, my family’s secrets were the one rumor that never managed to circulate through town.
I had no doubt that my father had paid dearly for that.
The rest of my shift went off without a hitch, and I soon found myself packing up my stuff and walking out through the parking lot—just in time for Braxton to be packing up his massive pick-up truck. I’d hoped I could make it by without him noticing, but, as fate would have it, I didn’t. One look at me and he was jogging over.
I’d forgotten how damn persistent that boy could be when it suited him.
“Izzy,” he started, coming up behind me. I picked up my pace. “I found it—my memory, that is. It was buried in my closet in a box labeled ‘the dumbest shit I’ve ever done.’ ”
“That sounds about right.”
I stepped into the road to get to the open lot where I was parked. Braxton was tight on my heels.
“Will you let me finish, please?”
“Not in the middle of the street I won’t.” With traffic headed our way, I jogged the rest of the way and kept on going until I reached my car. Not paying any attention to Braxton, I threw open the driver’s side door, hitting him in the legs.
“Jesus, Izzy!”
“Not sorry,” I clipped, tossing my bag across the front seat. I followed it in, settling into the driver’s seat. But when I went to close the door, Braxton wouldn’t let it go.
“You hit me with it, so now it’s mine until I feel like giving it back.”
“Jesus, are you five? Just shut the fucking door, Braxton.”
“You get that fancy vocabulary at college?”
“Yes. I learned many more, if you’d like to hear them.”
“I’ll pass. Cussing doesn’t suit you, Iz. You’re too classy for that.”
“Well shit. Looks like I fucked that all up, now didn’t I?”
“Dammit, girl, would you stop for a second. You can’t see past your anger to let me explain!”
“You’re right. I can’t. Give me another three years and then maybe we can chat.”
I jerked the door from his hands and slammed it shut, firing up the engine. I was about to throw it into reverse when he shouted something at me from outside that made me stop cold. I turned and looked up into his sad eyes and shut the car off. Opening the door, I climbed out to stand before him.
“What did you say?” I asked, my voice empty and low.
“Dad died. A month ago. He overdosed, not that that should surprise you…”
“Braxton…. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
Braxton and his father—a relationship that made my family dynamics look normal. Those two were always at each other. The physical and mental abuse that he’d taken from that man over the years was unthinkable, and though it should have in some way been a relief to us both that the old bastard was dead, it wasn’t. Mainly because I knew that all Braxton had ever sought was acceptance from his asshole father. And my guess was that he never got it.
“I’m not telling you that because I want you to feel sorry for me, Izzy. I’m telling you because him dying put a lot of things into perspective for me.” He looked at me as though that explanation should have meant more to me than it did. When he realized it did not, he took a deep breath and continued. “I hurt you, Iz, and I might never forgive myself for that. I probably shouldn’t. But I sure would like the chance to apologize for it—maybe explain, because I don’t want to leave things between you and me the way they are. Life’s too short for that.”
I stared at him, the silence between us dragging on. I may not have been ready to hear what he had to say, but I also wasn’t about to kick him while he was down either. He’d been a dickhead to me—there was no doubt about that—but standing before me the way he was, looking raw and vulnerable, only reminded me of the boy I’d spent my formative years with. The grade schooler who’d offered me the seat next to him on the bus when nobody else would let the new girl near them. The slightly husky preteen, who used to sneak into my room with the latest Zeppelin record so we could listen to it together. The awkward fifteen-year-old who’d punched Jimmy Haskins in the middle of the lunch room for calling me a snobby slut. And the filled-out captain of the football team who’d asked me to dance at our senior year Homecoming because he’d finally come to his senses and realized that he liked me as more than a friend—just like I’d realized the same about him a year earlier.
It was impossible to hate him when he looked at me that way.
“You hurt me,” I whispered, looking down at my fidgeting hands. “I don’t think you understand just how much.”
I could hear his heavy exhale and the crunch of dead grass underfoot as he stepped closer to me. His hand touched my shoulder and I instinctively pulled away from it.
“I didn’t. Not then, anyway. By the time I did, it was too late. I’d messed up too badly to fix it.”
“You never bothered trying,” I replied, lifting my watery gaze to meet his eyes. “You never even once tried, Braxton. You just cut that tie and buggered off. How could you do that?”
“Bryant!” a man shouted from across the street. “Stop trying to play grab-ass and let’s go. I got shit to do.”
“Watch your mouth,” he yelled back. The harsh tone he used shut the older man up in a hurry. “I’ll be there in a minute.” He turned back to me, his expression softening. “Can I come by your parents’ place later? I want to talk about this, but not here.”
“I don’t think that’s a good—”
“I just want to explain. That’s all. You can kick me out the second I’m finished. In fact, you don’t even have to let me in. We could go for a walk around the neighborhood—just like old times.”
I shook my head no.
“These aren’t old times.” A tear rolled down my face the second those words left my mouth. “Thanks for letting me know about your dad and your apology. I need to go now.”
I got back into my car and turned it on. Without hesitation, I put it in gear and pulled out, leaving Braxton behind me, a tall, gorgeous image in my rearview mirror. An image I hoped wouldn’t haunt me all summer long.
The emptiness in my parents’ house was maddening. TV could only prove a distraction for so long. When I ran out of things to watch and the VHS broke, I shut off the TV and went to the kitchen to make dinner. I turned on the radio to find Bananarama’s “Cruel Summer” blaring through the speakers. An unwanted reminder that so far, couldn’t have been truer of my school break.
As I cooked my mac and cheese, I questioned my decision to come home that summer. The image of Jason screwing that girl would be forever embedded in my mind. There was no erasing it.
My eyes watered at the thought.
How had everything gone so wrong between us? He’d been everything to me after Braxton abandoned me our senior year. If I hadn’t had him, I don’t know how I would have made it to graduation. We were so in love—or so I’d thought. When he chose to go to a different college than me, I didn’t think much of it. The school had an excellent engineering program, which he’d been accepted into. I visited him as often as I could. Everything seemed fine. But when I thought about it, really looking back, I think there were signs that I’d missed—or chosen to overlook. My blind need for the security he provided me set me up for exactly what I’d walked in on. Somehow, I missed the reality that he didn’t want me anymore.
Or maybe he’d become the sort of guy that wanted to have his cake and eat it too.
Then there was Braxton. His betrayal might have been older, but that wound still felt fresh. Seeing him earlier that day somehow managed to rip off that ancient scab and pour salt right on the open sore it exposed. Was he just as bad as Jason? Did I have a thing for guys that thought it was cool to treat me like shit?
I pondered that for a while before I came to a conclusion. Jason hadn’t looked sorry that he’d hurt me; he’d looked sorry that he’d been caught red-handed and wasn’t able to lie his way out of sticking his dick somewhere it didn’t belong. I couldn’t say the same for Braxton. When he’d overheard Wendy and me talking in the office, there was genuine regret in his eyes. Jason had had none of that. Annoyance, yes—but not regret. That said, Braxton might not have had any right after he’d dumped me like a hot potato either. He’d had three years to realize what an asshole he’d been. And that’s a mighty long time to finally figure that out.
After dinner, I plopped down on the couch, put on some TV sitcom that I didn’t care about, and stared at the screen. I couldn’t really focus on it. My mind was still overrun with the drama of my own life. Everything else seemed to pale in comparison.
I leaned back and closed my eyes, hoping that the imaged of Jason plowing that girl wouldn’t reflexively pop up. Though they didn’t, I wasn’t thrilled with what took its place. Instead, I saw me in a purple sequined dress, balloons and streamers blanketing the high school gym, and Braxton Bryant eyeing me from across the room. He looked at me in a way he never had before, and my heart skipped a beat just remembering his expression. He strode toward me through the Homecoming festivities and asked me to dance. In that moment, I didn’t care that I had a boyfriend standing ten feet away from me, talking to his friends, or that Braxton had a girlfriend, who was three years younger than us, sitting at a table with her giddy schoolgirl friends. All I saw was him and the way he looked at me. Like he finally saw me for the first time.
He took my hand in his and led me to the center of the room, surrounded by all the other couples, then wrapped his arms around my lower back. I, in turn, draped mine up around the back of his neck and gazed up at him like he was the sun finally shining down on me after years of rain. My face flushed with heat and I looked away from him, not wanting him to see how much I enjoyed the moment.
“You look beautiful, Iz.”
“Thanks.”
“Listen, I know that my timing with this is probably the worst ever, but…I need to know something.”
I broke out into a cold sweat.
“What?” My voice was so breathy and low that I wondered how he’d even heard me.
“I need to know if you—”
“There you are!” Shawn said with a smile. “I wondered where you ran off to.” He looked over at Braxton and smiled. The two of them had become friends while Shawn and I were dating. Shawn never would have never seen coming what Braxton and I would eventually do. “Mind if I cut in, big guy?”
Braxton smiled his easy smile and stepped aside like he didn’t care.
“Just keeping her out of trouble for you.”
He turned and disappeared into the crowd, leaving me with my boyfriend and my running mind that was desperate to find out what he’d wanted to ask me. Suddenly, it became all I cared about.
The rest of that night hardly seemed to matter. I felt like I was going through the motions, just trying to keep it together so Shawn didn’t become suspicious. But really, was there something to be suspicious about? As far as I was concerned, there wasn’t. Not yet, anyway.
When I got home that night, I laid in bed, staring at the phone in my room. I wanted to call Braxton and ask him to finish his question, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I had a private line at my house. He, however, did not, and the last thing I wanted to do was set his dad off in any way. If he was home from work, Braxton would have taken the brunt of his anger. I couldn’t set him up for that. Eventually I fell asleep, thinking about the way he’d looked at me that night.
Early the next morning, my phone rang.
“I need to see you,” Braxton blurted out without even greeting me.
“What’s wrong?” He’d sounded a bit frantic, which made me nervous. He usually sounded that way when he needed to get away from his dad.
“Nothing’s wrong, Iz. I just…I need to talk to you and I don’t want to do it on the phone. Can I come over?”
“I’m not even out of bed yet, Braxton.”
“Then you’d better get up now because I’m going to be there in fifteen.”
“Jesus. Okay, I’ll be ready.”
He hung up and I jumped out of bed, snatching up a pair of jeans and a tank top. I threw my hair into a high ponytail and ran downstairs while I slipped a jacket on. My parents were up having breakfast complete with their standard civilized silence.
“Braxton is coming over to get me. We’re going to go for a walk.”
“How was the dance, dear?” my mom asked, putting down her fork.
“Fun.”
“Just fun?”
“It wasn’t anything special. Just dancing and the usual.”
“You were home pretty early,” she pressed.
“I didn’t feel like going to the after party. All kids do there is get drunk and smoke pot. I’m not really into that.”
“A wise choice,” my dad said from behind his newspaper. I ignored the comment.
“Anyway… Braxton wants to tell me something important, so I said he could come over. Is that okay?”
“Of course, dear. Maybe he’s got some exciting gossip for you from the after party…”
“Maybe,” I replied, hoping to appease her nosey nelly tendencies. “I’ll let you know when I get back.” That last sentiment roped her in. The thought of getting juicy tidbits on her friends’ kids was all the motivation she needed to sanction my early morning rendezvous.
“Grab a muffin to take with you, dear. You’ll never fill out if you don’t eat enough.”
I groaned inwardly.
“Yes, Mom…”
I took two from the basket on the counter and made my way to the front door. I could hear the rumble of Braxton’s diesel truck coming down the hill. I didn’t want him coming in. My mother would never let him leave if he did.
“I’ll be back later.”
“No rush,” my mother called to me. “Love you.”
I walked out onto the front porch without replying.
Braxton was
just pulling in the long driveway, so I made my way down the sidewalk to meet him. His normal goofy smile was missing. In its place, I found a tight expression. He looked nervous, which made me uneasy.
I pried open the old truck’s door and tossed him a muffin as I climbed in.
“Where are we headed?”
“Don’t know.”
“You’re starting to freak me out, Braxton. You’re acting weird.”
“Yeah,” he muttered under his breath. “Tell me about it.”
He pulled out and headed back up the hill. We drove in silence for a solid five minutes before I couldn’t take it any longer. Just as he pulled into the abandoned rock quarry at the edge of town, I finally broke.
“Seriously, Braxton. What is going on?”
He parked the truck and killed the engine, then jumped out. He rounded the front of the vehicle and opened the passenger door for me. With a reach of his hand, he helped me down. I landed right in front of him, our bodies as close as they were the night before at the dance. The heat coming off of him felt warm and familiar, and I tried once again to hide the flush of my cheeks by looking down, but he wasn’t having any of that. He lifted my chin so I had no choice but to gaze up at him.
“Since when are you the bashful sort?” he asked me, finally wearing the smile I’d grown to love.
“Since you started acting all weird.”
He sighed and released my face. Taking my hand in his, he led me away from the car toward the path the meandered through the rocky landscape.
“How was the rest of the dance?” he asked.
“Fine.”
“You looked like you were having a good time.”
“Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do at those things?”
1983: Cruel Summer (Love in the 80s #4) Page 2
