by LaylaHagen3
I think I could be free there, in whatever would follow after the last drop of blood drains.
With a sob, I drop the scissors. I can’t do it; I can’t set myself free.
As usual, I’m too much of a coward.
Spring 2006 – College Freshman
I leave the room without making any noise, though the redhead is sleeping so deeply, I doubt an earthquake could shake her up. It’s always easiest to leave after they fall asleep. Saves us from some awkward after-sex conversation while I dress and prepare to disappear.
The first time I took a girl back to her dorm room, I was dead drunk after a frat party.
The second time only halfway so.
But every time since—I don’t know how many times, I lost count about halfway through freshman year—I was one hundred percent sober. I’ve no idea why, but I rarely have to do anything more than say a few words to get a girl in bed. Especially if I have bruises on me. I happen to have bruises almost permanently.
Turns out that sex, of all the things I’ve tried, is the one thing that completely rips me away from my thoughts and my guilt.
And I tried some seriously fucked-up things.
But as I leave the redhead’s dorm, choking on the early morning air, the guilt comes back, as it always does, amplified by the knowledge that I have tainted the one thing I had left of Lara. Her memory.
Again.
My cell phone buzzes. At five o’clock in the morning, there can be only one person calling. Ralph. My screen confirms this.
“Bad news,” he says. “My guy tells me there’s no way he can fix it.”
“Fuck your guy; I’ll find another one.”
“He’s the best mechanic there is. If he can’t fix your racecar, no one can.”
I curse again and light a cigarette as I stride across campus to my dorm. I know he’s right. The car was a wreck when they got me out of it. It’s how I got my latest bruises, only this time I got some serious burns to go with them.
“Then I’ll buy another car,” I say. “That one was getting old anyway. The new model is out this week.”
There’s a pause and then, “You spent a fortune on this one, James.”
“Since when are you babysitting me?”
“It’s not worth it. Why don’t you just buy a regular one, like mine? It’s not like we’re pros, for God’s sake.”
No, we’re definitely not pros. We’re just some hotheads showing off our egos at illegal car races. So far, I’ve won all the races. I bought a car that was faster than anyone else’s. More dangerous, too. If I die while driving it, it could easily pass off as an accident. It’s a thought that occurs to me every time I sit behind its wheel. But at that moment, when I stare death in the face, I realize I want to live. Every single time. But maybe I’m just too much of a coward to drive into a tree, like Lara did, and I mistake cowardice for the will to live. The accident that destroyed my car was just that, an accident.
“Where the hell are you?” Ralph asks.
“I’m on my way to my dorm.”
He bursts out laughing. “Scored again, have you? We haven’t even finished our freshman year, and you’ve had more—”
“Whatever Ralph,” I say, shutting off the phone.
The way he talks about women sometimes makes me want to punch him. As if they are some kind of trophies. I snort. What a lousy hypocrite I am for criticizing him. They’re not even trophies for me. They’re just a means to an end. Most of the time I don’t even know what that end is. But I learned my lesson. I never go beyond a one-night stand with them. Most of them don’t seem to want more anyway. I suppose they know that a bruised fuck-up with circles under his eyes almost as dark as his hair is only good for a one-night stand.
But some do want more.
Some smile at me in the hallways, or appear repeatedly—too often to be unintentional—in the same place I am. That’s the price for always picking up girls on campus, but I can’t be bothered to look farther away. They don’t say anything, probably expecting me to take the lead. I never do. They all give up after a while anyway, either ignoring me or throwing me disappointed glances if we happen to cross paths again. I hate myself for disappointing them, I do. But disappointed is better than dead. There’s nothing good that would come out of a relationship. I would end up breaking them.
Like I broke her.
Even though I spend more nights than I care to admit thinking about it, I still can’t seem to understand how things got so bad. I can’t put my finger on the moment Lara and I went from being a happy, in-love couple to two people who spent more time fighting than doing anything else together. We were still in love, of course. At least I was. I adored her. But the more I think about it, the less certain I am that she adored me. I can’t blame her.
We had known each other forever—we’d been attending the same boarding school since we were eleven. We started dating at the end of our freshman year in high school, spent the summer traveling through Asia, and were inseparable when we returned to school in autumn.
If I had to choose one defining moment, it would be our first anniversary. I’d booked a table at the most expensive restaurant in the area. Perfect view and everything. I had bought her a diamond key-shaped pendant as a present, and she bought me the Rolex I haven’t taken off since. We were midway through dinner when the waiter brought Lara a rose and a note from one of the other guests in the restaurant. We never knew who sent it. The note read, A beautiful rose for a beautiful girl.
Fucking corny.
And it set me on fucking fire.
She laughed at it, but I didn’t find anything about the situation even remotely funny. I started questioning her, even checked her messages when she went to the bathroom. I think that was the moment the monster emerged. Probably it’d existed there forever, but that rose and note was what it took to wake it up. I continued to interrogate her the entire evening. She said my jealousy was cute.
But she changed her opinion when it became a weekly, and then a daily thing. Before long, that was all we were talking about. One glance from another guy was enough to set me off. I would insist on accompanying her everywhere she went, something she, understandably, wasn’t happy about and one cause of our numerous fights. But then again, we were fighting constantly anyway. Especially after she got accepted at Harvard. I hadn’t, and already had my mind set on Stanford anyway. We’d discussed, for almost a year, going to Stanford together, but then she started having second thoughts. Second thoughts that didn’t sit very well with me, something I let her know repeatedly.
The day of our graduation she told me she had decided to go to Harvard. She’d made her decision months before, but hadn’t had the courage to outright tell me, fearing an outburst. Which was exactly what she got. She insisted that nothing would change. Although we would have a long-distance relationship, we could visit each other on weekends. But all I could see when I thought of long-distance was her surrounded by other men without me there to protect her.
When it was, in fact, me she needed protection from. The things I said to her that day, just before she got in her car . . . it wouldn’t be a stretch to think she crashed into that tree on purpose, to end it all. Part of me knows that she didn’t. Lara wasn’t the type to commit suicide; she was strong.
But on the nights I have nightmares, it’s hard to remember that she was strong. All I can see is her image, as vivid as if she were in front of me, repeating again and again the exact same words she said to me before getting in that car: “You make my life a living hell.”
Her last words—the perfect description of what our relationship had become.
My therapist says I am changed now, that I should try a relationship. That it would be good for me. The moron. I don’t know why having a diploma and a shiny office makes people think they know what they are talking about. A relationship wouldn’t be bad for me. It’d be bad for whoever I’d be in it with. The therapist might be under the illusion that I’m changed, but I know be
tter. The monster is still there, waiting to be woken up.
No woman deserves that.
I get inside my room, but only stay long enough to shower and pick up my laptop and the books for today’s classes. There’s no point in going to sleep; I have a class in three hours. I avoid sleep whenever I can anyway. Unless I’m tired as hell, I don’t go to bed. Too many nightmares. But between the car racing and the partying, I’ve got enough ways to exhaust myself most of the time.
I find a good spot outside the building and I open my laptop to catch up on my assignments. If people would be graded based on the number of hours they spend studying, I’d be kicked out of college in no time. As it is, it looks like I’ll finish my freshman year with acceptable grades. I don’t need much time for studying, something Ralph envies me for as much as for my number of conquests.
Two hours later my fingertips hurt from all the typing, and I’m about to close my laptop when someone says, “You’re up early.”
I look up and see Natalie standing in front of me.
“I had to finish an assignment.” I close my laptop and stand up. “I’m starving. I’ll go grab a quick breakfast before class begins.”
“I’m coming with you. I could use another coffee. So, James, there are just two weeks of school left. Any plans for the summer?”
“Sort of. I promised my little sister I’d take her on some roller coasters, so I’ll probably spend most of the summer traveling around with her, and Ralph is planning some kind of cruise on his yacht the last two weeks before college starts again.” I’ll also fit some serious racing in between, as soon as I get a damn car, but no need for Natalie to know all my shit.
Natalie nods. “I know about the cruise, he told me. I’m probably going to come too. So . . . I heard Lara’s parents are organizing a one-year memorial for her. Aren’t you going?”
Every bone in my body goes cold. Natalie looks at me with wide, expectant eyes. Her stare could pass as innocent. But it’s not. I don’t know what her deal is, but she brings up Lara far too often. It’s like she doesn’t want me to forget what happened. Coming from someone who calls herself my oldest friend—and she is, at Stanford at least—I don’t like that.
“I don’t think my presence in her parents’ house is welcome,” is all I say, barely managing to keep my voice even.
2009 – High School Senior
When I look up from my notebook, it’s already dark outside, rain drizzling against the library window. I glance around me; there’s no one left. Not even the others who train with me for the math challenge. I gather my books, pens, and the calculator, stuff them in my backpack, and then head to the door.
“Night, Ms. Dingle,” I call to the librarian, who’s up on a ladder rearranging the books on the top shelf.
“Goodness. I didn’t know you were still here, my dear.”
“There are just a few days until the challenge, so I’m trying to squeeze in as much training as I can.”
She pushes her glasses up her nose and smiles, her gray-streaked, chocolate-brown hair framing her face. “You’ll do fine, Serena. I’m sure everything will work out at the challenge. As will Stanford.”
I blush as I exit the library. Somehow, the entire school knows I’m hoping to go to Stanford. I thought they’d forget after a while, but I guess it’s something that will hold their interest for a little longer since not many kids in our school even dream of applying to Stanford. I really hope I’ll get in.
Winning The Williamson National Math Challenge for Underprivileged Teens would put me on the right track. I don’t have many options left; I’m a senior, after all.
I take the bus home, and though the ride doesn’t take long, by the time I get out of the bus the rain is falling in torrents, and I’m soaked when I enter the house.
“Finally, you’re home,” Jess calls from the kitchen. There’s considerable chatter in the kitchen, which means her mum, Ms. Haydn, is also in there.
I peek inside the kitchen. Both of them are at the stove, with their backs to me. It’s not easy to tell them apart. They’re both blonde and slender, but Ms. Haydn is a few inches shorter than Jess. “I’ll go change and then come down and help,” I say.
“There’s no need, dear,” Ms. Haydn says. “Dinner is ready. I’ll eat now and then leave for my shift, but you and Jess can eat whenever you feel like it.”
She turns around and looks up at me, pointing to the burgers on the stove, and I grin. It’s almost automatic now. Whenever Ms. Haydn looks at me, I smile. I’ve found that smiling keeps people from asking questions, or worse, trying to console the inconsolable. A smile seems to fool everyone, Ms. Haydn included. So I’ve perfected the art of smiling.
She frowns as she sees my soaked clothes. “Go change your clothes, Serena, or you’ll get sick.”
Jess comes out of the kitchen with me.
“Your rat called you,” she says as we go upstairs.
I pinch her arm. “Stop calling Michael that.”
“What? A rat? He looks just like one.”
“No he doesn’t.”
“You really deserve a better-looking boyfriend.”
“I like Michael,” I say simply.
He’s quiet and shy, like me. I still can’t believe he’s my boyfriend, though we’ve been dating since the beginning of our junior year. I will never know why he decided to date me instead of running for his life after I flirted with a line even the cheapest romance movie wouldn’t dare use.
“You’re not supposed to like him,” Jess said, faking a shudder. “You’re supposed to be madly in love with him. There’s this thing called passion. It’s like an explosion.”
Ah, yes, passion. That’s all Jess ever seems to look for in life in general, and in her boyfriends in particular. Much like Kate did.
But Jess proves to me time and again that passion doesn’t last. She changes boyfriends every six months. An explosion is not what I want. It’s the steady fire my parents have had since they married right out of high school that I crave. And that’s exactly what I have with Michael. I felt it the first time he told me he loved me, and have every time since. That steadiness and warmth is all I’ll ever need and want.
“At the very least, you’re supposed to feel butterflies in your stomach every time you see him. And when he undresses you—”
“Jess,” I cut her off, feeling my cheeks getting hotter. “Michael and I haven’t . . . I mean . . .”
She scoffs. “I know you haven’t. But it’s about time you do.”
“I’m very happy with how things are, thank you very much,” I say as we reach the phone on a low glass table between the doors of our adjoining rooms. “Did Michael call from his dad’s shop, or from home?”
Michael and I don’t spend an inordinate amount of time together, between all my extracurricular activities and his job at his dad’s auto shop after school. But when we are together we do simple things like watch movies with me huddled against his chest.
I like that. Well, I like movies. A lot. There’s something about movies . . . it’s like I get lost in them. For a few hours I forget where I am, hell, even who I am. I have quite a collection of movies—enough to qualify the whole thing as an addiction. Michael made fun of me for an entire week when he saw fifty DVDs stocked in my closet. I didn’t tell him there were twenty more under my bed.
“He called from home. He didn’t seem very happy when I told him you were studying for the math challenge.”
I groan. Michael can’t understand why I’m trying so hard to win the challenge. I’ve given up repeating that it’s to increase my chances of getting accepted into college and gaining a scholarship. He doesn’t have any intention of going to college. He wants to start working right after school, and doesn’t get why I want something different.
I’ve wanted something different since the day I came home from school and found Mum crying over a letter from the bank. I think I was seven or eight years old. She and Dad never told me what it said, but I unde
rstood when we had to move into a smaller house in one of London’s dodgiest neighborhoods. Our new location certainly made it easy for Kate to surround herself with the thugs she called friends.
Both Mum and Dad worked their asses off, so I knew that it wasn’t for lack of trying on their part that we couldn’t keep the old house. They did everything they could. But everything isn’t enough sometimes. When I was older I realized things could be different if I went to college. I could get a job afterward that paid far more than what Mum and Dad made. A job that paid enough for me to be able to ensure they both lived the decent life they deserved. I dreamed of going to college ever since. After Kate died, I heard the doctors reprimand my parents for not sending her to rehab. My parents’ answer, weak and regretful, was they couldn’t afford it. I didn’t only dream about going to college afterward. It became my life goal.
As I watch Jess stare at the poster of Stanford she hung above the phone months ago, biting her nails, I have a sudden urge to hug her. We may be different in many ways, but Stanford is one goal we share. Jess’s dad always dreamed of going to college, but never had the chance. I think Jess is trying to fulfill that dream, probably in the hope that her relationship with her dad will improve. They don’t get along at all.
“Well, I’ll leave you to call Michael.” Jess frowns at her nails, shaking her head. “I want to paint my nails before dinner. What do you think if I make them neon pink?”
I give a noncommittal shrug and pick up the phone to call Michael, mentally praying for Jess to change her mind as she disappears into her room. I hate neon colors.
Someone picks up after a few rings, and I’m relieved when it’s Michael who speaks. I always feel a bit awkward when his Mum or Dad pick up.
“Jess said you were at the library again,” he says.
“Yep, math challenge is in a few days.”
