“Selene, praise God. Drake isn’t here, but I can get him. He will come. They’ll be so happy you woke up. Emme and Drake are in the hall.”
Just then, I hear the door open, and I look over. Emme walks in and immediately bursts into tears, covering her mouth as if she might scream.
Aunt Vi. White room. Emme. Crying. Instantly, I realize I’m in the hospital. The memories begin rushing back. My unspoken confession. What I heard Aunt Vi and Drake discussing. Drake seeing me and the look in his eyes. Running to the car and him chasing me. The rain. The begging. The tree. My mama. Lacey. Drake. Oh, God. I wrap my hands around my head, trying to keep the memories out.
I feel a sob erupting from me as all the pain and anguish I had forgotten fills me. I can hear Aunt Vi and Emme panicking around me. Aunt Vi calling for the doctor. Trying to decide how to help me. I continue to squeeze my eyes shut and hold my head to block the memories out, but it isn’t working. I can still feel it. All the pain. My heart breaking. I want to go back to sleep. I don’t want this pain. I want someone to take the pain away, but no one can.
I hear Aunt Vi talking loudly, asking the doctor to help me as his hands cover mine, trying to pry them away from my head.
“Selene, tell me where it hurts. Is it a sharp pain? This isn’t uncommon with a head injury.” His voice is deep and soothing. I can’t be soothed. Don’t they understand that? Pushing his hands away, I look up at them with wide eyes, the burn of unshed tears behind them.
“No! You can’t help! I—I hurt everywhere!” I can see the confusion written all over his face. He doesn’t understand.
I look over at Aunt Vi, pleading with her to understand what I’m saying because I can’t say it out loud. I will completely break if I do.
With an unsteady voice, she asks, “Do you want me to get Dra—”
I put my hand over my ears. “No! Don’t say his name! I can’t. I can’t see him! I can’t think of him! I can’t love him!” Looking up at her, I say with an eerie calm, “I don’t ever want to talk about him again.”
Turning over and curling into myself as tight as I can, I stare at the heartbeat playing on the monitor. I watch it and am surprised it hasn’t flat-lined, because I can’t feel my heart anymore. I’m pretty sure it stopped beating the moment I remembered I can’t love him anymore.
Drake
WE BOTH STAND THE MOMENT we hear Mrs. D saying Selene’s name and talking to her. I rush to the window of the room and watch as she pleads with Selene’s stirring form.
“She’s waking up,” I say to Emme, who is now standing beside me. We can’t actually hear everything Mrs. D is saying, and now we hear Selene’s quiet voice. I think I hear my name, and a small gleam of hope lights inside me. I put my hand against the glass.
I feel Emme move beside me and realize she is headed toward the door. She looks back over at me. “Aren’t you coming?”
She has an exulting look on her face and tears glistening in her eyes. I can’t form the words, so I just shake my head. She starts to say something but just nods her head and goes into the room.
I watch everything that is going on, and then suddenly, Selene covers her head and begins crying out like she is in unbearable pain. I start to move toward the door on instinct to protect her, but then I notice the doctor rushing into the room, and know I would only be in the way. So I watch from the window. Every howling sound she releases, I feel it piercing my soul.
I can’t take it any longer and rush to the door. Just as I open it. I hear her say my name. She is shouting at Mrs. Durham and the doctor. She can’t see me. She can’t think of me. I swallow hard. She can’t love me. I’m nearly brought to my knees. I feel them buckle, and I put my hand on the wall to steady myself. She never wants to talk about me again.
I lost her. I really and truly lost her. She won’t ask for me. She doesn’t want me to fight for her. The tiny bit of hope left has been extinguished. I slowly make my way down the cold, empty hallway of the hospital. I feel colder and colder the further away I get from the brightest, warmest part of my life. I’m not sure how I’ll make it through this loss, but I guess I’ll just have to try.
Selene
SILENCE. IT HAS BEEN THREE days since I woke up in this nightmare, a place so full of lost dreams, broken hearts, and utter despair. All things I don’t want to face. I keep my eyes closed in hopes they will all leave me alone. If I could escape it by sleeping, I would. But even in my sleep, I dream of them. All of them. I dream of Mama and her sweet face. I dream of a girl I only knew briefly, who changed my life forever. And, most of all, I dream of a boy. A boy with a devilish grin and gentle touch. A boy who holds my heart.
“Selene.” I hear Aunt Vi say my name, but just as I’ve done every morning, I keep my eyes closed. “Selene, I know you’re awake.” She pauses, and I hear her sigh deeply. “Selene, you need to open your eyes. You get to go home today. The doctor will be in soon to check you over and sign the release papers.”
Maybe if I keep my eyes closed, he’ll let me stay. As shitty as I feel here, the memories are easier to deal with in this cold white room. This room doesn’t come with old memories I’ve yet to think about. I don’t have to get in a car and drive a familiar road reminding me of things I want to forget. Forgetting is the only way I’ll survive. If I can actually survive.
Reluctantly, I open my eyes and watch as Aunt Vi pulls the blinds closed over the glass. She turns, faces me, and our eyes meet. I resist the urge to close them again. The need to shut everyone out pulses through me. “Aren’t you excited about leaving this room today? You get to go outside.” She pauses and watches me. I can see she is waiting to see if I’ll respond. I don’t. “Winter is definitely here, so I brought you warm clothes. I’ll leave them here at the end of the bed, unless you need me—”
“No!” She looks startled and a little hurt by my reaction. I feel bad for hurting her. “I mean, no thank you. I can do it myself.” She nods and walks to the door.
Before she leaves, Aunt Vi pauses in the doorway. “She wouldn’t want this for you, Selene.” Confused, I can’t help but ask. “Who? What do you mean?” She still doesn’t face me. “Your mama. She wouldn’t want you to close yourself off and throw away an opportunity for love.” Without waiting for a response, she leaves me alone.
I lie back again and cover my head with the pillow.
Closing my eyes, I just want the darkness to swallow me. I can’t think of what Mama would want because it doesn’t matter now. She is gone. And, as for love. I don’t really believe it exists. Maybe the thought of real love exists, but falling in love only hurts. I know because I’m hurting. So I just want to stay in this darkness. I don’t want to get up. I don’t want to open my eyes until I can let them go. Until I can let him go.
Drake
MAKING MYSELF MOVE THROUGH THE days since I left the hospital have been nearly impossible. I’ve gone to school, but I haven’t really been present. Emme and Tommy have tried to pull me back into life, failing each time. Now they look at me as if I might break at any moment. The thing they don’t realize is I’m already broken.
It scares me, this feeling of hopelessness taking the place of every thought I have ever had. I’m spiraling. Again. Except this time I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to pull myself out. The things that normally scare me or make me think twice have no effect on me now. Put simply, I don’t care anymore. Crossing my mother’s path doesn’t even faze me as it once did. Nothing fazes me. I’m a shell of who I once was.
Barely able to lift my head, I look in the direction from where Tommy calls my name. I raise my eyes to meet his, and he winces once he gets a good look at my face. He couldn’t even hide his reaction.
“Dude, what the fuck?”
I just keep walking until I reach the locker room door and enter. He finally talked me into meeting him up at the school to work out a little. I don’t really want to be here, but I knew I couldn’t keep avoiding him.
“It doesn’t matter.” He wat
ches me as if waiting for more of an explanation, but I don’t give him one.
After a moment, he follows me into the building. I breathe a sigh of relief, knowing I don’t have to lie. I just don’t think I have it in me.
I’m wrong though. He isn’t going to let this go. “Uh, man. I thought this shit stopped.” His comment catches me by surprise. Looking up at him, I see he is looking straight at me. His facial expression changes once he catches the look I’m giving him. “It just seems…umm, well I thought maybe things mellowed after Lacey.”
He knows. Tommy knows, and apparently he has known for a while. The most self-centered, unobservant person I know actually noticed something other than what was right in front of him.
“Sorry I brought it up like that, but fuck—you didn’t cover it up this time, so I thought maybe you wanted to talk about it.” Shaking his head, Tommy takes a seat next to me.
Not knowing what to say, I remain quiet, staring at a speck of red paint on the gray lockers in front of me. We sit in silence until it almost becomes suffocating.
“I don’t think I realized what Selene meant to you until the last few weeks.” Turning toward me on the bench, Tommy watches me. Just hearing her name makes me feel like I’m breaking to pieces. “You changed after Lacey, but you opened up when Selene came here.”
I still can’t seem to focus on anything other than that red paint. I hear him. I know he wants me to say something.
Suddenly, he stands up and hits the locker. “Fuck, Drake! Say something! Anything! Do you know what it’s like to watch your best friend hang on by a thread? I know I’m an asshole, but I see things. Just because I don’t know what to say or do about these things doesn’t mean I don’t see them.” Seeing this side of Tommy catches me off guard.
“I’m sorry,” I say without the emotion I’m actually feeling on the inside. “I don’t know what to do anymore. I have been in survival mode my whole life, Tommy.” Standing, I begin pacing, feeling alive for the first time in weeks. “And I’m not sure I have anything to survive for any longer. My parents hate me. Lacey is gone. Selene blames me for—”
He puts his hand up to stop me, and his voice is loud with anger. “Bullshit! Snap out of this shit. You’re a fighter. Dammit, Drake. You’ve fought your whole life, and to give up now would be fucking stupid. You fought against your bitch mother, pathetic father, and you’ve fought for everything you ever wanted. You survived. Do you want Selene?”
I keep my eyes focused at my feet, remaining silent when I know he wants an answer.
“I said, do you want Selene?
I look up at him and nod my head.
“Then fucking fight for her. If you can’t win this time, then you’ll survive.” His voice softens again, and he puts his arm around me. “I think you’ll win. Drake Thomas doesn’t give up.” He doesn’t wait for me to answer. Smiling, he says, “Glad we could have this talk.” Patting me on the back, he keeps smiling at me. Something resembling happiness makes an appearance on my face for the first time in weeks.
I never thought I would say this, but Tommy is right. I can’t give up. I won’t give up because I want and need her. And, whether she realizes it or not, she wants and needs me. Maybe this will just take time and persistence.
Looking over at Tommy, I push him off me against the lockers. “Dude, get the fuck off me.” I open my locker and take out my track shoes. “And, seriously, don’t ever get emotional like that again. It freaks my shit out.” Just like that, thanks to my typically insensitive friend, I feel a glimmer of hope. I might be able to get Selene back. I just need to figure out how.
Selene
THE LAST TIME I WENT three weeks without speaking to Drake, I felt lost. This time seems a thousand times worse. I haven’t figured out if it’s because I’m feeling the loss of him and my mama all over again or if it’s just him. Physically, this is nearly unbearable. I can’t see him. I can’t forgive him.
Forgive what? a tiny voice in my head whispers. I push it out of my mind.
The conversation I overheard that day replays in my head over and over. When I saw his truck in the driveway that morning, I couldn't wait to wrap my arms around him and tell him I was ready. Ready for love. Ready to be happy. I couldn’t hold back all the feelings only he had ever been able to reach for one second longer. I was soaring high for once with the possibility of what my future could be. I finally thought I deserved something good.
I shouldn’t have been listening. I should’ve let them know I was there as soon as I heard their muffled voices. Then, when I got closer to the entry of the kitchen, I heard his words.
She just wanted to be with me, and I left her. I just wanted to protect her, but I didn’t. I allowed her to feel unloved and alone. She got in that car to look for me, and she died! She died, and she killed Selene’s mother too. And it’s all my fault!
It’s all my fault keeps repeating in my mind. I can’t see past that, and when he looked at me with all the guilt in his eyes, it was like he knew I could never forgive him. It was like he didn’t think I should ever forgive him. Now, I don’t know what to do or say. I don’t know how I’ll ever get past this. I shouldn’t have been so stupid to ever think I deserved to be loved and to love.
Aunt Vi says Mama wouldn’t want me to live this way. I don’t want to live this way either, but I just don’t know how to go forward. How do I understand? How do I forget?
I glance across my room to where my guitar leans against the wall. I guess to find the answers to any of those questions, I’ll need to believe I can first. And I’m not sure I believe in that kind of possibility.
Drake
EVEN AFTER MY CONVERSATION WITH Tommy, I still feel myself falling apart. Broken, I still hold on. Sometimes, it all seems pointless now I don’t have Lacey—or Selene. I loved them both more than my life, and somehow everything I did to protect them only hurt them more in the end.
I’ve tried calling Selene four times in the last few days. She never answers, and I never leave a message. I want to say the things I’m feeling to her, not some message. I would rather it be face-to-face, but I haven’t worked up the nerve to risk rejection in person. It has been hard enough letting my mind go crazy, thinking she could be sitting there next to her phone, watching my name light up the screen and still not wanting to answer. This is torture. I won’t let myself give up though.
It’s killing me as I lie here thinking of her. Of the mistakes I made. I feel like I’m in a dream where I want to run but can’t move. Tommy said I can win her back. I’m not sure. Is it even possible for me to win? I take a deep breath and close my eyes. I think of when I last saw her. I remember how kissing her felt. It didn’t feel right. Well, the kiss felt good. Holding her felt good. All of those things with Selene have felt real since the first time our lips met. But the last time the air around us was clouded with doubts and fears neither of us could explain but knew were out there. I could even see it in her eyes, although she tried to play it off like she wasn’t afraid. Everything between us was coming to an end. I clench my fist into the blanket. There was something pushing us apart even as she kissed me and I held her.
I look at my cell phone again and push the talk button. It rings and rings until finally I hear her voice pick up. Her voicemail again. This time I listen. She sounded so happy. It was such a change from the girl who first came here, and even more of a change from the girl I saw a few days ago. When the phone indicates it’s time to leave a message, the words rush out of me.
“God, Selene. I wish you would pick up. Talk to me…something. I…I don’t know. I promised myself I wouldn’t call or go to you, but I have things to say. I need you to listen.” I plead desperately. I didn’t realize how badly I needed to say these things. “I just want to say when you came here, I had an enormous hole in my heart that needed to be filled up, and you did that, Selene. You made it whole again.” Taking a slow breath, I say one last thing. “I can’t let you go…I won’t.”
Hanging up
the phone, I grab my keys and head out the door. There is someone else I need to visit. It's been too long, and I need to make sure she knows I haven’t forgotten her either.
Selene
LOOKING UP, I REALIZE EMME is standing in the doorway, staring at me. I give her a half-hearted look of pleasure on my face and put my phone under my pillow. She isn’t impressed.
“You know, you should answer that call.” Walking toward me, Emme sits next to me on the bed.
I widen my smile, hoping she doesn’t see through it. “And please tell me why I should answer a telemarketer’s phone call.”
Reaching for the glass of water on my end table, I take a sip. I don’t know why I just lied. It feels like if I don’t acknowledge his call, then it didn’t happen. Rolling her eyes, she picks up the new People magazine and starts flipping through it.
“I know you’re lying, Selene. It was Drake, and I can see in your eyes you’re as miserable avoiding him as he is trying to get you to forgive him for something that really isn’t his fault.”
I literally feel like someone punches me in the stomach as the words leave her mouth. She continues, not even concerned I may not want to talk about this.
“He has always felt the need to protect those he loves by taking on everything, even things he has no control over. It drove Lacey crazy. He hurt himself trying to keep her safe.”
Shaking her head, she lets out a long, drawn-out sigh. “We all knew, but no one said anything. We knew what she did to him. What kind of mother does that? Drake did everything to take the attention away from Lacey. That night, Lacey decided she wasn’t going to let Drake be the only one who was bad, so she drank.” Emme goes quiet, tossing the magazine aside. She gets up and walks over to the window.
When Destinies Collide Page 19
