by S. M. Parker
Alec catches me, his hand around my waist. “Do you have any idea how much I’ve done for you, Zephyr? How much I would still do for you?”
I slink away from him, move to the sink, brace my hands against its lip.
He drags his fingers through his hair. “I saw you dancing with Gregg. I saw him shove his tongue down your throat. I saw you let him shove his tongue down your throat.” He lunges toward me then, grabbing my arm too hard.
“I don’t know what you think you sa—”
“DO NOT lie to me!” His face consumes mine. He harvests a deep breath, makes a study of my cleavage before running a finger down the path from my neck, through my chest. “Look at you, practically naked. No wonder he thought he could fuck you.”
“Stop!” I try to wrestle my arm free, but he only grips tighter.
“You said I could trust you. You made me trust you and now you’re dressing like a whore and hooking up with someone who’s wanted to get in your pants for years.”
His fingers dig deeper into my flesh, redirecting blood flow. “You’re hurting me.”
“Hah! I’m hurting you? How do you think it felt to see you sucking face with Gregg?”
My primal brain orders flight or fight. I spy the knife block on the counter. “Let go,” I say, and his hold releases.
He steps back, shakes off his frustration. “Christ, Zephyr, you make me crazy. Why do you have to do that?”
“I didn’t do anything.” I inch toward the knife set.
“See!” He jabs his finger at my words. “That right there. You’re so good at playing innocent. And then I get nuts because I don’t know what to believe.” His step swallows the space between us. I smell the mint of his shampoo and I flash to that first day. Before I know it, his hands creep around my waist. “Forgive me,” he begs. “I just want you back.”
“Alec, this isn’t good for either of us.”
Alec caresses the cut of my jaw, the softness of my cheek. “You are so beautiful.” His fingers travel along the span of my collarbone, up the tight angled curve of my neck. My body cringes. My breath comes shallow and rapid.
“You like that, don’t you?”
I brace myself against the counter, inching closer to the knives.
Then the air pulses quiet for just a breath. His body releases from mine. Gone is his feather touch. There is only me and silence and Alec and stillness. I focus on Alec in this slip of time. How his arm raises, his elbow becomes a sharp point hovering. “So why would you leave me?” He drives his angular elbow into my skull. A hole is drilled somewhere above my ear. My head rings. Bells fill the hollowed-out space. I feel myself slipping down the length of the cabinets, my dress hooking on a drawer pull. I hear the fabric rip away from itself, a soft screech. I crumple to the floor, my head a basin filling with the rushing tide of terror.
A word sits on my tongue. No? Don’t? I can’t form my defense. The room kinks. Speech abandons me. My ears drum. I think there is no greater pain possible until a spike drives through my side, slamming my ribs. His shoe. The kick is a stake. Planted. Executed. I crunch into the agony, my brain crowded with all the words I cannot scream. A black rage erupts under my skin, under the footprint Alec has gouged into my side. I bite on my lip and taste the copper blood trickle on my tongue.
Words reach me. “You make me do this, Zephyr. You just couldn’t love me enough to keep Slice’s tongue out of your mouth, could you?”
The gravel of sound shakes free from my tongue, harsh as sandpaper. “Get out!” My skull explodes with pain. “Get out!”
His hands are on my arms then, propping me up. “I’m so sorry. . . .”
Blackness.
Then I’m in his arms, my head on his lap. “Talk to me, Zephyr. . . .”
Blackness washing.
“I love you so much.” His voice strangled with fear.
I rock.
He’s rocking me.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you, but I have to protect you. We planned a life together, Zephyr. You can’t give it away to another guy.”
A deeper blackness.
I surrender.
Welcoming the way it swallows me and the pain all at once.
But there’s a girl inside, too long silent. She wants a fight.
She raises my hand to my head and tries to press away the sharp ache, but it only makes me cry out in pain.
“Zephyr, let me help you.”
“Leave. Now.” My voice and her voice combine in a groan. Then she says, “I’ll call the police.”
And I am proud of her, a light of strength in this darkness.
Alec laughs, but looks confused. “It’s me, Alec. Your future. Remember? What do you need the cops for?”
Her strength begins to leave me and I fear her absence. “Get. Out. Now.”
He stands, stumbles back unsteady. “I’ll let you get some rest. We’ll talk tomorrow.” And he walks out the door.
As if we’ve just ended a normal date.
As if I am not broken.
As if he has not shattered me.
I listen to the fridge hum for a thousand years. Shame drenches me. I am slick with stupidity. For throwing away my future for Alec.
I struggle to stand, carefully carrying the fireworks of pain. It takes too long to make it to my room, using the wall for support. Tears drain off my cheeks, a wet trail.
I shimmy out of my dress, hating it as it slides to my ankles. I burrow into a T-shirt and crawl into bed, every movement grueling.
I close my eyes and catalog my injuries. My skull. Ribs. Places others can’t see. He was precise, and I am glad for the careful placement of my wreckages. So I don’t need to show the world my shame.
Chapter 36
I wake to the smell of bacon and panic. Is Mom home? Is there blood on the cabinets? The night crashes back to me with too much clarity. I press my fingers to the golf ball pounding under my scalp.
Then Lizzie’s voice.
So close.
“Zee, it’s me. “I made you some food.”
Her kind tone coaxes me to sit upright. I find I am in my room, surrounded by the familiar. Photos on my wall. My record player. Clothes. Lizzie.
And a tray on my bureau, with eggs and bacon and a small bowl of yogurt.
The smells turn my stomach as bits of Alec crash into my head. I reach for the water on my bedside table.
Lizzie leans in. “Just take it slow.”
I take a sip and rest against my pillows. My side yelps.
“How bad is it?” Lizzie asks.
“It hurts.” A squeak.
A song rises from the kitchen. Cee Lo. Faint, but Cee Lo. I see you driving ’round town with the girl I love and I’m like, Fuck You!
Lizzie gives a guilty shrug. “I couldn’t resist.”
My phone. Still in the pocket of my jacket. Is my jacket still in a heap on the kitchen floor? The way I was?
Lizzie strokes my leg. “Alec could have really hurt you, Zephyr.”
“He did hurt me.”
“You know what I mean.”
I do.
“Do you remember what happened?”
I remember too much. “How did you know to come?”
“When you didn’t text me, I called Slice. He said you’d left.”
The wedding. The kiss. Alec waiting in Mom’s car.
“Do you remember me coming over?”
I remember falling to the floor, Alec begging me to forgive him. I remember blacking out and coming to. And blacking out. “I remember something cold, and hearing your voice.”
“I wanted to call the police, Zee, but you wouldn’t let me. I still think we should.”
“No,” I say quickly.
The phone rings again. Alec.
Lizzie stands, paces. “Don’t let him get away with this, Zephyr.” She tucks back a string of her pixie white hair. “He beat you, Zee. For no reason.”
“Not no reason.”
A scoff. “Please don’t tell me y
ou think he was justified.”
“No. Of course not. But I kissed Gregg. Alec saw us.”
“I don’t care if he saw you and Slice having sex. Nothing gives him the right to hurt you.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Of course, Lizzie. It’s just—”
“Please be careful how you finish that sentence.”
The tears start now. Full and round, pooling in the corners of my eyes. The thoughts that tortured me all last night as I slipped in and out of awareness. “Shouldn’t I have seen this coming? What is wrong with me that I let this happen? He was supposed to be perfect. I loved him, Lizzie. I gave him everything.”
He reaches out to me again, my phone singing in the background.
Lizzie kneels at my bedside. “There is nothing wrong with you, Zephyr, and he’s far from perfect. He’s the asshole here, not you.”
I pull my covers tight around my chest. “I can’t have anyone know.”
“You can’t be silent about this, Zee.”
“But I can’t tell anyone, either. Then they’ll know that I’m the idiot who fell for the wrong guy, and that I let him take too much. I can’t, Lizzie. It’s been hard enough admitting that to you and my parents; I can’t have the school knowing.” Tears conquer me. “Don’t make me do that. I won’t survive the shame.”
“You have nothing to be ashamed of. This isn’t on you.” She stands quiet, thinking. “What’s going to happen when you see him in school?”
“I don’t know.”
“How are you going to explain the fact that you can barely walk?”
I pull a tissue from the box, wipe my face. “I don’t know.”
Lizzie sighs out a long breath. “You’re sure you were clear with him? That it’s totally over?”
I swallow hard. “Yes. Of course. That’s why he’s pissed.”
“Is there any way he thinks you’ll forgive him again?”
Again.
It is a word.
An accusation.
My failure.
“No way.”
“Okay, I’ll stay quiet. I won’t say anything until you’re ready.” She collapses into my desk chair, taps the top of the Boston College catalog. “You can recover from this, you know.”
I thought I could, but now? “Can I?” I swing my legs over the side of the bed and the muscles around my ribs shriek. I push onto my feet. Lizzie half stands to help me, her arms extended, but I wave her away. I slip one foot in front of the other, my spine realigning, my muscles stretching into this newly reordered skin.
Lizzie follows me as I amble to the kitchen and swallow hard against every wrong decision I’ve made. Alec’s constant calling is a soundtrack to my bad choices. I bend to my jacket, stroke its sleeve. When Cee Lo calls to me so close, I jump. As if the phone discharged an electric shock. Under my skin, scorching my bones. I pull out the phone, my thumb hovering over the irony of the word “accept.”
I press.
“Zephyr? Is that you? Are you all right?”
The immediate push of his concern startles me but I gather purchase. “N-no. Not even close.”
“What can I do? I never meant for that to happen, you just made me so jealous. See me. Let me apologize in person. Please, Zephyr.”
“Alec.” A beat. A slice in time. “This is over.”
“Don’t say that. I love you, Zephyr. Can’t you see that’s why this happened in the first place? Don’t do this to me. To us.”
I take a deep breath, stand. Steel my nerves. “There is no us.”
“Forgive me.”
A shudder mangles me.
“Give me another chance. Things can be perfect again.”
Things were never perfect.
“It is so too late for that.” I lean against the door, begging it for strength.
“Zephyr, don’t do this.”
My mind bends to the day on the swing set and then to the park. His car in the woods. The past. I press my thumb hard into the bump on my skull and a lightning bolt scorches, reminding me of the now.
“Don’t come near me again.” I flick off the call and there’s an unyielding pain in my chest that has nothing to do with my bruised ribs.
A second later, Cee Lo. Lizzie grabs the phone from my hand, mutes the ring. “I was thinking you should come over to my place. Get your shit together before school tomorrow.”
School? Tomorrow? Monday.
“You’ll be safe there. Besides, I don’t think you’re ready to face your mom.”
“Oh shit, my mom.”
“I texted her from your phone last night. Everything’s cool. She’ll be back tonight around dinner.”
She returns my phone and I see the seventeen missed calls. Seventeen voice mails. All from Alec. I block his number, delete the thread of our texts. It’s not much, but it’s a start.
“Get dressed. Eat something if you can. I’ll clean up the kitchen.”
I don’t ask whether she’s talking about the dishes from this morning or the chaos of last night. What I do know is that it’s not her disaster to clean up.
“I need to stay here.”
“Alone? No way. You were a mess when I got here and there is no way I’m leaving you alone so he can come over here and finish what he started.”
“He won’t, Lizzie.”
She spurts disbelief. “How can you say that?”
“I know him. He flipped last night because of Gregg and the wedding, but he won’t come back.”
“I won’t leave you.”
“You can’t stay with me forever.”
“We’re not talking about forever, Zee; we’re talking about the day after your ex went psycho on you.”
I peel my back from the brace of the wall. “I need some time alone. To figure shit out, get my head straight for tomorrow morning when Olivia and I call Boston College. I can’t focus on anything else, Lizzie. I can’t fuck this up again.”
“Shit, Zee. That’s tomorrow? Could it be worse timing?”
“No, it’s perfect. It’s exactly what I need. I need to move on. Put this behind me. Trust me.”
She finally concedes. “But I’m calling every hour to check on you. Maybe every half hour.”
“Deal.”
Lizzie moves to hug me, wrapping her arms gently over me. She is careful with me, and not only because of my external bruises. “I love you, Zee.”
“I know, and I’m sorry for letting you down.”
“Never apologize. None of this is on you.”
As Lizzie leaves, she tells me, “Keep your door locked.” I do. I bolt the door and humiliation’s undertow drags me down. I slink against the wall and lower my core until my bottom connects with the floor.
I curl my knees up and hold them close, the position bringing comfort. And that’s when the scene plays out. Me and Alec. Just a few feet away, in the opposite corner of the kitchen. Alec branding me a whore. His elbow jammed into my head. His shoe splitting my ribs. Him begging for forgiveness.
And before. How he loved me.
Cooked for me.
Brought me my acceptance letter like a gift.
Held me closer than I thought one person could wrap another.
Chapter 37
Mom and I sit at the island the next morning linked by a suspended hope. Me, too aware of my hidden bruises, determined to move beyond all my mistakes. Mom with her need to protect me, fix what went wrong—the parts she knows about, anyway. I want this second chance with Boston College so badly it hurts more than my physical wounds. We listen to the clock tick and neither of us talks about the wedding or Dad or anything other than this goal before us. And when it is five minutes past nine o’clock, Mom picks up the phone, dials the number printed at the top of my acceptance letter.
“Yes, I’d like to speak with the dean of admissions, please. Tell her Olivia Doyle’s calling in regards to an acceptance packet my daughter received.”
In no time, I listen to Mom go into pr
ofessional argument mode. No blame, no presumptions. Just facts spread out between two adults. There’s been a mistake, she says. We’d like to remedy it, she says. She’s careful not to reveal why this mistake occurred, but so articulate in providing options, solutions. She is powerful and believable and I think she could get anyone to see our way. But it is the silence when Mom’s not talking that kills me.
When Mom hangs up, she brushes the front of her wrinkle-free suit. “I think it’s good. The dean asked that you come for an interview a week from Thursday.” Mom sets the date and time in her phone and I do the same. “This will be your opportunity to reaffirm your commitment to the school.” She studies me for that commitment. “She’s doing you a huge favor, Zephyr. Most kids don’t get one chance at this school.”
“I know. You won’t regret this, Mom.”
“But don’t count on anything, Zephyr. She said this is highly unusual and it sends up some red flags.”
“I know.”
“So we’ll need to prepare you, no different than how I prepare a defendant. We’ll get you ready to handle questions from any angle. You’ll need to prove you’re capable of the social and academic challenges Boston College will demand. And that you regret declining their offer of acceptance.”
I do. “I will, Mom. I’ve never been more ready. I’ve already contacted the field hockey coach. I want to see her when we’re on campus.”
She pulls on her coat. “Good.” She fastens her last button. “These are good first steps, Zephyr. Strong steps.”
And I feel it, the tidal wave of Mom’s help and how she reached the dean. Maybe before my packet did.
But as I drive to school, I almost bail a hundred times.
Because I can’t see him.
I won’t see him.
I inhale deep abdominal breaths and exhale through my nose, a calming technique Coach taught me that is having zero effect on my spiraling nerves.
But I can’t run away. Can’t let Alec take more.
I walk across the parking lot and through the halls, kaleidoscoping glances in every direction, searching through the crowds.
But it’s not Alec waiting at my locker.
Gregg points to the slight limp in my gait. “You hurt?”
“Twisted my ankle running.” Lie.
“Not dancing?” He winks.
