by T. S. Joyce
“Mom—”
“No, you listen. I know you’re mad at him. I know it. He didn’t go about it the right way, but you should know that bear in your middle was always the plan.”
“Whose plan?”
“Yours. You and Clinton were bonded early when you were just little kids. And oh, it terrified your dad and me. Watching you fall so hard for a boy with a bear in him? But as the years went on, and we saw Clinton’s character, how he took care of you, stuck up for you at school, was so devoted to you, and pushed you to be better, to be stronger… He became a son we’d never had. And we were glad he picked you, and that you picked him back because he was so steadfast. I even had a dress picked out for your wedding because I just knew I was gonna be the mother of the bride as soon as you two turned eighteen. You were just so confident in him, and you always had great taste in people. You told us when you were fourteen that someday Clinton would claim you, and you would be like him. You told us you two were already talking about it, but he wanted to wait until you were older so that the bear wouldn’t scare you. He wanted to give you time to be human. You would come home so angry.” Mom laughed thickly. “It was all you fought about. You two got along so well, but you would get mad because he was putting off Turning you. But I knew it wasn’t because he didn’t want to claim you. He just wanted to make it special. And he’s gutted now because he failed at that. He didn’t do it the right way, but you have to realize, he’s waited his whole life for that moment. If his bear was still okay, and if he hadn’t gone into that damned facility, he would’ve made it a beautiful declaration for you. But his bear got scared of losing you, and Clinton couldn’t help himself. You’ve known you loved him for a few weeks, but that boy, that man, has loved you with everything he has since he was ten. Please, honey, for your sake and for his, give him a chance to explain himself.”
Alyssa heaved a sigh and hugged the phone closer to her ear. “Okay, mom.”
“I love you, baby.”
Her lips twitched up in the first smile in days. “I love you, too.”
And when she hung up, she rested her head back against the wall and tracked Nards’s progress over her leg and into the bathroom. The little field mouse with the giant testicles had a potato chip in his mouth, bringing dinner back for his lady mouse, Nipples.
Another knock sounded at the front door, and this time she didn’t ignore it.
This time, she got up and wiped her cheeks and straightened her spine. It was time to stop feeling sorry for herself and face the outside world.
It was time to move on.
Chapter Seventeen
Alyssa pushed the door open, but Clinton wasn’t standing there like she thought he would be. He was sitting with his back to her on the top porch stair, as if he hadn’t expected her to answer. It was pouring rain, and his white T-shirt was soaked through, but that wasn’t the most heartbreaking part of seeing him again. There was a soggy mattress on her porch, right by the door as though he’d been sleeping in the downpour that had soaked Damon’s mountains over the last two days. There was no comforter or pillow.
Clinton’s shoulders were rigid from shivering, and when he turned around, his eyes were so full of raw heartache, it nearly buckled her knees.
After everything, how had they gotten here?
Clinton stood slowly. His shirt clung to his body, so see-through she could make out every muscle, tensed against the shaking. But she could see something more as well—the scars her bear had given him. They were red, angry, and raised all along his throat and torso. His eyes were silver and churned like the storm clouds above him. She’d seen the same color in her own eyes in the mirror…because he was her maker.
He backed down the stairs, chin lowered, gaze on her legs, neck exposed. He was giving her space. She was glad. She was heartbroken. All these different emotions roiled around inside of her like a tornado. What was she supposed to feel now? Anger? Gratefulness? Surely not this empty feeling that had consumed her.
“I have to show you something,” he said low.
Lightning flashed behind his shoulders, and thunder boomed. Although she jumped hard at the loud sound that rang against her newly sensitive eardrums, Clinton didn’t react at all. He just looked broken.
“What is it?” she asked.
“It won’t make up for what I’ve done, but maybe it’ll help fill in some of the blanks of your story.” He opened his mouth like he meant to say more, but closed it again and ducked his gaze to the ground. He pulled a folded piece of paper from his back pocket and set it onto the wet porch railing, then tried to smile and strode toward his trailer.
Slowly, Alyssa made her way down the stairs and unfolded the note. It was an address.
The blue ink was wet and smeared, but still readable.
1414 LAKE RANCH ROAD, SARATOGA, WY
“Clinton?”
He hunched his shoulders and turned in the rain, neck still exposed.
“What is this?”
“Your childhood home. I bought it because…”
“Because what?”
He gritted his teeth, his jaw clenching hard. “I bought it because I wanted to be close to you. And because I wanted to remember what it felt like to be okay.”
She clutched the precious note to her chest and hesitated with her response, hoping desperately her voice would come out stronger than she felt. “Will you take me?”
When his blazing eyes jerked to hers, he looked so uncertain. “I swear I won’t hurt you. I won’t hurt you again. You’ll be safe in the truck with me.”
“I know. Go put dry clothes on. I don’t want you getting sick.”
“I won’t get sick.”
“Clinton, I have all these instincts now. And I’m really confused about where we stand, but I know I can’t watch you shiver like that anymore.”
He dipped his head once, then disappeared inside his trailer while she made her way to his truck.
“Am I your mate?” she asked, the second he slipped behind the wheel of his truck.
Clinton froze, gaze averted, and with a huffed breath, he nodded.
“Since when?”
“Since we were ten.”
Alyssa could hear lies now. It was one of the growing list of things she liked about her bear, though she wasn’t quite ready to tell Clinton ‘thank you’ for giving her to Alyssa. He’d still gone about it wrong. Clinton had been telling the truth. Age ten. Eighteen years she’d been Clinton’s mate, but for the life of her, she couldn’t remember their youth other than those two dreams. She felt robbed. He had all these memories that bound him to her, but she had so few. Sure, he still felt like everything good in her life, but she didn’t have the history or the context he did.
It wasn’t fair.
Clinton was so quiet on the way to Saratoga, Alyssa turned up a country station on the radio just to drown out the heavy silence. He normally drove like a maniac, but today he drove slowly, coasting each corner.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because you’ll leave soon, and I don’t want to rush my time with you.”
The agony in his voice had settled an ache in her stomach that made her keep her questions to herself for the rest of the trip. And when he took a right onto Lake Ranch Road, Alyssa leaned forward in her seat, desperate to have some memory sparked from this place.
There was nothing, though. No recognition at all. The memories just weren’t there, didn’t exist anymore. They’d been burned away with whatever medicine those awful people had given her.
Clinton pulled up to an old, dilapidated house. It had been painted white at one point, but now the paint had chipped on the wood siding and given way to rot. The roof sagged, and the old fence out back had been knocked over. But the yard stunned her. There were thousands of dandelion weeds, all topped with yellow flowers.
The other yards in the neighborhood were mowed and pretty, but here, there was no grass. Only flowers.
“I planted them,” Clinton murmured as he wa
tched her.
“You planted weeds? Why?”
“You’ll see. Stay there, and I’ll get your door.”
Clinton jogged around the front, shoulders hunched against the rain, then opened her door and folded her in his arms. She didn’t ask to be carried across the mud and weeds, but as she stretched her toes out, she realized she hadn’t put on shoes when she left. Carefully, she slid her arms around his neck, and Clinton brushed his jaw against the top of her hair, as if he couldn’t help the affection.
There was an official note from the city on the front door telling Clinton he needed to take care of his yard, but he just ripped it down and threw it in a pile of papers just inside the door.
He set her down on the dusty wooden floors and backed away a few feet, giving her space. He looked at her so expectantly she had to come clean. With a shake of her head, she whispered, “Nothing.”
“That’s okay.” He slid his big hand around hers and led her to a small bedroom. She looked behind her at the footprints she’d made in the dust, right next to his giant boot prints. The light in here was muted and natural, streaming through the windows. The rafters on the ceiling of the room were covered in cobwebs, and one of the windows had a long crack. Water sounded—drip, drip, drip—off the windowsill and onto the floor that had been warped from long-term water damage.
Clinton sat against the wall, drew his knees up, and rested his arms over them. He twitched his chin at the center of the room where there was no dust around one of the floorboards. Slowly, she padded over to it and sank down to her knees. And then she pried the loose board up easily. Inside was a half-full bottle of whiskey and a colorful diary.
And still…there was nothing.
Alyssa opened it to the first page.
Shalene Dawn Dunleavy – age ten
Mom told me she used to write her adventures in a journal, and so she bought one for me for my birthday. I don’t really know what to say in these things. Oh, well I found a kitten the other day by an old barn in the woods and mom said we could keep it. He doesn’t have a tail and he is black. I know lots of people say black cats are bad luck, but that isn’t true, so I named him Lucky. I have to bottle feed him every few hours. He is so cute.
Below that, there was a terrible drawing of a cat without a tail. Alyssa huffed a surprised laugh. She recognized those wonky eyes. Here was her signature shitty drawing skills, displayed at age ten.
Enamored, she turned the page.
Clinton said he loves me today…
I cried and then forgot to say it back and now he probably thinks I’m mean and I’m a crybaby. I’m not. I just got excited. I’m going to tell him soon, no matter what.
Tonight, Clinton came and asked if I could go out into the woods with him because he had a surprise. Mom let me, even though it was a school night. I don’t get scared in the woods because Clinton is special and would never let anything happen to me. He’s stronger than anyone. We caught fireflies and put them in a jar and brought them back for Mom and she smiled really big. I didn’t tell her, but Clinton kissed me out there. It was like a peck, but soft and it made my stomach feel funny, but in a good way. I told him I love him too.
A couple months passed before the next entry. Alyssa lost herself in her life story. It was like a book, but better, because she’d written it for her eyes only, uncensored, and now she was getting this amazing look at herself she never thought she would have.
Age Eleven
Clinton is doing bad in school. He tries but he has trouble with his attention, so I’m helping him learn after school. I love his family. They always let me come over and his mom is a really good cook. She makes food that makes people happy to sit around the table and talk. I always get this good feeling when I eat dinner with them, even though his brothers are really annoying and make kissing noises at me and Clinton. On Friday, Mrs. Fuller taught me how to make cracker crumb chicken, and now maybe I want to be a chef when I grow up. I want to make people feel good when they eat dinner together too.
Alyssa shook her head and dared a look at Clinton. “I love cooking.”
He offered her a lopsided smile. “You and my mom were magic in the kitchen. You two were always cookin’ up something good. She always wanted a daughter, but got all boys who didn’t give a shit about making food. But you spent the time with her. I called her the other day and told her you’d claimed me, and she cried for a long time. My family wants to see you if you’re ever ready.”
Alyssa nodded. “I’d like that.”
She made her way to Clinton and rested her head in his lap, then read the next entry out loud as he stroked her hair. “Clinton got me a ring for Christmas and told me it was a promise ring. It turned my finger green but I don’t care. We didn’t tell anyone at school what it means, but we know. Someday, I’m going to be Shalene Fuller and wear a big white sparkly dress. Or maybe I’ll make him be Clinton Dunleavy.” She’d doodled both names onto the bottom of that sheet in curly, swirly letters.
Alyssa giggled and kept reading. She read page after page, year after year as she got to know herself through her own youthful eyes. And she noticed similarities. She still had the same wit and found the same humor funny. She still liked the same kind of music and wished her hair was more manageable.
An entry at age fourteen took her a while to get through. It talked about her conversations with Clinton and wanting him to Turn her so she could be like him, so she could be his forever. She cried at that part. Clinton looked gutted and stared out the window, shaking his head like it was too much. But she got through it and went on to the next entry, which was about a concert she and Clinton had gone to with his brothers and how annoying they’d been. It was a fun one to follow the heartbreak. It was the comic relief she’d needed to regain her composure and push on.
Age sixteen
Alyssa pulled off a plastic bag that had been taped over the entry. Inside was an old, dried dandelion flower.
Aloud, she read, “The other day, Clinton gave me this flower. It’s yellow, my favorite color, and he said it was so pretty that it reminded him of me. He’s never given me a flower before, so I dried it in between the pages of my math book and put it here. I’m going to keep it forever. He told me, ‘Look for me in the dandelions,’ because if I ever saw that flower, that was his love for me.” Alyssa’s voice dipped to nothing. Her lip trembled, and she snuggled her face against Clinton’s thigh.
She taped the flower back to the page and turned to the next. It was blank.
“You were taken a few days after this,” he said in a hoarse voice. “That was your last entry.”
She could see something written through the thin paper, so she turned to the next page. This one was written in black ink and neat, small, capital letters. It matched the handwriting on the address Clinton had given her today.
I’m back here, but not really. It’s been years since I’ve been in this house, and I thought I would feel happy here again. I hoped. I swear I can almost smell her scent still lingering on these old walls, but I know I’m just imagining it. Shae is just a ghost and so am I.
Next page.
I got weak and spent three paychecks traveling out to North Carolina to see her. Creed was pissed that I ditched the Gray Backs mid logging season for a random vacation. When I saw her, I thought about introducing myself, but I hate everyone after Amber. I don’t want to hate Shae. I just watched her work at this diner for hours, just stared at her through the window and felt like my heart was being ripped out of my chest. She’s way too good for the man I’ve become.
Selfish Monster. Leave her alone.
After that entry, they all ended with that tagline. Selfish Monster. Leave her alone. Alyssa closed the diary because she couldn’t read anymore of his pain and be okay. Not now. She wasn’t ready, wasn’t strong enough yet.
“I bought this place a few years ago,” he explained. “I was hoping your parents didn’t know about the diary and hadn’t taken it with them when they moved because
I wanted it. I wanted that piece of you. Wanted the reminders about how much you had cared about me once. The Boarlanders don’t know I own this place, so I come out here when everything gets too heavy. And I drink and read your journal and remember the good parts before Amber got to me. I remember you because you are all my good parts.” Clinton scrubbed his hand down his beard, and his eyes rimmed with moisture. “I’m sorry I broke you, too. I’m so sorry.”
Alyssa sat up and straddled him, melted against his chest and hugged him hard. “I didn’t know it was like this for you. I didn’t know I was already yours or that you were already mine. I’m angry that you scared me, but I understand. You were scared to lose me again.”
Clinton kissed the side of her head, let his lips linger there for a long time as he held her tightly against him. “I was terrified of losing you. It’s not an excuse, though. I can’t stop thinking about you running from me and not being able to stop my bear. I can’t stop seeing the fear in your eyes when I bit you. And now this…” He eased back and cupped her face. He brushed the pads of his thumbs right under her eyes. “You’re so goddamned beautiful, but the silver in your eyes will always remind me of what I did to you.”
A warm tear streaked down her cheek as she kissed the palm of his hand. “Listen to me.” She held his gaze so he could see her honesty, as well as hear it. “I forgive you.”
“Don’t let me off the hook—”
“I do. I forgive you for all of it. I know you were trying to protect me. And I saw you trying to stop your bear. These silver eyes? They were always meant to be mine, Clinton Fuller. Do you hear me? Always. We just took a really long, broken road to get here. I don’t regret the bear you gave me. I love her. Now that I know how we were, what I’d wanted, how scared you were to lose me, I love her. Come here.”
