Till it Stops Beating

by Hannah R. Goodman

  I smile and nod. He reaches for his psych book, and we sit silently, me thumbing through the pages of my notebook and him reading.

  Then I look over and see his eyes half closed… 5, 4, 3, 2—

  Yep. He’s out. Psychology does it every time.

  I doodle 1-3-4 on the cover of my yellow notebook. The same number of pages I have handwritten in this notebook. Underneath the numbers I’ve written in all caps: Mya and Dylan, A Love Story. I’ve only let Sean read bits of it. I’m afraid of how obvious I’ve been. The only thing he’s ever said about what he’s read is, babe you are so talented.

  I reach for my laptop and save the document I had spent the last hour working on. First fifty typed out. Another twenty to go. A full-length novel is impossible. Novella is my new goal. The entire rough draft is due Monday.

  Sean makes a squeak and sigh. I call this his Dying Mouse move.

  I slide out of his bed. And why does he have to snore like that?

  I stand and stretch. Then stare at myself in the mirror that’s nailed to the back of the door to the hallway. My skin looks the best it ever has. No zits. I’ve been running more lately, except when it snows. And I hit send on two more college applications.

  I turn back to Sean still snoring, but a silly grin spread across his face. I shake my head and climb back in bed. Something tells me we won’t be making it out tonight.

  . . . . .

  A few weeks pass with Sean and me in the same routine of hanging out in his dorm on the weekends and then coffee and dinner with Peter, Jack, and Susan. The future—college, graduation, prom—are items on my “to think about list.”

  Nothing on that list gets checked off.

  . . . . .

  No school this week. Mid-winter break. Sean has school, so Susan and I are having a girls’ day. It’s been awhile. On the agenda: studying for our last French test, get our nails done at the mall, and grab a greasy dinner at the food court. The evening will bring movies with Sean …the thought of which makes my stomach tighten.

  But enough of that. It’s A Perfect Day. February thinks it’s April, which is fine with me. Blue sky. Sun and no wind. Susan and I sit on the front porch, wrapped in blankets, and in our hands, The Stranger by Albert Camus.

  “This Meursault dude is a total tool!” Susan tosses the slim paperback to the side. “What did Mrs. Malone say about him again?” Susan never writes a thing down in this class and has maintained an A average all year. Typical. I study my ass off and maintain a B.

  “He has no conscience. No feeling.” I take a squeaky highlighter to the printouts of SparkNotes and underline the word “stoicism” then say, “It’s a bunch of existential weirdness. Stoicism. Nihilism. Absurdism.” I thump the notes with my end of my highlighter.

  Susan wraps the blanket around her shoulders and pulls her sunglasses down from the top of her head. “Need to get laid-ism,” she says it like a suggestion.

  I consider this, chewing on the end of the highlighter. “Now that might be under absurdism.”

  “What? You’ve been with Sean for months! That poor boy must have the bluest balls. I mean you won’t even give him a hand job.” She motions with her fist.

  “Susan!” I grab her hand and shove it away. Then I say, “I always thought it would be with—” I haven’t said his name in months…at least not out loud.

  Susan raises her eyebrows and says, “Justin.”

  I put the notes and highlighter down on the blanket. “Yes, but I’m sick of waiting for…for what? It’s not like Justin’s called me. For all I know, he has a girlfriend. He’s moved on.”

  Susan rolls to her side and adjusts the glasses on her head. “You aren’t hot for Sean anymore.” It’s not a question the way she says it, because it really isn’t a question anymore. It’s a fact.

  “You know when we fool around, it’s still good...” Because my eyes are closed, and I can pretend that he’s…

  “Listen Maddie, I know all those self-help books you’ve read would say that’s you know, dysfunctional, that you should break up with Sean, but I think considering all you’ve been through, you might be the exception to the rule.” She pushes the shades back on her head and looks right at me. “Sean is kind of like your practice guy. Maybe the real guy is Justin…Maybe not. But you needed to have a real boyfriend. Not one who dies or one who goes to rehab.”

  Touché.

  “Ride the whole thing out until you can’t deal with him.” She grabs my book from me. “Now, let’s ditch this Meursault and go get our manipedis.”

  Amen.

  . . . . .

  Sean and I see less of each other over the next two weeks. He’s got midterms and I have to do the edits on my final draft. The only thing I miss is that sweet escape of fooling around. Doing without Dying Mouse or dorm room dinners is a relief.

  . . . . .

  Sean and I have finished dinner with my parents. It was the send-off dinner for Barb and Cliff who are set to drive out to Massachusetts tomorrow morning. Yep. Moving in together and moving on. It’s the real deal because she turned her lease over to her roommate Pam. Barb will begin her first teaching job in the summer on The Cape. In the meantime, she’s helping Cliff open up his new restaurant aptly called, “Cliff’s.” I think “B” just got her happy ending.

  I want to go to a coffee shop and write in my journal, which I haven’t done in months. The last entry was in November. I need some alone time, but it’s too late to do that and Sean is staring at me across the table. Dreamily.

  So, I say, “Mom, we’ll be back in a bit for dessert.”

  Sean and I bring our dishes to the sink and then dash off to my room. When we walk in, the lights are off, but my computer is still on. The screen saver is a picture of me and Sean. He’s smooching me on the cheek. I look like I just ate a jelly doughnut.

  I turn to him once the door is closed, and we kiss. But he pulls away and says, “Oh, shoot. I have to check my email. I’m supposed to get the night rehearsal schedule for this week.”

  I kiss his neck. “Let’s check.”

  Sean walks to my computer and grabs the mouse. But nothing happens.

  “Oh, shit! Is my computer frozen?”

  He doesn’t say anything.

  “Sean?”

  “What’s this?”

  And then, “Who’s Noah?”

  Oh no.

  Oh no oh no oh no.

  I leap over and grab the mouse then click close my inbox. “Oh, he’s a friend from camp.” And someone I technically did not cheat on you with.

  “There was something in there about how great it was to see you. What’s that about?” He kisses my nose. “Forget it. I trust you.”

  I kiss him back on the mouth taking a mental eraser to my brain, but try as I might, I can’t erase the guilt. But I didn’t cheat on Sean. I probably could even tell him what happened… “Hey Sean, remember that weekend…that you asked me to be your girlfriend…” Ugh. That wouldn’t go over well. Plus, in the email, Noah tells me that Columbia’s freshmen orientation is in the middle of August. Could I give him part two of the tour to NYC? I haven’t replied yet.

  Sean pulls me on to the bed and pulls my shirt off and kisses his way from my collarbone to the top of my bra before sliding it off. I lie on my back and stare up at the ceiling. I think about what Susan said, Sean being my “practice” boyfriend. And there are things I haven’t let us practice yet. I have everything else down. The whole lovey-dovey couple stuff.

  “Sean,” I whisper to the top of his head. “Let’s book a hotel room for after prom.”

  He stops kissing my body and looks up
at me, an excited smile across his face. “Really?”

  I pull his face up to mine and kiss him intensely. “Really.”

  In the back of my mind I calculate how many weeks until prom and the number is the same number of weeks we’ve been boyfriend and girlfriend.

  Will we even make it?

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Finish Line.”

  We made it.

  My dress sparkles. A lot.

  I let Jack and Peter talk me into wearing this...Barb’s old prom dress. It’s cocktail length, sparkling, electric blue and has a t-back. Jack found a pair of matching shoes in the City. I look down and click my heels together.

  I turn from one side to the other, inspecting my arms and the slight curve of my hips. Sexy. I never think that way about myself, but this dress fits perfectly. Which is odd since Barb is six inches shorter than me.

  “You look amazing!”

  I turn. Sean. He wanted to see me before we left. We found out that school policy states no one over eighteen can come to prom unless they are a student at Lincoln. Jack, Susan, Peter, and I are going as a group.

  “I can’t wait to see you after.” He wraps his hands around my waist.

  I nod, and then busy myself with brushing my hair.

  “I booked a room at the Radisson.”

  I stop brushing and push my mouth into a smile.

  He wrinkles his brow at me in the mirror. “Hey, we don’t have to.”

  I don’t want to have this conversation. I made a small deal with myself that I would get through tonight no matter what. Have a blast at the prom and then lose my virginity and then in a month, graduate. A revised to-do list.

  “No, no.” I look back to the mirror and turn sideways again. “I’m just feeling nervous, you know, about this dress.”

  Sean leaps over to me and throws his arms around my waist. “You look so hot that I’m glad you are going with two guys who are dating each other.” I let him hug me. I even turn and close my eyes and kiss him. When we kiss I wonder, if Sean knows me so well, hell, if he loves me so much, why doesn’t he sense that something inside of me is kind of gone, absent? Like he did all those months ago in the forest.

  Sean pulls away and cups my chin with his hands. “I love you, Maddie.”

  I open my mouth to reply. He holds my face in his hands and waits, his eyes eager and happy. But I just can’t do it.

  Sean’s hands drop from my face. Can’t ignore that.

  “I don’t know what to say.” I reach out and to touch his arm, but he backs away.

  “…..”

  “I—wish—I—wish I…I wish that I could be—” I try.

  “In love with me? In love with me like I am with you?”

  “….”

  He takes another step back. “Thank you.”

  What?

  “I would have never ended this, Maddie.”

  “…”

  “I would have stayed like this.” He runs a hand over his hair. “Man, am I fucked up.”

  “…”

  “I would have let you go through with tonight, I would have let you keep trying and trying.”

  “Trying?”

  “Trying to love me back.”

  “I’m sorry.” I step towards him. Lame, lame, lame. But I can’t think of anything else to say.

  “Sorry?” He says his face shifting from composed to pissed off. “You know what? I feel sorry for all the other guys you are going to date. I feel sorry for them because you won’t ever love them. You won’t ever love anyone, not even that Noah guy.”

  I open my mouth to protest, but he holds his hand up. “I don’t want to know what the deal is with him. Spare me.”

  “It was nothing, Sean. I saw him that weekend you went to the competition.”

  “You mean the same weekend I asked you to be my girlfriend?” His eyes are black and cold. “That weekend?”

  I cross my arms and look away.

  “You know what? It doesn’t matter. That Noah guy and that Zak kid and me, you know what we were? We were just your stand-ins until Justin shows up again. I’ve read your writing Maddie. Come on, the end of the book “Mya” and “Dylan” wind up together.” He smirks. “I know you aren’t over him. I never said anything.” He laughs. “I believed that you were falling for me. That you were writing fiction.”

  I don’t bother to protest.

  “And that stuff about the cult you have in there. Lame attempt to fictionalize, by the way.”

  I open my mouth to tell him I killed that section any way, but I keep my trap shut. I’ve done enough.

  “The sad part for you, Maddie is you don’t even know Justin, anymore. You’re in love with a fantasy, and it’s never going to happen. You’re going to have to finally let go of this guy at some point.”

  I turn away from him as the tears creep in.

  “But I won’t be there,” he adds. “You won’t be able to use me again.”

  The sting of reality ignites anger in me. I glare at him, wiping the tears from my eyes before they fall. “You used me as much as I used you.”

  “What?”

  “You used me. It’s not like you have this booming social life. You said it yourself, you hate Fairfield.”

  “Are you serious?” His face is red.

  We stare each other down and far away on the other side of the house I hear the side door open and close. I hear my mom and dad laugh. Susan, Peter, and Jack have arrived complete in their similar color scheme garb, all electric blue. Mom’s gotta be snapping away at the pics.

  “I guess you are the social life expert, with your gay husbands and freak girlfriend.” He smirks, but it’s a look that’s more sad than angry.

  The anger fizzles. I can’t be mad at Sean. I deserve all this shit he’s shoveling on me. I think of Bubbie, of course, my relationship guru. I think of what she said to me about Zak and Justin. “Not everything is meant to be forever. Sometimes people come into your life to show you something or teach you something.” I step towards him. “You taught me how to trust myself again. That you can fall apart and then come together.”

  At first, flickers of understanding, of letting go, flash across his face but then he changes his mind. “The only thing you taught me, Maddie, is to never believe a girl when she says this time it will be different.”

  “Sean, I’m sorry.” I take another step.

  But he just shakes his head and backs out of the room glaring at me.

  I stand very still and listen to his footsteps speed down the hallway, the voices of my family and friends grinding to a halt. Then the door opening and slamming with a BANG.

  I wait to cry, to feel that heavy sadness of a break up. But it doesn’t come.

  . . . . .

  “Close your eyes.”

  I feel a soft tickle on my eyelids. I blink.

  “Maddie!”

  “Sorry.” I close my eyes again and try to focus on breathing through the tickle torture.

  “You are amazingly fine.”

  “Yeah, I guess I am.”

  “Are you relieved?”

  “I feel bad saying this, but yes.”

  Jack stands back to admire his work. “Having sisters has finally proved to be useful.”

  “I keep waiting to cry or something. To feel bad.” I flutter my eyes at him.

  “To do the usual Maddie martyr guilt?” He bends down to brush a little more eye shadow.

  I stick my tongue out at him
just as Peter comes into the room. He’s holding his cummerbund. He’s only in his tux pants and a white t-shirt.

  He stands behind us, frozen, and looks in the mirror at me.

  I look too. My eyes are smoky and sexy.

  “You are hot,” Peter says ultra-serious.

  “Should I worry?” Jack says to him in the same tone.

  “Actually, yeah.”

  “I don’t think so, boys. You see, I already exposed myself to Peter once upon a time and these guys didn’t work.” I stick out my breasts.

  Peter’s face is tomato paste and Jack is howling. “Oh, I forgot. Peter is so gay that breasts frighten him. Didn’t he throw-up or something after your boob fell out?”

  “No, no, that was me. He fainted, and I had to smack him to life.”

  “With your boobs, right?”

  Peter scowls and crosses his arms. “Very funny.”

  “My turn! My turn!” Susan comes racing into my bedroom, her dress dragging without the height of her electric blue heels, open-toe version of mine.

  Jack takes a few more minutes to blush brush and eye shadow me.

  “Look at my hair!” Susan says as I stand up. Her hair is long and curly thanks to some extensions. She looks like a Barbie doll. She looks amazing. We both look in the mirror.

  “And our dates are a couple.”

  All four of us look in the mirror and laugh.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Photograph

  “We’ll go park.” Jack says as he stops the car in front of the curb of the Stamford Marriot.

  “How hetero of you, Jack,” Susan says checking her lipstick in her small compact.