His forehead still leaning on mine, I can’t help it: I allow the words to come out. “I love you. I don’t even know what that means, but I know that I have never felt this way about anyone else before you, so I am pretty sure I love you, and I don’t want you to feel like you have to say it, too, because I’m sure you don’t feel the same way, but this is how I feel, and I needed to say it out loud. Please say something. Otherwise, I am just going to keep talking, and as I keep talking, what I am saying is going to get less and less intelligent, so seriously please say something.”
“When I told you at the dance that I was falling in love with you, what I should have said is that I already am in love with you. I’m pretty sure I have been since the moment I first saw you… Everything about you is perfect: the way you smile, the way you frown, the way you try to push people away and yet somehow managed to pull me in. And of course my new favorite, the sarcasm.” I laugh. “I love you, I love you, I love you. And I think you are very cute when you ramble, and apparently rambling is contagious.”
I don’t know if there is or isn’t a God, but I am praying to whatever there is right now that nothing happens to take him away from me. I couldn’t take it. With that thought, I lean my head back on his chest. I don’t know how long we sit there, but I could have stayed forever.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Chase
In my wildest dreams, I would never have imagined this happening. If someone had told me when I walked up to her in the park yesterday, that tonight I would be taking her to homecoming, I would have told them they were nuts.
Driving to school, this amazing girl sitting next to me, I am awestruck. I can only assume she has never had someone do something like this for her before, and my aunt did an awesome job of making her the picture of a typical teenaged girl. I have to really concentrate to keep my mind and eyes on the road, but every once in a while, I steal a glance in her direction. She has the cutest smile on her face, yet she looks like she could burst into tears at any second.
Maybe I shouldn’t have made the message in the playlist quite so obvious. She probably thinks I am psychotic. We are almost there, though, so I just let it keep playing.
Pulling in to the parking lot, I steal one last glance before she will know I am looking at her, and the smile on her face looks much more comfortable now. Not only that, but that smile is contagious. I now have a huge dopey grin on my face just thinking about the rest of the evening.
We park, and I get out as fast as I can so that I can open the door for her and help her out. I can’t resist the urge to kiss her, so I do. Then I offer her my elbow, and she puts her small hand into the bend in my arm as I escort her into the school.
When we get into the gym, it occurs to me that I have never danced with a girl before, probably something I should have considered before this moment. Hopefully, it will be fine if it’s just our being together.
After only a few moments, the DJ announces the first slow dance, and she happily accepts my invitation to dance with me.
The feeling of her in my arms is indescribable. The only comparison I can think of is that she makes me happy when skies are gray, or when skies are black, or purple. I should have just stuck with indescribable. Even in my head that was bad.
The entire time we dance, our eyes are locked. I’m pretty sure a tornado could rip down the walls around us, and we wouldn’t notice. I am completely, wholeheartedly, in love with this girl in my arms.
The song ends, and we are still standing there eye to eye.
“Thank you,” I stammer.
“Why are you thanking me?” she asks.
“For allowing me to not only take you to this dance, but to dance with you, too. I promised you that I would save you from your life, and I hope you see that this is just one of many ways that I’m going to make that happen.”
I need to know if she is still thinking she is going to be dead before her eighteenth birthday, and yet, I don’t want to ruin this moment. I don’t know what to say. My brain and my mouth are not connected to each other at that moment, a seemingly common occurrence when I’m around her.
“Tenley, I am falling in love with you, and I have every intention of making you fall right along with me. A few days ago, I asked you what you wanted to be when you grow up, and your response was dead. I need to ask you again. So what do you want to be when you grow up?”
Without even a moment of hesitation, she replies, “Yours.” Best answer of all time. My feet may actually have left the ground at this point, because I am pretty sure I’m floating. “You don’t have to wait; you already are. And I’m yours.”
This dance is not good enough for her anymore. My head is spinning, and I need to get out of here. “I have had my dance with you; now if you don’t mind, I have something I would like to show you.”
“Yeah, I think one dance with you is plenty.” She smiles, and I fall even more in love than I already am.
The first day we moved here I was driving around just trying to get a feel for what was around, and I followed a road that terminated at the airport. This cool clearing in the middle of a bunch of trees was right by the end of the runway, and I could pull my truck right up to the fence. If you lay in the back of the truck, the planes fly right over your head. I think Tenley is going to love it. I am patting myself on the back in my head for putting a bunch of blankets in the truck.
We pull up to the spot, and she stays in the truck while I grab the blankets and try my best to make the back of the truck not look like the back of the truck. Once that is done, I go around to her side of the truck and open her door. She turns to get out, and I gently grab her waist to help her down, but every time I touch her, I have to kiss her. I settle for a kiss on the cheek because I can hear a plane faintly in the distance.
“I’m sure you have heard that guys bring girls here to make out, but I discovered this place before I even knew that, and I thought you would really like it.
“See, from this spot, the planes taking off fly right over our heads. It gave me a sense of freedom the first time I came, and knowing what you are going through with your mom, I thought maybe you could use that sense of freedom, too. Obviously we aren’t on the plane, but we can try to imagine where they are going and why, and we can imagine where we would go,” I explain.
I help her up into the bed of the truck and start unbuckling her shoes. These buckles were clearly invented by a woman because my man fingers are having a hard time, but I get them off and bring her to the back of the truck just in time for the plane to take off.
I told her to keep her eyes open so that she would get the full experience, and the glimmer in her eyes as the plane flies overhead holds a mixture of awe and that ever-present sadness. She is smiling, however, so there must be at least a hint of happiness in there somewhere. Not being able to stand it anymore, I reach for her and kiss her. Trying to pull away from her all the way is useless, so I just sit with my forehead on hers.
We sit like that for about a minute before she pulls back and looks at me and starts nervously rambling. It’s so adorable that I have everything I can do not to laugh because she is clearly very nervous about the powerful words coming out of her mouth.
“I love you. I don’t even know what that means, but I know that I have never felt this way about anyone else before you, so I am pretty sure I love you. And I don’t want you to feel like you have to say it too, because I’m sure you don’t feel the same way. But this is how I feel, and I needed to say it out loud. Please say something; otherwise, I am just going to keep talking, and as I keep talking, what I am saying is going to get less and less intelligent, so seriously please say something.” She stammers.
“When I told you at the dance that I was falling in love with you, what I should have said is that I already am in love with you. I’m pretty sure I have been since the moment I first saw you… Everything about you is perfect: the way you smile, the way you frown, the way you try to push people away and yet somehow managed to
pull me in. And of course my new favorite, the sarcasm.” I laugh. “I love you, I love you, I love you. And I think you are very cute when you ramble, and apparently rambling is contagious,” I reply in the hope that she will believe me. In an effort to reassure her, I reach out and hold her face in my hand and give her a kiss on the forehead.
This has certainly been the best night of my life.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Tenley
We didn’t get home until four AM, and in what little sleep I had, I dreamt about Chase. The kiss, the way his hand felt in my hair as he pulled my face to his, the way he smelled, the way he looked at me, the way that I felt dancing with him. And mostly, the way that he made sure the night was perfect for me. In every way.
What I hate most about situations in which people find out about my mom is how they look at me with pity. But with Chase it isn’t pity; it is genuine sadness, like he feels what I feel. But I think, in some ways, that it’s actually worse than pity.
It amazes me that I met him on Friday, and already he is consuming my every thought. I have this strange connection with him, like I have known him forever, and yet, I don’t know him at all. It’s only six AM, so I have only had two hours of sleep; but I know I am up for the day. I throw on my favorite hoodie, toss my still-curly hair up, and go to the window, not really sure what it is that I am looking for. Chase is sitting in the front yard with a sketchpad at the ready watching my window. As soon as he sees me, I check my phone to see that he has sent a text.
C: Good morning.
T: Good morning. What are you doing outside this early?
C: Waiting for you. I think it is adorable when you sit in the window and watch me, and I don’t ever want to forget that, so if you don’t mind, I want you to sit in the window so that I can draw you.
T: Draw me? Are you kidding?
C: Well I could do it from memory, but I would rather have the real thing.
T: You are very strange.
C: Thank you… now sit. Please.
T: Can I do anything? Or do I have to just sit?
C: You can do whatever you want, but you can’t keep texting me. I can’t draw and be distracted by your messages at the same time.
T: ‘K.
Having someone draw me is an odd feeling. Knowing that he is looking at me and examining every line, every freckle and putting it on paper. And it takes a lot longer than it might seem.
I don’t know how long I sat there before I fell asleep. I had only had two hours of sleep, so I was exhausted. When I wake up, it takes me a second to remember why I am sleeping in the window. When I look out, I see that Chase is still sitting in the same spot in his yard, concentrating on what he has on his paper. He looks up and sees that I am awake and smiles. I smile a sleepy smile back at him. I look at the time and panic. My mother will be up any second, and this is not going to go well if she sees me in the window clearly communicating with him. I send him a quick text telling him I have to go, slip the phone back into the spot between my mattresses, and make my bed.
As predicted, my mother comes in exactly two minutes later. She stands in the doorway with her hands on her hips and proceeds to give me her version of a “good morning.”
“It’s time to get up. You have stuff to do. If you have any hope of getting it done, you better get your ass moving.”
“You don’t have to tell me that every single morning. I know that I am only here to do things so that you don’t have to. It never even crosses my mind that I might actually get time to do anything I want to do. So just save yourself some time and skip the morning greetings.”
“Well, since you have such a lovely attitude today, I will make sure that I keep you busy all day. Especially since you didn’t bother to do anything yesterday, other than be a whore with the neighbor kid.”
I open my mouth to argue with her, but decide against it. I walk towards my door to go downstairs, she is still standing in the doorway, so I have to squeeze between her and the wall in order to get through. Once again though, being too smart to hit me or retaliate in any way, she just stands there and glares at me.
As soon as I walk outside, I wish I had gotten around to mowing the lawn yesterday. Today is significantly colder than yesterday, typical for our bipolar Wisconsin weather. A person can literally wear shorts one day and a winter coat the next. I turn around to go back in the house to change my clothes, not before sneaking a glance across the street to see that Chase had gone in the house. There goes any chance of being rescued again.
I run up the stairs and change from shorts into jeans and soon am back outside. I love the feeling of mowing the lawn. I know it sounds weird, but I get that instant gratification of seeing what I am accomplishing. Even on a cold day like today, walking up and down and seeing those straight lines, feeling the wind on my face, makes me forget how crappy my life really is. I can pretend it’s my house, my yard. I can pretend that when I go in the house, I will be able to snuggle up on the couch with a hot cup of coffee to get the chill out from being outside. I can pretend that Chase will come over this afternoon and join me on the couch to watch the Packer game. But that is all it is. Pretending.
I have to remember that my reality is nothing like that. My reality is that I will go in the house, get yelled at for getting imaginary grass clippings all over the floor. My reality is that I will then have to scrub the floor, even though I did it yesterday, to remove said imaginary clippings. My reality is that no one will save me from this. Not Chase, not anyone. My reality is that I am alone, and I always will be.
Once my reality slaps me in the face, I am in a hurry to just get on with the day so that I can once again bury my thoughts in sleep. I get the lawn mowed and the weeds pulled and go back in the house. Once again, as predicted, my mother is immediately verbally attacking me about the grass clippings. With the mood I am in, it doesn’t even matter, so I just do what I am told.
The rest of my day is spent cleaning, doing laundry, changing the sheets on her bed and mine and washing them. Much like Cinderella, only without the happy ending.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Chase
I would think that by the time I dropped her off and got home a little after four this morning, I would be exhausted, but I can’t sleep. I keep thinking about how I could just take her away from all of this. And the only thing stopping me is my dad. He already lost my mom, and there is just no way that I could just take off. I wouldn’t be able to tell him where we went because I am sure that the police would question him, assuming of course that her mother would call them, and not just be glad she was gone.
Still, that option stays planted firmly in the front of my brain.
Giving up on sleep I put my running stuff on and get my run for the day out of the way. By the time I get home, it is once again that perfect morning light for drawing, so I shower quickly and go outside, this time to the front yard, and try to find some inspiration. I find myself watching her window, and soon I am drawing the window while I wait for her to wake up. I assume she’s a normal person and will probably sleep in, so I am surprised to see her sleepy smile in the window just as the sun is coming up.
I send a quick good morning text and ask her if she would mind if I draw her sitting in the window. She hesitantly complies, and within seconds, that smile is on the paper in front of me surrounded by all of the other things I love about that face. It only takes a few minutes before she is sleeping with her head leaning back and her forehead just barely touching the glass. She has her knees pulled up to her chest and some kind of fuzzy socks on her feet. Her hair is still curly from last night, but is now in a loose ponytail on top of her head.
Although I realize I have limited time to draw before she will no doubt have to go and do some chores or something, I can’t help but just sit and stare at her for a while. She looks so peaceful, well, as peaceful as someone can look sitting up and sleeping in a window, anyway.
Back to drawing. I spend way too much time on her face, but t
hat is after all the most important part. I am watching and drawing for about an hour before I see her eyes open. I give her a little wave, and she smiles that smile. I see her glance at something and immediately receive a text that says she has to go. I can only assume her mother is awake or will be soon. I don’t want her to feel uncomfortable if she has to do outside work or something with me sitting there staring at her, so I grab all my stuff and head back in the house. A few minutes go by, and I can hear her outside mowing the lawn. She must be exhausted. I know I am.
I can hear my dad moving around upstairs, and I know he is going to want to know how everything went last night. Also, I want to know how bad his night was, too, so I make a pot of coffee, poor myself a cup and a cup for him, and sit down at the dining room table.
Before he even sits down, he has already asked me about three thousand questions, and I can’t help but laugh at his enthusiasm. We sit and talk about Tenley and our night for about an hour, and then I finally ask how his night went.
“You know, the more time I spend with her, the more I just feel sorry for her.” He explains. “She has a daughter that she can’t see through her own bitterness. She apparently doesn’t talk to any of her other family members either, because according to her, they are all “out to get her.” She said that a while ago, everyone tried to get her to let Tenley live with her grandparents, and I guess that was the end of most of her relationships. She was telling me last night that she has been seeing a guy for a while now, but it’s hard because she can’t trust Tenley to stay home alone. And she won’t bring him to her house because she is sure that Tenley would do something to embarrass her, so their relationship is pretty much limited to lunch dates. Tenley doesn’t even know they’re dating. I asked her if she felt that maybe we should not be going out to dinner, if maybe he would get upset, and it seemed as if she didn’t even hear me ask; she just moved on in the conversation. It was very strange.”
Clouds That Were (Weathered Hearts) Page 7
