by K. A. Linde
I was still shrugging into my leather jacket in the freezing cold when I reached her door. I banged on it as hard as I could until I felt like my hand was going to fall off from the cold.
“Ari! Are you in there?” I yelled. “I need to talk to you about last night! Please, please talk to me. Aribel! Come on! I’m freezing out here. Can we please just talk this out? I was an idiot. A motherfucking idiot. Look, I don’t care how cold it is out here. I’ll stand out here all day if you won’t let me—”
McAvoy opened the door. “Bro, I think we got that.”
“What the fuck is this?” I asked, bewildered.
“I stayed the night.” He shrugged like it was no big deal.
“With who?”
I wasn’t sure why it even mattered. McAvoy had had his fair share of women, but he wasn’t like Vin and me. He would pick chicks for a purpose, and usually dated them casually. We’d had a number of girls McAvoy dated like that hang around the band for a few weeks, but none of that really mattered right now.
“Gabi.”
Huh, the little pixie. I would have never guessed. “Is Ari in there? I need to talk to her.”
McAvoy looked confused. “She left early this morning.”
“Left for where?” My blood ran cold. No. I need to fix this. She had to let me fix this.
“Bro, I thought you knew. I would have told you.”
“Where did she go?”
“Back to Jersey. I heard her tell Gabi something about an early flight to Boston, but I guess I assumed she meant Sunday.”
“Thanks, man.”
I dashed away back to my room. I heard McAvoy yell something after me, but I didn’t bother listening. I had to get back to Jersey. I had to see her. She could not leave for Boston before we talked.
I packed quickly and grabbed my guitar. I banged on Sydney’s door. When nothing happened, I moved to Miller’s door. “Where the fuck is Sydney?”
Sydney’s head popped out. “Can I help you, resident asshole?”
“We’ve got to go. Get your shit together.”
“What? I’m not going.”
“I need to leave now! So, let’s go.” I was getting hysterical. I needed to get to Ari as fast as I could.
“Bro,” Miller said, “she can come back with us.”
“Take care of her.”
“I’m not a doll.”
“See you later, cuz,” I said, mimicking her nickname.
Then, I was out the door.
The drive back to Princeton felt like it was taking forever. The roads were shit from a snowstorm that had blown in recently. It had been awesome on the slopes, but it wasn’t so great to drive in. I was thankful for my truck because I drove recklessly back to Ari. I just had to get to her. I had to make it right. No matter what it took.
I heard the beating on the door before Cheyenne did. I dashed to her room and flung the door open wide. “Chey, you have to answer the door.”
“Ari, are you sure about this? I’ve never known you to back away from confrontation,” Cheyenne said, her voice sympathetic.
“I’m not backing down from confrontation. We had our confrontation last night, and it was horrible! I can’t talk to him today. Please, I’ve never asked you for anything like this.”
“Besides driving you back from the ski resort a day early when I was getting together with Vin?”
I shuddered. Vin. Gross. “Thank you. You’re the best friend ever.”
“All right, but I’m only doing this because I love you,” Cheyenne said.
She walked to the door, and I huddled on the floor within earshot of the conversation that was about to go down.
I hadn’t thought that Grant would follow me. I’d made a split second decision this morning to come back to Jersey. I’d even called my parents and asked if we could move up the flight to Boston, so I could come home earlier. They’d been surprised since I’d insisted on going on the ski trip in the first place, but they hadn’t complained. They missed me.
Now, Grant was here. What do I do now that he’s here?
“Grant…hey,” Cheyenne answered warily.
“Where is she, Cheyenne?”
My heart pounded from the sound of his voice. I just wanted some space. I needed time to think about whether or not this was what I wanted, but then hearing his voice…it just brought back all the memories.
“She left already.”
“What? No way. Her car is still out there!”
“I dropped her off.”
“In Newark?” he asked incredulously. “You would have never made it back by now.”
I watched Cheyenne shrug. She was lying for me. I would squeeze her if I didn’t feel like a total jerk for cowering behind the door while she fought my battles for me.
“Come on, I know she’s in there. I need to talk to her.”
“I already said she’s not here. You should just go back home.”
“Ari!” he yelled.
I heard his hand hit the door gently to keep Cheyenne from closing it.
“Ari, I know you’re in there! Just come talk to me. Can’t we talk about this?”
I closed my eyes and put my head between my knees. God, I just wanted to run to him. I wanted to see him and have that feeling of completion again. But I couldn’t forget our argument, and I wasn’t ready to have another one. I’d asked for time, and I still needed it.
“She’s not in here!” Cheyenne yelled back. “And even if she were, do you think she would talk to you with all this yelling? Haven’t you done enough damage?”
“I just want to fix this,” he told Cheyenne. “She has to know how I feel about her.”
Oh no, not the tears again.
“Well, if you really care about her, I think the best thing to do is to just back off. She’s stressed. She’s never been in this kind of situation. I told her you were going to break her heart, but she wouldn’t listen.”
I felt the tears trickle down my face at Cheyenne’s words. There was the I told you so that Cheyenne had kept from her lips when I asked her to drive me home this morning.
“So, just give her some space. Maybe after the break, she’ll want to talk to you.”
“I can’t wait that long. I can’t risk losing her, Cheyenne.”
“You already have.”
Her words hit me like a ton of bricks, so I couldn’t imagine what it had just done to Grant. I’d risked so much by getting involved with him, but it felt like I was risking more by giving him up. And this relationship purgatory we were currently hanging in made the agony of a decision even worse.
He hadn’t lost me. I was still his.
My heart and my body called out to comfort him, but I didn’t. My mind was still reminding me of how much he’d hurt me.
“Well, if you see her, then tell her I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said those things. I shouldn’t have even let Kristin into my room. I understand how serious it all is, but there is no one else for me. No one. It wasn’t even a thought in my mind. Ari is it. She’s the only girl I’ve ever fallen for, and I’d really be worthless if I let her walk away without a fight. So…so, just tell her to talk to me. I want to make it right.” Grant’s voice was hoarse. I’d never heard him like this.
“I’ll tell her, but I really think you should just leave her alone,” Cheyenne said.
“I can’t. I’ll never be able to.”
Cheyenne sighed. “At least for break. Just think about what she wants for a change. If she wanted to talk to you and make things right, wouldn’t she be talking to you right now?”
“I’ll give her whatever she wants. If she wants silence, I can give her that.” He practically forced the words out. “But I’m here to stay, Cheyenne. You tell her that, too.”
“I’ll tell her,” she said before closing the door. “Well, that went well.”
I shook my head and let the tears fall freely. “I should have spoken to him. He sounded so distraught.”
Cheyenne plopped down next
to me and wrapped a comforting arm around my shoulder. “I know this is your first real relationship, Ari, but take it from someone who knows…it’s better to let him suffer a little.”
“I don’t want him to suffer.”
“Don’t you? Just a little?”
I laughed, but it came out more like a hiccup. “I just want to put the pieces back together. I feel…God, I don’t even know. I feel like he ripped my body in half.”
“It’ll be okay,” she said softly.
I rested my head on her shoulder and cried.
“Just go away for break. Take some time to think about everything that happened. If you want him back, then it sounds like he’s willing.”
“What if I wait too long?” I whispered the fear that came to me.
“Then, he was never worth it to begin with.”
The only thing I wanted for Christmas was hundreds of miles away and refusing to talk to me. Despite telling Cheyenne that I would remain silent if that was what Ari wanted, I was having a terrible time with it. I’d texted her constantly the first couple of days, and I’d called her more times than I even wanted to admit. She hadn’t responded. I had to face facts that she actually wanted my silence.
I still texted her when I couldn’t bear to let her think that she was off my mind. But even those, I let dwindle to once a day, then every other day, and then every third day.
Guilt infected everything. Guilt about how I’d treated Ari, how I’d talked to her, for not going after her, for not doing enough. Guilt about how I’d treated Sydney, how I’d treated the guys, how selfish I’d been in everything I’d been doing for months…years. I was no better than my old man. That much was becoming a pretty obvious fact. Self-sabotage was the name of the game, and I was the goddamn reigning champion.
Normally, in these situations…well, shit, I’d never been in this kind of situation. But when I got down, I usually overindulged in anything that would make me forget. Everything made me think about her though. I didn’t want to drink. I didn’t want to smoke. I didn’t have the energy to think about anyone but her, so there was no way I was going near women. A fucking blizzard had ripped through Jersey, so I couldn’t ride my bike. The only thing I still had was my guitar, and her song seemed to be the only one I remembered.
“Are you going to mope around all break?” Sydney asked a few days before Christmas.
I’d apologized to her as soon as she’d gotten back from the ski lodge. She’d brushed it off like it didn’t matter and told me it just ranked right up there with my other bizarre behavior. Really reassuring.
“I’m not moping.”
“You are so moping!”
I just shrugged. I didn’t want to argue with her. I started strumming out “Life Raft” for the hundredth time, and Sydney groaned.
“Stop playing that song. Can’t you just…I don’t know…find someone else?”
My eyes shot daggers at her.
“All right, all right. Bad idea.”
“She just needs time.”
“Has she spoken to you at all since she left?”
I couldn’t think about that. I couldn’t consider that she had moved on. My life was hanging on the edge of disaster with those thoughts constantly swirling through them. I didn’t need the push that would send it into a spiral of chaos.
“Look, cuz,” she said, sinking into the seat next to me, “I know this is hard on you, but you need to do something else, something to get your mind off of her.”
“Like what? Everything that I’ve ever done in the past just conjures up more memories.”
“I don’t know. Just do something productive. Go work out or go for a run or go work for Randy again. Sitting here and thinking about her all day is only going to make you depressed. You were never exactly chipper, but this…this isn’t you.”
I ran a hand back through my hair and tried to listen to reason. Sydney was right. Ari was on my mind 24/7 and if I didn’t get myself together, her walking out of my life was going to destroy me.
“All right then.”
Sydney and I drove to Duffie’s, and I smiled at the old familiar feeling at seeing the building. A long line of people greeted us when we entered. The hostess recognized Sydney. They hugged and started talking rapidly. That was my cue.
I wandered back to the kitchen and found my aunt and uncle where I’d always found them before. Randy was busy making pizza dough from scratch while young servers busied themselves around him. Carol was sitting at a cash register, ringing out customers and making change. It felt…homey.
“Grant!” Carol said with a big smile on her face. “How wonderful to see you, honey.”
“Hey, Aunt Carol, Uncle Randy.”
“Sydney get you out of the house?” Randy asked with a knowing glint.
So, he had been behind this.
“Yeah, she did.”
“Well, what are you waiting for?”
A white apron was launched at my head, and I caught it easily with one hand. I laughed. It felt good to have something to laugh about.
“We have a lot of work to do.”
The pizza place closed at midnight. I stayed after to wipe down tables and refill Parmesan and red pepper flake containers. The steady motion of running the restaurant had kept my mind occupied and had given me a blissful reprieve from my thoughts. When I finished around one in the morning, I closed up shop. Instead of going straight home, I turned and walked out onto the beach.
I’d been avoiding the beach at all costs. It had once been my place of solitude—just me and the crashing waves, the sand between my toes, the salty air. Peaceful, serene, entrancing. But I’d brought Ari here. I’d shared my favorite place in the world with her, and now, it wasn’t mine. It was ours.
I was exhausted from working hard all day, and I wanted to feel a piece of her when I couldn’t be anywhere near her. The only time we’d ever been closer was when I’d told her about my parents. We’d connected on such a strong emotional level that she’d given me her body. I couldn’t have either of those things right now, so I gave myself the beach as a small consolation.
I tramped out through the snow, letting the dry, cold air seep into my lungs. I finally reached a point where the ocean had washed away the snow, giving way to hard-packed sand. I stood there in icy silence, just watching the waves come in and then flow back out.
Working had never held any real interest to me. I had money, lots of money, from what had happened with my parents. And the band made good enough money to top that. But I suddenly wanted a job. I wanted to feel like I was doing something worthwhile. A secret part of me wanted to prove Ari wrong. I’d never been motivated or ambitious. I’d been treading water in my life for a long time. Maybe it was time to change that after all.
Going through the motions at home was surprisingly easy. My family had never been particularly emotional, so I could hide my feelings behind an expressionless mask. I’d never told my parents that I was dating anyone. Thus, they had no reason to suspect my sullen attitude was anything out of the ordinary. Only Aaron seemed to notice a shift in my moods, but he kept his thoughts to himself, just like my family always did.
I was upstairs, getting ready for my father’s annual Christmas party, when Aaron appeared in the bathroom mirror.
“Are you about ready to go?”
Sometimes, I swore that Aaron and I could have been twins. He was much taller than me, but he had the same natural blond hair and matching dark blue eyes. He’d graduated from Princeton the year before I’d attended, and he was now working in business in Boston, like our father.
I swished the mascara across my lashes one more time, and then I put the tube away. “Sure.”
“Have you been okay?” he asked, crossing his arms over the chest of his designer tuxedo.
“Fine.”
“Aribel, I know you’re not fine.”
I ran my hands down the front of the black lace dress my mother had picked out for me when we’d gone shopping. It had a
n open V-cut with thick straps falling over my shoulders, a tiny empire waist, and an A-line skirt that fell to my knees. Grant’s dog tags had been replaced with a simple gold chain with a little bow pendant. My parents had gotten it from Tiffany’s for me for Christmas. It was simple yet extravagant.
I hated taking off Grant’s dog tags almost as much as I hated wearing them. They were my reminder as much as his text messages were. I desperately wanted to pick up the phone and make it all right, but something had kept me from doing it. I missed him terribly, and honestly, I couldn’t believe some of the things we’d said to each other, but I wanted to trust Cheyenne’s advice. I did need time away from him to get my head on straight again.
“Are you daydreaming?” Aaron asked, waving his hand in front of my face.
“No,” I said immediately. “What were you saying?”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you are lovesick.”
The color drained out of my face, and I was thankful for the rouge I’d just applied to my cheeks. “I’m just not feeling well.” I took a step around him. I found a pair of black heels and slipped them on.
“Aribel,” Aaron said softly, following me into the room. “Did something happen at school? Is that why you came home early?”
Oh, how I wanted to confide in my brother, but I knew exactly what he would think about Grant. Aaron would assume what I’d assumed when I first met Grant. But there was so much more to Grant than met the eye. I’d said that he hadn’t changed, that he wasn’t ambitious…and more terrible things, but none of them were true. His drive, and ambition just didn’t fit the mold I’d been carefully cut from. That didn’t mean it didn’t exist.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I’m your brother. You can trust me.”
I sighed and relented. “I was dating someone. We got into a big fight when school ended. I’m just trying not to think about it.”
“Well, as your brother, I can say that no guy is ever going to be good enough for you.”
I cringed at his words.
