I’m not quite sure I’ve ever felt so ashamed.
I wonder whether I overreacted that day on the bus, whether I jumped to assumptions too quickly, whether my past warped my perceptions of the present.
Finally he saunters outside, toward a banged-up Honda parked in front of the shopette, and within seconds, he’s driving away.
It isn’t until I’m in Eleanor’s car, turning onto Route 41, that I realize I’m following him, just trailing the faded red of his taillights for a couple of miles until he turns right, down a shabby street full of potholes, and pulls into a driveway. I hang back, not quite in front of his house, staring at his mailbox, which reads Luke Simmons, 1243 Brighton.
Luke Simmons.
I shake my head, completely disgusted with myself. Because I didn’t even know his name. Didn’t bother to look at his driver’s license when I stole his wallet. Or any of the wallets, for that matter.
Those people — they weren’t even people to me.
Embarrassment cresting like a tidal wave in my chest, I put the car into drive and pull away. When I get back to Rusty’s, I stride into the house, grabbing a stack of notepaper and envelopes on the way to my room, feeling lighter with every step I take. Outside my window, the sky is red and orange: morning, bursting through the night. Crashing to the floor, I lean against the futon. And I start writing.
I tell those men everything — everything that happened to me and everything that happened because of me. I want them to understand what I did and why I did it. It’s my story, after all, every screwed-up piece of it, and they need to hear it because I’ve yanked them into it. When I’m finished, I grab their wallets, using money from my purse to replace what I stole.
As I’m pulling out their IDs to find addresses for the envelopes, I feel it. The terror. Because what will they do after they’ve read my letters? Will they tell Rusty what I’ve done? Materialize on my doorstep, screaming and ranting? But I don’t stop. I just keep on going until the feeling passes.
#
For the record, I don’t return Owen’s wallet, because I didn’t actually steal it. And even if I did take it, I couldn’t have sent it back to him, because I don’t have his new address.
Besides, when I’m having a particularly tough day, I pull it out of my desk, slide out his old driver’s license, stare at his picture and remember.
#
Weeks slip by, and not one of those men shows up on my doorstep. Luke Simmons doesn’t so much as glance in my direction as I come and go from Rusty’s. Has everyone forgiven me for what I’ve done? It appears that way as time trudges on, summer vacation bleeding into the first several weeks of school.
Sawyer, who’s promised to testify in court about what he saw that Labor Day weekend, quits using steroids and sends a letter to Clemson, explaining why he won’t be attending their school next year. I pass him in the hallways sometimes, and we nod at each other — awkward yet strangely familiar.
I spend my free time doing the therapist thing and the homework thing, or else holing up in my room with my violin. I’m staying above water — I am — but I miss Owen and Janna. Their absence is deep and gaping, a hole I tumble into, time and again, and the longer I go without a phone call or a text from them, the more I wonder whether they’ve moved on. Even though I’ve never said as much to Faith, she peers at me over a magazine one Thursday evening in late September, and says, “I’m sure they’ll call you soon.”
I blink at her from the couch, where I’m bent over an English paper. “Who will call me soon?”
She sighs and flips the page.
Forty-Nine
The thing about Eleanor is that it’s easy to believe all the ridiculous stuff she says, but also it’s impossible to believe all the ridiculous stuff she says. She’s so garish it makes perfect sense that she’s capable of outlandish things, but then she’s such an obnoxious old crow that you can’t really trust a single thing that comes out of her mouth.
“You’re getting a tattoo,” I say, jacking up an eyebrow as our waitress hustles past us with a tray of drinks.
Eleanor takes a noisy sip from her soda, peering at me over the rim of her cup. “That’s what I said.”
Leaning back in my seat and crossing my arms, I give Eleanor a dubious look. Island Pizza is crowded, packed with the usual cast of characters — tourists and locals who’ve dragged in from the beach, sunburned and relaxed. “Why are you getting a tattoo?” I ask.
“Eh.” Eleanor shrugs. “Always wanted to.”
“You’ve always wanted to.”
“Why do you always repeat everything I say?”
I pinch my eyes shut with my thumb and forefinger, sighing. “I was just wondering,” I say slowly, measuring my words, “why a sixty-nine-year-old woman would want to get a tattoo.”
She holds up her spoon and makes a horse face at her reflection, picking something out of her teeth. When she puts it down, she says, “I don’t know, because it just feels like something I want to do, I guess?” She cocks one eyebrow at me. A dare. “Want to get one, too? I’m buying.”
My answer comes quickly, before I even have time to fully consider her question. And as we walk out of the restaurant that day, my heart might be thrumming double-time and my mind might be whirring. But for once, I’m not afraid.
#
I need to scream in the worst, eye-bulging, mouth-pursing, mind-cursing sort of way. But Eleanor is standing at my side, arms crossed and eyes challenging me, so I draw in a deep breath and let it out through my nose, willing my heartbeat to slow.
I will not have a heart attack in Sorry Mom Tattoo Parlor.
I will not.
I can feel the backs of my thighs sweating against the vinyl seat as Tom, the tattoo artist, who has — no shit — a dragon tattoo creeping up his neck and around his eye, makes me doubt every decision I’ve made today, particularly the stupid, spontaneous, irrational one that led me here.
Tom straightens up and swaps out his ink vial, and then he bends over me again, moving the needle to a different part of my foot.
Turns out, I know a lot of cuss words.
I glance at Eleanor, my hands gripping the sides of the chair. “Why didn’t you tell me that this is one of the most sensitive places to get a tattoo?”
Eleanor’s eyes trail to the tattoo, hanging there for a moment. If she has questions about my artwork selection, she doesn’t voice them. She simply says, “You’ve got this, slick. You’re a criminal, remember? Embrace your inner badass.”
Tom eyes me with sudden interest.
Eleanor smirks.
I smirk back at her.
On the way here, Eleanor gave me one of her side-looks and said, “How’re you holding up, kid?” I stared out the window for a couple of beats, trying to put together a reply.
I hadn’t seen Mr. McAllister, and I probably wouldn’t until his sentencing, whenever that happened. But earlier that week, I’d learned that two other girls had stepped forward, claiming he’d sexually assaulted them as well. I’d also found out that he’d told the police he’d been molested as a child. This was his excuse for raping three girls. It didn’t make me any less angry with him. That was the hardest part for me — the forgiveness. I kept trying, because I felt like I should, because I felt like it would help me get over everything, but in the end, it seemed like forgiving him would be like granting him a favor, excusing what he did.
Finally I turned to Eleanor and said, “I’m still pretty angry.”
She nodded. “Me, too. The guy’s a dick.” I laughed out loud and tipped my head at her, like Well said, and then she went on to say, “Choosing to think otherwise would be a tall order for you.”
Sitting in this chair with my foot basically on fire, I keep thinking about that conversation. Because it’s never occurred to me that I have a choice. I’ve always felt helpless to the things
life has thrown my way. And I guess, in a way, I’ve chosen to feel helpless, again and again and again.
I close my eyes, draw in a deep breath and exhale, releasing my death grip on the chair, just letting go, letting go of everything, listening to the buzzing of the needle and the sound of my slow inhalations. It seems like only seconds later when I hear Tom say, “What do you think?”
I sit up and blink a couple of times. Is he finished? He’s finished. I glance at my foot and then back at him. I smile, because I feel a little better. Or different. Like I’ve reached the top of something. Or else, the bottom of something. I look at Eleanor, who nods at me, grinning, and then at Tom and then again at the top of my foot. It’s red and puffy and sore as hell. It’s foreign in the best possible way. “It’s beautiful.”
Fifty
By the time I arrive home that afternoon, I feel lighter and happier. Rusty is standing at the kitchen sink, filling a glass of water. He turns and says hello, his gaze skimming over my face in an assessing sort of way that I’ve grown accustomed to lately: Does she look like she’s been crying? Is she hurt in any way? I guess I pass his evaluation, because he smiles and says, “Want to go grab an ice cream? We could drive down Longboat to that place on the —”
“Actually, I thought maybe we could go visit Dad.”
“Yeah. Okay,” Rusty says without even thinking, as though I’ve just asked him if he wants to settle into the couch and watch a TV show. “That’s a great idea.”
We don’t go to the cemetery where Dad is buried, though. That’s the thing. We go to the river.
Even though it’s within walking distance, Rusty drives us in his truck. He stares straight out the windshield, tapping his thumb to the music on the radio. I can tell he’s lost in thought, so I let him be, resting my head against the back of the seat and gazing out the window until the tires crunch on the gravel parking lot.
Rusty gestures toward the riverbank as we climb out of the truck. “Have you been since you came back to New Harbor?”
“Once,” I say, grabbing a bag filled with bread slices and shutting the door. “You?”
“Nearly every day since your dad died.”
I blink at him. “Really?”
He nods once and adjusts his hat. “It was your dad’s favorite place. We used to fish here all the time,” he says quietly, squinting at the tight knots of mangrove lining the water like there’s no place in the world more important than this tiny pinprick of southern geography.
We settle on the riverbank, both of us quiet for several minutes. Somewhere behind me, frogs call out to one another. A family of ducks swims past and I toss them a handful of bread. They flap and splash as they scoop it up. It’s a knife in my chest, the way they make me think of Dad, but I watch them anyway. Moving on, I guess, isn’t about glossing over the past. It’s about choosing happiness. And sometimes, choosing happiness means acknowledging painful things and then letting them go.
“Lucky ducks,” I murmur.
Rusty smiles softly. “Your dad told me once that people tend to put their stock into one of two things, luck or hope. But that when it really comes down to it, luck and hope are the same thing — a wish, thrown up to the universe.” He’s quiet for a second, and then he goes on. “He said the world is built on those wishes.”
My breath hitches and my eyes blur, because it feels a bit like Dad is speaking to me from the grave. Like he’s telling me to hang in there, to keep wishing and hoping and rebuilding my world. I send him a silent thank-you. I think maybe Rusty is talking to him, too, because his face is about as serious as I’ve ever seen it. Finally Rusty says, “Your dad would want you to be happy, you know.”
“I know.”
Rusty looks up like maybe the answers to everything are skywritten above. His brows furrow. “And you’ll be more than happy. I’ll damn well see to that.”
I’m not sure what more than happy would even look like. Won’t I always be That Girl Who Was Sexually Assaulted? I throw another handful of bread to the ducks. “Do you still think of me as the same person?” I ask, my words tumbling out before I can catch them, revealing all my hopes and fears.
He gives me a surprised look. “Of course. Why do you ask?”
“I feel like people see me differently now. Kind of like —”
Damaged goods.
Rusty says, “I don’t think you’ve changed as much as you’ve learned. And you’ve learned things about trust and cruelty that a girl your age ought not ever learn, and it would please me if you never learn anything that brutal again.” He exhales heavily, like he’s just exhausted himself, and stares at the water. Then he goes on. “And anyway, it doesn’t matter what people think. This is about you. It’s your life. Your story. You just need to figure out where your next chapter will lead you.”
It’s my story.
I always passed this off to Janna. What’s the story? I’ve asked her, time and time again, never once taking the time to decide this for myself.
What do I want?
I think about all the things I’ve wished for, farfetched or not, and I think about all the people I’ve wanted to share my life with, farfetched or not, and I realize: I’ve never asked for any of them.
“Do you think we could afford to hire a private violin teacher?” I say, fast and loud. I’ve never spoken those words, and now that I have, it’s cathartic and empowering. It makes the entire world seem possible.
Rusty blinks. “Sure. Yeah. Anything else on your mind?”
I smile at Rusty. It’s a hesitant smile, maybe even a little bit fearful, but it feels more genuine than ever. “Yeah,” I say. “I think I’m going to call Janna and Owen.”
Fifty-One
It takes a little while for me to figure out what I’ll say to Janna when she picks up her phone. By a little while, I mean five hours. Possibly six. Whatever the case, it’s nearly midnight when I finally punch in the number I’ve known by heart since middle school, praying it hasn’t changed. When she answers, I open with the only line that seems to fit.
“So I got a tattoo.”
I can tell this throws her a little, because she doesn’t reply right away. After a hiccup of silence, she says, “If you tell me it’s a butterfly, Grace Cochran, I’m hanging up on you.”
That’s how I know we’ll be okay.
I’m so relieved I almost drop the phone.
Keeping it light for the first few minutes, we talk about Janna’s new school and the weather in Illinois. And then we grow quiet, the phone heavy with everything. Janna clears her throat and says, “How are you doing, Grace? Are you okay?”
No.
I’m not okay.
I know this without a doubt. But I also know that I will be. I’m already on my way.
I’m sprawled out on my bed, hair everywhere, a chorus of cicadas chirping outside my bedroom window. Wedging the phone between my ear and shoulder, I spin sideways on the futon so I can plant both feet on the wall. “Actually,” I say, “I’m screwed up beyond measure. You?”
“Total train wreck.”
“High fives,” I say with a snort.
And so it goes. Neither of us mentions her father, yet the tone of Janna’s voice is a little uneasy and hesitant and something else — sad, maybe. Or else wistful. So I give her all the positivity I can muster, telling her stories about my therapist and Eleanor and Andy. Finally Janna sighs and says, “I’m so glad you called. I’ve missed you terribly. Have you talked to Owen?”
Owen.
The name wobbles unsteadily inside me — a loose wheel on a shopping cart. I swing my legs over and sit up on the edge of the futon. “No. I’m calling him next.”
Janna’s silent, and then says, “Um.”
I jerk to my feet, all my worries suddenly mushrooming inside me, pressing against my skin, trying to get out. “Um, what?”
“It’s just — we’re all so messed up right now, Grace.” Janna stops and exhales, long and slow. “I don’t know. I mean, what are you looking for? From him?”
“I want to —” I break off abruptly, not knowing how to end my sentence, not knowing what I really want. To make sure he’s okay? To talk? To rekindle our friendship? To resume something more?
Maybe. Maybe to all of them. Maybe to just one or two of them. I don’t even know.
I just want a chance for a Maybe.
Fifty-Two
After we hang up, I dial Owen’s number, but click the END button before it even rings. I stare at my phone for a while. I clean my room. I go to the kitchen to get something to eat. I walk back to my room. I stare at my phone again. I stick my tongue out at it. I call Janna. I have never made so many phone calls in my life.
“Here’s the thing,” I say as soon as she answers. “I’m worried that Owen doesn’t want to talk to me.”
“Grace, it’s two thirty-seven.”
“Two thirty-eight,” I correct without a pause. “Don’t you think he would’ve contacted me by now if he wants me in his life?”
“I don’t know,” Janna says. “But you could find out IF YOU CALLED HIM.”
I chew on my thumbnail, pacing across the room. I’m jittery and jumpy, like my body isn’t made up of tissue and muscle and bone, but motion. “Does he ever mention me?”
“Two thirty-nine.”
“Janna —”
She groans all over the place. “I mean — of course he’s mentioned you. But I haven’t heard from him lately because he went away to college.”
This gets my attention. “Where did he end up going?”
She yawns, an unsubtle reminder that I’ve woken her up. “University of Florida. He missed the application deadlines for the other schools.”
The Leading Edge of Now Page 20
