Crazy Maybe

by Justice, A. D.

  He’s the one who needs to be in the psych ward, dammit!

  My anger hits a boiling point and I hit the button for the next floor and get off the elevator. I make my way back up to the 16th floor to give him a minute of my time – intent on only telling him what’s on my mind and not giving him a chance to say anything. But he’s not there when I exit the other elevator and I run into his parents, who are more than a little shocked to see me again so soon.

  I brush past them without a word and barely a glance as I walk towards Bill’s office. I’m still looking around for Luke because I’m intent on finishing this now. Closure. Not finding him, I go back to the elevator and I’m relieved to see his parents have already left. I hit the button for the 6th floor to take the bridge to the parking lot. My phone beeps in my purse, telling me I have a text. It’s from Luke.

  L: Andi….please

  U and ur dad got what u wanted. Stop pretending now & leave me alone.

  L: NO, Andi, that’s not

  He didn’t finish his text but now my phone is ringing. He’s calling me to finish his sentence and have this conversation out verbally but he’s shit out of luck. I have nothing more to say to him. I decline his call and every consecutive one after that until I turn my phone off to be left alone. I consider stopping by the cell phone store to get my number changed but decide I am way too mentally drained to do that today. I make a mental note to do it later.

  When I get home, Christina, Tania and Katie are waiting for me in the driveway. Thankfully they’re in one car so I open both garage doors and tell Christina to pull her car inside. If Luke comes by and sees a car here, I know he won’t leave. Another mental note to call that real estate agent that I’ve been meaning to call but have been putting off.

  Procrastinators unite – tomorrow!

  My girls don’t have to ask – they know where everything is and what I need. They make quick work with the margarita machine and soon we’re all headed to Margaritaville with Jimmy. I give them a recap of my day and I’m infinitely grateful that they don’t need all the details of my mental hospital stay to believe me when I say it was all based on a lie. They know me well enough to let me have a little breathing room and time to regroup.

  Christina turns on my iPhone to put it on the speaker dock and one text after another comes through all at once. Followed by notifications of numerous voicemails. We ignore them, turn on the music and turn up the volume. The hot tub on my back porch has never felt better than it does right now. We’re all in it, only leaving the hot water and relaxing jets to use the margarita machine and refill our pitcher. Several times.

  I’m thankful to have a large house with multiple bedrooms and bathrooms because everyone will be staying with me tonight. Actually, we have done this pretty frequently, so every one of them have some clothes here. And whatever they don’t have, they know they can just take mine – except my toothbrush, of course. It feels a lot like when we were in college and all shared a 4-person dorm room.

  I don’t know what I’d do without my fun and supportive best friends.

  Friday night at the club with my girls, I plan to get my drink on and try to feel better. I still haven’t talked to Luke or responded to his daily text messages. And I obviously haven’t changed my number yet. But I have started back at the gym instead of letting him run me off from one of the few places that have ever felt like home to me. I am glad that we’ve somehow missed each other all week, though. I’m not getting into this front of Mack and the guys.

  Tonight is my real birthday celebration though – with my real friends. We meet at a small sports bar before heading to the club later. After my last performance, I left the club before finding out if I had advanced to the finals or not. At the time I didn’t really care, but when Mitch sent me a text to let me know I’m one of the five finalists set to perform next weekend, I have to admit I was excited. So now I have to figure out what song I’m going to sing. I have an idea but I need to work out the details in my mind first.

  It’s still early, but the restaurant-slash-bar is already pretty full. The two TVs over the bar are on the local channels and we’re sharing some appetizers when I hear the reporter saying my name again. I roll my eyes as I say, “I thought my 15 minutes of fame was over.”

  The silence at the table is suddenly deafening. I look up to see Christina, Tania and Katie’s stunned faces. I whip my head around to the TV and they’re showing the youth center. I’m being investigated for my involvement with the kids and what kind of influence I am on them.

  There’s a social worker, who has never met me, giving an interview and reciting all the ways that I may be a threat to the children. They’re questioning who approved me to work there. They cut to a parent who is asking if I will be suspended until an investigation can be conducted.

  They don’t even know that it’s my personal money that funds that youth center. They’ve never questioned my involvement or my motives before this week. They’ve never cared that while some of the parents were too high on drugs to care for their own children, I was feeding, clothing and protecting them from the dangers of the neighborhood. Or when the parents were working multiple jobs and long hours just to try to make ends meet, I was helping their children with their homework and doing everything possible to keep them in school. But suddenly, I’m the monster who has been hiding in plain sight and feeding on their children without them even knowing it.

  The reporter is holding up the front page of several different publications – magazines, tabloids, and newspapers – with various headlines but all about the mental hospital, the youth center or my alleged attack on my foster father. It’s sickening how the vultures have descended upon me and have torn me apart without the first shred of evidence. The term “innocent until proven guilty” has never really rang true with me – why else would someone have to defend themselves? It’s more like “guilty until proven innocent, but even then doubt will always remain.”

  I bury my face in my hands for a minute. I am not retreating, I am not giving up, and I am not caving in. I am simply refortifying and readying myself for all-out battle. I can’t avoid this any longer – it’s impacting the youth center now and there are too many kids who need support. And if my former foster family has any foster kids now, they need to be protected more than anyone I know. I steel my nerves and take a deep breath as I raise my face to my girls.

  “It’s about time to head to the club,” I firmly state.

  Our usual table is inhabited by the usual suspects – Shane, Will, Brandon and of course, Luke. He has his back to me and doesn’t know I’m here yet. So I walk to the DJ booth and tell him to queue up a song for me. I had a few drinks at the pub we just left, I’m pissed and I’m really fucking hurt, so I’m going to take it out on the stage. The song, Just A Fool, is actually a duet between Christina Aguilera and Blake Shelton, but tonight I’m singing it solo. And I’m singing it with every bit of emotion I have bubbling just below the surface of my cool façade.

  The lyrics are perfect for me right now. I obviously feel like a fool because I can’t get over him and I can’t let him go, but I know I should. I feel like I’m weak for wanting him to make this all up to me. For even thinking I could forgive him if he would just do something to take this pain away. Love feels like a cruel joke and no one has hurt me in the way that he has. I just want to forget about love and about him, but somehow he’s in every thought I have and every move I make.

  I leave the stage and a friend from the gym I haven’t seen in a while stops me and asks me to dance with him. Another slow song is playing so I step into his embrace and we take the opportunity to catch up. He asks how I’m holding up, knowing how bad my life sucks right now, and I give him a non-committal shrug of my shoulders. Christina taps on my arm and her gaze suddenly shifts and I turn to see what she’s looking at.

  Oh. It’s Luke and he is charging forward like a bull, hell-bent on his destination. Which happens to be me at the moment.

  “And
i,” he barks at me.

  “Yes,” I reply smugly.

  I watch intently as he grits his teeth and clenches and flexes his hands. His anger is barely contained and he’s working hard at restraining himself. I know I’m not helping it but I’m no more in the mood to be fucked with right now than he is.

  “I need you to come with me,” he finally says.

  “No.”

  He nods his head, seemingly understandingly, until I realize that I read him completely wrong. He just decided he wasn’t going to argue with me. In the typical method of the men in my life, he picks me up with ease, throws me over his shoulder, and charges back to the front door. People watch with amused expressions as I scream obscenities at him like a lunatic until he reaches the door. Then I realize we’re going outside and there may be cameras that catch me actually acting like a lunatic so I stop.

  “Luke – do not walk out that door with me over your shoulder. I’m in the news enough as it is. I don’t need to add any more to it,” I say in my sternest voice possible. This stops him in his tracks and I know he hears the words I didn’t say – thanks to your family.

  He puts me down but doesn’t let go of me. “Then walk with me like a normal person would.”

  I sigh heavily, not hiding my dislike of his demand, and respond with the typical pissed-off female response. “Fine.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  LUKE

  Damn, infuriating woman! I’ve called, left voicemails, sent texts, banged on her door at all hours of the damn day and night. No answer – not even one! The last thing she said to me implied that I was only with her to help my dad get what he wanted. That not only hurt, but that also infuriated and insulted me. Then she ignores me and won’t even let me fucking respond to that fucked up statement. What the hell?

  Shane has been barely speaking to me for the past couple of weeks. He’s known something has been really wrong. He’s not stupid by any means. He’s known all this shit with Andi has something to do with me. I finally broke down and told him everything today and I swear I thought he was going to tear my head off. I’m not afraid of any man but I know I would’ve deserved this ass-whooping. He broke a bunch of shit in the gym to work out his anger and avoid breaking me.

  He did ultimately threaten to have my balls stuffed and mounted if I didn’t make everything right for Andi. I believe he would carry out that threat. He really does love and protect her like a brother should for his sister. Like I should have as her friend and her lover, but when the pressure was on, I caved. The press is getting bad around her and we’re both concerned about what kind of toll it’s taking on her. Her strength amazes me.

  I’m waiting inside the club because I know she’ll be here tonight. Shane told me he’s meeting the girls here so I am taking full advantage of it. We were waiting here for them when her face was all over the TV screens and when I heard all the people, who don’t even know her, tearing her down, my protective instincts went into hyper drive. Then she walked right by our table and went straight for the stage. I’ve had to use every bit of my willpower to keep from storming the stage and carrying her off so we can be alone.

  That song she’s singing is killing me. Killing me. She’s pouring all of her pain into it and singing about what a fool she is over me – because she thinks I used her. She thinks the reason I didn’t stand up to my dad is because I was in on his blackmail scheme. She thinks every second I spent with her was a sham and that I’m not sitting here with my heart bleeding out inside me. Killing me one damn word at a time.

  Shane stands up and he is one pissed off brother. He glares at me and I swear he was about to break my jaw when Katie stands up, takes his hand and leads him to the dance floor for a slow dance. The others follow suit and leave me here to stew and wallow alone in my pitiful state. All of my willpower drains when she finishes singing and starts dancing with some other man, who is too happy to have her in his arms. So, I stomp towards her and demand that she come with me.

  And, of course, being as stubborn as she is, she refuses to come with me. So, being as stubborn as I am and refusing to let one more day go by, I nod to my own conclusion that I will resort to kidnapping her and deal with the consequences later.

  I throw her over my shoulder and carry her off the dance floor. People give us curious looks but no one interferes. I guess my don’t-even-fucking-try-it face is on full strength tonight.

  It’s only when I hear the voice that she uses with the kids who get out of line at the center that it registers I’m about to walk outside with her thrown over my shoulder, against her will, and she’s obviously pissed off about it.

  I reconsider my kidnapping idea since there may be cameras outside that capture my crime. The damn reporters have been following her everywhere lately. Mitch has done a good job of keeping the fuckwads out of the club.

  I put her down but I don’t let go of her. I can still kidnap her and make it look like we’re holding hands. Once I have her at my place, I just won’t let her go until this is resolved. I’ll take good care of her for the next 40 or so years until she decides to forgive me. Then we’ll live happily ever after. She agrees to walk with me like a normal person would so I take full advantage of it by linking our fingers together and holding tight.

  I lead her to my truck and help her into the passenger seat and lock her door before closing it. I quickly round the front of the truck, climb into the driver seat and buckle her in while she looks at me like I’m crazy. I may be a little nuts right now but it’s her fault if I am. If she’d just answered my calls, my texts or even her fucking door, I wouldn’t have to resort to committing a felony right now.

  “Luke. What the hell do you think you’re doing?” She asks in annoyance as I start the truck and put it in drive.

  Think fast. “With all the press coverage, I thought it would be best to keep moving so no one films us talking and twists it for another story,” I lie. I’m kidnapping her and the longer I can keep her from realizing it, the more likely I am to succeed.

  She nods tentatively, like she’s considering my reasoning but isn’t completely sure of my sanity. I sneak a look at her when I check the adjacent lane for traffic.

  “So, you’re just randomly driving then? No destination in mind?” She asks calmly, but I know that tone she’s using better than she thinks I do.

  Shit. “Yes.” No. “I’m just driving the roads I know well. In case I need to make a sudden detour.” Sounds reasonable.

  “What do you want from me, Luke?” She sounds exhausted now – weary with me. It suddenly occurs to me that I have to somehow get her out of the truck without her throwing a fucking hissy fit on me. That would draw way too much attention.

  “I want to talk to you, Andi. And I want you to listen to me. And I want to help you,” I reply and even I can hear the pleading edge of my voice.

  “If I agree to this, will you leave me alone then?”

  “Yes.” No.

  She sighs heavily again, telling me she’s pissed that she’s being forced into it, but I’ll take it any way I can get it.

  “Fine.”

  “Your house or my apartment?” I say casually. I really don’t care which one she chooses but her house would be easier because she doesn’t have close neighbors.

  “My house,” she replies without hesitation or issue.

  The kidnapping stars are aligned and winking at me tonight.

  Her phone beeps and she pulls it out to check her text message. She quickly types a response back and I mentally note that all of her fingers are, in fact, not broken, thus she could’ve answered any of the hundreds of messages I’ve sent her.

  “Your friends worried about you?” I ask with a smile, though I just really want to know if some fucker is texting her.

  “Yeah, they asked if you kidnapped me,” she says pointedly.

  I stifled a choke to avoid giving away my plan. I chuckled at their joke. “And what did you tell them?”

  “I said that still remains to
be seen,” she cuts her eyes at me, “but that I’m fine for the moment.”

  I give her my best smile, “You know I’d never hurt you, Andi.” Kidnap you, yes. Hurt you, never.

  “Maybe. But that’s not what they asked, is it now?” She cleverly replies. My little vixen is very shrewd.

  “Here we are,” is my only response as I pull into her driveway.

  I’ve never been so glad to reach a destination in my life. I jump out of the truck and rush to open her door and escort her inside, astutely cloaking my excitement at being at her house, with her in tow, and all without the need of chloroform to achieve any of this. All in all, it’s a good night.

  We’re inside now and she’s walking towards the chair, but I want her to sit with me so I gently steer her towards the couch. She sits at one end and I know she expects me to sit on the other end, but when I sit I leave no space between us. She looks a little perturbed at this but she turns slightly towards me and waits patiently.

  “I’m not really good at this, Andi, so first let me say I’m sorry right now in case I say something wrong.” She nods but doesn’t say anything.

  “Saying I’m sorry isn’t enough, even though I mean it. I’m infinitely sorry for what I’ve done, but there are a few things I want to explain that will hopefully help you understand me,” she looks interested in hearing what I have to say so I continue.

  “Several years ago, I started seeing this girl, Megan. We were together for a while and we were pretty serious. Her father, Carl, owned the gym where I was working out and that’s where we met. My father’s business was doing really good and he had a lot of high-profile development projects going on. So, during a family get together one night, Carl mentions in casual conversation with my dad that he has some plans to revamp his gym. They talk shop for a little while and before long, they have a verbal agreement for my dad’s men to do the work for Carl.