by M. Mabie
Most weekends he’d stay at our house from the time school got out Friday until we went back Monday morning.
True to his family’s nature, he worked jobs for cash. He’d pick up a few shifts here and there at Tinnitus Music, where Cory worked, when they needed help, but mostly he’d tend bar or work the door at music venues. He’d play a show here or there when a band needed a fill in, but he didn’t play regular shows with just one band.
After we’d sat there longer than his fly-by-night patience allowed, he stole the water bottle from my hands, finished it off, and tossed it toward the nearby trash can. He missed, but instead of picking it up, he tipped his chin up at me. “Start talking, man.”
“Where the fuck do I start?” I asked, leaning my head back against the metal surface.
“Start where it started.”
Where it started? If I could go back to where it started and do it all differently, I would’ve. But I didn’t have a time machine. Where was Doc with a DeLorean and a clock tower when you needed him?
I began with, “She looked like a drowned cat,” and just kept going from there. I told him about that first weekend. Then, about how I looked her up after she started the job with Couture Dining. Aly, Chicago, and how I’d set it up for us to meet in Atlanta.
He listened to me go on and on about city after city, revisiting each chance I had—and missed—at telling her how I felt and what I really wanted. How we talked almost every day, but never really said much. I told him about her wedding, and what happened when she came to me after my mom died.
I told him everything I could remember, and as I listened to myself rehash the past few years, I cringed with every fuck up.
Another few hours passed and we shared a bag of sunflower seeds, taking turns spitting the shells on the ground. He ran across the highway to the park bathrooms and brought back two more bottles of water.
It wasn’t like us to have deep conversations about that kind of shit. Every time I thought it was getting too weird or I felt like I was acting like a silly girl, he’d punch my shoulder and urge me to keep going.
By the time I reached the part where she gave me the letter, he’d called me a fucking idiot under his breath ten or two hundred times. As much as I knew the release was cathartic, remembering how good we were together brought an achingly familiar pain to my chest. I fucking missed her. And after all the shit we’d been through, I knew it was all worth it.
“What are you going to do now?” he asked, when the story butted against present tense, his knee bobbing up and down. I think I was stressing him out. I knew the feeling.
“I’m not sure. What do you think?” He knew everything and I could finally get some sort of outsider’s take on it all. A weight had been lifted. I looked at the water that was not plainly visible and wondered what she was doing, pushing my foot through the dirt over and over until I made a rut.
“I think you have to trust her,” he admitted, throwing his hands in the air.
“Trust her?”
“Sounds fucked, huh?” He chuckled and hopped up, stretching his back with his arms in the air.
“No. I do trust her, I’m just sick of fucking waiting.”
“Well, if I were you I’d wait. I’d get my shit together and wait my fucking ass off,” he said, looking at me as he bent over to touch his toes.
It wasn’t at all what I thought he’d say. I imagined him saying something more like, “Well if she comes back, then cool, but don’t hold your breath.” But he didn’t.
I cocked a confused eyebrow at him, silently asking him to elaborate on his grand master plan, which took him all of two hours to figure out. Was it really that easy?
“The way I see it, if you call it quits here, you’ll be fucked up forever. She said she was going to fix it? Let her. She has one hell of a mess to clean up, but if she says she’s willing to do it, then she’s one tough chick. A girl like that is worth waiting a little while for.” He chuckled a little under his breath, then said to himself, “Fuck. I know all about waiting.”
I didn’t know how long it would take her to come back to me, but he was right. She would. I had to trust her and I had to be worth coming back to.
I owed myself that much. Be a man she couldn’t ever leave again. I’d get her and I’d keep her.
Friday, January 1, 2010
I HAD TO COME up with a plan where I got to keep Casey. I needed to think long and hard about how to do it. I owed it to myself to make sure this wasn’t one more thing I messed up. My guilt kept piling up by the second.
It was New Year’s morning and I’d chosen a later flight, having guessed Grant would take the first one available. I hadn’t been far behind him arriving at the airport. I didn’t want to see him just yet. I didn’t want to see anyone. I needed to sit and process everything that had happened, so after I checked in, I hung out awhile to think before going through security.
The rehearsal dinner.
The wedding.
My chat with Aly in the bathroom. She’d freaking slapped me. Slapped me.
Then the fight. Or was it a fight? Maybe it was just a drunk man and a sober man trying to claim what they each thought was theirs. But I wasn’t Grant’s by any stretch of the imagination. And I wasn’t really Casey’s yet, either. Hearing them go back and forth, Grant yelling and Casey staying reasonably calm, had been an emotional smack that made the bitch slap I’d taken in the ladies’ room look like child’s play.
From my vantage during the quarrel, all I could see was the storm in Casey’s eyes. I was sick of hurting him.
Maybe Aly was right. Maybe I was bad for Casey. Deep down, I think we both knew what we were doing wasn’t good for either of us. So why couldn’t we ever just stop? Why didn’t he ever just say forget it and be with her?
But he had been with her.
Was I allowed to be jealous? Was anyone ever entitled to another person? He had every right to be with her and her with him, but the thought of them together gave me a chill. It was very possible I was going to lose him. To her. And she’d been right. Every time I’d left Casey, it made it that much easier for her to be there for him.
I’d made such a fucking mess.
Sitting in the abandoned terminal, I drank coffee after coffee waiting for my connecting flight out of Reno. But it was good. I needed the minutes.
I needed the quiet. It was peaceful.
My life had just exploded. My husband learned about my affair with the man who I’m really meant for, and once again, I’d left him. Left Casey.
I watched the sun rise over the tarmac.
The planes slowly taxied around the runways, almost as if they were on a leisurely Sunday stroll. They made me question my own patience. A question I wasn’t ready to answer, but knew was the root of one of my biggest problems.
They called my flight next and like all the other quiet travelers, I stood in line and waited my turn. Funny how things appear to you all at once.
I sat over the wing on the way to Seattle, watching the low-lying clouds blanket the Earth below me. It was so sunny up there, but the ground couldn’t see it. It was covered with grayness when all along the sun shined just above.
At thirty-thousand feet, I accepted that my patience was a bad thing. I was too persistent. At every turn, it was my endurance, my ability to wait for that right moment—that was never going to happen—that had failed me.
Tolerantly, I had waited to fall in love with Grant. My patience had hovered over our relationship like the thick clouds I watched out the window. It wouldn’t allow the sun to filter through. Perhaps, in that relationship, there had never been any sun waiting to filter through. Perhaps the wait would have been in vain anyway.
I waited for Casey to tell me what I wanted to hear instead of taking a leap of faith and just asking him. I was so stubborn it had resulted in him not telling me until my wedding day. Then I’d set a timeline of a year. A year? Who does that? What was I waiting for and where in the fuck did I get this sens
e of fortitude? Because it never felt like I got what I was actually waiting for. It never got me him.
It was when I’d been spontaneous that I’d been the happiest.
The night I’d met Casey in Hook, Line and Sinker, I’d said fuck patience. To hell with waiting. I’d wanted him. That night was almost perfect.
He’d told me what he wanted.
I’d wanted it too.
I sipped cold coffee and vowed to fight my patience. To stop waiting. To move. To appreciate the overcast. After all, the sun wasn’t that far away. It was just out of sight for the moment. Not gone all together.
When I landed, it was still very early for New Year’s Day. Most people were sleeping it off after a night of partying and celebrating.
Who knew airports could make one reflect so much? I bought a water—another cup of coffee might have made my skin vibrate straight off my bones—and sat by baggage claim after I retrieved my bags, and continued to reflect. I could only imagine what I looked like to the few lonely people in the airport. I had the good sense to at least open a magazine I’d bought so I wasn’t just staring off into space. They would have called security. There I was in a dress, trench coat, and last night’s makeup and hair. What a hot, pathetic mess.
But my body waited for my head to sort it all out, even though I looked like a single piece of candy in a crystal dish. Forgotten and singular. Regardless, with only the buzz of the suitcase conveyor to hum along with, I could finally hear everything clearly.
I wasn’t going back to the house Grant bought for us.
There was no going back. I was never really there anyway.
I’d talk to Grant later, but it was best I either got a hotel room or went to my parents’ house. Not just for Casey’s and my benefit, but for Grant’s as well. This wasn’t his fault. I owed it to him to tell him the truth—almost more than anyone. He hadn’t deserved his wife cheating on him. No one did. He probably had a major hangover on top of it all.
I reached into my bag for my phone and powered it up for the first time since I’d turned it off before I left the bathroom at the bar. It was late, already early afternoon. I was flooded with messages and missed calls, but the one that stuck out to me was from Casey.
Casey: Happy 2010. Goodbye.
Like hell, Goodbye. I wanted to think about my reply thoroughly. I needed to be careful with my words to Casey. How much more could he take? Would he take? I had to do better by him. When I’d neglected him, it hurt me worse. That had to stop. There was no mistaking how badly I desired communication with him.
Me: Happy 2010. Don’t say goodbye. We’re just in a fight. Remember?
He didn’t reply right away. I didn’t expect him to. I wasn’t going to stop reaching out to Casey though, dammit. I needed to think more about what to say to him, but not saying anything to him anymore simply wasn’t an option.
I didn’t think twice about looking up the number for the Hotel Max. I needed some sleep, even though my mind was still running at full speed.
I took a cab and checked in. I smiled at the door to the room I’d met Casey in so long ago as I walked down the hall to the room I’d been given today. Was there anywhere he hadn’t left pieces of himself in my life?
Showering and changing into pajamas, I lay down on the comfortable bed and stared at my phone.
I knew what I needed to do and even though it wasn’t going to be easy, it also wasn’t going to be that hard. I was going to be with Casey and nothing else mattered. It was where I belonged.
My fingers slid over the screen as I typed to him and hoped his faith in me was still there.
Me: I won’t give up on us.
That it wasn’t goodbye for us. The light at the end of the tunnel would get brighter and like the sun above the clouds that I couldn’t see from the ground, I had to believe it was there.
It was there.
It was there the whole time. I just had to have faith.
Friday, January 1, 2010
IT WAS HARD TO have faith when I didn’t know how she was or what she was doing.
My phone burned a hole in my pocket all day. I checked the battery. Checked my service. Double-checked I hadn’t missed something, scrolling through my missed calls and messages over and over until it was starting to look like a nervous tick.
Troy saw me do it, but had the good sense to leave me alone. I appreciated more as we got older the kind of friendship we had. No bullshit.
When I returned to my quiet home, I didn’t have to hide my compulsions.
It was then that something switched in my head and I decided not to look at it anymore. I found the last messages between us and read them again.
I was still doing it. Same as always. I was waiting for her. I always had. Allowing it to be her move. How long did I expect her to be the only one going forward when all I ever did was let her muddle through the shit on her own?
Real fucking fair, Casey.
I couldn’t hold her responsible time after time, for buckling under the weight of it all, after carrying the burden for both of us. I couldn’t expect her to do it alone.
If I wanted to be the man she needed, the man she deserved, I needed to fight too. Hard. I had to quit fighting her and fight with her.
The night before I’d felt like a man possessed and possessed I was. Territorial even. Like I had control—for maybe the first time—and it was all because I did something. I was part of the change I wanted. There was no mistaking the look on her face when she dialed into my assertive behavior. Even worse, or better for me, Grant made a fucking ass of himself.
When I took control, I was a man worthy of her. Composed. Owning my shit. I wanted her; my need was obvious. It felt like lasers shot from every pore on my body, searching for her at all times. She never went undetected.
At the wedding, he fell apart, getting drunk and acting like an ass in front of everyone. I couldn’t really blame him. He’d realized a pretty huge thing. But in the bar when he looked weak and pathetic, I stood tall, knowing he was on my turf and I wasn’t about to play the part of the fool.
Sure, I could have beaten his foolish ass all over that bar and no one would have stopped me. But I didn’t. I was a man deserving of her love.
Then—like a fool—I’d been rough and indifferent with her heart, when all along it was mine feeling vulnerable. Once again, I’d reacted in a way that would have any other woman running for the hills. I’d text her “Goodbye,” and she was still fighting for me.
I opened my phone to take it back. It was time I was the better guy. Me.
The old way didn’t work for either of us. If I had any chance of making her mine, I’d have to be hers. I’d have to be there for her.
My finger slid the phone open on a mission to retract my shitty message, that I’d only said—once again—to make her feel the hurt I felt. She’d just told me she loved me for the first time and I didn’t even look at her.
What a prick.
I wouldn’t have been surprised if that was too much. If this time, when I’d pushed her way, she’d really let me go.
Then my phone buzzed and lit up like the night sky on the 4th of July. Many notifications of missed calls and messages flooded it.
Spectacular are those moments—the silent, invisible connections revealed—when you pick up the phone and it chimes. The time for us to be a team in this thing was right in front of us, and it appeared she felt it too.
Honeybee: Happy 2010. Don’t say goodbye. We’re just in a fight. Remember?
Honeybee: I won’t give up on us.
Honeybee: I’m at a hotel, not at Grant’s.
I read the last one three hundred fucking times. She couldn’t have sent a better text. I’d wondered if she was going back to their house. Finding out she hadn’t was like hearing my death-row heart receive a pardon. Even the way she said “Grant’s” excited me. Grant’s house. Not home. Not their house. His. If she wasn’t thinking of their house like hers, then maybe she was finally going to
make this happen. Us.
We were fantastic at frustrating each other, but we also knew exactly what to offer as a life rope. And that’s what she’d done. She tossed me a line and on the end of it was hope.
Admittedly, I’d been rough on her at the party. Parading Aly in front of her. Playing that song. Dancing to it with another woman. Another woman who she’d just learned I’d been with in her absence. I could only imagine how that conversation went down. What had Aly said?
It certainly wasn’t a good time to ask, but someday I’d find out. I imagined Aly being callous and Blake not taking her shit. But who knew? I’d put both of them in an ugly situation that night.
I wasn’t perfect and hated facing the ugly reality that I’d been with someone other than her—even though I knew she’d been with Grant. And of all people I’d chosen Aly, someone who Blake already had a less than stellar history with. The lines of faithfulness were never clear with us. I wondered if they ever would be.
Actually, no. Going forward, those lines had to be clear.
Would she trust me? Could I trust her? There was no way of knowing. But, shit, I didn’t want to find out firsthand if it was all possible. Love can make a dude do some messed-up shit.
Me: Are you okay?
Honeybee: I think so. I did a lot of thinking. Took the long way back. Had a layover in Reno, and then hung out at the airport for a while.
Me: Want to talk about it?
Honeybee: I don’t know. I’m afraid of being wrong or hurting you any more than I already have.
Me: We hurt each other. It’s not just you. It never was.
Honeybee: I don’t want us to be like that anymore, Casey. I want this done already. I want to be together.
Me: Me too.
It wasn’t like we were talking on the phone, but I muted the television anyway. I’d only been back home for a little while, long enough to order a pizza and take a shower. I lounged on the couch, and it was probably the shock of her sending me the message I’d been dreaming of for a long damn time that made it a mute-worthy moment. I felt like I’d won a battle I’d been fighting alone. Finally, relief.
