When I was able to look at him, he was staring at me, bobbing his dark head softly with pursed lips and a look of overwhelming coolness as he jammed along with the stereo.
I shook my head. “Really?”
His eyebrows shot up. “What? I thought this was your theme song!”
I laughed and again shook my head, this time with slow deliberation. “You know, the true shame of this moment is the fact that you had this song at the ready.”
“It’s true. You can’t imagine the crap I have on here because of you.”
“What? How is this because of me?”
“Oh, come on. I’ve got a Faye Playlist on this fucking thing from all the crap you made me listen to. And on repeat if I recall.”
I sighed. “It wasn’t crap.”
He stared at me until I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Ok, it wasn’t all crap, but you’re still the one with it on your phone.”
“Blame nostalgia. I was actually going for Time After Time – you know, get some Cyndi going in here - but I couldn’t resist.”
I looked at Evan for the first time that night – truly looked at him – and saw the same boy I’d spent years of my life with. He’d grown into his looks, the dark hair and eyes, the goofy grin – they’d all combined with a hint of stubble and mature eyes to create a strange Marlboro Man effect, despite his bright red pants. He gave me a queried look, and I smiled.
Evan always carried a ‘mark,’ as I’d called it – a sadness to his eyes that drove you to want to collect him under your wing and protect him, shield him from something, though you weren’t sure what. It was that sadness, that heaviness that seemed faded now.
Evan and I were friends for two years before I discovered the cause of that sadness; the night he showed up on my porch, shirtless and bleeding because his Dad had taken the buckle end of a belt to him for putting a dent in the very car we were sitting in.
I wondered if that kind of mark ever truly faded, or if we carried them like freckles or green eyes. I wondered if he could see mine, if I did indeed have one too.
I was sure I did. How could I not?
“You look good, Evan.”
He smiled. “Are you hitting on me?”
I rolled my eyes. “How did I know I would regret saying that?”
“I’m kidding. Thank you,” he said and nudged my arm. “I could say the same about you.”
I found myself glaring at him. The notion of a male thinking I looked ‘good’ almost irritated me. I don’t like to be patronized. “I highly fucking doubt that.”
He furrowed his brow a moment, and I felt a reprimand coming. Instead his face softened. “It’s true. The side Mohawk really works for you.”
I laughed, but I felt coddled. Evan had an uncanny ability to say exactly what he was thinking. It’d gotten him in trouble many times. Yet, there in that car, he hadn’t said it – whatever it was.
“You have no idea what lengths I went to this afternoon to perfect this.”
I shifted in my seat remembering the ordeal of that afternoon. No, really Evan. You have no idea.
He paused. “I’m glad you came.”
I nodded and leaned my head against the car door, letting the cool air chill my skin. My phone buzzed again, and I retrieved it. There were two people I could think of that might be texting me at that moment. I didn’t want to talk to either of them.
I set the phone down on the car seat and continued to stare outside. A moment later, it buzzed again. I didn’t care.
“You alright, Jensen?”
It was so weighted, the car felt as though it might collapse in its gravity. He wasn’t asking if I was comfortable or cold or in need of sustenance – he was asking far more, and he knew the answer. I shook my head and swallowed hard.
“Is it that douche bag?” He asked.
I laughed sadly.
I bumped my temple against the car frame, as though a jolt of pain might settle this rising misery I felt. “No.”
“Ok then,” he said. “So what’s up?”
I frowned. “I don’t even know anymore.”
Lie. Yes I did.
He nudged me. “Talk to me.”
I shook my head, feeling that hot tension in my throat that betrayed just how close I was to crying. I didn’t want him to hear that in my voice. Though honestly, how could he not?
“You know, I know people. I could arrange for an accident of some kind, perhaps with heavy machinery -”
I chuckled. Though it was clear he was kidding, I imagined it wasn’t too far off from the truth.
“I prefer karma. It’ll be more subtle, I think.”
“I don’t. I’m all for bloodshed.”
I couldn’t help but smirk. “Well, I appreciate your love of gore in my time of need, but I don’t think it would help at this point.”
“Then talk to me. What the hell? All the Faye I get these days is through Stellan. You have me here, fucking utilize me.”
“Utilize you? How do you want me -”
“Fucking vent. Scream. Punch me, I don’t give a fuck. Whatever.”
I shifted in my seat. There was a pressure, like air from a punctured tire. I felt close to words, but despite his requests, it felt wrong to subject him to them. “What do you mean you get your Faye through Stellan?”
“That’s the only way I know what goes on with you.”
“He tells you about me?”
He scoffed. “Of course he does. How do you think I knew about the douche bag?”
I’d been too upset to even notice. “You didn’t think to ask me yourself?”
“I don’t have your number.”
I glared at him. “You know people with heavy machinery and a capacity for murder, but you couldn’t find my number? What is the world coming to?”
He paused. “Touché.”
“Damn straight, touché.”
He forced a smile. “I guess I was afraid you’d…”
“I’d what?”
He took a deep breath and locked his fingers behind his head, leaning back into the seat. When he blew out, it was through pursed lips. “You know, I come back to town more often than anyone knows. Few times a month at least.”
I turned at this. Even with our mutual friend, this was news to me. “I thought you were on the West Coast.”
“I am for the most part, but I come home. Only person who I really talk to around here is Stell - or the dukes, obviously.” I nodded. The Dukes was what he called his parents, in case you wondered. I waited for him to continue. “Do you know what happens when I tell anyone other than Dad or Stellan that I’m coming?”
“No,” I said, but I could guess.
“Eighty voice mails, sometimes more - old MIT buddies, people from high school. I fucking heard from Ms. Jameson one time, it was surreal.”
Ms. Jameson was our high school Geometry teacher. I watched him drum his fingers on the steering wheel as he searched for words.
“They all wanted to get together; they were so happy for me, proud of me. I said yes, planned parties. A couple times I was truly excited to see a few of them, excited to catch up.”
“Yeah?”
“Do you know what they all wanted to talk about?”
I didn’t speak.
“Money. ‘Oh Ev, let me tell you about this exciting business venture I’m cookin up’ – ‘Lambert, you crazy son of a bitch, I need a loan.’ Every single one of them. Even Ms. Jameson needed money – did you know she had breast cancer?”
I gasped. “She did?”
“It’s ok. They got it, she’s fine. Almost lost her house trying to pay the bills, but she’s fine.”
I cringed. Calling what I felt at that moment ‘humility’ would be an understatement. “Did you -”
“Pay her bills? It’s Ms. Jameson. Of course I fucking did.”
I reached across the seat of the car and squeezed his hand. He hadn’t chang
ed. Somehow, the years since I last saw him, I’d assumed he was different – that money and success had changed him. Yet I sat next to the same punk kid who ran naked through Sleepy Hollow screaming ‘Attica’ to give Stellan and I a chance to run for it.
“She’s the only one though. I was pretty free with the cash at first, but after a while it got – well, let’s say I grew fucking tired of it. Starting telling people all my money is tied up in business ventures or real estate.”
“Is that true?” I was honestly curious. Here I’d envisioned him swimming in a pool of gold coins like McDuck. “Now I don’t tell anyone I’m coming. I move like I’m on reconnaissance, for fuck’s sake.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Psh, don’t be sorry. I haven’t told you the best part.”
“Oh. Ok.”
“There are just a couple people in the world I would literally lay down my life for, as you know. Hire mercenaries, purchase third world countries – I’d do anything for them. Well, I found out this year that one of the elite few had her house foreclosed on and didn’t call me.”
I opened my mouth, but I didn’t speak.
“I know we haven’t kept in touch - I’m to blame for that, I realize, but you always have access to me. I didn’t magically turn into a raging douche bag because I made some money -”
“I didn’t think -”
“- and I know you. You are one of only two, maybe three people in the world who, if you asked me right now, I’d write you a check - not even think twice.”
He stopped and seemed to search my face. “But you never would, would you?”
I looked at my hands, inspecting the lines at each knuckle as though the act might make me invisible. I had thought of him a couple times as my world was falling apart – when I needed to come up with four months mortgage payment because they were foreclosing and wouldn’t take anything less. I’d thought about how little that amount would be to Evan, thought about the many nights he’d crashed on my couch, or we’d slept in my station wagon because he couldn’t bring himself to go home.
I still never asked Stellan for his number.
He smiled. “Yeah. Douche bag doesn’t know what he had.”
I scoffed. Evan seemed oblivious to the fact that men were practically repelled by me. I tried to brush the thought of Stellan - the pressure of his hands on my shoulders, pushing me away – aside. It wasn’t working.
I might have wallowed in my misery another moment, but a strange chant of aggressive rap music was coming from Evan’s trousers. He shifted quickly and pulled out his cell phone. He made a face at me and answered it.
“What’s up, Brutha?”
Though I couldn’t make out words on the other end of the line, I recognized the voice. It was Stellan. He was upset.
“She’s fine. I got her.”
Stellan grew louder on the other line. I could make out a couple swears, but no actual sentence structure. This was most likely because he’d erupted in Swedish.
“You want to talk to her?”
I flailed my arms around the car in the universal sign of I’ll-fucking-stab-you-if-you-hand-me-the-phone. Evan made a face at me and found his lie.
“I actually just dropped her off at the house. She’s already inside… Yeah, she seemed alright… Would you like me to go stick my head any further up her ass?”
It was my turn to make a face.
“Dude, she’s fine. Probably passed out the second she got in the door… Yeah, I can tell. Don’t worry about it, I’ll catch ya tomorrow. Peace.”
Evan set his phone down and raised an eyebrow at me. I did my best not to squirm in his gaze. Then, instead of speaking or demanding details, he snatched my phone up from the seat between us and began examining. He made a tsking sound and turned the phone to face me.
“No wonder,” he said and waited for me to look at the screen.
Stellan had tried several times to get me – there were six texts and a dozen missed calls from Stellan over the course of the half hour that I’d been gone.
Stellan -Where’d you run off to? I’m back in the kitchen.
Responsible Stellan - Faye, where are you?
Scolding Stellan - Ignore me after you tell me you’re alright.
Irritated Stellan - Hello??? I’ve looked fucking everywhere.
Guilt trip Stellan - If you’re trying to scare the shit out of me, you’ve succeeded.
Enraged Stellan - PICK UP THE FUCKING PHONE!
I sighed. Despite my anger at his rejection, I still felt guilty at the thought of making him worry.
No wait, you know what? Fuck him.
“He was worried someone roofied you, and you were being taken advantage of.”
Woops. Strike those texts. I’d misread terror as rage.
Ok, maybe I did feel guilty.
“Of course he was,” I muttered to myself.
My words betrayed more venom than I’d intended. Evan furrowed his brow and inspected me over the bridge of his nose. “Now what’s going on with you two?”
I shook my head. “Nothing. I just did something stupid.”
“What’s new?”
I smacked him in the arm with more force than was necessary. He flinched. How easily I forget his aversion to pain.
“He sounded seriously fucking terrified. I haven’t heard that kid lose his shit in – in a while.”
Evan stopped, and I knew exactly what he was thinking.
The tone was rare, I’d only ever heard it once – saved for moments of sheer desperation or fear. The day I heard it, he was calling me from Emerson Hospital, and his Dad was in an operating room with his chest wide open.
Lennart hadn’t been feeling well that morning and called in to the office to let them know he’d be staying home, something he never did. Half way through the morning, his work ethic kicked in, and he changed his mind, driving into work. Somewhere along Route 2, Lennart felt unwell, pulled over onto the side of the two lane highway and proceeded to have a massive coronary. No one knows how long he was there before someone stopped. Back before the age of every ten year old having a cell phone, back before help was a button away - had he been any further from the hospital, he might not have made it.
When Stellan called me that afternoon, they still weren’t sure he was going to.
My eyes grew heavy remembering it – even moreso to think he cared enough about me to have sounded even close to that concerned now.
There was a knot in my stomach that could only be described as all-encompassing guilt being tied up and beaten by a mildly inebriated sense of justice.
“You should call him when you get home.”
I didn’t respond. Even if Evan was right, I knew I wouldn’t be doing any such thing. Not tonight – and though I hated to admit it, probably not for a while after that.
Jesus Faye, what have you done?
My phone buzzed to life again on the seat between us, and Evan snatched it up before I could. I didn’t mind. I was content to have a mediator between myself and the rest of the world.
“Is he yelling at me?” I asked, bracing.
Evan stared at my phone a minute, glancing at me. “You’ve received a text from a ‘Festering Asshole.’”
Ah, yes. The pseudonym I’d programmed into my phone for Cole a few weeks earlier. I felt an almost burning tension between my breasts.
Oh god, what had I texted Cole? I want your dick to fall off, something like that. This was why I hated saying just what I thought. I hated being on the receiving end of someone else’s fighting words. They turned me into someone I’m not proud of.
I held my hand out for the phone. Evan faltered as he handed it to me.
Cockgobbling hobbit - I deserve that. I know I do. I’m so sorry.
I squeezed my phone so tightly in my fist, the plastic creaked. Evan gently pulled my fingers open to take the phone from me.
“I take it Festering Asshole is, in fact, dou
che bag.”
I rocked my jaw, my molars grinding against one another as I imagined my fist colliding with the side of Cole’s handsome face – imagined myself walking in on him fucking that other girl, his bare ass gyrating in the air, grabbing him by a fistful of hair and dragging him out of the bed to slam my boot heel into his groin. I’d never humored violent thoughts like this, but right now I wanted someone to hurt even half as much as me.
I was too angry to speak. I simply nodded. I didn’t bother contemplating how the conversations between Evan and Stellan must have gone for Evan to know of ‘Festering Asshole.’
Evan set the phone down on the seat again and rubbed the back of his hand on my arm. I was tempted to swat him away, but I didn’t.
The anguished words spilled out before I knew I’d spoken. “Why doesn’t anyone want me?”
I immediately turned my face toward the graves outside, refusing to let Evan see more of what must be playing across my face. The tears had pushed through, just a few, and I was now setting my jaw against allowing any more.
Why did you say that? What is wrong with you? Evan doesn’t need to hear that! You’re pathetic! Shut up, shut up!
Evan shifted angrily in the seat beside me, forcefully shutting down the car and tossing the keys on the seat between us as he faced me. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
I stared at the graves.
He reached into the back of the car and pulled out his jacket, then wrapped the bright red thing around my shoulders. I pulled it tight around me, only then noticing I’d sprouted goosebumps. We were left in complete silence, save for the soft shuffle of leaves overhead in an almost constant flutter and the sound of the engine clanking as it cooled down.
I didn’t speak. I pressed my hand to my cheek, as though to hide myself from him. I was so embarrassed. Ten years we’d seen each other maybe twice, and here I was in his car, pouring out more of myself than I’d let even Meghan or Jackie see.
Why did this have to happen now? Why was I loosing the lonely corners of my mind now?
I tried to wipe a tear as inconspicuously as possible.
Catch My Fall Page 20
