Suffer Love

by Ashley Herring Blake

  “Nothing. It’s not you. It’s me. That sounds totally lame, but it’s true. Her problem is with me. If you’d just sit down and let me talk, it’ll make more sense.” I reach for her, but she steps back.

  “No. I don’t want to talk right now. I just want to go home.” She wipes at her eyes and is out the door before I can raise another protest.

  Livy’s door opens and she pads into the hall, eyes bleary from sleep. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing,” I say as Hadley passes her without a glance. “Go back to bed.”

  “Sam, did you tell—”

  “Later, Livy.”

  Livy frowns, but nods when I squeeze her shoulder. I tail Hadley down the stairs like a damn puppy. She’s already out the front door, closing it in my face. I fling it open and run after her, heading her off before she can slip into her car.

  “Hadley, come on. Wait. Talk to me.”

  She whirls around. “God, enough with the talking, Sam! This is too much right now. I want to go home.” She presses her fingers into her eyes and takes a shaky breath. When she speaks again, it’s a whisper, almost a plea, which makes me feel like shit all over again. “I’m so tired of talking, Sam. Can we please just say good night?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, okay.” She lets me hug her, lets me press a kiss to her forehead, but she’s like a rag doll in my arms. I’m almost scared she’ll fall when I let her go. But of course she won’t, and when she pulls away and drives off, I’m the one who has to lock my knees to keep them from buckling.

  I make it back to the kitchen in a daze. Mom sits on one of the barstools. A glass of red wine swirls in one hand and she pulls her phone from her ear, tossing it onto the counter with a muttered curse. Christ, she’s pissed.

  “Dammit, Sam.”

  “Mom, you don’t get it.”

  “What is there to get?”

  I drag both hands through my hair. “I care about her.”

  She sips her wine, her expression stony. “Are you serious? I can’t believe this.” She points a finger at me. “This has gone far enough!”

  My hands ball into tight fists because she’s right. She has no idea how far enough this has really gone. But this whole scene—her, sitting there like none of this has anything to do with her—just pisses me off. My temper rises red and hot, ready to burn the shit out of anything in its path.

  “I will not have you jeopardize our life here,” Mom says. “My job is going well and Olivia’s smiling for once.”

  “Yeah, you know why? She has friends, Hadley being one of them. She has something she’s interested in. She knows Hadley and likes her, and yeah, it’s messed up, but I’m figuring it out.”

  “You have no idea what you’re doing. You’re acting on whims, impulses, selfish desires, just like you always do, anyone else be damned. You think this is easy for me? If you hadn’t—”

  “If I hadn’t what?”

  Her eyes narrow, but she looks away. “You know what.”

  I sense Livy behind me, her steps as soft as her touch when I feel her hand close around the back of my shirt.

  “This is such bullshit,” I say. “You’re the one who did this, Mom. You. You want someone to blame for your life, for your wrecked marriage, your disaster of a relationship with your daughter, look in the goddamn mirror.”

  “Samuel.” Mom’s eyes drop to Livy’s arm around my waist, and she deflates. I recognize that softness in her features from when she used to sing at night and laugh while eating dinner. But it’s not for me. It never is anymore. Her gaze passes right through me.

  “Yeah. An angry kid lost it and stuck a bunch of papers all over a door,” I say. Livy’s grip tightens and I put my hand over hers. “But that angry kid just had his world obliterated when he walked in on his mother screwing someone who wasn’t his father.”

  Mom’s mouth drops open. Actual tears well up in her eyes. “I made mistakes. I understand that, and I do not need my son throwing them in my face. But you are the one lying now, Sam. You’re leading that girl on, and she has no idea who you are or what you did.”

  We stare at each other for what feels like forever. Shit, she’s right. I’m lying like I do it for a living. I’m pretending I’m a different person living a different life, just like Mom did. Just like Hadley’s dad did. Her accusations ping around in my head, but I push them back and grab ahold of this pissed-off feeling that’s never far from my reach.

  “I don’t give a shit what you think you know about Hadley or about me or Livy or about this situation you put all of us in,” I say. “Fuck your blame and fuck your fabulous new plan for your fabulous new life.”

  Livy grabs my hand as I turn to leave. Behind me, sobs start up as something long buried in my mother bubbles to the surface and breaks her open.

  But I just don’t care anymore.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Hadley

  I don’t go straight home. I drive all the way into Nashville, through the streets of my old neighborhood, past my old school, my old house, my old life. When I finally get home, I sit in the car for a while. My hands white-knuckle the steering wheel as I stare down my dark street spotted with orange circles from the streetlights. It’s cold and my breath sends little white ghosts wandering into the air.

  My phone vibrates in my bag and I find a few missed calls from Dad and a text from Kat filling the entire screen.

  Ajay left the pig and he made that cup! We’re going out tomorrow. Can you believe it? The pig’s a boy, btw. I named him Charlie. Mom’s freaking, but so far, he’s still here. How was your date?

  I feel my lips bend into a little smile, but they quickly fall back into a straight line as I text her back.

  Give Charlie a kiss for me. Date was fine.

  Fine. It was more than fine, and then it was something out of a prime-time drama. I don’t understand anything that happened tonight. All I know is that I feel like I’ve lost something and I have no idea where to start looking for it because I don’t even know what it is.

  Jinx greets me when I walk in the door, mewing and swishing around my legs almost frantically. As I pick her up, a hysterical laugh bubbles up my throat. Because I’m seventeen and I’m basically one of those people who live alone with their cat. She mews again, loudly, her little body a tense ball in my arms.

  “What’s wrong, girl?” I ask her, scratching under her chin.

  “Hadley?” Dad calls from the living room. “Can you come in here please?” he adds when I don’t answer.

  “Dad, I’m really tired.”

  “Hadley, please.”

  Mom.

  Her voice splits through me like a crack of thunder. Still clutching Jinx, I hurry into the room to find them sitting on separate couches. Their expressions are grim, but something childlike leaps in my chest. I can hardly breathe, and I realize it’s because I’m excited, hopeful even. Things have been awful since the affair came out, but I’ve hated Mom being completely gone. Without her here to make things at least resemble our normal family environment, this house feels like the last rung on the ladder into hell.

  Jinx wiggles and I set her down. “Mom?”

  She manages a smile, but her eyes look weary. Getting up, she pulls me into her arms. Her fingers press into my back almost desperately. I should feel relieved, but it’s been so long since she’s really touched me, nerves tighten in my stomach.

  “Are you okay?” I ask. “Are you home to stay?”

  Mom tosses a glance at my dad, who’s clutching his phone and staring at his lap. “I’m okay. And yes, I’m home. But we need to talk to you, honey.”

  “All right.” I let her lead me to the couch.

  “Hadley,” Dad says. “We . . .” He blows out a long breath and rubs his eyes. “Are you . . .” He looks at the ceiling, his throat bobbing with a hard swallow.

  “Jason, I’ll do it. I’ll tell her.”

  “No. This is my fault. I need to tell her.”

  “I need to tell her. I need to face t
his too.”

  Dad and Mom square off, their expressions a mess of glares and pleas. Finally, he deflates and rests his head in one hand.

  Meanwhile, my entire world is shrinking.

  This is it, I think. This is why she came home. To tell me they’ve finally given up. Soon our house will fill up with That’s mine and That’s yours and Hadley will stay with me on the weekends and every other Christmas. I’m a minute from bolting, flinging myself into my car and texting Sam to meet me at Love Circle. Nothing can touch us up there, on top of the world.

  “What’s going on? You guys are scaring me.”

  Mom inhales deeply before speaking. “Honey, Cor—” She swallows and clears her throat. “Your father called me a while ago, right after he received a phone call from Cora Bennett.”

  I flinch, sinking farther into the cushions. “What? Why? Why is she calling you?” None of this makes sense.

  “She called because she’s concerned about her son,” Mom says.

  “Her son?”

  “Are you friends with a boy named Sam?”

  “Why are you asking me that? What does he have to do . . . with . . .” But Sam’s name in Mom’s voice sparks something in my head, and my questions fizzle out.

  “Hadley,” Dad says from his corner, eyes locked on the floor. “Cora Bennett was . . . she was the woman I had . . . with whom I was involved.”

  I blink at him. That’s all I can do. Open and close my eyes. Any moment now, I’ll open them to a different room, different people, different words.

  Mom rests a hand on my arm, but I shake her off.

  “Sam is . . . His mom is . . . No, this is crazy.” I say. “This isn’t the same Sam.”

  “Oh, honey, I’m so sorry.”

  “No, it’s not possible. And even if it is, he can’t know who I am. He would’ve told me.”

  “He knows,” Dad says, his voice impossibly small. “From what his mother said on the phone, he’s always known.”

  I need to tell you some things, but it’s really hard for me.

  “Oh, my God,” I choke out raggedly. “This is who you screwed around with?” Dad flinches, but says nothing. All this time, I’ve always pictured some super young grad student who got pregnant in high school the first time she slept with her boyfriend, popping out this strange kid who would one day freak out and plaster dirty notes all over my front door. I never fathomed she was a sophisticated woman with a real family. A family with feelings and lives and hearts.

  “Hadley,” Mom says. “I really think it’s better that we know this. We can get it all out in the open and put it behind us.”

  “We can never put this behind us!”

  I cover my mouth with my hand, pushing back the sob that’s fighting to break free. Mom presses next to me. She twirls a strand of my hair around her finger like she used to do while we watched a movie or just sat and talked.

  “Honey, who is Sam to you?”

  “He’s . . . he’s . . .” My God, how could I be so stupid? My mind flies over Sam’s own story, about his father leaving, what Livy told me about why he left, the timing of it all that he so conveniently never let slip and I stupidly never asked about. How could I not have known?

  I press my hands harder against my mouth. My nails dig into my cheeks.

  Mom keeps twirling my hair, winding her finger up to my face. Her touch is soft and steady.

  “I wish you would’ve told me about him,” Mom says.

  “And when would I have done that?”

  “I know I’ve been . . . detached from your life for a while, but—”

  “Detached? Is that what you call it?”

  Her lips press flat. “I want things to change, Hadley.”

  “Mom, please don’t.” I disentangle her hand from my hair. I can’t sit here and listen to her voice of reason after everything that’s happened.

  She grabs my hand again, the familiar scent of her jasmine shampoo wafting over me. “I know you’re angry. With me, with your father, with this boy. But we love you so much, sweetie. We’re so sorry. We all need to try and move on. This anger, it’ll bury you, honey.”

  “Then let it!”

  “Hadley,” Dad says, standing.

  Mom’s eyes brim with tears, the first I’ve seen in months. “Sweetheart. You don’t mean that. It’s time to let it go.”

  Just get over it, Hadley.

  “Like you have?” I say, snatching my hand back.

  She frowns and looks down at her lap. “I know I haven’t set the best example. But I’m here now. I’m ready to try.”

  I shake my head. Dad’s voice says something else, but I’m not here anymore. Not in this room, in this house, in this life. I’m standing in front of a red door, papers flapping in the breeze. All I see are those words, that messy black scrawl like a thousand knives cutting through my skin, revealing a life I didn’t even know was being lived right in front of me. A hidden life, with me in the dark.

  Then it all connects with a sickening crack.

  Sam wrote those notes.

  My head swims and my eyes and nose sting. I’m floating up, up, up. Not on top of the world, but too far above it. I can’t decide if I want to laugh or cry. This is really happening. The one guy I choose to trust, choose to give myself to, and he turns out to be nothing but a liar with an unfathomable connection to my family.

  Someone who hurt my family.

  Both my parents watch me, but I barely register their worried expressions. The enormity of the truth takes over everything. I fumble to standing. Jinx, lying at my feet, mews and bolts upright. I take the stairs two at time, but Mom follows me up and down the hall, past my parents’ dark bedroom, past the guest room where her paisley duffel bag sits on the bed. In my doorway, I whirl around, preventing her from coming inside.

  “Hadley—”

  “You want to know who Sam Bennett is to me, Mom?”

  She just stares at me, my own pain and confusion mirrored in her expression.

  “He’s no one. He’s just a guy, like every other guy.”

  She steps back, and I close the door on my lie.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Sam

  She’s already here. I stand outside the Green-Eyed Girl, freezing, and watch her through the window dotted with colored leaf decals. She’s sitting at the same table where we sat that day we skipped school. She cradles her coffee mug between both of her hands, her long hair braided and pulled over one shoulder. As much as I want to touch her, talk to her, hear her say my name, I’d give anything not to have to walk into this damn café right now.

  Hadley called a few hours ago and, I swear to God, relief almost swallowed me. Since I woke up at the crack of dawn, I’d already called her twice, texted her three times, and was ready to risk a run-in with her dad by driving to her house. Mom was holed up in her room and Livy had disappeared after breakfast on her bike, so I roamed the house freely, chewing my nails down to the quick. When she finally called, I thought I’d feel better just hearing her voice, no matter what the words were.

  I didn’t.

  “Have you talked to your mom lately?” I’d asked after her robotic greeting.

  “Yeah, she’s home now.”

  “Oh. Well, that’s good, right?”

  She didn’t answer, so I pushed forward. “I’m really sorry about last night.”

  No response.

  “Hadley?”

  “Yeah. Can I see you later this afternoon?”

  We worked out the details, but after I hung up, I felt like I’d chugged a two-liter of Coke on an empty stomach. I still do.

  I open the door to the café. A blast of warm air hits me, along with scents of butter and espresso and, I swear, a hint of Hadley. I slide into the chair across from her. She looks up slowly, her expression unchanged. She doesn’t meet my eyes.

  “Hey,” I say.

  “Hey.” She nods toward her drink. “You want something?”

  I shake my head and plunge in. “Lis
ten, last night was so screwed up, but I really wanted to talk to you. I understand it was weird with my mom and I don’t blame you for wanting to get the hell out of there, but now I need you to listen—”

  “Why is April the cruelest month, Sam?”

  Her voice is almost tender, but the words explode in my ears. “What?”

  “The first day we met, you were wearing a shirt that said ‘April is the cruelest month.’ I asked you if you believed that and you said yes. Why?”

  Behind the counter, the milk steamer kicks into gear. A baby wails in the corner. A chair screeches across the tile floor. Suddenly, everything is chaos in my head. Too loud. Too wrong. Too late.

  “Maybe it has something to do with this.” She digs into her bag and retrieves a wrinkled slip of paper.

  And everything slows down.

  Crash.

  In Romeo and Juliet, stars didn’t cross. They collided.

  Game over.

  Hadley slides the paper across the table.

  I don’t need to look at it.

  I know what it is.

  Crash.

  “You wrote that,” she says. “You put that on my door.” She finally lifts her eyes to mine and it takes all of my concentration not to look away. Because she’s looking at me like I’m a stranger.

  I’ve seen this look before.

  I try to push back the memory of that day in April, but it comes bubbling up anyway. Jason St. Clair calling Mom, every ounce of color sucked from her face, his tense voice on the other end of the phone. Mom’s eyes landed on me and they went completely dark—dead.

  I can’t believe you did that, Sam. I can’t believe you did that to me, to that family.

  Neither one of my parents ever looked at me the same again. Neither one of them bothered to contemplate why a kid would do such a thing. They never even asked.

  Hadley doesn’t ask why either. She doesn’t even look at me for more than a few seconds before her eyes float away from me.

  I want to shake her. I want to ask how the hell she found out, to explain, to deny it, to take her hands in mine and tell her that none of this matters, none of this is about us.