by Shelia Grace
“What do you want, Gretchen?”
“I want things to go back to the way they were,” she said sulkily. “We were happy.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Happy? Really. You were? Because I was numb.”
“It will be different this time. We’ve both grown up a lot. I think we’re more ready for marriage.”
I stared down at her impeccable exterior in disbelief.
“You mean now that I’m not playing the starving student?”
“You never wanted that. You were just doing it to piss off your parents.”
So much for better or worse, richer or poorer, and all that bullshit.
“Was I?”
She nodded and came closer, not catching the edge in my tone.
“Besides, Ryan. Our parents think we’re great together.”
“Because that’s what really matters.”
She glared at me.
“You’re not making this easy.”
“Making what easy?”
“Getting back together.”
She said this like I was daft—like it was a given. I took a step back, wondering if she was really that fucking crazy … or if I was having a hallucination. When she followed me into the cottage, I seriously started to wonder if I had blacked out during breakfast last week and woken up in an alternate fucking reality.
“Kathleen wanted to announce it at your birthday party …”
My party was news to me.
“And I want to have a new ring picked out and everything.”
“Have you lost your fucking mind?”
She laid a hand on my arm.
“I know it’s a stressful time right now, but Ryan, think about your parents. Don’t you want your father to be at the wedding?”
Her practical tone, combined with the fact that she had factored into her event planning my father’s apparently imminent demise, snapped something in me.
“Get out.”
She laughed in surprise. Then she saw I wasn’t joking. She sneered.
“I guess you haven’t changed that much. You’re still a selfish fucking bastard.”
“And you’re still a cold bitch. We probably do belong together.”
“Fuck you.”
I smiled and pointed toward the door. She stalked out, and Finn, who was trotting back in the direction of the cottage, gave her a wide berth. Shutting the door, I heard the tires of Gretchen’s BMW screeching on the asphalt. The only thing I wanted right now was get in the car and drive to Alex’s dorm, but I knew that it was probably the most fucked up thing I could possibly do. I called Jess instead.
“How are you, man?” he asked in a tone that said people in the department were wondering about my sanity.
“Been better.”
“Santiago sent out an e-mail saying you had deferred.”
“Yeah, I should have called you.”
I went through the short version about my father and made a vague reference to Alex.
“That little freshman you hooked up with last term?”
I winced.
“Yeah.”
“You sound like shit.”
“It’s been a pretty fucked up week. And to cap it off, my ex just stopped by to take a chunk out of me.”
“Nice. Makes me feel grateful for Brenda right about now,” he laughed.
“Don’t take her for granted.”
“She wouldn’t let me.”
I laughed—and I then pictured Jess pulling at his hair and pacing around his tiny office at the department.
“Are you still on campus?”
He paused guiltily.
“Go home, you fucking junky.”
“Yeah. I’m going. What about you? Are we gonna see you anytime soon?”
“When are the wedding invitations going out?”
“I think Brenda said June, so if I don’t see you before the big day, take care.”
“Yeah. You, too. Say hi to the missus for me.”
I put the phone down. Shit, it felt like I was dismantling my life piece by piece. The question was: would there be anything left when I was done? With the weekend yawning out before me like a big black hole, I yanked off my jeans and grabbed a pair of shorts from the duffle bag I had packed. Rummaging through it, I found the only remaining pair of workout socks. I hadn’t done laundry since getting back, and I was running low on just about everything with most of my stuff still at the house.
Jamming my feet into my running shoes and tying the laces, I whistled for Finn and walked out the door. The sky had cleared, and the moon was out, providing perfect visibility through the vineyard. Taking off down the dirt path, I climbed until I reached the edge of the vines. Hitting the hill where I used to do repeats in high school, I pushed myself through a dozen intervals, reaching for oblivion. I tried not to think … of anything. But the goddamn picture of Alex with the mystery douchebag kept haunting me. Cruising back down past the cottages, I followed the driveway to the road and then stopped and looked up at the sign.
Bennett Family Cellars
I thought about my father’s speech. His inevitable disappointment in me. But I was here now. I had come back. Still, I knew it wouldn’t be enough. I couldn’t be Reece. Disappointment had become the major theme in my life—the people closest to me wanting me to be someone else. Maybe that was why it had never occurred to me that Gretchen had never wanted me, but rather a cardboard cutout of me.
It wasn’t that my brother didn’t deserve to be worshipped. In my memory, he did. When I had been eight, Reece had just gotten the monster of all trucks—an eighteenth-birthday present from our father. My brother could have gone out with his buddies, but instead he had taken his little brother and driven out to a rugged, empty lot that hadn’t been developed yet. Blasting the music, he had taken off through the mud. I never told my parents about that day, and over the years it had become a legend in my mind.
If I closed my eyes, I could hear the song, still feel the bumps in the road. My brother had been larger than life, and now nearly two decades after he had died, he still haunted me.
Finn yipped, bringing me back to reality. I took off running up the driveway and sprinted the last hundred yards. In the cottage, I stripped off my shoes and shorts, and my cell buzzed right before I got in the shower. It was the locksmith.
“I can be at your place at eleven-thirty.”
“Great. Credit card okay?”
“Cash is better.”
“How much?”
He gave me a ballpark estimate. I could have easily changed the lock myself, but I didn’t want to wait until morning. And I definitely didn’t want to spend the extra time. What I wanted was to drive straight to Alex’s dorm.
“I’ll meet you there.”
Tossing the phone onto the counter, I got in the shower. I was way too fucking happy to have an excuse to be in Alex’s general vicinity. By the time I got dressed, Finn was already in his dog bed. Scratching his head, I grabbed my laptop, and then headed for the door, texting Becca to ask her to pick him up in the morning and keep him for the weekend. My sister, unlike my ex, loved Finn.
As I got in the car, I told myself I was just going back to get the locks changed, but I knew my ultimate destination was Alex’s dorm. I had less than no right to talk to her—much less see her—but the visit from Gretchen tonight had been like a personal visitation from The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.
Gretchen was what my life would have become if I had never met Alex, and Alex … She was my second chance. My redemption. And all I had done at every possible opportunity was abandon her, each time so sure that I had done the right thing. But what the fuck did right mean? She had been afraid I wouldn’t love her, and she’d had every right to be afraid—because I had been afraid to love her.
The plan forming in my head was beyond insane. Everyone I knew—including Alex—would have me committed to a mental facility, but I didn’t fucking care. As of this moment, I was done half-assing my life, and
as soon as I reached the interstate, I punched it. I had never been pulled over by the CHP, and I wasn’t about to break my streak. Keeping within ten miles of the speed limit, I watched the miles on the odometer passing with excruciating slowness.
I exited the freeway and stopped at the ATM before pulling up in front of my house a few minutes later. I was insanely and irrationally happy, even if I had no idea what Alex would say when I got to her dorm. When I got to the pickup truck at the curb, I shook the guy’s hand.
“How long for the front door?”
“You the owner?” he asked, eyeing me.
I nodded and took out my keys as I walked up the front stairs. Opening the door, I tried to ignore the state of the house as I went back to my room and packed a bag for the weekend. While the locksmith worked, I set the computer on the front table and e-mailed my sister’s jeweler about the ring.
Chapter 35
Alex
A knock at the door made me jump, and I watched warily as Julie jumped off the bed. After an epically bad second date with Nick from the bookstore, Julie had been indulging my need to watch Pride and Prejudice for the millionth time.
“With your luck, it’ll be some dick from the second floor,” she said, leaning toward the peephole.
Shaking her head, she turned back to me.
“Fuck. Worse.”
“What do you mean worse?” I cringed. “Did Nick come back?”
I was still feeling horrible about essentially slamming the door in Nick’s face after he had tried to kiss me just a couple of hours ago. I probably shouldn’t have said yes to the second date, but he had done most of the talking on the first date, and I had actually liked not having to talk about myself. So, I had been fine all the way up until the second he had leaned in. Then I had just broken down crying and slammed the door in his face. Julie shook her head.
“Teacher man.”
Scooting to the very corner of my bed, I swallowed, unable to speak as Julie turned and swung open the door.
“What the hell do you want?”
“Julie, right?”
Hearing Ryan’s voice caused me physical pain, and the clawing desire I had to see his face just made it worse.
“Yeah. And you’re the asshole who keeps screwing over my friend,” Julie said. “I know all about you, you fucking ass. Is this like your hobby, fucking with poor little freshmen?”
There was a long pause, and I sat silently, arms locked around my knees, trying not to breathe or move.
“I need to talk to her.”
“So you can screw her over again, and she comes home from a date with a perfectly nice guy in tears because she can’t get over the asshole from hell? Why don’t you go fuck yourself?”
Julie started to slam the door on him, but he caught it. When she shoved, it wouldn’t budge. Finally she turned and looked at me like, What the fuck am I supposed to do now? Shaking, I climbed down from the bed and touched Julie’s shoulder.
“It’s okay.”
“No, it fucking isn’t, Alex. I’m not going to watch this asshole hurt you again.”
I hugged her and reached for the doorknob.
“All right,” she huffed. “I’m going over to Chris’s. If you need me to come back with him—and five other guys—just text me. Okay?”
I nodded and bit my lip to keep from laughing like an unhinged maniac. The thought of Chris and five of his friends taking on Ryan was kind of ridiculous. If Ryan wasn’t afraid of half a dozen thuggish frat guys, then freshmen weren’t exactly the most realistic of threats. But I appreciated Julie’s offer—and her faith in her boyfriend. As she walked by Ryan, she bumped him with her shoulder. Then I was left staring up at him.
“What do you want?”
I had been hoping to sound dismissive, but my voice cracked.
“I want you to forgive me … but I don’t deserve that.”
My throat tightened, and I shook my head.
“Ryan, I can’t do this. First my dad shows up …” I threw my hands up in the air. “And now you. So, what the fuck? Is it Men Who Abandoned Alex Week?”
“Your dad was here?” he asked, clearly stunned.
Nodding, I inched away from him. I couldn’t blame him for sounding surprised after what I’d told him about my dad. And after not seeing my dad since junior high, having him suddenly appear at my dorm had been a major fucking shock. Too bad him being drunk hadn’t been as surprising. I had gone with him to a café off campus—by foot—and then left when he had ordered a beer.
So much for our father-daughter reunion.
I curled my hand into a fist, because I desperately wanted to reach out and touch Ryan, craving a closeness that I knew would only hurt me. Looking down, I felt a familiar emptiness. I knew it would swallow me as soon as Ryan left again. It was like I was twelve again. Tears started leaking from the corners of my eyes, and I retreated into the room, putting my hand up when Ryan came closer. When I started talking, the air escaped in quick bursts.
“You know, I finally accepted that I’ve been trying to make things right with him. Like if you loved me—if you didn’t leave me—then everything would be okay, and I wouldn’t be that little girl who didn’t fit anywhere. That I would be real to someone.” I let out a shuddering breath. “Well, I’m done pretending, so you can just leave now, okay?”
My vision blurred, and suddenly I couldn’t breathe, sobbing so hard that it felt like I was going to break apart and disappear. I had never told anyone about the strange floating feeling I got whenever I looked at my family—Mom, Stephen, Stephie. Instead I always just pretended that everything was okay even when it felt like I was drifting alone, set apart from the people I loved the most.
Besides, Ryan faced losing his father, so how could I admit that I hadn’t even wanted to see my own dad? Worse, that seeing him had only torn open wounds that I pretended weren’t there?
It was the same as how I could never tell Mom that I felt like a castoff—a leftover—from the part of her life she wanted to forget. Or how jealous I was of Stephie and how naturally she fit. I loved my little sister more than words, but I also knew deep down that she was the real daughter.
I wasn’t. Real.
I slipped to the floor, and I knew I was going to stay there. Suddenly, with a strange wave of relief, I understood why Ryan had left the other morning. He hadn’t wanted to make me live his loss any more than I wanted him to see me like this. I needed him to leave right now.
“Go,” I choked.
Tomorrow I would be fine. I would pretend this had never happened. I would pretend that nothing could ever hurt me. Because my problems were silly. They were in my head. Ryan had real problems. And whether he had left because he wanted to spare me from them or he just hadn’t wanted me, the result was still the same. I hugged my knees and waited for his shoe to move out of my peripheral vision. I waited to hear the door open and close behind him, but the room remained completely quiet apart from my uneven breaths.
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to stop crying. Then I froze at the sound of Brit’s harsh laughter coming from the stairwell. She burst in a second later, and I looked up at her, wishing I could just melt into the ground. I must have looked like shit, because she started roaring with drunken laughter—until she noticed Ryan. Behind her I saw a new second-floor asshole.
Me with snot running down my face, my sensitivity-challenged roommate, her nightly hookup, and Ryan all in the same space? I just wanted to disappear. Ryan grabbed my arm and hoisted me up like he was lifting a ragdoll.
“What the fuck? You and him?” Brit chortled.
“Get your things,” Ryan said in a low voice. “Pack for the rest of the weekend.”
I didn’t question him, only because I wanted out of this room so badly that I could barely stand it. I grabbed jeans, socks, underwear, and some shirts, shoving everything into my duffle bag with my toiletry bag. Then I grabbed my jacket, my backpack, and the laptop. Ryan took most of my stuff from me before stopping
in front of the guy at the door. When Ryan looked down at him, the guy backed up immediately, and I walked out without a word to Brit.
As soon as we got into the hall, Ryan pointed toward the bathrooms. I nodded. One rule of crying was that if I didn’t blow my nose and wash my face, I could keep crying indefinitely. Walking into the bathroom, I took out my phone and texted Julie, who burst in from the door across the hall only seconds after me.
“Did he leave?”
I shook my head and turned on the water.
“I’m going with him.”
“Alex! Fuck, no. You can’t be one of those girls who keeps going back to the dickhead that treats her like shit.”
After I blew my nose and splashed my face with water, she handed me a paper towel.
“I know.”
“So? Tell him to fuck off and be done with it.”
“I can’t.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Because I need closure.”
“It wasn’t closure enough when he left you in the hospital, or when he broke up with you the last time?”
“No. Because if I leave it like this, then I’ll end up being the girl who always gets left, and the same thing that happened tonight will keep happening. I’ll keep doing the same stupid shit. I have to make a conscious choice, not sit around waiting to get broken up with.”
Julie looked at me skeptically.
“You do what you need to do, but I get dibs on the next cry fest.”
I shook my head and blew my nose again.
“Uh, uh. No way. You tell Chris that I’ll kick his ass if he hurts you.”
“And I will kick Teacher Man’s ass.”
I smiled shakily.
“Yeah? Well, I think he’s afraid of you.”
“Good! You’re going to come see me the minute you get back, right?”
I nodded.
“I hope you figure things out.”
“Me, too. Tell Chris I’m sorry I stole you.”
She nodded and tapped her fingers on the metal lockers.
“You gonna be okay?”
“Yeah.”
