by Shey Stahl
The tears began, loose and quiet with no control.
“Tell me something that’s not a lie.” I paced the barn, trying to control myself, but I had so much going through me I wanted to scream. Or vomit again.
“Tell you what, you come over here and talk to me.” His voice had that same drawn out Southern drawl I knew well. “I’ll tell you everything.”
“I can’t do that.” The wind picked up, howling around us.
“Why?”
“Because.” I gave him the best bitch brow I could. “I just can’t.”
“You can’t or won’t?”
“Won’t.”
“Well …” His head hung low, tucked against his chest. “That changes everything then.”
I stared him down, making sure he knew exactly what I meant. “As it should, Bensen. You can’t treat people like that.”
“I thought by leaving I was being smart and that it was better for you,” Bensen said with a bitter smile, turning to face the side of the barn. “It hurt to know that I let myself lie to you for so long. I should have just told you about the stupid bet.”
I wanted to go back in time and tell the past-version of him what an asshole he was. I cried and kicked the side of the barn, smacked at his chest, trying to make him feel an ounce of what I was feeling. And when that didn’t work, I gave up because he did.
Feeling no better, I wrapped my arms myself, continuing to cry as I sat against the side of the barn leaning on a bale of hay.
“I feel like I don’t even know who you are … like I never knew,” I mumbled, hoping he heard me over the passing storm.
“You do know me.” His voice came out shattered, and his appearance wasn’t any better.
“No, I don’t.” Shaking my head, I repeated, “I don’t know you.”
That guy, the one that went around making bets about taking the virginity of his friend, or whatever I was to him, I didn’t know that guy.
Bensen turned and looked at me, and for a moment, he let me see just how truly tired he was of this. How completely beat down he had become by this one secret, the one thing he knew destroyed us. I wanted to help him and ease the burden, letting him know he didn’t have to deal with it alone, even though I was the one hurt here.
He frowned and looked at me like he wanted to say something. I waited—nothing. He swallowed, his eyes intense, maybe too intense. Feeling controlled, something flickered behind his eyes, but he blinked, and it was gone. Finally, he spoke, “Can you listen to me?” he asked again.
In just those few words, there was something in his tone—something buried that made me curious.
I tried to tell myself I would listen, calmly, carefully, and consider why he did it. I told myself I wasn’t going to be a bitch and I wasn’t going to get angry.
I told myself that. But it wasn’t true.
There was a very good chance I would listen to nothing. It was possible that by him telling me the truth, for once, everything could come crashing back, and my good intentions of being civil would disappear.
I knew this was our last chance—our final opportunity to salvage some good from the train-wreck that had been our relationship since that first summer.
Bensen shuffled from foot to foot, uncomfortable. “I’m sorry.”
“You should be sorry. None of this is okay, Bensen. You’re one fucked up son of a bitch if you thought I would just give up and forgive you!” He flinched at my harsh words. “Years … years! I spent years wondering what it was I did wrong to make you leave, and then I find out this way!”
“You’re right!” Bensen shouted back at me, his voice louder than I’d ever heard before. He stood, taking one step toward me, eyes dark and so angry. “I can’t tell you how fucked up I really am. I can’t tell you how long I wondered why I let myself be so goddamn blind. I don’t know what you want me to say to make it better.”
Now we were getting somewhere. We were both angry now. This we could work with.
“You can’t make it better. That’s where you’re wrong in all this. I want you to be so fucking sorry that your lips can’t form the words. Be that sorry.”
“Goddamn it, Sophie!” Growling out a rushed breath, he punched the side of the barn. The old wood buckled and splintered, cracking on impact with the force of his left-handed jab, dust floating around. “I am. I AM THAT FUCKING SORRY!” he shouted. “I am.”
“Okay,” I said, actually feeling a little relieved I wasn’t the only one blowing up tonight. “Just tell me the truth.”
“Fine.” He was growing impatient and irritated, he started pacing as I had just done. “You wanna know the fucking truth, here it is. I wasn’t good enough for you. I never was. And I was never going to be. It wasn’t the bet that held me back. It was me. I didn’t think I could amount to anything, even if you did know the truth. At the time I couldn’t provide you with a goddamn thing. I could barely keep a place to live.”
I nodded, a little shocked at what he was saying.
“I’m not saying that so you’ll give me a chance.” His voice softened finally, and he sat back down across from me, grabbing the bottle from my hands and taking a drink. “I’m saying that so you’ll understand.” His emotions were raw and obvious, in the depth of his eyes and the crease in his brow. He was looking at me again, longing for a redemption I wouldn’t easily give. I could see him now, repeating words in his head, going over everything he wanted to say, just as I had done so many times while writing that journal. He also knew this was our last chance to do right by one another.
I tried to be patient, but the silence was killing me.
Bensen went to say something and stopped before taking another drink and swallowing. Then he looked down, frowning and fiddling with the neck of the bottle.
“Sophie …”
“Yes?”
Squeezing his eyes shut, he grunted quietly. He sighed in frustration and rubbed his right hand across his jaw. “Jesus,” he mumbled, shaking his head. “It shouldn’t be this difficult.”
“I know.”
“I rehearsed what I wanted to say in my mind,” he said, obviously embarrassed, “and I was smoother than this. I suck.”
I smiled and leaned against his truck. He wasn’t looking at me.
“Admitting anything you’ve kept to yourself for years is hard,” I said.
“Why is it that I can say anything around you but the truth?” I blinked and swallowed. I knew exactly what he meant. “But you deserve the truth.”
I started to itch again. Or did I ever stop?
With a soft chuckle at my scratching, he continued, “I told him the bet was off after that night in my room, after I kissed you that first time, and that I couldn’t do that to you. But I already had. It didn’t matter if I hadn’t followed through. The damage was already done. He never knew I slept with you. Well, he kind of did, but I didn’t sleep with your sisters so it didn’t matter.”
“How much?”
“We never set a price or anything. I was fifteen. I was just a dumb fucking bet.”
“I can’t believe you bet him that,” I said, finally feeling a little weight lift. The fact that it was a bet sucked. I had spent years wondering why, and now I had my answer. One I never considered, but I had one. I had closure. I knew why he reacted the way he did. So why didn’t I feel more relieved?
Bensen frowned and looked away. “I’m sorry.” I could feel him struggling to talk to me like this, open, honest, and unguarded. “You have to remember I was a kid. It doesn’t make it right, but I was a kid. Young and dumb.”
“Did you have feelings for my sisters?”
His eyes trailed over my face, watchful. “No.” He stroked my hair and looked deep into my eyes. “Only you. That’s why after I kissed you I couldn’t do it.”
“But why—”
He laughed at my confusion. “It’s not as complicated as you think. You weren’t the one that changed everything or any poetic shit like that.”
“Well
, don’t sugar coat it or anything, asshole.”
“See?” He tipped his head, pointing at me. “That right there is why.”
“Because I tell you the truth?”
“Part of it.”
“Why me, though? That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Sophie, you can love anyone you want. It’s not fate. It’s falling.”
“What?”
Bensen shook his head. “If you want to fall, you will. Fate is forgettable, if you ask me. You can brace yourself or you can free fall.”
“And what did you do with me?”
“I free fell. I wasn’t scared to love you. I was scared for you to love me, yes, but there’s a difference.”
Okay, so he made a stupid bet that summer, but why me? Out of all my sisters, and even Hadley, why was he friends with me? Why was I different? Why wouldn’t he trust himself with me?
Was it really because of his fate versus free falling theory?
“I didn’t think, and I’m sorry. I knew it would be tough after that night, but I couldn’t stay and risk seeing what I see now.”
I shook my head, trying to fight the emotion.
“I’ll tell you, just listen.” His voice went quiet, hands on my face. “It’s you. It’s not your sisters or Hadley or any other fucking girl. It’s you.”
“Don’t tell me what you think I want to hear.” I sounded pitiful as I spoke the words.
“I’m not telling you what you want to hear.” His eyes bore down on me, his voice dropping in both pitch and volume. “I’m telling you the fucking truth.”
I wondered when this happened. When it got to this, a day of lies and confessions. If by chance I hadn’t shown him that journal, would he even be saying these things to me?
“So all those times you begged me to have sex with you, it was because of that bet? You were just trying to hold up your end of the deal.”
“No. It wasn’t like that.”
“I never followed through with the bet. I didn’t have sex with your sisters.”
For a second, I let myself look at him without the distorting haze of anger and resentment, and I saw him as I used to—beautiful and special, remarkable and talented, damaged and hurting. His eyes caught mine, and suddenly I was back to the day we first met. The day I first saw those eyes looking at me like no one else ever had.
Bensen knew the power he had on me. He counted on it back then. I hated that as soon as I saw him he could harness that much control. One kiss could demolish every defense I put in place. He knew that. I hated him for it, but hated myself more for feeling that way.
It was just Bensen, but then again, it was Bensen!
The Bensen who stole my heart at thirteen and never gave it back. The Bensen who was beautiful and damaged and never truly mine. The Bensen who was brash and crass and never apologized. That guy that pissed you off, teased you, and made you want to explode with raging anger until you kissed the hell out of him. That was the Bensen I knew. And loved.
“Sophie … it wasn’t like that with you. I know it may seem that way, but it wasn’t. You were never just a bet to me.”
“Oh, well explain to me how it wasn’t that way then.” I was finally getting a handle on my shaking. But I still itched.
“It was never about the sex with you, or the bet.” I closed my eyes at his words, feeling a fresh round of tears spill onto my cheeks. “You were my friend.”
“Could have fooled me.” I snorted, wishing he wouldn’t have taken the whiskey from me. He must have sensed this and handed it back to me after taking another drink. “Friends don’t just leave, asshole.”
“Don’t be like that. I’m trying to explain myself. And I don’t even deserve that, but just let me, please?”
I nodded, giving him the moment to explain to me why I was different. I would give him one minute. That was it.
His eyes examined my face, waiting for me to probably hit him again, maybe searching for another lie to tell me. I wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he continued, finding the words.
“Why did you really come here, Bensen?”
“I came for Ivey,” he admitted. “But then I saw you, and you gave me that journal. I couldn’t live with it anymore. I had to tell you the truth. And I’ll be honest. I thought you knew. For a long time I thought you knew because you so often said no. But then you were still my friend, and I knew there was no way you could know about my bet with Grayden and still talk to me. I … you … never mind.”
He wanted to say so much more.
I choked out a breath as another round of tears started. His intensity returned at the sight, his body stiffening. “You never planned on telling me, did you?” I asked, moving away from him. I had only the faintest idea of what I was saying or what it really meant, but I spoke with what authority I could muster.
“No,” he admitted, shifting his weight and leaning forward, wrapping his arms loosely around his legs, his head hung. “I never meant to hurt you, Sophie.” He kept apologizing and kept repeating himself, but still, I didn’t have the answer I was looking for.
For about ten minutes he let me be and finally stopped apologizing—probably because I told him I would punch him if he talked to me again before I was ready.
And then, after a few drinks from of the whiskey, I needed some answers.
“Why did you leave?”
His head shot up when I spoke, looking every bit like the boy who taught me so much. He drew in another deep breath and turned his head to look at me. “Your dad found out.”
As shocked as I was, it made sense. If anyone could have deterred Bensen from me, it was my dad. Bensen had no relationship with his own and had no idea how to actually act around a father. When mine set him straight that first meeting, Bensen knew deep down that if there was one person who could keep him from me, it was Kevin Kaden.
“Your dad found out and said he would tell you if I didn’t leave. I couldn’t bear the thought of you knowing after what we had just done, or have you thinking that I had just had sex with you because of the bet.”
“How did my dad find out?”
“Grayden told him at the graduation party.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s Grayden …” Bensen shrugged, trying to bit his tongue, something he didn’t always have the ability to do, especially around me. “He thought I was fuckin’ around with his girlfriend at the time … but I wasn’t.”
“So you had sex with me because of the bet?”
“No. I didn’t,” he said, his eyes distant and sick of repeating himself.
“Then why—”
His anger took over again. I wanted to let it go and stop asking so many questions, but I couldn’t. And he couldn’t stop his outburst. Standing, he paced, and then fell to his knees before me, his hands reached for mine, gripping them so tightly I had no choice but to look at him. “Shut up, just shut the fuck up for once. Stop fucking talking and asking the same questions over and over. For the last time … It. Wasn’t. About. The. Bet! That shit was made when I was fifteen. I was a fucking kid. A stupid fucking kid. No matter how you fucking look at it, it meant nothing. They meant nothing. It’s always been you. That fucking bet ended long before we had sex!”
He was pouring his heart out, and I was strangely focused on how many times he said fuck. Five times.
“Then why couldn’t you tell me?”
It was like I wasn’t listening. I probably wasn’t.
“I wanted to tell you!” he pleaded with so much emotion I felt him vibrating, his hands still wrapped around mine. “So many times I wanted to, but I couldn’t say it to you. And then I came back and you handed me that fucking journal. There was only one pair of eyes that ever mattered. Ever. And when I saw them, the look I was met with fucking broke me.” His hand was over his chest now, staring at me with regret.
It was probably the most honest he’d ever been with me—ever wanted to be.
I sighed, nodded some more, frustrated and bitt
er. I barely muttered a “yeah,” because it was all I had left in me.
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop saying that until you can actually admit what exactly you are sorry for, Bensen.” He looked up, surprised by my tone. “Are you sorry for how you created a war between my sister and me, so bad that Stephanie and I haven’t got along with each other since the night you kissed her in front of me? Are you sorry for making me love you? Are you sorry for taking my virginity against a fucking wall, or are you sorry for it all being a lie?” My face was fire, breaths short and constricting my words, if I had any at all. I don’t think I did. “Do you have any clue, Bensen? Any fucking clue how much you hurt me? No. You can’t. You couldn’t.” My voice was escalating again, my heart ready to beat out of my chest and throw itself on the ground before him. A product of the anger and the alcohol. At least my chatty, drunk self was working out in this case.
He looked up at me then, wide-eyed and confused, giving way to regret and sorrow for the damage he’d done. “I think I have an idea.” Dropping my hands, he moved back a few inches.
“So what exactly are you sorry for then?” Just as the question left my lips. I jumped slightly when another flash of lightning followed by the crack of thunder rumbled through. The wind picked up, whistling through the weather-beaten barn boards.
I couldn’t ignore the agony in his words when he said, “All of it.”
PART OF me thought I should have known this all along. But there was truth, here and now, with his words that burned hotter than the sun on my pink cheeks. He knew instantly what he’d done, and by the look on his face, what it meant.
Adjusting my legs on the bale of hay I was on, I looked at him, hair falling in his face, flushed cheeks. “What was I to you?”
He sighed as if just the thought of me was refreshing to him, a needed breath when suffocating by the suppressed years of regret. “You were my kid-sister’s friend, but to me you were this freckle-faced, pretty girl who looked at me like I could be anything I wanted. I know that’s not a good explanation.” His head shook, maybe trying to clear his thoughts. His hands started at his eyes and then scrubbed over his mouth, as he squeezed his eyes shut. “I’m no good at this.”
