Happier Without You

by Nicole Thorn

  I should have left before they began to run around, yelling and throwing that damn ball in the air. I should have been home by then, reading or sleeping. Yet I lingered, and watched the boys play a game I didn’t care about. And I watched Peter as he moved like a bullet across the field. He got three goals in the first ten minutes of the game.

  He looked fine. He was in the middle of a game, sure, but he looked fine. Not bothered by anything at all. More so when he high fived a teammate after a goal. They laughed about something in an exchange that I couldn’t hear, and my body heated.

  That fucker was fine. Smiling, and playing like he always did. How could he not have been a little slower, or not have a harder time smiling? He cried when we broke up, and told me he was sorry. How could he have felt like shit then, but be so gleeful now? He wasn’t ever gleeful before.

  Happier without you, happier without you, pulsed in my head, reminding me. I guessed I was some kind of dark cloud that must have dampened his moods. Though I knew him for a little while before we got together, and he never seemed happy. Something had always been wrong, and he used to tell me I made it better. When did that change?

  They took a break, and I realized I had been there for too long. Almost an hour, when I checked my phone. I really, really should have taken off, but my feet stayed planted on the ground. I kept on watching Peter, though the last thing I wanted to see was his face.

  He went over to the bleachers, and Kelly separated from her fellow cheerleaders. Peter stopped in front of her, and the two chatted. Peter smiled again, and Kelly laughed at something he said. The two didn’t touch at all, or move closer than the three feet between them. Still, my chest hurt when I saw it.

  I really, really needed to get the fuck out of there. My stomach turned, and I wanted to throw up all over the car I leaned on. The owner would probably have been upset if I did that. I stood up straight, and decided that I didn’t need to hurt myself anymore today. I could go home and eat a box of Cheese Nips, and everything would have felt a lot better.

  With one more look at Peter smiling the day away, I put my forehead against the Bug, and wished I’d gone the hell home when I had the chance.

  I didn’t notice the car starting to roll until one of the tires ran my foot over. I yelled, and the car kept on going. Everyone on the field stopped, and turned to see what was happening at the top of the hill. I would have freaked out about that more, if I didn’t have to stop the car.

  It traveled fast, thanks to the incline on this bad idea of a parking lot. I couldn’t have caught it with my bare hands, obviously, but I tried something else as a girl screamed from the lacrosse field. I called on all of the glass attached to the car, and told it to stop. I hoped that it would have made the car come to a pause, and I could have pulled it back to me. That did not happen.

  The glass popped, and shattered in and out of the car. I flinched back when it flew out in my direction, doing the opposite of what I wanted.

  I watched the car keep rolling down the hill, gathering speed as it went. A girl flew up the hill in my direction, but I didn’t look at her for more than a few seconds. The car smashed into a streetlight, the pole destroying the trunk like it was a boulder falling onto playdough.

  “My fucking car!” the girl at my side screamed. “What did you do to my car!”

  I stared at her, my eyes wide open. The people on the field below now all looked up at the two of us, and my skin tingled when I caught sight of Peter, his eyes right on me. I didn’t look for long, because I wanted to pretend I didn’t know he looked. This sick thrill rushed through me, knowing I got his attention as I acted like he didn’t have it. That same thrill made me feel nauseous, wishing he would look away.

  “I didn’t mean to,” I spat out. “I… I leaned on it, and then it started moving. It had to have been in neutral.”

  The girl—Tammy I thought was her name—shoved me. “Are you really blaming me for this? You destroyed my car!”

  I still had no clue what I was meant to say here. A fucked up car sat at the bottom of the hill, twenty or thirty people stared at me, and I couldn’t have defended myself. “I’m sorry.”

  “You’re sorry!”

  “I—I don’t… I didn’t know it would happen.”

  Tammy’s fingers locked in her blond hair as wild eyes went from the car, to me, to the car again. I thought she was about to try and choke me to death, which would have been justified, of course. One of her friends came up, and put her hands on her shoulders. It didn’t seem to calm down Tammy.

  “Breathe,” the other girl said, and then she glared at me. “You’re paying for this, you little moron.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, I know. Hold on. My mom is a metal worker. She can fix this.”

  I pulled the backpack off of me, and started digging around for paper and a pen. My hands shook violently as my legs got all wobbly where I stood. I heard Tammy growling at me, and her friend calling me names to make her feel better. Letting it go, I kept looking for paper. I grabbed a notebook, and wrote out an address and the name of the shop my mom worked in.

  “Just take the car in,” I said, handing over the paper. “Anything wrong with it, they can take care of no problem. My mom can have it looking like nothing ever happened. I promise.”

  Tammy didn’t take it, and instead, glared even harder at me. “You’re really fucking stupid, you know that? Maybe don’t touch other people’s cars. What the hell were you doing anyway?”

  I glanced down at the field again, where most of the players still watched me. Some had moved on, getting back to the game and calling the others. Peter wasn’t watching me anymore, because I must not have been that interesting.

  “I was…” I started. “Someone called me, and I stopped to check my phone. I wasn’t paying attention, and I leaned against the car. Then it started rolling.”

  Tammy wouldn’t look away from me, or take the paper from my hand. I didn’t want to lower it, and make her think I took the offer back, so I got to awkwardly hold it as I waited for her to try and murder me. I hoped she made it quick.

  “Do you even care?” she asked. “Do you care that you ruined my car, and my day? Because your dopey ass face makes me think you just wanna get the hell out of here so you can get back to your life.”

  I didn’t want to tell her that was true, so I stayed silent. It wasn’t that I didn’t care, it was more that my brain didn’t quite register what I had done. So mustering up a reaction face wasn’t all that easy for me. I wasn’t expressive, even on the best of days.

  “Well?” her friend asked. “She has a point. Do you go around being this careless all the time, or are you in a mood today?”

  What else could I have said? It wasn’t like I’d set out to break a car when I woke up this morning. I said I was sorry, and offered to have it fixed. My people skills didn’t stretch enough for me to properly have this taken care of.

  Tammy’s friend took the paper from my hands, ripping it from me so fast that it sliced my finger open. “Thanks,” she snapped. “You really need to get your shit together.”

  Yeah, I really did. “I’m sorry,” I said again.

  Tammy stared daggers at me, her fists tight at her sides. “I don’t even know what the hell to say to you. This is, like way too much for me today. I don’t want to look at your fucking face anymore. You might as well leave.”

  I put my backpack on again, and took a step backward. I wanted to be as far away from this place as I could have gotten, running and hiding from the world, and the eyes, and everything that hurt inside of me. I could only escape halfway. “I… When you call, ask for Zinnia Walsh. She’ll take care of it.”

  I stared at the field one last time, seeing if Peter had taken up interest since I’d last looked. He had gotten back to his game, and caught the ball a few seconds after I glanced over at him. He had a big smile on his face, and called out to one of the other players as he chucked it through the air. Life went on, as I saw in front of me. Kelly cheered
for Peter, and he turned that smile right to her. He used to look to me in the crowd when something like that happened. I would wave him on, and that smile made me feel like I mattered. Those days were behind me, and I knew I had to accept that.

  Kelly waved both of her arms at Peter, and yelled so loud for him that I actually heard it. He stopped on the field and called back to her. Every word stung. He couldn’t have been bothered to come see what happened with me, but he could stop the game to wave to his friend. How did I go from mattering the most to him, to not mattering at all? To not being worth a couple minute’s effort?

  “Thanks,” Tammy echoed her friend, the word sounding harsher somehow. “I’ll be sure to tell her how stupid her daughter is.”

  I turned, and started to walk away. “She already knows.”

  Chapter Three: It Certainly Does Roll Downhill

  Going home didn’t seem like a great idea at the moment. Tammy would make that call, and then my parents would want to sit me down for a talk. With my legs still shaking, I wasn’t up for going back now. If I could have avoided home forever, then I would have. But that was the rub. I didn’t want to be home, but I didn’t want to be anywhere else either. Nowhere made me feel better, or calm.

  I started walking, not paying attention to the direction I headed. Surely I would end up somewhere. I mean, I have to, right?

  My gaze stayed on my feet, as if they could have offered entertainment for me. What they did do, was distract me from how much time passed me by. When I checked, it had been a half hour, and I ended up in a Walmart parking lot.

  Well, I could always use more candy.

  I went inside, and grabbed a basket from the bin at the entrance. An old man welcomed me to the store, and I had to make myself smile at him so he didn’t know I was terrible. He seemed to have bought it, because he wished me a nice day.

  I made a bee line for the candy section at the middle of the store, and accepted that I would get diabetes before I turned twenty. Since I’d be eighteen in a month, that felt like a good run to me. Snickers had earned the right to take me out.

  When I got to the candy section, I had myself a little moment to feel overwhelmed with my choices. My entire stash back at home went quickly, since eating at three in the morning made me feel better. Or, it at least distracted me for a little while. That and my TV got me through some long nights.

  Candy didn’t make my thoughts go away like I’d hoped it would have. I kept thinking about the car rolling away from me, and how useless I’d been to stop it. Everyone saw me being stupid, and careless. It wasn’t like I’d been well received at that school anyway. They all knew me as the oddly quiet girl, who always hung off the arm of one of the lacrosse players. I could only have imagined what I would be dealing with now.

  I started with the candy bars, picking out my favorites, and the favorites of my parents. If I bribed them with candy, maybe they wouldn’t have hated me for crashing a car into a lamp outside. As well as destroying all the windows. Tammy would have to get that thing towed, and I wouldn’t ever hear the end of it. School would be hell tomorrow, but thinking more about it would only give me an anxiety attack.

  I put a handful of candy bars in the basket, and moved over to the bagged things. I cocked my head at them, staring until something called out at me. Several items looked okay, but I put them in the basket halfheartedly. The whole time, I kept thinking about how I shouldn’t have been doing this. It was a waste of money, and my parents would have wanted me to come home. This wasn’t going to do anything to help them trust me. I wished I’d left that hammer in the toolbox where I’d found it.

  “Excuse me,” someone said from behind.

  I turned, and saw a boy standing in front of me. He had his hands in his pockets, and a shirt that said Ninja Sex Party, with, you guessed it, a cartoon ninja guy on it, and another guy dressed in blue. Once I got past that, I glanced up. The boy had hair such a dark brown, that it looked almost black as it fell slightly over his forehead and around his ears. He stood tall, at what looked like six feet, and the t-shirt made it clear that he had some muscle on him. Not a ton, but enough to look like he could have picked me up and thrown me a good twenty feet. Bulky wouldn’t have been the right word to describe him, but he looked just shy of it. Finally, when I looked into his dark blue eyes, I realized I’d seen his face before. I was pretty sure I had a couple classes with him, but I didn’t know his name.

  “Yeah?” I said.

  He smiled. “I’m a little lost and I was hoping you might know the store a little better. Where can I fine knitting supplies and Magnum condoms?”

  I tilted my head, narrowing my eyes at the boy. “Seriously?”

  He scratched the back of his head. “I’ll be honest here, I thought that would go over better.”

  Exhaling, I said, “Thought what would go better?”

  “Well, you looked like you were hoping a train would come out of the wall and hit you, so I thought I’d be nice and try to make you laugh. I was only kidding before. I don’t actually knit.”

  I pressed my lips together, trying not to smile.

  “That’s a lie,” the boy said. “I do knit. I knit like a motherfucker. I can make a sweater in three hours flat.” He snapped, and put his hands back in his pockets.

  I nodded, and switched the hands that held my basket, since the handle bit into my fingers. “Well it was nice to meet you, weirdo.”

  Before I could turn, he stuck his hand out to shake. “Thanks, you too. Poe.”

  Reluctantly, I shook his hand. “Clover.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, I wouldn’t talk, buddy.”

  He waved his hands. “No, no I liked it. Glad to meet someone else in the weird name club.”

  I let myself smile a little. “Your parents a fan of The Raven or something?”

  The boy’s eyes darted around for a few seconds, and he cleared his throat. “Um, no. You know anything about The Legend of Zelda?”

  I couldn’t contain my laugh, covering my mouth as I snorted in amusement. “Are you kidding me? Your parents named you after the ghosts?”

  He shrugged. “I have a ten year old sister who didn’t avoid the honor either. She’s Malon.”

  “Oh, you poor bastard.”

  “Eh, I’m kinda into it.”

  Again, I smiled, and then set my basket on the floor when I couldn’t handle the weight any longer. “Okay then, Poe. I guess you have some giant condoms and knitting things to gather up.”

  I turned again, going back to my selection of candy that I didn’t really want all that much now. I felt like I bought it just to buy it, either for something to do, or something to eat. It all looked like a bad idea and a stomach ache from here.

  Poe poked his head around me, looking at the candy. “Whatcha doin’?”

  “I could ask you the same thing.”

  “You still look miserable, and I feel like if I leave you alone, it would be rude of me. Also, I’m in a Skittles mood.” He picked up a pack from the shelf.

  “Please,” I deadpanned. “Don’t pity me. I can fend for myself.”

  “Obviously. You got the little chocolates with toffee in them, so I know you’re smart. The point being, it’s kind of a bummer to see someone so sad, and so close to the candy.”

  I wasn’t in the mood to spill my guts to a stranger, or even a person I knew. I’d found that I did better when I let the pain rot inside of me, like a normal person. I needed to tell the guy to shove off in the nicest way I could have.

  I opened my mouth, but then Poe cut me off. “You have first lunch?”

  “Um, yeah.”

  “Cool.” He paused, and then squinted at my hair. “You have some glass in your insane curls. Is that like a fashion thing or…”

  I sighed, and went searching. Poe had to help me, sifting through an orange mess until he found the piece. I’d probably wake up with blood all over my pillow from unseen leftovers, but I had that coming.

  “All better
,” Poe said. “Best not to wear something pointy. At least, that’s my policy.”

  “Right…”

  He waggled his eyebrows at me. “It was nice meeting you, grumpy Gus. I hope I’ll see you around.”

  “Sure ya do.”

  “What? I do.”

  I didn’t want to get into a fight in the middle of a store, so I nodded. “Then I guess I hope I see you too.”

  ***

  If I could have snuck into my room without being noticed by my parents, then I would have. I could hear my siblings playing before I unlocked the front door. I winced when I turned the lock, and considered sleeping in the park for a night. How bad could it have possibly been? The slide could fit someone my size.

  I pushed the front door open anyway, and looked inside. While I could hear Orny and Tuney, I didn’t see them or our parents. I slipped inside, and closed the door behind me before I bolted for my room.

  I breathed again when the door shut, and I sat on my bed. My room was a safe place. Everything organized to the way I wanted, and empty. It worked for me in a world where nothing worked. This was as close as I could have gotten.

  I laid on my back, and glanced at the clock. It felt like nearly eight, but the stupid clock told me it was only about five. Not even dinner time. How could time have gone by so slowly? It didn’t make sense to me how I could have been left with so little to do.

  Before Peter, I had a handful of friends. Casual, but I spent some time with them, and it had been fine. Then he came along, and everything changed. We got so close, and those other friends didn’t matter for me, and he had none to begin with, so it was the two of us. With my best friend gone, I had this massive gap to deal with. That might have been the most jarring thing. I had no one to reach out to when I had news, or felt bored, or lonely. My only friend was missing, and I didn’t know what to do with myself anymore.