by Blair Holden
“What’re you doing here?” There’s still more than enough distance between us for me to take a step forward.
“You left; I had to make sure you weren’t causing too much trouble wherever you went.”
He looks amused, which is a relief to me. I’d spent the previous night coming up with way too many scenarios, none of which seemed to end well for me.
“And is that the only reason you’re here? To keep me in check?”
“Well, now that I’ve made sure that everything’s in one piece, no black eye, no visible wounds, and the building is standing upright, I think I can let that one go. But I do have my own reasons to stay.”
“And those would be?” He advances toward me, getting so close that I have to place a hand on his chest to keep some distance between us. The closer he gets, the more I tend to lose my train of thought.
“I’ve been thinking and…”
“That never really ends well for me.”
“I said thinking, not overthinking, okay? So like I was saying, I’ve been doing some thinking and have realized that the way I acted the last time we were together wasn’t fair to you.” I swallow. “I always end up projecting the worst of my insecurities and fears onto you and expect you to be some kind of superhero, just take everything I pile on you and be okay, unaffected. That was never my intention, and I’m sorry if this past year, I’ve made it all about me, if I haven’t been a good enough girlfriend. I realize that I whine a lot, I come from a family of whiners. If you’d ever listen to my mother after a book club meeting, good god, you’d think someone had committed sacrilege by not liking Mr. Rochester enough. Anyway, my point is, or rather one of my points is, that I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said those things to you; I didn’t mean any of it, either. It’s just…and I don’t want to put you in an awkward place by thinking that you have to take sides, but what Cassandra said was like someone verbalizing my worst fears. I’m not playing the victim, but it’s powerful, you know, to be told that you’re making the person you love the unhappiest—”
“God, Tessie, stop, you’re breaking my heart here.” He grabs the tops of my arms and pulls me to his chest. “You never have to explain yourself to me, don’t you know that? I know what’s going on in that mind of yours, that’s always thinking, always questioning, always doubting. The last person you could ever need to apologize to is me, and it kills me because I know you’re hurting, and saying all that wasn’t easy. But, just know this, no matter what happens, no matter how bad things get, I’m not going anywhere. You hear me?”
I nod, embarrassed to realize that my eyes are stinging. He notices my tears but doesn’t say anything. Swinging an arm around my shoulder, he tucks me into his side and leads us into the lobby. Huh, this is a lot easier than I’d anticipated.
“Don’t you want the whole story? How I found you, when I got here, whether or not I’m staying, which I am, you know, the works?”
“I have a feeling you’ll tell me yourself. I just have one question, though, where are your bags, or did you already have Lan take them up? Is that why he’s been acting so cagey? You two been planning this all along?”
“Kind of,” I wince, “but my bags aren’t at Lan’s.”
We stop in the middle of the lobby. “And where are they?”
“In a room two floors up with Cami?”
He stops, whirls around and gives me a pointed look. “What?”
“You heard me. I uh…I think it’ll be a good idea for us to live here separately for a while. Lan’s letting us crash at the apartment since it’s vacant, and I thought it’d be a nice idea to be out in the city, away from all the drama back home.”
“But we can live in the same place; Lan has plenty of room.”
“Yeah, he does, but here’s the thing, we’re not going to be sharing a whole lot of space these next few weeks.”
His brows go up. “Did you come all this way to break up with me, Shortcake? Is that what we’re doing here?”
“No!” I all but shriek, and the lovely residents of the building stop to stare at the two of us. So Cole grabs my hand and walks us to the elevators, and we wait patiently for a car to arrive. By patiently I mean the tension coming off of him is pretty tangible.
Once we get inside the elevator and he presses the number for Lan’s floor, he crowds me into a corner. “So what were you saying?”
“I’m saying that it’s not healthy for us to go from zero to sixty all the time. We’re either arguing or we’re patched up, there’s no in-between. Ever since college started, it just feels like we’re on or off. I’m either worried that a bunch of cheerleaders would kidnap you and stuff you into a Mini Cooper…”
He rolls his eyes. “I wouldn’t fit inside a Mini.”
“Or, as I was saying, we completely forget to work out the problem at hand and go back to pretending that there’s nothing wrong with our situation.”
“You’re not making a lot of sense right now, Tessie. I thought you wanted to put all of that behind us and just start over? The way it used to be, before college.”
“But that’s my point! We have three more years of school, and we can’t spend all of them doing more of the same. At least for me, all the self-sabotaging that I’ve done so far is more than enough for a lifetime. And I do promise you that I’m done doubting, feeling weak. But you know you’ve got problems of your own to figure out, big life decisions. With all of my drama just always being at the forefront of things, I know we never really get to talk about you.”
He opens his mouth to protest but I cut him off. “Don’t you dare tell me I’m wrong. Half of the time you’re canceling other commitments to spend time with me because I’ve made you think that you need to spend all your free time with me. I’ve talked to Lan about this, okay? I know you don’t hang out with your friends as much as you should, and as much as I’m trying not to collapse under a mountain of guilt or self-blame, all that needs to change. We both need to be a priority in this relationship, not just me. And you’ve got to stop treating me like something breakable.”
I’m breathless by the point I end my tirade and as I stop talking, we reach Lan’s floor. This is not part of the plan, but I’m helpless as Cole leads me into the apartment. Shutting the door behind him, he presses me against it with his body. “So correct me if I’m wrong; you’d like a little rough treatment from me? Is that what this is about?” His grin is smoldering and sexy, the double S’s of doom.
“Hold off the smolder, perv, we’re talking about serious stuff here.”
Placing an arm over my head, he presses his lower body into my stomach. “Trust me, I’m very serious about this conversation. What was it you were saying about me being too gentle?”
“Not like that.” My cheeks are on fire and he chuckles.
“Well, you could fool me. With all that talk about BDSM and sex clubs, now you don’t want me to be gentle with you? It seems to me like the answer to all our problems is really simple.”
And in a sudden movement, I’m lifted in Cole’s arms, my arms struggling to find balance and finally twining themselves across his neck. “W-what are you doing?”
“Too much talking. I think we can work out our problems another way.”
He walks us rapidly to what I assume is his bedroom and deposits me on the bed. Shutting the door behind him, he comes to stand at the foot of the bed and starts taking off his shirt.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop! Clothing does not need to come off right now.”
“Really? I’d listen to you, but it’s really hot today, so you gotta do what you gotta do.”
I cross my arms across my chest, protecting my threadbare t-shirt. “I said we need to talk. You can talk with your shirt on.”
He gives me a sultry look that’d melt the panties off a less determined woman. “We can talk after. I really missed you, Tessie, and I think we need to get reacquainted.”
My eyes widen and then it hits me. Studying him closely, even in the darkened room, I notic
e how fidgety he is; the glazed look in his eyes that’d been endearing before now rings alarm bells, and the slight clumsiness in his step is a straight-out sign. He’s been great at hiding it till now but…
“You’re drunk, aren’t you?”
He rolls his eyes. “Did Lan ask you to stage an intervention? I told him I’d be out of here in a day or two.” Frustration seems to roll off him in waves, and that’s when I realize that he’s doing what he thinks works best for us, avoiding talking about the actual problem but distracting me with physical intimacy.
I eye the vase on the bedside table and think about throwing it at him, but it’s glass and looks a little too expensive for me to replace.
“He doesn’t need to ask me to do anything! I’m your girlfriend, I care about you, and I don’t need anyone telling me to do my job. I saw you get out of a car just now! What the hell were you thinking, drinking and driving?”
He scoffs. “Are you seriously trying to start a fight right now? Because I’m not in the mood. I thought you said you wanted to start over?”
“Starting over by having sex and forgetting how we got in this situation in the first place? No, that wasn’t my plan. I can see that you’re hurting, Cole, so please, if I did this, then tell me. Blame me, tell me that I hurt you. Talk to your parents about what they said and how it made you feel. That’s how problems get solved, not by drinking.”
I’m still hugging myself, having backed into a corner of the bed, and Cole’s moved further away, standing by the door. His expression is unreadable, and I’m not sure if I’ve ever been this clueless as to what’s going on in his head.
“Before I left, I remember you saying that you didn’t like Cassandra psychoanalyzing the shit in your brain. I get why that’s so annoying now, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t try to do the same to me.”
“Cole, I’m not trying to make this into something that it’s not, but don’t you see what you’re doing? You’re trying to replace conversation with sex, you’ve been out drinking god knows where in the middle of the day, and I know for a fact that you haven’t returned any of your parents’ calls—”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake! This, this is why I left. I wanted to have some time alone without you judging me. I’m not having a meltdown; you don’t need to worry about me having a relapse. I…” He looks as tired as I feel. “I just need some time to cool off without someone keeping an eye on me. Maybe it’s a good thing you’re staying with Cami after all.”
Ouch.
***
“Ouch.” Cami scoops some more ice cream and piles it in my bowl.
“Exactly.”
“What an asshole! You were trying to help, and first he tries to turn it into a casual fling, and then he basically asks you to go to hell. I’m not sure I’m cheering for Team Cole anymore.”
I stare glumly into the gooey mess that is my strawberry ice cream. To say that I’ve been unsuccessful is an understatement.
I failed.
I crashed.
I landed face-first in a crap ton of dog crap, so double the crap.
That is to say, my ship sank faster than the Titanic.
Do you get my point?
“But why do I feel like you were expecting this? You’re not exactly heartbroken and curled up in a ball on the floor. I did purchase supplies for that, just in case it happened. I also purchased a baseball bat in case I needed to hit someone.”
“Lan take you shopping today?” I ask, avoiding the subject.
“He did, and I must say, I’m impressed he didn’t do what guys usually do when they go to malls with me, you know, tell me that they’re going to the food court and poof! I never see them again.”
“Someone really did that?” I want to hunt that person down and kill them in the most painful way possible.
“A lot of someones, I tend to get a little carried away. But I don’t just spend time buying the usual girly things, I think what ticks people off the most is the amount of time I could spend buying knickknacks that I’ll probably never use again in my life. IKEA is the gateway to heaven for me. I might not go to church every Sunday, but the IKEA back in my hometown? Girl, you would die!”
I laugh, despite the circumstances, as I try to picture Cami in that environment and how easily she could spend hours trapped in that vortex.
“So, now that you’re in a slightly better mood, tell me what’s going through your head right now.”
I roll back my shoulders, the stress of today wreaking havoc on my muscles. Even now when I think of how cold he’d been to me, I get hit by a jolt of pain. Not that I’d been expecting a warm welcome, but he’d been so…unlike himself that I don’t know how to proceed. But then I’d run into Lan as I was leaving his apartment in tears, and over coffee, as he tried to calm me down, he told me something I realize now that I already knew, and it’s what I tell Cami.
“It’s his fallback, to shut everyone out. I think I forgot, you know, while I’d been expecting him to always be there for me and help me deal with my fears, that he’s got his own troubles, and when it gets too much, he’s as bad with alienating the ones that care the most as I am.”
“Congratulations, you’ve hit the dysfunctional couple lottery! Now what do we do?”
“I’m going to wait it out, see how much he plans to isolate himself. By the look of things, I’ll probably have to face a few more blows to my heart before he realizes that I’m not going anywhere. He needs to stop drinking, that just makes the situation uglier than it needs to be. He’s going to make himself sick one of these days. I’m going to start small, test out if he’s ready to talk without being under the influence of alcohol. He knows that it’s a hard limit for me after my brother.”
“So essentially, you’re going to Out-Cole Cole?”
“Whatever that means, yes, I am.”
“And you’re okay with the hurt it could entail? We came here with the thought that he’d be open to your wooing, but right now he’s lashing out, real bad from the sound of it, and you know,” she shrugs, “we’ve just got you back to a good place. Anything he might say could end up being a trigger for you.”
“Then that’s a risk I’m willing to take because I know he’d do the same for me.”
Chapter Fourteen: You Don’t Win Wars with Morning Breath
I begin the morning with a sense of renewed energy. So what if yesterday had been a disaster? I could try again today. God knows Cole tried for a lot longer just to get me to open up, to accept the fact that a guy like him loved me and that like a lot of the people I’d trusted, he wouldn’t leave me when things got tough. But with Cole, it doesn’t feel like I’m returning the favor, like I’m doing this simply because I owe him the effort. I’m doing this because I love him, because I believe that we need to go through this in order to come out the other end stronger.
In a great mood, I find myself whistling as I attempt to make breakfast. Since I know I’d never be able to pay for the damages in case I burned down the apartment, I stick to toast and coffee. Cami pops her head out of her door, as if summoned by the smell of coffee. She rubs her eyes as she walks out.
“Morning—late night?” I remember going to bed, leaving her and Lan out here in the living room, and I don’t know how long he stayed over.
“It’s not what you’re thinking. Yeah, he stayed for a while, but we were just talking.”
She raises her brows as if daring me to disagree. “Anyway, you look awfully chipper for someone whose boyfriend decided to turn into an asshole overnight.”
My face doesn’t fall, testament to how good of a mood I’m in. “Don’t you think it’s fair that he’s the one who gets to act like this for once? I’m not saying it’s okay, because I’m not that kind of girl who’ll let a guy walk all over her, but Cole’s always had to be the strong one in this relationship. God forbid he be the one who decides to have an off day for once. So when all the bad stuff piles on and you don’t have outlet for it, you…”
“…A
re more likely to not be able to deal with any more of it, and something in your head automatically decides to shut down, making you retreat into yourself?”
“I forgot that I was talking to a psychology major.” I laugh. “But yeah, something like that. I’ve let him think that he needs to be my rock for too long and haven’t been able to do the same for him. Do you know he’s thinking about quitting football? That’s such a huge decision and we barely talk about it.”
She seems surprised but doesn’t comment on the subject. Instead, after we’re done eating, I tell her all about my plan for the day, and it feel goods to know that I have a firm supporter in her. I’d been waiting for her to tell me that my idea was stupid, that I’m being too rash and impulsive, but she seems to think it might actually work, so who am I to question her? Especially when she’s the head of the “it’s so crazy it just might work” committee.
***
Large, black garbage bag in hand, I make my way to Lan’s apartments. On my way I do get curious looks from the other residents of the building, who seem to be trying to figure out if the management’s hired a cleaning lady that they don’t know about. I pass them a smile as I walk by.
“You can never have too many trash bags.” I wave the stupid thing like it’s a flag at an old lady who seems to suspect that I plan to use it as a body bag.
Lan quickly ushers me in as I knock on his door. “You’re actually going ahead with this.” He seems slightly panicked. “God, you’re actually doing it.”
“Calm down, Landon, he’s been drinking for a week; I don’t think I need to fear for my life just yet.”
“Yeah, but it’s bad, really bad.”
I square my shoulders. “Have you heard anything about my brother?”
He looks down, seemingly embarrassed. “Cole may have mentioned him once or twice.”
“Then you would know that Cole’s situation, however unfortunate it is, is nowhere near as serious as Travis’s. He was drunk every single day for so long that I stopped counting the days. Just when I’d start to hope that he’d stop, that he’d become my elder, responsible brother again who could hold my collapsing family together, he’d disappoint me. But you know what finally worked?”
