But he’s not there. Relief floods through me, sending shivers through my limbs. I look around the room, turn out the light, and turn to leave. Then it hits me.
I turn the light back on and sweep the room with my eyes. One towel hangs from the rack. One razor by the sink. One toothbrush in the holder.
Jacks is gone.
I find the note on the countertop in the kitchen. A small piece of paper, folded in half.
* * *
Ritchie-
I’m going to stay at Nat and Bex’s. I think the only way for us to stop hurting each other is to stop seeing each other. I talked to my therapist about it this morning—it’s not something I want to do, but I think we need this in order to heal. Please don’t be mad. I love you too much to keep fighting with you.
-J
* * *
I drop the note like it’s burning me. He’s gone. After all these years, he’s left me. I can’t believe it. A knock comes from behind me, then the sound of a key in the lock. Did he change his mind? I scrub at my eyes to sweep away the evidence of tears.
“Ritchie?” Teri’s voice calls as she steps into the apartment. My hopes deflate.
“I’m here.” I turn to face her, and I know my chin is wobbling and there are tears in my eyes, but I can’t stop them.
“Oh, honey.” She pulls me into a fierce hug. “I’ve got you. You’re gonna be okay. We’re going to get through this together, I promise.”
“He left.” My face crumples into her shoulder. “He left me.”
“I know. Nat called me at the shop.”
“I got a new job so we could spend—so we could—”
“Shhhh. Let’s go sit down, okay?” She leads me to the couch and pushes me down. “Take a few deep breaths. I’m going to order us some food. Do you have anything to drink?”
I let out a broken laugh. “Champagne. To celebrate the new job.”
“Well, we can still toast to that.” She ruffles my hair like I’ve seen her do to Jacks so many times over the years and pulls out her phone. “I’m ordering all your favorite Chinese takeout and if we drink all the champagne, I’ll run out for more.”
I sit there on the couch that is also the bed I’ve shared with Jacks for ten years, and I let the pain in—the only time I’ve ever hurt more in my life was when I used a screwdriver to break into my own bathroom while Jacks was bleeding out on the floor. The first sobs feel like they’re suffocating me, and a loud cry comes with them. Nausea churns my stomach and I gag. Teri wraps her arms around me and holds me through it. She strokes my hair and lets me sob into her shoulder. When the food comes, she leaves me barely long enough to bring it to the coffee table and then holds me again.
When the storm of it all passes and I’m hollow and empty and have no more tears in me, she hands me the carton of lo mein and a fork.
“Come on, you need to keep up your strength. I’m going to get you a drink. Then we’re going to talk. Real talk. Okay?”
I nod woodenly and take a bite of my noodles. They’re fine—but they don’t taste as good as they normally do. When Teri hands me the glass of bubbly wine, it’s fine too.
“Jacks did not leave you. He left the situation the two of you are in. I know that seems like a very small distinction, but I promise you, it is everything.”
I can’t look at Teri while she does a postmortem on my relationship. I stare down at the bubbles in my glass, then take another drink.
“He moved out,” I say.
“He’s staying with Nat and Bex. You know exactly where to find him. But I’m going to ask you not to do that just yet. Because if you run over there and try to talk him into coming back, it’s going to make this worse.”
“How can it be worse?” I hiss. “He’s fucking gone, Teri. He’s gone.”
She hands me something. Jacks’s note. “I want you to read it again. I want you to read that last sentence.”
“I love you too much to keep fighting with you.” I read sullenly.
“So, you want to run over to Nat’s place and pick a fight?”
I shake my head, the knot in my stomach growing. “I never want to fight with him. I don’t even know why we keep fighting.”
“You’re scared to think about why you keep fighting, but I think you know. You’re furious with him. You’re so angry, you don’t even want to listen to him. You haven’t heard anything he’s said in months.”
“So, this is my fault?” I stare at her. “I can’t help how I feel. But I never take it out on him. I would never do that.”
She smiles and pours more champagne into my cup. “He knows that. But he also knows you aren’t dealing with those feelings. And he can’t keep waiting for you to erupt. He’s spent too much time hiding from a man with volatile moods.”
“I wouldn’t erupt at him. I would never. I know what he went through growing up. I would never.”
“Maybe you need to.” She says it so matter-of-factly, I don’t even realize what she’s saying.
“You mean yell at him and tell him he scared the shit out of me and made me feel like the worst person on the planet because I missed all the signs that he was in trouble?”
“Well, no. I mean, yell at me and tell me those things, and then deal with your feelings in a productive manner. The first thing you did after you knew he was safe was to blame Nat. You remember?”
Guilt flushes my cheeks. “I remember. I was ready to blame anyone but him.”
“And then you forgave Nat because she was so good to him. You remember that too, right?”
I nod.
“So, you started blaming yourself, thinking maybe you could have saved him. Maybe, if you had seen something. Maybe if you had been a better boyfriend. What if you smoked less weed. Maybe, what if, maybe, what if. And you never stopped doing that. You never forgave yourself.”
“I never will,” I say it solemnly, like a promise.
“If you want him back, you’re going to have to. Because he can’t heal until you do, and neither can your relationship.”
I walk to work with a hangover the likes of which I’ve never experienced. I give my notice to the restaurant manager at the beginning of the shift, and as I expected, he sends me home. Instead, I put my headphones in my ears and listen to melancholy music that only makes me feel worse about myself. I eat a slice of pizza and wash it down with a coke, and I remember a beautiful day in Brooklyn when Jacks told me what it meant to be free.
I don’t know how to deal with him needing to get free from me.
I won’t punish you for having feelings.
But isn’t that exactly what I’d done?
I don’t find answers wandering around the city with music in my ears, and when I show up at Bridgeview a half-hour early for my first bartending shift, Farrah takes one look at me and knows something’s wrong.
“Oh hell, Ritchie who died?” She puts a gentle hand on my arm.
“Jacks left me.” I swallow and blink back the threatening tears. “I’d really rather not talk about it.”
“You got it, babe. Let’s get you working and take your mind off it.”
Farrah runs through the inventory with me, shows me the register, and gives me a book of cocktails to learn. “You can keep it in your pocket until you don’t need it anymore, then keep it behind the bar for when someone wants to stump you.”
“Stump me? For real?”
“Trust me. There’s always someone who wants a ‘gotcha’.” She rolls her eyes. “Now, the stuff that has nothing at all to do with mixing drinks: you look fine the way you are, and we don’t have a dress code, but if you wanted to dress more like you do on stage, your tips will probably be bigger.”
I glance at her dressed down in jeans and a t-shirt with the bar name on it. “Is that why you always wear leather on Thursday nights?”
“I wear leather because it drives Teri crazy and I’m petty. But I am never one to complain about bigger tips.” She scowls then. “And if you need to hide that you’ve bee
n crying, eyeliner works wonders in a dark room.”
“Teri teach you that life lesson?” I ask, casual-like.
“She’s taught me a few.” Farrah shakes her head. “What’s going to happen Thursday?”
And I have no answer for her but the truth. “I don’t have the first damn idea.”
“Well, all right then.”
The rest of the staff drifts in—introductions aren’t really needed, but they seem surprised to see me behind the bar.
Ken, the bouncer, pulls me in for a friendly hug. “Good to see you, man.”
I pat his shoulder. “Thanks. You too.”
“You doing okay? You look rough.”
“Hungover. You know how it goes.” I try a smile but suspect it looks more like a grimace. Farrah meets my gaze and gives me a short nod of perfect understanding.
When the patrons start coming in, Farrah introduces me to some of the regulars and their favorite drinks. Pretty soon, I’m too busy to fret about being new, or about the ashes of my relationship. I pull pints, I mix drinks, I pour wine, and I paste on a fake smile so wide I think my cheeks will hurt at the end of the shift. An hour before last call, Farrah gently pushes me out from behind the bar and settles me on a barstool.
“Go home, Ritchie. I’ve got it from here.”
“Are you sure?” I look around the mostly empty bar.
“I’m sure. You had a great first night.”
But there’s nothing waiting for me at home but all the reminders of what I’ve lost. Of who I’ve lost. I linger at the bar, and she pours the rest of a bottle of chardonnay into a glass for me. “Not ready to go home yet?”
I shake my head. “It’s full of ghosts right now.”
She nods. “It’ll get easier.”
My phone buzzes in my pocket and I pull it out.
Teri: Checking in. How’s my buddy?
Ritchie: Tired. Just finished my first shift at Bridgeview
Teri: the new job is at Bridgeview? Farrah’s your boss?
Ritchie: Yeah. That cool?
Teri: of course. Tell her hi.
“Teri says hi.”
Farrah rolls her eyes. “She’s probably going to start coming in when you’re working, isn’t she? Haunting my barstools like the ghost of Christmas never gonna happen?”
I laugh in spite of myself. “Why do you think you two have never gotten together?”
“Oh, we almost did, once. But we want fundamentally different things from a relationship.”
“Like what?” I ask.
“Like, for instance, a relationship.” She folds her arms over her chest and sighs. “Teri isn’t made to settle down, and I’m not made for casual hookups.”
“That’s it, that’s the only reason?”
“I am jealous as hell of every woman who leaves with her on a Thursday night, and goddamn, Ritchie, I care about her. But I’m not the person she wants me to be. That person—it doesn’t matter. It’s never going to happen.”
“Nat said something once like ‘Farrah fucking nobody, Teri fucking everybody, and both of them fucking miserable’.”
“That pretty much sums it up.”
I drain the rest of my wine glass. “That sucks. I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. Well, I guess we both have some idea of how shitty love can be, don’t we?”
“We sure do.” I sigh.
“Go home, Ritchie. I’ll see you Thursday, okay?”
“Yeah.”
“Remember. Eyeliner in a dark room. Works every time.”
I manage a weak smile as I wave goodbye.
Chapter Thirteen
Thursday, when I return to Bridgeview, Nat is waiting for me in the green room.
“Hey.” She shoves her hands deep in the pockets of her torn jeans. “Close the door.”
“Hey.” I stare at the floor, a thousand questions on my lips. “How is—”
“He’s not coming tonight, Ritchie.”
The ground seems to disappear from underneath my feet. “He’s not—? How can he not be coming?”
“He’s gone to Los Angeles with Ade and Kortney. He’s going to be gone for a few weeks. Three, maybe four.”
I will not cry.
I repeat it to myself until it might be true. “A few weeks.”
Nat glanced away. “I have his half of the rent money for you. He didn’t want to leave you short.”
Embarrassed that I hadn’t even thought of it, I swallow and manage to say “Oh.”
“Are you okay?” She picks up my hand in her own. “Are you dealing with all of this—at all?”
“No, I’m not. I’m not okay. And I don’t know how I’m ever going to be.”
That’s when the tears come.
Nat wraps her skinny body around mine and holds me tight. She shushes against my chest and strokes my hair. When the sobs finally quiet, she steps back.
“I want you to do something for me,” she says to me, looking me right in the eye. “I’m going to come over to your place, and we’re going to make an appointment for you to speak to someone.”
“Speak to someone? You mean like a shrink?”
“Like a counselor. Your lover of ten years attempted suicide and then left you. You said yourself you aren’t okay.”
The idea terrifies me, sending a cold shudder through me. I could barely talk about this with her and Teri.
“I can’t. I can’t tell a stranger all of this.”
“I know it’s scary, Ritchie. When I made the first call to start seeing my therapist, Bex held my hand while I made the call. I still have the beehive in my chest sometimes, but now I have ways to deal with it. Wouldn’t it feel good to deal with some of this shit?”
I don’t know how one deals with being dumped. “You’re going to come hold my hand while I make the call?”
“Yeah, Ritchie. Or I’ll make the call for you if you need me to.”
A knock sounds on the door.
“Come in,” Nat calls, not breaking eye contact with me. To me: “You’re going to be okay, I promise.”
“So, rumor has it, you folks need a stand-in for your drummer for the next month.” A voice out of time calls from behind me. Nat’s face splits in a wide grin.
“Drea! You look amazing.”
I turn and drink in the sight of a woman who was once one of my closest friends. Until she disappeared off the face of the planet. “Drea.”
“Ritchie.” She pulls me into a hug, then holds me at arm’s length and studies my face. “You look like shit.”
“Gee, thanks.” I stick my tongue out at her. “I just got dumped. When did you get into town?”
She cringes. “About a year ago. I didn’t know if any of you guys would want to see me, so I’ve been kinda laying low. I called Teri a couple weeks ago about some new ink, but I told her I wasn’t ready to see everyone yet. Not after how suddenly I left. I still feel bad about it.”
“Your mom died. Your dad needed you. We’re not going to hold that against you.”
“Well, I know that now. I should have gotten in touch. I stalked your Instagram for months before I worked up the nerve to call Teri. I missed you guys.”
“We missed you too.” I squeeze her hand. “How’s your dad?”
“Retired and remarried. I think both of those things are good for him.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
Teri arrives a few minutes later and sweeps Drea into an effusive hug. “You’re a lifesaver. Thanks for doing this.” She looks at me. “It’s temporary, Ritch. He’s coming back.”
“I’m not cut out for the punk scene, anyway.” Drea laughs. “At least not the way Vertical Smile does it.”
Teri leers at her. “After a few shows, you might change your mind. The, ahem, hedonistic part of the show is always fun. But Jacks is coming back.”
The show that night isn’t as raunchy or wild as it can get when Jacks is with us. Drea stays firmly seated behind the drum kit, playing Jacks’s familiar beats and watching me car
efully.
Nat is as brilliant as she always is, lewd and over the top in the best way, but the crowd seems to be able to tell something is off. At the end of the set, we gather in the green room, and my first instinct is to apologize.
“I’m sorry. It’s my fault he’s gone.”
“No, Ritchie. It’s fine. It’s a different vibe.” Nat reassures me. “Drea maybe isn’t going to jump out from behind the drum kit and bite all over the bulge in my pants, but it’s okay. It’s good.”
“You could grind up on Nat,” Teri says to me. “We’d have to change the timing so it happens during the drum solo instead of your bass moment, but it would work. You’re not wild like Jacks, and that restraint might make it hotter.”
“Oh, I like that idea.” Nat agrees. “Ritchie looking all detached and sexy.”
My face flushes. Jacks always loves the part of the show when he comes out from behind his kit and makes all the boys in the crowd wish they were in Nat’s shoes. I love watching it, knowing I’m the one he’s going to get down on his knees for later, but I’ve never considered being the one to work up the crowd.
“You know what would be hot?” Drea says thoughtfully. “Hair pulling. I mean, I know Teri’s the only one with enough hair, but if Nat really got a hold of Teri’s hair and Ritchie got behind Teri on the other side.”
Teri grimaced. “I think that should wait until Jacks gets back. Ritchie can pull his hair and Nat can get her hands in his pants.”
“Are we planning a show or an orgy?” Nat grins mischievously. “I definitely like the hair pulling idea, but agree it would be hotter with Jacks in the middle. No offense, Teri.”
I wish I were as confident as Teri that he was coming back. I start to pack up my bass while they discuss the finer arts of hair-pulling. And it’s not even that I don’t find the idea hot, but I don’t see the point in doing this without Jacks.
“I liked playing with you again, Ritchie,” Drea says, coming up behind me. “It was good times. I hope you know I don’t want to replace Jacks. I only want to help out.”
Out of Sync Page 14
