Bend Me, Break Me (22 page)

I’d caught her talking to Lacey, a girl who lived in her hall as if the two had been friends for a while and when I asked her about it, she just shrugged.

“We bump into each other in the bathroom sometimes. She seems nice. Her roommate is crazy, so sometimes she asks if she can hang out with me.” I nearly fell over. I’d never seen her willingly interact with anyone other than me, so I couldn’t help gaping at her.

“I’m not totally socially inept,” she said a little defensively. “I mean, I used to have lots of friends.” I’d seen the pictures.

“Look at you, making all kinds of friends. I thought you hated people.” She smacked me in the chest and then apologized.

“I don’t hate people. I just have a hard time getting close to anyone for obvious reasons. You get it, right?” I nodded as we headed back to her room to have dinner. She seemed to avoid the cafeteria at all costs and one of my goals was to get her to go there with me at least once.

“It’s totally reasonable. But, I still think you’re underestimating everyone else. Sure, you should definitely be selective, but you’re smart, Ingrid. I don’t think you’d let someone into your life that didn’t deserve to be there.” I definitely didn’t deserve to be in her life, but I wasn’t going to get into that right now.

“I guess,” she said as she went to the microwave to heat up some water for tea. She seemed thoughtful for a moment.

“I like the way you see me, Coen,” she said. Now I was the one who wanted to blush. That was a compliment of the highest order and it made my heart feel like it was going to bust out of my chest.

“I see what’s there, Ingrid, but only because you let me. Even though you tried not to. I could see you and what I saw was so beautiful. You are beautiful, Ingrid. In so many ways.” Now I was saying too much. She went red and fussed with the coffee cups that were stacked on top of her microwave.

“You have to stop saying things like that, Coen. It freaks me out and it makes me think that you’re thinking about being more than friends.” Shit. I definitely had said too much.

“Sorry. I’ll reel it in. Just friends.” I put my hands up in surrender and she glared at me.

The microwave beeped; she put in the tea bags and handed me mine before taking her seat on the bed.

“What about your family? I don’t want you to think that you can’t talk about them to me. You could, if you wanted to.” I had been resisting talking about them, but not for the reasons she thought. Still, I could share a little without saying too much.

“Well, I have my stupid brother and my mom and my stepfather. I have a few aunts and uncles and cousins, but my grandparents are all dead.” They had all passed when I was much younger, so my memories of them were hazy and blurry.

“What about your dad?” I flinched, visibly.

“I don’t want to talk about him,” I said, trying not to grit my teeth too hard. There was no way I could hide my reaction to her mention of him.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, looking down at her lap. I had to take several deep breaths and calm myself before I could answer her. Thinking about
him
tore me out of the moment with her and put me somewhere else. Somewhere dark and terrible.

“Coen?” her sweet voice brought me back to the present. I had to swallow a few times because I felt sick.

“I’m sorry. I just… I can’t talk about that.” She reached out and rubbed my arm, but jerked back when she realized she wasn’t supposed to touch me. I cleared my throat and then looked at her. Now she was the one looking at me with concern. No pity. Just pure understanding.

“I didn’t know you had… I didn’t know. You never said anything.” I lifted one shoulder.

“Yeah, well. It seemed trivial compared to what you’ve been through.” She sighed.

“Oh, Coen. That’s not true. It isn’t a competition.” No, it wasn’t. But if it was, she would win.

“Anyway,” I said, clearing my throat, “my brother is a moron and my mom calls me incessantly and my stepfather is all the father I’ve ever needed. So that’s my family.” I went ahead and told her some of my favorite memories growing up: when Todd taught me to ride a bike and when I taught Ike to ride a skateboard.

“You were a boarder? I can totally see that,” she said, assessing me in a way that made me want to kiss her.

“Yeah, I was a bit of a punk when I was younger. Got into trouble, skipped classes, that kind of thing. Nothing really bad.” She gave me a look.

“Okay, so I got suspended a few times. But I never hurt anyone or did any permanent damage.” She laughed at me.

“What were you like?” Before she answered, she thought about it for a long time.

“I had a lot of friends. Went out a lot. I wasn’t big into drinking or pot or anything, but I had friends that were. I was a cheerleader. Played the flute. I did okay in school. Not fantastic, but not terrible either. In the middle. Nothing special.” That last part wasn’t true, but I let it slide.

“I don’t know, I didn’t have anything that I was super passionate about, which I guess is one thing that hasn’t changed. Except for books. I loved to read then and I love to read now.” I took a risk and spoke.

“Well, maybe you could do something with books? Like a librarian or publishing or being a writer?” Her eyes snapped up when I said the last word. I’d figured they would.

“I don’t know.” She picked at her nails and I could tell she wanted to talk about something else.

“You’ll figure it out. We’ll both figure it out. We don’t have a choice, really. You have to get a job if you want to have money and buy things.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” she said in an odd tone.

“Maybe you could be a Timothy Olyphant expert. I’m sure there’s a need for one,” I said and her face melted into a smile.

I didn’t mean to tell Coen as much as I had, but something seized me and I just couldn’t hold everything in anymore. Now, it was like waking up and seeing the sun shining through the curtains.

I just… I didn’t want to be alone anymore.

It started with saying hello to Lacey when I saw her in the bathroom, and I kept it going by telling Coen a little about my family. I talked more with Lacey and found out that she was hilarious and a little bit crazy. I even made a plan to hang out with her on the weekend and watch movies. I honestly couldn’t remember the last time I’d hung out with another girl. It was like I was learning how to be a functioning human being all over again.

I didn’t just open the floodgates and let the whole damn world in again, but a few drops here and there were fine. In fact, once I started, it became easier and easier. Disturbingly easy. I had to keep checking myself to make sure I didn’t do too much.

The nightmares were still strong and persistent, but they started to seem… distant. Not as potent. Still horrifying and I still woke up in a cold sweat sometimes, but it was easier to get back to sleep, or to talk myself down afterwards. I really thought I’d turned a corner.

And then, as life often does, I was knocked flat on my back.

One phone call undid everything that I’d been moving toward. Like I’d been knitting a scarf and someone reached for the yarn and unraveled every stich. And then broke the needles in half.

To be fair, it wasn’t Mr. Howard’s fault. He was the district attorney who’d prosecuted the person (although he didn’t even deserve that title) who murdered my family. Every now and then Mr. Howard would call and check on me and this time, he had some news that
his
appeal had been filed.

I never answered when Mr. Howard called and he knew that, so he left detailed voicemails for me. I’d been in class when he’d called, so my phone had been off. I hadn’t checked it until I was with Coen, having dinner in his room. Just seeing that I had a missed call from Mr. Howard’s number was enough to send me to a grinding halt. I tried to put my phone away and keep my face passive, but Coen was smarter than that.

“Whoa, you just got really pale. Are you okay? Are you sick?” He reached toward me, totally ignoring our no-touching rule. To be fair, we both violated it on a regular basis.

“N-no,” I said, stuttering. Waves of hot and cold washed up and down my spine and I felt like I was going to throw up. He tried to touch me and I flinched away, putting my hands up for him to stay back. Sensing he shouldn’t try to do anything, he sat back and waited. I closed my eyes and breathed through my nose, willing the feeling to pass.

This always happened when Mr. Howard called. No matter what. And I’d always been alone. It was different, having someone witness what was happening to me.

The waves of nausea slowly passed and my heartrate went back down. Not to normal, it was still fast, but close enough for me to open my eyes and look at him.

“I need to go back to my room. Now.” Coen just gaped at me, but then slammed his mouth shut and nodded.

“I’ll walk you,” he said, getting to his feet and then holding his hand out to help me up. We’d been eating dinner on his floor, a towel spread out to catch the crumbs.

He didn’t say anything as we walked side-by-side back to my room. His phone trilled and he pulled it out of his pocket, frowning before he silenced it and then shoved it away. Must be his mom. I knew she called him a lot. I didn’t know what that was like anymore. I wished, more than anything, that I did.

I knew I needed to say something, to explain, but the words wouldn’t come.

“I’m sorry. This is one of those times when I need to be alone. I’ll talk to you soon.” I had the absurd urge to kiss him on the cheek, but I didn’t. I just turned and walked into my building without another word.

The message from Mr. Howard was brief, but just the cadence of his voice was enough to throw me back into that courtroom. Memories like that aren’t just visual. They have weight, substance. I could feel the wooden bench that had made my back ache. I could smell the polish and the floor wax and the various perfumes and colognes from everyone around me. I could hear the coughs and creaks as people walked the floor. Most of all, I could see
him
.

I had to dash to the bathroom when the message ended and everything I’d eaten recently came up. Like my stomach was trying to turn itself inside out. I heaved and heaved, not even caring if anyone heard me.

Finally, it seemed as if my stomach exhausted itself and I sat on the floor, my entire body trembling. I blinked the tears out of my eyes and spit a few times to try and clear my mouth of the bitter taste of stomach acid that had come up after my body was done rejecting food.

There was a knock on the stall door.

“Um, are you okay?” It was Lacey. I gripped the toilet paper dispenser and pulled myself to my feet. My head swam for a moment, but then I flushed the toilet and unlocked the door.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Think I have the flu or something.” I pushed past her to the sink to wash my mouth out. I was so wrung out I didn’t even care what I looked like.

“I’d say so, you’re really pale. Do you need some medicine or something?” I spit the water out and wiped my mouth with my hand, avoiding looking at my face in the mirror.

“No, I’m good.” I looked back at her and I could tell she was just trying to be nice. “Thanks, though.”

“Sure. I’m a nursing major so it’s kind of an occupational hazard to want to take care of sick people. Seriously, though, I have, like, a pharmacy in my room. Wow, that sounded bad. But it’s true.” She flipped her hair and smiled. In my previous life, we definitely would have been friends. Maybe even best friends. She was a lot like Lila, my former BFF.

I hadn’t heard from Lila in weeks. Most of my friends had stood by my side, even when I shoved them away. And I’d shoved. So hard. But you can only try so hard to be friends with someone who doesn’t want to be friends anymore. On graduation day, they gave me limp hugs and said we’d talk soon.

We never did. I’d deleted my social media accounts and got a new phone, so that had pretty much ended it.

I gripped the edge of the sink to hold myself up and wondered if I’d have the energy to go back to my room and make some oatmeal and ginger tea to soothe my stomach. It was going to be a while before I was going to be up to eating regular food again.

Lacey was staring at me and I realized I had been looking off into space for a while.

“I’m probably overstepping again, but you look like you could use someone to talk to. And my roommate is blasting country music and it makes me want to puncture my eardrums, so I would appreciate the break.” I knew exactly what she was doing and I wanted to say no. But then my mouth said yes and we were walking back down the hall to my room together.

“Oh my God, this is cute beyond belief!” she said as she looked around the small space. I kept it pretty neat, since I didn’t have a whole lot of things, so I wasn’t worried about her stumbling on a pair of dirty underwear or something.

“It’s not much, but I don’t have to share, so,” I said, closing the door and then slumping in the one and only chair.

“Yeah, I totally get that. I’d give up some square footage if it meant that I didn’t have to live with a country music loving mouth breather.” I almost laughed. Almost. My throat was raw from throwing up and I honestly just wanted to go to sleep, but Lacey was flitting around my room and looking at everything. Seemed like she had some issues with boundaries, which wasn’t surprising.

“Can I get you anything? Some tea or something?” She turned her attention back to me and I thought about rejecting her but I didn’t.

“Um, some tea would be great,” I said, my voice totally raw. I thought she was going to head for the microwave, but she walked right over and put her hand on my forehead. I flinched back.

“Sorry,” she said, wiggling her fingers. “I can be kind of hands on and I forget that not everyone is okay with that.” I just nodded and leaned on my desk.

“Okay, tea, tea,” she said, muttering to herself as she located the microwave, cups and my little boxes of tea.

“Be right back,” she said, flitting out of the room and coming back moments later with the cup full of water.

Within fifteen minutes she had me tucked in bed, sipping ginger tea and was tidying my already-tidy room.

“You don’t have to do that,” I rasped for the tenth time.

“I know. But germs live everywhere and you don’t want to get sick with something else while your immune system is compromised.” I wasn’t going to tell her that getting sick had nothing to do with my immune system.

My phone beeped with a text message. Lacey handed it to me without reading what it said.

Coen. Asking if I was okay. I groaned and Lacey got all concerned again. I had to tell her that it was all good and she finally sat down in my chair, but then kept shifting her position, as if she couldn’t get comfortable. She was a bit like a fluttering bird that could never settle on a perch. It was a little hard to watch, but she was nice, and she was being kind to me, so I didn’t say anything.

“So, who is that cute as hell boy I’ve seen you with?” She raised an eyebrow and gave me a smirk. Oh, boy talk. I was so out of practice being friends with girls.

“Um, he’s a friend.” She made a little snorting noise.

“Yeah, I think he’s a little more than that. You can see it in the way he looks at you.” I looked into my empty cup as if it was going to supply me with the right words to say to that.

“What do you mean?” I didn’t sound convincing at all, and I cringed internally.

“Oh, girl. He’s got it bad. You can practically see the little hearts coming out of his eyes. He’s a human emoji when he looks at you.” My stupid face got red.

“We’re… it’s complicated.” She laughed and it made her sound much younger.

“Isn’t it always? Especially with boys that look like that.” I didn’t respond.

“Fine, fine, I won’t barge into your private business the way I barged into your room.” Good.

“Thank you,” I said and she laughed again. “So, what’s your story?” I didn’t want to talk about me anymore. I needed a distraction from my life in the form of hearing about someone else’s.

“My story? Well, I’m eighteen, an Aquarius, I like long walks in the park…” she trailed off and smiled. “Just kidding. Well, I do like those things, but I’m also a nursing major, which you knew—my mom’s a nurse, my aunts are nurses, literally everyone in my family is a nurse or a paramedic. I should have been the rebel, but I really did want to go into nursing. Even if no one in my family did. I’ve lived in Maine my whole life, I have three sisters and one brother, my parents are still married, I have two nephews, I’m allergic to fabric softener and I have an unhealthy obsession with cheese.” She clapped her hands together and I jumped.