Birdie (14 page)

Birdie

Her arrival is unexpected.
I’m finishing up in the library, locking the double glass doors that give the entrance an old fashioned look when I turn and see her.

My mother stands against the green Ford Ranger truck and watches me. She doesn’t try to smile or wave or come towards me for a hug. She nods in the direction of the passenger door and I climb in silently.

“Where am I driving to?” she asks.

“Lott river. By the bridge,” I answer.

Once there in the quiet of the river bank, we walk in silence down the length of it. I show her how to skip a stone the way Wes showed me but she doesn’t pick it up easily and after a handful of tries she gives it up and settles on the damp grass. The sun sets and we watch it sink below the horizon, pulling all the pink and orange hues down with it. We soak in each other’s company without saying a word. Because words will break this silent truce and we’ll have to face off in our corners.

But I can’t wait anymore. I break the truce.

“Why are you here?” I ask.

“I missed you.”

“Why did you leave me?”

“Because I was scared.”

“That’s a bullshit answer.”

“It is but it doesn’t change it.”

It’s getting dark around us. Night colors everything. I suck in my cheeks and try to sort out the feelings swirling in my chest. I think it’s mostly anger.

“Birdie, I want you to be strong. Not some pushover like me. I’m afraid of rubbing off on you. I can barely take care of myself. I’ve always needed someone.”

“You had me!” I bark angrily and Mom looks away sadly.

“I’m not supposed to need you. Robert has been good to me. Much better than Howard ever treated me. You would like him, I think. I should have visited sooner. But I knew you’d be angry that I left and I didn’t know how to face you.”

“You’re doing a shitty job of it now.”

“How is Tim?”

“At home. Waiting for me. For dinner.”

“Well, then. Let’s not keep him waiting.”

Mom drives me to back to the trailer park. Tim is surprised but he doesn’t say anything. Just let’s her in the house wordlessly. Dinner isn’t just the three of us. Esther spies us through her window and comes over bearing a half a loaf of sliced bread. The curiosity is too great for her. Mom eyes her warily, but Esther just gives her a toothy smile and doesn’t ask the obvious questions.

After dinner, when the nosy neighbor is tucked safely back in her own trailer, and Mom’s picking up her purse and placing it over her shoulder, I clench my fingers into my palms and barely look at her as she leans in to give me a hug.

“I’m so proud of you, sweetie,” she says and I just nod without a word.

When she leaves I begin washing the dishes. I bang the pans in the sink and turn the water on to run hot. I’m getting splashed, the noise is loud, I’m basically throwing an eighteen-year-old temper tantrum but I can’t stop myself. Soon the water is just pouring over the stacks of pans like a miniature metal waterfall and I’m staring at the stream. My shoulders shake as the sobs begin.

Tim comes up behind me and wraps his big arms around my shoulder. His face gets lost in my hair. His “shhhh’s” lightly blow a curl next to my ear. My sobs become more violent. I’m letting the dam of feelings go and I can’t plug them up. I can’t tuck them away and hide them from Tim.

He turns me around. He reaches around me and shuts off the water.

“She left,” I say in a stuttering voice and Tim holds my head between both his hands.

“I know,” he says. “I won’t. Okay? I won’t leave. I’ve got you.”

His eyes are steady on mine. I look at them through my tears. His look isn’t indifferent like Howard’s. It doesn’t hold a shaky love like my mother’s. It’s strong and sure and unwavering. I cling to it.

He pulls me to him and I cry into his shoulder. I don’t even realize my fingers are death-gripping his shirt until they start to grow sore. I test them out, curling and uncurling them to bring the blood back. He takes over dish washing and I put away the leftovers. We work in silence.

When the kitchen’s clean, we move to the couch and watch Leno until my eyes get heavy and I move to my room.

Birdie

The early start letter
for the University of Houston arrived at the beginning of May.
Space is limited
it read.
Register now
.

I hold the form in my hand and reread through it. I didn’t register like the letter demanded when I first received it. It had always been my plan to do so. I had my full ride in my back pocket. I just needed to earn enough money at the library to add to my savings so I could start early and move on campus on June fourteenth. So I could pay for the extra cost in dorm fees and tuition before my scholarship kicked in. So I could relieve the burden Tim took on when my mother tossed me out of the truck as she drove by.

That had always been the plan.

But when that letter came, all I saw was Wesley Lott. I thought about starting in the fall like everyone else. Buying a few more weeks with him. Each day I became a little more reluctant to give him up.

Bunny Lott’s words ring in my head now.

What would happen after high school? Long distance relationship between our colleges? Houston and Austin weren’t that far apart. Close enough for a weekend relationship. Then what? What if it was only a matter of time before Mr. Lott browbeat him into politics? Graduate school at Bowman on the east coast? Would we survive that? Or perhaps he holds his own and goes into teaching. But I still felt shaky thinking about it.

We hadn’t even gotten that far and my plans were already changing. I had already postponed the first step in my independence.

I snatch up Tim’s phone and dial the number on the letter. After a brief hold, I find out that it isn’t too late to register. A twenty-five dollar late registration fee is all that separates me from getting back on track.

I select my classes and hang up the phone. I feel in control. I feel right again.

I bite my lip.

Twenty-five dollars is not all that separates me from getting back on track.

I pick up the phone and call Wesley.

Birdie

He gives me a
ride to my truck left at the library. It’s early on Sunday morning – the town is not yet awake. He pulls up next to my truck and shuts off the engine. I don’t mention seeing my mom Friday night. I told him I’d run an errand with Esther on Friday and left it here. It was the first time I’d ever lied to him.

“Benny’s is open already if you want to get some pancakes,” he says. Benny’s is the other diner in town with not as good food but where we go when Wes doesn’t want to feel like he’s at work on his off time. “Since you refused to make them for me this morning. And I’ll even still pay for them despite your withholding my most favorite breakfast in all the land.”

I shake my head. His eyebrows draw together. My sad quietness will no longer be ignored. It’s going on too long to be my usual pensive bout. He can feel the difference.

“Birds, what’s up?” he asks.

I trace patterns in the seat between us. “I’m going to do the early start at the University of Houston. I have to be there by June fourteenth.”

“O-
kay
,” he draws out slowly.

“And I’m going to stay with my friend Kelsey until then. I’ll be leaving right after finals.”

“This week is finals.”

“I know.”

I chance a glance at his face and am hit full blast with his flabbergasted expression.

“When were you going to tell me?” he demands.

“Now. I told you right away, actually. I registered yesterday.”

Now his look turns to annoyance. “You’re mincing words. Yeah, maybe you registered yesterday, but how long have you been planning this?”

“Since I moved here. I just dropped that plan after we started dating. Which just proves how distracted I’ve been. I had everything set up, Wes. I had all my goals laid out. It just occurred to me yesterday that I need to continue on with what I was going to do the whole time.”

“Without talking to me?”

“I didn’t have to talk to you when I originally planned this.”

“Well, Birdie, things change. You’re in a relationship now.”

“Yeah, one I didn’t want,” I snap and I instantly regret it. His face turns into a cold I’ve never seen before. Not even when he talks about his parents.

“Look,” I say, though my words come out weaker now. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.” No response. I keep talking. “We weren’t going to do this forever. We’re going to different colleges. We lead very different lives. I was only going to be in Shenoah for a few months. It’s not like I’m ever going to come back here. This was all temporary.”

Again. Wrong words.

His face just keeps morphing into deeper levels of unfamiliarity as it hardens. “Wow,” he says, shaking his head. “Just…wow. Temporary, huh? Is that what this is?”

I don’t answer. Everything I try to say makes it worse.

“Perhaps this isn’t what you expected when you moved here,” he continues. “Perhaps things didn’t go according to your plan. But it happened. I mean, come on. When two people fall for each other, you don’t time stamp it to make sure it fits into your schedule. You come up with a new plan and make it work. Don’t you want to make this work?”

He’s China Star and he’s pumping my fried rice full of peas. No matter how I try to explain my order.

“You keep not listening to me,” I insist. “From day one. I knew it would turn out like this. You always knew I was leaving.”

“Birds. You’ve been pushing me away since day one and I’ve just refused to let you. This is me still refusing. Go to the early start classes. Run if you need to. I’m not going anywhere.”

I stifle a groan. “Wes. Yes you are going somewhere. We’re both going places. Opposite places. We’re opposites.”

Wes grips his steering wheel. “Birdie, stop fighting it already.”

“I just can’t, Wes.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“I
can’t
, Wes.”

“Do you love me?”

I don’t answer. My silence is answer enough for him.

Sadness threatens to crack on his face and he steels himself by pursing his lips and looking anywhere but at me.

“Don’t forget your phone,” he says picking it up out of his cup holder and extending it to me. I take it. I wait but that’s all he has so I climb out of his truck and into my own. I turn and watch him reverse and pull away.

Instead of feeling better, I feel an unfamiliar, hollowing ache.

Birdie

Lacey helps me with
the last of my things. I survey my room which is now almost empty. Six boxes and four suitcases sit in a pile by the door. I remember the two haphazard suitcases I had when I arrived here and I’m looking at the mountain now, trying to puzzle out how it multiplied in such a short time.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Lacey asks, eyeing me. She’s asked me that a million times the past week after realizing the glacier status of Wes’s and my relationship. I never gave her more than a simple, “We broke up” and she never pushed for details. But that didn’t stop her from checking in nervously several times a day.

As she should. I’ve been a walking zombie, carrying that ache like a best friend piggy backing me. I can’t seem to shake it. Even Rachel’s laser glares don’t rattle me. I want to be as far away from here as possible as soon as possible.

I give her a weak smile. “Promise.”

“I’m sorry I can’t ride down with you, but I’ll be there the second week of August,” she says and I shrug it off.

“You have graduation.”

Her look is stern. “It’s your graduation, too,” she insists. “You should walk.”

Another weeklong fight which I shake my head at. “Not my school. Not really. I don’t feel the need to walk. I’m okay,” I finish as she opens her mouth to no doubt check one last time.

She hugs me. “If you need anything…”

I hug my friend back. “I will.”