Bittersweet Catastrophe (Second Chances #2.5) (23 page)

“Shit, that’s fuckin’ cold!” I was startled by the abrupt contact of ice on my face. “So you’re saying you noticed me before you almost smashed my face in?”

His mouth expanded into a wide grin before he playfully took his bottom lip between his teeth. “How could I miss you? Not only was I distracted by this sexy, little thing lying out there in the sand, who I’m now realizing isn’t from around here, you’re also the only girl out here on the beach.” Yeah, I guess that made sense. I couldn’t really blame him for looking; he was a guy after all.

I furrowed my brow quizzically. “What makes you think I’m not from around here?”

“Your accent, darlin’. You sound like a Yankee.”

Ohmigod is he for real?
“Did you seriously just say that? Don’t give me that Yankee-Confederate bullshit. It’s 2013! Get the fuck over it already!” The three of them stopped what they were doing and stared blankly at me; one of them had his mouth hung open in amazement. My sudden outburst even caught me by surprise.

“I like her, Brett! She’s feisty!” A dark-haired guy about the same height as Brett scanned me up and down with a hungry look in his eyes.
Great, just what I needed.
“Do you have a boyfriend? God, please tell me you don’t.”

“You would be the one to ask her that, Travis. You always were a glutton for psycho bitches.”
Wow. Note to self: Corey is an asshole.

“All right, guys. Relax. I’m sorry if I offended you, uh…wait, I never caught your name, darlin’.” He leaned against the tailgate with his legs crossed at the ankles.

“It’s Liberty. Look, I appreciate your help and everything…even though you’re the reason I needed help in the first place, but I should probably get going. Thanks for this,” I said as I held up the quickly melting bag of ice.

I grabbed my shoes and started to walk back towards my car. I didn’t make it very far before I felt Brett’s hand lightly grasp around my elbow, halting me. He ran his fingers through his hair, tugging at it nervously. I actually found it kind of adorable whenever guys showed they were nervous. It was nice to see that vulnerable side of them every once in a while.

“Look, I’m really sorry if I offended you back there. We don’t all have the ‘stars and bars’ attitude. It’s just sort of become a habit for us to call northerners ‘Yankees’.”

I looked at him apologetically. “It’s all right. I guess I overreacted a bit. I shouldn’t have chewed you out like that.”

“Do you…do you think maybe I could get your number? Just so I can check up on you and make sure you’re all right. I’d really like to make it up to you, too. I still feel horrible about giving you a black eye. It’s not the friendliest way to welcome you to town.”

Although it was nice of him to offer, I still wasn’t 100% convinced I was staying in Savannah, and I definitely wasn’t ready to be building any lasting relationships when it was hard enough to say goodbye. I wasn’t sure what Brett’s intentions were, but I thought they might have been a little bit more than friendly; he just wasn’t quite as blunt as Travis had been.

“Sorry, but I don’t think I’m going to be sticking around for very long.”

“Oh, well…I hope you have a safe trip then. It was really nice to meet you Liberty, even considering the circumstances. And again, I’m really,
really
sorry about what happened. Just try to keep ice on it the rest of the day and most of the swelling should be gone tomorrow.” His smile was weak, and I could see the disappointment in his eyes when I said I might not be staying.

“Thanks, Brett. Nice meeting you guys, too.” I waved back at them before turning and making my way up the beach to get back to my car.

I felt bad to a point about turning down Brett’s offer to “make it up to me”, whatever that entailed, but I literally just met the guy. For all I knew he could be a crazy serial killer who knocks young women unconscious with footballs and hides them in his basement until he’s ready to gut them. Okay, that might have been a bit of a stretch, but you never know!
Gah! I really need to stop watching so many movies about serial killers!

I sat in my car, watching Brett and the other guys while they packed everything up in their truck. I must’ve looked somewhat like a stalker, but there was something about him that grasped my attention and made me want to know…
more
. He gave off such a familiar vibe, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.  Maybe it was the fact that he had poured so much concern over my bruised face, and his gentle touch simply warmed my heart. Then again, it could have been his overt honesty when he openly admitted he was checking me out and told me I was gorgeous and sexy. I mean, what girl doesn’t love to hear that? Well, I could tell flattery was definitely going to get him far with the ladies if he kept that up!

I grabbed a motel room for the night, and after attempting to shield my face as I checked in, I took the ice bucket and loaded it to the brim. I wanted this nasty-ass bruise gone! Tomorrow I’d worry about whether or not I’d be staying in good ‘ole Savannah for the long haul. If that were the case, I’d have to look for a job pronto because I was in desperate need of some steady income to pay for some real food and an apartment. I could only survive on fast food and crappy motels for so long.

Somehow I always ended up renting a room next to the couple that decided to spend the entire night screaming their lungs out at each other until the sun came up. I couldn’t tell if they were screams of passion or if they were trying to kill one another, but I swore at one point I thought I heard gunshots, and that was the icing on the cake. I set all of the locks on the door, even barricaded it with one of the dressers provided in the room just to be safe, and attempted to get some sleep before heading out the next morning...that is if I made it out of there alive.

Luckily I was beyond exhausted so sleep came easily. It was the dream that accompanied it that I could have gone without. It was the same recurring dream that had plagued me for the last four years, but for the first time in months, it made an unwanted reappearance.

Mackenzie gave me a ride home from school, since it had only been a week since I got my driver’s permit. The entire ride over I played with the braided, white-gold chain necklace delicately splayed across my throat that AJ had given me for my 16
^th
birthday, and I couldn’t wait to tell him the amazing news I just received from my biology teacher, Mrs. Young. I got accepted into a summer camp for advanced biology students and would be going to Florida for two weeks to study species diversity in tide pools. It was a dream come true for me, and AJ knew how badly I wanted to go to school for Marine Biology. I forced him to watch
Flipper
and
Free Willy
with me so many times that I thought I pretty much had him convinced that I was a fish in one of my past lives.

“Thanks for the ride, Kenzie!” I shouted as I ran for the front door. I set my backpack down on the couch and went straight for AJ’s room, but he wasn’t there.

“Hey AJ, are you home?” I waltzed into the kitchen with a little extra spring in my step. If he wasn’t holed up in his room then he would definitely be in the kitchen eating everything in sight. I swore my brother could eat enough to feed an entire army with all of the calories he burned off during football practice. Hmm, he wasn’t there either.

I stood there with my hands resting on my hips, pondering where else he could be. Football practice should have been over half an hour ago, and he always came straight home. Maybe he decided to stop at Amber’s house. I knew he had a thing for her, and I teased him relentlessly because they had been spending a lot more time together lately.

I walked out to the garage to grab a can of soda from the spare fridge, but when I turned around, it slipped between my fingers and spun around in a circle as it sprayed everywhere. All of the air left my lungs, and I collapsed to the cement floor. I was unable to scream. Unable to move. Unable to process what the fuck I was even seeing.

His body hung there lifeless from the rafters; his face already drained of color from lack of oxygen. But that couldn’t be him…he would never…

A blood-curdling scream erupted from behind me as my mother stepped into the garage, and she ran towards my brother crying hysterically, shouting for my father to call 911. I could hear sirens in the distance and my father pulled my mother into his chest, whispering in her ear to look away. Emergency workers stepped around me, and I watched as they cut the rope that suspended him. His body fell limp into the arms of the crew standing just below him, and as they walked past me, I saw that his eyes were still open. His beautiful eyes that were now so dilated that I could barely see the cerulean blue that encompassed them and brought them to life.

I knew this was the last time I would ever see him, and the image would forever haunt me…

The funeral was even harder than I imagined. I debated whether or not I was even going to show up, but deep down I knew I had to. As much as it killed me to be there, my parents needed me now more than ever. I was all they had left.

Upon entering the church, I was overwhelmed by the smoky incense that surrounded me. I always loved that smell as a child. There was something soothing about the way it prickled my senses, almost numbing them. Being there in that beautiful sanctuary always brought me a sense of peace that I couldn’t find anywhere else. I longed for that peace now, but I knew it would never come.

The somber atmosphere was slowly suffocating me. As people gradually filed in, I could hear their muffled conversations and soft whimpers echo off of the walls, but my feeble attempt to tune them out was useless; it was deafening. I could hear AJ’s name repeated over and over like a mantra, each time breaking what remained of my fragile heart a little more. 

I went to stand by my mother and father just outside of the church, where the rest of the funeral procession had congregated. The skirl of the bagpipes slowly filtered through the air, and everyone in the church stood to watch as the pallbearers proceeded to carry my brother inside. I choked back a laugh as I watched the man dressed in a kilt play the bagpipes. It was neither the time nor the place to be laughing, but I thought to myself that if my brother were here, he would find the humor in the situation. I pictured AJ standing next to me and asking, “Do you think he’s wearing anything under there? I bet you he’s free ballin’!” I chuckled again, and my mother’s crestfallen gaze bore into me with tears streaming down her face. Yeah, I was definitely going to hell for that.

As we sat down and the pastor’s words permeated through the church, a strange feeling was cast over me. I was seated at the end of the pew next to AJ’s closed casket when it hit me. I would never see his beautiful, radiant smile again. Never hear his boisterous and ridiculously contagious laugh. Never feel his strong arms wrap me up in a comforting embrace that would make all my worries effortlessly slip away.

“Would anyone like to come up and say a few words about AJ?” The pastor stood there waiting to see if anyone would step forward.

My father nudged my shoulder. Clearly I was the first victim nominated to bare my soul about my dead brother. Languidly, I approached the front of the church, genuflected in front of the altar and stepped up to the podium, adjusting the microphone for my lack of height. I surveyed all of the people seated in front of me who came to pay their last respects to my brother. I was able to pick out of few of our mutual friends, some estranged family members that we only saw maybe once a year, and several attendees I could honestly say I had never seen before in my life. There had to have been at least three hundred people crammed in that tiny space. It was heartwarming to see how many lives he touched in the short amount of time he was able to share with us.

My gaze lowered to the casket, and I knew he wasn’t really there. It had been three days. Three days since he left me here to pick up the pieces of my shattered heart. Three days since I had let his name pass through my lips. Three days since he selfishly took his own life, leaving me with an image that will forever be burned into my brain. Inside that cold, hollow box was just a remnant of what once was my whole world…my brother, my best friend, my rock.

I tried to surrender all of the feelings I held locked in my heart for AJ, but the words just never came. The longer I stood there staring back at the blank faces before me, the harder I trembled. Finding my brother’s lifeless body had left me in a state of shock that I still had yet to come down from. I never allowed myself to fully mourn him…not one tear was shed. But now, I no longer had control over my body as my emotions came barreling through me, fighting to find their release.

What happened next was a blur.

I don’t remember running from the church, but I had finally broken free from the haze as I collapsed to my knees on the hard, cold ground, gasping for air as if it were my last breath…