Broken Promises (16 page)

Trystan drops his arms suddenly and turns around. He pins me in place with those cobalt eyes, and I wish I could take away his pain. He nods once and then twice as he shoves his hands into his pockets. “I’ll talk to her.”

CHAPTER 26

MARI

I
’ve held this ring in my pocket intending on giving it back to Trystan, but I haven’t found the right time. The thick band feels cool against my skin as I run my fingers over the Greek inscription not for the first time today.

I pull it from my pocket and stare at it. How did we get like this? Maybe I should have gone to him a long time ago, but I was so hurt, and it’s not as if he approached me either. It really looked like he nailed me and left, just one more name in a long list of conquests. It’s classic Trystan Scott.

Giving Trystan advice in light of Seth’s death is making me replay a lot of my choices over the past ten years—since I lost my mother. I didn’t give her a chance to make up. I mean, I tried, but I was still mad at her. That anger never really went away. It bore a hole in my chest, infected with something rancid. Now every time I think about her I feel sick with guilt. I wouldn’t wish that on an enemy.

The guilt needles its way into the crevices of my mind, filling my memories with doubt. What if mom felt rejected and pushed aside? What if her attempts to fix things with me didn’t go well because I wouldn’t let them, because I couldn’t forgive her for ignoring me for seventeen years?

From my earliest memories, she was always with Dad. If I needed something, I had to wait, because Daddy came first. She was with him at work and stayed late even when she didn’t have to. She skipped my awards at school and barely showed up for anything for twelve years. From the time kindergarten started until the time I filed for early graduation in eleventh grade, she failed to show up.

Then one day, she was there. It was like someone flipped a switch and I suddenly had a mother. I didn’t know what to do with all that rejection. It piled up on my shoulders and crushed my heart for so long. It felt awkward, but I tried to accept her attempts to reconcile. I wanted it. I wanted her in my life. I wanted her to accept me for who I am.

All that was stolen from me before I even knew what she thought. One day she was there and the next she was gone.

I don’t visit her grave. I don’t talk to her, and I try so hard not to think about her because it only fills me with remorse.

When I look at Katie’s tear-stained face, I see glimpses of that pain, of that bitter regret that seeps in when someone dies too soon. I don’t know how to be there for her in this, because it’s becoming clear I didn’t handle my mother’s death well—assuming I dealt with it at all.

Katie enters the room in a black dress and wool coat. She’s saying goodbye to her best friend today, and I need to be there for her. I pocket the ring, but the flash of silver catches her eye. “What is that? You keep playing with it.” She speaks over her shoulder as she grabs a dark blue scarf off the hook on the wall.

“Nothing.” I quickly stuff the ring in my pocket, hiding it from sight. If she’s seen it, she doesn’t know what it is anyway. There’s no way she’d realize it belongs to Trystan.

Katie settles into her usual spot. Her cheeks are red from the cold, and her skin is pale. She smirks. “So want to hear a joke? It’s kind of lame, but funny in a dorky kind of way. It’s up your alley.”

“How do you do it?” I shouldn’t ask, but I can’t help it. “How do you go on as if nothing’s happened and still have a smile on your face. I didn’t smile for a year after Mom died. How do you find humor in anything?”

Katie’s eyes glisten almost instantly. She smiles serenely, closing her eyes for a second. When she opens them again, she walks toward me and places a mitten-covered hand on my arm. “I smile for Seth. If I couldn’t smile, if I couldn’t laugh after knowing him even for a little while, what’s the point? I’m going to be the woman he saw in me. I’m going to be the best parts of him, so he lives on through me. And I’m going to randomly cry my ass off for no apparent reason, so stop asking me stupid questions, Cockapoo, and let’s go.”

I grab the entire box of tissues and follow her into the hallway. Today is the worst day of Katie's life, and yet she can see her way through the storm. She’s an amazing person, and I’m lucky to have her in my life. If I say that now, though, the limo ride will be a snotfest, so I make a mental note to tell her later. I need to get out of the habit of assuming people know how much I love them. Even if they do know, they need to hear it.

CHAPTER 27

MARI

T
he days inch by at slug speed. When I lie down at night, I can’t sleep. When I wake up in the morning, Katie is in the same spot on the chair, her thin body tucked into a ball, in the same position she was in the night before. The dark circles under her eyes are getting bigger, but there’s nothing I can do besides wait with her.

We watch old TV shows, and I fix a lot of food that doesn’t get eaten. Katie picks at her meals, but she’s not consumed much in the past few days.

About a week after the burial, Katie pulls on a pair of jeans and slicks her hair into a ponytail. She grabs a jacket and pulls it on. “I’m going to the cemetery for a while.”

I’m on the couch, not watching the show flickering in front of me. I turn to her. “Do you want me to come with you?”

She shakes her head and ties the belt tightly around her waist. “No, I need to be alone. Don’t worry, I’ll be okay.” Her hand rests on my shoulder for a moment.

“We’ll get through this.”

She tries to smile, but her lips twitch and fall. Over the past few days, she’s stopped joking. Once she stopped kidding around, laughing at my jokes soon followed. She seems hollow, as if what made her Katie was scooped out. My friend is gone.

I hope I can help her find her way back. I know deep down, under all that grief and pain, she’s still in there. Every day is a struggle, but in the end she has to be the one to decide to keep fighting.

She squeezes my shoulder. “Call Trystan. He still doesn’t know his lines.”

“How do you know that?”

She pads toward the door. “Because he told me not to tell you, but he still can’t remember his lines. Was he like this in high school? No wonder you wanted to kill him half the time.” She grabs a scarf from the hook and puts it around her neck before grabbing her keys.

“Yeah, he was. I think he has dyslexia or something because he couldn’t seem to see the script.”

“Was he ever tested?”

“I don’t know. When I mentioned it back then, he didn’t want to talk about it. I guess it’s a sore spot.”

“Good thing he has you, Drill Sergeant Mari. Go beat his part into his brain.” She smiles and waves as she heads out the door.

I pick up my phone and dial my old number. Trystan answers on the first ring. “Mari, what’s wrong?” Music blares behind him and suddenly stops. He must be at rehearsal for his next record.

“Nothing, I’m sorry. I didn’t know how else to contact you, so I used this number.” I kind of like that he jumped to get the phone, even though it was a little evil of me. I did have his other number, but I assumed I’d be routed through an assistant. “I’ll be quick—Katie mentioned you’re still having trouble with your lines.”

He makes a sound in the back of his throat and laughs, but it's too high-pitched. His voice drops as he replies. “No, that’s okay. I’ve got it.”

“You’ve learned them?”

“Yup.”

“All of them?”

“Of course.” He sounds like his mind is far away, and I can hear him picking at the strings on his guitar.

I spit out a line from the movie, “I had to see you again. To be this close and pretend you didn’t exist, I’m sorry. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stay away.” I wait a moment and when he doesn’t jump on his line, I prompt him. “And now it’s your turn.”

“Something about a plane,” he says in a flat voice, and I picture him sitting on a speaker in those old ripped jeans and leather jacket, kicking the scuffed toe of his boot against the floor. His hair is probably hanging in his eyes so no one can see his face and he’s not smiling. He’s embarrassed, but he’s hiding it with humor and charm—the way he always has.

I can’t help it. I laugh. “A plane? Trystan!”

“Yes?”

“Do you want help?”

“I was going to show up and improv the whole thing, but I’m guessing they’ll like your idea better.”

“And what’s my idea?”

“Learning the script.” I swear he’s pouting. I hear him suck in a breath and picture him pushing his hair out of his face and smiling. “Fine, but I can’t go to Katie’s anymore. We need to meet somewhere else, and coming here won’t be easy on you and Derrick. The press will say things he won’t like. I’m not sure where else to meet.”

“Let me take care of that. You finish your... whatever you’re doing, and I’ll give Bob an address. See you later.”

There’s a pause, before he says, “Mari?”

“Yeah?” My heart starts thumping all wonky like a flat tire.

The silence stretches on for a moment, and then he lets out a little breath. “Nothing. I’ll see you later.”

I end the call and stare at the phone in my hand. Every time I talk to him I feel like I did in high school as if no time has passed at all. But ten years have passed, and lots of things have happened.

Life occurs in segments, little bursts of time setting us on a course. Our little boat floats out into vast waters, sailing along until a storm comes to knock us off course—or worse. How many people are floating around, lost? I’m not even sure I am floating anymore. It’s more like I’m trying to break my boat free from years of rot after it’s been filled with sediment and settled on the ocean floor.

I’m not a bad person, but I don’t like what my life’s become. I go through the motions, day in and day out, and for what? At one time, I had an answer to that. Now I feel like I’ll be shoveling silt out of my hull for eternity.

CHAPTER 28

MARI

W
hen I find a place that works, I tell Bob where to drop Trystan off and what we’re doing. He’s relieved someone is finally helping Trystan. Bob thinks if Trystan backs out of the movie deal, everything will fall apart—that everyone is waiting to watch Trystan crash and burn. Since he’s been in the crashing phase for a while now, burning can’t be too far away.

Something inside me snaps into place. I feel it move from a callous, 'I don’t care what happens to him' thought, to an 'over my dead body' notion. Before I have time to analyze the reason it happened, I’m convincing Bob that Trystan won’t burn at all—not while I’m around.

Is that something I can offer? I don’t know, but either way, I sound confident I can prevent it from happening. Bob is partly right about the movie, but the things that could break Trystan are unseen. Things happening behind the scenes are so hard on him right now. He hasn't mentioned his mother since the night I read him the note. I’m sure that’s eating at him, along with many other things.

I’m sitting at a table in a diner on Deer Park Avenue, not far from my old high school, waiting for Derrick. I have a glass of water, and I’ve been watching beads of condensation slide down the side.

When he walks through the door, he scans each table until he sees me. He crosses the restaurant in long, lean strides, with a grin on his face and his rarely seen dimple showing. He looks beautiful today, all decked out in a gray suit and shiny shoes. He lightly brushes his lips against mine before sliding into the booth across from me.

“So what’s the occasion?” He settles in across from me, obviously wondering why I dragged him half way across Suffolk County to a diner he’s never heard of before.

I hand him a menu and explain. “I’m just feeling nostalgic. I used to come here after class with Katie. I thought it’d be nice to have some memories here with you, too.”

He glances around. “Ah, so this is the place where you two went and got in trouble.”

I grimace. “I never got in trouble.”

He laughs and scans the menu. “That’s not what I heard. Your father was adamant about that, especially where your, and I quote, 'idiot ex-boyfriend' was involved. I now assume he was referring to Trystan.” He glances up at me. “Is it okay to talk about that? I’m not being an asshole, am I?”

He’s sweet to ask. I reach across the table and take his hands. “No, of course not. We should be able to talk about anything.” It feels like we’re walking on eggshells with this topic. Derrick swings from being completely understanding to beyond irritated in a blink. I’m certain it’s because fame is involved. A guy’s ego is a fragile thing. I don’t want Derrick thinking that he’s living in the shadow of a legacy. That time in my life is over.

He presses his lips together into a tight smile. “Good, that's how I feel, too. So, I need to know—”

Apparently it’s awkward question time. “I mean it, ask anything.” I rub his hand gently and then sit back in the booth.

He opens his mouth, makes a false start, and snaps it shut. The second time he starts over, he actually speaks. “Why did you guys break up? He doesn’t seem like an asshole and, from what I can tell, you don’t hate him—so what happened?”

This is the sore spot, because there is no real answer. “He left me, and it ended. That’s it. I did hate him for a while, but that’s in the past. I can't walk around hating his guts. It’s exhausting.” I laugh, trying to make light of it.

“Yeah, but you guys seem like friends again now. So everything is all right?”

“As much as it can be. I’m going to help him with his lines again later.” Our food arrives, and I dig into my gigantic salad, but Derrick just stares at his sandwich. “What’s the matter?”

Derrick appears as if he’s thinking too hard. His brow is furrowed and there are worry lines etched into his forehead. “I think I’ve been pretty supportive, but this guy is your ex. Would you be okay with me hanging out with my ex-girlfriend? By the way, she’s a supermodel, incredibly funny, and rocket-scientist smart.” His tone is light, but his hands are on either side of his plate and his eyes are locked onto mine, worried.