Bruises of the Heart (4 page)

"Here's some ice. I hope your mom doesn't notice," he said.

"If she does, all you-know-what is going to break loose. It won't be a good time for either of us. She'll jump to some crazy conclusions," I replied.

I was trying to completely convince myself that what had happened wasn't Will's fault. He had obviously been deeply hurt by his father, and anger was the way he expressed that hurt. He needed me to be understanding of his situation, so I decided I would be supportive of him and help him any way I could.

"How does it feel now?" he asked.

"It feels better. How does it look? Am I going to have to go get some makeup?"

"It's red, but not bruising. It might be like that because of the ice, though. I'm so sorry. I can't even begin to express how sorry I am."

"I know, and it's okay. I know that you didn't mean to hit me. I'm just worried that my mom is going to come back home before it goes away and then I'm going to have to tell her something," I said, grimacing at him.

"Are you allowed to go out on a Sunday night? We could go through a drive-thru and then eat in the car. By the time we get back, your cheek will probably be back to normal. Then your mom won't have any reason to ask any questions," Will suggested.

"Okay, that sounds good. I'll leave her a note so she'll know where I am, and I'll be back well before my normal curfew, so she shouldn't have anything to say," I said as I walked to the kitchen and pulled out a pad of paper. When I had finished writing a brief message to Mom, we went out and got in his car. We went to a drive-thru in Riverside and then parked alongside the river to eat.

"It's not as noticeable now," Will said, then reached over to stroke my cheek.

I flinched a little, but he didn't seem to notice.

"It still hurts a little and it feels hot," I said, putting my drink to my cheek in hopes of cooling it off.

"Why would you say that? I apologized. Are you trying to make me feel guilty?"

"No, I'm not trying to make you feel guilty. I was just letting you know how it felt. I know that you didn't mean to do it," I said, trying to placate him.

Will stared at me for a long time. I tried to just meet his eyes without any emotion visible on my face. After a few minutes, he looked away and took a deep breath. "Sorry. I'm just a little on edge. I'll take you home now. I don't think that your mom will notice. Just make sure you remember to check in the morning in case it bruises."

"Okay."

The rest of the ride home was quiet, but not in an uncomfortable way. He held my hand and raised it to his lips several times, and reached over to stroke my cheek as well. Will was so loving I almost forgot why we were driving together in the early evening on a Sunday.

We sat in his car for a few minutes after arriving at the cabin, holding each other. I felt like we had come to a common place in our relationship and I was so very hopeful for the future.

"Well, I better get going," Will said against my hair.

"I know," I said.

"Victoria, I want to tell you something, but I don't want you to think that I'm saying it because of what happened today. And I don't want to freak you out, but the truth is that I love you. I'm not sure what I would do if you weren't in my life. You've made my life better in so many ways," he said looking at me.

At first I wasn't sure what to say. I knew what I wanted to say, but I was so scared to give someone else my heart
—
give someone else the power to crush me like Noah had when he'd ended our relationship.

I took a deep breath and plunged ahead. "I love you, too, Will. I think I have from the moment I met you," I said, smiling a genuine smile for the first time in a while.

"Whew, for a minute there I thought you were going to break my heart. I love you, Victoria, more than you can possibly imagine, and I know that we haven't been together a long time, but I believe that love happens when it happens and there's nothing that anyone can do about it," he said.

"Well, I better get inside. How does my cheek look?"

"I can't see anything, so you should be okay. I'll see you tomorrow at school."

"Tomorrow at school."

I got out of the car, stood on the porch of the cabin, and watched him drive away. Taking a deep breath, I went inside to see if I could get through the rest of the evening without Mom discovering my secret. I hated keeping anything from her, but I knew she would go through the roof if she knew Will had hit me. Even if it had been an accident, she would still see it as something awful that she would need to be all parental about.

I got past her, but once again my dreams were troubled. But this time, the person pulling me away from the safety of Noah's arms had red glowing eyes inside of the hood. Even in the dream, I could feel the anger and hatred rolling toward me in waves. These emotions buffeted my subconscious mind until I woke up shaking, with silent tears streaking down my cheeks.

"Get it together, Victoria. It doesn't mean anything," I said to myself as I lied there in my bed until the first light of dawn was streaming through my window. I couldn't shake the sense of foreboding that kept running up and down my spine.

My mom dropped me off at school because Tara was still mad at me. We hadn't spoken since Friday and I wasn't looking forward to seeing her today. I wished we were speaking so I could share with her that Will had told me he loved me. Normally she would be speechless and then demand to know every little detail of the conversation including, but not limited to, facial expressions and tone of voice.

The morning passed very quietly. Tara still wouldn't speak to me. To be fair, though, I hadn't spoken to her either, so maybe it came down to each of us waiting for the other to make the first move.

At lunch, I waited until Tara took a seat, then I went and sat beside her. "Hey," I said.

She looked at me briefly, like she wanted to say something but didn't dare to. "Hey, Victoria," she began. "I'm sorry about Friday."

"Me too. I'm not even sure what all of that was about." I grinned at her.

"I've been doing a lot of thinking, and you're my best friend. Whatever either of us said, I'm willing to forget." She smiled back at me.

"Oh, I'm so glad. I have the most amazing news to tell you. I've been bursting to tell you all morning, but I didn't know how to get past what happened on Friday."

"You have news? What news? I haven't heard anything new," she said, dropping back into her role as the queen of gossip.

I told her everything that had happened over the weekend,
carefully excluding the part
about Will hitting me. Luckily my cheek
hadn't bruised, but I did have one on my upper arm where he had grabbed me when I'd been talking with Noah on Friday.

Tara was, as expected, overjoyed at the news I had given her. It was then I realized Will wasn't with us in lunch. I wondered where he was, but knew I would see him soon.

We got up and arrived in plenty of time for P.E. After we changed, we made our way into the gym and stood off to the side, talking until class began. Fortunately, we were doing different stations that week, which left lots of time to chat. After we had cycled through all of the stations, we leaned against the wall and watched while everyone else finished.

"Hey Tori, Tara… Can I talk to you a minute, Tori? Alone," Noah said, looking pointedly at Tara.

"Sure, I guess so," I said.

"I see that you've been hanging out with the new guy, Will," he began.

I was instantly on edge. My guard came up at full strength. "Yeah."

"I
…
I don't trust him, Tori. I don't know what it is about him, but there's just something. Can you honestly tell me that you have complete confidence in him? That you trust him? Because I saw how hard he grabbed your arm on Friday, and I also know that you probably have a bruise from it."

I hesitated before speaking and squashed the voice in my head that was screaming to tell him the truth. "I do trust him," I said, getting angry. "And how dare you question him? It's none of your business, and you really should get your nose out of my relationship."

"None of my business? You are my business!"

"Not anymore," I said through my clenched teeth, allowing some of the hurt I still felt to show through. "You lost that right when you broke up with me. You've ignored me for months, and now you think that you can, what? Pretend nothing happened?" I almost yelled at him by the end. My patience was beginning to wear very thin.

"No, Tori. I can't pretend that nothing happened, because it did. It was a mistake, but that's something that I'm going to have to live with. I'm just concerned because I want what's best for you and I'm not convinced that he's what's best."

I was shocked Noah was acknowledging to me that breaking up had been a mistake. What could that possibly mean? I forced myself to move all the questions that were quickly multiplying to the back of my mind, and I silently promised to deal with them later.

"But you don't get to decide what's best for me. That's my decision to make, not yours. And I would appreciate it if you would stay out of my life. I spent far too much time getting over you and I've moved on now. So please, just leave it alone," I said, then turned around without waiting to see if he had anything else to say.

I forced my feet to keep moving even though I could feel every cell in my body screaming to turn around, reaching out to Noah. The voice in the back of my head was oddly silent for once, and I found that disturbing.

Luckily it was time to go change, and I passed Tara in my rush to escape Noah's view. She kept up with me, and as soon as we were at our lockers, she pounced as I'd known she would.

"What was that all about? He looked really pissed for a while and then he looked hurt and almost sad. Are you crying?"

"No, I'm not crying," I said, turning my back to her and wiping at my cheeks. "Besides, I've done enough crying over him."

"So tell me what happened. Obviously, he said something that upset you," she said as we left the locker room and headed for our next class.

I gave her the simplest breakdown I could on our way to History. I could see she was brimming with questions, but she was going to have to wait, just like all of the questions I kept pushing to the back of my mind until I could have time to sort through them.

"Please, don't say anything about this in front of or to Will. I don't want him to get upset over this. I'll deal with it on my own. Please?" I asked Tara.

"Okay, but you had better call me this afternoon after Will leaves your house, or you will regret the consequences," she said, narrowing her eyes.

I smiled my thanks and went to my seat next to Will, who was already there waiting for me.

"Hey." I gave him a tight smile. "You weren't in lunch. I wondered where you were."

"I told you that I had to make up a test in Science," he said a little belligerently.

"I don't remember you telling me that," I said, digging in my bag for my book.

"Well, I did. It's not my fault if you can't remember anything," he said.

"I'm sorry, I guess I didn't remember," I said.

I didn't want this to turn into anything right now. He had embarrassed me in front of my classmates, so I turned my attention to the top of my desk. I could feel how hot my face was and I fought to keep the tears that threatened to spill over my lashes from falling.

I glanced up as class started and saw Tara was looking at me with a concerned expression. I shook my head at her so slightly I wasn't sure she even saw. I tried to concentrate on class enough so I could answer a question if I was asked, but I couldn't follow everything that was said. All I kept thinking was I only had one class left before I could escape the suddenly confining walls of school.

I was relieved when the dismissal bell finally rang. Will and I separated to go to our lockers and then I made my way to the doors leading to the student lot, and there was Noah. At first I thought I was experiencing déjà vu, but I just wasn't that lucky. I took a deep breath and kept walking, hoping to slip past him. My luck once again failed me. Did I even have any?

"Tori?" He grabbed my arm, but not painfully. Just enough to stop me. "I wanted to say sorry if I upset you earlier. It wasn't my intention. I want what's best for you is all."

"Look, Noah, I know you mean well, but I'm happy now. I can take care of myself. I don't need you looking out for me."

"I know that you think he's the guy for you, but…"

"Here you are, Victoria. I thought we were meeting at the car." Will was glaring at where Noah's hand was resting almost possessively on my arm. His eyes turned hard and I mentally shrank back. I shook Noah off and stepped to Will's side. Noah's hand hung limp and then it balled into a fist.

"Is he bothering you?" Will asked me, but his gaze remained on Noah.

"Of course I'm not bothering her. I'm her friend."

"The way I heard it, you weren't much of a friend. You broke her heart and then moved on to a string of other girls. Doesn't sound very friend-like to me."