Leaving Paradise (21 page)

“Aren’t you Caleb Becker?”

“Yeah. I—”

“How do you know my mother?” he demands.

I put my hands in my pockets. “I worked for her.”

He hesitates, confused, then his mouth goes wide. “
You
built the gazebo?”

“Yeah.”

“While Maggie Armstrong worked here? The both of you, together?”

“With Mrs. Reynolds,” I assure him.

“Did she know you were the one that hit Maggie? Forget it, from the look on your face I assume my mother knew. She probably tried to patch everything up, didn’t she?”

“Yes, sir. I need to talk to Mrs. Reynolds.” She’s the only one I have left now.

“She passed away yesterday morning.”

No. No, this can’t happen. A hole forms in my chest and spreads through my veins. “You’re lying.”

“My mother had a heart attack in her sleep. Now I don’t know what’s been going on here, but I know Maggie’s mother doesn’t want you hanging around her daughter. Respect the family and leave her be.”

“No problem. No problem at all,” I say.

forty-two

Maggie

Mom told me Mr. Reynolds had a surprise for me. I went to Auntie Mae’s Diner after school and Mr. Reynolds gave me the keys to his mom’s Cadillac. I protested, but Mom assured me Mrs. Reynolds would want me to have it.

So now Mom is driving me to Mrs. Reynolds’ house on her break. She helps me open the garage. I smile when I see the car, remembering the time Mrs. Reynolds helped me get over my fear of driving.

“You sure you’re ready to do this?” Mom asks.

“Yeah, I’m sure. Now get back to work. I’ll be fine.”

“Maggie, you’ve been so strong lately, but I don’t know if you’re ready for this.”

It’s time I tell her how I’m feeling. I’ve been trying to hold it in so I don’t hurt her, when all along I think I’ll hurt her more if I don’t say anything. “Mom, I need some space,” I say, then gauge her reaction. She’s looking at me skeptically, but I can tell by the way her lips are together in concentration that she’s listening and attempting to understand.

I take a deep breath and say, “I know it’s hard for you. It’s been unbelievably difficult for me . . . but I’m finally ready to accept my body and my limitations. I’m me . . . the new me. It might not be a perfect me, but I’m okay with that. It’s about time I stopped trying to escape my life, don’t you think?”

A tear runs down my mom’s cheek. She smiles at me, this warm smile that reaches her eyes. “The accident . . . it took a part of you away.”

“Only because I let it.”

Now we’re both crying. I give her a long hug.

After a few minutes she gets in her car and drives away from the house, giving me the space I need. Taking a deep breath, I scan the yard. And swallow hard. The gazebo is standing like a castle in the middle of the grass, outlined by the flower beds. The bulbs are patiently waiting in hibernation until it’s their time to poke their heads out of the ground for the first time and vibrantly come to life.

After yesterday, I feel like I’ve bloomed. It took a romance and an old lady to coax me out of hibernation, but it happened.

As I’m carefully driving home, I see Caleb at Paradise Park at the basketball courts. I stop to let him know I’m not upset he betrayed me. I’ll get over him. It might take a while, but I’m going to be just fine. I’ll have other boyfriends and adventures in life, other times I’ll be able to feel confident and carefree and happy. I’m a survivor. Even with my limp. Getting out of the car and gathering all my courage, I walk over to him.

He sees me, but doesn’t stop dribbling the ball.

“Caleb,” I call out.

“Why didn’t you tell me about Mrs. Reynolds?”

“I didn’t have a chance. I wanted to,” I say, then step toward him.

“You better stay back or I might start harassing you.”

Okay, I deserve that. I did slap him and refuse his help yesterday. But that was before I straightened everything out in my head. “I heard you got in trouble.”

“You come here to rub it in or you want to challenge me to a one-on-one?” he says.

“You know I can’t play.”

He looks me up and down suggestively. “Oh, you play, Maggie. Maybe not basketball, your games are more complicated than that.”

“What are you talking about?”

He takes the basketball and holds it at his side, then gives a short laugh. “I can’t believe you’re afraid of me.”

I move forward, stepping closer to him and putting my chin in the air with confidence. “I’m not afraid of you.”

He stands before me with as much confidence as I’m showing him. “Prove it.”

“How?”

He tosses the basketball to the side of the court and steps toward me, closing the distance between us. “Figure it out.”

My breath catches and I panic. “I . . . I don’t know what you mean.”

“I think you do,” he says, coming so close I can almost feel his emotions as my own.

“You want me to kiss you?” I ask breathlessly.

“You’ve ruined me, you do know that don’t you?” he says right before I stand on my tiptoes and touch my lips to his.

He grabs my waist and pulls me close so I can feel the full strength and length of his body against mine. My fingers wrap around his biceps at the same time. I’m lost in the protection of his embrace and the smell and taste that’s uniquely Caleb Becker. Uniquely . . . us.

As our kiss turns more intense, I sense a change in him. He’s kissing harder, fuller. Angry.

I stumble backwards and push him away from me. “What are you doing?”

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “Making sure I scare you. It’s what you want, isn’t it? So you can claim being the victim.”

We’re standing here staring at each other. Controller and controlled. Perpetrator and victim. Boy and girl.

He picks up his basketball. “Go home, Maggie. You got what you came for.”

Movement out of the corner of my eye catches my attention, breaking the connection. It’s Leah.

“Caleb, Mom and Dad want you home. Now,” she says.

I smooth down my hair, pat dirt off my pants, clear my throat, and do everything but look at the two of them.

Then I run back to the car as fast as I can.

forty-three

Caleb

“You didn’t tell her that I hit her, did you?” Leah asks as she watches Maggie run away from the park.

I shake my head.

“But you and Maggie. I saw how you looked at her and I knew . . .”

“What?” I say quickly, then look my sister straight in the eye.

I start walking back home and my sister steps in beside me. “Getting mixed up with Maggie can ruin our family, Caleb.”

“Lay off, Leah. I mean it.” I turn to her. “I’ve just about had it.”

When I get home, my parents are waiting for me by the front door. My dad is standing rigid, a stern look on his face. My mom is beside him. I can tell she’s totally out of it.

“Where were you last night?” Dad orders in such a stern voice you’d think I was out committing murder.

“Visiting an old friend. What’s the big deal?”

My mom looks at my dad.

I hold my arms wide. “What?”

“I saw Maggie coming from the direction of the park,” Dad says.

“So? It’s a free country, Dad. People can walk where they want to.”

My mom clutches her arms tight, grabbing on to her sweater. “We just don’t want to see you get into trouble. People talk . . .”

“About what?”

“I don’t want to discuss it,” Mom says, then starts to walk woodenly back into the house, no doubt to numb herself again.

“Let’s hash it out. Right here, right now.”

“Caleb, please, not so loud.” My mom glances nervously at the neighbors’ houses, making sure they don’t witness the scene I’m about to make. God, I wish she’d stop worrying about appearances and see that her family is falling apart.

“What are people saying?”

“Nothing, Caleb. Everything’s fine. Now stop this nonsense.”

I step into the middle of the front yard and say as loud as I can, “Are they saying I’ve been starting fights at school? Are they saying I’m harassing Maggie? Making my friends drink alcohol? You think it’s true, don’t you? Come on, hit me with the fucking gossip already!”

“Now you’ve crossed the line,” Dad says, stepping between us. “Go inside the house and calm down. You can apologize to your mother before supper.”

I snap, like a rubber band that’d been pulled so tight for so long it just breaks apart violently. Kissing Maggie, school suspension, Kendra’s manipulations, my sister’s warning, my parents’ inability to face reality, my mom’s addiction problem, the false gossip . . . all of it is driving me nuts.

“I’m not leaving this spot until we have it all out on the table,” I say. I look at my sister.

“Caleb!” Leah cries. “Please stop.”

My dad’s posture stiffens even more, his lips purse and the expression in his eyes is hard. “This is my home,” he says. “And as long as you live here you’ll abide by my rules. Now go inside the house, leave your mother in peace, and . . . calm . . . down!”

I swallow, hard. It’s not easy for me to say the next words coming from my mouth, but I can’t hold it in any longer. My family is screwed up, each and every one of us. They want to stay ignorant, to forget reality and live in a made-up world they’ve created. It’s fake, it’s sick . . . and I can’t do it. I think the only way they’ll heal is if I’m not here. I’m the root of their problems. If I take the root away, I’ll remove the problem.

“I’m leaving,” I say.

My thoughts turn to Maggie, the one girl who I used to think wasn’t worth a second glance. But when it comes right down to it, she’s the strongest girl I know. She confronted me about Kendra before the accident, she goes to school even though people laugh at the way she moves, and she worked her ass off for Mrs. Reynolds in order to achieve her dream of going to Spain. The accident made her a stronger person. Hell, she made
me
a stronger person.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Dad demands.

“Inside to pack, then I’m out of here. I can’t live with shame and denial around me. And you shouldn’t, either.”

“This is who we are now, son. The accident changed us . . . all of us. We were fine until you messed it all up.”

I shake my head. “Don’t you want to go back to the way it was before? I would do anything to make this family normal again.”

“Shouldn’t you have thought of that before you hit Maggie? I would have never thought I’d say this to my own son, but you . . . Caleb Becker . . . are a selfish bastard.”

I walk past my parents and Leah, heading to my room. Pulling a duffle bag out of my closet, I stuff it without really thinking. I’m ready in five minutes, then look back at my room one last time.

My lightsaber is still on my shelf, waiting for me until I return. But I’m not coming back. Hopefully, after I leave, my mom won’t have to drug her life to make it bearable and Leah can live her life the way she wants—with or without the truth. And Dad . . . well, one day he’ll have to face reality. When he’s ready.

It’s up to me now to pave the way for myself and to stop trying to make sure life is back to normal. Screw normal. Normal doesn’t exist. Caleb Becker’s family doesn’t exist. I’m on my own now.

With a sigh of determination I step back in the room, snatch the lightsaber, shove it in the duffle, and head out. Leah is at the front door, blocking it. “Don’t leave,” she begs.

“Get out of my way.”

“Mom and Dad need you, Caleb. I need you.”

I give a short laugh. “Mom and Dad’ll be just fine. They like living in denial. As for you . . .” I take in her black attire. “You’ve got to get past the accident. Face the facts before people like Kendra make you face them. I can’t protect you anymore. It’s time to protect yourself.”

I move around her and walk outside. I have no clue where I’m going or what to do, but I feel free. Tossing my duffle over my shoulder, I start walking. When I reach Maggie’s house, I don’t see her but I know she’s inside.

I give her a goodbye salute and keep walking.

Mrs. Reynolds’ gazebo is where I spend the cold, lonely night. When a shooting star flies above me as I stare up at the sky, I wonder if it’s the old lady giving me a sign.

forty-four

Maggie

Caleb kissed me last night at the basketball courts. I kissed him back. I still can’t believe either of those things happened. I thought I was okay without needing him so much. I should have wiped off my lips and washed them with soap before I’d gone to bed, but instead I kept looking in the mirror. My lips are still puffy, a reminder of how Caleb’s own lips were hot and demanding.

For years I’d imagined what kissing Caleb would feel like and taste like. To be honest, I wanted to push him away, to make him want me like I wanted him and to reject him like he rejected me.

But I couldn’t.

All those feelings from my childhood came back, from the time Caleb urged me down from the tree in front of my house to the time he took the blame for that broken statue. I can’t even forget the times he patted my back while I was crying to Leah about my parents’ divorce. For the past year, the accident ruled my life and molded me into who I’ve become.

I’ve taken back my life.

Sitting on my bed, I pull up my pant leg. I notice that my heart is racing a little less as I scan the scars with my eyes. I used to think of them as angry scars, but now I don’t see them as angry. They aren’t even scary. I trace the lines with my fingers, and I don’t even wish they’d disappear. They’re a part of me.

I close my eyes, remembering the accident. It’s so strange to think about that night without massive emotions running rampant through my veins. Through the darkness behind my lids, the image of Caleb driving the car that hit me is outlined in my head. But something doesn’t feel right.

Chills run up and down my spine.

Because, as I shut my eyes tight, the image of the driver becomes clearer and the foggy haze dissipates.

It’s Leah. A look of horror and fear in her eyes as she loses control of the car.

Leah was the one who hit me that night.

Not Caleb.

Why would he . . . why would they . . . ?

The doorbell rings while I’m still trying to sort it all out. My stomach is queasy. I want to throw up. But I can’t, because my mother is calling me downstairs. I almost fall down as I greet a man and a woman wearing matching dark navy suits.

“Maggie, we’re from the Illinois Juvenile Department of Corrections. We’re here to investigate your complaint about Caleb Becker.”

“I didn’t file a complaint,” I tell them.

The woman opens her briefcase and pulls out a folder. “We have documentation you called the 1-800 juvenile justice number complaining to the operator that Caleb Becker was harassing you.”

Oh my God. I shake my head and look to my mom. “I didn’t call. Mom, I swear I didn’t call.”

“Are you sure?” the man asks. “You don’t have to be afraid, Maggie. We’re here to make sure you’re protected.”

I stand up. “I’m not afraid of Caleb. We’re friends.”

My mom says, “Please excuse my daughter. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. She’s been instructed not to have any contact with that boy. Right, Maggie?”

I bite down on my bottom lip. “Mom . . .”

“Maggie?”

Last night at the park makes sense now, why he was testing me. Oh, how he must hate me, thinking I’d call and complain when I would never do anything to hurt him. Kendra would hurt him. I wouldn’t. “I have to go see him.”

“Maggie, come back here!”

I hobble over to the Beckers’ house before anyone can stop me. Mrs. Becker answers the door.

“Is Caleb home?” I ask frantically. “I really, really need to talk to him. I know you probably hate me for being the reason he went to jail, but I think it was all a mistake and—”

“Caleb is gone,” she says, totally unfazed by the words coming from her mouth. She even has a strange smile on her face. “He left.”

By now my mom has followed me over to the Beckers’ house with the investigators in tow.

Mom regards Mrs. Becker strangely. “Penny, what’s wrong with you?”

As soon as my mom says it, Mrs. Becker slips and falls right into my mom’s arms. After Mom shrieks, the two investigators help her carry Mrs. Becker into the house. “She’s passed out,” one of them says.

As they’re taking care of Mrs. Becker, I step back. What did Mrs. Becker mean when she said Caleb
has gone?
I rush home, grab my keys and drive to Mrs. Reynolds’ house. I check the garage, gazebo . . . he’s not here.

All along, I blamed Caleb for hitting me, without questioning his guilt. He pleaded guilty, but deep down I detected something strange in him. I thought it was a lack of remorse for hitting me, when all along it was a lack of guilt.

My heart sinks lower with each passing moment as I drive around Paradise. I’m looking for Caleb, or some sign he’s still here. Before I know it, I’m at the place where my life changed.

The scene of the accident.

The skid marks from the car are still on the curb, a dark reminder of that day. I haven’t come here since the accident. I wouldn’t have had the strength before to relive it up close. I step out of the car and walk over to the fading skid marks, staring at them for what seems like forever. Will they eventually disappear altogether, so the only physical reminders of the accident will be the ones I carry with me?

I know the truth, though. That the visible scars aren’t as deep as the emotional ones Leah and Caleb have been struggling with. I have a burning desire to help them, just as Caleb helped me. The most important thing I’ve learned the past few months is that friends are invaluable. People you love can get you through the toughest of times. They need me just as I need them. I miss Leah as my confidante, my best friend. And the love I have for Caleb is the forever kind that will never go away, no matter how hard I try to deny it.

“Maggie.”

I turn around. Caleb is riding in a black Toyota, a guy I don’t recognize at the wheel. Caleb tells the guy to stop the car, then he walks up to me. He looks sad and lonely and worried.

“How did we get here?” I ask.

“Here’s where it all started.”

“I didn’t call and complain about you,” I say hurriedly. “You see, these investigators came to my house this morning and said they were following up on a complaint I made and I insisted I never made it and then I realized you must have thought I did and then—”

Caleb puts a finger to my lips, stopping my babble. “It doesn’t matter.”

“But it does. And I trust you. Isn’t that what we’re all about? Trust and honesty.”

I need to prove it to him, a sign that I trust him without any reservations. I pull up my left pant leg with one hand, revealing all my scars up to my knee.

His brows knit together in pain, as if he was the one who put them on my leg. I take his hand in mine and together we trace the swollen lines with our fingers. “You see, there’s nothing I want to hide from you anymore. Do you feel the same, Caleb? No secrets, no lies?” I need him to tell me the truth about what happened that night. I need to hear it from his own lips, his own words.
Tell me you didn’t hit me
, I want to say.
Tell me the truth.

“Yo,
amigo
, you ready to
vamónos?
” a guy yells from the car.

“Who is that?”

“Rio.”

I’m worried. “I mean, who
is
he?”

“You don’t want to know, Maggie,” Caleb says. “Listen, I gotta go.”

I look up into his beautiful, intense face. At the same time I know he’s never going to give away the secret he’s been holding inside. That fierce, protective spirit is a part of him, a bond he can’t break.

“Where are you going? When will you be back?”

“I’m not coming back.”

Looking into his serious, sad eyes, I know he means what he’s saying. My eyes start to water and tears roll down my cheeks. “You can’t leave me. Not now.” I want to beg and plead and cry and grab him until he changes his mind. I want to play tennis with him today, and tomorrow, and the next day.

He gently swipes my tears with his fingers. “Then come with me.”

The tables have cruelly turned. I tell him, “I realized you were right. It’s a copout to leave. I’m going to stay in Paradise until I graduate, and save the money Mrs. Reynolds gave me for college.”

“Becker, you comin’ or not?” the guy in the car calls out.

Caleb nods and says, “Yeah, I’m coming.”

I lean in and touch his forehead to mine. “Tell me what we had was real,” I whisper. “Please.”

Caleb’s hands lightly clasp my head on both sides, enclosing us into our own private world. “As real as it gets. Don’t ever question that, no matter what. Okay?”

“Right now I’m questioning everything. Why did I even come here?”

“Because you’re ready to start a new life, Maggie. You’re free of the past now. It can’t hurt you. For me, being free means leaving Paradise.” Leaning in, he kisses me. So soft and full of warmth and longing and remorse.

I want to grab him and keep him safe. “Does that mean we’re both free?”

He nods, unable to put it into words.

I know he’ll never write or call. He’s going to cut all ties with his family and this little town that’s caused him so much grief. Including me. God, how I wish Caleb never pled guilty to hitting me. Although if the accident had never happened, if he’d never gone to jail and been stuck doing community service, Caleb and I might never have been together.

I wouldn’t have changed that for anything.

He steps back and winks at me. “Bye.”

“I’m not going to say it back to you, you know,” I tell him.

He gives a short laugh and keeps retreating backwards. “Then tell me something I can remember as your last words to me. Tell me you love me. Tell me you’ll think of me every night before you sleep. Tell me—”

“
The red hen has flown the coop
,” I say.

He laughs. “I’ll always remember Mrs. Reynolds, the gazebo, the daffodils, you and me in the gazebo . . .” Caleb winks at me one more time and turns around, his back to me as he walks to the Toyota. I want to scream at him for leaving me. I want to run up to him and forget being sane. Let us live in the streets together. As long as we’re a team, nothing can bring us lower than we were apart.

But he never did tell me it was Leah who hit me. He’s the one who, in the end, didn’t trust me . . . or himself.

I’m sobbing now, more than I did after the accident. And my heart hurts, more pain oozing from it than my leg ever had.

“Caleb!” I yell right before he slides into the passenger seat and closes the car door. I hold my breath, waiting for him to come back to me. To turn around. But he doesn’t.

The car screeches away, its red lights a blur through my watery eyes.

I head back home and some time during the ride I stop crying. There’s strength within me that I didn’t know existed before. It’s as if Mrs. Reynolds is nudging me to stay strong. Life is too short, she’d once said. She was right. As I pull into my driveway and get out of my car, I notice Leah. She’s standing in the front doorway of her house, her eyes puffy.

I walk over to her. “Is your mom okay?”

She shrugs. “I guess. Your mom’s with her.”

Well, it’s a step in the right direction. It’s about time we mended that invisible fence. I look up at my old best friend.

“You saw him, didn’t you?” she asks me.

“Yeah.”

She holds her arm over her eyes and starts to sob. “I need to tell you something really, really important. But I can’t look at you while I do it.”

I take her arm and lower it. “You don’t have to tell me right now,” I say. “When you’re ready, we can talk.”

“You’re going to hate me, Maggie. For the rest of your life you’re going to hate me.”

“I’m not going to hate you. I know, Leah. I know what it is.”

“You do?” she says, all glassy-eyed.

“Yeah. But it’s okay.”

“It is?”

“Let’s just say our friendship means more to me than holding a grudge or living in the past. You know what always helps me forget?”

“What?”

“A pie run.”

Leah gives me a small smile behind her tears. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Nope. Come with me for a drive to Auntie Mae’s. Let’s get our moms . . . I think they need some pie, too.”