Nicole Helm - Too Much to Handle (3 page)

"Because none of that matters."

It was enough of a slap in the face for him to be able to move out of her reach. Shut it all down. "You're very, very wrong about that. What happened matters. It will always matter."

"I know. It's the one thing that defines all our lives. This tragedy, and don't ever think I believe it wasn't a tragedy, but I am here, Henry. Me." She slapped her palm to her chest, eyes shiny and fierce. "I am living and have to keep living and so do you. Why should tragedy and pain be the only thing we let in?"

She was standing too close. Everything was too close to the surface. He wanted to push her away, or hold her close, and because he was torn between the two, he just stood there.

"Kiss me, Henry. Please…let yourself have something."

"I most certainly shouldn't have you."

"You should have what you want. We both should. And I want you."

"I can't." And he couldn't. It would be…betrayal. And wrong, no matter how right it felt. "You should leave. I don't just mean my apartment. You shouldn't be living next to me. Move on to the next thing, Ellen. Find somewhere you belong. It isn't here."

"You don't get to decide where I belong," she said, her voice low and dangerous. "I'm not moving. I'm not walking away. You know why? Because I'm alive and I have all the choices he doesn't. Stripping yourself of choices and friends and joy is a slap to Ken's face, not penance for your…mistake."

That burned, a searing pain he'd felt so many times since Ken's death. Painful enough to snap at her, even if he was afraid she was right. "Pretending he doesn't exist so you can be happy isn't exactly honoring his memory, or dealing with it."

"When you've dealt with it, talk to me. Until then? Bite me." Finally, finally, she turned around. She grabbed her coat off the back of the couch, scooped up her damn scabby cat.

He wouldn't feel guilty. He wouldn't. Because what he'd said was true. She wanted to call it "finding happy" or whatever the hell bullshit, but all she was doing was pretending the bad had never happened, and he refused to dishonor Ken that way.

She wrenched the door open, but before she stepped out, she turned, tears streaming down her face.

Well, fuck.

"I thought you were different than my parents, you know." She sniffled, wiping at her nose with her free hand. "But you're all the same. Was he really that much more important than me? So much better? He's dead and no one can even acknowledge I'm here? No one can care about me? It's all about him. Well, I, for one, hate him. I hate that he decided to drink and drive. And I hate that he was so damn important that no one can live their damn life years after he's gone."

And then she was gone, slamming the door behind her.

Ellen hated crying. She'd spent most of the first few months after Ken's death crying and it had become something of an obsession to make sure she never did anymore.

But Henry's words made her cry, and him making her feel like her parents made her feel when she thought he understood…

She sniffled into a patch of Scabby's fur that wasn't scabby. And then someone knocked on the door.

The only person it could be was Henry, and she was torn about whether to answer or not. On the one hand she didn't want to be yelled at any more, but on the other hand maybe he was interested in what she'd been offering.

That thought alone propelled her from bed and down the stairs. She opened the door and looked up at Henry standing there sadly in the dark, big puffy coat on. She gestured him inside.

"I…I'm sorry for that. I am, but I can't… I could never feel right about getting involved with you."

"Never?"

He shook his head. "There are things you don't know. No matter how beautiful and amazing you are, you'll never not be Ken's sister."

There it was again. Just like her parents. Defined by what had been lost. Something that had nothing to do with her. "I'm Ellen. Who I am is who I am. Regardless of who I'm related to, or how they died. And, Henry Peterson, who you are is who you are, and it is not defined by the one night you didn't take your irresponsible friend's keys away from him."

"You know how you went to that dance camp the summer after Ken died?"

"Yes, but what does that have to do—"

"I paid for that."

She tried to make sense out of him paying for her dance camp, but she failed. How could he have—

"After Ken's funeral, when you were staying with your grandparents, I think, I went to your parents to apologize for my role. They said because of the costs of the funeral they couldn't afford to send you to that dance camp you wanted to go to. So…"

"So what?"

"I gave them the money I'd saved up for—"

Her heart stopped or dropped or both. "Tell me they did not take money from an eighteen-year-old."

"I offered."

"That does not make it right. That doesn't make any of that right! You…you were going to go to Iowa State. You were going to… God, I'd forgotten all about that. You and Ken were going to be engineers."

"Close enough."

"Close enough. Close enough? What is wrong with you? That's… They never should have accepted that. That's awful—more awful than I've ever given them credit for."

"They were grieving."

"They will always be grieving. It does not give them the right to prey on a teenager."

"It was hardly like that."

"They should have said no."

"Well, they didn't, and it's not the only thing I've given them money for when it comes to you. So, understand that this is far more complicated than you want it to be."

It felt like a blow, like she'd been knocked flat. Her parents had taken money from Henry so she could follow all her different whims every time she'd run away trying to find happy.

"Look, you may not agree with it, but I will always, always feel responsible for what happened to Ken. I knew he was too drunk to drive, but I was tired of being the responsible one. Some girl was going to let me go home with her, and I let that be more important than my best friend's safety. I can't let that go."

"He did it! Why do we all have to blame you?" Ellen's throat was tight but she didn't want to cry anymore, so she let the anger overtake the sad. "It's his fault. His! Not yours. Not Mom and Dad's. Not mine. We should all hate him for it."

"Ellen—"

"How much?"

"What?"

"How much money do I owe you?" She had to make this right. She turned into her apartment to find her checkbook. Of course her account was on the zero side since she'd bought this damn townhouse. Taking money from Mom and Dad for this would be ludicrous. But she had to—

"You owe me nothing. Not a cent."

"No. I…it's not right. You changed your life all so I could go to some dumb dance camp? I'm not even a dancer! This is awful."

"It's fine. I chose—"

She whirled on him. "To be an idiot. A stupid, guilt-ridden, moronic… You were wrong. So damn wrong."

"You don't get to tell me that. Sorry. I did everything I did because it was the right thing to do."

He said it so resolutely, as if there were no other option. It was such utter crap.

"Everything you did is because you enjoy being sad and miserable and in pain. That's why you do it, Henry. Just like Mom and Dad. You all love being fucking miserable, because if you'd ever try to be happy again something bad might happen. Well, it's a crappy way to live, and I won't go around pretending it's not." If she lived like they did, she'd never be able to get up in the morning. "I'd like you to leave."

"I just had to explain to you that this isn't as simple as you think it is."

"No. No, it's an excuse. Your life is excuses for hiding away from anything that could possibly go wrong or cause you pain." Her way might not have been much better, running away, living off of other people, but she was changing that. She was here to change that.

"You would know. That's what you're doing. Chasing happy. How is that not avoiding anything that would cause you pain?"

She paused because he was right. But that didn't make her wrong. "Good night, Henry." And she closed the door in his face.

Henry stepped out of the dilapidated old building his boss, Jacob, was thinking about buying. Leah ahead of him.

"Have to rewire everything, and I mean everything," Leah said to Jacob. "There's not crap for restoring, electrically speaking."

"Plumbing, too. Have to redo everything. Shit hole." Which was a little harsh, but Henry was feeling harsh. And he was feeling like a jackass, so why not be one?

"Pipe dream, Boss." Leah clapped Jacob on the shoulder.

They kept on talking, pointlessly, in Henry's estimation. This whole thing had been pointless. As pointless as, say, pretending he wasn't all twisted up over how things had gone with Ellen a few nights ago.

The irritating part was that he wasn't wrong. He would never feel right about getting involved with her. It was the stuff she said about her parents, about him being like them, and them all enjoying their misery.

It hit a little close to something. Not the truth, because he didn't enjoy his misery, but he could see how Ellen might think that, and might feel slighted because of it. In a weird, warped way, wasn't that his fault?

He really needed to find a way to stop thinking about this. About her. About the way she'd asked him to kiss her. Please. About how that was the thing he most wanted—and absolutely couldn't allow himself.

He looked over at Jacob and Leah, still chatting away. "You two gonna blab all afternoon? Freezing my balls off." He marched over to the truck, refusing to feel guilty about being a jerk.

He settled himself in the backseat and Leah climbed into the passenger seat.

"What crawled up your butt and died?" she asked, jerking her seatbelt over her lap. "Something young and pretty?"

Henry held on to the bitter retort by sheer force of will. He might be a little grumpy and snarly with his coworkers on occasion, but he did like and respect them.

Leah turned in her seat. "It is young and pretty."

"You want me nosing into your life, Santino?" He crossed his arms over his chest. "And she's not that young," he grumbled.

Leah chuckled. "How young is not that young?"

"What do you care?" Okay, he was starting to fail at not being surly. Luckily, Jacob finally climbed into the driver's seat and Leah looked straight ahead.

Best to focus on business. "You're not going to offer on it, are you, boss?"

Jacob made a noncommittal sound.

"Oh, damn it, Jacob. Why on Earth would you make an offer on it?" Leah demanded.

He shrugged. "Sometimes you gotta take a chance."

Leah groaned, but the words lodged uncomfortably in Henry's brain. A chance. No. There were no chances when it came to Ellen. It was too wrong.

But the idea was there, and he couldn't quite get rid of it.

*

Ellen stood in front of her childhood home, a pretty, well-kept two-story in the middle of one of the nicer areas of Bluff City. The neighborhood had changed subtly over the years, except for this place.

There were happy memories here and she wanted to remember those, but all the unhappy snaked around her heart.

It was why she hadn't even moved permanently back to Bluff City until now. Unhappiness lived here.

Unfortunately, unhappiness had lived in Philadelphia, Chicago, Baltimore and Seattle, too. She kept moving, but it always dogged her eventually.

So she'd come back. After everything Henry had told her, she didn't have a clue as to why. Home was just a bunch of pain.

But she'd bought a house. She'd made a commitment. If her parents refused to find happiness, if Henry refused to allow himself some happiness, well, that didn't mean she had to ignore her own.

She forced herself to move up the walk. Then she stood on the stoop and stared at the door. Go right in or knock? Always such a dilemma.

In the end, she did both. Knocked, then gingerly pushed the front door open.

"Ellen. You're home." Mom's smile was pretty and wide and for a few seconds, Ellen allowed herself to hope. Hope it would go better than the last few times.

"Hi, Mom. Hope you don't mind me stopping by unannounced."

"Well, I was working on the forums." Mom pointed to her computer. The last few years she'd started moderating grief forums online. In some ways, Ellen was glad it gave her something to do, somewhere to go with her grief.

In other ways, though, perhaps selfish ways, it would always make her feel like she wasn't enough. Much like the entire house did. A shrine to Ken with his pictures everywhere. Couches fading with age, curtains out of date and tired looking. It didn't match the stately outside of the house at all, but heaven forbid they change anything since Ken's life had left this house.

It might as well be a tomb, really. Ellen swallowed and forced out an apology. "Sorry."

"It's all right. I didn't even know you were coming home until Christmas."

"I decided to move up the trip a bit. Where's Dad?"

"Phoenix until Friday."

"Ah."

Uncomfortable silence settled over the room, so Ellen pressed forward. She had plans. She was going to enact them. She was going to live.

"Does Mrs. Armstrong still have that bakery on Main Street? I didn't see it when I was down there."

"Oh, yes, she just moved to a better part of town." Mom's eyes drifted toward her computer and Ellen wondered if it was possible to shrink from the inside out.

"Remember when she offered me a job the last time I was home? I thought I could take it. If she's still interested in having an apprentice."

"I'll ask. Does this mean you're staying?"

Ellen smiled. Mom almost sounded excited. "Yup. I even…put an offer in on a house." Little white lies wouldn't hurt, right?

"Wonderful. You'll be able to visit Ken more often. It's a lot of work keeping his space cleared and filled with flowers. Those groundskeepers at the cemetery are worthless."

Like the movie she'd watched with Henry the other night, it reminded her of the dance recital. They couldn't leave Ken's side. Even when he was dead.