True North (11 page)

Caleb and Nate looked content to let him go, but I wasn’t.

“
Wait!” I called.

He didn’t.

I took off to catch up, which was ridiculous in the high heels I was wearing. I quickly pulled them off, held onto them and ran barefoot to stay behind him. He burst through the fire doors and into the alley.

“
JAKE! Please stop!” I shouted.

“
I can’t be in there anymore! I should have never come out!” he panted at me, pacing the alley back and forth like a caged animal.

“
Okay … we don’t need to stay here. We could just walk,” I tried.

“
You don’t belong with me, Liv,” he said. He held out his hand, and it was still shaking.

“
It’s just adrenaline from the fight,” I assured him. “It’ll pass.”

“
No it’s not, and I don’t know what I was thinking taking you out like this, trying to recreate something that happened a lifetime ago,” he snapped. “I’m not even that guy anymore. This isn’t even the fucking real world, Liv! This is like a magic land where guys work nine to five jobs and little girls like
you
don’t have to get your hands dirty and instead get to go to college.”

I swallowed his words hard.

“
You don’t know fuck about me, and you wouldn’t want to.” He looked around the alley. “I almost killed that guy in there. I
wanted
to,” he seethed. “You get yourself back upstairs to Nate and have him take you home. You have a long drive back to school tomorrow.”

“
But …” I stammered. “I don’t want to leave you … here … now.”

“
But I want you to,” he said gruffly. “I
don’t
want to be with you, is that clear enough?”

I couldn’t move.

“
I can’t leave you in this alley alone, dressed like
that
! Get your ass out of here!” he ordered.

I felt hot tears fill my eyes. When I blinked they slid down my face. But he didn’t get any sweeter, and he certainly didn’t look sorry; instead he just screamed, “GO!”

I startled, and then turned and ran up the stairs, trying not to let my tears turn to sobs.

Nate dropped me off at our house and went back to the Norths for my backpack and stuff. As he backed his truck out of the driveway, I pushed open the front door to our small, empty house. The pain in my heart was replaced by rage. My mind kept spinning with all of the things I wished I’d said after Jake treated me so cruelly and thoughtlessly in the alley.
First he acts like he loves me, then he protects me, then it’s like he hates me!
Nothing like a bunch of bi-polar snaps to make you wonder, what the fuck?

I hated myself for opening my heart so freaking fast after three years of nothing! I hated myself for falling for him and trusting him with such immediacy. I’d been ready to give myself to him.

I sat on my bed and pulled my arms protectively around myself. I’d learned to survive with an absent father and without a mom, but it was when I was vulnerable and afraid that I missed my mom the most. A best friend is great, but she doesn’t replace a mother.

There you go, Liv, a two-for-one agony. Enjoy the misery.

I experienced her rejection all over again. If she’d died, there would be something to blame the pain on; but the reality that she was just simply able to abandon me so effortlessly … she didn’t love me. She didn’t love me enough to ever try, to ever call, to ever say she was sorry. She left nothing but emptiness and a hole so deep inside of me it could never be healed or filled. Only time allowed me to distance myself from the pain—but it never really alleviated it.

I was jealous of people in the movies or in books whose mom or dad died. Their acute pain was monstrous I was sure, but when they got to acceptance, one thing they were still sure of was their parent’s love for them. They could visit a gravesite or talk to their parent, believing they could hear them from whatever other world people go to after they die. My insides would tangle up with jealousy at the thought. Isn’t that horrible? To wish my own mother had died?

It had been years since she’d left us, and I still thought about her consciously almost every day, even if it was just for a moment.

I would have given anything for my arms to be hers right now.

Damn you, Jake!
I should have closed myself off. I shouldn’t have let this happen. I drove here with the full intention of keeping myself guarded. Instead, like a small, featherless bird, I tried to fly from the nest, fell to the hard dirt below me and was crushed between the jaws of a powerful cat.

The door downstairs slammed shut, startling me. Wondering what had gotten Nate worked up, I ran down to make sure he was okay. I stopped halfway down the stairs, surprised to see it wasn’t Nate, but our dad. My body involuntarily stiffened. Last time I’d seen or heard from him was when I’d gone away to school. He’d said goodbye and that was it. After the night I’d had, it would have been nice to run into my daddy’s arms for a hug, but he wasn’t that kind of dad and I didn’t feel like I could trust him anyway, so I kept my distance.

“
You don’t say hello to your dad, girl?” he slurred with an edge of annoyance or anger.

I wished I’d stayed upstairs. I couldn’t handle this—not tonight. Dealing with him when he was mean and drunk was like trying to walk over eggshells without breaking or upsetting any of them. A knot formed in my chest and I tried hard to keep my voice steady. “Hello, Dad,” I replied softly.

“
What are you doing home from school? Did they kick you out?” He laughed at his little joke then added. “Of course not, you’re too …
perfect.”

I dropped my eyes to the brown carpeting that climbed the stairs and decided to just turn around and go back to my room. But before I could, my dad looked me up and down, and I remembered I was still dressed up for the evening.

“
Holy shit, girl! Are you part-timing as a prostitute?” he snarled and shot me a disgusted look. “Thought you were better than that … Miss High-and-Mighty. Get out of my sight.”

I just stood there like an idiot, the knot in my chest tightening, threatening to strangle me completely. Dad didn’t give me another thought. Instead he stumbled to the couch and lay down. A second later, he was snoring.

What a perfect ending to this night. I ran into my room, threw my clothes onto the floor and pulled on sweatpants and a t-shirt. Just a few hours ago, I had felt like a princess, now that was all very much erased.

I pulled myself underneath my blanket and curled into a fetal position, feeling numb and wishing I could just forget everything.

A little while later, the door to my room squealed a bit, and Nate came in, saying, “Hey, you okay?”

“
What do you think?” I bit back.

“
Can I come in?” he asked.

“
Whatever.”

He sat quietly at the foot of my bed. Nate was sweet, but he wasn’t very good at dealing with heavy emotions. When Mom left and Dad went inside himself, Nate felt responsible for picking up the pieces and taking over parenting. He’d gotten into this habit of just sitting next to me. Sometimes—okay usually—he didn’t say anything; he’d just be there, you know? Sometimes it was enough. But tonight it made me ache for more.

The crying started and wouldn’t stop. I couldn’t control it at all.

Nate just lay beside me with his arm around me as I sobbed.

Chapter 9

“
Empty”

Ray LaMontagne

When I woke up I was alone. The loneliness was acute, and I felt detached from my body. Guess a serious cathartic cry can do that.

I brushed my teeth and showered, dressed and stuffed my shit into my backpack. I was grateful Nate had gone and gotten it for me last night.

I laid out my keys, mp3 player and cell phone. I knew Jules would’ve texted me last night and, seeing that it was already ten a.m. probably this morning too. But she’d have to go by faith that I was okay ‘cause I couldn’t handle it yet—I didn’t want pity or sympathy or happy wishes.

I scooped up my mp3 player, turned it on and flipped through my songs. I knew which one I was seeking out—the song I simultaneously loved and hated. It could either cause me dread or strange comfort, and today I needed the strange comfort. It was a folk song that my mom had listened to endlessly. When she left, my dad took up the mantle, playing it over and over, day and night, blasted as loud as the stereo could go as he drank himself numb and senseless day after day for months. Sometimes I used to blame the song for the loss of my dad too. When it was on I’d bury my head under as many pillows as I could to drown it out. As I got older, the words and music became my funeral song—my go-to when the torment was too strong and I had no place to put it.

I looked around my room. I wondered if it might be a good thing if I never came back here. I could start another life. It wouldn’t be fair to the people who loved me and who I loved but … fuck, my mom and dad did it—shut themselves off from whatever made them feel. Like a cancer, I could cut the Norths completely from my heart. That would include Jules, though. I pulled in a calculated breath. She’d always make me think of Jake, and when he moved on and eventually got married I would have to hear all about it. I’d have to come home for visits and see him with his wife—a wife that was
not
me—and his little kids—
not
mine—and remember everything: every crushed dream, every moment I’d believed with all of my heart we’d be together someday.

It would be easy. I’d just stay at school
. Too much work. Sorry, can’t come back now.
Perfect excuse. Then, even though I’d planned to come back here to work for local therapists and schools, I could send my resume out all over the country. I’d never been to the east. Boston, I heard, was a beautiful city. I could let my relationship with the Norths slowly fade—it happened all the time with people anyway, right?

I secured my North Face pack over my shoulder and went straight out of the empty house and to my car.

Like the fool I was I’d almost expected a folded piece of paper in my car this morning from Jake—a song, a note.

Nothing but an empty car.

I took off down the road. When I got to the town’s center I noticed the yellow streamers and banners had all been taken down or were dangling haphazardly, worn from the wind and dew of the weekend. In the span of two days my life had spiraled into an absolute shit storm.

Whatever, right? I had a five hour drive ahead of me with nothing but open road, blue skies and music. I threw my phone into the backseat so I wouldn’t be tempted to check calls or texts and let the distance swallow me.

The next three weeks sucked. There’s no other way to describe them. You would have thought Jake’s rejection would have finally given me closure after all these years, but it didn’t; it only caused hurt that vacillated back and forth with consuming anger.

“
Ms. Morrisey, could you come to earth please and be present for my class?” Ms. Kline quipped.

Thanks.
“Yes, ma’am. Sorry.” Math wasn’t my strong suit, but I did need to pass.

So has what’s-her-face been tangled up around him for the past two weeks?
I wondered. I mean what else would keep him from at least calling to apologize? I wished I’d punched him in the face that night in the alley. It would have felt better than this obsessive brooding. I couldn’t concentrate in any of my classes, and my roommate was starting to get pissy with me. I hadn’t been much fun before, but now I was a real downer.

“
Class dismissed.” The words broke through my thoughts.

It was my last class for the day so I grabbed my pack. My stomach growled, reminding me I needed food. I took off to the nearby Subway for my favorite—grilled chicken with provolone and avocado. After I ordered my sandwich, I saw an empty table and decided to eat my food there and knock one of my homework assignments out. I sat down and situated my laptop, notebook and text. Earbuds in to close off everything else, some Linkin Park and I was good to go.

Thank you, Art History! Something I loved. Maybe I’d be able to get my mind off of him.

The sandwich was good and the homework was easy. Midway through the assignment I startled at a tap on my shoulder. I turned around and some guy was moving his lips at me, so I took out my earbuds.

“
A little loud you think?” he asked.

“
Probably.” It was Scott Terrence from math. “What’s up?”

“
Place is kinda packed. Can I share your table?”

“
Sure,” I said, organizing my strewn stuff so he’d have space.

He sat down and unwrapped his sandwich, and the smell of onions wafted around my head. “So how are you liking classes?”

“
Fine,” I answered vaguely as I clicked on a site about Michelangelo’s David.

“
What’s your major?”

“
Art and autistic studies.”

“
Interesting combination,” he replied between bites.

“
Yep.” I took a drink of my Coke.

There was a brief pause, then he said, “Well, Scott, tell me what
your
major is.”

I cocked an eyebrow at him and he answered himself, “Electrical engineering, thanks for asking.”

“
Sorry, I’m focused on this paper,” I said with a half-smile.

“
Yeah, I could tell that about you,” he said with a tone.

I looked up from my screen. “Is that supposed to be snarky?”

He smiled. His teeth were perfect. I rolled my eyes.

“
You know you really do need to cut loose every now and again,” he suggested.

I studied him. He was definitely cute. He had blonde meant-to-be messy hair and a real laid back look to him. His red t-shirt was crumpled, and he wore a black leather wrist band and a small black hoop in his left ear. He took a huge bite of his sub, smiling at me as he chewed. Obviously cocky too.