TWENTY-THREE
Aleena
Loving someone is one of the biggest chances we ever take. Maybe the most unfair part of it is that it’s rarely a conscious decision we’ve made. It’s something that blossoms slow or hits us hard, something that stirs and builds gradually, or something that shocks us with its sudden intensity. And sometimes it’s something that’s been a part of us our entire lives.
But almost always, it’s inevitable.
Even if I had been given the choice, I would always choose to love him. Even if he’d produced my greatest pain, he’d also given me my greatest joy.
I’d surrounded myself with his little notes that were spread out on my bed, the words that had come straight from his heart, words I would forever cherish. So many of them spoke of his shame, words that made it clear he would never believe himself worthy of the love that endlessly flowed from me. Some were just plain sweet. Those spoke of that boy who had once smiled so freely, one who just couldn’t recognize the joy that was hidden inside him.
In all of them was Jared. In all of them me. In all of them – us. What we’d created, the honesty of what we’d shared.
I hugged my knees to my chest as I studied his gifts. I rocked myself, searching for comfort when none could be found. I missed him. I missed him so much that some days I thought I would die, while others I forged through because I knew I had to go on.
I had to be strong because there was no other option.
But today I felt weak.
Heightened emotions grew thick in my throat, and I held myself tighter as tears slipped down my face.
Jared had changed me. Changed who I was and the direction of my life.
Almost three months had passed since he went away. Thanksgiving was just a week away. Not a single word had reached me, not a single indication of where he’d gone, not one assurance that he was okay.
Like he’d promised, he’d walked away and forgotten about me.
And it killed me because I would never forget him. Couldn’t because he’d permanently etched himself to me, left a part of himself forever within me. For so many years I’d loved him, but when he’d gone this time, he’d taken part of me captive, too, a piece that could never be retrieved because it would always belong to him.
I looked down through bleary eyes over the words he’d revealed to me.
On some level, I guessed we’d always belong to each other.
Classes had started and were passing in a blur, and I was still working at the café. Really, I was just drifting through the days.
I worried about him constantly, because I knew how deep his sorrow went, how he was consumed by grief and guilt. I didn’t want him out there suffering alone.
But it was what he’d chosen and it was the risk I’d taken, and now I was suffering alone, too.
Christopher was still the only one in my family to know about Jared and what he’d meant to me. As far as my mother knew, Jared had really just been passing through, and he’d stayed a few days and then gone on his way. When she’d asked what was wrong with me since he’d left, I’d lied to her and used Gabe’s name, said we’d broken up, the words rancid as they’d been forced from my tongue. Saying it had felt like some sort of mortal betrayal because Gabe could never come close to making me feel the way Jared did. But by the same token, admitting what had happened between Jared and me felt like it would be an even greater betrayal. I knew Jared had some sort of messed-up idea that he was protecting me by keeping us a secret. But I knew there was no hiding this forever. I just wasn’t ready to tell her yet.
Things had changed between Christopher and me as well. For the better. Of course after I’d moved in with Christopher, we’d gotten really close. But now we seemed to realize we didn’t need to hide anything from each other. He’d become my greatest supporter. I supposed it was because even after everything, Christopher truly cared about Jared, too, that he really understood.
One day I would have to find Jared… tell him… finally reveal it all. But it was really difficult to track someone down who didn’t want to be found.
I gathered up his notes and tucked them back into their keepsake box. Then I put the box next to my sketch pads because, like them, they’d become my treasure. And I finally fell into the fitful rest that I had called sleep since he left.
The next morning, I headed to the café at six for the breakfast shift. It’d been hard getting out of bed, the weakness I’d felt last night only following me into today. It was crazy because I would think it would get easier, but it only grew harder every day.
I have to be strong, I reminded myself as I wrapped my apron snuggly around my waist, tying the long straps off in the front. I set to work. It was Saturday, and the place was packed, the hours seemingly longer than my shift was supposed to last. I felt frazzled, completely frayed at the edges as I rushed around the restaurant floor, struggling to keep up with the demand while my body was bending with the strain. Flashes of blond kept infiltrating my mind, flickers of his face, my skin tingling with the vestiges of his touch.
I dropped my head as I refilled a cup of coffee in the kitchen. How could I go on like this? His absence cut me so deeply that it physically hurt. This sorrow rattled me all the way to my bones.
Clara eased up behind me, squeezing my shoulder as she contemplated me with blatant worry. “How are you doing, sweetie?”
The first time she saw me after Jared had left, she’d clued in immediately. She said there was no mistaking heartbreak like the one I wore like a visible badge. There was no hiding it. Funny how she’d warned me that she’d been there before and she didn’t want to see me go through the same. But the same was exactly where I ended up.
I bit at my bottom lip, my eyebrows drawing together as I forced myself to nod. “It’s been a rough day, but I think I’m okay.”
I wasn’t. Not at all. But I had to believe one day I would be.
“You know you can just ask if you need something. Someone to talk to or whatever you need.”
Meaningfully, I smiled at her. “Yeah, I do. Thank you, Clara.”
“Hey, us girls have to stick together, right?”
The rest of my Saturday shift dragged. I couldn’t wait for the day to be over.
Finally, after three, Karina told me I could cut out.
I plodded out to my car and slumped into the driver’s seat. I just sat there, staring at the blank wall of the restaurant my car faced, my sight blurry with the tears that I was constantly fighting, as if they’d just become a permanent part of me. I felt so worn, so frail, like I would crack from the smallest blow. Above all of that, I felt alone. I knew it’d never been Jared’s intention, but this huge piece of me felt abandoned. It throbbed and ached, begging to be filled.
Wiping my eyes, I started my car and pulled out onto the street. Instead of heading toward home, I turned toward my parents’ house because I couldn’t stand the thought of being by myself in the desolate apartment, wasn’t ready to fully give myself over to the memories of Jared inhabiting that place.
I parked in their driveway and climbed from the car. The neighborhood was quiet and the air was warm, although the scorching summer had finally passed. Swallowing deeply, I pushed myself forward, wondering if stepping through my parents’ door would be the final blow, because I didn’t know how to go on like this anymore.
I was splintering.
Breaking.
Now it was just a matter of holding the pieces together.
I knocked once and pushed the door open. “Mom?” I called as I poked my head inside.
“Aly?” She wasn’t surprised this time. She sounded almost relieved.
I edged in just as Mom rounded the corner, coming to meet me. She took one look at my face and hers fell. “Oh, Aly.” She quickened as she approached, never hesitating to pull me into her arms. “Come here, sweetheart.”
Her warmth rushed over me, and I buried my face in her neck, could do nothing but let myself go. My pain bubbled up and escaped as these racking sobs, loud and uncontainable. Part of me had an uncontrollable instinct to hide this from her, because I’d hidden him for so long, but I couldn’t hold it in any longer.
“Shh… ,” she murmured, running her hand through my hair as she slowly rocked me. “Shh.”
Her comfort only made me cry harder. “Mom.” In her name was the torment I felt, a plea for her to somehow tell me that this would all be okay. And she knew none of it, had no idea what I was really going through. But I needed her.
“Why don’t we go in the family room and sit down and talk?” she offered.
I nodded and she shifted her hold to my waist, supporting me as she led us to the couch. She lowered us to sitting, refusing to let me go. She tucked me close and I curled into her side. She held on to me like she’d done when I was a little girl. For a long while she rocked me and let me weep into her shirt as she emitted these soft whispers of encouragement, promising me it would be okay. I just didn’t know how it could ever be. I was so scared. So scared of doing this alone.
“Is this about Gabe?” she finally asked.
Tears ran down and streaked my face, as if expelling them would somehow purge a part of this pain. My mouth opened wide as the confession bled free. “No, Mom, it was never about Gabe.” I squeezed my eyes closed, feeling something tearing loose inside me.
A small, sympathetic breath seeped from her nose, and she caressed her hand down my back. “I didn’t think so.”
I guess she always did know when I was lying.
“Are Dad and Aug here?” I asked because I really didn’t think I could handle having an audience for this.
“No, sweetie, it’s just the two of us. Your dad drove out with him to one of his day training camps. You can tell me whatever you need to.”
I wasn’t ashamed. Still there were some things I just wasn’t ready to say. But it was time I finally said his name.
I rolled a little so my head was on her shoulder, looking out the windows over the backyard where it was all peace and tranquility, contrasting the disorder in my heart. I shook as I filled my lungs with air. “It was Jared, Mom.”
It was always Jared.
The air between us shifted from this soft sympathy to a stunning sadness. Just his name was enough to clench my heart.
Her voice was rough but knowing. “He hadn’t just been at your apartment for a few days, had he?”
Slowly, I shook my head, wetting my lips as I looked up at my mom in admission. “No.”
Mom’s eyes filled with awareness, her words full of meaning. “So he’s the one.”
He was the one. The only one.
I rested my head back on her shoulder. “I love him so much. I think I have since I was a little girl… but I never imagined anything could feel like this.”
Silence took us over while we sat together and let the truth sink in.
“Are you upset?” I finally asked.
“Am I upset that you fell in love with Jared or am I upset that you kept it from me?”
I winced, sensing her frustration, the disappointment, but there was no condemnation.
Finally she sighed. “Of course I’m not mad, Aly. I just don’t understand why you felt the need to keep it from me. For God’s sake, didn’t you and Christopher think I’d want to know that Jared was back in town? I worried about him for years, and it turns out he’d been hiding out at your apartment?”
She looked at me seriously. “That day when I stopped by… it was so obvious that there was something going on between you two… or at least that you both wanted there to be. But then you lied to me about that other boy.” She shrugged in something that seemed like defeat. “I don’t get it. When was I ever the mom you couldn’t confide in?”
“I’m sorry, Mom… but don’t you remember what it was like after Jared was sent away? It was like no one was allowed to mention him. Dad was so angry with him. Do you think Christopher and I didn’t realize he blamed Jared for finally driving Neil completely away? And neither of us knew how long Jared was going to stay. In the beginning, it really was just supposed to be for a few days while he looked for his own place. And then he just stayed.”
No doubt, because of me.
That place inside me quivered and swelled, crying out, because without him, I was so empty. It was his mark, the imprint he’d left behind.
I gulped around the heaviness in my chest before I continued. “Everything changed when he showed up at our apartment. It was like this crush I always had on him instantly became something so intensely real.”
A part of me realized that it’d become real the night when he was sent away, when I’d understood true heartbreak for the first time in my life at the age of fourteen. But maybe it took the two of us coming face-to-face as adults that brought it to fruition. Maybe it took our completion to shatter us wholely.
“He became my world, Mom. Living without him has been the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.”
“I don’t know if I even want to know how long you were hiding this from me.” Fidgeting, she inclined her head, making it clear that she really did want to know.
“He was there for three months.”
I was always hiding things from her. And I still was because I didn’t know how to voice it.
“God, Aly.” She slowly shook her head, sadness coloring her words. “And I have to guess he left pretty quickly after I found him there?”
“Yeah, it all fell apart that night. He blames himself for all of it. He doesn’t believe he’s allowed happiness, so he destroys it the second he feels a flicker of it.”
I had felt him sabotaging us that night. He ruined us, just because he believed he was supposed to. “All it took was me telling him I loved him, and he was gone.” I figured I’d spare Mom all the details of that night because, in the end, that was all it really came down to. Jared didn’t believe he deserved to be loved.
Mom’s face pinched as she released a regretful sigh. “I’m so sorry, Aly, sorry that you’re going through this. Sorry for ever once giving you and Christopher the impression that I didn’t care about Jared or that we should forget about him. I did try to get him help. I saw him unraveling, but every time I tried to intervene, there was nothing I could do to stop it. I tried to convince Neil to get himself and Jared into therapy, but he was so wrapped up in his grief he couldn’t see anything else. Neil gave up on himself… gave up on life. Without Helene, he didn’t think he had anything.”
Mom closed her eyes as if shielding herself from that pain. Neil was never the same after he lost Helene. Our family had lost him, too.
“That was the most helpless I’ve felt in my life… watching Jared destroying himself over an accident that any one of us could have caused,” Mom continued, sucking in her bottom lip as she got lost in thought. She released a ragged breath. “All these years I worried for him, praying he was safe. I tried several times to get in contact with him after he’d been released, but I could never find him. I guess probably because he didn’t want to be found. All I could do was hope he’d gone somewhere where he’d be able to find some peace, even if he couldn’t be here. When I saw him at your apartment, it was about the greatest relief I could have imagined.”
Mom cringed when she looked down at me. “But I was scared for him, too, Aly. One look at him told me he was still haunted… broken. All those marks covering his body, screaming out about how miserable he was inside. The fear in his eyes when he saw me standing there.” Her mouth trembled, and she let her attention travel the room as if she were gathering herself. Then she turned a soft smile on me. “But there was a light in his eyes that had been missing after the accident.” Mom hooked her finger under my trembling chin. “It was you, Aly. Do you think I didn’t catch the way he was looking at you? Like maybe you were going to save him? Like you were the only thing that mattered in that room? And you were looking at him the same way, too.”
“I miss him so much,” I whispered.
“There was always something special between the two of you.” She held my gaze for a long time, before she patted my knee. “Hang on a second. I want to show you something.”
Mom got off the couch, wandered down the hall, and returned a couple of minutes later. She sat back down beside me, handing me the picture she held in her hand. Of course it immediately brought tears back to my eyes because over the last three months I really hadn’t stopped crying, these emotions wringing me out. But this… this warmed and soothed and broke me a little more.
There was no mistaking the little boy, the stark white hair and beaming blue eyes. He was sitting on the couch, Helene right beside him as she helped him support the baby propped on his lap.
Softly, I trailed my fingers over the picture.
“From the minute I brought you home, you were always his baby. He would run in ahead of Helene, calling for you. He could barely talk, but there was no mistaking him saying your name.” A wistful smile kissed her mouth. “God… he was just the cutest little thing, Aly. He was always looking out for you, making sure you were never left behind.”
A small sob worked its way up my throat. I pressed my fist to my mouth, trying to hold it in.
Because he had… he had left me behind. He forgot me, leaving me completely alone. It hurt so much. And I was trying so hard to see myself on the other side of it, to be strong because I knew there would be a time when I would treasure what he’d given me. There’d be a time when I was no longer afraid and I’d smile when I saw him in glimmers of what he’d injected into my life.
Tremors rolled through the length of my body, shaking me to my core because all I wanted was for him to be a part of it.
Mom reached out to touch the memory of her friend’s face. Her voice dropped in slow encouragement. “You know, she always said the two of you would end up together. She’d watch you playing together and then give me this look that said I told you so.” Warm laughter trickled from her mouth, something that sounded so hopeful and so very sad. “You don’t know how happy it would make her to know you love her son the way she always hoped you would… how happy it makes me to know you’ve found someone to love this way.”
Her assertion burned me deep inside. “Mom, how can you say that? He’s gone.” I emphasized the word because I realized then that was what I really needed to accept.
Sorrow squeezed my spirit.
He was gone.
Mom cupped my cheek. “Hearts have a way of finding their way home.”
Tuesday evening I drove the short distance back to the apartment after my classes ended for the day. Sunlight barely clung to the sky. Golds blazed at the horizon and danced with the waning blue. Through the windshield, I lifted my face to it, hit with the intense urge to curl up on my bed with my sketch pad, to free my hand and see his face.
All I wanted was to see his face.
I wound around the lot and parked in my spot. Sucking in a deep breath, I got my bag and stepped from the car. I felt drained. Fatigued. I always felt a little bit off, like this overall sickness burdened my body. My feet were heavy as I crossed the lot, heavier as I studied them, coaxing them to take the next step. I took them one at a time, holding on to the railing for support.
All the breath left me when I lifted my head, and I was engulfed in fear and panic and an almost terrifying explosion of relief.
Because the only eyes I wanted to see were watching me from where he sat on the top step, his forearms resting on his knees, his intense ice blue eyes staring down at me.
“Jared.”