Light in the Shadows

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO


-CLAY-



Maria left the following morning without saying goodbye. There wasn’t a phone call, a note, nothing. I sent her a text, just to make sure she had gotten back to Alexandria safely, but she had never responded. A week later and I still hadn’t heard from her. I thought about reaching out but had decided not to.

Shaemus agreed that I needed to leave it alone. When I brought up Maria’s whacked out visit during our next session he said it was best to let it go. We had processed how I had been triggered by Maria’s erratic behavior and it had called into question my own mental stability. The truth was I had seen way too much of myself in Maria Cruz. It was like looking into one of those messed up mirrors in a fun house. This warped distorted view of who I was.

School started to ramp up toward graduation and I felt like I was hurtling through space toward some unknown destination. I was no closer to knowing what the f*ck I was going to do with my life than I ever was. Maggie and her friends were excited about college. Daniel had gotten accept to VCU and Rachel would be going to the University of Richmond. They’d be less than fifteen minutes apart.

Maggie had tried on numerous occasions to bring up college but I shut it down each and every time. I felt like everyone was sprinting past me and I was falling further and further behind. I wasn’t sure I was ready for college and everything that entailed and Maggie wouldn’t contemplate a future that held anything else.

We loved each other so much but I felt like we were starting to head in two very different directions. Every day I felt the crushing weight of my fear and anxiety pressing in. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t think. I only wanted the sweet oblivion of physical pain or a syringe full of mind erasing drugs. The need was all I could think about.

Shaemus insisted I start going to NA meetings. He could see how close I was coming to a relapse. I knew it too, but some sadistic part of me relished in it. Craved the total meltdown. Because right now I couldn’t handle the effort of working through a normal life. It was completely beyond me.

And pretending was proving next to impossible.

Maggie could see something was wrong. She confronted me and I couldn’t deny it. I wanted to tell her she had nothing to worry about, but I was way past lying to her. If I couldn’t give her the future she wanted, I could at least be honest.

Even if I downplayed it a bit.

“Maybe we could go visit Piedmont Community College. I’ve heard they have an excellent art program. You know, just to have a look. You don’t have to make a decision,” Maggie suggested as we sat in her backyard on a Sunday afternoon. It was hot, the start of summer a little over a month away. We were already in the middle of May and I just wished I could share in her enthusiasm for graduation. But it seemed to loom in front of me like a warning sign, Caution, rough road ahead.

“Yeah, maybe,” I said dismissively, already knowing I wouldn’t do any such thing. The wedge had been firmly inserted between us and I wasn’t sure what to do to get past it. Or whether I wanted to. Maggie continued to come to therapy every other week. And I was trying the whole healthy communication thing, but I could admit that I was starting to feel like it was all a freaking waste of time.

Why would I continue to ask her to devote energy into something that hadn’t a hope of going anywhere? She would go to university and I would what? Work at Bubbles for seven dollars an hour until I felt like ending it all just to escape the mind numbing misery my life would become?

Why couldn’t I just indulge Maggie? Who knows, maybe I could see myself in one of these colleges and the road would be laid out for me? But my self-defeating thoughts were too loud in my head. It wasn’t the highs and lows of mania anymore, just the constant drone of pessimism and paranoia that were making it hard to focus on anything else.

Shaemus had again brought up the fact that I could return to Grayson’s. That an extended stay in the facility could be extremely beneficial for me. I rebelled against the thought; feeling like returning at this point would be a huge failure. Not that I was doing a bang up job anywhere else in my life.

Plus, financially I couldn’t afford it. Grayson’s was a secluded and very expensive facility. My parents had completely cut me off. I hadn’t received any money from them from the moment I discharged myself from the center. I wasn’t sure whether my mother had been in contact with Ruby and if she had, I didn’t know about it. It was like I no longer existed for them. Their emotional negligence was both freeing and crushing.

“Come on, Clay. It won’t kill you to go on the tour. Who knows, you may actually like it,” Maggie said lightly, leaning back on her elbows in the middle of her yard. I looked up from my sketch book. I had been drawing the birdbath in the corner of the garden. Not the most amazing subject to draw but it kept my hands busy. And I needed them to be occupied with the direction my thoughts were going lately.

The sun was hot and I could see sweat pebble along Maggie’s collar bone. She really was perfect in every way. I was such a f*cking fool for not seizing the future she was handing me. Isn’t this what I had wanted? The possibility of a life with her? Why did the thought scare me to death?

I had been doing everything right. Taking my meds, going to therapy, playing the responsible guy and getting a job to contribute financially at home. I had ticked every god damned box and yet here I was, still stuck in the same bullshit mind f*ck that had always sucked me in.

“I don’t know, Maggie. I just don’t want to think about it right now,” I said tersely, sick of talking about it. Maggie was like a dog with a bone though and she wasn’t going to give up that easily.

“Clay, you have to start thinking about it. Graduation is less than a month. The deadline for applications to Piedmont are next week for the fall semester,” she said and I shot her a look. She shrugged her shoulders. “I’ve been doing my research, okay? But seriously, why can’t we ever talk about it? I feel like you’re not even trying to figure stuff out,” she said in frustration which in turn triggered my own.

I closed my notebook and got to my feet, wiping the grass from my shorts. “I told you I don’t want to talk about it, Maggie. I know you want me to jump on the college bandwagon, get my sweatshirt and all that shit, but I just can’t. I don’t know what’s going to happen with Ruby. Hell, I don’t know what’s going to happen with me. Just please, back off.” I was practically yelling by the time I finished and Maggie just stared at me.

Damn it, I was being a dick again. Maggie stared down at her hands. “You’re doing it again. You’re shutting me out. Even when you promised you wouldn’t,” she said quietly and it just made me feel even guiltier. I sat back down beside her and took her hand.

“I’m sorry. Really. It just freaks me out talking about all these plans for my future. Because I can barely plan tomorrow let alone the rest of my life,” I answered her honestly. Her hand shook slightly in mine and I tried to reassure her with my touch. I ran my hand up the side of her arm and leaned in to kiss below her ear, her favorite spot.

She pulled away, still not looking at me. “Are you still taking them?” she whispered and I froze. Oh f*ck no. I was not going there again. I felt the anger sweep through me like a forest fire and I dropped my hand from her skin.

“Are you really asking me that? What the hell, Maggie?” I asked, trying to control the ugly emotions starting to bubble to the surface.

“It’s just you’ve been so distant and off lately. I just wanted to make sure,” she replied, her voice cracking. I was torn between feeling horrible for being the source of her doubt and being royally pissed off at her lack of trust.

“I’m taking them, I told you I would never do that again, and I’m working hard on keeping those promises. Give me a little f*cking credit here,” I said harshly. Would we have this argument for the rest of our lives? Would she ever just be able to trust that I was trying? Logically I understood where she was coming from but it didn’t stop the hurt.

“I know you are, Clay. I’m sorry,” Maggie said, still not looking at me. We were at a standstill and I knew that if I stayed there, the situation would only deteriorate more.

“I’m gonna go. I don’t want to do this right now. I’ll call you later.” I kissed her on the cheek and went to leave.

“Just think about the tour, Clay. I want you happy, that’s all,” Maggie called out before I left. Some of the anger left as I took in her sincerity. But there was nothing more to say.

I was in a horrible mood when I got home. I wanted nothing more than go up to my room, turn on some music and figure out a way to wash off all of the bad feelings. The only ways I could think of to do that were not good ones. And even though I knew I should pull out my healthy coping skills, they just didn’t appeal to me the way the unhealthy ones did.

“Clay, you’re home early,” Ruby said, startling me. I had been so lost in my thoughts that I didn’t even realize she was home. She had taken to spending most of her days at the shop. While I was glad she was getting out of the house and trying to get on with her life, I worried she was instead suppressing her grief by working herself to death.

“Hey, yeah, I was tired so I thought I’d take a nap,” I said, just wanting to head to my room and be alone.

“Do you have a minute? I was going to talk with you this evening, but since you’re here, no sense in putting it off. Come into the kitchen and I’ll make you some tea,” Ruby waved me down the hall and all I could do was follow her.

Ruby and her freaking tea. I wasn’t sure what herbal number she’d force my way this time. But watching her move around the room, I realized she was nervous. What the hell did she have to be nervous about? Her edginess made me edgy.

“Need any help?” I asked and she shooed me into a seat at the table. When she finally set a cup of god knows what in front of me, she sat down and gave me a look that had my heart racing. She looked sad and worried. And I did not like that at all.

“So, what’s up?” I asked, trying to sound calm. She surprised me by reaching over and grabbing an envelope off of a pile of letters and slid it toward me. I arched my eyebrow questioningly.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“Just open it and then I’ll explain,” she urged and I did just that. Slowly I lifted the tab and pulled out what was inside. It appeared to be a check book. I opened it up to the first page and almost swallowed my tongue.

“Ruby, this is a lot of money. Where did you get all of this?” I asked, completely taken aback.

Ruby sipped on her tea before answering. “It’s Lisa’s life insurance money. It just came through a few days ago. So I went and opened a joint account. The money is yours, Clay. To do what you want with it. You could use it to go to school, or travel, or whatever. I just wanted you to have it. Lisa would have wanted you to have it.”

I flipped through the checks, seeing my name and Ruby’s on the top. This was unbelievable. I tried to push it back into her hands. “I can’t accept this Ruby. You need this money more than I do. Lisa would have wanted you to use it. Seriously, it feels wrong for me to take it,” I said.

Ruby took my hands and pressed the small blue book into my palm. “This isn’t open for discussion, Clayton. You need this. You are a bright young man with the world at your feet. This is just a means to get you wherever you want to go. You’re parents are useless and I know they have cut you off. I don’t want you starting this next chapter of your life struggling. Do this for me, so your old aunt won’t worry about how you’re keeping yourself. I have always loved you like you were my own. Lisa did too. You were the son we never had. You made our lives…”

“Miserable? Don’t blow smoke up my ass, Ruby. I was a f*cking nightmare while I lived with you and Lisa. How you can say anything different is beyond me,” I muttered around the lump in my throat.

Ruby closed her hands around the one holding the check book. “Clay, you made our lives complete. You gave us purpose. Loving and caring for you has been my greatest joy. Lisa saw you for the amazing, complicated and talented young man that you are. Don’t throw this gift back in her face. Use the money and do something with your life. You deserve it,” she said emphatically.

Shit, I was going to cry. What was it about this tiny woman that brought me to my knees so quickly? She went straight for the jugular and I couldn’t refuse her.

“Thank you, Ruby. I just…I don’t know what to say.” My voice broke and I tried not to sob like a pansy. But I hadn’t been expecting anything like this. It was all so…overwhelming.

“Anything for you, Clay. Anything. But there’s something else I need to tell you,” she said and I could detect a wobble in her voice. She was looking nervous again.

“I’m selling the house and the shop. I’ve already had a real estate agent come by and start the paperwork. It’s too hard staying here. I don’t need a house to keep my memories and I just think it would be easier to get on with my life if I wasn’t drowning in the grief I feel here,” Ruby said, tears dripping down her face.

I felt like I had been smacked in the face with a two by four. Ruby was selling the house? She was getting rid of the shop? I felt like I was plummeting to the ground without a parachute. My world had just gone out from underneath me and I was in a free fall.

“What? Where will you go?” I demanded.

Ruby dropped my hand and sat back in her chair, picking up her mug and holding it between her palms. “I was thinking of going back to Florida. Lisa and I had talked about retiring to Key West and I think that’s where I want to go. I just have to leave Davidson. I feel like I’m suffocating. I used to be so happy here. But now, I just see ghosts,” Ruby sobbed and I knew I should probably comfort her. But I was too busy freaking out.

Ruby was selling the house. She was leaving me. The one person in my family who had never abandoned me was leaving me behind. That tiny kid inside of me curled into a ball and started to scream. How could she do this to me?

“What about me?” I rasped out, my voice gone. Ruby’s face crumpled and she started crying in earnest.

“My darling, Clay. I won’t leave until you decide what you’re going to do. I wouldn’t do that to you. But please, just understand that I need to do this. I just can’t…move on! If I’m going to live this life without Lisa, it just can’t be here!” My dependable aunt was f*cking flaking out on me.

I stood up so abruptly that I knocked my chair onto the floor. “Well, it seems that what I have to say about it doesn’t really matter then does it?” I said coldly. Perhaps I was being unfair but I couldn’t think much past the turmoil in my head.

Ruby was leaving me. Maggie was leaving me. Everyone leaves me. Because who can love someone who is so completely screwed up?

How could I have ever thought I would be able to live a normal life? I was only destined for loneliness and pain. That’s all I deserved.

Ruby hurried to my side, her body shaking with the force of her sobs. “Clay, you can come with me to Florida if you want. I don’t ever want you to feel like I’m leaving you! I would never do that!” she implored, but I was passed hearing.

I pushed by her and grabbed my car keys. Without another word, I took off, not sure where the hell I was going. Part of me wanted to leave before anyone could leave me. I hated Ruby for doing this to me when I was already feeling vulnerable. She was supposed to be my rock. Well my rock had just crumbled.

I kept driving, not knowing where I was headed. So I was surprised when I stopped my car in a familiar field. I grabbed my cellphone and walked down the well-worn trail through the woods. Breaking through the trees, I took in the sight of the swimming hole. It was late afternoon and hot, but there was no one else there.

I sat down on one of the rocks and stared out into the water. I flipped my phone over and over again in my hands, wondering if I should call Shaemus. Or Dr. Todd. I knew I was at my breaking point. But I didn’t’ make the call. I only sat there, feeling emotional numbness filter into my body.

Abandoned, alone, unloved. The words bounced around in my head until it was all I heard. Just cut it all away. One slice and you’ll feel better. The voice in my head had grown louder and harder to ignore.

No one cares about you. You’d be better off dead.

Ugly, dishonest words that veiled themselves as truths.

My phone started to ring in my hands and I looked down to see Maggie’s name flash across the screen. I hit ignore and then turned my phone off. Coming back to Davidson had been such a colossal mistake. I had been an idiot to think it could be anything else.

If anything, it taught me that my life didn’t belong here anymore. With these people who didn’t want me. It ran like a loop through my brain. I didn’t belong. Nobody wanted me. I was cracking up.

“I thought I’d find you here,” I looked up sharply at that sound of a voice breaking through my internal tirade. Maggie stomped through the under bush and made her way toward me.

“Guess I should find a better place to be alone if I’m so easy to find,” I said sarcastically. She doesn’t want me. She would leave me. Everyone leaves me.

“I’d always be able to find you,” she promised, jumping up on the rock to sit beside me. I couldn’t look at her, not when I was feeling the way I was. I recognized the beginnings of my very real meltdown. And Maggie, being a huge trigger for me, could make it all so much worse.

She didn’t touch me, as though she could sense that would be the wrong thing to do. “Ruby called,” she said in explanation.

“Oh yeah? So that’s why you’re galloping in to the rescue?” I asked nastily. I don’t know why I was lashing out at her except that I was hurting and she was here and she had always taken my bullshit without complaint. It wasn’t fair to her, but it was a pattern we obviously hadn’t broken yet.

“Well in saying that, you just confirmed you need rescuing then,” she observed and I didn’t acknowledge it. She sighed heavily and I still refused to look at her. Because looking at her would be my undoing and I was already dangling over the edge, my fingers slipping one at a time.

“So, Ruby’s selling the house,” she said. I nodded.

“Yep, so I’ve been told,” I sounded bitter. Well who f*cking cares, I was bitter.

“And you’re feeling like she’s leaving you.” What the hell was with the on the mark analysis?

“Wow, you can read me like a book, huh? Why don’t you tell me all about my f*cked up head, Dr. Young,” I spat out, feeling angry and raw and ready to take down anyone and everyone around me.

Maggie grew quiet again, clearly taken aback by my verbal attack. “You feel like cutting. Or using. Don’t you?” she asked in a hush after a few minutes.

My shoulders sagged and I just felt tired. “I don’t know. Yes. No. I’m just really messed up right now. You should probably leave. We’ve been there done that and you don’t need the front row seat,” I said angrily, wishing for once she’d leave me to my hell. Why did she insist on riding this train wreck with me?

“I’m not going anywhere. Because no one is abandoning you. People can move on and live their lives but that doesn’t mean you’re not a part of it anymore. I love you, Clay. Ruby loves you. Because you, Clay are worthy of that love. You deserve it. All of it. And Ruby and I just want you to find the place where you’ll be okay and healthy. You can get angry with me, tell me to leave. But not once have I ever turned my back on you and I won’t start now,” she told me, putting her hands on me for the first time.

Her fingers gripped my chin and pulled my face around to her. The sight of her in my confused state of mind was like striking a match. And I lost it. I just f*cking lost it. I started to sob and I couldn’t stop. I don’t know exactly what I was crying for, except that everything that had been dammed up inside of me was pouring out.

I had always believed I was irredeemable. That I couldn’t expect others to love me when I didn’t even love myself. But Maggie’s words hit me at a moment when I so desperately needed to hear them. I needed to believe that she was right, that I was worthy.

Because I was so angry at myself right now. This had been my chance to make things right. Leaving Grayson had been my new lease on life and I had ruined it. I had deluded myself into thinking I was ready for all of this. Even with the therapy and the meds, I couldn’t do this.

So I cried for the man I couldn’t be. At least not right now. And I felt like in some ways I had been transported back to five months ago when I had made this same realization. Only then it had come with much harsher consequences.

This time, I didn’t cut. I didn’t think of some way to end things so I’d never have to feel this way again. Instead, I clung to my girlfriend. The person who had always been my light in the shadows and who continued to love me even at my worst. Who reminded me that everyone deserved love, even me.

“It’s okay, Clay. We’ll figure it out. Together,” she crooned with my head buried into the soft skin of her neck. Together. That was a word I could live with.

***

I don’t know how long I was at the swimming hole. But I felt like being there, with Maggie, crying like a little kid, was strangely cathartic. By the time we headed back to Ruby’s, it was getting dark. I was more exhausted than I could ever remember being. But that nastiness inside me was thankfully quiet. And I couldn’t help but feel like I had turned some sort of corner. I had been given the opportunity to make a choice and I was proud of the fact that I hadn’t made the one that ended in blood.

Maggie followed me in her car. I knew I had scared the shit out of her, but she hadn’t shown it. It was only because I knew her so well that I was able to see the terror in her eyes. I knew how hard it was for her to see me like that, perilously close to that edge I had fallen off before. Not knowing whether I would take her back down the dark road again.

I wish I could say that I would never do that. But the truth was, I just couldn’t be sure and there lied the crux of the problem. The last two and a half months had been more of a holding pattern. I was existing, thinking I was making progress, but in reality I still had such a long way to go.

On the drive home, I finally made a decision about my future. I knew it wasn’t the one everyone wanted me to make, but it was mine. I had made it. Me. And I felt a measure of pride at that.

Ruby was pacing the living room when Maggie and I walked through the door. “Clay!” she called out, rushing over to me. I was enveloped in her patchouli scented arms and I felt the guilt for making her worry.

Maggie stood in the doorway until Ruby waved her into our hug. My aunt held us both, crying and blubbering. “If you don’t want me to sell the house, I won’t. Clay, I’m so sorry, I had no idea it meant so much to you,” Ruby said through her tears of relief that I was home and in one piece. No life threatening self-mutilations. No drug and alcohol induced benders. Those were Maggie and Ruby’s fears when I lost it like that. And that made the choice I had made in the car all the more clear.

I stepped out of Ruby’s hold. “No, Ruby. You can’t make a decision based on me. I’m an adult, not a little kid. I shouldn’t have taken off like that. I didn’t mean to scare you.” I kissed the top of her greying head.

“If you need to sell the house and shop, then you sell the house and shop. You need to do what’s right for you,” I assured her. Maggie wrapped her arm around my waist and I leaned into her body.

“But if this makes you unhappy, I can’t be okay with it,” Ruby argued and I held up my hand, stopping her.

“You’ve always done what’s right for me, for Lisa, for the shop. This time, do what’s right for you.” And I realized I really meant it. It didn’t take away the pain and the deep rooted fear that I was being abandoned but feeling Maggie’s arm around me I knew it would all be okay.

I looked down at my girlfriend, who stared up at me with tears in her eyes. Would there ever be a day when I didn’t make her cry? I used the pad of my thumb and wiped the wetness from her cheeks.

But she was right. We were in this together. And that made it all okay.