CHAPTER TWO
“ Where are you keeping your spices?” Mom asked.
“ What spices?” I asked, shifting my eyes around my counters.
“ Like rosemary and thyme…those sorts of things.”
“ I have salt and pepper.”
My mother’s tight-lipped smile did a poor job of hiding her worry. As if by not having spices, I could therefore not provide for myself in other areas of life. Did she wonder how I even brushed my teeth on my own?
“ We’ll go grocery shopping again sometime this week and pick up the basics,” she answered while nodding. She was nodding because my answer didn’t matter. She had said a statement and then nodded to herself in agreement.
I ground my molars together, wondering if pieces of the calcium could chip off and get lodged in my throat. What a strange way to go.
“ You don’t have to do that. I can go by myself.” I tried to keep my tone calm and collected.
My father turned away from the stove where he was preparing egg whites and a vegetarian version of bacon. “Pumpkin, why don’t you let your mother help you?” His hard stare told me to pick my battles carefully. What he didn’t realize was that maybe I’d been storing up past battles in my head for too long and soon all the battles were going to break through the surface and turn me into a maniac.
But who was I to deny my mom her thrills in life: keeping me alive, and now apparently making sure my food was flavorful.
“ Sounds fun. I guess I could use some spices,” I relented, feeling a wave of fatigue hit me out of nowhere. I shuffled back toward the table and sat, trying to ignore the worried glances from my parents.
“ I’ve been on my feet all day, decorating the apartment and shopping with you guys. Don’t look at me like that.” My stamina still wasn’t where it should have been for a healthy nineteen-year-old, but I was getting there. Having them look at me like I was a baby bird wasn’t helping.
“ So are you enjoying your apartment?” Mom asked, trying to change the subject.
I had moved into my own place a little over a month ago. It had taken a lot of lobbying, and even a well thought out power-point presentation, before my parents even considered the idea. We ended up compromising. I was allowed to get my own place if it was down the street from their house. So, there I was, sitting in my one bedroom crap-apartment two minutes from my childhood home, and I loved it. It was freedom. That chipping paint was mine; the creaky floorboards were my home.
“ I really like it.”
“ Have you met any of your neighbors?” my dad asked, flipping the eggs.
I considered lying to them, just to put their minds at ease, but instead I decided to withhold the truth. There’s a difference. I didn’t want to tell them I had met my neighbors to the left: an old gay couple, one part blind man, one part disabled veteran. It was quite an interesting amalgam until the blind man hammered drunkenly on my door the other night. Literally hammered, with a hammer. He was demanding that I give him back the thirteen dollars I’d apparently stolen from him. I had no clue what he was talking about. I never answered the door and he had eventually wandered back to his apartment.
“ No, not yet, but I haven’t left the apartment much,” I lied.
“ Hmm, I’m sure you’ll meet some nice people soon,” my father promised as he slid the eggs and faux bacon onto a large serving plate and brought it over to my kitchen table/desk/collector of random items. Currently, a distressed owl candle holder and a pile of medical pamphlets served as a centerpiece for our breakfast.
My mother’s brown eyes caught mine as she took the seat opposite me and I wondered for the millionth time where the hell my features had come from. They both had brown hair and brown eyes. Yet, I had light strawberry blonde hair and sage green eyes. My mother always told me that my hair color skipped a generation; according to my mom, when my Nanna was young she had wild golden hair, too. I had to take her word for it since none of my grandparents were still alive.
We ate in silence for a few minutes until my parent’s nervous fretting made my skin crawl.
“ What are you guys planning to do for the rest of the day?” I asked, pleading with the gods that they had plans that took them far, far away.
“ We were going to stay here to help you finish unpacking,” my mother answered, offering me a smile.
Pick your battles, pick your battles, pick your battles. In a few days, I’d be gone, away from them, for two weeks. Happiness-coated-in-guilt settled in my stomach and I forced a nod. “Thanks. That’d be great.”
…
Privacy was obviously a rare occurrence in my life and I made sure to soak up as much of it as I could as I tromped around my apartment, picking up things and putting them in spots I deemed to be their new home. My parents had left a little over an hour ago, after they were sure that I was well fed, showered, and in my pajamas. Apparently, I was a toddler.
I had no plans, even though it was a Sunday night and I had nothing to do the next day except meander around my apartment. I’m sure Mom would stop by at some point, but that didn’t feel like enough anymore. For so long I had gotten away with watching TV and escaping into books because that’s all that I could physically handle, but now what?
I was given this heart and at every turn I felt that sharp pang of guilt that I wasn’t using it how other people, better people, would have.
Beck had flitted through my thoughts roughly one trillion times since the day before. The moment I’d closed my car door I had flipped his business card over. On one side it read: “Daniel Prescott, CEO Prescott Publishing” with a phone and fax number. On the back there was Beck’s name and number, scribbled in handwriting so messy that I’d have assumed it was written by an infant had I not witnessed it being done with my own eyes.
When he’d handed the card to me, I’d had no intentions of doing anything with it. But now, as I tried to decide if I wanted to watch reruns of the Real Housewives of Whatever City, or you know, throw myself out of my second story window, I decided there wasn’t much left to do other than see what sort of weirdness Beck could add to my life. And yes, to be honest, I couldn’t stop thinking about how good-looking he was. There. Are you happy?
I pushed myself up off the kitchen chair and grabbed my phone from the counter. For one wild minute I considered calling him, but then I remembered that I hadn’t actually spoken with a guy on the phone before. Well, other than my dad, but he hardly counted. What if I sounded really strange on the phone? You know how when you hear yourself speak and you think Holy God, how do people even stand listening to my voice? So, I texted him instead.
Abby : Why do you want to go on my road trip?
My heart puttered wildly in my chest, and for one quick second I thought that it might decide right then to fail on me and stop beating. I smoothed the pad of my finger over the rough scar a few inches below my collar bone. Luckily for my heart, Beck texted me back quickly.
Beck : Abby?
I was excited to see his name flash across the screen, but then I thought, what kind of desperate person actually texts back right away ? I’d learned enough from Gossip Girl , and other accurate pop culture aids, that the cool thing to do was to act as if you were too busy to text back quickly. So instead of responding, I slid across my apartment’s old hardwood floors on my fuzzy socks a few times, pretending I was ice-skating. When enough time had passed, I hit send.
Abby : You answered my question with a question.
Beck : I don’t like cliffhangers.
He had texted back quickly again, and in that moment I decided that Gossip Girl wasn’t actually all that accurate considering they had cast thirty-year-olds to play high schoolers. So, instead of being cool, I responded.
Abby : You answered my question with a non sequitur. You’re getting worse.
Beck : No, trust me, it’s a sequitur. I don’t like cliffhangers. Enter-girl buying an urn. She clearly lies about what it’s for and then takes off into the sunset? I have to know how it ends. Murder suicide?
Abby : Don’t you have a life?
Beck : I’m living it right now.
Abby : I mean work or a family. Oh god, are you a dad?
Beck : Do I look that old?
Abby : Maybe.
Beck : I’ll take that as a compliment, and I’m not leaving anything behind that can’t be put on pause for two weeks.
I thought about how much that statement translated to my life as well. My stomach churned until I pushed the thought away so I could type out another text.
Abby : What percentage of you wants to rape and murder me on the side of the highway?
I had to ask. I could have probably been more suave about it, but there was no point. He wasn’t actually going to come on my road trip anyway.
Beck : Are you crazy? The side of a highway is a terrible place for a murder. There are witnesses driving by. I don’t know how long it’d take me to find a dump site. And Lord knows, you wouldn’t be compliant. Plus, I’d never get past the cliffhanger you’ve thrown at me.
Abby : Sarcasm doesn’t translate very well over text, so I’m going to assume you’re serious and not text you anymore.
I didn’t put my phone away. I knew he was kidding, and even if he wasn’t kidding, his greenish swirly eyes were almost worth taking the chance on him being a serial killer.
Beck : Not texting me is a sure fire way to get to the top of my murder list… You’d be leap-frogging the guy in Chipotle earlier who skimped on my rice.
Abby : La la la… This is me not responding.
Beck : Okay, hold on. We just met and I’ve made two murder jokes…
Abby : Stay on topic…
Beck : Sometimes you have to trust people.
I snorted. Yeah, right.
Abby : You just answered my question with a cliché.
My phone dropped on the table and I left it there as I wandered around my apartment. I went to my refrigerator and browsed the bleak contents. I strolled through my room, rearranging things that I’d just placed thirty minutes earlier.
But the only thing I actually did was consider Beck’s comment and the way it had burrowed into my consciousness.
An hour later, I replied again with two simply words.
Abby : I know.
I said “I know”, but I couldn’t think of a single person I had been forced to trust like that. For the rest of the night as I laid in my bed, I tried to imagine Beck and I living like the gay, one part blind couple next door. They seemed really happy, albeit suffering from an alcohol addiction. They had a few cats and sometimes through the walls I could hear them playing music and laughing. That seemed like love to me.
…
The next morning, I woke up to a text.
Beck : When do we leave?
I didn’t answer. It was one thing to consider taking him on my road trip in the middle of the night when I was nearing unconsciousness and feeling lonely in my tiny apartment. In the light of day, clarity sank back in and I shoved my phone into my purse without a response.
I started that day like I did every day since the transplant; I took my temperature and then swallowed each of my anti-rejection drugs in one big gulp. I’d learned that trick early on. I would say I was pretty talented at being sick.
Once a week I had an appointment with my doctor to make sure my body wasn’t attacking my shiny, new heart. That’s where I was heading with my mom that day. I was staring out the window, letting my eyes lose focus on the homes flashing by, when I considered for the first time that I wanted Beck to go on the road trip with me. In fact, I didn’t want to go on the road trip without Beck anymore. I squashed the thought by turning the stereo up louder, but Mom quickly turned it back down.
“ You don’t listen to music that loud when you drive, do you?”
“ Um, no, not really,” I lied. The louder, the better. How can you feel the music if it’s not blocking out every other sound?
“ Abby, you can’t be distracted when you drive. It’s important to focus on the road and to drive defensively.”
You might be wondering why my mother was repeating all of this even though I was nineteen and should have been driving for three years already. Well, it turns out that when you have congenital heart failure, your heart can crap out on you at any moment and you’ll pass out, and you know, take out quite a few people heading south on highway - 71. So even though I had my license, I didn’t start driving until after the transplant two months ago.
“ We’re just doing lab tests today, right?” I asked, trying to turn her focus toward my health. It was her favorite distraction, and I was actually quite thankful to have her help 99% of time.
“ Yes, and then I think Dr. Pierce will do a quick physical like usual.”
…
I pulled my sleeve back down after they drew a few tubes of blood. I hated wearing a long-sleeved shirt in summer, but I always had to wear layers to Dr. Pierce’s office. I’d lost so much weight in the last few years, and even though the new heart was helping me put some of it back on, I still felt chilled to the bone most of the time. Good thing I lived in Texas. At least I’d warm up when we walked outside.
“ You’re all done. I think your mom is waiting out in the lobby for you,” the medical assistant offered politely, finally making eye contact. She was always the one to take my blood. The first time I went in, she couldn’t find my vein despite me being ten shades beyond pale. After that incident, she just took my blood and we averted eye contact until the very end. Humans are weird.
“ Oh, actually, is Alyssa here?” I asked, shuffling my feet awkwardly.
The medical assistant eyed me skeptically and then nodded. “Yeah, she’s on break though…”
She really wanted to add, so go away and don’t interrupt her fifteen minutes of peace.
Too bad, lady.
“ It’s just a really quick something, and I promise she likes me. She told me once that I was her favorite patient.” I couldn’t actually recall Alyssa ever saying that. She had a straight forward, cut-the-crap attitude. I actually don’t recall her ever paying me a compliment, but it worked. The medical assistant turned toward the break room to retrieve Alyssa.