It wasn’t until three weeks later when Garrett Chadwick sent me the first of many packages that I realized just how deep the idea of him resided under my skin. Every three weeks like clockwork, another gift would show up at my front door. At first it would obliterate me, and I would relive all the pain he created, eventually, his gifts became the codependency in which I craved the strange routine. It woke up those feelings that lingered just under my skin, and for a split second of total confusion in which I believed he still wanted me, needed me, and maybe even loved me.
In the exact precision of his character, whether it was clockwork or perfect presentation nothing would flank the packages but a label, handwritten in black Sharpie pen. FROM: MISTER / TO: ROSEBUD. When you spend your nights working instead of sleeping, it wasn’t too hard to forget the demons that hide under your bed, in the dark. But Garrett Chadwick made sure I’d never go too long without thinking about him, just long enough to begin to forget, but always fleeting enough to draw him right back to the surface of my skin. It’s been a year now, and I hadn’t opened one, never gave any of the packages a second glance, until today . . . until I was broken enough to accept his invitation to a world of hurt.
Now, I was fighting to keep a handle on my life. My heart’s being ripped to shreds by the death of my best friend and the gaping void that was growing every minute. Sybil was the only woman I ever trusted. The walls were closing in on me, my life was crumbling to nothing more than memories of painful betrayal, and the people I’d lost because of it. Even Shane, who claimed he loved me has become collateral damage.
Shane . . . just thinking about him confused me, drove shivers down my spine straight into the guilt of wishing he was here. There was no way I could’ve dealt with it if I had seen him. What he once meant to me had now become the fuel for letting him go, especially now that he had found out what I was. The friendship we created and the unfulfilled desire I had couldn’t become anything more than memories of a life I once desired. I had to let him go. Let everyone go and move on. Besides, Shane was with Martie, he had a woman who loved him, and no matter how screwed up she was, I’d never be able to compete with her. I just didn’t have it in me, not anymore. I was a girl who had nothing to offer him. Nothing that would last longer than a three-minute roll in the sack.
‘Good thing you cut him off before you made that mistake.’ A wave of relief thundered through my body as the voice in my head interrupted my self-induced fuck-off party.
The truth of my relationships stung deep. It was Garrett Theodore Chadwick who announced he was engaged to Ashley Hancock. It was Sybil St. James who died at San Francisco General, leaving me to navigate the streets alone, and it was Shane West who made me fall in love with him even though he had a girlfriend. They were the only three people who were able to thieve my heart, and become the dealers of my missed chances. I stood on our black shaggy carpet between our beds and looked around the apartment. Sybil’s bed was covered in stacks of clothes, mine covered in boxes from Mr. C and I realized time was being a damn snitch and curiosity was being a motherfucking killer. I picked up a package from my bed and wondered if I should open it.
For the next couple of days I grieved everything I had lost. I spent hours staring at the mountain of packages on my bed and packing up all of Sybil’s things. When it all would become too much, I’d pass out from pure exhaustion and wake up to the same pain I tried to escape. I never once answered my phone or unlocked my door, and only managed to drink every last drop of alcohol in the apartment. Without hesitancy through the last two days, I’ve picked up that fucking mental dagger every second since I’ve been alone and thrust it over and over again into my heart. I tortured myself with wasted moments, unopened packages of empty apologies and unfulfilled promises and I loaded what equated to Sybil’s entire life into eight large black plastic trash bags.
I figured at this point would the content of Mister’s packaged bribes really matter? They represented nothing more than intentions lost on expensive gadgets. Packages that were better left untouched under my bed. I hated him for the curiosity the boxes and padded envelopes sparked in my gut, and hated myself even more for deciding to open one of them, let alone the one I was clutching in my hands.
I held the small white padded envelope, flipped it over and dragged my fingers down the bubbled texture. It was light, yet bulky, dusty from the time it laid in wait for my attention. I gripped the corner and noticed a gap inviting my finger. Do I really want to open the promise Mr. C made to me in this envelope? Promises made to me with material things, things I could easily replace if lost or stolen. It was my heart which ached to be opened and cherished, not this shit. I didn’t want what was waiting in the clusterfuck of cardboard and plastic envelopes piled on my bed. All I wanted was my heart back from Mister, Sybil and Shane.