“Honey, no!” my mom said, coming to sit next to me on the bed. She rested a hand on my leg, and I pulled away from her touch. She sighed. “You didn’t even give him a chance? I think he would have understood. He would have supported you.”
“It’s not that big of a deal.” Strangely enough, I meant those words. I didn’t feel anything about breaking up with Daniel. All I felt was the giant, aching bruise my body had become. I felt the sudden absence of emotion, the all-encompassing lethargy that, even after so many hours of sleep, wouldn’t let me go.
“Sweetie . . .” my mom began, but I held up my hand to stop her.
“Please,” I said. “No lectures. That’s the last thing I need.”
“What do you need?” my dad asked, gently.
“She needs to eat something,” my mom answered, glancing at the untouched, slightly wilted bowl of fruit on my nightstand.
“Not now, Mom!” I said. “Please.” I sunk back down beneath my covers, not answering my father’s question. I wasn’t sure what, exactly, I needed. I needed for them to leave me alone. I needed more sleep. But mostly, I needed to turn back time, take back my bad decisions, and find a way to pretend I didn’t feel like I wanted to die.
Tyler
After I left Mason’s house, I took a long shower, hoping the hot water would help release some the tension in my body. But all I could think about was the look on Amber’s face when I walked into her bedroom. All I could hear was her screaming for me to get out.
I’m not a rapist, I told myself over and over as I dried off and got dressed. This is just a misunderstanding. My head throbbed, so I grabbed some ibuprofen from the cupboard above the stove in my kitchen, and poured myself an enormous tumbler of water and drank it down, knowing that hydration was the only road back from a hangover. Dropping onto the couch, I picked up my phone from the coffee table, where I’d set it when I first got home. I unlocked the screen and clicked on Amber’s contact info, assuming that, if I called, she wouldn’t pick up, but if I texted, she might at least read what I had to say.
“Amber, please. Talk to me,” I wrote. “Whatever happened last night that made you freak out when you saw me, I didn’t mean to do. I love you. I would never hurt you. You have to know that. We can work this out.” I pressed send, wondering if her parents had pushed her into telling them why she’d screamed at me. Would they believe her if she said what happened was rape? Would they make her report me to the police?
With this thought, at the idea of being arrested and taken to jail, I stood up and began pacing in my small living room, just as I had at Mason’s. The anxious energy coursing through my body was a giant, revving engine. I couldn’t sit still.
“Fuck it,” I muttered, then headed into my bedroom, where I picked up a pair of socks from the dresser and my running shoes from the floor. I put them both on, snatched my keys from the table, and headed out, not caring that going for a run was the absolute last thing I felt up to doing. The only thing I cared about was quieting the fear twisting my mind into knots—trying to escape the mistake I might have made.
As I ran, I went over the last couple of days in my head, thinking about my panic attack the night of the tanker truck accident, the fight with my father, and the way Amber had looked at me on the dance floor. It was the same look Whitney used to give me when she’d come over to my apartment and let me lay her down on my bed—a look that said we both wanted the same thing.
But then I remembered the last time we were together, a couple of days before she went home for the summer. “Damn,” she said, once we were done. “You were on a mission. I’m gonna have bruises.” She rolled onto her side in order to curl up with me, not seeming to notice my body flinching in response to her touch.
“Sorry,” I said. She didn’t understand that my physical intensity wasn’t a result of how much she, specifically, turned me on or how desperately I wanted her. It was the swell of my anxiety, adrenaline seeking release—the only thing I was desperate for was relief.
“That’s okay. I kind of liked it.”
The hopeful tone of her voice only amplified my discomfort. She thought I had something to offer her. I turned so I could sit sideways on the edge of the bed, half-facing her. “I hate to do this,” I said, “but I’m pretty wiped. Do you mind . . . ?” I trailed off.
She stared at me with hurt in her dark brown eyes, which she quickly attempted to mask by looking away. “You can’t sleep with me here?”
“Sorry,” I said again. “I’m sort of used to sleeping alone.”
She sat up then, too, yanking the sheet up over her breasts. “Oh,” she said. “Okay.”
“I’ll text you later.” I pulled on a pair of boxers, waiting for her to take the hint.
“Want to maybe catch a movie sometime this week?” she asked.
“I wish I could, but with work and it being my mom’s birthday and everything . . .” It wasn’t my mom’s birthday. I was simply willing to say anything, tell any lie, to get her to leave.
“Oh,” Whitney said, laying a small, cool hand on my bare back. “Do you ever talk with her about me?”
“No, I don’t.” My insides itched. I stood up to get away from her hand on my body. “Listen. I like hanging out with you. It’s fun. But I can’t do a relationship right now, okay? I’m just not there.” Not with you, anyway.
“But I like you. I mean, like, really like you.” She dropped her gaze to the floor and then lifted it back to mine. In that moment, she looked so much younger than her twenty years. So vulnerable and insecure. “I just want to know . . . is there any chance . . . ?” She trailed off, waiting for me to fill in the empty spaces of her questions.
“No,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh,” she said again. Her voice was small. She scooted down to the bottom of the bed to avoid having to climb over me, then quickly got dressed. I did the same.
“So this is done?” she asked as she slipped on her shoes. “Is that what you’re saying?”
“Yeah,” I said. “It is.”