But I Love Him (11 page)

But then he glances back at me, my hand still on the door, and he smiles just the slightest bit and mouths, “Thank you,” as he looks at me.

And I just nod and climb back into the truck, where I wait for the next two hours.

Connor and I scoop the remains of Nancy’s things into a big plastic bag. She’s in her room, knocked out thanks to the concoction of pain killers prescribed to her.

I wish I could glue all this back together. I wish I could make it good as new again. But I can’t, so I just shovel more of it into the bags. Connor takes a full sack out to the curb and then comes back and collapses on the couch and stares at the ceiling, and I can see that he’s drained.

“How many times has this happened?” I ask as I put a little angel figurine, missing its wings, into the bag.

“More than I can count. It’s easier now, of course. I can drive. And my dad won’t touch her if I’m around. If she can get to the phone in time, I can stop him altogether. But she’s always in denial. You can see his moods a mile away, but she never calls before it happens. Every time, she thinks it’s going to be different.”

I swallow and try to pretend that a broken porcelain frog takes all my attention. My mom never needs me and Nancy always needs him. I wonder what that would be like. I don’t think it’s any better. I think it’s worse. She leans on him and his world weighs too much as it is.

“Where do you think he is?”

Connor shrugs. “He usually goes to his brother’s for a week or so after it happens. He probably knows I’d kill him if I saw him after this.”

I nod. I know he cares about his mother. I know he wishes he could save her from Jack, that he could somehow stop it all from happening ever again.

“I just wish she would leave him. Put out a restraining order. Change the locks. She’d be so much happier.”

I think so too. I can’t understand how she can put up with this. How she can look at herself and think this is what she deserves.

“Yeah. Probably,” I say.

I cram the rest of Nancy’s broken things into the bag and then drag it out front and put it next to Connor’s full one.

Tomorrow a garbage truck will come and take it away, and it will be gone forever, and Nancy will pretend it was never there at all.

Until the next time. Because if Connor’s right, there will always be a next time.

February 20

Five Months, twenty-one days

Today Connor and I are out for a drive. It was his idea. He wanted out of the house. He wanted to stop thinking about the latest event in his so-called life.

I’m in the driver’s seat, taking him down the most scenic, winding country roads I can find, hoping it is enough to take his mind off the bruises he saw on his mom’s arms. It won’t be. But I can hope.

“Wow, that’s a pretty horse,” I say, pointing to a splashy black and white horse in the field we pass. “Someday I’ll have one. I’ve always wanted a horse.”

That’s only sort of true. I wanted one when I was little. But I haven’t thought of it in a long time. I guess I was just filling the silence.

“Yeah. It’s not bad,” he says, half-heartedly.

We keep driving. It’s all trees and shadows and ditches. What am I supposed to talk about?

We reach a stop sign and a small colonial house sits on a grassy knoll across from us. It’s not huge or fancy. In fact, the paint is peeling and one of the shutters is hanging crookedly to the side, but it’s cute. “I wouldn’t mind a house like that one when I’m older,” I say, pointing to it. “You could do flower beds around the front walk. And the roof—”

“Don’t you get it?”

The harsh tone of his voice stops me mid-sentence.

“Get what?”

“I’m not going to have any of that stuff. It might be attainable to you, but to me, it’s out of reach. It will never happen. So stop acting like it will.”

“What do you mean? We’ve talked about this. We’re going to live in a big—”

“No. Now drop it,” he growls.

I stare at him for several long moments, trying to figure out what I’ve done to make him so angry. He’d been fine just seconds before. Sad, yeah, but angry? It’s like a switch flipping. I wish I knew what I was supposed to do. I wish I could read him better.

A car honks behind me and I’m forced to look back at the road, and I take a right turn and leave the little colonial behind. Only moments later he speaks again, and his mood has shifted a second time.

“Look, I’m sorry. It’s just … sometimes I think you’re too good for me. You can have anything you want. Including a house and a horse and whatever else you want. But people like me … I’m never going to have all that. My life will always be one big mess.”

A wide spot opens up next to the road and I pull into the gravel and put the car in park. I leave the engine idling and turn toward him. “That’s not true, Connor. I promise you. We’ll work together and we’ll get everything we’ve ever wanted. I swear to you, it’s going to happen.”

Connor doesn’t seem to hear my words. He turns and stares out the window, even as it fogs over. We sit in silence on the side of the road for what seems like eternity.

And then he speaks. “When I was seven, my mom kind of lost it for a while. I don’t even know where she ended up. Probably a psych ward. But I ended up with my dad for a few months without her around.”

Why is he telling me this? What does it have to do with anything? Is this part of his anger or has he tipped back toward depression? Which one is worse?

“We never had much money. And with her out of the house, he had no reason to hide what he spent on alcohol. He’d buy bottles and bottles of it while the cupboards were empty. Some days I’d eat nothing but dry ramen noodles or ketchup or frozen French fries. I couldn’t even cook the stuff ’cause he said I wasn’t allowed.”

And then it makes sense. The reason he took up cooking.

“Wow. I’m … I’m …”

What? Sorry? That doesn’t seem like it’s enough. I reach out, rest my hand on his shoulder. He shrugs. I don’t know if he’s trying to shrug my hand off or just act like it’s not a big deal.

I run my hand down his arm, then reach for his hand and pull it onto my lap, interlacing my fingers with his. He’s not looking at me, but the feeling of skin-on-skin somehow makes me feel better, like he knows I’m here for him.

I know he wants the stories out, but I know he also wants to act like they don’t matter anymore, and he’s forever stuck between hiding the pain and letting it pour out.

“I know I can’t blame him for everything,” he says.

“Who?” I ask, even though I know the answer.

“My dad. I mean, eventually I’m supposed to just get over it, right? I’m supposed to just say fuck it, and move on, and forget all the shitty stuff. I’m supposed to be normal and grow up and buy colonial houses with flower beds and pretty horses.”

Oh. Now I get it. I take a long, slow breath, trying to figure out how I should answer, what I should think.

Because yes, sometimes I think he should just be over it. He can’t blame everything on him, can he? He’s eighteen. Old enough to take control of his life. Old enough to create his own and forget the man who screwed up everything.

But then, who am I to judge? Who am I to know what it’s like? I can’t even imagine the crap his dad has done to him. Maybe it’s normal that he’s haunted by it all. Maybe he’s supposed to think about it and confront it and not just ignore it all.

“I guess,” I finally say. Because that’s all it is. A guess.

“That’s what I want. To just put him behind me and pretend like he doesn’t exist. To just … be someone else. To work hard and to get ahead and not live this.”

I nod my head, but I don’t say anything. Sometimes the things he says … I don’t know how to answer him. I come from somewhere else. Somewhere with fancy cars and big birthday parties and Christmas sweaters and rose gardens and big screens. I’m not this.

“I wish I would stop fucking everything up.” Connor still isn’t looking at me. He’s staring out the windows, as if the answer to all his problems lies somewhere in the grassy field next to my car.

For a minute I’m not sure if I heard him correctly. But then he says it again.

“I know there’s a point where I’m supposed to just stop fucking everything up and look myself in the mirror and like what I see, and be my own person, and not let him be anything to me. I just wish I knew how to do that.”

“Yeah. That makes sense, I guess.” I stare at his hand in mine, run my finger up and down his, trying to resist the urge to trace the scars and remind him of their existence.

Am I supposed to agree, or tell him not to worry about it? And if I do agree, like I want to, if I tell him to just get over it and move on, is that judgmental? Will I sound too much like my mom?

The seat creaks a little as he turns to look at me, finally just look at me. His blue eyes are filled with such sad dejection mingled with a tiny piece of hope that it breaks my heart. “I just want … I want us to be … to just be. I don’t want him to affect everything. I don’t want to screw this up. You’re the first good thing that’s ever happened to me, and I don’t know what to do with it.” He’s having a hard time talking, like the words are too heavy or too hard to get his lips around.

I stare straight into his eyes, and neither of us says a word for at least a full minute. These are the moments I fall deeper in love with him. When neither of us says anything, and we just … stare. There’s an understanding there that goes much deeper than words ever could. A connection so real I can’t speak, because words could never say the things I feel.

“I just want you to know … I want you to know that despite everything … despite anything I might do or say, anything I’ve done before or might do in the future, I love you. More than life itself. And if some day something should happen and we’re not together anymore, I’ll still love you and I’ll still think of you.”

“Nothing like that will happen,” I say. “I promise you, if you love me like I love you, nothing like that will happen.”

“I know. We’ll be together forever,” he says. “I worship you. I love you. You’re everything.”

“I love you too,” I say.

“Promise?”

I nod my head, slowly, solemnly. “Yes, I promise.”

He kisses me, and I close my eyes and concentrate on the feeling of his lips, soft, against mine. It makes me dizzy, and I have to open my eyes.

He squeezes my hand. I don’t move, just let the car idle where we sit, somewhere halfway to nowhere but not nearly far enough away from everything.

“Sometimes I think I spent forever waiting for you,” he says. “My whole life, I’ve never had someone like you. Someone who doesn’t have to be there, but is anyway. Someone who wants to just … be with me because they want me. For me. Not because I’m your brother or your kid or anything, but because you choose me.”

I grip his hand tighter. “I know. My mom … sometimes I think if she could undo me, she would. If I could just somehow disappear, you know? I think I remind her of my dad, and she hates me for it.”

The seat creaks again as he leans over and kisses me on the cheek. “I wish I could make all these times slow-motion, and then whenever you leave for school or work, I could fast-forward until you’re back again.”

And sometimes I wish that too. I wish I could control it all and fast-forward through the scary stuff.

I just wish Connor was never a part of the scary stuff.

February 13

Five months, Fourteen days

Today is the anniversary of my dad’s death.

For the last eight years, I have baked a cake. I’m sure to someone on the outside, it seems stupid. Like I’m baking a cake to celebrate it or something. But it’s not like that.

When I was little, my dad loved cakes. Absolutely loved them. He would eat one for dinner every night if my mom let him.

I was nine the day he died. It had been coming for so long. It was like watching a freight train barrel down at you, getting closer with every second, totally unstoppable. And while my mom broke down that day and sobbed, I went a little numb. I was in denial. And so in my nine-year-old brain, I came up with the idea to just make him a cake. It made no sense then and it still doesn’t now, but I like the idea of making a cake anyway.

So now it’s a tradition. Each year it’s gotten a little better, starting with the crappy concave disaster when I was nine to the multi-layered German chocolate I’m assembling now. I know if my dad were here, he’d cut out the biggest piece imaginable and sit down with a glass of milk and devour the whole thing.

Somehow, for this one moment, it’s like he’s here, and the cake is just waiting for him to walk down the stairs.

I’m not sure if I should be doing this. My mom and I don’t really get along anymore, and she used to eat it with me. We never said much while we ate, but somehow there was a moment when we were both thinking about him, and it was almost as good as talking about him.

But today, it feels … like a cop-out, doing this. Like I’m going to hand her this cake and she’s going to smile and we’re going to have some Leave It to Beaver moment, and I can pretend when I leave for Connor’s house that everything is perfect.

But I know it’s never going to be that, because even if things go great with Connor and she miraculously starts accepting him, I remember the things she’s said. They’re like a wedge between us, and the words can’t be taken back.

But I’m making this cake anyway, because if I don’t, it’s like ignoring my dad. It’s like pretending he never existed. And my mom does that enough for both of us.

My mom gets home from work at six, and she walks past the kitchen and then does a double take when she sees me sitting on a stool, the cake towering in front of me.

“Hi,” I say. “It’s German chocolate this year.”

She just stares at it for a long, silent moment, and I’m not sure what she’s thinking, if she’s happy or touched or just angry that I would even try to do something like this after the fights we’ve been having.

Sometimes I think I might just march right up to her and say I love you, right to her face, just to see if she says it back.

A month ago, I stood in the hall outside her room. And I really wanted to do it. I really thought about it. But no matter how many times I reached out to her door, I couldn’t get my fingers to grip that brass doorknob. There were too many other arguments, too many hurtful words between us to say it now.

And so that six-paneled slab stayed between us.

“Thank you,” she says, her voice quiet. “That was very nice of you.”

And then she shocks me, because she crosses the room and she hugs me, at this awkward angle because I’m sitting on a stool.

But she doesn’t let me go, she just keeps hugging me. And so I stand and hug her back, and she just hugs tighter and tighter, and neither of us speak for such a long, silent moment it seems to stretch on forever.

It’s too hard to break. The silence is too heavy, too firm, to break with those three words, even though now seems like the time to do it. The words are lodged in my mouth, though. They won’t come out.

And then she sniffles and pulls away. “Can you put that in the fridge? I think I’ll take a hot bath.”

Her voice comes out choked and gargled and I don’t have time to say anything before she’s walking up the steps.

What just happened?

February 7

Five Months, eight days

Connor got a new job. He’s gone today, and I am alone.

After months of it being him and me all the time, I don’t know what to do with myself. I have time and quiet and silence.