Losing Her (38 page)

“We weren’t broken up!”

“What in the hell were you then? Amy said she saw Ace home and alone for two weeks prior to her dad passing away and said she didn’t see any sign of you.”

Rumors were circulating about us at home? Of course they were. Everyone had been shocked to see us together and expected us to fail.

I hang up without saying another word and toss my phone on the bed so I don’t have to see the large quantity of texts and voicemails I know Erin’s left for me. I collect the remote and the back that splintered off when it hit the wall and replace the batteries before sprawling across my bed. Several channels pass before I stop on an MMA fight. My eyes follow the contenders for a few rounds, providing me with a strange sense of relief, as though I’m vicariously punching through their fists. It also serves to increase my level of tension as my muscles become more tightly wound with the desire to actually connect my fist with someone.

Then I see her.

My body jackknifes from the bed so I can get closer. As the camera pans out to the rest of the crowd, I lunge for the remote, fumbling with it as my eyes and fingers scan the buttons, trying to make sense of the same ones I push every day, unable to recall how it functions as my heart thrums in my chest. Common sense tells me there’s no way it’s her. She hates fighting. There’s no way in hell she’d go to a fight. But I swear I saw her.

I hit a few buttons to make it rewind and then hit play, scanning the screen anxiously as I step closer. Her blond hair is longer, her face still looks too thin but not nearly as gaunt as it had been in the picture Jameson showed me back in December. I’d know those eyes anywhere though. I’ve stared at them so many times, they’re burned into nearly every one of my memories, even ones she wasn’t present for.

I press pause and study her. She’s talking to a man that’s sitting beside her, laughing at something he’s saying, giving him her genuine smile. My smile.

I slump to my bed and stare at her. This man did something I couldn’t. He fixed her. He’s healing her.

My entire body aches as I sit in bed, rewinding and playing the scenes with her, time and time again.

“God, I’ve missed you,” Erin moans against my bicep from where her tongue dances across my tattoos.

Why can’t she just shut up? Why can’t I just enjoy this moment? She’s here, willing, warm, begging, and all I can do is focus on not thinking about
her
again.

“Kiss me, Max.”

I look at Erin’s face. Her lashes rest on cheeks that are covered with small freckles she works to conceal with makeup. I still have never seen her without makeup. She goes to sleep with it on, and then instantly reapplies it after her shower. Even when we go to the gym she has it on, like she’s trying to hide from the world, or maybe she’s trying to hide from herself.

I press my lips to hers, desperately trying to empty my mind.

She pulls her head back and looks at me. “Max, kiss me,” she demands.

“I am kissing you.”

“I mean really kiss me.”

“It’s kissing,” I snap, sitting up.

She huffs and sits up beside me, completely comfortable with her nudity as her large breasts hang between us. I’m living the male dream here, and yet all I want to do is scream at her to leave.

“Are you seriously stopping?”

“I’m not in the mood.” This is one of the most honest things I’ve ever told her.

“Do you want me to help you get there? Because I need something here, Max. You can’t just call quits.”

Her words should have me thinking about sex, and foreplay, and what I can make her body do with my own. Instead, the word quit is running on repeat.
She
quit me.

“Like hell you can’t.”

“Whatever, I’m going home.”

I’m more relieved than I could have imagined when she stands to pull on her clothes.

Erin’s supposed to be my stepping stone, my distraction, but since I saw that fight, and saw
her
sitting in the stands, all I can do is compare the two of us and our situations.

Is she sleeping with him? Did she make him wait for any length of time? Does she say she loves him?

As Erin slams the door behind her, I hear her mutter the word quit again in an angry breath.

Quit.

If fuck is considered a bad word, quit sure as hell ought to be.

I flip on the TV and open my recordings, pulling up the MMA fight of Danny Hirsch. I’ve watched this so many times that if it were an old video cassette like the ones my grandma still has Disney movies on, it would likely be broken by now.

I lie in bed and fast forward to the parts I know she’s in. I watch her expressions, her smile. It took me several hours to of rewinding and playing short scenes of her to let the entire footage play through. It was near the end that I learned she wasn’t there because of the man sitting beside her; she was there for the fighter: Danny Hirsch.

I watch her lean over his body and kiss him, and hear the crowd grow raucous with cheers. Then I Google him again and seek any information that may tell me more. There are a few photos of the two together along with the man that’s at the fight with her. There are websites with allegations of him dating “the mysterious blonde” and a few reports on them having known each other for years. This gives me a small piece of mind, knowing that the internet and these sites often fabricate information for ratings. She didn’t know him after all …
right?

I’
d known for years that my parents fought. Our house in Arizona was fairly small and the walls were paper thin. I’m sure that even our neighbors knew. Their fights had never been physical. They were always verbal spars—my mom accusing my dad of not loving her enough, him accusing her of working too much, her accusing him of drinking too much, him accusing her again of working too much, and so on. There were plenty of times I’d been sure it was going to become physical when the accusations had turned to threats and the strained voices turned into angry volatile tones. My brothers had too, apparently, because on those occasions one or both of them would shove our dad into the attached garage and lock the door. It always seemed strange to me that he’d never left while in there. I have no idea what he did while he was in the garage; he had access to get out but he always stayed until Hank would eventually go unlock the door.

While he was in there, Hank or Billy would go and talk to mom while I tried to remain oblivious to the events by hiding under my covers and pretending to be asleep.

The fights escalated when Hank left for college. Although Hank could be a grade A-asshole to Billy and me when he wanted to be, his absence took a sense of peace from the house that had always been too fragile to begin with. Billy was only fifteen, and his hot temper didn’t serve to resolve the conflicts. Usually, he escalated the issues.

One night, the fighting had built, becoming particularly heated. Billy was failing miserably at calming things down. I crept out of my room and down the hall to the dining room where the three of them were converged. At ten, I still only came up to my dad’s chest, but I was channeling Hank, hearing the sternness of his voice as he used to direct our dad to calm down and get out.

My voice wavered a bit with the first word, then came out shockingly loud and clear. I felt triumphant as my dad stopped and turned to look at me, his cheeks flushed with alcohol and rage, then he laughed. It was a loud, cruel laugh, and my stomach rolled at the stench of bourbon permeating his breath as it reached me in waves. Even when it wasn’t on his breath, my father always reeked of bourbon; his pores excreted bourbon sweat.

Anger surged through me for him laughing in my face, especially in such a demonic manner. I’d never seen or heard my dad laugh when Hank instructed him to leave. Hell, I’d never heard him laugh like that period.

His laugh stopped as quickly as it had begun, and before I could react, he backhanded me. Hard.

The metallic taste of blood from my cheek hitting my teeth filled my mouth as my eyes grew round with surprise. My brothers had hit me many times, way harder than that even, but my dad had never hit any of us.

My shock was reciprocated on his face as his mouth fell open and he choked on a few incoherent words.

Billy punched him in the gut before the shock wore off, making him double over. Although Billy was a lot shorter than Hank, he was thicker, his muscles more compact, and he could deliver a punch that left you dazed.

My ears registered my mom’s screaming, and by the hoarseness of her voice, she’d been screaming a while. She threatened to call the police and demanded he leave. In all of their fights I’d never heard her tell him to leave, usually she begged him to stay.

I
wake up with my heart pounding as I sit up and quickly scan my room. It’s still dark enough out to know I should still be sleeping.

Erin’s next to me, her naked leg stuck to mine. I pull mine away and roll so I feel the coolness of the sheets, offering me a chance to breathe. Maybe having her so close to me triggered the dream? I intentionally work to sleep on the opposite side of the bed from her on the nights she stays over, which is becoming a routine.

Zeus’s head lifts at the side of my bed from where he lies on his dog bed each night, and I drop my hand over the edge to reassuringly pat his head and let him know to go back to sleep.

He lies his box head on the mattress close to mine, looking lonely, and I make a quiet vow to him that I’ll take him running.

He doesn’t move.

We both know it’s not running that he’s missing right now. It’s
her
.