LoveLines (20 page)

“I have a budget. Relax.”

“You also have to think about assembling. The flowers can’t go on until the night before the wedding,” I pointed out.

“I’m not assembling them, silly! You are! What do you think a maid of honor’s supposed to do?”

I smiled sheepishly. She was right. This is what I signed up for—tying fresh flowers to boxes. Me, sorting and snipping and arranging fresh flowers just so on the top of 150 teeny tiny boxes. I’m talking about me. Are you understanding this? I stepped out of my body for a moment and pictured myself doing this—battling my OCD that was both detrimental to
and
beneficial for a task like this. Catch-22. No wait. Nicki’s twenty-four. A Catch-24.

Well, at least I had bridesmaids to help me. That was if I didn’t let my perfectionism take over and redo all their work.

“Only you can make them look like this,” Nicki said, holding up a picture of “exactly” what she wanted “with the ribbon and all.”

“May I have that?” I asked. “To have a guide?”

Nicki passed it over. “Don’t lose it.”

“I won’t.”

“And I don’t want the girls helping you. They’ll screw them all up,” Nicki said.

“Wait. You’re asking me to assemble 150 boxes all by myself?”

“Is it a big deal?” she asked.

“Umm, yeah. I have a job. A boyfriend. A freaking life!”

“Bailey, no one in this wedding party is going to have a life three weeks before the wedding. Let’s just be clear about that now.”

I bit my tongue as our waitress placed salads on our table.
Once she left, I addressed my overbearing sister.

“Nicki, you have to let the girls help me. I’ll be up all night tying those flowers.”

“But why have the girls help you? You’ll just redo them anyway.”

There. There it
was. I was waiting for the evidence. Erica still thought I was delusional about Nicki’s motivation for appointing me maid of honor, but I was right! I knew I was right. I just didn’t have the proof. But now I did. Nicki was taking advantage of my OCD, and she nearly said so.

I cleared my throat. “I don’t have OCD anymore,” I said flippantly.

Nicki narrowed her eyes at me. “Huh?”

“I said I don’t have OCD anymore. Just so you know. I’m not, like, a perfectionist with things like I used to be.”

Nicki stared. “Oh, really?”

“
Mmhmm. I mean, if that’s what you were worried about with having the bridal party help me with the favors. I’m not gonna scream at them or anything. Or go back and redo their work, even if it’s not all that great.” God, I’m mean.

Nicki said nothing. She took a bite of her salad instead, and I listened for the sound of the little cogs in her brain turning. It made me the slightest bit nervous.

“I didn’t know you could be magically cured of OCD,” Nicki said after a moment.

“Well, stranger things have happened.
”

“So you don’t turn your locks three times anymore before going to bed?”

“No.” Lie.

“You don’t tap your pens?”

“No.” Another lie.

“You don’t count your steps from your car to your kitchen door?”

“No.” I just kept on lying.

“You don
’t wash your sheets every third day? Put the same number of ringlets in your hair when you curl it? Avoid the pavement cracks and walk to a rhythm you count out loud under your breath? Organize your Tupperware when you’re anxious? Count your peas before you eat them?”

“I don’t count my peas anymore!” I shouted.

Patrons turned in our direction. Nicki shook her head, silently telling them, “She’s not well.”

That bitch knew exactly what she was doing. The more she talked, the more anxious I grew. I tried really hard to suppress the urge. I talked myself out of it before. Lots of times. But the fork was very demanding. It was yelling at me: “I’m not
a pen, but I can hang!” I picked it up, hating my very core as I flipped it in my hand and tapped the end three times on the table.

Nicki smiled triumphantly. I wanted to scream at her some more, but I couldn’t. Acting on my compulsion erased all the tension, anxiety, and anger. All that remained was a touch of sadness, sitting uncomfortably on my heart.

“You’re using me,” I whispered. My eyes burned as the tears pushed forward, threatening to spill over the edges of my eyelids.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Nicki replied.

“You’re using me for your wedding. You’re using my OCD. It’s a shitty thing to do, Nicki.”

Silence.

“All for perfect boxes and scored edges,” I continued, and then I looked up at her. “I’m supposed to be managing it. You just want it to stay bad.”

“For a while longer, Bailey. That’s it,” she replied.

My eyes grew wide, and I felt the tear slide down my cheek.

“Are you hearing yourself?” I breathed. “What is wrong with you?”

“You’re so good at this stuff. I’m not,” Nicki said. “I can’t do any of this without you. You’re, like, a professional.”

“Stop flattering me.”

“But you are,” Nicki insisted. “Mom and I agree.”

“Of course you do.” I wiped the tear and stood up.

“Hey, where are you going?”

“Home. And you can pay for my salad,” I said. “I didn’t
want the fucking thing anyway.”

***

“Nicki is a selfish bitch,” Erica said, watching the play area like a hawk. Little Noah held Annie’s hand as they ascended the blue plastic tube. No way in hell I’d ever get in that thing. All I could think about was kids’ pee.

We sat in the McDonald’s near her house, eating Big Macs and fries and trying to remember when kids’ play equipment changed from metal to plastic.

“The nineties. That’s when everything started going downhill,” Erica said.

“You think?”

She nodded. “Mid-nineties. Suddenly kids could get hurt! OMG!”

I laughed.

“The world is just too safe,” Erica complained. “Kids need to cut themselves on some sharp edges. Experience stitches. A broken limb. I want Little Noah looking like a beat-up mess by the time he’s eighteen.”

“Why?”

“‘Cause no woman wants her a delicate man. He needs to be sporting at least five scars.”

“I thought mothers don’t want to think about the day their sons will date,” I said, swirling my fry in ketchup and Special Sauce.

“Eh. I’m realistic. I gotta think about it.”

“He’s four!” I cried, and giggled.

My hair kept sliding forward into the glob of ketchup on my wrapper. I fished out a hairband from my purse and pulled it back.

“You didn’t even wipe the ends,” Erica pointed out.

“Doesn’t matter,” I replied dismissively, and took a huge chunk out of my burger.

“This is a new Bailey,” she observed.

“Not really,” I replied. “Just defeated at the moment.”

Erica eyed me. “So like I said, Nicki is a selfish bitch.”

I nodded.

“You knew all this, though, when you agreed to b
e her maid of honor,” Erica pointed out.

“I know that. But what was I supposed to say? I’m her sister,” I argued.

“We’re more like sisters than you and her,” Erica replied.

I smiled. “True dat.
Doesn’t change the fact that I agreed.”

“You have a choice, Bailey, and if you’re
gonna cry every time Nicki makes you feel badly for your disorder—”

“But that’s just it! She wasn’t trying to make me feel badly. She was trying to convince me how awesome it is so that I’d do up her boxes of truffles just right.
The girl is a sociopath. What kind of person manipulates a debilitating condition into a positive? She’s twisted, that one.”

“Then why even help her? Just pull out. Let her toady BFF be maid of honor.”

“And risk the wrath of my mother? No, thank you. Isn’t worth it,” I said. “Plus, Dad would have to hear all about it, and that’s just not fair to him.”

“True,” Erica agreed. “I just worry that this wedding planning business will exacerbate your condition, and your job is to manage your compulsions.”

“I know.”

“I don’t
wanna show up at your house one day and find you sorting and stacking and pulling your hair out strand by strand and counting them.”

“Cute.”

“I’m serious! And I definitely don’t want you going back to counting your peas,” Erica said.

“What is up with the peas today? Nicki mentioned it, too!”

“B, it was freakin’ weird, okay? You counted your peas, then divided them into even groups on your plate. And if there was an odd number, you’d give the leftovers to your sister.”

I finished my burger and balled the wrapper in my fist.

“I was seven.”

Erica threw
up her hands. “I know. Just sayin’.”

“Don’t you dare tell Reece about the peas,” I hissed.

“Why the hell would I do that? I like this guy. I hope you marry him,” Erica replied.

My face lit up. “Really?”

“Sure. He’s sweet and funny. He’s smart, thank God. He’s got you relaxing.”

“I’ve stopped arriving to work at 7:58 A.M.”

Erica’s mouth dropped open.

“Oh, I didn’t mention that?” I asked nonchalantly.

“Give it up,” Erica ordered, holding her hand in the air. I slapped it. “I’ll go help him pick out a ring.”

I laughed, then turned around at the sound of Annie’s high-pitched screaming. Erica shot up and ran into the play area. I watched her pick up her daughter, ask her a few questions while she inspected her knee, then nuzzle her and rain kisses all over her tear-stained cheeks. I smiled.

“Just a little bump,” Erica said, carrying Annie back to our table. Little Noah followed behind.

“And what about you?” I asked him.

He grinned.

“Any bruises on you?”

He shook his head. “Nope.”

“Well, you better get to working on that. Your momma wants you scarred up by the time you hit high school.”

He stared at me, confused, and I reached out suddenly to grab him. He squealed and hid behind Erica.

“Little flirt,” I mumbled.

A hurricane was coming. Wrightsville Beach and Wilmington were due for one since it’d been three years since a storm of that magnitude touched down. It was late October—right outside the traditional hurricane season—so the storm surprised residents. It really just annoyed me because I thought we’d be spared another year. Nature’s trick. She’s a tricky bitch.

Hurricane Holly was her name, and I had a hard time taking her seriously. You see, I went to elementary school with a little girl named Holly who sold Girl Scout cookies and braided friendship bracelets. When we were all learning cuss words for the first time, she was still screaming, “Golly!” She landed herself one r
eally obnoxious nickname: Golly Holly.

And I starte
d calling the hurricane “Golly Holly” until Reece told me to have some respect. He’d recently learned that it had been reclassified as a Category 2, and experts predicted it may climb to a Category 3 status before reaching landfall. Reece was really into this hurricane. He watched The Weather Channel religiously, making predictions and asking me endless amounts of questions. This would be his first hurricane by the beach, and I was growing impatient with his enthusiasm.

“Calm down, or I’m putting you on a plane to Baltimore!” I said, standing outside his apartment.

“I just don’t know if we oughta board up your windows now¸ or wait a little later when we learn the hurricane’s exact trajectory.”

I rolled my eyes. “It’s a hurricane, Reece. It’s really fucking huge. I think it’ll hit my house either way.”

He laughed and poked my side. “Be nice. I can’t help I’m hopped up on all this. It’s exciting and scary as hell. I’ve never lived somewhere with hurricane evacuation signs all over town.”

I nodded.

“Should we get more milk?”

“Not yet.”

“You sure? I’ve been collecting bottled water, matches, batteries—”

“Just let me see your apartment
already,” I interrupted.

“You’re a buzz
kill, Bailey.”

“I promise to get hopped up on this hurricane with you as soon as you let me inside. I’ve been dying to see your place, Reece.”

“Fine, but you’re about to be majorly disappointed.”

I pushed past him through the door and into his living room. He wasn’t lying; it was bare. A couch. A coffee table. A TV. That’s it. I turned to the dining room, or what I thought was supposed to be the dining room. No table or chairs. I didn’t wait for permission and walked into his bedroom. A bed. A nightstand. And a fishing pole.

Fishing pole?

“Reece?” I knew he stood behind me. I could feel him.

“Yes?”

“Where do you keep all your things hidden?” I asked playfully.

He chuckled. “These are it.”

“This is everything? A couch and a bed? And a fishing pole?” I turned around to face him.

He nodded.

“You fish?”

He nodded again.

“Well, you’ll get along with my dad then.”

He smiled.

“I need you to explain all this to me. Are you a minimalist?”

“I’m a foster kid,” he replied. “Why do you think I’m so personable?”

I didn’t know if he was joking, so I didn’t laugh.

“I’m joking,” he said softly. “Well, about the personable thing. Not the foster kid thing. I am a foster kid.”

“Oh.”

He walked toward me and took my hand, leading me back to the living room where we sat together on his couch.

“I never had a permanent home. I was moved around a lot as a kid, and I learned quickly not to get attached to things because they were often taken away. Once I hit middle school, my odds of getting adopted plummeted. No one likes older kids. They want the young ones. You know, cuter. Don’t have attitudes. All that. So I shuffled between children’s homes throughout Baltimore until I turned eighteen.”

My brain couldn’t absorb all this. I felt like a jackass. Don’t ask me why. I just did.

“Put myself through school. Graduated with a degree in marketing. Made a few friends. Stayed in Baltimore and worked at a shit firm until Camden convinced me to move down here. And there’s my story in a nutshell.”

I opened my mouth to speak.

“No, I don’t know my parents. Yes, I looked for them once. Yes, I learned that my mother was a drug addict who died when I was twelve. No, I never found my father.” He paused and looked at me.

“Did you leave behind a girl?”

He shook his head. “They never wanted to stick around. I guess because I don’t have a history. Does that make sense? I mean, if I marry, I’m giving her what? No family on my side. No fun childhood stories. No, ‘Oh, so that’s where you get that. From your dad!’ moments. What am I
gonna do? Give her my name? I don’t even know where ‘Powell’ comes from. A part of me thinks I made it up. And then there’s the issue of . . .” He grabbed my hands. “Bailey! Oh God, don’t cry! I didn’t mean to say all that stuff to make you feel sorry for me! Oh, baby.”

He pulled me onto his lap. I was a gurgling, blubbering mess. Way more water than Hurricane Holly planned to dump on this town. I soaked Reece’s neck, trying my hardest to muffle my cries against his skin.

“I realize I made a really bad case for myself just now,” he said. “Is that why you’re crying? You don’t wanna be with me because I don’t know where my last name comes from?”

I wailed and clung to him
harder, shaking my head vehemently.

“I love you!” I cried.

“I love you, too,” he said quietly.

“I don’t care if you don’t know where your name comes from,” I went on.

He hugged me tighter.

“I . . . I feel awful,” I said.

“Why?” He pushed me away gently so that I was forced to look at him.

“Because I wish that wasn’t your life.”

He considered this. “I wish it weren’t either. But I can’t change it. And it wasn’t all bad. I met Camden in school and spent the night with him all the time. His family practically adopted me.”

I nodded.

“I learned how to survive on my own.”

“But where are your things, Reece? You should have interests and stuff in this home that reflect you. Where are you?
Who
are you?”

I felt the panic surge through my heart like a hot arrow, piercing the muscle and sending it into emotional arrest. He saw because he grabbed hold of my shoulders and shook me lightly.

“I’m here,” he said. “Okay? Yes, I’m a foster kid. Yes, I’m a person with no pictures. Yes, I’m a person with no family. But that doesn’t make me less of a person, Bailey.”

“I know.”

“I have interests. I just keep them all in my closet,” he whispered.

“Like whips and chains?”

He smirked. “Exactly.”

I leaned over and kissed his lips. “Show me.”

He led me back to his bedroom and opened his closet doors. It was a large walk-in with clothes on one side and “stuff” on the other. I saw the tackle box first.

“Doesn’t it smell?” I asked.

“I clean everything really well. Plus, I haven’t fished in forever. Job keeps me pretty busy. And you,” he added.

“Oh, am I keeping you from it? I don’t mean to. I know hobbies are important,” I said.

“Relax. It’s no big deal. When I get the overwhelming urge again, I’ll bring you along. How’s that?”

I nodded. The second item I noticed was a large box of books. I peered inside.

“I’m into Stephen King and Tom Clancy,” he said, watching me.

“You’re such a guy,” I mumbled, and he laughed.

“Read them all.”

“What’s back here?”

“All my tools,” he replied.

“Tools?”

“I didn’t mention I owned a house in Baltimore? It was a fixer-upper, so I learned how to do everything myself.”

I fingered his hand tools—wrench, hammer, crowbar.

“All my big stuff is in a storage unit. Miter saw. Ladder. Tile saw. I just keep these guys around for easy access. Just in case.”

“So you’re a fixer,” I said.

“That’s what they tell me,” he replied.

We fell silent as I contemplated this revelation. Reece was a fixer. He liked to fix things. Is that why he was dating me? He saw my OCD as a project? I shuddered at the thought. If it was really a project he was after, then
the “I love you” didn’t count. It didn’t mean anything. It was just a way to weasel himself into my life, take over, and starting “correcting.”

I thought about our love-making. I thought about the control he wielded in bed. I thought it was sexy at first, but maybe it meant something else entirely. Maybe it was Reece exerting power over me—turning me into what he wanted. The girlfriend he never had. It was easy for him. I was compliant. I was changing—ignoring my rituals. Fighting my tics. But that’s good, right? Those are good things. So why was I freaking out?
Oh my God, I was really freaking out.

“Bailey?” Reece asked carefully.
He must have seen the panic in my eyes.

“I’m not a project!” I screamed. I pushed past him for the living room, and he caught my arm.

“Where the hell did that come from?” he asked.

“You . . . you fix things. You
wanna fix me. That’s why you’re dating me, right? You wanna fix my OCD. You wanna—”

“Stop.”

“—make me into some new person. You wanna—”

“Stop it, Bailey.”

“—change me. You don’t really love me. You just said that—”

“I said stop!” he shouted, shaking me.

I shut my mouth. I tried to focus on my breathing—without counting—but it wasn’t working.

“Don’t you ever say again that I don’t love
you. I’m not here to fix you. I have no desire to change you. Help you manage your condition? Yes. But you told me I was supposed to do that.”

I remained silent.

“I would have never pursued you with the intention of changing you. Why would I bother? Seems like a lot of work if you ask me.”

I listened intently.

“I fell in love with you because of you. I like your quirky ways. You know how many times I got myself off thinking about your ‘just so’ ponytail? You know how fucking weird that is?”

I cracked a smile.

“I stole all your pens that morning because I wanted you to come after me and scream at me. I wanted an excuse to act on my weird attraction to your weird tics.”

I laughed.

“Camden said the most ridiculous and inappropriate thing to me a long time ago when I told him I was attracted to you,” Reece said.

“Oh yeah?”

He nodded. “He told me not to get involved with you because people with OCD are hard to handle. Hard to date. Hard to live with.”

I shrugged. I couldn’t be upset with that advice. It was good advice.

“He . . . gave me examples.” Reece scratched his stubble and cleared his throat.

“Do share,” I encouraged.

“He said you may be one of those who counts the number of times you bounce up and down on my dick during sex.” He paused, staring at me, waiting for my reaction.

I clapped a hand over my mouth
to hide the grin. “What an idiot,” I mumbled.

“I know. But it got me thinking. All night
I thought about you doing that. It turned me on. Are you hearing what I’m saying to you? I got turned on thinking about you counting out loud!”

“You’re as freaking weird as I am,” I noted.

“I know, right?! Bailey, if you think I wanna fix you, you’re dead wrong. I don’t even wanna help you manage this thing you’ve got going on. I’m only doing it because I know it’s the right thing to do, but I’d much rather you go tic-ing all over my heart and brain.”

“You selfish bastard,” I replied, but the flattery was evident on my face. I blushed and grinned.

“I know it.”

“You
wanna do it right here on the floor and listen as I count, don’t you?”