On an Edge of Glass (22 page)

Ben
looks up.  When he sees me standing in the open door, his beautiful gold-flecked eyes go wide and that perfect of his mouth opens, but nothing comes out of it.  It wouldn’t matter if it did because I can’t hear him now.  I’m already off—down the hall, through the door, and pushing against the sea of bodies crashing into me, pulling me under.  Everything is starting to morph together—the people and the lights are blurring and shifting like a dream and it’s not the alcohol this time.  I’m crying real tears that fog everything up and weigh me down.  I can barely think, but I know that I need to make it out to the black, bleeding night before everything inside of me rises to the surface. 

Wiping my face,
I stumble past the bouncer who guards the front door of the bar and I turn a corner.  Ben’s voice is somewhere behind me.  He’s calling my name and he’s using the word
please
over and over again.  A hundred million pleases but I still won’t look.  Everything is ruined and broken and I just want to get away from it all.

I step toward
the street and lift my hand up for a taxi even though there isn’t one in sight.  Ben reaches for my outstretched arm and I knock him away.  He shifts and tries to pull my face back so that I’ll have to look at him.  I don’t want him to see my traitorous tears, so I shove and push and spin.

“Ellie,
stop it!  I swear that it’s not what you think.”

That’s it.  I laugh.  His words are too much of a cl
iché and I can’t handle clichés right now.  Not after getting my disappointing LSAT scores and everything that has gone wrong with this day.  “Oh, you mean to tell me that I didn’t walk in on you and your
fiancé
in an embrace in the back room?  That’s funny, because that’s what it looked like.”

Ben winces.  He didn’t know that I know and now he does and I can see the regret sliding around
his face, altering his features.  “That stuff between me and Lily is ancient history.  You have to understand why I never told you all of it.” 

“
Ancient history?  It was a few months ago!  And, no, I don’t have to understand anything you tell me because
this
,” I point back and forth between us, “is done so let’s not waste each other’s time by hashing out all the gory details.”  I want to take it back almost immediately, but anger and hurt are working tandem on me, pushing me further.  “I’m finished with you.”

Ben grabs my elbows
harshly.  He’s backlit by a street light.  “Ellie!”  He sounds almost as worked up as me.  “Will you just listen to me for one minute?  That’s all I’m asking you to do.”  When I don’t respond, he takes a deep breath and releases his hold on my arms.  “I didn’t tell you about Lily because it has nothing to do with us.  What’s happening between you and me is totally separate from all that shit! I didn’t tell you because I knew that it would freak you out and I was afraid, okay?  I was afraid that you would bolt and then I wouldn’t have you in my life.”  He lowers his head so that his eyes are at my level.   “And I
want
you in my life, Ellie.  I want you in my life so much that I didn’t think things through.”

“Ben…” 
I drop my chin, but he pulls it back up with his index finger. 

“Don’t do this.
”  He says in a softer voice.  We’re so close that every time he breathes I can feel it on my face.  My skin starts to tingle.  My heart pounds even harder against my breastbone.  “Please don’t do this.  We’re right for each other.  I know it.”

I blink.  Then
I do about the stupidest thing ever.  I kiss him.  I kiss him like I won’t be able to breathe otherwise.  I press against him, and wrap my arms around his neck.  Ben hesitates for a fraction of a second, and then he opens his mouth and lets me inside, and the spinning all around me is centered in one place.  Strong hands go to my waist and pull me in, crushing me to his chest.  It’s like neither of us can get close enough.

And for a few
moments I forget and everything is perfect.  But, here’s a sad fact: perfect isn’t meant to be.  When you aim for perfect, you just wind up ruined.  I’m learning that the hard way.  I had all sorts of perfect plans, but look how they turned out.

There’s goodbye on my lips.  My mouth
slows and I feel Ben stiffen and pull away.  He rests his face against my cheek.  His voice is resigned, like he knows my secret thoughts.  “Why?” 

I shake my head.
  Tears are burning my eyes.  “It doesn’t matter anymore Ben.  This whole thing isn’t going to work out.  Not in the long run.  We’re going to wind up wanting different things from life and hurting each other even more.”  I swallow a sob and let the words continue to tumble from my lips.  They feel like lies, but I can’t seem to stop them.  “It’s better if we end this before it can blow up in our faces.  Right now we don’t even know each other’s middle names.  If we go further down this road, we’ll end up tearing each other apart.  This way is safer.”

H
e jerks back and his expression is anguished.  It’s strange how this day started out with so much possibility.  I think about the goodbye kiss on the cheek that Ben gave me this morning before he left for his last exam, and how I pinched his butt as he walked away from my bed.  How did we end up fighting on a dark street outside a bar? 

“
Safer?  Why are you saying that?”  His voice is laced with accusation.  “Why can’t you give us a real chance instead of assuming that we’re doomed before we start?  You act like what’s between us is a piece of shit.  It’s not.”

I place my hands on
top of his and hold his eyes with mine.  “I know that.”

“
Jesus Ellie.  You won’t even tell your friends that you’re with me.  When I bring it up, you act like I’ve asked you to get my name tattooed over your heart or something.  It’s like you’re embarrassed of me.  Why is that?  Is it because I’m not some perfect boyfriend who’s got country club parents and a five-year plan that’s carved in stone?”  He steps away from me and I shiver. 

I shake my head. 
“It’s not like that, Ben.  You know that it’s not.”

“Then what is it like?  Because it feels like you’re ripping my
fucking heart out of my chest.”

I taste the salt of my tears. 
“Ben, please…”

“Please what?”  When I
don’t respond, he keeps going.  “I need you to know that Lily and I are nothing to each other anymore.  She and I are over and done with and it has nothing to do with what’s going on between you and me.  And our engagement?  That was a mistake.  I’ve never felt…” He glances away from me.   “Ellie, I swear that I was telling her goodbye again and she was sad so I hugged her, but if you think that it was more than that you don’t understand. How could I…”

There’s something like sincerity in his
voice, but I’m pissed and sad and drunk, and everything from this day is crammed up inside of me to the point where I’m afraid that I’m going to explode.  I don’t want to hear anymore.  I tell him so. 

With his back angled to me, h
e takes three steps away.  He’s standing in front of a large acrylic sign that displays the city bus schedule.  Before I realize what he’s planning to do, he cocks his arm back and punches the sign so hard that a large dent appears in the center.

“Fu
uuuuuck!”

“Ben, no!” 
I gasp and grab for his curled hand but he pulls it away and cradles it against his chest. 

He shakes his head and glances
over my shoulder.  When I turn to see what’s caught his eye, I see Mark standing in the distance, under a street light, watching us apprehensively.

“You know
what the worst part is?”  Ben whispers.  “I knew that afternoon in the coffee shop.  I knew it.  Somehow, I knew that even though I was already broken, you would find a way to grind me down into nothing.  That’s why I didn’t come over and talk to you, Ellie.  I wanted to.  Damn, I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to meet someone so badly before, but I just knew.  And after everything that happened with Lily and Drew, I didn’t think I could handle it.”  His eyes close and a pained frown pinches his forehead.  “And then fate steps in and makes the two of us roommates and… well, I guess that you know the rest.”

“Ben…  I-I don’t know what to say.” 
I reach for him, wanting to connect somehow.

“Forget it,
Ellie.” Ben moves away from me.  His body quivers.  He stops and turns back.  His nose is pink from the cold, or all of the emotion, or maybe both.  “Phillip,” he says quietly.  “That’s my middle name.”  Then he tightens his jaw, shifts his injured hand and keeps going until he’s around the corner and I can’t see him anymore.

It’s
like everything that’s running inside of me is finally catching up and the only thing I’m left with is a big, hollow, empty space where all the good stuff should be.

Mark is
staring.  He walks forward until he’s standing directly in front of me.  I think about how he saw this coming and warned me all those weeks ago.  He could gloat right now, but he doesn’t.  He tucks my head into the safety of his chest and hugs me close. 

After a silence that feels bigger than the night, I say,
“Mark, what about his
hand
?  He won’t be able to play guitar tonight.”

Mark squeezes me tighter. 
“I know, Ellie-bear,” he murmurs into my hair.  “I know.”

“
So, what do you want to do?”  Mark asks gently when the taxi drops us off at my house. 

             
I shake my head.  “I don’t know exactly, but I don’t want to be here in case he comes home.  And, I don’t really feel like explaining to Payton and Ainsley why I took off tonight.”

             
He nods wordlessly and we walk to my room and finish getting my suitcase together.  I’m glad that I started packing for winter break yesterday because my thundering head and my mixed-up heart are making it difficult for me to think properly.

             
It takes us a few minutes to figure out the car situation because after everything I drank, there’s no way that I can drive tonight.

             
Mark takes the jangling keys from my hand and heads for the front door.  “I’ll just drive yours so that you’ll have it at my place and can leave for home from there in the morning.  I’m sure that I can figure out getting my car tomorrow.”

             
“Okay.”  I fall in step behind him.  “Are you positive?”

             
“Yes.  Let’s go.”

             
We’re quiet the whole way to Mark’s apartment.  I don’t cry, but I’m close.  My stomach’s churning and complaining, and every time I close my eyes, things start to sway and I think I’m going to hurl. 

             
I finally do lose it when we get to the parking lot of Mark’s apartment complex.  I’m puking my guts out over the brittle frozen grass and I’m freezing because I didn’t want to ruin my coat so I took it off. 

             
Like a champ, Mark holds my hair while I throw up.  But because he’s Mark, in between rounds he gets back at me by torturing me with stories about the Kardashian sisters because he knows that I can’t stand them.  By unspoken agreement we don’t talk about Ben or what happened.

             
When there’s nothing left and my stomach is as empty as every other part of me, Mark helps me shuffle inside and brush my teeth three times and get into an oversized long-sleeved t-shirt and yoga pants.  He scoots me into his bed and then stays there, looming over me and looking hard like he’s trying to figure something out. 

             
My head’s still swimming, but I’m not so gone that I don’t start to feel awkward.  “What is it?”

             
A line appears on his forehead.  “Are you sure that you’re okay, Ellie?”

             
I chuckle.  “Well my mouth still tastes like ass and I think my organs might be lying in the grass out in front of your apartment building, but other than that I’m peachy.”

             
Mark shakes his head.  “I meant earlier…”

             
I know what he
meant
, I just don’t know how to answer him.  I close my eyes and wish that everything would stop whirling.  “No.  I’m not fine.  Not at all.  I don’t know when I’ll be fine, if ever.”

             
“That’s what I thought.”

             
“I ruined things with Ben.”

             
“I know.”

             
“He’s probably never going to speak to me again.”

             
Mark leans down and kisses my forehead.  “Never is a really long time.”