“What?” I ask, honestly confused, between my hangover and seeing her like this.
With a colder look in her eyes, she says, “I said, ‘Hardin, where were you all day?’ ”
I snap back to the situation. Fuck.
And right as I’m about to make an excuse, Carly walks up and smacks me on the ass. “Well, Mr. Dark and Moody, can I go? You can walk back to your car from here, right? I really need to get back home.”
Tessa’s eyes go wide. “Who are you?”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Not this. Not now.
Carly smiles and gives Tessa a little nod. “I’m Hardin’s friend Carly. Sorry about your accident.” Then she looks at me. “Can I go now?”
“Bye, Carly,” I snap.
“Wait,” Tessa says. “He was with you last night at your place?”
I try to make eye contact with her, but she continues to stare at Carly, who says, “Yeah, I was just trying to take him back to his car.”
“His car? Where’s that?” she says, her voice shaking.
“Bye, Carly,” I say again and glare at her.
Tessa stands up, though her knees buckle a little. “No—tell me where his car is.”
I grab hold of her elbows in an attempt to stop her, but she pushes me away and then whimpers from the pain of the motion. “Don’t touch me,” she says through her teeth.
“Carly. Where is his car?” Tessa asks again.
Carly raises her hands and looks back and forth between Tessa and me. “At the bar where I work. Okay, I’m going now,” she says and wanders off.
“Tess . . .” I plead. God, why am I such a fuckup?
“Get away from me,” she replies. Her cheek goes in a little; I can tell she’s biting down on it to keep her tears at bay. Now that she’s standing here, staring off in the distance and trying to appear emotionless, I’m missing the days of her constant crying.
“Tessa, we have . . .” I begin, but my voice cracks. Now I’m the emotional one, and for once I don’t care. The panic from seeing the front end of her car smashed still courses through me, and I don’t want anything other than to hold her right now.
She still doesn’t look at me. “Go. Now. Or I’ll tell the officer to make you.”
“I don’t give a fuck about them—”
Her eyes whip back toward me with a vengeance. “No—I’m done listening to you! I’m not sure what happened last night, but all morning I knew—somehow knew—you were with someone else. I was just trying to force myself not to believe it.”
“We can work this out,” I beg. “We always have.”
“Hardin! Do you not see that I was just in an accident?” she yells and starts crying, prompting the EMT to walk back over. “Actually, you probably can’t tell, your version of reality is so warped. You write me a note last night about going out with your dad this morning, then you text me that you fell asleep drunk in your car after drinking with Landon. With Landon! You must think I’m stupid enough to believe anything—even things that contradict each other.” She glares at me. “Of course, you’re a walking bundle of contradictions, so, yeah, I can see how you might mistakenly think the rest of reality is, too.”
The realization of just how stupid I was fills me, and I can’t speak for a moment. I’m so stupid, so very, very stupid. And not just because I couldn’t keep my stories straight.
The EMT takes that moment to put a hand on Tessa’s shoulder and says, “Is everything okay over here? We need to get you to the hospital, just to check everything out.”
Wiping her tears from her cheeks, Tessa looks dead at me and says to her, “Yes. I’m ready. I’m ready to leave now.”
chapter seventy-eight
HARDIN
I crack open my fourth beer and spin the cap on the glossy wooden surface of our coffee table. When is she going to be here? Is she going to be here?
Maybe I should just text her and tell her that I did have sex with Carly, just to end both of our miseries.
A loud knock on the door breaks me from my plotting.
Here we go. I hope she’s alone. I grab my beer, take another swig, and head for the door. The knocking quickly shifts to pounding, and I swing open the door to find Landon. Before I can react, his hands grip the collar of my T-shirt and he slams me against the wall.
What the fuck? He’s much stronger than I ever expected, and I’m astounded by his aggressive behavior.
“What the hell is wrong with you!” he yells. I didn’t know his voice could even get that loud.
“Get the fuck off of me!” I push back, but he doesn’t move. Fuck, he’s strong.
He lets go of me and for a second I think he’s going to punch me, but he doesn’t. “I know that you slept with another girl and you caused her to wreck her car!” He gets in my face again.
“I suggest you lower your fucking voice,” I snap.
“I’m not afraid of you,” he says through his teeth.
The alcohol makes me indignant, when I should be ashamed. “I already beat your ass before, remember,” I say as I go back to the couch and sit.
Landon follows me. “I wasn’t as angry with you then as I am now.” He lifts his chin higher. “You can’t just go around hurting her all the time!”
I wave him off. “I didn’t even sleep with that girl. I just slept over at her house, so mind your own damn business.”
“Oh, wow! Of course you’re drinking!” He gestures at the empty beer bottles on the table and the one in my hand. “Tessa is all banged up and has a concussion because of you, and here you are getting drunk. You’re such a prick!” he practically screams.
“That wasn’t my fucking fault and I tried to talk to her!”
“Yes, it was your fault! It was your damn text message that she was trying to read when she crashed. A text that she knew right away was a lie, might I add.”
The breath is knocked out of me. “What are you talking about?” I choke.
“She was so anxious to hear from you all day, she grabbed her phone as soon as she saw your name.”
This is my fault. How did I not put it together? I cause these injuries to her. I hurt her.
Landon continues to stare at me. “She’s done with you—you know that, don’t you?”
I look up at him, suddenly weary. “Yeah. I know.” I reach for my beer. “And you can leave now.”
But he snatches the bottle from my hand and walks into the kitchen.
“You’re really fucking pushing it,” I warn him and jump up.
“You’re being an idiot and you know it. You’re here getting shit-faced while Tessa’s hurt, and you don’t even care!” he yells.
“Stop yelling at me! Fuck!” I twist my fingers into my hair, tugging at the roots. “I do care. But she isn’t going to believe anything I say!”
“Do you blame her? You should have just come home, or how about this, never left at all?” he says and pours my beer down the drain. “How can you be so uncaring? She loves you so much.” He goes to the refrigerator and hands me a bottle of water.
“I’m not uncaring. I’m just sick of waiting for some shit to happen. You were babbling on and on about your fucking perfect love life and making sacrifices, blah, blah. Then Tess goes and says his damn name.” I roll my head back, staring at the ceiling for a moment.
“Whose name?” he asks.
“Zed. She said his name in her sleep. Clear as day, like she wanted him to be there instead of me.”
“In her sleep?” he asks, and I can hear the sarcasm in his voice.
“Yes. Sleeping or not, she said his name instead of mine.”
He rolls his eyes. “You do realize how ridiculous this sounds, don’t you? Tessa said Zed’s name while she was sleeping, so you go out and get drunk? You’re making a big deal out of this for no reason.”
The water bottle crunches and collapses in my hand from my grip.
“You don’t even—” I start, but then hear keys and the sound of the front lock turning and opening.
<
br /> I turn around and see her come through the door. Tessa.
. . . and Zed. Zed next to her.
I can’t see straight as I get up and move toward them. “What the fuck is this shit?” I scream.
Tessa takes a step back, stumbles, and catches herself on the wall behind her. “Hardin, stop!” she yells at me.
“No! Fuck this! I’m sick of you coming around every time shit goes down!” I say and shove my hands against Zed’s chest.
“Stop it!” Tessa yells again.
“Please,” she says, then looks at Landon. “What are you doing here?” she asks him.
“I . . . I came to talk to him.”
I nod sarcastically. “Actually, he came here trying to fight me.”
Tessa’s eyes nearly pop out of their sockets. “What?”
“I’ll tell you later,” Landon says.
Zed is breathing hard and he’s staring at her. How could she bring him here after everything? Of course she’d go running to him. The man of her dreams.
Tessa turns to Zed and puts a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Thanks for bringing me home, Zed. I really appreciate it, but it’s probably best you go.”
He eyes me. “Are you sure?” he asks.
“Yes, I am. Thank you so much. Landon’s here, and I’ll be going to his parents’ place tonight.”
Zed nods in agreement—like he gets enough of a say to agree to anything!—then turns and leaves. Tessa closes the door behind him.
I can’t control my anger as Tessa turns to me with a scowl on her face. “I’m getting my clothes.” She walks into the bedroom.
I follow her, of course.
“Why did you call him for a ride?” I shout behind her.
“Why did you go drinking with this Carly girl? Oh, wait, you were probably complaining how needy and full of expectations your girlfriend is,” she snaps.
“Oh, let me guess how quick you were to unload to Zed about how fucked up I am,” I growl back at her.
“No! I didn’t tell him anything, actually. I’m sure he already knows it.”
“Are you going to let me explain my side of this?” I ask her.
“Sure,” she remarks, attempting to pull her suitcase from the top shelf in the closet. I move to help her.
“Move,” she snaps, obviously out of patience with my bullshit.
I step back and let her get the case down. “I shouldn’t have left last night,” I tell her.
“Really?” she sarcastically says.
“Yes, really. I shouldn’t have left and I shouldn’t have drunk so much—but I didn’t cheat on you. I wouldn’t do that. I only slept at her house because I was too drunk to drive—that’s it,” I explain.
She crosses her arms and gets that classic mad-girlfriend pose. “Then why lie?”
“I don’t know . . . because I knew you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Well, cheaters usually don’t admit when they cheat.”
“I didn’t cheat on you,” I tell her. She sighs, obviously not convinced.
“It’s really hard to believe you when you blatantly lie all the time. This time isn’t any different.”
“I know. I’m sorry for lying before, about everything, but I wouldn’t cheat on you.” I put my arms in the air.
She neatly places a folded shirt in her suitcase. “Like I said, cheaters don’t admit they cheated. If you didn’t have anything to hide, you wouldn’t have lied.”
“It’s not that big of a deal, I didn’t do anything with her,” I say, defending myself as she adds another article of clothing.
“So what if I got wasted and stayed the night at Zed’s house? What would you do?” she asks me, and the thought nearly sends me over the edge.
“I’d fucking kill him.”
“So it’s not a big deal when you do it, only if it were me?” She calls me out on my double standard. “None of this even matters—you made it clear that I’m only temporary in your life,” Tessa says. She walks out of the room and into the bathroom across the hall to get her toiletries. She really is going with Landon to my father’s house. This is bullshit. She isn’t temporary to me, how could she even think that? Probably because of all the shit I said to her last night and my lack of words today.
“You know I’m not going to let this go,” I tell her when she zips her suitcase.
“Well, I’m leaving.”
“Why? You know you’ll be back.” My anger speaks for me.
“That’s exactly why I’m leaving,” she says, her voice shaky as she grabs her suitcase and leaves the room without looking back.
When I hear the front door slam shut, I lean my back against the wall and slide to the floor.
chapter seventy-nine
TESSA
Nine days. Nine days have gone by without a single word from Hardin. I didn’t think it was possible for me to go a single day without speaking to him, let alone nine. It feels like one hundred, honestly, though each hour does hurt microscopically less than the prior one. It hasn’t been easy, not even close to that. Ken made a call to Mr. Vance asking that I be allowed to take the rest of the week off, which only meant missing one day anyway.
I know I’m the one who left, the one who walked away, but it kills me that he hasn’t even tried to get in touch with me. I have always given more in the relationship, and this was his chance to show me how he truly feels. I guess in a way he’s showing me—it’s just that what he feels is the opposite of what I had desperately wanted. Needed.
I know that Hardin loves me, I do. However, I also know that if he loves me as much as I thought he did, he would have made it a point to show me by now. He said he wasn’t going to let this go, but he did. He let it go, and he let me go. The part that scares me the most is that the first week I was walking around completely lost. I was lost without Hardin. Lost without his witty comments. Lost without his crude remarks. Lost without his assurance and his confidence. Lost without the way he’d sometimes draw circles on my hand while holding it between his, the way he’d kiss me for no reason and smile at me when he thought I wasn’t looking. I don’t want to be lost without him; I want to be strong. I want my days and nights to be just the same whether I’m alone or not. I’m beginning to suspect I may always be alone, as dramatic as the thought seems; I wasn’t happy with Noah, yet Hardin and I didn’t work. Maybe I’m like my mother in that way. Maybe I’m better off alone.
I didn’t want it to be over this way, so cut-and-dried. I wanted to talk about everything, I wanted him to answer my calls so we could come to some sort of agreement. I just needed space, I needed a break from him to show him that I’m not his doormat. It backfired on me because he obviously doesn’t care as much as I thought he did. Maybe this was his plan all along: get me to break up with him. I’ve known a few girls who go that route when leaving their boyfriends.
During the first day I did expect a call, text, or hell, I really expected Hardin to come bursting through the door screaming at the top of his lungs and causing a scene while his family and I sat in the dining room in silence, no one quite sure what to say to me. When that didn’t happen, I lost it. Not crying-in-the-corner, feeling-sorry-for-myself lost it. I mean I lost myself. Every second I lived in anticipation of Hardin coming back to grovel for my forgiveness. I almost gave in that day. I almost went back to the apartment. I was ready to tell him to hell with marriage, I don’t care if he lies to me every day and doesn’t respect me, as long as he never leaves me. Thankfully, I snapped out of that and salvaged some respect for myself.
Day three was the worst. Day three was when the realization really began to hit me. Day three was when I finally spoke after three days of near silence, having only muttered a simple yes or no to Landon or Karen during their awkward attempts to engage me in conversation. The only sounds that actually came out were a strangled sob and a choppy explanation through tears of why my life would be better, easier, without him that even I didn’t believe. Day three was when I finally looked i
n the mirror at my dirty and bruised face, my eyes swollen to the point of barely opening. Day three was when I fell to the floor, finally praying to God to make the pain disappear. No one can handle this pain, I told Him. Not even me. Day three I called him, I couldn’t help myself. I told myself that if he answers we would work it out and both come to a compromise, apologizing profusely and promising to never leave each other again. Instead, I got his voicemail after two rings, proving that he rejected the call.
Day four, I slipped and called him again. This time he had the courtesy to let it ring to voicemail instead of pressing ignore. Day four was when I realized how much more I actually care for him than he does me. Day four was when I spent the entire day in bed reliving the few times he actually told me how he felt about me. I began to realize that most of our relationship and how I portrayed his feelings for me in my mind was just that . . . in my mind. I began to realize that while I was thinking we could do this, we could make this work forever, he wasn’t thinking about me at all.
That was the day I decide to join the ranks of normal teenagers and had Landon show me how to download music onto my phone. Once I started, I couldn’t stop. Over one hundred songs were added, and headphones were put in my ears and barely removed for almost twenty-four hours. The music helps a lot. To hear about other people’s pain reminds me that I’m not the only one to suffer in life. I’m not the only one who loved someone who didn’t love them enough to fight for them.
Day five was when I finally showered and attempted to go to class. I went to yoga, hoping that I could handle the memories it would evoke. I felt strange walking around in a sea of cheery college students. I used all the energy I had in hoping that I wouldn’t run into Hardin on campus. I was past the stage of wanting him to call. I managed to drink half of my coffee that morning, and Landon told me that the color was coming back into my cheeks. No one seemed to notice me, and that was exactly what I wanted. Professor Soto assigned us to write down our biggest fears when it comes to life and how they relate to faith and God. “Are you afraid to die?” he asked us. Aren’t I already dead? I answered silently.