What happened? I still don’t understand. Maybe I’ve never understood James and Linden’s relationship, maybe I’ve underestimated the guilt complex that Linden harbors. Maybe his parents screwed him over far greater than I thought.
But I know one thing is for sure. He doesn’t love me. He doesn’t know what love is. It’s not his fault, if he’s never been told and if he’s never felt it.
But it still hurts worse than a knife to the stomach, than a bullet to the chest. It’s my heart in a claw trap, bleeding and pierced, and I can’t seem to loosen it.
When I get to my parents, my mom is waiting for me outside. It’s like she knew. My father’s car isn’t there because I guess it’s not their date night or some bullshit like that. It’s too bad though. I like my dad in situations like these. He’s good at talking sense, at seeing the male point of view.
My mom brings me into a hug and I immediately start bawling. I lose it on the front steps until she brings me inside and lays me down on the couch. She gives me some of dad’s Scotch. She listens to me as I try to explain through my sobs and hiccups.
It doesn’t sound any clearer, any better. My mother seems as confused as I am. But then when I calm down she sits beside me and pats my knee.
“He’s hurting too, you know,” she says.
I shake my head. “Not like me.”
“You don’t know that sweetheart. I’ve seen that boy many times now. He loves you. He really does. But sometimes, when people have no real experience with using their hearts, it’s easy for them to get confused. It sounds like his relationship with James was a lot more complicated than you thought.”
I sip back the rest of the Scotch, finding small comfort in the burn. “They seemed fine. Linden sometimes felt James resented him…”
“And if he felt that, and James has been closer to him than his own family, he may feel he needs to do what he can to not have it be true. You can be like that too sometimes.”
I look at her sharply. “Like what?”
“Eager to please. Wanting approval. From us.”
I raise my brows but my mom just smiles warmly. “I know. I don’t blame you. It’s mostly our fault, I guess. With your brother…he demanded so much attention.”
“He was sick, mom.”
“I know. And Nate needed that attention. But you were sometimes pushed aside. We didn’t mean to do it. But we saw it happening and we just hoped that you’d grow up to understand.”
“I do understand,” I implore her.
“Just because you do, doesn’t mean it stops. Life leaves scars. Sometimes you don’t see them until later. Sometimes you don’t know where they’ve come from. Sometimes they fade before your eyes. But the world leaves its mark on us. Linden may not understand his.”
I sigh and sit back. “So what does this mean? What do I do?”
“I wish I knew sweetie. It sounds like he needs a friend. Do you think you could be his friend?”
“I want to,” I start but my heart sinks with sadness. “But I can’t. I know it’s selfish of me, but I just can’t. I’m in love with him. I can’t ever be his friend. He left his mark on me too deeply.”
“Sometimes you need to be selfish,” she says. “Want to stay for supper?”
“Sure,” I say, my stomach rumbling at the thought. I only ate a bag of rice crackers yesterday. “Where’s dad?”
“He’s napping?”
“Napping?”
She jerks her head in the direction of the bedroom. “Didn’t I tell you? He moved in last week.”
“What? I didn’t see his car outside.”
“It’s in the garage now.”
“So everything is back to normal?” I ask.
She smiles, her eyes crinkly and soft. “In this world, yes.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
LINDEN
Dead-man walking. That’s what it feels like. That’s what heartbreak, heartsmash, heartruin, feels like.
I’d never experienced it before. I hope I never do again.
And the funny thing is, I know I won’t. Because I won’t ever give my heart to anyone else. It belonged to Stephanie. It always will.
And because she has it, I am without one.
Deep, yeah maybe. But I’m in so much fucking sorrow, in so fucking deep, that there’s no coming out of it. There is just an endless pit inside me that keeps caving in. All day. Every day.
They say the nights are the hardest. I think the mornings are. Mornings are when I reach over in bed to hold her and grab nothing but air. Mornings are when no one scolds me for drinking orange juice out of the container. Mornings are when I make scrambled eggs for one, when I have no reason to drive into the Mission district, when I make too much coffee because I don’t know how to make any less.
Mornings are when I can’t kiss her goodbye.
I can’t kiss her ever again.
I lost her. I let go. Fully and completely.
All to appease my conscious. All to feel like I did nothing wrong.
I had conceded to James for the first time in my life and I’m beginning to think it was the wrong thing to start with.
It all came crashing down on me anyway.
A few days after I ended it with Steph, I couldn’t even bring myself to hang out with James. If he always resented me in some form, I was starting to resent him. I was starting to blame him for everything.
But it’s the day before Christmas Eve and he invites me over to his placet. He’s not working. He wants to have a drink, but obviously not at the Lion.
So I go over there. I bring a twelve-pack because that’s what buddies do.
The door is open. James lives in a rather shitty walk-up but he’s at least done a good job decorating the inside. Still, the neighborhood isn’t the nicest.
“Maybe you should lock your door, aye,” I tell him as I come inside and lock it behind me.
He’s sitting on the back of the couch and staring at me, like he’s been waiting for me to come inside this whole time.
“What’s up?” I tell him, putting the box of beer on his kitchen table. The room smells like weed but I can’t tell if he’s high or not. “Why do you have your crazy face on, brother?”
“I can’t believe you lied to me,” he says, his face eerily blank, and that’s when I know it’s all over. It’s almost a relief.
Still. I have to try. “What are you talking about?”
“Stephanie,” he says. And my first thought is, oh my fucking hell, did she speak to him? Did she tell him that she knows he’s in love with her? What else did she say?
Is she okay?
Of course she’s not fucking okay. You broke her god damn heart.
“What about her?” I ask, still hoping.
“You’ve been screwing her. For months.”
And here it is. The fucking truth.
I raise my chin in defiance. “Who told you that?”
“Her friend, Kayla,” he says. “She says you broke her heart. I guess I had something to do with that, didn’t I?”
I don’t even know what to say, so I don’t say anything. There is nothing to say.
“No apology?” he asks bitterly.
Right. Well I guess there is that. But I know that it won’t do any good. “I’m sorry I lied to you.”
“Sure,” he says with a quick nod. “Okay. You lied. Point blank to my face. You told me you had never been with her.”
“I had been with her.”
“For months.”
“For months,” I agree.
“How long have you been in love with her?”
“About as long as you have.”
He shakes his head and laughs humorlessly. “And of course, you end up being the guy she falls in love with. It had to be you, didn’t it?”
I can’t seem to swallow the brick in my throat. “It didn’t have to be. But I’m not sorry it was.” I pause. “But I broke it off with her because I didn’t want to see you get hurt. I didn’t know you loved he
r, James. Come on.”
He narrows his dark eyes. They look like a viper’s. “But did you at least suspect? You said you didn’t before, but you were lying then anyway. Did you at least think I had some feelings for her?”
I nod. “Yes. Maybe not in that way…”
He clucks his tongue. “Typical. Well, I can’t say I’m surprised. I saw her first but I guess in the end she had to become yours anyway.”
“She’s no longer anybody’s.”
He shrugs. “Why do I care?”
I’m stunned. “But I gave her up for you. That counts for something.”
“You gave her up for you!” he suddenly yells at me, spit flying from his mouth. “None of this was for me. This was to get rid of your own guilt, to make yourself feel better, like you’re a noble, better man, when you’re nothing but a self-centered asshole. You always have been and always will be.” He takes in a deep breath. “But now at least you’ll know what it’s like to lose. You’ve lost her. And now you’ve lost me.”
I don’t need to protest. I don’t need for him to tell me to get the fuck out like Stephanie did. I can only nod, turn around, and leave the apartment. James and the box of beer stay behind.
***
It’s amazing what people will do on Christmas Eve if you pay them enough money. By the time nine o’clock rolls around and I’m hauling my suitcases to SFO, my entire flat is packed up and in the back of a moving truck. Not only were the moving people willing to work all day loading my shit for the right amount of pay, but some grumbly Jewish man was up for the job of driving all my belongings across the country.
Originally I was going to do it myself. But when I called my father last night and told him I was going to take him up on the flat in Manhattan, he insisted I get there in time for Christmas. Which is, you know, tomorrow.
It will be the first Christmas with my family in ten years. I’m not even sure what to expect anymore or who my family is. But I know it’s better than staying in San Francisco where I have absolutely nothing left for me. My father had been right – what was the point of putting down roots if there was nowhere for me to grow?
There is no Stephanie. There is no James. And though I loved my job to death, there are always new jobs to be found. Manhattan is full of helicopters needing to be flown.
Manhattan is full of possibilities for a new world.
I get on the airplane and as we race against another flight taking off at the same time, I stare out the window, at the tips of the Transamerica Pyramid building and the Bay and Golden Gate Bridge as they poke through the shroud of fog.
I leave my heart in San Francisco.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Three months later
STEPHANIE
“I’m so glad you gave me a second chance.”
I nod, spearing a piece of butter-soaked broccoli with my fork. I’m not really listening, to be honest. I should be, because my ex-boyfriend is sitting across from me and we’re at one of the nicest restaurants in town and I’m not hating it entirely.
But my mind is elsewhere. It’s always been elsewhere since Linden left.
I’m not really sure what possessed me to actually give Owen a chance. Loneliness, I guess. That’s kind of what my life has been boiled down to lately. Acute, aching, loneliness that breaks me on a daily basis. When Owen called the other day, telling me he never stopped thinking about me and that he wanted to make things right, I felt all my defenses cave. Sure he was the guy who cheated on me all those years ago, sure he was, at last look, a boring accountant who drank straight vodka. But I wanted, needed to have someone tell me they wanted me.
I need and want Linden. But that’s not what I have.
Instead, Linden lives in Manhattan, in a fancy apartment his parents got for him. At least, that’s where I assume he lives. I actually don’t know a thing about him anymore. I don’t even know if he’s a helicopter pilot or has gone into political science or schmoozing with high society or being a playboy like his older brother.
I haven’t talked to Linden since he left right before Christmas. It all happened so god damn fast. One minute we were screaming at each other and the next minute he was gone. It was like he took every broken part with him and now I’m left with nothing but just the outline where his love used to be.
Or where I thought his love used to be.
It’s the end of March. It’s warm and sunny in that nutty SF way. My online business is booming and I’m planning on closing the physical store once my lease in October is up. Things do look bright but I just can’t look at them that way. They used to look so much brighter.
My girlfriends, Kayla and Nicola, have been great, really supportive, but I feel like even they might be getting fed up with me. They tell me to forget about Linden, they tell me I’m hot and still young and that I could have the city in the palm of my hand.
It’s not true but I don’t care anyway. I just want what I had and what I can’t have anymore.
And I certainly don’t want Owen. But for selfish reasons, I’m glad I’m out with him. I was so tired of being alone. It really begins to get under your skin after a while. I’m all about independence, but a little close human contact – a little affection – is sometimes needed.
“Stephanie?” Owen asks and I look up at him. He’s got a receding hairline now and his ears have gotten elf-like. I think he’ll look like an aging Legolas when he’s fifty. He’s even wealthier these days, running his own accounting firm for many of the major businesses in Silicon Valley but to his credit, he hasn’t changed much.
“Sorry,” I quickly say. I finish chewing my broccoli, slowly, in an effort to buy more time, to think. “I’m glad you decided to get in touch.” There. That’s as diplomatic as they come. I may be lonely, but I don’t want to give him the impression that this anything more than it is.
He smiles, seemingly happy with that answer. “Good. It’s funny how life goes sometimes, isn’t it? Some people come and go and some go and come back.”
Yes. But not the ones you want.
Suddenly my phone rings from my purse. I normally wouldn’t answer it on a date but I’m not too worried about this one. That’s the one good thing about exes, they can be as comfortable as an old shoe. I pull it out, expecting to see a call from Nicola asking me how it is and if I need an escape plan, but it takes me a full second to register the number.
Speaking of exes - it’s James. I haven’t talked to James since December either. I couldn’t stomach it, not after I learned how he felt about me, not after I knew he was a catalyst. I lost both him and Linden at once.
I shoot Owen an apologetic look. “Sorry, I have to take this.” Because I do. Because James would never call me out of the blue unless it was important.
“Hello?” I answer it.
“Stephanie?” James says. “Have you seen the news?”
His voice is so dull and grave it sends chills down my spine. “What? No, sorry I’m out for dinner.”
“Okay,” he says and I expect him to let me go but he goes on. “I’m sorry to call you like this but you need to know. There’s been an accident.”
Thump. Thump. Thud. My heart falters and skips to a stop.
Oh god.
It can’t be.
“What?” I whisper. I almost don’t want him to answer.
“It’s Linden. There was a helicopter crash.”
“What?!” I am shrieking. The whole restaurant is staring at me but I don’t care. My soul turns into a cold, dark place, like the sun has been snuffed out. I’m sucking in air, afraid to move or breathe or do anything. I feel like the longer I hold still, the longer this moment will last, the longer I won’t have to hear news that could destroy my world yet again.
“I don’t know what happened,” James says. “But I thought you should know.”
“Is he alive?” I whisper, frantic. I am pure panic.
“Yes,” he says and I’m so relieved I nearly fall out of my chair. I notice Owen is at my
side, holding me up and everyone is still staring. “Yes I think he’s fine. Well, he’s not fine, he’s badly banged up. Broken leg, ribs, arm. Concussion. Lacerations. But he’s alive.”
“How did you know this?”
“Bram, his brother, he called me. I guess he thought we were still…”
Friends is what he wants to say.
“Yeah,” I say softly, understanding, while Owen is rubbing my shoulder now and asking if I’m all right. I ignore him, wrapped up in this phone call, this last lifeline to Linden, to the life I had.
“Do you want to go see him?” James asks.
“What?”
He clears his throat. “Do you want to go see him? In the hospital. Fly to New York.”
“What? When?”
“Tonight. Red-eye. I…I looked online the moment I heard and saw there were flights. Bram said it would be good, that Linden doesn’t really have any friends out there. He said to text him when we get there.”
“You’re going to go?” My heart is thumping louder now. Should I go?
Wait. That’s a stupid question.
“Yeah. I realized I need to apologize to him. For a lot of things.”
I swallow and nod. “Yeah. Me too.”
“So you’ll come if I book us tickets? Eleven PM from SFO. Virgin America. I’ll pick us up.”
“Yes. I’ll go home right away and pack. See you in a bit.” I pause. “Thanks James, for calling me.”
“No problem, Steph.”
I hang up the phone and look at Owen. Thankfully now the other patrons are back to their meals but Owen is looking really concerned. I don’t blame him.
“What happened?” he asks.
“You know my friend Linden?”
He flinches a bit. I know he remembers Linden. “Yeah.”
“He was in a bad accident. He lives in New York now and he’s in the hospital. I’m going to catch the red-eye to go see him. I’m sorry,” I tell him and then stand-up. “I don’t mean to cut out on our date like this.”