[ - ]
Table of Contents [Report This]
Printer Chapter or Story Microsoft Word Chapter or Story
- Text Size +
Before: It's Been One Week...


Nick


I'd spent a lot of time thinking about Dogface.

I thought about what it would be like seeing her mug on the counter by the coffee pot in the morning when I was pouring my coffee. And I thought about seeing her weird chick food in the fridge when I opened it to get out the milk for my cereal. I thought about sitting down in the living room with her, watching the highlights on ESPN. I thought about her leaving books and magazines around the room, and of this weird tiny blanket that she kept on her own couch at her apartment. I pictured spending everyday of my life with Dogface.

Really, it didn't look that different than my everyday life.

Maybe it wouldn't be terrible if Dogface was always around.

But I had a feeling she was probably really pissed off at me after what I'd done. I knew I'd need a Grand Sweeping Gesture. But I couldn't think of one. So I didn't call her immediately, and the more time that passed the grander the sweeping gesture had to be.

Three days before my birthday, I was suddenly inspired.

And it started with a flight.

When I knocked on my mother's door almost nine hours later, she looked shocked to see me there. "Nickolas," she said, her eyes red-rimmed, like she'd just been crying. "What are you doing here?" she asked.

"I left something here at Christmas," I said, "And I need it back."

She looked disappointed, but she backed into the house, holding the door opened. I stepped into the house and looked around. It was quiet and dark, dust caught in the sunlight hung in the air. I jogged into the house and down the basement stairs. The record was still there, under the bed where I'd left it back in December. When I came up stairs, my mother was laying on the couch, her eyes covered with a damp face cloth. I stood in the doorway awkwardly, unsure if I was supposed to talk or just leave.

"I - uh -" I spun the record in my hands.

"Just go if you want to," she muttered.

I wanted. But despite that, I couldn't just go. I hesitated, wanting so badly to be cold enough to just take off. But something about her laying there with that towel on her face made me feel guilty. So I asked, "Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fucking splendid."

I really wanted to be the guy who took sarcasm seriously.

I looked around the house. And that's when I realized what was missing: dead animals. "Where's - uh -" I couldn't remember her boyfriend's name.

"Craig left," she said.

"Oh."

"Found a younger woman," she continued.

I licked my lips. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry," she said, moving the towel from her eyes, "Just a typical man, that's all." She waved at the door. "Go on, Nick, go on and be a man."

I sighed.

"Of course, it's not just men," she continued, her voice thick with drama, "It's everyone. Everyone leaves me. Even Leslie."

"Mom..."

"No," she said, "Don't. Just leave."

I looked at my watch. If I wanted to get back to the airport in time for my flight home to LA, I needed to leave now. I looked own at the record. I sighed and put it, and my backpack down. I walked out and sat down in the chair by the couch. "Mom, it's not your fault, about Leslie."

She looked up at me.

"I mean, us kids aren't perfect, none of us are. Sometimes it's because dad, sometimes it's just life circumstances, you know? But it's not you. We're just fucked up is all."

My mother said, "I'm always so alone...and I wonder why, I wonder what I did to cause it. Why am I such a bad mother? I try so hard to be good to you kids..."

I had to bite my tongue to keep from mentioning the way she'd treated Dogface.

"I just fail you all the time," she said.

I shook my head, "No, mom, you don't fail us."

"I do, too," she said. Her eyes were brimming with tears. "It's been almost a year, and you know, we still haven't had a proper memorial for Leslie, as a family?"

This was something we'd exchanged words about several times over the past year because it was mostly my fault that we hadn't. I didn't go to the funeral. I'd been on tour, and I'd used touring as an excuse to not face everything that happened.

"So let's do it," I said.

"Do what?" she asked.

"Let's have a memorial for Leslie," I said. "We'll all be there, we'll all talk and remember and it'll be good. We can say good-bye properly, as a family."

She looked hopeful, "Where?"

I thought for a moment. "Niagra Falls," I answered.

"Niagra Falls?"

"That was Leslie's favorite place, and it's beautiful, and it's common ground so you and dad can both go without it being weird. I'll buy the flights."

"Really?" she was sitting up now, excited. "When?"

"On Thursday," I said, "The one year anniversary."

She leaped up, she wrapped her arms around my neck. Her hands were cool against the skin on the back of my neck. "That would be so beautiful," she said, and I felt the tears slipping down her cheeks.

And she spent the rest of the time I was there making plans.




Ashley

After Nick left the night we almost became friends with benefits, I couldn't sleep. I felt like crap. I ate the whole large pizza I'd ordered, and them promptly regretted it. I felt like throwing up. I paced my hallway, my mind racing. When I got tired, I sat on the couch and watched back to back to back episodes of Everybody Loves Raymond and Roseann on TV Land. I hugged my knees and tried to convince myself that everything was going to be okay and that Nick would forget about the whole thing and things would just return to normal, like it never happened, like he never put his hands on me, like he'd never walked out the door.

But did I want that? Did I want Nick to pretend it never happened, and have everything go back to the way that it was before? Or would Nick ignoring me hurt even more now? I could not unknow that Nick wouldn't have given me the follow-up if I'd given in without asking him.

I finally fell asleep around four in the morning, exhaustion literally not allowing me to stay awake any longer. My alarm went off at six, and wok me up. I moved through my day like a zombie, droning mindlessly through my working hours, and went instinctively to the bar that night. I sat in our booth for hours, waiting, looking around for Nick, but he never came. I didn't give up until after ten, when the waitress had asked me four times if I was interested in moving to an empty spot at the bar.

The next day, I called in at work and I stayed on my couch. It went on like that for the next week: me, laying on my couch and only moving to go to the bathroom, get food, and once to change the batteries in the remote control.

Each day that I didn't hear from him, I felt even worse. Here I was, at age thirty-two, alone and laying on my couch, sitting and waiting for a guy who had walked out on me to come back. Maybe that's what Nick had realized, maybe that's why he'd bolted and disappeared and abandoned me, just like my parents. Maybe I wasn't follow-up material for anyone.

It was the day before Nick's birthday before I heard from him.

I was wallowing in week-old sweatpants and a Journey tee that I'd stolen from Nick forever ago. I was hugging a pillow and running my fingers over the bulb of beach sand around my neck that he'd given me, watching Message in a Bottle on a cable broadcast. It was muted, and I was just staring at Kevin Costner in the rain when my phone vibrated on the coffee table. It spun against the wood. I stared at it, almost unrecognizing it. I picked it up slowly, staring down at the photo ID that told me it was Nick.

The picture was from Halloween, when Nick and I had spent hours making candy corn cookies for the kids in my apartment building before going out to a party dressed as Winonna Ryder and Edward Scissorhands. In the picture, he wasn't in make-up yet. I'd thrown flour at him while we were baking, and it was on his face. He was smiling up into the camera. The picture had always made me feel better bcause at the time I'd felt like a fortune cookie had been cracked open and it had read this is your future. But now... now it felt like the fortune had read never gonna happen.

I thought so long that his phone call went to voicemail.

I clicked play.

"Heya Dogface... It's me. Look, I ain't heard from ya in a bit, and I ain't gonna be in LA tomorrow to head out to the airport with you but I got your ticket all booked for Vegas. You're coming, right? You better be! It ain't my birthday without my wingman, Dogface. So check it... I emailed the flight info to you. Flight leaves in the mornin'. Don't be late, a'ight? Okay so I gotta go. Talk to ya later, Dogface!"

I closed the voicemail and opened my email. Sure enough, Nick had sent me all the information for a flight to Las Vegas.

I sat up. The pillow fell off my lap and onto the floor.

Whatever it took, I had to go to Vegas and show Nick that I was willing to be whatever he needed me to be. I needed him to see that I understood, that I didn't need him to be a follow-up guy.

I jumped up off the couch to go pack. I was now a girl on a mission.