Chapter 2

Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident.

CHAPTER TWO

 

The party went exactly how I thought it would and consisted of the very few faces I expected.

Abigail, the one who called this morning. Abigail is an attention seeker and always gets what she wants. She also loves to stand out in a crowd and lucky for me, all eyes were on her during the party.

Jamie, the only person I have talked to daily since Bryce left. The only person who understands. Though her reason isn't identical to mine, it's the fact she doesn't pester me to get over him so quickly that makes her decent company.

Kyle, the one who is in love with me. It's not his fault really. We have been paired up together since we were toddlers. Our parents were friends before we were even born, it was bound to happen. To be honest before I met Bryce I had given Kyle a second glance or two. I had tried to make myself seem attractive to him but nothing ever came of it until Bryce was my main focus, my fixation, the one I didn't have to make myself seem attractive to. The one who found me attractive when I had no makeup on and had just woken up, my hair a mess.

Kasey was at the party. She's my tutor, the one I had assigned to me this year, though I still failed and will now have to repeat my last year of high school again.

I can't even bring myself to think about focusing on any subject without thinking of him and our nights together discussing our homework and distracting each other.

Laura, the life of the party. She wore her usual baggy vintage tee-shirt with ripped leather pants and flats. I've always been jealous of her hair. How she can pull off long black waist length locks topped with short fringes is beyond me. I could never do that. She's also naturally skinny and eats like she is always hungry. Every time I see her she's eating something. Whether it be bananas, skittles or something sour, she's loving every second of it.

Rebecca, the one who thinks I need to get over him. The one who brought her boyfriend to the party and looked like she were in agony when around me.

Caleb, the musician. He's in one of those indie rock bands. The kind that dreams of being famous and one day will have their song featured on a movie that hits off big with a certain age group. He's been a crush of mine since junior high, but he's also been a ladies man. He'd have a new girlfriend or fling every week before he met Rose.

Rose, who was naturally early. She arrived with an armful of gifts. She knew I didn't like gifts  but the joke was on me when I opened them and they all had an image of us together and post-it notes that read 

We love you. You know it. We don't have to say it. Remember us while going through your last year and if you lose our phone numbers we'll have to kill you. Yes, kill you. Slow and torturous. Just how you like it. 

That made me laugh. It was by far the best gift I had gotten apart from Laura's bag of skittles.

Rose is the type of girl you'd always love to be around. She's nice, but knows how to be rude if you push her buttons. She's beautiful but doesn't cake on makeup or talk about herself much. She's a straight A student but doesn't act like it. She's the one you want to be, the one you're parents would want you to be if someone spoke about her perfection. Her parents aren't in love with her intelligence, they're  in love with her looks. No A is rewarded. I think that's part of the reason why she is so humble.

That was it. The only faces I actually knew and were friends with. The others were people my parents knew and kids that hated me at our school. Kids who thought I was a dork or trouble-maker.

No one in my family knows but I was voted most likely to be a serial killer in the school’s magazine. My face plastered along a few famous murderous people with drawn devil horns on it. They said it was due to my lack in education and attendance days. Not to mention the boyfriend who rode a motorcycle to school with me posed on the back as if I were a trophy.

I miss my arms around his frame, my hands tracing the emblem on his belt buckle. The one I bought him...

My thought process halted abruptly at the sound coming from downstairs. Apparently I hadn't performed how I was expected to. Apparently my loss of replies and tears that dared to sting my eyes every second were noticeable.  

Something is wrong with her. We can't help her here. This school, this town, it'll only kill her. She needs to get away for a while. 

It wouldn't kill me. My Mother is wrong. The memories, I like the memories. He'll come back if I stay here. 

If he comes back, we'll lose her. He knows the address, we can't leave, can't go elsewhere. We have friends and work here. We can't move to a different house, he'll find that easily.

If he comes back.

If.

He will.. I know it. They know it. They're scared of it. 

Where would we send her that would be better? You know I won't move. We've discussed this the entire time school has been out. 

Exactly. No place would be better. My father is right, he can talk her out of it.  

Well.. 

I don't want to move. I don't want a new town. How will he find me?

I was thinking about this cute school in Minnesota. It's going to be getting boarding soon. Meaning, she'll be able to feel right at home with someone her own age...well...below her age but close enough. Maybe it'll help her focus on her schooling. 

No. No it won't. 

Where will she sleep? 

Good question, Dad. Very good question. 

They allow the students who don't have family to stay with to sleep on beds, twin beds, in an old gymnasium they are no longer using. The girls sleep away from the boys. It's a nice environment. 

Great. Sounds like every kids dream school.  

Do they have a current gymnasium? 

Oh good ol' dad, such a physical health enthusiast. 

Of course they do. If they do well in school, they recommend them to colleges. They have their own members on certain college boards. 

Sounds like they try to sell off as much sparkle and shine as possible to lure pitiful teenagers to their deaths. 

What people? 

My dad again, getting all of the facts before agreeing, I guess. 

Kids that attended the school who have grown up and went to college, they suggest the school’s students highly. Not to mention they have one of the highest numbers of students likely to attend and finish college. 

If nothing else sold him, that will. 

Hand over the brochure, I'll look through it tonight. This might as well be fit for her.

No. Not him too.

I stood to my feet and shut my door, my hands lingered for the longest time as I tried to steady my breathing. 

This isn't happening. I'm not going. They'll change their mind. 

No matter how many times I try to console myself, my breathing and rapid heartbeat won't slow down to a normal pace. My heart and lungs know the truth. I'm going. There will be no way to reach Bryce now. No way to leave a light on in my bedroom like a beacon in the dark, like a lighthouse waiting for the captain of a long lost ship to sail home.

Instead I'll be the widow who left behind everything that reminded her of the so said captain, of the man she gave her heart and soul to. The widow might as well go to the edge of the lighthouse and jump. It'll kill him if I'm not here, here waiting... If I was the cause of his death...I. I don't know what I would do.

What if he is dead. What if that's why he hasn't come for me. Hasn't reached out with as much as a phone call. What if there was an argument on his birthday or on mine. What if the argument was about me and he was headed out of the door. What if his father's temper with him grew rapidly and he killed him. He'd rather have him dead than with me?

My hands gripped at the dull ache in my chest, mind willing the image of Bryce laying dead and cold outside on the ground at his father's hand away. I buried that image along with the thought in a locked away trunk under everything else I held in my mind. Under all of the happy memories and the knowing I tried to instill into my mind that he is alive and he is coming for me.

I drifted off into sleep in front of my door on my carpet, thinking of the time I had fallen asleep in his arms as he went through his album collection.

“Why do you have to alphabetize them?” I whined, my eyes as heavy as bricks.

“Why do you have to ask so many questions?” His lips curved into a smile to let me know he was just joking with the tone. I loved when he did that.

“Because you amuse me.” I purred, my eyes looking up at his jaw tensing. He hated the mushy gushy stuff, but couldn't avoid it for long.

“You annoy me.” His lips were on my forehead, then tasting mine. “In a good way.” He spoke in between kisses, his hand venturing down my frame to rest on my inner right thigh.

“Hmm?”

“Yeah, don't act like you don't.” He laughed against my skin, his breath like the sun's embrace on a fall day.

“You bug me.” I wrapped my fingers in his, curling the tips of my nails gently into his rough palm. “More than just a little.”

“But I'm not a bug.” He murmured against my hairline. “Therefore I cannot bug you.”

I giggled, my exhaustion catching up to me. “How's your ribs?” I asked, referring to his limp when he had answered his door.

“They'll heal.”

“I've went through eleven full years of school, I know with the right care bones can heal, Bryce.” My voice shook, my eyes staring into the distance but not seeing..

“Why do you do this?” his voice was filled with despair, his lips pressed desperately against my skin now.

“Because I care.”

“Funny.” He let out a low chuckle, shaking his head now, his eyes staring into mine.

“What?”

“How I have to fight to see the only one who does and deal with the ones who don't.”

“We won't have to fight for long.” My eyes desperately found his.

“Say that again...” He whispered into my ear.

I giggled. “We won't have to fight for long.” I brought my arms behind his neck and slid off of his lap, pulling him onto me.

“What's that?” His fingers were squeezing my ribs gently, causing me to laugh. “What did you say?”

“We won't have to fight for long!” I exclaimed through gasps of breath.

“You better be right.” His arms were around me now, mine around him. He dug his face into my neck, his breath on my skin. “Don't you ever leave me.”

“I won't.” I whispered, my fingers tracing up his back and into his dark hair.

“Promise me.” His lips pressed briefly against my neck as he leaned into me. “Promise you won't leave me.”

“I promise.” I kissed his temple, my legs wrapping around his waist. “Now unless you want me to poke your ribs until you cry, you'll tell me how they are.” I feigned irritation, though my heart's happily rapid pace shown different.

“They're hurt. Really bad. Not broken, but just...” He sighed. “I don't need to do too much on them for a while.”

“Get on your back!” I playfully smacked his arm. “Don't you be laying on me like this, you'll hurt yourself.”

“No.” He grumbled into my neck. “This is good, this feels perfect. You feel perfect.”

“You can't tell me it doesn't hurt.”

“Okay, okay. It does.”

“You better take something for pain.” I huffed. My eyes on his as he got up from where he had been laying on me and headed over to his night stand.

“I'm doing that now.” He took two pills from a bottle he kept in his drawer and swallowed it with water.

“That's my man.” I smiled up at him as he made his way back over to where I laid on his floor, then scooped me back onto his lap.

I didn't remember much after that because of my sleepy state at the time. My eyelids were hard to open, my heart had slowed into a rhythm only my breathing could keep up with. After a few more mumbles of words, I soon heard the soft clack of his album cases against one another and sleep took me into it's grasp. Only to be woken up an hour later to his dad shutting the front door.

I remember kissing Bryce goodbye and then climbing out his window so his father wouldn't see me. He knew my parents, knew how they hated us together and he hated it just as much. If Bryce was happy, he was miserable. He had enough determination to make us both miserable with him.

 

I awoke with my door being pushed into my back, my hair a mess and a puddle of drool below my face. In my dreamy state I reached up for him, for Bryce but he wasn't there. He was no where to be found. I had to have fallen asleep smiling. Had to of. Because my cheeks hurt like I had been laughing for three hours straight. Like I hadn't stopped smiling since I fell asleep thinking about Bryce.

“Move out of the way, Alice.” My Mother's voice hit me like a thousand bricks. Though I didn't want to let her in, I stood to my feet and stumbled to my bed. “Did you fall asleep on your floor again? You know what that does to your back.”

My back throbbed at her accusation. When I slept on hard surfaces my back got stiff and ached, it always had. I hadn't done anything in my lifetime to hurt or damage it. I also hadn't went to any doctors to see if there was anything wrong with it. All they would tell me is 'don't sleep on hard floors'.

Simple as that.

“Anyway.” She sighed when I didn't reply and continued with the sentence I had been dreading since last night. “Your father and I have been talking...” she began and my heart began a rapid thudding against my rib cage, my mind racing. Here we go. “...and we have found the best thing for you this year...”

“I don't want a different school.” I muttered in a low tone, my eyes on the floor.

“Now, don't say that. You haven't tried it out yet.” She continued. “It's in Minnesota and it's got boarding so you won't have to stay here. You'll have your own room with a nice roommate.”

“I don't want a roommate.” I broke in. “I want to stay here.”

Bryce could come back. Bryce could rescue me from this hell. If I left he wouldn't be able to find me.

“Too bad. We know what's best for you at this point.” Her stern look was beginning to burn holes into my skin.

“No.” I concluded. “I-I won't go.”

“Yes, you will.”

“No, I won't. You can't, you can't take me from hi-” I broke off. My sentence sending chills down my spine and my heart plummeting to the ground. “He's coming for me...” I finally spoke the words I had been holding in for so long.

“No, he's not.” Her voice raised an octave. “He's not coming for you, Alice. Don't you see? You're killing yourself over this boy when you could do so much better.”

“There is no better!” I stood to my feet, my voice breaking with the tears that dared to fill my eyes. “I don't want anyone else. Everyone is flawed in comparison! Everyone! I didn't deserve him but he wanted me and you took that. You and his stupid Father tore us apart and now he's gone and now I'm dying.”

Silence filled the room as I took in deep breaths, tears falling down my cheeks.

“I feel like I'm dying inside and all you, my Father, my brother and friends can say is there's better.” My voice shook. “Well guess what, you're all clueless.” I inhaled deeply, my teeth gritted together and chattering with the anger that boiled in me. My hands were shaking, my legs like jelly shook along with them and my heart was in sync with my rapid breathing. “You are all so pathetically clueless. You couldn't see real love if it were in front of your own f*****g eyes. ”

She gasped, her eyes wider than the china bowl my aunt Miranda gave her last Christmas. Her hand was on her mouth as she turned to face my Father and brother who had been standing at the door. “She needs this school.” Her voice was shaking too. “I won't have her curse under my roof.”