Never Let You Go(89)

Jared and I spent almost every weekend together since my birthday and it was great at first. When I was with him, I didn’t have to think about my dad or how he died, and having sex was kind of like getting high, but in the last couple of weeks it hasn’t worked the same anymore.

It had been raining heavy all day and I felt restless and bored. All we ever did was hang out in Jared’s bedroom and watch movies or have sex. We’d skip school early and go to his house before his parents got home. Sex had gotten better now. I felt different. More grown up.

“Delaney doesn’t call me anymore,” I blurted out.

“It’s because you have a boyfriend and she’s still single.”

Maybe he was right. She’d been hanging out with some other girls at school and I was glad she made new friends, but I missed going to movies and coffee, or coloring our hair and hanging out. Then I wondered if it was my fault. Maybe I was the one who stopped calling her.

The other day I saw her in the parking lot at school and tried to talk to her, but she was in a rush to meet with her friends. They were going swimming at the pool. We used to love to go swimming. We’d stay in the sauna so long it would feel like our skin was melting off.

It wasn’t just Delaney who was drifting away. I never had time to draw anymore. Last weekend I was going to hang out at home, but Jared needed my help editing the pictures we’d taken down at the harbor. That was fun at first too, helping him on his photo shoots, but then I got tired of spending hours outside in crappy weather just so he could get the perfect shot.

He turned away from the computer. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I’m just tired.”

He climbed into bed with me. “I’ve been looking at apartments online for when we go to UBC. If we find something great now, we can sign a lease before anyone else takes it.”

I looked at him, confused. “You mean for you?”

“For you and me. We’ll get a nice place—maybe something with a view downtown.”

“I told you Delaney and I are getting a place together.” We hadn’t talked about it lately, but that’s always been our plan. I hope it hasn’t changed because I’ve been thinking that it might be good for Jared and me when we go to university. This summer he’ll be traveling with his family, and when we start school, we’ll have even less time to hang out. Then I wondered why I wanted less time for him and added it to the pile of things that I didn’t want to think about.

“Yeah, but that was before,” he said. “I thought you’d want to live with me now.”

“We’re only eighteen.”

“So?”

“Don’t you want to live with your friends?”

“They’re slobs. I want to live with you.”

“Why? Because you think I’ll clean up after you? Can you even cook? Or do you want me to do all the cleaning and cooking and shopping?”

“Whoa. Where is that coming from? I can learn to do all that stuff.” Of course. He had to learn to do something that I’d been doing for years. He’d had everything easy.

“I’m not ready to think about next year. I just want to get through graduation.”

“We can talk about it again in the summer. I’ll put a deposit on something.” He looked unruffled, like he was so sure I’d come around to his way of thinking.

I sat up, crossed my legs, and faced him. “I don’t know if I want to live with you ever. My mom got with my dad when she was only nineteen and she missed out on all kinds of stuff.”

“I’m not like your dad.” Now he was starting to look annoyed, but it didn’t make me want to back away, it made me want to dig a little deeper.

“You’re kind of acting like him.”

“That’s a shitty thing to say.” His face was flushed.

“Every time I want to stay home, you act like you are all bummed out, then I feel bad.”

“You kidding me? You’re always depressed, so I’ve been trying to keep you busy.”

Everything was lurching and scrambling inside me and I just wanted to get up and go home and hide in my bedroom with my earbuds and loud music. I’d stay in there for days. Maybe weeks. I’d never come out again. “Sometimes I want to be alone. I need space.”

We stared at each other. I could feel the truth crumbling inside me, the horrible aching yearning to be on my own, to not have to discuss my feelings or wonder what he was thinking, or try to make him happy, or be Jared and Sophie. I just wanted to be Sophie again.

He sat up. “You need space?” His face was pale, his eyebrows a dark slash. His lips even seemed pale, as though I’d stabbed him and all the color had bled out.

“Not forever, just a small break.” I couldn’t believe I’d said it, but now the words were out and I watched them fall like bombs onto his face. His eyes widened, then his mouth drooped.

“Seriously?” He sounded winded.

“I’ve been thinking lately that maybe I haven’t really dealt with my dad dying. Maybe I just dove into everything with you because I was avoiding it.”

“I tried to get you to talk about it.”

“That’s the problem. I don’t want to talk about it. I just want to work it out in my own head. I was thinking that maybe we shouldn’t see each other over spring break.”