In the Stillness(27)

“I’m staying here this summer,” I balked petulantly.

“I don’t think so, young lady,” my dad answered. I could tell I was on speakerphone because I heard my mom start talking in the background.

“I stayed here last summer, Dad. I took classes and did an internship to help build my student portfolio. I’ll be doing the same thing this summer.” Panic started to rise through my body.

“Natalie, this year has been an emotional one for you. You need to come home this summer to regroup.”

“Ryker will be home soon!” I shouted. “I’m not leaving until I see him. Dad. He was shot, his best friend died, and I’m not going to have him come home and me not be here!” My voice shrieked into a cry that I no longer tried to conceal.

Tosha walked in the room and mouthed “Ryker?” when she saw me crying. I shook my head and mouthed “parents” back.

“Here’s the deal, Natalie,” my mother piped in, “either you come home at the end of the semester, or your father and I will stop paying for your education. We will not send our money only to have you blow it on a relationship with this Ryker boy.” The ice cubes from her voice froze my tears in place and traveled down my spine.

“That’s fine. Don’t pay for school anymore. But you forget, I’m twenty years old and have no legal obligation to return to your home under any circumstances.” Tosha threw her fists into the air and, I think, said “hallelujah.”

My parents sat in what I assume was stunned silence on the other end. I’d called their bluff. They had nothing else up their sleeves.

“Hello?” I prompted.

My dad cleared his throat. “I’ll call you later, Natalie.” He hung up.

I won that round. Now, I just needed Ryker to come home. Fast.

*

Little fists bang on the door, interrupting my stare-down with Eric.

“The only reason,” I purr venomously, “that I’m unemployed is because you begged me not to have an abortion. Then, you continued on your merry way to your Ph.D. while I became a stay-at-home mom because we couldn’t afford for me to continue school, and we didn’t want our kids in daycare for the hours that I’d have to work at the job I already had.”

He swallows hard as I step slowly toward him.

“As for the cutting? If you think it has nothing to do with you, then you’re as sick as I am.” I push past him and open the bedroom door, addressing my boys, “Guys go sit back down please, Mommy’s coming out to make you breakfast.”

They turn and scramble back toward the TV as Eric stops me. “What do you mean it has to do with me?”

“It’s us, Eric. I’ve been horribly unhappy for months, trying to deal with being basically a single mom while you were at the lab—”

“Getting my doctorate, Natalie. It’s not like I was screwing off.”

“I know!” I huff. “But three seconds after you get a job you’re talking about buying a house and knocking me up again. What about my plans?” My strained whisper is starting to turn into a yell.

Eric’s eyes burn through me. “It’s not just about you anymore, when will you accept that?”

“Never, because it wasn’t about me when this happened, either. I never wanted any of this, and I refuse to serve a life-long sentence because of it.”

Eric shakes his head rapidly in frustration. “Look,” he whispers, “that’s not how this started.” He grabs my arm, pointing to the nearly faded marks. “This is how it started. It stops. Today.” He squeezes my arm a little before throwing it down to my side.

We stare at each other in a silent standoff. I’ve threatened to take his kids and he’s threatened to tell my mother about the cutting—which would ruin things even more than they already are.

Shit.

Placing a smile on my face, I walk to the kitchen and proceed to make my children breakfast. Eric kisses the boys on the head before he leaves for work, but says nothing to me. I need to keep my shit together long enough to make a plan, so I silently resolve not to cut until after his graduation. I’ll have to wear a fancy summer dress, anyway.





Chapter 14





Apparently I smoke now. Thankfully, since the boys were up early this morning, they went down for a nap shortly after lunch. Honestly, my first thought was to go to the bathroom and cut. This morning’s fight with Eric was the nastiest one we’ve ever had. I can’t cut, though, and it’s driving me insane. I just want to a little. Just a little. I need a release from this pressure cooker Eric and I are living in—I need to exercise some control. So, when the boys fall asleep I thankfully remember the cigarettes I bought before I went to visit Tosha.

I’m two cigarettes in when Tosha walks up our back stairs.

“Jesus, you look like hell.” She sits next to me and holds out two fingers. I hand her a cigarette and a lighter. After the first long drag, she looks at me. “Eric called me today.”

“Shocking.” I was truly prepared for this. “What’d he say?”

She leans forward, resting her arms on her knees. “He said he knows you’re cutting . . . wanted to know if I knew anything about it. I lied.”

“Thanks.”