Not If I See You First(48)
“Other people saw and word got around.”
“Why didn’t you tell me!”
“Why would I? You hung up on me just for telling you he was in your Trig class.”
Shit… I did hang up on her then… That’s not how it seemed at the time. I thought I was just…
“Sorry.”
“You don’t have to be sorry—”
“Yeah I do.” I swallow. “Anyway, I texted him.”
“Really? When?”
“Sunday.” I hand her my phone.
I lean away and rest my head against the arm of the sofa. The coarse weave, like burlap, is rough but somehow pleasant. It’s nice to feel something, to keep me grounded while I sort this all out.
“Wow,” she says.
“You were always on my side, but if it were you, you’d have forgiven him. Wouldn’t you?”
“If it were me, sure I’d have been mad, I’d have frozen him out awhile. Then I’d have probably thawed out and made him buy me an expensive dinner or something. That doesn’t mean I think you should have. Maybe I’m wrong—maybe staying with him would have been weak and you did the right thing. Do you know what I mean?”
“Sort of. You’re still not telling me everything, though. I can tell.” I sit up straight but don’t turn to face her. “Just say it.”
“Please,” she says in a small voice. “Can’t we just forget it?”
I hear that she’s doubled over, face on her knees. I bow my head from the weight of it. I’m more than an idiot sometimes. Sheila was right; I can be totally blind.
I slide off the couch to sit on the floor at her feet and clasp my hands together on the back of her neck. I whisper into her ear.
“I love you, Sarah. I’m not going to throw you away.”
She sniffs. Is she crying? Sarah crying is more rare than Sarah laughing.
“You threw Scott away.”
This hits me in the chest like a physical blow.
“That was because of what he did, not what he said or believed. It’s not the same.”
“He was my friend too.”
Oh God. This never crossed my mind. Never. “I didn’t make you throw him away.”
She doesn’t answer. Her breathing is ragged. I open my mouth to say more, to convince her, but now I just want to un-say it because I see what a gift she gave me back then and how hard it must have been.
I let go of her and hold up my right hand, fingers spread.
“Face,” I say.
“Mm-mm.”
“Please?”
She knows it’s not fair to hide her face from me just because my eyes can’t see it like anyone else’s would, and I don’t abuse this request by making it often—it’s been years in fact. She lifts her head and presses her face lightly against my palm, her nose between my index and middle fingers. Her face is tightly scrunched up, her eyes squeezed shut, her cheeks damp.
“Oh, Sarah…” I climb up and wrap my arms around her. She pushes her face into my neck and gasps.
“He… he was… he…”
“Shhh…” I say. “We have all afternoon.”
“He was… so… upset…”
“Scott? Yeah, I—”
“No, Rick. He was really, really upset. I… I almost changed my mind.”
She starts really crying, shaking and sobbing. I’ve never heard her cry like this, not even when her dad left. I hold her tightly and try to keep from crying myself. It’s not easy. If Sarah were trapped on railroad tracks, I’d break all my fingers for her too.
She slips down to lie across my lap and words start pouring out of her along with the tears. “And… and… and it made me think that if Rick felt that bad breaking up, when he didn’t even really love me, how did poor Scott feel? But I couldn’t tell you that… I couldn’t… because I’m on your side…”
I feel strangely hollow except for how much Sarah means to me, how much I depend on her, and in a way that makes me feel good, not weak or dependent or pathetic. I reach out and feel her hair lying across her face. I tuck it behind her ear.
“I was so happy for you back then,” she says between sobs. “I wasn’t even jealous. I sometimes wondered why I wasn’t but I wasn’t. Maybe if I wanted Scott but he was yours and I was happy for you and I just hoped I’d find someone like that someday. I even… I even hoped my dad would help me like yours did… but… but…”
Sarah stops talking and struggles to breathe. I hold her and try to think about how much I love her and not about how much her dad doesn’t.
I wish these weren’t all one-way conversations. I need someone I trust to tell me if I’m going crazy. Thank God I have Sarah back, but everything else is quicksand. Jesus, Dad, I’m bobbing, even now with the weight of Sarah on my lap I still can’t tell exactly which direction is up. I never thought there was anything psychological to that but the more I lose my grip on what’s going on around me the more I can’t stay steady.
Scott said seeing me cry in that classroom back then was like waking from a dream, wondering how he could have ever believed what he had before. That’s how I feel now. He was my best friend, closer than Sarah, as impossible as that seems, maybe because of that extra spark we had… How could I have thought this one stupid thing was more true than everything else? How could I have been so goddamn paranoid I immediately thought the worst and never questioned it again?