Pieces of Summer (A stand-alone novel)(23)

She nods slowly, still watching.

“He was so sweet, always holding me, touching me, kissing me in a way that made me feel loved. When I had sex with him, it didn’t feel wrong. You probably don’t want to hear this, but it was years ago. I couldn’t get enough of him back then. When summer ended, it felt like my heart stopped beating. It was all I could do to get through the school year, but at least he sent me letters. He didn’t have a phone at that time.”

“He wrote you?” Whit whispers, her eyes wide and mystified.

“I wrote him more than he wrote me. He was saving his money, so buying a lot of stamps was an issue. Sometimes I sent him stamps in the envelopes just so I’d get to have more letters from him. I loved his words in writing, even though most people would consider it cheesy nowadays. He was working in the off season at a restaurant as a busboy—I was saving up most of the money Dad paid me for working odd jobs on the ranch. But during the summer Chase was mine and I was his—no work. We only had just under three months together, so we spent every second making it count.”

She clears her throat. “You said it was intense,” she states in a hushed tone. “Both of you. Sounds more like it was epic. What happened? What really happened?”

A tear rolls down my cheek, and I sigh while wiping it away.

“My parents divorced. Long story short, my mother lost it a little when my dad remarried, and she wouldn’t let me come back the next summer. I knew Chase was hurt or mad because he hadn’t written any letters to respond to mine. I stopped hearing from him just before summer. By spring, I was desperate to see him and explain what had happened. I didn’t care if we had a night or a week to be together before my mother sent police. I honestly even thought about quitting school and talking him into running away with me.”

Tears gather in her own eyes as she listens attentively.

“I drove, managed to make it down here in record time, and I went straight over to his house. There was a party that night, though. And I got to see why I hadn’t heard from him. I got to see why he wasn’t responding to all the letters I sent him about how much I loved him… About how much I missed him… About how much I couldn’t wait to be with him for longer than summer…”

My words get choked on the way out, and Whit tenses.

“What happened?” she prompts.

Swiping away another tear, I take a calming breath.

“He was with another girl. They were all over each other. At one point she even had her hand down his pants. I watched it like I couldn’t look away until… finally I was able to. Then I drove straight back home. The end.”

A tear falls down her cheek, then another. In a moment, she’s sniffling and dabbing at the onslaught of tears.

She didn’t even have to hear the worst part. No one should know the worst part. That part was just teenage drama and heartbreak that I over-exaggerated. It’s what teenagers do. It wasn’t as intense and epic as my mind led me to believe—because that sort of love doesn’t exist.

Dr. Kravitz assured me of that. Even Dr. Stein agrees that I romanticized all my feelings to the nth degree. While losing Chase was painful, it wasn’t nearly as painful as everything I endured after the night that changed my life.

The real nightmare came later. It’s not often something shapes your life and changes the way you have to look at absolutely everything.

“So why come back? Obviously he destroyed you. Why come back?” Whit asks, drawing me out of my reverie.

I shrug, staring down at the bar. It’s a ludicrous explanation to a sane, rational, healthy person. She’d never understand. So I give her the philosophical version instead of the f*cked-up truth.

“I’ve spent my life living with a hollowness inside me that I can’t explain. When you find something that feels as intense and real and pure as what we once had, it f*cks you up. It’s a deluded, exaggerated version of it, because it couldn’t have been that amazing. Anyway, it’s not worth the good times when you have to endure the hellacious aftermath… but I can’t seem to move forward from this point in my life and have a lasting, healthy existence.”

That sounds so much better than the truth, even if it does make me sound a little pathetic by default.

I stand and pour more coffee, ignoring the hot tears pricking my eyes.

“I decided I needed closure. My… therapist… agreed. Sort of.” Therapist sounds much less eyebrow-raising than psychiatrist. “It’s the only way I’m ever going to move forward. The bowling alley is unfinished business. It was supposed to be ours. I spent three years planning out every detail with Chase when we were younger. Hunter helped me pull it all together when I finally decided I had to do something drastic for closure. So… I bought this house and the bowling alley.”

It seemed like it was meant to happen now, at this time, considering how everything kept shifting into place.

“My dad had a stroke shortly after I saw Chase sucking that girl’s tongue down his throat. Early last year, he finally passed away. He hadn’t been able to really communicate since the stroke, and spent years suffering from it. My stepmother stayed with him, even though she just kept the married title and did whatever. In order to inherit anything, she couldn’t divorce him. In the end, she had to follow the will. She couldn’t sell the house to anyone but family—and only for the price stipulated in the will. She wanted to sell it to her son, but he was just going to sell it immediately after in an effort to get around the will and sell it for a much higher price. We both had lawyers going to war over it. I won. They lost. The stipulations were that I had to live here, since my lawyer made the case my stepbrother was just going to sell it as a means of getting around the will. To honor my father’s wishes, I was given the house if I truly wanted it for the sentimental value my lawyer fought to prove it had to me. I agreed to the move without thinking about it.”