Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
kane
Forget Me – Lewis Capaldi
“What the fuck?” I mutter when I go to play my guitar and realize a fucking string is missing.
I look up as Marcus enters the room during a rare break from the game he’s been streaming on a platform he uses to make money while people watch him play his favorite games.
Swinging his keys around, Marcus stops when he sees me tossing aside my guitar.
“What’s up, man?” he asks, not looking at me as he grabs a drink from the fridge. I assume he restocked it today because this morning I was left with nothing but two butts of bread that I shoved in my mouth as I rushed out the door to get to school before it opened.
“My guitar,” I say in disbelief. “It’s missing a fucking string.”
He looks visibly shocked as he stares at me with wide eyes before looking around the room as if he’ll find the string or the culprit.
“I was streaming all day, but I haven’t noticed anything.
I guess someone could have come over and I just didn’t hear them with my headphones on, but I feel like I would have heard them.
But I haven’t noticed anything weird. I can’t even play the guitar,” he rambles.
When he finally finishes speaking, he takes a big breath that he clearly didn’t take during that entire monologue.
“Are you okay, dude? Did you take my string?”
Marcus spits out some liquid and wipes his chin, his entire shirt now covered in purple Gatorade.
“What? I don’t even know how to do that?
” he says, more as a question than a statement.
He caps his drink and places both hands on the counter before finally looking me in the eye for the first time tonight.
“Okay… Well, that’s weird. I swear it was there last night.
I was going to play after I got home from showing Lindsay some of the spots in town, but I was wiped so I guess I didn’t look hard enough…
Did I do it?” I wonder out loud, fisting my hair.
Maybe the never-ending exhaustion from work at the bar and school has finally gotten to me.
I look around the area as if maybe the string just jumped off the guitar itself and is waiting for me to find it.
The ridiculous notion has me scoffing . These past few weeks have been hell.
A haze of misery and self-loathing, and I must have finally cracked.
Unsure what else to do since it was Avery’s night with our friends and I didn’t want to face how empty the apartment would be, I decided to show my new coworker, Lindsay, around town.
Morgan initiated a schedule on nights when the group gets time with one of us.
All of us are just trying our best to navigate this new arrangement.
But Lindsay’s cool, and she talks enough so that I don’t have to.
When we met up with her girlfriend, I realized we had a lot in common, and it was nice to not feel the heavy weight of loneliness that’s been a constant these past few weeks.
Neither of them missed the way I kept staring at Avery’s contact all night, but they were kind enough not to say anything.
I felt the need to call her all night, to tell her everything.
From the stuff Lindsay said, to this new song I heard at the vintage shop we used to go to.
I found myself wondering what would happen if I just sent one text.
Would she respond? Or would it push her further away?
“Yeah, dude, that’s really weird. So, uh, I have to go, but I’ll be back at 11.
We’re going to go see some new movie Morgan swears isn’t a rom-com,” he says, pulling me out of my thoughts.
He grabs his keys and jacket because spring in Tennessee is always a gamble.
You could be sweating one minute and bundled up the next.
I scratch the back of my neck, knowing that means Avery will be there. I hesitantly ask, “So, uh, how is she doing?”
It’s the question I’ve only allowed myself to ask him every other day since the breakup, knowing I can’t not know how she is, but also wanting to respect her and the breakup she wanted.
His eyes soften as he turns and gives me his full attention. I almost take my question back, knowing I won’t be able to handle it if he tells me she’s dating someone new. Rage burns through me at the thought.
He finally puts me out of my self-loathing misery. “She’s okay. I mean, she’s sad, we can all see that. But she won’t talk about it, you know. She’s working more at Second Chances, though, and that has helped,” he answers hesitantly, like he’s scared of my reaction.
What else could I want for her? I want her to be happy.
I want nothing but the best for her. I know she’ll flourish with whatever she does, I just wish I was still there to witness it.
It’s like going to see your favorite artist and no longer being in the front row, somehow getting pushed to the back, trying to see over everyone in front of you to catch even a glimpse.
Fuck if I haven’t sat and mapped out every inch of her body the way I imagine one does in art, every inch and curve of her made to perfection.
I rub my chest, wondering if this tightening I feel every time I think of Avery is ever going to go away as Marcus leaves the apartment and shuts the door.
I turn, wondering what to do now. With my guitar out of commission and my friends with the only person who’s ever made me feel anything, I grab my water to go to my bedroom.
I call some stores around me to pick up a new string only to be told by every store in a fifty mile radius that their stock is sold out. I toss my phone away from me in frustration and decide to give myself the night to think of another solution.
What fucking luck.
I finish some notes I need to make about Trevor, a boy who has been coming into my office lately.
We talk about mundane things mostly, like how his day is going, but I’m slowly trying to get him to open up.
I’m hoping he starts trusting me more soon, because if I have to ignore one more odd-looking mark when he sits down, I might lose it.
He’s brushed everything off as an injury from work or simply being clumsy, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I wasn’t exploring every path.
After that’s finished, I scroll on Instagram, stopping when I reach Morgan’s story and catch a glimpse of Avery in the back.
Her long dark hair that I’ve had sprawled across me—and woken up suffocated by—more times than I can count, the faint smell of lemons filling my nose.
I spot a new dress I’ve never seen before and the boots I got her for Christmas.
The ones I knew she wanted and saved a month’s worth of tips for, because I knew she wanted the limited edition brown ones, and I refused to put it on my father’s card and let it be another thing he could hold over my head.
I don’t know how long I sit there and stare at this picture of her. I fixate on her smile that seems bright, her white teeth shining, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. Those beautiful, brilliant blues look dim in comparison to when they used to fall on me.
I’m torturing myself with the idea that maybe this is all I’ll get for the rest of my life, glimpses of her through a screen. I know it’s not enough for me. I’m not sure I’ll ever get enough of her. Which is a shame because I lost her, and I don’t even know how.
I roll over and try to think of anything else.
The sun will be up far too soon, and another day of counseling the young minds of South Hill High will keep my mind busy enough for me to get through the day without falling apart.
It seems to be all I can do these days—just put my head down and get through.
An alert hits my phone and I jump up, getting tangled in the three layers Avery always insisted we needed, faceplanting to the floor as I reach for my phone. I deflate when I see it’s just my dad.
Sperm Donor
You need to stop by in the morning to meet with one of my associates.
Yeah right, an associate. He means one of his golf buddies’ daughters that he’s been parading in front of me, like I’m looking for a wife’s dowry to keep my family afloat.
He’s just mad because I’ve been even more distant since the breakup.
I have refused to use the credit cards he “gifts” me, keeping at least that much of his control out of my life.
Avery always told me I didn’t need him or his validation. That somehow being me was enough. That his inability to love me did not have anything to do with me, but everything to do with him and how nothing will ever be good enough for him.
And I started to believe her.
But didn’t Avery choose to leave just like everyone else? Didn’t she take one last look at me and decide I wasn’t enough for her too?
A familiar tightness starts to spread across my chest, the tingling starting in my fingers and my vision blurring at the edges.
I grip my comforter and force myself to breathe before this turns into a full-blown panic attack.
They’ve increased over the past month, that suffocating feeling waking me up more nights than not.
I count and try to focus on each breath as the world spins around me.
Once my heart rate slows and the feeling has passed, I lock my phone and resume my self-deprecating inner monologue.
I fall asleep to the thought that this is all temporary and that I will get her back.
I’ll give her the life she always pictured for us.
Whatever she wants, she can have—I just need to figure out what went wrong.
And where did I put my fucking guitar string?
“Kane, I need you to meet with a student later today. They’re new to the school, and they’ve been to four other schools in the past two years, so I just want you to check in.
Make sure everything is good at home, if you can,” Principal Danner’s secretary, Dawn, tells me as I walk in the front door.
My bag is slung over my shoulder and my extra-hot latte burns my hands.
My eyes are still heavy with sleep, and my hair refused to be tamed this morning, so I opted to leave it a mess of waves.
I make a mental note to schedule a haircut as soon as possible.
“Sure thing, Dawn. Can you email any info to me so I can get a good understanding of their background?” I ask as I head toward my office, not bothering to wait for her response since I know Dawn will have everything to me within minutes.
She is probably the most efficient person in this school, the glue that keeps this place running.
Being at one of the most underfunded schools in the district, it’s hard to find good teachers and staff who are willing to work for pennies.
The kids in this section are falling through the cracks, and the government is being less than helpful.
That’s the main reason I applied here—the forgotten kids.
Whether forgotten by a messed-up system or by the people who were supposed to put them first but didn’t.
Once I get into my office, I throw my bag on the desk and start up my computer.
Taking a heavy pull from my drink, I let the warmth flood my system, giving me a boost to get myself together.
I pull up my calendar and email, take in all the info Dawn has already sent me, and note that my calendar is full today.
My weekly meeting with Trevor is at noon, and I’m hoping he shows up today.
Sometimes he doesn’t, but I always leave my door open anyway.
I also made a note to follow up with another student after her two-week absence to see what we can do to get her caught up on her work and stay eligible for graduation.
I heave a sigh at how much there is to do, but a sense of fulfillment hits me all the same. This is what I love, being helpful and giving some of these kids a voice they may not have otherwise.
My phone buzzes on the desk, already buried under all the files I’ve pulled for my morning sessions.
I shuffle papers around, my sleeves already up to my elbows with the sweltering heat blasting from the vents.
It buzzes again and I frantically look around for it, worried something has happened so early in the day.
Sperm Donor
Answer your phone, Kane.
I raised you better than this.
As a scoff rises out of my throat, I put my phone on Do Not Disturb and hide it away. The looming shadow of my father clouds my mood as my first student of the day arrives.