Chapter 5 Snow
SNOW
“…and then to see you walking home like nothing happened? It’s one thing to disappear but to come home with a man? So much for respecting the rule of no one else in the apartment. Were you going to fuck him, huh?”
Caleb’s voice booms through the bathroom door.
I’ve locked myself in and the shower runs, but I can’t bring myself to get in.
The last thing I need is for Caleb to burst in here while I’m naked and vulnerable to continue the argument that’s been raging for the past six hours.
It’s the same thing, over and over and over.
I can’t take it anymore.
I need out.
I need away from him.
“Shut up!” I scream as all the anger and frustration overflows.
Flying at the door, I wrench it open and glare at Caleb standing in the hall with his hands on his hips.
“Just shut up Caleb! What do you get out of this, huh? We hate each other. Living together is hell and I have tried to make it work, oh, have I fucking tried! It’s bad enough that we’re locked into this joint lease and can’t afford to move out, but at least I try to make it work, but you?
You’re a disgusting wretch of a man, Caleb.
Hell, you’re not even a man! What I do with whom is no one’s business but mine! ”
“Noelle—”
“No! This is my time! You’re not a man, you’re a fucking weasel!
Did you think I wouldn’t notice you taking money out of the joint account, which is the only buffer we have between us and homelessness?
If that empties, what’s going to pay the rent and utilities, huh?
And you hid!” I throw my hands in the air.
“You hid from the loan sharks you engaged with because you’re a coward.
I had to face them, I had to deal with them.
I have to pay the bills, put food on the table, cook, clean, work, scrape together rent, all while you sit around in your own filth! ”
“It’s my account too so I can do whatever the fuck I want with it!
Oh, fuck right off,” Caleb snarls. “You think it’s easy for me to get a job?
You think I like living like this? With a fucking nagging bitch in my ear every two minutes?
I want to live and relax but you’re always around like a fucking mosquito, so fucking noisy and so fucking useless.
You’re draining me dry, Noelle. You’re a fucking vampire! ”
“Who pays for a roof over your head!” I can’t hold back. Every word tears from me laced with furious venom. “So what if I wanted to bring a man home? This is my home!”
Storming past him, I stomp into the messy living room.
“Look! You can’t even clean up the trash around your pit.
It’s like all basic human traits that keep people clean have left that thick skull of yours.
And as for a job? I got you so many interviews that you never turned up to, which is your fucking failure, you hear me?
I can’t believe I ever loved you. You’re utterly pathetic, acting like a child with my alarms and my phone and my keys! ”
“Shut up!” Caleb roars. “Shut the fuck up!”
He lunges at me, but I’m faster, ducking under his arm and racing to my room.
My door slams in his face just as he reaches it and he pounds against it with both fists while I hold it with my weight.
“I never loved you, you hear me? You were just an easy mark, which makes you infinitely more pathetic than I am because at least I knew what I would get out of it from the start! But you? You fucking fell for everything and you still would! Some flowers and a kind word and you fall for anyone who gives you attention because you’re nothing, Noelle.
You only exist for others, you hear me?”
Again and again he pounds on the door while I hold it closed, my heart hammering and my body jolting from the force of his punches and kicks.
His words should hurt, and to an extent they do, but he’s said all of this before and much worse.
“I’m leaving!” I yell. “You hear me? I’m not spending one more day in this fucking house with you because unlike you, I actually have value. I do good. You? You’re a fucking waste and no one would miss you!”
“Fuck you! You wanna stay in there, fine! Stay in there!”
Silence falls suddenly and the door no longer trembles.
My heart races and after a few seconds, I dart away and drag my chair in front of the door.
I should call someone.
Who?
My friends won’t answer.
None of them like Caleb and it’s late.
Dragging my phone from my pocket, I dial 911 but as the call rings out, my stomach knots.
The last time I called them, they told us to work it out because no one had been hurt and we both can legally stay here.
I have no options.
Hanging up, I toss my phone onto the side table and sink down onto my bed in despair.
Hot tears sting at the corners of my eyes and I press my trembling hands flat, palm to palm.
Suddenly, loud crashes sound on the other side of the door.
The handle begins rattling immediately and after a final loud thunk, the handle collapses away from the door.
“You wanna stay in there?” Caleb roars. “Then fucking rot in there!”
After a final slam against the door, his heavy footsteps stomp away and silence falls.
A few minutes later, the front door slams.
The fucker removed my door handle?
Approaching the door, I cautiously slip my finger into the small hole left behind by the absent handle and try to pull at the door, but I can’t get enough of a grip from such a small hole.
After attempting to put my half of the handle back in the door and failing each time, I return to my bed, miserable.
How did my life end up like this?
I should have given up on my studies and gone with my parents while they followed the tour of one of their favorite bands.
Maybe then I also would have fallen in love with Spain and moved there with them.
Instead, I’m here.
Hollow.
As I crawl under my covers and lament my predicament, Xander pops into my mind.
He was so kind without a single thought, and it was such a simple gesture to walk me home.
Such a quiet man who gives off a rather cold, grumpy aura and yet twice within the last two days, he’s given me a smile that feels like it means something.
Maybe he really was just being kind and Caleb is right. I’m looking into things because a single affectionate gesture makes me feel wanted.
But in the end, I’m this.
Alone in bed, locked in my room with Caleb gone and no one to call.
Anger melts into pain and the tears come.
I muffle them in the pillow for as long as I can and end up falling asleep.
Dark, turbulent dreams gradually give way to a warm dream of Xander with his strong, muscular arm in my hands but rather than a coat between us, his arm is bare.
He speaks, but I can’t decipher his words.
His skin is hot to the touch and as I work my hands up to his shoulder, his other hand curls fingers under my chin and lifts my attention to his sexy, dark eyes.
They’re an inviting abyss and then he smiles, leaning close.
I wake abruptly, overheating under my blanket with my heart pounding painfully.
It’s morning.
Sunlight streams in through my open curtains, and my alarm bleeps loudly, alerting me to a brand-new day.
The chair is still in front of the door, undisturbed.
I sigh in relief.
At least Caleb never came near me.
Distantly, the sound of the shower running brings fresh dread. The water bill is going to be insane, never mind the heating.
“Fuck.”
Unable to get my door open, I’m forced to dress quickly and climb out of my bedroom window into a world white with frost and icy winds.
It’s not the first time I’ve escaped the apartment this way, but it’s going to be the last.
I barely have anything saved to see my parents, but my share of money in our joint account might be enough to get me a one-way ticket out of here.
I can’t do this anymore.
Out in the street, the empty space where my car should be taunts me.
Caleb stole it.
That asshole.
Forced to walk to work, I’m sweaty and exhausted by the time I arrive.
I sprint to one of the shower rooms and wash quickly until I’m presentable enough that Jen won’t have any complaints.
No clean clothes means borrowing scrubs from the closet, but I fill out the paperwork so Jen can’t accuse me of stealing, then I head to work.
The day passes slowly.
Like most arguments with Caleb, I’m left with an odd hangover that makes my neck ache and my thoughts run slow, but there’s one good thing about my day.
Xander.
I only see him once in the corridor, but he holds my gaze as he passes and it makes me feel seen.
He was likely being polite, but I cling to it throughout my shift because the look he gave me was the same in my dream.
Thinking about that makes me warm all over and I need something to get me through the day.
“Noelle?” Jen’s raspy voice drags me from my spreadsheet of patient information.
I glance up, ready to give her my usual withering look, but I falter at the sight of two cops standing behind her.
“What’s up?”
“These officers need to speak with you,” Jen says, barely hiding her glee.
Not only has she brought police right to my desk, but she looks poised to linger so she hears every word.
“Miss Montoya?” One of the cops adjusts his stance.
“Yes?”
“Is there somewhere we can go to speak privately?”
My heart starts to pound even as Jen barely conceals her disappointment.
“Uh… sure, yeah. We can use one of the empty patient rooms. Follow me.” My ankle catches on the leg of my chair as I stand, and heat warms my cheeks as I walk around the desk.
Leading the way to the nearest empty room, my mind races.
Is this about the call I made last night?
I hung up without speaking to anyone, but would that get me into trouble?
Maybe someone saw me climbing out of my window and thought I was robbing the place.
Inside the empty patient room, I close the door after the two cops enter and then face them, fighting to keep myself calm. “Have I done something wrong?”
“Miss Montoya, are you familiar with a Mr. Stern?”
“This is about Caleb?” Groaning, I rub the back of my neck. “Look, I don’t know what he told you but he’s just as much to blame as I am, okay? We argue all the time and some of the things I said I didn’t entirely mean, but this feels like overkill.”
The officers exchange a look, then the second one steps forward. “You misunderstand,” he says.
“Oh. Does he need to be bailed out again? Because I don’t have the money.”
“Miss Montoya… I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but Caleb Stern is dead.”
The whole world falls away, enveloping me and the cops in a blanket of gray. “What?”
“I’m so sorry. He was pronounced DOA in a car crash last night.”