Chapter 20 Reason Twelve #3
“I’m in some kind of storage closet. There are mop heads and ... Wait. No, those are wigs,” I said, holding my phone out as a light source. “Oh my God, what kind of monster puts wigs in a janitorial cupboard? Is this 1930s Berlin?”
“Did they keep wigs in storage closets back then?”
“I am going through psychological turmoil, Gray Collins. Stop laughing at me!” I was spiraling. I knew I was. Call it a coping mechanism, but somehow, it helped.
“Sorry,” he said, making his voice serious again. “I’m here. I’m here and you’re safe, and all of this is going to be fine, I promise.”
“He might be gone. It’s been a while. Should I check?”
“Don’t,” he barked at me. “Don’t open that door until I get there, okay? I’m coming for you, Half-pint. I’m coming for you, and I’m not going to let you go. Not again, I promise.”
We were quiet for a while. The only sound on the line were my cries and his frantic breathing.
In an attempt to calm me down, he hummed, but he chose the worst possible song.
My song. Just for me. Always just for me.
An image flashed in my mind of him standing at the front of a church, watching her walk down the aisle as Abide With Me played in the background, and the mental picture broke my heart.
I must have fallen asleep at some point because the next thing I knew, there was a banging coming from the other side of the door.
“Oh my God," I cried into the phone. "I think he’s trying to get in. Where are you?”
“I’m right here,” he called out from the other side of the door.
I stood up and flung the door open. My arms wrapped around him and I pressed my face against his neck.
“You’re okay. I’ve got you. I have you.” I kissed his neck, and he made no attempt to stop me.
I chalked it up to the excitement of it all. “Come on, let’s get you home.”
My legs were like cinder blocks holding me in place. “Is he out there? Did you see him? He was wearing a white shirt and jeans.”
“Kent,” he whispered into my ear. “Baby, look around. The place is empty. The only other person here is the bartender. I had to give her a twenty to let me come in and look for you.”
“I must’ve fallen asleep. I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to worry you.”
He pulled away and stared at me. His hand slipped from my waist, rising toward my face, and he pushed the hanging heap of brown curls away from my eyes. “It’s my job to worry about you.”
For a second, I thought that would be that. He would release the grip he had on me and walk me back to his truck. We would ride back to West Clark engulfed by an impenetrable silence, and he would send me away with a smile and a nod.
Gray leaned forward and kissed my cheek. “Do you maybe want to grab a burger?”
I whimpered.
He reached down and slid his fingers between mine, bringing my hand to his lips. “I’m sorry. About the lake. About the ring. I’m just so dang sorry.”
And it almost looked like he was smiling. Like his mouth was opening wide and coming toward me. Like nothing but hope lived in his eyes, and he wanted to shine that hopeful light on me.
I woke up with the worst hangover I’d ever experienced in my life. I was naked, lying on my stomach with my legs spread eagle, my bare ass out for anyone to see. Only one person actually saw it, thankfully. Unthankfully, that person was my mother.
“Good Lord, what in the world is going on in here?”
I lifted my head off the pillow and realized that I had vomited half-digested bits of burger onto it at some point the night before. I turned toward the door, my eyes squinted so tightly I could barely see.
“Too loud,” I croaked through a raw throat. I turned toward the door and motioned for her to leave, only to realize she had her back to me, facing the wall.
“I’m going downstairs. I want this cleaned up now, Kent Maxwell Fox. I don’t want to ever discuss what I’ve seen in this room again.”
“You gotta stop screaming. My head is on fire and the walls are too bright.”
“I don’t know what in the world that means, but I know that I don’t like it. Clean this up.” She slammed the bedroom door behind her, and I cupped my hands over my ears and groaned.
It took me a while to get my body to cooperate. Every inch of me ached, and I felt like I’d just gone twelve rounds in the ring with ... whoever the hell one goes twelve rounds in the ring with.
I collected my discarded clothes first, throwing them into the empty hamper.
Mud coated my jeans, and there was a rip in my shirt.
My heart raced as I tried to remember the events from the night before.
The last thing I remembered was Gray standing in front of me.
I turned around to look for my phone. While it wasn’t anywhere in sight, the source of my mother’s upset was right in front of me.
“Fuck!” I shouted. “Fuck, fuckity, fuck-fuck-fuck!”
My entire body cringed. I debated opening my window and hurling myself to my death, only to remember we lived in a two-story home. I walked toward the window and peered down. The drop wouldn’t be enough to kill me, but maybe if I landed just right, I might slip into an endless coma.
I turned back to my bed and sighed. Battling a throbbing migraine, I walked forward and picked up the fully visible Fleshlight and economy-sized tube of lube.
Once those were in my hand, I collected the discarded dildo that sat directly in front of my door.
I hid all of them inside of my bedside table.
Next, I gathered the vomit-covered sheets and pillowcases, throwing the larger chunks of undigested burger in the trash can beside my bed.
With the linens crumpled in my hand, I threw on my bathrobe and made my way downstairs, bracing myself for the walk of shame I was about to perform.
The front door closed as I made my way down, and when I reached the bottom of the staircase, there was a note taped to the banister that said, We will never speak of this morning again.
I don’t care if some therapist says it will help. We take this to the grave.
When I was done in the laundry room, I returned to my bedroom and fell onto my bare mattress.
I hadn’t even gotten my legs on the bed before my phone started blaring a torturous tune.
I reached and grabbed it off the bedside table, taking a look at the screen.
A picture of Rhonda and I, complete with her miraculous beehive and terrible blue eyeshadow, flashed across my phone. I hit accept and put it on speaker.
“I need you to be as quiet as possible because my head feels like it’s stuck in a vise.”
Her voice came through heavy and harsh. “The truck got here two hours ago. You were supposed to be here at six. Bossman is pissed, and I’m not too thrilled either, doll.”
Unloading a truck filled with boxes of stomach-churning food sounded like physical and psychological torture, and I hoped my groan got that point across. “No. Dear God, no. I can’t. Rhonda, I just can’t. I’ll vomit on everything and everyone.”
“What’s that?” She asked someone in the background. “Fired? Fired and you wish he’d never come back to town? You never want to see him again, and you hope that when he dies, the last sound he hears is your laughter? Christ, Gray, that’s harsh, even for—”
I hung up on her and frantically pounded out a text message, hitting send seconds before Rhonda called back. I tapped accept and screamed like a madman into my phone, “Tell him to check his messages!”
“What the hell are you talking—”
“Tell him to check them,” I screamed again. She let out a thunderous laugh. “No,” I said, knowing that she’d somehow just ruined my life. “What did you do?”
“It’s Sunday. I was just screwing with you. You’re off today. Dear Lord, we were off the phone for less than thirty seconds. What did you do?”
I groaned, and then I screamed a string of expletives no man should ever scream at a lady.
She continued cackling as I unleashed holy Hell on her.
At some point during the annihilation of Rhonda Macknemera, my phone beeped.
I looked down to see the loveliest of sights.
It was a picture of Gray I’d stealthily taken when he was stocking canned goods at work.
A beautiful image of the back of his head, bald spot fully on display.
My mouth watered as butterflies fluttered in my stomach.
I rejected the call. “He’s calling me now. Why are you like this?” I whined. “I hate everything about this day.” The phone beeped, and I declined him yet again.
“He’s just going to keep calling,” she said.
“I hate you. More than I’ve ever hated anyone in this life, that’s how much I hate you.”
“I need to know what this text said. Come on, throw Momma Rhonda a bone.”
“We are never making Momma Rhonda a thing,” I said as I pulled up my messages. “Oh, fuck a duck and screw a canoe.” After rejecting another of Gray’s calls, I read the message to Rhonda. “Don’t be mad. I’m hung. Over.”
“That is the best thing I’ve ever—”
“Die.” I hung up on her and threw my phone across the room, into my hamper. It beeped three times in a row, and I lunged across the room for it, despite my stomach’s insistence that I halt all communication and vomit uncontrollably.
We need to talk
Answer the phone, Kent. I know you’re up
Please?
My forehead was pouring sweat as I made my way back to the bed. I pulled my knees to my chest, rocking back and forth as I called him.
He answered on the first ring.
“Hey,” he said with a steady voice.
“Hey, so … about that text. I didn’t mean I’m hung. I’m not hung.” I cringed. “That’s not how I meant for that to come out. Obviously, I’m hung.”
He snorted. “I’ve seen it, Kent. You’re not fooling me.”
“Jesus on the cross, Grayson. If you don’t stop insinuating that I have a small penis—”
“Are you alone?” he interrupted.
I rocked back and forth, my churning stomach be damned. “Yeah.”
“Can I come over? I think we need to do this face-to-face.” He didn’t sound angry, which was a good sign, but he definitely didn’t seem happy.
Looking in the mirror, I cringed at the mess of a man staring back.
The entire area below my right eye was a vicious hue of dark purple.
There was a tiny bit of red inside of the eye itself.
It looked like my eyeball was bleeding. The whole area was a swollen, hideous situation, and I didn’t want him to see me like that.
“Can we just do it over the phone? I look terrible.”
“I’m sure you don’t.”
“My eye.” I wanted to tell him it was a disaster area. That it should be sectioned off with yellow crime scene tape so that no one could see the hideousness of it all. “I look like a monster.”
“Listen, I’m coming whether you want me to or not.
I told you last night, it’s my job to take care of you.
Do you need anything? Alka Seltzer? Pepto?
I’ve got some leftover pain meds from when I had a tooth pulled last year," he said, dishing out opiates in lieu of his love.
“I just need a few minutes to trick Dog-Dog into getting in his crate.”
“What the hell is a Dog-Dog?”
“My dog. You met him last night, remember?” A dog growled in the background, and it sounded like Gray had whimpered.
“Crap. He’s looking me dead in the eyes.
That’s never a good sign. Listen, baby, I’m going to stop by the pharmacy on the way over.
Give me an hour, okay? Try not to get punched in the face in the meantime. ”