Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
HAILEY
14 years old
A truck door swings shut outside my bedroom window. I’m sprawled on top of my plaid comforter. Aunt Karen’s cackle echoes from the living room where she’s been watching Friends reruns for the last three hours. Which means… No.
It’s the end of August and the middle of fire season. There’s no way it’s him.
I convince myself to get up and look anyway.
Jack doesn’t come home, even on his rest and recovery days. But when I pull back the gauzy curtains, I see him. He’s dressed in casual clothes, popping open the tailgate of his Toyota Tundra.
Between the slight slump of his shoulders and the weathered lines on his face, he looks older than my friends’ dads. Like he’s lived a thousand lifetimes in the span of my fourteen years.
What is he doing?
He trudges through a blanket of pine needles that make up the landscape of our backyard and squats when he reaches the shed door. There’s a rock the size of an orange, large enough to hide a key beneath it but small enough to blend in with the others. He palms the top, unearthing the silver object, and returns the rock to the same spot. The door swings wide with the latch undone. He disappears for a moment before stepping back out with a heap of fabric and an armful of long poles.
I should go talk to him. Find out where he’s going.
I push away from the window and pad down the hallway. Aunt Karen is too engrossed in the TV to even notice me slip outside.
I stop on the last plank that meets the steps of the front porch and say, “Hi,” with enough volume to make sure he good-and-well hears me.
He drops his first load of camping equipment in the bed of his truck, then pauses. “Hey, Hayes. Where’s Karen?”
I pretend it doesn’t bother me that he still calls me by my nickname. It’s the one used by the closest people in my life, of which he is not.
I hoist my thumb behind me. “She’s inside. Got hooked on an old series with a love triangle situation. The guy forgot to use oven mitts and pulled a pan of tater tots from the stove with his bare hands.” I chuckle. Even repeating it back sounds funny. But it must not be his kind of humor. He doesn’t return my smile.
I stuff my hands in the back pockets of my jean shorts. They fidget if I leave them at my sides.
“Going somewhere?”
He eyes his packed belongings. “Yeah.” His back is my view as he ducks inside the shed. “I’m going camping with some friends this weekend.”
I perk up. Camping’s something I wouldn’t hate doing with him, but he’s never had the time.
“That sounds fun,” I say.
I wait for him to invite me. To show a small sign that he’d like to spend time together on his days off. But he just says, “Yeah. It should be.”
He retrieves a fishing pole and cookstove to add to his pile while I just stand there.
I’ve learned by now if it means enough to me, I have to fight for it. And while I feel vulnerable putting myself out there, it’s the only way I’ll know my answer.
“I could come along. Help give you an extra hand with that tent?”
What am I even saying? The man doesn’t need help. He lives out of a tent!
He slams the tailgate shut and dusts his palms together.
“It’s okay. You don’t need to come. I don’t know how much fun you’d have anyway.”
Gah, he’s making this as painful as possible.
“I know I don’t need to come. I… want to.”
His expression twists. “Oh.”
Did he really think I was offering because I feel bad for him? The only way we’ll ever have a relationship is if we spend time together.
I slowly back away. “But if it’s a guys’ trip, it’s fine.”
“How about we take a rain check,” he offers.
Not “I’d love to have you there,” just “another time.” I’m some scheduling obligation he’s resigned himself to.
I’ll admit, it doesn’t feel good. I’m used to needing to be the bigger person to keep this relationship afloat. I try not to let it bother me and think of the positives instead.
He didn’t say no , just later . Which means, deep down, there is a world where he doesn’t find me repulsive to be around.
I convince myself that there’s still hope for us.
Present Da y
This is my nightmare.
The Boeing’s tires grind over rough gravel with their sudden rotation, and I’m trapped in a human pinball machine with nowhere to go. Not even my armrests act as reliable support. They rattle with the motion of the cabin. I squeeze my eyes shut.
“Are you okay?” Reed says, and covers my hand with his. The hot center of his palm sends an electric current up my arm. I jump at his touch.
“I’m fine.”
I lie to him for the second time in a few minutes. The first was telling him that I’m okay with him remaining in the seat next to me. I think Dolores might be more sympathetic about my fear. I have a feeling he’s more likely to skydive from this plane than know how to secure my oxygen mask if I can’t do it myself.
As if I weren’t already a stressed-out mess, my iPhone chimes. I forgot that I left it wedged between my knees. When I flip it over, the text reminder flashes on the screen. What compels me to open it now of all times, I have no idea.
You don’t need to come , it reads.
I messaged him late last night. But instead of telling him I took the job, I said I’d visit him on R&R. That was his reply.
I pinch my eyes shut.
It stings just as much as the first time he said it nine years ago. Can’t he see that I want to come? That I don’t particularly love going a solid year without seeing him in person, let alone four?
I planned to respond to him before we took off. But that doesn’t seem to matter now that we’re barreling down the runway. It’s not like I’m turning back.
I hold the side button, powering down the device. The intercom dings, and a woman with a Delta branded vest and curls piled on top of her head pulls out a radio from the wall next to her. Her knuckles are nowhere near the same shade as mine when she presses it against her lips.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome aboard Delta Airlines flight 3994 bound for Boise, Idaho. All carry-on items should be stowed securely in an overhead bin or beneath the seat in front of you.”
I sacrifice my safety for a split second to stuff my phone into the front pocket of my JanSport backpack.
“All electronic devices should be turned off at this time. If you’re seated in an emergency exit, please review the responsibilities for emergency exit seating on the back of the safety information card located in the pocket of the seat in front of you.”
The nose of the plane careens forward as she wraps up her speech and takes a seat. My chest constricts with every pull of air into my lungs. My vision tunnels and my ears ring.
After all these years, it’s clear I haven’t learned my lesson.
Do you really think he’ll talk to you? Finally ask you what it is that you love in life? my overactive imagination taunts.
You think he cares what you’ve accomplished while he was away? That he’d be excited you became an EMT like her?
My thoughts continue to mock me. The answers to those questions loom over me. But it’s my final thought before this plane lifts off the ground that really does me in.
He hasn’t missed me.
It surfaces now, my anxiety.
Claws at my insides like the raging beast that it is.
It eats its way up my esophagus from the place it’s lied dormant, waiting to strangle me.
And I berate myself. Because I let this all-consuming feeling come back for a man who doesn’t even care that I exist in the world.