Twenty-Seven #3
I set the box on the desk and start filling it up with the few things I left here.
A few clothes still folded in the drawer, some books on the bookcase, including the philosophy textbook that I let Thomas borrow in the hopes that it would be useful for him.
A bottle of perfume from the bathroom cabinet.
I stare at it before bringing the atomizer to my nose and sniffing.
It brings back the memory of when we went to the mall together for the first time, the same day I moved into the frat house.
He resisted at first, surly as always, but then I gave him my best pleading doe-eyed look and managed to convince him to go with me.
And in the end, we left with Thomas loaded down with bags and me triumphant, with a pistachio ice cream cone in hand.
He picked out this perfume. I had been torn between a cherry-scented one and a vanilla one.
But Thomas, tired of my constant indecision, grabbed one with notes of raspberries.
That was the right one for him because, he said, it reminded him of my freshly washed hair.
So not even waiting for my approval, he went up to the checkout and bought it.
He even had the cashier gift wrap it and tie a ribbon around it.
That made me smile. What kind of gift could it be if I already knew what it was?
Thomas, laughing, told me that I ought to appreciate it because he wasn’t going to do anything else like that for the next hundred years.
It was a beautiful moment. And this perfume will always remind me of it.
Maybe I shouldn’t put it in the box. The fewer things I have to remind me of him, the better off I will be.
I leave it on the desk, next to the small wooden box where Thomas keeps his steel rings.
I open it instinctively. I touch the rings, scattered around haphazardly, and press them between my fingers before bringing my hand to my chest. It’s as though by doing this, I can hold on to a part of him one last time.
Say a final goodbye to him, in my own way.
And what a paradox it is that this is where our story ends, right here in this room where it all began. In this room…
I shut the box, and eyes blurred by tears, I notice the leather bracelet tied around my wrist. Another gift from Thomas.
I get goose bumps when I think about the things he said to me when he tied it on my wrist, the weight that gesture seemed to carry, the importance he seemed to have settled on me.
I’m just about to untie it, when the door behind me swings open suddenly and then closes again with a thud that makes me jump.
When I turn around, Thomas is looking me up and down with bloodshot eyes, breathing heavily, his face weary and waxen. Then he spots the cardboard box and demands, “What…what are you doing?”
“What does it look like? I came to get my stuff.” I grab the box and try to lift it, but he holds my wrists and guides it back down to the desk. The anguish in his eyes is palpable.
“You’re not taking anything.” He shoves his hand through his hair.
“Are you trying to drive me crazy? I didn’t sleep a wink last night knowing you were with him!
And now you show up here with no notice and grab your stuff.
What next? Are you going to go off the grid and end things without giving me a chance to explain? ”
“Explain?” I laugh in a hysterical way. “There’s nothing to explain! It’s all too clear!”
He grabs my arms, and I hate how warm and comfortable my body feels at his touch.
This is the kind of comfort I needed last night.
The kind I still need today, because it represents a cure for all that ails me, but at the same time, it’s the source of all those ills.
Joy and damnation. Roses and thorns. How do I overcome that kind of conflict? How do I want to overcome it?
“I didn’t sleep with her, Ness; you have to believe me! I don’t remember touching her or letting her in; I don’t remember any of what she told you!”
“Only because you had too many drugs in your system to remember anything!” Anger vibrates in my chest as I pull roughly away from him.
“Christ, how could you ever think that I would do that to you? Look at me, for fuck’s sake; I’m destroyed!”
“You?” I exclaim indignantly. “You are destroyed?” I yell, shoving him back.
“I” Another shove. “Am.” Another. “Destroyed!” I continue to rain blows on him, but he does nothing to stop me.
“I trusted you! I trusted you! I put my heart in your hands, and you…you crushed it! Do you think that’s my only problem?
Whether or not you slept with her? You told her about the two of us, damn you!
You made me feel stupid for having feelings.
You looked me right in the eye and told me that you would never reciprocate those feelings!
You hurt me, humiliated me, and mocked me!
Do you seriously have the gall to come to me and tell me that you’re the one who is destroyed?
” I’m crying again and breathing hard. I didn’t want to cry.
I didn’t want to be weak in front of him.
But I can’t control the pain—it controls me.
I turn my back to him and grasp the edge of the desk. “I was prepared to be everything you needed, Thomas. All of it. Your shoulder to cry on, your heart, your voice. But you threw it all away instead.” I sniffle, wiping away tears. “But that doesn’t matter because I made mistakes of my own.”
“It’s not your fault…” Thomas’s voice is broken, and his eyes are glistening. Seeing him like this throws me off balance, but I can’t let it affect me.
“Of course it is, partially.” My throat gets tight as I try my best to hold back more tears. “You told me over and over again in every way you could that you aren’t made for that kind of thing. You never were. But I didn’t want to hear you. And now look where my stubbornness has gotten us.”
Thomas falls down on the foot of the bed in defeat. “It’s not your fault. It’s my fault, only mine. I never wanted any of this for you.”
I heave a sigh and answer. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Yes, it does,” he growls, getting to his feet. “It fucking matters to me.”
A bitter laugh floats out of my throat. “So did it matter when you called me a delusional idiot for hoping for something more with you? Did it matter when you were an inch away from my face telling me that you’d never love me and calling me pathetic for even thinking of it?
Or when you told me that the only reason you got with me was because I kept throwing tantrums?
Did it matter when you kicked me out of this room like a stray dog?
Or when you found yourself in bed with someone else the next morning?
” My shouts hang in the air between us, leaving us both momentarily speechless.
“You said our relationship is constantly foundering, and you know what? You were right. I realized that over the last month, I’ve put so much energy into trying to save this, but in the end, I was destroying it all along.
I never should have let it get this far.
You and I are poisonous to one another.”
“Don’t say that.”
“It’s the truth. This was a mistake. The night you asked me to come with you to the frat house, I should have said no.”
“Stop,” he begs me, but I keep going.
“I should never have kissed you. Asked you to stay with me. Tried to ease your pain. Fooled myself into thinking I could be enough for you. Because it’s clear to me that no one will ever be enough for you.”
“You were enough for me from the first moment I saw you,” he confesses in a weak whisper.
“That’s not what you said!”
“I know what I said!” In a fit of rage, he hurls all the objects off the desk onto the floor. The empty bottle shatters into a thousand pieces with an awful sound. “You were never the problem!”
“Right. You’re the problem. You always are, aren’t you?
Because life has been unfair to you. Because you grew up without any guidance.
Without love. You lost your brother. Your mother.
Your father. And the only way you know how to deal with the catastrophe inside your head is to destroy everything around you.
Because in your insane way of seeing the world, if you have someone by your side, then you have something to lose.
Something to ruin. If you don’t have anyone…
well then, you aren’t risking anything. And that’s why the idea of being loved scares you so much.
Love is the ultimate self-destruction as far as you’re concerned.
And you’d rather destroy the feeling than risk being destroyed by it.
You’re really just a coward. And I pity you for that, Thomas.
I feel a deep pity for your constant need to shame people who don’t fear happiness and aren’t afraid to show themselves as they are! ”
As good as he is at hiding emotions, I spot something new in his eyes this time.
Something different, fragile and vulnerable, which tells me that my words have hurt him like they never have before.
But he doesn’t flinch. In fact, he stays right there, ready to absorb the next blow, fully aware that he deserves it.
And none of this calms me down because hurting him gives me only a momentary sense of well-being.
Fingers trembling, I slide the leather bracelet off my wrist and put in on the desk.
“Do whatever you want with this. Throw it away or burn it if you like. It doesn’t mean anything anymore.
” I try again to take the box and leave, but he stops me once more, holding my shoulders and pressing my back against the wall.
“Please don’t go.”
“Move,” I order harshly, glaring at him. Because the despairing way he says those three words is making me waver. And I can’t. I don’t want to falter.
“No.”
“Thomas,” I chide him.
He presses his forehead against mine. “I can’t, Ness. I can’t just let you go like this. I…I need you.”
I can feel my heartbeat thundering deep in my throat. My certainty is slipping away. And that’s when I decide to do the one thing that will free me of him. It’s the only way I’ll be able to stay away from him. Otherwise, I know that I’ll give in—I know it. But I won’t let it happen again.
“I slept with Logan.”
I say it just like that, straight out, shooting the lie at him like a bullet from a gun. For a second, everything stops. Neither of us is breathing. A flame ignites in his green eyes, spreading to me. “What the fuck did you just say?” he breathes out, moving his head back a few inches.
“You heard me.”
He stares blankly at me for endless seconds. “No. I don’t believe you. You’re only saying that because you’re angry. You wouldn’t do that.”
“Are you sure?” I raise my chin, challenging him. “I did it with you the night I broke up with Travis, remember? What makes you think I wouldn’t do the same thing with him?”
He pulls away as though touching me is suddenly repulsive.
His chest rises and falls rhythmically. His jaw muscles tense.
“Tell me it’s not true.” He’s standing there, waiting for my reply.
But I don’t say anything. Not a thing. I want him to suffer like I’m suffering and to hate me the way I hate him.
And then, all of a sudden, Thomas’s fist crashes into the wall next to my face. I squeeze my eyes shut, holding in a gasp. When I open them back up, his fist is still there, surrounded by cracked plaster, stained with blood along his knuckles. Thomas’s head is bowed, and his eyes are closed.
“Why?” he murmurs, looking up at me. “Why?” he shouts, just inches from my face.
I shrug my shoulders with false unconcern while I die inside. “Because I felt like it. Because he was there and easy,” I hiss venomously.
Thomas stares at me, knowing full well it was no coincidence that I chose those particular words. “Take your stuff, and don’t come here again,” he demands. Then he leaves, slamming the door so hard that the walls shake.