Chapter 2
Drew
R
eed Michaels is one of the few people who has been to my apartment since I moved here in June. He was also one of the few to have seen where I lived before here, a cheap, old one-bedroom outside the University of Milwaukee’s campus.
I moved out of my parents’ houses at 18, so I definitely had limited choices as to what I could afford back then, and I definitely don’t miss the smell of stale beer that was stuck in the carpets.
Reed is also one of the two things from my hometown that trickled over into my life after high school. My best friend, Lacey, is the second of those two things, and, without her, there would have been no Reed.
Everyone in our hometown couldn’t believe that the boy with a flannel and work boots fell for the girl in skinny jeans, band tees, and box-dyed black hair.
Reed and I officially met about halfway through our junior year of high school even though we both lived in our small town our whole lives. We went to different elementary schools and middle schools, but all the schools funneled into our district’s one high school.
The first two years, we had some classes together, but I never would have considered him someone I knew. We didn’t truly meet until one morning when I was waiting for Lacey before school.
I was leaning against her locker, picking at the black nail polish on my fingernails when Reed showed up.
“Hey,” I heard from behind me. I didn’t turn to face the voice because I initially assumed it wasn’t directed at me. Then, I heard it again.
“Hello?”
I turned and was struck with a sight I had never seen up close before. Reed’s hair was damp from the snow falling hard on that Tuesday morning in February, and the smell of gasoline and oil lingered on his clothes from helping his dad open up their family’s auto repair shop. I felt his foggy blue eyes hook into me at that very moment, and I couldn’t look away.
And I’m still, to this day, trying to unhook myself from the feeling I get in my stomach when those eyes are on me.
“Hey,” I muttered, barely getting the word off my tongue.
“I’m Reed. You’re Drew, right? Lacey’s friend?” He ran one hand through his hair, moving the pieces that were falling over his eyes and revealed a crooked smile, his lips wavering to one side of his face. His other hand was holding his backpack that was slung over his shoulder.
“Uh yeah, that’s me.” My words made his smile deepen, exposing a single dimple on this left cheek.
I was expecting him to respond by politely asking me to move out of his way or something, but he didn’t. He actually didn’t say anything else that day. He just looked at me, and I couldn’t tear away from his gaze.
His stare was enticing.
I watched his eyes move from my eyes to my lips then back up to my eyes, and the look on his face told me that he had already known the answer to his question before asking.
It told me he already knew who I was, but it told me he wanted to know me more.
It told me I was going to mean something to him.
It told me he was going to mean something to me.
He swung his backpack off his shoulder and opened the locker next to the one I was waiting by. He put what he needed into his backpack, and closed his locker before heading down the hallway. I watched as he walked away, thinking that maybe I was wrong about the way he was looking at me.
Maybe our interaction was just a one-and-done.
But then he looked over his shoulder, catching me staring, and my cheeks warmed at the smirk he sent me before he turned back around and continued on his way.
The days following, there was a flicker in my stomach every time I turned the corner to the hallway where Lacey’s and Reed’s lockers were.
A friendship between him and I budded during those moments I waited for Lacey in the morning or between classes at her locker. Those few minutes alone each morning allowed us to get to know each other more and more. Then, before I knew it, a relationship blossomed beyond that space, and we were inseparable as two high schoolers could be.
We spent every moment we could together, falling further and further in the mutual infatuation that inevitably turned into my first experience with love.
I learned the little I knew about love from my parents, and for as long as I could remember, I longed for what it felt like to not have to work, hope, or long for love. For as long as I could remember, there was a hole in my stomach that left me feeling so lonely, so empty, so unlovable.
But, every time I was with Reed, I felt that hole fill, and I never wanted to let go of that feeling.
I never thought I would have to.
My mom and dad separated when my brother and I were in the early years of elementary school; I was ten, and my brother was eight.
My parents were never married, making everything that followed their breakup much more messy. Between the custody battles and child support, my brother and I were pawns in their twisted game.
Since then, or maybe even before then, there were always inconsistencies between their love and care for us. The love we received was laced with control and the strain for power over each other, and my idea of what it felt like to receive love became so convoluted to the point that I don’t think I knew what it felt to have love reciprocated.
Growing up, my parents each held me responsible for so many things, but they also held me responsible for reading their minds as to how they thought I should manage everything.
They always found something wrong with what I did, even when I was breaking my back to do everything they wanted. They wanted me to excel in school, but reminded me that I should be spending my free time working to earn my own money. I was expected to help out with my brother and around the house, but they also became worried that I didn’t have any friends or a social life.
My brother suffered the same, causing him to find anywhere else to be rather than home as we got older. Him and I drifted, never really having a relationship aside from shared experiences and DNA. With him avoiding their houses as much as possible, I was the only one left for my parents to put in the middle of their arguments and disagreements, both constantly using me as a figurative punching bag to complain about the other.
So, I always did everything I could, telling myself if I did everything they wanted, they would show me the unconditional love I longed for.
It wasn’t until I almost exploded under all the pressure the night Reed and I were supposed to go out to dinner for our six month anniversary and our last hooray of the summer before our senior year of high school.
We had just parked in front of the restaurant, and he noticed I had been quiet the whole ride.
“Is everything okay, D?”
I answered with a nod because I didn’t want to ruin the night.
“Are you sure?” He turned to face me, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold anything in if I looked at him.
“If you’re okay, why can’t you look at me?” Reed asked, as if he could read my mind.
I couldn’t even form words because I felt the tears well up in my eyes, threatening to fall at any second.
H reached over to grab my hand that was sitting on my lap, and there was no more holding it in. The feeling of his touch sent me into full-blown sobs.
He grabbed my arm and pulled me onto his lap in the driver’s seat. My legs on each side of his, he wrapped one arm tightly around my waist and put one hand on the back of my head as he pulled my head into his chest, giving me the space to cry.
I had confided in him how I felt about the position my parents put me in and how I never felt like I was doing enough to make them both happy, but that night, he didn’t say a word. Maybe not knowing what to say, or knowing anything he said wouldn’t make me feel better.
The comfort I felt just being in his arms gave me the space to let out the cries I had been carrying for so many years.
I sobbed into his chest until my eyes were raw, and he just held me until the cries faded, and my tears began to run out.
He stroked my back as I calmed down. “You’re going to kill yourself if you keep this up, killing yourself trying to do everything they want,” he said into my hair.
“I know,” I whispered.
“You don’t have to keep this up,” he whispered back.
“I know,” I whispered again.
“Then why do you let them make you so upset?”
“I’m just never good enough for them. I do what they tell me to and more, yet I’m always in the wrong. I just can’t do anything right.” My voice was shaky from the residual tears, but I felt the sadness in my chest burn into anger, like a paper turning black from a flame. “I’m so sick of feeling this way. So sick of thinking I need them because I don’t. I’m better off without them in my life.” I turn my head, still against Reed’s chest, and look out the window.
The sky was still lit by the slanting rays of the slowly setting sun, giving a warm orange tinge to the sky. The night looked warm and inviting, but Reed holding me tightly in the car felt safe and familiar.
In that moment, I realized that I was never going to meet my parents’ unattainable expectations, and they would never see me as enough. But, I also realized that I didn’t need them.
I didn’t need them because I had Reed.
Once again, as if he could read my mind, Reed’s palms warmed my cheeks as he brought my face to look at him. “You have me, Drew. And, that’s all you need.” His blue eyes had a gray tint that contradicted the warm sky, but in that moment, there was no place I would have rather been.
It began to make sense in my head.
His support, his comfort, his words.
This must be what love is supposed to feel like.
Reed helped me feel like I was enough.
Until who I was wasn’t enough for him either.