Chapter 31 #2
I talk, sometimes ramble, chasing down memories I haven’t allowed myself to think of in years.
Julie chose the university not too far from here, just so we wouldn’t be apart.
Despite that, we had plenty of ups and downs, like every relationship.
After she graduated college, she got her first job doing marketing for a law firm and we celebrated by me giving her a key to my house.
I’d just built it and she moved in a week later.
Telling all of this to Cassie feels like sensation returning to a numb limb. It’s uncomfortable but it also means I’m feeling something again.
“She sounds wonderful,” Cassie says quietly.
“She was.” Before I can choke them down, I let my next words land. “She was wonderful and she’s dead and it’s my fault.”
And there it is. The truth of it crushing me under its weight.
My voice cracks on the last word and I have to clench my jaw to keep it together.
Cassie doesn’t gasp, doesn’t rush to contradict me. Doesn’t say a word. She just waits. So I keep talking because now that I’ve opened that wound, I can’t stop.
“It was two years ago. Second week of November.”
My voice doesn’t sound like mine anymore. It’s hollow. Detached. Like if I keep enough distance from my past, it’ll lose its power to destroy me all over again.
“The forecast called for storms. I’d watched the weather all fucking day, Cassie. By late afternoon, rain was coming down in sheets, lightning streaking across the sky. I should have postponed. Who the fuck goes to dinner when it’s storming?”
My heart is beating so hard I hear it in my ears, my breaths coming in shallow bursts. But I have to keep talking. I have to get it all out, this nightmare, this festering wound that just won’t heal.
“That night, the black velvet ring box called the shots.”
I can feel her staring at me, but I can’t look her in the eye knowing I could have prevented what happened that night. I’m terrified to see whatever’s on her face right now.
“I had it all planned out. I’d take her to that fancy farm to table place she loved in downtown Creekwood.
She’d order those overpriced deviled eggs, and we’d share a bottle of wine to relax.
Then after crème br?lée, I’d get down on one knee right there in front of everyone and ask her for forever. ”
I drop my head into my palms and try my damndest to calm my breathing. My hands go to my hair and I tug, hoping to ease the pain of the last two years, but I hardly feel it.
“She called around five. Said she was running late but she’d get there as soon as she could.
Instead of telling her let’s do this another night, I said ‘Be careful. The roads are bad.’ She said ‘I’m always careful, babe.
’ I told her I loved her and she said the same three words she always said.
Love you more. Those were the last words we ever said to each other. ”
Cassie brings a hand to her mouth. “Your tattoo.”
Nodding slowly, I think about the tattoo I got on what would have been her twenty-eighth birthday. Her handwriting down the side of my ribs. Love you more. Right now I swear I feel it, like a brand against my skin, hot and burning.
The fire blurs in front of me, the colors blending to an orangey haze through a sheen of tears. I blink fast to clear my vision and shake my head. I haven’t cried since Julie’s funeral. Not once. I don’t deserve to shed those tears.
“Since Jules was running late, I didn’t see a reason to leave so soon.
I hung around at home another fifteen or twenty minutes, working through a couple melodies I’d had running through my head.
When I figured enough time had passed, I headed out.
I was about fifteen minutes from the restaurant when I came up on it.
I knew it was her car immediately. She drove this little blue bug she’d had since high school.
A goofy daisy on the dashboard.” The images from that night flash through my mind, as vivid as the night it happened.
They never fade. Not even after all this time.
“The ambulance hadn’t even arrived yet. Neither had the cops.
Just two cars. The fucker slammed right into her door going god knows how fast.”
My fingers grip the arms of the chair so hard my knuckles ache.
I’m no longer on my deck with Cassie. I’m there, dialing 911 as rain soaked through my clothes and my shoes slipped on the wet asphalt as I ran to her car.
Glass crunched under my shoes, the harsh scent of gasoline was the only thing I smelled.
And I heard nothing other than the ringing in my ears as I approached Julie’s crushed vehicle.
“Jules was trapped. The steering wheel, the dash, everything was crushing her.” Bile rises at the back of my throat.
“And the blood. It was everywhere. I’ve never seen anything like it.
On her face, in her hair, fucking everywhere.
I knew she was losing too much of it. Her eyes kept drifting shut.
Her skin was going pale. I whispered over and over Stay with me, Jules. Help’s coming. Just stay awake.”
Memories night twist around me like vines, holding me in place, constricting until I can’t breathe.
My lungs are a deflated balloon and my heart is pounding, a thunderous baboom, baboom, baboom, in my head, in my ears, surrounding me.
Images from that night assault me and words pour from my lips in a rush. I need to get the rest out.
“Rough hands dragged me away. They were yelling for me to give them room, but I couldn’t.
I couldn’t pry my hands from hers. I fought them but eventually a cop shoved me to try and calm me down.
It was pointless. All I could do was stand there helplessly while they loaded her into the ambulance.
” My voice drops to a hoarse whisper from talking so much.
“She died before they even made it to the hospital. Massive internal bleeding.”
I gasp for breath but it’s not enough. The less air I take in, the more panic seizes me.
Darkness creeps into my vision, and I reach wildly for something to hold onto.
Warm hands clasp firmly onto mine, and I’m only vaguely aware that Cassie has moved to kneel in front of me.
Does she know I’m trying? But the memories are suffocating, dragging me under.
“Liam. Stay with me.” Cassie’s lips are moving, but it’s like I’m hearing her under water. I’m sinking deeper while she’s calling to me from the shore. “Breathe in through your nose. With me.”
I try, but the shallow breath I manage hitches in my chest and stalls out.