Day 131
Adam
“This feels so weird,” I admit as Eve hands me another ice-cold beer.
“Because it’s so normal.” Her faint smile shows me she knows exactly what I mean. She always does. That beautiful brain of hers works in the exact same way my own does. Although, admittedly, hers works much better than mine.
The waves are a nice soundtrack to our sunny day on the California shore. The beers, sunglasses, and sunscreen all join together to create an illusion of normalcy that feels so out of place, now.
We’re splayed on two sunbeds, and I know that before long I’ll be hauling her into my lap, but for now I settle for ravaging her from afar.
Her skin is slowly turning gold from the exposure to the sun, and the sight of the camo bikini brings a smile to my lips.
It’s downright racy, and I guess I should have known when she picked it up exactly what kind of crazy girl I’m dealing with.
I don’t think I’d change much, though. We’ve had our fucked-up moments, but they’re ours; raw and crazy and real. And she’s my crazy girl.
“I’ve been meaning to ask…” she starts after a while.
“Ask away,” I tip the bottle to my lips and realize I’ve emptied it already. Staring at the golden plains of her body must’ve gotten me thirsty.
“Did you grow up around here?”
I’m quiet as I lower the bottle into the sand. I knew this would come, eventually.
“I technically grew up all over the place, but, yes,” I admit. “My… birthplace is California.”
She waits for a moment, but I just stare at the water lapping at the shore. Just our luck that there aren’t any waves today. We simply paddled around on the surfboards on the flat surface.
We can always stay here, wait a few days for the weather to change. There’s no rush. We quite literally have all the time in the world.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” she offers.
“I want to.” My hand drifts to hers and holds onto it. I can’t bear to look at her, but maybe I can give her this. Even if I’m not sure that the handhold is really for her.
“It doesn’t have to be now.” Her fingers slither and intertwine with mine.
“I only lived here until I was seven,” I speak before I can overthink it. “With my birthparents. My dad wasn’t a good man.” It feels like a joke to say it so nicely, and I flinch at my own sugar coating.
Just say it like it is.
“He beat my mom a lot. Me too, once I was old enough to try and intervene.”
“Oh.” There’s pain in the simple sound, and her hand tightens around mine.
“The last time—” I can still remember it, his words clear in my mind. “He told her she was weak. That she’d never leave, because she’d never survive without him.” I lean my head back against the headrest. “She took me and left the following morning.”
“Fuck yeah,” she mutters, and I can tell she’s happy, at least for that part of the story.
I wish I didn’t have to break her heart again so soon.
“We lasted two days in the motel we were in.” I remember the day like it’s playing out right in front of me; her pacing the motel room, mumbling to herself and looking at me with tears in her eyes.
I assume it was my father’s voice she heard in her head.
You’re weak. You think you can handle life without me?
You think you can take care of him? You two will never survive on your own.
“Before she took me to a hospital. And left.”
Eve goes still at my side, her thumb no longer tracing the back of my hand. “What?”
“She left me with a note but told me not to open it. To give it to a doctor when they came to check on me.” I can remember struggling to read it myself.
It was in cursive, and I was only in second grade, with attendance which was sporadic at best. Still, I remember thinking her handwriting was beautiful.
By the time a staff member asked me if I was okay, I’d spent forever looking at the unintelligible writing.
“It only said, ‘I’m sorry. He’s better off without me. ’”
“Adam…” Eve’s mumble sounds teary. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. I’m sorry.”
“Talking or not talking about it doesn’t change the fact that it happened,” I repeat the sentence that one of the therapists told me over the years.
“She didn’t go back to him, which was a small win.
She just disappeared. When I told the social services about my father, they gave me a choice, asked if I wanted to go back to him. ”
You’re a smart kid, Adam, so I’m going to say it like it is, okay?
The nice lady said to me. She had blue eyes like my mom’s but her hair was dark.
If you choose not to go to him, you’ll go into foster care.
It’s a place where a lot of kids like you are.
Kids that… whose parents couldn’t take care of them right.
“I looked them dead in the eyes and said I’d rather die before going back to that man.” A ghost of a smile toys with my lips. “I think I spooked them a little. But it worked.”
Her thumb resumes the gentle tracing on my skin and for a moment I just lose myself in it. I close my eyes, but her touch keeps me in the here and now. Away from the memories.
Not that I could ever forget them, but at least I can access them from far away. Detached.
“People don’t adopt seven-year-old boys with trauma, so I just jumped around the system. I think I must have moved…” I try to stack them up, to count, but they all blur together. “It must have been twenty homes, at least. All across the country.”
“Is that where you learned how to fight?”
I open my eyes and look at her. “How’d you know?”
“It was pretty obvious that the army didn’t teach you to win by biting.” There’s a hint of embarrassment in her voice.
“Yeah, they don’t play dirty like that.” Not like every kid in a situation like mine had to.
We don’t speak for a long while.
Then, she says, “Is it bad to say that I hate them?”
“The US army? Not very patriotic of you.”
“Your parents,” she clarifies, but she’s sporting a relieved little smile. As if she’s glad to hear me joking.
“It’s not bad.” I stare at the sunny sky. “I don’t know if I hate them, though.”
“You don’t?”
“At first, I did. When it fully dawned on me what was going on. When I realized what my life had become because of them.” The sound of the waves is the only thing filling the silence other than my voice. “But I’ve grown since. Realized it’s not as simple as that.”
“Your dad was a scumbag,” she determines. “See? Pretty simple.”
“Still is,” I supply. “Or, well. Maybe not anymore, since—” I gesture around us.
“He kept in touch?” She’s just as surprised as she is angry.
“I wouldn’t call it that. He’d occasionally remember I existed.” I let the instances cross my mind and then fade. Like a dark cloud. “When he was in debt. When he needed a blood donor. When he couldn’t afford rehab.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure that ‘hate’ is what I’m sticking with.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I do hate him. And I definitely don’t forgive him, but sometimes there’s more to it.” I look at her for the first time in a while, somewhat delighted to find her turned to me, her entire body attuned to my words. “Do you think I should hate my mom, too?”
“I’d understand if you do,” she says carefully.
“Because she left me.”
She nods.
“But she also saved both our lives,” I point out. “By taking me away. And if she hadn’t left me, she might have caved and taken us both back to him.” I watch as Eve’s expression turns into understanding. “She did love me. More than he ever did, I think, but…” I sigh. “Like I said. Not that simple.”
“I wish it was,” she says quietly. “Sometimes I wish the world was black and white.”
“I don’t mind if you hate them for the two of us.” I bring our joined hands to my lips, kissing her skin.
“You seem so at peace with it,” she observes, and it makes me smile when I spot the worry in her voice.
“I know I can’t change it.” I shrug. “Don’t think that I didn’t spend most of my adult life trying to.
As soon as I was emancipated and could work, I set aside some money for therapy.
I didn’t want to end up like some of the other kids in the system.
” I can still remember some of the names and faces, little teeth and round cheeks replaced with mugshots or headstones over the years.
“Even though going to therapy was a bitch.”
“I can’t imagine going through it alone,” she mumbles, scooting her sunbed closer to mine so she can lean into me.
“The holidays were the worst,” I admit. I’d watch families and feel so jealous. So neglected. I’d watch them smiling and laughing and all I wanted to do was scream, why not me? Why don’t I deserve it?
Funnily enough, I asked the same questions in therapy too. Just slightly different. Why me? What did I do to deserve it? How can someone hit or abandon a little kid?
“Therapy helped, though,” I stare at the ocean again. “At least in figuring out what my problems are. Solving them is a different story.”
“Did they slap labels on you?” There’s a sympathy in her voice that can only come with experience.
“Some did. But others listened. And maybe that’s all I needed, you know?
” The waves crashing to shore are like a gentle encouragement to keep talking.
“Not actively trying to heal anything. I think pretty early on, I realized that there would be no… undoing what happened.” I pull her closer.
My hand in hers doesn’t feel like enough for what I’m about to say.
“I had a lot of pain and anger. I knew that love wasn’t supposed to hurt, but all I was taught was painful love, or a love that leaves. ”
“You deserve so much better.” Her voice is thick with unshed tears.
I wrap my arm around her shoulders. “I think eventually, I might start believing it,” I confess, burying a hand in her hair. It’s hot and smooth and when her face nuzzles into my chest, there’s warmth there that has nothing to do with the sun. “That I do deserve better.”
Love. A constant one. An unyielding one.
There’s somehow still hope in me, for it, even though life has proved me wrong so many times.
I don’t tell the girl in my arms that the hope has everything to do with her.