Chapter 22 What We Deserve
WHAT WE DESERVE
The band had played their last set, and Tristan’s roommate sat at the table with us. Craig was reliving the worst tattoo he had ever gotten, given to him by Tristan. “And this fucker”—Craig pointed his beer bottle at Tristan—“was so drunk he couldn’t see straight.”
“You asked me to.” Tristan sat back in his chair, his arm around me. He was relaxed around these people. His friends. When I pictured our life together, our friends were faceless people who didn’t exist. They weren’t a funny chef from New York or a quiet drummer from a band named Mostly Sunny.
“I was fucking drunker than you. One of us needed to be the voice of reason,” Craig said, bringing his bottle to his mouth.
“Stacy warned you.” Tristan played with the straw in his one and only drink. “Besides, it’s not like anyone can see it.”
“It’s right here.” Craig held out his forearm to show off a knife tattoo. It wasn’t the worst I’d ever seen, but it wasn’t the best.
“Is that the knife you always want to show people?” I asked.
A big smile crossed Craig’s mouth. “No. You want to see that one?”
“No one wants to see that shit. I should’ve been drunk during that one too. You ready?” Tristan ran his thumb along the back of my neck.
“You leaving? We were going to head to Fifty-Two for last call. You should come. Bring The Evan. Stacy would love to know she’s real.”
“Fuck off. And no, I’ve seen enough of your ugly face.” Tristan stood.
I stood, and Tristan helped me put my jacket on. “I’m beginning to worry I won’t live up to all this hype.”
Craig sat back in his chair and watched Tristan and I before smiling. “Nah, you’ve lived up to it. Tris, you still coming over tomorrow? I got the plans back.”
“Yeah, I’ll be over in the morning. I got an appointment at one.” Tristan pulled out his keys. “Ready?”
“If you want to go with them, I can get an Uber,” I said as we stepped outside.
“I can go out with those two anytime.” He opened my car door.
“Can I ask you something?” I said before getting into the car.
He leaned against the open door. “If it’s about Craig’s knife, no.”
I looked down at my boots. The ones I bought with Zoey and Callie, when we had gone to Mexico on a whim.
“Why now?” It was the one question I needed the answer to.
Why had it taken so long? We could’ve had more nights like this one.
We could have been going home to our apartment.
Instead, it felt like we had wasted all that time. “Why did you wait twelve years?”
He toed the tire of his car. “Because for once I didn’t want you to have to fix me.
What we had back then was stupid. It shouldn’t have been that way.
” He turned away, looking out across the almost empty parking lot.
“I should’ve taken you to prom and homecoming.
We should’ve done stupid shit like run from the cops and make out at the movies.
Instead all I did for you was bleed on your bathroom floor. ”
I wrapped my arms around his waist and rested my cheek on his back.
“It wasn’t stupid. I didn’t care about prom and movies.
Though if making out with you at the movies is still an option, can we go now?
” He didn’t see the humor in my words. “You may not have taken me to prom, but you taught me how to roll a joint, how to kiss, and how to give a blow job. All skills that came in handy in college.”
He twisted in my arms to face me. “I didn’t need to hear that.”
I pulled him a little closer. “Maybe you do because those things shaped who I am. So did all the nights we lay under the stars dreaming big dreams. The days we’d race down a country road with the windows down, laughing, trying to outrun the world.
And so did you leaving. And the twelve years you weren’t in my life. So why did it take you so long?”
Tristan cupped my jaw, his thumb caressing my cheek.
“Because I was trying to claw my way out of a hole that kept swallowing me. Every time I thought I had my addictions under control, Noah would call or my mother, and I’d slide right back into that hole.
I didn’t want to drag you any deeper into it than I already had. ”
“And now?”
“And now.” Tristan brushed the hair from my shoulder. “The hole is still there and some days I come close, but most days I’m able to stay out of it.” He took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “I came back because I was scared, Ev.”
“Of what?” I had asked him once if he ever was scared of James. It had been a bad night. A bruised ribs night. Tristan had lain curled up next to me, his head on my chest. He’d said not anymore, because that was what James wanted. He had wanted Tristan’s fear. And Tristan wouldn’t give him that.
“Of losing you. I was afraid I had waited too long. I’ve still got shit to figure out. But…” He inhaled sharply. The muscles in his jaw tightened. “Tell me I’m not too late, Ev. Or tell me I am and that this. Us. Is over. Tell me to leave you alone. That you never—”
“Stop.” I pressed my finger to his mouth. The parking lot of a bar was not the place to fix us. “You’re not too late.”
He pressed his forehead to mine. “I wish I could go back and do things differently.”
“I wish we both could.” I cupped his cheek. “But we can’t. All we can do is move forward. Come home with me. Please.”
* * *
Back at my apartment, I opened all the blinds in the bedroom, slipped off my shoes, and lay down. Tristan lay next to me. The glow from the city made my room look almost magical, almost like we were back in that field with a whole lifetime of mistakes waiting to be born.
“Tell me something I missed.” Tristan traced my brow.
“I cut my hair once. I went to Mexico, drank too much cheap tequila, and threw up in a gutter.” I smiled at those memories.
Callie had laughed so hard she’d peed herself.
After that, no cab would take us, so we’d had to walk two miles in the dark, drunk.
“I once got a speeding ticket and a parking ticket on the same day.” I laced my fingers through his. “Your turn.”
Tristan inhaled, letting it out slowly. “I did a line of cocaine off a dirty bathroom counter in north Minneapolis. I went to a doctor who told me I had more scar tissue in my hands and ribs than a professional athlete, and then I did another line. I once got so fucked up I didn’t know where I was. Your turn.”
I moved closer to him just so I could be closer, so I knew he was okay.
“I wrote a paper about heartbreak. I told a therapist about you. She made me cry.” She had told me that sometimes we love broken people.
We just couldn’t break ourselves to fix them.
But I didn’t think she had ever seen what it looked like when someone you love was breaking.
Tristan took an unsteady breath. “I told Craig about you and then I got high. I learned to tattoo to help keep my head clear. I tried to date a girl to forget you. I had to go to the ER because I OD’d. I didn’t see God or a bright light. I saw nothing but darkness.”
The tears burned my nose and throat. “I had a panic attack in my grief class. No one came to my college graduation. Once I kissed a boy at a frat party because after too much vodka, he looked a little like you. I once missed you so much I couldn’t get out of bed for a week.”
For a moment Tristan said nothing, just ran a finger down my nose, then traced each point of my cupid’s bow, then brushed my hair from my brow. “I still love you.” He breathed his confession into the air between us.
I tried to stop them. The tears. I tried to swallow them down like I had twelve years ago. But I couldn’t. I choked on them.
“Come here, love,” Tristan whispered, pulling me into his embrace.
I clung to him, sobbing into his chest. It was one thing to say you miss someone, but it was another to feel it so deep in your bones that it ached.
That your chest felt like it was breaking open, letting out years of sickness that you didn’t know you were holding on to.
I cried all the tears I couldn’t twelve years ago.
Tristan pulled away, wiping the tears from my cheeks. “Why would you ever want me back in your life, Blu? I do nothing but bring you heartbreak and tears. Maybe it would be best if I—”
“Don’t,” I cut in. “Please don’t leave me again.
” This was where I should have listened to the developed frontal cortex of my brain.
I should have seen all the flags and warning signs.
I should have, but the thing about being human was sometimes we loved broken people.
And no matter how many therapists you saw, or how many classes you took, your heart will never let go of them.
“So, where do we go from here?” Tristan pressed a kiss onto the top of my head.
“I have to break up with him. It’s only fair.”
“If he’s better for you… Then you stay with him. For all that has changed, there is still so much that is the same.”
“I don’t love him.” I didn’t know if you could love two people the same. I didn’t think I would ever love anyone the way I loved Tristan. It was like breathing, I never had to think about it. The love I would have for Ian would have to be learned. It would have to grow and be carefully tended to.
I looked up at Tristan. “Because I never stopped loving you.” I laid my head back on his chest and listened to his heartbeat.
The steady unbroken part of him.