Once Upon a Present
My hands wouldn’t stop shaking as Liam disappeared around the corner.
“I fucking hate that every time I close my eyes all I see is your face…”
I was his nightmare. My face haunted him.
My lungs fought against the blade in my heart. Every breath strangled by quiet sobs.
“Use your beauty, girl, because it’s all you’ll ever have.”
My face.
“I just wish you would have pulled the trigger sooner.”
All the words, the anger… The night I left I saw my father in Liam’s eyes, and maybe I cut too deep when I walked away, but it had been the only way either of us would’ve survived. I’d let myself become the villain. But I was tired of the role, tired of hating myself, tired of proving my father right. I wanted to be more than the girl who destroyed everything, more than a face that haunted dreams and covered magazines. Exhaustion sank deep into my bones and I sagged against the wall, wishing I could let my legs give out, sink to the floor with the filth where I belonged. But the hallway filled with laughter as the back room erupted into song. They were shouting the words to “Happy Birthday.”
I sucked in a deep breath, ignoring the sharp twinge in my chest. I wiped under my eyes and forced my legs to move, letting my palm graze along the wall to help keep me steady. Even though the front of the bar was empty, the room felt narrow, like a tomb. The weight of the dim light was smothering me. I had to leave before I saw him again. Panic flooded my veins and a spike of adrenaline coursed through me, giving me the push I needed to get the fuck out of there.
“Hey, I thought you got lost, I got you another shot.” Tracey’s laugh died when her eyes met mine. “Are you alright?”
I shook my head as I sifted through my purse with trembling fingers.
“What happened?” she asked and I ignored her.
When I’d moved to Los Angeles, for the first year, I struggled with anxiety. Leaving the dream of moving with Liam behind, I’d been forced to be on my own. I’d severed myself in two. My job required perfection; the business didn’t give a shit if you were rotting away on the inside as long as the outside looked fresh, they were happy. On occasion, it was hard to reconcile who I was supposed to be. Always stuck between being remade or letting myself fade away completely. I kept my anti-anxiety meds in my purse, just in case the choice started to drown me. I rarely used it, but today… I needed something to slow my heart enough so I could breathe. Tracey’s words were a dull buzz in the background as I opened the bottle, popped two pills onto my tongue, and poured them down my throat with the shot of bourbon sitting on the bar. It wasn’t smart, but it was a reprieve from the assault Liam had left on my heart.
Tracey’s eyes narrowed. “What the hell happened back there?”
The tears hadn’t stopped leaking from my eyes as I lowered them to her full shot glass. I licked my lips as a clap of thunder seemed to shake the walls of the pub. Tracey stared at me, awaiting an answer; her girlfriend was just as rapt with curiosity. I grabbed her bourbon and let it slide down my throat. The heat in my belly intensified and Tracey stood from her stool.
“Are you crazy?” Tracey grabbed my wrist as I reached for my purse.
“I’m tired of breathing.” I hadn’t meant to say it out loud.
“What the hell does that mean?”
“It means I’m sick of barely surviving.”
Tracey’s eyes turned glassy and she released my wrist. “I should’ve been there for you, protected you. I should’ve—”
My small gasp interrupted her. Liam and his girlfriend emerged from the back room, his eyes avoiding me, his face stoic. They walked by and instead of closing my eyes I watched them leave. She looked a lot like me, but with curly hair. She was shorter, pretty, and I wondered if she made him happy. Her hand fit in his, their ink blending together as one. My stomach bottomed out and the liquor in my gut spoiled. Liam’s life was full. His girlfriend matched him. She was covered in tattoos, and no matter how hard I tried to deny it, she looked really good at his side. All these years, I’d lied to myself… I was never right for him.
Tracey’s warm grip on my shoulders turned my attention away from the couple.
“Was that Liam?”
My head felt like cotton as the booze and pills kicked in. I needed to leave.
I nodded my head. Tracey had only met him the handful of times she’d come to town over the years.
“You’re entitled to more than a guy who can’t figure out his own life.” Her eyes were hard as they searched mine.
Tracey only ever got bits and pieces of our relationship, but she could never understand why I’d stayed here for a man. Lived under Dad’s tyranny for Liam.
“No one is entitled to love, but his love, it was… he… he was the only safety I’ve ever really known.” I dropped my chin and she let go of my shoulders.
“You’re stronger than that.”
The disappointment in her tone raised my gaze to hers and I whispered, “No, that was you.” I lifted my purse and slid the strap over my shoulder. “I always wanted to be rescued. I just got tired of waiting is all.”
My mouth dried as I reached into my purse and pulled out my keys.
“Let us drive you to your hotel,” Erin offered, her brow creased deeply with worry.
“The weather sounds like it turned to shit, and I don’t think it’s smart for you t—”
“I’m fine.” I gave her a weak smile. “My hotel isn’t too far from here.”
She let her eyes linger on my tear-stained face for what felt like an eternity.
“I promise, I’m fine.”
She nodded. “Let me know when you get there, okay?”
“She’ll worry if you don’t, and then I’ll have to put up with her overdramatic paranoia.” Erin laughed softly, breaking up the stiff mood into more manageable pieces.
“I’ll call you.” I leaned in and hugged Tracey.
She surprised me by pulling me tight against her. Her arms felt too good, and if I stayed in this embrace too long I’d fall apart, and I was saving that for once I was safe in my hotel room.
“Love you,” I whispered. She let me go and the air between us cooled.
She leaned in and said into my ear, “Take care of yourself, okay?”
I nodded and Erin stood from her stool. We all said our goodbyes again, and the longer it took, the harder it was to stand. By the time I collapsed in my front seat, the rain had begun to pour. I’d missed the deluge by barely twenty seconds. I’d kept the tears at bay long enough. I let the sound of Liam’s voice, the words he’d said when I’d given him my virginity, open the dam again as I started the car and turned on the wipers.
“How do you feel?”
“Free.”
I closed my eyes and allowed myself to remember what it felt like to have his hands on my face. To feel what it was like to be honored and loved. To feel free. I’d left him because it was the only thing I could do to stop the cycle we’d both naïvely fallen into. I’d chosen to live for myself. I’d needed to figure out what I really wanted, what my dream had really been made of.
Fake smiles.
False hearts.
Fabricated.
I might’ve broken our cycle, but I’d never be free. Leaving saved us from the same fate as our parents, but all the bitterness I’d hoped to cure him of colored his brown eyes today. And, after seeing him with her, someone who fit on his arm, the truth I’d never admit to myself, it finally hit me. I’d always been the cause of his resentment. In all the years we’d been together, what he had to give, it hadn’t ever been enough. I’d always asked for more. Maybe I’d been the one who had led us to that treacherous fate all along.
My eyes opened as the harsh sound of my sobs tore past my shaking lips. I switched on the radio and the soft music calmed me, silencing the white noise of the rain, and drowning out my black thoughts. As I backed out of the parking lot, it was hard to see past the sheets of rain and tears. My chest felt empty and my limbs were weightless. The pain had finally been tucked away beneath the blanket of pills and alcohol.
The numb feeling hadn’t stopped my eyes from overflowing onto my damp cheeks as I drove. The city danced on my windshield inside the tiny droplets of water as they skated across the glass. The pink flowers of the cherry blossom trees that lined the street stood out against the low gray sky. Their petals fell under the weight of the storm and swirled in the gutters, almost mimicking snow. It could’ve been the beauty of the moment, and how, for just a split second, everything felt easy, or maybe it was the way my heartbeat was pounding inside my ears that I missed the signal. The blaring horn was in a tunnel of wind, and bourbon. The red light just another distraction.
My eyes were drawn to the bright yellow headlights, the sound of screeching tires clenched my fingers around the steering wheel and set my spine straight.
It was too late.
Steel stretched and shredded in ways it shouldn’t. Glass shattered as the steering wheel ripped from my grip. Pain broke through my fear as I watched the world spin around me. I tried to grab the wheel and, in my confusion, I slammed on the gas instead of the brake. The agonizing burn was the last thing I felt. A fire tore across my cheek as my car wrapped around the dark trunk of a cherry tree.
The chaos, the sirens, the wet, sticky trickle dripped from my cheek as I wheezed in a high-pitched breath, once and then again, and then...