Chapter Twenty-Four
The only thing that cuts through the silence is the sound of heavy raindrops breaking on the flimsy roof of Hale’s trailer. I wonder how long it’s been going on for, how long it took those few threatening droplets from the blackened sky to become a steady rumble like an earthquake in the distance, all without us noticing. How long it might take them to band together and become the kind of storm that might sweep me up into the air and away from here, like Dorothy’s tornado ride out of Kansas.
Because that’s what I want. I need to be anywhere but here right now, anywhere but standing in front of Hale. Anywhere I can’t see his face, even though I’ve carried almost the exact same picture of him in my mind for a decade. I recognise the expression he’s wearing, clear now as it was then. It’s exactly the same way he looked the last time I told him I couldn’t go with him.
Wherever my storm is, it’s not coming quickly enough.
‘I’m not going to lie,’ he says eventually, ‘I saw that one going kind of differently.’ He pauses, either to try and talk himself out of the little knife twist we both know is coming, or to make sure it lands with peak effectiveness. ‘Fool me once, I guess.’
‘That’s not fair, Hale.’
‘No,’ he says. ‘No, I guess it isn’t.’ But there’s no apology to go along with it, not this time.
‘You know I can’t go with you. There’s Mom, and the diner, and…’
‘And, and, and. There’s always something, Carrie. Every time.’
He’s not angry; angry, I could deal with. If he was angry at me for refusing, I’d just walk out the door right now, and be done with it. The worst part is that he just sounds resigned to my answer, as though part of him never expected anything else. Like he’s almost disappointed in himself for getting his hopes up. He really does want me to go with him, I think. It’s not just something he’s saying. Now, just as much as he did then.
Fool him once.
‘Is that what this is about?’ I ask. ‘Ten years ago?’
‘No. Of course not.’ But he doesn’t look at me as he says it, even though there’s nowhere else in the trailer for his eyes to fall. I’m not sure he can.
‘For God’s sake, Hale… you knew I had to stay. You must have.’
He says nothing.
‘What was I supposed to do?’ I ask. ‘Run off into the distance with you and just hope for the best? At sixteen? No job, not even a high school diploma? No money worth a damn? No plan, even? It was crazy to even consider it. I’m not even sure you should have gone, let alone try to convince me to come with you.’
Because that was cruel, Hale, I think. Oh, that was the cruellest parting gift you could possibly have left me with – because you managed to make it all my fault. You somehow made losing you a direct result of my decision not to go with. It wasn’t about you running after that. It was about me staying. You gave me the thin sliver of hope that things might have worked out, but at what cost? What would I have had to give up to make that happen? You asked me to gamble everything on you, Hale, and you were surprised when the bet was too rich for me.
‘I did what I had to do,’ he says simply. ‘I didn’t have any other choice.’
‘There was always a choice. All you had to do was wait a little while longer – just another year, then we could have escaped together. We could have gone together, Hale. And you didn’t have to stay with your dad. There were options. You could have got a cheap room with the money you made at the building site, even just for a little while. You could even have come to the diner with us, if things got that bad. You know my dad would have helped you out if he could. But you didn’t. You chose to run. Don’t take it out on me just because I chose to stay.’
‘Carrie,’ he says slowly. ‘I. Didn’t. Have. Any. Other. Choice.’ Every word is a bullet, an accusation.
‘I had people here, Hale,’ I say. ‘I still do. That’s the difference between you and me. I had other people to think about, not just myself.’
‘And I didn’t?’ In that instant, it’s as though everything I thought I knew about Hale has frozen solid: the cold of his eyes seems to run through him, head to toe. His voice doesn’t have any warmth left in it. ‘Is that what you think? That I was just being selfish?’
‘You know what I mean.’
‘No,’ he says. ‘I don’t think I do. Why do you think I left that night?’
‘You got into a fight with your dad. He hit you.’
He shakes his head. ‘That’s not it. He hit me a bunch of times. There wasn’t a day since I was seven years old that I didn’t have a bruise on my body somewhere thanks to him. Why do you think that night was the one that made me want to get the hell out of town? Why then?’
‘I don’t know,’ I say. If I’m honest, I’ve never given it all that much thought; I was always more concerned with his absence than trying to figure out why, especially once I realised that he was never going to be around to give me answers. Maybe he just snapped. Stranger things have happened.
‘Do you want to know? Does it make a difference?’
I nod. Finally, at last, some closure. Better late than never, I guess.
‘I got in late from work,’ he says. His voice is slow and methodical, like a witness on the stand who’s been reminded to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. ‘About eight. A pipe had burst, and everyone had to pile in to help clear it up before it flooded the whole damn site. By the time I got home, Dad was already most of the way through a six pack, and it was showing. He was a real mean drunk at the best of times, but that night was one of the worst times I’ve ever seen him. He had a look in his eye, like he was jonesing for a fight and it didn’t matter who it was with. If I hadn’t come back then, I get the feeling he would have picked on the first other guy he found out there in the Grove, no matter how big he was. It was that kind of mood. But then I walked in, and suddenly he didn’t have to.’
Hale doesn’t really talk about his dad – not ever, if he can help it. Even when we were younger, even when the beatings were regular and I could see the damage he did, all the scratches and burns and bruises, he’d play it off as if it was no big deal. Just one of those things. I could never understand how passive he could be when it came to the way his father treated him.
‘I came in, and I hadn’t even set my bag down before he started giving me the usual kind of shit. Talking about how I thought I was a big man now just because I had a paycheck, and how that didn’t mean a damn thing to him. For some reason I reckoned it was a good idea to point out that it was my money and not his social security that was paying to keep the lights on so he could afford his damn beer, and after that… well, all bets were off. He stumbled over and got right up in my face—and he wasn’t a small guy, either. He was bigger than me, even then. Stronger, too, despite the drink and the fact that I’d spent the summer working construction. Once he stepped up, I knew that something was going to happen. I figured he’d try and push me around, but he didn’t. Instead, he started talking about you. My new girlfriend. The bitch who probably thought she was too good for the kind of people who lived in a trailer. People like us. Like I was anything like him.’
He winces as he says the word; even the memory of it stings him. ‘You don’t have to…’ I start, but it’s too late. He’s been sitting on this story for too long. He could no more stop it than he could turn back the tides.
‘He said… he said that maybe he’d find you, when you weren’t expecting it.’ Hale pauses, as though even speaking it out loud brings bile up into his mouth. ‘Maybe he’d see for himself just what it was that had put a spring in my step. How… good you were. Maybe that would teach me that my old man was still on top.’
Fuck.
‘I always thought I hated that son of a bitch,’ Hale says. ‘But as soon as he threatened you like that, I realised I didn’t know what hate was until that moment. Not even close. All I know is that when he took a swing at me, I wasn’t trying to defend myself. I was trying to kill him. One way or another, he was never going to lay a finger on me again – or on you, for that matter. Not a chance.’
So that explains it. The fight that Hale got in, the one he wouldn’t talk about. He had put up with a world of suffering at the hands of his father, but I was the step too far. Threatening me had been enough to finally make Hale lose his cool.
Just like it was with Scanlon. Just like it always was. No matter what the cost, Hale was trying to protect me.
‘What happened?’ I ask.
‘I don’t remember much,’ he says. ‘It was sort of a red mist situation. If it had been anywhere but the Grove, I’m sure the police would have been called a dozen times over, but no one wanted to draw attention to it. By the time we were done, I had a couple of cracked ribs and a bloody nose, but he was worse off. Every piece of furniture we had was in pieces, and he was just lying there on the floor, surrounded by bits of a smashed up chair, bawling his eyes out like a damn baby. That’s when I saw him for what he was: just a bully. Just another Scanlon. I was done with that. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to stay there anymore, so I packed a bag, washed my hands and face clean, and went straight to you. That was the last time I saw him – the last time I ever wanted to see him.’
‘But why didn’t you say any of this? Why did you just tell me to come with you? We could have worked something out.’
‘I wasn’t thinking straight,’ he says. ‘I knew I had to get away, and you were the only thing in the world I cared about. I was already losing my home, but I couldn’t imagine losing you too. Not in the same night.’
‘You wouldn’t have…’ I begin. ‘Damn it, Hale. Why didn’t you just tell me?’
‘I didn’t know how. I always figured I’d write you once I got settled somewhere. I must have started ten, fifteen, maybe twenty letters to you in those first couple of weeks, but I didn’t know how to explain what had happened. By the time I made it to New York and figured it out, I figured you would have forgotten about me. I mean, I was bussing tables at a couple of divey all-night restaurants, and you were going to college. What could I possibly have offered you? That was if you even would’ve wanted to speak to me again after I left. I just didn’t know what I was supposed to say to you.’
‘Am I really why you came back?’ I say. ‘Honestly?’
‘Honestly.’
‘Completely?’ There’s a sliver of a pause in his response, a hole just big enough for me to fill with my doubts. ‘You forget, Hale: I know you. I know how you think. And I know you’re not here because of me.’ No matter how much that hurts, it’s the truth. No matter how much he paints himself as my hero, Hale didn’t come back to Eden to save me. He didn’t even know I was going to be here.
‘You’re serious?’ he asks. ‘Carrie, I –’
‘Here’s the way I see it,’ I say, cutting him off before I lose my nerve; it needs to be said, but I don’t think either one of us is going to enjoy it. ‘You spent your whole life being beaten down – by Scanlon, by your dad, by everyone who took one look at you and decided that a poor kid from the wrong side of the tracks was never going to make anything of himself. That you’d be lucky not to be in prison by the time you hit eighteen, let alone a success. And it would have been real easy to believe them, for most people – to check out, forget the responsibilities, give up the struggle – but you didn’t listen. You worked your ass off and you managed to get out, and when you got to New York and things started going well for you… well, my guess is that you couldn’t quite believe it. That little voice was still in your head, wasn’t it? The one that kept calling you a failure. All those people who told you that you couldn’t do anything with your life, that you didn’t deserve your success.’
‘I don’t have to listen to this shit,’ he says, trying to push his way past me – but I’m standing firm, my tiny frame blocking the doorway. With nothing to do except physically shove me out of the way, he folds. He’ll listen, because he needs to hear it – because I need him to hear it.
‘Yes, you do, Hale,’ I say. ‘Yes, you goddamn do. Because you couldn’t unhear those voices, could you? And if you messed up your big shot, your grand tour, maybe that meant they were right all along. Maybe you weren’t worth it. Maybe you really were everything they said you were – and you’ve been running away from that your entire life. I think it would just about have killed you, in the end. I think you could have handled pretty much anything except that. That’s why you decided to sabotage it.’
‘Sabotage it?’ he grunts. ‘You really think that’s why I came here? To ruin my life?’
‘No. Not to ruin it. To spoil it on your terms, just enough so you could convince yourself it was your decision all along. But it’s not. Everything you do is because you’re running away from your past, from the man you’re trying so desperately not to be. You’re not him, Hale. You’re a good man. You just didn’t come here for me. Don’t try and persuade me otherwise.’
‘If I can’t persuade you of that,’ he says, ‘then what’s the point of all this? What’s the point of any of it?’
I wish I had an answer for him, but I don’t.
‘It doesn’t change anything, does it?’ he says slowly. ‘Knowing why I left.’
I shake my head. ‘No, Hale.’
‘You’re still not going to come with me?’
‘I can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘I told you why. Mom, and the diner. Everything.’
‘Do you want to?’
‘More than anything.’
‘But you won’t.’
I shake my head. ‘I can’t.’
‘That’s all just an excuse, Carrie,’ he says. ‘You know that, right? You’re just choosing to stay stuck in a rut.’
‘I’ve got responsibilities here.’
‘And what about your responsibility to yourself?’ he asks. ‘What about looking after Carrie Walker for once? What about putting yourself first?’ He pauses, and for a moment I expect him to pull me close and wrap his arms around me, but I think we’re past that now. ‘I’ve seen what this town does to people,’ he says. ‘It sucks them in and it never lets them go. I didn’t expect you to still be here. I needed you to be gone, and when you weren’t I couldn’t believe it. You were supposed to do something, Carrie. To be someone. And don’t pretend that you’re happy like this, because I don’t buy it. That goddamn diner is killing you, one early bird special at a time.’
‘That goddamn diner belonged to my father.’
‘And so let it be his!’ he yells. ‘Let it be his, and your mother’s. But don’t pretend it’s your dream. You staying here isn’t some sort of virtue. It’s because you’re scared of what comes next. You’re scared of the big, wide world. You tell me I’m scared of my future? For God’s sake, Carrie… look in the mirror sometime before you start throwing stones. For your own sake, if no one else’s. You deserve better than this.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with my life,’ I say. ‘Don’t you get that? Sure, maybe it’s not as exciting as yours – but it’s mine. It’s all mine, and it’s the only one I’ve got.’
‘Yeah,’ he says with a sigh. ‘Yeah, it is. Good luck with everything. I hope you wind up happy in the end, I really do.’
I don’t stop him this time; he slips past me and out into the yard of the trailer, his jacket pulled up tight against the heavy rain and his keys already in his hand.
‘Where are you going?’ I ask.
‘I’m running away,’ he says over his shoulder. ‘Apparently. I guess you were right about me all along.’
So this is how it ends, I think: with a snarky joke, and him driving away for good. Away from me. Away from Eden, with no reason to ever come back. No matter what has happened in the last week, no part of me saw this coming. Then again, even if I had predicted it… would I even have admitted it to myself?
He was always destined to go. Somehow, that knowledge doesn’t make things any easier. It doesn’t stop my tears mingling with the storm. It doesn’t cool the anger I feel burning away inside me.
Well, fuck it. I’m not him. I’m not waiting ten years to say my piece. All we ever did was wait.
‘You want to run?’ I say, yelling against the sound of the rain on the trailer’s roof. ‘Fine then. You run away, Hale Fischer. You can pretend you’re doing it for noble reasons, but don’t think even for a second that I believe that. It’s just you being scared to stick around – and if that’s all you’ve got, then you should run. Hop on your stupid bike and run as far and as fast as you can, and hope that sometime in the future you decide you’ve found something worth taking a risk on – because until you do, you’re going to lead a real lonely life, Hale.’
He stops for a moment, and despite the white-hot rage that’s bubbling away in my stomach, all I want is for him to stay. I want him close to me. I want to work this out, somehow. I want to find a way. I want that something to be me.
Stay, I think. Please. Please.
He swings one leg over his bike, and turns on the engine.
And then, for the first time in his stupid life, he does exactly as he’s told.