My mother once told me that women were grown from pain, and harvested by heartbreak. Every little fracture of our hearts plants another seed, and eventually one of those seeds will grow tall enough to withstand the weight of this world. It would grow tall enough to survive long enough to receive a happy ending in life. 

And then, we wither and die, taking our pain back into the dirt, fertilizing the ground for the next generation of girls. 

My plant bloomed a long time ago, but after tragedy, it began to recess back into the dirt, but now with a sunny forecast of freedom, I feel myself growing again, towering toward the sky. It’s a heavy burden, to love one man while falling for another, and I can no longer bear the weight on my shoulders alone.

On this cool October night, I sit beside Ashley on a tan sofa in front of a burning fireplace. The wood crackles as embers spark against the brick entrapment. In one hand, I carry a tall glass of red wine. In the other, I carry a heavy secret. I’m ready to spill, and I’m not talking about the wine.

The fire casts ominous shadows upon the dark room, highlighting our faces in lingering intrigue. I’m waiting for my moment to strike, to throw a curve ball at her, all the while praying for the best. Before she was the vice principal, she taught algebra for a year. She’s articulate and calculated, and she’ll either hand me the keys to continue what I’m doing, or stop me dead in my tracks.

Tonight, my fate is in her hands and she has no idea. Tonight, she is the puppet master holding the strings above my head, and I’ll dance however she wishes me to dance.

“He was worried sick about you.” She throws her hand against her chest, a failed attempt to hold the laughter in. “Her car is in the parking lot,” she says, mimicking my husband. “Of course, I didn’t know where you were, but I’ve been there with my ex-husband, so I calmed him down and assured him that you were with me.”

“He called, twenty to thirty times.”

“Where were you?” She leans in close, waiting for the dirty gossip, but I’m not prepared to spill the tea yet.

“Somewhere safe,” I assure her. “I needed to be by myself after I got the phone call Friday night.”

“What’s green and has wheels?” she questions me, inciting my favorite joke since I’ve been in the third grade. “Grass,” she laughs hysterically, hardly able to spit the punch line from her tongue. “Grass. I lied about the wheels.”

I stare her down, unamused.

“You need to laugh more.”

“I wish I could go to the funeral tomorrow,” I change the subject, and jump back on track, reigning in control of the conversation.

“I wish you could, but you can’t. Do you know what people would say?”

“If you were me, would you care?”

“Honestly?” she arches her brow. “I would, but we’re not the same person.”

“Coach and I aren’t together,” I spit out. Judging by the shock scribbled across her face, it’s a juicy bit of information.

“You’re joking, because if you weren’t, I’d know.”

I stare her down.

“You’re being serious.” She exhales a nervous breath. “What happened?”

“We fight all the time.”

“About Nathan?”

“You know what he did.”

“It’s a messy situation.” Her eyes retreat away from me. “I know you want me to condemn him for it, but he wasn’t in the wrong. He was doing his job, and sometimes that gets us into trouble.”

“Like I was doing my job when I got into that car?”

“Life is full of split-second decisions. We make a thousand choices a day, and sometimes they lead us down a road of unintended consequences. We can’t focus on the past. We have to keep moving forward.”

“Do you ever wonder who he was?”

“The other boy?”

I nod. “I know it doesn’t change anything. It’s an insatiable curiosity, though. Sometimes, it keeps me up at night.”

“Do you think he goes to our school?”

I shake my head. “Coach didn’t recognize him.”

“Coach?” she questions with a furrowed brow, her eyes full of judgment. “It’s that bad, huh?”

“It’s worse.” My fingers dig through my hair as I stare at the carpeted floor. “When we fight, it’s like we’re wielding knives.”

She sits her drink down on the table and places her palm on my thigh, comforting me. “Has he hurt you?”

“We hurt each other all the time,” I sigh. “It’s never been physical, though,” I continue, hurling a white lie. In the traditional sense, our fights haven’t escalated into physical fights, but the way he stormed after me the other night was frightening. I don’t mention this for two reasons; I refuse to be his victim any longer, and I unequivocally provoked him, pushing him to the point of madness with a simple, but vicious attack of my tongue.

“If you ever need a safe place,” she caresses my leg, “you know you can come here at any time.”

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” I sit up straight in the couch and take a long gulp of wine, finishing the glass. “I think I’ve found a safe place.”

“You’re being cryptic.” Her eyes twist. “What does that mean?”

I place the empty glass on the wooden table next to her half-full glass—or half empty, pick your poison—and stare up at the ceiling, inhaling a long breath, trying to work up the words I’ve assembled in my head so well, but I’m terrified will come out like jellyfish.

“Jesus, you look like a ghost. Do I need my drink for this?”

“How do you feel about infidelity?”

Her eyes bulge. “You know I love my romance novels, so that’s a hard one for me.” She leans to grab her glass from the table and takes a sip. “But, I’ll let you know in a minute.”

“It’s new.” My tongue swaths across my lips, wetting them as I reach into the far reaches of my mind, trying to remember my carefully crafted speech, but I remember nothing. I’m a high school student in speech class, my entire body shaking with nerves. “I never saw it coming, and it’s not something I was searching for. He came out of nowhere, and he saved me.”

“Saved you?”

That wasn’t part of the planned speech. The emotions from Friday night are still too real, and too raw. “It’s complicated,” I say dryly and sink into the couch.

“Uncomplicate it, then.”

My lips purse and my heart runs haywire, scratching for release from its mortal cage. “Please don’t react, but for a brief moment, I thought about taking my own life the other night.”

Her eyes sink. Her throat tightens.

I continue, speaking the most uncomfortable of truths. “I might have pulled the trigger if it weren’t with him.”

“You should have told—“ She stops herself and throws her arms around me, suffocating me with a tight hug that threatens the integrity of my ribs. “Don’t ever do that again,” she whispers against my ear.

“I’m good. I promise.” I pull away from her and force a smile. “You don’t have to worry about me like that, so please don’t. It was a moment of extreme weakness, and nothing more.”

It’s never that simple though. Right now, I’m weak, with the walls caving in on me everywhere I step, but somehow Kemper gives me strength. He carries me upon his shoulders as I try and navigate this tired world.

“As long as you promise not to go back down that road, I won’t bother you about it,” she says, “but if I see something suspect, don’t close yourself off when I start asking questions.”

“I promise.” I lock my pinky finger around hers. “Now about the affair…”

“I can’t approve of it.” She tilts her head and presses her tongue against her cheek, contemplating my actions. “I can’t condemn it, either.”

I let out a sharp exhale of relief. “Thank you.”

She didn’t give me her full blessing, but she’s not burning me at the stake, so it’s good enough.

“Who is he?”

“That’s a conversation for another day, perhaps sometime around June.” June 2^nd to be exact, the day Kemper will walk the same walk across the same field I walked across just six short years ago. Whether the fire burns out before then, or continues to burn hotter than the sun, is irrelevant. She can never know the truth until he’s no longer a student.

“Do I know him?”

“I think you’ve probably met him a time or two.”

“Great,” she huffs. “Now, I’m really not going to be able to sleep.”

If you knew who he was, you wouldn’t sleep for months.

“Can we please lighten the mood now?” I suggest and hop to my feet. I uncork the bottle of wine to fill up my glass and top hers off. “Is there any teacher-lounge gossip I’ve missed?”

“Oh.” She bursts to life, jumping to her feet, and ripping her glass out of my hand. “You’re never going to believe this shit.”

I glide back into a seating position, one eye focused on Ashley as she spills the proverbial tea, and the other keeping a close eye on the dying fire.