Being on the back of Cutter’s bike feels so freeing, I feel ready to tackle anything right now. Bravely, I peel one arm from around his waist. I lean back slightly and let out a yelp of excitement. He chuckles getting a real kick out of my enjoyment. I can feel his laughter tensing through his stomach muscles. Where do they breed guys who are naturally ripped like this? Harlan had a nice body, but he had to work hard to maintain it.
We speed through town and everyone is staring at us, but today I don’t care. I don’t know if it is because I took my meds or because of the effect Cutter is having on me. Or maybe I am just so lonely, the slightest attention is getting me excited. Either way, I am having so much fun for the first time in over a year.
Cutter is so easy to be with. I know I just met him, but Harlan always blamed me for everything that ever went wrong in his life. It feels good to be with someone who just lets me be me and doesn’t have any great expectations of me. Even when I am with my Gram, I feel like I am always letting her down in some way.
Classes start next week, and I am so nervous about it. Being I didn’t plan on attending, I am going to have to get a move on in preparing myself for them. But today I want to be anyone but me and being on the back of a motorcycle with a cute guy, makes me feel anything but myself. We turn down a winding road heading away from town. He takes me to the falls, it’s like he can read my mind.
He gives me some space on the bridge, but not much. I think he is afraid I will try to jump. I look to the cliff and close my eyes. “Harlan,” I whisper his name. The wind rustles slightly. I know he is here watching and listening to me.
“Don’t be angry with me, Harlan. I know you aren’t happy with me right now, but I need you to understand.” The feeling that he is close leaves me, so I figure it is time to go. He will forgive me soon enough. I reach into my bag for a cigarette, and I find the envelope I put all my paper daisies in.
“Whatcha got there,” Cutter asks as I pour some of the flowers into my hand.
“Oh these, they were a gift. I believe Harlan left them for me. I used to find them on my pillow at night.” I throw a few over the rail and out to the falls. I want Harlan to know I haven’t forgotten him, just because I am spending time with Cutter.
“So, he used to leave them for you when you were dating?”
“No, it might sound crazy but when I was in the hospital after Harlan passed, he would leave them for me.”
“Not crazy at all, but how do you know they weren’t from someone who wanted to see you smile. I’d bring you flowers if it would make you smile.”
I put the rest of the daisies back into their envelope and back into my bag. It is definitely time for that cigarette. The flowers had to be from Harlan, who else would have known how badly I missed being able to hide away in my Gram’s garden while I was in the hospital?
We go for a short hike around the falls before we hit the road again. I show him the best spots for spotting the bald eagles when they come here, but that isn’t until January. He makes me promise to come back here with him sometime to see the eagles. I say that I will but who knows.
The falls is supposed to be my special place for being close to Harlan. It feels wrong to be here with Cutter. Like I am bringing a new dog home and letting it mark his territory for his own. Not that I can keep someone from enjoying the falls, but I shouldn’t be in our spot with someone else, even if Harlan can never truly be here to enjoy it with me like he used to.
I lean in close to Cutter and wrap my arms tight around his waist. He kisses my forehead and tells me he wants to stop by a friend’s house.
We ride in silence for a few miles when he suddenly turns drown a driveway that I know all too well. “What are we doing here?” My stomach tenses, I think I am going to be sick. We are on the River family’s rental property. Nolan lived in this house. He moved out after Harlan died and moved to central Kentucky or, so my Gram heard from one of her old biddies. I used to come here a lot with Harlan.
“A friend of mine lives here, he is having a small get together. A kickstart to the semester.”
“Who’s your friend?” I weakly ask as we come to a stop in the driveway behind a black blazer. Please don’t say Nolan.
“Oh, his name’s Hurley. I think you two have met already, you made quite an impression on him yesterday.” Great, I think to myself, the cocky asshole from the diner, but at least he didn’t say Nolan. It is still early and there is already music blaring from the house. I swear this house was built to be a party house.
“I don’t think I can go in there,” I admit as he slings his leg over the bike getting off it. I feel tense and weak.
“Come on, you’ll be fine,” he pushes.
I know he doesn’t know what memories this house holds for me—both good and bad, but mostly bad. Nolan always found a way to shit on Harlan’s good times and mine.
One of the last times I was here, Nolan was throwing a party, well he was always having a party of some kind. I will never forget it. Harlan had been drinking a lot and there were lots of party favors being handed out. I never took drugs, and Harlan never would let me, not that I ever really wanted to. But he wouldn’t even let me try pot, and everyone and their brother has tried it. He would make me go out of the room if anyone was smoking it.
He would say to me, “Bella, you are better than all of this, and I won’t let you be ruined by this life.” But this time, Harlan had taken a pill he hadn’t done before. There was some kind of reaction with the alcohol and it made him go off the walls jealous. He was being very aggressive with me particularly.
One of his friends was talking to me about a new movie that was coming out, and suggested we go see it, and by we, he didn’t mean the two of us. He meant a group of us together. But Harlan mistook the suggestion. He came charging across the room at me. He knocked me flat on my ass with his fist. When I tried to get onto my knees to get off the floor, he placed himself over my shoulders, and began squeezing my temples with his knees as hard as he could, to the point I almost passed out.
It took three guys to pull him off me, including Nolan. My head hurts just thinking of it. I rub my jaw from the memory. It’s as if I can still feel the bruise. I had to put a bag of frozen peas on it to keep the swelling down. I became really good at covering bruises. So much so, that a professional makeup artist would be jealous of how good I can blend concealer and foundation.
Things weren’t always like that with Harlan and me. When it was just the two of us, nothing bad ever touched us—until the day he died. I am pulled from my memories by the shrieking of Brianna.
“Bella, oh my goodness.” she flips her long blonde locks behind her shoulder as she steps off the porch, and makes her way to where we are standing, in the driveway. “How are you? I have been meaning to come see you, but I have just been so busy with school coming up and all.” She smiles her fake bitch smile.
“Sure wouldn’t want you to trouble yourself with crazy ol’ me.” I roll my eyes at her and don’t attempt to hide my dislike for her.
She grits her teeth and saunters over to Cutter. “I didn’t know you knew Bella, with her not being well.” She gives me a wink and runs her fingers up his arm.
He flinches under her touch, steps away from her, and takes my hand. “If you’ll excuse us, I need to talk to Hurley.”
Clearly wounded her pitiful attempts at flirting have no effect on Cutter, she calls out after us. “Be careful with that one, her last relationship didn’t end too well.”
I don’t know what comes over me but the rubber band holding me sane snaps. I have been taking her shit all my life. I will not let her walk all over me and make me look weak. Harlan and Nolan aren’t here to protect her this time. I let go of Cutter’s hand and charge at her full steam.
Look out bitch here comes the crazy train. I smirk to myself.
Catching her and everyone by surprise, we tumble onto the gravel. And I let her have it. I let the back of my hand go and it connects with her jaw. The look on her face is priceless. She didn’t think I had it in me. She must not realize how undone I truly am. I don’t have it in me to care. Or it might just be medication hasn’t taken effect, either way, Brianna has had it coming from me, for years.
“You do not get to talk about him. You were nothing. You are inconsequential when it comes to Harlan!” I scream in her face. While I am ahead, I do one of the most disrespectful things a girl in the south can do. I spit in her face. I want her to know how unworthy she really has become.
“Shew wee, I knew you were a spitfire, when I first saw you. It’s in your eyes.” Hurley whoops with a laugh, as Cutter pulls me off Brianna. “Better watch out for this one, Cutter, she acts like a real firecracker.”
“Yeah, man, I’ll do that. I think it is best we go, just give me a call when you know more about that job we talked about.”
We get back to town and Cutter pulls in at the gas station. “I need to fill up, you need anything?”
“I’m alright.”
“You ready to tell me what that was all about?” He takes the nozzle from the pump and unscrews his gas cap.
“Nope, let’s just say something I have wanted to do for years.”
“Something to mark off the list then?” He grins.
“Yeah, definitely.” I hate that fucking cunt truffle.
I go in to pay for the gas. My cell phone begins to vibrate in my back pocket. It’s my Gram, I am sure someone has told her I am running around all over town with a hoodlum or something. It doesn’t take long for word to travel around this place.
“Hi, Gram —”
She cuts me off before I can speak any further. “Bella Rose, what’s this I hear about you gallivanting through town on the back of a motorcycle?”
“I am out with a friend, ya know socialization. I thought you’d be happy to see me being active and actually having human contact with someone other than Dr. Peters.”
“I am dear, I just worry, now you and your friend come on over for supper.”
“Gram, we already ate.”
“Don’t you sass me, Bella! Besides, I cooked your favorite.” She knows I can’t turn down her chicken and dumplings, mashed potatoes, sugar snap peas, and cornbread. I finish paying for the gas and direct Cutter on how to get to my Gram’s house.
“Already introducing me to the family, so serious so soon,” he flirts with me.
“Shut up and drive.”
He kicks the starter, and the engine purrs. What is about a man on a motorcycle that seems to drive women wild? I hug my arms around him tight and breathe him in. He smells good, manly is the only description that fits.
As we are pulling out of the parking lot Brianna pulls in driving her yellow Mustang, I flip her bird and holler, “Fuck you, Tweety Bird.”
Cutter laughs. “Did you just call her Tweety Bird?” I don’t answer, and he shakes his head and laughs harder. “What did Tweety Bird ever do to you?”
“If I told you, I’d have to kill you,” I sass.
He pulls up to my Gram’s grand house on Meadow Lane. “Wow, your Gram really has a beautiful home.”
“Yeah, I can’t wait to show you her flower garden.” I grab his hand and pull him through the front door.
My Gram’s house looks like something out of a historical romance novel. It has beautiful crown molding that runs along the high ceilings and hardwood floors. Her house was built before the civil war. It is listed as a historical property. She has gorgeous tapestries and rugs in every room. Her and my grandfather did a complete restoration when they first moved in. Her furniture is all grand with claw feet. My grandpa spared no expense on making the home feel authentic.
When I was little I would dress up in my princess gowns and pretend I was Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with The Wind. My Gram and I have watched the movie so many times. It is one of her all time favorites. I would make a grand entrance as I came down the stairs to go into the dining room for dinner; I was always a bit dramatic as a child. Gram always found my antics entertaining though.
Gram is waiting in the dining room for us. “Ma’am it is a pleasure to meet the lady who raised this feisty gal. Name’s Cutter.” he extends his hand out and Gram pulls him into a hug.
“You can call me Gram or Clara, everyone else does. What have you been doing, Bella? I hope you haven’t raised too much hell, already today?”
“No more than usual.” I wink at Cutter and notice he is baffled by my loose banter with my Gram. I hope he doesn’t spill the beans about my scuffle with Brianna a bit ago.
We all sit down and before anyone can even take a bite, Gram is badgering Cutter about his entire life history. I think she would ask him for his social security card and driver's license to do a background check on him, if I wouldn’t die from embarrassment. She thinks just because she is older than dirt and lived here all her life that she ought to know everyone she comes across. I put my foot down when she starts asking him about the maiden names of his grandparents.
His answers are vague but enough to satisfy Gram. He transferred here from Center College to the university. He is twenty-one years of age. He had a normal upbringing and he is looking for part time work to help pay his way. I think she as just as taken by him as I him. I guess charm sees no age. I get tickled how her cheeks blush when Cutter compliments her cooking and her home. I think the old bird is smitten—taken by him, just as I am.
He is laying it on thick, he even helps me clear the table and do the dishes. Harlan would have never offered to something so thoughtful, let alone sit down to eat dinner with my Gram. But then again, she never would let me ask Harlan over often.
Gram always had it out for Harlan. If she thought he was going to be at a party I wanted to go to, she’d try to ground me to keep me from going. I’d just sneak out and go anyways so her efforts were pointless. The way she is fawning over Cutter, I have never seen her like this. I may need to watch it.
My Gram might be a cougar.