Two days later
“You sure you don’t want it?” the guy asked, giving me a look like I was crazy.
“Positive.”
“It work okay?”
I sighed. “It’s brand new. I just want to get rid of it.”
With blunt, dark-stained fingers, he scratched the side of his face and looked at the jackhammer again. The brand new, never been plugged in jackhammer that I was selling him for a quarter of what it was worth.
“You didn’t steal it, did ya?”
I burst out laughing. Oh the irony. His face screwed up at my response, but he looked behind him at my house and must have decided that it was an asinine question. “No,” I said when I caught my breath, felt a little bit more sane. “I didn’t steal it. It just … reminds me of my ex.”
His eyes swung warily from the jackhammer to me, then back down again. “All right then. Well, you got yourself a deal, buddy.”
The wad of cash he handed me was crumpled, warm from his pockets, and in truth, I didn’t even really want it. For a moment, I stared down at it in between my fingers. While he was climbing back into his dirty work truck, I almost called out, almost ran down the driveway and shoved the money back at him so that I wouldn’t feel so dirty, like I’d just benefited from something I shouldn’t have.
Of course, he would think it was crazy that a jackhammer reminded me of a woman. But it did. As I walked back into the house, I rubbed at my scratchy, sleep-deprived eyes. They felt like I’d cleaned them with sandpaper because of how many hours I’d laid in bed and stared at the ceiling since Lucy walked out the door.
No matter how often I tried to call her cell, she didn’t answer. All I got in return for my obsessive checking was the disembodied voice of an operator telling me that the voicemail box was full. In those quiet hours that I laid in the dark, I thought about the concept of time. A lot.
The passage of time was warped depending on whatever you might have been experiencing. It was a theory I was well-versed in. Dinners at my parents felt like five hours, even if I only sat at the long, impersonal table for forty-five minutes. The days spent at my house reading or watching movies because it’s how I was used to spending my time felt quick. Felt normal. Working out blanked my mind so much that I could’ve been down there for three hours and still been able to swear it had only been twenty minutes.
And my time with Lucy was a blur. From the first meeting to when she stormed out was only a couple weeks. The things crammed into those days were so heavy and life-changing, both good and bad, that my mind couldn’t wrap around the idea of it.
How could she have had such an effect on me in such a short amount of time?
People would say it was crazy. The word she hated so much when applied to her. Lucy wasn’t crazy. That was a moment, when those words fell from my mouth, that stretched out painfully. I had no control over making it go faster, making it disappear. And now it was that moment that I couldn’t move on from.
Because I’d had an opportunity to tell her and show her exactly how much she meant to me. And I hadn’t.
Her anger, her hurt had rendered me mute. The shame from it still hung from my exhausted frame like a black robe, weighing down my bones, slowing my movements to pathetic sluggishness. I hadn’t showered. Hadn’t shaved. I couldn’t remember if I’d changed my clothes. Yes, I was pathetic. I’d never had to face a woman that I wanted, truly wanted, and had to work through something of that magnitude. Lucy had her own demons to work through, yes, but I’d been the worst kind of man in that moment.
Inactive. Mute. Frozen with fear at what I’d done. I’d simply stood there and let her walk away.
With a balled-up fist, I punched the wall in the kitchen. For the first time in two days, I felt like I wasn’t a shell. So I did it again. Over and over until I saw an angry red smear of blood on the drywall. No wonder she left. What kind of man could she possibly see me as, if that was my response to our first true test?
When I stretched my hand out to view the damage, I hissed. The split of skin over bone felt like a weak relief for the tumult inside of me that was roaring and clawing to get out.
That was what stopped me short. Was that how Lucy felt being thrown into my world? First hand, I knew what her life looked like. Maybe I didn’t know the particulars, the timeline, but I didn’t need that. Not once had she betrayed me, even though she’d had more than one opportunity.
And if she felt as agitated as I imagined, I couldn’t blame her for running. The chemistry between us had been tangible and electric, and she probably wouldn’t argue that fact. But chemistry was a wobbly base on which to build a castle, despite what society told us.
Deep inside me, I could feel the frigid swell of panic when I imagined her off somewhere by herself, watching over her shoulder for Claude to appear with those black gloves on his hands. It spread out, freezing my muscles and cracking the effort of my lungs to pull in oxygen.
I sank into a chair and dropped my head into my hands.
Did she hate me?
Probably. She probably thought I was weak and ineffectual. My breath was so cold that it hurt my throat to breathe. My hands opened and closed, into tight fists and back out again, the split skin on my knuckle aching with each flex of my fingers.
I tried to imagine what Watkins would tell me to do right now, how to calm the irrational part of my mind that immediately went to the worst case scenario.
He’d remind me that feelings can and will change. They’re fluid. When my anxiety over Lucy is gone, I’ll feel calm and rational again. He’d remind me to sit calmly, speak calmly, all things that my body wouldn’t normally do in an emergency.
There were things that I had control of in this situation. It hadn’t felt like that since my mother and Claude broke into the garage, but there were things that I had control of.
My breath slowed and warmed, my heartbeat slowed down incrementally as I thought through all of the things that had happened since then. As calmly as possible, I stood and walked to the sink so I could fill a glass with cold water.
I drank it slowly, something that I’d do on a normal day in a normal moment. Then I picked up my phone and walked into the living room, where I stared into my backyard.
My thumb tapped on the screen until I found my mother’s number. I never called her, because I didn’t have to. She always just popped up when I least expected or needed her to. Which is why she answered on the second ring.
“Xavier? Are you all right?”
Exhaling slowly, I tilted my chin up toward the ceiling. “Yes, I’m fine.”
“Oh good. You make me nervous when you call.”
“You’re nervous all the time.”
She clucked her tongue. “That’s not true. I just … you know I worry. And apparently with good cause, too! Look at what happened.”
“Yeah,” I rubbed the back of my neck and took another steadying breath, “that’s what I’m calling about.”
There were muted voices in the background, and then the click of her heels on the floor as the other sounds receded. She was quiet as I could hear a door close. “Sorry, I had to excuse myself from guests that are here visiting your father.”
“No problem. I’d rather have your undivided attention for this.” The screen of my phone was hot against my face, so I pulled it away and put it on speaker.
“If this is about Claude,” she said quietly and then paused to clear her throat. “Everything is taken care of. You don’t need to worry.”
“See, but I do.”
She huffed. “Xavier, you don’t. It’s all taken care of.”
“And that’s fine, but I need you to hear me on this.” There was no response. “I’ll get it in writing from you if you don’t. I know my way to our lawyer’s office if you fight me on it, okay?”
“Continue,” she agreed tersely.
“There’s no statute of limitations on this, and I haven’t even seen her since the day you two left with … the package. But if her name is breathed in conjunction with this, I’ll turn myself in.”
My mom gasped. “You cannot be serious.”
Calm spread through me, the decision acting like a tranquilizer, pleasant and comforting. “I am.”
“Okay, let’s just discuss this later—”
“No, now.” Even though she couldn’t see me, I jabbed a finger in the air to punctuate my point. “If a reporter mentions this case, if Lucy gets brought up even once, if she’s followed, if she’s watched, if she’s trailed, anything. If you think about pinning this on her, I’ll know about it and I’ll walk straight to the cops with every single ounce of proof I have.”
My mom was breathing erratically, and I couldn’t even find it in me to care if she passed out from sheer shock. I felt better than I’d felt in days.
“And believe me, Mother,” I continued in a low voice, “I have plenty of proof.”
“You’d … you’d go to jail to protect her? Her?”
“I would.” Of all the things I’d said or thought about Lucy, that might have been the easiest admission yet. And maybe that was what love was, or what falling into love was. The knowledge that you’d do anything to secure the other person’s happiness, even if it meant giving up everything, every part of your world, in exchange. “Don’t test me, because you have no idea how far I’ll go with this.”
When those words left my mouth, I’d never felt more like myself. There was an ache inside me still at her absence, and maybe I’d learn to live with it like a missing limb, but I could sleep better knowing that she’d be safe.
That’s when I heard a sound come from the kitchen. I turned and saw her.
Perched on the island, her legs crossed and a small screwdriver dangling in her hand, was Lucy.
My whole body flashed hot with excitement, my heart galloping, my stomach twisting at the perfect sight of her. Had she heard the whole conversation? She might think I was crazy for making that sort of threat. She might love it. She might hate it.
“Mom? We’re done here.” Amidst her stammered arguments, I disconnected the call.
She didn’t smile at me when I tossed the phone on the couch, and I glanced to the side and breathed out a laugh when I saw the security panel hanging off its hinges.
Of course, she broke in. Now I just had to figure out why.