Cassie

 

“Okay, girl, time to spill.” Reggie came up on one side of me and Nora the other, sandwiching me between Michael Jackson and Wednesday Addams at the counter. It was Halloween. “What’s got you in a funk?” He set his elbow on the counter and rested his chin on top of his white gloved fist.

“Who says I’m in a funk?”

Reggie and Nora shared a look. I glanced between the two of them. It was hard to take them seriously in costume.

“We’ve just noticed that you seem, a little . . .” Nora hesitated.

“A lot,” Reggie cut in.

“Down,” Nora said.

“Mopey as fuck,” Reggie added.

“Guys, I’m fine.” I squeezed out from between them, but there wasn’t really anywhere to go but the kitchen. I grabbed some of the dirty pitchers and carted them to the sink. They followed.

“Girl, you’re not fine, so try that line on someone else.”

“You’ve hardly talked all day,” Nora said.

“That’s not true. I’ve talked to at least twenty customers in the last hour.”

“That doesn’t count.” Reggie pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes reprovingly. “Your favorite song came on earlier, and you didn’t even sing along.”

“So, I didn’t feel like singing,” I sighed. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

“It’s Halloween, Cass, and you didn’t even dress up.”

I shrugged. “Wasn’t in the mood to dress up.”

“Doesn’t seem like you’re in the mood for anything. That’s kind of our point.”

I glared at him, and then Nora said gently, “You looked like you’d been crying when you came out of the bathroom earlier. We’re just worried about you.”

I rinsed and loaded the dirty dishes and coffee utensils into the washer to avoid having to meet their eyes.

“Allergies,” I lied. Truth was, I had been crying in the bathroom like it was senior prom night all over again, and I’d caught my date—the boy I’d crushed on all year—making out with my best friend Chloe in a corner. Only this time, it was much worse. I got over Jon Eddy two days later when Jesse Noren asked me out. We lasted all the way to graduation, and then he gave me the we’re going off to different colleges speech. I think I cried over Jesse for a week before I decided I was done crying over boys. Neither Jon nor Jesse had hurt like this. I think I even heard that Jon and Chloe got married last year. Besides being a little bitter about prom, I was happy for them.

But it’d been ten days since Nikolai picked Eli up from my house. Ten days since I’d told him I couldn’t do it anymore. Ten days since I’d spoken to him. And it hurt more now than it did then. I think I’d been in shock a little bit at first. Each morning that I woke up knowing it would be another day I’d have to go without seeing him, it hit me a little more. We were really done. That was it. Every day it got worse, not better. I missed him more, not less. I kept waiting for one day to be a little bit easier than the one before, so I’d know I was on the downhill end of it, but it hadn’t happened yet.

“It’s not allergies,” Reggie called my bluff. “We haven’t seen you like this since . . . since . . .” He didn’t have to say it. We all knew.

“Maybe, I just don’t want to talk about it,” I snapped.

Reggie looked taken aback. “But you tell me everything.”

“Not this,” I slammed the lid down on the dishwasher and stalked out of the kitchen. I stopped short when I saw who was standing at the counter.

Nikolai, with Eli in a puffy, green Hulk costume. Eli shoved his mask up and flashed a bright smile, waving the hand that wasn’t holding a bucket full of candy. “Hi, Cassie! We’re trick-or-treating.”

I remained frozen, my gaze trapped in Nikolai’s.

Reggie and Nora came up behind me. “Oh.” It seemed they could put two and two together.

“Hey, buddy,” I finally snapped out of it and tore my eyes away from Nikolai. “Your costume looks so good,” I told Eli. “Best one I’ve seen all day.”

He beamed. “Really?”

“Definitely.” I grabbed the bowl of candy Nora and Reggie had been handing out to kids all day as part of the downtown trick-or-treat, and walked around the counter. I ignored Nikolai’s presence the best I could even though I felt his eyes on me. “Take as many as you want.” I held the bowl out to Eli, knowing Nora had two more giant bags under the counter to refill it. His eyes got big and he reached in for a handful.

After he’d dropped the candy into his bucket he looked up at his father. “Do you have it, Dad?”

I allowed myself to look at Nikolai as he reached into his pocket and retrieved a small envelope that he handed to Eli, who then held it out to me. “It’s an invitation to my birthday party next weekend. Dad’s letting me have it at the arcade. Will you come?”

“Oh, umm,” I looked to Nikolai for help, because I didn’t know what I was allowed to say.

“He’d really like it if you were there,” Nikolai encouraged softly.

“Oh, I—of course I’ll be there,” I told Eli. He gave me an excited hug, and then another big group of kids came in behind them and his dad tugged him out of the way.

“We’d better get going, bud. There are still a lot of places left to trick-or-treat.” Eli waved goodbye and then followed his dad out. I stood there, holding the bowl of candy out to the trick-or-treaters, and watched them go. Nikolai glanced back over his shoulder before the door swung shut behind them. Our eyes met for a brief second, but I didn’t know what the look on his face meant. I didn’t know what any of this meant.

Could he have changed his mind? Was this his way of showing me he was going to let me be in Eli’s life? Or was this just him giving into his son’s wishes now that it didn’t matter because we were done?

When the last of this group of trick-or-treaters trickled out, I turned to set the bowl of candy back on the counter. Nora and Reggie stood behind the counter, staring at me with sad, sympathetic looks on their faces.

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Nora asked.

“Tell you what?” I ducked around the counter.

“How long?” she asked, ignoring my feigned ignorance.

I sighed. There really was no point in trying to hide it now. “A few weeks, or longer, depending . . .”

“Depending on what?” Reggie asked.

“Stuff happened a while ago, when I started babysitting, but we didn’t, not really, until . . . God, can we just not talk about it?” They wouldn’t understand what we’d been doing, and I really didn’t need their judgement right now.

“Cass,” Nora moved toward me, but I held up my hands.

“Just don’t. I can’t do this right now.” Or ever. “And please stop looking at me like that.” The pity in their eyes was too much.

“I’m sorry,” she stopped.

“We just want to help,” Reggie said.

“You can’t.” I turned away from them, grabbing the edge of the counter, staring at the cracks in the wood. “I knew it was a bad idea from the start. That’s why I didn’t tell you. This is my problem. Not yours.”

“But you can talk to us about it. We’re your friends,” Nora urged.

I looked at her over my shoulder. “I don’t want to talk. I just want you to leave me alone about it.”

“Okay,” she held her hands up, placatingly. “If that’s what you want, but you never talk about anything, anymore, Cass. You keep everything bottled up, and I don’t think it’s healthy.”

I gripped the edge of the counter and sucked in a deep breath, before gritting out. “You wouldn’t even understand.” How could she when everything in her world was perfect? She’d just announced two weeks ago that she was pregnant for fuck’s sake.

“How can you say that? Of course we would understand,” she argued.

“Yeah.” Reggie came closer.

I snorted a dry laugh. “No, you guys wouldn’t. You don’t get it. Not any of it. None of what I’ve gone through. You have no idea what the past two years have been like for me.”

Nora frowned. “I know better than anyone what you’ve been dealing with.”

“That’s just it,” I turned on her. “You don’t. What you and Em went through was different. God, it was horrible, and I can’t even imagine, but . . .” I looked away. I couldn’t bring myself to admit it. Not to her.

“What?” she pressed closer. “What is it?”

I met her eyes, so full of concern and confusion. “I loved him Nora, or I thought I did.”

Her brow creased further. “Nikolai?”

I shook my head. “Will. I thought I loved him. I even told him, the night he took you, when he came over. And he looked at me like hearing it made him so happy, like he felt it too, and then we . . .” I ducked my eyes again, unable to make myself say the words. “But it was all a lie. A sick joke. He was toying with me. He wanted me to feel those things for him, and I just don’t understand why.” I looked helplessly at Nora, like maybe she could tell me, but I knew she didn’t have the answers either. “Every time I looked in the mirror I felt sick, knowing what he’d done.” I clutched a hand to my stomach. “To those girls. To Em. To you. It felt like there was something rotten inside me, and it kept spreading like poison. I didn’t want to get out of bed. I couldn’t eat. I would go to bed and hope that I just wouldn’t wake up in the morning, because all those things people were saying about me, that they’re still saying, I believed them.”

Nora was holding a hand over her mouth, blinking back the moisture pooling in her eyes. Reggie just stood there, a sort of stunned and horrified look on his face.

“I had horrible dreams, so I just stopped sleeping, and after a few days, I was so out of, I didn’t know if I was awake or dreaming. I would see him and hear him laughing at me. My parents wanted to have me admitted to the psych ward. I spent two nights in the hospital being evaluated and doped up and prodded to talk, but I refused. I hated it there, and none of them could help me. Grandmama talked my parents into taking me home. She moved me into her house because I couldn’t go back to my apartment. I was prescribed antidepressants and sleeping meds and mood stabilizers, but drugs couldn’t help either.”

“How did we not know any of this?” Nora choked.

“You and Em were healing and dealing with your own nightmares from it all. And how could I tell you? How could I tell you that I was all torn up over the monster responsible for what you two went through?”

“I had no clue,” she grabbed my hand and I let her. “I didn’t know you loved him. You never let on. Your relationship seemed so casual.”

“I know. That’s how I wanted it to seem. I was scared to admit my feelings. He was the first guy I’d really cared about in a long time. I didn’t want to get my heart broken. I had no idea that was the least of the ways he could hurt me.”

“Oh, Cass.” She tugged me to her and wrapped her arms around me. Reggie pressed himself to my back and the both of them held me. My insides felt shredded and my throat was tight, by I didn’t cry. The tears weren’t even there. Not anymore. Because this wasn’t the first time I’d shared all of this.

I’d told Nikolai everything too, and he’d held me the same way while I had cried. He kissed my tears away and then he let me lose all of it in him. We hadn’t fucked that night. It was something else. And that’s when I finally felt myself letting go of all the shit. All the horror and fear and self-hatred. The only person who deserved my hatred and disgust was Aaron. And he was gone. Will, the guy I’d thought I loved, he was gone too. He’d never really existed. And it was time to live my life without him shadowing every moment of it.

I let go of Nora and she eased back, Reggie too. And then I told them about Nikolai. Not everything, because that, they would never really get. But I told them I’d been drowning before him, struggling and fighting to stay above the surface, but sinking all the same. His was the hand that reached into the storm and started dragging me out. His was the voice that reminded me I knew how to swim, and when I was too tired, I could float in his arms. I could trust him to keep me afloat and be my anchor. I don’t know if half of what I said made sense outside of my own head, but they listened and tried their best to be understanding.

I didn’t feel better at all afterward, but I suppose it was a relief to have someone know, to have it not be a secret anymore.

When I was done, Reggie let out an impressed whistle, “I have to admit, even though the two of you is a little twisted, it’s pretty hot, and almost even a little romantic.” I scowled at him. “I just mean that you two hated each other, and all that hate turned to passion and you got it on and were having like a full-blown affair. Then you fell for him. It’s like a movie or some shit.”

“With a horrible, shitty, ending,” I pointed out.

“I don’t know. I definitely felt some sparkage when he came in here, maybe it’s not the end yet. Maybe you’re still in the middle of the story.”

“I don’t know, but I think I need to quit letting other people decide how the story goes. It’s time for me to write it myself,” I said.

And then I quit my job.

Not all dramatic on the spot. I wouldn’t do that to Nora. I finished my shift, but I knew that it needed to be my last one. For once, I had plan, or maybe not quite a plan, but I had a next step, which was almost a plan. At least as far as where my life was headed. My love-life was another story. At the moment, it hurt too much to even think about.

Every time over the next week that I started to wonder if Nikolai had meant something by letting Eli invite me to the party, I shoved it down and told myself it was irrelevant. Nikolai equaled pain, both good and bad, and I’d had enough of the bad.

The changes I was making in my life, they were good, and I had a new rule. No going back, only forward. A big part of that was my new job. I’d first gotten the idea when I went back to Columbia Elementary to put money into Brittany’s lunch account.

It took a lot for me to walk into the school district offices last week, but I had.

It’d taken even more for me to walk into the school yesterday, but I’d done that too.

And in an hour, I would walk into the arcade and face perhaps the biggest challenge—seeing Nikolai.

It’ll be fine, I told myself. There will be kids, and Nora, and cake.

I was still telling myself that when I pulled into the parking lot. I flipped down my visor and spared one glance in the mirror. Then I sucked in a breath for courage, grabbed the present from the passenger’s seat, and went inside.

Given that it was a Saturday afternoon, kids were everywhere. A quick look around and I spotted Nora and Spencer standing by a table on one wall, decorated with balloons and stacked with wrapped packages, gift bags, and a pink box that looked suspiciously like it came from a bakery. I’d located the party hub.

I maneuvered my way through the maze of noisy pinball machines, shooter games, old-school classics, and the latest in virtual reality. I deposited my package, which rattled with the tell-tale sound of Legos, and waved hello to the gang. Marissa was there too, standing away from everyone else. She was the only one who didn’t greet me, unless you counted the way her face soured when she saw me. This time I wasn’t imagining it. Whatever her deal was, she didn’t like me.

Nikolai and Eli were the only ones I didn’t see at first, but after planting myself beside Nora, another scan of the room turned up the two of them across the room shooting at one of the screens.

Nora hardly had time to ask how my first day on the new job went, before Eli was dashing over, his dad following on his heels. He spotted me and adjusted his course so he crashed into my legs.

“Oof,” I caught him against me.

“You came!”

“I promised I would.”

He peeled himself off my legs and grinned up at me. “What d’ya get me?”

Nikolai interrupted. “Eli, looks like one of your friends from school is here. Why don’t you go say hi.”

We both turned our heads and spotted the kid who’d just walked in carrying a gift bag with his mom at his side. Eli scampered off to get his friend and I faced Nikolai.

“Hey.” I offered a nervous wave of my fingers.

He grunted something that might have been a greeting, but it wasn’t a friendly one. Neither was the hard look he gave me before he turned and ignored me completely. A thousand tiny daggers in the chest would have hurt less than that warm welcome. Nora and I shared a what the hell look.

“Have you guys talked since you saw him at the shop?” she asked quietly. She’d promised not to tell Spencer. I figured if Nikolai wanted him to know, he’d tell him.

I shook my head and watched him walk over to the lovely Marissa. Eli returned with his friend and Nikolai sent them off with a handful of quarters. I tried to visit with Nora and Em, but it was hard when I could feel Nikolai scowling at me from across the length of the table. Every time I’d look over there, he’d look away and go back to whatever conversation he was half engaged in. At first, I felt crushed, and then I just got pissed, because if one of us had the right to stare angrily, and be all broody, I was pretty sure it was me.

“I can’t just sit here,” I finally told them. “I might as well take out my frustrations on some aliens or something.” I convinced Nora to help me spend the quarters weighing down my purse. We ran through several dollars in no time at the rate Nora went through lives.

“I’m no good at this,” she laughed.

“No, you really aren’t, babe.” Spence appeared behind us, wrapping his arms around Nora’s waist, placing one protective hand on her belly, which was beginning to show.

After a few minutes of enduring their cute, teasing banter, I stepped aside and gave Spencer my gun. “I’m going to go find a pinball table,” I told them.

I never made it to the pinball tables. I bumped into Nikolai near Pac-Man. “Sorry,” I said, stepping aside to let him past, only he didn’t go around me. He eyed me up and down, then turned to go back the other direction. “What the hell is your problem?” I hissed, stalking after him. He stopped, nearly causing me to crash into him again, and spun around.

“My problem?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t have one, pet.”

“You could have fooled me. You’ve been glaring and sulking since I got here. What did I do now?” I threw my hands up.

“You sure you’re not just looking for something? A reason to start an argument?” He leaned in. “After all, fighting was like our foreplay. You miss me, sweetheart? The new boy not quite giving you what you need?”

“What new boy?” I asked.

“No need to hide it. It’s good you’re moving on. But if he’s not doing it for you, don’t come to me with all your pent-up frustration, and no need to stalk my kid at his school,” he growled.

“First of all, I’m not stalking anyone,” I whisper shrieked, given the number of children and people in general around us who did not need to overhear this. “Second, I am NOT pent-up. And who told you I was with someone new?”

“Doesn’t matter.” He pulled away and a wall came down over his features. “Enjoy the party, Cass.” He strode off and disappeared somewhere near the virtual reality car racing.

What the hell had just happened? I turned to go find Nora and see if she had any idea why Nikolai thought I was seeing someone else, but instead, I found a sullen Eli, sitting by himself in the corner.

“Hey, what’s up? Where are your friends?” I slid into the seat next to him, my problems momentarily forgotten.

He shrugged and continued to kick at the floor and fiddle with his hands in his lap.

“You’re not having a good time?”

He shrugged again.

“You can tell me if something’s wrong. I’ll do whatever I can to help fix it.”

He finally glanced up at me though crestfallen eyes. “Brittany didn’t come.”

“Oh. I’m sorry, kiddo.”

“I really wanted her to come. I even told her she didn’t have to bring a present.”

“I’m sure she wanted to, but maybe her family had other plans. Maybe, if your dad meets her parents, you guys could invite her another time.”

He looked hopeful and jumped up. “I’m going to go ask Dad if we can next weekend.” He ran off before I could stop him, and I hoped I hadn’t just gotten myself into more trouble. I abandoned my mission to find Nora and began working my way toward the loo. I hoped we’d get to cake and presents soon, so I could make my escape. The party was getting to be a bit too much.

The bathrooms were down a short hall at the back of the building. When I turned the corner to the hallway, I was annoyed to find a lip-locked couple blocking the restrooms. It only took half a second for the visual input to reach my brain and register that it wasn’t just any couple.

Suddenly, I didn’t have to pee.

I needed to throw up.

They started to break apart. I panicked and bolted before I could be spotted. I was halfway to the door before I realized I was running and there were tears running down my cheeks. I had my hand on the door before someone stopped me.

“Cassie?” It was Eli. He was right behind me.

I stopped and quickly wiped at my face before I turned and attempted to mask the utter agony I was feeling. “Hey.”

“Are you leaving?” He was frowning.

“I’m sorry, bud. I don’t feel very well, I think I might be getting sick. You should go enjoy the rest of your party though.”

“Is it ‘cause Dad made you sad? Is that why you don’t feel good?”

“I’m not sad.” I put my hand on his shoulder. Sad wasn’t quite a big enough word for what I was. “Today was the best. I’m so glad I got to come to your party.”

“Okay. I’m sorry you got sick.”

“Me too, buddy. Me too.” I tugged him to me for a hug, and squeezed my eyes hard against the tears pooling.