Week Seven

“YOU THINK HE’LL LIKE this?”

“TBucket 300, cherry oak guitar. Hell yeah he will.” We’re in a local guitar shop in South Carolina, my home state. Ben had a photoshoot with the band and we took the time to sneak away and grab him a gift for his birthday tomorrow.

“I was thinking of engraving it with our wedding date. Then I was going to get the strap engraved with his mama’s name.” Nick’s eyes stay on the guitar as he nods without saying anything.

“What?” I nudge his shoulder.

“Nothing.”

“Come on, tell me. Is it a bad idea? You think he’ll get upset?”

“No, no. It’s just I’m shocked he’s told you about Grace.”

“He told me not many people know.” I start walking, looking at all my options.

“I barely know anything. He told me about his dad beating on them and killing her, but other than that he’s been tight-lipped about it all.”

“It’s his dad he doesn’t talk about.” I smile at the other passing customers.

“He won’t. Whenever he does, that’s when the drugs get him. He has a very dark side, Sadie.”

“Are you trying to warn me or inform me?” I’m not sure where this is going. He, out of anyone, knows that Ben and I are having more highs and lows lately.

“Both. Listen, you’re the greatest thing to happen to Ben, but he has a side of him that you haven’t really tapped into and I hope you understand that. Be patient with him and hopefully when he’s ready he will get the help.”

“You think he’ll get there?” I appreciate his honesty, but I’ve already been uneasy over the gamble of being with Ben. This sure isn’t helping.

“Maybe, with you I think he’ll do whatever he can to make this work.”

“You’re good to him. So good.”

“He’s like a son to me and even though I don’t agree with more than half of the things he does, I love him and the choice he made to marry you is the one thing that I support more than anything.” The compliment is welcomed from this six foot, burley man. I adore him and knowing that Ben has him after the crappy life he had before him makes me hopeful for Ben’s future. Maybe both of us can help him stop running from his past and face his future.

I want to give Ben a home, a family, a safe place where he never has to feel unloved, hurt or alone, but he needs to be willing to lay down his cards too and hold up his end of the bargain.

“Thank you.” Giving him a hug, I relax just enough to focus on the task at hand—Ben’s birthday.

“Alright, let’s get him this guitar and go. I’m excited to see his face.” I change the subject, not taking today to think about everything that’s wrong in our marriage but more so the things that are right.

§

Today is Ben’s birthday and the boys threw him a pretty sweet tailgate party before the concert.

I felt sick toward the end, so I snuck away to get some rest during his show. Only problem is I should have known, with the alcohol and the boys doing drugs that my absence would cause him to go over the edge again.

When I woke up he was someone different.

Sneaking back to the venue, I take the back entrance and head toward the meet and greet, wanting to be here for some of the night and not totally leave him hanging on such a special day.

“Hey, Nick.”

“Oh fuck, hey Sadie. I didn’t know you were coming.” He blocks Ben from my view and I stammer back a little.

“Yeah, I’m feeling better and I wanted to come see him. What’s going on?” I attempt to move around him, but he stops me, grabbing my shoulders and setting me in place.

“Listen, it’s just his meet and greet. Why don’t you go rest and make sure you’re one hundred percent better.” I glare up at him, he’s doing a terrible job at hiding whatever it is that he doesnt want me to see. I step aside again, clearing him before he can stop me.

I stop dead in my tracks just as I watch Ben sniff coke off some girl’s stomach on the bar top in the back area. She laughs and I nearly lose my early dinner at the image.

My knees buckle and before I fall, Nick catches me under my arms. Knowing Ben does drugs is one thing, but seeing it out there in the open, so blunt and realistic, is another.

Ben hasn’t noticed me and I’m glad because I’m losing myself in a parallel universe. Not only is he doing drugs, but there’s a woman, a beautiful groupie aiding in his poor choices. His lips may have not touched her and he may not be making love to her, but who’s to say it wouldn’t lead to that if he went black?

Like a heart attack, I feel a strong grip on my heart, the actual feeling of my heart being broken in two. Gaining my equilibrium, I snap back into myself and fight or flight it. I push Nick off and make a run for the bus.

The night hair hits my skin the second I clear the door and the breeze helps cool my heated skin a bit. I have no time to think about anything, my flight senses are fully engaged and all I can think about is calling a cab and getting a red eye back to Portland.

Climbing on the bus, I pack whatever’s in sight, dumping it all into my suitcases with no method. Picking up my phone I dial Kate. If I tell my mama and papa about the drugs, they’ll never understand—ever.

“Hey, Sadie Jay!”

“Kate, I need you. Please find me a flight home to Portland,” I cry into the phone, moving around the bus in ghost mode, feeling completely out of my body.

“Oh my God, Sadie what’s wrong?”

“Nothing Kate! Just please get me a flight and send me the flight information. I’m in South Carolina, fly me out of Charleston International.”

“Okay, okay. I’m doing that now. Call me when you get to the airport, but Sadie?” she questions.

“What?”

“Tell me you’re okay?”

“I’m fine. Just help me.”

“Okay, I’m on it, sis.” Ending the call, I find the number for a taxi and wait for them to show up. When the taxi pulls up some minutes later, I see Nick running toward me.

“Sadie! Damn it, don’t run!” I throw my bags in the taxi and slam the trunk.

“I don’t have a choice, Nick.”

“We can help him together, we can do it. I promise, but you can’t give up on him.” Going to climb in the cab, I turn on him fast.

“Don’t make excuses for him. He has a choice and he makes the ones that hurt him the most. And me.”

“Sade, I’m telling you it’s not that simple.”

“Stop defending him! I can’t stay here, Nick. We rushed this, all of this.” Trying to stop me, he grabs the door.

“This is going to set him off, he’s going to fall off the wagon.”

“I can’t feel guilty for that. He has already fallen and he has promised me that he would try and stop multiple times. He hasn’t.” My words stun him, rendering him speechless. Nodding his head in defeat, he lets the door go and I tell the cab driver to leave.

It isn’t until I’m at the airport and my phone has been blowing up with calls and messages from Ben, that I realize everything that is happening. Ben is an addict, he can’t simply change with my presence, he needs more than that and me leaving wasn’t to prove a point for him to see how serious I am, it was for me. I needed to do it because I don’t know where I have a place in Ben’s life.

I realize now how young we are, even in my choices and how I choose to handle this. Running, it’s all I know to do. I’ve never been in love, let alone in love with a man who can be my best friend and a stranger all at once.

I do everything in my power to restrain myself from looking at the messages he’s sending me. Now what do I do? Going home means I’m going to have to tell my parents what happened. Maybe I can lie and tell them I came home a day early to prep for my internship. It starts Monday, so it doesn’t seem too far-fetched.

But what about my marriage? What about Ben? He comes home Friday and that’s just two days away. We share an apartment and let me not forget the major part about us being married—we’re going to have to face each other sooner rather than later. Gosh, what has my life become? Just a few weeks ago I was in marital bliss and now I’m spiraling down a rabbit hole of hows, whys and what ifs.

There is no right answer to any of them, no magic solution to fix my problems—I feel like a lost cause.

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