LbA: Victorious, Part 2

I felt like the walls were caving in.  I was going crazy.  Mad.  Maybe this is how it felt right before someone was committed.  I was lying on my back on my bed, my floral bedspread growing around me, making me feel consumed by a field.  I couldn’t breath.  I needed to get out.  Get away from this place.  Coming here was a mistake.  Coming to be with Luke was a mistake.  Coming to chase Aleah away from Luke, was a mistake. 

I jumped up like I had just been burned.  I slipped on my Crocs (they may be ugly, but damn comfortable), threw on a zip up hoodie, and snatched my keys off my desk.  I strode out of my shared room into the common area.  Only one of the other girls in my apartment was home.  She was making something that smelled like home.  Hamburgers being pan fried.  I paused, momentarily, taken back to a different time and place.

 “Hi, Victoria,” Cindy said softly.  I snapped back to reality.  I gave her a weak smile and started walking again.  “I made extra if you wanted to join me...”

I stopped, again.  I contemplated it.  I really did.  I could tell that all of my roommates walked on egg shells around me.  I think they were scared of me.  I was icy towards them.  I didn’t want to make friends.  “Um, I really have to go.”

I walked towards the door and put my hand on the doorknob.  I looked over at Cindy.  “It smells really good, though, thanks.”

I saw her grin at me before I walked out of the door.  I couldn’t help it.  I smiled, too.  Even though she couldn’t see me. 

I walked towards the door, feeling a little more free- a little less drowned.  But then I slowed.  There, coming in the door, was Aleah.  She hadn’t seen me, yet.  She looked really happy.  In all the times I had seen her, she didn’t look quite as naturally happy as she did at that exact moment. 

And then she saw me.  She glared at me, but moved out of the way.  Then I noticed the man coming in behind her.  He was smiling, and continued when he saw me.  A friendly smile.  He didn’t know who I was.  He didn’t know how Aleah knew me.  He nodded his head at me.

I suddenly felt timid and out of place.  Like I was interrupting something special.  “Uh, hi, Aleah.”

She looked at me like I had three heads.  But I’m sure me saying hi to her was probably the equivalent in weirdness.  “Victoria,” she replied icily. 

I felt incredibly nervous.  I don’t know what was happening, but word vomit started pouring out.  “I just wanted to tell you...” And I stopped.  I closed my mouth as quickly as I opened it.  What was I about to do?  I couldn’t tell her that.  Luke would never talk to me again, if I told her that.  Or worse, he’d cancel his devious plans for her and turn them around on me.

“What is it, Victoria,” she demanded impatiently.

I lost my nerve.  But regained my cool.  I sighed, as if I was bored with her, and she was the one who had stopped me.  “I just wanted to tell you, once again, to stay away from Luke.  He doesn’t want you.” 

And I burst through the door, before she could see the panic on my face.  That I was choking on my own breath.  That tears were threatening to flood my face.

~~~~~~~November 2009~~~~~~~~

I sighed, walking briskly through the grocery store.  It was the day before Thanksgiving, and my mom needed green beans for the green bean casserole.  Apparently, on her trip the weekend before she had forgotten them.  So she sent me.  And it was packed, and I just wanted to get home.  I was thankful to have the next two days of school off. 

It would be a much needed break.

It was hard being me.  Finding ways to pass without trying.  Jill and I ruled the school now.  We were looked up to and revered more than the senior girls.  And it was hard keeping up that image.  Always appearing effortlessly perfect.

I grabbed the cans of green beans, and shoved my hand into my jeans pocket to feel the crumpled dollar bills.  Making sure they didn’t fall out.  I rounded the corner of the aisle to head to check out and ran straight into a pole.

“Uff..” I moaned.  “Fuck.”

“Sorry.” So the pole speaks.

I looked up to see Luke.  I immediately thought back to the last night I had seen him.  His graduation.  I thought I would be back the next day, but I didn’t go.  And the day after that, I didn’t go either.  And with each passing day, it got easier and easier to not go.  And he never called or texted to find out why.  Or if I was okay. 

My mouth gasped open, and I took a step back, unintentionally.  He looked... haggard.  He looked at me... with pity?

“You look like shit,” I stated, simply.

“You look bitter,” he quietly replied.

“What are you doing here?”  I stepped to the side so I was out of the way of the hustle and bustle of people coming in and out of the aisle.

He rose a dark eyebrow at me.  “Probably the same thing you are.”

I sighed, annoyed.  “I meant, why aren’t you away at your big fancy college.”

His shoulders slumped, and he looked down at his feet.  THIS Luke, I had never seen.  The whole time we were whatever we were, I had never seen a side of him that even appeared remotely vulnerable. 

“Thanksgiving break.  I gotta go, Victoria.”  And with that, he was gone.

I got back home with the green beans to the usual sounds of home.  Oil spattering.  Overly loud television.  Sounded like Jeopardy.  My mom banging things around in the kitchen.  My dad snoring in front of the tv. 

I dropped the bag of cans on the raggedy kitchen table.  My mom turned around, timidly.  She smiled faintly at me.  The bags under her eyes, drooping.  Her red, once ferocious hair, dull and sad looking.  Years of abuse at the hands of my dad had done her in.  Once a beauty queen with the world at her fingertips, she fell for the handsome and cunning town drunk.  An abusive, philandering one, at that.  I had no respect for her, letting my dad walk all over her and put his hands on her like that.  I walked all over her, too.  Just not physically.  She let me do whatever I wanted, in hopes that I would like her.  Kind of like my dad.  That’s why she never confronted him about his infidelity.  She knew about it.  Hell, the whole town did.  But she just smiled and looked the other way.  Hoping he would stop hitting her if she would let him do whatever he wanted.

“Thanks, doll,” my mom said, trying to win favor with pet names.  I looked at her blankly as I let the single dollar left fall onto the table through my fingers.  Then I turned, and walked into the living room.

I noted four empty bottles on the side table next to the tattered Lazyboy he was lounging in.  And a bottle in his hand.  Five?  That wasn’t so bad.  He clearly decided to slow down for the holiday.  How generous of him.  Bastard.  Only at seven and more did he become physically abusive.  Eleven and more?  I stayed away.  He left me alone until he reached eleven.  Eleven was his lucky number.  And my unlucky number.  I became his slave at that point. 

I mean, I guess in a sense I was lucky.  It was usually just physical aggressiveness.  Only once had he groped me.  But I still think he just got my mom and me mixed up.  And he was way past eleven that time.  He probably would’ve groped the dog, if we’d had one.  I never spoke of it, and neither did.   

Unfortunately for her, my mom did.  She earned a black eye and 3 fractured ribs for that.  And for the next three weeks after, got accused of being a lying, jealous whore.

I tiptoed through the living room down the hall to my room, to make sure he didn’t wake up.  I shut the door and locked it.  They never required I eat with them, so hopefully they would leave me alone the rest of the night. 

I curled up on my twin canopy bed, and let myself think about Luke for the first time in months.

Thanksgiving passed uneventfully.  Whenever the grandparents were over, the dad and mom were on their best behaviors.  We appeared like the all-American, lower/middle class family.  After dinner, when the adults were all in the living room socializing over coffee (or Jack and Coke for my dad-he only drank liquor on special occasions), I went off to my room again.  I grabbed my neglected cell phone and checked the time, 8:43 p.m.  I started scrolling through Facebook.  I contemplated texting Jill, to see if she was done with family stuff and we could hang out.

I dropped my phone on my bed next to my head and drifted off to sleep.  I woke up to it pinging.  I let my eyes adjust to the light, which I’d left on.  I grabbed my phone and looked at the time.  12:18 a.m.  I saw I had a couple text messages.  The first one was from Jill.  She had the same idea I did.  It was several hours earlier, so I didn’t reply.

The second was from Luke.  Come over.

That was the one that woke me up. 

So I went.

I snuck through the house.  It was calm.  For the first time in who knew how long.  I grabbed my keys off the kitchen table.  I was only quiet to not wake my dad, who was passed out in his recliner.  My mom was in bed, I was sure.  I drove to Luke’s in silence.  It was like riding a bike.  Muscle memory.  Whatever.

I texted him back, finally.  Here.

He met me at the door and let me in.  Same shit, different day.  We silently flowed through his house to his bedroom.

I started unbuttoning my shirt, but before I could even get two undone, he grabbed my hand, stopping me.  He pushed me to sit on his bed and he sat next to me. 

He finally said, staring at his hands, “I didn’t go.”

“You didn’t go?” I asked, confused.  

"I didn't go to college."

 

 I sneered at him, somehow feeling superior in that moment.  “What happened to your all-star, full ride basketball career?”

He ignored my snide remark.  “Betty got sick.”  Betty was his little sister.  She was a surprise.  Way younger than him.  At his graduation she was 5.  Maybe 6.  I couldn’t remember.

“Sick how?”

“Cancer.”

My hand found its way rapidly to my mouth, covering it.  I gasped.  “Oh, no.  Is she at a hospital?”

He didn’t answer me.  He just kept looking at his hands.

“Luke?”

He looked up at me.  He was crying.  Real, legit tears.  “She lost the battle.”

My face softened and fell.  I leaned over and automatically pulled him to me, hugging him.  I pulled his head down onto my shoulder.  “I’m so sorry, Luke.”

We leaned back on his bed, lying down.  Me holding him.  And we stayed that way until morning.