Arms Wide Open: a Novella (5 page)

“We did.”

It gets quiet again, and we spend a few
moments saying nothing before the bell rings and we’re done. My heart breaks a
little as Grant stands up and offers me a quick, back-patting hug before
hurrying to the men’s room. Despite everything left unsaid, he still feels
right. Good. Comfortable. Seeing him feels like putting on a pair of my
favorite jeans. It’s always been the perfect fit for me.

I’m flustered and can’t think straight
as I watch him vanish into the restroom. I reach for my purse but knock it to
the ground instead. Change rolls everywhere and I have to crawl on the floor to
collect it while people are walking around or milling about at tables. I’m
gonna get trampled if I don’t hurry...plus, I just want to evaporate.

I gather everything in one big sweep of
the arm and shove it all back into my bag before I hurry away. I can’t do the
last round, no matter what I told myself. I’m gonna tap out and let the
universe have this one. Ten crazy guys would wreak less emotional havoc on me
than one moment looking into the vivid green of Grant Fierro’s gorgeous eyes.

I reach into my purse for my phone as I
head toward the front door. I pick it up to see a text from Harlow glowing on
the screen.
I’m sorry you’re having a bad time, but this guy so far is worth
every bad date I’ve ever had. *sigh* I’m a little gone on this one!

I can’t help but smile. She’s dated way
too many guys who were only using her for her power and connections. I pull up
my on-screen keyboard and text back
. I’m thrilled for you, but you might
want to sleep with the lights on tonight. You’ve been warned.

There’s a sleek silver trash can just by
the exit. I stop to drop in the feedback card I was given when I walked in and
registered for the 5 in 5 fiasco. I don’t care who wants my number, and I don’t
want anyone to call. I don’t even want the free coffee. I just want to go home
and shower this night off.

“Excuse me, please. Pardon!”

I turn around to see the eyeball guy
heading out, holding hands with someone. I stop to take her in. If I saw this
woman on the street, in her sensible shoes, denim jumper, cardigan, and out of
control red curls pulled back into a low, long braid down her back, I’d probably
look at her just long enough to realize someone else was there. I’d judge her
on her appearance, call her mousy, feel a moment of pity for her inferior DNA,
and then forget she exists as I go about my day. When I see her and the eyeball
guy together, though, she looks completely radiant.

I stare at them as they move past me,
and I cock my head to the side as I try to figure out how that happened.
They’re both glowing as they inch toward the door, trying to sneak out as
people get settled for the last round, and I can’t help but notice how
attractive they suddenly both seem. Maybe attractive isn’t the right word, not
in the magazine cover sense of the word...but the happiness they exude makes me
not care how they look at all. I’m sort of stunned by this revelation.

“Kevin!” I call as they reach the front
door.

He turns around, suddenly looking
embarrassed when he recognizes me. “Oh, hello, Lauren.” His companion looks at
him expectantly. “Tessa, I’d like you to meet Lauren. She was my first date
tonight.”

I extend a hand and shake hers. “It
looks like you two are trying to sneak out of the last round.”

“Well...uh...” He looks at the card
still in his other hand, where I see my number along with three others with a
dark X next to our names. He tosses it into the trash, too. “Tessa, why don’t
you wait for me at the bus stop? I’d like to say goodbye to my friend Lauren.”

She nods and ducks out, and I have to
wonder how he got her to speak enough to feel like they made a connection.
“Kevin, I have a question.”

He holds up a hand. He’s dangerously
close to shushing me with that devil finger of his again, but I step back just
in time. “Lauren, I’ll always cherish our time together. You’re the nicest
person I met here tonight, other than Tessa, and you know you can never have
too many friends!”

My eyes open wide in shock. Does he
think I’m jealous? “Oh, no, no! I just wanted to—”

Kevin offers me a sad little shake of
his head. “I think you and I will always be just friends. But when I met Tessa,
something about her just felt right. I think she just might be—”

“The one?” I finish. I have to smile at
his eager and happy grin. “That’s what I wanted to ask you about, Kevin.” I
look down. “I used to believe in the one, but now I don’t know. How do
you...know? And what if you think you have it and you throw it away? What
then?”

I’m asking the weirdest person I’ve ever
met if he knows the mysteries of the universe. What’s wrong with me?

He takes my question seriously, however,
if his drawn eyebrows and bemused expression mean anything. “Here’s what I
think. I think just about anyone can be
the one
, but the one for what?
That’s the question, isn’t it? Maybe Tessa is
the one
, or the girl to
help me prepare for
the one
, and maybe she’s just the one for coffee and
conversation tonight. I think I’ll know more later. You can’t find anyone if
you don’t try. It’s always worth it to try, don’t you think?”

“So you’re saying it’s always worth the
risk?”

“I am.”

“And you’re not worried about getting
hurt?”

He snorts at my question, even though
his gentle eyes show no malice. “Sure, I am. Aren’t we all? But a wise person
once said that the greatest blessings come from taking the biggest risks. ‘The
person who risks nothing, does nothing, is nothing and becomes nothing.’”

I raise my eyebrows in surprise, and one
corner of my mouth turns up in an appreciative smile. I used that very quote in
one of my papers. “Leo Buscaglia,” I say.

Kevin nods. “He also said something like
if you close your arms to love, you’ll be left only holding yourself. And what
kind of life would that be?” He glances out the window and grins at the woman
waving anxiously at him as a bus appears around the corner and pulls toward the
stop. “Most people don’t get me, but my arms are wide open. Open your arms,
Lauren. You might be surprised.”

I watch him hurry toward her and place
his hand protectively on the small of her back as she climbs up the steps. He
follows her onto the idling bus. The door jerks shut behind them and the bus
lurches forward before it disappears around the corner in a puff of black
exhaust. Kevin could be the poster boy for that old saying ‘there’s a fine line
between genius and madness,’ but his words resonate with me in an unexpected
way.

He’s right.

I’ve been spending too much time since
it all happened with my arms folded tight to my chest. I’ve closed myself off
to life. I thought I was living again, but now it’s starting to feel like I’m
only taking up space. I don’t want to just be a waste of oxygen anymore.

The Little Guy

As I reach the front door and again
start to push it open, the phone vibrates in my hand. I pause long enough to
check out the message, nothing more than an LOL from Harlow in reply to my
earlier text. I shove it back into its pocket deep inside my abyss of a handbag
when I hear a sound that can only be described as bizarre...but familiar.

I freeze when I hear a manly voice in
falsetto screeching, “Eee-er! Eee-er! Eee-er!” from somewhere near the back of
the coffee shop, and I have no choice but to burst out laughing. I turn around,
shaking because I’m laughing so hard, and I see my old friend Oliver standing
on a chair. His hands are cupped around his mouth and he’s shrieking out the
call we used to find each other in our high school’s overcrowded halls.

“Eeeeee-errrrr!” I squawk back. I could
never do it as well as he could, so I sound ridiculous. The people around us
are looking confused and a little annoyed at the hideous sound, but at the
moment I care as much about their opinions as I would’ve back in high school.

Oliver jumps off the chair and shoves
his way through the crowd to give me his famous tackling bear hug. He’s super
short, just 5’, making me feel like a giant at my completely average 5’5”. He
grabs me around the waist and rocks me back and forth.

“You’re such a perv, Oliver. I know
you’re just hugging me to get closer to the ladies.”

“Psh,” he scoffs. “You don’t have any
ladies.” He stands back to look me over, and then laughs and hugs me again.
“Oh, look! The boob fairy finally waved her magic wand over you. Congratulations!”
I slap him and he laughs, hugging me again. “Laur, you look amazing! What are
you doing here?”

“Right now I’m trying to escape.”

“Aw, don’t leave now! The fun’s just
starting! I’ve convinced four women that I’m a circus midget and asked them to
come on the road with me as the bearded lady. I promised them fame, adventure,
and a litter of small, hairy children. Oddly, I have no takers.”

I burst out laughing again. “Oh, man!
How did we ever lose touch?”

“Don’t leave!” he begs, grabbing my hand
and pulling me away from the door.

“I think I’m done,” I say with a shrug.
“You should’ve caught me two rounds ago, when I was still making an effort to
be in the moment at this psychotic meat market.”

He’s pretty insistent, however, and he
drags me to the table where I sat just moments before with Grant. “No, you
can’t leave until we catch up and I have your digits. I’m not losing my
tout-puissante
again. Ever.”

“Well,
secundum ver-bumtum
to
you,” I say, finishing the line. My ribs ache and I have a stitch in my side from
laughing so hard. I forgot how amazing it feels to laugh so freely, to laugh
and mean it. He’s quoting old choir songs, something we did to pretend we spoke
another language as we walked from class to class. We thought we were uber cool
and different, but I suddenly realize we were more ridiculous than I ever
imagined. “We were idiots, you know that?”

He wags his eyebrows at me. “Still are,
I hope. Nothing like a little nonconformity to keep it real.”

“How are you?” I ask.

Oliver pulls a face and smacks his
forehead. “How am I? Cheese and rice, woman, that’s the kind of question you
ask people you hardly know at a twenty year reunion,” he says. “Try again.”

I raise my eyebrows and do my best.
“Hey, wazzup?”

He nods approvingly. “That’s what I’m
talking about! So, you won’t believe this, but...I’m the choir teacher now.”

My jaw drops. “At Lincoln High? No way!
That’s so funny...you always swore once we got out of there you’d never, ever
step foot in that cement death-trap of a school again. And now you’re a
teacher? What parallel universe am I trapped in? You’ve become the arch
nemesis! You’re the new Miss Benson!”

“I have better cleavage, though.”

I snicker. I missed this guy.

He glances back toward the men’s room. I
follow his gaze and realize Grant is now the one hiding in the bathroom, which
pleases me in a very weird way. “So, Grant says you’re a shrink now. We might
have openings for a school counselor if you’re interested, if you’re looking
for work.”

“I don’t have the right endorsement, but
thanks. I’m thinking I’m a halfway house kind of girl, anyway.”

“Gotta save those lost souls since you
used to be one yourself?”

I look down. “Was it that obvious? I
thought I hid it so well.”

“You did. Looking back, it should have
been apparent. I guess we all have 20/20 hindsight.”

I sit back and fold my arms, looking
into the distance as my eyes glaze over and my vision blurs just a bit. It’s my
defense mechanism, my way of detaching from whatever scares me. Zone out and
ignore reality. I have to shake my head to pull out of it. “Go ahead and ask,
Ollsie. I have no more secrets.”

He leans forward earnestly. He’s all
about laying it on the table, like I am, so I prepare myself mentally for the
onslaught. I can’t help but smile at him, though. We’ve known each other since
kindergarten and we always stood up for each other. He had my back; I had his.
He got teased for being short, and I got mocked for being too skinny. All legs,
no boobs. We were each others’ fiercest defenders.

When Grant joined us in middle school a
few years later, we had another misfit to defend. We were all so gawky and
awkward, but I’m looking at Oliver and thinking I don’t care how short he is.
He’s hot. He has thick blond hair, blue eyes so light they’re almost white, the
pupils ringed with a circle of black, and a ruddy complexion. He has eyelashes
girls like me would kill for, and a perfect smile with gleaming teeth. He’s
stocky and muscular without an ounce of fat on him. I smile at him. “How did an
annoying little troll like you get to be so devastatingly handsome?” I ask.

“I work out under my troll bridge,” he
says, those eyes cutting through me. “Now talk. Here’s what I know: I’m away at
school, everything seems fine, all is cool, and suddenly Grant calls me out of
the blue to say your sister was killed, you tried to commit suicide, and he
just left you in the emergency room and thought they would be admitting you to
the psych ward for awhile.”

I pinch my lips together and take a deep
breath. “Sounds about right,” I say with a shake of the head, wrenching my neck
too far and too fast but I mask it as a hair flip, pretending I don’t want my
hair to fall in my eyes. Anything to look away.

He watches me expectantly. When I don’t
elaborate, his cheeks flush. “I need the dirt, Laur.”

I’ve hashed this all out with my
therapist, and I’ve accepted it. I’m not sure who the old Lauren was, because
she was so sick that she really had no way to know herself. The person I am,
the woman sitting in front of an old friend, is sort of a creation. She didn’t
exist last time this this guy saw her. Tears pool in my eyes. They want to
fall, and it will feel so good to let them go, but I grit my teeth and bite
them back. Talking to my therapist seems easy compared with facing the truth of
who I was and what happened with people I knew best.

I look down and swallow hard. I shake my
head, mad at myself. Mad that I have to tell anyone else. Mad that I’m still
mad at myself. Mad that I’ve accepted what happened and made a life for myself
without my sister.

“Coral was killed in a motorcycle
accident. She went to this party and met a guy who was way too old and driving
way too fast on his bullet bike, showing off for the girls. He decides my sweet
and innocent baby sister is worthy of his affection, and he talks her into
going for a little ride around the neighborhood. She was only fifteen, Oliver.
Her life hadn’t even started. She meets this bonehead loser who’s hot-dogging
to impress the girls...and they crash. The police figured he was going around
130 when he hit the curve and lost control. She was dead and it was all my
fault.”

He shakes his head vigorously. “No way,
Lauren. I mean, do you hear yourself? It’s not your fault some idiot wrecked
his bike.”

I bite my lip as the tears well in my
eyes again. I refuse to let them fall. “No, it really is,” I whisper. “My
parents told her she couldn’t go to that party. I had her come to my dorm for a
slumber party instead...so she could go. I snuck her out while telling my
parents we were just having a sister bonding night. Pajamas and popcorn.
Nothing could be more innocent, right?” I sniffle. “I drove her there and told
her to have fun, get crazy, and I’d come back around three o’clock to get her.
My parents had to go identify her body around three instead.” I snuffle again
and grab my purse, hoping I can find a tissue somewhere in there. I’m looking
just for the sake of doing something other than talking.

“Oh, man,” he says. He sits back and
shoves both his hands through his hair. He looks up at the ceiling as he processes
what I just said. “And...what about you?”

I laugh as I sniffle a bit. My eyes feel
bloodshot and I’m looking up to avoid making eye contact. I finally locate a
tissue and wipe my runny nose. I sniff again. “Turns out I was quite the head
case already. I didn’t know it, of course, but her death made me snap. The
night of Coral’s funeral....I spent that night under the dining room table at
Grant’s apartment, screaming that I was surrounded. It felt so real, those
images so vivid. I swear I was surrounded by faceless creatures in red, hooded
robes, and Coral was telling me to come and join her. Grant was fantastic. He
was so sweet, talked to me, tried to get me out. I think he finally went to
call the cops for help when I ran from under the table and locked myself in the
bathroom, where I promptly swallowed every single pill I could find.”

Oliver’s eyes are wide in disbelief. “I
don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything, ” I
tell him simply. “It happened. It’s over. This is my reality now. Mental
illness is like cancer in some ways. When you’re as messed up as I am, you have
good days and bad days, even on the meds. When I’m good, it’s like being in
remission. My roommate Harlow knows what’s up and she lets me know if she sees
anything suspicious where I need to get some extra help to get back on track.”

“So...what do you have?”

I grin, but it’s an empty one. It’s more
like laughing politely at a joke that’s not close to being funny. “What don’t I
have? Bipolar two and a little self-mutilation, with a side of anxiety disorder.
Your eyes are ready to pop out of your head, man. Blink, will you?”

“I can’t believe none of us ever saw any
signs that something was wrong. I mean, we all thought you were crazy, but it
was good, fun crazy, like you were a party of one that never stopped.”

I raise my eyebrows. “One of the
hallmark signs of bipolar two.”

“I had no idea. None of us did.”

“I tried to hide it from Grant. I made
sure to hide all the crazy, even from him, and we’d been together for years. I
don’t blame him at all for walking away and not looking back.”

“You’re wrong,” Oliver says. He shakes
his head at me, blond locks tossed back as he does. “He didn’t just walk away.
Grant never would have walked away from you.”