Broken Fairytales (52 page)

Once my sobbing had lessened to a sort of gasping/hiccupping cry, she
pulled back and looked at me.
“Feel better?” she asked.

I
shook my head.

She hugged me aga
in. “He’ll turn up.
I know he will.
He probably just
can’t call you back right now.
If his
Mom’s in the hospital, then
he probably wants to be with her, to make sure she’s getting the best care.”

I nodde
d, but I knew it was a lame excuse.

“Come on,”
she said, “you’re soaked. Let’s get you changed, and we’ll do something to take your mind off of Zack, okay?”

I nodded and let her help me up from the floor of the porch.

After changing and drying my hair,
my hurt turned to anger. “I’m so mad at him,” I said to Rachel, hating the emotion
s
I was feeling.
“He could at least
have had the courtesy to call. He should know how worried I am about his mom
.”

“I know,” Ra
chel said, sitting at my window
smoking a
cigarette
.

I watched her inhale deeply and blow smoke out into the wet afternoon. The rain had eased up as the storm passed, but the air was still damp and thick
.
 

“I want
one
,” I said, turning to face her
and gesturing to the pack sitting on the window sill.

She raised her eyebrows at me. “
Sin
ce when do you smoke?”

“I don’t, but I have befor
e, and now I want a cigarette.
Besides
since when did you become a full-on smoker
,” I challenged
accusatorily. 

I still wasn’t convinced that my
brother didn’t have more influence
over her decisions as of late, but it was her choice, an
d she seemed okay with the changes she’d made, so I didn’t push the issue.

“Okay,” s
he said ignoring my question as she shook out
a cigarette
from the pack and handed
it to me. “Do you even know how to light it?”

“Yes,” I said, tersely, grabbing the lighter from her hand and bringing it up to the tip of the cigarette, inhal
ing as I did so.
It tasted gross, but I didn’t care.
I blew the smoke out,
t
he tension slipping from
my mi
nd ever so slightly
.

We sat together on the
wicker
trunk, silently inhaling and blowing smoke out the window.
I could tell Rachel wanted to say something, but she also knew I didn’t feel like talking. It was just after I’d lit my second cigarette
that C
hase knocked on my door frame.
I looked up at him.

“If you guys are going to do that, you might want to keep the door closed. The hallway smells like smoke,” he said.

“We’re adults, Chase. We’re not doing anything wrong.”

“Em, trust me, I’ve been sneaking around for years because even though it’s legal, mom and dad will lecture the shit out of me if they find out I smoke – and I’m just talking about cigarettes. Take my word. Invest in some Febreeze, stick a towel under the door, keep the fan on and the window open.”

“Is that all you wanted
? To lecture us?” I snapped, slipping back into how I used to react to my brother coming into my room.

“Em
ily
!” Rachel said, stubbing out her cigarette as she looked
at
me, appalled
at my outburst
. “Don’t be a bitch to him. He was trying to be nice.”

“Sorry Chase,” I mumbled
, realizing what I’d one
. “That was shitty of me.”

He crossed the room to stand behind Rachel, his arms falling loosely
over her shoulders
. “
It’s fine.
I get it. I know you’re on edge right now.”

“No,” I said, firmly. “You guys have been great. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

“
Well, don’t snap at me again, but
Zack’s downstairs,” he sai
d softly.

Before I knew was I was doing, I was racing down
the stairs, cigarette in hand.
Zack was standing
on the front porch, just outside the screen door,
his hands jammed
into his pockets. He looked broken – thinner, as if he’d lost weight
in t
he five days since I’d seen him,
and he had dark circles under his eyes. I could tell h
e hadn’t been sleeping
much
. 

I flew into him,
dropping my cigarette to the ground before
wrapping my arms around his
neck and hugging him tightly.
I barely felt his arms move around m
e, holding me loosely in return.

I pulled back to look at him.
“She’s not . . . is she?” I asked, knowing
I could
n’t bring myself to say
it a
loud.

Zack shook his head,
just a small movement that allowed me to let ou
t the breath I’d been holding, before he hung his head.

“I’m exhausted,” he said. 

I put my hand on his cheek.
“I know
. You look it. Come inside. We can sit and talk. I’ll get you something to eat.
Have you eaten?”

He shook his head, but I wasn’t sure what he was saying no to. “Let’
s sit out here
,” he said.  “I want to talk to you.”

We sat down on the porch steps
.
Zack didn’t take my hand. He just folded his together in his lap.

“H
ow’s your mom?” I asked
, breaking the silence.

He shrugged. “She’s dyi
ng of cancer. She’s n
ot good.”

“Zack,” I pleaded, wishing he wouldn’t be so blunt about it. It was like he was turning his emotions off.

He
sighed, long and deep.
“Em, you know I care about you, right?”

I nodded, but he didn’t see it.
He
finally
looked ov
er at me.

“Yes,” I said, my voice coming out in a whisper.

“You care about me
too
, right?”

“Yeah, I do.
Zack, what are you getting at?” I asked,
putting my hand on his thigh.
He took it and put it back in my lap. 

“Don’t do that.
It’ll just make this harder.”

My stomach flipped and not in a good way. “Make what harder?” I whispered, already knowing the answer.

“Saying goodbye.”

“Oh
,” I said, realizing what was happening.
Then I shook my head a few times, my conviction suddenly fierce. “No. No, Zack. No. I can’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Say goodbye
to you
. I won’t do that. I care too much about you.”

He laughed a short, non-humorous laugh that almost sounded mocking. “You need to just forget about me,” he said, his gaze fixed on a far point in the distance.

“Absolutely not,” I said, reaching for his hand. This time he didn’t push me away.

“Emily,” he said at the same time he sighed, so my name came out sounding as tired as he was. “I’m not good for you, and I think we bot
h know that.”

“Like hell you’re not,” I said, the fight in me clear. I was not going to let him go that easily. I would fight for what we had.

Zack picked up the cigarette butt I’d discarded and flicked it out into the yard. “Em, I don’t think you realize how broken I really am.”

“I think I have a pretty good idea,” I mumbled.

He looked over at me, eyes flashing. “Then you
know I’m not good for you. Y
ou deserve so much more than a guy who can’t get his shit together and has no foreseeable future
beyond bartending and playing
guitar for a bunch of drunks. You deserve more.”

“If this is you ‘caring about me’, it’s fucked up, because you should know me well enough to know that
I don’t want more,” I said,
my conviction strong
. “I want you. Zack, I love you. I don’t care about the rest.”

He looked over at me,
fire blazing in his eyes.
I could tell he
didn’t like
what I’d just disclosed.

“Dammit, Emily!” he said, jerking his hand back. “This is what I didn’t want
. This is why I don’t date. I did
n’t want someone to fall in love with me.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Well too bad, because I did.”

Zack took a deep breath, almost to steel himself. “No you didn’t,” he said, calmly. “You don’t even know me.”

“I know enough.”

“You know what I allowed you to see, and that was pretty much bullshit, so no, you don’t know me. You don’
t know half of the shit that I’m dealing with
right now
.”

“Then let me in, Zack. Let me help you.”

He shook his head firmly. “No, I’m just, I’m fucki
ng broken, and you can’t fix i
t. You need go live your life and achieve all the things that you want, because you are special and amazing, and you’re way too good for me.”

I let my head drop to my hands, seriously in danger of losing it in front of him. He wasn’t making any sense.
Mere days before he had held me close and told me how much he appreciated me taking a chance on him
that summer – how much he’d needed me when he didn’t even realize it. Now he was pushing me away? It made no sense.
What the hell had happened?

“Em
ily
,
you told me when we first met
that you wanted a fairytale life, and you deserve that. I can’t give it to you. All I can offer you is a broken, cracked, melted fairytale, and that’s not good enough.”

“Fairytales are bullshit,” I snapped, using the same line as he’d used on me
, but I meant it
. After an imperfect summer with Zack, with highs and lows and everything in between, I no longer wanted the fairytale. It wasn’t real.

“No, they’re not,
” he said quietly. “
I’m not going to hold you back from everything you deserve in life any longer. If you stay with me you’ll drown, and I can’t let that happen. You need to go after what you want and forget about me.”

“What I
want
is to be with you,” I said firmly.

“And I
want to be alone,” he said and
dropped his gaze to his lap
as my heart broke
in
to a million pieces
.

I knew then there was no arguing and no amount of fighting that would allow me to keep Zack. He’d made up his mind
, and I had to accept it
.

“My mom
’s getting really bad,
”
he said then, his voice cracking. I looked over and saw tears in his eyes.

“
How bad
?”
I asked, all the fight gone from my voice. I could see just how broken he was in that moment, and I knew he needed me to just stop
pushing
. I took his hand in mine again
, being the friend I knew he needed
, even though it killed me to do it, knowing he didn’t want me anymore
.

He looked over at me, exhaustion written all over his face.
“
Bad.
Once she’s well
enough to travel
, they’ll let me bring her home. I know she doesn’t want to stay in the hospital until the end, so we’ll come back here
and then . . . I don’t want to think about
it
.”

I nodded in understanding, but w
ith that understanding also came the kn
owledge that he
would be alone at the end. I
wished more than anything that he’d let me stay with him, be there for him, to pick of the shattered pieces after she was gone, but I knew he never would. He’d made up his mind.

I
squeezed his hand and
blinked rapidly several times, trying to will the tears to say in my eyes.
I didn’t want him to know how much I wa
s hurting
,
since it could never compare to what he was experiencing,
but I was pretty sure he could tell. He always could read me better than anyone else.