Destiny (Waiting for Forever) (14 page)

“What do you think Jamie would tell you?” he asked quietly, picking up the blanket and folding it.

“He would tell me to forget him and get on with my life. In fact, he did,” I said and told him about the letter, about how Jamie had told me that very thing.

“It must have hurt to hear that,” he said after a minute. “I’m sure you would have much rather heard that he wanted you to find him, or that he was coming back to find you. Instead….”

“Instead, he put my happiness before his own,” I finished. “The problem with that, though, Father, is that he was part of that happiness.”

“And you feel guilty being happy without him?”

I thought about that. It did make me feel guilty. Jamie had always been there for me, loving me and supporting me. Two years ago, he had been everything to me. But since then I’d found friends. I’d found a life, and that life didn’t really have Jamie in it. I also felt guilty because while I had a life and friends, Jamie was alone, probably without a roof over his head. Going on with my life felt like abandoning him.

“Yeah, I do,” I admitted.

“If you found out that Jamie had gotten a job and had a place to live, that he was safe, but he’d moved on with someone else—would you want him to feel guilty?” he asked, and I knew that it was a trick question, but it made me think. I’d be hurt and angry if Jamie found a relationship with someone else when I had given up everything, but then he’d never asked me to give up anything. I’d made my choices, so I guess I couldn’t be upset with him for making choices of his own.

“I don’t think I would want Jamie to feel guilty about moving on with his life.”

“Then you shouldn’t feel guilty either. You did not cause what happened to him.” He put the last blanket up on the shelf. “Come on, kid, let’s go have dinner with our guests.” Father Matt put an arm around me and pulled me from the room.

Later that night I told the guys that I was tired from helping out at the shelter and went up to bed. Once I lay under the blanket with the lights off, my mind settled on Jamie. I had been searching San Diego for months and hadn’t come up with a clue as to where he might be. I’d been to every shelter I could find, sometimes hitting three or four a week, my hope fading a bit more with each depressing place I saw. That day, each of the shelters like Father Matt’s would have had a Thanksgiving dinner for people with no other options. Had Jamie been one of the thousands eating a cafeteria-style dinner, not for the joy of the holiday, but just to survive?

Guilt bubbled like acid in my stomach. If I hadn’t begged Jamie for that night together, his parents wouldn’t have moved, they wouldn’t have forced him into that place, and he would be safe. Deep down, I knew I would never forgive myself. However, for the first time in nearly a year and a half, I considered the possibility that I would have to let Jamie go.

The sobs went on for what felt like hours, stopping only when I fell into an exhausted sleep, dreaming about our tree house.

Eight

A
S
N
OVEMBER
turned to December, Leo and Emilio brought Christmas decorations down from the storage side of the fourth floor, and we all helped to put them up around the house. At first, I really enjoyed hanging the little cardboard decorations and garlands throughout the first two floors. We even swapped out the bowl that held free condoms with a bowl shaped like Santa’s head. When we started to assemble the tree in the common room on the second floor, I couldn’t help but think about how Carolyn and I used to do that every year. We didn’t have very many presents under the tree, but she went all-out every year cooking and decorating. I didn’t understand it then, but those were her ways of making sure Richard and I knew we were loved. Never again would I take her attention or her love for granted.

“I hate Christmas,” Mike said quietly as we strung the lights.

When I was growing up, I didn’t really have an opinion about Christmas. It reminded me to be thankful for what I had with Richard and Carolyn because I could have spent the day in the Hudson House, eating a Christmas dinner I was sure would rival any homeless shelter’s. The problem came when I went back to school after Christmas break and all the kids around me bragged about all the cool stuff they’d gotten. I wanted to tell them there was no Santa Claus and everything could be taken away from them at any time, but I never did.

I didn’t ask Mike why he hated Christmas. After living with the guys for a while, I knew some of them had horror stories about how they’d ended up at the boardinghouse. Mike seemed to know Leo really well, so I got the impression he had been there a very long time, and on his own even longer. Instead, I came up behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist. He stiffened in surprise but relaxed back into me, putting his hands on top of mine. Mike and I were friends, and he looked like he needed a hug.

“Thanks, baby boy,” he said in almost a whisper and turned his head to kiss me on the cheek. I felt my face flame at his affection, and I pulled him a little closer.

“You guys aren’t getting very far on those lights like that,” Leo said as he came into the room, and I jumped back. Mike and Leo both laughed.

“Calm down, kid,” Leo said and tousled my overgrown curls. “If that’s the worst thing I walk in on, I’ll be thankful.”

“B
RIAN
!”
Leo called as I crossed the common room on my way to the third-floor stairs. My damp shirt clung to me as sweat poured down my neck and back from working outside all day.

I stopped in his office doorway. “Yes?”

“You got a package, but I’m not sure I want to give it to you,” he teased, holding up a shipping box. The box wasn’t big, about a foot long by about two feet wide, but it made me insanely curious because I’d never gotten a package before.

“Oh, it feels heavy. It’s probably expensive,” Leo taunted, and I tried to grab it, but he laughed and pulled it out of my reach.

“You are the most amazing person, and you don’t look a day over twenty-five,” I said, smirking at him. He snorted and handed me the box.

“You’re learning, kid. Here,” he said, handing me his pocketknife so I could cut the tape. A piece of paper lay on top inside of the open box, a handwritten note:
Because we miss seeing our son—Merry Christmas! Love, Mom & Dad

Another box lay inside the shipping box, so I pulled it out and looked at it. Richard and Carolyn had sent me a little laptop.

“Nice!” Leo said as he read the box over my shoulder. “It’s a netbook, ultra-portable so you can carry it around with you to coffee shops and such.”

With both Richard and Carolyn retired, I tried not to think what it had cost them. I felt guilty about the generous gift because I had no way of reciprocating. My Christmas present to them, which was sitting upstairs on my dresser, included a cheap Christmas card and half a dozen candid pictures of me with the guys. It was all I could afford because, while I had a job landscaping, it didn’t quite cover my monthly expenses. Between the rent, bus pass, laundry, and trying to eat, I still had to rely, at least in part, on my savings. When Kenny had hired me, he’d brought me on at minimum wage with a promise that he would bump it up after a few months if everything worked out. I hoped he wouldn’t take too long. After talking to Leo for a few more minutes about the computer, I took it upstairs and locked it in my room before going to take a shower. For the most part, I trusted the guys who lived in the house, but they always brought friends up to the common room and to their own rooms. The friends of friends I had no reason to trust.

With the help of the tutorials from the center website and some other sites I’d found online, I’d become much more comfortable working with computers. I had a Facebook profile that I used to keep up with Sarah and Kyle. Occasionally, I also talked to Adam, but not often. I used instant messaging to keep in touch with my parents.

When I got out of the shower, I opened up the laptop and went through the setup wizard. Getting it connected to the house’s Wi-Fi turned out to be the hardest part, but Leo had written down the network name and WEP key for me so it was just a matter of figuring out where to put it. I spent about an hour playing with the different features, changing my wallpaper, setting up Internet favorites, and installing the free tools like an instant-messaging client. When I logged in, I saw that Carolyn was on as well.

[Brian]:
Hi mom.

As I waited for her to respond, I checked my Facebook page and saw that Sarah and her parents were going to be in San Diego the next weekend to see Sarah’s boyfriend, Ryan. Maybe her parents had changed their position on Sarah and Ryan’s relationship. I sent her a quick message and asked if we could get together while she was visiting.

[Carolyn]:
Hi, honey!

The response from Carolyn popped onto my screen and nearly gave me heart failure. The volume on the netbook had been set to its highest level and was deafening in my small room.

[Brian]:
I don’t want to sound ungrateful, so I’ll start with thank you very much for the computer. But you shouldn’t have spent so much money on me. I feel bad enough already that you’re still paying for my cell phone.

I grabbed the book for the computer and found the index for volume control and turned it down before her next message came.

[Carolyn]:
It was free. The only thing I had to pay for was shipping it to San Diego.

Curiosity blazed in me as I tried to figure out where my parents would get a free laptop.

[Brian]:
Okay, I’ll bite. How did you get it for free?

[Carolyn]:
Your father is consulting for the hospital, and as part of his contract, he purchased a new computer at the hospital’s expense. When he bought it, he got a deal, which included a free netbook. He doesn’t need two computers, and I don’t need one. When it arrived and we saw that it had that little camera in it, we decided to send it to you. Richard’s new computer has a webcam too.

[Brian]:
Thank you so much, Mom. Really.

[Carolyn]:
Okay, Adam said that we can either talk right through this program or we can install another program that’s just for talking on the webcam.

[Brian]:
When did you talk to Adam?

[Carolyn]:
Oh, he’s home for Christmas break and he stopped by to say hello. Since he’s a computer major, I asked him about it.

[Brian]:
Adam changed majors?

[Carolyn]:
Yes. When he was here, he mentioned that you guys don’t talk much anymore.

[Brian]:
I know. He’s usually on during the day between classes, and I’m usually on at night after work. We’ve just been drifting.

[Carolyn]:
It happens, even in the best of friendships. Okay, so if I press this button, it should video call you. Can we try it out?

It took a few tries to get things working, but after about ten minutes, I could see Carolyn on my screen.

“There you are!” she cried happily. “You need a haircut.”

“Thanks, Mom,” I said, laughing at her expression. “Right now I’m concentrating more on eating than worrying about my hair. My hat keeps it out of my face while I’m working, anyway.”

“Wow, and you got tan,” she observed and turned her head back and forth as if trying to get a better view of me. “You’ve lost weight too.”

“No, I haven’t,” I lied. My clothes were loose on me, especially my favorite jeans. Of course, I told myself it had more to do with the physical job I did every day and not my stress over money or Jamie. Her expression told me she didn’t believe me, but she didn’t say anything else about it.

We talked for another hour, and she told me more about Richard’s new consulting contract with the hospital and how Kyle had found a “special friend.” I knew Kyle had been going to their house for dinner to keep them company since I had left. He hadn’t brought his boyfriend because they had to be very discreet in that hateful little town, but Carolyn said he seemed happy, and that made me smile.

Apparently, she had also run into Sensei’s wife in the grocery store the week before, and the woman had asked about me. The dojo had expanded to another full-time instructor and seemed to be doing very well. She saved the most disturbing news for last.

“I’m not sure if you’re going to want to hear this, but Brad Mosely has been released from prison,” she said quietly. It took me a minute to process what she’d said. The judge had sentenced him to five years; even with parole, the lawyer had said he would have to stay in for at least two.

“How is that possible?” I asked angrily. I lived on the other side of the country, and I was practically a brown belt in karate so I knew he couldn’t hurt me. It just made me angry that they had released him early. Her sigh made me stop and listen.