Going Long (15 page)

Nolan

I woke up on Sienna’s sofa, my
face crusty with dried saliva, and God knows what else. My throat was dry as
hell, and I wanted to gulp glass after glass of water, except when I sat up my
entire world shifted, forcing me back flat on my face into the cushions. I was
still wearing my clothes from last night, and my boots were stuffed in the sofa
cracks, almost as if I’d clung to them overnight like they were a teddy bear. I
was pretty sure I never wanted to feel like this again.

The kitchen light flickered on,
and I heard the faint sounds of coffee brewing and pans sliding from a cabinet.
I pushed myself up on the sofa and cracked one eye barely open to see Sienna
leaning on her hands across the counter staring at me. Not really ready to deal
with the look on her face, I just grumbled and fell back into the couch.

“Well, good morning, sunshine,”
she said bitterly. “You ready to hear about the fantastic night you made me go
through? Or do you want to throw up and whine about your splitting headache for
a while?”

She was full-on banging pans on
the stove now, flinging the fridge door shut with extra muscle, and cracking
eggs to fry so loudly you would think she was throwing water balloons onto the
stove.

“Uuuuuuuuhhhhhg. Sienna, do you
have to do
all
of that now?” I spoke, my face still buried into the
pillow.

“Yes, Nolan. I do. It’s 11:30 in
the morning. I’m hungry, and I’m sick of watching you twitch and wail, and flop
around my living room couch. I want to watch TV, so sit your ass up,” she was
bullying me. It was a side of her I’d never seen, and I both admired and hated
it.

She was flipping cushions up to
move me now, so I slid to the end of the couch to curl up in a ball, and keep
my face buried in the covers and my hands. “Stopppp, I get it. I’m moving,” I
said, my voice defensive, like I had some right to be. I had no idea what
events led up to me being here, but I knew that there were at least 7 or 8 ounces
of vodka involved. My stomach felt like a tar pit, bubbling and full. I left my
arm wrapped around my chin, my nose covered and protected from any smells. I
hoped this would keep me from vomiting.

“Noles, I swear to God, if you
throw up on any of my shit, our friendship is over,” she said, flipping through
the channels and not even looking at me.

“Geeeeeeze, what the hell
crawled up your ass?” I rolled my eyes, or at least the one that was open.

At that, Sienna shut the TV off
again and got up off the couch to return to the kitchen. I had pissed her off,
and I knew I was acting like a major bitch, but I was so miserable that I
couldn’t seem to turn it off. “I’m sorry…” I half-heartedly grunted from my
sofa corner.

She just scoffed. I listened to
her bang around the kitchen some more, before I drifted back into a light
sleep. I slipped in and out of it over the next two hours. When I heard the
unmistakable sound of Sarah’s voice added into the mix, I finally rose from the
dead, my body a little more prepared to sit upright…and possibly take in some
liquids.

“Jesus, Noles. You look like
shit,” Sarah said, tossing a clean T-shirt at me from the chair on the other
side of the room. On instinct, I pulled my night-before top off and put on the
one she’d thrown to me. When I saw the small traces of vomit on my new blouse,
I realized how bad the situation probably had been.

I finally got up from the couch
and slid into the kitchen to pour myself a giant cup of coffee and sift through
Sienna’s cabinets for aspirin. “You won’t find it in there. Hang on, I’ll get
the bottle from my bathroom,” Sienna said from behind me. I hadn’t seen her and
her words startled me a little. She came back seconds later with two pills, and
I took them quickly, thinking the faster they were in my system, the faster the
nail pushing into my skull would go away.

“Thanks,” I said, sheepishly. I
was embarrassed now, both because I remembered how I behaved to Sienna just
hours ago, and because I couldn’t remember much before that. “So…how bad?”

Sienna sat there on a stool,
staring at me for a few seconds before she spoke. “Epic,” she said.

Sarah chortled a little, causing
Sienna to toss a wad of wet paper towels at her. “Fuck! What was that for?”
Sarah said.

“That was for leaving me last
night…in charge of…
this!”
Sienna said, waving her hand up and down the
length of my body.

My mind raced, “Oh god, what had
I done to make her this mad?”

“I’m sorry,” I started right
away, my instinct to repair things kicking in. I leaned my face into my hands
and rubbed my eyes before settling back on Sienna. “What…did I do?”

She and Sarah just looked at one
another for a little while, almost like they had some shared secret that they
were terrified to tell me. The longer it took them to give me words, the more I
worried and let my imagination fill in the blanks. Had I gone to Gavin’s? Did I
kiss him again? Did I kiss someone else?

“You called Reed,” Sienna said,
taking a slow drink from her coffee, her eyes watching me for my reaction,
which was devastated. My stomach felt as if I’d just dropped from the highest
point of a roller coaster, and suddenly, I knew I was going to be sick. I
sprinted to Sienna’s bathroom, and dry-heaved for about 10 minutes, my stomach
clearly empty from whatever I had turned over the night before. My equilibrium
finally giving me a break from the spinning apartment walls, I came back into
the kitchen with Sarah and Sienna.

“What did I say,” I whispered,
staring at the floor, because I couldn’t bear to see any more disapproval on
Sienna’s face.

“You weren’t very coherent,” she
started. “You had slipped away from me, for just a few seconds. It was the end
of the night, and you were confused. You thought we were fighting, because I
wanted to go home and you wouldn’t leave the damn bar.”

She was getting worked up again,
so I just put a hand on her arm and squeezed, forcing her to look at me. I gave
her a crooked smile, one full of genuine regret. “I’m soooooo sorry,” I said.

Finally sighing, she put her hand
on mine and squeezed it back. “I know you are,” she said, blowing out the air
in her lungs a bit. “You were just…a lot to handle. That’s all.”

I smiled a little bigger now,
but also showed my embarrassment. “Was Reed…angry?” I asked, still wanting to know
what I’d done.

Sienna looked at Sarah again,
exchanging glances just as they’d done before. “What? Oh my God, what did I
say?” I was getting slightly more animated now.

“No, no,” Sienna stopped me.
“It’s not what you said. It’s what Reed said…and did, I guess?” Sienna looked
at Sarah again for confirmation to keep going.

“What do you mean,” I was
desperate now.

“Well, first of all, when you
called and sounded in distress, he dropped everything. He was literally miles
into his trip down the highway by the time he got me on the phone. Noles, he
was so worried about you,” she said. I smiled faintly at this information, and
my insides lit up with a hope I hadn’t felt in weeks.

“He…came for me?” I asked,
wondering suddenly if I’d seen Reed in my condition, too.

“No, when I found you—out
front and in the gutter, by the way—he pulled over and stayed on the
phone with me until he knew I had you handled,” her words suddenly
disappointing me.

I was about to leave it at that
when I saw my two best friends exchange that look one more time. “Come on guys.
What is it? I can take it. I mean, look. I can’t get any lower than this.”

Sienna came over to sit closer
to me, almost like she was prepared to catch me if I fainted. It was making me
nervous. “He seemed to think you were with Gavin,” she said, her words
completely unexpected.

I clenched my jaw and pulled my
knees up into my body a little, holding in the anger. Gavin! He was going to
ruin my life! I was about to unleash a tirade about the nightmare Gavin had been,
when Sienna threw me off my road map.

“Don’t worry. I didn’t tell him
he was at the club. I didn’t think you’d want Reed to know. But, Noles? Is
there something happening between you two?” she asked.

“Wha…me…and Gavin?” I asked, my
forehead crinkle deep with confusion now.

“Yeah…I mean, he was awfully
touchy feely last night,” she said, and immediately my mind went to work taking
inventory on everything that I did last night. I remembered dancing, and I
remember letting people touch me in a way that this morning made me shudder and
feel ashamed. But I didn’t remember Gavin.

“Oooooooh, you totally don’t
remember at all, do you?” Sienna said, sliding over closer to me now, almost
feeling bad. Her hard shell was breaking a bit.

I just rubbed my eyes with my
hands, searching for more memories in my brain, but they weren’t there. Sienna
filled me in on what she saw. She said I also shoved him at one point, which I
thought was good. Regardless, though, I knew I was going to have to have
another conversation with him—and this one might be the most
uncomfortable yet.

I managed to recuperate from my
binge enough to actually attend a few classes Monday and Tuesday. I even made
it to the writing center Wednesday morning to work with Kira. She had come up
with an idea to turn her poem or essay into a song. She said she could usually
get through more of her words if she put them to music, which fascinated me. I
encouraged her to try it, and she agreed to let me write about it for one of my
assignments.

I packed up most of my things
for the long weekend after our session and made my way to my parents; the drive
on my own through the desert giving me too much time to think. Sarah, Calley
and Sienna had already headed to Coolidge, so I texted them when I was leaving
so we could meet up at MicNic’s for some much-needed catching up with Becky.
And after an hour in the car, with nothing but my worries and guilt to keep me
company, I was desperate for my girls.

Reed

Trig and I pulled into the
driveway of my pop’s house late Wednesday night. Sean had texted me that the
girls had gone out to MicNic Burger’s for the night so he was going to come
over to hang out for a bit. Our rivalry game against ASU was Saturday, so Trig
and I had to head back to Tucson late Friday morning. I was glad he agreed to
come home with me. I knew it was childish, but somehow it felt better having
numbers on my side when it came to Nolan.

Sean was already at the house
when we barreled through the front door, dragging our bags of clothes and loads
of laundry. Rosie was there to greet us, and just took the bags out of my hands
without me even asking. Bless that woman; she really knows how to spoil me.

Sean and Trig had met a few
times before, so they fell into a comfortable conversation right away in the
family room. I grabbed a few beers from the fridge and handed them each one
before I headed upstairs to check in with pops. He was propped up in his bed
with a breakfast tray on his lap and the remote in his hand when I walked in.

“Heyyyyyy, there he is,” he
said, muting
ESPN and clearing a little space on the side of the bed so
I could sit by him. I gave him a half hug, and then propped my feet up on the
bed and stretched out, putting my hands behind my neck.

“Hey, Pops. How’s the leg?” I
said, sitting up and knocking a little on his cast.

“This cast crap is for the
birds, Reed. It’s so damned itchy,” he said, whining as he tried to move his
leg around to find a comfortable position. There clearly wasn’t one, because he
just sighed heavily and then leaned back into his pillows, defeated. I chuckled
a bit at my stubborn independent cuss of a father.

I lay there next to him for a
few minutes, just staring up at his ceiling. I kept trying to start my
conversation, but I could never seem to frame the right words in my mind, so I
just stopped and waited, hoping he would pick up on my anxiety and fill in the
blanks for me.

“Well, shit or get off the pot,
would ya?” he finally kicked in.
Subtle
, Buck Johnson was not.

Sighing, I sat up again, pulled
Grandma’s ring box from my pocket, and slid it on his lap tray, just shrugging
a little at it, and curling the corner of my mouth up a little pathetically.
Dad just stared at it for a few seconds, trying to figure out what it meant.
Finally, he nodded a little and closed his eyes, shaking his head some. He
reached up to grab the ring box, and flipped it open to look at it silently
before closing it once again. Staring at the closed antique box for a few moments
more, he finally looked up to make eye contact with me, and then held it out
for me to take back.

“Pops, it’s not going to
happen,” I said, my stomach sick with this reality. “Just…just give it to Jason
or something, okay?”

I stood up and turned my back to
him, not wanting him to see the pain in my eyes. Not wanting to show my
weakness. But I was so weak. Nolan could bring me to my knees. In fact, she
had. I snapped back when I heard my dad’s familiar raspy laugh kick in. I
turned to see him turning the box over and over in his hand, the corner of his
mouth raised in a smirk.

“Reed, life is hard. I know you
know this…or think you know this…but let me remind you. Life. Is. Hard. It’s
ugly sometimes, and it throws shit at you, just like a 300-pound lineman charging
you full tilt just looking to flatten your ass,” he said, his eyes still
focused on the small box in his hand.

“And sometimes,” he looked up at
me now, right in the eyes. “Sometimes, that lineman knocks the shit out of you.
And it hurts. It hurts like fucking hell, the breath punched from your lungs,
and the will to stand gone from your muscles. But you don’t just sit there,
roll your ass off the field and lick your wounds, right?”

I was staring at the box now,
too, those damn visions of forever with Nolan flipping through my mind like an
old-fashioned picture show. I saw our wedding, our kids…our life. God, I wanted
it. But between those flashes of us in my head, I also saw her kissing Gavin,
the look on his face when he left her room that night, the fucking swagger in
his step, the kind that said he knew her intimately. Those thoughts made me
flinch and look back down at my feet. Chewing my lip, I finally looked back up
at Pops, and shook my head. “Dad, I will never love anyone like I love Nolan, and
you know it. But…
fuck.
Dad, I can’t talk about it, but it’s just not
going to happen. And that ring is killing me,” I said, choking a little on my
words and forcing down my emotions.

My dad just grabbed my hand and
put the box back in it, wrapping my fingers around it tightly, and then patting
them shut with his other hand. I reached up with my other hand and dashed away
the tiny tear that was threating to escape, sniffling a little to get a hold of
myself. I was losing it. I looked Pops in the eyes, pleading with him to
understand, to let me off the hook, but he just held on tighter.

“Life is hard, Reed. But we get
up,” he said, sliding from the bed now to reach for his crutches and force
himself to a stand. “I could give this ring to Jason, yeah, sure. But you and I
both know that Jason—God love him—will never pick a girl worthy of
wearing your grandmother’s ring…and you and I both know there’s only one girl
who deserves it.”

My dad carried himself on his
crutches out the door, and down the hall, leaving me there alone in his room to
stare at this damn box again. I wished he’d never given it to me. But he was
right; there was no way I could give it back. It was mine to work out, or live
with, and carry.

Jason and Dylan both pulled up
to the house together early Thursday morning. Dylan looked like she was dressed
for a charity gala, always so image conscious. Jason, on the other hand, looked
like he had just finished a morning round at the golf club, his pompous
sunglasses tucked neatly in the collar of his shirt as he walked into the
kitchen.

“Morning, jerk-off,” he said,
tossing a wadded up receipt at me.

“I know what I’m
not
thankful
for,” I said, tossing it back at his face. He rounded the breakfast bar and put
his arm around me for a squeeze.

“Oh, come on little brother. You
know you love me,” he said, kissing the top of my head with a Donald-Duck-ish
sucking sound. I just elbowed him off me and wiped my forehead.

I was helping Rosie peel
potatoes, the repetitive task soothing. I hadn’t slept since my talk with my
dad the night before, but instead, tossed and turned while I spun my
grandmother’s ring around in my fingers. I was fucking exhausted, which I
thought would come in handy tonight and help me get a really good night’s sleep
before heading back down to Tucson for the game. Trig was still asleep in the
spare bedroom upstairs, and I was so damned jealous of his happy-ass self.

Dylan walked over to the sink
and rolled up the sleeves of her sparkling turtleneck to wash her hands. She
smiled at me a bit, and I smiled back. I really didn’t have a beef with Dylan.
Yeah, she wasn’t the nicest to Nolan in the past, but I think it was really
more of her personality flaw rather than any actual malice or dislike for
Nolan. And she was good at her job. She’d learned a lot from her father, and
she was making some moves for me that I knew would set me up for life.

When she grabbed a potato and
started to peel along side me, I chuckled a little. “What?” she said, stopping
and putting her hand on her hip.

“Nothing,” I said, shaking my
head and continuing to laugh a little to my self. She was still staring at me,
though. “It’s just…you
sooooo
don’t look like the kind of girl who would
know how to peel a potato.”

She just smirked at that and
went back to work on her potato, peeling the entire thing in one cut, leaving a
swirl of perfect curls on the counter before me. She turned around then and
pulled a sharper, larger knife from the butcher block behind her. Turning the
blade over in her hands a little to look at it, she finally rested it at the
edge of the potato before lowering her gaze and then going to work, dicing it
into the tiniest, perfect squares in a matter of seconds. The entire scene left
me shocked—eyes wide, and my hands frozen in the suddenly inferior pile
of potato peels in front of me.

“Ooooookay, so maybe you
do
look like the kind of girl who can peel a potato,” I said, my smile wide.

Dylan blew the blade like it was
a smoking gun, and then giggled a little herself, moving to the sink to rinse
it off. We were just beginning to have a good time when Jason walked up and
slid into one of the stools to put an end to it.

“What the fuck do you find so
funny?” he said, rolling his eyes at me. I just stared at him, willing myself
not to engage. Realizing how hard I was trying, Dylan actually came to the
rescue, explaining her parlor trick to me.

“I went to culinary school for a
while,” she shrugged at me. I was surprised…and impressed. “I didn’t really
want to be a chef, but I just wanted to learn something completely different
from the biz, ya know?”

Suddenly feeling possessive or
something, Jason stood from his seat, and came over to stand behind her, and
kiss her neck a little, popping a piece of raw potato in his mouth. “That’s
right, bro. My girl can cook,
and
she’s fucking wild in bed,” he winked
as she elbowed him a little, embarrassed, but also clearly affected by his
compliment.

No, I didn’t mind Dylan. But
Dylan
and
Jason? That was a little much to take.

I helped Rosie prep in the
kitchen most of the day, avoiding Jason, who just sat on the sofa and watched
football with Trig and my pops. Dylan had some business to finish and spent
most of her day on a computer at the dining table until she moved to my dad’s
office, when Rosie started to dress the table for dinner.

Sean and Becky came over first,
followed by Sarah, Calley and Sienna. Each time a car pulled down the driveway,
I ran to the window like a damned golden retriever, waiting for his master to
come home. And I was both relieved and sad each time it wasn’t Nolan’s car
pulling in. It was only 5 p.m. and Sean had told Nolan to show up around 5:30,
so I took the opportunity to rush upstairs and shower. I was suddenly nervous,
like I was back in high school and gathering up the courage to kiss her for the
first time—or ask her to dance.

I hadn’t seen her face in weeks,
months almost. I had heard her voice, yes, but it was weighted with alcohol
when she called, and it didn’t sound right. I noticed the small box on the
center of my bed while I was getting dressed, and I grabbed it quickly,
stuffing it in the drawer of my night table. I wanted to look good for Nolan,
but I also wanted to look comfortable. I must have changed shirts a dozen
times, trying to find the one that sent the perfect message; except I had no
fucking clue what message I was trying to send. I was acting a lot like a girl.
“This is ridiculous,” I thought, finally settling on the long-sleeved black
thermal and my dark jeans.

I was sliding down the stairs
when I heard the familiar timber of her voice talking to Pops. Her words were
clear, on the verge of happy. It was so opposite from the last time I’d heard
her. I stopped a few steps from the corner just to listen.

“Nolan, my dear, you look
lovely,” Rosie said. I could see her reaching to hug Nolan, but still couldn’t
see her face. “OH! Honey, you didn’t need to bring anything.”

“I know…I…uhm. I just wanted to.
I made it myself. It took me all day, I hope it’s good,” she sounded so damned unsure
of herself all of a sudden. “It’s a peach cobbler. I hope it’s okay. I’ve never
made one before.”

“I’m sure it’s delicious,” Rosie
said. “Here, let’s put it in the fridge.”

“No, it’s okay. I know where it
is, I’ll take it,” Nolan said, and then passed through the group gathered by
the front door to head to my kitchen. I was frozen to the steps as I watched
her walk away from me, completely unaware that I was watching her. Her brown
hair had gotten longer. She’d curled it into waves, and wore a red sweater with
tight black pants, and knee-high boots. She looked like a girl from some
romantic movie—some main character that the boy sees once, and then
spends the entire rest of the movie chasing, just so he could learn her name.
“I was that lame-ass boy,” I thought
.

When I realized she was heading
to the kitchen alone, I squeezed my eyes shut for a second, pushing my palms
into them, a little confused at my thoughts. I had been so angry at her. But
seeing her again? Well, that had me suddenly a lot less angry. I took a deep
breath, and followed her into the kitchen. She was balancing the dessert in one
palm and trying to open the refrigerator door with her other hand, not quite
able to get it open.

“Need a hand?” I said, startling
her. She jumped a bit, and the edge of the tray hit the corner of the
refrigerator, knocking it sideways, and sending it in a slow-motion flip to the
floor. She just stared at the pile of peaches and crust that spread the floor
beneath her, her hand over her mouth like she’d witnessed some horrible
accident. And then without warning, she started to cry, her hand hiding her
face as she bent down to feel for pieces of her broken cobbler to clean it up.