Shattered (9 page)

I couldn’t believe that Jesse had the nerve to show up here.  I told him I wasn’t ready to see him, so now he’d taken it upon himself to make sure I had to see him on a daily basis.  Unbelievable.

“You two can catch up when we are finished here,” my dad said. “It’s about time for a break anyway.”

Jesse looked at me, hoping I would agree to stay and wait for him to finish, but I was fuming mad by this point.  “That won’t be necessary,” I stated bluntly before turning to leave.

“Lyss, wait,” Jesse shouted out as I was halfway across the driveway, “where are you going?”  He jumped off the wagon and started to jog after me.

I felt my nails dig in to the palms of my hands as I balled up my fists and stopped to face him. “Now what makes you think I’m going to tell you where I’m going?!” I crossly replied with my face twisted in annoyance, stopping his stride toward me. I continued to back away from him. “You sure as shit didn’t feel the need to let me know where you’d been the last nine months!”  I didn’t even bother waiting for him to reply as I jumped in my car.  When I pulled out of the driveway I snuck a quick glance at the newest Boyd Farms employee who was now regretfully hanging his head.

I spent my afternoon organizing the back room at the flower shop.  I was grateful for the distraction.  I still couldn’t wrap my mind around the fact that Jesse was back in town.  I’d pretty much given up on the idea of him returning.  I knew that every time he looked at me all he could see was the tragic event that unfolded the last time we were together.  Seeing him was bittersweet.  He looked amazing and everything I’d felt for him was still there, but that wouldn’t, couldn’t, be enough to erase the past.

I heard the door swing open, “Omigod! This looks amazing, Alyssa!”  Mrs. Evans, I mean Wendy, couldn’t believe that I’d managed to uncover the floor in only three hours.  I gave her a guided tour of her clean workspace.  I was careful to point out all of the labels and bins that I’d arranged for all of her supplies and was hopeful that she would maintain the order I’d created.

“See,” I smiled, “now all of your chaos really is organized.”

“Thank you so much!” She wrapped her arms around me and for a second I remembered how a real motherly embrace felt.

January came bouncing through the back door in her tailored khaki shorts and fitted, pink t-shirt. “Hey Mom…” she shouted out, “omigod! This place looks amazing!”  

Like mother, like daughter.

“Hey Jan.” Wendy smiled at her daughter, breaking our hug, “Alyssa cleaned this whole place up.  She did such a great job!”  I took in both Evans women standing in front of me.  Night and day.  January looked like a J. Crew model and her mother’s flowy, tie-dyed maxi dress was something from another time period.

“I’ll say.” January took a seat on the now debris-free sofa that sat along the back wall.  For the past two years, that couch had served as a catch-all for flower stems and empty boxes.  I’m sure it was a welcome relief for the cushions to get some actual seat action.  Just then, the bell chimed in the front of the store, alerting us a customer had entered.  Wendy excused herself.  “Where in the hell have you been?”  January demanded of me as soon as her mother left the room.

“What are you talking about?”  I sat down next to her on the sofa.

“I’ve been trying to get a hold of you for two days.”  She flung her elbow up on the back of the sofa, turning to face me, and rested her head in her hand as she waited for my response.

“Yeah,” I shrugged and laughed, “I guess I took a couple days off.”

She was not amused, “That’s not funny.  I’ve been worried about.  I texted you, like, a hundred times.”

I put my hand on her shoulder, “Sorry.  I was sleeping.”

“For two days?!” Her eyes widened.

“So?” I instantly became defensive.  So what if I wanted to sleep?!  I’m an adult now… I can do whatever I want.

“That’s not normal, Alyssa.”  She leaned back against the arm of the couch, never breaking her worried stare, and crossed her arms. “You’re taking the pills again, aren’t you?”  January had seen first-hand how out of it I was on the medication.  The last time I was on them she had to pretty much hold my hand night and day.  I actually walked into a wall at school one day.

I didn’t want to tell her that I couldn’t handle my feelings anymore, but  I knew she was already on to me. “I just took a couple,” I admitted, looking down at the floor, not wanting to see the concerned look in her eyes for one more second. “I just needed them to get to through graduation.”

 She sat silently for a moment.  “What about today?”

“Not today.” I looked around the immaculate room we were sitting in, “Think I could have done all this if I medicated?”  She knew as well as I did that cleaning was a coping mechanism for me.  It started on the roadside when I was picking up all the glass.  Now, whenever I needed to escape I threw myself into the biggest mess I could find.  You should have seen what I did in the sports equipment closet at school.  Those tangled jump ropes didn’t stand a chance.

“I know you’ve got a lot going on in that head of yours, but I really think self-medicating is the wrong answer.”  She never agreed with my mom’s decision to take me to the doctor.  She always thought that the sadness I was feeling was normal.  “People are supposed to grieve.  You need to feel those emotions to deal with them.”

“I know.”  As much as I knew she was right, I suddenly had the urge to take another pill.  “It’s just that…”

“Jesse,“ she finished my thought.

“He really didn’t help the situation by coming back.”

“Maybe it’s time you talk to him.”

“And say what?  Why did you leave?  Where have you been?  Do you still blame me for Garrett’s acci…?” She didn’t let me finish.

“Stop. It wasn’t your fault.  It was an accident.”  I knew in theory she was right, but I couldn’t help but think, if we’d just left when we were supposed to, Garrett would have seen the tractor before it went over the hill and slowed down.  “You have to forgive yourself, Alyssa.  Bad things happen that are out of our control.”

The warmness of tears running down my face, told me it was time to go.  I hated crying in front of people and I hated when people said cliché things like
everything happens for a reason
and
things happen that we can’t control.  
All of which, were spewing out of January’s mouth as she tried to reason with me.   “I’ll talk to him when I’m ready,”  I said aggressively before rushing out the back door.

 When I got back home, I was surprised to see my dad’s truck parked out in front.  It was way too early for him to be home.  The sun hadn’t even set yet.  When I walked into the house I could hear my parents in the kitchen in the middle of a heated conversation.

“I can’t believe you hired
that boy
to work here.” The tone of my mother’s voice was nauseating and I knew exactly who she was talking about.  I made sure not to let the screen door slam behind me as I eavesdropped from around the corner.

“That boy,” my dad argued back, “is a damn good worker and it’s not up to you who I hire, Mary.”

I could hear my mother curse under her breath, “You know, as well as I do, what’s going to happen.  It’s not good for Alyssa that he’s back in town.”

She never liked Jesse.  I knew it from the first time she saw him and Garrett standing in our driveway when we were kids.  “That boy was not raised right.  He lived above a bar, for Christ’s sake.” She’d said.  I was constantly defending him.  She knew nothing about his family or him, she’d just assumed that since his family owned the local tavern that he must be corrupt.  What she didn’t know was that even though Jesse came off as cold and uncaring, I knew better.  Yeah, his parents weren’t around, but when they were they were more loving than she had ever been.

The first time I met Jesse’s parents I was so nervous.  I’d seen them a couple of times and they appeared intimidating. The constant chatter around town about their crazy lifestyle may have influenced my preconceived opinion. They were big into the motorcycle scene and looked like characters from “Sons of Anarchy.”  They weren’t around much.  Jesse pretty much lived at Garrett’s house. They’d always been drifters, riding their bike back and forth across the country. Staying put just long enough to convince Jesse and his sister that they were home for good, before leaving the dream of a real family in the dust as they drove out of town.  Kelly was tough as nails, but Jesse struggled with it.  He never talked to me about it upsetting him, but I could tell.  He was always quiet, but for a week or so after they left he was completely shut off.  I couldn’t even get him to argue with me during that time and that’s what we did best.

As we walked up the staircase that led from the street level up to his house, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. We walked in the door and the amount of normal that I saw surprised me.  Mrs. Vaughn was bustling around the kitchen getting dinner in order and Mr. Vaughn was planted in front of the television in a Lay-Z-Boy.  They appeared to be an all-American family.

“Hey Mom,” Jesse called out as we all kicked our shoes off in the entry way, “can Garrett and Alyssa stay for dinner?”

She poked her head through the window cut-out between the kitchen and the living room, and smiled. “Sure, honey!  We’re having lasagna.” Her face was welcoming, accented with her dark eyeliner and burgundy lipstick.  Her make-up was a little over the top, but it worked with her tanning bed glow and 80’s style hair do.  The only thing bigger than her hair was her chest.  She was a petite lady, so her ample bust size always made her look like she was going to topple over.  She came around the corner from the kitchen and stopped to get a good look at me. “You must be Alyssa, I’ve heard so much about you.” She tucked a strand of my tangled hair behind my ear. “You’re right, Jess,” she commented to her son, “she’s a pretty girl.”

The vermillion shade of Jesse’s face was comical as his eyes widened in embarrassment. “Mom!” he huffed, furious at her for letting me know that he thought I was pretty.  I felt the blush rise in my cheeks as I dropped my head the same way Jesse had.  Garrett quickly tried to change the subject and help his friends out.

“She’s not as pretty as me, though, right, Mindy?”  He wrapped his arms around the woman who had taken over the motherly role in his life after his mom had passed.

“Of course not, Garrett.” she gave him a squeeze. “You’re still my pretty boy.”  It was sweet to see the way that she cared about Garrett.  After his mother died, Garrett longed for someone to fill that role, even if it was only for the few days that Mindy was home.  That was one more thing that Garrett and I had in common.  We both longed for a loving, caring, present mother.

“You kids go take your seats at the table.” She pointed into the dining room that sat just to the right of the kitchen and turned to face her husband, who was fully enthralled in a documentary on the Hell’s Angels. “Sticks!” she shouted out, “turn that off! Dinner’s ready!”

He frowned at his wife, but knew that he’d better obey if he wanted to keep her happy.  He clicked off the TV and sauntered into the dining room. Arlo “Sticks” Vaughn, gangly appearance had earned him the nickname in high school and it had stuck with him.  His hair had once been as black as Jesse’s but now was peppered with strands of white, making it appear gray.  He wore a handlebar mustache in the same shade and his eyes were the same color as his son’s.  “Hey guys,” he greeted us as he took his seat at the head of the table. “Miss Alyssa.” He said to me a warm smile. “It’s nice to meet the final member of the Terrific Trio. I’ve heard so much about you.” He leaned over and whispered something in son’s ear, causing his cheeks to redden again.  His son’s embarrassment caused Sticks to smile, but he never let the whole table in on their conversation. “Where’s Kel?” he asked referring to Jesse’s sister, Kelly.  She was a few years older than us and was the prettiest girl in town.  Every time I looked at her I would hope and pray that one day I would be as beautiful as she was.  

“She’s out with Craig,” Mrs. Vaughn told him.  Craig was her boyfriend and they were practically joined at the hip.

“Big surprise,” Jesse laughed as his mom placed a serving of lasagna on all our plates.

The rest of that night was spent laughing and talking around that dinner table in the apartment above the bar.   It was followed by many more nights like that when they‘d ridden into town, much to my mother’s dismay.  Maybe a few of the crass stories of motorcycle riders and drinking were a little inappropriate for our young ears, but they were never told without a disclaimer from Jesse’s parents.  “You better never…” Sticks would reiterate with a smile.

After meeting them, it was easy to see why Jesse was so upset when they left.  They were good people, they just had their priorities thoroughly confused.  As much as I liked them, a part of me hated them for hurting Jesse so much.

The sudden urge to defend Jesse overtook me, but I decided against mentioning his name.  “I’m right here,” I declared, turning the corner, entering the kitchen and offering my mother my most indifferent expression.  I could tell by my parents’ faces that the conversation they were having was not meant for my ears. “And I’m fine.”

“That’s good to know.” My dad smiled, grateful that my presence has stopped my mother’s incessant rant.  

“It’s not polite to eavesdrop, Alyssa,” my mother said, pointing her finger at me.  The disdain on her face was a common occurrence when I was involved.

“It’s not polite to look down on people, either, Mother.” I fired back.

“Do not talk to your mother like that.” My father scolded. Of course he took her side.  He always did.

Even though my father’s presence was rare, he still intimidated me. “Sorry.” I looked down at the floor.  I didn’t really know how to act around him, seeing as how we only interacted sporadically.

“All I was saying was that Jesse has been out of your life for so long and you seem to be coping so much better.” My mother tried to play up her concern for me, but I knew her only concern was for her self-preservation.  She seemed a bit nervous discussing Jesse with me. I assumed it was only because she didn’t want me to associate with him anymore.  What would the town say if her daughter was running around with that Vaughn boy again?  At least when Garrett was alive he served as a buffer between acceptable and unacceptable company.  He was the town golden boy, so it offset the stigma that Jesse’s parents had left for him.  Not to mention, the
coping
that I was doing so well, was only because I’d managed to avoid her since graduation and she hadn’t seen the train wreck I’d really been.  I really wished I had the clouded effects of my medication at that point in the discussion.  Then I heard the soft roar of truck exhaust echoing up the driveway.  I left reality for a moment and saw Garrett’s white Chevy.  I knew that it was wishful thinking, but none the less, the thought always crossed my mind when I heard that noise.  I walked out of the kitchen, and away from my parents, to see who was here.  It was a black truck with tinted windows, a custom paint job and lift kit.  I’d seen it rolling through town on many occasions.  Collin Smolder.