When he says that, my heart starts beating fast. I’m overwhelmed by the idea that I can end all the misery I’m feeling by simply manning up and speaking my truth to Jessa. Could it really be that simple?
I shoot to my feet, blood pumping through my veins. I know what I need to do. “I’m…I’m leaving. I’m going to drive back to Crescent Harbor, straight over to Cannon’s house and talk to her.”
I only make it two steps before my dad’s tone has me skidding in my tracks. “Well, son. I’m sorry to tell you this but I think you missed your window. Cannon and Lexi said she left.”
Air rushes out of me so quickly, I feel I’ve taken a steel toe boot to the gut. “What?”
No. That can’t be. It hasn’t been that long since she was standing on my doorstep. How could she be here one day and gone the next?
“She moved out of town for some new job,” Dad tells me. “She’s already gone.”
My eyes fall shut as I process this news.
I’m such a goddamn idiot.
She’s gone.
She’s gone.
She’s gone.
I need some air. I need to go break something. I need to get outside before my father witnesses me exploding.
I just want to go have a boxing match with a lamp post on the street corner. I’m pulling my hair out at the roots. “I can’t…I don’t…What am I supposed to do now?”
The sound of someone clearing their throat fills the room. Dad and I glance down at his phone. Mom is wide awake now, staring bright-eyed at the screen, and the look on her face says it all. She’s been sitting there a long time, eavesdropping. As usual.
“Dammit, Ma. Were you listening to everything?”
Her expression is unapologetic. Her eyes dance. She brandishes a piece of folded paper, waving it like a winning scratch-off ticket. “Good thing I’ve got Jessa’s new address…”
58 Jessa
The techno music is pumping. I weave my way through the half-naked, gyrating bodies, getting jostled and bumped into more times than I can count.
You’d think I was taking advantage of my single lady status at the club. But no, this is me, just trying to find my way across my new apartment to get to the microwave.
My obnoxious male roommates are throwing a party. Again. Though this one may be bigger than the last. I was able to drown out the heavy beat of their music last time with my white noise app. Nothing’s going to work tonight.
Is a quiet bubble bath and microwaved dinner too much for a girl to ask after a long day of working with screaming, energetic kindergarteners?
I should be grateful for the comically cheap rent I was able to secure, especially on such short notice. Living with my ex and his two idiot friends is not ideal but I had to take what I could get. I needed a roof over my head so I could start my new job ASAP.
Maybe I should grin and just be thankful. But good God, these living conditions are going to break even the most patient saint. My rented room is basically a closet with a tiny round window. And speaking of closets, I don’t even have one of those. The whole house smells like dirty socks and moldy pizza.
I’ve already started looking for my own place but pickings are slim. Especially on a beginner kindergarten teacher’s salary. I saw an apartment in the classifieds that looked promising but during the virtual tour, a cockroach strutted merrily across the bathroom wall. That apartment was a ‘no’.
Anyway, I manage to squeeze my way into the kitchen, finding the TV dinner in the freezer with my name on it. Utter relief smacks me that no one already took it.
I try to ignore the loud music. I try to ignore the naked girls dancing on every flat surface. I try to ignore Michael’s shouts from the other room, as he tries to convince me to join him. I hate that he’s drawing attention to me and making it impossible to ignore the weird, mohawk-wearing twins who are hitting on me as I wait for the microwave to beep.
And side note—what the hell is that white shit under his nose? Oh my god. Has he been coked out this whole time? Well, I guess that would explain his weird behavior all along.
I’m stirring my steaming plastic plate of food, as the shirtless guys flex next to me, when I hear my name again.
“What?!” I yell, wishing Michael would just leave me alone. He has to know this isn’t my scene. At all. Only, when I turn, I see that it’s not Michael at all. “Eli?”
My jaw hits the floor as I take him in. His hair is neatly combed, and he’s wearing a full suit, standing in the middle of the hallway of this dumpy house, at this trashy party. His tie is crooked but his stubble gives him just the right amount of edge. He clutches a bouquet of flowers and a file folder in his fist as he elbows his way past the mohawk twins.
I try to remind myself that he hurt me, I try to adopt an icy facade but the moment he utters my name, my chance of survival is no better than a pile of slush on the sidewalk in mid-July.
“Hello, Jessa…”
59 Eli
With her arms folded protectively across her chest, she leads me down the hallway to get away from the noise. I don’t know how she’s been living under these conditions. Hell, I just walked in here and I already have a splitting headache.
I’m not just sweating bullets. I’m sweating rockets, projectiles and spaceships. The idea of forgetting all
