I Need You To Hate Me, page 10
Breathe, I remind myself, you need air to live. The mellow brush of his mouth against my fingers sends a tremble through me. It’s gone as quickly as it comes, and I’m left speculating if it was even real or a part of my imagination.
Ace chooses a small pizza shop and holds open the door for me. The ambiance of the interior, its mouth-watering aroma of wood-fire pizza, further clarifies that I’m famished. Although, I’m unsure if the food will fully satisfy me. Perhaps, I’m hungry for the sentiment of Ace’s company.
He places his hand on my lower back when I walk past him, the touch delivering warmth throughout me. There aren’t many people inside, and he leads me to a seat near the window, which overlooks the deserted street.
“Do you like fighting?” I ask after we order food. I bite my straw and look up at Ace. He laughs, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. Instead, it functions as a barrier between his true emotions.
“Not the way I do it,” he answers, and I’m not sure what he means.
“But you do it almost every weekend,” I say, trying to understand him—trying to get to know him, because something keeps yanking us together like a rubber band. We pull away and then are launched back.
“I need the money,” he says. I realize he must make a lot from one fight. I recall how many people were betting with multiple hundred-dollar bills at his last one. But why does he need that much money?
It’s like he knows I’m going to ask, because he steers the conversation in a different direction. “Majoring in journalism?”
“How did you know?” I ask, and he shrugs like it’s obvious.
“Do you read other books? You know, apart from autobiographies?” I ask. I’m unsure why I continue to bring it up. Maybe it’s because you know a person much better if you know what they read and why.
“If you only read what everyone else does, you can only think what everyone else is thinking,” he says, but it doesn’t answer my question. Why does he have to be like this? Vague with his answers, almost discarding my questions, but nevertheless, still providing a pitiful response.
“Why journalism?” Ace asks me.
I shrug. “It’s freeing—I can travel the whole world and live internally through my own words in hopes of making a difference along the way.”
“Would it be odd if I said that I expected that answer?”
“In what way?” I ask.
Ace smiles. “I get a sense that you’re not the one to stay in one place for too long.”
I tilt my head, studying him. He appears to understand an awful lot about me. Am I that easy to decipher?
“What about you?” I ask. “Are you the one to stay in the same place, or do you find that dull and repetitive?”
“It’d be selfish of me to say that I’m the same as you.”
I’m curious to know what is holding him back, but I’m careful not to pry. “Maybe we ought to be selfish once in a while,” I say. Before he has the chance to muster a response, the waiter brings out our food.
We eat in silence, or I eat, and he watches me. When we’re done, we saunter back to the house in no rush, his hand intertwined with mine. It scares me how much I relish Ace’s presence. He causes me to feel nervous, but at the same time, excited. As though the enigma itself isn’t enough to run from.
“Can I use your shower? The upstairs one is broken,” I ask when we get inside, and he nods.
His bathroom is enormous, especially his shower. It can reasonably fit five people in here comfortably. I pick up the body wash that’s on the shower floor, smelling it. Flavors of woody citrus swirl in front and all around, filling the shower with the scent of him.
Ace is standing in his wardrobe when I come out of the bathroom, taking his shirt off. As if he senses my presence, he turns around, and his eyes scan me. I don’t move—the way he looks at me insinuates an unfamiliar covet. I intend to tear my gaze away, but I can’t. I’m stuck, frozen in his existence.
The sound of his phone ringing startles us both, and he tears his eyes away from me. Taking it out, he briefly glances at the caller ID. I can’t see who it is, but his face stills. He strides towards the back door and slides it open. He closes it behind him, but I hear the faint words. “Hey, baby, is everything okay?”
Baby? I stand there, frozen in time. Feeling stupid. So incredibly stupid.
Ace comes back in, and I wait for an explanation, but he doesn’t give one. He doesn’t owe me one. He doesn’t owe me anything. “Sorry, I have to go.” He picks up his keys off the nightstand and swings a t-shirt over his shoulder.
11
Innocent Phenomenon
GAZING OUT MY window, I watch the sun setting. It’s a delicate hue of deep orange and pink. It’s a shame it will dim into darkness within a few brief moments like all good things tend to do.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come home for a few days?” my dad asks through the phone. “I can come to pick you up, Cals.”
“No, Dad…I’m fine, really,” I say.
Today’s my mom’s birthday. We both know it, but neither of us mentions it. It’s been like that for the past two years. I truly detest it. We’re both trying to think about the accident less often, but my dad does a far better job at it—or maybe a better job at concealing it.
“Look, Cals, I know we don’t speak about her much…but it doesn’t mean that there’s even a second that goes by where I don’t think about her. That I don’t wish I could change it. That I don’t wish it was me instead of her in that damn car that night.”
I squeeze my eyes shut. The pain in my chest becomes unbearable. “Dad, don’t say that.”
“Why? It’s all I think about.” His voice breaks, and causes my own chest to heave.
I open my eyes, focusing on the lake in the distance. The dusk colors bounce off it, and it’s the most exquisite view I’ve ever seen. “Mom wouldn’t want that for us.”
He sighs. “I know. God, I know.”
It doesn’t make it any easier, though. I experience firsthand the guilt that comes with surviving the crash. I spend most of the time wondering if it would be more serene for my dad if it were me instead of her.
“I should go. I have a lot of reading to do for my class. Is Uncle Dave with you today?” I ask. As long as he has someone with him today, it’s all that matters.
“Yeah, he went to put flowers on Mom’s grave,” my dad says. Neither of us has been able to go there since the burial. Something about that place compels my skin to crawl. I don’t want to remember my mom like that—buried six feet under.
“Come visit soon. Don’t forget about your old man. I miss you,” he says, and the pain tightens—engulfing me.
“I miss you too, Dad.”
I hang up and continue staring out the window. I’m not fine, not really, but I can’t have my dad worrying about me, he’s already troubled with other afflictions. He has close friends and his brother—my uncle—to keep him company if he needs it. I’ll only be a burden.
Changing into a hoodie and sweatpants, I mindlessly walk downstairs. I sought to keep my mind occupied the whole day. I attended my classes and then caught up on university work. Now that I have nothing left to do, my mind keeps digressing to a place where there’s emptiness.
Liv and Zach aren’t home. Friday is usually date night for them, or a party—I assume it’s the former, since they didn’t pester me to come like they usually would if it were a party. Ace has been in and out all week, but we haven’t talked since the night he walked out without enlightening me of the reason.
My mind occasionally wanders to him… “Occasionally” is the wrong word for the circumstances. “He’s deeply embedded into my thoughts” would be a better way of putting it.
I open the cupboard, and in front of me is exactly what I need to numb tonight—alcohol. I hate alcohol. I hate how it makes me feel—almost as if nothing is real. But that’s the point right now; I require an escape from reality. Will I ever get over the fact that my mom, my lifelong best friend, is gone? Everyone says time heals all wounds, but how long? Or is my wound an empty hole incapable of mending?
Taking the bottle of vodka, I make a mental note to replace it—whoever’s it is, even though I doubt they would mind. Alcohol isn’t scarce around here.
It’s the last moments of dusk, and I leisurely walk towards the edge of the deck in the middle of the lake. There’s no cloud in the sky, and I twist the lid of the bottle, taking a mouthful. I cough from the taste and almost throw up. How anyone drinks this for fun is beyond me. Perhaps they drink for the same reason as I am right now—to anesthetize the pain.
It’s not long before it’s pitch black, but the darkness engenders the brightest stars. I lay on the wooden planks and look up. The breeze wafts, encompassing me with its chill—I wrap my arms around myself. The stars burn with the glistening sallowness of electric light. I envision that I see my mom—in the stars, in the lake. She’s all around me, yet I’m still so forlorn.
My head spins, but I only took one sip. Occasionally, there’s a shooting star—I don’t understand why people wish upon them. They’re simply an innocent phenomenon.
It’s at times like this when darkness overcomes and the silence engulfs the night. This is when my guilt and truly traumatized heart kick in—no distractions, no noise, just my wandering mind to keep me accountable for all the pain I could’ve avoided.
I see him before I hear him. Am I that delusional? The dark silhouette moves towards me. “I come here sometimes to clear my head.” His voice is rough.
“Ace?” Shouldn’t I be angry at him? I can’t remember.
“Were you expecting someone else?”
I wasn’t expecting you. “Um, no, but—”
“Good.” He sits against the wooden pillar. I roll my eyes and push the bottle of alcohol towards him as a peace offering. “I don’t drink,” he says. I scrunch my face but then recall that I’ve never seen him with a drink before.
“I don’t either,” I say.
He inspects me, then the bottle, and raises an eyebrow.
“I don’t,” I defend.
We sit in silence for a few squandered moments before I speak. “I remember one time, my dad and I went out on a lake just like this one back at home. I was only about five or six. We were in a wooden boat, and I climbed on the front of it, as far as I could go, and extended my arms. With the breeze in my face, it felt so liberating. My dad told me to get down before I hurt myself—I didn’t listen,” I recall.
“I ended up falling in the lake, and with my luck, there was a submerged rock below. I sliced my arm open and had to get stitches. My mom was so mad at my dad that day,” I say. I remember being angry at my mom that day too. I wasn’t fond of the way she yelled at my dad, blaming him for what happened when it wasn’t his fault.
“I can picture it,” Ace says, chuckling. “It seems as though you haven’t grown out of your clumsiness.”
I don’t find myself clumsy—simply unlucky. Wherever there’s trouble, it has a way of stumbling upon me. “Have you ever felt guilt eating up at you, strangling you with no way to escape?” I ask, squeezing my eyes shut.
“All the time,” he says. “All the damn time.”
I’m unsure of the reasoning for the next words which attain their escape. It’s not because I require Ace to feel sorry for me or even pity me—those are the last things I need. Maybe it’s because I’m over not talking about her. I’m through with keeping everything bottled inside. Or maybe, I have the relentless feeling that Ace and I are alike in many aspects.
“My mom died two years ago on Christmas Eve—in a car accident,” I say. I don’t look at him. I lie still on the wooden deck, directing my attention to the one star that shines brighter than all the rest.
When Ace doesn’t utter a single word, I take a deep breath. “It was my fault. If I didn’t make her turn around because I forgot my stupid journal, we would have already been home—” I begin. My heart quickens frantically.
“It’s not your fault,” Ace interrupts, leaning over me, so I’m forced to look at him.
“It is.”
“No, Calla, it’s not. You can’t blame yourself for that.”
“Ace, if I—”
“Fucking don’t,” Ace warns and places his hand on mine. “Don’t do that. No amount of guilt will change the past. Don’t blame yourself. It’s unfair, and it will destroy you.”
He gazes at me like I’m the stars when all I’ve ever felt before was the darkness that encircles them. He makes me feel insanely sane for the first time in my life. “It already has, Ace.”
The silence is becoming more frequent between us, more delirious. But he’s here—sitting next to me on the pier, in the middle of the lake, and the moonlight pours over his skin.
I’m uncertain if it’s the alcohol or the way he looks at me, and a smile surfaces on his mouth—definitely the alcohol. I don’t know what I’m doing, but I’m suddenly on his lap. My knees are on either side of his hips, and I observe how drained he looks. Where have you been, Ace?
He’s rarely at the house, disappearing all the time without any warning.
I trace the dark circles under his eyes and detect the way his body stills. My fingers trail down to his lips. My thumb brushes against them delicately, bordering the shadows, savoring every single moment—every single touch.
Ace arrests my fingers with his hand, and my eyes pounce to his. They’re sinister and filled with darkness but, at the same time, entrancing. I’m incapable of looking away even though I’m crumbling underneath them. His eyes have the whole world in them—his damn eyes are destroying me.
“Make me forget,” I say, my voice breaking. “Make me forget about everything. It’s killing me inside.”
Ace brings his hand to my cheek and gently wipes away the tears escaping my eyes. Every single stroke of his fingers against me is igniting a fire inside.
“Ace, please,” I beg. I need the despair, the suffering to fade—even if it’s for a brief second. It appears he’s the only one able to give me what I need.
“Calla,” he cautions, my demand has stunned him. His eyes meet mine again, and there’s something different inside them. I may be reading too much into it, but it’s as though his own demons are dancing directly in front of me.
“Tell me to stop,” Ace says, leaning into me.
Don’t stop. “Stop,” I breathe, but my body is uttering the complete opposite as my hands tangle in his hair, drawing him even closer.
“Mean it, Calla,” he says in a low voice, tightening his grip around my waist.
My body is burning everywhere he touches me. His calloused fingers graze my bare skin where my shirt has lifted. I need him to continue because no one has ever made me feel like this—I don’t wish for it to end.
His lips faintly brush against the corner of my mouth, waiting for my consent—waiting for me to change my mind.
I gasp at the subtle contact, craving more. “No, I can’t.”
“Fuck,” Ace swears, and suddenly, all I can taste is him. His mouth moves along mine, meticulously unhurried.
I never understood how people could be addicted to drugs. I’ve never even sampled them. My dad would have lost it, you know, him being the sheriff and all that. But at this moment, I’m an addict who can’t get enough. All the hurt in my mind, all the frustration and anger subside. Every thought in my head is exploding into a dark craving.
I’m addicted to the way Ace makes me feel. Of course, don’t get me wrong, I’ve kissed a handful of guys before, but no one has ever made me feel like this. Not even close. I wonder if it’s because we’re surrounded by the stillness of everything around us, the stars, the moon, the lake—the tranquility of time.
His lips are demanding against my own, and there’s nothing gentle about them. Ace is far from gentle. His hands are on my waist, luring me closer even though there is no space between us.
He runs his tongue along my bottom lip, asking for permission, and I let him. Pleasure darts through me as our tongues dance together in perfect sync. I don’t know how I’ve ever assumed kissing Ace would be anything less than this.
I hate that I relish it so much.
The last bit of rationality left inside me advises me to get out of this situation, but my body is glued to Ace’s. What is he doing to me? He’s breaking down all the barriers that I’ve formed to guard myself.
He pulls away. His voice low and rough. “We shouldn’t be doing this.”
“Ace,” I mumble against him, bringing his lips back to mine, not prepared for this feeling to end—not willing to accept the reality which is on the verge of crashing back.
I need more. More of him.
“Calla,” he warns, and it’s the finality of his voice that brings me back down to Earth. We’re both trying to catch our breath. “We shouldn’t. Not like this,” he says, firmer this time.
“Why does your mouth have to do that thing again, where it ruins everything?” I heave away. Ace reluctantly lets me go, and I suddenly remember exactly why this isn’t a good idea.
Baby.
We’re just friends.
I’ve never met someone who’s been able to keep my attention for long enough.
Three reasons that seep into my mind like poison. “Are you trying to flirt with me or start a fight?” he asks, irritated. He’s irritated…at me? The audacity. Don’t start this, Ace.
“Neither.” I get to my feet. My head spins, but I’m soberer than I’ve ever been. I don’t want to argue with him, and there’s the need to detach myself from the situation. How can we go from making out to the verge of an argument in less than a second?
“Where are you going?” he asks.
I ignore him and continue walking. I’m unsure of what time it is or how long I’ve been sitting out on the deck. How long was I here before he came and ruined it all? And why? Why can’t he leave me alone? Does he get a kick out of playing with my emotions?
“Calla, wait.” He catches up to me. Why am I so angry at him? But that question is not worth answering, because I already know.
