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And then, in direct opposition to what he’d just said, he turned his back on me. I watched the patch on his back move as he got into the SUV idling at the curb, then it drove off.
I stood there for a long time.
Things were going well.
Which, of course, was when everything went to shit.
Sariah and I finished summer school and took a trip to Nantucket for a few days in a beach house I’d rented, reading, relaxing and pretending the rest of the world didn’t exist. Elden didn’t call.
It hadn’t rained.
I hadn’t gotten arrested again.
There was no reason for him to call.
The fall semester started, and I again loaded up on classes, taking meetings with advisors to see if I could finish even a semester early. My grades were good, great even. It was possible for me to graduate earlier, but the advisors didn’t seem to understand why since to be fully qualified as an architect I’d need three more years of further study, at least. I wasn’t thinking about that, though. It made my heart race. All I was thinking about was my birthday, the end of my teenage years, and graduating college.
I’d been so anxious to do everything my entire life. To finish junior high so I could go to high school. To graduate so I could see the world, to leave France and the French asshole to get into a college routine.
Now I couldn’t wait to get out of college so I could feel more like an adult. And yes, most of the reason for that had to do with Elden.
It meant, in my many fantasies at least, that we could become something. That we could share more than a few stolen moments, intense looks, proclamations of ownerships. Phone calls in the rain.
And me rushing college was in a way rushing toward the secret coming out, one way or another.
Because after I graduated, I’d have to make choices. Even if I didn’t study at Brown for another three years. The plan had always been New York, maybe even London, to start interning at an architecture firm, work my way up. Travel. Get an apartment, live a fast-paced life, lightyears away from the kind of life I’d grown up in.
That plan had always been firm. I’d fantasized about it millions of times to the point I knew the color of my sofa in my small but chic apartment. Either in a Brownstone in New York or some old brick house in Notting Hill.
I hadn’t accounted for life getting in the way. For my feelings to change. Goals to change. Hadn’t accounted for my fantasies to change into a quieter, warmer vision of life that felt more like me.
I was struggling between two different futures. One that I’d wanted before I could remember—one I wasn’t sure I wanted for the right reasons because I’d just wanted anything that hadn’t been my mother’s life. And one that had changed because of a man. Something I promised myself I’d never do was warp my future so it fit around a man. Cut away pieces of myself so I was smaller, more malleable. Even though I know Elden didn’t want that for me. He was keeping away partly because Swiss might very well kill him but also because he believed I deserved better.
In short, I was a mess.
I was also operating off far too much caffeine and nowhere near enough sleep. At least that problem was not unique to me. Everyone at this school and everyone in our household was dealing with that.
When my phone rang, my stomach dipped. It wasn’t raining, so it still could be him. Although he could’ve been calling to declare that he couldn’t live without me, that he was abandoning all of his noble intentions. That we’d ride off into the sunset.
But it wasn’t Elden, it was my mother. I wasn’t disappointed, or at least I shouldn’t have been. Ilikedtalking to my mother. She was animated, passionate about her life. She was funny... I hadn’t known that my mother was funny. Hadn’t known my mother was not a Stepford robot. I was getting to know her as a complete person. Beyond that, she was due soon. Her life was blooming.
“Mom,” I greeted warmly. “How are you? Is Swiss still sitting at the bar of the restaurant, glaring at everyone so they don’t come in and make you cook?”
My stepfather was somewhat protective over my mom. Now that she was pregnant, it was an entirely new level. Mom was determined to work in the kitchen of the restaurant right up until her due date. Swiss was determined to make sure that there were no patrons in the restaurant for her to cook for.
I almost spoke again to see if she was still on the line when she didn’t respond for several long moments.
“Sweetie, I think you should come home,” my mother said in a gentle tone that chilled my blood. One I’d only heard once before. When she was preparing to tell me my father was an abusive piece of shit who almost killed her. It was a tone used before bad news. Before earth shattering news.
My back straightened. “What happened? Is it the baby? Did Swiss get into an accident?” My mind ran through all the possible terrible things that could’ve happened, which were many when your stepfather was a member of an outlaw motorcycle club who likely broke the law and put himself in danger on a daily basis.
But I’d never worried about such things until that very moment, until I was confronted with the perils of that life encompassed in my mother’s tone.
I’d never worried, not once, because I’d seen the way Swiss looked at my mother. With a love that seemed to soften the air around her. But also with a ferocity that made me believe that he would defeat anything and anyone who dared try to take him from the things he loved.
It hit me just then that I’d truly believed my stepfather could and would defeat death … law enforcement, natural disasters and everything in between.
But no one, not even someone as badass as Swiss, was immune to reality.
