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“You fucking bitch! You’re going to be a bitter old hag and alone forever.”
“I feel sorry for whatever girl you knock up and gets stuck with your pencil dick and your demon spawn. If you ever get within ten feet of me ever again, I’ll make sure every girl on this campus knows just how small the equipment you’re working with really is and how you couldn’t make a girl come with a road map.”
I turn on my heel to leave when I notice I’m still clutching the bag of sandwiches tightly in my fist.
“You’ll regret this, you slut.”
Instead of replying I chuck the bag at his head and don’t bother to see where it lands before walking through the door, though the “Oww” he cries out gives me a good hint that I was on target.
This is what I get for allowing myself to be vulnerable, for trusting someone with my darkest secret. I walk out of that dorm, head held high, tears streaming down my cheeks, and never return.
***
Standing naked in front of my full-length mirror in the early morning light, I gently run my fingers over the scars that cover my lower abdomen, right hip, and upper thigh. My scars are a physical manifestation of my metaphorical thicker skin. The battle armor I don every day without fail.
As soon as Carson fell asleep, I wiggled out from beneath his heavy limbs, careful not to wake him, and snuck back home. I didn’t want him to see my scars, at least not yet anyway. That’s why I wouldn’t let him turn the lights on last night. I’m not usually self-conscious about the web of marks that mar my body. Sure, I could tell him part of the story and not all the gory details, I’ve done it plenty of times before with random men I’ve hookedup with, but somehow it would feel like lying if I did the same thing to Carson.
I don’t know why it would feel like a betrayal to him, and frankly I’m not inclined to explore the feeling right now. Carson and I are not a possibility. Sleeping with him was a mistake. I should never have gotten entangled with a single dad, especially one that lives right next door. That was going to make the whole ghosting him thing significantly more difficult.
I force myself to look at the crisscrossing of scars on the outer edges of my wounds and slowly drag my eyes to the large, thick swatch of scar tissue over the right side of my abdomen. Because of an almost religious use of different scar minimizing creams, vitamin E, and visits to a plastic surgeon over the years, the scars are significantly lighter than the angry and puckered red they used to be. Finding a bathing suit is still a bitch though.
It’s funny. They look so small and benign yet they’re indicative of such a bigger problem. When I got into the head on car accident with a drunk driver at seventeen, everyone—paramedics, doctors, my parents—thought I was going to die. I was pinned inside the car by jagged and ripped metal running straight through my pelvis. It took them hours to extract me from the car and if it wasn’t for that metal somehow holding me together, I would have bled out long before emergency crews could have gotten to me.
Healing was a slow process but eventually the bruises faded. The bones stitched back together. My skin scarred over. The only lasting effect was that my uterus and one ovary had been practically obliterated, rendering having children an impossibility for me.
Admittedly, this wasn’t life shattering news. I knew from an early age that I didn’t want children. I have a clear memory of me at ten-years-old telling my mother I didn’t want to have kids. They were annoying, which was pretty ironic since I was one.Still, my mind had never changed, I don’t connect with children and don’t see the need to bring any more into this world.
But it didn’t matter that I had already made that decision because there’s a huge difference between not wanting children and having that choice taken away from you. So I grieved the loss of that choice, something a teenager should never have to do, but I ultimately came to terms with it.
It didn’t matter how at peace I was with it though. That same scene with my college boyfriend played out over and over again with a different lead actor every time. Of course, not every time involved cheating or a flying meatball sub. No, I learned early on to let them know my…limitations long before either of us spoke of love. There were guys who broke up with me right away, those that waited a few weeks to end it so they didn’t look like assholes, even though we both knew the unspoken reason, and the ones who thought we should be just friends… with benefits of course.
It was almost funny in a pathetic sort of way. You would think a guy in college would be happy to be able to go at it with his girlfriend like horny rabbits without having to worry about having an accident. Well, there were plenty that wanted to fuck me, but they didn’t want anything else.
Eventually, I gave it up all together. There was never going to be a man that was okay settling down with a woman who didn’t want, and almost more importantlycouldn’t,give him a family of his own. That’s when I knew that I was never meant to share my life with somebody. Some people just aren’t built that way and I’m one of them. I’ve stuck to my occasional impersonal hook-ups and have been just fine. They filled any longing for physical affection and my friends and family supplied me with all the companionship I would ever need.
The bottom line was that my life worked for me and I didn’t need some guy like Carson coming in and messing it all up. Ihated that I liked his kid, that I liked him, that it was impossible to escape him when he was so close.
I even feel a little guilty letting him believe I was on birth control last night. And I’m annoyed with myself for feeling guilty. I shouldn’t! There was no way I was going to get pregnant, I don’t need birth control for that. The end effect would be the same even if he wasn’t fully enlightened to the reason why.
No matter how much I try to tell myself differently, last night felt like a big deal. There were moments that didn’t feel like fucking. Like we had a real connection, something bigger than either of us. And that scares the shit out of me.
***
“Why does the birthday girl not have a drink in her hand?” Jenna yells to be heard over the pulsing beat of the music coming from the living room.
“I just finished my last one,” I shout back. It’s true, I’m at least three—or maybe it’s four—deep in those bright pink drinks Hollie whipped up. Fanning my face, I watch Jenna as she pours me a shot. I’m not sure if it’s the alcohol that’s making me flushed or the fact that there seems to be an inordinate amount of people squeezed in the house. Dad is going to kill me.
Dad’s house is much larger than ours and I convinced him to let me host my birthday party here this year. I promised there would be around fifty people but there’s at least twice that number crowding the rooms. Never underestimate the number of artists that will show up for free food and drinks.
“Here drink this,” she shoves the tiny glass in my hand and I don’t even bother asking what it is before I toss it back. It burns down my throat and clears my sinuses, as expected. There’s a drop on my lip and I run my tongue over them to clean it off.
Uh oh.I can’t feel my lips anymore. That means I’m well into the tipsy stage and heading straight into drunkville. Oh well, it’s my birthday and I’m safe at my dad’s house, even if the place looks like it’s been taken over by an unruly fraternity.
I wanted a sort of grown-up kids party and my friends did not disappoint. They have drinks poured into pouches like adult Capri-Suns and there are drinking games modeled after kids’ games scattered everywhere.
“Let’s go play red light/green light,” Jenna grabs my hand and drags me through the French doors into the backyard where there seems to be a spirited game going on. Apparently, if the caller catches you moving on red then you have to take a shot. I’m all over this. The current caller is swaying and looks like he’s lost a few rounds himself.
As soon as a new round starts, we all walk up to the line running across the grass. I look around and see some friends from school as well as a few coworkers from the gallery. There’s a guy at the end that looks vaguely familiar, and it takes me a second before I place him as Tyler, the guy that Violet is currently dating. I take another look around the backyard but don’t see her anywhere. Weird. Maybe she’s in the bathroom?
