AllFreeNovel
Share Us
* * *
When I opened my eyes the room was dark and streetlights from outside provided the only light. Shadows of trees were reflected off the white walls and the overall mood of my bedroom was eerie and hushed. The alarm clock read three AM. Suppressing my hunger pains wasn’t working any longer but the thought of eating made me feel worse.
I made my way downstairs and plodded to the kitchen. The coffee pot was still on, its bright red on/off button a beacon to the other side of the room. I poured a cup of the black tar and sat at the island, sipping the worst kind of liquid for a pity party. The microwave clock educated me to the fact that I had managed to get through four more minutes of my sad life.
I scrolled for Bo’s text history. Every third or fourth text was a simpleI love you. I touched the box to type a message, wondering what you said to a person you’d essentially ignored and then told to stay out of your family business.“I’m sorry. I guess I didn’t deserve you,”I added to the text train and set the phone down, waiting, and waiting, until the screen went black from inactivity.
I was correct in what I texted. I didn’t deserve Bo, and subconsciously I probably knew I didn’t. Why else would I have been so detached from the role I should have played in our love. That didn’t change the fact that I wanted him, missed him, and loved him in a way I’d never experienced. The sad truth was I didn’t think I could really change and he deserved better.
I tapped the screen desperately hoping that perhaps he’d responded. He hadn’t. I dumped the coffee in the sink, ignoring my stomach, and managed to make it to the sofa where I collapsed and chose a world where worries disappeared. Sleep.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE: Bo
The July sun beat down on me as I made my way to the third buoy. I was shirtless and the sun felt good against my bare skin as it rejuvenated my tan. I hooked the buoy and pulled it alongside the boat, attaching it to the winch and waited for the trap. Tourists had returned to the Low Country after tropical storm Maria cleanup so business was good for Marcus at the Crab King. As a result, he was buying all the lobster and crab I could pull.
“Six, seven and eight,” I mumbled, tossing two smaller lobsters back. “I’ll get you in a few years, buddies,” I added.
Getting back to my routine hadn’t taken long, and talking to myself was part of the deal when you lived, worked, and slept alone. I stared east across the water toward Charleston. A place I couldn’t see from there, but still I wondered. I reminisced and longed for the man who lived there, but the yearning still hadn’t convinced me to respond to the numerous calls and texts from Hayes.
Three weeks post Hayes, the hurt wasn’t fading fast enough. I kept telling myself that I was arip the Band-Aid offkinda guy. Maybe I was, maybe I wasn’t. Sure, I put my time in to heal from the hurt. The only way to the other side of pain was through the path I had traveled before. But my love felt like a skin I couldn’t quite shed. You can pick at it, and you can rub the wounds, but the thin veneer of hurt was always just slightly deeper than you could scratch.
I had recurring fantasies where I showed up at his house and put him over my shoulder, carrying him out kicking and screaming; hoping that after he came home with me he’d remember the Hayes who loved me at the shack. I imagined that he’d shed his clothes and his anxiety, just like he’d done for the five weeks he had amnesia. I selfishly thought that maybe if he’d remembered the happy, carefree man we could have succeeded. Those were the thoughts of a man who was lonely yet again and wishing for the impossible.
After an hour on the open ocean, I began the trip into the hot and humid Beaufort to sell my catch. Even with the wind on my bare flesh, I perspired and drained another two bottles of water out of the six stashed in my cooler. July and August were brutal in the south and after the storm the weather was intent on setting heat records. I’d spoiled myself when I got back to town two weeks prior and ordered a box air conditioner that I could roll around the shack. I set it at the foot of my bed and had a fan behind it to blow cool air on me throughout the night. I thought of Hayes and how he would’ve praised my damn near genius with my set-up. I smiled at the memory of his sense of humor, my first hint that heartache had an expiration date.
I chatted with Marcus until Jamie showed up for his shift. Marcus quickly made an excuse to exit after catching Jamie’s head nod toward the backdoor. I’d managed to avoid Jamie since I returned to Beaufort but today I’d lingered too long due to my conversation with Marcus.
“Got a sec?” Jamie asked as I made a move to hightail it out of there.
“Not today,” I answered, lifting my cooler from the gravel and turning to leave.
“I quit school, Bo,” he announced, freezing me in place. “I’m staying in town from now on.”
I didn’t turn around. “Sorry to hear that, Jamie,” I admitted truthfully. “Hope the decision is a good one for you.”
“I was just running away, Bo,” he confessed. “There’s nothing out there for me without you and I’ve blown things between us, so it is what is.”
“Sounds like you’re trying to move on. Good for you,” I said, not trying to be nasty. I hoped my delivery conveyed that sentiment.
He stepped in front of me, laying his hand on the cooler to get me to set it down. “I wanna say something to you, Bo.”
“Whatever you have to say will fall on deaf ears, Jamie, so why don’t we both just save it and move on.” Even with my effort to be kind, I knew my words were harsher than intended.
He managed to wrestle the cooler away from me and set it aside. “I just need one minute and I promise I will never bother you again. Can you at least give me that?” he asked.
I nodded but turned away from him.
“Bo, come on. Please look at me.”
“Okay,” I said, begrudgingly turning toward him. “You got one minute, Jamie.”
Jamie stared directly into my eyes for a few seconds. I returned his gaze and thought about the distance between us now. I had loved him with all my heart from when we were kids and up until he left me, and here we were unable to be civil with one another.
“I’m sorry for the cruel way I treated you, Bo. I was an eighteen-year-old punk and I was afraid of who we were to each other then,” he began. “Truth is, I ran away from you and the promises I made because I’m a fucking coward. As things turned out, nobody gave a shit about what we were to each other. Maybe I should have cared more about us than what others might be thinking about us, huh?”
I nodded but didn’t interrupt him.
“I’m not expecting forgiveness from you but I wanted you to know I take responsibility for my behavior.”
