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“What are you doing?” I ask, sitting up and watching as he walks through the kitchen to the sink.
“This shit has got to stop, Dane.” He pours the bottle down the drain.
I run over to him, needing to stop him. That’s the only thing that makes the pain go away. It numbs that overwhelming feeling of my heart breaking. “Stop!” I reach for the bottle. But once it’s emptied, he throws it down in the sink, and the empty bottle shatters.
He grabs me by the shirt and pushes me against the wall. “You will get the fuck up, shower, and go to fucking work. The world won’t stop just for you. Get your shit together.”
I shove against him and stalk back to the living room. “Fuck you! You don’t know shit about what I’m going through. You got to marry the love of your life. She didn’t fucking leave you.”
“No? You don’t think she left me? She left me with two kids I had no idea how to raise. I don’t know what you’re going through?” He lets a small laugh fall from his lips as he shakes his head. “The world didn’t stop for me, and it won’t stop for you. She’s just a girl, Dane, not your life. You will survive this. You just have to try.”
I fall back onto the couch “How’d you do it? What got you through?” Tears sting my eyes, but I refuse to let them fall. How did she get so much power over me?
He sits down beside me. “I had a good week of binge drinking, quite like you’re doing now. Then one day, I realized this isn’t the way I want to live my life. I needed to be a man, raise my children, and do right until I can join her.”
“I won’t get to join her. She’s gone.”
He nods his head, understanding that the love of my life didn’t die, she willingly left me. “I know it’s quite different, but that doesn’t mean you can roll over and die. You live your life.”
“She was my life, Dad. I did everything for her.”
“And whether you realize it or not, what she did, she did for you.”
I practically snort and roll my eyes. “That’s bullshit.”
He levels his eyes on me. “She believes in you. She put your wellbeing before her own.”
“Do I look like I’m doing better without her?”
“You should be taking every opportunity you can get. How many chances do you think you’ll get in a lifetime, Son? She knows what you could become, and she took herself out of the equation because you couldn’t see past her.”
I look over at him. “How do you even know this?”
“I just know. I know I’ve been wrong, but I’ve also been right. Don’t look at this like a punishment. Look at it like a chance you never thought you’d get.” He stands and walks over to the door. With his hand on the knob, he turns to face me. “You’ve had your time. Tomorrow, it’s time to come back to work. And you better be sober and not hungover.”
I don’t reply as he walks out, closing the door quietly behind him.
I know my dad’s probably right. He’s always right. I know I have to get up, dust myself off, and live my life without my heart. But one more night of self-loathing will be fine. I’ll go to work tomorrow. I’ll continue living. But music, that’s done for me. No more band. No more chances. That isn’t something I want without Alissa.
* * *
Days turn to weeks,and weeks turn to months. I still haven’t seen her. I do what I promised my dad I would: I get up and go to work. Nothing more.
Every day after work, I come home and lie on the couch while drinking myself to sleep. She hasn’t come back for me, even though I’m not on tour or with my band that managed to get a record deal without me. Someone new sings and plays with them in my place now. I haven’t heard from them since.
For several weeks now, I’ve been getting these random phone calls. When I answer, nobody’s on the other end. Just silence. It’s her. I know it. I hear her breathing. I beg her to come back every time. But she never answers. She never says anything. Each and every time she hangs up on me, I feel the weight of her decision all over again. The sound of her breathing is something I know like the back of my hand. I’ve spent too many nights holding her against me, listening to her breathe, letting it lull me into a deep sleep. I know it’s her.
When I pick up the phone, I talk to the silent presence on the other end. It’s the only connection I have left to her. I tell her that I didn’t go on tour when Busted Lip showed up. I tell her my band got signed without me. I tell her that I’m doing nothing but waiting for her to return. Because it all means nothing without her. I tell her I still love her, and I understand why she left. But none of it makes a difference.
I haven’t seen Sean either. I don’t go back to finish high school. I decide to skip my senior year and work full-time at the bar. I feel lost. Like I’m floating through life, waiting for her to come back. Or waiting to die. I don’t even care which anymore. Life isn’t worth living without her.
I’m alone almost all the time, and the depression is getting harder and harder to crawl out of. So is the bottle of Jack that’s almost permanently attached to my hand.
I drink more than I ever have before, and I almost always have a cigarette burning.
I drink to forget.
I drink to remember.
