“I don’t know what to feel now, Trey. I’m angry and I’m upset that I’m angry, but I can’t help it, it’s still there inside me, and I don’t know how to dislodge it.”
“What I did was wrong, whether I remember it or not. I hurt you, Harper. And you have a right to feel what you feel. Four years is too long to have to hold on to that.”
“It is.” I felt the tension in my body loosen. “I should have cometo see you and talk to you instead of hiding and licking my wounds, but I was so ashamed…”
“Then talk to me now.” I shook my head. I was exhausted. “I don’t mean just about that night. What I’m trying to say is…you can be angry if you need to, but give me a chance to fix it. Give me time. Don’t push me away. Let me have a chance.” He smiled. And I did, too. It was impossible not to when he looked at me that way. But it was a weak smile, a broken one. “Give us a chance to be friends.”
“The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.”
—William Shakespeare,The Merchant of Venice
13
Everything Was Smoke
The next morning, I felt sick. The events of the previous days had taken their toll on me, and my body was protesting the emotional and physical burden I’d subjected it to. My mind was so exhausted that if I closed my eyes, I could almost see my neurons on the point of short-circuiting.
I didn’t know what to feel, what to think, what to do about the situation. I didn’t know if that heaviness I felt was sorrow, anger, something else, or all those things together.
Luckily, we had electricity now, and when I jumped out of bed, my absolute first priority was to take a long, hot bath.
I opened the tap, and the tub started to fill. The wind had softened, the rain now a meek drizzle. The sky was clear apart from a thin veil of clouds pierced in places by the sun. At last, the storm was lifting.
I submerged myself in the hot water. I don’t know how long I stayed there, lost, my head bursting with thoughts I couldn’t get rid of or let go. I kept thinking the same things over and over, analyzing them from every possible point of view, but instead of coming to any conclusion, my uncertainty only grew.
Filling my lungs with air, I sank my head underwater. Beneath the surface, I could hear my mind more clearly.
I was thinking about my future, my expectations, trying to figure out what to do with my life. I couldn’t make any decisions. Couldn’t step back or move forward. I was hiding in a cell of my own creation.
Smoke—everything around me was like smoke. Impossible to breathe. But as I opened my eyes under the warm water, it started to clear away. And I felt my facade cracking. There was a truth there that I couldn’t ignore. I’d always cared about what others thought of me, even if I pretended otherwise. And that desperate need for acceptance was what made decisions so hard for me.
Even when I rebelled against my father, choosing to study literature, I didn’t do it for myself alone. No, I was thinking of my mother and how much she would have liked for me to follow in her footsteps. And when I focused all my energies on being the best student, it wasn’t for me, it was to show everyone else that I could do it.
All those faceless people I let control my life because…
Because why?
I didn’t dare think of the real reasons I’d slept with Trey that night. What I was trying to show, and to whom. The resentment I felt now. The forgiveness I was incapable of offering him.
I was scared to know. To see how deep my errors ran, to have to try to accept them. And yet, if I couldn’t do that, how could I accept others’ mistakes?
How could I forgive Trey?
I went back to my room wrapped in a towel. I took a clean pair of shorts and a not-too-wrinkled T-shirt out of the closet and dressed.
Trey was in the living room, sitting at the table with his laptop open and piles of paper, pencils, markers, and rulers. He looked up. I couldn’t help but stare at the glasses on the tip of his nose. They looked good.
“Hey.”
“Hey.” He smiled. “There’s coffee. You want some?”
I went to the kitchen and poured myself a cup. I made him one, too, and took it back out there. I guess it was intended to be some kind of peace offering. An open door inviting him to try to be friends, the way he had asked me the night before.
