In spite of the thing in my guts that reacts to his absence like a lost limb, the gesture of covering me with his sleeping bag makes me sour. It feels like he was putting his goddamn mark on me without my permission after I made it clear that there is nothing between us.
I sit up too quickly, and the van rocks.
The air inside is thick, and the windows are dripping with condensation.
I sniff, and all I can smell is Carey.
I shimmy to the end of the mattress and crack the window.
My reflection in the round mirror on the backsplash behind the passenger's seat proves that I look just as shitty as I feel. My hair is a wreck with tufts of blond and black sticking up at every angle. My eyes are puffy, my jaw is covered in sandpaper stubble, and my lips are cracked and grey like I’ve been gnawing on them.
Still in my sweatsuit from last night, I pull my duffle bag out from where it's tucked under the edge of the bed. Before going any further, I open the cupboards beneath the sink to make sure Carey restocked the water. Thankfully the twenty gallon tub isfull, and there’s a brand new five gallon bottle hooked up to the filter tap.
I brush my teeth, the coldness of the water making my whole mouth sting. I wish I’d just bit the bullet and splurged on the hot water heater, but living out of this thing was never really the plan. I carry on, doing the best I can with frigid water and a washcloth, then change into a new hoodie and sweatpants.
My boots are still where I left them, and stepping into them grounds me, but in the kind of way that replays countless other awkward morning routines in uncomfortable places after reckless nights. Motels, random couches, back seats. Eden, myself, and faceless women crammed into a double bed more times than I can count.
I grit my teeth, grab my coat, and exit the van.
The cold out here is like a tyrant, slapping the remaining sleep right off my face.
After zipping my jacket the whole way, I pull the hood of my sweatshirt up over my head and look for signs of Carey. After noting his surfboard is gone and his bag has been rummaged through, I find the rest of the camp is exactly how we left it last night. There is a fresh fire in the pit and the flames look so inviting I want to collapse into one of the camping chairs beside the warmth so badly, but that’s not what I need.
I need to walk.
I need to clear my mind.
Marching past the firepit, I head right along the beach, keeping the tree line close to my side.
The roar of The Pacific is like thunder.
The thunder of that night.
I can't escape it.
It just keeps going round, and round, and round.
I’m at least one-hundred yards from the shore but I can hear every time the high-tide waves crash into the boulders in thesurf. I really wish Carey wasn't out there right now. It's too dangerous, too cold. He should be by the fire keeping warm.
I look down at my right hand, flexing it, watching the skin around my scar stretch and release before turning it over to look at the palm. It’s worse there, more discolored. I can’t remember how many stitches it took but I know it was months before I got all the feeling back in my fingers.
I think about Jintae, and pull out my phone to text him like I do every morning. It’s never much, just a reminder that I’m thinking about him and here if he needs me. Not that he’s ever replied. Not even once in a month. I know he’s running, and I can’t blame him for that. I’d run too if I could. But today, even my memories of him are stabbing at me. I can’t stop thinking about how round his face was when he was little, how cute his dimples were, and how he used to cling onto my hand when he was scared.
There’s no excuse for what I’m doing to Eden. There’s no clever justification. It’s plain and simple, Carey is off limits—the kind that’s never spoken of but always known—and I keep letting him in.
I’m not just a bad friend, I’m a traitor.
I shiver, but don’t stop moving.
I want to scream into the wind, anything I can do to rid myself of the excessive need I have for him. But I keep my head down, watching my boots on the rocks, never venturing close to the water until my calves are burning, the wind is hurting my throat, and I’ve reached the beach’s dead end where the cliffs are too sheer to climb so I just stare out at the ocean's silver and violent surf.
Closing my eyes, I let the wind batter me. I imagine it tearing off layers of skin, muscle, and bone until there’s nothing left but my good intentions. I imagine the waves coming up to claim me, dragging me under and out of my misery… It doesn’t work.When I open my eyes I’m still here, still me, still the same idiot who let a pretty smile and a smart mouth undo a decade of self-control, and now I’m the villain in someone else’s story.
I find a small alcove in the rocks and lean against them as I call Eden because I have to hear in his voice that he’s pissed at everything else in the world andnotme.
It rings out, because, of course it does. This is Eden van der Hart we’re talking about.
I call again, and this time on the fourth ring I get a begrudging; “What?”
