Bitter End (21 page)

It had finally started to get cold in the evenings, and I was wishing I’d brought a hoodie with me. The breeze seemed to whip
right through my polo, and before I even sat down I was shivering.

Georgia set the mugs on a table and pulled out a chair—
the same one Bethany had been sitting in on the day we first saw Cole here. Georgia used her hand to wipe off a couple of
stray leaves, then moved around to the other side, did the same, and sat down.

“Whoo, winter’s gonna be here before we know it,” she said, picking up her mug and blowing across the top. I thought maybe
I could see steam float away when she did that, but probably that was just me feeling cold and thinking it was colder than
it was.

“Feels like it’s already here,” I said, easing down into the chair and wrapping both hands around my mug. “Thanks for the
hot chocolate.”

She waved me away. “Lily loves the winter,” she said, looking out over the highway at the rush-hour cars lined up at the stoplights,
their headlights lit and their windows dark. “But, oh, it’s such a pain, trying to get her from place to place in all that
snow and slush and ice in a wheelchair. I’m not ready for it already.”

“How’s Lily doing in school?” I asked.

Georgia smiled. “Aw, she loves it this year. Has a great teacher. Just great.” She was silent for a moment, sipping her hot
chocolate. I followed her lead and took a drink of mine, too, and was instantly warmed. The shivering died down a little,
and I took another.

“You know,” Georgia said at last, “one thing about winter is you can hide a whole lot of flaws with all those big, bulky clothes.”

I stopped in midsip and looked at her over the top of my
mug. She was still staring out over the highway, her forefinger wrapped in the handle of her mug.

Without thinking, I set my mug down and rested my hands in my lap. “Uh-huh.” My voice was quiet and uncertain.

Finally she snapped out of her highway trance and leaned back in the chair, patting her neck. “I can wear turtlenecks and
hide this damn turkey gobbler I’ve got going on.”

I giggled. “You don’t have a turkey gobbler,” I said, even though, now that she said it, I could totally see that she did.

“Girl, just you wait. You’re beautiful now, but eventually you’ll turn forty, and next thing you know you’ll be gobbling and
hiding behind the couch come Thanksgiving.”

We laughed, and I sipped my hot chocolate again, picturing Georgia with a big set of tail feathers.

“Just make sure,” she said, interrupting my thoughts with a very serious tone, “that you’re not hiding things that shouldn’t
be hidden.”

The giggles rushed up on one another and died right there in my throat—a stagnant stockpile that created a lump so huge I
thought for sure Georgia could see it on the outside.

“I don’t know what…” I said, my voice sounding all strangly coming around that lump. “Like what?”

She reached over and grabbed my hand, which I’d absentmindedly rested on the table again. My wrist actually didn’t look bruised
under the concealer in the dark. It looked like a perfectly normal wrist, and had it not been for the
way her eyes looked liquid and searching, I might have denied that anything was there. Instead, I just swallowed.

“Is he hurting you?” she said, her voice low and urgent.

And once again I had this thought that I’d finally been given my chance to come clean about what had happened between Cole
and me. I finally had my chance to talk about it. To get my advice. To cry because I still loved him and was worried that
he was so mad he’d never come back. And cry even harder because I knew how that made me sound and I so didn’t want to be that
girl, the one everyone pities because she is too stupid to stop loving an abuser.

But once again, saying those things felt like trouble. I knew that I was going to work harder than hell to keep this from
ever happening again. And if I spilled it all out now, then when he came around, everyone would hate him and I’d lose him
for sure. The lump surged forward—pulsating and begging to be let out—but I couldn’t break it loose. I had to keep it down
in there, undulating and safe.

I shook my head.

She closed her eyes briefly and took a deep breath. “You sure?” she asked. “Because that doesn’t look like a door slam to
me. That looks like fingerprints.”

Once again, my wrist felt as if it were on fire, only this time the fire spread up my arm and into my face, and I was sure
if I opened my mouth again, everything would spill out of me in a rush. I pulled my hand out of hers and stood up, the backs
of my knees pushing the chair back on the patio with a loud grating sound.

“I’ve gotta go,” I said. And before Georgia could so much as argue, I bolted back through the restaurant and out the doors
I had come in through at the beginning of the day.

I was digging through my purse for my keys and concentrating so hard on getting out fast, before Georgia could come after
me. I was almost all the way to my car before I saw Cole leaning against it.

In an instant, my fingers went numb and I dropped my keys on the ground. I bent over to pick them up, my heart beating so
hard it felt as if it was going to pop right out of the top of my head. I was hit with a rush of emotions—so many of them,
I wasn’t sure what I was feeling at all.

“Hey,” he said, pushing off from the side of the car as I stepped down off the sidewalk. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

“I had a meeting with my manager,” I said, stopping a good distance from him. I tried to pull off cool and uninterested, but
I was certain he could see my chest heaving in and out under the force of my heartbeat.

“I know,” he said. “I saw you.”

Are you spying on me now?
my mind echoed from our earlier argument, but I shooed the thought away. There was only one way in and out of The Bread Bowl
employee parking lot, and that required you to drive past the store. He probably just drove past us when he got here.

Unsure of what to do next, I took an awkward step toward the driver’s side door, punching the unlock button on my key. The
blinkers flashed yellow against his forehead,
making it look like the edges of my bruises. Again I pushed those thoughts away and tried, with whatever faltering grip I
had left, to hold on to my take-you-or-leave-you attitude.

But finally, the leather of his jacket creaking, he moved forward, cupping my cheeks with his hands.

“Alex,” he breathed, then pulled me into a hug. I tried not to react—to just stay stiff—but I could feel myself thawing. I
couldn’t get that hug from Georgia. I couldn’t get it from anyone. Not Bethany or Zack or even my dad. But I could get it
from Cole. And it didn’t matter what he’d done—being enveloped felt so good, no matter who was giving it out.

I leaned into him. My body felt hungry up against his, and for the briefest second I could imagine that nothing had ever happened
and that everything was good now. Everything was perfect. Even though I knew it wasn’t.

He pulled away, his hands sliding down my arms. He stopped at my hands and pulled them up, turning them over to inspect my
wrists. He stared at them, dropping my good hand and tracing my hurt wrist softly with his forefinger. He lifted it and kissed
it, gently, tenderly, once, twice, three times.

“My Emily Dickinson,” he whispered, and when he searched my face with his again, I could see sorrow in it, just like before
at the lake. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “My Alex, I’m so, so sorry.”

I pulled my arms away from him and stepped back. “You should be,” I said, my voice ragged. “You just assumed
I was screwing around on you. You didn’t even let me explain.”

He reached for me again, but again I stepped back, determined to let him know how I felt about everything that had happened.
“I’m sorry,” he said again. “I should have… you’re right… it’s just… God!” he turned and kicked the wall of The Bread Bowl,
cramming his hands into his jacket pockets. “It’s just my parents. Brenda’s put herself in the hospital again. And my dad…
you’d think the whole freaking world was basketball. And you told me you weren’t going to let Zack touch you anymore. I just…
I can’t deal, Alex.” He lurched toward me, grabbing my arms and pulling me into him. I could feel his frustration running
tight through his body. He wrapped himself around me, burying his face in my neck. “You understand,” he said. I could feel
his breath on my neck, giving me goose bumps. “I know you understand. You’re the only one who does. Please forgive me, Alex.
Please. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Tears—of relief, sadness, understanding—started falling down my face, wetting both of our cheeks as they brushed together.
“I swear to you, I’ll never hurt you again,” he said into my hair. And then he turned me so that my back was against the car,
and he kissed me like I’d never been kissed before, his hands rushing all over me, like he was assessing that all the parts
were present and accounted for, unbroken, undamaged.

After a long time, he pulled back. He ran his hands through his hair, then wiped them across his messy face,
which was covered with streaks of my mascara. He used his thumb to wipe my cheeks, so gently I could barely feel them against
my skin.

“I’ll never hurt you again,” he whispered, and I believed him.

This was nothing, I convinced myself. I could fix it. We could fix it together.

I was so glad I’d rushed out of The Bread Bowl before I told Georgia the truth.

I would tell nobody. What had happened would be our secret. He and I would share it alone. Another reason that he and I had
to stay together. We already shared so much. This was just another piece of us that we—and only we—owned.

I could feel my body relaxing as he pulled me tighter against him, as if he were holding on to a life preserver, whispering
and dropping kisses into the hairs at the nape of my neck. And more than anything, I was glad that I hadn’t told anyone what
had happened between us.

An hour later—my lips numb and sore from all the kissing, my eyes tired from all the crying—I knew I’d done the right thing
by keeping this a secret. I was all Cole had. I understood him. And we would work through this together. I didn’t feel guilty
at all for leaving Georgia sitting on the patio alone.

It’s just… I didn’t expect her to still be sitting there when I drove by on my way home, her eyes on Cole’s car following
behind me.

I was still carrying the coffee that Cole had brought when he picked me up for school, and I almost spilled it on him when
Bethany bounded up to me.

“Guess what?” she said, practically bubbling over. “Guess what?”

“What?” I said, jerking my arm away from her flailing hands to save my coffee.

“Watch it,” Cole snapped, pulling back, like he was being hit by a scalding tidal wave or something. Funny how Bethany’s presence
could wind Cole tight like that. Just minutes ago he’d been standing at my door, grinning over a steaming coffee, kissing
me after I sipped it, smacking his lips and saying,
Mmm, sweet! And the coffee’s tasty, too!
and making me giggle. He’d just been joking with me in the car, squeezing my knee and putting my name into dirty limericks,
making plans for all the things we’d do
together over Christmas break. And now he was snapping at us like he’d woken up on the wrong side of the Earth this morning.

But his mood was going to do nothing to squelch Bethany’s. “Zack got the lead in
The Moon for Me and You
!” she squealed. “Total upset. Mickey Hankins thought he had it in the bag. Mickey’s, like, freaking out right now. Nurse’s
office, crying. Swear to God.”

Mickey Hankins had good reason to think he’d get the lead in the musical. After all, he’d had the lead in All Things Theatrical
since he was in the womb. But Zack had worked really hard over the summer at drama camp and had even taken private voice lessons
from a college student, some girl he called Big Boobs Belinda. He was gunning to go out his senior year as a lead instead
of chorus drone in just one production, and he was definitely out for Mickey Hankins’s head.

In my opinion, Mickey never stood a chance. Zack had gotten amazingly good.

“Oh my God, I can’t believe I forgot about tryouts last week. That’s awesome!” I squealed. “Where is he?”

“Outside,” she said, looking toward the double doors. “He wanted to call his mom and tell her. She was dying to know.”

I turned to Cole, who was still scowling at my coffee. “Did you hear that?” I said excitedly, pulling on his arm. He’d acted
so sorry in the couple weeks since the wrist incident. I was hoping he’d make another try at getting along
with Zack. Or that he could at least pretend, for my sake. “Come on, let’s go outside and congratulate him. He’s gotta be
so stoked.”

“Pass,” Cole said, pulling his arm out of my grasp.

I tried to ignore the look that flitted over Bethany’s face. I was pretty sure she’d passed the stage of being afraid to dislike
Cole in front of me. And I was pretty sure I couldn’t blame her. Not that any of them seemed to care what kind of awkward
position their little feud put me in every day.

Bethany continued. “We’re going to celebrate after school at El Manuel’s. Come with. All-you-can-eat salsa, extra hot, and
virgin piña coladas, extra yum…”

“Okay. Yeah. Of course,” I said. “I’m off tonight. We’ll be there.”

“No,” Cole said next to me. “No,
we
won’t.”

“Cole,” I said, turning and looping my arms through his. “Can’t you try? Just this once? For me?” I batted my eyes, trying
to make him laugh like he’d just been doing in the car.

He sighed and kissed me on the nose. “I can’t,” he said. “Basketball practice, remember?”

“Oh,” I breathed. “I forgot about practice.” I turned to Bethany. “I promised I’d come watch.” Bethany visibly wilted, and
I let out a deep sigh. “Cole… I mean, it’s just practice, right? And Zack’s worked really hard for this all summer. I’ll leave
Manuel’s early and catch the end of basketball, okay? I’ll do both.”