The Coincidence 06 The Resolution of Callie & Kayden (4 page)

Later that day, I return to my dorm room with a bag that’s holding what I think will be the perfect costume. I know I’m being silly, that I’m almost twenty and should not be getting excited over a silly party, but I am.

Last Halloween, Kayden and I weren’t technically boyfriend and girlfriend. Yeah, we were hanging out, but that was about it. And about a month later, around Thanksgiving, everything fell apart when Kayden beat up Caleb for what he did to me and then his father beat up him and stabbed him for getting in trouble with the police over it. It was a terrible, horrible time. I know Kayden still thinks about it a lot, even though he doesn’t talk to me about it too much. So I want the end of this year and future ones to be fun. Plain and simple fun.

After I put my bags away, I turn on my iPod, hitting random before popping my headphones on. ‘Winter Song’ by Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson clicks on, totally fitting for the storm outside. Then I get my laptop from the nightstand and plop down onto the bed.

I do a little writing for my internship, but after getting bored with it I change documents and work on one of my Advance Fiction projects for my end of the year portfolio. The theme is fiction, but Professor Gladsyman pressed that we should write about something that feels real, something that’s resting on the line between fiction and nonfiction.

Sometimes, I feel …

Yeah, that’s all I have so far. It’s not like I’m having writer’s block. Okay, well maybe I do, but it’s not only that. Writing the vague truth, that’s the hard part. But I’m not even supposed to be writing the truth, am I? Honestly, I’m kind of confused which route I’m supposed to go, especially since the professor kept making air quotes whenever he said fiction. I swear he wanted us to read his mind or something to figure out what he wanted.

Sighing, I delete my whole three words and then take up the hobby of staring at the blank, white screen and that damn blinking cursor, the one that I swear is whispering,
you better find an idea
, over and over again, not to encourage me – to torture me. Every time I try to get it to stop, the voice only grows louder and I swear to God I’m going crazy – writer crazy.

After a while, I get up and get a snack from my dresser drawer then I take out my dress – aka my costume – and admire it again, totally procrastinating.

When I’d tried the dress on in the store, I’d felt like a gothic princess. Yeah, it was of a cliché thought – well, minus the gothic part – but I welcomed it, remembering how I used to dream of being a princess and going to prom before it got squashed. After I was raped, I shut down completely, living only within myself. I chopped off my hair and only spoke to my journal for the most part, everything I was feeling pouring out through that pen. That’s what I did until I left for college, which means I convinced myself all that high school stuff was silly when really I wanted to go. Never happened.

‘It could be like prom for you,’ Seth had said when he was trying to convince me that this was indeed what I needed to wear. ‘And you could be like Cinderella and lose your glass slipper so Kayden has to find you and give it back.’

I’d been holding the dress up to myself and gazing at my reflection in the store’s mirror. ‘Seth, this is just a party. And this is definitely not a dress Cinderella would wear.’

‘Then be Callierella,’ he said with a wink. ‘Or Calliepunzel and you can lock yourself in your bedroom until Kayden begs for you to let him in.’

I had snorted a laugh. ‘Are you drunk? I mean, I know you had a margarita at lunch, but it usually takes a lot more for you to get tipsy.’

‘I’m not drunk,’ he said, snatching the dress from my hand. ‘I’m just trying to give you the fairytale you deserve.’

‘Life isn’t a fairytale,’ I replied. But in the end, I bought the dress, kind of wishing it was.

If life were a fairytale
, I think to myself as I hang the dress up in the closet,
it would be dark and twisted a lot. Then again, some of those fairytales do have a dark side, an evil villain, a wicked dilemma to get over like a curse. But I would never want to be a princess, at least the kind that waits around for a prince to save them.

I’d want to save myself. And maybe the prince as well. Maybe we could save each other together.

An idea sparkles inside my mind and I let out an excited clap and cheer. ‘Holy crap, I’ve got it!’

Right then, Harper enters the room with a bag slung over her shoulder. She gives me this weird look as she sets her things down on the dresser and her bag on the bed.
You okay?
she mouths because I have my headphones in.

I nod eagerly as I skip back to my bed. ‘Yeah, just got a really cool idea.’ Then I turn to the computer and place my fingers on the keyboard, listening to the voice inside my head that doesn’t belong to a cursor, but a character, as I type the first three words.

The Truthful Fairytale.

Working at the gym isn’t what I want to do for the rest of my life, but it gives me a cash flow. It’s loud and always has this weird smell I never notice when I’m working out but can barely breathe through when I’m working. It usually takes me at least an hour before my nostrils get used to it. Today, though, it’s giving me a headache, or maybe that’s just because I didn’t sleep very well last night. I want to lie down on the floor and go to sleep, but instead I have to stand at the front counter for four hours straight and talk to people when they need help.

My phone’s been buzzing in my pocket all day, but I can’t answer it until my break. I think it might be Callie, and it’s driving me insane because I want to talk to her, yet I don’t. After our conversation the other day about moving in, I’ve been worried about what she’ll say, afraid she’s going to ask me what my decision is and I’m going to have to tell her I have no clue. My only hope left is to maybe sort out my jumbled thoughts at my therapy appointment tomorrow.

Finally, at a little after two o’clock, I get my break. After putting on my jacket, I step out the back door and into the cold. The sky is grey and the snow is refusing to stop or melt, piling up on the roads. I wonder just how intense the winter’s going to be. Usually it doesn’t even start snowing until November, but it’s the end of October and there’s already a shitload.

My phone vibrates again and I cut across the icy parking lot toward my car as I rummage around in my pocket for it. I’m getting ready to dial Callie’s number when I see the screen and realize all the missed calls aren’t from her but from my older brother Dylan.

‘That’s fucking weird,’ I mutter, retrieving the keys from my pocket as I reach my car. Dylan and I talk about once a week, but usually if I miss his call, he doesn’t call back until a few days later. Today, however, he’s tried to call over eight times and sent one text.

Dylan: Call me ASAP.

I dial his number as I hop into my car and turn the engine on, cranking up the heater with the phone pressed to my ear.

‘Hey,’ he answers with an edge to his voice. ‘I was actually going to try to call you again.’

‘Yeah, I was at work,’ I reply, staring out the window. ‘What’s up?’

‘Nothing … well, everything.’ He hesitates then sighs. ‘It’s about Tyler.’

My heart rate quickens at the mention of my other brother’s name. ‘What happened to him?’

Dylan sighs again and it’s more weighted this time. ‘I got a call from him a few days ago, and he said he needed help, that he’s been living on the streets. I could tell he was ripped out of his mind – could barely understand half the words he said.’

‘Living on the streets where exactly?’

‘I’m not sure yet. Haven’t gotten that far with him.’ Dylan sighs for the third time and I know it’s bad. Whatever’s going on, it’s really, really bad. ‘He was actually headed up to Virginia when he called me. I guess he found out where I lived and started hitchhiking to my place. He was strung out and we’re trying to help him detox right now, but I’m not sure how well it’s going to work.’

‘Where was he hitchhiking from?’ I dare ask, wondering if it’s from wherever my parents are. And what if it is? What does that mean? That they’ll be entering Dylan’s life again, too? Will he let them?

A thousand questions race through my mind as Dylan answers, ‘I have no idea. Somewhere down south, I think, but he acts like he can’t remember.’

I grip onto the steering wheel, attempting to control the frustration stirring inside me, but I’ve never been great at controlling my emotions and I start to sweat from the anxiousness I’m feeling. ‘Or maybe he does, but he’s not saying because Mom and Dad told him not to.’

‘Yeah, I kind of wondered the same thing. Been wondering it for the few months after you got ahold of me and told me what’d been going on, but then again, Tyler is, well, Tyler. And he might just have been living on the streets so fucking high he really can’t remember where he was.’

‘Yeah, I guess so.’ Dylan’s right. Tyler could easily have just wandered in from off the streets, but part of me wants it to be the other way around, wants him to know where they are. I don’t know why, though. It’s not like I want them back in my life. I don’t even want to see them again unless it’s seeing my dad behind bars. Just like his father – my grandfather – is now.

‘I know what you’re thinking, Kayden,’ Dylan says interrupting my thoughts. ‘And you need to stop thinking about that. You need to try to let it go. Don’t worry about Mom and Dad anymore.’

‘I’m not worrying about them,’ I lie and well, too. I’ve always been good at lying, which isn’t a good thing, but it’s something I had to learn how to do at an early age when people would ask about my bruises and broken bones.

‘Well, I didn’t really mean worry. More like, letting them get to you.’

‘I’m fine. Really,’ I lie again. I don’t feel fine. I feel angry. All the time.

‘Are you still seeing your therapist?’ he asks cautiously.

‘Yeah.’ I turn down the heater. ‘Once a week, every week.’

‘Good. I think it’s good for you. I still see mine sometimes when things get bad, like the other day when I had to pick Tyler up.’ When I don’t say anything, not sure what to say, he changes the subject. ‘But anyway, I just wanted to call and let you know what’s up. We might check Tyler into a rehab if we can get him to commit, so he might be around for Thanksgiving when you come out.’

I frown. ‘Thanksgiving?’

‘Yeah, you’re coming up, right?’ he asks. ‘I mean, I thought that’s what you said.’

What I said was I’d think about it, but I still mutter, ‘Yeah, I guess.’

My lungs begin to constrict as I think about last Thanksgiving and what happened. It’d started out okay, getting to spend time with Callie, and then we’d had sex for the first time. But things got ugly from then on, a beautiful moment tainted by reality.

‘Look, I got to go. My break’s over,’ I lie to Dylan for the third time during this conversation. ‘But let me know what happens with Tyler.’

‘I will.’ He hesitates as I turn off the engine and get out of the car. ‘And Kayden, just so you know, he’s been asking about you – what you’re doing, if you’re okay. He keeps saying he wants to talk to you, but I’m not going to let him until he sobers, just to make sure he doesn’t say … well, anything that isn’t meant to be said.’ I think he might be trying to protect me, but I’m not sure since no one has ever really done that for me before, at least no one in my family. ‘And you only have to talk to him if you want to.’

I’m unsure how to respond. Dylan and I have been getting along okay, but right now he’s showing a lot of emotion directed toward me. It’s strange and unfamiliar, especially since I spent a lot of time thinking that he hated me when I was a kid, after he took off when he was eighteen and left me with our dad and mom, never so much as even calling to say where he was living. It’s something we haven’t really talked about too much either, although my therapist thinks it might be healthy for us to do so. However, I don’t want to go down that road yet – open up those old scars that are still trying to heal.

‘Okay … thanks for letting me know,’ I say awkwardly as I lock the car door then shut it because it’s too old school for a key fob.

‘Yeah, no problem,’ he replies, sounding uncomfortable himself. I hear someone say something in the background and he quickly says, ‘Oh, and Liz wants to know if you’re bringing anyone here for Thanksgiving with you.’

I want to tell him I haven’t even fully committed to coming yet, but instead say, ‘I’m not sure, but I’ll let you know soon.’

‘Okay, but just so you know, we’d love to have you and Callie here if she can come.’ He sounds like he means it.

Again, I’m a little thrown off by this weird I-care-for-you thing he’s got going. I keep my composure, though, and say goodbye before heading back to work, even though I have ten more minutes of break time. I try not to think about Tyler too much, yet I can’t help it. Because what if he really does know.

Knows where my father is.

‘Really?’ I say to Seth as I read what he just wrote on my whiteboard. Seth and I have been creating this to-do list since the beginning of freshman year when we first became friends. There’s no rule to what goes on there, it just needs to be something we think at least one of us has to try. This whiteboard version actually starts at one hundred since the list got so long we had to transfer some of them onto a piece of paper.

‘Yes, really.’ He taps the marker against number one hundred seventeen. ‘It isn’t any weirder than this one.’

‘Hey, I totally did that the other day.’ I snatch the marker from his hand and draw a line through number one hundred seventeen.

‘You’re so weird,’ he says as I put the cap of the marker back on and toss it aside.

I roll my eyes at him. ‘That’s the pot calling the kettle black.’

‘Totally,’ he agrees, his gaze drifting to the window. ‘So are you ready for this?’