You Make Me (5 page)

“You don’t get to save seats,” he said mildly, not looking like he cared as he adjusted his knit cap. He wiggled one of his incisors like a six year old with a loose tooth.

“What are you doing?” I asked despite my better judgment.

“I have a loose tooth. Puck to the mouth in practice.”

The perils of hockey. “So leave it alone. You’ll make it worse.” My phone buzzed in my pocket.

When I pulled it out I saw that Ethan had texted asking me to come meet him down by the concession stand.
Got something for you
.

That was exciting. Ethan was good at gift giving. I pictured a cupcake or a flower. I stood up and shoved past Ryan. “Take my seat. I’m going to meet Ethan for a minute.”

“You’re going to make out under the bleachers, aren’t you?” Carl asked.

“What are we, fifteen?” Aubrey said. “They’re not going to make out.” She gave me a look. “Are you?”

“Of course not.” Making out in public was not my thing.

Ryan slid down into my seat as I made it to the steps.

“Oh, thank God,” Aubrey breathed. “I can’t feel my legs.”

“Be right back.” I trotted down the stairs and picked my way across the stands and on down to the concession area. I saw Ethan in his nylon jacket pacing in front of the hot dog line.

“Hey,” I said, giving him a smile.

He didn’t smile back. He took my hand and pulled me to the side of the building, away from everyone standing in line.

My stomach clenched. “What’s wrong?”

He pulled a plastic drugstore bag out of his jacket and handed it to me. “Here, put this in your pocket.”

“What is it?” I took it and stared down at it. There was a small box inside the bag from what I could tell.

Leaning in right next to my ear, he murmured, “Emergency contraceptive pill. Go in the restroom and take it. That way we know it’s fine.”

I shoved it inside my jacket immediately, afraid someone had seen, even though it was impossible to tell what it was through the plastic. My face went hot. “Do you think I need to do that? You didn’t…” Why the hell could I never say ‘come’ out loud? But I wasn’t Aubrey. I couldn’t talk about sex casually.

“Chances are less. But there is sperm in pre-cum. It’s a possibility.”

Awkward.

But then Ethan tucked my hair behind my hair. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I drank too much but that’s no excuse. I think it’s better to take the pill and not have to stress about it, and I promise that will never happen again.”

I couldn’t fault him for that. He had stopped as soon as I had asked and I knew why he’d been so aggressive. And now, true to form, Ethan was trying to make up for it. He was looking out for me.

“Okay,” I said, giving him a quick kiss. “Maybe I should look into better birth control.”

“Only if you want to. I don’t want you doing anything you’re not comfortable with. I can control myself better.”

See? Perfect.

I went in the restroom and I took the pill.

After the game and dinner, Ethan walked me back to the sorority house. We were holding hands and despite all my advice to Aubrey, I was shivering slightly. With the sun down, it was windy and brisk.

“Am I coming in?” Ethan asked as we hovered on the sidewalk in front of the house.

I knew what he was asking. Were we having sex. Was he staying over. But my headache was back and I was feeling emotionally overloaded. I just wanted to crawl into bed wearing fleece pants and sleep. I couldn’t have sex with him. I just really couldn’t. “Actually, that pill gave me cramps,” I said. “I don’t feel all that great. Do you mind if I just go to bed?”

“Of course not.” He put his hand on my stomach and massaged me through my coat. “I’m sorry. Take some ibuprofen and get some sleep.”

“Thanks.” I took a step back and as I did I saw movement behind Ethan, on the side of the house.

A figure stepped out behind the bushes and I jerked a little as I realized it was Heath. I’d recognize that posture, that walk, anywhere. I knew his expressions, his gestures, his movements, as well as my own.

But before I could say anything, like WTF, he put his finger to his lips in the universal request for silence. Then he shook his head.

So he didn’t want Ethan to know he was there. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that, but to buy myself time, I pulled Ethan in for a hug, opening my eyes wide at Heath over Ethan’s shoulder to try to indicate I had no idea what he wanted.

He held up a piece of paper, folded into a small square and tossed it under the nearest bush. Then he gave me a smile and retreated backward into the dark.

“Let’s get you inside.” Ethan led me up the walk. At the front door to the house, he gave me a kiss on the forehead. “Nite, baby.”

“Goodnight.” I opened the door and went inside. I waited. And waited. There were a couple of girls in the lounge and they glanced over at me and waved. I waved back.

I patted my coat. “Crap, I think I dropped my phone,” I lied.

“Ugh, that sucks,” Janice said in sympathy.

Opening the door cautiously, I checked to see if Ethan was gone. He was down the block and had no reason to turn back around so I darted over to the bushes and peered into the darkness, wondering if Heath was still there. I couldn’t see anything. I paused, listening, but all I heard was the wind and leaves blowing around. So I bent over and looked under the bush, snatching the paper as soon as I saw it.

Feeling like a criminal, I went back inside and shut the door behind me. I should have waited until I got to my room, but I couldn’t resist. I unfolded the paper with jerky movements.

Written on it was a phone number.

Heath’s number.

He’d been waiting for me.

Chapter Five

“Did you find your phone?” Janice asked, startling me.

I pulled it out, heart pounding, and wiggled the phone. “Yes, thanks. It was on the front walk.” Then I ran upstairs to my room. It was my first year living in the sorority house. My freshman and sophomore years I’d been in the dorm. What I liked at the house was each room was a single so I had some privacy, yet there were always girls around to keep me company or hang out with. Aubrey’s room was down the hall. I wasn’t sure if she was there or not but I didn’t want to talk to her. I closed the door to my room softly and locked it.

The piece of paper was crumpled in my sweaty palm and I released it, studying it as it rested there. I shouldn’t text him. Yet I couldn’t help but wonder what he wanted. Where he had been. What he thought I had done. I put on pajama pants and paced my room for a whole of three minutes before I caved.

I entered Heath’s number on my phone. Then when I saw his name staring up at me as a new contact, I realized I couldn’t use his real name. What if he texted me and Ethan saw it? He would have questions. That I didn’t have answers to. But it felt so wrong to be keeping something from my boyfriend. Yet I didn’t feel like I had any choice. I couldn’t risk losing Ethan.

But then I rationalized I wasn’t doing anything wrong. Heath was my foster brother. I had cared about him. It was perfectly reasonable for me to establish contact with him again. Ethan would understand that. Better to be honest than have it bite me in the ass later. It wasn’t like Heath and I were going to cross a line or anything. I was with Ethan. He was with Darla, apparently. We hadn’t spoken in four years.

Feeling better that what I was doing wasn’t completely shitty, I texted Heath.

It’s Cat.

Hey Cat. Meet me at the Tavern at ten.

Oh, hell no. As much as I wanted to see him face to face, that was just a big fat no. For many, many reasons. First, because there was no way to explain to my boyfriend why I was going out solo on a Saturday night to meet Heath at a dive bar just off campus. Second, because Heath had a lot of nerve making any sort of demands. And that was no question. It was an order, which rubbed me wrong. No word in four years and suddenly he’s all meet me here?

Uh uh. Not doing it.

I can’t. Where have you been the last four years? Seriously.

Marines. Afghanistan.

Oh. Well, that made sense. It was a logical way to get out of Vinalhaven. But why had he left without telling me?

What do you think I did? What were you talking about before?

Doesn’t matter. I was wrong. Can you meet me tomorrow?

I didn’t answer, unsure. My room smelled like sour milk for some unknown reason and I moved around agitated, searching for the source of the odor. I must have left a food container somewhere. I tore back bedding, picked through the trash, shuffled aside papers on my desk. Nothing. Frustrated, I sprayed air freshener and ignored my phone. It chimed with a new text.

Damn it.

I want to talk to you. Please? Just once then I’ll leave you alone.

I couldn’t resist that. How could I resist that?

And did I really want him to leave me alone? I wasn’t sure that I did.

Ok. Two o’clock?

Sure. How about my place? I miss you.

I sat down hard on my bed. Tears came to my eyes. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair of him to do that to me. He hadn’t missed me. Or I would have heard from him. And now he wanted to just stroll onto campus and do what? Fuck up my life?

I don’t feel good. I’m going to bed.

It was peevish. It was me avoiding responding. Because I had missed him too, but damn it, I was pissed off at him. He should know that.

I wanted him to work at it. I could admit that. I wanted him to coax the truth out of me. Ethan would. Ethan was patient and always willing to approach me from different angles until I gave in.

But Heath wasn’t Ethan.

He wasn’t going to play games. Or let me be passive-aggressive.

Nite.

That was it. Nothing else.

Not what I wanted.

Lying back, I hugged my pillow and I cried, not wanting to feel anything for him anymore, but never wanting to let go of the enormity of what he had meant to me.

“Why did Heath leave?” I had demanded of my father that afternoon when I had realized that he was gone and I had no way to reach him.

We were in the kitchen, a tired room of sixty-year-old cabinets and almost equally ancient appliances. The curtain on the window had been there when my parents had moved in back in the eighties, and it was yellow with bunches of grapes on it. It was like everything in our house- faded. Dad had asked me to fix him something to eat. I was slapping around the bread, the mustard, the cheese. At that point I was still angry. It hadn’t set in, the hurt, the pain. The loneliness.

“He turned eighteen, Cat. He aged out of foster care. He was allowed to leave whenever he wanted.”

Dad was leaning against the counter, using the crook of his elbow on his bad arm to hold a beer can. With his good hand he popped the top.

“He wouldn’t have left without telling me unless there was a reason,” I insisted. I was wearing a bikini and shorts because Heath and I had plans to go out on the fishing boat. We had plans. He wouldn’t just leave. I quickly spread the mustard over the bread.

One of our new fosters, Tiffany, came wandering in, chewing the ends of her hair. “Is that for me?”

“No. Make your own sandwich,” I said, rudely.

“Caitlyn.” My father frowned at me.

I instantly felt tears in my eyes. Tiffany was tiny and malnourished and I was pretty sure somewhere in her history she’d been abused because if you moved quickly around her she winced. She was about twelve and had big brown eyes. I couldn’t take my anger out on her, of all people.

“I’m sorry.”

“S’okay.” She came toward me, but she gave my father a wide berth. “Can I just have a piece of cheese?”

“Sure.” I put the cheese on a slice of bread and handed it to her. She left the room again, biting it.

I put the knife down and bent over, suddenly feeling like I couldn’t breathe. “Daddy…” a sob choked out of me.

“Hey.” He came over and set his beer down, then put his arm around me. “Baby, it’s okay. Someday, you’ll be glad he left. Not today. Not tomorrow. But sometime when you’re living a good life with a nice guy, you’ll recognize he did you a favor.”

I scoffed, wiping my eyes on his T-shirt. “There’s no way.”

“Guys like him are emotionally unstable. They suck you in and don’t let go and trust me, you don’t want to live like that.”

“What do you know about it?”

“I married your mother. That’s what I know about it.” His voice was hoarse. “I love her. And I can never leave her. But she’ll never love me the way I need.”

He’d never spoken about my mother before. Not like that.

I froze, not sure what to say. He kissed the top of my head.

“There’s a better future out there for you, baby. You just have to be brave enough to take it.”

It was great advice.

I wished, lying there in my small room in the sorority house, that I could ask him for advice again. That I could cry against his shirt.

But I couldn’t.

Because my father was dead.

It occurred to me on Sunday that Heath had to know my father had died. He hadn’t asked me about him. Only my mother. He’d been close enough to my dad, had liked him genuinely. My father had felt the same way about him, despite his advice to me. He had liked Heath well enough as a person, he just hadn’t necessarily loved Heath with his daughter.

So Heath would have asked, I was sure of it, if he thought my dad was alive. He must know that eighteen months earlier my dad had a heart attack. The question was how.

I slept late, my head still pounding when I woke up, my sinuses swollen. I might not have even woken up when I did if Ethan hadn’t called. We had a groggy five minute conversation where I said “Uh huh,” a lot and yawned repeatedly.

“Go back to sleep, baby,” he said finally, sounding amused. “I’ll call you later.”

“No, it’s fine,” I protested, trying to sit up. I had water somewhere. “It’s almost noon. I need to get up.”

“What do you have going on today?”

Shit. Only meeting my ex-boyfriend at his apartment. “Nothing, just studying. I have that econ midterm this week.” I yawned again.