Page 88 of Avenged

After I’d made the bed, I took a bath, soaking in the hottest water I could stand, trying to let my body rest. Trying to use every mental strength and skill I had to will it to just let go, to loosen. But I was too worried about Truck, and Dawson, and us, because I’d read the regret in Truck’s tone and look when he’d said I couldn’t come with him.

He was doing the one thing I hated for him to do. Regretting us. Regretting me. It tore some new holes into my being. I finally climbed out of the water, dressed in yoga pants and an old T-shirt, and went back to the room to stretch out using the exercises from the physical therapist. Often, they hurt more at first, but then in an hour or so, I’d feel my body sigh with relief.

I wasn’t sure I was getting any relief today.

When Truck still hadn’t returned by seven, I started to get nervous. I thought back to when they’d arrested my dad and how long it had taken to see him so he could tell me what he needed from me. Which had been nothing. He’d wanted nothing to do with me for weeks. I’d been the reason he’d gotten in the car after all.

For the first time since the accident, I fought back at that thought. I wasn’t the reason he’d gotten in the car drunk. He could have called me a CarShare or a taxi. He could have told me I needed to get a ride from someone else. He could have told me to suck it up and live with the consequences of my lying to him and sleeping with my boyfriend instead of staying with Malorie. But he hadn’t. He’d made the choice to get behind the wheel when he’d barely finished the bottle of Jack. He made the choice to let Violet get in the car with him.

My guilty conscience, while understandable, shouldn’t have been mine. I’d just been a teenage girl, lost after having sex for the first time, lost at the perceived abandonment of the boy she’d chosen as he’d left her in bed to continue drinking with his buddies. Talking about us. Talking about the trail of blood I’d left on his sheets. I’d wanted to go home. I’d wanted to be away from the talk and the drinks and the abandonment.

Truck had already felt responsible for Dawson. He’d already blamed himself for whatever had occurred in their hometown, but now, he’d feel guilty he’d missed whatever signs Dawson had put out, saying he was still drowning. He’d blame himself for Dawson’s arrest. Blame the fact that he’d been absorbed in my life. More of my own guilt to shoulder, because if I hadn’t let him in, he wouldn’t have missed the signs. If I hadn’t married him and moved in, he would have been all about Dawson.

I wanted to ease both of our pain and guilt, but I couldn’t if he wasn’t there. I couldn’t help him see that, no matter if he’d been paying attention or not, Dawson was still responsible for his own choices. I didn’t want it to turn Truck into something he wasn’t. I didn’t want him to become hateful like my father, or invisible like me. I finally texted him.

ME: Are you okay? Is Dawson okay?

It took a long time before he answered. I saw the dots come and go that said he was texting a response. They went away for a few minutes and then came back, as if he was debating answering me at all. It stung.

While I waited for his response, I stared at the name I’d entered into the phone for him?Captain Coast Guard. He wasn’t a captain yet, but after Violet had teased him about it at the Comic Con, I realized it fit him. He’d stormed into my life like a superhero. After everything we’d been through since then, I wasn’t sure if it fit anymore. I wasn’t sure what name I needed for him. I knew he meant more to me than some fictional comic book hero. He meant more to me than probably any person besides Violet.

I dropped the phone as the truth hit me. I loved him.

That realization made me sweat. It made my stomach muscles clench even tighter. I didn’t know what I was going to do with that—the fact I loved my husband. The man I wasn’t supposed to be involved with at all. We’d written a contract, and then we’d proceeded to break almost every single one of the rules we’d agreed to.

Finally, my text tone, an Avengers’ song, played, letting me know he’d finally responded.

CAPTAIN COAST GUARD: They let him go with a slap on the wrist.

Relief filled me. Relief for him and Dawson. Relief that his focus on me wouldn’t be the reason Dawson ended up in jail. Tears filled my eyes, and before I knew it, they had spilled over onto my cheeks and were dripping down and landing on the phone.

I could barely see while I typed.

ME: That’s really good news. Will you be home…

My fingers froze after I’d typed the word home, heart and stomach whirling. I backspaced until the word was gone.

ME: That’s really good news. Will you be back soon?

CAPTAIN COAST GUARD: No. Not yet. I’m not sure when I’ll be back.

My heart squeezed tight. I tried not to feel the same sense of abandonment I’d felt when Skip had left the bed we’d had sex in for his friends. It wasn’t the same. Truck had very valid reasons for being gone. But I also knew, because I knew him better than I’d known Skip, that he was avoiding me. That he was trying to figure out where he’d gone wrong. And I knew where. It was the moment I’d let him say I do.

We needed to talk before I overreacted. Before I took my own emotions and made them his. But I felt this huge need to withdraw as well. On Friday, I had thought we could do this, make love and move on when his time in New London came to an end without anyone getting hurt, but we couldn’t. Dawson had gotten hurt. I’d gotten hurt. Truck… Truck had been devastated, because he hadn’t done for his sibling the one thing he’d been determined to do. Save him.

I’d thought I’d have time to rebuild my shield before Truck moved on to another city. I had thought I’d survive because I’d survived worse, but this…this was worse because he would see me now like I had seen my father. I’d be the cause of his sibling’s loss. Like I’d blamed my dad for Violet’s life being so small.

But was Dad really to blame? Or was it my fault Violet’s world was so tiny? Was I the reason they were all hurting?

The thoughts and voices in my head were enough to drive me batty. I needed to get out of the house. I needed to do something—anything—to stop myself from coming completely unhinged. I hadn’t planned on going to work today. It was Sunday, and Wil was scheduled to work, but I couldn’t sit here, drowning in my own new layer of regret and guilt.

ME: If you’re not going to be back soon, I may go to the bookstore.

I waited twenty more minutes before I left. I kept opening and closing my messaging app. But it still remained the same:

CAPTAIN COAST GUARD:

The lack of response hurt worse than the pain which coursed through my pelvic muscles. It hurt worse than anything had hurt in a really long time. Not quite the loss of Mom, but close. Not quite the shock, and humiliation, and sadness from the first time Dad had ever reached out and struck me. But there was both humiliation and sadness twisted together in my chest.

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