Page 43 of The Cost of Forgetting You

“You don’t get to judge me for how I handled things.” I shake my head. “You weren’t there, Tru. You couldn’t possibly understand.”

His brows rise. “It happened to me, too. Did you forget about that?”

“I didn’t see people cornering you in the hallways. Passing you notes with horrible things about your parents written on them.” I study his face. The ripple of regret. “No one tricked you into coming to a party so they could film you being sexually assaulted, did they?”

He reels backward as though I’ve hit him. And I hope I have, right where it hurts. Because I’ve been bearing the brunt of it for far too long. All by myself.

Just like Dad thought I would. Knew I would.

“I didn’t know that part until you were already gone, Delilah, I swear. I—I wanted to say something the minute you showed up at that party. And then when he kissed you, and you seemed so into it… I?—”

“You walked away.”

He winces. “What?”

“You walked away when I needed you.” I stand, putting as much distance between us as possible. Hating the desperate plea in my words when all I want is to show this man I’m strong enough to do this alone. I didn’t need him back then. Not really. I’ve never needed anyone. I’m practically an expert at handling myself.

I correct myself with my next words, hoping to convince us both. “My world was falling apart and the only person I wanted was my best friend, but you shut me out.”

His mouth parts, but I cut him off.

“You became yet another person who left me to deal with everything on my own. How am I supposed to forget that, Truett?”

His gaze searches my face. For what, I don’t know. But I stopped waiting for a response from Tru nine years ago.

“Take me back to the house.” I turn toward the four-wheeler, leaving him standing among the switchgrass. “It’s been a really awful day.”

I don’t watch as he gathers his clothes and tugs them back onto his damp body. This time I’m not even tempted.

We ride in silence. Or as silent as the engine and the insects and the animals can all get, which is still magnificently noisy. But we do not speak. I sit behind him instead of in front, hands braced on the rack behind me so I don’t have to hold on to his waist. I ignore the way his T-shirt clings to the damp ridges of muscles cording his shoulders. I also ignore his hand reaching for me as I dismount and walk away, leaving him as alone in my front yard as I was all those years ago.

My phone lights up the moment I drop it on the dresser. I glance at it, fully prepared to delete whatever message he’s sent me before I remember he’s blocked. Instead I see my mother’s contact photo.

Mom

Miss you. Can’t wait for you to be home.

Guilt blooms in my chest, right along with all the raw pain this night has brought forth. I collapse into my bed, sand-covered shorts and all, and close my eyes. I pray for sleep and enough good sense to stay the hell away from Truett Parker.

Chapter Fourteen

Henry

May 17th, 1997

Months pass like scenes on a movie reel. Shadows of the world unfolding on the screen. I become something of a silhouette in my daily life. Still taking up space, but I’m empty inside.

I go to school. Get good enough grades for Mom not to worry. Not that she’s checking. Saturdays and Sundays are filled with shifts at the factory where my dad worked, scraping in extra cash to help Mom with the bills. She picks up a job waitressing at the local diner. We remain in constant motion, never slowing enough for the grief to catch us. On the rare occasion we’re both home, we’re less like a family and more like two ghosts haunting the same old house. Neither of us know how to move on.

I start to forget the way football games filled our home with background noise on the weekends. The sound of my father’s larger-than-life sneezes. The sight of the two of them dancing in the living room while Etta James crooned through the boom box speakers. At some point I even forget exactly which song has the skip in it, the result of a small scratch on the CD—my fault from dropping it a few years back.

The idea of running off to Nashville falls by the wayside. Instead I’ll go full-time at the factory after I graduate next month. Save up some money. Make sure Mom’s all right. Then, in a few years, I can follow my dreams. It’s just a pit stop, not a complete derailment. At least, that’s what I tell myself.

Part of me wants to ask Lucy to wait for me. A bigger part insists I have no right.

We stop going to church. Mom, because she can’t walk into that sanctuary without seeing Dad’s casket at the base of the stage steps. Me, because I can’t be near Lucy without wanting to hold her. Touch her. Make music with her. Passing her in the hallway is miserable enough. I can’t sit through two hours of her dad’s rambling sermons while feeling her presence like a heartbeat outside my body three pews ahead.

It’s a season of wanting everything I can’t have, and despising everything that I do.

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