Page 51 of Pieces of Me

Or for our hearts.

And broken hearts aren’t just a metaphor because I can feel the physical cracking of mine beneath my ribs. I can hear the cry of its pain in the way my pulse beats—weak—clinging to this wreckage of my life.

24

Jamie

Holden joins me in the car and rests his head on the steering wheel. For seconds that feel like hours, he stays that way, his ragged breaths floating between us. There are so many words flashing through my mind, so many things I wish I could tell him. I’ll start with an apology, I decide, and then I’ll go from there. I open my mouth to speak, but he beats me to it.

“I needed to know what happened with you and Colton, so I could find a new reason to be mad at you because I’m running out…” He lifts his head, his sad, solemn eyes right on mine. “And I can’t do this again. I can’t fall for you again, and I’m starting to. And the worst part is thatI know… I know we could be so good, but I also know that I would wake up every single day with this fucking paralyzing fear that you’re just going to disappear on me. Just up and leave me, and I…” He sucks in a breath, releases it slowly, and all I can do is watch him. Watch the hurt and destruction I caused tear him down. Break him. Shatter him. Piece by piece. “I need to protect my heart so that you can’t destroy it again.”

He starts the car and takes off, giving me no time to respond.

My mom used to tell me that the silence was the worst… that she could feel the anticipation that the silence created right in her bones. That’s why they would shake the way they did. Add darkness to the silence, and her fear would be debilitating.

I’m surrounded by silence now, sitting in the darkness beside the boy I once loved—Istilllove—but the fear that’s making my bones rattle beneath my flesh… it isn’t caused by him. It isn’t even caused byme. It’s caused by the strengths of my untold truths. The reason I left in the first place. The reason he’s hurting. I thought by now, he would know—that the person responsible would’ve admitted to their betrayals, their truths. Clearly, they haven’t.

I keep my back to him, so he doesn’t see the tears flowing freely or my body’s reaction to the heartache slowly drowning me, wave after wave, hit after hit, and I… I do the only thing I can seem to do lately.

I cry.

With my head leaning against the window, I let the outside worldwhooshby, never looking at anything, never taking the time to appreciate it.

And I cry some more.

Silent cries and endless tears.

And I wonder where I would be if I didn’t come here.

This time.

Or the first.

We’re almost back at the nursery when, like so many other times before, he settles his hand on my leg. Back then, it was because he wanted me to draw on it. Right now… I don’t know why he does it at all. Not until he says, “I’m sorry, Jamie.”

Me too, I don’t say out loud because it’s too damn late, and those two simple words mean nothing anymore.

He pulls into the driveway and parks right next to my RV, his headlights illuminating the open space of the shop. He doesn’t kill the engine, doesn’t make a move to get out, but he doesn’t remove his hand from my leg either.

He’s not ready to let me go, and I’m not ready to leave. Not until I give him one last truth that’s mine to give. “I’ve been here before.”

“You’ve been staying here a week, Jamie. I thought you said you weren’t drunk.”

My eyelids are heavy; my heart is the same. I rest my head against the back of the seat and stare at the nothingness in front of me. I feel empty. Detached from my emotions. Like I’m nothing but flesh and bones because at some point tonight, everything keeping me alive stopped doing its job. “I’ve been here before,” I repeat. “Five years ago.”

“What?”

I attempt a nod, but my body refuses to move because it’s dead, dead, dead inside. “It’s weird because when Mom and I ran from Beaker, we took a bus and just rode around until we found a car dealership. We bought the cheapest reliable car available and paid for it in cash. I didn’t even ask her where she got the money from, but… we got it, and then we just started… driving.” My vision blurs as the memories fly through my mind, like still images on flashcards I’d memorialized in ink. “And she could do it… she could drive for hours, and we’d never see the same things twice. At one point, I got a map of the entire country from a gas station and started marking the places I thought we’d passed… It’s crazy when I look back on it. We drove through Atlanta and got all the way down to Key West in Florida, and then we drove along the coastline until we got to the Texas/Mexico border.” It’s pathetic that I smile. That I can picture the excited gleam in her clear eyes at the prospect of a new beginning. “For hours, she spoke of nothing but starting a new life in Mexico.”

Holden stays quiet, listening to every word.

“The next day, we headed north. I started marking it off on the map until I realized where she was going.” My stomach sinks at the memory—another crack in my heartbreak. “There’s a reason we ended up only four hours south of where I grew up. She was going back to him. I never told her I knew. Maybe I should have. Maybe one day I’ll get a chance to. Anyway,” I breathe out, and I know I’m rambling, but I need to get this out. It’s time. “The point is, whenIleft, I just… drove around in circles. For days. I finally gave up hope I would get anywhere, and so I grabbed my phone, opened the navigation, and the only place I could think to type in was here.Eastwood Nursery, Blessing, North Carolina…”

I lift my hand, wipe the wetness off my cheeks, then point in the general direction of the road. I continue to stare ahead when I say, “I parked on the road right opposite the driveway and even stepped out of the car. I was in awe when I first saw it. The pictures online or in that catalog you gave me… didn’t do this place justice. I fell in love at just the sight of it, and I hadn’t even stepped foot on the property. I thought… if you could just wait a few weeks. You’d graduate, and I’ll be here waiting for you. And we could spend the summer together, start our lives together. Justus. Away from any outside influences. And we’d be happy… just you and me. All we had to do was wait a few weeks.” I close my eyes, my head lolling to the side.

“But you weren’t here waiting for me, Jamie…” Holden murmurs.

I push aside the ache in my chest, prepared for what comes next. “I got a call while I was standing there. It was um… it was the cops. Beaker had died a few days earlier,”—Holden gasps, but I push through—“and when they’d gone through his house… they found a bunch of stuff. Mainly his drug lab in the basement, but they also found my driver’s license. It was the only thing taken that night of the attack. That’s when it was confirmed… it was my fault… what happened to you.”

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