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The highway sign leading home appeared up on the right in my headlights.
Not that I wasn’t in pain every day of my life anymore, but a fresh dose started at the back of my throat as my eyes watered.
With every mile that passed on this agony-filled trek down memory lane, I drowned a little more in those fluids filling up my face and chest.
Suffocating with knowing that Faith wouldn’t be there when I pulled into town, the last bit of fire I had in me to go on went out.
I hadn’t been back at all since I left for football camp in July. But sometimes, when that wound needed freshening up again, I’d call Jason to find out if he’d heard anything about her.
Otis was still as broken up as I was about Faith disappearing off the face of the Earth. Our phone calls got fewer and fewer as he attempted to go on with his life, but I just never could figure out how to do that.
I took the exit with the hospital sign, because my eyes burned so bad I couldn’t read the letters anymore. Rolling to a stop at the top of the hill to wait for the light to change, I zoned out entirely as I stared into the red glow.
At least a hundred times a day, I replayed the last night with Faith in my mind. It was still as clear to me as the moment it happened. Clearer, I think, since I’d analyzed every detail repeatedly to figure out where I’d gone wrong with her.
Like scratching a bug bite on your arm until it bleeds, I turned left for the other side of town instead of toward my parents’ home when the green light popped on. I just had to drive past her house one last time and break my own heart again.
I was due at my mother’s an hour ago to discuss how I got booted from the football team for never coming to practice. But since I had to tell her I was flunking all my classes, too, I wasn’t in any hurry.
In fact, I hadn’t been to any classes at all in weeks. When I wasn’t drinking myself into oblivion, I stared at the walls and replayed those first and last kisses.
I slept with the phone in my hand, taking turns praying to God and making deals with the devil every night so it would ring. But when I woke up to an empty voicemail box every morning, I only died a little more inside.
Yeah, I guess you can say I was at my lowest point that night.
Otis was on the overnight shift at the rock quarry permanently since he didn’t have to worry about Faith being alone all the time. And since every light was off when I pulled up to the curb, I knew she couldn’t be home — not that I expected her to be after what I’d done.
I sat at the bottom of the hill and turned down the radio, putting my hands together to talk to her wherever she was. “I have to get something off my chest before I go.”
Blowing out slowly, I widened my eyes at the lip balm she left behind in the dash like she might still be connected to it. “I, uh…” The world blurred as tears rose in my eyes, and I could barely whimper the words. “I cheated on you last weekend.”
My lashes fluttered to flick off the tears as I sniffled. “I don’t even remember leaving the dorm that night, I swear.” I took shower after shower until my skin cracked, trying to wash away my sins against her. But I could never peel away knowing I’d ruined any chance of us ever getting back together. “I just woke up next to this girl, but I never saw her before and haven’t since. But I…”
My throat was on fire. My whole body ached constantly. And no matter how much I cried over her, there were always more tears. I only wanted it to be over.
Clearing my throat, I shook my head as I finally made the choice I’d been wrestling with since I got into my truck that afternoon. “I know you’ll never come back to me now, and I don’t blame you if you hate me.”
I blinked up to the bedroom window I crawled through at least three times a week for over two years to be inside her. “So, I’m just here to tell you goodbye and that I love you and always will.”
The book of religious quotes my mother sent me was on the passenger side floor under a bag of old fast food. I gave it a shrug because I wasn’t sure if God existed, but I understood he wasn’t listening to me. “And maybe if we meet again on the other side, you’ll give me another chance.”
A star shot across the sky above the house, and I shut my eyes tight to be the first one to wish on it. “I promise I won’t fuck up next time. Please find me quick.”
I kissed my fingers and put my hand out the window as I reached for the keys. “See you soon, baby.”
The lip balm tube flipped over in the ashtray when I pulled out onto the main road. Like it was waving me in for one more taste of her, I fished it out of the little metal cubby.
I slathered it on my lips and bit the end of the whole thing off, mashing the cherry goo between my teeth. “No wonder she left you, dumbass.”
The chain link fence lining the road by the elementary school playground was coming up down the street, and I slowed down to stare at the old tree in the middle of the yard.
For three years, Faith hid away in my arm to get away from it every time we passed it, and I shook my head at how fucking clueless I was sometimes. “She’s terrified of that thing, and you propose to her under it. Good job.”
I was about to jump off that bridge like I thought about doing when I first moved here. But when the headlights shined off the oak’s bark, our entire life together replayed in a few seconds, and I understood everything for once. “Hero? You were supposed to be her hero.”
That pain that gripped me for months lifted as soon as I pulled off my seatbelt. “Don’t worry, baby. I got it.”
Mashing my boot into the gas pedal, I hopped the curb and went through the break in the fence. Once I got the tree lined up square in the center of the windshield, I took my hands off the wheel and closed my eyes so I could watch Faith walk back into the cafeteria again. “You don’t have to be afraid anymore.”
