Trust Me, I'm Lying

I wasn’t sure what had gone wrong. It was like something had sat on my head subsequently giving me the worst headache I’d ever felt. I couldn’t sleep and nothing helped. For a while I literally thought I was going to die of some sort of brain explosion. But, I guess it worked out for the better. Since I couldn’t sleep, I’d stayed up all night thinking. I thought about why I came home, thought about how he’d reacted. I thought about what Jared had told me. It was complicated. Every last bit of it was complicated. At the same time, it was so simple that it ended up being annoying. It often amazed me how much I actually thought about it all. As annoying as it was to admit, I hadn’t ever stopped thinking about him. So why couldn’t I get to sleep? There was nothing different about my thoughts. Maybe it was just nerves. Or, better yet, maybe my allergies were acting up, changing environments and all. Either way when my alarm went off at nine I still hadn’t slept a wink.

I rolled over slamming my hand against the clock grumbling curse words under my breath. Sitting up slowly I felt like I had a hangover, worse than any hang over I’d ever imagined. If this was how it was going to be like to be back here then I wanted out. I wanted to go back to New York. I wanted to see all my friends from school, and hang out with my adopted older brother. I wanted to be normal.

“Hey, I’m going to find Garrett,” Pat said sticking his head in. I looked at him like he was mentally insane, why was he up this early? “Are you alright? You look like you got hit by a train, truck and semi all at once,” he said.

“Thank you, Patrick,” I said. I didn’t need to be reminded that I looked like shit. I hadn’t even looked in the mirror yet, now I was afraid to. “Have fun, tell Gary I say hi,” I ordered. With a laugh and a nod he left.

After showering, dressing and, because I hated what I’d picked out, redressing I finally made my way downstairs. It was only to find that everyone had gone off to work. It was nice though, being alone anyways. It was peaceful, relaxing. It was as if I was living on my own again. My hands dug through the fridge finding leftovers for breakfast, but after seeing what it looked like decided I wasn’t really as hungry as I thought. I just couldn’t concentrate on anything. I had Jared’s words floating in my head. I couldn’t help but think that if he was such a wreck without me that he would have made attempts to contact me. Slamming my hands against the counter I grunted in anger and reached for my phone. The only way, I figured, I would ever get over him completely was talking to him. I waited listening to his annoying ring back tone. When he didn’t pick up I wanted to throw my phone, yell at him for ignoring it. He would be up by now; John didn’t sleep passed eight thirty on Saturdays. He had to watch his cartoons. Even without an alarm he was always up, like clockwork.

“Cosmo, I’ll be back in a little bit,” I told the dog. I didn’t think he really cared, but it felt good to tell someone. I grabbed my phone and headed towards the all too familiar house. It was strange; the streets of Tempe were still familiar to my memory. I could see my favorite haunts from a kid, the houses I’d avoided after we learned a child molester lived there. The houses where every Halloween they gave out something better than chocolate, they gave out money. I paused right before I rounded his corner. His truck blocked my view, the beat up grandpa of a car that barely ran now. That truck had a lot of memories that I didn’t want to forget. It was in that truck that I’d told John about Leigha, it’s where we’d been when I went into labor. It was what I was taken home in, it was what he’d taken me to his prom in. We did a lot in that truck.

As I turned the corner I watched as John and Emery, the town slut from what I remember, sat on his porch talking. Figures he’d have to find someone to sleep with him all the time. I crossed my arms looking over at the two. That twofaced jerk, I wanted to yell it from the top of my lungs. I settled to thinking it. He wasn’t allowed to toy with my emotions; we’d already made that clear, so why was he being a jerk about my being home? Why did he have to act like it didn’t bother him? Why did he have to be the tough guy that didn’t get upset when I left? Why was it that I had to be the one angry, upset, in pain, hurt whatever you called it? Why was it me? I wondered if just leaving, just packing my car and driving away would be justified now.

It wasn’t until he was closer to me that I realized he was talking to me. I was too busy thinking. He called my name and I looked at him. I wanted to scream at him, call him an egotistical bastard and walk away. But, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t. I wasn’t that mean. Ever.

Instead, I shook my head, and left. I couldn’t talk to him without calling him every word I knew to describe bastard. I couldn’t talk to him without bringing up everything from the past and I certainly couldn’t talk to him in front of Emery. I jogged away carrying myself as far away from my pain as I could. I didn’t know where to go. I could find Kennedy but that would just cause drama. I could go see if I could catch up with Pat and Garrett but I didn’t feel like explaining everything. I settled on Jared, not so much settled as ran directly into him.

“Slow down speedy, what’s going on?” he asked me. His arms wrapped around me gently.

“He’s not a wreck, he’s having fun with Emery,” I sighed disgustedly. “You were wrong.”

I felt him exhale. It was sharp, like he’d gotten the wind knocked out of him. I felt bad, I’d probably done that. It was probably my fault. He started walking me up to his house letting me lean on him for support. Jared’s house always was delicate and impeccably clean. His parents were forever away on business trips, it was that very reason that Jared was a legend at throwing parties. Whatever booze his parents didn’t have in the house already, John, with his height, could easily buy without and ID. Worst case scenario we had Aaron’s older brother buy it for us. I took a stool in the kitchen as he started working around the cabinet setting glasses in front of me.

“What are you doing?” I asked softly watching him work.

“I am making you a pick-me-up. Regardless of what you may think, John really is a wreck without you. He just…Emery’s persistent, and you’re not with John and so she thinks she can move in on him. Emery calls him Johnny.”

“He lets her call him Johnny?”

“She doesn’t care,” he said. That was a shocker, John hated the name Johnny. I’d called him that once and he freaked out. I think it had something to do with his grandmother calling him ‘Johnny apple seed’ when he was younger. “Anyway, she’s not as pretty as you and the guys don’t like her like we like you,” he further explained.

“That doesn’t mean John won’t date her, you guys didn’t like a lot of my boyfriends, I still dated them,” I pointed out.

“No, we didn’t like one of your boyfriends. We were all fine with John. At least he knew if he fucked up he might as well just kill himself before we got to him. Carter was just an asshole.”

“Can we not,” I said quickly. I stared him down when he went to say something more. He chose to leave it alone, a blessing to my current state of sanity. I really didn’t want to bring up the past especially after many years of therapy had made it half way bearable. My hand reached out and I fiddled with the cup as he worked. Taking the cup back he poured some coke into it for me and added some rum. I hate coke and rum on a good day, but today was a bad day. Today it would get me buzzed faster than a simple beer would. I was a light weight and proud of it. “Maybe I should just stop this whole thing, maybe I should just go home.”

“But now we all know you’re in New York and I enjoy scavenger hunts,” he informed me. “Don’t worry, Emery is no concern to you, John will never ‘go for her.’”

“JARED!”

I cringed. He was loud and he was here, fuck. His eyes flitted towards me pouring me a second glass as he left me sitting there. I didn’t want to be sitting alone in a kitchen drinking coke and rum. I didn’t want to be near John, I wanted him to just leave me alone. I wanted him to know I was angry, hurt, upset. I wanted him to know that, for all I cared, he could fall off the planet and I wouldn’t miss him. At least, not right this very second. I was certain that if I just got him off my mind for a while I’d be back to normal, I’d be happy. Maybe, just maybe, if I could get him off my mind I could move on. I’d only had one boyfriend after John and he hadn’t lasted long. Not with all the memories of how happy I’d been before things changed. I couldn’t think of not having John in my life. It hurt too much. At the same time, I couldn’t stand to have him in my life this way. It didn’t take long for Jared to return, a few minutes tops. He looked concerned and I almost immediately turned to leave the back way.

“Wait, he left already, I told him you weren’t here. Megan, what happened between you two? Why did you leave?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I said quickly downing my second cup. I was not in the mood. I wasn’t ever going to be in the mood. Not when it came to that. “I’m gonna go home,” I said getting up. I had zero intentions of going home. In fact home was on my last place to go home. I was going to find someone I hadn’t seen in a long time. “Thanks for the buzz, Jared,” I said hugging him before retracing my steps out of his house.

The Arizona sun greeted me once again and I regretted not wearing sun glasses. I wished that I had thought about that before I’d left to go see John. I started up the street walking the still familiar streets that made up Tempe. After twenty blocks and thirty to forty minutes later I was getting into the neighborhood I wanted. The houses were huge, mansions compared to the white house. It was insane. This was the neighborhood we would trek to for Halloween as they were known for giving out king sized candy bars. It was the neighborhood where if your grass wasn’t green you were fined. I always felt trashy coming here, but it was the only place I could think to find him. I counted the numbers until 432 showed up. I smiled; the exterior was still a pale yellow color, the strangest color of house I’d ever seen. It worked though. My finger pressed against the doorbell and I waited for someone to let me in. He opened the door his brilliant blue eyes the same as when I’d left. His hair was shorter now, and black, but it was still him. I grinned hugging him. He pulled me inside closing the door behind and pressed his lips against mine. This, this I’d missed.