Be My Escape

Watching kids programs with a baby who was only about a year old and couldn’t have cared any less what was on the TV was not exactly how I envisioned spending my Sunday. Yet there I was, sitting on my couch with Emmy on my lap as we watched some children’s show that had her giggling and smiling and cooing all throughout.

I was woken up that morning after a terrible nights sleep and an even worse nightmare by my phone ringing. It was my father, begging me to watch Emmy for the day. He and Hanna had a million and one things to take care of, and their usual babysitter couldn’t help so I was their last resort. I had agreed, even if the last thing I felt like dealing with was a baby. But when Hanna and my dad dropped Emmy off, who was all smiles when she saw me, I couldn’t help but melt inside.

Now though, after the third consecutive hour of TV, I was getting bored. Even Emmy, who had been entertained the whole time, was starting to fuss. I didn’t really know what to do though, because it wasn’t like I could take Emmy out for a walk or something. She wasn’t hungry either, and she didn’t need changed, so I knew she was just bored. Poor girl. I had to have been the worst babysitter in the history of babysitters.

I hit the remote and turned the TV, picking Emmy up and getting off the couch. “What can we do?” I asked her, obviously not expecting a reply. I looked down at what I was wearing—a pair of ratty old sweatpants and a plain white t-shirt with stains on it—and realized I really wasn’t dressed or ready to go out anywhere. Then again, I wasn’t in the mood to go out anywhere anyways.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Josh and our kiss. It just kept replaying in my mind; the only time it stopped was when I slept, which I couldn’t very well do all day. I desperately wanted to go talk to him, because as sad and upset as I had been after he left me stranded on the rooftop, I was angry with him still. He couldn’t kiss me and then yell at me for it and expect that to be okay! It most definitely was not okay.

I walked over to the window in the living room while I bounced Emmy on my hip to keep her happy and gazed out at the gray Reading day. The clouds were thick and dark, which I had come to learn, meant a storm was coming. It wasn’t exactly the most inviting weather, which just made my bored state that much more severe.

I looked down at Emmy and sighed. “Sorry kid, I’m not much of a babysitter.” She just giggled as she stared up at me with her big blue eyes and blew a spit bubble. “Okay, ew,” I laughed and walked into the kitchen to get a paper towel to clean her up.

Just as I was wiping the remains of the spit bubble off her chin, I heard voices outside of my front door. I cleaned Emmy off quick and then walked over to check. I heard Max before I saw him, which was strange. He didn’t usually raise his voice, except for that one time the other day in the fight with Josh. And now here he was, standing outside my door, having what seemed to be another argument with Josh.

Instead of opening the door and surprising the shit out of the two of them, I stood there with my ear pressed against the door and listened. It was all muffled, but I could still make out some of it.

“You have to stop screwin’ with her like this, Josh.”

“She’s the one screwin’ with me, Max. She’s just as bad as Beth.” I quietly gasped at this. How was I as bad as Beth, who was a whore? And I wasn’t screwing with him! He kissed me!

I didn’t want to hear anymore at that point. I knew it’d just make me angry, and I really needed to just push Josh out of my mind. So I turned and walked away from the door. I made it no further than the couch where I was getting ready to sit down before there was a knock. I could only pray that it wasn’t Josh.

I walked over and opened it, only to reveal Max. “’Ello, love,” he smiled. “How are my lovely sisters doing this mornin’?” he asked as he leaned in and kissed Emmy on the forehead before reaching out to give me a hug.

I shrugged, stepping aside to let him in before closing the door. I made sure to check the hallway to see if I would find Josh, but he was no where to be found. I followed Max into the kitchen, where he was now digging in my fridge. “There’s nothing in there,” I warned him as I took a seat at the counter. I set Emmy on my knee, bouncing her to keep her happy.

“Clearly,” he grumbled, standing up straight again before walking over to me. “You seem irritated.”

“I am,” I said shortly.

“What’s wrong?”

I just shook my head to indicate nothing was wrong. “Emmy and I are bored, that’s all. I don’t have any games or anything to play with her, and it’s raining out so I can’t even take her to the park or something.”

Max smiled brightly at this. “Go get ready, love. I know exactly what we can do.”

***

“Strawberry please,” I smiled at the teen working behind the counter of the ice cream shop while Max stood beside me holding Emmy. He carefully spooned tiny bites of vanilla into her tiny mouth while she giggled delightedly after each time.

After I got my cup of strawberry ice cream, Max and I took seats at a booth. He continued to hold Emmy and feed her ice cream while I ate my own. He claimed to not be hungry, but I think he just wanted to bond with his sister, which was cute.

“Are you ever goin’ to tell me what happened between you and Josh last night? Because he’s been actin’ like a proper mental case for the past twenty four hours, and I can only assume it’s from you.”

I rolled my eyes. “You can drop the dumb act, Max. I heard you outside my door with Josh this morning, so I know you know.”

He blushed, which was funny. Max didn’t get embarrassed easily, from what I had gathered. “I just can’t believe he kissed you, Peyton. It doesn’t make any sense, none of it does.”

I shrugged. “You’ve got me, Max. I don’t really know what’s going on any more than you do, so we can be lost together.”

Max shook his head. “You don’t understand, Peyt. He’s hardly looked at another girl since Beth. He’s all but sworn off the whole female gender, but then you come along and it’s all different. He gets angry with you and you guys fight and generally act like you hate each other. Something changed though. Somewhere alone the way, something changed. I’m not sure what though, and I don’t think either of you know either.”

I sighed, partially because Max was right and partially because I didn’t want to think about Josh but Max was making that increasingly difficult.

“You know, Dan told me I reminded Josh of Beth, which is why he was treating me like shit. But that in itself is like a slap in the face, because that means I remind him of the deceiving whore that broke his heart.” I rolled my eyes as I said, “Gee thanks, Josh, what a compliment.”

Max shrugged as he fed Emmy the last bite of ice cream. “You are like her, though, so I guess it makes sense.”

My jaw dropped. “I am not a deceiving whore!” I exclaimed.

“I didn’t say that!” Max yelled back while the teen behind the counter gave us dirty looks, probably at our or rather my choice of words. “What I mean is, you and Beth have some similar qualities. Not only are you both blonde, but you’re quiet. At least at first you’re quiet. Beth was shy when Josh first met her, when we all first met her. I think that’s what made Josh like her. So she’s this quiet lass right?” he asks to make sure I’m paying attention. I nod to show I am. “But then some times she’d yell at Josh for stupid little things, but that didn’t happen until later on. So she was quiet but then it was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde; she’s this quiet lass one second and this biting bitch the next, and Josh didn’t know what to do with that, but he liked the unpredictable-ness of it all.”

“Until the unpredictable broke his heart,” I finished, finally understanding. Josh didn’t trust me any further than he could throw me; it was no wonder he would get so angry with me. He could only see the bad parts of Beth in me, and it irritated him, probably even hurt him. I suddenly felt sick to my stomach.

Josh may have irritated me and made me mad and I may have liked yelling at him sometimes, but no one deserved to hurt like that.

Not even myself.

“Max, I have something to tell you,” I said suddenly, my voice tentative and unsure. I was unsure, though; I had no idea if what I was about to confess to Max was a good idea or not, but I knew I had to. He had the right to know; especially after all he had done for me.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, looking up from Emmy, clearly sensing the change in tone of my voice.

“Do you remember when my dad mentioned how things back home were hard, and how you questioned me about it but I brushed it off?”

“When we went out for breakfast?” he asked, and when I nodded he did too. “Yeah, but Peyton, what’s that—”

“My best friend died right in front of me,” I blurted out, tears appearing in my eyes. I blinked to try and get rid of them, but it was too late. I was crying now, but luckily it was just a quiet cry and not the full out sob I had done in front of both Jake and Josh. “It was a year ago, and we were at this beach…”

I told him the whole story of Amanda’s death, and I even told him how I felt like it was my fault. I told him about the nightmares and I told him how it was all part of the reason I had come to England: to escape.

When I finished and I was wiping the tears from my eyes, Max’s mouth was still wide open. Luckily, Emmy had fallen asleep on his lap, so she wasn’t fussing. It was just the two of us, quiet as we stared at each other.

“Oh my God, Peyton. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” He wasn’t mad or hurt, he was just pitying me, or at least I though he was.

“Because I don’t tell anyone,” I mumbled as I looked down at the table and began to rip the napkin in my hand up into a bunch of tiny pieces. My dad knows, and of course my mom knows, but no one else. Well,” I shrugged, remembering one other person, “Jake knows, but let’s not even go there because that whole ordeal makes me sick to my stomach.”

“Peyton, it wasn’t your fault,” he said finally, reaching across the table to grab my hand. “I know you feel like it was, but it wasn’t. There’s a good chance if you both had jumped, you both wouldn’t be here right now. Please don’t feel like it was your fault. You don’t deserve that burden on your shoulders, yeah?”

I shrugged. “It doesn’t matter if I deserve it or not, Max. It’s there, and it’s always going to be there, because the fact of the matter is that if I had jumped Amanda wouldn’t have hesitated and if she hadn’t hesitated her jump wouldn’t have been awkward and she would be sitting right next to me right now.” I continued to cry once I finished telling Max this.

He got out of the booth and walked over to sit next to me, pulling me into his side as I cried into his shirt. For some reason, the way he was comforting me was different from when Jake did it. When Jake did it, he just wanted me to stop. Max just wanted me to get it all out, which was what I needed.

When I finally finished crying, and when I felt like I was okay again, Max, Emmy, and I all left the ice cream shop. Neither of us talked the rest of the way home until we reached our building. Max stopped me outside and held onto my shoulders as I held Emmy. “Listen to me, Peyton. I understand the burden you’re feeling, and I understand it hurts. But try and believe me when I say it wasn’t your fault, okay? And if you ever need to talk about it, you’re going to come to me yeah?”

I gave him a small smile but nodded. “Yeah.” We hugged before heading inside.

We were at the end of the hallway when we saw him. “Uh oh,” Max muttered. “Look, if you don’t want to—”

I stopped him. “I have to. I need to talk to him.”

Max gave me a quick nod before heading to his own flat and leaving me to head to mine. I nodded at Josh sitting in front of my door, obviously waiting for me to return. “Come on,” I told him as I opened the front door and let him inside.

I carried Emmy over to the portable crib my dad had brought over for her and lay her inside of it so she could nap. Then I gestured to the kitchen and had Josh sit at the counter while I stood across from him with my arms crossed in front of my chest. “So what are you doing here?” I asked him, trying to keep my voice quiet as to not disturb Emmy. I may not have been as angry with him for the night before as I had been earlier now that I understood a little more, but I was still a little hurt. And sometimes, hurt translates to anger. At least for Josh and I it did.

He sighed and did his signature hair tossle. “I feel like I should just apologize to you a few thousand times so you can have them saved for the next time I screw up.”

I shrugged. “It would be a lot easier. But you know what would be even easier?” I asked him. I didn’t even give him time to answer. “If you just talked to me for, like, a millisecond.”

He was quiet as he looked down at the counter, drawing a circle over and over again. If he kept it up, he was going to engrave that circle into the countertop.

“You know,” I said, taking a step back from the counter. I could feel some of my anger bubble up inside of me. “Most straight guys wouldn’t exactly get pissed when they kiss a girl. So either you aren’t straight or you find me completely repulsive and you just lost sight of this for a moment last night.” I narrowed my eyes at him as I glared, unable to contain my anger anymore. I will not get out of hand, I will not get out of hand, I repeated in my head. I wasn’t as angry as last night, but as I said, I was still hurt. I couldn’t help that.

He sighed again. “Maybe I deserved that.”

“Maybe?” I scoffed, rolling my eyes. “You definitely deserved that, Josh.” I shook my head in question. “I just don’t get it Josh.”

He looked up at me finally; the anger from the previous night was gone. He just looked tired, both physically and mentally. “Get what?”

“Do I remind you of Beth?” I asked him bluntly. I wanted to hear it from him, not Max or Dan or anyone else. I wanted to hear the words come out of Josh Franceschi’s mouth, and I wanted them now.

He stumbled over his words for a minute. “Erm, uh, what?” He cleared his throat, which his nervousness would have made me laugh if it didn’t give him away so obviously. “Why would you remind me—”

“Guess I have my answer,” I said sadly.

Josh sighed in frustration, raking his hands through his hair. “it’s not my fault you remind me of her, Peyton. Because I want to be friends with you. You seem nice and funny and kind of shy and I like that, but then you change and you butt heads with me and I’m just thrown right back to where I was with Beth and it scares me,” he admitted. This was Josh at his most vulnerable, and I knew if I didn’t say the right thing next we were screwed for all eternity. It was now or never.

“I’m not Beth, Josh. I’m not the shy girl you think I am, or at least I didn’t use to be. But things have happened to make me this way. Then you come into my life and bring out the old me.” I shrugged as I looked down at the floor.

“I’m not Beth though. I’m not going to break you like she did. You can trust me,” I told him when I finally looked up again.

Something changed again. I could almost physically feel it and see it. The look in Josh’s eyes changed. It was no longer guarded and pissed, but more warm and welcoming. It was nice. I smiled at him as I reached out and stuck my hand out. “I want to be friends Josh. Fighting with you, at least all the time, is exhausting.”

He nodded in agreement. “I can’t guarantee that we won’t butt heads on occasion Peyton, but I really do want to try and be friends with you.”

I nodded too and stuck my hand out further. “Friends then?” I asked; my voice was hopeful.

He smiled and grabbed it, shaking it gently but firmly. “Friends.”

And just like that, I felt a weight lift off my shoulders. I just hoped this was going to work out like I hoped it would.