Come Back To Me

I watched the realization of what I had said flash through Garrett’s eyes before he set his pizza down and looked at me. Those bright blue eyes stared right through me and the hurt in them made me want to shoot myself. He seemed confused, but deep down I knew he’d understood what I said. Garrett always understood me, even when I didn’t understand myself.

“You what?”

“I have to move to Chicago,” I said more quietly.

“When? Why? How come you took so long to tell me?” he asked.

I didn’t know how to respond to all of those questions at once so I looked away and watched John and the others skating around the rink. They looked so happy out there and I suddenly wished that I hadn’t said anything to Garrett. Maybe things would have been easier if I had just disappeared without a trace. Maybe my best friend wouldn’t be sitting across from me with a look of despair on his face. I sighed and turned back to Garrett when he cleared his throat, signifying that he wanted me to talk to him.

“I didn’t know how to tell you Gare. You know me better than anyone else, even myself. You should know by now that I have issues coming straight out and saying things, especially things that I know are going to upset people,” I said quietly.

He nodded and then reached over to take my hand. “You’re right, I do know that Merry. But I also know that you wouldn’t be agreeing to it if you had a choice. When are you leaving?”

I shook my head, not wanting to reply to that question because I knew the answer would rip him apart inside. Pulling my hand away from Garrett, I set it in my lap and looked down. There was a pleasant warmth in my hand where he had touched it and it tingled. I would do anything for that boy, including go all the way to fucking Pluto if he told me to. My eyes were stinging with the tears that I was holding back as I looked up at him again.

“Merry?” he asked, his voice rising slightly as he saw the tears in that were on the verge of spilling over.

“I—I leave tomorrow morning,” I said softly, wiping my eyes with the backs of my hands. I felt stupid sitting there trying not to cry because I was telling my best friend that I had to leave and move 1500 miles away. To be honest, it was stupid that I was sitting here about to cry over something so trivial, but I couldn’t help it.

“Tomorrow morning?” Unable to say anything, I just nodded and looked back out at my other friends. They were always there when I needed them but I didn’t have any special connections with them like I did with Garrett. Sure, me and John would always hang out and party together, but that was partying. Jared and Pat were like the brothers I had never had growing up and both of them would always be there whenever someone tried to hurt me. Kennedy was like the odd one out, because I’d never really talked to him much. We were friends by association and not much else. Garrett though… there were just so many things about Garrett that made our friendship as amazing as it was. Like the way he always knew what to say (or rather what not to say) when I was upset. He was the one who came over and took care of me when I was home sick and nobody else was home. He was my first kiss (which may or may not count because it was during a game of spin the bottle.)

Garrett stood up and skated around the table until he was standing in front of me. My view of the skating rink was now blocked and I had to look down at my lap to avoid looking at… well, let’s just say it was a matter of privacy. He crouched down so that he could look me in the eye and gave me that heartbreaking smile of his. I watched his hand reach out and grab mine without saying anything.

“C’mon. You and I are going to enjoy our last day together. Then tomorrow, I’m going to come over to your house and see you off,” he said as he lifted me to my feet and kept me from falling over. My eyes were still a bit watery, but I smiled nonetheless and let Garrett lead me to around the wall and back onto the floor of the skating rink. We joined the other guys and all of the little children and continued skating as if this wasn’t my last day here in Tempe with my friends.

I and Garrett spent the next two hours skating around hand in hand and laughing as all of the little children played limbo under our arms. He made me laugh, he made me smile, but most of all, he made me forget. And that was all that mattered at that point in time. I wanted to forget that I was moving and Garrett let me do that just by being there and making sure I was having a good time. We both laughed as we tumbled and fell to our knees on the wood floor. This was why I always wore jeans when we went skating, no matter how hot it was outside. Looking over at that smiling face beside me, I realized how hard this was going to be. I wouldn’t be able to wake up and see that smiling face whenever I wanted to anymore. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to live without talking to Garrett and I wasn’t looking forward to trying. If anything I would probably refuse to try.

“Quit thinking about it, Merry.”

“I’m not.”

“Merry…”

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t lie to you, I know.”

“Good.”

I watched my best friend push himself back up and onto his feet before reaching down to help me up. He was always a perfect gentleman and it was one of the numerous things that I loved about him. His strange obsession with zombies freaked me out just a little bit, but I suppose that all guys have at least one thing that they nerd out about. Zombies just happened to be Garrett’s. I smiled as he kept a tight grip on my hand, almost as if he was afraid to let go. Maybe he knew that things weren’t going to be right without us together.

When Garrett dropped me off at my house that night, I remember watching his car drive off down the road, silent as could be. That’s the last time I’ve gonna see him drive off, probably for a long time, I thought as I walked in the front door and went quietly up to my room. Both of my parents were already in bed, which was where I was headed myself.

As I lay in bed, I stared up at the ceiling and thought of how things were going to change in the morning. I was leaving my hometown, all of my friends and my whole life behind for something new and different. Normally, that would be okay with me, but this was too much difference being thrown on me at once. Garrett was the only one who knew that I was leaving Tempe tomorrow; we’d decided not to tell the others because they would have tried to throw a last minute party with a bunch of people I didn’t even know. But I knew that they’d noticed the cloud of metaphorical sadness that had been hanging over my head when I said goodbye to them. I rolled over onto my side and curled up into a ball, letting the silent tears run down my face as I cried myself to sleep for the last time in my childhood home.