All We've Ever Known

“She hasn’t responded to any of my texts in the last week, and her phone goes straight to voicemail whenever I call… I’m worried,” I said to Jack as I stepped out on the back porch. I sat down in the chair beside him and sighed, peering down at my phone. Macy’s response was particularly terse the last time I had spoken to her, which was after her brother had caught us on the balcony. After that, she never said a word.

“I’m sure she’s fine,” Jack replied absentmindedly as he typed away on his phone.

“Can you get off your phone for two seconds? This is why I like talking to Rian,” I snapped.

Jack glanced up from his phone and sighed. “Alex, I don’t know why she’s ignoring you, okay? I can’t answer that. Maybe you freaked her out!”

“What?” I exclaimed. “No, she seemed… Normal when I came to her apartment…”

“Macy was always a master at hiding her emotions. She’s a people-pleaser, dude.”

“No… No, that’s not it…” I objected softly.

But it was starting to sink in that maybe Jack was right. Maybe Macy wasn’t ready for a relationship with me… I couldn’t blame her, I wasn’t entirely sure I was ready for such a relationship, but that didn’t stop me from wanting to be with her… Macy was all I could think about for years – I couldn’t just let her go again! I couldn’t turn away from the fact that I loved her more than I had ever loved anyone.

“Jack… I can’t lose her again. I can’t let this be it,” I muttered sadly.

He leaned his head against the back of the chair and answered, “I know you can’t. But you can’t push her to do something she’s uncomfortable with…”

“How am I supposed to know that she’s uncomfortable, though?”

Jack shrugged and said, “How many times have you texted her since the last time she answered you?”

I searched through my conversation with Macy and sighed, replying, “Honestly? Twelve…”

Jack’s eyes widened momentarily, but he quickly composed himself and replied, “I think it’s pretty obvious…”

“Don’t tell me that!” I cried, pushing myself off of the chair. I began pacing the deck, unable to accept the fact that Macy didn’t want to be with me.

“Alex…” Jack mumbled, watching me warily.

The doorbell sounded from the living room, making me feel even more uneasy.

“Fuck…” I hissed, shaking my head furiously. “She can’t be here today!”

I walked nervously to the front door and opened it, revealing a downtrodden Lisa. She was staring at the pavement and only livened up when Baz bounced up to her.

“I’ll bring him back in three days,” she reminded me. As if I didn’t already know that…

“Take care of him,” I said softly as she turned to leave, Baz squirming away in her arms.

She stopped midway down the sidewalk and turned, her eyes filling with tears. She tried her best to retain them, but it broke my heart to see her that upset.

“You know, if I was doing something wrong you could’ve told me…” she whispered. “You didn’t have to… You didn’t have to break up with me over this.”

I looked down, unable to make eye contact with her. I was ashamed that I had ended it between us, mainly because I had promised Lisa that I wouldn’t develop feelings for Macy. Whether Macy visited or not, I would have realized eventually that Lisa and I weren’t right – we weren’t healthy! We broke up constantly over silly things, and it didn’t make sense to stay in a relationship like that… Granted, I still did love her, and every time I looked at her I still got that strange swell of happy emotions I got the first time we started dating… It just… Wasn’t in the cards anymore.

“I’m sorry, Lis…” I muttered. “I really, truly am.”

She laughed dryly, and retorted, “No you aren’t… You’re not sorry.”

She turned and walked back to her car, gingerly placing Baz in the passenger seat. Once she got in, she began pulling out, and I waved to her as she sped away down the street.

Jack approached me from behind and clapped me on the back, making me jump.

“Jack, am I making a mistake?” I sighed.

He only shrugged and said, “I don’t know, man… There’s a lot that needs to be figured out before you can determine that…”

I nodded and grabbed my shoes from their spot by the door. I hurriedly sat on the couch and tied them as fast as my fingers would allow me to go.

“Where are you going?” Jack asked, clearly confused when I jumped up and headed back for the door.

“I’m going to find her… If she’s not interested in me, she can tell me to my face… Like you just said, I need to figure this all out,” I answered quietly.

I grabbed my keys and passed by Jack, not even giving him a second glance. He muttered a quick good luck before I got in my car and headed out to the main highway.

There was no way I was going to let Macy throw this all away. I knew by the way she looked at me that she loved me back – she said it for Christ’s sake! I wasn’t going to let her fears and insecurities get the best of her…

The two hour drive to Seaford seemed to drag on, and I finally found myself parked outside of her apartment building. My heartbeat increased as I walked up the steps, the setting sun casting a long, eerie shadow against them. I pressed the button for the appropriate apartment number and, moments later, was told to come up.

My anxiety was so horrid that I was sure I would panic by the time I reached her floor, but I tried to keep my composure when I knocked on the large, white door. The door opened a crack, and I could make out the misty hazel eyes that belonged to Val.

“We gotta make this quick,” she muttered. “Paul’s going to be home any minute.”

She swung open the door and I hastily entered, extremely confused. She seemed nervous, as if this was such a forbidden thing to do – and to an extent, it was. Clearly Paul didn’t like the idea of me being back in Macy’s life – and I couldn’t blame him. I could end up doing more harm than good if I didn’t watch what I was doing.

“I just want to know if Macy’s here…” I said, looking around. The apartment was quiet, and my heart sank at the possibility of her being out.

Val shook her head and replied, “No, she’s not here. But I know where you can find her… You have to promise you’ll be careful, though… She hasn’t been doing well recently.”

“What?” I asked, confused. “What do you mean not doing well?”

She sighed and said softly, “Paul said some things that really fucked with her – and you know how Macy can be when hurtful things are revealed. She’s just been… A mess.”

“But… What did he say? I don’t understand…”

“Never mind that,” she said, pushing me back towards the door. She glanced down quickly at her phone and cursed. “Paul’s on his way home…”

“Alright! Just tell me where she is.”

“She said she was going to walk to some lake – something about being there with you there once or something?”

I nodded and said, “Yeah… The lake… Thanks, Val.”

She winked and smiled fondly, pushing me out of the apartment and slamming the door behind me. I walked back out to my car, my anxiety still has high as ever. I drove as quickly as I possibly could to the spot out in the woods where I was told she’d be.

Sure enough, she was sitting on the rock facing the large lake, her back to me. She had her knees pulled up to her chest, her chin resting on her arms. I smiled as I quietly got out of the car, not even shutting the car door all the way so she wouldn’t sense my presence. I tiptoed across the grassy area between us and stopped a few feet behind her.

“I was beginning to think I’d have to file a missing persons report,” I laughed, as if nothing was wrong. She whirled around, intense fear in her eyes. When she registered it was me, she put her hand to her chest, trying to calm down her presumably racing heart.

“Don’t ever fucking scare me like that again…” she huffed, turning back to the lake.

“Sorry,” I sighed, sitting beside her.

She was extremely quiet as she looked out across the water. Her arctic blue eyes were contemplative and her eyebrows furrowed in frustration.

“You can’t be here…” she finally whispered.

“And why’s that?” I replied nonchalantly.

“You just can’t… You need to leave.”

“But, why? I’m not leaving until you give me a proper answer,” I said.

“Because everything is wrong!” she exclaimed. “Everything is so fucking wrong and seeing you is one of them!”

Her outburst surprised me, and I leaned back a bit as I searched her face for any type of emotion. All I could read was pure anger and sadness. The way her eyebrows furrowed and her mouth quivered told me she was deeply hurt by something, and it hurt knowing that I contributed to it.

“Mace, what happened?” I asked quietly.

She looked over at me, her eyes piercing mine with an emotion so strong, I had to look away. “Alex, you don’t get it do you? I’m messed up! I’m fucked out of my mind and there’s nothing I can do about it! I only get worse as the years go on, and my brother’s fucking right… I do need everyone else to help me. I can’t rope you in like that! I can’t keep fooling myself thinking I can be in a relationship with you when I really can’t.”

She started crying at the last part, and I knew it was all just deep-rooted feelings pouring out. I had opened the floodgates, and there was no way I could close them now. I just snaked my arm around her tiny shoulders and gently rubbed her arm, letting her say what she needed to say.

“Alex, I feel terrible…” she muttered after a couple moments of silence. “You’ve been so nice to me, and I’ve been so foolish to let you think that you’re getting my old self back. There’s no way I’ll ever be the same, and I’m so, so sorry if I made you think that…”

“Mace, come on – don’t talk like that…” I replied soothingly. “I know that you’re different. I’m different – everyone’s different! Everyone has experiences that shape them, and yours just so happened to be a little more intense. It’s nothing that would make me love you any less!”

New sobs wracked her body and she burrowed her head in her arms, unable to control herself. Between sobs she constantly muttered, “It’s all my fault. It’s all my fault. It’s all my fault” and my heart broke at the pure desperation in her words.

Once she calmed down a bit, I quietly mumbled, “Macy Lynn, nothing is your fault. I promise you - nothing is your fault.”

Instead of comforting her, like I had intended with those words, I only enraged her. She threw herself off of the rock and stood with her back to me, her hands grabbing at the roots of her hair.

“How can you fucking say that?” she whispered menacingly. “How do you fucking know what’s my fault and what isn’t? You have no idea what the hell I’ve been through!”

I stayed in my spot on the rock, careful to not provoke her – although, I had already done quite enough provoking already. “You’re right! I don’t know what you’ve been through.”

“It’s all my fault,” she whispered again, falling to the ground. She buried her head in her arms again and her small body began swaying slightly.

“If I hadn’t done the drugs, if I hadn’t let my eating disorder get as bad as it did, if I hadn’t fucking left Timonium, I would have a healthy baby right now,” she cried. “I would be happy and I wouldn’t have this exhausting guilt on my shoulders every fucking day of my life.”

I kept quiet, waiting for her to continue. She cried for a bit and then whispered, “If I hadn’t gone downtown to find Freddy I wouldn’t have been… I wouldn’t have been attacked. I wouldn’t have the problems I have now. I wouldn’t have the scars I have now. I wouldn’t be in this unsure mess of a situation with you, and I would be able to trust people like normal human fucking beings are able to. This wouldn’t be so hard.”

At this, I leapt off of the rock and walked over to her, my blood pumping hard through my veins. So that was where the scars had come from? Some son of a bitch assaulted her? I could taste the bile in my mouth just thinking about it. I kicked the tree beside her and then fell in defeat. I had known Freddy in high school, and I knew that he and Macy had become friends before we broke up. I had no idea he would be the guy to change her so completely for the worse.

“Mace, I’m so fucking sorry that I wasn’t there,” I whispered, laying down in the soft grass. “I swear to God, none of this would have fucking happened. I feel sick to my stomach knowing that I wasn’t there to stop it.”

She shook her head furiously and replied, “No, no. None of this is your fault, Alex. None of it. Please don’t blame yourself.”

“How can I not when you’re sitting there beating the hell out of yourself for things you couldn’t control?” I yelled, sitting up. “Macy, I know it’s incredibly painful that you lost a baby, but you can’t possibly blame yourself as much as you do. You were hurting and you had to deal with it somehow – I just wish I was there to help. And it’s definitely not your fault some douchebag… Hurt you.”

She looked out across the field that lay across the road. My eyes scanned one of the two scars that graced her face - the deep, jagged scar that made its way through her eyebrow, down to her cheekbone. I reached up and gently traced it, causing her to flinch.

“Macy Lynn, I will never hurt you. I will never let anything happen to you, and I sure as hell will help you through anything. You need to trust me on that… I get it – I’m in this for the long run, okay? I want you to be happy again, and I swear to God you will be.”

She looked up and searched my expression for what I assumed to be any trace of deception. I took her face gently in my hands and leaned down to kiss her, her tears rubbing off onto my cheeks. I attempted to wipe some of them away with my thumb as her lips moved with mine. Her hand gripped my forearm as I laid her down in the grass, and I was careful to softly and gently grip her around her waist, since she loathed people touching her in places she deemed “fat”.

I broke the kiss after I felt my breathing was about to send me to the ground, and I looked into her tear-filled eyes. She was slightly smiling though, which reassured me.

“Macy Lynn, I want to do this – I want us to try to be ‘us’ again…” I whispered, touching my forehead to hers.

She sighed and answered, “What if it doesn’t work out?”

I laughed dryly and said, “Well, then I’ll have hell to pay for it… Mace, we’re older now - things are different. We’re different. We can do this!”

She played with the seam of my shirt, unable to reply. I leaned down and kissed her once more, being sure to put more passion into it – there was no way that I was leaving without Macy as my girlfriend.

She broke away and said, “You tour, Alex… You’ll be away a lot and… And I’ll be home alone.”

“There’s no reason why you can’t visit me!” I smiled. “I’m sure you haven’t used any vacation days… This is your opportunity to see the world!”

She smiled at that and actually looked me in the eyes while doing so. “You think we can do this?”

I wiped away the last remaining tears from her cheeks and nodded, saying, “Absolutely.”

She gently pushed me off of her and stood up, making me wary of her next move. I was scared that she was going to get upset again, or yell at me – or both. She only turned around, her eyebrows knitted together ever-so-slightly and said, “Then let’s do it… What’s left to lose?”

I laughed dryly at that, since I knew everything was at stake the moment I expressed my desire to be together. It didn’t matter though – Macy said she was in. I had my springtime-smelling, mysterious girlfriend back, and that was all I cared about. My heart felt like it was going to explode thinking about how, the girl that I had known before any of my other friends – the girl who was there from the very beginning, who had seen me at my worst – was now mine again.

I stepped forward and enveloped her in the tightest hug I could give. She grunted out of pure force and a small laugh squeezed out of her crushed lungs. “Alex, this is great and all – but I really can’t breathe.”

I laughed and released her, only to take her by the hands once more and kiss her so wildly, so passionately that both of us were out of breath and slightly laughing by the time we broke apart.

“Macy Lynn, I promise things will be amazing from here on out.”