All We've Ever Known

“Good morning,” Alex smiled once I had opened my eyes. “Looks like you actually fell asleep last night!”

I laughed and turned onto my other side, away from Alex. He was right, though – for once in a very long time I had actually fallen asleep naturally and at an acceptable time. I could feel my muscles aching already though, which killed my good mood. Clearly the rest of the day would be one filled with pain, which I was not at all looking forward to. Ever since I was eighteen, my joints started acting up at least every couple of weeks, and after struggling with my eating disorder for a couple of years after that, my joints were shot and I was in pain practically every day. I definitely fucked over my 80-year-old self (who would most definitely be confined to a wheelchair).

“Are you hungry for breakfast?” Alex asked, propping himself up on his elbow. I turned around to face him and smiled. His hair was a rat’s nest and was sticking up in every direction. I laughed and reached up to ruffle it. He smiled widely and leaned down to kiss me, which made me uncomfortable since I was sure I had terrible morning breath.

“Not at the moment… But thank you,” I replied, attempting to sit up in bed. My face scrunched in pain as I pulled myself up into an awkward sitting position.

“You alright?” Alex asked warily, his hand touching my shoulder.

“Yeah, yeah! I’m fine!” I answered quickly, trying to sound as reassuring as possible. I slowly lowered my feet on the floor and stood up, feeling all of my joints scream in pain.

“You don’t look ‘fine’…” Alex laughed, getting up and helping me straighten out.

“Yeah, well, I don’t exactly get the reward for best body on the planet, that’s for sure. I’ll be fine in a minute, I just need to give myself time to adjust to being awake and upright.”

“If you say so…” Alex sighed. “Do you want me to give you a shirt or something to wear today? You know, so you don’t have to go all the way home to get changed?”

“Yeah, that would be nice…”

Alex nodded and then dug through his dresser to find something. I shuffled into the bathroom and brushed my teeth, realizing that I didn’t have my makeup with me to cover up my scars.

“I found you something!” Alex said happily, walking into the bathroom. He must’ve sensed that I had a dilemma, since he followed his statement with, “What’s wrong?”

“I… Don’t have anything to cover up these things,” I replied, touching the scars on my face.

“You can’t go without the makeup? You look beautiful either way!”

I narrowed my eyes at him and said, “Mhm, right. Because giant bright pink scars jumping out at you are an attractive attribute.”

“To me they are!” he smiled. He leant down and gently kissed the scar at the side of my mouth. “If it makes you feel better, I might have some extra cover up in the closet that Lisa left behind. She had a stash of her favorite kind, so if she didn’t remember to take them, you can use some. That is… If you’re comfortable with that!”

“It’s concealer, Alex! It’s not like I’m going to wear her clothes!” I laughed.

He opened the closet door, and lo and behold, the concealer sat quietly in the back. He gave it to me and left, to get changed I assumed. Once I was done in the bathroom, Alex was nowhere to be found upstairs. I descended the steps and found him pouring some cereal for him and Rian.

“Good morning, Mace!” Rian chirped. “And how are you on this fine morning?”

“I’m doing pretty well!” I laughed.

“You want some cereal?” Alex asked, pouring milk in the two bowls.

“Uhm, no thank you,” I replied quietly. I sat beside Rian at the table and picked at my nails.

“Well, you have to eat something…” Alex said carefully, setting the bowls on the table. “Toast? Eggs?”

I sighed, knowing that I wouldn’t win the battle if I tried to argue with him. On any normal day, I would’ve felt more annoyed that I was being pressured to eat when I really didn’t want to, but I felt a little more relaxed than usual.

“I, uhm… I could go for some eggs,” I said, picking the less calorie-filled of the two. If I was going to have to keep my cool the whole day, I wanted to make sure I didn’t do anything to upset myself.

“Alright then!” Alex smiled, leaning down to kiss the top of my head.

“What are you two doing today?” Rian asked, looking to the stairs as Cassadee descended the steps. She was fully dressed and her hair and makeup seemed to have been done.

“We’re going to just drive around town,” Alex responded as he switched the eggs from the skillet to a plate. “You want anything to drink, Mace?”

“Water’s fine,” I replied. “Good morning, Cassadee!”

“Good morning!” she said happily,drawing out the “o”’s. She smiled as she took a seat beside me.

Jack burst through the door moments later, stopping everyone in their tracks from fear. He bounded into the kitchen and took a seat at the table, not saying a word.

“You could knock, you know…” Alex muttered, placing the eggs and a glass of water down in front of me.

“Thanks,” I said, picking up my fork. I tried my best to ignore the fact that I was in a room full of people, but I could feel Jack staring at me.

“Macy Granger,” he said slowly. “What are you doing here?”

He looked to Alex and raised an eyebrow, and I realized just how strange it was that I was at Alex’s house in the morning eating breakfast.

“Sheesh, I knew you went off to get her back, but… Wow, I didn’t think you guys would move this fast!” Jack laughed, taking Rian’s spoon from out of his hand and taking a bite of his cereal.

“Dude, seriously?” Rian snapped incredulously, wrenching the spoon out of Jack’s hand. “That’s fucking disgusting.”

Alex approached the table and sat down, smacking Jack in the back of the head while doing so. I had to stifle a laugh, but I honestly did feel a bit uncomfortable. Why else would I be staying the night? There was no way Jack’s assumptions were true, but I did still feel a little embarrassed.

“I was drinking last night,” Alex huffed. “I didn’t want to drive two hours and risk both of our lives!”

Jack only shook his head and got up, his intentions set on getting himself a bowl of cereal.

I tried to finish my eggs as fast as my body would allow me to, simply because I was itching to see the house I had grown up in.

“You ready?” Alex asked once I was finished. I nodded and slowly got up from the table, feeling my knees crack. I winced in pain, but grabbed the plate and put it in the dishwasher.

Alex and I said our goodbyes and then left the house for our daytime adventure. His hand stayed firmly clamped around mine as we pulled out of the driveway and headed out.

“So where to, Miss Granger?” Alex asked, kissing the scars on the back of my hand.

I laughed and replied, “I would really, really like to see my house right about now…”

“Sounds like a great start! I want to take you to one other place afterwards… I’m not sure if you even remember it, but I do,” he said.

I nodded and sat back in my seat, reveling in the beautiful weather that was just outside the car. I was more than excited to see the house that I had grown up in. Though it probably looked like a shithole to the rest of the neighborhood it was located in, I had such fond feelings toward it. Some of the worst things had happened to me there, but some of the best things did too, and since I was feeling especially nostalgic when I woke up, I was ready to see it again.

After I “moved out” (or ran away, really), my mom and my brother decided that it would be better to move into a smaller apartment to save more money. Due to the multitude of health problems my mom had when I was growing up, she was advised not to work, so we had no money coming in until my brother and I were old enough to help provide. Since my brother is six years older than me, he was able to hold a full time job at the time that I had left. He was far out of school, which allotted him time for working to help my mom out more. My mom collected welfare to keep us all afloat, and I suppose after a while it made more sense to not waste it on a tiny house we could barely afford. I was sad when I got the news they had moved, but I had no say in the matter since I hadn’t been home for quite some time.

“So where’s your mom now?” Alex asked, his mind apparently in the same place mine was.

“She works in New York now… She has a small art exhibit at some museum – nothing big,” I replied.

My mom was always so enveloped in her art, but she could never make a career out of it. Every now and then she’d try to sell a painting if she needed some extra cash, but she never felt she was good enough to sell it to people who would pay more than thirty bucks. She had gotten sick of not working for years, and decided it was best to really take her art to the next level, so she took a chance and happened to catch a break at a small museum a few miles outside of New York City. It was perfect for her – it didn’t put a strain on her health issues, and she fucking loved it.

“Does she like it out there?”

I shrugged and replied, “Yeah… She really likes it. She made a lot more friends and just seems generally happy.”

“Do you see her a lot?” he asked.

“She’ll visit occasionally… She came for my birthday in April, but that was pretty much it…”

I didn’t have the best relationship with my mom… I definitely held some resentment toward her, but it was because of things she couldn’t help. My mom was diagnosed as bipolar when I was extremely young, but I never really paid attention to it and she never really lashed out at us because of it – so I wrote it off for years. When I hit high school though, some switch in her brain must’ve been hit and she turned into an absolute psycho asshole who yelled at just me because I was the fuck-up. My brother did everything right and provided well for the family, but I was the druggie who cut herself and made everything difficult for everyone. Ultimately, that made me perfect for her to go after constantly.

Those fights with my mom definitely left a huge imprint on my mind. I vowed to never do that to my kids, no matter how much my mental problems got in the way. I wouldn’t put another human being through that, or ever hurt them the way my mom did. Easier said than done – I know, trust me. But my mom never even tried to get a handle on her issues, which definitely effected the family.

I was grateful that the conversation ended when we turned onto my old street. It looked so familiar and so bright that I couldn’t help but smile at the passing houses. I could see Alex looking at me in my peripheral vision, but I chose to ignore him. I was completely entranced in the nostalgic memories that were flooding my mind. A particular memory came to light when I laid eyes on the familiar maroon fence that belonged to my neighbor from across the street.

”Alex, you can’t do that!” I hissed from the other side of the street. I was too late, though – Alex had already reached my neighbor’s gated fence and opened it quietly.

I tiptoed across the street (though I’m sure no one would have heard me anyway) and followed him through the gate and into the back of the house. He was careless with the way he closed it, since he loathed the ugly colored, maroon fence that was the biggest eyesore of the whole block. I’m sure he would’ve ripped it apart with his bare hands if he had the chance.

“Alex, seriously… One of the other neighbors is going to catch us…”

He waved a hand and replied, “Macy Lynn, you worry too much. These fuckers aren’t even home! And you know the people around us won’t give a damn if we come back here. They hate these guys just as much as we do!”

My neighbors that lived across the street from me were probably the biggest assholes around. They made it their mission to hunt down every single trouble maker who stepped foot on our street. All kids that lived in the area were forced to go elsewhere to participate in their shenanigans, since the those guys would bitch about them to the police as if they were snorting coke (which in my case, wasn’t too far off).

Alex approached the side of the large in-ground pool and removed his shoes and socks. He looked to me and raised a mischievous eyebrow as he dipped his foot in.

“It feels really nice!” he said, putting extra emphasis on the word nice.

“I don’t care! Can we please go?” I snapped. He started to take his shirt off and I exhaled heavily.

“Don’t be a tight ass, Mace! Why does it bother you so much?”

He took off his jeans and was now standing in front of me in nothing but his underwear. I had to laugh as he dropped his jeans to the ground and turned in a slow circle.

“Come on, you don’t want me to put those back on do you?” he laughed, nodding his head toward the small pile of clothes on the ground. He wrapped his arms around me and kissed me gently, his hands moving up my sides and under my shirt. I gasped at his cold touch and then pushed him away, laughing slightly.

A devilish smile spread across his face as he backed up to the edge of the pool once more. Without another word, he slowly began falling towards the water.

“Come on, Macy Lynn!” he laughed before he finally hit the water with a huge splash. Water cascaded down the front of my clothes, completely soaking me. When he resurfaced he could only laugh as he took in my appearance.

“You are the biggest asshole I’ve ever known in my entire life,” I huffed as I removed my soggy shirt and pants.

“Not as big as these guys!” he exclaimed, jabbing a finger at the large house.

I shook my head and then ran towards the pool, jumping dangerously close to where Alex was standing. The look of pure fear on his face made me laugh as I broke the surface of the water.

“You could’ve killed me…” he muttered as he pulled me toward him. He kissed me before I could even reply and then suddenly dunked me under.

I smiled widely at the surprisingly nice memory and then turned to face the house that I had grown up in. My breath hitched in my throat as I took in its beautiful appearance.

“Alex… It’s gorgeous…” I whispered, leaning toward him so I could get a better look. “Whoever lives here now must’ve remodeled or something…”

“Yeah, they did…” he replied. He squeezed my hand and then got out of the car, signaling for me to follow. I got out and crossed the street, taking a step onto the sidewalk.

“They redid it a year after your mom and brother moved out,” Alex finished, taking my hand.

“God… It looks so much better now!”

The house that had once been extremely shabby and falling apart was now a sparkling white home with a perfectly manicured lawn. Flowers were planted all around the door and beautiful flowering shrubs scattered the property.

I was shocked, to say the least. My mom never had the money to fix anything in our house, so more often than not something fell apart and we could never replace it. That left the house looking like it belonged in the slums, and apart from the hideous maroon fence our neighbors had, our house definitely stuck out like a sore thumb in comparison to the other typical suburban homes. Now, though… Now it truly looked like it belonged.

“That was my old room…” I said softly, pointing to the right window on the top floor. “It probably looks so different now… Do you even remember what it looked like?”

Alex laughed and said, “Of course I do! I only spent about seven years of my life in that room with you!”

I smiled and looked down, my eyes finding the small slab of concrete that clashed with the stone of the sidewalk. The town had filled in a giant pothole that the ugly-fenced neighbors had complained about when I was about ten or eleven, and it was on my side of the street. Alex found what I was looking at and smiled.

“1999…” he muttered, reading the fading date that we had etched into the then-wet concrete. The slab read, “Macy Alex was here – 1999”

“Jerk…” I muttered. “You just had to cross out my fucking name…”

Alex laughed and wrapped his arms around me, saying, “Yep… I couldn’t let you have all the fun.”

“Why couldn’t we have both our names there without you ruining it?”

Alex shrugged and replied, “Because I didn’t feel it was necessary.”

And with that he leaned down and kissed me, making my head spin in combination with the heat of the early June weather. The kiss, as well as that slab of concrete, reminded me of one extremely crucial part of my past. Alex was always there. Alex was my transition through everything – my first best friend, my first boyfriend, my first kiss, my first “time” (for lack of a better phrase). He was always there and now he was with me again. Alex remained infinite to some extent, and it gave me a surge of emotion that I couldn’t place. Alex was my everything and always would be.