Who Knew Then? (What We Know Now?)

Jared

“Where is she?” I demanded as Brett finally opened the door to his apartment. I’d been “grounded” until lunchtime today by Eric and Tanya, and so I’d spent my entire morning pacing the basement, waiting for them to let me go and try to talk to Kass.

“What are you talking about?” he asked, sounding like he’d just woken up.

“Kass! Where is she? Tanya said she was here,” he blinked slowly, trying to process it.

“No, she hitched a ride back to Charlotte with Brody yesterday – she was here for a whole five minutes,” he replied, and my blood ran cold. I couldn’t believe she’d went back without me, I knew I’d been a jerk and a half, but I hadn’t expected this. Kass didn’t just do spontaneous, off-the-cuff things, especially not ones like leaving the city on a dime like that.

“O-oh,” I stammered, and he just gave me a cross look.

“Whatever the hell you did to her, you better get your fucking act together. She isn’t going to stick around so you can treat her like shit whenever things don’t go your way,” he growled at me, and I nodded.

“I know, I fucked up… I can’t even start to explain,” I sighed, and he raised an eyebrow. “But Tanya told me she’d stayed here overnight – which I understand. I wouldn’t want to have put up with me either. But they didn’t say she’d went back to Charlotte,”

“Well Kassy was a wreck when she was here, so maybe she doesn’t want to be followed,” he told me, and I swallowed hard.

“What time did they leave?”

“Around four thirty,” right about when Eric had drug me with him to go pick up the kids. It’d all been planned, and I hadn’t had a fucking clue.

“Thanks Brett,” I mumbled, turning and leaving. I had to get my ass back to Charlotte, as soon as was physically possible.

I sped the entire way back to Eric and Tanya’s, and had my stuff thrown into my bag and packed up at lightening speed. I was just at the top of the stairs when Tanya and Eric saw me, and they both came over, looking confused.

“What’re you doing?” Eric asked.

“Going to Charlotte. I need to talk to her Eric, I fucked up,” not like I had to tell him that.

“You sure that’s what she wants? From what she thought of what you said, things were pretty much over,” that weight of dread settled in my stomach again.

“I have to talk to her, and I have to apologize. I’ll do whatever I can to make it right, but if she doesn’t want me that’s her decision,” I allowed, and they both looked like they didn’t want me to go. As I opened the door Eric moved to stop me, but Tanya’s hand on his arm stopped him from doing so.

“Say bye to the boys for me, all right? And… and tell them I’m sorry for acting so poorly while I was here,” I told them, and then was out the door.

The three hour drive seemed to take six or seven hours, drawing itself out as long as was physically possible. I pulled into the parking spot at our building, and ran up the stairs to our apartment, taking the back way so I wouldn’t have to stop and visit with the guy who worked a the front desk for a half an hour. Most other days I wouldn’t have minded, but today I was a man on a mission.

The knock would have been loud enough for the neighbors to hear, but there was no answer from inside the apartment. Finally after waiting for a few moments I pulled out my keys and let myself in – as far as I could tell everything looked the same. Most of our boxes were still unpacked, sitting on the floor. I could only think of one other place she’d be, and so pulled out my cellphone to call Brody.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Brody, it’s me, Jared. Please tell me Kass is there with you?” I all but begged him, and heard him let out a long breath.

“No she’s not; she just caught a ride back with me. I dropped her off at the apartment and went home,” he answered, and suddenly I had a really bad feeling.

“You’re sure? Have any of the other guys talked to her? Is she with them?” I pushed, hoping for some piece of information that would help me out.

“No, I don’t think so; I told her to give me a call if she needed anything,” he answered, and moments later I said goodbye and hung up.

I walked to our bedroom, and when I turned on the lights my legs nearly gave out. All of her stuff was gone – the boxes of clothes, her things from the closet… everything of hers that had been in here.

“No…” I raced through the apartment then, searching through the boxes, coming up short from finding any of hers. She’d left, she’d actually packed up and left.

“Shit… shit, shit, shit…” I was getting desperate, trying to find any hint or sign of her. I looked at the mantel and saw the two frames missing, a note with my name on it sitting in their place. I fell to my knees then, letting the tears fall from my eyes. If the picture of her and her dad had still been there, there might have been a chance that she’d come back.

But now I knew that there wasn’t.

I hadn’t just lost another opportunity to do what I loved – I’d just lost the girl I loved too.