Unless, he already has.
Unless she feels how I know he feels.
Unless she looks at him like she used to look at me.
When she looked at me, really looked, it was as if she didn’t want to miss a single thing. No freckle, blemish, twitch, or line went unnoticed. She saw with her soul and seized mine every single time her deep chocolate eyes met mine. Through her gaze, I could actually feel her love, and it was vast and true. Vulnerable, but fierce. It felt unstoppable. She made me feel unstoppable.
Zoey was always more of an observer than a participator. She could read anyone like an open book, see things you didn’t even know were there. But she had a blind spot for me. Maybe because she never really had to try to read me, since I was a walking open book. Until I wasn’t. Until I had something to hide, and she saw what she wanted to see. And I didn’t correct her.
On the days when I am at my lowest, when my demons come to collect, I find myself rooting through my mind, grabbing hold of any fragment of a memory of her and those big, expressive eyes, looking at me like I was the answer to every question.
Fuck, I miss her.
I’d love to say that I would be that guy who would step out of the way if she felt even a fraction of what I’m almost positive Blue feels for her, but that would be a lie, and I’m trying really hard not to do that anymore.
So, fuck it, no, I don’t care how they feel for each other because there is no way in Hell it comes even remotely close to how I still feel for her. My love for Zoey is insurmountable. It goes beyond reason and defies every fuck up and regret. It has never once waned throughout the years. In fact, it’s only swelled in her absence. I know I broke her heart more times to count, and her trust in me is nonexistent. She can’t even stand the sound of my voice. But I know, underneath the resentment and avoidance, there’s still something there. I can feel it, I think. I hope. Maybe it’s one-sided, maybe it’s all in my head, or just wishful thinking, but I can’t not try, and I will try.
I’m ready to own up to every fucked-up thing I did to her, to me, to us. I’m ready to work, to do anything and everything I need to do to prove to her that I’m not that idiotic, selfish asshole anymore. I mean, it’s not like she can hate me any more than she already does. I’ve already hit rock bottom, more than once, and I’ve climbed my way back up. So, if I’m going to fall back down, I might as well go down swinging.
Whether Blue stands in the way or not.
I’m getting my girl back.
If she’ll have me.
What A Time
Zoey
The first time I heard Delaware sing, I cried.
We were eleven. It was the summer after fourth grade. I had survived my first year at a new school in a new city and state that seemed like a foreign country compared to my hometown in Tennessee. To be honest, not only did I survive but I flourished. And ninety-nine percent of that was because of Delaware King. He took me under his wing and not only made me feel safe and appreciated but he pushed me to do things I wouldn’t normally do.
He encouraged me to speak up in class when he knew I knew the answer but was too chickenshit to raise my hand. All he had to do was give me a little nod and a wink and my hand listened to his silent order.
He taught me how to play basketball, and even though I sucked, he never once laughed when I would miss a basket, which happened often. I even played a few games of three on three and H.O.R.S.E. He never made me play longer than I wanted. And he always knew when I’d had enough.
Over that summer, we jumped off rocks into Wilson River and floated down the stream on an obscenely large plastic unicorn.
We scarfed down snacks from trucks.
Del’s oldest brother, Clay, let us sneak into rated-R movies with bags of Sour Patch Kids and cans of Coke in our pockets.
We rode public transportation into the city, almost alone. We always had some sort of chaperone, but they would keep their distance; usually, it was one or both of Del’s brothers.
And midway through the summer, I sat with Del as he serenaded tourists and hipsters on the streets of downtown Portland.
I couldn’t believe what my ears were hearing. How could so much talent be inside this string bean body that is no more than four feet and nine inches tall? But there he was, in dark blue skinny jeans and a Lumineers t-shirt, belting his heart out with covers of old ’60s and ’70s pop and R&B records. The worn, twenty-dollar guitar he found at a yard sale strapped around his back. To this day, I cry every time I hear “A Change Gonna Come” by Sam Cooke. It’s my favorite song. It’s the first song Del crooned in front of me and a crowd of people on a sidewalk in front of a tattoo shop in Southeast Portland. It’s a song I will never forget. It is ingrained in me, just as he is.
His voice, oh his voice, was so damn tender, but full of far too much soul for a pre-teen to embody. It baffled me. Still does. It sounded as if he had lived a thousand lives before this one. Like he knew all the answers and was just waiting for us to catch up. His voice ached and cracked, drenched in emotion too heavy for my brain to comprehend. But my heart, my heart understood. Every lyric poured effortlessly from his lips, puncturing my soul so deep it made a home there.
I fell in love that day. And I haven’t gotten up since.
No matter what Del has done, I just can’t shake him. I want to. I want to hate him so badly. Some would say he deserves the hate that I can’t seem to muster up. And they aren’t entirely off-base. But they don’t know what I know. Not really, anyway. They only see what he allows them to see. I made that mistake before and I lost him because of it.
♫♬♫
It’s been a week since I got that first voicemail. He’s called every day since. I know I should answer. I always did before. Maybe that’s why I don’t now. Even though he sounded healthy, good, like the Del I once knew. Like the Del who spent his Thursdays in the summer busking until just before the sun came down. The Del who held my hand when I had to practice a speech for class. The Del who would mouth every word of that speech I stuttered out, his determined but soft eyes locked on mine, willing me to finish.
Yeah, no, I’ve also made that mistake before. Thinking, hoping, I would hear the Del who was my everything from ages ten to eighteen, only to hear the slurred, incoherent, and cruel ramblings of a falling pop star.
I know he didn’t mean it. I know he was sick. But it doesn’t hurt any less. I have to consciously rifle through my mind, yanking any happy memory I can find because the bad ones started to outweigh the good years ago, and that is terrifying. And really freaking sad. So I cling, and I laminate, and I lock those suckers up until I need to remember again.
I’ve remembered a lot this week.
My stomach has been a rolling tumble weed of anxiety.
I haven’t listened to the other voicemails. But I’ve gained an unhealthy obsession with staring at the damn things taking up space in my inbox. It’s like a game of chicken—my thumb hovers over the link just above the cracked screen. My head, the one that is overcrowded with the worst versions of Del, is screaming at me to hit that trash icon and let that be the end of it. It’s protecting my overly empathic heart like a mother fucker. Avoidance is bliss. But that snowflake heart of mine, is a grown ass heart who can defend itself and it’s singing a tune I know all too well. And it’s a song only written for Del.