Escape In You (30 page)

“I’ll miss that place. But I think it’s an excellent idea.”

His eyes widen a little, and hope is plain on his face. “Does that mean you might have some interest in where I end up?”

And just like that, it’s there in front of me. The future that I want. Freedom. School. Taylor. Could I ever let go of the guilt that trapped me, prevented me from having those things? He said he was going to try to let go of his demons. Can I do the same?

“On my seventeenth birthday, I brought a group of girls home,” I say, my voice just above a whisper. “We had been to the movies and out to dinner and we were supposed to end with cake at my house. My mom had been planning it for ages.” I smile a little. “She loved baking. Really loved it.”

The next part is hard to get out. “We walked in and she wasn’t there, wasn’t in the living room or the kitchen. And there was no cake waiting for us. I walked into her bedroom and found her. She was naked on her bed, passed out, with vomit all over her.”

I squeeze my eyes shut. The image is so clear even after all this time.

“Some of the girls had followed me back, saw everything. They knew what we were looking at before I did. It wasn’t until we got to the hospital and the doctors started talking that I realized she had tried to kill herself.”

“God, Zoe, I’m so sorry.”

I shake my head. “Everything changed after that. All my friends looked at me differently. There were rumors about me at school, lots of gossip and joking. It was a nightmare. That’s when I hooked up with Ellie and her friends. They didn’t give a shit what other people said, and they had access to booze.” I smile a little. “I was mostly interested in the booze.”

“That can’t have been easy for you.”

I lower my eyes, not wanting to tell him just how bad it really was but knowing that I need to. “She came home with new medicine and new doctors, and I thought everything was going to be okay. Sometimes it was. Other times…”

I swallow, hearing her words in my head.

“When she was having a bad day, she would say things to me. About how…how I ruined her life. How she couldn’t ever get the help she needed because she had to worry about me. That it was my fault that she tried to…that she did it to get away from me, and I had even ruined that by calling 911.”

I hear his sharp intake of breath, but I have to keep talking, have to get it out before he tries to comfort me.

“She’d eventually even out, and she’d be horrified, absolutely horrified by what she had said. Sometimes that was worse, actually. Because she’d cry so much and be so depressed. I was always so afraid, those times. That she’d be so sad she’d try again.” I take another deep breath. “I never really knew what was wrong with her. Still don’t, not really. It didn’t matter to me much. All I knew was that I had to help her, had to take care of her. If her condition was my fault it was the least I could do.”

“Please, stop.”

I finally look up and see tears in his eyes. “Come here.” He holds out his arms to me, and I sink into them. God, I’d missed him so much. Missed the way that this felt, the way that it calmed me and centered me and heightened everything in me all at the same time. Taylor hooks his hand behind my knees, nudging my legs up onto the bed. He breathes out a sigh of relief as he pulls my body tight to his chest.

“That’s better,” he whispers into my hair. “I’m sorry I interrupted you. I just needed you in my arms. And to tell you…God, Zoe. I’m sorry all of that happened to you. I’m sorry it happened to
her
.”

I nod against his chest. “Me too.”

“That day that you…when you left…” I hear the pain in his voice, and hold him tighter. “You said she wasn’t doing well. Is everything okay?”

I squeeze my eyes shut. “No. She’s here, Taylor. She’s been here since that morning. I got the call when you went into your room to chill out.”

“What do you mean she’s—” His voice cuts off. “Oh, God.”

“She was having some kind of hallucinations. They found her on the highway.” I leave out the rest. “Jerry left. I don’t know if it was in response to her episode, or if her episode was in response to his going. Regardless, she’s here.”

“We’ll figure this out, Zoe,” he says. “My dad knows a lot of people, he’ll help us find out what she needs. I promise, we’ll figure this out.”

Something seems to break apart in me—maybe it’s that last bit of guilt, or the weight of thinking I’m alone. Whatever it is, its absence allows me to look up at Taylor and say the thing I should have said from the very beginning.

“I love you, Taylor.”

He stares down at me, his eyes wide, and I’m scared for a minute that he doesn’t feel the same way. But then he’s kissing me, my lips and cheeks and eyelids, every inch of my face he can reach. And with each kiss he whispers it back.
I love you, I love you, I love you.

We have a long way to go—that much is obvious. We’re both screwed up, maybe irreparably so. But it doesn’t matter, not anymore. We’ve come so far already, both of us, and that was on our own. Now that we’re together, we’ll get the rest of the way there, I know it.

He told me once that I was his escape, and I agreed. In a world that was cold and dark and scary, Taylor was my safe place. When I felt trapped in that house, trapped in my guilt and my fear, he was my escape, my way out.

But I want more than that now, more than a mere escape. Grace and Peter have both assured me that this is okay. That my mom would want it for me too. That it’s right and normal for me to want more than just a safe haven, more than just a small pocket of temporary happiness. And I
do
want more now. I want the whole world. And I want Taylor there with me when I find it.

Epilogue

Zoe

“So what is the point of this, exactly?” Ellie asks me for at least the tenth time.

“The point is to be awesome,” I say as I take the coffee from her. “Thanks.”

She yawns dramatically. “Coffee is essential, seeing as how you dragged me out of bed at this inhumane hour.”

“You’re such a drama queen, Ells,” Fred says, joining us on the sidewalk. “Has anyone ever told you that?”

She sticks out her tongue at him, and I wonder when the two of them will finally get together. They’re running out of time—Fred will be going back to school in a week.

The summer is winding down. In a matter of days Grace will be back at school as well, along with most of the kids who return to town for these few months. It’s strange to imagine fall semester starting. My life is so different than it was at this time last year.

“Should we go check it out?” Fred asks, looking down the street to where the art festival is taking shape.

“I thought it wouldn’t be ready yet?” I look down at my phone. Though the artists have been working for hours already, it’s still only nine a.m.

“It won’t. But you don’t want to miss the process. Believe me.”

I’m so glad we listen to him. When we get over to Taylor’s sidewalk plot it doesn’t look like much—just vast stretches of blue and green with outlines and grids sketched in white taking shape. He’s much more interesting than his art at the moment—dressed in paint-splattered jeans and a tight tank top with his hair pulled back, he’s looking about as good as I’ve ever seen him. At least, as good as I’ve ever seen him fully clothed. The really sexy thing is his look of utter concentration as he works, slowly creating a magical world right there on the sidewalk in front of us. Even Ellie can’t find anything to complain about.

He takes a break after an hour or so, approaching us with a huge grin on his face. “What do you think?” he asks. He grabs me around the waist and pulls me in close for a kiss. “You impressed?”

I lean into him so I can whisper in his ear. “I really want to do you right now. Right here.”

He laughs. “Nice.”

I wink. “Seriously, this is awesome. And you’re sexy as hell making it.”

“It should be done in a few hours,” he says, then looks at his watch. “Now would be a good time to go walk around if you want to see the booths and stuff.”

I kiss him again before heading off with Fred and Ellie. The Clarksville Street Art Fair also includes traditional artists selling their wares in booths up and down Main Street. We go in that direction, checking out a myriad of artwork. From glass beads, to wirework, to embossed prints, to oil paintings, there’s a little bit of everything. It’s fascinating.

After we’ve seen just about everything there is to see on Main Street, we head back toward the sidewalk pieces. Many of the artists are working on 3-D pieces, like Taylor, while others have used chalk to recreate famous works of art or original two-dimensional drawings. A few of the smaller ones are completed already, and we stop to gawk at depictions of fiery caverns, cliff tops, and a series of rolling hills.

“That’s fucking freaky,” Ellie mutters, looking down at the cliff edge. “I seriously feel like I’m going to fall. How do they do that?”

“Wait till you see our boy,” Fred says, pride in his voice. I feel a rush of affection for Fred. I’m going to miss him this fall.

We find a crowd gathered at Taylor’s plot. There’s a reason he’s attracting so much attention. In the time we were browsing, he’s just about finished up. The result is breathtaking. He’s created a full-scale landscape of various scenes. A rolling field of flowers fades into a forest which gently opens up to a stretch of water, behind which a city gleams. In the center of the field, heading out to explore, is a couple, holding hands.

“You like it?”

I turn to face him, a lump in my throat. “It’s us.”

He smiles at me. “Yeah. Is that cheesy?”

I don’t speak, sure I’m going to cry. He smiles and takes my hand. “I wanted to paint us exploring the world. The whole wide world, out there for us to experience together.” He winks. “Cheesy enough for you now?”

I smile. “A little cheesy. But very nice.”

It’s a wonderful day. I’m so proud of Taylor, so damn happy that he’s here at all, happy that I’m with him. We’ve come a long way since that day in the hospital two weeks ago. I know we have far to go, that we’re nowhere near being whole yet, but we’re certainly on our way.

“So are you ladies all moved in?” Fred asks as the four of us sit in the grass next to Taylor’s piece, enjoying the lunch we packed that morning.

“Just about,” Ellie says. “I ever so kindly gave Zoe the bigger bedroom.” The two of us are sharing an apartment now.

I make a disbelieving sound. “Yeah, right. Your room has a walk in closet, I barely have a cupboard.”

She smiles. “That may have been part of my decision process.”

Fred shakes his head. “That apartment is going to see some epic parties. I’m kind of sad I’ll be missing it.”

“You’ll be back soon, won’t you?” Ellie asks, a hopeful note in her voice.

“Sure,” he says, and smiles at her.

I catch Taylor’s gaze, and he gives me a pointed look.

“What about you?” Ellie asks Taylor. “Are you settled in yet?”

Taylor nods, still looking at me. “Yup, Zoe helped me pick out new sheets and everything.”

Taylor had asked me to come and stay with him in his new apartment once everything was finally settled with my mom. I was tempted, for sure, but I was also scared we weren’t ready yet. I didn’t want to do anything to disturb the fragile happiness we were rebuilding. Besides, living with my best friend was exactly the kind of “normal shit” experience everyone kept telling me I should be having.

I feel a familiar pain when I think about moving out of the house. It was both thrilling and terrifying at the same time. I don’t know that I’d ever been more excited about anything, to be honest. At the same time, my leaving the house also meant that my mom was leaving the local hospital and going to the residential place by Uncle Peter. She would be there for the foreseeable future. I was glad it was close, not that she would let me come visit her. She hadn’t exactly forgiven me yet.

“You okay?” Taylor asks quietly.

I look up at him and tamp down the instinct to say yes. “I’m getting there,” I say instead. We’re both working on telling the truth, even when it sucks.

He smiles at me, and reaches over to rub my palm with his thumb.

The artists start packing up in the late afternoon. Taylor is dead on his feet, having gotten up before sunrise to get started. He actually lets me drive his car home, which is unheard of. We say goodbye to Fred and Ellie, who will be making the hour-long trek in the Honda.

“Will I see you at home?” Ellie asks me before she climbs into the driver’s seat.

I look over at Taylor, who shakes his head in an emphatic “no.”

Ellie sighs dramatically. “Fine, go get some, you skank. I’ll be fine all on my own with no man in my bed.”

“I could help you out with that, Ells,” Fred says cheerfully as he climbs into the car. He closes the door before I can hear her response, but from the look on her face I’m pretty sure it involves some kind of threat to his balls.

Taylor sleeps most of the way home, and I take great pleasure in playing whatever I want on his iPod. He wakes up as I pull into the parking lot of his new place.

His dad picked it out while Taylor was still in the hospital and arranged to have all his stuff moved over. I was impressed; I didn’t want Taylor going back to that house if at all possible, and I was glad to see his dad thought so, too. Though Taylor tried to insist that he could afford rent with his job at the shop and wouldn’t be taking help from his dad, his father convinced him that he should be focusing on school and not work.

When fall semester starts in a week, Taylor will be taking classes. Not at RSDI—that decision has been tabled for the time being—but at an art program at the university downtown. He’ll have a familiar classmate—Peter has helped me enroll as well.

“Whatcha thinking about?” Taylor asks sleepily as I park the car.

“Just about how much everything is changing.”

He’s quiet for a moment. “You scared?”

“A little. It’s big, you know?”

He reaches over to take my hand. “One day at a time, babe. That’s how normal people do it, you know.”