Has to Be Love (21 page)

Why now? Why did he have to do this now?

But now that I'm home, maybe I'm looking at Elias and me in a different light too. He is everything good and sweet that belongs in a small town like the one we're in.

I'm …

My heart twists and I set the ring down.

I don't totally know what I want yet, but I don't think I can be tied like this.

Not now.

Not yet.

Leaving for school and being long distance with Elias seems like the obvious solution, but just the thought of it doesn't fit somehow. The idea of being split like that makes me feel completely off my path and totally out of balance. Unfinished. In limbo. Like a life stuck in rough draft.

If I go to New York, I don't want to be split between here and there. I want to
go.
If I stay here, I don't want to look down at my hand and wonder if that's what's keeping me here. I want it to be about
me.
No matter what I decide right now, I need it to be for
me.
Maybe that's just me being stubborn … selfish … or maybe I'm finally realizing that saying yes to Elias was putting myself on a much simpler path than the one I want to be on.

I send Cecily a text, the words still not seeming real.

I told Elias yes, but I think it was a mistake. What do I do?

She writes back almost immediately and says pretty much exactly what I knew she would. You know what to do. I'm sorry.

Sorry … sorry … There are not enough sorrys in the universe right now. I don't want to hurt anyone. I don't want to hurt. But with the way I feel, there's no way around it.

It's so surreal. The whole situation. The ring is clenched in my fist and I'm about to give it back to Elias. “I can't marry you. I'm so sorry.”

We stand in the parking lot of my school because I'm horrible and it took me all day to work up the courage. I'm fully aware of how I'm destroying him, and I feel like I'm being ripped apart for it.

“You're not making sense, Clara.” His voice breaks twice, which just splits my heart further.

“We can't get married,” I say. “I might be leaving for school.”

His head shakes quickly. “People who are married are separated all the time.”

I knew he'd fight this. I just wasn't totally prepared for what I'd say. I wanted our split to be quiet. Something I didn't
have
to fight. If I have to argue my way out of marrying him, I'm bound to say something horrible that will hurt him even worse. I don't want to hurt him at all. It's just that every time I think about not getting married, I feel lighter. Mom would have understood. Would have known what to tell me to say. Instead I'm … I'm fumbling.

Tears start down my face as I struggle to find the words I rehearsed last night. “I just can't … I'm so sorry.” Where's all the strength I got on my trip? The idea that I really have to look out for me?

“Military. Even the people who work on the oil slopes. We know so many. They're gone half the time.” His fingers don't stop tracing patterns on my arm. “We can last through that.”

“I'll be gone for two semesters a year.” I
can't be torn like that. Not with you. I can't wonder how many of my decisions are tainted by wearing a ring on my finger.
“I don't want to hate you for wondering what if …”

“What does that mean?” he asks.

“I …” But I don't know how to explain. I'm supposed to know what to say. What words to put together. I'm coming up with nothing.

He cocks his head to the side, his brown eyes pleading, and my heart breaking. “And you'll be home for holidays, and I'd fly you home for long weekends if you want. Maybe come hang with you for a week once in a while.”

“And stay where?” I ask.

“I don't know. With you.”

This is so weird. I realize in this moment that I'm breaking up with him. I, Clara Fielding, am breaking up with Elias Motter—the boy who is far too good for me and far too good-looking. And me with a face that will never really be fixed. How did this happen?

The ring is beginning to turn into a chain—holding me far too tightly to let me breathe.

I don't want safe anymore.

“Elias, I just can't. I'm not ready to commit to forever.”

He pulls in a breath. “I get that. I don't need you to right now. We can see each other over the summer and Christmas, and I can still come visit. We'll just—”

“We'll just have to be careful until we get married?” I offer, feeling like I'm negotiating the sale of a car instead of my relationship with Elias.

“Exactly.” He takes my hands, but my left hand is curled into a fist around the ring he gave me.

He steps back as he stares at my hand. “You took it off. Clara. Why? I don't understand
why.”

“This is what I need. I'm so sorry.” And just like that, with the look of utter devastation on his face, I hand him the ring.

And like somebody who is a complete and total coward, I turn and walk away, my body both stretching from the relief and caving in from the pain.

I pull open the door of my truck and am openly sobbing by the time I get it started. I don't look at Elias. I don't even do a double check in my rearview mirror before pulling out. I just drive away because I can't handle the aching hammering in my heart—especially knowing it's my fault.

27

I now have this big, black cloud following me because I know how I devastated Elias. I know giving back the ring was the right thing, and
I'm
devastated. He, I'm sure, does not believe it's the right thing, which has to make him feel even worse. The second I pull into our driveway, I run for the loft of the barn.

Every time I close my eyes I see the pain on Elias's face when I said I couldn't marry him, and bile slides up my throat, even though I know in the deepest parts of me,
down into my soul
as Dad would say, my decision was smart.

I tried to talk to Rhodes today about Columbia, but all he said was that he was glad I had a nice trip.

That's it.

How can that be it?

I'll be back at school tomorrow. And so will Elias. And I know it's going to be awful.

The barn door opens, and I can't deal with Elias or Rhodes or any kind of advice Dad might have for me. I just can't.

“I am absolutely, completely, and totally not in the mood,” I say in a flat voice.

“Just me,” Cecily says, and the ladder creaks as she makes her way up.

Without a word, she lies down next to me in the hay. I turn to face her, knowing I'm a mess and beyond happy that she made it home before this.

“How'd he take it?” she asks, reading the expression on my face.

An odd cough-laugh comes up my throat. “How do you think?”

“Bad?”

“Actually, I sort of shoved the ring at him and ran away.” I run my hands through my hair again, and it's already half covered in hay. “But not well.”

She gives me a weird frowny face. “So, even now, you can't be totally honest with him? This has to be a sign you did the right thing.”

“Maybe. You're judging me. I can see it on your face.”

“Sorry.” She rubs her hand over her face a few times like she's roughing it up and then smiles. “Better?”

It's now my turn to frown. “Only a little.”

“So?”

“So I tried. I tried to tell him I was seriously thinking of leaving. That there are so many things open to us right now and that I want to experience some of them. I know I didn't say anything the way I should have. I just can't have my decisions tainted right now. I can't.”

“And he tried to talk you out of it?”

“He tried to say he and I could be together while I went away to college.” All the feelings of being torn between two places and never actually leaving home help me remember why I had to split with him. Doing the right thing shouldn't make my chest feel like it's cracking apart. It's that I said yes to Elias for selfish reasons. I pushed him further for selfish reasons. I kissed Rhodes for selfish reasons. I have to move past that, and I'm going to have to find a way to talk to Elias for real to explain.

“Married
together while you go to school?”

“Any
kind of together.” Tears start flowing again as I think about how much Elias was willing to give up for me, and how little I was willing to give back. “Am I just a horrible person?”

“No. You're doing what's right for you. And he needs someone who's ready to turn their life upside down to be with him, the way he was for you.”

I don't have an answer to that. Why don't I love Elias enough to be what he needs?

“It'll be okay. And maybe we'll be in New York together this fall.”

That's another huge thing I don't know if I can think about or tackle, but if I didn't split with Elias to go to New York, why did I split with him?

“And maybe if you have a ten-year reunion, you and Elias will be friends again and you'll meet each other's spouses, and it'll all be fine.” She smiles.

I roll onto my side, and the pain of being separated from him hits me again. Elias with someone else?

But then when I think about me with someone else, stupid Rhodes's face comes in, and then the guys I hung with when I visited Lachelle, and I wonder if I could be with someone else. It's kind of exciting thinking about first glances and first touches—there's some hope that maybe someone else wouldn't mind my face …

I could start over and ask them all the things I never asked Elias. Do things Elias wasn't willing to do, though I'm not sure I'm ready for that either. It's just … “I don't have any idea what I want.” Splitting with Elias gave me that twinge of relief, but I wasn't prepared for the new weight.

“Why don't you just try to
let go
and have some fun for a while. I think it's been entirely too long since you've just
had fun.”

“Yeah …” I pull in a deep breath. “Maybe.”

I'm just not sure, even after all my own selfish thoughts, if I have it in me.

28

I'm trying to brush my hair, but my stomach keeps flipping over, threatening to relieve me of the half a toaster waffle I barely crammed down this morning. Oh, and my hands are shaking. My eyes are bloodshot and rimmed with dark circles after my sleepless night.

It's a horrible, horrible thing to think, but I should have waited for a Friday to break up with Elias so we'd have a couple days before we'd be forced to face each other again.

“Clara!” Dad calls. “Please don't be late for seminary! Sister McEntyre puts a lot of effort into your lessons!”

I'm so wishing I hadn't already used a fake illness … or two.

I cough twice before the word makes it out of my mouth. “Coming!”

My fingers slip on my scripture pages in Sister McEntyre's basement, and I'm asked to say the prayer and have no idea what comes out of my mouth. My flipping stomach has turned into a knotted one that twists tighter every time I think about running into Elias at school. My heart breaks a little when I think about seeing him and him not smiling at me. What will it be like?

The drive to school, which normally takes hours, takes seconds.

I stand outside my truck staring at the front doors of the school, still wondering if I have the guts to drive away. Give myself a few more days to figure out how to put my feelings into words for Elias.

My last hope of Elias possibly taking a sick day is dashed when I see his truck parked on the opposite side of the parking lot. Meaning, the opposite of where he used to park it so we could park next to each other on the days we didn't share a car.

Yeah, today is going to be as awful as I figured.

By the end of first period, whispers are all over the school. It's not totally their fault. Any news in this tiny place is big news. The last rush of news had to do with the ring on my finger, which makes this turn of events that much more interesting. Whispers follow me down our short hallways.

Just stringing him along … so weird … He could do so much better anyway … Wonder if she's leaving for college … wonder if he got sick of kissing a scar …

I'm blinking over and over, staring at the books I have clutched in front of me like a shield and darting between students to get into English. I take a deep breath the moment I sit down—and then panic because the seat next to me is empty. But it's Elias's seat and he'll be here any second. Maybe it'll be okay. Maybe we'll be like the friends we were before we started going out.

I open my binder and start the warm-up assignment on the board. It's just two hundred and fifty words, but these few words are about to occupy my brain and take over enough that I won't notice when Elias sits down, and then when I do look up, it'll be to listen to Mr. Kennedy lecture, and the whole class will be looking because … well … he's Mr. Kennedy and the class is almost all girls, and then I can busy myself with my things while Elias walks out and it will all be fine and perfect and okay.

My pencil is poised over my paper but words won't come. Nothing. I'm blank. Two hundred and fifty words on any poem from our last section.
Any
one. And my mind refuses to cooperate. The bell rings, and Elias still isn't here. I write my name and put yesterday's date on the top right and then wait for inspiration to strike.

I stop breathing when Elias steps in the room. Two minutes after the bell. The smell of sawdust and whatever manly, delicious soap he uses waft by, followed by Elias himself. He doesn't even pause at his chair, just continues to the front of the class stopping at Mr. Kennedy's desk.

Now I'm straining to listen but people are sharpening pencils and whispering to each other like I don't need to hear what's going on.

Elias's voice carries over the noise. “… I was helping in the office, and now …”