Landslide (44 page)

Now, Erica and are I the cliché when it comes to dancing; she
loves
it whereas I can take it or leave it. I’m not necessarily opposed to dancing in general, and I can do it most often without looking like a jackass, I think, although when it comes to line dancing, she and I both don’t get it. We feel like idiots tripping on our own feet and why anyone would want to look like an idiot in public escapes me. But, I never passed up an opportunity to experience everything we had the chance to during the course of our road trip, and when we were in Texas that summer and went to a public, old-fashioned square dance, I had to practically carry Erica out to the floor and force her to participate in the shenanigans.

She argued with me about it then, even though she knew she’d end up having fun no matter how ridiculous we thought we looked, but this time when Brookes and Dunn’s “Neon Moon” started playing and couples began taking the dance floor, she practically bounced with glee, actually clapped, and made a
mighty
big deal of “reminding” me of when we learned the Cowboy Cha Cha and what a great time we had. I knew exactly what provoked her, and it wasn’t a love of dancing country style. However, I kept my mouth completely shut and more than willingly let her tow me out from under Jeanette’s rudely dominating presence and to the middle of the dance floor where we were swallowed from sight by all the other couples. Not surprisingly, Erica’s face beamed the entire time we tripped, schooched, shuffled, and twirled our way around the dance floor. We laughed, reminisced a bit, and it ended up being a highlight of the night for me.
 

The missile that caused
me
to erupt though and ultimately saw me ending my evening in the back of cop car was Ryan and my overly aggressive and intoxicated reaction to his hammered and unwelcome attempt to get in Erica’s pants. She and I were headed out back again for another smoke, but I had to take a leak first so I told her to go on ahead and I’d join her in a minute. I did my thing and while I was washing up, Jerry came in and decided that standing in front of a row of urinals, two of which were occupied by guys with their zippers down, was as good a place and time as any to lecture me.
 

“So, explain to me what that was about earlier. I mean, I don’t know what you’re thinking, buddy, but I’m seein’ how you’re lookin’ at her and I cannot believe you haven’t told her what’s up.”

“I know. And thanks for picking up what I was putting down. I’m gonna talk to her, I am. It’s just…I need to be sure.”

“You need to be sure. We’re not talking about a gray area topic here, Cole, it’s about as cut and dried as it gets, so how much more time are you gonna take? ‘Cause pretty soon, you’re gonna hit the point of no return, you know. And I’m not gonna say anything to her myself, but that doesn’t mean someone else won’t. And besides, that girl trusts you and needs you to be straight with her. She deserves to have a say in whether or not she gets even more involved than what she apparently already is.”

“Yeah, I get it. I know what I’m doing, okay?” I actually had no idea what I was doing because if I had thought about it at all, taking Erica anywhere in public where people know me was about the dumbest thing I could do and I’d done it multiple times in the last week, so I guess I’ve just been lucky. Or, really fucking blessed. “It’s way more complicated than you know though, Jerry, so please, tell everyone to keep their mouths shut. And I’m begging you, stop badgering me and let me handle my life my way.”

“Well…kinda my point. It’s not just your life we’re talking about anymore, now is it? She trusts you for a reason. Live up to that reason, my friend. Man up and tell her, sooner rather than later, because I think you know just as well as I do that you’re gonna have a huge damned mess on your hands and a
lot
of hurt goin’ around if you wait much longer.”

I nodded my agreement as he zipped up. Then he washed his hands and the two of us went out back. Just as we went out though, Erica was heading back inside. She seemed irritated and when I questioned her with my eyes, she simply shook her head and indicated Ryan without using words. He was standing with the one college guy who hadn’t puked earlier and they were sort of laughing together about something. But when Erica told me she was going to get herself some water and went ahead inside, Ryan’s eyes made a beeline to her ass, so I decided to stay out there and have what I felt was a long overdo chat with him.

I lit a cigarette and looking Ryan straight in the face, I told him flat-out, “You
need
to quit hitting on her.”

“What’s your problem…you’re not banging her, are you?”

Trying to keep cool, I simply took my smoke from my mouth, exhaled, and said, “You did not just ask me that.”

“Yeah, I didn’t think you were,” he muttered while the frat boy stood there smirking at me before going back inside, “But seriously, look me in the eyes and tell me you don’t wanna pound that pussy.”

He was coming dangerously close to pushing me to my breaking point. Still, I was making an effort to control my temper because he’s a friend and I knew he was drunk, and that if he hadn’t been, none of the crude shit coming out of his mouth would’ve ever been said aloud. So, feeling my nostrils flare, I just shook my head and took another drag.

“Ryan, we’re friends. But even so, you need to get it through your drunk-ass head that you’re not getting even a teeny sliver of her ass so quit fucking trying to cut a whole slice.”
 

“Oh, I see how it is…little mouse is afraid to play while the cat’s away,” he said, puffing up like a goddamned peacock and getting far too close to me for his own good, “Or are you just scared of a little competition, soldier boy? ‘Cause I bet before you can even get close to her holiest of holies, I’ll have already fucked her so hard that she’s on a first name basis with God.”
 

I body slammed him against the wall so fast and hard,
I
didn’t even know what was happening. “Listen up, you fuck. You don’t know the first thing about the Hell I’ve lived through or the lengths I’ll go, and believe me when I say you won’t survive throwing down with me in this.”
 

Jerry tried his best to interject and stop us, but his efforts were in vain. A single blast from a siren had me momentarily turning my attention to the alley behind me, and Ryan took advantage of my distraction by pushing me off him and throwing the first punch. He went to swing again and rather than swinging back, I ducked, rushed him and turned, wedging my shoulder into his chest to lift him up and then throw him down onto the hood of the police car that had just swung into the alley while routinely patrolling the streets. Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew that if I really hurt Ryan, or anyone for that matter, I’d be in deep shit if charges were ever pressed because of the conditioning and training the military provided me, but that knowledge didn’t seem to carry much weight in the heat of the moment. So, I was just starting to rearrange Ryan’s intestines and was about to land a nasty blow to one of his kidneys when the cops pulled their guns on us and effectively broke up our fight before it got really and truly ugly.
 

Luckily, the officers know both of us, and Jerry explained how the fight started in the first place, and turns out, I didn’t use excessive force so Ryan wasn’t badly injured and neither of us was legitimately arrested. We were handcuffed, though, put in the back of the cop car, and then thrown into two different cells at the station where we were told we would be sleeping it off for the remainder of the night. As I was being shoved into the backseat, I reminded Jerry what I’d asked of him in the bathroom, and then further asked him to not make a big deal about what had gone down when he went inside and told Erica why he would be the one taking her home.

And she certainly wasn’t to be allowed to come bail me out. I’ve gotten into fights defending Erica before when we were in high school and stuff, so she wouldn’t have been terribly surprised about this one after she—knowingly or maybe unknowingly—let me know she’d had it with Ryan, but…being carted off to jail is a little different, and all I needed was for her to come racing down here to fork over however much dough—that I know she doesn’t have—just so that I could sober up at home, and then no doubt sob while screaming at me for being a fucking stupid asshole who gets drunk and then beats the snot out of one of his friends, who is fucking stupid too but also happens to be a loudmouth douche when he’s drunk. No thanks.

I did my time like a man, woke up sore as fuck and with a hangover that would probably incapacitate a grizzly bear, and was handed three ibuprofen, my phone, and my car keys without further ado at about seven this morning. Stepping out into the chilled foggy morning and noticing the fresh blanket of snow on the streets, I pull my phone from my pocket to call someone and ask them to come down here and then take me to my truck. The echoing sound of silence broken only by the branches of trees nearby creaking under the weight of snow has me reconsidering. It’s only a couple miles to where my truck spent the night and I figure I can use the alone time to think. Besides, the serene solitude that comes with a breathtaking landscape of newly fallen snow before cars and foot traffic defile its innocence can’t be passed up, so I pull my jacket’s collar up as high as it’ll go and set out.

Everything that Jerry had said last night swirls around me in the breeze amid the lightly grounded snowflakes that the wind has invited to dance. On a resigned sigh, I acknowledge to myself that he’s right; the longer I wait, the higher the likelihood that not only will someone mention something that I haven’t, but that Erica will be hurt by my omissions even more than knowing what I haven’t told her. Well, maybe not more, although she’ll definitely look at it as a refusal on my part to trust her, and I can’t have that. She
does
trust me, implicitly, and I owe it to her to be honest and earn that trust before I lose it altogether. The thing is, I am
so
terrified that once I man up, I’ll lose her forever in finally telling her about not just the skeleton Jerry is aware of, but the whole fucking cemetery that skeleton dwells in, which only by the grace of God have I managed to keep from Erica the last couple weeks.

I squelch the urge to vomit in thinking about the whole thing when my phone pings with a lengthy text from my dad in lieu of a phone call…

My dad: Was about to call and realized you’re probably still sleeping, but wanted to give you a heads up that we’re coming home early. We’ve sucked all the fun out of the sunshine state that we can and I think we’re on the verge of wearing our welcome out.

I go to reply when another text comes in right away.

My dad: Plus, weekday flights are cheaper than the ones on weekends. Just rescheduled our return trip and I’m saving $400+ by flying the redeye this Wednesday instead of the Sunday before Christmas. I’ll email you all the flight info. so you know where and when to pick us up. Love you.

Reading it, I come to a standstill and close my eyes.
 

Tick tock, my man…
 

Around me the temperature seems to take a sudden dip and I look to the sky, realizing that I’d better pick up the pace in more than one way. Reaching my truck and having finally come to a decision, I wait a few minutes with the heater running full-blast, thawing myself out and trying to think of the best way to sit Erica down for a brutally honest conversation; one that will without any doubt whatsoever hurt one or both of us in some way. I don’t know where to do it or when exactly either. Today might not be my best bet if she’s already pissed at me for last night; although, I really should apologize for that as soon as possible. And who knows, maybe if I just go straight to her place and suck it up first thing, I’ll be able to find some kind of opening to apologize for not being 100% up front with her from jump. And from there, I can really only hope she can see everything from my side and find it in her heart to understand why I waited until now.

I’ll have to come clean about how I feel too. I didn’t want to so soon or before she said something because I don’t want it to seem rushed or premature, but I knew once I decided to go all in again that I would have to tell her that I’m in love with her. Or rather, that I’ve
been
in love with her. For, like, ever practically. And I guess when I think about it like that, I’m not really rushing. Still, that’s no guarantee she’s had enough time to see us the way I do. I sigh and throw my truck into gear, muttering out loud, “This is
so
gonna suck beyond the telling of it.”

I make one stop at the coffee shop for a half-dozen donuts and two coffees to go, and then the whole drive to Erica’s I obsess and freak myself out in not having even the faintest idea of how she’s going to take hearing any of the myriad things I’m going to lay on her before the day has had a chance to hit double digits on the clock. Pulling up in front of her house though, an unfamiliar Volvo parked behind the Grenada in the driveway has my eyes narrowing and my stomach turning into a pit of slithering snakes.

My fingers tighten and clench the steering wheel while I tap my forehead against it, desperately trying to breathe and drum up the courage to get out of the truck; to allow God or whomever to convince me that it’s not as bad as what I’m imagining it to be. Because what I’m thinking is that one of the frat boys somehow made an impression that was enough for him to finagle his way into convincing the woman who is my everything into being willing to share her bed and body with him last night. And you know, been there, done that. I even got the fucking t-shirt and dog tags as souvenirs.

Still, I don’t actually
know
…

I pull further ahead so I’m not directly in front of her house, and then down the rest of my coffee before slipping out of my truck. Closing the door without sound, my intent is to sneak around a little to see if I can give myself an idea of what I’m walking into here. Just as I take maybe five or six steps away from where I’m parked, the front door opens. It’s not Erica. It’s not one of the college guys or anyone from the party either though. I don’t recognize the man who confidently steps out Erica’s front door in his boxers, an Oregon Ducks sweatshirt that judging from the fit is probably Erica’s, and sable colored Ugg boots. Holding what looks like a book of matches in one hand, he rubs both hands together, cups them over his mouth and blows; he then repeats the process as he heads to the side of the porch. At the railing, he leans over a ways to look down the side of her house. He rights himself and comes back to the top of the porch steps, about to walk down them when he sees me.