Patrick glided around the ice by himself before practice, testing out his knee. All was quiet in the rink with no one else out there with him. It gave him time to think. And despite all the thinking he’d done last night he still needed to do some more. He just couldn’t figure out what had happened with Gabrielle last night.
She’d literally gone from smiling to yelling at him in about half a second. He couldn’t figure it out. What had he done wrong? She’d yelled at him about volunteering her for babysitting, but he didn’t really think that could be it, right? And he wasn’t at all buying her excuse of ‘I don’t do kids.’ She always said that. ‘I don’t do’ insert word or phrase here. It drove him nuts.
She’d used the same phrase when she was trying to avoid dating him. She said it as a defense to keep herself from having to tell him about her past eventually. She always said it when she was trying to avoid telling him about something. What was it this time? What did she not want to tell him now?
Two thoughts hit him at the same time and both were equally unsettling. He just couldn’t think of any other reason. Maybe Gabrielle didn’t want children. That would certainly not work for him because he always had when the time came. Or maybe Gabrielle was pregnant and afraid to tell him. Oh God. That couldn’t be it.
“How’s your knee feeling?” Mike, the team’s trainer, called out interrupting his thoughts.
“A little tight, but no pain,” he called back. He got off the ice and followed Mike back to the training room.
He didn’t have a chance to think about Gabrielle anymore that morning. He was officially cleared to start practicing with the team that morning. He made his way out to the ice again and participated in his first practice in a month with the team. Just pushing through the practice kept his mind off of Gabrielle for a little while.
“How’s Gabrielle doing?” Tazer asked him in the locker room later. He shrugged.
“I haven’t talked to her,” he responded.
“Check out Sharpie digging the manic depressive chick,” Keith yelled over. He shot him a dirty look and chose not to respond to him, because Keither had no idea.
“She wasn’t good last night when I brought her home,” Tazer told him. Patrick looked up at him in surprise.
“You took her home? Did she say anything?” He was hoping for anything that could help him figure out what had gone on last night.
“Sorry, man,” Tazer replied with a shake of his head. Patrick felt the disappointment. “She was throwing up in the parking lot and shaking when I got out to her.”
“I don’t know what happened or what to do,” Patrick said helplessly.
“Just go talk to her.” Yeah, he was going to have to do that.
Patrick left the rink and drove straight towards Gabrielle’s apartment. He had to find out what had happened. If it was because of either situation he’d thought up then they really needed to talk. He called up from the lobby and she buzzed him up. He got up to her apartment and walked through the door only to be met with a woman he’d never seen before. She was putting on a jacket.
“You must be Patrick,” she said with a smile. He nodded as she held out her hand and he took it. “I’m Olivia.”
“Olivia? Gabby’s school counselor,” he said dumbly. He couldn’t help it. He was surprised to see her, or anyone for that matter. She laughed a little.
“Yes, that’s me,” she replied.
“Were you in town?” he asked. She shook her head.
“Gabrielle called me early this morning and I hopped the first plane out of St. Louis to come see her,” Olivia explained. Patrick’s heart dropped. If Olivia dropped everything to fly out to Gabrielle immediately than something really awful must be going on. Olivia must have seen the look on his face. “She’ll be okay if you just hear what she has to say.”
“I will. I’m going to. I just…..it scares me when she gets like this. I don’t know what to do,” he confessed. He watched as Gabrielle walked around the corner looking like she hadn’t slept all night.
“You’re doing exactly what she needs,” Olivia assured him. “It was very nice to meet you.” She moved past him towards the door.
“I’ll walk you out,” Gabrielle spoke up, her voice harsh, like she’d been crying.
He watched as the two of them walked out the door leaving him standing in the entryway. He walked further into the apartment with all intentions of sitting down, but he realized he was too nervous to do that. Instead he began to pace around the open space wondering what was going on. The sound of the door closing caused him to look up and see Gabrielle coming back.
“Are you okay?” he asked moving over towards her. She hesitated for a moment as her eyes darted around the room.
“No,” she finally whispered out. He’d known the answer, but hearing her say it hurt.
“I just don’t know what happened. You were fine and then…..” He let his voice trail off as he searched her face for any clue. None came, and she kept her eyes locked onto a spot on the floor. “Was it the kids? Do you really not like them?”
He watched as her face twisted into complete anguish. He felt so helpless. He didn’t want to hurt her, but he had to know what was going on. She wasn’t exactly being forthcoming right now. Even so he just couldn’t seem to stop talking. He just needed to get it out and see what she said.
“If that’s the case I don’t know what to do. I love them. I want them someday. I’ve always seen myself having a family when I’m ready to settle down. It’s kind of a deal breaker for me. You need to tell me if you don’t want them, Gabrielle. I need to know,” he pushed.
He watched as her expression changed from anguish to grief as he spoke. Then he waited. When she spoke he hardly heard her, her voice was so quiet. He almost asked her to repeat herself, but he was in so much shock that even he couldn’t speak. Had she really just said that?
“I have a daughter.”
As soon as the words were out of her mouth she turned and walked away from him. He watched her retreating back for a moment before he could make himself move. He followed her into her studio where she collapsed down onto the futon in there. He glanced at the easel and took in the painting that was set up there.
He suddenly began to understand, at least a little, about what was going on with Gabrielle when he saw it. In the painting there was a crib in a nursery. A large letter Q was on the wall above it. A woman was also half out the door of the nursery. She had a duffel bag in hand and was walking out of the room. She was also glancing back towards the crib.
“Her name is Quinn. She’s with Rachel,” Gabrielle whispered.
Patrick turned back to me with astonishment all over his face. I couldn’t blame him. He thought I’d told him everything, but I hadn’t. This was something I thought that I would take to the grave with me. I’d never planned on telling a soul. It hurt too much. He moved over to the futon and sat down next to me.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked quietly.
“Because she’s my biggest regret and my biggest failure. I just left her. I let them take her from me and I didn’t put up a fight. I never wanted her and I almost killed myself because of it,” I choked out.
“What are you talking about?” he wondered. I took a deep breath as the most painful memories in my life resurfaced. These were memories I’d never wanted to remember or relive.
“When I was still an addict I used to do awful things just for drugs. Until I met you sex for me was a means for the cocaine or simply happened because I was too drugged out to really know what was going on. I’m not proud of it, but it’s the truth.”
Patrick remained quiet as he waited for me to explain what that had to do with anything. I needed to take another deep breath before I could continue.
“At a party one night, this guy I knew, Vince, somehow ended up alone with me in a bedroom. I wish I could remember how that happened, but I can’t. I remember him locking the door and me arguing with him about why he did it. He started trying to take my clothes off and I kept shoving him away. He became really angry and started yelling at me about how I gave it up to everyone else so why not him. I tried to get out, but he yanked me back and hit me. He beat me until I couldn’t fight back. Then he raped me as the party raged outside the door.”
I felt each blow as the scene replayed in my mind. I could remember clear as day how the entire incident felt. Every feeling I had then washed over me now. Tears fell from my eyes as Patrick looked at me in horrified silence.
“I ran to Olivia when it was over. She took me to the hospital and called the police. They gathered evidence and I pressed charges. It took over a year, but Vince was convicted thanks to another girl coming forward when she heard about me. He’s been in jail ever since for beating and raping us both.”
“Jesus, Gabrielle,” Patrick whispered, taking my hand in his.
“Just over a month after it happened I found out I was pregnant. I knew Vince was the father because I hadn’t let anyone touch me after that happened. In fact you were the first since then. Anyway, I didn’t want the baby. I didn’t want to carry my rapists child, but my family wouldn’t let me get rid of it. They’re values wouldn’t allow it, so I was forced to have her.”
I thought about Quinn and wondered how I could have ever had those feelings. Common sense told me it was only normal to be feeling how I did back then, but I just couldn’t comprehend that I ever had.
“When I had her I didn’t even want to look at her. People always talk about loving your child as soon as you see them, but that didn’t happen for me. I saw her and saw Vince and what he’d done. For three weeks I took care of her and cried nonstop. Eventually I couldn’t handle it anymore. I’d gotten off of the drugs when I found out I was pregnant, but I needed to escape my feelings. I did them again and overdosed. That was when I almost died.”
I watched as understanding dawned on Patrick. He knew how this part of the story ended. He knew that’s when I left.
“My parents had had enough. I had dragged their name through the mud during the very public trial of Vince. His lawyer called the other girl and me out. He brought up that we were addicts, called us sluts, all to defend his client. Then I was pregnant. Now I’d overdosed and almost died. They took Quinn from me and kicked me out. You know the rest.”
Patrick pulled me into him, up onto his lap, and let me cry. He held me as the tears and emotions that I hadn’t shed all these years poured out of me. I just curled up on his lap and released everything I still had left in me. He just sat there and held me and allowed me to do that.
“I’m so sorry, Gabby. So sorry,” he whispered when I’d become drained.
“I think about her every day,” I told him.
“Of course you do.” I shook my head.
“You don’t understand. It happened in rehab. I fell in love with her. I’ve loved her and missed her every day. I can’t handle what I did to her. I failed my daughter. I love her so much, but I failed her,” I choked out. He put his hands on my face and forced me to look at him.
“You didn’t fail her. If you hadn’t ever loved her, then you would have. Only then would you have failed her. But you do, Gabrielle. Don’t you see? Even if she doesn’t know it, she has your undying love, and that makes her the luckiest girl in the world.” New tears formed in my eyes at what he’d said, but not tears of sadness or pain.
“How do you see things so clearly? How is it that you seem to know, to understand everything that I never could?”
“Because I never had to experience it like you did. And I know you. I see you for who you truly are and I know what you have in your heart.”
He kissed me then, softly, and kissed away the last of my pain. There would always be an ache when I thought of Quinn, but Patrick had once again helped me to come to terms with my past. I had nothing left to hide, nothing to run from. Everything was out, and he was still sitting here with me, kissing me. Olivia was right, like she usually is. Patrick had saved me.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Monday, June 14, 2010
Chapter 25
Patrick and I sat in the family room at the rink before the game that night. I’d been coming in with him and we’d sit down in the room and have dinner while we talked with the rest of the team’s families. I knew Patrick was getting antsy about getting back out on the ice and playing, but I was going to miss doing this when he did.
Playoffs were just around the corner and each game was starting to feel more and more intense. I knew next to nothing about what playoffs would be like, but just listening to everyone around me talk about it was getting me both excited and nervous for them. I’d even become kind of a joke with the girls. They kept telling me if the guys lost out and didn’t win the cup it was a good thing there was a psychologist who could help them get over the disappointment.
Nathan had continued his improvement both inside and outside of school. He loved coming to the games with me and hanging out with Patrick and the team. It kept him from skipping school and getting into trouble outside of it. His grades had even been on an upswing after I’d hooked him up with a tutor.
Gia was also starting to get better. She was starting to come in to my office more often on her own whenever something was bothering her. Even if she just came in to vent I knew it was a good thing because I hadn’t seen a single bandage on her wrist since that one day. We’d also had a meeting with her parents so that they could see what they were doing to her. Once they’d realized the extent of Gia’s hurt and anger they’d stopped all the fighting.
She’d told me they were separated, which made her sad, but also gave her a sense of relief. They’d believed they were doing the right thing by trying to stay together for her, but once they realized it was only harming her, they’d done what was necessary. She was coping just fine.
Patrick and I really couldn’t have been any better. We saw each other almost every day for at least lunch or dinner. He wasn’t travelling with the team since he was injured and it had been nice to have him around all the time. We’d even gone on some double dates with Paige and Harding. Paige loved Patrick and never failed to miss an opportunity to tell me how lucky I’d been to find someone willing to put up with all my shit.
“Where did all these kids come from?” Patrick asked as we watched easily a dozen of them running all around the family room and the area immediately outside of it.
“It seems everyone brought friends tonight,” I agreed. There were definitely more children here at the game tonight than there usually were.
I watched them run around, play mini sticks, and sneak food when their parents weren’t looking. I could see the amused smile on Patrick’s face as he watched them run around and felt a pang of hurt and guilt. I just couldn’t muster up that kind of amusement as I watched them. At one point it seemed like they were crawling all over Patrick and he seemed to be loving every second of it.
As I watched him do his best to play with the kids I knew that being a father would suit him. He seemed to be made for it. He was great with them and the look in his eyes was unmistakable. He loved kids. I should have known that before now with the way he’d talked about becoming an uncle before. Faith was going to pop any day now and he couldn’t wait to meet his nephew.
When it was time for the game to start Patrick and I separated and I went to my seat with the rest of the girls. We met back up downstairs at each intermission, and each time Patrick seemed to be preoccupied with playing. To be honest, as I watched him I just wanted the night to end so I could go home and get away from there.
The game ended and we met back up in the family room. I figured we’d be leaving like we usually did as soon as he came out of the locker room, but that wasn’t the case tonight. Tonight the second all the kids saw Patrick walk in, they wanted to play once again. He said he would just for a few more minutes and I was stuck standing there pretending to love the scene as much as everyone else.
“He’s so great with kids!” Emily, Byfuglien’s girlfriend exclaimed. I forced a smile onto my face and nodded.
“You guys are going to be lucky if you have kids someday,” Dayna, Seabrook’s girlfriend threw in. I started to get more and more upset by the second and just wished for Patrick to get up and say it was time to go.
“You two can babysit my kids anytime you’d like!” Corrine Huet joked. Patrick looked over at me and grinned.
“We’d love to,” he announced. I felt sick and the last remaining bit of smile I’d been managing to keep on my face disappeared.
“Excuse me,” I muttered as I turned to talk out of a room that suddenly felt very small and claustrophobic.
I put my hands over my face and tried to concentrate on my breathing to calm myself down and keep the panic attack from hitting me. Usually that helped, but this time it wasn’t helping at all. I could feel my chest getting tighter even as I struggled to force oxygen into my lungs.
“Are you okay?” I heard Patrick ask. I felt his hand touch my shoulder and I jerked away.
I didn’t answer him and instead ran down the hall and into the bathroom. I locked the main door behind me when I saw I was alone in there and then slid to the ground. I pulled my knees up to my chest and rested my forehead on my knees. Just breathe, Gabrielle, in and out. Just breathe.
It took a little time, but I managed to get my breathing under control. When I felt better I got up and splashed some cold water on my face. When I looked up at my reflection in the mirror I could see the strain on my face. And then the anger started. How dare he? How dare Patrick volunteer me for something without asking me?
“Gabby? Are you okay?” I heard him call through the door after a knock.
I turned to glare at the door and the only thing I could think was ‘who do you think you are?!’ I made my way over to the door, unlocked it, and yanked it open. He jumped back in surprise at the violence of my exit. Then he looked confused when he saw the look on my face.
“Don’t you ever volunteer me to babysit anyone’s kids without talking to me first!” I yelled at him. His eyes widened in shock and I could see everyone standing in the hallway halt their conversations to turn and face us. I didn’t care.
“I’m…..I’m sorry…..I didn’t realize it was…..”
“I can’t even look at you right now,” I told him and turned to walk away. My stomach was churning and I felt sick. Then I felt his hand latch onto my arm.
“Hey, hold on. What’s wrong? What did I do?” he asked as I spun around to face him.
“I don’t do kids,” I told him through clenched teeth. My head began to spin with more thoughts than I could vocalize right now. I just wanted to get home, get in front of my easel and paint it out.
“Gabrielle, you’re a school psychologist,” he reminded me.
“They’re not kids, they’re young adults. It’s very different,” I told him as I ripped my arm out of his grasp. I needed to get out of there. I needed to get home and now.
“So what, you don’t like young kids?” he asked.
“Just stop, okay? Stop! I can’t do this. I can’t be here. I can’t be around you. I have to go.”
I could feel my chest tightening up again and I felt like I was going to be sick. Without waiting to hear any sort of response from him I turned and ran down the hallway and out the door into the parking lot. I hoped that the fresh air would help to calm me down, but I was only getting worse.
Too many things were rushing in and out of my head. Too many old conversations. Too many new situations. Harsh words and stupid decisions. Pain. Sadness. Confusion. Loss. Abandonment. I bent over a bush along the side of the rink and began to throw up even as I struggled to breathe.
When I stopped I stood up and let the tears fall down my face. Never once since I’d grown up had I needed a family more than I needed one now. I had no one. Well, I had Patrick if this little fit hadn’t royally screwed that up, but I couldn’t talk to him right now. Now he was the cause of all of these feelings and I couldn’t, just couldn’t, face them right now.
“Hey, I’ll bring you home,” I heard someone say from behind me. I turned to see Jon standing there, keys in his hand.
Now you can add embarrassment to every other emotion running through me. I’d just made a crazy spectacle of myself in front of half of Patrick’s team. Right when I get them to start to like me, I pull a stunt like that. What kind of person am I? Who wants to deal with someone like me?
“You don’t have to,” I told him through the tears.
“I don’t mind. Really. I just want to make sure you’re home safe.” He looked sincere and concerned, so I nodded.
We didn’t talk the entire trip to my apartment. I simply thanked him and then apologized when we got there before getting out and going upstairs. Loxley ran over to me, tail wagging when I walked through the door and I knelt down on the floor, wrapping my arms around his neck.
“I’m so screwed up, Lox. So screwed up,” I whispered into his fur. He gave me a lick in the face and I managed a small smile at him. I took him outside before locking myself up in my studio.
I sat for a moment just dumping different colors onto my palette. I didn’t know what I was going to paint, I just let myself go. I just painted until all the emotions were gone. The sun was coming up and shining into the room in the background, casting an angelic glow around my now finished creation. It had taken me all night with no direction, but now I was looking at a picture that made my heart ache. I picked up the phone and called the only person I could.
“Hello, Gabrielle,” her voice greeted me. It brought on tears and it took me a moment to compose myself enough to speak.
“Olivia, I need you,” I choked out.
I’d never forgotten, but until this moment I’d managed to forgive. Now forgiveness was gone.
Playoffs were just around the corner and each game was starting to feel more and more intense. I knew next to nothing about what playoffs would be like, but just listening to everyone around me talk about it was getting me both excited and nervous for them. I’d even become kind of a joke with the girls. They kept telling me if the guys lost out and didn’t win the cup it was a good thing there was a psychologist who could help them get over the disappointment.
Nathan had continued his improvement both inside and outside of school. He loved coming to the games with me and hanging out with Patrick and the team. It kept him from skipping school and getting into trouble outside of it. His grades had even been on an upswing after I’d hooked him up with a tutor.
Gia was also starting to get better. She was starting to come in to my office more often on her own whenever something was bothering her. Even if she just came in to vent I knew it was a good thing because I hadn’t seen a single bandage on her wrist since that one day. We’d also had a meeting with her parents so that they could see what they were doing to her. Once they’d realized the extent of Gia’s hurt and anger they’d stopped all the fighting.
She’d told me they were separated, which made her sad, but also gave her a sense of relief. They’d believed they were doing the right thing by trying to stay together for her, but once they realized it was only harming her, they’d done what was necessary. She was coping just fine.
Patrick and I really couldn’t have been any better. We saw each other almost every day for at least lunch or dinner. He wasn’t travelling with the team since he was injured and it had been nice to have him around all the time. We’d even gone on some double dates with Paige and Harding. Paige loved Patrick and never failed to miss an opportunity to tell me how lucky I’d been to find someone willing to put up with all my shit.
“Where did all these kids come from?” Patrick asked as we watched easily a dozen of them running all around the family room and the area immediately outside of it.
“It seems everyone brought friends tonight,” I agreed. There were definitely more children here at the game tonight than there usually were.
I watched them run around, play mini sticks, and sneak food when their parents weren’t looking. I could see the amused smile on Patrick’s face as he watched them run around and felt a pang of hurt and guilt. I just couldn’t muster up that kind of amusement as I watched them. At one point it seemed like they were crawling all over Patrick and he seemed to be loving every second of it.
As I watched him do his best to play with the kids I knew that being a father would suit him. He seemed to be made for it. He was great with them and the look in his eyes was unmistakable. He loved kids. I should have known that before now with the way he’d talked about becoming an uncle before. Faith was going to pop any day now and he couldn’t wait to meet his nephew.
When it was time for the game to start Patrick and I separated and I went to my seat with the rest of the girls. We met back up downstairs at each intermission, and each time Patrick seemed to be preoccupied with playing. To be honest, as I watched him I just wanted the night to end so I could go home and get away from there.
The game ended and we met back up in the family room. I figured we’d be leaving like we usually did as soon as he came out of the locker room, but that wasn’t the case tonight. Tonight the second all the kids saw Patrick walk in, they wanted to play once again. He said he would just for a few more minutes and I was stuck standing there pretending to love the scene as much as everyone else.
“He’s so great with kids!” Emily, Byfuglien’s girlfriend exclaimed. I forced a smile onto my face and nodded.
“You guys are going to be lucky if you have kids someday,” Dayna, Seabrook’s girlfriend threw in. I started to get more and more upset by the second and just wished for Patrick to get up and say it was time to go.
“You two can babysit my kids anytime you’d like!” Corrine Huet joked. Patrick looked over at me and grinned.
“We’d love to,” he announced. I felt sick and the last remaining bit of smile I’d been managing to keep on my face disappeared.
“Excuse me,” I muttered as I turned to talk out of a room that suddenly felt very small and claustrophobic.
I put my hands over my face and tried to concentrate on my breathing to calm myself down and keep the panic attack from hitting me. Usually that helped, but this time it wasn’t helping at all. I could feel my chest getting tighter even as I struggled to force oxygen into my lungs.
“Are you okay?” I heard Patrick ask. I felt his hand touch my shoulder and I jerked away.
I didn’t answer him and instead ran down the hall and into the bathroom. I locked the main door behind me when I saw I was alone in there and then slid to the ground. I pulled my knees up to my chest and rested my forehead on my knees. Just breathe, Gabrielle, in and out. Just breathe.
It took a little time, but I managed to get my breathing under control. When I felt better I got up and splashed some cold water on my face. When I looked up at my reflection in the mirror I could see the strain on my face. And then the anger started. How dare he? How dare Patrick volunteer me for something without asking me?
“Gabby? Are you okay?” I heard him call through the door after a knock.
I turned to glare at the door and the only thing I could think was ‘who do you think you are?!’ I made my way over to the door, unlocked it, and yanked it open. He jumped back in surprise at the violence of my exit. Then he looked confused when he saw the look on my face.
“Don’t you ever volunteer me to babysit anyone’s kids without talking to me first!” I yelled at him. His eyes widened in shock and I could see everyone standing in the hallway halt their conversations to turn and face us. I didn’t care.
“I’m…..I’m sorry…..I didn’t realize it was…..”
“I can’t even look at you right now,” I told him and turned to walk away. My stomach was churning and I felt sick. Then I felt his hand latch onto my arm.
“Hey, hold on. What’s wrong? What did I do?” he asked as I spun around to face him.
“I don’t do kids,” I told him through clenched teeth. My head began to spin with more thoughts than I could vocalize right now. I just wanted to get home, get in front of my easel and paint it out.
“Gabrielle, you’re a school psychologist,” he reminded me.
“They’re not kids, they’re young adults. It’s very different,” I told him as I ripped my arm out of his grasp. I needed to get out of there. I needed to get home and now.
“So what, you don’t like young kids?” he asked.
“Just stop, okay? Stop! I can’t do this. I can’t be here. I can’t be around you. I have to go.”
I could feel my chest tightening up again and I felt like I was going to be sick. Without waiting to hear any sort of response from him I turned and ran down the hallway and out the door into the parking lot. I hoped that the fresh air would help to calm me down, but I was only getting worse.
Too many things were rushing in and out of my head. Too many old conversations. Too many new situations. Harsh words and stupid decisions. Pain. Sadness. Confusion. Loss. Abandonment. I bent over a bush along the side of the rink and began to throw up even as I struggled to breathe.
When I stopped I stood up and let the tears fall down my face. Never once since I’d grown up had I needed a family more than I needed one now. I had no one. Well, I had Patrick if this little fit hadn’t royally screwed that up, but I couldn’t talk to him right now. Now he was the cause of all of these feelings and I couldn’t, just couldn’t, face them right now.
“Hey, I’ll bring you home,” I heard someone say from behind me. I turned to see Jon standing there, keys in his hand.
Now you can add embarrassment to every other emotion running through me. I’d just made a crazy spectacle of myself in front of half of Patrick’s team. Right when I get them to start to like me, I pull a stunt like that. What kind of person am I? Who wants to deal with someone like me?
“You don’t have to,” I told him through the tears.
“I don’t mind. Really. I just want to make sure you’re home safe.” He looked sincere and concerned, so I nodded.
We didn’t talk the entire trip to my apartment. I simply thanked him and then apologized when we got there before getting out and going upstairs. Loxley ran over to me, tail wagging when I walked through the door and I knelt down on the floor, wrapping my arms around his neck.
“I’m so screwed up, Lox. So screwed up,” I whispered into his fur. He gave me a lick in the face and I managed a small smile at him. I took him outside before locking myself up in my studio.
I sat for a moment just dumping different colors onto my palette. I didn’t know what I was going to paint, I just let myself go. I just painted until all the emotions were gone. The sun was coming up and shining into the room in the background, casting an angelic glow around my now finished creation. It had taken me all night with no direction, but now I was looking at a picture that made my heart ache. I picked up the phone and called the only person I could.
“Hello, Gabrielle,” her voice greeted me. It brought on tears and it took me a moment to compose myself enough to speak.
“Olivia, I need you,” I choked out.
I’d never forgotten, but until this moment I’d managed to forgive. Now forgiveness was gone.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Chapter 24
“I really need your help with something,” Patrick confessed. I looked across the coffee table from the chair I was in at him and Burish sitting on the couch across from me in my apartment.
“We really need your help with something,” Adam corrected. I narrowed my eyes suspiciously at them.
“Why do I get the feeling I’m not going to like this?” I asked, only to have Adam laugh and Patrick roll his eyes at my question.
“She knows us too well,” Adam told Patrick.
“Just hear us out before you judge,” Patrick said. I crossed my arms over my chest and nodded at him to continue.
It had been a little over a month since the confession to Patrick about my past. Thankfully things had worked out with us. He hadn’t judged me and I’d felt myself lightening up about everything. Even my coworkers and Paige, who didn’t know what had happened, were commenting on how different I seemed. They chalked it up to my relationship with Patrick, and while it was that, it was so much more. A weight I’d been carrying for a decade was gone. Well.....almost gone.
I’d found that things in my life almost seemed to magically be better with Patrick in my life. Changes had been going on that I almost hadn’t noticed had happened until they were long past. I could still remember the look Patrick gave me a few weeks ago when I grabbed a bottle of wine and refilled my glass to have a second.
“What?” I’d asked him when I saw him looking at me. He shrugged, but eyed me warily.
“Nothing,” he’d replied.
It wasn’t until I’d taken a sip that I realized what had happened. It had been the first time I’d had a second glass of anything alcoholic since rehab. Even more, it was the first time I’d had any alcohol at all without thinking about my past and the drugs. It was like I’d been freed from something. Suddenly going out to a bar with Patrick and some of his teammates wasn’t scary anymore. I still didn’t get drunk, but the whole idea of alcohol was no longer terrifying.
I’d even found myself happily agreeing on getting together with the other girls. Before I avoided most social contact with people in fear of what they might discover or pick up on. Now it was so nice just to get together with a group of women and talk. I hadn’t known what I was missing. On one occasion I’d even joined them on the dance floor. Patrick had nearly choked on his beer when he saw me out there.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked me after making his way over to me on the dance floor.
“Dancing,” I told him with a smile. He looked like he couldn’t figure out what to say. “Do I look that bad doing it?” He shook his head.
“No, not at all. You look…..wonderful.” I’d grinned at him, and he returned it before moving away to leave me to dance.
It wasn’t until one afternoon when I finished up a painting and looked it over that I saw the true transformation. For what might have been the first time in my life I looked at a painting I’d done and smiled. It was a large house surrounded by fields and a white picket fence. There were two dogs running through a field that looked suspiciously like Lox and Dudley. The sky was a bright blue, sunshine spilling down all over the scene. Oh Lord, Gabrielle, what has happened to you?
Now I was sitting in my living room listening to Patrick and Adam’s proposal in shock. They couldn’t be serious. People actually did things like this? Like I’d promised, I heard them out until they were done talking despite wanting to interrupt and tell them not a fat chance in hell they were getting my help.
“So what do you think?” Patrick asked when they were done.
“I think you both need to find a shrink,” I told them. Adam turned to Patrick.
“I told you she wouldn’t go for it,” he said.
“You were right.”
“Come on. Do it for the poor cripple,” Patrick begged.
I glanced down at his knee, and could see the outline of the brace under his pants. He’d gotten hurt in a game on Valentine’s Day, of all days. To me the holiday meant nothing, but Patrick had really wanted to do something special for me. Instead we’d spent a portion of the night at the hospital while he had his knee checked. I can remember how scared I was when I saw him go down, and how I’d never felt so worried about someone before in my life.
“You’ve played the handicap card way too many times this past month. It loses its effectiveness.”
“We’re doing this for your honor,” Adam tried. I narrowed my eyes at him. What the hell was he talking about?
“I’m sorry?”
“It’s getting back at Tazer for those texts he and Kaner sent you a few months ago. We’ve already gotten Kaner, but it’s Tazer’s turn,” he explained. My jaw dropped.
“You’re doing this to him for me?!” They both laughed and nodded.
“That’s why we need your help. It’ll be even better,” Patrick said. And somehow I found myself agreeing.
Patrick settled into a seat at the bar and Gabby sat down next to him. Normally after a game he was feeling pretty bummed out about not playing, but tonight nothing was going to be able to kill his mood. The rest of his teammates and their girls who had come out filled in around them. After some strategic maneuvering, he and Burs had managed to get Tazer next to Gabrielle.
He and Burs managed to talk the whole table into only drinking hard liquor instead of beer, mostly offering to buy shots. It was all part of the plan. Things wouldn’t work if Tazer was drinking beer. He also managed to track down the cocktail waitress and tell her what they needed, slipping her an extra $200 on top of the tip at the end of the night to ensure it got done.
Every once in a while he heard Gabrielle proudly order another rum and coke for her and Tazer. She was going drink for drink with him. Actually, the joke could have ended there. Tazer was acting like an idiot. Tazer couldn't back down from a challenge though, and he didn't want to be outdrunk by a girl.
Due to what was going on, he and Burs were heavily relying on Gabrielle’s newfound ability to carry a conversation with anyone. So far she was doing fantastic. She’d spent most of the night talking to Jon even over himself. A few times he found himself marveling at the person she’d become in the last month.
When they’d first met, he would have been lucky if she’d said two words to his teammates. Gabrielle had just been reserved by nature, not that he’d minded. Ever since she’d told him everything, and he hated saying this even though he couldn’t think of another phrase, she’d blossomed. The Gabrielle today was not the same Gabrielle he’d first met. She was better.
He felt like he’d taken a lot of her pain away from her by listening and being there for her. He’d done something only Olivia, who he’d love to thank in person someday, had done. He hadn’t judged and had only wanted to help and appreciate. He’d felt for a while that he was quickly falling for Gabrielle, and to learn what she’d gone through in her life and to see how she’d turned out, he was only more proud and falling even more for her. Watching her interact now with his teammates only strengthened that feeling.
“Jesus Christ, I’m shit-canned,” Tazer slurred at one point in the night. It was the moment he and Burs were waiting for.
“Don’t worry, Tazer, we’ll get you home,” Burs told him, standing up from his position across from him. Patrick laughed as he watched Jon’s head bobbing and his eyes struggling to stay open.
“Yeah…..home,” he mumbled. Gabby looked over at him and rolled her eyes, shaking her head. He got up, followed by her, and then Burs and he helped Tazer out of his seat.
“Guess he had too much to drink,” he heard Gabrielle saying to the rest of the group. God, she was playing her part perfectly.
Burs wrapped his arm around Jon’s shoulders and assisted him out of the club. Even though he hated to admit it, Patrick didn’t mind having his arm around Gabrielle’s shoulders. She’d never said a word about wanting to help him walk with his knee, but she knew he was in pain. He kind of liked that she discreetly pretended she just wanted to be snuggled up to him when she was really just trying to help him walk.
They called out their goodbyes to the group, laughing at the jokes tossed in Tazer’s direction about how he couldn’t hold liquor. It was hard not to just lose it right then and there. They finally got him into the car. Gabrielle got into the driver’s seat since he couldn’t drive with his knee, Burs had had a few beers, and Tazer was obviously incapable of driving.
Gabby’s “rum and coke’s” had actually just been coke’s the whole night. All of Jon’s besides the first one had been triples. They’d made sure to give him one normal mixed drink so he wouldn’t be suspicious. Burs sat in the back doing his best to keep Jon awake while Patrick gave Gabrielle the directions. They reached Tazer’s place, and by then he was passed out in the back.
Tazer sort of woke up once they reached home, and Patrick and Burs left him with Gabrielle to entertain him. It was probably more likely the other way around. By the time they were done with their plan, Gabrielle was nearly in stitches with the ridiculous things Jon was saying to her.
“Apparently he’s desperate for a girl to take out on moonlit walks and send flowers to,” Gabrielle announced when they finally walked into the living room they’d dumped them off in while they worked. Burs snorted out his laughter.
“Oh God am I going to have to give it to him about that,” he responded.
Patrick, Burs, and Gabrielle took a short nap with an alarm set to wake them up. Just at sunrise they dragged Tazer outside where everything was set up. Then they set up the camera and waited. Once the sun was up, with it being a weekday, one which school wasn’t in session, people were getting out and about to head to work.
Everyone in the neighborhood stopped to stare at the spectacle in Tazer’s front yard. The three of them laughed as they filmed the expressions on everyone’s faces as they looked out at every piece of furniture from Tazer’s bedroom set up on the front lawn in exactly the same place and distance from each other as it had been inside, with Tazer sleeping in the bed in just his boxers, and no blankets.
A few shook their heads in disgust. A few took pictures of the Hawk’s captain in just his boxers on his front lawn. Still more just honked their horns and laughed as they drove by. It didn’t take long for the commotion to wake Tazer up. They filmed him stirring, rubbing his eyes, and stepping down from his bed, only to pause in confusion when he felt grass instead of carpet. He woke up with a start, looked around at his surroundings before running to the front door only to find it locked.
“That’s what you get for fucking with Gabrielle, you little prick!” Patrick called through the door.
“Fuck you, Sharpie, let me in!” he yelled, trying to cover himself up. Patrick eventually opened the door to let him in, exposing him, Burs, and Gabby doubled over in laughter.
“That was a real nice show you gave the neighbors,” Burs commented as Tazer glared at the three of them.
“You too?” he asked Gabrielle in surprise.
“What can I say? I side with this guy,” she replied jerking a thumb towards Patrick.
“I fucking hate you all,” Tazer growled out. Patrick was really going to enjoy showing this video to the boys in the locker room tomorrow.
“We really need your help with something,” Adam corrected. I narrowed my eyes suspiciously at them.
“Why do I get the feeling I’m not going to like this?” I asked, only to have Adam laugh and Patrick roll his eyes at my question.
“She knows us too well,” Adam told Patrick.
“Just hear us out before you judge,” Patrick said. I crossed my arms over my chest and nodded at him to continue.
It had been a little over a month since the confession to Patrick about my past. Thankfully things had worked out with us. He hadn’t judged me and I’d felt myself lightening up about everything. Even my coworkers and Paige, who didn’t know what had happened, were commenting on how different I seemed. They chalked it up to my relationship with Patrick, and while it was that, it was so much more. A weight I’d been carrying for a decade was gone. Well.....almost gone.
I’d found that things in my life almost seemed to magically be better with Patrick in my life. Changes had been going on that I almost hadn’t noticed had happened until they were long past. I could still remember the look Patrick gave me a few weeks ago when I grabbed a bottle of wine and refilled my glass to have a second.
“What?” I’d asked him when I saw him looking at me. He shrugged, but eyed me warily.
“Nothing,” he’d replied.
It wasn’t until I’d taken a sip that I realized what had happened. It had been the first time I’d had a second glass of anything alcoholic since rehab. Even more, it was the first time I’d had any alcohol at all without thinking about my past and the drugs. It was like I’d been freed from something. Suddenly going out to a bar with Patrick and some of his teammates wasn’t scary anymore. I still didn’t get drunk, but the whole idea of alcohol was no longer terrifying.
I’d even found myself happily agreeing on getting together with the other girls. Before I avoided most social contact with people in fear of what they might discover or pick up on. Now it was so nice just to get together with a group of women and talk. I hadn’t known what I was missing. On one occasion I’d even joined them on the dance floor. Patrick had nearly choked on his beer when he saw me out there.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked me after making his way over to me on the dance floor.
“Dancing,” I told him with a smile. He looked like he couldn’t figure out what to say. “Do I look that bad doing it?” He shook his head.
“No, not at all. You look…..wonderful.” I’d grinned at him, and he returned it before moving away to leave me to dance.
It wasn’t until one afternoon when I finished up a painting and looked it over that I saw the true transformation. For what might have been the first time in my life I looked at a painting I’d done and smiled. It was a large house surrounded by fields and a white picket fence. There were two dogs running through a field that looked suspiciously like Lox and Dudley. The sky was a bright blue, sunshine spilling down all over the scene. Oh Lord, Gabrielle, what has happened to you?
Now I was sitting in my living room listening to Patrick and Adam’s proposal in shock. They couldn’t be serious. People actually did things like this? Like I’d promised, I heard them out until they were done talking despite wanting to interrupt and tell them not a fat chance in hell they were getting my help.
“So what do you think?” Patrick asked when they were done.
“I think you both need to find a shrink,” I told them. Adam turned to Patrick.
“I told you she wouldn’t go for it,” he said.
“You were right.”
“Come on. Do it for the poor cripple,” Patrick begged.
I glanced down at his knee, and could see the outline of the brace under his pants. He’d gotten hurt in a game on Valentine’s Day, of all days. To me the holiday meant nothing, but Patrick had really wanted to do something special for me. Instead we’d spent a portion of the night at the hospital while he had his knee checked. I can remember how scared I was when I saw him go down, and how I’d never felt so worried about someone before in my life.
“You’ve played the handicap card way too many times this past month. It loses its effectiveness.”
“We’re doing this for your honor,” Adam tried. I narrowed my eyes at him. What the hell was he talking about?
“I’m sorry?”
“It’s getting back at Tazer for those texts he and Kaner sent you a few months ago. We’ve already gotten Kaner, but it’s Tazer’s turn,” he explained. My jaw dropped.
“You’re doing this to him for me?!” They both laughed and nodded.
“That’s why we need your help. It’ll be even better,” Patrick said. And somehow I found myself agreeing.
Patrick settled into a seat at the bar and Gabby sat down next to him. Normally after a game he was feeling pretty bummed out about not playing, but tonight nothing was going to be able to kill his mood. The rest of his teammates and their girls who had come out filled in around them. After some strategic maneuvering, he and Burs had managed to get Tazer next to Gabrielle.
He and Burs managed to talk the whole table into only drinking hard liquor instead of beer, mostly offering to buy shots. It was all part of the plan. Things wouldn’t work if Tazer was drinking beer. He also managed to track down the cocktail waitress and tell her what they needed, slipping her an extra $200 on top of the tip at the end of the night to ensure it got done.
Every once in a while he heard Gabrielle proudly order another rum and coke for her and Tazer. She was going drink for drink with him. Actually, the joke could have ended there. Tazer was acting like an idiot. Tazer couldn't back down from a challenge though, and he didn't want to be outdrunk by a girl.
Due to what was going on, he and Burs were heavily relying on Gabrielle’s newfound ability to carry a conversation with anyone. So far she was doing fantastic. She’d spent most of the night talking to Jon even over himself. A few times he found himself marveling at the person she’d become in the last month.
When they’d first met, he would have been lucky if she’d said two words to his teammates. Gabrielle had just been reserved by nature, not that he’d minded. Ever since she’d told him everything, and he hated saying this even though he couldn’t think of another phrase, she’d blossomed. The Gabrielle today was not the same Gabrielle he’d first met. She was better.
He felt like he’d taken a lot of her pain away from her by listening and being there for her. He’d done something only Olivia, who he’d love to thank in person someday, had done. He hadn’t judged and had only wanted to help and appreciate. He’d felt for a while that he was quickly falling for Gabrielle, and to learn what she’d gone through in her life and to see how she’d turned out, he was only more proud and falling even more for her. Watching her interact now with his teammates only strengthened that feeling.
“Jesus Christ, I’m shit-canned,” Tazer slurred at one point in the night. It was the moment he and Burs were waiting for.
“Don’t worry, Tazer, we’ll get you home,” Burs told him, standing up from his position across from him. Patrick laughed as he watched Jon’s head bobbing and his eyes struggling to stay open.
“Yeah…..home,” he mumbled. Gabby looked over at him and rolled her eyes, shaking her head. He got up, followed by her, and then Burs and he helped Tazer out of his seat.
“Guess he had too much to drink,” he heard Gabrielle saying to the rest of the group. God, she was playing her part perfectly.
Burs wrapped his arm around Jon’s shoulders and assisted him out of the club. Even though he hated to admit it, Patrick didn’t mind having his arm around Gabrielle’s shoulders. She’d never said a word about wanting to help him walk with his knee, but she knew he was in pain. He kind of liked that she discreetly pretended she just wanted to be snuggled up to him when she was really just trying to help him walk.
They called out their goodbyes to the group, laughing at the jokes tossed in Tazer’s direction about how he couldn’t hold liquor. It was hard not to just lose it right then and there. They finally got him into the car. Gabrielle got into the driver’s seat since he couldn’t drive with his knee, Burs had had a few beers, and Tazer was obviously incapable of driving.
Gabby’s “rum and coke’s” had actually just been coke’s the whole night. All of Jon’s besides the first one had been triples. They’d made sure to give him one normal mixed drink so he wouldn’t be suspicious. Burs sat in the back doing his best to keep Jon awake while Patrick gave Gabrielle the directions. They reached Tazer’s place, and by then he was passed out in the back.
Tazer sort of woke up once they reached home, and Patrick and Burs left him with Gabrielle to entertain him. It was probably more likely the other way around. By the time they were done with their plan, Gabrielle was nearly in stitches with the ridiculous things Jon was saying to her.
“Apparently he’s desperate for a girl to take out on moonlit walks and send flowers to,” Gabrielle announced when they finally walked into the living room they’d dumped them off in while they worked. Burs snorted out his laughter.
“Oh God am I going to have to give it to him about that,” he responded.
Patrick, Burs, and Gabrielle took a short nap with an alarm set to wake them up. Just at sunrise they dragged Tazer outside where everything was set up. Then they set up the camera and waited. Once the sun was up, with it being a weekday, one which school wasn’t in session, people were getting out and about to head to work.
Everyone in the neighborhood stopped to stare at the spectacle in Tazer’s front yard. The three of them laughed as they filmed the expressions on everyone’s faces as they looked out at every piece of furniture from Tazer’s bedroom set up on the front lawn in exactly the same place and distance from each other as it had been inside, with Tazer sleeping in the bed in just his boxers, and no blankets.
A few shook their heads in disgust. A few took pictures of the Hawk’s captain in just his boxers on his front lawn. Still more just honked their horns and laughed as they drove by. It didn’t take long for the commotion to wake Tazer up. They filmed him stirring, rubbing his eyes, and stepping down from his bed, only to pause in confusion when he felt grass instead of carpet. He woke up with a start, looked around at his surroundings before running to the front door only to find it locked.
“That’s what you get for fucking with Gabrielle, you little prick!” Patrick called through the door.
“Fuck you, Sharpie, let me in!” he yelled, trying to cover himself up. Patrick eventually opened the door to let him in, exposing him, Burs, and Gabby doubled over in laughter.
“That was a real nice show you gave the neighbors,” Burs commented as Tazer glared at the three of them.
“You too?” he asked Gabrielle in surprise.
“What can I say? I side with this guy,” she replied jerking a thumb towards Patrick.
“I fucking hate you all,” Tazer growled out. Patrick was really going to enjoy showing this video to the boys in the locker room tomorrow.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Ugh.....
So sorry I haven't posted anything in forever. I am not done with this story, I'm just ridiculously busy. It's been very difficult in the last month to find time to write any chapters for any of my stories. Hopefully in the next two weeks I'll get a couple done at least. At the end of the month I'm heading to Mexico on a much needed vacation and there will absolutely be no time to write while I'm there, so I'm hoping to get some done before then. Thanks for everyone who's sticking around and waiting patiently!
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Chapter 23
Patrick stared up at the ceiling in the middle of his second sleepless night in a row. This time though his anger wasn’t directed at Gabrielle, it was directed at her family. How could any parent or sibling treat someone the way they’d treated Gabrielle as a child? While she made some really bad choices in her life he couldn’t help but blame them for it.
Looking back at the way she’d acted at Christmas with his family, things really started to make sense. He realized now that she’d been so nervous to go because her definition of family and his were completely different. No wonder she’d broken down into tears when his mother had accepted her. That whole trip was adding up now in his mind in a way it never could before.
He felt her shift slightly next to him in bed, and he wrapped his arm tighter around her. He didn’t like the things Gabrielle had done in her past at all, but what kind of person would it make him if he just left because of things she’d done a decade ago? He’d be just like every other person that had been in Gabrielle’s life if he did, and he couldn’t even begin to think of doing that to her.
He reflected back on the rest of the day after Gabrielle’s confession. After he’d finally convinced her that he wasn’t going to kick her out of his house, she’d managed to relax some. They’d sat back down and she continued to talk, to tell him about herself back then. He knew she probably just needed to get it all out, even if it wasn’t easy for her to tell or for him to hear.
She told him that she wasn’t an alcoholic but she didn’t drink because of the memories. Cocaine had been what had put her into rehab, and more often than not, she’d drink when she did it. After leaving rehab she’d sworn off drinking because she was afraid that if she did all of those cravings would come rushing back. Then she told him about the night they’d gone out and she’d rushed out in a hurry and he’d found her shaking at home. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t figured it out then.
She recounted all of the times she’d accomplished something without the support of her parents. He listened with anger at the neglect they’d shown her and the favoritism they’d shown her older sisters. Until she’d started getting into trouble, Gabrielle seemed to be a child any parent would be proud of. He made a silent vow to himself that very moment that when he had children he’d never let them feel like he wasn’t proud of them and he didn’t love them.
His heart broke when she told him about the first time she’d cut herself. It had been on accident when she’d been drunk and fumbled a pair of scissors that had cut her arm. She told him how at first it had brought on tears and then that it had struck her that it was the first time she’d cried in as long as she could remember. A few days later, after another slight by her parents she’d been sitting in her bathroom wondering why she felt nothing by it. Then she’d spotted the scissors still sitting on the counter and remembered the tears. She picked up the scissors, hesitated for a moment, and then cut, just a small shallow line on her arm. The tears came again and it would take a long time for her to learn to stop.
After she seemed to have gotten everything out, they agreed to go back to her place. She had to work in the morning so she couldn’t stay with him, but he didn’t feel right leaving her alone tonight. He’d packed an overnight bag, put Dudley in the car and followed her home. He ordered food for dinner that they’d both only picked at as they sat curled up together on the couch. They put on a show on TV that neither seemed to be paying much attention to. They were sitting quietly when Gabrielle said something he hadn’t seen coming.
“Don’t ever fall in love with me,” she’d whispered. He’d pulled back from her in surprise, but she didn’t turn to look at him.
“Pardon?” he’d asked. Without moving a muscle she responded.
“Don’t ever fall in love with me,” she repeated. He forced her to turn her head and look at him. It was then that he saw the tears swimming in her eyes.
“Why would you say that?” he questioned.
“I’m not saying you are or you would, I’m just asking you not to.” She avoided directly answering his question, but he wasn’t going to let it go.
“Why can’t I?” he pressed.
“Because I don’t know that I’m ready or even capable to be able to ever love someone back.”
He’d pressed a kiss on her forehead and pulled her back into him. He hadn’t said anything else to her then or the rest of the night about it, but he couldn’t stop thinking about it either. He wouldn’t tell her how sad it made him to hear that. He wouldn’t tell her that she deserved to find someone to love that would love her back. He wouldn’t tell her that he was already halfway there.
I sat down behind my desk at school and sighed. After the events of the last couple of days, I did not feel at all qualified to be doling out advice to anyone about anything right now. I could hardly figure out my own life so what right did I have to guide others in theirs? I felt like a hypocrite sitting here in this position.
After catching up on what I’d missed the day before and rescheduling appointments I’d had, I prepared for the day. Today was a session with Gia, and I had to get my head together for it. While we hadn’t made a ton of progress, we’d made some, and I didn’t want to take any steps back because I couldn’t be all there for her.
We’d had two sessions together since school had started back up from break and Gia had stayed at my house. She still wouldn’t say a word about anything that was bothering her, but at least now she’d talk some. Usually it was just about photography and some of the newest photos she’d taken. I didn’t mind, because with people like Gia, baby steps were necessary and important.
When the bell rang I waited hopeful that she’d show up for her record third straight appointment in a row. A few moments later she walked through the door. Only this time, unlike the last two, she didn’t greet me with a smile. She just walked in, dropped her bag on the floor next to the chair, and flopped down in it.
“Good morning, Gia. How are you?” I asked.
“Fine,” she mumbled. I held back a sigh at the return of old Gia.
“Okay. How’s school going?”
“Fine.”
“Any new photos this week?”
“No.”
At this point I realized that this was not going to be like the last two meetings at all. It was going to be like pulling teeth to get anything out of her and I took a moment to figure out a new approach. It was in that moment that Gia lifted an arm up to push a stray strand of hair behind her ear. I saw the edge of a bandage on her arm and felt sick. It was in that moment that I took a risk I’d always told myself I’d never do.
“You know that whatever you say in here stays between us, right?” I asked. She just looked at me blankly and nodded. “Okay, then I’m going to ask you to do me the same courtesy. If I tell you something, will you be able to keep it in here?” Her curiousity was piqued.
“Yeah,” was her response.
I took a deep breath and pulled off the button up sweater I was wearing. I put it around the back of the chair and turned to look back at Gia who was looking on in confusion as I then rolled up the sleeves of my blouse. I glanced down at my arms before extending them out on my lap, palms up. Gia looked down at them and I heard her sharp intake of breath.
“I was a teenager, your age actually, when I did this to myself,” I told her.
“Why are you showing me this?” she asked quietly, not lifting her eyes from my arms.
“Because I know what it’s like to need to feel. Just because I’m sitting here in this office talking to students about their concerns doesn’t mean I’m immune. I had the same problems and concerns that they do. Believe it or not, I wasn’t perfect.”
Gia looked up at me and I saw a single tear fall down her face. I pulled back my arms and rolled the sleeves of my blouse back down as I let Gia contemplate what I’d just shown her. I put my sweater back on and then shifted my eyes to Gia’s arms. She pulled them against her in response.
“You don’t need to do that, Gia,” I told her quietly.
“Do what?” she asked, her voice shaking, as she tried to hold herself together.
“I did it. For years. I know the signs, all the ways to try to hide it. I know, Gia.” Her arms fell to her lap in defeat.
“It’s the only thing I can control,” she whispered.
“What can’t you control?” I asked. She hesitated as a few more tears fell.
“My parents. My boyfriend. My friends. School. Everything.”
“Why don’t you pick one thing and tell me about it. Any one you want to talk about right now. It’s up to you. You can control what we talk about. Trust me, it’ll feel better just to get it out.”
And so Gia did. She talked. She told me about her parents fighting. She told me they fought daily, sometimes all night. She told me that sometimes the fights were so bad they’d forget she was there. She told me she was taking care of herself because they weren't doing it. I listened as her appointment ran over its allotted time. I let her talk as long as she needed to.
When she finished talking about her parents I gave her some time alone in my office to compose herself before giving her a late pass for her class. She walked to the door in the outer office and hesitated before turning back to me. I watched as a small smile formed on her face.
“Thank you.” She turned and walked out before I had a chance to react at all. I began to smile as I watched her disappear from view down the hall. I turned back to head into my office when I spotted my secretary looking at me in surprise.
“I’m sorry, was that Gia or a look-a-like?” Kristen asked. I just shrugged before walking into my office and shutting the door behind me.
Looking back at the way she’d acted at Christmas with his family, things really started to make sense. He realized now that she’d been so nervous to go because her definition of family and his were completely different. No wonder she’d broken down into tears when his mother had accepted her. That whole trip was adding up now in his mind in a way it never could before.
He felt her shift slightly next to him in bed, and he wrapped his arm tighter around her. He didn’t like the things Gabrielle had done in her past at all, but what kind of person would it make him if he just left because of things she’d done a decade ago? He’d be just like every other person that had been in Gabrielle’s life if he did, and he couldn’t even begin to think of doing that to her.
He reflected back on the rest of the day after Gabrielle’s confession. After he’d finally convinced her that he wasn’t going to kick her out of his house, she’d managed to relax some. They’d sat back down and she continued to talk, to tell him about herself back then. He knew she probably just needed to get it all out, even if it wasn’t easy for her to tell or for him to hear.
She told him that she wasn’t an alcoholic but she didn’t drink because of the memories. Cocaine had been what had put her into rehab, and more often than not, she’d drink when she did it. After leaving rehab she’d sworn off drinking because she was afraid that if she did all of those cravings would come rushing back. Then she told him about the night they’d gone out and she’d rushed out in a hurry and he’d found her shaking at home. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t figured it out then.
She recounted all of the times she’d accomplished something without the support of her parents. He listened with anger at the neglect they’d shown her and the favoritism they’d shown her older sisters. Until she’d started getting into trouble, Gabrielle seemed to be a child any parent would be proud of. He made a silent vow to himself that very moment that when he had children he’d never let them feel like he wasn’t proud of them and he didn’t love them.
His heart broke when she told him about the first time she’d cut herself. It had been on accident when she’d been drunk and fumbled a pair of scissors that had cut her arm. She told him how at first it had brought on tears and then that it had struck her that it was the first time she’d cried in as long as she could remember. A few days later, after another slight by her parents she’d been sitting in her bathroom wondering why she felt nothing by it. Then she’d spotted the scissors still sitting on the counter and remembered the tears. She picked up the scissors, hesitated for a moment, and then cut, just a small shallow line on her arm. The tears came again and it would take a long time for her to learn to stop.
After she seemed to have gotten everything out, they agreed to go back to her place. She had to work in the morning so she couldn’t stay with him, but he didn’t feel right leaving her alone tonight. He’d packed an overnight bag, put Dudley in the car and followed her home. He ordered food for dinner that they’d both only picked at as they sat curled up together on the couch. They put on a show on TV that neither seemed to be paying much attention to. They were sitting quietly when Gabrielle said something he hadn’t seen coming.
“Don’t ever fall in love with me,” she’d whispered. He’d pulled back from her in surprise, but she didn’t turn to look at him.
“Pardon?” he’d asked. Without moving a muscle she responded.
“Don’t ever fall in love with me,” she repeated. He forced her to turn her head and look at him. It was then that he saw the tears swimming in her eyes.
“Why would you say that?” he questioned.
“I’m not saying you are or you would, I’m just asking you not to.” She avoided directly answering his question, but he wasn’t going to let it go.
“Why can’t I?” he pressed.
“Because I don’t know that I’m ready or even capable to be able to ever love someone back.”
He’d pressed a kiss on her forehead and pulled her back into him. He hadn’t said anything else to her then or the rest of the night about it, but he couldn’t stop thinking about it either. He wouldn’t tell her how sad it made him to hear that. He wouldn’t tell her that she deserved to find someone to love that would love her back. He wouldn’t tell her that he was already halfway there.
I sat down behind my desk at school and sighed. After the events of the last couple of days, I did not feel at all qualified to be doling out advice to anyone about anything right now. I could hardly figure out my own life so what right did I have to guide others in theirs? I felt like a hypocrite sitting here in this position.
After catching up on what I’d missed the day before and rescheduling appointments I’d had, I prepared for the day. Today was a session with Gia, and I had to get my head together for it. While we hadn’t made a ton of progress, we’d made some, and I didn’t want to take any steps back because I couldn’t be all there for her.
We’d had two sessions together since school had started back up from break and Gia had stayed at my house. She still wouldn’t say a word about anything that was bothering her, but at least now she’d talk some. Usually it was just about photography and some of the newest photos she’d taken. I didn’t mind, because with people like Gia, baby steps were necessary and important.
When the bell rang I waited hopeful that she’d show up for her record third straight appointment in a row. A few moments later she walked through the door. Only this time, unlike the last two, she didn’t greet me with a smile. She just walked in, dropped her bag on the floor next to the chair, and flopped down in it.
“Good morning, Gia. How are you?” I asked.
“Fine,” she mumbled. I held back a sigh at the return of old Gia.
“Okay. How’s school going?”
“Fine.”
“Any new photos this week?”
“No.”
At this point I realized that this was not going to be like the last two meetings at all. It was going to be like pulling teeth to get anything out of her and I took a moment to figure out a new approach. It was in that moment that Gia lifted an arm up to push a stray strand of hair behind her ear. I saw the edge of a bandage on her arm and felt sick. It was in that moment that I took a risk I’d always told myself I’d never do.
“You know that whatever you say in here stays between us, right?” I asked. She just looked at me blankly and nodded. “Okay, then I’m going to ask you to do me the same courtesy. If I tell you something, will you be able to keep it in here?” Her curiousity was piqued.
“Yeah,” was her response.
I took a deep breath and pulled off the button up sweater I was wearing. I put it around the back of the chair and turned to look back at Gia who was looking on in confusion as I then rolled up the sleeves of my blouse. I glanced down at my arms before extending them out on my lap, palms up. Gia looked down at them and I heard her sharp intake of breath.
“I was a teenager, your age actually, when I did this to myself,” I told her.
“Why are you showing me this?” she asked quietly, not lifting her eyes from my arms.
“Because I know what it’s like to need to feel. Just because I’m sitting here in this office talking to students about their concerns doesn’t mean I’m immune. I had the same problems and concerns that they do. Believe it or not, I wasn’t perfect.”
Gia looked up at me and I saw a single tear fall down her face. I pulled back my arms and rolled the sleeves of my blouse back down as I let Gia contemplate what I’d just shown her. I put my sweater back on and then shifted my eyes to Gia’s arms. She pulled them against her in response.
“You don’t need to do that, Gia,” I told her quietly.
“Do what?” she asked, her voice shaking, as she tried to hold herself together.
“I did it. For years. I know the signs, all the ways to try to hide it. I know, Gia.” Her arms fell to her lap in defeat.
“It’s the only thing I can control,” she whispered.
“What can’t you control?” I asked. She hesitated as a few more tears fell.
“My parents. My boyfriend. My friends. School. Everything.”
“Why don’t you pick one thing and tell me about it. Any one you want to talk about right now. It’s up to you. You can control what we talk about. Trust me, it’ll feel better just to get it out.”
And so Gia did. She talked. She told me about her parents fighting. She told me they fought daily, sometimes all night. She told me that sometimes the fights were so bad they’d forget she was there. She told me she was taking care of herself because they weren't doing it. I listened as her appointment ran over its allotted time. I let her talk as long as she needed to.
When she finished talking about her parents I gave her some time alone in my office to compose herself before giving her a late pass for her class. She walked to the door in the outer office and hesitated before turning back to me. I watched as a small smile formed on her face.
“Thank you.” She turned and walked out before I had a chance to react at all. I began to smile as I watched her disappear from view down the hall. I turned back to head into my office when I spotted my secretary looking at me in surprise.
“I’m sorry, was that Gia or a look-a-like?” Kristen asked. I just shrugged before walking into my office and shutting the door behind me.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Chapter 22
Here it is, the big reveal. Thanks for sticking with me up until now. Sorry that there's so much dialogue from Gabrielle, but it was really the only way to get everything in, ya know?
Patrick was like a robot the next day at practice. He hadn’t been able to sleep at all that night. He just couldn’t, for the life of him, figure out why Gabrielle had lied to him. Why would she say she didn’t have any family if she did? Was there something wrong with them or something wrong with her?
They were the only options he could think of. Either they’d done something unthinkable to her or she’d done something unthinkable to them. Neither of those seemed to make much sense to him though. Gabrielle was one of the most amazing people he’d ever met. How could a family be so awful to her or how could she be awful to them?
“What’s going on, man?” Burish asked him after practice.
“Nothing. I’m fine,” he responded. He wished that he could have actually been slightly convincing, because there was no way Burish was buying that.
“You look like shit. Something’s wrong,” Burs pushed.
“I didn’t sleep last night.” Not wanting to have this conversation in the middle of the locker room Patrick walked out of it and outside.
“Aw, did you and Gabrielle get into your first little argument?” Burish teased. Patrick wasn’t in the mood.
“There was nothing little about it. She lied to me. She’s been lying to me the whole fucking time,” he said through gritted teeth. Burish’s smirk faded when he realized that it wasn’t some stupid spat.
“What about?”
“Her family. The one I told you she didn’t have. Turns out she does. Her niece showed up last night.”
“What did she say?”
“Nothing. I didn’t give her the chance.” He sighed at the look Burish gave him. “Her niece came in tears. It wasn’t the time to start questioning her.”
“Sometimes it sickens me how nice and understanding you are,” Burish cracked, causing a tiny smile to form on Patrick's lips. “When are you going to talk to her?” That was the million dollar question. He felt too riled up about it still to do it now. Not to mention Gabrielle was at work. He just needed some time to cool off.
“I don’t know. I just need to figure things out.”
Patrick made his way to his car and headed home. He let Dudley out the back door and tried unsuccessfully to just forget about Gabrielle for now. He was exhausted and needed sleep. The problem was that he knew sleep wasn’t going to come while his brain was working overtime to make sense of the lie she’d told about not having any family.
Dudley came back inside and Patrick went straight into his bedroom and lay down. Maybe if he stayed there long enough he’d eventually fall asleep. As he stared up at the ceiling he realized that he was so worked up because he’d fallen for Gabrielle. Hard. The doorbell rang just as that hit him and he considered staying in bed. It rang again and with a groan he got up to answer the door.
He checked who was there before opening it. He wasn’t sure he should open the door to her, but he did anyway. Gabrielle stood on the other side of his door in the middle of a school day looking worse than he did. Her eyes shifted from the ground to his face and tears immediately welled up in her eyes. He fought the urge to just pull her into him and wrap his arms around her.
“Hi,” he said quietly. She bit her lip before responding.
“I’m not sure I deserve it, but I was hoping we could talk. I realize that you’re more than angry at me right now and that once you hear why it’s only going to get worse. I just felt like you deserved the truth. I was hoping you’d at least let me explain things so you’d understand.” Curiosity got the best of him and he stepped back, allowing Gabrielle to walk into his house.
It was a painstaking wait for the hours to go by until Patrick would be home from practice. I had to explain to him, let him know why I’d kept my family a secret. He deserved the truth. He always had, but I’d selfishly kept it under wraps foolishly thinking that maybe I’d never have to tell him.
Now I was here, in his house, sitting on his couch. He didn’t look pleased or even ready to have me there with him, but I had to get this out now. I just wanted to rip the bandage off and let the pain come. The quicker the pain came the quicker I could start trying to get over the loss of him in my life.
He surprised me by sitting down next to me on the couch instead of on the chair across from me. I wasn’t sure whether to be relieved that he didn’t hate me enough so far to want to be as far from me as possible or be worried because having him that close made it that much harder to tell him. We sat there in silence for a while as I struggled to think of how to start.
“Have you ever died?” I asked him. He looked at me strangely. I knew that probably didn’t make much sense, but I waited for an answer anyway.
“No,” he finally said, his brow furrowed.
“I have. Twice. Only I just recently found out about the second time. The first time I was 17 and I was dead for two minutes before they revived me. The second time was just two weeks later. My parents kicked me out of the house and I found out last night they put an obituary in the paper saying I’d been in a car accident and had died from the injuries.”
Patrick looked utterly confused and stunned at the same time. I didn’t blame him. I hadn’t exactly started this off slowly or with an explanation. Instead I’d only added more mystery to my past. I took a deep breath before starting at the beginning.
“After my parents had Rachel and Bailey they decided that two children was enough. Unfortunately 10 years later I was born. I was unexpected, a mistake, and unwanted. They never missed an opportunity to tell me that. Even as a child in elementary school I knew they’d never wanted me and they weren’t happy I was around.”
A sob escaped my throat after saying that and I took a minute to compose myself before continuing. I noticed a change in Patrick’s demeanor. He looked a little less angry, but I knew that was going to change very soon. Once he heard the rest he’d never look at me with any other emotion in his eyes.
“I spent years trying to gain their love. I wanted them to be as proud of me as they were of Rachel and Bailey. I did everything my sisters did. They did well in school so I studied hard to be just as smart. They played soccer and so did I. They were in chorus and played the violin, so I did too. Those were the things that made my parents proud of them and I thought that if I did the same things too they’d be proud of me like they were of them. I did everything my sisters did, and I did them all better. It didn’t matter. My sisters only saw me as a tag-along burden because of the age difference and my parents saw me as an inconvenience.”
As I talked I began to have flashbacks. I remembered my teachers wanting to put me into accelerated classes in elementary school because the regular classroom pace was too slow for me. I remembered my parents declining even though they’d done it for my sisters. I remembered scoring the game winning goal in the championship of a soccer game without my parents or sisters in attendance. I remembered looking out at the crowd after a solo only given to the best violinist in orchestra during a concert and seeing the two empty seats that had been designated for my parents.
“I decided as I got older that being like my sisters wasn’t going to get me attention so I turned to getting into trouble. I thought that if I got into trouble my parents would be forced to pay attention to me and then they could see that I really just needed them to care. I argued, I back talked, I did everything to upset my sisters and parents. By 11 I’d smoked my first cigarette. At 12 I had my first drink. By 13 I’d gotten high for the first time. When I was 14 I started skipping school. 15 was when I lost my virginity. At 16 I’d tried cocaine, speed, and ecstasy. At 17…..well, 17 was a real banner year for me.”
Tears were streaming down my face at this point. I paused to collect myself again before continuing and looked at the expression on Patrick’s face. I couldn’t read it. I had no idea if he was pitying me or thinking I was the most despicable person on the planet.
“My parents never cared. They were only embarrassed. You see, my dad wanted to be a Senator of Missouri with hopes of maybe someday being president. I’m from St. Louis, by the way. My antics were meant to make them care, but they only turned on me more. They told me I cost my father the election. Voters didn’t want a man running their state that couldn’t even control his child. My sisters hated me. That's when it turned from needing attention to being vindictive. Everything I did was aimed at hurting my family, with nothing but revenge fueling it. By 16 it had gone too far and I was too lost to stop.”
Patrick reached out then and covered my hand with his. I let my head fall in embarrassment. I didn’t want to look at him when I told him the next part. I pulled up my shirt sleeves to show off the scars on my forearms.
“I lied to you about these. They weren’t from an accident. I was depressed and I felt numb all the time. I used to cut myself. At least then, at that moment when I watched blood drip down my arm from the newest slice I’d made I felt something. It was the only time I ever felt anything.”
“Jesus, Gabrielle,” Patrick whispered, seemingly overwhelmed by my confession.
“I OD’d when I was 17. That’s when I died. After that my parents decided that they’d had enough. They never tried to help me, only saw me as a burden. They gave me my inheritance early and told me to leave. My high school counselor, Olivia, took me in. She was the only person in my life that gave a damn. She sent me to rehab. There’s a day in rehab when family comes in for a therapy session. None of my family showed up.
Olivia home schooled me and I went to community college after getting out of rehab. After graduating from there I moved here to Chicago and went to school to get my degree in psychology. Then I got my PhD. I wanted to help kids the way Olivia helped me. Olivia said she told my family about all of my accomplishments, but they never responded. They’d cut me out of their lives for good when I wanted nothing more than for them to see that I was different. Then I found out from Kaylen last night that they killed me.
So that’s my past, my story. I had a family that thought I was a burden and instead of proving them wrong I showed them they were right. I hurt and embarrassed them along with myself. I’m a terrible person that doesn’t deserve someone like you. I’m sorry for lying to you and stringing you along. You didn’t deserve it. I just wanted you to know why I lied. I’m so sorry again for what I did.”
I took a deep breath and stood up from my spot on the couch. Now that Patrick knew the truth I knew that our relationship was over. Who in their right mind wants to date an ex-drug addict with abandonment issues? No one sane, that’s for sure. I turned my back on him and began the walk to the door.
“Where are you going?” I heard him ask.
“I’m leaving,” I responded, glancing over my shoulder.
“Why?” It was a simple question, but I couldn’t comprehend it. It just didn’t make any sense to me.
“I…..I don’t…..I have to go,” I stuttered. I turned away again and reached for the door handle. Somehow in that short time Patrick had gotten up and across the room to reach me. I felt his hand on my arm and turned back.
“You’re not that person anymore, Gabrielle,” he whispered.
“Yes, I am. I’m always that person. Every day I’m that person and every day for the rest of my life I’ll be that person.” He looked into my eyes and forced me to look into his by placing his hand under my chin.
“No, you’re not. That Gabrielle was combative, vengeful, and didn’t care about anyone including herself. The Gabrielle I know is sweet, intelligent, and bends over backwards to help anyone and everyone she possibly can. The two can’t be more different. You’re not her anymore, Gabby, why can’t you see that?”
I took in his words in shock and surprise. Why wasn’t he angry with me? Why wasn’t he asking me to leave? There was no anger in his eyes, no disgust. I only saw sadness in them and new tears filled mine.
“You don’t deserve to take on my baggage, my trauma. I came out of it scarred literally and figuratively. I’m not okay. I don’t know that I’ll ever be okay,” I told him.
“I can’t even begin to imagine what your life must have been like in the past, but that’s exactly what it is. It’s a past. I’m sorry, so sorry about everything you went through, but I refuse to believe that you’ll never be okay. Of course you’re going to be scarred. No one would come out of that unscathed. The scars don’t make you, Gabrielle, how you deal with them does. You’re stronger than you think you are. You have to be if you beat all of that to become who you are now.”
“How are you like this? Why don’t you see me like everyone else that knows all that does?”
“I don’t give up on people I care about. I told you once I wanted to save you. I don’t go back on my word. I’m here, Gabby, and I’m not going anywhere.”
He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into him. I fell into his arms and let the tears come. No one had ever said things like that to me before. No one had ever cared enough to even give me a chance, let alone a second one. He pulled back a little and looked down at me. My heart nearly exploded when his lips touched mine. If he could forgive me, maybe now I’d be able to forgive myself.
Patrick was like a robot the next day at practice. He hadn’t been able to sleep at all that night. He just couldn’t, for the life of him, figure out why Gabrielle had lied to him. Why would she say she didn’t have any family if she did? Was there something wrong with them or something wrong with her?
They were the only options he could think of. Either they’d done something unthinkable to her or she’d done something unthinkable to them. Neither of those seemed to make much sense to him though. Gabrielle was one of the most amazing people he’d ever met. How could a family be so awful to her or how could she be awful to them?
“What’s going on, man?” Burish asked him after practice.
“Nothing. I’m fine,” he responded. He wished that he could have actually been slightly convincing, because there was no way Burish was buying that.
“You look like shit. Something’s wrong,” Burs pushed.
“I didn’t sleep last night.” Not wanting to have this conversation in the middle of the locker room Patrick walked out of it and outside.
“Aw, did you and Gabrielle get into your first little argument?” Burish teased. Patrick wasn’t in the mood.
“There was nothing little about it. She lied to me. She’s been lying to me the whole fucking time,” he said through gritted teeth. Burish’s smirk faded when he realized that it wasn’t some stupid spat.
“What about?”
“Her family. The one I told you she didn’t have. Turns out she does. Her niece showed up last night.”
“What did she say?”
“Nothing. I didn’t give her the chance.” He sighed at the look Burish gave him. “Her niece came in tears. It wasn’t the time to start questioning her.”
“Sometimes it sickens me how nice and understanding you are,” Burish cracked, causing a tiny smile to form on Patrick's lips. “When are you going to talk to her?” That was the million dollar question. He felt too riled up about it still to do it now. Not to mention Gabrielle was at work. He just needed some time to cool off.
“I don’t know. I just need to figure things out.”
Patrick made his way to his car and headed home. He let Dudley out the back door and tried unsuccessfully to just forget about Gabrielle for now. He was exhausted and needed sleep. The problem was that he knew sleep wasn’t going to come while his brain was working overtime to make sense of the lie she’d told about not having any family.
Dudley came back inside and Patrick went straight into his bedroom and lay down. Maybe if he stayed there long enough he’d eventually fall asleep. As he stared up at the ceiling he realized that he was so worked up because he’d fallen for Gabrielle. Hard. The doorbell rang just as that hit him and he considered staying in bed. It rang again and with a groan he got up to answer the door.
He checked who was there before opening it. He wasn’t sure he should open the door to her, but he did anyway. Gabrielle stood on the other side of his door in the middle of a school day looking worse than he did. Her eyes shifted from the ground to his face and tears immediately welled up in her eyes. He fought the urge to just pull her into him and wrap his arms around her.
“Hi,” he said quietly. She bit her lip before responding.
“I’m not sure I deserve it, but I was hoping we could talk. I realize that you’re more than angry at me right now and that once you hear why it’s only going to get worse. I just felt like you deserved the truth. I was hoping you’d at least let me explain things so you’d understand.” Curiosity got the best of him and he stepped back, allowing Gabrielle to walk into his house.
It was a painstaking wait for the hours to go by until Patrick would be home from practice. I had to explain to him, let him know why I’d kept my family a secret. He deserved the truth. He always had, but I’d selfishly kept it under wraps foolishly thinking that maybe I’d never have to tell him.
Now I was here, in his house, sitting on his couch. He didn’t look pleased or even ready to have me there with him, but I had to get this out now. I just wanted to rip the bandage off and let the pain come. The quicker the pain came the quicker I could start trying to get over the loss of him in my life.
He surprised me by sitting down next to me on the couch instead of on the chair across from me. I wasn’t sure whether to be relieved that he didn’t hate me enough so far to want to be as far from me as possible or be worried because having him that close made it that much harder to tell him. We sat there in silence for a while as I struggled to think of how to start.
“Have you ever died?” I asked him. He looked at me strangely. I knew that probably didn’t make much sense, but I waited for an answer anyway.
“No,” he finally said, his brow furrowed.
“I have. Twice. Only I just recently found out about the second time. The first time I was 17 and I was dead for two minutes before they revived me. The second time was just two weeks later. My parents kicked me out of the house and I found out last night they put an obituary in the paper saying I’d been in a car accident and had died from the injuries.”
Patrick looked utterly confused and stunned at the same time. I didn’t blame him. I hadn’t exactly started this off slowly or with an explanation. Instead I’d only added more mystery to my past. I took a deep breath before starting at the beginning.
“After my parents had Rachel and Bailey they decided that two children was enough. Unfortunately 10 years later I was born. I was unexpected, a mistake, and unwanted. They never missed an opportunity to tell me that. Even as a child in elementary school I knew they’d never wanted me and they weren’t happy I was around.”
A sob escaped my throat after saying that and I took a minute to compose myself before continuing. I noticed a change in Patrick’s demeanor. He looked a little less angry, but I knew that was going to change very soon. Once he heard the rest he’d never look at me with any other emotion in his eyes.
“I spent years trying to gain their love. I wanted them to be as proud of me as they were of Rachel and Bailey. I did everything my sisters did. They did well in school so I studied hard to be just as smart. They played soccer and so did I. They were in chorus and played the violin, so I did too. Those were the things that made my parents proud of them and I thought that if I did the same things too they’d be proud of me like they were of them. I did everything my sisters did, and I did them all better. It didn’t matter. My sisters only saw me as a tag-along burden because of the age difference and my parents saw me as an inconvenience.”
As I talked I began to have flashbacks. I remembered my teachers wanting to put me into accelerated classes in elementary school because the regular classroom pace was too slow for me. I remembered my parents declining even though they’d done it for my sisters. I remembered scoring the game winning goal in the championship of a soccer game without my parents or sisters in attendance. I remembered looking out at the crowd after a solo only given to the best violinist in orchestra during a concert and seeing the two empty seats that had been designated for my parents.
“I decided as I got older that being like my sisters wasn’t going to get me attention so I turned to getting into trouble. I thought that if I got into trouble my parents would be forced to pay attention to me and then they could see that I really just needed them to care. I argued, I back talked, I did everything to upset my sisters and parents. By 11 I’d smoked my first cigarette. At 12 I had my first drink. By 13 I’d gotten high for the first time. When I was 14 I started skipping school. 15 was when I lost my virginity. At 16 I’d tried cocaine, speed, and ecstasy. At 17…..well, 17 was a real banner year for me.”
Tears were streaming down my face at this point. I paused to collect myself again before continuing and looked at the expression on Patrick’s face. I couldn’t read it. I had no idea if he was pitying me or thinking I was the most despicable person on the planet.
“My parents never cared. They were only embarrassed. You see, my dad wanted to be a Senator of Missouri with hopes of maybe someday being president. I’m from St. Louis, by the way. My antics were meant to make them care, but they only turned on me more. They told me I cost my father the election. Voters didn’t want a man running their state that couldn’t even control his child. My sisters hated me. That's when it turned from needing attention to being vindictive. Everything I did was aimed at hurting my family, with nothing but revenge fueling it. By 16 it had gone too far and I was too lost to stop.”
Patrick reached out then and covered my hand with his. I let my head fall in embarrassment. I didn’t want to look at him when I told him the next part. I pulled up my shirt sleeves to show off the scars on my forearms.
“I lied to you about these. They weren’t from an accident. I was depressed and I felt numb all the time. I used to cut myself. At least then, at that moment when I watched blood drip down my arm from the newest slice I’d made I felt something. It was the only time I ever felt anything.”
“Jesus, Gabrielle,” Patrick whispered, seemingly overwhelmed by my confession.
“I OD’d when I was 17. That’s when I died. After that my parents decided that they’d had enough. They never tried to help me, only saw me as a burden. They gave me my inheritance early and told me to leave. My high school counselor, Olivia, took me in. She was the only person in my life that gave a damn. She sent me to rehab. There’s a day in rehab when family comes in for a therapy session. None of my family showed up.
Olivia home schooled me and I went to community college after getting out of rehab. After graduating from there I moved here to Chicago and went to school to get my degree in psychology. Then I got my PhD. I wanted to help kids the way Olivia helped me. Olivia said she told my family about all of my accomplishments, but they never responded. They’d cut me out of their lives for good when I wanted nothing more than for them to see that I was different. Then I found out from Kaylen last night that they killed me.
So that’s my past, my story. I had a family that thought I was a burden and instead of proving them wrong I showed them they were right. I hurt and embarrassed them along with myself. I’m a terrible person that doesn’t deserve someone like you. I’m sorry for lying to you and stringing you along. You didn’t deserve it. I just wanted you to know why I lied. I’m so sorry again for what I did.”
I took a deep breath and stood up from my spot on the couch. Now that Patrick knew the truth I knew that our relationship was over. Who in their right mind wants to date an ex-drug addict with abandonment issues? No one sane, that’s for sure. I turned my back on him and began the walk to the door.
“Where are you going?” I heard him ask.
“I’m leaving,” I responded, glancing over my shoulder.
“Why?” It was a simple question, but I couldn’t comprehend it. It just didn’t make any sense to me.
“I…..I don’t…..I have to go,” I stuttered. I turned away again and reached for the door handle. Somehow in that short time Patrick had gotten up and across the room to reach me. I felt his hand on my arm and turned back.
“You’re not that person anymore, Gabrielle,” he whispered.
“Yes, I am. I’m always that person. Every day I’m that person and every day for the rest of my life I’ll be that person.” He looked into my eyes and forced me to look into his by placing his hand under my chin.
“No, you’re not. That Gabrielle was combative, vengeful, and didn’t care about anyone including herself. The Gabrielle I know is sweet, intelligent, and bends over backwards to help anyone and everyone she possibly can. The two can’t be more different. You’re not her anymore, Gabby, why can’t you see that?”
I took in his words in shock and surprise. Why wasn’t he angry with me? Why wasn’t he asking me to leave? There was no anger in his eyes, no disgust. I only saw sadness in them and new tears filled mine.
“You don’t deserve to take on my baggage, my trauma. I came out of it scarred literally and figuratively. I’m not okay. I don’t know that I’ll ever be okay,” I told him.
“I can’t even begin to imagine what your life must have been like in the past, but that’s exactly what it is. It’s a past. I’m sorry, so sorry about everything you went through, but I refuse to believe that you’ll never be okay. Of course you’re going to be scarred. No one would come out of that unscathed. The scars don’t make you, Gabrielle, how you deal with them does. You’re stronger than you think you are. You have to be if you beat all of that to become who you are now.”
“How are you like this? Why don’t you see me like everyone else that knows all that does?”
“I don’t give up on people I care about. I told you once I wanted to save you. I don’t go back on my word. I’m here, Gabby, and I’m not going anywhere.”
He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into him. I fell into his arms and let the tears come. No one had ever said things like that to me before. No one had ever cared enough to even give me a chance, let alone a second one. He pulled back a little and looked down at me. My heart nearly exploded when his lips touched mine. If he could forgive me, maybe now I’d be able to forgive myself.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Chapter 21
I felt my stomach churning as I told Rachel who was on the phone. I heard her sharp intake of breath and she was quiet. I waited for what felt like forever for her to say something. I half expected something scathing and half expected her to hang up on me. I wasn’t let down.
“What the hell do you want?” came her angry reply. I bit my tongue at the sarcastic response I wanted to shoot back at her. That was the old Gabrielle.
“I’m sorry to call and bother you, but Kaylen’s here,” I told her. There was another silent pause.
“I’m trying to figure out why you’d be calling to lie to me after all these years, and yet I’m coming up with nothing but a blank. Kaylen’s at her friend’s house.” I sighed and glanced over at the teenager sitting in the other room.
“No, Rachel, she’s sitting right here in my living room,” I corrected her.
“That’s impossible. She has no idea where you are. I have no idea where you are.”
“Well, she found out somehow. It’s Chicago, by the way. Kaylen left school early and caught a bus here.” I could hear Rachel try to muffle the phone and instruct someone to call Kaylen’s friend.
“This just doesn’t make any sense. Why would Kaylen search you out and then at 14 find a bus to Chicago to go see you?” There was a short pause and then Rachel started talking again. “Have you been in contact with her? Have you been talking to my daughter behind my back?”
“No, I haven’t. I…..” Rachel wasn’t done.
“Who do you think you are trying to barge back into our lives after everything you put us through? I thought we made it clear that we wanted nothing to do with you.”
“I didn’t…..”
“And now you go behind my back and start talking to my daughter, an impressionable teenager? How dare you!”
“Rachel!” I yelled into the phone, successfully shutting her up for a moment. “She heard you and Lance fighting. She overheard you saying you just wish you hadn’t had her.”
“I never said…..oh, God. That’s not what I said, not what I meant. Did she run away?” she asked, realization striking her.
“She did, but she came here. She’s safe, Rachel.” I heard her laugh when I said that and cringed.
“I doubt anyone’s safe around you. Give me your address. I’ll be there in five hours.” It was late and it was going to be a long drive from St. Louis, but I didn’t argue with her. I knew better. “If you said anything to her…..” Rachel warned before hanging up the phone.
I sighed and fought back the tears that were trying to force themselves out from under my eyelids. I deserved it, everything she said. I just wanted her and the rest of my family to know. I wanted them to know I was different now even if they couldn't forgive me. Even so, there was also a small part of me that wanted to blame them and shove what I’d become in their faces. I composed myself before walking back into the living room and sitting down next to Kaylen.
“Your mom is on her way. I think she’s driving so she’ll be here in about five hours. You can go into the other room and get some sleep if you want. I’ll make up the bed,” I offered. Kaylen nodded but didn’t move from her position on the couch. She was staring at an invisible spot on the floor.
“Why did everyone tell us you were dead?” she asked after a moment. My eyes widened in surprise and I felt like my heart stopped. They’d what?
“I’m sorry, what did you say?” She glanced up at me and took in the shocked expression on my face.
“You didn’t know,” she whispered. I could feel the tears building again. I wasn’t sure if they were because of anger, pain, sadness, or a combo.
“What did they tell you?” I asked quietly. She thought for a moment before responding.
“One day you were just gone. They took down all the pictures of you and locked up your bedroom. Mom and Dad told me that you’d been in a car accident. They told everyone that. I saw the obituary in the newspaper when I was older.”
This new revelation stunned and hurt me. My family hadn’t just cut me out of their lives, they’d killed me. My family was capable of almost anything, but even that seemed low. Wasn’t I still their daughter, their sister? Didn’t that count for anything? They never even gave me a chance.
“How did you find out I wasn’t?” I asked Kaylen after a while. She shrugged.
“The story seemed a little off to me. I’ve heard the whispered stories about you. That you got into a lot of trouble. Then you were in a car accident? I’m good with computers and looked up the obituary. I didn’t think there would be one, but there was. Only there was no story about a car accident. You’d think the death of one of the daughters of Ogden and Ramona Tunney would be big news. I started searching for you and eventually found you,” she explained.
I nodded and wanted to ask her more. I wanted to know what she’d heard because I had to know what else my family had lied about when it came to me. Even so, I couldn’t bring myself to ask. Instead I no longer tried to stop the tears, choosing to let them come. Kaylen slid over on the couch and put her arms around my shoulders.
“It’s why I came to you. I knew you’d understand what I was feeling because they did it to you,” she whispered.
I felt sick at her words. I couldn’t be sure that she was right, but I knew my family. She was probably right, and she didn’t deserve that. The Tunney’s wanted perfect little cookie cutter children. Anyone that dared to be different was shunned. I wanted to keep Kaylen here with me. I wanted to slam the door in Rachel’s face when she knocked on my door, but I knew I couldn’t. There was nothing I could do.
“Kaylen, listen to me. I’m not a good role model, for anyone. I did a lot of things wrong and screwed up more times than I can count. That’s not all their fault. I chose to do it. They were bad choices, but ultimately they were mine. Don’t look up to me. Don’t do what I did. Whatever they’ve said, whatever you’ve heard about me, at least part of it is true.”
“But not anymore. You have a great apartment with a dog and a boyfriend. I know that you’re a counselor and that you help kids. Your life isn’t so bad,” she argued. I looked at her sadly and shook my head.
“I’m lonely. Hardly a day in the last 10 years has gone by that I didn’t hate what I’d done and become. I lost them because of those choices. Until I met Patrick my life was lonely. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.” Kaylen took in my words and nodded. I grabbed a piece of paper and wrote my phone number on it, without my name. “This is my number. You can call me anytime you need to.” She took it and folded it into a small square before tucking it into her pocket.
Kaylen fell asleep in the studio on the futon a little while later and I stayed awake waiting for the knock on the door that I was dreading. As I waited I called into work for the next day. There was no way I was going to be able to go into school tomorrow. I was too emotionally wrecked and exhausted to be of any use to a student.
My phone rang a while later indicating that someone was downstairs wanting to be buzzed up. It was Rachel and I did just that. Then I went in and woke up Kaylen. She was just coming out of the studio when the knock sounded on the door. Kaylen grabbed her bag as I went over to the door and pulled it open. Rachel stood there, arms crossed, with a look that could kill aimed right at me.
“Where is she?” she demanded. I took a step back and allowed her to come in.
“I’m right here, Mom,” Kaylen said. Rachel rushed over and hugged her.
“I’m so sorry, sweetie. I’m so sorry. You know we didn’t mean that, right? We love you.”
Anyone who walked in and saw this scene would have found it sweet and heartbreaking to see a mother who loved her daughter so upset over saying something that caused her to run away. I, however, saw a mother who was only sorry that she’d have to explain this situation to her family. They separated and headed for the door. Kaylen hugged me on the way by.
“Thank you, Aunt Gabrielle,” she whispered. I smiled at her and watched her walk out the door. Rachel paused on her way out to look back at me.
“I have to admit I was surprised that you lived someplace as nice as this.” I clenched my jaw at the comment and refused to take the bait. “I don’t expect to be hearing from you again.” With that, she turned her back on me and closed the door behind her.
I stood there staring at the door long after their footsteps had faded away. I’d expected to be sad and depressed upon seeing the sister I’d let down so many years ago. Instead I only felt anger. How dare they? All of them.
The information Kaylen had given me opened the floodgates. Suddenly I wasn’t beating myself up for what I’d done back then. Now I was blaming them. I would never have been like that if they hadn’t been the way they were. They’d killed me when I left 10 years ago? No. They were dead to me now.
“What the hell do you want?” came her angry reply. I bit my tongue at the sarcastic response I wanted to shoot back at her. That was the old Gabrielle.
“I’m sorry to call and bother you, but Kaylen’s here,” I told her. There was another silent pause.
“I’m trying to figure out why you’d be calling to lie to me after all these years, and yet I’m coming up with nothing but a blank. Kaylen’s at her friend’s house.” I sighed and glanced over at the teenager sitting in the other room.
“No, Rachel, she’s sitting right here in my living room,” I corrected her.
“That’s impossible. She has no idea where you are. I have no idea where you are.”
“Well, she found out somehow. It’s Chicago, by the way. Kaylen left school early and caught a bus here.” I could hear Rachel try to muffle the phone and instruct someone to call Kaylen’s friend.
“This just doesn’t make any sense. Why would Kaylen search you out and then at 14 find a bus to Chicago to go see you?” There was a short pause and then Rachel started talking again. “Have you been in contact with her? Have you been talking to my daughter behind my back?”
“No, I haven’t. I…..” Rachel wasn’t done.
“Who do you think you are trying to barge back into our lives after everything you put us through? I thought we made it clear that we wanted nothing to do with you.”
“I didn’t…..”
“And now you go behind my back and start talking to my daughter, an impressionable teenager? How dare you!”
“Rachel!” I yelled into the phone, successfully shutting her up for a moment. “She heard you and Lance fighting. She overheard you saying you just wish you hadn’t had her.”
“I never said…..oh, God. That’s not what I said, not what I meant. Did she run away?” she asked, realization striking her.
“She did, but she came here. She’s safe, Rachel.” I heard her laugh when I said that and cringed.
“I doubt anyone’s safe around you. Give me your address. I’ll be there in five hours.” It was late and it was going to be a long drive from St. Louis, but I didn’t argue with her. I knew better. “If you said anything to her…..” Rachel warned before hanging up the phone.
I sighed and fought back the tears that were trying to force themselves out from under my eyelids. I deserved it, everything she said. I just wanted her and the rest of my family to know. I wanted them to know I was different now even if they couldn't forgive me. Even so, there was also a small part of me that wanted to blame them and shove what I’d become in their faces. I composed myself before walking back into the living room and sitting down next to Kaylen.
“Your mom is on her way. I think she’s driving so she’ll be here in about five hours. You can go into the other room and get some sleep if you want. I’ll make up the bed,” I offered. Kaylen nodded but didn’t move from her position on the couch. She was staring at an invisible spot on the floor.
“Why did everyone tell us you were dead?” she asked after a moment. My eyes widened in surprise and I felt like my heart stopped. They’d what?
“I’m sorry, what did you say?” She glanced up at me and took in the shocked expression on my face.
“You didn’t know,” she whispered. I could feel the tears building again. I wasn’t sure if they were because of anger, pain, sadness, or a combo.
“What did they tell you?” I asked quietly. She thought for a moment before responding.
“One day you were just gone. They took down all the pictures of you and locked up your bedroom. Mom and Dad told me that you’d been in a car accident. They told everyone that. I saw the obituary in the newspaper when I was older.”
This new revelation stunned and hurt me. My family hadn’t just cut me out of their lives, they’d killed me. My family was capable of almost anything, but even that seemed low. Wasn’t I still their daughter, their sister? Didn’t that count for anything? They never even gave me a chance.
“How did you find out I wasn’t?” I asked Kaylen after a while. She shrugged.
“The story seemed a little off to me. I’ve heard the whispered stories about you. That you got into a lot of trouble. Then you were in a car accident? I’m good with computers and looked up the obituary. I didn’t think there would be one, but there was. Only there was no story about a car accident. You’d think the death of one of the daughters of Ogden and Ramona Tunney would be big news. I started searching for you and eventually found you,” she explained.
I nodded and wanted to ask her more. I wanted to know what she’d heard because I had to know what else my family had lied about when it came to me. Even so, I couldn’t bring myself to ask. Instead I no longer tried to stop the tears, choosing to let them come. Kaylen slid over on the couch and put her arms around my shoulders.
“It’s why I came to you. I knew you’d understand what I was feeling because they did it to you,” she whispered.
I felt sick at her words. I couldn’t be sure that she was right, but I knew my family. She was probably right, and she didn’t deserve that. The Tunney’s wanted perfect little cookie cutter children. Anyone that dared to be different was shunned. I wanted to keep Kaylen here with me. I wanted to slam the door in Rachel’s face when she knocked on my door, but I knew I couldn’t. There was nothing I could do.
“Kaylen, listen to me. I’m not a good role model, for anyone. I did a lot of things wrong and screwed up more times than I can count. That’s not all their fault. I chose to do it. They were bad choices, but ultimately they were mine. Don’t look up to me. Don’t do what I did. Whatever they’ve said, whatever you’ve heard about me, at least part of it is true.”
“But not anymore. You have a great apartment with a dog and a boyfriend. I know that you’re a counselor and that you help kids. Your life isn’t so bad,” she argued. I looked at her sadly and shook my head.
“I’m lonely. Hardly a day in the last 10 years has gone by that I didn’t hate what I’d done and become. I lost them because of those choices. Until I met Patrick my life was lonely. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.” Kaylen took in my words and nodded. I grabbed a piece of paper and wrote my phone number on it, without my name. “This is my number. You can call me anytime you need to.” She took it and folded it into a small square before tucking it into her pocket.
Kaylen fell asleep in the studio on the futon a little while later and I stayed awake waiting for the knock on the door that I was dreading. As I waited I called into work for the next day. There was no way I was going to be able to go into school tomorrow. I was too emotionally wrecked and exhausted to be of any use to a student.
My phone rang a while later indicating that someone was downstairs wanting to be buzzed up. It was Rachel and I did just that. Then I went in and woke up Kaylen. She was just coming out of the studio when the knock sounded on the door. Kaylen grabbed her bag as I went over to the door and pulled it open. Rachel stood there, arms crossed, with a look that could kill aimed right at me.
“Where is she?” she demanded. I took a step back and allowed her to come in.
“I’m right here, Mom,” Kaylen said. Rachel rushed over and hugged her.
“I’m so sorry, sweetie. I’m so sorry. You know we didn’t mean that, right? We love you.”
Anyone who walked in and saw this scene would have found it sweet and heartbreaking to see a mother who loved her daughter so upset over saying something that caused her to run away. I, however, saw a mother who was only sorry that she’d have to explain this situation to her family. They separated and headed for the door. Kaylen hugged me on the way by.
“Thank you, Aunt Gabrielle,” she whispered. I smiled at her and watched her walk out the door. Rachel paused on her way out to look back at me.
“I have to admit I was surprised that you lived someplace as nice as this.” I clenched my jaw at the comment and refused to take the bait. “I don’t expect to be hearing from you again.” With that, she turned her back on me and closed the door behind her.
I stood there staring at the door long after their footsteps had faded away. I’d expected to be sad and depressed upon seeing the sister I’d let down so many years ago. Instead I only felt anger. How dare they? All of them.
The information Kaylen had given me opened the floodgates. Suddenly I wasn’t beating myself up for what I’d done back then. Now I was blaming them. I would never have been like that if they hadn’t been the way they were. They’d killed me when I left 10 years ago? No. They were dead to me now.
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