"I gave him the weekend off."
"Are we going in the Lexus or the convertible?"
"The convertible of course."
"Nice!" he said, excitedly. "Can I drive?"
"Lane-"
"I know. I"m not supposed to drive."
"I"m sorry..."
"No," he said, clearly hurt, but trying to hide it. "I get it. Can I at least pick the place?"
"Anywhere you want."
"Okay then, let"s go. I"m starving!"
As I watched him run off out the front entrance, I knew there was no way to tell if he actually felt that happiness he was pretending to feel. I doubted everything. Perhaps it was Mom"s constant warnings that had gotten to me, or the fact that I knew Lane more than he thought he did, more than he showed anyone, that I felt suddenly afraid. What if there was something wrong? What if he had come here because there was something going on back at school that he didn"t want to talk to me about? I went outside anyway, hoping I wouldn"t have to find out. Hoping that my baby brother was actually happy and not just pretending to be.
ELENA.
People tell you how you"re supposed to work on broken relationships, instead of throwing them away. Only, not all broken things can be fixed. Sometimes it"s better to just give up and move on before you get hurt even more. In a relationship sometimes you would go years without feeling like there"s a problem and then there will be that one moment where you just know everything is lost forever. For me, that moment came when I saw Nick with that woman and I just couldn"t keep it together. I knew I couldn"t let him do this to me. There is something about Nick that always made me feel like I was the bad one in this story. Even though he was always the one cheating and lying, he somehow managed to make me feel like I deserved his rotten behavior. And it"s not just me. Nick is the kind of guy who manipulated you so you would forget why you were mad at him and instead think about what you were doing wrong. He does this with just about everyone. He"s never even been supportive of my writing, because Nick tends to think that unless something makes you money it"s not worth doing at all. He was constantly reminding me that I was living in fantasy, that I was one of those dreamer types who like to think they"re special when they"re not. Always telling me how I wasn"t pragmatic, and how my unrealistic standards and desires were simply not something that one can survive with in this world.
Penny, being the good listener that she is didn"t say a word while I let it all out that morning. She stayed supportive and waited until I had related the entire account to her. My ex had always been a kind of riddle to me. Up until then I kept giving him second chances even though Penny always advised me against it. As I was unloading about this to Penny, it was like Nick"s spell broke. I could see things I wasn"t even seeing before. Nick was the only guy I had ever dated, and I know now that I was being blinded by the idea of a fairy-tale ending to our romance.
"Listen," Penny said when I was done talking. "I don"t expect you to start dancing around just yet that would be wrong. You take all the time you need, I"m right here. But it won"t be right if he starts talking to you again or tries to see you and you go back to him. I just want you to remember that."
I don"t think Penny understood how much I wanted to get away from Nick. She didn"t know how much I really hated him now, and how being with him was the last thing I would ever want. It was hard to believe but something broke inside me the minute I saw him naked in bed, in our bed with her, sharing that kind of intimacy. Just thinking about it made me want to cry again so I started to look for a distraction. That"s when it occurred to me that I hadn"t told her about the Thorne Ryker incident.
"Penny," I said. "You won"t believe what happened."
"What?"
"Yesterday, when I was trying to hail a cab I met this guy. I was messed up with what happened with Nick, and it was late and cold outside so I took up on his offer to sit inside the diner and get coffee. He was all smiles and big blue eyes and everything. He saw me crying and I guess he felt sorry for me or something. So anyway, we"re there, having coffee and talking and when I"m leaving he asks me if he can drive me someplace.
"Of course I say no and I politely thank him and say goodbye. I get a cab and I come here. I wake up in the morning, step outside and there"s this limo standing outside with a chauffeur or a bodyguard or whatever named Stanton. He actually introduced himself! He said Mr. Ryker sent the car for me so I could have brunch with him!" I was laughing at this point because for some reason the whole incident sounded funnier now. "G.o.d," I said. "Can you believe that?"
"Thorne Ryker?" Penny said. "Six-foot-two, dark hair, blue-eyes Thorne Ryker who looks like he just stepped out of a Calvin Klein billboard and forgot he was in it?"
"You know him?"
"Know him? Elena, he"s been in Forbes list forever! My company works with his sometimes and I once met him at some corporate event. Aside from being extremely loaded, he"s also a major a.s.shole."
"He is?" I said, unconvinced. "I thought he was pretty nice actually."
I wondered if that whole nice personality was just a front like the one Nick had, but Penny knowing the guy made him sound more real. It also made him sound like less of an axe-murderer which, by the way was my main concern with the whole stalker bit.
"He"s nice now because he wants you in his bed," Penny said. "Men are always good until that happens."
"You say men like they are some kind of alien being."
"Did you know some evolutionary biologists think men and women are going to become a separate species altogether?" Penny said. aSomething to think about, isn"t it?"
"So what? Never the twain shall meet?"
"Something like that," she said. "But more importantly, every guy turns into some kind of incredible hulk when you"ve been with him long enough."
"I get it," I said. "I"ll be careful when it comes to Ryker. You don"t have to scare me off the entirety of the male population."
"You need to be careful, period."
Penny took a glance around the motel room. "G.o.d," she said. "This is just depressing."
I couldn"t agree more.
"Most of my stuff is still with Nick," I said.
She turned towards me and grinned. "Can I go and bring it?" she said. "You know how much I enjoy insulting people like him!"
"You do what you have to do sweetheart," I said. "Just get my things back."
"No insulting until said things are in possession, I promise."
When there was silence in the room again, Penny didn"t allow it. "Come on," she said. "Let"s go out."
"Can"t we please stay in just for today?"
"I told you hon, there will be no sitting here wallowing in despair for some stupid jerk. We have a life to live!"
"Okay, tell you what. If you can stay in with me tonight, I promise I"ll go anywhere you take me tomorrow. After we bring my stuff back from Nick"s place of course, because otherwise I have nothing to wear."
"Anywhere?"
"Anywhere."
"Sounds fair," she said. "Tonight we have one of those good old-fashioned pajama-parties at my house."
Pajama Party was Penny"s code for a slumber party with alcohol.
"Thank you," I said, truly grateful.
She gave me a ma.s.sive hug. "Just don"t forget you promised me this is only for tonight."
THORNE.
Lane"s idea of his favorite breakfast turned out to be this tiny place in Brooklyn that I had never seen before. It was actually a surprise to know that Lane had been anywhere near there himself but apparently there were things about my seventeen year old brother that I was still learning. "You didn"t tell me we were supposed to come this far," I complained as we entered the joint. Everyone"s eyes were on us. The place looked full at first glance but the waiter found us a nice table to sit by the window. The same breakfast that Lane wanted to have, he was barely touching it once it arrived.
"So," I tried to make conversation. "What"s going on?"
"Not much."
"That"s all I get?"
"Did you bring me here so you could interrogate me? I told you I"m fine. I know no one believes it but it"s true. I"m not about to go crazy any time soon."
"We"re just worried."
"Can you not be worried for the length of this breakfast?"
"Sure."
"So, what"s going on with you?"
I wanted badly to tell him about Elena. But what would I tell him? That I met someone for one night and so far I haven"t seen sight of her and have no idea if she"s ever going to talk to me again? It would hardly make for an engaging conversation.
"Lane?"
A young boy of about Lane"s age was standing at our table. "What the h.e.l.l!" he said and Lane did some form of secret handshake with him in response. "Why haven"t you been coming to school? The teachers have been going nuts!" the boy said.
A flush colored Lane"s face. The boy looked at me and I smiled at him, and went back to the food. Lane got up. "I"ll be right back," he said to me and left with the boy to talk outside the breakfast place. I was still waiting for Lane to come back when I saw two women walking past the window and they didn"t even look at me but I saw who one of them was-Elena. The other one must have been a friend. It took everything in my power not to go after her right then. I knew I couldn"t stand annoying her any more. But at least I could guess that this was where she lived now. Had she moved in with someone or gotten a place of her own? I was curious. But Lane came back before I could think of acting on my impulses. He looked more relaxed than before. His shoulders were no longer hunched and he was even taking interest in the plate of eggs in front of him.
"Will you tell me yourself or do I have to ask?" I said.
Lane looked clueless. "What?"
"School Lane," I said, not believing for a second that he had forgotten something so important in the ten minutes it took for him to have the conversation with his friend. "How long have you been cutting cla.s.ses?"
Lane"s smile disappeared. "Oh."
"Oh? That"s all I get?"
"Are you going to tell them?"
"I guess I"ll have to decide that after I hear your side of the story."
Lane toyed with his food. "I was going to tell you," he said.
"I believe you," I said, trying to appear calmer than I felt inside. "Just tell me what the h.e.l.l is going on?"
A pause. "I don"t want to go to school anymore."
The sentence hit me like a ton of bricks. "What?"
"Don"t get mad," he said. "Thorne it"s just...not my thing."
"In case you"re forgetting," I said. "You"re still a minor. And that"s not your decision to make."
"Stop talking like her."
"Excuse me?"
"I hate it when you talk like Mom!"
"Lane, cut the c.r.a.p. Tell me what"s going on. Now. Or we"re having this discussion in our family home with both our parents present."
I must have managed to intimidate him because he looked somber, just a tad bit afraid to speak up. I couldn"t understand what was going on but I was trying hard to be patient. I was just glad I was having this conversation with him and not Mom or Dad because they would have totally freaked. Finally, he spoke. "I can"t do it," he said. "I"m having trouble, and I"m failing cla.s.ses."
"So we"ll get you a tutor."
"That"s not it. I just...I don"t want to."
I set my fork aside. "Lane," I said. "I know with everything that happened, it can"t be easy on you, believe me, I get that. But you"re talking about throwing away your whole future because of one bad year!"
Lane looked wounded. "One bad year?" he said. "That"s what it is to you? One bad year? You don"t know what the h.e.l.l you"re saying!"
"Lane, I"m sorry. That"s not what I meant-"
"Can we please go back now?" he said, standing up. "I think I"ve had enough."
In the car, on the way home he did nothing but stare out the car. "You can give me the silent treatment all you want," I said. "But you"re staying with me. Sooner or later, you"re going to have to talk."
I couldn"t even tell if he heard it or not.
He shoved his earphones in and I could hear the music from where I sat in the driver"s seat.
It was going to be a long drive.