In the Stillness (3 page)

I shouldn’t be here. At all. The last time I was here was about three days before my parents pulled me out of school for a year. I screamed at him—I screamed at a grave. Today, I’m not screaming. I’m just . . . remembering. Remembering how this all really started.

* * *
 

 
Ryker and I had been together for about four months by September of 2001. He was enrolled at Amherst College and we met at a concert on the Amherst common at the end of our freshman year. He was wearing a grey t-shirt with “National Guard” in black block letters across his toned chest. At a height I placed around 6’5”, he was so striking, I had to sway my tipsy self over to him and say “hi.” He had a blonde buzz-cut that let me see the tight muscles in his neck each time he tilted his head.
 

“I’m Natalie,” I giggled, “you’re cute.”
 

I watched the heat wrap around the back of his neck and up to his cheeks. “Thanks. I’m Ryker Manning. You’re hot.”

“National Guard, huh?” I pressed my palms onto his pecs. I was more forward, then.
 

“National Guard.” He grinned, grabbed my wrists, and pulled me into a kiss. Just like that. Four seconds after meeting Ryker Manning, I was standing on the common kissing him.
 

“Who’s your friend, dude?” A slightly shorter guy stepped to Ryker’s side.

“This is my new friend, Natalie.” Ryker laughed, “Natalie, this is my best friend, Lucas.”

 
Lucas was a childhood friend of Ryker’s who went to Westfield State.
 
He was also in the National Guard, which seemed like a really good idea in June of 2000 when they graduated high school.
 

In all honesty, all “National Guard” meant to me, as far as Ryker was concerned, was it forced us to have one sexless weekend a month. That summer, I stayed in South Hadley, rather than returning home to Pennsylvania, because I’d gotten an internship. That’s what I told my parents anyway. In reality, I took enough classes to keep my dorm room for the summer, and I busted ass tending bar at Rafter’s Sports Bar. All in the name of Ryker Manning.

He was taking classes, too. He was a poly-sci major at Amherst and wanted to go into legislation. He spent that summer interning for the local government. I was able to sneak him away at the beginning of August for a Dave Matthews Band concert in Hartford, CT. Tosha and Lucas outright refused to go—they hated DMB. Ryker wasn’t crazy about them, either. But, he was crazy enough about me to go.
 

He kind of stood with his hands in his pockets and nodded along to most of the songs, but when they played “The Space Between”—a new song of theirs at the time—and I went nuts, he laughed.

“Shh!” I scolded playfully. “Just listen.”

By the end of the song he was standing behind me with his arms wrapped around my shoulders, and I was swallowed up in his massive arms. We swayed to the music as his lips rested on the top of my head. It’s my favorite memory of Ryker Manning, August 3, 2001.

In the two weeks leading up to September 11th, Ryker and I hadn’t seen much of each other, as classes were getting underway and we were both workaholics. It was a gorgeous Tuesday morning. I was putting in some work study time at the campus library when someone said, “A plane crashed between the Twin Towers.” We all kind of looked around with a
wow, that sucks
look on our faces.
 

The next thirty minutes are seared into my brain in snippets as people ran in and out of the library.
 

“Was it a passenger plane?”

“Oh, it was a plane in one of the towers, not between them. Shit, another plane just crashed into the second tower.”

“This is no accident.”

“Guys, a plane just hit the Pentagon, and apparently one has gone down somewhere else.”

“This is an attack.”

“We’re going to war.”

“Holy shit! One of the towers fell!”

Without permission, I grabbed my bag and ran from the library, got into my car, and sped along the curves of 116 straight to Ryker’s dorm. I didn’t even have a cell phone yet. I didn’t call my parents, I didn’t call my friends; I just drove straight to Ryker.

Amherst was a total shitshow, as usual when anything even mildly political happens. People were crying on the sidewalk, asking questions and clutching cell phones. I sprinted up the steps to Ryker’s dorm building. I ran down the hallway, and before heading up the stairs I saw him; he was with his friends and suite mates in the common area watching the news.

“Ryker,” I said just a hair above a whisper.

He’d been sitting with his elbows on his knees, hands clasped together, staring intently at the TV. When he heard my voice, his head whipped around and he sprang to his feet and jogged toward me. As soon as our bodies connected, I started crying. I’d listened to the news on the car radio the whole drive over. There were millions more questions than answers still, but all the answers were bad. Really bad. I saw Lucas out of the corner of my eye, which struck me as odd since his school was a half hour away.

“It’s gonna be okay, Nat,” he whispered in my ear.

 
Up until that moment we’d been having great sex, laughing at Lucas’s lame attempts to pick up women, and having a genuine good time together. That moment sealed us together in ways I still can’t describe. At the time, I thought he was telling me I’d be okay. That we would collectively be okay. It wasn’t until he was over there that I realized he had been preparing me for what was to come.

* * *

My cell phone rings, cosmically protecting me from the rest of that memory. For now.
 

“Hello?” I sniff and run a finger under my eye.

“Nat? You okay? You sound like you’re crying.”

“Eric,
please
don’t call me
Nat
.”
 

Especially not today.

“Sorry. Just checking in.”

Seriously? I get a whole day to myself and he has to call me? The war-cries of 4-year-old boys in the background are the real reason for the call.

“It’s gorgeous out, Eric, why don’t you take the boys to a playground. Let them run that out. Hell, take them down to the football field for all I care. I gotta go.” Annoyed, I click the phone off and stare at the polished granite.

Lucas J. Fisher

“I wish you hadn’t died, you know.” I sit cross-legged six feet above his body. “I haven’t been here in a long time, and I’m sorry. I just . . . you know . . . well, you
don’t
because you weren’t here.” A sound just above a mew leaves my throat as tears roll down my neck. “Ryker lost it when you died, Lucas. Anyone else, it could have been
anyone
else and
none
of this would have happened! Why’d he have to see it all?” I slam my palms into the warm grass and dig my nails into the dirt.

Ryker watched as Lucas’s Humvee exploded under firefight right before his eyes in Afghanistan. By the time Ryker got to him, it was too late; the boy I loved held the charred body of his best friend
—t
hen got shot in the back. That was his ticket home. His body came home, but his soul had been devoured in the firefight of a godless desert.
 

I sigh and run my hand over the information on Lucas’s headstone. His name, his rank, and the dates he laughed and lived are all there.
 

Loving Son.

Best Friend.

My eyes focus on the date of his death, causing me to check my cell phone.
 

“You’re kidding,” I half-yell into the grass. “Ten years? Yesterday? You died ten years ago
yesterday?
”
 

A chill shoots up my spine as the wind picks up, an answer from Lucas perhaps. I can’t believe it’s been ten years since Ryker’s mom called me for the first time.

I’ve gotta get out of here.

I carefully time my return home for
after
I know the boys are in bed. The apartment is in shambles, as to be expected when Eric’s at the helm. My eyes survey the mess, and I decide to start picking up the toys off the living room floor while Eric stands with his back to the counter.

“Don’t worry about it, hon. Just go read or take a bath or something; I’ll clean up.”

“K.” I sigh.

As I walk past Eric, he sticks out his arms for a hug. He does this a lot, just opens up and expects me to fall into him. When I look up at him, about to blow him off, I suddenly see the twenty-three-year-old on the sidewalk wearing a tattered Redskins hat. I walk into his hug and he seems to sigh in relief.

He rests his chin on my head. “You look like you’ve been crying.”
 

I can’t lie to the boy on the sidewalk. “I went to Lucas’s grave today.”

Eric’s muscles tighten as he pulls away and holds me at arms-length. I swear I see his eyes dart to my left arm for a split second, but I don’t pull it away in defense, just in case. There’s
no way
he made that connection.
 

“Why?” His eyebrows sink in question.

I clear my throat. “I haven’t been since before I met you. It’s been too long . . . he died ten years ago yesterday.” Fresh tears cloud my vision.
 

“I’m sorry.” He pulls me back into a hug and I cry some more.
 

It’s not for Lucas that I’m crying right now—as awful as that seems. It’s for every fucking thing that happened after. Eric knows. And that’s why he’s squeezing me so tightly; he doesn’t want me to go back down the path. The one where I alone control how I feel. At all times.

As we crawl into bed and Eric wraps his arm around my waist, I realize I’ve made a fatal error. I don’t cry—not anymore—but I did just now in front of Eric. He knows those tears belong to the girl I was on September 10, 2001. The girl who never knew what a panic attack was, or what true fear felt like.

 
I’ll have to be more careful, now. I feel like I’m crawling out of my skin and wish I could make just a small cut to release some of the pressure, some of the pain. My heart races as I realize I’ve opened Pandora’s Jar. I have to cut, now. That’s all there is to it. I’ll feel better tomorrow when I do, because the adrenaline high numbs the pain. It will help me from making stupid mistakes like visiting Lucas’s grave, or crying in front of Eric. Soon I fall asleep, playing over the look on Eric’s face the first time I told him about the scars.

Chapter 4

“Morning,” Eric whispers as he kisses my forehead. He places coffee on the table next to my bed.

“Hey.” I sit up and immediately panic at the brightness outside my window. “Shit! I overslept! I’m sorry. Where are the boys?”

Eric laughs and sits at the foot of the bed. “I took them to school. My mom’s going to pick them up and they’re going to stay over at her house tonight.”

Wait, what?

“Wait, what? She’s had them overnight, like, two times, Eric, why now?”
 

What did you tell her?

“I told her we needed a night out to celebrate my almost finishing up my Ph.D. and she happily agreed.”

“Of course. Anything for you.” I roll my eyes and sit up.

“Jesus, Natalie, don’t be happy that I planned for you to have another day—” he stops and winces a little as my jaw drops, “
God,
this is frustrating!” He stands and runs his hands through his hair, tucking it behind his ears when he’s done. “What is it, Natalie, huh? What is it? We haven’t had sex in three weeks, you’re moody as hell, and yesterday you go to the grave of someone you barely knew who died ten years ago? What’s going on?” He closes his eyes and takes a careful breath. That’s Eric, always trying to regain control.

“
Barely knew?
Just leave me the
fuck
alone, Eric! Goddammit! You’re in the lab twenty-four-seven and I’m with
them
twenty-four-seven. I love the boys, Eric, you know I do, but sometimes . . .
Fuck!
” I jump out of bed and head for the shower, locking the door behind me.

As the steam takes over my tiny retreat, I stare at the last razor left in my bathroom—the one I use to shave my legs. Before I know it, I’m breaking it apart and dragging it slowly across my hip bone. I wince a little at first, until the adrenaline kicks in and gives me its promised high. I have a whole day and night alone with Eric—something I regularly complain we don’t get enough of—and I find myself clamoring for an escape.

I should call Dr. Greene, is what I should do—if she even still has a practice in the area. That’s who my parents set me up with when they
allowed
me to return for my junior/senior year at Mount Holyoke. It should have been my senior year, but that semester spent in intensive therapy in Pennsylvania was necessary by their standards.

When Eric came along, my parents were more than supportive. He was the first boyfriend I had since Ryker, and it was long enough after “the incident” that
they
felt the timing was appropriate. Given that Eric was on the road to his Ph.D. and was
not
in the military, I’m surprised my mother didn’t plan a wedding the first time she met him. It wouldn’t be long after that, however, that two pink lines would walk me down the aisle.