Two Roads (20 page)

yes I did, lindsay. you really are a great girl, you know that right? you deserve to live your life. don’t worry about me. I’m fine.

A pause.
you sure?

I smile.
I’ve never been surer about anything else in my life.

ok… I’ll try. but let me know if you need anything!

I will.

Then, I close my phone and look around me. The whole lobby is bright and buzzing with the laughter of convention attendees, and I swear everyone else here is happy but me. My heart is still pounding from my conversation with Logan and I keep replaying his words again and again in my head, realizing how selfish I am to have been acting like I’m the only one affected by Ben’s death, like I cared more about Ben than anyone else.

My heart starts hurting at the thought, and I hate myself for not comforting him when I should have, for not realizing he’s just as broken as I am, for not doing anything to fix it.

I’m about to close my eyes and try to nap all of the feelings away when a familiar voice startles me.

“Have I ever told you that I hate you?” a voice says behind me. I spin around to see Ruby standing in front of me, hands on her hips, smile on her face. She’s wearing black country boots and one of Jaden’s t-shirts, and behind her is the man himself, drop dead good looks and all: Jaden.

Ruby watches me closely. “You okay?” she asks but I don’t answer her.

“What are you two doing here?” I say, narrowing my eyes at her to let her know I’m not in the mood.

Ruby sits down beside me. “Not even a hello?” she says. “I’m offended.”

I have no idea why she’s here, but I’m glad to see her. I missed her, and I realize now just how much I need her presence. She is my best friend, and I need her. So before I know what’s happening, I reach out, stiffly wrap my arms around her, and I hug her. It feels weird and awkward and I’m reminded just why I’m not of the hugging type, but it’s okay because I know Ruby doesn’t judge.

She looks confused as soon as I pull away, and then her face melts into a smile. She winks at me, and I roll my eyes because I know her well enough to realize my hug just increased her ego by three billion times.

“So you’re here because…?” I say.

“Well, you kind of ditched me. I got your note and knew you were at the convention and since Jaden was missing a certain roommate of his as well, we decided to come road-trip down here and check on you two. You know, just to make sure you weren’t abducted by aliens, and to ensure that you had successfully gotten it on.”

I glare at her the second she says ‘gotten it on.’ “You’re horrible.”

“And you love me for it.” It’s the truth. “Anyway, now that we see you’re here, on to the important business. Where is the man of the hour?”

“Not here,” I say, and I drop my gaze to my feet when I remember our conversation. I bet Logan is still at our breakfast table, probably waiting to pay the check like the perfect freaking gentleman he is, and as much as I want to go back to him, to tell him I’m sorry and it doesn’t matter if he keeps these things about Ben to himself--that I understand completely--I can’t. I don’t know why, but I can’t.

Ruby eyes my suspiciously and I think she can tell something is up, but she doesn’t press me. “Moving on, how many times have you and him done the deed? Have any hot, steamy hate sex stories you care to share? We’re all ears.” She motions to Jaden, who just sighs.

“I’m sorry about her,” I say to him.

“Me too,” he says, but when Ruby eyes him, he just beams at her and that seems to settle her down.

“And no.” I shoot Ruby a warning look. “No hate sex here.
So
sorry to disappoint.”

“What? I want my money back. Seriously, retirement home residents get more action than you guys do. Jesus.” Then she adds, “Jaden and I would know nothing about that” and grins up at him and it looks like they’re about to kiss, so I sigh loudly to voice my displeasure.

Ruby shoots me a look. “Well, we have some shopping in town to take care of,” Ruby says. “I here they have
great
shopping in LA.” But by the tone of her voice, I’m not sure she’s talking about actual shopping. Probably more along the lines of a certain three-letter word that begins with S and ends in X. “See you later?”

“Yeah,” I say. “Thanks for coming. I think.”

She rolls her eyes. “You’re welcome.” She starts to turn back to Jaden, to leave me here, but at the last second she spins back around. Then she leans into me and whispers, “If you and Logan are fighting about Ben like I have a feeling you are, I have one word of advice for you: don’t let Logan go.” I bite my lip. “Also,” she says. “Your parents stopped by our apartment yesterday. They wanted me to give you this.” She hands me a card, squeezes my hand, and then leads Jaden right back down the hallway, down the stairs, and out of sight.

Once they leave, I open it up. A picture immediately slips out, and I have to catch it before it falls to the ground. I turn it over in my hand. It’s of Ben and I when we were little kids and decided to build a snowman, and in it we’re clinging to the snowman’s body from either side, scarfs and wool coats wrapped around us, faces puckered into giant grins. Mom and Dad stand beside us, smiling too, looking like they genuinely cared. The snow is falling and all of a sudden I remember that picture, remember how happy I was that day, that day back when we were a family.

Then, I flip the picture over and read the back. Four words are written on it in Mom’s rushed handwriting:

We miss him too.

~

This feeling is so foreign

so distant

so confusing

so… fake.

She knows it isn’t real

it can’t be

it won’t be.

This feeling is more than just mattering,

or being happy

or being in love.

This feeling is hope.

Hope.

She has hope.

~

Logan
and I meet up by the entrance just before the convention begins. We don’t speak to each other, just nod to acknowledge each other’s presence. His face looks all tired, like he just ran a marathon or something. That little dazzle I’ve grown to love in his smile is completely gone, and I wish I knew how to bring it back.

Logan continues to look totally sad as we walk into the poetry convention, next to each other but not really next to each other, like a married couple on the brink divorce, and I feel my heart sink.

He blames himself too.

All these years I hated him because I thought that he was okay, that he’d moved on, that he didn’t blame himself for what happened to Ben like I did, and now that I see I was wrong, I wish I could find the words to comfort him, wish I could take back what I said and tell him the truth: that he means so much to me, that I need him in my life, that I’m sorry and I don’t know what I’d ever do without him.

The room is just as large and as breathtaking as it was yesterday, with posters covering the walls, booths scattered everywhere, and a whole block of tables positioned in front of the stage, where a red-haired woman stands. The air smells like some sort of mixture between new books and ravioli, and everywhere around me I hear raucous laughter. The convention looks even more packed than yesterday.

There isn’t much new here today except for different poets attending and a few shifted stations, but there is a guest speaker this time--the woman. Without a word, Logan tugs me toward her, and we sit down at a back table which has an assortment of fancy-looking mushroom and casserole appetizers laid across it. In the center of the table sits a glass bowl of Skittles, though, and it would be laughably out of place if I weren’t craving their fruity goodness so damn much at the moment. So it goes without saying that I grab a handful of Skittles and shove them into my mouth. They aren’t caffeine, but they do the trick.

Logan watches me from the other side of the table, his expression blank, and it hurts not to see his smile.

I decide to distract myself, so I turn back to face the front of the room where a tech crew checks the mic. The speaker steps up to the podium as soon as they leave, smiles a warm smile, and then addresses those of us watching her. The buzz of gossip and clinking of glasses that filled the room seems to die down as soon as she starts speaking.

“Good morning, ladies and gentleman,” she says. “It’s great to have you all here at the National Poet’s Convention 2013!” A small applause surfaces around the room--Logan and I do not participate--and the woman beams before continuing. “You may know me as Katherine Fischer, poet and blog owner. Poetry has taken over my life in the recent years, which is why I’m incredibly excited to be invited to speak here today. I hope you enjoy listening, and of course have a great time at the rest of the conference.” She pauses. “I want to talk to you today about love,” she says, her eyes scanning the crowd. I feel Logan’s gaze on me but I don’t turn to meet it. I don’t want to know what he’s thinking--not yet. “Love is a big part of poetry of all kinds, and considering all of the poems I write are about love, I like to think I know a thing or two about it. When I was in high school, though, I really didn’t know anything about love. I thought I did, but I was way wrong. See, I had this best friend who I totally adored being around and everything. We meshed perfectly, as friends. I dated around a lot and for some reason my heart was never in any of these guys. Not only that, but it never
wanted
to be in any of them. I didn’t know what was wrong with me, so I stopped dating for a few months. In the end, I realized I was in love with my best friend all along.” She takes a deep breath. “We’re happily married now, and I couldn’t have asked for a better life. But the point is, after all those years, the one person I really wanted was right there in front of me the whole time. And that’s the thing about love: no matter how hard you search, no matter how fast you run, sometimes, just sometimes, true love is right in front of you all along.” Without even thinking, I turn to Logan, and I guess he does the same. Our eyes meet for one long second, and I swear we’re thinking the exact same thing. I gulp, ignoring the heat that is creeping into my cheeks, and I force myself to pull away.

No. I can’t be thinking this.

The woman continues, and her distraction is a huge relief. “And that’s why I love poetry,” she says, “because poetry allows us to explore love in all of its stages. It lets you see what the mind cannot, lets you feel with your heart, lets you explore what would otherwise go unexplored. Love is something so powerful it does not make sense to most people, but poetry allows you to understand it, to feel it, to bring it to life. H. Jackson Brown, Jr. once said ‘Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye’ and to me, that is exactly what poetry is. It’s seeing with the heart. Finding what’s really there. Using language and ideas and metaphors to understand and explain something as powerful and as awe-inspiring as love, something that is otherwise mysterious. So that’s why I enjoy reading and writing love poems, because they explore love of all types, in simplistic ways and in complicated ones, depressing love and light-hearted love. Love cannot be defined exactly, it cannot be put into one stock category, and poetry can’t achieve that, either. But what poetry can and does do is make sense of love in all of its forms, and there is something truly beautiful about that.” She stops then, smiles at the crowd, and looks around at each of our eager faces. I’ll admit, she knows how to give a pretty great speech. “So for now, let’s just say,” she says after a minute, “that falling in love with my best friend was the best goddamn thing I’ve ever done.”

Then, she puts her microphone down, and applause erupts as she walks off the stage and disappears into the crowd. I try not to turn to face Logan, who I can tell is still watching me, not wanting to put a face to everything this Katherine Fischer just said.

A convention worker comes up to the microphone next and starts explaining everything that is going to be happening today at the conference, but I tune him out. All I hear is the woman’s words.
And that’s the thing about love: no matter how hard you search, no matter how hard you run, sometimes, just sometimes, true love is right in front of you all along.
I have no idea if it’s me driving myself crazy or the whole world trying to make me fall in love with Logan because all of these signs keep pointing to him, and it hurts more than anything to realize I’m not even fully in love with him yet and my self-destructive self is already going to fuck it all up.

I’m going to fuck him, and not in the way I want.

After a few minutes, Logan stands up, and I walk over to him despite myself. I take another small step so that I’m facing him, my feet to his feet, his gentle breath on my lips. Both of our bodies are all tight and closed off, and I can feel myself wanting to touch him and tell him I’m sorry, that I should’ve been there for him as much as I wanted him to be there for me, that he doesn’t need to feel so guilty. But I don’t know how to say it, and so we just stand there, breathing heavily, with all of the words in the world to say but unable to utter even a single one of them. My heart beats so quickly in my chest I swear it’s going to eventually explode, and I have this sudden desire to find a way to fast-forward past all this awkwardness, to go right to the part of the story where Logan and I are… whatever we are… as long as we’re together, and happy.

“Cali,” he finally says.

I step back. “Don’t do this now,” I whisper.

He doesn’t move. “Do what now?”

He knows exactly what I’m talking about, of course, so I just scan the crowd in front of me, hoping one of them will provide a distraction, an answer. Something. Anything.

“Don’t do this,” I say. “Don’t try to make an excuse. Either tell me, or don’t.”

He opens his mouth to argue almost instinctually, then thinks better of it and eyes me suspiciously instead. “How did you know I was going to do that?” he says.

I roll my eyes, still not looking at him. “I’m a bitch, not an idiot, Logan.”

I swear I can feel him smile, just a little. “Who said you couldn’t be both?”

“Have I ever told you I hate you?” I bite my lip. I’m not going to let him make me smile today.

“You may have mentioned it once or twice,” he says. There’s a pause, and the warmth I always get from talking to him trickles right back in. Dammit. How is it so freaking hard to stay pissed off at him? Make that reason number three billion and one why I hate him. “So are we going to try to find The Roadkeeper lady or what?” Logan says after a while.

“You want to?”

“Well, you said she always came to the conference, so why not?”

I turn back to face him. A few people push past us as we talk, and we seem to be the only ones in this whole place who aren’t moving. “We don’t even know what she looks like,” I say.

“So?” Logan says. “You might as well call me Sherlock Waters, because I’m a pretty badass mystery-solver.”

I shoot him a look. “You did not just say that.”

He gives me the most ridiculous head swivel. “I just did.” I have to work hard not to smile.

“Okay,” I say, “so all we know about her is that she’s a human who loves poetry.” I motion at the packed room around us. “That does not narrow things down.”

“We’ll figure something out,” Logan says.

“That’s not much of a plan.”

“I am well aware.” He glances around the room. “But it’s not like we have anything else to do besides stare at each other awkwardly, and you always wanted to meet her, right?”

“Right,” I say slowly.

“So why not?” He pauses. “Are we going to do this?”

“Yeah.” I nod uncertainly. “But it would be unlike us to do it without a catch.”

He gets a little twinkle in his eyes at that. Even all of the way out here in LA, our rivalry still holds strong. “I’m listening,” he says, watching me closely.

“Well, let’s make a bet.”

“Continue. What do you get if you win?”

I hesitate. “If I find her, you tell me everything you know about Ben.”

His jaw tightens as soon as the words leave my mouth, but he otherwise doesn’t betray any emotion. I wait for him to say no way, to tell me that I’m not worth it anymore and that this whole relationship is not going to work and I am just a waste of time, but he doesn’t. “Okay,” he finally says.

“And if you win?”

“Let’s just say I have something in mind,” he says, but he doesn’t look like he’s ready to elaborate.

“We have until the end of the day to find her,” I say. “And she has to admit to us that she’s The Roadkeeper.”

“Deal. When do we start?”

I bite my lip. Smile a little. I am
so
going to win this. “Now,” I say.

I like to think the single word is the start of the avalanche that is the rest of the day.

~

I search
for The Roadkeeper all afternoon. And by “search,” I mean eavesdrop on every female in the whole place--there are hundreds--and wait until I hear one of them say something I recognize, something that will tell me distinctly that in front of me, this person, is the Roadkeeper. When you read someone’s blog for years, you get to know them, even if you don’t
really
know them. I can’t put a face to The Roadkeeper, not exactly, but I know for a fact that she will find a way to touch me inside, and I will know who she is the instant I set eyes on her. She is simple, I imagine. Plain and boring-looking, maybe somewhat irritating on the outside, but within? I know she has the most beautiful personality ever. Her face is not pretty, the way I see it, but her mind--and her heart--is. I imagine her as kind of like Ruby, quiet but strong, like maybe a modern day Matilda.

I search for hours, having haphazard conversation with random strangers who range between somewhat interesting to how do they even function with that little personality, hoping to figure out which one of them is The Roadkeeper. None of them is her, though, and I know that for a fact. I’ll just know when I meet her. I don’t know how, but I’ll know--I’m sure of that much. The Roadkeeper and I will mesh. She’ll be the cool and caring mom I never had or the sister who isn’t afraid to throw a punch when needed, depending on her age.

Case in point: the search for The Roadkeeper is not successful. Logan does not seem to have much luck, either, though, thank god. I am totally determined to win for two main reasons. One is the simple fact that I desperately want to meet The Roadkeeper, possibly fangirl and profess my love for her before I collapse into a pile of excitement and awkwardness at her greatness (I have this whole thing planned out pretty well) and second is to get Logan to come clean, to tell me everything he knows about why Ben did it so I can finally start healing.

So I look for The Roadkeeper all afternoon, talk to maybe one-hundred people for times varying from five minutes to three seconds (one of them was decidedly not a woman), and shoot Logan as many dirty looks from across the room as possible.

I overhear more poetry presentations than I’ll ever need, and the steady buzz of the whole place is weirdly thrilling. I love that I can look up at the wall beside me and see posters of my favorite poets hanging there. I love that I can go over to any random person here and they’ll be able to recite and explain ‘The Road Not Taken’ by Robert Frost to me. I love that I feel at home here. I love that I feel like I belong.

I’ve spent my whole last four years trying to slip in the shadows with everyone else, to work as hard as I can not to turn out like my parents want, and in general just get by. But here, at this convention, getting by is the last thing I want to do. What I really want to do, more than anything in the world, is to stand out. I don’t really feel scared of others so much anymore for some reason. I mean, I’m still scared, but now it’s a good kind of fear. It’s the fear I felt when I left with Logan to this convention, the fear I felt when I asked him to come to my bed. It’s the fear that drives people to do great things, that caused Robert Frost to leave for England and pursue his dreams, the fear that comes when you’re on the brink of greatness.

And I, Cali Monroe, am on the brink of greatness.

After a while of searching for The Roadkeeper, I return to the same table Logan and I sat at earlier and do them the great honor of cleaning out their Skittles supply. I mark it as my Charitable Deed of the Day in the back of my mind.