Chain Reaction 3.1.11: White Horse

Alaric

     I get up from the table and go to look for my girlfriend. The waitress tells me there is no one in the ladies' room, and my heart sinks. I thank her for checking, hate the look on her face like she knows I was just ditched, pay with a generous tip, and leave the restaurant.

     She can't have gone far... right? What if she hired a cab to get home?

     I try texting her, but I don't want to just stand around while I wait for a response.

     Then I see her. She didn't go far.

     "Kate!"

     She turns to look at me and bites her lip as I approach. She doesn't say anything, but the look in her eyes only makes my heart sink more.

     "What happened?" I sit down next to her. I fear she may try to bolt.

     "Talk to me."

     She looks like she wants to cry. "Alaric, I... I just needed to sit out here by myself for a few minutes."

     "So why didn't you tell me that instead of pulling a disappearing act?"

     "I didn't think I'd be out here that long. Sorry."

     We sit quietly for a moment before I speak up again. "What was it that you had to come out here to think about?" I feel like I have something caught in my throat. This is bad. This is all very bad. But I want to know.

     "Alaric, this is all very wonderful..."

     "But?" Very bad.

     "But it's too much."

     "I just wanted to do something special. It was never to make you feel uncomfortable."

     She exhales and turns away, looking like she's trying to figure out how to say something. Whatever it is, I have a plumbing good feeling I don't want to hear it.

     "Hey." I take her hand.

      She watches me, wondering what I'll say.

      "Th-that that I said back there... That just sorta... slipped out. You, uh, you do that to me, do you know?" Well, all girls do but most especially her. "I didn't even know I was going to say it." But I won't say I didn't mean it. "It just... happened. Don't feel like you have to dwell on it."

     I think I figured her out. "But... is it... true?"

     I look down at her hand and squeeze it. That catch in my throat is back. "Yes."

     "Alaric..." Her voice trails off.

     "Don't feel like you have to feel the same way. Look, I guess I'm just the crazy romantic type. I'm figuring that out about myself." I chuckle. "You should see my journal." Hah! "Um, no, maybe that's a bad idea."

     A little smile blesses her perfect features. "You have a diary?"

     "Huh? No. I mean it's, uh, something I write stuff in. Mostly it's a bunch of bad poetry. I just keep it because I feel like if I have too many thoughts in my head and if I don't write some of them down I'll explode." Please don't think it's a diary. It's not a diary!

     "That shows you probably have real talent. That whole 'I must do it or I'll explode' thing."

     "Nah. It's crap. It's all just a bunch of crap, but I feel better after I write it. What I'm saying is..." What was I saying? "Oh yeah. I'm saying that I have way too many thoughts in my head, and sometimes, they get blurted out. That's what happened."

     We get quiet.

     I want to tell her how she's in it, my journal, that is. She's all over it. I've done at least five terrible-but-I-like-them-anyway poems on her eyes alone. I vented my frustration about her jerk of a father and how I want to help her. I've even written something about the way she looks when she's exasperated. It's so cute.

     I really should write more about her lips... 

     She lets out a muffled gasp when I surprise her with an intense kiss. Well, it's not as intense as I'd hoped it would be. I'm intense. She's reticent. I want to eat her alive. She wants to push me back. So I back off, but I'm unable to stop my fast breathing. Her dress is virtually see-through at the flesh-covered areas! She's not wearing a bra, and it's making me go crazy.

     This isn't supposed to be how the night should go. I should be talking to her about moving in with me, but I keep getting distracted... like how the mesh fabric at her shoulder feels on my tongue...

     She roughly frees herself and stands up.

     "Take me home. Or I'll call a cab."

     I am SO mad at myself right now. I can't even control myself for a plumbing few minutes in order to say what I need to say. This night just keeps getting worse.

     "I wish that wasn't your home." My voice is biting now.

     She turns. "What?" I get up. "Why say that?"

     I walk around her, standing in front of her.

     "Let me help you get out of there."

     "That's my home." She's really pissed off--and not in a good way.

     "It's not 'tiny living'; it's a dump! Your parents would rather spend the day getting trashed instead of being parents. That's why you say you can't have anything real. Because you know they'll go pawn it for money to go buy more meth or whatever it is they're doing." This is a disaster. Now I'm getting her going on the defensive.

      "You listen to me, Alaric Goth! I know exactly what my parents are! Why do you think I've spent my school days preparing myself so that I could leave?! I can do this."

      "I want to help you." This is pathetic. This isn't how it was supposed to go. I'd rehearsed this whole thing in my head a dozen times. I just failed to think of the bad scenarios and how to handle them.

      "I don't need your help! I'm getting that scholarship! I'm leaving Eden, getting as far away from them as possible, and I'm going to do it ON MY OWN!" She tries to walk past me, but I sidestep, blocking her. She tries again; I sidestep again. Then she thinks she can fake me by acting like she's going in one direction but instead going another, but I'm on to that ploy.

     She lets out a raging squeal of aggravation. "This was a mistake. I knew better. I don't have time for this nonsense! But you were just so nice and... things... But it was a mistake. I never should've agreed to go out with you, Alaric."

     My heart would shatter right now, but I'm not giving up without a fight first. "Whoa!" I catch her as she storms past. She acts like she's going to freak, so I let her go. But I make it obvious that I'm not letting her walk away. "Kate, chill."

     "Chill? CHILL?!" Uh oh.

     "Gosh, how lucky am I that I found out exactly what you think of me, of where I come from."

     "That's not what I meant."

     "I know they're terrible, but they're all I have!"

     "That's not true."

     "And you think you can just waltz into my life on your white horse to come and save me like a princess locked in a tower. Well, guess what? Life doesn't work like that but you wouldn't know because you've been given everything in life. I have to earn it! I want to earn it! So just LEAVE ME ALONE!" This time I do grab her and hold onto her when she tries yet again to walk past me.

     My voice is quiet, almost a whisper. "I can't do that. Not when I love you so very much."

     She starts punching my shoulder and crying. "Damn you, Goth! I had my life all worked out before you came along." She now sobs into my shoulder, and I merely hold her and let her cry. Then she pulls back, but I grab her hands.

     "Please don't go." This is a disaster. "I'll take you... home. But don't end this because you feel like you have to if you won't accept my help." Oh, she could construe that up badly. "I mean..." I wince. How do I say it right?
     "I know what you mean. Alaric, I'm sorry my dad scared you like that. I wish you'd just talked to me about it. It's not like they hit me or anything. They mostly just ignore me unless I make too much noise. That's why I'm at the library all the time... except for that morning I decided to get some air at the park."
     My thumbs move on her hands. "I'm sorry I backed you into a corner." At least this way she's not leaving Eden to go live with family on the other side of the world. I smile as a more simple plan forms in my mind. "But why not instead of go to the library you just come over to my house? There's at least one computer that no one uses." It belonged to the butler once upon a time. "It's pretty quiet, and I'll try not to bug you too much." Actually be low-maintenance liked I'd once claimed to be. I know I'll be much happier if I have the knowledge that she's at least somewhere in the house, even if she leaves it to go home to that dump. I'm not apologizing for calling it a dump.
    "Alaric..." She fidgets. "It's just... I meant it when I said I was going to leave Eden one day."
    I kiss her hands. "Well, that's still a few years away." Maybe after a few years together, I can convince her to take the Alaric Goth scholarship and go to school somewhere closer to home. Or SCU where I want to go. "Give your overeager boyfriend another chance?"
     She sighs. "Fine. Just take me home." She walks past me to the car. I don't think this argument is really over, but I don't know what else to do!
     She won't let me even hold her hand on the way back to the car. She may have said 'fine,' but I don't think it's the 'fine' I want it to be. This whole evening has been a disaster.