This was part of the yearly tradition. The guilt. The stupidity.
Promising myself that today would be the last day. The last time I would do this. The last time I would piss away money on a ring that would get buried in the dirt. The last time I'd smoke myself sick, sitting on that goddamn rock, waiting for something to happen that just wasn't meant to happen.
"The last time," I whispered as I stood up.
I left the apartment and stopped to get a filling, greasy breakfast. Then I was off. Another drive. More time to think about how it all happened and how it all went down.
"The last time," I said as I turned off the road to the dirt road that would take me to the rock and to the cabin.
The truth though was simple.
The last time … would be with my last breath.
Lacey
PRESENT DAY
I woke up a little lost and little more free. There was no schedule to follow and nothing to really worry about. I casually strolled downstairs and made coffee. I opened the drawer-the infamous junk drawer-and I found an old pack of cigarettes.
It was so dumb.
But it made me think … of him.
I didn't need to look at the calendar on the fridge to know what today was.
I should have been on vacation. That had been my plan, and it hadn't let me down yet. Skip town, distract myself, let the day pass.
In the beginning, it had been really hard to do. And on the first-year anniversary, I was legit on vacation with friends. I was on the beach, hunky shirtless guys all around, everyone smart and rich, living a good life. I saw two people standing on a pier, kissing, the water as their backdrop. And it just sank into me. How much I missed River. How much I really did love him.
I promised that time would help. But time didn't help me at all. Time just made things worse. And each time I tried to get to him, something went wrong. It was like the universe was pushing me away from him. Screaming no to me the way my mother and father did more than once if I dared bring up his name.
Once the bottom finally fell out and I took off, it was too late. River was gone.
I took my coffee and my cigarettes outside. The back deck was comfortable. The sun felt good on my skin. I drank the coffee and skipped the cigarettes. I licked my lips. I hated the way they tasted, and they did nothing good for me. But if I shut my eyes and took a drag, I felt whisked back to that abandoned house. Back to the first time I smoked. The first time I … you know. Both with River.
My phone rang, and it was Bev. I snorted and sent the call straight to voicemail. She was begging me to come back to work. That wasn't going to happen at all. I was done with that place. What I needed was to have a break and to refresh my mind a little. Find something new. Find what was next.
I should have been a doctor, but I decided to chase a ghost.
"A ghost," I whispered.
My phone started to ring again. I swore, if it was Bev calling again, she was going to get a piece of my mind.
It wasn't Bev, though. It was who I guess I could have considered my best friend, Karen. When I took off from New York, she let me crash on her couch for a long time. It was crazy to meet a stranger like I did with Karen and for her to trust me, but there was a bond there.
I answered the call. "Good morning, sunshine."
"You're sitting outside drinking coffee," Karen said. "And something's wrong."
"Um … "
"I'm right. I know I'm right."
"And why do you think that?" I asked.
"Because you usually call me and ask me to go somewhere this week with you," Karen said.
I shut my eyes.
Shit.
She was the only person I ever opened up to about River.
"I wasn't sure if this is because of Kyle … "
"No," I said. "You know everything about that situation."
Again, Karen was the only who knew everything about Kyle. How I felt. What he meant. And why his death was so much harder than what met the eye.
"So today is the day," Karen said, emphasizing the last words because of what they meant. "And you're sitting home?"
"For now."
"If you were going to bolt on the day, you'd be gone," Karen said.
"Maybe I'll come visit you. Hey, I quit my job."
"No way!"
"Yeah. Too much death. Sadness. And the corporate culture of dying? That's not my thing."
"You were always too nice," Karen said. "I know you love to take care of people, Lacey. You should take care of yourself. Do you have any money saved?"
"Yeah," I said. "I'm good for a little while."