I kept my face in my hands and thought about where it went wrong. So many things had happened to her, to me, to us during our relationship, but I wasn't sure if I could pinpoint when everything went askew.
I thought about when I first met her. "When she transferred to my school, she was the quiet girl with baggy shirts and loose-fitting jeans. Her hair was long and looked like it hadn't been taken care of in a while. She never wore makeup and rarely met anyone's gaze as she passed. But in spite of all that, she was still the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen. She had a natural beauty about her. One you don't often see in the sea of high school girls. It was refreshing to meet someone so perfect without all the heavy makeup and expensive clothes. Honestly, it was the first thing that drew me to her."
"So you saw something in her you didn't find in anyone else. That's a good start, Dane. Because I'm sure that person is still in there. You can still find her. She's not dead."
I wanted to acknowledge Eden, but I knew I had to stay focused on my memories with Gabi if I ever wanted to figure out when the turning point was. "On the first day of junior year, I noticed her in the hall. She was looking at her schedule and the numbers on the doors of the classrooms. I was with a group of friends. They were in the middle of telling me something, but as soon as I saw her, their words vanished and I walked away. All I saw was her."
"Did she change over the summer at all?"
"Not really. Her hair was longer, but still unkempt. She still wore baggy clothes, but it seemed as though the shirts had gotten a little tighter. I walked straight up to her and asked her out. I didn't say hi or ask how her summer was. I stood in front of her and waited until she looked at me. She smiled and her eyes lit up. I asked her to dinner on Friday, and to my surprise, she said yes. I wasn't expecting it, so I didn't say anything else. I stood there, looking like an idiot as she laughed at me." I couldn't help but chuckle at how naïve I had been.
Eden was quiet, which I was thankful for.
"The beginning was great. She made me wait three weeks before I could kiss her, but as soon as she allowed me to press my lips to hers, I thought the world tipped on its axis. It was easy to tell she'd never been kissed, and it made me high. I can't explain it, but there's something about being the only person to claim her lips that made me feel special."
I dropped my hands but didn't look at Eden. Instead, I stared at the bathroom in front of me. I focused on the darkness through the cracked door and let my mind wander, piecing things together as they came to me.
"Maybe that's what it was. She made me feel special. I had a good life, a great childhood. I don't want to sound ungrateful for anything my parents did for me, but making me feel special wasn't something they knew how to give. They provided for me and supported everything I went after, but it was no different than the support I'd get from any other adult.
"My father helped out and loaned me the money to help Mr. Allen. But it wasn't like he simply wrote me a check without a second thought. We had a long talk and he spent a few days thinking about it. He made me sign a contract and had me treat it as if it were a business transaction, because that's what it was. And when I had success at that, he continued to treat it as a business transaction. He never once told me how proud he was of me. He took the money I owed him, plus the interest, and that was the end of it. A neat and tidy transaction void of any emotion."
"You said Gabi made you feel special. Did she show you support through this? Was she there with you during this part of your life?"
I nodded and twisted my hands between my legs while I carried on with my story. "She went on and on about how proud she was of me. It only took me three months to tell her I loved her. It took her an extra week before she returned the sentiment." I snickered at the memory. "That was the longest week of my young life. But … she said it, and that was all that mattered."
A giggle filled Eden's words when she said, "It sounds like she made you wait for everything. That must be where you learned to be patient."
"Yeah. She made me wait eight months before we had sex. It was the first time she'd ever had sex. And knowing she was giving that part of herself to me was an emotion unlike any other. But then a few months later, my world came crashing down. For the first time in my life, I experienced true tragedy."
Instead of prying, she simply rubbed my back and waited for me to continue. It comforted me and took some of the weight off my shoulders as I remembered the first heartbreak I had to go through in life.
"My grandmother, who meant the absolute world to me, died of a stroke. Since my parents were workaholics and hardly ever home, she had practically raised me. The majority of my childhood had my Grans in it. She was my everything, and I was hers. But I woke up one morning, got ready for school, and found out during breakfast when the phone rang. It had been the worst day of my life. I climbed into bed again, still dressed for school, and hid beneath the covers for the rest of the day. Gabi came over after school and climbed in with me. We didn't talk-we didn't kiss or even have sex. We just laid there in silence. She was the only one there for me."
"That was the first shoe that dropped?"
I nodded and wiped my burning eyes. "Yeah, but it didn't take long before the next one fell. Except, this time, it was Gabi who suffered. It's the worst feeling in the world to know something's going on with the one person you love more than anything, and you can't do anything about it. I knew something was wrong, but she wouldn't open up. Once she did, my world fractured, right before it shattered. I had never experienced such anger or helplessness before. I could have murdered someone, and I probably would have if the authorities hadn't stepped in."
"Is this the secret you can't talk about?"
"Yeah. I don't feel right violating her confidence."
"You don't have to explain. I understand."
"The trial and depositions and testimony practically broke her." I met Eden's stare. "That was the first time I watched a piece of her die, and I think some of me died with her. It had taken more than a year before she resembled normal again-and by normal, I mean she wasn't depressed. At one point during the whole ordeal, she was on a suicide watch for three days in the hospital after taking an undetermined number of pills. I hated that more than anything, but I never left her side. I slept in the waiting room throughout the entire ordeal. No one else was there. Her mom, stepdad, and stepbrother never once came to see her. I was the only one. That's how it always was-just the two of us. I had her and she had me. We had no one except each other."
"But you said she got better, right?"
"Better … but never the same. That changed her in ways I don't think anyone could ever come back from."
Eden sniffled. The tears in her eyes did something to me, broke and healed parts of my heart, for reasons I didn't comprehend. I had to look away. I couldn't see her sympathy and not be greatly affected by it.
"Gabi followed me to college, even though she didn't attend. But we lived together and everything was great. She smiled and laughed and had fun, but not like before. The days spent endlessly crying seemed to have been over for the most part-however, her insecurities grew. I convinced her to go to the salon one day and get her hair done, and she seemed to have felt better after that. But about a month later, we got into an argument and she accused me of trying to change her. That I'd wanted her to look different and prettier. That was never my intention. I had thought it might make her feel good about herself again. I knew after what she'd been through, she'd never be the same, but that didn't stop me from trying. The fucker who hurt her was locked away for a long time and his life would never be the same, but it didn't matter because hers wouldn't either."
"This was all while you were in college?"
I nodded. "We moved home after I graduated. My parents came to the ceremony, but they treated me as if my accomplishments were merely an expectation and not a success. Gabi didn't act that way, though. She was proud of me and let me know it. We never discussed what would happen after I finished school; it was more or less assumed. She didn't have anywhere to go, and I never intended to stay away from home forever, so she came with me. That was the first time our relationship seemed like an obligation."
"You didn't want her to move home with you?"
"No … I did. Of course I did. But she moved to Tallahassee so I could go to college. She stayed at the apartment. She didn't go to school, she didn't work, she was just there. And then when I came home, she followed with no discussion about it. Don't get me wrong … it was exactly what we both wanted. I went to school so I could get a degree and support her. I never thought twice about it. But looking at it now … it just feels different."