Forever Changed

I nodded again, even though I didn’t believe her. I was pretty sure my heart would be ripped to shreds for a long time.

I was literally going insane. I hadn’t heard from Kassandra in days. The first night, I assumed she went home and fell asleep before she could text me back. By the end of the next day, I was worried that something had happened to her. I threw caution to the wind and called her house, but no one picked up the phone. Without knowing what else to do, I drove to her house, completely relieved to find her Explorer in the driveway. But where the hell was she? I texted her every twenty minutes the next day and never got an answer. By Sunday, I didn’t care that I hadn’t been appropriately introduced to her mother, I drove back to Kassandra’s house, determined to know what was happening. I parked my car across the street from the two-story home she shared with her family. As I made my way up the walkway, I began to freak out, suddenly realizing I had no idea what I was going to say.

I waited a moment to collect myself before ringing the bell. I was tempted to leave and wait for Kass to contact me, but my desire to see her made me stay. I could hear the doorbell chiming from inside as I pushed the button and waited. After a few minutes I rang the bell again and peered into one of the long windows that flanked the door, but saw no one.

“They’re not home,” a snippy elderly voice said behind me.

“What?” I said, turning to face a little old lady that could have been a twin of that chick in the movie they made about the Titanic.

“I said, they’re not home,” she snipped. “You need to borrow my hearing aid?”

“No, ma’am,” I said, turning on the charm. “Do you know where they went?” I asked.

“Yep,” she answered.

“Could you tell me?” I pleaded.

“Nope,” she answered.

“Can you at least tell me if they’re okay?” I asked, allowing my frustration to come out.

She looked at me hard for a moment. “They’re fine, or as fine as they can be after the tragedy that struck them this year. You know all about that?” she asked.

I nodded my head.

“You ain’t hurting one of my girls, are you?”

“No, ma’am, I love one of them,” I admitted.

“I suspected as much. They went on vacation. Their momma came over and asked me to collect their mail, said her daughter was hurtin’ over some boy. You know anything about that?”

“No, ma’am, I don’t. I wish I did,” I said, raking my hand through my hair in frustration.

“Well, I reckon it can be resolved once they get home,” she said, turning to leave.

“Yes, ma’am,” I said, feeling defeated as I walked toward my car.

“Young man,” she called.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“You remember, just because your papa has his demons don’t mean they’re your demons,” she said, disappearing into her house.

I stared after her, wondering what she knew about my demons.

I headed home to wait out the rest of the break. In a week I’d find out exactly what was going on, one way or another. The question was could I make it a whole week without knowing what had happened?

We arrived home the night before classes were supposed to resume. I was pretty sure Mom had planned it that way so I wouldn’t dwell on it too much. The trip at least helped the days pass and allowed time for me to sort out my feelings for Maddon and re-categorize how I felt about him. I began to wonder if it was even possible to fall in love with someone you’ve only known a week, or was the whole thing just me being stupid and lonely. By the time we were flying home, I had myself convinced that it was probably the latter, that after years of being with a guy that I had no chemistry with, I was bound to fall for someone that sparked a fire in me.

I would have responded the same with any guy who showed interest, I lied to myself the next morning as I got ready for school.

“You ready for today, honey?” Mom asked, handing me a cup of coffee when I entered the kitchen.

“Sure,” I lied.

“It’ll be okay,” she said, seeing through my lie.

I nodded, figuring it wasn’t worth it to argue. I was pretty sure that nothing about school would be fine again. I had less than five months to go before I walked for graduation.