I struggled to sleep that night. I could still feel Hunter’s body on my skin. I could stilltastehim on my lips. His smell, spicy and musky and sweet, was stuck in my nose like a bad idea. All of it was made worse knowing that a single wall separated us.
I woke up early and went for a jog. Volleyball season was over, but I told myself I wanted to stay fit through the summer. Of course, the truth was that I just wanted to get the hell out of the house.
After a quick five miles, I even felt better. Until I got home.
Hunter’s Civic was gone from the driveway. That by itself wasn’t alarming, but when I walked through the front door I found my parents and Brad sitting at the dining room table.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“It’s about Hunter,” Dad said.
Ice ran up my spine. Did they know we had made out in the garage? Had we been discovered? In a flash of insight I understood the fear that Hunter had felt, because now it gripped me like a vice. While my parents and Brad were sitting there,staringat me, I desperately didn’t want them to know what had been going on between me and Hunter.
Before I could think of an excuse, Brad slid a piece of paper across the table toward me. “He left this morning.”
“Left to go where?” I asked.
“Portland,” Dad said, confusion on his wrinkled face. He nodded at the paper. “He says he’s moving in with his uncle in Portland.”
Mom let out a sniffle. “He didn’t even say goodbye…”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, and I didn’t dare touch the piece of paper on the table. My feet turned me around and carried me upstairs, taking the steps two-at-a-time, stumbling on the last step and scrambling toward his bedroom anyway. I turned the knob and threw open the door, expecting to see him sitting there recording a YouTube video, smiling at me and asking why I hadn’t knocked.
The bed was made. I couldn’t remember it being made since before he had moved in. All the boxes of belongings and car parts were gone. Two towels and a washcloth were folded neatly on the bed.
He’s gone,I thought, tears running down my cheeks.He’s gone, and it’s all my fault.
14
Erica
Present Day
As I fled from the Columbus Small Business Expo, abandoning my table next to Lizzy’s CBD-infused beauty products and the dude selling bacon-flavored beer, I thought to myself:this must be what Hunter felt like all those years ago.
This was what it was like to run away from your problems.
Whatever Hunter had run from five years ago, he was back in town now. He washere, at the convention. I couldn’t handle it. One dashing smile from him and I was seventeen again, blushing whenever he looked at me.
I found my car in the big convention center parking lot. The enginegroanedas I turned the ignition, making me think it wouldn’t start, but after a few seconds it roared to life. I sighed with relief as I drove out of the parking lot and onto the I-270 loop.
It took me twenty minutes to get home. Moving back in with my parents after graduating from college had felt strange at first, but now the house I had grown up in felt too big and empty. Especially while Brad was out of town.
I hurried through the house to my room, changed clothes, and then hopped on my steel touring bicycle. One fringe benefit of living here was that I was just a ten minute bike ride from the Buckeye Brewing Company, where I worked as a bartender. And the commute was all on safe trails, so I never needed to bike on the road. There was even a grocery store on the way back.
Biking around town had allowed me to stretch the lifespan of my beat-up car, which was crucial since I couldn’t afford a new one any time soon.
“I thought you took the afternoon off,” Charlie, the brewery manager said when I walked through the door. “You said you had some comic book convention.”
“It was a small business expo,” I corrected. “And I… I ended up leaving early.”
Charlie grunted. It was rare that I took a day off—heck, I usually worked as many shifts as possible since I needed the money. But if he was surprised that I had reneged on my day off, he didn’t say so.
“Tracie could use some help behind the bar,” he said. “Big lunch rush.”
I flashed him a thumbs-up, clocked in at the terminal by the merchandise stand, and then went behind the bar.
Tracie put one hand on her hip and squinted suspiciously at me. “Erica! Didn’t expect to see you here!”