After We Fell Read online

  A woman around his age appears at his side and takes the stool next to him. She wraps her thin arm around his shoulder and he greets her warmly. She doesn’t strike me as the homeless type, but she obviously knows him. He probably spends the majority of his time in this shithole of a bar. I use this distraction to check my phone for messages or calls from Tessa: nothing.

  I’m relieved but annoyed that she hasn’t attempted to talk to me. Relieved because I’m drunk, but annoyed because I miss her already. Each glass of scotch that slides down my throat makes me want her more, makes the hollowness of her absence grow.

  Fuck, what has she done to me?

  She’s so damn infuriating, always trying to push my buttons. It’s like she literally sits around and devises new ways to enrage me. Matter of fact, she probably does. She’s probably sitting cross-legged on the bed with that stupid fucking planner on her lap, a pen between her teeth and another behind her ear, coming up with things to do or say that will drive me insane.

  Six months we’ve been together now—six months. That’s a long-ass time, longer than I ever thought I could stand to spend with one person. Granted, we haven’t been dating the entire time, and a lot of those months were spent—no, wasted—with my trying to stay away from her.

  Richard’s voice breaks my thoughts. “This is Nancy.”

  I nod at the woman and stare back down at the dark wood of the bar top.

  “Nancy, this well-mannered young man is Hardin. He’s Tessie’s boyfriend,” he proudly says.

  Why would he be proud of me dating his daughter?

  “Tessie has a boyfriend! Is she here? I’d love to finally meet her. Richard here has told me so much about her!”

  “She isn’t here,” I grumble.

  “That’s too bad; how did her birthday party go? It was last weekend, right?” she asks.

  What?

  Richard looks to me, clearly imploring me to go along with some lie he’s obviously told. “Yeah, it was nice,” he answers for me before gulping down the rest of his drink.

  “That’s nice,” Nancy says, then points toward the entrance. “Oh, there she is!”

  My eyes dart to the door, and for a moment I think she’s talking about Tessa, but that wouldn’t make sense. She’s never met her. Instead a too-thin blonde walks across the small room and over to us. This dive bar is getting too damn crowded.

  I hold my empty glass in the air. “Another.”

  After an eye roll and a whispered “Asshole,” I’m given another drink.

  “This is my daughter, Shannon,” Nancy informs me.

  Shannon looks me up and down with eyes that appear to have spiders stuck to them. This chick is wearing way too much makeup.

  “Shannon, this is Hardin.” Richard speaks, but I don’t make any motion toward greeting her.

  Many months ago I probably would have paid at least a little attention to the desperate girl. I maybe would have even let her blow me in the disgusting bathroom here, but now I just want her to stop fucking staring at me.

  “I don’t think it’ll go any lower without taking it off,” I say regarding the obnoxious way she keeps tugging at the hem of her shirt to show off the small bit of cleavage she can manage.

  “Excuse me?” she huffs, placing her hands on her narrow hips.

  “You heard me.”

  “Okay, okay. Let’s all just settle down here,” Richard says, putting his hands in the air.

  With that, Nancy and her slutty daughter walk away to find a table.

  “You’re welcome,” I say to him, but he shakes his head.

  “You’re an unpleasant son of a bitch.” Before I can react, he adds, “Just how I like ’em.”

  THREE DRINKS LATER, I can barely sit on the bar stool. Richard, who obviously drinks for a living, literally, appears to have the same problem, as he’s leaning way too close to me.

  “So then when I get out the next day, I had to walk two miles! Of course it started raining . . .”

  He continues on, telling me about the last time he was arrested. I continue to drink and pretend that he isn’t talking to me.

  “If I’m supposed to keep your secret, you should at least tell me why you told Tessie you were expelled,” he says at last.

  I somehow knew he would wait until I was full-on drunk to bring this up again. “It’s easier if she thinks that,” I admit.

  “How’s that?”

  “Because I want her to go to England with me, and she isn’t exactly thrilled with the idea.”

  “I don’t get it.” He pinches the bridge of his nose.

  “Your daughter wants to leave me, and I can’t let that happen.”

  “So you tell her you got kicked out of school so she’ll go to England?”

  “Basically.”

  He looks down at his drink, then over at me. “That’s really stupid.”

  “I know.” And it does sounds really fucking stupid when spoken out loud, but it somehow makes sense inside my fucked-up head.

  “Who are you to give advice to me, anyway?” I say to him at last.

  “No one. All I’m saying is you’ll end up just like me if you keep it up.”

  I want to tell him to fuck off and mind his own damn business, but when I look up at him I see the resemblance I noted when we first sat down at the bar. Fuck.

  “Don’t tell her,” I remind him.

  “I won’t.” Then he turns to Betsy. “Another round.”

  She smiles at him and begins to make our drinks. I don’t think I can handle another.

  “I’m good. Right now you have three eyes,” I tell him.

  He shrugs. “More for me.”

  I’m a shit boyfriend, I think to myself, wondering what Tessie—fuck, Tessa—is doing right now.

  “I’m a shit father,” Richard says.

  I’m too drunk to comprehend the difference between thinking and speaking, so I don’t know if him saying this is coincidence or I was speaking out loud—

  “Move down,” a gruff male voice says to the left of Richard.

  I glance over to see a short man with an even fuller beard than my drinking companion’s.

  “There aren’t any more stools, partner,” Richard replies slowly.

  “Well, then you better move,” the man threatens.

  Fuck, not this. Not now.

  “We aren’t moving.” I dismiss the man.

  The man who then makes the mistake of grabbing Richard by the collar and roughly yanking him upright.

  chapter ten

  TESSA

  The walk back to my car after yoga feels much longer than usual. The heaviness of Hardin’s expulsion and the move to Seattle were lifted from me during meditation, but now, outside the walls of the classroom, the weight is back and multiplied by ten.

  As soon as I begin to pull out of the parking spot, my phone vibrates on the passenger seat. Hardin.

  “Hello?” I stop and shift the gear into park.

  But it’s a woman’s voice that barks through the speaker, and my heart stops. “Is this Tessa?”

  “Yes?”

  “Good, I’ve got your father and . . .”

  “Her . . . boyfriend . . .” I hear Hardin groan in the background.

  “Yeah, your boyfriend,” she says snidely. “I’m gonna need you to pick these two up before someone calls the cops.”

  “Calls the cops? Where are they?” I shift back into drive.

  “Dizzy’s on Lamar Avenue; you know the place?”

  “No, but I’ll Google it.”

  “Huh. Of course you will.”

  Ignoring her attitude, I hang up the phone and hastily get directions to the bar. Why the hell are Hardin and my father at a bar at three in the afternoon? Why the hell are Hardin and my father even together?

  This makes no sense to me—and what about the cops? What did they do? I should have asked the woman on the phone. I can only hope they didn’t get into a fight with each other. That’s the last thing any of us needs.
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  My imagination has run wild by the time I make it to the bar, and has concluded that Hardin’s either murdered my father or vice versa. There are no cop cars outside the small bar, which is a good sign, I suppose. I park directly in front of the building and hurry inside, wishing I had worn a sweatshirt instead of a T-shirt.

  “There she is!” my father calls out jubilantly.

  I can tell he’s loaded as he stumbles over to me.

  “You should have seen it, Tessie!” He claps his hands. “Hardin just whooped some serious ass!”

  “Where is he—” I start, but right then a bathroom door opens and Hardin walks out, wiping his bloody hands on a red-stained paper towel.

  “What happened?” I yell to him from the opposite side of the room.

  “Nothing . . . calm down.”

  I gape as I walk over to him. “Are you drunk?” I ask, then twist slightly to look at his eyes: bloodshot.

  He looks off to the side. “Maybe.”

  “This is unbelievable.” I cross my arms as he tries to take my hand.

  “Hey, you should be thanking me for having your dad’s back. He’d be on the floor right now if it wasn’t for me.” He points to a man sitting on the floor holding a bag of ice against his cheek.

  “I won’t be thanking you for anything—you’re drunk in the middle of the afternoon! And with my father, of all people. What the hell is wrong with you?” I storm away from him, back toward the bar, where my father is now sitting.

  “Don’t be mad at him, Tessie; he loves you.” My father is defending him.

  What the hell is going on here?

  As Hardin walks over, I ball my fists at my sides and shout, “So what, you two get drunk together and now you’re best friends? Neither of you should even be drinking!”

  “Baby,” Hardin says into my ear and attempts to wrap his arm around me.

  “Hey,” the woman behind the bar says, knocking on the counter to get my attention. “You gotta get them out of here.”

  I nod at her and glare at the drunken idiots who are my lot. My father’s cheek is pink, giving the impression he was hit, and Hardin’s hands are already swelling.

  “You can come to our house for tonight so you can sober up, but this isn’t acceptable behavior.” I want to scold them both, like the children they are. “For either of you.”

  I exit the smelly little space and am at the car before they make it to the door. Hardin scowls at my father as the older man tries to rest an arm on his shoulder. I get into my car, disgusted.

  Hardin’s intoxication puts me on edge. I know how he is when he’s drunk, and I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him this drunk before, not even that night he destroyed all the china. I miss the days when Hardin didn’t drink anything but water at parties. We have a list of problems right now, and him drinking only adds fuel to the flames.

  APPARENTLY, MY FATHER has graduated from being an angry drunk to one who tells endless jokes, most of which are tasteless and obnoxious. The whole ride home he laughs too hard at his own words, with Hardin joining him every now and then. This isn’t how I envisioned this day at all. I don’t know what it was that made Hardin warm up to my father, but now that they’re both drunk in the middle of the day, I don’t like their “friendship” at all.

  When we get home, I leave my father in the kitchen eating more of Hardin’s Frosted Flakes and head for the bedroom—where most of our arguments seem to begin and end.

  “Tessa,” Hardin begins as soon as I close the door.

  “Don’t,” I say coldly.

  “Don’t be mad at me—we were just having a drink.” His tone is playful, but I’m not in the mood for it.

  “ ‘Just having a drink’? With my father—an alcoholic who I’m trying to build a relationship with, who I wanted to maybe think about getting sober. That’s who you were ‘just drinking’ with?”

  “Baby . . .”

  I shake my head. “Don’t you ‘baby’ me. I’m not okay with this.”

  “Nothing happened.” He wraps his fingers around my arm to pull me to him, but when I pull away it causes him to stumble to the bed.

  “Hardin, you got in a fight again!”

  “Not a big one. Who cares?”

  “I do. I care.”

  He looks up at me from his place on the edge of our bed, his green eyes laced with red, and says, “Then why are you leaving me? If you care so much?”

  My heart sinks a little farther into my chest.

  “I’m not leaving you; I’m asking you to come with me.” I sigh.

  “But I don’t want to,” he whines.

  “I know, but this is the one thing I have left—apart from you, of course.”

  “I’ll marry you.” He reaches for my hand, but I step back.

  My breath hitches. I’m sure I couldn’t have heard that correctly. “What?” I raise my hands, blocking him from coming closer.

  “I said I’ll marry you if you choose me.” He stands up, stepping toward me.

  The words, even though they’re meaningless because of the amount of alcohol coursing through him, still excite me. “You’re drunk,” I say.

  He’s only offering marriage because he’s drunk, which is worse than not offering at all.

  “So? I still mean it.”

  “No, you don’t.” I shake my head and dodge his touch again.

  “Yes, I do—not now, of course, but in like . . . six years or so?” He scratches his thumb across his forehead, thinking.

  I roll my eyes. Despite my fluttering heart, this last bit of hedging, offering to marry me in a vague “six years or so,” shows that reality is creeping back into his thoughts, even as he drunkenly tries to convince me otherwise. “We’ll see how you feel about this tomorrow,” I say, knowing he surely won’t remember it tomorrow.

  “Will you be wearing those pants?” His lips form a wicked smile.

  “No; don’t even start talking about these damn pants.”

  “You’re the one who wore them. You know how I feel about them.” He looks down at his lap, then points at it and looks up waggling his eyebrows.

  Playful, teasing, drunk Hardin is sort of adorable . . . but not adorable enough to make me lose my ground.

  “Come here,” he begs, mock-frowning.

  “No. I’m still upset with you.”

  “Come on, Tessie, don’t be mad.” He laughs and rubs his eyes with the back of his hands.

  “If either of you calls me that one more time, I swear—”

  “Tessie, what’s wrong, Tessie? You don’t like the name Tessie, Tessie?”

  Hardin grins wide, and I feel my resolve fading the longer I stare at him.

  “Are you going to let me take those pants off of you?”

  “No. I’ve a lot to do today, and none of those things involve you taking my clothes off. I would ask you to come along, but you decided to get wasted with my father, so I have to go alone.”

  “You’re going somewhere?” His voice is smooth yet raspy, thick from the liquor.

  “Yes.”

  “You’re not wearing that, though, right?”

  “Yes, I am. I can wear whatever the hell I want to wear.” I grab a sweatshirt and head for the door. “I’ll be back later; don’t do anything stupid, because I won’t bail you or my father out of jail.”

  “Sassy. I like it, but I can think of something else to do with that smart mouth of yours.” When I ignore his crude remark, he coos, “Stay with me.”

  I quickly leave the room and the apartment before he can persuade me to stay. I hear him call “Tessie” as I reach the door and have to cover my mouth to hide the giggle that escapes. This is my problem: when it comes to Hardin, my brain doesn’t see the difference between right and wrong.

  chapter eleven

  TESSA

  By the time I make it to my car, I already wish I’d have stayed in the bedroom with Hardin and his playful mood.

  But I have too much to do. I have to call the woman back about th
e apartment in Seattle, get a few things for the trip with Hardin’s family, and, most importantly, clear my head about Seattle. Hardin offering me marriage nearly swayed me, but I know he won’t mean it tomorrow. I’m trying desperately not to overthink his words and let them change my mind, but it’s much harder than I expected.

  I’ll marry you if you choose me.

  I was surprised—shocked, really—when the words were spoken. He seemed so calm, his voice so neutral, as if he were announcing what we were having for dinner. I know better, though; I know he’s getting desperate. The liquor and his desperation to keep me from moving to Seattle are the only reasons behind his offer. Even so, I can’t stop replaying the words in my mind. Pathetic, I know, but if I’m being honest, that mix of hopefulness and knowing better than to feel that way is how I feel.

  By the time I get to Target, I still haven’t called Sandra (I believe that’s her name) to discuss the apartment. It looks like a nice place from the pictures on the website. Not nearly as big as our current space, but it’s good enough, and I can afford to live there on my own. It doesn’t have bookshelves for walls or the exposed-brick wall that I have grown to love so much, but it’ll do.

  I’m ready for this, for Seattle. I’m ready to take this step for my future; I’ve been waiting for this since I can remember.

  I stroll through the store, daydreaming about Seattle and my situation, and soon I find my basket full of random things, none of which I actually need for the trip. Tablets for the dishwasher, toothpaste, a new dustpan. Why am I buying this if I’m moving anyway? I put the dustpan back, along with some colorful socks I tossed in there for no apparent reason. If Hardin doesn’t come along, I’ll need to start over and buy all new dishes, all new everything. It’s a huge relief that the apartment comes furnished, since that crosses out at least a dozen things from my to-do list.

  After Target, I’m not really sure what to do with myself. I don’t want to return to the apartment with Hardin and my father, but I don’t have anywhere else to go. I’m going to be spending three days with Landon, Ken, and Karen, so I don’t want to drive to their house and bother them. I really need friends. Or one friend, at least. I could call Kimberly, but she’s probably busy planning her own move. Lucky girl. It’s Christian’s company that’s taking her to Seattle, granted, but I can tell by the way he looks at her that he’d follow her anywhere.