I'll Be Here

was stupid.  I take Spanish.
    The car slows to a stop at the light bracing Howard Avenue against Collins Drive.  Our bodies sway forward and then settle back into the bucket seats of the black Beemer Dustin’s dad bought him for his eighteenth birthday.  It was supposed to be an upgrade from the used Land Cruiser he’d gotten for his sixteenth birthday.  My parents consider my six year old silver Honda an upgrade from riding the bus.
    The Beemer still smacks of newness—all leather and fresh carpet chemical smell.  He’s particular with the car in the extreme.  No food allowed.  Ever. 
    Dustin’s right hand slides down the side of the steering wheel.  The low-timbre hip hop that Dustin favors ensnares the quiet and shoves it out the exhaust pipe.
    There’s a faint pink ribbon of light edging the building darkness.  Mom’s probably going to wonder why I’m home so early.  Before I skittered out of the house and hopped into Dustin’s car nearly two hours ago I had mentioned a movie that I wanted to see.  Behind me, Dustin had grunted in typical boy fashion.  I’d assumed it was because he wasn’t in the mood for a goofy romantic comedy and I’d said something about seeing it next week or whatever. 
    Whatever. 
    That bit keeps playing back in my head and I feel a teeny bit stupider after each replay.  Like I should have known then that there is no next week for us.
    “Willow,” he says in a voice so low that I can barely hear the words over the music.  We’ve stopped at a red light.
    I turn then and when I look at his face—all eyes and mouth and faint lines spreading out in worry, I think that this whole night has been a huge mistake or a really lucid dream and I’m going to wake up and everything will be all right.  Dustin Rant cannot be breaking up with me.  He cannot be leaving me.  It cannot be true. 
    I blink.
    The moon watches patiently.
    Dustin looks ready to say something.  My heart thumps wildly in my chest and I think about reaching over to brush my fingers across the planes of his face.  My hand moves.  But the light flicks to green and just like that, the moment snaps.  Dustin’s expression changes and his forehead rumples.  He turns away and his foot descends on the clutch forcefully.  He shifts the car into first gear and we plunge down the road leaving the words behind us.
    Five turns later and we’re on my street.  The house three across and one down is having a party and the guests have eaten up all the street parking. 
    Dustin pulls into my driveway and kills the ignition.  Muffled music from the party crawls over the lawns and hedges and through the glass of the closed car windows.  I can barely make out the cheesy love anthem.  It feels like ironic mood music. 
    For a few minutes, Dustin and I just sit in the dark—each of us alone in our bodies.  I think that I should probably open the door and get out but it’s like my butt is glued to the seat.  My seatbelt is still looped across my chest.  Dustin’s gaze burns into the side of my face.  I don’t know that I am crying until I taste the saltiness of tears on my lips.
    Now his voice is a sigh.  A whisper.  “I’m sorry.  I’m so sorry.”  He repeats it again and again. 
    I’ll never understand why I have to ask but I need to know.  “Is there someone else?”
    Dustin’s breath catches.
    Minutes hang from the moon.
    I could climb up them like a ladder and bury myself in stars. 
    I let myself look into his hazel eyes and now I know the truth. 
    I know it all without the words. 
    There is someone else and he doesn’t have to say it to make it true.  There it is.  And I’m hurt and bled dry but in some ways I guess it’s better to be left for something than left for nothing. 
    “Thanks for dinner,” I say robotically as I let myself out of the car. 
    Dustin says something else but I don’t hear it.  I am already halfway to the house and my heart is in my ears.  I stumble on something but I find my balance and keep moving.  My muscles ache and my eyes sting but I just go forward because I need to. 
    This is me, Willow James, broken and crying. 
    This is me, Willow James, at the beginning. 
     

 
     
    I’ve had a perfectly wonderful evening.  But this wasn’t it.
    ~Groucho Marx

 
    CHAPTER TWO
     
    I’ve swallowed a thousand bricks.
    At least, that’s how I feel as I lean the solid weight of my head against the closed door.
    Gracelessly, I drop my purse on