Point of Retreat

front light on and the door unlocked, in case she changes her mind and wants to talk. I also decide to sleep on the couch instead of in my bedroom. If she knocks, I want to be able to hear it. I lay there for about half an hour, cussing myself. I can’t believe this is happening right now. This isn't how I'd envisioned falling asleep tonight at all. I blame the damn basagna.
     
    I jerk up when the front door opens and she walks in. She doesn’t look at me as she continues across the living room. She stops at the bookshelf and reaches her hand inside the vase and pulls out a star, then turns and walks back to the front door.
     
    “Lake, wait,” I plead. She slams the door behind her. I get off the couch and run outside after her. “Please, just let me come over. Let me explain everything.” We make our way across the street again. She keeps walking until she gets to her front door, then turns to face me.
     
    “How are you going to explain it?” she says. Her cheeks are streaked with mascara. She’s heartbroken, and it’s all my fault. “The one girl you’ve had sex with has been sitting in class with you every day for over two weeks! Why haven’t you explained that ? And the very night I’m about to leave with you…to make love to you… I find you in your bedroom with her? And you’rekissing her on the freaking forehead !”
     
    She starts crying again so I hug her. I have to; I can’t watch her cry and not hug her. She doesn’t hug me back, though. She pulls away from me and looks up at me with pain in her eyes.
     
    “That’s the one kiss of yours that I love the most, and you gave it to her,” she says quietly. “You took that from me, and you gave it to her !” she yells. “Thank you for allowing me to see the real you before making the biggest mistake of my life !”
     
    She slams the door in my face, then opens it again.
     
    “And where the hell is my brother!?”
     
    “In Detroit,” I whisper. “He’ll be back Monday.”
     
    She slams the door in my face again.
     
    I turn around to head back to my house when Sherry appears out of nowhere. “Is everything okay? I heard Layken yelling.”
     
    I walk past her without responding. When I get to my house, I slam my own door. I don’t slam it hard enough, so I open it and slam it again. I do this two or three more times until I realize I’ll just have to pay for it when it breaks. Instead, I shut the door and punch it. I am an asshole. I’m an asshole, a jerk, a bastard, a dickhead…I give up and throw myself on the couch.
     
    When she cries, it breaks my heart. I hate seeing her sad. But the fact that her tears are because of me now? That my own actions are responsible for her heart breaking? That’s a whole new emotion I’ve never experienced before. One I don’t know how to deal with. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what I can say to her. If she would just let me explain. But that wouldn’t even help at this point. She’s right. She didn’t accuse me of anything I didn’t actually do. God, I need my dad right now. I need his advice so bad.
     
    Advice! I go to the vase and pull out one of the stars. I sit down on the couch and unfold it and read the words hand written across it.
     
    “ S ometimes two people have to fall apart, to realize how much they need to fall back together. ”
     
    ~Author Unknown
     
     
     
    I fold the star back up and place it back inside the vase on the very top. I’m hoping Lake picks this one next.
     

 
     
     
     
     
    Saturday, January 21 st , 2012
     
    FML.
     

 
    Chapter Seven
     
    I didn’t get any sleep at all last night. Every single noise I heard would bolt me right off the couch in hopes that it was Lake. It never was.
     
     
     
    I put on a pot of coffee and walk to the window. Her house is quiet-the shades are all drawn. Her car is still in the driveway, so I know she’s home. I’m so used to seeing the gnomes line the driveway next to her car. They aren’t there anymore, though. After her mother died, Lake gathered all the gnomes and threw them in the trash. She doesn’t know it, but I dug one out and kept it. The one with the broken red hat.
     
    I remember walking out of my house the morning after they moved here and seeing her dart out the front door with no jacket…in house shoes. I knew as soon as those shoes hit the pavement, she was going to bust her butt. Sure enough, she did. I couldn’t help but laugh. Southerners seem to underestimate