Chasing the Tide
Page 7

“Where am I going?” I asked Julie after she pulled away from the house I had lived in for only three months.
“I’ve found you another family. A great one. They have a girl a few years older than you. Her name is Chelsea.”
“I’m seven. So is she nine?” I asked her, wondering about Chelsea.
“No, she’s eleven. She goes to the middle school. But they seem like really nice people. So let’s not put glue in the beds or rip up their flowers. And don’t dump out the food on the floors and remember, if you have to go to the bathroom, you need to use the toilet,” Julie said, sounding like my teacher at school.
I tucked my face into Clive’s soft fur. I hated that she brought up the bathroom. Sometimes when I got really upset I would pee in the corner of my bedroom. Mrs. Evans would yell at me when she found out. And then I’d pee again.
“Okay,” I said quietly.
Julie stopped the car a while later and opened the door for me to get out. She put her hand on my shoulder, squeezing it. I stared up at the house. It was so pretty. With red shutters and a big porch.
I wanted to live there forever.
I hoped this family loved me.
Two months later I was back in Julie’s car driving to a new house with a new family.
**
The house was the same.
I hadn’t really expected it to change. Flynn wasn’t the sort of guy to alter anything. He needed consistency and routine.
I took my time driving down the gravel path, wanting to prolong and savor the moment I had built up in my head.
I had just seen Flynn two weeks ago.
I had been shocked as hell when he agreed to come to my graduation. I hadn’t expected him to. While I knew he was happy for me in his Flynn way, the effort it took him to travel to new places and to sit in a crowd of people would be hard for him.
“You don’t have to come,” I had told him as we neared the end of our brief phone conversation a month before my graduation date.
“Do you want me to come?” he had asked flatly.
I hadn’t said anything right away because I wasn’t entirely sure what to say. If I said yes, he would come. He would do anything I wanted him to, even if it made him uncomfortable. And he would be uncomfortable. And I’d spend the entire time worrying about him.
I knew I shouldn’t push him. That I needed to convince him that it was okay if he wasn’t there. That I’d be back in Wellston in just a couple of months. That I never wanted him to feel anxious or awkward.
But this was a big deal. This was a penultimate moment in my life and I knew I wouldn’t be completely happy unless the person I loved the most was there to share it with me.
I loved him. Beyond measure. Beyond reason. But this was a major difficulty in our relationship that had yet to properly deal with. Those times when Flynn’s inability to do what I needed him to do became a source of resentment that I just couldn’t get rid of.
We were faced with the constant struggles of loving each other. Flynn with his disability and me with my instinctual urge to self-sabotage and push everyone away.
“Of course I want you there. But if it’s too much for you, I’d understand,” I had told him.
“If you want me to come, I’ll be come. It will take me six hours and twenty-four minutes to drive there. I can stop every hour and a half to stretch my legs. I will pack a lunch so I can eat it on the way.” I felt the relief when he agreed. I had been scared that he would deny me, as he had denied me when I had asked him to come with me when I left three years before.
“What about Murphy?” I asked him, knowing he wouldn’t be able to bring the large, slobbering dog with him.
“Imogen can keep him for me,” he had said without hesitation. His mention of a woman I had never heard of before ignited a burning flame of jealousy in my gut.
“Imogen? Who’s Imogen?” I had found myself asking, hating the sound of my suspicion. When had he ever given me reason to distrust him? When would my subconscious stop trying to find ways to ruin what we had?
I had never wondered about Flynn’s fidelity, despite the hundreds of miles that had separated us. I had never questioned his love or devotion. Nor had he ever any reason to question mine. Not that it was in his nature to ever doubt me.
But I couldn’t help the ugly demons inside me that reared their heads. The voice that tore away at my confidence and feelings of self-worth, wanting to destroy everything. It was the voice of every foster family that hadn’t wanted me. It was the voice of every guy I had slept with and had thrown me away afterwards.
It was the voice of a father that was never there and a mother who walked away.
He will never really love you. He sees you for what you are. Unlovable.
“I work with her. She’s a professor at the college. She teaches Art Theory. She hired me,” he explained as though I should know this.
“Oh. Do you spend a lot of time with her?” I asked, not even trying to mask my green-eyed monster.
“Why do you sound like that? I can’t see your face, Ellie. I don’t know what’s wrong,” Flynn said, his voice still bland but the volume rising slightly.
I had come to learn that honesty was the only way we could be together. Flynn didn’t know how to be anything else and I was learning my truthfulness was how Flynn could learn to react appropriately.
“I’m jealous, Flynn. I don’t like hearing about you being with other women. I know it’s stupid. But I can’t help it. It’s how I feel,” I told him simply, trying like hell not to feel like an idiot. I was still not used to being open and vulnerable with anyone.