Time
The next thing I know is a cold, unfamiliar bed. I already feel wrong before I even open my eyes, and that feeling only increases once I do open them and stare at my surroundings. It takes longer than it should for me to recognize that this is my parents’ guest room. That doesn’t solve the problem of the bed being cold and empty aside for my own body, though.
Carrick.
I scan the room again, but it’s no use. He isn’t in here. The clock on the bedside table tells me that I’ve slept away the better part of the morning, half a day of my short vacation in Tulsa and time I could have spent fixing things with Carrick gone.
And I still don’t know where he is.
It takes so much effort that I might as well be hungover, but I finally manage to pull myself out of bed. I don’t bother changing clothes, not caring at all how I look in my t-shirt and sweatpants. I just make my way to the door and walk up the stairs, hoping to find Carrick somewhere in the house.
As soon as I hit the landing halfway to the second floor, I hear voices, and I follow them into the kitchen. Carrick is sitting at the table with my mom, each of them clutching mugs that I’m sure contain hot cocoa. The bag of mini marshmallows next to them is a dead giveaway, but so is the fact that my mom was famous around Tulsa for her hot cocoa before her sons ever dreamed of being famous themselves. She made it for every church get together once the weather turned cold, and she’d even peddle it in Styrofoam cups right along with our CDs when we played those early concerts. The only thing surprising about the picture in front of me is that both she and Carrick appear happy.
That happiness fades from Carrick’s face as soon as he sees me standing in the doorway. Of course, that causes Mom to look my way, too, but she’s oblivious to the tension. At least, she’s oblivious to the cause of it, which is good enough for me.
“Oh, Zac,” she says. “You slept in, didn’t you? Well, there are plenty of leftovers, and if you’re really lucky, I might whip up something else for dinner, but you’re not getting anything out of me before then unless it’s a cup of cocoa.”
“You know I couldn’t come here and not have a cup,” I say, surprising myself with how nonchalant, even happy, I sound.
It seems to fool Mom, too, and soon she’s dashing around the room whipping up her award winning recipe. With her back to us, I mouth the words we need to talk to Carrick. I know he understands them, but he shakes his head.
When I try to ask him why, he ignores me completely, and I decide it’s best just to drop the subject. I don’t intend for it to stay dropped for long, but the entire Hanson clan seems to have other plans. Throughout the day, nearly all of them—with the notable exception being Taylor—drop by to hang out and mooch off the considerable leftovers. What all that company means is that Carrick and I barely have a moment alone for the rest of the day, so even if he did want to talk to me, it would still be impossible. He’s made it pretty clear, though, that he has nothing at all to say to me.
His silence stays for the rest of the day, even after we’re both tucked into the bed that I’m still amazed my parents are fine with us sharing. Carrick’s back is to me and my eyes are on the ceiling, trying to figure out how to begin this conversation before he falls asleep. He may be asleep already, or he may just be pretending in order to ignore me further. Either way, I’ve got to take a chance.
“Carrick,” I say softly but firmly. “We have to talk about yesterday. We can’t just ignore it.”
“I really think it would be better if we did.”
“I thought I was usually the one who ignored my problems and ran from them,” I remark.
“I’m not running from them,” he says. “I’m just trying not to think about something that is likely to make me sick if I spend more than a few seconds reliving it.”
“You didn’t have to do it.”
“Neither did you,” he replies, his voice almost inaudible.
“I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe I did. Maybe there isn’t a difference between what I want to do and what I need to do, what I have to do. I don’t know anymore. I just know that I can’t… I can’t let myself give in anymore.”
“But you do,” he shoots back, rolling over to mirror my position, eyes in the ceiling. “Every time, you give in again, and every time you regret it. When will it stop? Will it stop?”
That’s the question, isn’t it? Carrick knows I don’t have a good answer. I can’t predict the future. It isn’t fair of him to ask me questions like that, and surely somewhere deep down inside he realizes that. He’s a smart guy, after all. Smart enough to know that he’s putting up with far more of my crap than he ought to. I think I’m finally witnessing him realizing that.
“I don’t know,” I finally admit softly, so softly that I wonder if Carrick even hears it at all.
He simply rolls over and goes back to sleep. That’s the end of the conversation, but I hope, not the end of us.
The next day begins exactly the same way, with an empty bed and a quiet, distant Carrick. Our Tulsa vacation is over now, and we’re left going through the motions of packing and flying back to California. All the work involved in that, work that we’re both all too familiar with, keeps us too busy to have any sort of real and meaningful conversation, and I have a feeling Carrick likes it that way. I’m not sure why I want to talk so much, when I know whatever conversation we have couldn’t possibly end well. Everything, until this trip, has been going so well that I guess I just still feel so hopeful that it just has to all work out somehow.
But it doesn’t. At least not right now. Right now, we’re just two people existing in the same space the way that Kate and I were for so long before we finally realized it was over. As soon as that comparison comes to mind, I hate myself for it. It’s not the same. We’re not the same. Carrick and I aren’t almost over.
Are we?
It’s a question I don’t want to think too hard about right now, and so I throw myself even more into the process of getting ready for our flight. There are bags to pack, all sorts of family to say goodbye to—but not Taylor, of course—and then all the security and red tape at the airport.
Carrick buys a thick paperback at the airport’s gift store, and I know that’s a big hint. He really doesn’t want to talk to me at all. Sure, he’s a big reader, and so am I. It’s not unusual to see either of us reading during a flight, but I know on this particular occasion he’s sending me a message. If we didn’t have to sit right next to each other, I don’t think anyone would even realize we’re here together.
I hate this. I really, really hate this.
What can I do, though? I can’t force him to talk to me. Sure, I could keep bugging him until he gives in and has another pointless conversation that won’t fix anything. I know that’s all that will happen. It’s obvious that Carrick won’t let any more than that happen, and since my answers to him won’t ever change, neither will the conversation.
And so all I can do is wait. Wait for one four hour flight to end, and then wait the rest of my life.
Surprisingly, the flight seems to take no time at all. Somewhere over Colorado, I fell asleep. It’s a well-known fact that I can sleep through anything, even my entire world crashing down around me. It’s just exhaustion, I suppose. I’m not calm and relaxed; I’m just too damn tired of everything, too emotionally exhausted to go on.
I could say it’s a good thing that the flight didn’t take long, but now Carrick and I are at an impasse again. My truck is parked at the airport and I know that if the weekend had gone fine, he would be riding home with me and most likely spending the night in my apartment. But now, I can’t even be sure he wants to spend another five minutes with me.
“Hey,” I say as we pick up our suitcases like strangers. “Do you think… I mean, it would be stupid for you to call a cab…”
“Yeah, I guess it would be,” he replies listlessly. “Let’s not draw this out. You can give me a ride back to my house. Not to yours.”
It’s a better response than I expected, so I nod. I can’t quite bring myself to smile, though. Still… he isn’t totally refusing to be around me. Somehow, this feels like a victory.
I lead the way outside to my truck and take the initiative to load Carrick’s bags into the back for him. He doesn’t roll his eyes at my attempt to be chivalrous, but I’m sure he feels like doing it. I’d roll my eyes if I were him. Stupid little niceties can’t fix what I’ve done to him, no matter how many of them I manage to throw his way. But in spite of how hard Carrick has been trying to ignore me, he isn’t mean enough to point out all of my flaws, and so he lets me open the door for him, too, and sits quietly in the truck while I drive toward his house.
It’s a long, frustrating drive from LAX to Silver Lake, and Carrick is completely silent for all of it. I turn the radio on just to drown out that awful silence, but it does nothing to actually calm my mind. Of course it doesn’t. Nothing but talking to Carrick—which still seems impossible even though he’s only two feet away—will fix anything.
When we finally arrive at his house, I pull into the driveway and put my truck in park, halfway expecting Carrick to just hop out, grab his bags and run off. But he doesn’t. He just sits there, staring out the windshield with his brow slightly furrowed. I have no clue what he’s thinking, but I can guess the general subject.
“Carrick… I don’t know what to say right now…”
“No,” he replies. “I suppose you don’t. I don’t either. If anyone did know what to say in a situation like ours, I think I’d be seriously worried about their sanity.”
“Yeah, well…” I reply, chuckling nervously. “I can say I didn’t mean for this to happen, and you know that. I can say it won’t happen again, but it might. I can say I know how awful he is for me and how wonderful you are and how much I love you… and all of that is true. You know all of that already. What I can’t do is go back in time and undo Thursday night. And right now, that’s all I want to do.”
Carrick shakes his head. “But still, all you have is words. There are no actions. None that you can really take, anyway. And until there are… and god knows what they could even be… I don’t know what we can do. I don’t know what we can be, Zac.”
“You mean… like, us together?”
“Yeah,” he replies. “I mean, I’m not breaking up with you. I don’t think… well, I don’t know what that would solve. I just need some time to think, and I know that is the lamest thing I could possibly say. But it’s the truth. I just need time.”
“I can give you time,” I say, not even stopping to think before the words come out.
It doesn’t mean they aren’t true, though. If time is what he needs, I’ll give it to him. I can give him anything, it seems, except fidelity and trustworthiness. And I suppose those are what matter the most.