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Chapter Sixteen

I t was early when I woke, the morning sun warming my face through the blinds we didn’t close, too lost in our desperation and emotions to do anything other than touch, taste and take.

I wiggled back, desperate to feel his body against my own, but was met with nothing but cold space. Rolling over I opened my eyes and found the bed was empty.

“Jacky?” I called on a stretch, wondering if maybe he had snuck off to use the bathroom but there was no answer.

Lazily, I peeled the sheets back and ducked into the ensuite, but he wasn’t there. Suddenly awake, I ducked into the room where all of his things were, the room he took while he stayed here, but it hadn’t been slept in.

A feeling of dread sent my heart rate pumping as I barrelled down the stairs and into a quiet kitchen. No sign that he had ever come back last night, even his shoes normally at the door, no longer there. Racing outside, the space where his car was parked, now lay vacant and it was with the weight of the knowledge that he truly was gone that I sank to the floor in a pool of sobs.

I knew it was coming.

I knew I was too weak to go with him and he had no choice but to leave.

Again. But why when it was my decision, my choice to stay here, did it suddenly feel so suffocating. So oppressive.

Having him here was different this time in so many wonderful ways and the thought of going back to the mundanity of life was excruciating.

Why was I like this? Why couldn’t I grab life by the handles and do what I wanted? Instead I was constantly weighed down by overthinking and paranoia. What if I knew no one other than Jack and I became a nuisance to him? What if his friends hated me, or worse, ridiculed me when he wasn’t around. What if being somewhere new felt oddly discomforting, like when you forget to wear your jewellery for a day? The ambiguity alone gave me a stomach ache.

But somehow, this was worse than all of those things. This was a full body ache which started in the centre of my chest, tiny cracks splintering across every inch of my skin.

Dragging myself from the porch after what felt like hours but was likely only a few minutes, I padded inside and headed for the stairs. Each step was laced with the sadness that came with knowing I had done this to myself.

Done this to us.

Me and my own need for control and expectedness. The comfort in knowing suddenly suffocating.

There was no cure for this kind of pain. No over the counter medication for the incorrigible emptiness his leaving had triggered.

I needed my bed.

A space where I wouldn’t need to think about how alone I suddenly felt without the chance to say goodbye.

Heading to the window to close the blinds I froze.

My name written in perfectly monochromatic script on a blank sheet of paper hung lifelessly from my typewriter. The subtle inconsistencies in the font, not from my own fingers, stared at me as I lunged for the paper.

Blood swarmed my ears as a vicious scream erupted from my throat.

Willow Bay had always been my home.

It was where I found my comfort and my predictability and gave me the space I thought I needed to be my pure self.

But it was never this place. It was him.

He was my home.

How could I have been so selfish?

Jack had spent his life doing everything within his power to support me. He protected me, fought for me and inspired me to be the best version of myself despite my idiosyncrasies which often meant he carried the load when any else was around.

And when he told me he loved me – really loved me – I didn’t even have the guts to tell him I loved him too.

I’d once again let my fear and frustrating need for normality consume me.

Was I going to stay in Willow Bay forever? Would that make me happy? To marry a local — probably someone who passed me in the corridor at school many times and never once gave me the time of day. Someone who stood beside my tormentors at one time or another. Would that be what made me feel safe?

The idea was laughable because I knew what made me feel those things and he was probably already hours away.

My parents had left me to travel the country yet I felt some insane need to remain for their return?

The epiphany bubbled out of me in self-deprecating laughter. How had I been so foolish? There was nowhere else I wanted to be but with him.

Because I loved him too.

Ripping the paper free from the platen, I grabbed a handful of fresh sheets, feeding them through before stretching my fingers. The need to organise my world tingled in the tips of my fingers as the veracious metallic cadence commenced. With each keystroke, everything I wanted to say but had been too scared to confront roared out of me.

The discordant lyrics of John Mellencamp’s, Jack and Diane, ricocheted around my mind and I started to sing aloud, my typing providing an off-beat backing track. Like a time machine through my twenty-six years, I saw Jack and I in primary school, trading our fruit after we had each eaten half of whatever our parents packed for us. At his eighth birthday party, trying desperately to get the donut tied to the clothesline without using our hands. His sticky little face covered in cinnamon as we giggled until we frustratingly gave up and shovelled the treats into our mouths.

I saw him training as often as he could, the sweat pouring off him as he ran laps, bouncing, kicking and passing a ball while I sat on the sidelines with a stopwatch in hand.

The look of pure joy on his face when his name was called, congratulating him on being signed by what was the best AFL team in Australia. A fact I didn’t realise until later that night, when I spent hours researching everything there was to know about The Sydney Hearts.

His dimples when I reached him after his very first match, still covered in that oil he smeared on those lethal arms when he played, the scratch of his stubble against my cheek when he buried his face into my neck with excitement.

All of my happiest memories involved him and I realised with sudden clarity, that was something I’d never even told him.

Staring at the three full sheets of script, I removed the papers and read them aloud.

I knew what I needed to do – the thought alone making my heart race – but I would and I could. For him.