Inked Armour

After I left Frank’s office, I went to my parents’ house. Despite my daily visits, I hadn’t accomplished much in the way of cleaning out my childhood home. Sadness overshadowed the warmth of the familiar surroundings. Being in the house without my family hurt; it had become a mausoleum instead of a home.

I wandered through the house, lingering over familiar treasures, boxing up things I felt compelled to take with me. I could almost see my parents in the living room, cuddled up on the couch watching TV. I missed my father’s dry sense of humor and my mother’s warmth. I missed summer di

Yet I realized that even if I could have it all back, it would never be the same. I was a different person now. I could no longer live in the protective cocoon of my previous existence; I had seen too much. The trauma had triggered my metamorphosis.

I stopped in the doorway to my bedroom. The black comforter went perfectly with the band posters and the framed prints of Escher and Dalí. My parents had always allowed me creative freedom. Maybe they’d believed it would be enough of an outlet for my rebellious tendencies, but it hadn’t been. My mom had argued with me over the piercings as they traveled up the shell of my ear. When I brought up the possibility of a tattoo, I got a lecture on the type of image I should want to project.

When Co

I had always straddled the line; many of my interests were unacceptable in my social sphere. So I fostered them through the subjects I chose to study.

Until Hayden.

I crossed the room and ran my fingers over the bedspread. What would Hayden have thought of my teenage bedroom? What would my parents have thought of him? Would they have been able to see past the unconventional exterior? I wanted to believe they could.

They might have seen him as a passing phase, something to try out and eventually move on from. Maybe before the crash I would have regarded Hayden as an experiment in deviance, but I doubted it. I would still have been drawn to him. But I wouldn’t have had the courage to act on that attraction. His allure would have been overshadowed by my desire to fit into an impossible mold. My loss had made him accessible in a way he wouldn’t otherwise have been. Hayden understood my impulse for difference.

His quiet, unassuming intelligence and his unique perception of the world kept me intrigued. Beyond that, our physical co

I missed our physical co

Moving around my old bedroom, I peeled the posters off the wall and rolled them up, threw some knickknacks I couldn’t leave behind in a box, then went downstairs to lock up. The next time I came to Arden Hills, it would be after I’d decided what to do with the house. With every additional piece of my past I released, I felt more capable of embracing my future.

Driving away, I resolved to do the one thing I’d avoided since my return. I stopped at a greenhouse and picked up poinsettias. They wouldn’t last long in this weather, but I wanted to leave something beautiful behind. As I pulled into Hillside Cemetery, I felt a pang of guilt for not having done this sooner. The memorial service had been horrible, not healing, which contributed to my avoiding the cemetery.

Trying to understand why the crash had taken so much from me was pointless. I’d internalized that pain, allowing it to take over my life, but I couldn’t anymore. Not if I wanted to go back to Chicago, to Hayden. It had taken returning to Arden Hills for me to finally realize that the tragedy wasn’t a punishment for my transgressions.

At the cemetery, I visited everyone: the friends I’d lost, Co

Co

He’d been stolen from life so early. I traced his name on the stone, followed by his dates of birth and death. He was a constant in my life; I’d grown up with him. The summer before I started college, things had changed between us. He looked at me differently. Treated me differently.

Dating had been a natural progression. In the begi

In the cold, quiet of the cemetery I mourned my old life, finally allowing myself to grieve Co

2

HAYDEN

A few days, a week, just a little longer. Everyone told me she needed time. Her silence told me she needed time.

Fuck time.

Time went on and on. An endless cycle of sleep, wake, bear the agony, and repeat. I fucking hated time.

Tenley had been gone for three weeks. Every day without her was sensory deprivation, drawn out and torturous from begi

Memories of her were everywhere: home, work, Serendipity. I couldn’t escape. So at least I understood why she came to Chicago in the first place: to get away from the ceaseless reminders. I couldn’t figure out what had compelled her to go back, though. She could run from me all she wanted, but returning to the place she’d fled from didn’t make much sense. Unless she was looking to shackle herself to the guilt again. It was easy to deny the possibility of a future when she let the past drag her down. I knew. I’d done that for years until Tenley came along.

There was a soft knock on the door to the tattoo room. Lisa was checking up on me again.

Inked Armor was closed, but for the past three weeks I’d spent most of my free time at the shop or Tenley’s empty apartment. Being alone in my condo was unbearable. At least in the shop I could pretend things weren’t so shitty. Hints of her presence still lurked like shadows, but not in the same way as at her apartment or my condo. It was depressing as hell. Regardless, I went to her apartment every day, if only to briefly check on her things. On the worst days, I stayed for hours and steeped myself in the pain of being there without her.

Lisa poked her head in the door. “Hey, I tried to call you.”

“Sorry, my phone must be off.”

I picked up a deep red pen and filled in some color on my sketch. It wasn’t the right shade. The design ruined, I filed it in the folder along with the others and grabbed another sheet of paper.