A Mess of Reason (30 page)

“I need you to stop giving a fuck and start
giving a damn. Now…now, Tess!” I slam my fist against the door,
quickly regretting it.

“I’m in the middle of something
important.”

“Really, in the bathroom? World leaders
summit? Fluffing your shower cap? Hiding bodies? You and I have not
seen each other in weeks—four, almost—a month, and you can’t open
the bathroom door to see my face. I need to see your eyes for what
I have to say.”

Women are good at the silent treatment. I
think it’s a pre-packaged deal. It goes something like this: Oh,
hey look, you’re the XX chromosome. You come with the following
list of ingredients: blah, blah, blah.

“I miss you, Tess. And I’m not gonna get
over you…not ever. But I am gonna get in you, and under you and on
top of you… You want that, don’t you? Please fucking say yes.”

I hear her moving around, the sound of
slippers dragging along the ceramic tile floor, until her body hits
the door as she slumps down to sit. I’m guessing we’re perfectly
aligned back to back. I can feel her, so close to me now.

“Are you willing to leave me starving for
you? I could exist only on the air that comes from you. I could do
that, you know.”

Minutes go by. The silence kills me.

“I’ve made a lot of promises to you. I
intend to keep all of them. Every last one.”

“Now you’re lying,” she says with a furious
groan.

Finally. Phones connected…
and
we’ve
got a dial tone.

“Is this where you want to jump in, Tess?
Right here? Fine. What am I lying about, exactly?”

“The promises—damn you!” I hear her nails
tapping on the floor and I’m just going to take a wild guess that
she’s also twirling a chunk of hair around one finger right about
now.

“Why can’t you forgive me for whatever you
think
I did…and please, what did I do, exactly, that’s got
you so damn mad? So mad you were willing to walk away—walk away
from us, Tess?”

I’m pretty sure she has it all wrong in that
stubborn head of hers, but I need to hear her put it together. I’m
willing to help, but an olive branch from her side would be nice. I
need to see her fight for us; I need to know she has it in her.

“It was our secret.”

“It still is.” She has turned this thing
inside out and has added a few gnarly knots into it for good
measure. She’s on the driveway that will never reach a road. Poor
girl.

“Liar!” She slams her body against the door.
Oh, she’s bringing it now. Coming at me all fire and brimstone.

“Nope. Not me. I’m not a liar…but you are.”
This might hurt a little.

“What? Fuck you!”

“No, but you can fuck yourself. I know
Roxanne knows. And I said nothing to her, so that leaves you.
Liar
.”

“I had no choice. I had to talk to someone.
You abandoned me.” I hear her get up and start slamming things
around. She’s riled now.

“Are you fucking kidding me, woman?
Abandoned you! You all but told me to get lost. I was just obeying
marching orders!”

“I know what you did!” She has me nearly
hung and she’s all wrong about the verdict.

“And what is that, exactly?”

“You told Striker. You showed him pictures.
You…talked about re-skinning and re-wrapping and new cans, and
you—you said…”

Now we’ve entered the next phase. The full
on sob-a-thon. I hate to feel guilty right now, but I kind of do. I
could make this whole thing end right now, but I have a plan, and I
need to follow it through. If it weren’t such a life-changing plan,
I’d take a U-turn and stop the car crash we’re just heading into.
But I can’t: the brakes are off. She’ll be thanking me later in all
kinds of ways. Trust me. It’ll be the best story of her life. Mine
too.

“Yes. I did tell Striker. I wanted it to be
surprise. You must have overheard us.”

“I am not some…some
thing
. I am a
person and I am beautiful inside, even—even if…if my skin
isn’t…perfect. I know this now!”

“I’ve known it all along. Not sure what took
you so long. I’ve never asked for perfect. I love everything about
you…I’d never ask you to change.”

“Oh, right! You’d just barge in and take
over. You shouldn’t have told him. You’re such an ass. How could
you do that to me!”

“I needed his help. Big changes are never
easy, Tess.”

“I’m not yours to fix. And anyway, it’s done
with. I’m finished with this conversation. No need for you to
meddle anymore. I took care of everything myself.”

“Please don’t tell me that, Tess. Please
open the door and let me see you. Let me touch you…. We can end
this argument right now for good.”

“You don’t deserve me.”

“Maybe I don’t, but that’s not gonna to stop
me from wanting you and from making you mine.”

“I’m so mad at you. Why didn’t you just tell
me to my face? Why go behind my back? That was my business, not
yours. You’ve crossed a line with me, Scout…how can I ever trust
you again?”

“You come out here, and I’ll prove it to
you. I promise, Tess, you can trust me. I was trying to do the
right thing for you. You just chose to believe I was doing
something else.”

“Oh please, I heard every word, okay. Do the
right thing? What is wrong with you! You’re sick…I mean, sick-sick.
You can’t even begin to understand how much it hurt me to hear you
say those things.”

Shit almighty, she is pissed with a capital
P! I mean, slamming her hands against the door, spitting at me like
a wildcat caught in a trap. Too bad it’s a trap she invented, then
stepped in.

“How are you going to feel when you see my
face, when you see me naked again after saying those words? How?
Because I know how I’m going to feel!”

“I’m going to feel love when I see your
face, even though you’re madder than a nest of hornets on fire. Let
me take you out in my truck and show you how I’m going to
feel…”

“Not a chance. You want sex?
Ha!
You’re practically outside of my species right now. Not
happening!”

I brought my tool bag in with me this time.
Mama didn’t raise no dummy.

“So are you going to sit in there the rest
of the night, with me out here?”

“I don’t know what I’m gonna to do right…oh
fuck. Bleeeecchhhh…” She’s scrambling, then retching.
Hangover-style retching. The kind where your grip on the seat is
the only thing from keeping your head from falling into the soup.
You know that kind, right?

“Hey, baby…are you okay? Are you throwing
up?”

“Yeah, you are making me sick. You see, this
is what’s happening to me…”

Did I say
pissed?

“You open that door now.”

“I can’t.”

“Because you’re sick or because you can’t
see me?”

“
Yes!
”

“Fine.” Twice now I’ve removed doors to get
to her. Twice.

I start on the top right side. It’s easy,
just a little bit of jimmying…and pop.

“Scout. Stop…don’t come in here.” Her hands
are against the door, and please forgive me, but I am chuckling.
You ever see a little mouse holding a door closed with a buffalo on
the other side? Me neither.

“I’m coming in, and then you’re coming with
me. I don’t care if I have to throw you over my shoulder and carry
your skinny ass kickin’ and screamin’. I love you that much. I do,
though, wonder how much you love me, Tess.”

Time to rip the Band-Aid off. Enough
suffering. It was fun for a little while—as fun as the doc fondling
my nuts, asking me to cough—but it’s showtime. She’s on the
opposite wall, back to me (no shit, right?), hanging onto the towel
bar like she’s on a palm tree in a tsunami. I kid you not. Cutest
damn thing ever. She has on her penguin pajama pants, bunny
slippers, and a sweatshirt big enough for a family of six to live
in. I want to bury my face in her mop of long, blond, loose curls,
but that’ll have to wait until later.

I pick her up and toss her over my shoulder,
forgetting for a sec how sore my body still is. Thank God she
weighs as much as a sack of potatoes. She’s kicking, smacking my
ass, my back…beating the living daylights out me. This is the kind
of vigor I want later. Trust me, she’ll be doing that.

For winter, it’s a warm day; we get these
now and again. No snow on the ground, sun blazin’ like it’s
summer…I’d put it around mid-sixties. It’s late afternoon, and the
sky is on the verge of wanting to change, but still holding onto
that little edge of blue before she rides straight into the
watercolor pinks and plums that drape over the mountains like
velvet. I climb into my truck with Tess clinging to my shoulder.
She falls off of me onto the seat once we’re both in and scrambles
to the passenger side of the truck as if I’m some kind of creep
who’s just picked her up off the highway. Sorry, but I’m smiling.
It’s funny—to me, anyways.

We head over to my ranch and cross the river
that takes us onto the back forty. Back forty-five-hundred, but
who’s counting. This part of my land is sacred to me…well, to both
me and Tess, really. I bought it years ago once my music started
hanging out in the single digits on the
Billboard
charts.
When Tess and I were sixteen, we used to sneak our motorcycles out
here and fly like two bats out of hell across this land. Most guys
I know wouldn’t do the shit on a bike she would, but remember, Tess
rode bulls. A motorcycle’s got nothing on a bull. Believe me.

“Where the fuck are you taking me?” Ah, that
mouth. I’ve missed it. She’s always had it. “Sass” fits her
perfectly in every way, shape, and form.

“Just settle down. You’ll see soon enough.
Why don’t come over here by me?” I tickle her waist and she slaps
my hand.

“Because you’ve kidnapped me against my will
and you’ve been an asshole. You haven’t even apologized.”

“Believe me, sweetheart, you’ll be the one
apologizing. And you seemed to like it last time I kidnapped
you.”

Her back is to me with her face buried
against the window.

“You weren’t a jerk back then. Funny thing
is…now I know why you needed to see me naked—so you could fuck me!
Well, you fucked me, all right. You talked a big game, all hearts
and flowers. Weren’t you getting enough ass everywhere else? Did
you need me, too? Need to mess with me so you could go tell Striker
all about it?”

Lip can go only so far with me. I slam on
the brakes and throw my truck into park. I grab her arm, drag her
to me, and pin her down on the seat, because she’s too wild and
fired up for anything else. She needs this as much as do; more,
even. Her eyes are crazed and her lips are trembling, her mouth
pinned shut as though her jaws are wired. She tries to look away
but I have her chin in a grip and my eyes claim her with lock-on
mode. I’m having intercourse with her right now, like it or not,
even if it is only with my eyes.

“I’m going to prove to you today how very
much I love you, Tess Harlow. Now give me some fucking credit and
the goddamned chance to do just that! Now would be a good fucking
time to stop ripping into me, because you’re gonna hate all the
regret in your gut later on. Got it, sweetheart?”

I don’t even try to kiss her—I’m pretty sure
she’d bite my tongue off and I’d be like that Bobbitt fellow from a
few years back that got his Johnson nipped off. She says nothing
once I let her up. For once, it thrills me.

Finally we get to the barn. This gem has
been here for two hundred years or so, and looks like it from the
outside. It holds more than memories to me: it holds promises and
my future. The one kiss I got from Tess after the eighth grade was
out here when we were sixteen, riding our cycles. I’d thought maybe
it was going to be more than a kiss. It would have been for me but
she stopped us cold as my hands were headed north under her
shirt.

I’ve recently turned it into an amazing
place, just keeping the exterior shell of it here for memory’s
sake. The inside, though, has been beautifully finished off. The
original hayloft, where we kissed, is finished out as fantasy
bedroom of sorts. You see where I’m going here? I write and sing
music for a living, remember…the story part of it just comes
naturally to me.

When we pull up, Tess looks like she’s seen
an alien spaceship. I’ve not said one word to her about this place
since she’s moved here. I’ve known all along it would be a
surprise, just not quite as big a surprise as it has turned out to
be.

“Remember this old place?” I ask as I open
my side of the truck, then drag her across the seat to me. She
looks at my face and winces, but comes willingly. I think for the
first time she realizes how banged up I look, rough around the
edges from the accident.

“Yeah…our kissing barn,” she says as she
looks past me, taking in what a beautiful place it really is.

“I wondered if you’d remember that,” I tell
her as I lift her out of the truck, setting her on the ground and
then taking her hand in mine. For the first time, she doesn’t pull
away.

“I want to show you something, baby.”

She looks terrified, I probably do too.
Inside, I’m all fireworks. I’ve waited forever for this day. I want
to press pause on life and keep us in this time capsule so that I
have the chance to memorize every millisecond of it in slow motion.
The huge barn doors start going up after I click the remote. The
rumbling sound making my knees shake like I’m sixteen again.

Then Tess sees her: Gypsy Girl. I wish I had
words to describe the feelings running through me. The look on her
face, tears streaming down both of our cheeks, the vibe between us
as we stand together looking at her old motorcycle with a new
gorgeous bohemian skin—sacred.

“I promised you, I don’t break my promises,”
I tell her as I take her hands in mine. We’re a collective mess of
love. If we so much as move a step, we’ll surely both slip in the
sea of gush and gooiness going on between us.