Page 66 of Crumbling Truth
After a deep breath, he continued. “In high school, Alex started to drift, I guess. Started to resent me, or at least that’s how it felt. I was first string in soccer, older, half a foot taller already. During my senior year, I went out with a girl from his class, Michelle McNulty. He was barely speaking to me at that point, so I had no clue he was into her. If he’d told me, I never would’ve asked her out in the first place.”
“Bro code,” I said, drawing a wry smile from his lips.
“Bro code, yeah. In any case, I didn’t know, and we dated for the last six months of my senior year, but with me heading to college, we decided we weren’t going to try to stay together beyond that summer. My feelings just weren’t strong enough to try to keep it going long-distance, so I figured we’d end it on good terms. I thought she felt the same.”
I blinked in surprise. My assumption was totally wrong—I thought he’d been so in love, her death had scared him away from serious relationships.
“On the night of our prom, I invited Alex to come to the afterparty. I hoped it might bridge the gap between us before I graduated, you know? Someone’s parents owned a summer house on the lake and offered to let us use it. The cottage was out past the public beach, near the lighthouse.”
Theo rubbed his forehead with his free hand, looking like just reliving this tale was sapping his energy. I squeezed his fingers and shifted my chair so my thigh pressed tightly against his, lending him strength.
“There was a kid at the party whose brother worked at the lighthouse, giving tours or something for the Historical Society. He borrowed the keys and suggested we go see if it was really haunted. The schools do field trips there, so we’d all been inside before, but Michelle—”
When his voice broke, my heart jumped into my throat.
“I guess I was wrong that she felt the same way about breaking up. Most of the other kids were drunk and didn’t want to go up all the stairs inside, but she dragged me up to the top floor, kept talking about how romantic the view was. I should’ve put my foot down, I just didn’t think. She’d been drinking, but she wasn’t smashed or anything. When we got up there, she was all over me, trying to kiss me, begging me not to dump her.”
“Theo,” I whispered.
“I told her it was over. Fuck—I wasn’t very nice about it, but I was blindsided by her throwing herself at me like that. Alex was coming up the stairs and heard me tell her I didn’t care if she didn’t agree, we were through. He started yelling at me, telling me I didn’t deserve her, that I ruined everything.”
I closed my eyes for a beat, shaking my head. “That’s not true.”
“We’d tussled as kids, but my mom always shut it down quickly, so I didn’t expect him to start throwing punches. I took a right hook to the jaw, fell back and hit my head against the wall so hard I had a concussion. I got up and grabbed him so he couldn’t hit me again, but Michelle tried to shove past the two of us. She made it down a handful of stairs before she tripped over her dress.”
Ice filtered through my veins. “Oh, no.”
With a sharp nod, he forced himself to continue. “She went over the railing. She was dead the minute she hit the ground, right in front of a dozen of our drunk classmates.”
“Jesus, Theo. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” I said, turning in the chair to wrap my arms around him.
When he buried his face against my neck, I tangled my fingers in his hair, anchoring him against me. Though he wasn’t crying, a harsh breath shuddered from his lungs. After several long moments, he squeezed me tight and put his hands on my hips to set me back a few inches in order to finish the story.
“It was an accident. A horrific accident. It wasn’t Alex’s fault, but I just—I couldn’t look at him. And he blamed me. Rightfully so.”
“It wasn’t your fault, either.”
“He didn’t feel that way, and neither did I. I should’ve ended things the minute I realized my feelings had changed. If I’d been clear about it, she wouldn’t have tried to change my mind. We never would’ve gone up there.”
“You can’t know that for sure,” I said firmly, but he shook his head.
“Even when the paramedics forced me into the ambulance, Alex was screaming at me that I always ruined everything for him.”
I scowled, forcing his face up toward mine. “It was an accident.”
“Yeah.” He drew a breath. “You know what it’s like, hearing the whispers, seeing the looks people give you. Nobody was up there with us, so you can imagine what the rumors said. He pushed her to get back at me, I pushed her because she was cheating on me with him, we made a blood pact not to let a girl get between us and both pushed her.”
“Jesus, what is wrong with people?”
“I was supposed to start college here, but I couldn’t bear to be so close. I applied down at UNC and left that summer.”
My heart shattered for him. The soccer star, the eldest son of a local legend like Anita Vasquez-Silver, exiled himself because of a freak accident that cost a young girl her life. It was no wonder people didn’t talk about it in any detail—none of them even knew the real story.
This wasn’t juicy small town gossip, though. This was a true tragedy.
“I’m sorry, Theo.” The words were weak and insignificant, but they were all I had. “I shouldn’t have asked.”
Theo pulled me down onto his lap, pressing his face to the top of my head. “You deserved the truth. I’m sorry I didn’t give it sooner.”
