Ivy

I’m walking back from my car where I’d left one of my textbooks, when my phone chimes. It’s a text from Jon. He wants to talk.

I say a little prayer. Please let it be good.

Stepping off to the side to let a group of students pass me on the sidewalk, I text him back. When?

It takes, like, a second for him to reply. ASAP.

How about now? Do you want to call me?

I’m coming over. U home?

I glance over at the dorm. I will be in a minute.

K. See u in 5.

I blow out a long breath to calm my erratic heartbeat.

Does he want to talk about why he left?

I can’t tell if he’s still angry. I hope this means he’s not. I really miss him. Then I think about how he rode back with Tina. He’s not going to tell me that he’s breaking things off with me and getting back together with her, is he?

I read through his texts again, trying to decipher what he’s thinking, so my head is down, when another group of students passes.

“Keep going without me,” says a male voice to my right. “There’s someone I want to talk to. I’ll catch up with you guys later.”

That voice. It’s…familiar. Too familiar. I raise my head, look over, and my blood runs cold.

There, just a few feet away from me, is Aaron Marquette, Chase’s younger brother, the guy who’s been making my life a living hell.

“Hello, Ivy.”

How is this even happening?

“Aaron.” I can barely hear my voice over the roaring in my ears. It’s tentative, like a question. As if I’m not sure it’s really him.

He laughs. “Surprised?”

I take a step backward, but there’s nowhere to run. No White House bathroom to hide in. He’s already seen me.

Security. Call campus security. Oh God, what the hell was the officer’s name, anyway?

I don’t want to talk to Aaron or hear anything he has to say. His taunts. His lies. It’s bad enough reading the stuff online.

My conversations with Dr. Mehta echo in my head. There could be an element of truth to some of what Aaron is saying, which causes me to make assumptions that he’s right about all of it.

Logically, I know this, but what if he is right? What if I did kill Chase? What if I did do it on purpose?

“What are you doing here,” I ask, trying to make my voice sound stronger than I feel. The back of my neck aches and my temples start to pound.

He rubs his thick beard as his gaze rakes over me, assessing every inch and making me feel dirty. “They want me to play baseball here, so I’m practicing with the team. Won’t that be great?” His smile is cold.

So it is true. My perfect little world at the school I love is coming to an end. I can’t possibly stay if Aaron’s here, too.

“You’re looking good,” he continues, nodding almost to himself.

I want to say something that cuts him to the bone, something witty and clever, but my brain pretty much isn’t working right now. “What do you want, Aaron?”

“Life without my big brother has worked out well for you. I can see you’re all broken up about losing the love of your life.”

My whole body tenses up. “Chase was never the love of my life. I know a lot of people thought he was, but he wasn’t.”

He takes a menacing step toward me. “Well, you’ve obviously moved on, haven’t you? What a fucking bitch. I don’t know what my brother ever saw in you.”

Ignoring the name-calling, I stand my ground. “So why are you here then, if you’re not getting on with your life?”

He’s either surprised by my reaction or I struck a nerve, because he hesitates for a half-second before replying. “I’m here because that’s what Chase would’ve wanted. He always dreamed of playing professional ball, so he’d have been excited for me. This is my chance, Ivy. I’m doing it for him.”

I’m suddenly more pissed off than I am afraid. So it’s okay to move on if you’re doing it for him? That’s such bullshit. I’m done having Chase’s memory haunt me. I want to live my life for me. No one else. And I’m sick to death of being scared.

“He loved you, Ivy. All he wanted was to get married and start a family with you. Or the other way around, whichever happened first.”

I open my mouth to say something, but stop. The other way around? Start a family and then get married? Why does that sound familiar?

My head is really pounding now.

“But no,” he continues. “You had to break up with him. He was crushed, Ivy. He didn’t know if he could live without you.”

Give me a break. “Couples split up every day, Aaron. It’s called dating. If he couldn’t handle it, that was his problem, not mine.”

He narrows his eyes as he assesses me. I get the sense that he wasn’t expecting me to argue with him. “You like wearing the pants in a relationship, don’t you? Chase tried to teach you that life doesn’t work that way, but you wouldn’t listen. Does your new boyfriend let you talk to him like that? Does he enjoy being pussy-whipped?”

I don’t dignify his bullshit questions with an answer.

As I look at him and listen to his words, it becomes clear to me that I’ve been giving Aaron way too much power. Maybe my mom was right on some level. It’s easy to read words on a screen and think that there’s an intelligent human being on the other end making the claims. You think, what’s wrong with me? What did I do? When the real question should be, what’s wrong with him?

It’s easy to see the messenger for who he really is. A misogynistic, egotistical bully, just like his brother.

I may not be able to make Aaron go away online, but my attitude about the power he has over me has changed. Unlike back home, I have people here who support and care about me. People who believe me. People who will protect me. I will not let him intimidate me again.

“Chase thought that if you got pregnant,” Aaron says, “you’d settle down.”

Pain spears through my temples, but I try to ignore it. “As in barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen, catering to his every desire?”

Aaron smiles. “Yeah. Something like that.”

I can’t take it any more and laugh. Right in his face. “Last time I checked, it’s the twenty-first century, dickwad, not the fifties.”

In a flash, he grabs me by the wrist. “Think that’s funny?” I try to jerk away, but he holds on tight. “You know what would’ve been goddamn funny is if Chase’s plan had worked.”

“What plan?”

“Don’t you know? He was sabotaging the condoms, trying to get you pregnant.”

“What?”

Condoms?

Pregnancy. Baby. Marriage.

My legs turn to rubber as a white-hot pain splits my head open. Aaron lets go and I fall to my knees.

I can see it now. It all comes back to me in rush of memory.

We’d been at a party out on Miller Quarry Road. People were hanging out, laughing, talking. Music blaring. I’d broken up with Chase earlier, but he wanted to talk.

We walked out to his car and before I knew it, he shoved me inside and took off. He told me he loved me and couldn’t stand the thought of me ever being with someone else. When I told him to take me back to the party, he told me not to be stupid. And when I demanded to know where he was taking me, he just laughed. It became clear that he’d been planning this. I had visions of him locking me up again somewhere, but for longer than a weekend. Cut off from my family and friends. Cut off from anyone else but him.

Then, as I cowered in the passenger seat, trying to figure out how to get away from him, he admitted he’d been poking holes in the condoms in order to get me pregnant. That way, if I were carrying his baby, I’d never be able to leave him. He would always be in my life.

That’s when I told him I’d been on the Pill since high school. One time I thought I was pregnant, which had really freaked me out, so Deena and I drove to a neighboring town, went to Planned Parenthood and I got on birth control.