Secrets with the Moon || keaton stromberg

Five

I thought I needed more time, that I wasn't ready to see him again.

I was completely right.

It's almost like he had never left, my mom still makes her zucchini bread for him, my father continues to talk about the Seattle Seahawks with him. The only thing different; Keaton and I don't talk, and my mother and father never discuss their split. It's almost like they are pretending to be married for the sake of everyone else, although their minds work in two completely different ways.

I lean my arms on the marble counter of our kitchen, watching my family and his interact. It's like earlier today, everyone had silently decided to dismiss what happened when the Stromberg's arrived, me running off and all. Keaton's fiancé, Kara, has trouble letting the whole fiasco go, though. Her "behind the scenes" glares are the only real emotions anyone could sense in the room.

I pick at my cuticles, the skin all dried up from my recent exposure to the sun and lack of moisturizer. My ears block out all the sounds, except the ticking sound of the clock staring me down. For some reason, my job demands that I work Saturday and Sunday nights, the shifts no one wants to work. I have about 20 seconds before I can pass off the "I have to get ready for work now" excuse.

19

"Hey, Kara can you pass me the butter?" Keaton asks her.

18
17
16
15

"Yeah sure."

14
13
12

"Oh crap I dropped it!"

11

"Dammit Kara, you're so clumsy!"

10
9
8

"Keaton it's all over my shirt!"

7
6
5

"Here I'll wipe it off."

4
3

"Okay."

2

"Keats stop that it tickles."

1

"Keaton!"

"Okay, I have to go get ready for work, I'll see you all tomorrow!" I mutter without saying goodbye. But before I can begin my trek up the stairs, my mother stops me.

"Estelle, I called off work for you tonight because the Stromberg's are here!"

And just like that, my world shatters.

Keaton and Kara are still "cleaning" up the butter on the floor, so they don't notice when I pull my mother into the living room. Keaton's mother, Laraine, and my father are distracted by some weird photo hanging in the kitchen. My mother's warm, hospitable eyes are hopeful, but they aren't met with anything more than a cold, lifeless, pissed-off daughter.

"What the hell, Sarah?"

"Stel, don't use my first name in that tone of voice, I'm not a child, I'm your mother," she closes her eyes and tightens her lips as she speaks.

"You're acting like a child!" I attempt to keep my voice low, but angry at the same time. She twirls her black her around her finger in a nervous habit. Her eyes turn to the ground in shame.

"Why would you do this to me? You know I'm not comfortable being around him yet!" I scold her. My hands are shaking at my sides, and my body begins to heat up with angered adrenaline.

"It's been five," she pauses, trying to keep her lost composure. "It's been five years, Estelle, you can't keep avoiding what happened between you two!"

"Like you're the one to talk!" I fight back. her eyes dilate in surprise, her mouth hung open like door whose hinges have completely broke. "You and Dad have been divorced for five long ass years, yet you can't look him in the eye when the court papers say he has to take care of me on the weekends. You're barely home on the weekends! You work as a nurses assistant on those days and live at hospital to avoid him! Yet here you are, pretending that the divorce never even happened. If I'm avoiding my situation with Keaton, then, in comparison, you're saying that you and Dad are happily married with 18 loving children!"

Both of us stop moving. I barely believe I have even said those words until tears come out of her eyes. And it's in that moment that I realize her divorce has been harder on her than my time away from Keaton has been on me.

"Mom-"

"Just get out of here, go work at that coffee shop, I don't want to see you until tomorrow." She shakily moves her body to the bathroom, where she will slowly put herself back together before she goes back into the kitchen with a smile on her face.

I scan the living room for a source of confidence and a source of direction, but when neither is found, climb up the stairs as quietly as I can before storming into my room. I'd rather not have very one looking at me again today. Softly, I close the door behind me, my back leaning up against it for support. I can already sense the tears, the heat behind me eyes eyelids so immense I feel as if I could shoot laser beams. My boiling anger rips my eyes open to find yellow traveling bags neatly placed in one corner of the room and black ones in the one opposite of it.

This, this is what throws me overboard.

Diving under my bed, I pull out the green travel bag I hadn't used since Wesley's wedding. Inside, I find all my memories from that trip, along with all the things I would need if I were to live in a treehouse for the summer. I grab random articles of clothing from my dresser and toss my notebooks and drawing and writing utensils inside. I zip it up quickly, sling the bag over my shoulder, and I grab my pillow as I climb out of the window and into the night.

My bare feet plunge into the ground below my window. Shoes, that's what I forgot. Luckily, a pair of flip flops are still buried in my bag, but I have no desire to get them out now. Left, Right, Left, Right, my legs walk in that pattern and my eyes release tears in the same manner as I make my way into the forest. For some reason, a poem that I had written years ago, before any of this had even started, pops into my head. I wrote it without any knowledge of what would happen, but I wrote it after I watched a sad romantic movie where the guy in said story wrote a poem about a girl who left him. It's where my whole love for poetry began. It's funny how much the poem relates to my life now.

Tears drip from eyes while I think of the fact that you will never think of me even half as much as the way I think of you. I'm sorry for all the broken promises you expected to stay glued together. My fragile porcelain was never meant for the cold air of the harsh climate I was thrown into when you left me, you forced me to look for ideas and places new to me. One touch from the small pad of your index finger could align the pieces of the porcelain that I am and was. But you refuse to come near me, to have anything to do with me anymore, no matter the intensity of the stakes. And I'm sure the stakes will never change.

"Estelle?" I hear someone calling my name, and when I realize it's not my mother's voice, nor Keaton's or Kara's, I turn to face the one who seems to have an interest in where I am going.

Wesley's wife, of almost six years, stands before me, her eyes showing no sign of pity or sympathy, but they are overflowing with empathy and understanding, the two things I could really use right now.

"Where you headed off to?" She asks kindly, her voice bearing nothing but honesty and love.

"I have a treehouse in the forest, I think I'm going to stay there for a few days just to clear my head of all this drama," I reply almost truthfully. I plan to stay there all summer if I have to.

"Can I come with? Wesley and the baby are both asleep right now, and I don't know everyone well enough to go in and start talking," she asks as she makes her way toward me.

I nod, my mouth not finding enough conviction to tell her to go inside or to tell her to tag along.

We begin our trek into the forest quietly, both of us appreciating the sounds around us, that is until we pass the lily that I dropped earlier today, it seems like it's been forever since then.

"This flower deserves a good home." These are her only words before she picks up the flimsy plastic the lily lives in.

Everyone deserves a good home.