Between Then & Now || Currently Editing for Wattys 2022

35.

I'm still in my pajamas, something like ten hours away from where we had slept the night before. I reread the email when I woke up and immediately grabbed Thelma and my keys. I didn't care where I was going. At this point, there's no point in trying to draw up a map, because something would just mess it up. And I just needed to drive.

The cup holder in the center console vibrates. Then, again. And again. And again.

Frustrated, I take my eyes off the road for a second, holding onto the wheel with one hand and using the other to grab my phone from the cupholder. It vibrates again as I lift it up, placing it into the holder on the dashboard.

Text from Michael.

Text from Michael.

Missed call from Michael.

Text (3) from Tessa.

Text from Ma.

Missed call (3) from Michael.

I grab a granola bar from the other cup holder, tearing it open with my teeth as my eyes flicker back to the road. The van steers a little to the right, almost on the shoulder, and I correct, a little too sharply. Thelma whimpers as she slides against the passenger seat.

"Shit, I'm sorry-" The phone begins to ring again as Michael's face pops up on the screen. In an instant, something I had wanted for so long doesn't seem all that great anymore. I keep my eyes on the road as I swipe the answer button aggressively on the phone. "What? What do you want, Michael? I don't fucking need this right now. "

There's silence on the other end of the phone for a second. Finally, for the first time since that day I caught him with Tessa in our bed, I hear his voice.

"Okay," the response is a little hesitant. "I guess I deserve that."

I don't say anything, laser-staring the road down. The dashed yellow lines morph together into one. A speed limit sign passes by on the right. Above it looms a billboard advertising some adult sex store in Saint Paul, Minnesota. I wait for him to continue.

Finally, "I'm so sorry, Ola." There's another pause. Does he expect a response from me? An, oh, that's okay, everybody makes the mistake of cheating on their girlfriend of three years, don't worry about it? He continues. "I don't know why I-"

"Look, Michael, I really don't care." My voice snaps as I swallow the bite of granola bar in my mouth, looking in the rearview mirror as a light blue Sedan passes me on the left. "I don't know why you're calling me. It's been a month."

"I just feel-"

"What? What do you feel, Michael? Because the last time I checked you never cared to check up and see how I was feeling after you fucked my best friend in the same bed you told me you loved me in every night." A bug splatters on my windshield, and I pull into the left lane, speeding up to pass the tractor on the road fifty yards in front of me. Cornfields pass by in a blur on the right. "Look, dude, I'm not going to be a bitch to you even though you definitely deserve it. Not because I care about your feelings because, honestly, I don't. But because it's not worth my time. I have a dad that's dying and my own life to get figured out." I pull back into the right lane, the tractor growing smaller in the rearview mirror. "Stop calling me. Stop texting me."

"I just want to apologize." He butts in.

"You had an entire month to do that," I snap. The wrapper flutters to the ground on Thelma's side of the car. "And, for weeks, I sat and waited for you to. But you didn't. And that was your choice."

There's silence for a moment. After a second, I realize he's not going to talk so I continue. "You hurt me. I'm not going to pretend that you didn't because you did."

For a moment, nothing. Then, "is there any way I could make it up to you? That we could try again, fix things? Ola, I miss you-"

"Absolutely not."

A pause. "There's no possibility you could forgive me?"

"Michael, no. You don't get to choose if I forgive you or when I forgive you or how I forgive you. That is not your choice to make. Because you cheated on me, you hurt me. You threw away absolutely any semblance of a relationship we had.

And that. Was your choice."

The other end of the line is silent, and, on the right side of the road about a hundred yards ahead, in some random person's field of corn, a bright yellow billboard stands, advertising Minnesota's Largest Candy Store. I raise an eyebrow and begin to watch for an exit up ahead.

"Stop calling me. Stop texting me. We are done, Michael. We have been for a long time."

And, in that second, I reach forward, Michael stammering on the other end, and I hit the End Call button.

Maybe it's just because I'd eaten nothing but a granola bar in the last twenty hours. Or maybe it's the stress. But a shit ton of candy sounded real good right about now.