Trapped✔️

5

H O L D E N

Present

Why weren't you mad at me?

The words rattled around his mind. They made him want his drum set, want to play until the rhythm soothed the mess of thoughts in his head and ordered them into something less raw, less tangled.

Instead, all he had was Nina, and a question he had no way of answering cohesively.

I wasn't mad at you because I knew you'd be mad at yourself.

I wasn't mad at you because I love you, and love has room for forgiveness.

I wasn't mad at you because I was too numb to be mad at anyone.

He drummed his fingers on his leg as they walked down a cornstalk-lined pathway, a light breeze ruffling Nina's hair as well as the corn-silk. The pattern of beats was cathartic to him, helping him figure out what he wanted to say.

"I understood you." Nina turned to him, startled, expectant. "I knew exactly what you wanted to do, how you were feeling. We were hurting, so we self-medicated. You went dancing and drinking. I smoked pot. And I get it, I get what it's like to hurt people because I'm chasing that drug, that high. I mean, how many times have I hurt you because of that?" He tried for a weak smile. "That's why I wasn't mad. Because what I'd done to you was a thousand times worse."

The moment after he'd spoken - only for a second - he saw Nina's mask vanish, saw her as the same heart-on-her-sleeve, no-filter girl that she'd been in their childhood. Then it was gone.

"You're not a bad person," she whispered. "You were just trying to cope."

She put her hand on his cheek, cupping his face. He closed his eyes, wishing things could be like this forever, wishing he could be trapped here, with her. "You, too, Nina. You, too."

"I miss you. So much. Why did we waste so much time, Holden?" Nina looked up at him. Her pupils were dilated, swallowing the irises whole. She looked like she was breaking open, unfurling all the layers she'd wrapped around herself. "Why didn't we stay friends? Why did I pick Todd over you so many times?"

All he managed to say was the two words that were searing a brand on all his thoughts, holding them captive till he blurted them out: "Just friends?"

Nina hesitated for one minuscule second, one that felt like a lifetime, one that felt like hanging onto a cliff's edge, not knowing if it would be better to stay or fall. "No."

And then he leaned in and kissed her, the easiest thing in the world, a reflex or instinct or gravity, easier than breathing, easier than falling, just as easy as it was to love her.

:::

N I N A

A minute ago, she had been fine.

A minute ago, she had been broken.

A minute ago, she had been empty.

Now, she was coming undone, falling apart and being pressed back together, like a butterfly with a broken wing being preserved in a book. She was not kissing him so much as she was being trapped by him, held by the lovely cage of his body, feeling gloriously alive.

They broke apart. If kissing him had been the most effortless thing in the world, then stopping was the hardest.

Everything in her had sped up: her breathing, her heartbeat, her thoughts.

"I've wanted to do that all day," she confessed, her fingers clasped behind his neck.

"I thought you've been wanting to get out of here all day," Holden countered, his hands still fitted to the dip of her waist. She could not remember the last time she had been so deliciously happy.

"Maybe I wanted to get out of here with you." Nina grinned at him, and took his hand, and they made their way down the path together.

:::

H O L D E N

He was smiling like a fool, but frankly, Holden didn't give a damn.

Nina had her hand in his back pocket, and was smiling at him - till she wasn't. "Is this what I think it is?"

She pulled out a map of the corn maze. Crap. He'd forgotten he'd stashed that there after leaving Bobby at the daycare.

"I - yes?" Holden gulped meekly.

"Holden!" They both turned. "Nina! Thank God I found you."

"What's wrong, Hailee?" Nina looked at her, and the expression on her face broke his heart. She looked like someone who had been dreaming, who had wrapped themselves in a bubble of hope and wishes only to have it popped. "Is it Bobby? Was he hurt?"

No, Holden thought. He can't be hurt, he can't be. Nina will never forgive herself -

"Robert's fine." Hailee swallowed. "It's your mom, Nina. She's having her baby."

"I - you're kidding." Nina had gone white as the one wisp of cloud that had dared intrude on the cerulean sky above them.

"No." Hailee shook her head. "I'm not."

:::

Seven Months Ago

"So, Robert and I have something to tell you." Her mother - Mrs. Green, as Nina had taken to calling her in a sign of utter disrespect - smiled at Nina, as though fake cheer would heal the rift that had appeared between them.

This wasn't Napoleon and the freaking Concordat - it was betrayal. It was divorce. It was false regret, feigned sympathy.

It was her world crashing down.

"Yes?" Nina summoned every ounce of teenage rebellion into her posture, leaning against the wall, one hand fidgeting with her new nose ring.

"We are - Oh, Nina, did you really have to put that thing in your nose?" Her mother asked, frowning in disapproval at the hoop in her nostril. Mission accomplished, Nina thought. "Well, anyways, Robert and I are having a baby!"

If her world had crashed down before, now it was taking her with it, leading her down a long, dark spiral.

"Wow." She fueled her attention into being as sarcastic as possible. If she focused on sarcasm, she would not cry. Would not cry. Would not fricking cry. "Congratulations on your new family. I don't know why you bothered bringing your old one here when you've clearly replaced it."

"Nina!" Robert - Mr. Green, Holden's dad - spoke up. "Don't talk to your mother that way!"

"Well, you're not my dad! I have a father, you're Holden's father! All you had to do was keep being Holden's fricking dad and both of our families would not be falling apart!" Nina shouted.

She was angry. Anger was good. Anger would keep the tears at bay. Anger would brand itself on her heart, reminding her that nothing good could last.