I had a straight 4.0 GPA at the start of the spring semester, and I had applications out to a dozen of the best universities for post-graduate work in speech-language pathology research. Jason was still breaking football records, and had scouts for half a dozen NFL teams watching every game he played.
If I had to pick a word for our lives, up until February of our junior year at U of M, I’d have called it idyllic. I filled thirty-six composition books with poetry during those years, and Jason had a portfolio of breathtaking photography and was warming up to my suggestions that he think about trying to sell a few of them. Football was his passion, but to me photography was his true talent. He could capture so much in a single photograph. He focused on macroscopic shots primarily, closeups of everyday objects, especially insects and flowers. He had a few closeups of flowers that reminded me eerily of some of Georgia O’Keefe’s paintings, which he said was his intention. His photography major included a heavy dose of art and art history, and he seemed to absorb it all like a sponge.
Then, one Sunday morning in mid-February, Kate called me.
“Becca? I’m worried about Ben.” Her soft, quiet voice sounded panicked.
“Why? What’s going on?” I set aside my textbook and sat up on the couch where I’d been studying.
“He’s not answering my phone calls. We…we had an argument, a bad one. He left, and I thought…I thought he was just going out to cool down, but it’s been three hours and he’s not back, not answering my calls or texts. He knows that worries me, and he always texts me back right away.”
“Was it bad enough that he’d…regress? Like, relapse?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I hope not, but I’m worried. Is there anywhere he’d go that you know of?”
I racked my brain. “I don’t know. I’m sorry, I can’t think of anything.” I sighed, worrying at my lip, trying to think of something I’d know that Kate wouldn’t. “If I think of anything, I’ll let you know. Are you worried enough that you want me to come down and help you look for him?”
She hedged. “I don’t want to worry you, and I know you’re busy getting ready for finals, but…no. Not yet. If I don’t hear from him soon, I’ll let you know.”
“Ben used to disappear for days at a time,” I told her. “I never knew where he went, honestly. I guess I assumed he had, like, secret druggie hang-outs or something. Since he’s been with you, that stuff has stopped. But if he was mad enough to have a relapse, he might go back to one of his old hangouts. I just don’t know where that is or who to ask. I stayed out of his life, in that sense.”
Kate moaned. “He hasn’t seen anybody he used to party with in, god, a year and a half. Aside from the time I found that pinner in his Pall Malls, the only really big fight we’ve ever gotten in was a few months after I started dating him. He’d been sober for a while, and we’d talked about his drug problem, and I told him if he really wanted to stop the temptation to do drugs, he had to cut off his association with people who did them. So he stopped hanging out with his party friends. Then he hung out with an old friend who I knew for a fact was a hard-core stoner, and I got mad at him. He said he hadn’t smoked, but that wasn’t the point—it was just being around people who smoked. Eventually he’d relapse.”
“Well, you might want to check with someone like that.” I hesitated, then blurted, “What were you fighting about?”
“His cigarettes. I asked him if he’d ever quit those, too, and he got mad. He said he’d given up everything else for me, so why should he give up those, too? He stormed out when I reminded him that he had quit drugs for him, not me.”
“That’s it?”
She sniffed. “That’s the Cliff’s Notes version. There was a lot more to it.” Kate sighed. “He’ll come back. I know he will.”
“Keep me updated, okay?”
“Okay, I will. ’Bye, Becca.”
“’Bye.” I hung up and set the phone on the coffee table, but I didn’t go back to studying.
I was worried now. The longer I thought about it, the harder the knot of fear in my stomach became. Eventually I got back to studying, but my mind wasn’t totally in it.
Later that day, during dinner with Jason, Kate texted me: He’s back now. Stoned.Says it was only a little pot to calm him down. Im so mad but dont know what to do.
I sighed and showed the message to Jason. I’d explained the phone call to him after he’d gotten back from his run, and he’d agreed that if we hadn’t heard from Kate by tonight, we’d have to think about going down to look for Ben.
I texted back: At least he’s back and it wasn’t hard drugs.
Yeah, but for him weed really is a gateway drug to worse things.
I know, I responded, but I also know he loves you, and he won’t want to risk losing you. Maybe remind him of that, without making it a threat?
After a pause, Kate responded: Good point. I’ll try that. Thanks.
A few weeks passed and things seemed to have settled a bit, as I hadn’t heard anything else from Kate. Jason and I decided to head down for the weekend to check on them. Both Ben and Kate were at work when we got in, so we unpacked some of our clothes and went for a drive, ending up at the old oak tree, where we made love in the cab of his truck for old time’s sake. When we got back, Ben was home, sitting on the front step of the apartment building, smoking a cigarette, smoke mixing with the steam from his breath.
I nodded for Jason to go on in and sat down next to Ben. He looked pale, thinner than I’d last seen him, and his eyes held the old glint of tamped-down anger.
“Hey, you,” I said, bumping him with my shoulder.
“’Sup, Beck.” He didn’t look at me, flicking the filter of his cigarette with his thumb so a chunk of ash fell between his feet.
“So, how are you?” I wasn’t sure how to broach the conversation now that I was here. He looked like shit, but I’d never say so outright.
“Kate send you?” He sounded petulant, morose.
“No, I haven’t seen Kate. She’s still at work, isn’t she?”
“Fuck if I know. She left.”
I was stunned. I thought Kate would have told me if she was leaving Ben. “Why? When? Why would she leave?”
“Stupid shit. She never understood how smoking helps me. I tried, Beck. I really did. But it was just never good enough for her. No matter what I did, it wasn’t good enough for Miss Perfect Kate Yearling.”