I smiled. The world needed more women like her. The world needed more people who were like the book Persuasion: a perfect blend of profound moments stirred with dashes of entertainment.
The following Friday, Brooks didn’t come home until two in the morning. It was pouring rain until around that time, and I couldn’t sleep, listening to the storm rolling through. I sat in the living room, listening to Mrs. Boone’s jukebox, playing song after song, waiting for the front door to open.
When it finally did, I gasped, listening to it slam.
Version two of Brooks came walking through the door, soaking wet and drunk from his time on the lake. “What the hell is this?” he hissed, looking over at the jukebox. With five large footsteps he went to the machine and unplugged it from the wall. “I don’t want to hear that.”
Grumpy.
Whenever I played music around him, he’d always force me to stop.
I walked over and plugged it back in.
I did want to hear it.
He stood up tall and puffed out his chest. “You can’t do that, Maggie. You can’t come here and play that shit.” He unplugged it again, and I plugged it back in. “Goddammit, will you just leave? I don’t want you here. What don’t you get about that? I don’t want you here! You’re driving me insane. I’m sick and tired of this bullshit. I’m sick and tired of you trying to push yourself into my life, to make me feel better, to force me into something I’m not ready for. How fucking dare you?” he hissed, drunk and hurt. “For over twenty years I allowed you to be whatever you had to be to get through whatever you had to get through. I never pushed you, I never pressured you, but now you’re doing all of that to me. When you told me to leave years ago, I left you. I gave you your space. Why can’t you do that? You’re smothering me, trying to save me. But don’t you see? I don’t need you to save me. I don’t want to be saved. I’m done. I just want you to go home. Why can’t you fucking leave me alone?!”
My body trembled as his words sank in, slapping me hard.
He turned away, running his fingers through his hair, annoyed, pissed off.
The angrier he grew, the more annoyed I became. He unplugged the jukebox again, and I plugged it back in.
Every time I stepped near him, the whiskey on his breath sighed against me. With one final tug of the cord, Brooks shoved the jukebox with his right hand. “Enough! Why? Why the hell won’t you leave me the fuck alone when I let you be all those years ago? Screw your music, and your hope, and your list of things you want to do. If you’re waiting for me, it’s never going to happen, Maggie.” Each word was a hit, each word knocked me back. “You’re wasting your time, so just get the hell out of—”
“YOU PROMISED!” I screamed, my voice cracking as the words flew through my mouth. My hands flew over my lips, and my stomach tightened. Did I say that? Did those words come from me? Was that my voice? My sounds? My words?
His brown eyes were perplexed, confused by the sound, by my voice. I was just as confused. He lowered his stare to my lips and stepped in. “Say it again,” he begged.
“You promised.” I moved closer to him, unable to hide my trembling body. My stare fell to the ground before I looked up. “You promised me you’d be my anchor, and I always promised myself to be yours if you ever needed me. I’m here because of the promises we made, but right now I don’t even know who you are,” I whispered. “The boy I knew wouldn’t yell at me. Never. The boy I knew wouldn’t beat himself down so much.”
“Maggie.”
“Brooks.”
His eyes shut tight at the sound of me saying his name. “Again?” he asked.
“Brooks,” I murmured.
When he opened his eyes, I was closer. My fingers landed against his chest. “Brooks…please, don’t do this. Don’t keep pushing me away. I want to help you, but you keep punching me each day with your anger, your hurt, and I can’t take anymore. I can’t keep being your punching bag. Don’t do this to yourself,” I begged. “Don’t make yourself drown. It’s too much, and I should know. I’ve been drowning for years. You’re sitting here killing yourself each second, as if you were alone, but you’re not.” I took his hands and placed them against my chest. “I’m here. I’m here for you, but you gotta stop punching me with your words. You gotta stop acting like I’m the enemy in all of this.”
I dropped his hands, and he kept staring, stunned by my voice perhaps? Or maybe by the words my mouth produced.
“It’s going to be hard. It’s going to be really hard. I’m not backing down, but you don’t get to treat me like that, Brooks. You don’t get to become something you’re not. You’re not a monster. You’re the complete opposite of a monster. You’re gentle, and kind, and funny, and my best friend. You know this. So, I’m not leaving here until you find it again,” I said.
“Find what?”
I placed my hands against his chest, and gave him a gentle kiss on his cheek as I whispered. “Your voice.”
You promised.
Her voice. Her first words in years, and they were directed toward me due to her frustration. The truth behind those words kept me up all night. Along with the sound of her voice. I hated the fact that her voice came out when she was angered and hurting. I hated how I was the one who pulled her to that level.
What had I become?
“Maggie,” I whispered around five in the morning. I tapped her shoulder slightly as she lay asleep in bed. “Maggie, wake up.”
She stirred for a moment, before yawning and rubbing the sleep from her eyes. She raised an eyebrow, puzzled.
“I know it’s early, but can I show you something?”
She nodded, and I wondered if I’d imagined her sounds earlier that night. She climbed out of bed, and I led her to the back of the cabin, down the dock, where I sat down. She joined me, sitting beside me.
Tilting her head, she narrowed her eyes at me, confused.
“Number sixty-seven on your to-do list. Watch a sunrise or sunset over the water.”
A small sigh escaped her lips, and she looked up at the dark sky that was slowly beginning to wake.
“You toss and turn in your sleep at night,” she said.
“Yeah. I know.”
“Do you wake in sweats, too? Sometimes does it feel like you’re drowning in the water and even though you know it’s not really happening, it feels like you’re there again?”