Statistically

Chapter Fifteen

Time starts to blur again.

First, just hours into one another, but before I realize it - days.

Then a week.

I don't know how else to be without her, other than to do what I have always done.  Which is survive from one moment to the next until they all become the same.  Just one big blur of nothing.  I try to keep myself busy and when I can't do that, I just try to think of nothing.

Instead, I think of her arms around me and her voice in my ear.  Be happy.  

I wonder if she is.

Someone calls with an offer for the house and I take it, even though it is below the asking price.  It doesn't matter anymore.  

I can't stay.

*

I think about calling Lee about a million times, but I never do.  I try to think up some way to make him understand that I never set out to hurt him, that it never had anything to do with him.  But for years, that is what Elle and I have done, whether it was intentional or not.  We hurt him.  And I think maybe part of the problem was that it wasn't about him.  It should've been, at least partially, even when we were younger.  I should've thought about him.  I should've been able to look at him and know that he had always loved her, long before I did.  

I should've always known that that life they have together was never really meant to be mine.

I don't know what else to do so I decide instead of calling, I'll just go back to California.  I don't know how to be a part of their lives, but I told my mom I was coming back and some new version of myself that I am creating wants to be a man who is true to his word.  I am in the backseat of a cab, on my way to the airport, when something catches my eye out of the window and I ask the driver to stop.  I get out and watch him as he drives away and wonder what I am doing.

I stride across the pavement, glancing across the parking lot filled with motorcycles, and straight in the the office.  The man behind the counter stops what he is doing when he sees me and the look on his face tells me that I might not be looking exactly normal right now.

"Can I help you?"

I try to stand up straight and act natural when I say, "Yeah, I need a new bike."

*

I don't feel bad about wasting the plane ticket.  I can't remember if I have ever had the desire to ride across the country on a motorcycle, but who knows, maybe I wanted to at some point.  Maybe I forgot.  I think somewhere along the way I forgot about a lot of things that I wanted to do.  There was a point in my life when I had dreams,  when I had a list for my life that was just for myself.  Elle and Lee were such a big part of everything for so many years that when I started trying to forget them, I forgot more than that.  I forgot who I was.  I forgot that there was a time when I was happy without her.  I don't know if I can be that again, but maybe.

For some reason, instead of calling my mom and dad to let them know I am coming, I call Tuppen.  I feel like I should let somebody know.

"You're what?"  He says. I can't tell if he is almost laughing or almost screaming.

"I'm going to ride back."  I wasn't really sure that I was going to until I said it out loud.

He tells me to be careful but he doesn't tell me that he thinks I'm crazy.  Instead he just says, "I'll see you when you get here."

And I tell him, "Okay."

*

She isn't there with me, on the back of my bike, her arms curled around me, into me.  Down roads lined with trees so thick I can barely see the sky, branches spread above me like a canopy.  On other roads where the land is so flat I can see for miles, the lines of towns and cities cut out on the horizon like they were put there with stencils.  On nights when the stars are spread out above me like glitter, brighter than I have ever seen them before, with their clusters clearly visible.  She isn't there.