Just Before You Go

I met Tyler at Central Park, which was a place I’d yet to visit during my short life in Huntington Beach. It was astoundingly beautiful, endless trails nestled into looming trees. I waited at my car, leaned up against the doors as the hot sun beat down against me.
He’d been released from the hospital the morning before and was eager to take steps into his new life. I’d visited him every day of his stay, our connection rekindling a little more each time. Jimmy had been missing for most of the week, citing the reasons as “top secret”. I was curious but he’d been tight-lipped about the whole thing.
Jimmy’s absence created a window of free time for me, which Tyler was happy to occupy. We’d made progress in spades, nearly forfeiting all of the prior trauma to bitter memory. We leaned on each other as we began our decent into humanity, each determined to come out better people on the other side.
A single day lingered around us, working as the ultimate test of our new convictions. We’d be back on the road by sunrise, so I was determined to enjoy my last few hours in California—I wasn’t sure when I’d see it again. Granted, there were only a few months left of the Avenged tour. So, it was guaranteed we’d be back before Christmas.
It was wild the way time had flown by. It felt as thought it was just yesterday that my parents had essentially kicked Jimmy out of their house—that I’d met Jimmy in the first place. Here we were, creeping up on the annual anniversary and I had only loss to show for it. I’d sacrificed my family, I’d sacrificed Jimmy once or twice, I’d sacrificed Jenny. Now it was time to sacrifice myself, letting the callouses heal over into something stronger than what they’d blistered over.
Tyler finally arrived, stepping out of his car with a sheepish wave. He was sporting a long-sleeved shirt, which seemed absolutely ridiculous given the humidity. Even Tyler could feel ashamed, I assumed.
We’d had long talks about the way his mind worked; the way his demons would endure the wheel. His contempt for his own shadows grew more and more forceful with each push of will. I wasn’t convinced he wouldn’t stray back into the darkness, but for the time being, I was glad to see the change. It was subtle at first; a sincere smile or a hearty laugh. The way he looked at Blair had changed from desperation to affection in the blink of an eye. She’d relished in the relief, tapping the brakes on her responsibility to him. That was the best change of all.
“Am I late?” Tyler asked happily, sliding a pair of aviators over his eyes.
I shrugged, “Not very.”
“I got distracted,” he laughed. “My parents left this morning. My mom’s a hugger, so…Was delayed.”
Despite my longing to, I hadn’t been blessed with the opportunity to formally meet the Brodys. I’d seen a glimpse of them disappearing down a hallway with Blair Peterson one afternoon when I’d stopped by the hospital to bring Tyler lunch. His father was impossibly tall, even slouched down to hold Blair against him as they strolled.
“That’s cute,” I smiled.
He shook his head, “It really isn’t.”
My mother had never been overtly affectionate; not that she was necessarily cold. Not in my youth, anyway. The creature she’d slowly morphed herself into couldn’t possibly be mistaken as kind. She’d abandoned me, her only daughter, in lieu of some fictional world she’d conjured up within her own mind. She was the only one of my family that I’d really found myself missing at all.
She’d been a great mother as I’d grown. She had been meticulous about nurturing my empathy, encouraging my intellect. I guess she’d missed the part about compassion, though, as I clearly did not possess much of it. But I’m not sure how much you can place onto your upbringing after a certain point. Once you’re old enough to start making your own decisions, as I was so sure I was, responsibility tends to fall upon your own shoulders. No excuses, no contamination; it’s all you.
Tyler took a step to get us moving forward. We walked slowly, almost too casually considering everything that had happened over the last few weeks—hell, the last few months. He rubbed at his arm with a hint of a wince hiding behind his strong jaw.
“Hurting today?” I asked cautiously.
He shook his head, “No, just itchy as all hell. I’ll be happy when the stitches are out.”
“Can you get that done anywhere?” I quizzed, curious about the mechanics of follow-up appointments whilst out on the open road.
“I don’t see why not,” he shrugged. “I don’t have much of a choice.”
I nodded.
“Is Jimmy still missing?” Tyler asked then, his voice light.
He’d seemingly moved passed the jealousy that had once engrossed him. We didn’t spend too much time discussing my and Jimmy’s relationship, but it came up often enough that we’d had to work out a bridge. It was rickety and shaking and I didn’t have much faith in it’s construction, but it was good enough for now.
“Yeah,” I half-laughed. “It’s top secret though, so don’t ask me where he’s gone.”
He smirked, glancing down at me as we strolled passed a group of angry squirrels, “Blair’s been missing too.”
“Interesting,” I noted, catching his implication.
“What do you suppose those two are working on?” he laughed.
I chuckled, “Knowing them, probably something ridiculous.”
Jimmy had taken my encouragement to stand by Blair to heart. He’d spent every waking hour of the first few days of Tyler’s hospital stay with her, from sunrise to sunset. I was surprised to find it didn’t bother me at all. After a while, I started to find it almost cute. If Brian wasn’t threatened, then I had no right to be either. It was a welcomed change that I gripped tightly, praying to god it didn’t slip away.
“She’s been different this last week,” Tyler thought aloud, as if seeking some sort of validation.
“Different how?” I asked, reflecting on everything I’d seen.
The only real difference I’d seen in Blair Peterson was an unexpected lightness. She’d once appeared so burdened that she’d slump when she sat and she’d walk with her shoulders pressed into the concrete. Now her eyes were full of life; an extra spring laced into her step. If I didn’t know her, I’d almost swear she was happy.
While I’d like to bestow the credit for that onto Jimmy’s shoulders, as he absolutely played a key role in her newfound survival, I was sure the one and only Brian Haner was the piece that had completed her. The way she looked at him was enough to make the world float away; the way he looked at her would have me endlessly envious. It was the kind of look you only find once in a lifetime, when you’ve really found your match; that same star dust from which you stole existence staring back at you.
I hadn’t been lucky enough to stumble on that look, which I didn’t see the worth in lingering on. Not all of us are lucky enough to meet our destinies, so we look for them in reflections. I wasn’t sure Jimmy was my soul mate, especially compared to the connection he shared with Blair Peterson—and Brian Haner—but he was, undoubtedly, the only person I could imagine sharing my life with.
He was an old soul, matured and experiences in the hectic misshapen ways of the world; I was too new to have stemmed from the same universe. I still had too much to learn; there was still too much left for Jimmy to teach me. I’d always been a good student.
“I’m not sure,” Tyler replied slowly, considering it with care. “She’s…”
When the silence lingered on for a moment too long, I stepped in, “Happy?”
He laughed, letting his smile steady itself on his face, “Yeah.”
“I would never describe Blair Peterson as a positive person,” I thought aloud. “But you really think happiness is a big change for her?”
He stared at me sternly, “Fucking yeah, it is.”
“And to what do we owe her happiness to?” I pressed, set on judging his response.
“You know,” he replied flatly.
I smirked, “I do. But I want, so badly, to hear you say it out loud.”
“You’re an asshole,” he snickered.
“Come on,” I encouraged with a light shove.
He rolled his eyes, “Maybe I was wrong about Brian. Maybe. I’m not getting suited up for a fucking wedding any time soon or anything. But…I don’t know. Maybe I was wrong.”
Sweet, sweet victory.
“You were absolutely wrong,” I grinned.
“She does seem happy,” he noted again, as if trying to completely convince himself. “Maybe she just needed some space from me after all…I hate to think I was a burden on her all this time.”
My amusement faded to a frown, “You weren’t a burden on her, Ty.”
He shrugged, “Everything Blair has been over the last seventeen years is because of me.”
“And is that all bad?” I pushed, sensing I might be losing my friend to the self-loathing gods.
“No, of course not,” he sighed. “Blair’s…Well, you know. But she’s complicated…and she’s guarded. And that’s my fault.”
“Now that you know that, you can change it,” I offered lightly. “There’s no one in this world that can get Blair to let herself loosen the reins but you.”
He smiled again, “Yeah, I guess.”
“You’re her best friend,” I reminded him. “And that means everything.”
“I’ve never seen her sob like that,” he told me grimly, both our minds floating back to the morning after the massacre had nearly taken him and Blair out simultaneously. “Never.”
I found that hard to believe. From what I’d heard, this was a stunt Tyler had repeated more times in his life than he could count. Blair had always stood by him, held his hand as they stitched him up, rubbed at his arm as they pumped his stomach. She’d always been there—and she’d always been steadfast.
“It was…” he trailed off for a second. “It killed me.”
“That’s reality,” I shrugged. “That’s like a fraction of how she’d be if you’d…. succeeded.”
He frowned with a sigh, “I never want to make her cry ever again.”
“Then don’t,” I smiled.
He nodded, glancing down at me again, “You know, you’ve been on this tangent lately about how what an awful person you are…But you’re not as bad as you think.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” I groaned.
He nudged me with his elbow, “You’re a good listener. And you’re pretty fucking forgiving. I don’t think I would have forgiven me…After the way I acted…”
“But you have,” I noted seriously. “I acted just as badly as you. And here we are.”
Our gaze met up from behind our shades and for the first time in years, I felt connected to this life. It was nice to have another soul to depend on without worrying about compromising the crystalized rose-coloured glasses that inevitably were adorn throughout relationships. I was comfortable enough to tell Tyler whole-truths, unafraid of his judgements. We’d already been vicious to one another, and somehow, we’d managed to sport our scars as some badge of honor for a club we’d created from the torment.
“I’ve been having this bad feeling lately,” Tyler spoke after a comfortable silence had settled and dissipated.
We rounded the corner of our current trail and I followed Tyler to the nearest bench positioned beneath the shade. He collapsed against it with a huff escaping from his lungs. I was far more graceful in my approach, relieving my feet of my weight slowly.
“What’s the bad feeling?” I asked curiously.
He contemplated it for a second, “Like Blair’s going to leave me or something.”
“Leave you?” I repeated with confusion.
“I can’t explain it,” he shrugged. “We’ve always had a bit of a link. She knows what I’m up to before I’ve even thought of doing it yet—and sometimes I manage to peg her right, too. And I have this sinking feeling like she’s getting comfortable in a life without me.”
I scoffed, “I seriously doubt that.”
“I don’t know, Aria,” Tyler mused. “Maybe she’s hit her quota for my bullshit, you know? Things between us have been…better…but I’m not the reason her life is improving. I think she’s going to want more than this. More than the life I’ve been offering to her.”
“Don’t you too?” I pressed thoughtfully. “Obviously the life you guys built is wonderful. There’s no doubting how much you love her. But…”
Tyler raised his brows in anticipation, “But?”
“I don’t know,” I laughed nervously. “Don’t you want more?”
“More than Blair?” he smirked. “No such thing.”
I laughed, “I’m serious. Don’t you think it would be great to have two lives instead of one? Sounds less stressful to me.”
“Do you and Jimmy live two lives?” Tyler asked, curious for honesty.
I nodded, “I think so. We’re very different people. I think I tried to mold him into something I thought I needed…But that isn’t right. You can’t force people to change—and I’m not sure you should even want them to. You know?”
“Not really,” Tyler snickered. “You’re talking in circles.”
I smiled, “Jimmy is very much his own being. And…I’m becoming my own person, too. It’s slow…But I can feel it. I’m going to change if it kills me. I want to be worthy of him.”
“Worthy of him,” Tyler repeated incredulously, as if the idea of changing yourself for the betterment of another was enough to make himself.
“And myself,” I added seriously. “I want to look at myself and feel good about what I’m seeing. I’m not quite there yet.”
Tyler shrugged, “I like what I see. You’re selling your good qualities short, Aria. You should focus on the good stuff; stop dwelling on the bad.”
If only it were that easy. That was, in essence, my main problem. My brain was far too active. I could think up a million negative scenarios at any given point in my life, and I’d manipulate my world to meet my unrealistic criteria. My attention was too invested in the bad things that had happened that I was always missing the best things in my life. I’d nearly missed Jimmy and I refused to make that mistake again.
“You’d be okay, you know,” I told him quietly.
He rolled up his sleeves without thinking, the heat—or maybe the pressure of our conversation—finally getting to him. I tried my best not to look, but the scene was horrific. He caught my glance quickly, rolling his arms away to hide the shame. My gaze forced itself upward.
“If Blair left,” I continued like I hadn’t just broken my own heart.
Tyler nodded without sincere belief in my sentiment.
“I mean it,” I smirked, reaching over to take his hand into mine. “She won’t go far. Let her find whatever she needs. I’m here while she’s not.”
To my surprise, he squeezed my hand back. It was the most Tyler act of appreciation I could have expected. Quiet…but effective.
We sat that way for a while longer, watching the birds fly overhead and the joggers move by at impressive speeds. Under the California sun, hand in hand, Tyler and I began to change; together and apart.

Notes

Some Tyria to mark the beginning of Aria's self-discovery journey. Who better to get started with?

xx