My long awaited summer vacation had finally arrived. The doctors told me that I would be off my crutches and out of my cast within the first week. Thumbs up to that. The only problem was the physical therapy that came afterwards. My leg had been out of commission for so long that it could barely support my weight. Therapy was taxing and monotonous, but necessary if I ever wanted to walk normally again.
All-in-all, it wasn’t too bad, but there were so many other things that I would rather have been doing instead. Richie couldn’t be there for the most strenuous parts of the therapy because he started touring again. I didn’t really mind since he had already turned down so many jobs to be with me these past several months. I wasn’t about to let myself hold him back any longer.
But just because I knew it was better for him to go didn’t mean that I didn’t miss him when he was gone. Things were just so dull when he wasn’t around. I found it almost eerie how often I texted or called him; I was practically obsessed.
Being alone with nothing to do was definitely not something I was fond of.
Within the first month of summer, the doctors were amazed at my progress. I had, after all, helped it along a little bit. As soon as I could, I started going on walks around the city. After I got a little better, those walks turned to jogs. It was a good way for me to keep myself occupied.
Two months after school ended, summer was almost over. Richie was signed up for a two-week tour, and I was alone, again. My last physical had deemed me completely back to normal and therapy was finally over. I hadn’t grown out of the jogging habit, however, and I continued to do it every morning.
Following a well-rehearsed routine, I tightened my laces and took off at a steady pace, still grateful that I was able to make a full recovery after such a serious injury. After about one mile, I started to feel a bit winded, which was strange for me. Nevertheless, I pushed myself to go a bit further. This early in the morning, there were usually very few people on the streets. The few that were out were usually fellow joggers and we rarely paid much attention to each other.
But it wasn’t every day that you passed by Alex Wolff on the street while on a morning jog.
We ran straight past each other, paused, and backed up to make sure we weren’t hallucinating.
“Rosalina?”
“Alex?”
We took sever long moments staring dumbly at each other it all seemed too surreal.
It was Alex, alright. He had changed a lot, the most obvious being his height. The tiny drummer from two years ago was suddenly not so tiny. Taking a good look at him, I found it hard to believe that he was younger than me; Alex looked like he should have been in high school.
“Wow. This is awkward,” he said, his voice already beginning to lose its boyish pitch.
“Yeah, it is. You out on a morning jog?”
“Yep. What about you?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s nice to see you back on your feet. How are you feeling?”
I was hoping that Alex wouldn’t bring up the accident; the incident with his brother that night in the hospital was far from forgotten. Then again, Alex was just trying to be a friend.
“Everything’s fine. I’m back to normal again. How are you? You know, you’ve gotten really tall.”
“I’m aware of that,” he grinner. Alex was still quite the charmer. “Things are going pretty good. We’re heading out on a little mini-tour tomorrow. We’ll be back by the time school come around.”
“That’s good. Well, I should be going. I have some place to be.”
It was an obvious lie, and Alex could probably see right through it. It wasn’t as though I didn’t enjoy talking to him after all this time, but the experience was just too weird for me. Deep in my heart, I knew that I wanted to rekindle my friendship with the guys, but this meeting proved that I still wasn’t ready to face them. Not yet.
Just as I was about to take off again, Alex made a point to stop me. “Hold up a second.”
“No, Alex. I have to get going.”
“It’ll only take a minute.” He was starting to get frustrated.
“No. I really have to-“
“I don’t think so. Shouldn’t we talk about what-“
“There’s nothing to talk about, Alex,” I snapped, more harshly than I had intended. “Goodbye.”
I turned around, but he grabbed my shoulder and spun me around roughly; I had almost forgotten how much bigger he had gotten.
“You’re lying, Rosalina! You’re almost as bad as Nat!”
That had definitely caught my attention and I was no longer in such a rush to leave. “What do you mean?”
“He always acts like everything’s fine when it obviously isn’t. One second he’s talking about patching things up and the next, he’s ready to bite our heads off. It’s so hard to move on when he can’t just let it go. Don’t you think this has gone on long enough, Rosalina?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I let it go already. I’ve moved and I’m happy.”
“Really? Do you honestly expect me to believe that when you can’t even look me in the eye right now?”
He was right, but he shouldn’t have been. I thought I was happy. I thought I had already found my peace, but I couldn’t even bare to look at Alex right now.
Alex sighed and his tone softened. “Look, Rosalina. I know we weren’t the closest members in the band and we never talked that munch or anything, but even I can tell when you and Nat are lying to yourselves. I don’t care what you guys say. Neither of you have moved on and neither of you are as okay as you say you are. You can talk all you want. You can say that you’re ready to play nice again, but until you actually do something, it’s nothing but a bunch of lies.”
I still didn’t say anything. My eyes were burning but I refused to shed a single tear in front of Alex. I guess I was just too stubborn and stupid to realize that everything he was saying was true, and that I hadn’t put the past behind me.
“He misses you. The day you got into that accident, he went crazy. He wouldn’t talk to us for days and he even went missing for a few days. We thought he just locked himself up in some room for a few days, but we couldn’t find him anywhere. Wherever he was or whatever he was doing, we were just happy when he came back in one piece. He looked awful though. It was about four in the morning, a few hours before you woke up. Even after everyone found out you were fine, he still wasn’t. Nat’s a ghost without you. How much more proof do you need, Rosalina?”
“What makes you think that this is just about him? What about you and the rest of the guys?” It was a weak response, but my denial was still in control and I couldn’t think of anything better to say.
“Are you kidding me? You know how the guys are! They cooled down a long time ago. Nat said the same thing to me as you did. You two aren’t fooling anyone. This isn’t about David or Thomas or Qaasim or even Richie, or whatever his name is. It’s about you and Nat, and you both know it.”
“So what do you want me to do about it?”
“Were you even listening just now? Did you not hear a word I just said? I don’t care what you guys do! We’re going on tour tomorrow. It’s just another distraction for him. You’re going to graduate high school after this year. If you think you can just vanish without a trace, without leaving a single memory behind, then you’re wrong. I don’t care what you do. I don’t care if you ever speak to us again. This is between you and nat. Just stop lying to yourself. Don’t say you’re okay when you’re not. Don’t say there’s nothing to talk about when it’s the only thing there is to talk about. Don’t say you’re ready to move on when you’re only standing still. Don’t tell me it’s over. Don’t say you forgot. Quit lying to everyone and quit lying to yourself. It’s not fooling anyone and it’s high time that you two figured yourselves out. If you can do even one of those things then you’re already five steps ahead of Nat. He’s not ready to let this go and he’ll never be ready to let you go.”
Alex sighed and took a thoughtful glance at me, exhausted. He looked up at the sky, down to the sidewalk, and then at his watch. Finally, he sighed again and decided that he had said enough.
“I won’t say that it was nice talking to you again, but I really am glad to see you up and running. Nat will be glad to hear it, too. That accident tore him up pretty badly. Given enough time, maybe a few years or so, everything will cool off and we can all forget about everything that happened, but if you guys want to end it well, then you don’t have much time to do it. I just don’t want either of you guys coming back to me in a few years whining about the missed opportunity you had as a kid to make things right. In the future, if we ever have a big Naked Brothers Band reunion, I want it to be because we wanted to have some fun, not because we felt the need to apologize for something as stupid as this. Whatever. It’s up to you. I have to go pack. Goodbye, Rosalina.”
He ran off, leaving me feeling alone, vulnerable, and foolish. Alex was smart, very smart. He had laid me out like a fish and set me straight in a way that even Richie had failed to do. I didn’t know whether Alex could read me so well because I was that obvious or because he was going through the exact same thing with Nat. I didn’t know which one I would have rather preferred, either.
All that mattered, though, was that he was right. No matter how much I said it, I hadn’t let things go, and it seemed that, unless I did something about it, I never would. I knew that Nat was never one to make the first move, and I knew that if I wanted something to happen that I would have to be the one to do it.
But one question was holding me back. When was I going to stop just ‘knowing’ and start ‘doing?’
