Has Anybody Ever Made Such A Fool Out Of You

[raeghan]

Here's the second part.

Chapter 6/?

When she gets back to her old house her father is waiting for her in the driveway holding a small bouquet of daisies and a sad smile and when she gets out of the car she takes the flowers and hugs him and for the first time it doesn’t feel awkward or forced. She’s been in desperate need of a hug since that horrible night and she feels like she could cry that it took her this long to get one.

“Do you want something to eat?” He asks her and she nods.

He makes her favorite meal from when she was a kid, lasagna and mashed potatoes, she had weird tastes as a kid and they eat in comfortable silence, Hank only tries to talk but can’t find the words to say and Harper doesn’t hold that against him because she’s been suffering from the same thing for the past 23 years, save for the brief seven months that she was fully committed to Lee, where words and everything else came naturally and easily.

She cleans up after dinner, gently pushing her father into the living room so he could watch the news before he goes out to the front porch and his friends come over to talk about baseball and the town and how taxes are going up in it and they’ll complain and laugh. It’s a fall tradition that dates back for as long as she can remember but it’s picked up in the recent years. It’s not daily instead of weekly. She guesses that has something to do with her dad’s grim diagnosis, they want to get as much time together as possible before he runs out of it.

Usually she would head up to her room, crack open the window and light a cigarette near it, listening to the slow rumblings of laughter that came from the porch as she slowly inhaled and exhaled but tonight she slips on her jacket and exits the house telling Hank that she’ll be back later.

She has no destination in mind. Not one that she’s willing to admit to anyways. Every where she goes she gets either two looks. They either don’t give a shit about her being on a huge TV show, falling in love with the winner and then getting cheated on by said winner. That’s the one she likes. It’s refreshing and normal, makes her feel like what happened isn’t a big deal, like the same basic thing is happening every day across the county to countless number of women and if they can all deal with it, so can she. The other is the one that she’s regrettably used to. Sympathy and pity and ‘you got your heart smashed into teeny tiny bits while the whole county was watching’. It’s mostly from women. They ‘care’. They guys usually look at her like she’s looking for a rebound or companionship and they’re willing to give her whatever she needs.

She spots Aaron before he’s able to zero in on her and she makes the decision to pick him before she can think that it’s a bad idea, which it is. She’s that girl again, the simply complex one that she was before she left for Hollywood and before he left her in Chicago and she strides with a forced confidence in her walk over to him, pulls the glass of beer from his mouth mid sip and kisses him, earning a few whistles and cheers from his group of drunken friends.

He says that he’s sober enough to drive home but she’s that level of stupid that she wouldn’t even care if he wasn’t and he takes her back to his place, her hands all over him the whole ride, not stopping until he holds them over her head as he kisses down her neck, something that used to drive her wild with desire but now only serves to leave her feeling cold and cheap and guilty which makes her mad. She’s guilty about sleeping with someone else almost three months after Lee did.

“Can we do this again?” Aaron asks her as he’s catching his breath, his lips still at her neck and she puts her hands on his shoulder and pushes him back.

“No.”

“Fine.” He snaps and rolls away from her to his side of the bed. “Whatever Harper, I don’t care.”

“Yeah, you never did.”

“It’s hard for a guy to care for a guy like you.”

That cuts her deeper than anything Lee ever did to her because that’s the start point for all her problems. It’s her and her fucked up life that’s to blame.

She leaves right away, shamefully pulling on her clothes in the order that Aaron ripped them off of her just twenty minutes before and gets out of his house. She has to walk home and pulls her jacket around her to fight off the late October chill that’s sweeping the streets and her shoes crunch over the dead leaves on the sidewalk.

When she gets home there are still a few of her dad’s friends left on the porch and they nod to her and she nods back before she gets inside and runs upstairs. She starts to unpack her things for the first time in a long time. She never unpacked on tour. To her packing is final. It’s staying and putting down roots and she wanted to save that feeling for when she moved in with Lee but that didn’t happen and she just didn’t have the strength to do it at Katie’s but she’s home now. A version of home. One that will always be there for her and she feels comfortable enough to take out all her things and set them up around her room.

She finds things that she didn’t want to see. Pictures of him and her that she tucked into her bag for safe keeping. They’re photos of them in front of venues or falling asleep on the bus, a few of them are taken in front of Welcome To state signs that he just had to have taken because he was floored that he was in Louisiana or Florida and she laughed at him teasing him that there was more to American than the Midwest and he pretended to be offended and kissed her and someone, she forgets who took the picture, snapped the camera just at that moment and caught them kissing and it’s the kind of picture that would be framed and cherished and hung on a wall in their bedroom and they would tell their children and grandchildren the story behind it with a fond smile about their younger years and being crazy in love and how they managed to make it last all those years but now she’s contemplating tearing it up and throwing it out, like he did to that love.

She drops it back into her suitcase and fishes around for more pain, quickly finding it in sheets of paper that belonged to him but somehow ended up with her. Lyrics that he wrote. Such pretty words scrawled and set into the paper. They’re about love and her and being happy that they found each other. It was supposed to make her happy. That’s what all his music and work was supposed to do. That someone she loved and that loved her wrote something for her but now it only brings her pain and she has the drop those papers before tears can stain them.

She spends two weeks at home before she finally hears her father talk about what happened. He doesn’t talk to her directly; it’s indirectly, like it always is. He didn’t even tell her that he was sick. She had to overhear that while she was attempting to sneak out one night. He and his sister and a few close friends were sitting around the kitchen table and she was waiting for them to leave, standing on the top of the stairs when she heard the word ‘cancer’ and suddenly her plans of sneaking out were thwarted and she went back to her room, softly closed the door and laid on her bed for the rest of the night. Now she’s overhearing the porch conversation like she did for so many years, the window open, wrapped in a blanket to combat the cold and the cigarette stuck between her fingers, hand hanging out on the sill, wrist dangling over the edge.

“I feel responsible for this.” She hears him say and she narrows her eyes.

“How can that be?”

“I feel like I pushed them. I wanted her to find someone so badly that I just rushed them into that.”

“They’re grown adults. They did this themselves. He did this. It’s not your fault.”

“Still. I really thought she had this one. It seemed so perfect.”

“Nothing is ever perfect.”

She snorts as she takes a drag from the cigarette at how true that is.

“I don’t want her to be alone forever.”

“She’s a strong girl. She can make it on her own.”

“But she shouldn’t have to be. I feel like I failed her. She’s only the way she is because that’s the way I raised her. I messed her up.”

She stops listening then and stubs the cigarette out against the metal window and shuts it and falls back into bed.

She figures that she might as well stay through Christmas. She can shut out the fact that his CD is coming out and that Katie is most likely going home and she’d be alone in L fucking A over it. She doesn’t care to read review of his album, but she knows they’re going to be good and she doesn’t want to read or listen to people analyzing every word her wrote on it, trying to relate it back to her and what happened, because she knows that most of them will be successful. She also figures that she shouldn’t eat all the cookies in some depressed fog and should probably work out and re-dye her hair because if she comes back fatter and blonder. She starts to write again, sad, sad songs about everything awful that she could think of and the sounds from the guitar vibrate off the walls of her room in melancholy tunes.

She watches Breakfast At Tiffany’s with her dad the night before she leaves and sighs heavily at the end, listening carefully to every word Paul speaks to Holly while she’s sitting in the cab.

‘ You know what's wrong with you, Miss Whoever-You-Are? You're chicken, you've got no guts. You're afraid to stick out your chin and say, "Okay, life's a fact, people do fall in love, people do belong to each other, because that's the only chance anybody's got for real happiness." You call yourself a free spirit, a wild thing, and you're terrified somebody's going to stick you in a cage. Well, baby, you're already in that cage. You built it yourself. And it's not bounded in the west by Tulip, Texas, or in the east by Somaliland. It's wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself’

He tosses the ring back to Holly and walks off and Harper can’t stand it anymore.

“You know it’s not your fault right?” She asks Hank and he looks away from the TV at her.

“What do you mean?”

“What happened to me and Lee? That wasn’t you. I heard you talking.”

“Eavesdropping is rude Harper.”

“Whatever. I’ve been doing it since I was five.”

“Doesn’t make it right.”

“It wasn’t you. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I just want you to be happy Harp.”

“I know. I want that too I guess.”

“You won’t do that…”

“If I keep doing what I’m doing. I know. You’re not the first person to tell me that.”

“You gotta make a change,”

“I know all this dad.”

“Then why don’t you do it?”

“Because it’s not that easy.”

“When your mother died.”

“This isn’t the same thing. She died. Lee just cheated on me.”

“But you loved him. Absolutely. And then that love died.”

“No it didn’t.” She whispers as she wipes at her teary eyes with the back of her hand and her dad starts to come over to her to comfort her but she stands up and waves her off. “I’m going to bed, I need to get an early start tomorrow, I’ll probably leave before you’re up, thanks for letting me stay here for so long, I’ll call you when I get back to L.A.” She rushes out before she hits the stairs again and roughly gathers all her things into her bag and lies down on her side in bed, facing the wall.

She starts to record in the middle of January and when Lee hears that on the news he braces for songs about him but then cringes at his own vanity. It doesn’t have to be him. He’s been apart from her for months, which was plenty of time to move on and find someone new.

But he’s pretty sure that it will be all about him when they’re both booked to play a small concert downtown. It’s some press thing that Idol is doing and they’re the previous season and it sucks but neither of them can say no so they have to go. He leaves Chloe behind because he thinks that’s the right thing to do, that she’ll in some way appreciate it but when she scans the crowd and doesn’t see her she feels angry, like she thinks he thinks she’s not strong enough to face her. He’s totally right but that’s not the truth she feels like living.

They end up singing to each other through cover songs, he sings Tell Me A Lie by Griffin House and she sings You Still Hurt Me by William Fitzsimmons and Think Of You by A Fine Frenzy and the whole crowd is watching her with baited breath just waiting for her to break down into tears on stage and she almost does but her pride outweighs her pathetic side and she keeps it in until afterwards when the crowd leaves and she hits the bar. Hard.

She thought he had left and that’s why she drinks drink after drink so by the time he comes up to her she’s drunk beyond repair.

“Go back to your girlfriend.” She slurs.

“Not until I know you’re okay.” He says softly and she frowns.

“Shut up Lee. Leave me alone.”

“No. You should go home. You’re living with Katie right?”

“None of your business.”

“Come on Harper.”

“No, don’t come on Harper me. That’s shit and makes you look like an even bigger tool than you already are. Do you know what you put me through? I fucking loved you and you tossed me aside.”

“I made a mistake.”

“A mistake is a typo or dropping a glass of milk or something like that. You fucked up.”

“Okay, so I fucked up.”

“You really fucked up and now you have to live with that fuck up every fucking day because there’s not a chance in hell that I’ll ever forgive you or take you back, not that you need me to, you look fine. Do you even care? Does it hurt you?”

“Of course it hurts me. You think I want this life? I hate it.”

“It looks pretty good from where I’m sitting.”

“I don’t love her and I never will and she knows that but doesn’t care because she’s an idiot.”

“Then why are you with her?”

“Because you won’t be with me and I need someone.”

“Fuck you. You’re such a guy. You don’t anyone. I’m not with anyone.”

“And does that make you happy.”

“Go to hell.”

“I’m not trying to upset you.”

“You already did that months ago Lee. I’m still reeling from it.”

He rubs his hand over his face.

“I’m so sorry Harper.”

“I’m so sick of hearing that. And I don’t want to talk to you. The only reason that I am is because I’m drunk. If I was sober I would’ve burst into tears and stormed out of here.”

“I wish you would.”

“What?”

“I wish you would show something other than just being mad at me.”

“I save that for when I’m alone.”

“I want to see it. I want to fix this.” He touches her arm but she pulls away from him.

“You can’t.”

“But let me try.”

“No. You don’t get a second chance when you screw me over.”

“But…”

“I don’t want to keep going in circles Lee. Let me get over you. Katie says I have to get over you.”

“I don’t want you to.”

“Well I didn’t want you to fuck someone else but you did and now you have to live with it, which by the way, you’re doing a hell of a job at. You cheat on my and claim that you’re sorry and then you continue to date the slut that you cheated on me with. I wish I could do that.” She stands up off the stool and fishes though her bag to find some money and throws it on the bar. “Get out of my way. I’m going home.”

“Let me take you.”

“No. Go to hell.” She stumbles and he grabs her waist to steady her.

“I’m taking you home.”

“You are not.” She raises her voice and pushes him away trying to cause a scene and she’s successful and he backs off.

But only until she stumbles out onto the street and before the paparazzi can flood her he’s got her by the hand and pulls her to his car, gets her in it an slams the door before she can protest.

She stays silent as he drives and when he opens the car door to help her out she puts an arm around his shoulder.

“I hate you.” She says evenly and he leans against the car because his knees weaken in disappointment.

“That sucks Harper because I’m in love with you.”

She closes her eyes and lets herself be pulled into a hug which turns into him lifting her out of the car when she starts to cry and refuses to walk. She sobs quietly on his shoulder, soaking through his shirt as he holds her in the elevator and kicks Katie’s door to get her to open up.

“What…” Katie questions but Lee shakes his head to cut her off.

“Where’s her room?”

“Back there.” She points to a door and Lee nods and walks off with Harper still in his arms.

He lays her down on the bed and she covers her face with her hands so he can’t see the tears as he takes off her boots.

He sits down on the bed with her and gently removes her hands from her face.

“Why can’t you just be miserable? Why can’t you do that one thing for me Lee? Why do I have to be the one like this? Why can’t it be you?”

“It’s me too.”

“I don’t believe you. I don’t believe anything you say anymore.”

He brushes some hair out of her face and she leans into his palm.

“Did you feel guilty?”

“Yes.”

“Do you still feel guilty? I had sex with Aaron..”

“Aaron? That guy that ditched you in Chicago?”

“Judgment from you? The guy that cheated on me? You’re no better than him. Don’t act like you are. I had sex with him and I felt so guilty I couldn’t even stand it. Like I was hurting you.”

“That does hurt me.”

“Good.” She says as she moves her face out of his hand. “I wanna hurt you like you hurt me.”

“You did.”

She sniffles a few times and then calms down enough to speak without her voice cracking.

“Just go Lee.”

He hangs his head and squeezes her shoulder before he stands up and walks out of her room then straight out of the apartment and down to his car where he sits and thinks about everything he fucked up.