The spoiler, p.26
The Spoiler, page 26
A truly horrifying version of myself reflected back to me in my mirror one dark December night. A girl who was so far gone, she couldn’t even find the person she was supposed to be. Shadows darker than I’d ever seen clung beneath my eyes, tainting my skin, which was now so pale, I looked sickly.
What did he ever see in me? His image overtook my mind and was all I could see when I finally pulled myself away from my own reflection.
The more I thought of all I’d lost and obsessed over his hauntingly beautiful face—the words he’d whispered to me in the dark sanctuary of our blissful night together, the curve of his lips as they'd closed on mine—the more my mind was filled of memories from days gone by. Tristan had spent years seeing me, and I’d spent years convinced he’d never really see me. Every spoiled movie accompanied some kind of observation on his part of what I was suffering. And every time he’d tried to save me, I’d been too irritated or angry to feel the emotion behind his efforts. And so I attempted in earnest to see through the lens of his eyes.
June 2004
I sat in a far corner at Rob’s graduation party, my solace of the empty den. It was a blistering July day, but Dad had insisted on having a nice breeze cut through the house, so the windows were open. Dozens of Rob’s friends ate and played lawn games and tossed water balloons at each other, occasionally coming in to sneak beers from the fridge.
It was easier if I kept huddled inside alone with my eyes on the kitchen clock. I used to think everything would be easier if I were alone. So I sat there, holding my knees to my chest, nose in a book, sipping cream soda. The back door opened and a cluster of hockey guys slipped through to rummage in the cabinets for harder drinks that I knew they’d never find. Dad kept liquor on lock-down in our house.
“Ah, Rose. You won’t tell on us, will you?” This came from Kevin, a stocky goaltender who was always just slightly nicer to me than the others. He slid onto the far end of the couch and eyed my book while his friends moved in to hear my answer.
“She won’t tell. Rose can keep secrets.” Rob wasn’t with them, but I continued to peer over Kevin’s shoulder at the window, hoping he’d appear and ward off his vulturous buddies.
“Mhmm. I won’t tell.” I took a deep breath and let it out with a sigh.
“She’s kept secrets for me before, this one.” This one. What one? At the time, I was somewhat clueless when it came to signals and certain implications that a conversation could have with hungry jocks. I wasn’t even sure what secret I’d kept before for any of them, but it didn’t seem to matter. The one who’d said it looked over his shoulder, then crouched next to me, leaning over to whisper in my ear.
I looked back on that day from my own perspective time and time again, feeling stupid and naïve. The guy, Brandon Welch, quickly placed his hand on my arm while he put his head next to mine and said, “We should go hang in Rob’s room. I can bring up some beers, get away from all the people.” He said it like it was some kind of nice gesture. Hey, Routine Rose, I want to help you. Let’s go upstairs. I tilted my head to one side and found Kevin’s eyes. He looked like he fully supported the brilliant idea to vacate the crowded party together. And these were guys on the hockey team, Rob’s friends. This made sense, right? Maybe they aren’t so bad after all.
I turned and stood from the couch then. “Sure, we can go hang out upstairs. There’s actually more beer in the basement fridge, ya know.” Wow, was I cool.
That was maybe the last thing I could clearly remember saying to them when I looked back on that memory over the years. But as I sat alone and fought through the heartache to see Tristan’s perspective, things kind of changed. There was more to the story.
We all reached the stairs, Brandon casually curling an arm around my waist, just as Tristan came through the front door. He looked at Brandon, his arm, the beer in his other hand, Kevin, two other guys behind us, then over to me.
“Where you all going?” Tristan asked. I remember my eyes widening at the sight of his face, the apparent irritation with what he’d stumbled upon. And I remember it made me angry that he was trying to stop me from having this silver lining moment that would make the party better for me.
“None of your business,” I responded with an edge to my voice. Brandon laughed next to me and slid his hand over the small of my back. It was a place nobody had ever touched me at that point and, for some dumb reason, it made me feel special. He was being kind, ushering me politely up the stairs, flirting with me.
But that is not how Tristan saw any of it. He stood a whole head taller than any of the guys on the team, so when he stepped up to the stairs and shouldered Brandon away from me, it wasn’t surprising how easy it looked. He shoved Brandon down the stairs and yelled at him before turning back to me.
“Don’t do shit like this, Rose!” At the time, I took his words to be some kind of order. They angered me and made me feel like he was pulling some surrogate big brother shit.
“You don’t get to tell me what to do!” I screamed back at him, but he completely ignored me. Instead, he grabbed my arm and pulled at it until I was following him up the stairs alone. “Let go of me!” I shook at his grip, but he kept on trudging us up two more flights until we were in my stifling attic room.
“Rose, what the hell are you doing?” He towered over me and looked down with a kind of anger I’d never seen. His chest was pumping rapidly through his irate breaths.
“I’m doing whatever I want to do. It doesn’t concern you. What, are you jealous that some guys are giving me attention?” At the time, I was spitting mad, and it was the first thing that popped into my head.
“Maybe I don’t want you to regret your decisions,” he answered.
“Maybe it isn’t up to you if I make decisions I’ll regret. Unless… you think all of my decisions, good and bad, should involve you. Is that it?” I certainly wasn’t off the mark, looking back, but I was saying it out of pure petulance. He swallowed and took a step back from me.
“No. I—I’m just looking out for you, Rose.”
“Since when do you even fucking care, Tristan?” He’d been spoiling my movies for months at that point, so in my mind, he only cared about being a jerk to me.
The heated anger of the moment drove me to sit on my bed. I remember looking far away from him and wishing he would say he cared. It would change everything if he actually did care. He said nothing, though. Just idled in my room until the moment got the best of me. I started biting my nails, my cuticles, anything I could while I sat there waiting for some romanticized response that would never come.
“Roslyn,” he said to me. My mind was far away at that point. “Rose.” His voice was soft, caressing as it tried to rouse me from my trance—it was nothing like Drew’s had been.
And then he dropped it. The spoiler. One that ruined The Man in the Iron Mask. Looking back, I wondered how he knew I hadn’t seen it yet. It was like he had some kind of clairvoyance on my movie watching, a window into my mind that kept him abreast of every title I hadn’t yet seen from my mystery box. I shook my head at him and hissed some kind of nasty remark that ultimately forced him from my room and the memory was over.
Tristan hadn’t come in there to spoil something for me or make me feel like shit. He’d swooped in when I was putting myself in a precarious situation, likely stopped me from letting some shitty guy fondle me, and then he’d snapped me out of my moment of compulsion. It was just the same as dozens of other times back then. Only now, I could see it a lot clearer.
Seeing Tristan for who he really was should have made me happier, but in the end—as I ran through a dozen memories of spoilers—it only made me miss him more. And then, in seeing him more clearly while missing him so desperately, it was that much easier for my mind to be drawn to more recent memories. Memories of words that my mind heard differently now.
I stared at the off-white ceiling while I envisioned his tall frame hovering beside my desk. “He’ll go on loving her, even if it means… never having her.” Then his hands on my waist in the kitchen, as the look in his eyes shifted. “I’m so sorry, Rose.” My knees were tucked beneath me as I perched on the landing above Rob’s room. “I don't think I can sink it, so I don’t. I choke… It’s the same with her. Every time." The anguish on his face as I made to flee my parents’ house. “I struggle like you do and don’t deserve all of this…” I’d thought he meant that he didn’t deserve my anger, but now I knew he felt he didn’t deserve me or my life. “It feels like you’re telling me what you wanted then is what I want now; what I’ve wanted for a very long time.” It had nothing to do with trying to sleep with me and everything to do with wanting me as I wanted him. And just how much had he tried to tell me? “I have so much trouble saying what I’m thinking, but I keep trying to tell you…” “You’ll know… if it’s the last thing I do. You’ll know.” “Always wanted this… Rose... my Rose.” “August 10th, 2003. It started as the worst summer of my life and ended up being the best.”
And suddenly I could see the forest through the trees. All these years of me being the focus of my insecurities blinded me to the idea that I wasn’t alone. I was never really alone. That Tristan was dealing with issues just like anyone else. He was trying to help me while struggling in his own way, and that all I could do was see him in a way he didn’t deserve. What he’d tried so hard to tell me made so much sense now. It was his faltering effort to give me a window into his mind—a peek at who he really was. The guy who wanted a better life than what he’d had as a child, who’d tried so hard to be perfect and be liked and be happy as a result. The guy who wanted for me to be happy, but would sacrifice his own happiness to make sure I didn’t hate myself. The guy… the guy I now knew without a shadow of a doubt that I loved.
The remainder of my December was just as dark as the day we’d parted. Nothing would bring Tristan back to me, I was convinced. I floated through the days with a shadow over my heart, only able to see a sliver of light ahead at the idea of seeing my family.
It was in that final week before Christmas, with a blip of happiness at the thought of going home, that I pulled myself from bed one morning and drove to my rescheduled therapy session. Joy sat in the far corner of her office that day while I completely broke apart. It was only my second session—she was still a stranger to me in many ways, and yet, just having someone to listen after being so alone was what I needed.
I told her how terrible everything had been, how little I’d focused on trying to help myself through my moments of OCD, and how everything was affecting school and work. And while some part of me wanted to use the whole hour to cry over Tristan, I didn’t. All I told her was that I was starting to see things differently—from his point of view—but that I wanted to learn how to see myself differently as well.
We spent the rest of our time talking about Routine Rose and who she really was—and wasn’t. Too soon the hour was over, but I left looking forward to the next session, knowing that I was starting to see that I really could be just Rose.
Finally, on the Saturday before Christmas, I packed a light bag and headed out for Blue River.
All the mountain towns were blanketed in more snow than ever this year, so I took my time navigating the winding roads until I could see town in the distance.
Blue River’s massive Christmas tree was up and lit in the square, a beacon to welcome me as I passed last-minute shoppers and a horse-drawn sleigh. Every year, the town’s tree got bigger, but normally just around the middle. The mayor loved to boast about “the fattest tree we’ve ever had,” though it was becoming somewhat comical.
I stopped at the video store before heading to the house. After everything that had happened and my sudden break off from Drew, I hadn’t rented a single movie. Catching the end of Tristan & Isolde was the closest I’d come to letting myself feel any kind of connection to the way I’d once lived. And the more I thought about all that had happened, the more I came back to one idea: maybe what I once thought of as an acceptable obsession wasn’t acceptable after all. Maybe I should never have let myself be obsessed with anything at all.
With an attempt at some semblance of recovery, very little appealed to me in the movie department, but I let myself have just one rental to see me through the inevitable alone time I’d have at night during my short visit.
“Randy, Roslyn is home!” It was the second time in a row I’d come home without warning. They knew I’d be there for Christmas, but my brief conversation left a lot unanswered, especially after failing to show for Thanksgiving. I slowly walked through the door and into my mother’s arms, where a sudden punch of guilt hit me. I had shut myself down so much and they didn’t deserve that.
“Rose, honey, how was the drive? I thought maybe you’d be here a few days ago. No matter, you’re here now.” Dad pulled me in for a second, all-consuming hug and a kiss on the cheek.
“Hi, Dad.” I tried my best to sound somewhat happy.
“How’s the new place, kiddo?”
“It’s…”
“Rose,” Rob said with a kind of sigh as he came down the steps. His brows drew together, and he studied me a second before practically collapsing into me and tightening his grip on my shoulders. “I’m so mad at you. And I fucking miss you.”
“No f-word at Christmas, Robert,” Mom scolded beside us. She was the queen of f-bombs, so it was extra funny when she implemented holiday-only cussing rules.
“How are we supposed to deck the fucking halls that way, Ma?” It was the question we asked her every year and the one that made her break down and laugh each time. I set my head on his shoulder and laughed until tears were in my eyes.
We had a nice family dinner at home that night, watched Mystery, Alaska, then Rob and Dad went out to do some work on the ice rink.
“He’s finally learning how Dad does it, then.” Mom and I watched from the den while they replaced some old panels with new ones they’d painted that afternoon. The rink was always positioned between the house and the orchard, but this year Dad had strung lights up in the nearest trees and it gave off a nice glow across the finished ice.
Things were changing in such a good way, the more I thought about it. Usually I’d be out there replacing panels or putting together benches with Dad. Rob would be inside playing video games until it was done. Now he was taking an interest in something he’d never given much of a thought to before. I watched as he set his drill down and pulled his phone from his pocket. A smile that turned into a big laugh let me know it was Nicole. Rob had mentioned how funny she was at least three times in the last few hours.
“You’re both getting older,” Mom spoke, tilting her head at me with a soft smile. “Lots of new things happening. How is your job at the campus store?” There wasn’t much to say except the truth.
“Not great, I guess. I… I’m having OCD flare-ups again, so I dunno, but I’m trying to figure it out.”
“Oh, hon. I’m sorry. Are you—never mind.” She wanted to ask about therapy, but stopped herself short.
“I went the other day, and I still have a lot to work on. I’m just trying to keep myself above water, I guess.”
“Is this about Tristan?”
I squinted up at her. How did she know?
“Honey, you may be the only person in this household who didn’t realize how much Tristan always liked you.”
“Jeez. Well, I don’t think it really matters anymore. That ship has sailed.”
“You’re young, Roslyn. Nothing is over. No ships have sailed. Life carries on, you’ll see.”
Mom was always concise in her wisdom, and usually right, but this time it didn’t feel that way, especially if those pregnancy tests had ended up positive. I nodded and gave her a half-smile before turning in for the night.
Christmas Eve at the Maraczek house was always a whirlwind. All the family we didn’t want to see would be around the next day, so Mom and Dad could be spotted rushing all over the house to prepare for guests. The kitchen would be in full use by midday, pies in the oven and veggies being prepped. Scraps of wrapping paper would litter the dining table while one of them would always be shouting for the scissors or the tape.
“Trish, where are the scissors?!”
Rob laughed at Dad, then kicked his foot out at me from the recliner. We were on our third game of NHL ‘99 for the night.
“Hey! I would have stopped that!” The puck sailed past my goalie and he mocked me with a broom sweep motion on the floor. “Oh, you have never swept me. I literally won the last game!”
It was just after dinner when we’d picked up our favorite Christmas Eve tradition, only this year, I’d had to pull Rob away from his phone to get him in the den.
“You’re ringing again.” I kicked back at him and he grabbed my foot before impact.
“I am missed. What can I say?” he said with a wide smile.
“She in Georgia for Christmas?” Nicole came from a blue-blood southern family, but she’d told Rob many times that she wasn’t sure she wanted to go home for the holidays.
“Yeah, hating every minute that she’s away from me.” I rolled my eyes back at him while he chuckled. “Nah, she just has a lot of family issues. I probably should have just invited her here.”
“In this chaos?” Mom emerged from the kitchen in a frazzled state looking for her glasses, which were on top of her head. “She’d go running back to Georgia in a minute.”
“Ehh, it never bothered Trist—” He stopped himself and took a deep breath.
“As it turns out, nothing ever bothered Tristan until I told him I hated him.” My head flopped back on the couch as I rubbed a hand over my face.
“I’m sure he knows you don’t hate him.”
