Elizabeth Scott - Between Here and Forever

In the last one I look at, Tess’s head is resting in the crook of Claire’s neck as her hands cover Claire’s breasts, and Claire has her eyes closed, her mouth turned toward Tess, seeking.

I have to sit and look at the floor for a little bit after that one. I just … Tess and Claire. Al those times they were in here with the door closed, listening to music and working on homework, they were …

No wonder Tess always yel ed at me for trying to come in her room without knocking.

I look at the dates on the photos, and they seem to run from Tess and Claire’s freshman year to right after their senior year started. To right before Tess came home and spit out, “Claire’s pregnant.”

The last two photos are dated about the time I figure Claire got pregnant. The first one is in Claire’s room—I’ve seen Cole scrabbling across the comforter that lies tangled on the bed.

It’s morning, and Tess is lying on her stomach, sleeping, her closed eyes facing the camera but not seeing it. Not seeing anything. The light is tangled in her hair, shining off it and the bare skin of her back. She looks otherworldly, beautiful.

Underneath, someone has added Bliss in an elegant, cursive font, like they tried to title the photo.

The second photo shows Tess at a party on the beach, sitting and talking to a guy. She’s smiling, mouth curved wide, familiar, but her eyes are looking at the camera, not him, and they look—

They look sad, but they look angry too.

The same font has been used to label this photo as wel . It says Your Choice .

I stare at it, wondering who wrote those words—Tess? Claire?—and what they mean. I know what happened, but there’s something … there’s something I’m not getting. Not seeing.

I close the folder and open the other one, “beth messages.” There’s only one thing in it, and it was last opened—

It was last opened on New Year’s Eve, right before Tess left for her party.

It’s another online conversation, but it’s not from that night. It’s from before, from Tess’s last semester in school, from last fal , and from the first line, when someone says, I need to talk to u, I know it’s a fight.

I think it must be the fight that ended things.

It’s hard to tel , though, because the person I think is Beth (Beth0728—it has to be her) is the only one talking.

She says she needs Tess to trust her, and that she wants to stop pretending.

There’s no reply, but Beth keeps writing, types that she knows who she is, and adds that everyone knows about us already .

Stil no reply, and Beth types, i don’t know why you cant admit it. i want us to be together for real i want to be able to say this is my girlfriend.

Stil no reply and Beth types, say something say anything don’t get all quiet on me okay? Please? Tess?

Nothing and Beth types, fine. i can’t take it anymore. you have to do this or it’s over. OVER. you know Im not Claire I won’t break your heart.

Tess final y types something back then.

She types, I broke my own heart.

“Oh,” I say, and my voice is loud in the silent room, so loud I can hear it above the roaring in my ears, hear it past the words I’ve just read and the memory of those photos of Claire and Tess.

Claire and Tess and in the very last photo, Claire wasn’t in it at al . It was just Tess and that guy, Tess smiling at him as she stared at the camera.

Stared at whoever was taking the picture like she was sad and angry. Stared, but wasn’t moving. Was sitting by the guy’s side like it was where she wanted to be. Had to be.

Claire took the photo. Claire was the one Tess was looking at.

Your Choice.

Claire told me, “She only ever said she loved me,” and now I realize what that means. What Tess did. She said it, but only in private. She said it, but would never, ever do anything more. Anything public.

Claire didn’t break Tess’s heart. Tess broke hers.

I just don’t know why. Was it because Claire got pregnant? Did Claire cheat on her and Tess couldn’t—wouldn’t—forgive her?

I broke my own heart.

Those words are so familiar. Too familiar.

I cal Beth, because she’l know what happened. She has to, but as soon as I say, “It’s Abby, Tess’s sister,” she says, “I’m not talking to you. I know you’re angry, but you have to understand that I can’t—”

“But that’s just it,” I say. “I didn’t understand, but now I do, and I just want to know why you and Tess broke up.”

Beth laughs and it sounds so much like Claire’s laugh when she talked about Tess before, so brittle and angry and sad, that my skin prickles.

“Why?” she says. “You want to know why, like it’s just one reason, just one thing?”

“Okay, I’m sure it was complicated, and I didn’t mean—I just want to know what happened. You lived with her, you two were—”

“I can’t talk about this,” Beth says. “I just—I can’t.”

“You mean you won’t.”

“No,” Beth says. “I mean I can’t. I don’t know why she wouldn’t admit we were together. Go ask Claire, always lurking around her hospital room, always hanging around in Tess’s head, always—always there.”

“Claire?”

“What, you’re surprised? You didn’t know?”

“I do, but I don’t exactly know what happened.”

“I don’t either,” Beth says, her voice weary. “Al I ever knew is that something happened with Tess and Claire and—wel , my guess is Tess freaked out because Claire ran off and had a baby rather than admit she loved Tess and it fucked Tess up. Ask Claire if you want to know. It’s not like—God, it’s not like you haven’t had the chance.”

“But—”

“No,” Beth says. “Two years, okay? I loved Tess so much and she loved me but not enough, never enough, and I final y told her to choose and she just—she shut down, spent the rest of the semester looking through me, and now she’s in the hospital and I won’t ever—” She sniffs once, twice, like she’s struggling not to cry. “I’ve had to let her go and I can’t—don’t cal here again.”

And then she hangs up.

“What are you doing?”

I look over my shoulder and see Mom standing in Tess’s doorway, glancing from the computer to the phone in my hand, and then to me. She looks worried but not surprised, and I wonder if she’s trying to figure out why I’m in Tess’s room.

“I was—” I point at Tess’s computer. “I was just looking for something. A file. For school.”

“On Tess’s computer?” Mom says, shaking her head at my transparent lie, and I say, “I just—Tess was—is—” and watch her expression change ever so slightly.

Watch her realize I’ve found out something she already knows.

Mom knows, and I stand up, putting the phone down as I say, “You … why didn’t you tel me about Tess?”

I figure Mom wil try to talk her way out of it, say she wanted to wait or something like that. But she doesn’t.

She just says, “It wasn’t my place to tel .”

“Wasn’t your place?” I can hear my voice rising. “Al this time I thought Tess—”

“What?” Mom says, eyes narrowing, and I think she actual y believes I’m going to judge Tess for who she cared about, that I—

“Hey!” I say. “I’m not—you mean you didn’t tel me because you thought I’d, what? Try to set her on fire? What kind of person do you think I am?”

“Abby,” she says, coming toward me and touching my arm. “I didn’t—”

“You did too.”

“No,” she says softly. “I didn’t. I don’t. I—I just don’t know what you know.”