Chapter 7

Chapter 7:
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Christina pulled over to the side of the road and stopped the car. Suddenly, the past few months flew at her in a blur. When she found him lying in a pool of his own blood, something in her snapped. Suddenly she didn't want to be her anymore. She told her photography job that she was taking a leave of absence. Her boss loved her work and told her the job would be there when she got back. She threw her cell phone away immediately. All it did was remind her of him and she didn't need that reminder following her around.
Her mother had insisted that if she was going to ride her bike around the country, she was going to need some form of communication. So Christina allowed not just her mom but several of her friends to lend her their cell phones in case one got lost or something happened to the battery. Christina would have preferred complete silence but she couldn't shut her mother out completely. She just knew that she couldn't stay there.

Ryan stretched and opened his eyes. What the hell, they weren't moving. He looked at the driver's seat and found that Christina wasn't even in the car. What in the hell did he miss?
He wiped the sleep out of his eyes once more and stretched again before sitting upright. His neck was killing him from the strained position it was in but from looking around he could tell he was almost home.
He got out of the car to find Christina looking out at the horizon. There was a small beach right by the shoreline and it was almost sunset. They were finally in Georgia and they would be at his house in an hour.
He walked over, careful not to spook her. She was sitting on a rock staring out into the vast blue where the sky met water, tears slowly falling down her face.
She didn't even bother wiping them away as he sat down next to her. "you okay?" he asked, his voice worried.
Her voice cracked a little as she talked. "he loved the ocean. We would take trips sometimes to collect shells and sea glass. We even had jars to save pieces we really loved. But then he stopped coming to the beach with me. He never left his apartment. He stopped throwing garbage away. And even his appearance changed. He stopped shaving, stopped getting his hair cut. He was even getting a little skinnier."
Ryan could only assume she was talking about her ex. She had mentioned being on the road because of an accident but she had never said anything else. He looked over at her to see why she had stopped talking only to see her face crumpled, more tears coming down her cheeks. It broke his heart to see this beautifully strong woman break down. He put his arm on her back, not really sure if she wanted to be comforted or not. With that gesture she collapsed into his chest, crying for a good while before finally sighing and collecting herself. He put his arms around her and gave her a hug. He still didn't know the whole story but he didn't care as long as she stopped crying.

After a while, she picked her head up again. The tears had mostly dried on her face, but his shirt was now soaked where they had fallen. "sorry about your shirt," she said, her voice raw. He shook his head. "as long as it made you stop crying, my whole shirt could be soaked and I wouldn't care." she cracked a smile and managed a soft giggle. Suddenly she felt like she couldn't sit still anymore. Ryan was still good company, she just had to move her legs. She had the panicky feeling again, and moving around seemed to help that. She grabbed his hand and lead him towards the water's edge.
"I need to tell you something, and it's not going to be easy," she started. "you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to," Ryan said gently, squeezing her hand. "no, I need to tell the story. I need to get it out of me so it can stop eating me up inside."
Christina took a deep breath. She had no idea where she was going to begin, so just started with the first words that came out of her mouth.
"I loved him so much, it hurt. I really thought he was the one I was going to marry and have babies with. He was the best thing that happened to me. And then it all went to shit."
Christina cleared her throat before continuing. She took a deep breath and continued her heartbreaking tale.
As she recanted the story of how the whole bloody mess unfolded, of all the nights she stayed up late worrying and all the doubts she kept pushing away, she realized something. There was nothing she could have done to save Ben from himself. He was hellbent on destroying himself and that wasn't anywhere she needed to be. It made her run to the point of exhaustion. To think that because of this incredibly selfish man, she was so afraid of love that she was willing to travel across the country just to get away from the pain.
But of course she would never be able to outrun it. It would always come to haunt her because she would always find some unsuspecting and perfectly nice boy to hang out with until he showed some type of feeling for her and then of course she would be gone.
But for some reason, she didn't want that to be the case with this one. Even though she had only known him for a short period of time, looking into his eyes she knew that her words were safe with him. She felt that they had a genuine connection, had known it since she set foot on that bus and sat behind him. And now here she was sobbing in front of him, telling him the most painful parts of her, and he wasn't making a fuss or telling her she was stupid for running away or anything. He just let her talk and cry.
It was at this point that Christina felt the tears coming again. It was the part where she found her exboyfriend dead that caused her to run time and time again.  So she wouldn't have to be this vulnerable again. Ryan squeezed her hand gently.
"something bad happened, didn't it." her face crumpled and the tears were streaming down her face again. She honestly didn't know if she could say this part out loud, but somewhere she found the strength. "I found his body. I think a piece of my soul broke apart from me right then and there. The person I was before that moment is gone. The person I am now, well, I'm not sure who that even is yet or if I even like her."
After she finished her story,  she stopped walking and fell onto her knees in the sand. It was almost sunset and she was too close to the water's edge to stay dry but she didn't care. She welcomed the cool water soaking her clothes. She let the water wash away the pain of remembering. She looked up at Ryan's face and knew that he was absolutely the right person she could share this story with.  She got up and took his hand again, suddenly having another flashback of that night.
"as I was on the phone with dispatch, I came across feet. I stuck my head into the bathroom and saw that it looked like he had been standing and then fell. There was a needle in his arm and he was laying in a pool of his own blood. It looked like what he did was shoot up while standing and it was such a large amount of heroin that he collapsed and smacked his head on the bathroom sink on the way down. And by the time the paramedics got there, I had already been passed out and Hunter was laying beside me. He wouldn't let the paramedics come help me at first so once they saw that I was breathing and the blood on me was from the dog, they got the body out of there before waking me up. Hunter was such a good boy, he licked my face until I woke up. I got an ambulance ride and he came with me and never left my side. My parents had to adopt him. Even though he's a bigger dog than they're used to, he's sort of become the family dog. My mom even holds the phone up to his ear so he can hear my voice."

Ryan waited for her to stop talking for a little while before he got the guts to speak up.
"I'm not even sure of what to say right now. Thank you for sharing all of this with me." They embraced for a short while before heading back. The sun was dipping below the horizon and although Ryan was okay to drive, he knew Christina needed a real bed, a real shower, a real meal, and a real night's sleep.
They walked back together in silence, both contemplating the contents of Christina's story. Christina was thankful to have found someone she felt she could share her story with. The tears she had cried were behind her now, belonging to this beautiful beach where the water could absorb them along with every horrible emotion she had kept bottled up inside. For the first time since being on this trip, she was beginning to feel like she was on the right track.
Ryan was stunned by everything this woman had been through. One minute she's the beautiful woman sitting behind him on his bus, asking if she can get dropped off so she can ride her bike the rest of the way to her friend's house, the next minute she's sobbing on a Georgia beach, telling him things she never had the strength to tell anyone else. He knew she was special the minute he laid eyes on her but he had no idea how much. Lots of people would go mad if something like that happened to them. Granted, she was baring her soul to someone she just met, but he knew better than to hurt her. It almost felt cruel for him to let her go after she spent the night at his house. It wasn't even like he just wanted to have his way with her and be done with it. He was too busy actually caring about her to worry about anything remotely sexual. All he knew was that for some reason, they were put together on this journey. He knew without any prompting that it was his duty to make sure she arrived safely at her destination.

As they got to the car, the sun had finally finished setting. Christina handed Ryan the keys before climbing into the backseat to take her turn napping. Ryan smiled as he got into the front seat, remembering just two days ago when this beautiful woman stepped onto his bus in a very similar fashion. She had been able to keep him awake out of curiosity at first, but as they got to know each other her story was too compelling for him to turn away from. And now they were on their last leg of their journey together before she left for Florida. Even if he was still sleepy, her story would be playing in his head the whole way home, even if she slept the whole way.
He readjusted his rear view mirror and his seat as she made herself comfortable with pillows and a blanket.  She looked so adorable all curled up in the backseat. He stole one more glance at her as she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.
Finally, he started the car and once again they were on their way.