Odd One Out

Chapter Forty One - His Guilt

Shit. Shit. Shit. My head whipped between Mabel staring out the windshield in shock and Ethan looking like he wanted to murder me. His hands were clenched tightly at his sides and his expression was murderous, his eyes hooded with anger.

I glanced at Mabel, biting her lip nervously, "Give me a minute." I murmured quietly as I got out of my truck slowly, closing the door behind me and walked towards Ethan, stuffing my hands in my pockets nervously.

"Hey Ethan," I called, my voice wavering even to my ears.

He just stood there, glaring at me and I couldn't help the rush of guilt that surged through me. I felt his pain as if it was my own as well. A part of it was.

And suddenly, thoughts of Ethan and Vanessa rushed through me like a flood. The times when things were good, when I took Vanessa and her little brother to a baseball game, when I taught him how to throw a baseball because their shit dad abandoned them as children, when I stayed up until two in the morning making sure Vanessa's assignment was done and it felt unbearable all at once. But not because I missed Vanessa like I usually felt, but because of the insurmountable guilt that filled me. It was my fault that Ethan had no one else in his life. It was my fault that I took his sister away from him.

As if reading my mind, he twisted on his heel and walked away from me. "Ethan, please wait!" I called out to him and surprisingly, he stopped.

He turned around abruptly and spat, "I have nothing to say to you."

I took a hesitant step back. I would never get used to Ethan hating me. He used to look up to me. He used to think of me as family - a big brother. "Ethan, please. I know this is hard."

"Oh, is this hard for you? Sure seemed like it when you were making out in your car," he glared at me.

I ran a hand through my hair in frustration. "It's not like that, Ethan. I... I have to move on. I can't stay there, ET." The old nickname that Vanessa and I called him after we watched ET slipped out and I winced as his expression became impossibly more bitter.

"Don't fucking call me that," he seethed.

I raised my hands, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry." And I truly was. For everything I had put him through and everything he was still fighting to get through. "I'm not out here fucking around, Ethan. I'm just trying to make something of my life. I'm trying to find happiness. I can't live in the past anymore and I'm sorry I can't do anything for you."

"You're sorry? I have a hard time believing that when you're here where we used to watch movies together. Isn't this where you took me and Vanessa? And you're back? With some other chick. I can't even stand to look at you!" He shouted.

My heart thumped rapidly in my chest at his words. "What could I have done, Ethan? I tried everything I could."

"You could have given her a suicide hotline! You could have checked her into a goddamn hospital! I don't care! You could have made sure she was alive!"

I felt a tear roll down my cheek as I saw his flood with his own. But I knew I couldn't do anything for him. I couldn't even help myself much less anyone else. "I'm sorry. You don't know how sorry I am, Ethan. I'll never forget it. It's seared into my head always."

He glared at me through tear soaked eyes and cheeks, "And I hope that's always the case. I hope you wake up everyday with the pain I feel at having to live life alone. I hope you never have peace and I hope her memory haunts you forever as it does to me. Every day and every night."

I couldn't even open my mouth to reply. He looked so broken and all I felt was guilt. Guilt that I couldn't be there for Ethan. Guilt that I had left Vanessa. Guilt that I thought I could move on with my life. Guilt for dragging Mabel into this mess.

I could almost laugh at how life could always get away with playing me. Every time I felt like I had some sort of happiness, it was taken away from me.

I watched in silence as Ethan walked away from me. As his figure disappeared, I turned around to get back into my truck but all I could think of was Ethan's words. My gaze met Mabel's concerned one through the windshield and I opened my door and sat in the driver's seat in complete silence.

Mabel said nothing. She just reached for my hand and held onto it tightly and I was glad for that because I didn't have the words she was hoping to hear right now.

I started my truck up and began the drive back to our apartment, my mind still racing. That's how the entire car ride remained, Mabel's hand in mine and absolute silence.

We finally made it to our apartment building and I unlocked the door to my apartment as Mabel followed me in a little unsurely. I felt so bad that I made her feel uncertain. None of this was her fault. She was perfect. Too perfect for me to get into a relationship with a total fuck up. I'd already promised myself I would try everything I could to make her comfortable always. But this was just another promise broken.

She reached her arms around me tentatively and held me in a tight embrace, her head at my chest. My arms wrapped around her and I enjoyed just being in her presence for a moment longer.

"I wish I could do something, Marcus. Anything. You don't deserve this," She murmured against me and I felt another stab of guilt.

"I deserve worse," I whispered.

"You deserve to be happy," She replied. "What can I do?"

I couldn't stand to hear her kindness. I didn't deserve it. I'd break her like I'd broken everyone else. Or she'd break me like I'd been broken so many times before. But she was my Mabel and I couldn't stand to part with her. My sweet Mabel who couldn't sleep when I was upset. Who thought of everyone else a million times before herself.

What made me think I could keep her?

I couldn't.

My arms unwound from her body and she took automatic step back, her eyebrows furrowed. "I think I just need some time."

Her frown deepened, "Away from me?"

"To think," I nearly choked out. I couldn't believe I was saying these words. This was Mabel.

She nodded, biting her lip and blinking her increasingly wet looking eyes rapidly, "Okay," she whispered, giving me a small smile.

I thought this was all behind me. That I could finally move on with my life. But the thing is that I wasn't. And I'd never be free from it.