When I Break

Chapter Eight

McKenna

I could not have handled that worse. I hated the idea that I'd offended Knox; that was never my intention. Maybe he'd been serious about opening up one-on-one with me-perhaps it hadn't been a pick-up line at all. And I'd overreacted. Horribly. A sour pit sank low in my stomach and settled there.

I noticed a small leather-bound notebook resting against the desktop where Knox had been leaning. Crossing the room to retrieve the book, I wondered if there was a way to find him, to apologize and return his journal. I should have just waited to return it to him next Saturday, assuming he came back, but I knew that wasn't what I wanted.

This group was supposed to be anonymous, but Knox gave his last name at the first meeting-Bauer. And his first name wasn't all that common, so perhaps I'd have some luck finding him. I pulled out my smartphone and typed his name into Google: Knox Bauer + Chicago, and was rewarded with an address. A home in the South Loop, not too far from where I lived.

Since I hadn't yet gotten around to buying a car, I took the city bus to a stop that would let me off two blocks from his neighborhood. Along the way, my mind drifted to Brian and the overprotective nature he'd been exhibiting lately. I knew I needed to have a talk with him soon.

After moving to Chicago, Brian had interviewed at several accounting firms in the city and quickly got multiple offers. He insisted that he wouldn't have me living by myself in a strange city, and changed his entire career plan for me. Living here alone was part of the appeal, but of course I hadn't argued. I had someone to hang out with Friday nights or go to the Laundromat with on Sundays. It was nice. And he was someone steady I could rely on. I couldn't really complain; he looked after me and I wasn't naive enough to think that a young girl alone in the city didn't need a friend.

Of course there was a chance he might read things wrong between us if we lived together. Sometimes the way he looked at me for too long made me wonder if he and I were on the same page about our friends-only relationship status. But he'd insisted, and I hadn't refused, even though I knew I'd never reciprocate any deeper feelings he might have. Maybe he was too safe a choice-he wasn't broken-there was nothing for me to fix, so he held no appeal. But either way, I just wasn't attracted to him that way.

My thoughts drifted as I stared out the window of the bus. Cars whizzed past and tall buildings loomed in the distance. There was a whole bustling world out there that I wasn't a part of. My life had become something almost unrecognizable. I knew how I'd gotten this way: one tiny step at a time. A few months after I lost my parents, I began volunteering. The grief counselor I saw at school thought it might help, and she was right. Caring for others got my mind off my grief and reminded me that not everyone led a charmed life. I spent time at the soup kitchen, the homeless shelter, a center for special needs kids. It became somewhat of an obsession. It was my escape from the harsh reality my life had become.

My parents' deaths had been my fault. Not literally, of course; I wasn't foolish enough to believe that. But in a small way, I was responsible, and that was all that mattered. There was no un-doing what I'd done. They'd died in a terrible car accident at the hands of a drunk driver on their way to church one Sunday. I still remembered every vivid detail about that morning.

I'd wanted to sleep in, as I often wanted to do on Sundays. It became a sticking point for me and my mom. We'd fight every weekend because I didn't care about going to church. I was too old for Sunday school and didn't see the importance of going. We'd argued that morning, and I'd screamed at them from my room and slammed the door in my mother's face. They'd left late because of me, much later than usual, and when they drove through the intersection of Main Street and Fourth, the drunk driver was there, running the red light just in time to slam into the passenger side door, killing my mom instantly and banging up my dad pretty badly. He was airlifted to a nearby hospital and died from bleeding inside his brain two days later.