12.
It was Monday morning and Rachel had the day off. She got to the car and drove to Havenpond. It had been two weeks since the last time she had spoken to David. She had texted him and tried to call him a few times, but got no reply. She didn’t care if he didn’t want to see her again but she wanted to at least understand what was going on.
The shiny cobalt blue Audi was definitely not a common car in Haven pond and everyone turned eyes to it as she drove by. She saw some kids on the sidewalk and asked for directions. They told her she was close and soon as she turned the corner she saw the gate. On the wall in big graffiti letters she could read “DeKal School”. She parked and walked out. She looked around. Even though it was less than half an hour from London center Rachel had never been there.
The place was obviously overpopulated and degraded. She imagined that was how Valcena neighborhood would have become if they hadn’t created ValSocial.
She was dressed casual with some looser jeans and a salmon tank top but still she could not avoid feeling all eyes were on her as she was walking.
She reached the door took off her sunglasses and went in. A middleaged woman was sitting behind a desk, a bunch of young kids running and laughing called her attention. She shushed them sending them outside. Then, turning to Rachel asked:
“Are you lost?” – it was clear that she didn’t fit in.
“I’m starting to feel like it” – Rachel confessed smiling.
The woman, appreciating her honesty smiled back – “How can I help you my dear?”
“I’m looking for David, I believe is working here.” “The Portuguese trainee?” – she asked.
“Yes!” – Rachel feared she wouldn’t find him – “Do you think you could take me to him?”
“He’s not working today, but if you want I can have someone check if he’s home. It’s not far. Is he expecting you?”
“I don’t think so… that’s fine. If you could just tell me where it is I’m sure I’ll manage to find it on my own” – she wanted to see him privately.
“Don’t mean to be disrespectful miss, but someone like you doesn’t manage well on her own around here” – the woman claimed looking at Rachel – “Wade!” – she called over her shoulder.
A couple minutes later a boy came running with a baby in his arms. He was wearing oversized Basketball shorts and an old t- shirt. He shouldn’t be more than 14 years old.
“I need you to do something” – the woman told him. Then facing Rachel asked – “What did you say it was your name?”
She hadn’t – “Rachel. Rachel Coombs” – she said.
“So I thought” – the woman confessed recognizing her. Turning to the boy she added “I need you to take Miss Coombs to David’s home, and you’ll wait at the door until she’s done” – the woman told the boy.
“Oh that won’t be necessary, really” – Rachel insisted.
“You won’t leave without her, is that clear?”
The boy nodded. He gave the woman the baby and approached Rachel.
“Hi I’m Rachel” – she introduced herself informally.
He took off his cap to greet her – “Wade” – he replied.
Rachel recognized the bandana covering his head. It was the same one David was wearing the first time he had gone to her house.
Without saying a word Wade directed her to the door.
“Did David give you that?” – she asked nicely pointing to his head.
The boy nodded. Wade wasn’t exactly what you could call a talkative person, but Rachel continued:
“Are you friends?”
He shrugged – “He’s cool, I guess.” “I agree” – she said.
They kept walking.
“I defeated him” – the boy said eventually.
“What?” – she wasn’t paying attention, she didn’t expect him to talk.
“David. We were playing one on one. I defeated him. That’s how I got it. I won it.”
“Good job!” – she commended him – “You must be real good then.”
“I guess” – said Wade blushing – “so, you’re the chick he likes, right?”
“Did he tell you that?” – Rachel asked. Apparently Wade was more talkative than she thought.
“He didn’t give me names, but he said she was gorgeous so I just assumed…“- his voiced faded he was blushing again.
Rachel thought he was cute – “Well, thanks.”
“This is it” – said Wade stopping in front of a very dilapidated building – “It’s on the second floor, on the left.”
Rachel wondered if she should pay him for his help. She didn’t mean to offend him, but she thought he might enjoy it.
She grabbed her wallet and got some money but the boy didn’t take it.
“It’s cool you don’t have to, madam.”
“Please call me Rachel, and take it, you deserve it” – she insisted.
“Thanks, but David is my bro. His girl doesn’t need to pay me.”
“Well, I’m not his girl…” - though I wouldn’t mind Rachel thought.
“But you will be.”
Rachel smiled at the boy – “You don’t have to wait for me this may take a while.”
“Are you kidding me? If I show up back there without you Miss Jones will kick my butt!” – he was seriously worried – “I’ll stay, take your time.”
Rachel walked up the stairs hoping she was doing the right thing. She reached the door, took a long, deep breath and knocked. David opened faster than she expected but he got petrified when he saw her standing there.
“What the heck… what are you doing here?” – he asked stuttering.
“I came to see you” – she answered him calmly. She had the time to prepare herself for this. She wasn’t going to freak out.
“Are you crazy? Do you have any idea how dangerous it is for someone like you to walk around here alone?” – he reprimanded her.
“I wasn’t alone, Wade walked me. Actually he is downstairs waiting for me. Miss Jones made him promise he wouldn’t leave me.”
“Good!” – David said relief.
Rachel couldn’t understand how everybody seemed to think she was safer with a 14 year old boy as a bodyguard.
David walked out and yelled his name. Wade came running in a second.
“What’s up dude?” - the boys performed some private handshake.
“Thanks for taking care of her for me” – David said – “I’ll take it from here.”
“Miss Jones said…”
“I know, but it’s okay. I’ll walk her back when we’re done” - David guaranteed.
“Ok.”
“Dude! Can you keep eye on her car?” “Sure man.”
“It’s a blue Audi…” - Rachel started.
“Trust me he won’t have trouble finding it.” Then approaching Wade he whispered: “Let’s keep this between us, okay?”
The boy nodded. David was sure that by this time the whole neighborhood was aware of Rachel’s presence, but still he wanted to keep it private.
“Do you want something to drink?” – he asked when they finally got in.
“Water would be fine.”
It was an one bedroom apartment and despite being very old and needing some renovations it was actually much tidier than she expected.
There was a couch, table, couple of chairs, an old TV, and not much more. On the wall there was a picture of him and Lea that Rachel loved.
“Here” – he said handing her the glass and inviting her to sit.
David thought he was doing pretty well getting over her, but now that she was right there all he could think was how much he wanted to kiss her.
What happened at the party had brought a lot of memories David didn’t want to deal with and that was why he had gotten mad in the first place. Controlling his feelings for her was getting harder everyday too, so walking away just seemed like the best thing to do.
“How are you?” – he asked.
“Confused…” - she didn’t want to push it but she had to go straight to the point – “I was hoping you’d give me at least a chance to apologize. The way I was acting with those guys…”
“It’s none of my business. I’m not your boyfriend. I’m just a guy you kissed once” – he interrupted her calm and unemotional.
She tried to meet his eyes but he was avoiding eye contact – “You know that’s not true.” – she said – “But that’s why I never quite understood what made you leave. I mean, I know I acted like a jerk at the party… Kimberly told me all about it but… I thought you had stood me up and… that’s no excuse, but you made it clear you didn’t want to have anything with me so I don’t get it” – she vented.
He sighed – “I know… I was a jerk too” – he ended up saying.
David was a confident guy. He was sure of himself but he wasn’t cocky or a show off. He was so different from Chase that Rachel often wondered how she had fallen in love with such different people. David, however, was painfully retracted. She could see he wanted to tell her something but he was holding back again.
“Babe” – she called.
He loved the way she’d pronounce it “It’s okay. You can talk to me.” – she assured him.
He wanted to tell her, but he knew he was going to lose her. Rachel had a good heart and was open minded, but she was also a huge celebrity and there was no way she could deal with all of that publicity.
“How much has Dee told you about my past?” – David asked her.
“Not much… She just said that you had left when you were younger and that you never spent that much time with them in Valcena” – she answered – “why?”
“You want to know why we can’t be together and why I walked away, right?” – he asked. There was no point to procrastinate. Either way he could not be with her.
She nodded.
“Okay, so let me tell you about my childhood.”
Rachel didn’t understand, but that was a topic he had never wanted to discuss before so she agreed.
“I never met my father and Alexandre’s father left us soon as he was born, so I was about seven.” – he told her – “We moved in with my grandma for a while, but when I was nine my mom decided to emigrate. She had met this guy and he was going to France, so she decided to go along. Alexandre was too young so she thought it was better to leave him with grandma but I had to go” – he told her.
“In the beginning it wasn’t that bad” – David admitted – “I mean I didn’t speak French, but the school was nice and the city was way bigger than Valcena. The first two years were okay, but then after long months of fighting John left and everything started to fall apart.”
He paused.
“At first mom got depressed. She would stay in her bedroom crying day and night. She wouldn’t go grocery shopping, she wouldn’t feed me, and she would skip work. I used to go there and apologize, I’d say she was sick, I’d lie. The manager was a good guy and he cut her some slack but after a lot of notices he had no choice but fired her.” – he told her – “Then one day somehow she got herself a new group of friends and she started go to out to party every night. I thought it was part of dealing with the breakup, but after a while it became too much. She wouldn’t get home until 6 a.m, she’d be totally wasted. Sometimes she wouldn’t even come at all.”
He stopped. Rachel held his hand.
“How old were you?” – she asked.
“Thirteen.”
“How did you cope with it?”
“I started to hang out with this group of older kids. I didn’t want to go home, I would feel lonely. So I’d rather just wander with them on the streets, getting myself in trouble.”
“How could you survive if she was unemployed?” – Rachel questioned.
“I’d do some work here and there, but mostly we lived with the money that grandma would send us, but it was barely enough. She wanted to help but she had Alexandre to raise too. Plus, later mom started using…” - his voice faded Rachel moved closer – “It’s okay babe. We can stop now if you want”– Rachel had learned more about his past in the past half hour than in the last month and she didn’t want him to feel pressured.
“N, now I have to finish.”
She nodded.
“With mom doing drugs the money was gone even faster.” – he continued – “We tried to get jobs, but who wants to hire a junkie and a 14 year old boy? A lot of times we lived out of charity… at first I thought it was just for a while, that things would get better, but they didn’t. She was consuming more and more every time and I knew I had to find a way to get the money” – he stopped again and Rachel saw a couple tears running down his face. With her left thumb she gently cleaned them off and fondled his face.
Rachel was taking it better than he had expected but the worst was yet to come. He looked at her and wished he could have one last kiss. Reading his mind Rachel pulled him to herself and slowly kissed him on the lips. He wished he could forget the past and stay in that moment forever, but he had to be honest to her. She deserved it.
“We were drowning in debt” – he continued – “and I only knew one way to get a lot of money real fast… so by the age of 15 I became a drug dealer” – he confessed without being able to look at her.
Rachel twitched in her seat but didn’t let go of his hand. “Were you using too?” – she then asked.
He expected her to freak out or at least walk away. Rachel had enough drama in her life and the last thing she needed was to be associated to someone like him, but she didn’t move a muscle.
“No. Not drugs.”
She didn’t understand exactly what he meant by that but she let him continue.
“I sold them. Which is equally bad… maybe even worst. I wasn’t just screwing up my life I was taking other people with me. They wanted me because I was still in school. I would lure the younger kids. I would get them started” – he was ashamed of himself.
“What made you stop?” – asked Rachel.
“I… I killed someone” – he whispered.
Rachel couldn’t believe. Dave? Sweet Dave killing someone? – “What happened?” – she questioned.
“There was this kid… he had just moved in and had been transferred from another school. He was having trouble finding new friends, truthfully he was an easy target. He got addicted faster than most do.” – David closed his eyes for a moment remembering him – “He was a nice kid. He was just lonely. He wanted to fit in, I guess he tried too hard...” – he could barely speak – “he overdosed. I found him dead in the school’s bathroom.”
Rachel wanted to be strong for him but she couldn’t hold her tears.
“Babe…” – she had no idea what to say so she wrapped her arm around him and hugged him tight.
“He was just a kid” – he cried.
“So were you!”
He rested his head on her chest while she fondled his hair. Neither of them talked for a few minutes. Not until David straighten himself up and continued.
“I was 17 then. Mum was pregnant with Lisa so I begged her to move back to Portugal and we did. I thought if I could get a new start things would be different. Soon I found out that no matter where you are you’ll always have to face your demons.”
“Did you face yours?” – Rachel was still struggling to believe how little she truly knew about David.
“I tried to ignore them… but I couldn’t. I couldn’t sleep without his face haunting me” – he confessed – “there wasn’t one day I didn’t mistake him with some other kid on the streets. I was losing my mind. So I started drinking” – David admitted – “It seemed to help my mom sometimes. After John left that was the only thing that would get her out of bed, so it couldn’t be that bad, so I became an alcoholic…”
Rachel started to understand his reaction to what had happened at Kimberly’s party.
“Ironic, right? I had spent three years selling drugs and resisting them and when I tried to get out… I just get myself in some more crap. I think those were the worst times… Mom would come and go. Meanwhile, she had gotten pregnant again and had Eva. So there was mom, that between the booze and drugs barely notice we existed. Me, 20 years old wasted in every corner. Grandma, who was working three jobs to try to get enough money to provide for us all. Lisa who was two and Eva who was just a newborn. Then there was Alex who was only 14 years old, and in the middle of babysitting the girls and trying to fix mom and I, had managed to somehow graduate from high school early and was going to college.”
His past kept getting worse Rachel had no idea how he had managed to turn his life around and become such a different person – “Was he the one that made you change?” - ever since they had met, Rachel had noticed how much Alexandre’s opinions on him were important to David.
“In a way… even though I don’t think he knows that.” – he said.
“Why’s that?”
“So, this one evening we were all at home and I had been drinking” – he told her – “I was already pretty wasted, but I insisted I wanted to go out to meet some friends. Grandma tried to stop me. We argued and… I just wanted her to move so I could open the door, but I misjudged my strength” – David confessed – “I pushed her too hard and she fell. Alex was coming in the room at that exact moment and I’ll never forget the disappointed look on his faxe as he yelled at me to leave. I used to be his idol and that’s when I realized how low I had gotten” – he stated sadly.
“That was when you stopped drinking” – Rachel assumed.
“No. That night I drank more than I had ever drank. I had nothing else to lose” – David explained – “I just didn’t care anymore. If she hadn’t showed up I don’t think I wouldn’t have made it another day.”
“Who?” – Rachel asked intrigued.
“Dee” – he said smiling – “she saved me that night.”
So that was what they shared Rachel thought. She could tell there was something between them something utterly special. Now she was getting it.
“What did she do?”
“She just talked to me… I was sitting on this bench at the park. I had puke all over myself and I could barely speak. It was late, real late. I had no idea what she was even doing there.”
“What did she tell you?”
“She told me she knew what had happen and that it was time for me to grow up and be a man. I whined. I told her there was no point, that I should just disappear, that they would be better without me. She was brutally honest” – he remembered – “she told me I was probably right but that I was the only person that could change that. Become a better person, the person she knew in her heart I was and regain their love.”
Rachel smiled, even at 14 Dee had the right timing and had found the right words to make the difference.
David continued – “I kept making up excuses for myself. I told her that there’s no way I could change, that nobody would want to help me.” - then she opened her jacket and took out an envelope. She put it in my hands and said:
This is not about what other people are willing to do for you. It’s about what you’re willing to do for yourself. I’m helping you. I’m giving you this money. There’s enough here to get you somewhere and help you out in the beginning. You’ll have to save, you’ll have to work, and you’ll have to figure something out. I believe you can do it. Please don’t let me down.
Then she walked away.
“What did you do?”
“Next day I went to rehab. I got myself clean and then got on a plane and moved to Canada. I found myself a job, a tiny room to, and I applied for night classes to finish high school. Three years later I got accepted in college and met Hayley – Lea’s mom. We dated for two years… then one day she just dumped me. I honestly thought it was going to last forever” – he admitted.
Rachel understood him. She had the same feeling about Chase.
“The rest you already know… I never heard from her until that day when she dropped off Lea at the apartment.”
Rachel nodded. What a life, she thought she had been through a lot, however, compared to David’s her life had been a fairytale.
David was astonished how well Rachel seemed to be taking everything. She was simple, practical, and not a drama queen, that was one of the things he loved the most about her.
She stroked his face kindly looking at him as she had never looked before. When their eyes met she lovingly said:
“Thanks for telling me.”
“Thank you for listening” – he said taking her in his arms. Rachel started to kiss him. He knew he should resist, but he was exhausted and just let himself go.