Another Love Story

Chapter VI: The bad boy

Declan Knight. Seriously? I got freaking rescued by Declan Knight? Declan Knight was my knight in shining armour? Really? And yes, I do realise the irony in getting rescued by a boy whose last name is Knight. I am serious as can be when I say that my life is a joke and I am the punchline.

Remember the car accident that killed my father? I do. Like it was yesterday. The one thing I left out; it was caused by a reckless seventeen-year-old asshole, also known as Scott Knight. As you have already put two and two together; Scott was Declan’s older brother. He was the original wild child. And with original wild child I mean that he drank, did drugs, raced cars and motorcycles, nothing was too daring or dangerous for marvellous Scott Knight. The whole town knew it had to go wrong at one point or other. His parents, the Knight’s, had tried everything to straighten him out; from giving him space to sending him to rehab and to military school. Nothing worked. One night Scott had too much to drink, started a fight and as the police arrived, he drove away on his vintage Harley. It quickly turned into a high-speed chase. Scott panicked because it was going to be his third strike; he had been arrested for breaking into the high school on a dare and the second time was because he was carrying an obscene amount of weed that couldn’t be interpreted as just for private use. So as his third arrest was imminent, he realised that if arrested, he would be tried as an adult and was facing serious jail-time. So, he did the only rational thing one can do in a high-speed chase; he put pedal to the medal and ran a red light to get away from the police. Scott running that red light didn’t let him escape the police, it made him hit my father’s car at 80 miles per hour. His motorcycle cut into the car like it was butter. My father never stood a chance. The first few hours after the accident, when he was put on a ventilator, that was just for show. It gave my mother a chase to donate his organs, the ones that ware still useable after being clobbered by a motorcycle. And it gave me and my brother a chance to say goodbye, although seeing our father hooked up to machines that indicated there was no brain activity only put me into shock and Brad didn’t really understand what was going on. Scott Knight? He got thrown off of his bike. He landed over 20 feet from the scene. Dead on impact is what the doctor said. His parents were devastated. Not only did they lose their first born, his reckless actions also caused the death of someone else. It almost destroyed Declan. His brother was his God.

That accident left me so angry at the world. But most of all, I was angry at Scott and the Knights. Accident my ass. If his parents had straightened him out, my father would still be alive today. I do realise that this is all mute. No amount of blame will bring back my father. No matter what I say, no matter what I do. And as I said, Declan never really got over it as well. He looked up to his big brother, believed that even though he was a wild child, he would grow up to make something out of himself. 

How do I know? Well, Declan Knight and I, we grew up together, we’re the same age. As children, we were best friends. We did everything together, even the embarrassing bath-time. And yes, there were pictures to prove it. That all changed in an instant. My mother didn’t want to blame Scott’s parents, but just like me, she couldn’t help but feel hatred towards them. The love of her life got torn away from her and her family without warning and for no good reason. Not that there is a good reason for death I suppose. The goodbye we said in the hospital, it wasn’t a real goodbye. He was already gone. We knew that. Mum didn’t go on a tirade, or openly accused the Knights’ son of murder. She just let the friendship between our families’ fade. The Knights’, they didn’t blame her, they seemed to understand. Their family was hanging on by a tread due to what Scott had put them through. Somehow both our families came out on the other end, stronger than before, but forever on opposite sides.

Declan Knight grew up to follow in his brother’s footsteps. We didn’t hang out together anymore. That friendship ended with the death of my father and the sudden halt in communal activities of our family. We did still go to the same school, but he had kept his distance. So had I, but I did get to watch him grow up. He wasn’t the wild child his brother was, but then again no one was that wild. He was the odd one out. Like his brother he got on a motorcycle as soon as he could, granted, unlike his brother he waited until it was legal for him to do so. He didn’t drink or do drugs but rebelled in his own way. He dressed differently than everyone else, he talked differently too, and he was interested in different things. He did get straight A’s in school but pissed off every teacher he ever had. Skipped out on classes if he found them to be too boring or not worthy of his time. He refused to participate in Physical Education, something about it being a way to calm the masses and spent his time working on a vintage Harley. Yes, it is the same vintage Harley his brother was driving the night of the accident. It’s almost as if he thinks that if he could fix that motorcycle, it would somehow fix what happened, or help to make sense of it. 

As I already mentioned, Declan Knight and I used to be close as children. We had been best friends since the day we were born. The Knights lived on the same block as we did and Declan and I were born within two weeks of each other, he was two weeks older. Our mothers had hit it off ever since their first coinciding appointment at the maternity unit of the hospital one town over. After we were born, our fathers started fishing together and before we knew it, we were spending most every major holiday together and going on trips with both of our families. So, you can say that there was a huge whole in our lives after that night. Not only had our family lost a husband and father, but we had also lost our best friends. The first few weeks after the accident Declan tried to reach out to me. I guess after losing his brother he didn’t want to lose his best friend as well. He showed up at my door and when I didn’t want to come out, he waited for hours hoping I would. I never did. Then he started calling the house incessantly, but I never picked up the phone (we had caller-id). When that didn’t work, he wrote me letters (filled with spelling mistakes – remember, we were twelve), he must have written a hundred, I never replied. I don’t even think I ever read them or opened one up even. After six months of this, on the morning of my thirteenth birthday, I found a present at my front door with a note attached. 

The note said: ‘From Declan, with all my heart.’

I never opened the present. I don’t even remember what I did with it or the letters for that matter. Did I keep it all or did I throw it away? It’s probably buried in the back of my closet with all the other keepsakes from way back when the s**t hadn’t hit the fan. Declan and I, we grew up together, we had history. But after the death of my father and his brother something broke inside of me. I’m pretty sure that it was my heart. Maybe that’s why my anger towards Scott and the Knight family hadn’t really diminished at all after all those years. And that’s why I haven’t been able to open up to anyone, not really anyway. Or it could be that I’m just looking for excuses and holding on to a grudge because it’s easier, less risk of getting hurt. I know that accidents happen. I know that it wasn’t the Knights or Declan who caused the accident. I know that there are a million and one variables to be taken into account for that night. It was dark, it had been raining. Things like that, but I am still overwhelmed with a strong sense of anger regarding that night and the death of my father. It may not be fair towards Declan and his parents, but it is how I feel.

Now there we were. Me in my hospital bed and Declan freaking Knight only a few feet away. As the sheriff had seen the expression on my face change from calm and safe to pure panic and unease, he quickly came back into the room to ask if everything was okay. As Declan started to retreat, I answered the sheriff that everything was fine, that I was just taken aback when seeing and recognising the boy in the black T-shirt. As the sheriff asked how we knew each other, Declan responded by saying that we had been best friends as children. Sensing that there was more to it but that neither of us seemed eager to spill the beans, the sheriff left the room once more.

Declan opened his mouth and as I held my breath, I heard my mother screaming from across the hospital, of course she was only a few hundred feet away, but you get my drift. So, before Declan could even get one word out, he decided that he’d better go before my mother got there. I couldn’t argue with that. That is why I let him walk away without so much as a thank you. Three second after he had left the room, my mother stormed in, tears rolling down her eyes. I could tell that she was in a state of panic, and so could everyone else. As I calmed her down and told her what had happened, I started to realise just how much I owed Declan for coming to my rescue. I hadn’t given him any reason to put himself at risk to save me. Well, other than that it was the right thing to do of course. But considering our history and how I had treated him after the accident, the fact that he still came to my rescue and hung around just to see if I was okay, showed a great sense of responsibility. It was something I admired about Declan. Maybe it was time to let go of my anger towards Declan and his parents. Or at least start working on letting go of my anger towards them. When I got to the end of the tale and revealed who my ‘knight’ in shining armour was, my mother fell silent. Which is something that does not happen very often, trust me. I could see that there were a million things going through her mind. 

‘He's nothing like his brother.’ She looked up, put her hand on top of my head and slide down to my cheek as she continued. She knew that I had never gotten over the fact that it was Declan’s brother that caused my father’s accident. That it was Scott Knight that was responsible for the death of my father, at least in my mind. And that she too had struggled with it for a long time. But as the years had gone by, that she had realised that dad wouldn’t have wanted us to hate in his name. My mother never told me, but apparently she had written a letter to Scott’s parents, the Knights, about two years ago, on the anniversary of my father’s death. In that letter she had expressed her deepest condolences for the loss of their first born son, and her sincerest apologies that it had taken her so long to do so. That she knew that Mark wouldn’t not want her to blame anyone for his death, but that grief has a way of changing people. And that we all grieved in our own way and on our own terms. She told them, she didn’t blame them for what had happened and hoped that one day our families might be able to come together again, like we used to. Two days after my mother had sent that letter, she received a reply from the Knights. It stated that they had long been stricken with guilt over that night. That my mother’s letter and in turn her absolution meant the world to them. They told my mother that they did miss her and her children. That Declan took it pretty hard when Alice shut him out of her life entirely, but even despite his young age, he did understand it at some level. The Knights expressed the same hope my mother had, that one day we might be able to come together like we used to.

My mother turned to me and without saying a single word, I knew what she wanted to tell me. Even though I didn’t want to hear it, let alone admit that I knew she was right. So, without uttering so much as a single consonant or vowel, we had an entire conversation. I knew I was lucky to have her as my mother. We had always had a deeper connection then most, I don’t know if it had always been like that, or if that just started to grow after my father passed. Maybe I should follow my mother’s lead. Let the past be the past. Look forward and let go of my resentment and anger. Those things can only hold you back in life. 

‘You still have his letters, you know.’, my mother said with a devilish like smile. She explained how she didn’t have the heart to throw away his letters and the present he had left at my front door for my thirteenth birthday. But that I was persistent on them ending up in the trash. It was where they belonged, or so I kept repeating. But instead of discarding them like day-old trash, my mother had boxed them up at put them in the attic. Just in case I would ever want to read them or open up that present.

After a night in the hospital, I wanted to go home. Doctors had cleared me, but still warned me to take it easy and rest. I had a contused right jaw, two broken ribs and a hair-line fracture in my left wrist. But I couldn’t care less about that or the pain I was in. The one thing that matter most to me, that was still intact. Well, not my ego, that was shot to hell when I couldn’t fight off Victor. What ever happened to him you ask? After he was arrested and thrown in jail for the night, his parents tried to get him out. But when they read the transcripts of my statement and it became clear what he had done, they decided to let justice take its course. He didn’t have to do actual jail-time because he was a minor. But he did get 500 hours of community service, which was code for picking up trash along the highway. On top of that he had to take anger management classes and s****l harassment classes. Furthermore, as his parents were offended and deeply ashamed by what their son had done and attempted to do, they sent him to military school. Basically, he got off easy, well not that easy. Because I don’t believe that the punishment fit the crime. But that is a whole other discussion. 

Upon my arrival home Joy, Josh, Lucas, Tim and Mary were waiting for me; to welcome me back. As they all went on about how guilty they felt about what Victor had done to me and tried to do. Even though, it wasn’t really their fault, there wasn’t really anything they could have done. They still felt awful for not seeing through his whole loving façade. They were my best friends, they were supposed to be looking out for me. Even though, they never in a million years thought he would be capable of doing something like that. As they went on about how they felt and started to question how I was doing. I realised that I didn’t really care much for talking at this point. What did capture my interest was the fact that from my front yard I could spot the vintage Harley sitting on the Knights driveway. And because my mind was elsewhere, I thanked everyone for being there as I got home, but that I could really use some peace and quiet. They all understood or pretended to understand. As I headed inside, up the stairs, towards my room I came to a halt right beneath the hatch of the attic. Mother said that she had stored all of Declan’s letters in a box. Is it still up there? I headed to my room. What good could come from reading a bunch of old letters written by a child so many years ago? What was the point? I opened the door to my room, I threw myself onto my bed and pulled the covers over my head. Sleep; that is all I want for now.

I woke up in the middle of the night, soaked in sweat. The doctors had informed me that could happen. They said that victims of abuse or r**e would often have trouble sleeping. That they would have terrible nightmares reminding them of what happen. It was the brain’s way of trying to process it. Our subconscious trying to deal with it. They explained that some victims don’t have them, others only experience them once or twice and the really lucky ones; they had them for the rest of their life. Something to look forward to, not. I went down to the kitchen to get a glass of water and as I walked back up the stairs, I headed towards my room. For no obvious reason, I again halted right beneath the hatch to the attic. As I pulled down the stairs to the attic and headed up, a sense of calm came over me. I turned on the attic light and explored the attic with my eyes, I started to grow more curious as to what Declan had written to me. After only five minutes I saw the box. How did I know it was ‘the box’? My mother had always had a flair for the dramatic, she had put stickers of motorcycles all over it. That had to be the box she had put the letters and present in, hadn’t it? And as I pulled it closer and opened it up I felt my heart flicker and my stomach turn. I was excited but at the same time I was reminded of my father’s accident. I soon turned my focus to what was in the box, so I wouldn’t have to think about dad in a negative way. There were so many letters. Where to start? I couldn’t just pick one at random, what if the order mattered? I started putting them according to their dates. The oldest one first. After about an hour of sorting through letters, I took the box down to my room. Since I wasn’t likely to fall back to sleep anytime soon, I figured there was no time like the present to start reading those letters.

‘My darling Alice’, that was enough the get me hooked. It was only as the sunlight started creeping through my window, that I realised how long I had been at it. As soon as I had started reading Declan’s letters, I hadn’t been able to put them down. Granted the first ones contained more spelling mistakes than anything else. It was disarmingly charming at the same time. The further along I got the more I got a sense of the evolution that Declan had gone through and what the accident had meant for him. As the letters aged, so did Declan. His writing and thoughts matured so fast and he could describe his thoughts and feelings so clearly that it was almost as if I could see his life unfold in front of me. The first twenty or so letters were about the accident. How he felt about losing his brother and the manner in which it all happened. How his brother was responsible for the death of my father and how it impacted the both of us. Again, very mature thoughts for a child of only thirteen. The more letters I read, the more I realised that he had gone through the same struggles I had. He had suffered a loss greater than he was prepared to handle. And then he lost me as well. As I was consumed by hate at that point in my life, I didn’t really grieve the loss of our friendship. I didn’t have room for any more grief, or rather I couldn’t handle any more grief at that point. The second pile of letters, they had a different tone to them. A month had passed and Declan had found a way to deal with his grief. He had simply told me about it. Even though he had to write it down instead of being able to tell me in person, it had had the same cathartic effect on him. Meanwhile I was still searching for a way to process the death of a parent, Declan was already trying to process something else. That was where the second pile of letters come in. After dealing with the death of his brother. He had been left with a whole in his heart, or so he wrote. He had come to realise that the death of his brother wasn’t the only loss he had to deal with. He also had to deal with the loss of his best friend; me. The further along I got in this pile of letters, the more we both realised; ‘child’ Declan and ‘teenager’ me, that he was also dealing with the realization that I wasn’t just his best friend. Somewhere along the way, I had become more. He had fallen in love with me. 

He was in love with me. 

My heart skipped a beat and I gasped for air, and I turned into an addict. I started to devour letter after letter and as the third pile of letters revealed that he had come to grips with the fact that he had lost me as a part of his life I started to calm down. He said his goodbyes in so many ways because it never seemed to be the right way to say goodbye, that is how he put it anyway. So, he devised a plan, he would back off. He had found the perfect way to say goodbye to me, to let our ways part. On my thirteenth birthday he would get me one last present, which would show me how he felt about me. Whether I decided to open it or not, that was something that he had no control over. But what he could control is himself. He vowed that he would wait, it didn’t matter how long; he would wait. His plan was a simple one and in retrospect, Declan might not have expected for it to be years. None the less, he would leave me alone and stay out of my way until I was ready. Ready to let him back into my life. And as I read his parting sentence, I couldn’t help but let a tear escape my eye and roll down my cheek.

‘I don’t care how long it takes, I will always wait for you, because you are worth the wait.’

No girl could read that and not shed a tear; it is basically the most romantic thing anyone can tell you and it was the most romantic thing I had ever read. 

In only a matter of hours Declan’s letters had managed what years, a loving family and great friend hadn’t been able to do. They made me lower my guard. The velvet baby blue box caught my eye. It was the present that Declan had left for me at my front door, the day that I had turned thirteen. Now, four years later, as a seventeen-year-old, I slowly reached for it and as my heart began to pace, I opened the box. There it was. Declan’s perfect goodbye gift. A silver locket dangling from a long silver chain. At first glance it might not have been special. But as I examined the locket closer, I discovered it could be opened. As I opened it up, the first thing that jumped out at me was the picture on the right side of the locket. It was a picture taken on a sunny day in the town park. I remember that day. I think Declan and I were about eleven years old and our family met up with the Knights to go the town park for a picnic. The picture was of my dad, Declan and me. We had been throwing around a football, I think. And my mother said that we looked so happy, she wanted a picture to remember that moment by. I was sitting in my father’s lap and Declan had one arm over my father’s shoulder and was hanging over it. All three of us had the biggest smile on our faces. Looking at that picture, thinking about that moment; it warmed my heart. And as I turned to look to the left side of the locket, I read:

‘Forever yours – D’

It was the perfect gift.