I guess I shouldn’t have worried so much about people at work saying anything to my dad about Garrett, as someone far closer to home was a much bigger concern.
A girl that I considered my friend that I worked with at the grocery store before going to work for the hospital, we’ll call her Alicia, was the someone I’m referring to. However, Alicia decided to approach my momma once while she was casually grocery shopping when Alicia was working a shift. This girl, turns out, had a crush on Garrett, also — and wanted us to break up so that she could date him. She confronted my mom complete with alligator tears, telling my momma that he and I were having sex.
I can’t recall if my Mom ever confronted me about this little unwarranted interaction that she had with Alicia at the grocery store. But, it honestly wouldn’t take them very long to figure out that I was seeing Garrett behind their backs… sorta. I was already eighteen years old and looking into moving out by this point — so not really sneaking around, but in my parent’s eyes, I was.
One night, Garrett and I went out together again, him driving my car. We were literally right down the street from his grandmother’s house where he lived to hang out when he leaned in to give me a kiss.
This split-second decision… would end up being a costly one.
I can still remember what ran through my head at the start of the crash, and what transpired after it like it was yesterday.
Is it sad that you’re more worried about your life being in danger because now your dad is gonna find out what you’ve been hiding from him than if I would even survive the crash in the first place? Because that’s what ran rampant through my brain.
Instead of feeling the actual crash taking place in slow motion, glass flying everywhere in slow motion, the whiplash in my neck in slow motion. The leftovers from where we went for dinner flew all over the car interior in slow motion. But, alas, all I could think of… was now my parents would officially know if they didn’t already… and how my dad was gonna react when he found out.
The paramedics said that had we not hit the concrete barrier blocking the creek bridge we crashed over, the Jaws of Life would have had to come get me out on my side. Garrett was up and walking around, perfectly fine. But I, however, had to be rushed to the emergency room by ambulance.
I found out later on that Garrett walked down to his friend’s house that same night while I was en route to the hospital and got high. Yeah, you heard that correctly.
Once I finally got to the hospital and back to a room, the same hospital I worked at, I called my parents from the hospital phone. I can’t remember where my vintage early 2000’s cell phone was at this point. My momma answered the call, and I knew that by her reaction that she had seen on the caller ID where the call had come from.
Groggy, she answered the phone, wondering why she was getting a call this late from the hospital where her husband and daughter both worked at. But, one of them was home with her and the other wasn’t. I need to explain something quickly — I have changed most of the names in this series so far, but for this next part to even make sense, I have to explain that Garrett and Toby have the same name in real life. Obviously, different last names, but they both have a first name in common, a name we’ll say is Bob to explain this next part. I’m going to assign random last names to them as a legend of sorts so you can follow along easier.
Toby — we’ll call him Bob Smith.22Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYdKocLgHag
Garrett — we’ll call him Bob Notsmith.
See what I did there?
Okay. Moving on.
“Momma?” I said. She replied with my name, with a heavy air of both confusion and curiosity in her tone.
“Yeah. Um,” I hesitated for as long as I felt I could, “I got in a car wreck. I’m at the hospital.”
It didn’t take long for her attention to be piqued and immediately began asking more questions as she started getting ready to leave the house to join me at the hospital.
“Are you okay?” She asked with such sincerity.
“Yes. But… I was with Rob.”
“Rob…” she questioned before asking for more clarification, “…Smith?”
You see, around this time, Bob Smith, A.K.A. Toby, was back in town around that time frame. She knew this, so it wasn’t strange that she thought this could have been a good possibility of happening.
“No.” I stalled, again for as long as I felt I could get away with, “Notsmith.”
Needless to say, I was met with heavy criticism and disappointment. But, nonetheless, her and my dad headed up to the hospital, I believe dropping my brother off at my grandparent’s house on the way.
I did something that probably made my dad really mad, but I didn’t care. I told the hospital staff that my parents were on their way up, but that I was scared of what my dad would do and requested that only my momma be let back to the room.
This did end up pissing my dad off, but later I found out it was more than likely because of his image he was portraying. You see, over the years of my dad working at the hospital, he had made friends with a lot of the security guards that worked there. The department I worked in, however, actually worked as a combination department with the head of security — so I knew them just as well, if not even better now, than he did. It didn’t take long for quiet rumors and assumptions to be made after that.
But, I was not a minor, the hospital told me that I could allow or deny anyone access to me back in the room. So, I did.
They ended up bandaging me up and releasing me to go home.
I think it would be safe to assume that the car ride home was awkward… to say the least.
Within the next few days, things were tense at home. I had already began distancing myself from him as I secretly looked at apartments and saved up, and had requested that he remove the “Daddy’s Little Girl” decal from the back of my car prior to the crash. I thought that maybe I was finally getting through to him, as my dad didn’t lash out at me the way I had expected him to. Looking back at things now, with that twenty/twenty hindsight, the reason my dad didn’t lash out at me was probably more so not wanting to raise any more suspicions about him at work from the security team.
Whatever the case may have been, for him not reacting the way I’d feared, I was grateful.
Over that week, Garrett had tried contacting me. At one point, he called me at work — where luckily Bryce was working the desk and was able to tell him I couldn’t receive calls at that number and to cover for me. Bryce didn’t keep that information from me, though. He knew when I showed up with a severely scraped-up chin and neck from contact with the airbag in the wreck, he knew the circumstances behind everything. So, he let me know so I could handle anything I needed to. I ended up calling Garrett from the break room phone, I didn’t want any evidence of contacting him on me at all.
I told you earlier that I found out Garrett had walked to his friend’s house down the street to get high while I was en route to the hospital. Yeah, he tried to tell me that he came up to the hospital with flowers that night to see me, but my dad supposedly turned him away. The thing with that was, the hospital was a good distance drive from where the wreck happened, and you had to hop on the highway to get there.
He rode a bike everywhere.
He had his license… but didn’t have a car.
Well, but — couldn’t he have woken his grandmother and they take her car up to the hospital?
Sure… had he done what any other human being would have done in that situation. However, information later obtained from credible sources revealed she had no clue any of it even took place until the very next morning.
Okay. Well, but that’s good… right?
Imagine a sound clip of metaphorical crickets being inserted here.
His grandmother called me just as soon as she found out about the wreck…
…demanding that I give the recycled ring he gave me back.
Yeah, he had given me a ring that I found out he had just given every girlfriend, he would just keep asking for it back. It was just a simple hundred-dollar ring, nothing special. I pawned it for thirty bucks. I figured he wasn’t gonna be replacing my car, so I’d spare his future exes a recycled ring.
And if it tells you anything about him, our town experienced a vandalism spree after all this happened, our house being one of the targets. When we called the police to just report it, they asked if we knew anyone who would be capable of or have reason to do something like that, when my momma spoke up. She said, “Well, my daughter has an ex who doesn’t have the best record.”
Thanks, Mom!
When they asked the name, they knew immediately who it was. Both cops nodded their heads — very emphatically, mind you — and said they were aware of him.
I’m not saying anything — I’m just gonna set that there, and I’ll let you take with that what you will.
I was finally able to get him outta my hair.
I was still eyeing apartments so I could move out as soon as possible, but it had become even more evident how power-hungry my dad had gotten as far as controlling me. So, I did this discreetly so as not to rock the boat, so to speak. I would hang out with friends from a dad-approved list, and my parents began enforcing strict curfews and check-ins at certain times. I didn’t like the whole sneaking around and rebellious thing, but I wasn’t a fan of all these extremes, either.
On the approved list of friends, was Sarahbeth, Sara, her sister Stacey, Bryce and some other friends from work that my parents knew. I would go hang out with them regularly, all of them covering for me if I ever did do anything to accidentally slip up so I didn’t have to face his wrath.
As I continued to save up and buying items for what I called my “hope chest” to be prepared to move out at a moment’s notice, I would date around here and there.
As I mentioned, I got in really good shape while working at the hospital, and please do not take this next part as me being conceited or braggy… because that couldn’t be further from the truth.
I turned a lot of heads at that point — I was a little hottie toddy, okay? A real cutie patootie. So, I began getting a lot of different attention from different suitors. And, I would have to have them approved by my dad.
But, I will say that when my dad obtained even more control over me, things with our relationship at home got better.
My dad didn’t always approve my dates — one notable ones for a very ironic reason.
There was Wren — I met him while waiting outside the main set of employee elevators at work while doing my shift. He was contracted to do some kind of electrical service with the electrical system — right outside the elevators I would stand outside of. Listen to me talking like I know what I’m talking about. I don’t, by the way… for anyone curious.
Sarahbeth was usually the one who got all the attention from boys at the hospital, so it shocked me that he was interested in me and not her. I wouldn’t have even known he was interested if it weren’t for his boss intervening wanting to play Cupid with his arrow that day. He spared no detail when telling me that Wren wanted to take me out and thought I was super cute. So, I gave him my number.
Sometime later that week, I believe, him and I set up a time to go on a date — but my dad wanted to meet him first. He ended up going home and we didn’t end up going on the date because my dad just wasn’t feeling it. He didn’t see it working out because Wren started talking about like planet alignment or something like that… I don’t remember. But, what’s ironic about that, is that is gonna end up playing a pretty big role in my own story a little later.
Then I had just befriended Tom, he was deaf, and seemed so sweet and like he would be a good friend, and since I was just texting back and forth with him and not talking to him in an actual romantic capacity, I didn’t bother telling my parents about him. When I got a phone call from his phone number one day, I knew something was wrong, as we only texted. Come to find out, it was his wife who had viewed me as more than just a friend. Once I discovered this, I quickly cut all contact with him… I’m not about that drama.
Again, the male friends I hung out with regularly were on the pre-approved list of friends I was allowed to hang out with, mostly work colleagues — the main ones being Bryce and our friend Eric. We would go to movies together and just hang out — just as friends.
At least, that’s what I thought.
