Page 1 of Untamed
The expression “down the well” is used by bull riders to describe a situation in which a bull is spinning in one direction and the force of the spin pulls the rider down the side of the bull into motion’s vortex. This is a dangerous scenario that often results in a bull rider getting hung up to the bull.
I give myself to others, even when I can’t or shouldn’t. It’s something I’ve always done.
Which might be why I’m careless. Reckless . . . loveless. And in the aftershock of lost love, I don’t smile more.
Or maybe I should say I smileless. Or, maybe not at all. I’m not fine. In the loneliest moment of devastation, when my world fell apart, all I could do was stare blankly. I lost the love of my life. I had a boy who looked at me like the world revolved around me. I pushed until he caved, until he couldn’t take my ways and now, all I have left is his memory.
So yeah, careless, reckless, and whatever . . . loveless. I would love to say this is a story about a girl who took the path less traveledand it ended up being the right one, but I would be lying. It’s about a girl who knew right from wrong and still chose wrong because the right way seemed insignificant and quite possibly irrelevant at the time. Sometimes it’s the wrong choices made on a whim that teach you what life is really about.
You know that song by Lee Ann Womack “I May Hate Myself in the Morning?” It’s playing on the radio in my room and though it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with my situation, I certainly don’t love this heartbreaker in my bed now, but he’s someone I can ignore; he just won’t let me. And maybe the song has nothing to do with me, or my situation, other than me hating myself in the morning for continuing whatever this is we’re doing.
End it. Set yourself free from him. You don’t owe him anything.
The boy on the edge of my bed, I don’t owe him anything despite what he thinks. His back is turned, and like my mind, his focus is elsewhere, unaware of the hurt we’re causing by what we just did. But guys like this, they’re like lighting a torch to your soul and he’s thewrongone. His name is Joel Peterson and he’s the perpetually bad side of the one I lost.
“Thanks,” he mutters, buttoning his jeans and pulling on his shoes. His cheeks are flushed, his breathing still ragged, reminiscent of moments ago, but that’s not why my attention shifts to his. It’s the tattoo on his back, a bull’s skull outlined in what appears to be blood dripping from the horns, and then it’s the Central Washington hoodie he pulls over his head. “I’ll see you tonight sometime?”
I hate the sound of his voice. It reminds me of his twin brother.
I shrug. “We need to stop this.”
Pulling on a shirt from beside my bed, I cover myself, hide away from the humiliation I hold within. I don’t look at his face. I’m not sure I ever do. Why would I? I don’t mean anything to him. And I’m not entirely sure why he’s telling me thanks. I just found out he’s seeing someone now. Has been for the last month.
Before you judge me, I never imagined myself as the other woman. Or in my case, girl because can you really call a seventeen-year-old girl a woman? I don’t want to destroy relationships. That’s not me, but then again, maybe it is. Maybe I don’t know anymore.
Standing, he glares at me with a deep crease to his brow, all traces of his earlier relief I gave him fading. “What the fuck do you mean we need to stop this?”
“That’s exactly what I mean. You’re seeing someone.”
His face falters, his too-familiar brown eyes narrowing. “Who said I was seeing someone?”
“It doesn’t matter who told me, Joel.”
Joel’s jaw flexes and his chin dips, nodding once. “Whatever.” His deep voice is barely above a whisper, his features controlled, sharp, not giving me much to go on.
I don’t say anything else. He leaves, out my window, like he came, without another word.
I watch him walk up the driveway, his steps quick and light, coming back from someplace he never should have been.
Lighting a cigarette, I sit next to my window, my eyes drift, smoke filtering through dawn blue. Pinks, reds, smudges of colors that make this world beautiful surround me. It’s a summer sunrise in Ellensburg, Washington. I flip my cell phone around in my hand. There’s a message on it from almost four years ago I refuse to delete. A heavy weight gnaws at my chest. A decision I made . . . a consequence I never saw coming. I can’t say that night will haunt me forever, but here, now, surrounded by the same colors as the morning I found out he left my life forever, I’m reminded of the boy who changed my life—who continues to change my life—maybe for the worse. Sometimes I feel like I’m trapped in a room full of mirrors, each one reflecting back at me the mistakes of my past. I want to smash them to pieces, destroy the reminders, but that’s bad luck, isn’t it?
Cracking the window open, I draw my bare legs to my chest and let out the cloud of smoke drifting from my lips. I angle my head so the wind blows over my face. Drawing in gentle breaths, I close my eyes. It’s relaxing. Breathe in the fresh air, hold it in, imagine it’s everything you want it to be and then some. The wind is blowing, usual for Ellensburg, but I don’t mind. It gives me the fresh breath I’m looking for. Something pure, so unlike what I’m drawing into my lungs.
I like to think despite my young age, I’m an old soul. I believe there are parts of this world that are pure and natural. It just happens. Like the way a river cuts through a valley. The way a sunset blankets the flat plains of eastern Washington every night. The way a sunrise on a crisp fall morning clears the early morning fog. Or the way the stars, so glittery and beautiful, light your way through even the darkest of nights.
As Miranda Lambert says, “I feel a sin coming on.” One I know I’m going to love and regret at the same time. It’s buried in my bones, a need, a desire for more out of a life laid out for me, only it’s the wrong life and one I’m not about to follow. This can’t be it. I want to look back on my life and say, damn, that was a wild ride. I don’t want to look back when I’m fifty and be like, it was okay. I wish I had, or maybe I could have. . . . Life needs to be lived, not wished.
Blowing out another breath, I snuff out the cigarette I know my dad will kill me for smoking and turn to stare at the clock on my nightstand. It’s nearing four in the morning and it’s time to get on with the day. Living on a ranch, there’s a good amount of work to be done and you need every ounce of daylight you can get.
It’s already late July and so far my summer has been the same as it’s always been. Working on a ranch time has forgotten. Problem is I’m young and I have dreams, things I want out of life, and they’re not going to happen if I stay here forever. My Grandpa Lee used to say life is your story and death is a sentence only to be defined by living your best life. He was like a hundred when he died so I tend to believe in everything he said to me. Nearly as old as the nineteenth-century buildings in the Kittitas Valley.
You know what he said to me the morning he passed away?
“Be wild, be free. In the clouds I’ll see you again.” He had dementia. I’m not even sure he was talking to me that spring morning we said goodbye, but I like to think he was.
Just before sunset, I’m ready to get out of the house and let loose. The moment I reach for the front door, stacked bangle bracelets giving my presence away, and the old wood squeaks, drawing my dad’s attention to me. There’s nothing worse than trying to sneak out of the house unnoticed only to have the door and bracelets give you away.
Damn you, door.Should have used the window like Joel did.
