Always Pointed Home

Before Everything Changed

Time doesn’t erase feelings.

It only changes them.

Sometimes it softens the sharp edges until you can touch a memory without bleeding. Sometimes it twists love into anger, longing into resentment, and regret into something that settles permanently between your ribs.

And sometimes, if you’re very unlucky, time only makes the feelings stronger.

Deeper.

Harder to understand.

My feelings have always been complicated, but I suppose that was inevitable. You can’t spend your entire childhood loving someone in one way and expect your heart to ask permission before it begins loving him differently.

The Manzies were part of my life before I was even born.

My parents met Laura and Vincent Manzie in high school. They went to college together, stood beside each other at their weddings, and bought houses next door to each other when they decided it was time to settle down and become responsible adults.

There wasn’t a fence separating our backyards. There was only a narrow strip of grass nobody bothered claiming because, according to our parents, there had never been a need.

My parents only had me.

The Manzies had two boys.

Nico was my age, born a little more than three months before me—a fact he mentioned whenever he wanted to pretend he was older and wiser.

Damien was two years older than us.

Growing up together was one thing.

Being raised together was something else entirely.

We weren’t neighbors who occasionally played together. We were three children belonging to four parents who never seemed particularly concerned about which house we were in. Our mothers bought groceries for all of us. Our fathers coached the same teams, repaired the same bicycles, and delivered the same lectures whenever one of us did something stupid.

Which was often.

If my mother couldn’t find me, she called next door.

If Laura discovered an empty cereal box shoved back into her pantry, she came looking for Nico and me.

If something was broken, Damien was blamed first because he was the oldest and therefore, according to every adult involved, should have known better.

He usually did know better.

He simply did it anyway.

Sunday dinners were sacred. They alternated between our houses, although the arrangement hardly mattered. By five o’clock, both kitchens were crowded with too many people, too much food, and at least one argument about how something was supposed to be cooked.

Vincent believed anything could be improved with garlic.

My father believed anything could be improved on the grill.

Laura made homemade pasta, and my mother baked desserts elaborate enough to belong behind glass in a fancy restaurant.

Nico and I were responsible for setting the table, which meant I set it while he stole pieces of bread and com,plained about being oppressed.

Damien was supposed to help our fathers outside, but he always wandered into the kitchen before dinner. He would lean against the counter, all long legs and careless confidence, sampling whatever our mothers were making until one of them slapped his hand away.

He always stole something before he left.

A piece of bread.

A spoonful of sauce.

Sometimes the cherry from the top of the dessert I had been saving for myself.

“You’re an asshole,” I would whisper.

“You’re slow,” he would answer, chewing my cherry with a grin.

I hated that grin.

At least, that was what I told myself.

Sunday dinners were loud. Everyone talked over everyone else. Vincent told terrible jokes. Laura laughed at them even when she had already heard them a hundred times. My father asked the boys about sports, and my mother asked about school. Nico kicked me beneath the table whenever I exposed one of his lies.

Damien rarely needed to kick me.

One look from him was usually enough.

Even as a boy, he had a way of looking at people that made them listen. Nico filled every silence he encountered, but Damien watched. He noticed things. When I was upset, he knew before my parents did. When I was lying, one of his eyebrows would rise as if he were giving me one final opportunity to reconsider.

He could be unbearable.

He could also be the only person in the world who understood me without requiring an explanation.

Our birthdays belonged to all of us too.

There were separate cakes and presents, but never separate celebrations. Nico and I usually had one large party between our birthdays. The backyard would be filled with balloons, folding tables, neighborhood children, and adults who stayed long after the candles had been blown out.

Damien pretended he was too old to participate.

Then he spent the entire party following us around, interfering with our games and making sure nobody bothered me.

On my tenth birthday, a boy from school shoved my face into my cake.

Before I had wiped the frosting from my eyes, Damien had the boy pinned against the picnic table.

He was twelve.

The boy was thirteen.

Damien didn’t care.

“Apologize to her.”

“It was a joke.”

“I didn’t ask what it was.”

The boy apologized.

Damien was grounded for threatening him, but later that night, he climbed through my bedroom window and handed me the biggest slice of replacement cake.

“You didn’t have to do that,” I told him.

“Yes, I did.”

“Why?”

He shrugged as if the answer should have been obvious.

“Because you’re ours.”

At ten years old, I understood what he meant.

I belonged to the strange family our parents had created. I belonged beside Nico at the children’s table. I belonged between our mothers during holiday movies and on Vincent’s back when he gave us rides through the pool.

I belonged to all of them.

Years later, I would remember Damien’s words and wonder if he had meant something else.

Holidays were even more entwined.

Thanksgiving started before sunrise and ended with all of us half asleep in the living room. Christmas Eve was spent at the Manzies’ house, while Christmas morning happened at ours. Our stockings hung together above whichever fireplace we were using that year.

Five stockings would have made sense.

There were seven.

One for each of us.

Nobody ever questioned it.

Every Christmas morning, Nico tore through his presents like the wrapping paper had personally offended him. I tried to take my time. Damien watched both of us, pretending to be bored until he received something he genuinely wanted.

Then his whole face changed.

That was the thing about Damien. His smiles were rare enough to feel like secrets. When he gave one to you, it felt earned.

New Year’s Eve was celebrated with music, champagne for the adults, sparkling cider for us, and a countdown none of the parents could complete at the same speed. At midnight, everyone hugged everyone.

Damien always hugged me last.

When we were little, he lifted me off my feet just to make me squeal.

As we got older, the hugs became shorter.

Then awkward.

Then dangerous in ways neither of us was ready to name.

There were summer vacations too—two families packed into neighboring cabins or one oversized beach house. Our fathers fished. Our mothers read beneath umbrellas. Nico and I raced into the water while Damien followed more slowly, claiming he was only there to make sure we didn’t drown.

He taught me how to swim beneath the waves.

How to throw a proper punch.

How to drive before I was old enough for a permit.

He taught me how to climb onto the roof outside my bedroom and reach the old oak tree without getting caught.

Damien was behind almost every rule I broke and somehow responsible for getting me home safely afterward.

Nico was my best friend.

Damien was something else.

He was my protector when I didn’t need protecting and my tormentor when I wanted peace. He called me Bug because I had followed him everywhere as a child. I called him Saint because everyone thought he could do no wrong, and we both knew better.

He knew when I had cried.

He knew when I was frightened.

He knew I hated thunderstorms but loved watching lightning from the covered porch.

He knew I picked the marshmallows out of my hot chocolate and saved them for last.

He knew everything about me.

Except the moment my feelings changed.

Or perhaps he knew that too.

That is the part I still can’t decide.

People like to believe there is one moment when love begins. One glance. One touch. One perfect second that divides everything into before and after.

It would be easier if that were true.

I could blame the summer I turned sixteen.

I could blame the storm, the porch, or the way Damien looked at me when he realized I wasn’t a little girl anymore.

I could blame him.

For years, I did.

But when I force myself to look back honestly, I know there wasn’t one moment.

There were thousands of them.

A stolen cherry.

A slice of birthday cake.

Seven stockings above the fireplace.

His arms catching me whenever I jumped before checking how far I might fall.

Damien Manzie had been woven into every important memory I possessed. I never learned how to live without him because nobody imagined I would have to.

Least of all me.

Maybe that was where we went wrong.

We thought what we had was permanent.

We believed our parents’ friendship had made us family and that nothing could destroy the world they built around us.

We were young enough to think love protected people from hurting each other.

It doesn’t.

Sometimes love is the reason the wound goes so deep.

And Damien didn’t merely break my heart.

He changed the person it belonged to.