by S. A. Wolfe
“Well, this sucks,” Imogene gripes.
“Shut up,” Jess says.
Everyone is silent, waiting for me to make my next move. The initial laughs and smiles upon seeing the TEAM TALIA T-shirts have quieted into murmuring frowns.
Peyton steps closer to me. “I’m sorry I didn’t execute this the right way. I’m sorry I’ve upset you. And I’m not trying to be a dick toward Adam.”
“No problem here,” Adam says, looking sympathetically at Peyton.
“Tonight,” Peyton affirms. “Let me see you tonight.”
I want to say no again, but all these people are watching us so expectantly, and I don’t want to be the person to let Finn down. His eager face crumples when my mouth forms another no.
“I’m going to stop by your house tonight,” Peyton says.
“Fine.” I shake my head in exasperation.
He puts his arm around Finn and directs him back the way they came. My friends don’t say anything, with the exception of a few audible grumbles from Dylan and Imogene. Even Lois goes quietly back down the hill to her car.
Adam’s guests go back inside while I watch Peyton’s caravan drive away.
“He seems pretty serious to me,” Adam says as he steps next to me.
“Peyton likes winning. He’s serious about winning, but then he moves on to his next conquest.”
Adam shakes his head. “Didn’t look like that to me. I think he’s serious about you, and he’s intent on proving that.”
“I hope not.”
“You’re just afraid he’ll prove you wrong.” He walks back into the house and leaves me alone.
• • •
At nine o’clock, there is a firm knock on the front door. A look passes between Aleska and my mother, who are watching some inane TV show that I can’t follow because my mind is on Peyton.
I leave them in the family room and walk down the hall to the front door. The longest walk of my life, with so much doubt on the other side. I take a deep breath and open the door.
Just like hundreds of times before, he never fails to make me feel gobsmacked, in awe of his beautiful face. And then it’s his eyes. Those stupid, gorgeous eyes trap me in place.
“Hi,” he says with a tentative smile.
“Hi.” I gaze at him a moment too long. I can’t live like this! “Let’s sit outside. My house is too small, and there are too many ears.”
“Sounds good.” He steps off the front stoop and pulls up two upturned, Adirondack chairs sitting by a patch of dead grass. He places the chairs next to each other and brushes off their seats. “Please.” He points to the chair for me.
I sit down, keeping my arms wrapped around me as if I’m holding in all my tightly wound nerves and emotions. The weathered wood creaks loudly as Peyton settles his weight into the other chair.
“I wanted to see you as soon as I got back from Los Angeles. I was waiting for the right time to talk to you. Little did I know I would make everything worse instead of better. I’m pretty sure I only have one shot left with you.”
“You thought going to Adam’s home in those T-shirts was your shining moment?”
“That was Finn’s idea. I felt I had to do it to show him I value his input on this. And I had to do it to show you I could put myself in the position of looking ridiculous and humiliated … for you.”
“I was still angry at you. I was flattered, too. It was funny to see you coming up the hill dressed like that. And Adam’s guests found it very entertaining, too.”
“Entertaining Adam is always important to me.”
“You like to cut him down, but you two are similar in some ways.”
“Except one very important way.”
So earnest. Not a word I would have used to describe Peyton in the past, but here he is, being earnest and putting his vulnerability on display for me. My breath catches.
“Talia, you don’t think of Adam in the same way you think of me.”
“I guess you heard about my date with him.”
“I heard. I’m also not making any assumptions about you and me, because I know you don’t forgive people. Your dad and Marko come to mind. I’m hoping I’m the exception and you’ll believe I’m sincere when I say I want to be with you. Only you. On your terms.”
“My terms? I have no idea what you’re talking about. You and I have never discussed—”
“We’ve discussed plenty. At work, at my home, in my bed, we’ve discussed the important things in life. What’s important to us. You’ve revealed everything about yourself. You also thought I was too self-absorbed to listen to you, to pay attention to the details and what you were saying between the lines. I heard every word you said, Talia.”
“You think you know me so well?” I laugh half-heartedly and steady my shaky hands in my lap, trying to wrestle my nervous, gurgling stomach with calming thoughts. Having hot and sweaty sex with Peyton is easy, it’s when my libido takes over. But this is hard. Revealing true feelings and taking an emotional risk with him is terrifying.
“I know you,” he says. “I watched Eat Drink Man Woman. Your favorite movie.”
I can’t hide my surprise that he remembered.
“Yeah, I remembered,” he says. “Of course, you didn’t pick something common like Titanic. I had to hunt the movie down, but I found it. I wasn’t going to quit until I saw the movie that made Talia Madej declare it the best movie ever.”
“Wow.” A flush of heat warms my skin. I’m thankful it’s too dark outside. “Did you like it?”
“I did. Very much. I’ve been trying to figure out which character is most like you.”
“No, you haven’t. That’s not how you spend your waking hours.”
“Wanna bet? I’ve been a little obsessed with its relevance to you. I want to know what you’re thinking when you watch it. At first, I assumed it was all the cooking scenes that appealed to you, but it’s not that simple. That would be too obvious. It’s much more than that, isn’t it?”
“You’re right. It’s more than the complicated cooking scenes. Although I like the part where the oldest daughter is upset with the neighbors’ late-night karaoke singing, and then the middle daughter says, ‘We communicate by eating. They communicate by singing.’”
“Because you use cooking and feeding people as your way of showing your love for people. I know that, too, Talia.”
“Yes.”
“Every scene and every character in that movie made me think of you.”
“I’m like the eldest daughter. My heart was broken by a man—Marko—and I assume I’ll be taking care of my mother forever so Aleska can move out and have a real life of her own. But I’m also like the middle daughter. She wants a career, and she thinks she may be in love with a man who’s not available.”
“I’m available.”
“I’m not finished. That daughter chose instead to have a friendship with that man, in case you weren’t paying attention.”
“I was paying attention. You’re not her.”
“Okay, well, I’m also like the youngest daughter, because I did play a manipulation game with you when I shouldn’t have.”
“You’re not like the youngest daughter either. She needed a shotgun wedding. You’re not like the timid, oldest daughter, and you’re not like the middle daughter who casts off a jerk boyfriend but settles for friendship with a married man. You’re like Master Chu, their father. He holds everyone together.”
“I’m like a seventy-year-old man?”
“In theory. He says, ‘Worry is what makes us a family.’ You worry a lot, sunflower.”
“I do. If I’m going to worry so much about everything, I’d rather be surrounded by a big family, like Master Chu.”
“You want some payback or reward for all the worrying you invest in other people,” Peyton says. “You want your own family … and the father in the story had a heart condition. Like you, it was both physical and emotional.”
“Not exactly like me. He’s an old man, Pe
yton. I love that movie, but you’re reading too much into it, and you’re not a psychiatrist.”
“I’m not finished. The father is in love and wants more in his life than cooking grand dinners for other people and all the family drama that surrounds him. He can’t put his life on hold, so he proposes to the woman he’s in love with, a much younger woman.”
“I don’t have a much younger man, and I’m definitely not proposing to anyone.”
“You have me, and I’m not going anywhere.”
I quickly stand up. I’ve been in this situation before. A man I thought I would love forever used an opportunity similar to this to propose to me, and I said yes. Fear begins to creep in, along with a cold sensation. I want to believe everything Peyton is saying, but I cannot be hurt again.
“This is too much, too soon. I think I should go inside.” I take a step away from my chair, but Peyton stands and pulls me toward him.
“We’re right together.”
“I used you, knowing you were going to leave Hera.”
“But now I’m not leaving.”
“But look at all the baggage I come with. This … us… was never a possibility. Look at me and my life. I’m a mess, and I can’t fathom combining my life with yours. You are a restless, ambitious man, and I’m a worried, stay-put kind of woman. Oil and water, right?”
“Wrong. Opposites attract,” he says gently, then kisses me on the cheek. So chaste. “Think about what I said. Take your time.”
“No pressure, right? I only have to work in your kitchen every day.”
“I’m not holding that over your head. Regardless of what happens between us, it’s your kitchen, too.”
“Nice in theory, but not realistic.” I pull away from his grasp. “Last time I made a decision like this—to be serious with a man—it blew up in my face. This is too fast, Peyton.”
“No, it’s not. You have some concerns, and that’s understandable. I can be patient and wait for you.”
“Some concerns,” I scoff.
“I’m in love with you,” he says effortlessly. “And you’re in love with me, sunflower.”
I put my hand up to stop him from saying anything further. “It’s also possible that this isn’t love at all. We could be under the influence of our own extreme emotions. In my case, my surgery was fairly traumatizing to me. And you became a parent overnight, and it’s made you more emotional. And don’t forget you encouraged me to pursue Adam because you were only in this thing with me for sex. Then you got jealous toward Adam. Maybe you and I aren’t fit for a serious relationship because we’re scared and indecisive. Did you ever think of that?”
“I’m not scared now. I’ve made a decision,” he says coolly.
“I’m scared, Peyton. I’m scared.”
The headlights of a car turning into our driveway temporarily blind us. As the driver cuts the lights, Peyton and I are blanketed in a dark silence. The sunset came and went, and I never noticed.
“Hi, guys,” Gavin says as he approaches. He’s nothing but a black silhouette until he’s within a foot from us and I can make out his face in the moonlight.
“Hi,” Peyton and I say in unison.
Gavin senses the delicate air between us. “Well, you don’t want to stand out here too long. The mosquitos are pretty thick these days.”
The light above the front door switches on, and then my mother appears on the threshold, smiling warmly at Gavin. “Hello.”
Aleska appears behind her, but her eyes are on me and Peyton.
“Why don’t we invite these two to join us in a movie or a game of Monopoly?” Gavin says. It’s evident he wants to be with my mother and leave the two sullen people on the front lawn.
“No!” I interject. “Peyton was just leaving, and I have … stuff to do.”
Peyton’s face falls and he exhales sharply.
“I made you dinner, and I just took a pie out of the oven.” My mother is cheerful as she holds the door for Gavin.
“You don’t have to keep feeding me,” Gavin says politely, but you can hear the appreciation in his voice at the thought of one of my mother’s late-night feasts.
“Yes, we do,” my mother, Aleska, and I all say together.
Then Peyton and I are alone again.
“So, I’ll leave,” he says.
“Yeah, and I’m going—”
“And then I’ll try on another day.” He tips his head at me, then walks across the lawn to where he parked his truck on the side of the road.
I don’t want to be caught watching him walk away. I definitely don’t want to think about how he just looked at me. With those goddamn gorgeous eyes gazing upon me like I’m his future.
Talia
WE AGREE TO MEET. His text arrived early in the morning, and I spent a half hour wondering what more we could possibly talk about before I decided to respond. And why did he pick such a public place?
I park my bike in front of Bonnie’s Diner and survey the street for anyone who may notice me. The diner is only steps away from Blackard Designs, and across the street I can see Swill and its parking lot. Anyone could spot me heading into the diner, the busiest gossip hub in town. I only hope none of my friends are inside there now.
I take my purse out of my bike basket, checking its meager contents as a means to stall. The sun is beating down on my face. Standing here sweating isn’t going to make this situation any easier. I just have to go inside and face the consequences of my decision.
I’m greeted with a swoosh of cold air conditioning as I open the diner door to a cacophony of a sizzling grill, conversations among the tables, percolating coffee, and silverware clinking against dishes. All familiar, comforting sounds.
Imogene’s mother, Pam, who is also the owner, waves hello to me. I wave back, then quickly move through the crowded diner, glancing at all the occupied tables, looking for that one face.
He’s sitting in a booth in the farthest corner from the door. I wonder how early he got here to snag that somewhat private spot. Though nothing in this diner is very private. Maybe that’s why he chose it. The diner is the primary source of all community information in Hera. It’s also the location where a person is least likely to yell or argue publicly if they don’t want to be the subject of dinnertime gossip. So maybe that’s why he chose this spot to meet. He wants me calm and rational and hopes the setting will prevent me from creating a scene.
As I approach the booth, he steps out and stands, puffing his chest up a bit. He looks like he wants to hug me, but I don’t want to move closer and make it easy for him.
He puts one hand gingerly on my shoulder and gives me a hesitant smile. “Talia,” he says with a hint of relief.
“Hi, Marko.”
I haven’t seen him in more than seven months. The rage that consumed me is gone. And there’s not even a whispered trace of the marital fantasies I used to have daily.
He looks exactly the same. The same bulky physique from his gym routine. The same rugged, yet clean-shaven face that gives him a tough-guy persona. I used to think it made him look sexy. I’m sure it still does to many women. His deep tan is the result of doing roofing jobs shirtless. I know him so well. His ego was always seeking out female admirers, and I was foolish enough to care about that because I thought it said something that he chose me over the other women who fawned over him. His jeans and polo shirt are a little too snug for my taste. Too showy, too much machismo.
He gives me a peck on the cheek as if that’s the safe thing to do. “You look beautiful. Thank you for coming.”
A bit of my residual grudge hovers near the surface, but I want to prove to him that I’m healthy and strong and doing just fine without him. I actually curled my hair for him—his favorite look. But it’s not for him. It’s for me, and I want to show him what he’s missing. I also wore a blouse with a bit of cleavage so he can see my scar.
“Thanks. I feel great. You look good, too.” I step away from him and slip into the booth.
He e
ases his large frame into the other side, and then the waitress appears with two cups of coffee and menus. Marko gives her his familiar smile-wink combo. I hate it, and in that split second, I hate him.
He turns back to me and just stares.
“What?” I ask tersely.
His eyes dip from my face to my chest then back. “I’m sorry.” He reaches across the table and takes my hand. I let him. The feel of his rough fingertips brings back memories.
On the outside, Marko looks like a caricature of a TV assassin. On the inside, he can be warm and tender, when he isn’t being a clichéd ass. I forgot about his nice side. In all the months I was scared for myself, I didn’t stop to ask him if he was afraid I could die. I knew his concerns about birth defects, and passing on my faulty genetics to future generations, but I never really knew if my possible death crossed his mind.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t around when you needed me most. I didn’t want to disappear. You have to believe me. I’ve always loved you. I didn’t know how to reassure you, and I saw how weak I was.”
“Are you asking me to forgive you? I don’t understand why you’re here.”
“I want to apologize and to ask for your forgiveness. You deserve more than an apology. You went through something very difficult, and I didn’t live up to my part as your fiancé. I don’t blame you if you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you. I was angry with you. I was hurt by you. Then I had to stop thinking about you and take care of myself. I had to stop caring about you so I could get on with my life.”
“Have you stopped caring about me?”
“I spent months wondering why my fiancé would leave me when I needed him most. I accepted that this must have been a test of our love. My illness showed me a different side of you. And me.”
“But I’m here now.”
“Marko.” I shake my head. “I was so sad. So broken. At the hospital and during my recovery. It was only when I stopped being angry at you that I could make any progress. You leaving taught me how to be strong on my own.”
“I should have told you how scared I was for you. I wasn’t taught how to be that kind of person. My family—”
