by Elsa Kurt
“Eh, well, yeah. But he wanted to meet on a Tuesday, and I—”
“You chickened out, didn’t you? Molly McKenna-Peterson, you are all talk and no action. Okay, that’s it. We are making a pact right now. We are going to accept dates this weekend, no excuses.”
“I—”
“Nope, Eric has your girls for the weekend. Well, Eric and his mother that is. And my girls are going to be at Darren’s. We are single and free.”
“Okay, deal. Finish your article, and we’ll compare Mates later. Bye bitch.”
“Ha. Okay, it’s a deal. Bye.”
Somehow, the tables had turned, and Keira was now the leader.
Well, you opened your big mouth and took one more step out of your bubble, so I suppose you’re going to have to walk the walk.
Keira sighed and closed the chat window with a twinge of guilt, but reminded herself that she did NOT want to see BIGMIKE’s ‘grain of rice’ now or ever. Almost immediately, the chat icon chimed again. Shit. She’d accidentally hit the ‘like’ button instead of closing it. BIGMIKE responded promptly with… a dick pic. Keira grimaced and closed the chat window hurriedly.
Ha. You grimaced, looked at it for more than a moment, squinted, tilted your head this way, and that then closed it.
Four hours later, article finished, and Molly once again at her door, Keira was ready to tackle her MateMatch inbox.
“Okay, honestly? I’m nervous. What if no one has messaged me? How embarrassing will that be?”
“Oh, pu-lease, princess. You’re our little Barbie doll—without the boobs, that is. Your box is probably full. Listen, if they’re hounding me, they will definitely be all over you. Now, let’s get to it Awkward Barbie.”
In high school, Molly had called Keira variations of Barbie, depending on Keira’s whim of the moment. Whilst there’s too many to list, these are on replay— Bubble Barbie, Stepford Barbie, Awkward Barbie, Garden Barbie… and so on.
“We’ll see about that. And don’t put yourself down, you’re gorgeous and fabulous, of course, they’re hounding you, like they always have. Head out to the porch, I’ll grab us something to drink.”
A little about Molly, forthright…
Over the summer that followed sixth grade, Molly had... blossomed. She suddenly had curves where the other girls still had straight lines. Added to that was long, auburn hair and big blue eyes. When the fall came around, so did the boys. At first, Molly enjoyed the attention, but it quickly led to petty and mean-spirited jealousy from the girls, who told her she was fat and spread rumors she was a slut. The consequence was a severely undermined sense of self-confidence and made her guarded and untrusting. It also caused her to try to cover and hide her endowments for years after. Keira understood all of this, of course, and though Molly outgrew her need to hide her figure, she still tried to hide her insecurities under a gregarious personality and an ‘I don’t give a shit’ attitude.
***
Molly often wrapped self-deprecation in a joke, and the one thing she hated more than being called Molly-dolly was being called out for her lack of self-confidence. But a real friend pushes past the surface and gets real whenever necessary. For Keira, it was her constant battle with social awkwardness and discomfort, hence Molly pushing her out into a world that didn’t fit inside her safety bubble. For Molly, it was her struggles with appreciating her generous curves and self-image, hence Keira pushing her as well.
The two women had an uncanny knack for balancing tough love with humor so that one rarely got mad at the other. Annoyed, but not mad.
“All right, let’s get this shit-show started.”
“Ha, and a shit-show it shall be. Hey, speaking of shit-show, what the fuck is you-know-who’s truck doing across the street?”
“Oh, didn’t I tell you? The Lawson’s moved out and are going to rent the house out, so they hired him to do renovations. Awesome, right?”
“Wait, how does he even know them? Also, um, isn’t that like stalking or something? I’m telling you, I’ve told you, he’s a whack job. I think you should get a gun. Just saying.”
“I guess Mr. Lawson came across the street one time when R—he was working on the house for me and asked him for a business card. So, he must’ve called him and asked him to do the work. He had no way of knowing the situation. It is what it is.”
The ‘situation’ was her relatively recent status change from ‘in a relationship’ to ‘just dodged a grenade.’ A whirlwind short yet eventful association with a guy whose name she now refused to speak—or hear spoken in her presence—out of sheer mortification and repulsion at what an absolute, classic rebound, utter mistake he’d been. He was not accepting the break up as final, convinced that she didn’t really mean it (because she didn’t actually use the words ‘break up’) and hoping that she’d change her mind if he changed everything about himself. Literally, he changed everything. His style of dressing, his hair, his habits... all in a day’s time. Creeped everyone out. She stopped answering and returning his calls and avoided him like the plague. Classic conflict avoidance. Never ends up well, does it?
“Ugh, Keira that sucks. Have you seen him? He’s probably got fricking binoculars, and a video camera trained on you and your place at all times and whacks off at night to your pictures. What is it with you and guys like that? Oh, and speaking of guys like that, have you told Darren the Dick to stop walking into your house as if he still lives here? Or did you wimp out again?”
Keira clenched her teeth, there was that ‘calling each other out’ thing. She forced herself to relax.
“No, I haven’t told him yet. I’m waiting for the right time.”
“Uh, how about, the next time he walks through your door, say, ‘Hey, dickface, get the fuck out of my house and knock like a civilized human being?”
“Ah, yes, because that will make matters so much better. Listen, he’s being... tolerable. I’m picking my battles, and this isn’t that big a deal to me. It’s irritating, yes. But not hugely so. I think the girls like it, it makes them feel like everything is stable.”
“Well, sunshine, you’re a bigger woman than me. Well, not literally, of course. God, I wanna punch Eric in the throat most of the time, and he’s not even half as bad as Darren the Dick.”
“Aww, poor Eric, he’s just… fragile. You never liked Darren, did you?”
“Nope. Not when we were in high school and especially when you two started up. I warned you though. But the princess wouldn’t listen.”
“Don’t remind me. Christ, I was nineteen. I didn’t know anything about anything. Except that Marco broke my heart, and I wanted to meet someone entirely unlike him so that there’d be no reminders of him.”
Oh, no. You said the M word. Here we go again.
“Wow, I haven’t heard you say that name in, what? Fourteen years? Your older man, the mysterious, the infamous, the magical Marcoooo.”
“Oh, stop. That was a lifetime ago. God, everyone was infatuated with him, remember?”
Which is why you had to have him.
“Yup. Didn’t do it for me. But you thought the universe revolved around him. What was he, like twenty-four to our seventeen? Imagine that today? Jesus, he’d be in jail.”
“It wasn’t like that at all. I mean, I guess it was. I’d kill my girls if they tried to date someone that much older. Hell, I’d kill the guy. It was different then though. Marco was different. He knew he shouldn’t get involved with me and it tormented him,” Molly rolled her eyes, so Keira added, “Stop. He avoided me like the plague for the longest time, but I was relentless. He loved me despite himself.”
“Hmm, well, loved you or not, he ruined your prom, your graduation, and—”
“Ugh, I remember. Awful. We were together for two years, and I think he broke up with me twelve times, and every time he came back, I took him back. This sounds stupid, but I understood him. That was my problem, I think. I understood him better than he understood himself. Damn… graduation night. I’d forgotten
about that. Two days before the rehearsal I told him it was over between us. It was the first time I’d ever been the one to say it, and I guess it kind of unhinged him.” Keira winced at the memory. “Remember, I told him, ‘don’t come to my graduation.’ And what’d he do?”
He came to graduation. Sigh.
“He came to graduation, and you missed the biggest after-party of the century so he could cry and beg you to stay with him. It was the first time you’d ever seen him cry… yes, I know the story as well as you do.”
“Ha, yes, I suppose you do. You had a damp shoulder for weeks from my crying on it.”
“Okay, as lovely as it’s been revisiting Marco memory lane, can we get down to monkey business here?”
Keira tried to force herself from her reverie, but memories flooded back. Once painful, then bittersweet, and now merely nostalgic. She remembered the pain and anguish, the heart squeezing, the all-encompassing love she had for Marco. She’d never felt that way about anyone before or since, and she never wanted to feel that way again.
Molly was still talking, but her mind drifted again, back in time…
Ugh. Here we go again.
“You should smile more.”
“Excuse me,” said Keira, so startled from her book she dropped it on the library carpet with a thud, and smacked her head on the table when she bent to retrieve it.
“Yikes, that must’ve hurt. And I said, ‘you should smile more.’ You look so pretty when you smile,” said Marco.
Then, he reddened, even through his Cafe au lait complexion. Keira set the book on the table, studying him as she rubbed the welt on her forehead. Marco Sanchez had silky looking, ink-black hair, chocolate brown eyes, and full lips, that when parted into that sexy slow smile of his, showed straight white teeth. He was like a Latin Elvis, complete with his own flock of teenage girls hovering around him, clamoring for his time and attention. She looked around, then said,
“So, where’s your harem?”
She smirked at him, at his evident discomfort. He was the unwilling object of obsession in many a schoolgirl fantasy. His tall, dark, handsome looks, and ability to resist all temptation made him the perfect Latin figure of desire. Keira was far from immune to his charms and easy smile. Knowing he’d never shown an ounce of receptiveness to the onslaught of hormonal girls—who just so happened to lean against him with their breasts to touching his arm or drop their pencils in front of him— made him that much more desirable. To the high school girls, it was sport to lure someone like him into indecency, but he never played. The only difference between Keira and the other girls who lusted after him was that she refused to act as if she wanted his attention. No, Keira’s method was different, if not her interest. She often placed herself in his proximity but made a point of ignoring him. It was working. Keira intrigued Marco Sanchez—or as she thought of him, Spanish Darcy.
“Hilarious. No harem today, thank you. Everyone is out at field day, so why are you in the library?”
“I have a pass, thank you. Coach Philippe said, and I quote, it would be safer for everyone if I sat this one out. So, what are you doing in here? Doesn’t Mrs. Cullen have papers for you to grade?”
“Touché, and that is why I came in here. What are you reading?”
Marco pulled a chair beside her and peered at the book open in her lap.
“Well, I was reading Pride and Prejudice.”
“Really? By choice?”
“Yes, by choice. Why do you ask like that?”
“Nothing, nothing, just… you’re kind of different from the other girls. I mean, not because the whole can’t-walk-a-straight-line thing, but you don’t—”
“I don’t follow you like a lovesick puppy?” Keira chided.
“No. Stop. I meant— okay, that, a little. But the Jane Austen thing, that’s… uncommon. I notice you kinda do your own thing a lot, too.”
“Oooh, Mr. Sanchez noticed me. Cute.”
She didn’t know what had come over her, why she was teasing him so. Usually, Keira behaved tongue tied and awkward. It made her reserved… unless she was around her core group of friends.
“Okay, everyone calls me Marco, which you know. And yes. You stand out.”
They had inched closer, so subtly it was almost imperceptible. Almost. They bantered back and forth, critiquing one another’s reading choices. Keira was professing the greatness of Fitzwilliam Darcy as the quintessential leading man, tapping her book cover emphatically. He made a grab for it playfully, and she pulled it away, setting it behind her back, and daring him to get it. He obliged, reaching both arms around her, as she held tight and laughed. In classic Keira fashion, she leaned back in her chair a little too far, upsetting the equilibrium for both, and then Marco’s arms were around her to keep them both from falling. His face was so close to her cheek, his chin at her collarbone, and the laughter died away as their nearness registered. His lips hovered at her neck, and she held her breath.
“Hey. There you are— oh. Well, what do we have here, hmm?”
It was Molly, clad in her FRANKIE SAYS RELAX t-shirt and neon mini skirt, and smirking at the compromised position she’d found her best friend. Keira’s crush was no secret amongst friends.
“Molly. Hey. We, he— I was, uh, showing Marco the book I’m reading, and it, uh, fell, so he — “Yeah. Uh, don’t care. Lori Campbell and Marissa Leon just got into the brawl of the century. Hair flying everywhere. You missed it, dummy. Anyhoo, I’ll leave you two to your... books,” Molly turned away, a sly grin on her wild cherry glossed lips. After a pause, she turned back to Marco, crossing her arms and resting her chin on her fist. She wagged a finger in his direction as she narrowed her eyes.
“Hey Marco, is your younger brother Aiden seeing anyone?”
Aiden had made it a habit of coming to visit Marco at school several times over the past weeks, and he and Molly had flirted on more than one occasion.
“Uh, he, um, no. Not that I know of.”
“Hmm. Interesting. I have an idea. Why don’t you give Aiden my number,” she grabbed a pen and paper and wrote her number down quickly and handed the sheet to a mortified Marco, “and you could bring him by my house so we could hang out. You’re welcome to hang out too, of course. Oh, and you could even pop by, too, Keira.”
She left before either of them could answer.
“She’s blackmailing me, isn’t she?”
“Yup,” Keira agreed. “She is.”
Marco hung his head in defeat.
“So, if I get my brother over there, are, uh, you going to be around?”
“I think I could manage that,” Keira replied, suppressing her smile.
He was true to his word, probably in fear of Molly blabbing to the whole school about his inappropriate moment with Keira in the library and brought Aiden over to Molly’s house. Keira arrived soon after, only to find Marco sitting on the back-porch stairs by himself, scowling and throwing pebbles at the garage. Before she could speak, he launched into a sermon.
“This is wrong, this thing, here,” he wagged his finger between them, “I can’t, we can’t get involved. I’m sorry about the other day, I don’t know what I was thinking, but we can’t take it any further. You realize that, right?”
“Marco. I like you. A lot. I think you like me, too. Besides, I’m almost eighteen.”
She sat down beside him, close enough that their thighs and knees touched. Despite his words, he didn’t move away, which emboldened Keira to rest her hand over his. Again, he made no move to pull away. They sat like that until Molly and Aiden came bounding out the door laughing and teasing one another.
“Hey, bro, if you two are all set here, I need you to take me to the store.”
“Yeah, yeah sure. Go wait in the car, will ya.”
“Sure, man. C’mon Molly, let’s give these two privacy.”
When they rounded the corner, Marco spoke, but Keira stopped him.
“Don’t. Just, don’t decide right now, okay? Here’s my number. Cal
l me tonight.”
He hesitated before taking it, their hands lingering for a moment. Before he could turn and walk away, Keira quickly stood up— not tripping or crashing into anything for once— and pulled him to her and boldly kissed him. He tensed, then relaxed into the kiss. When they broke apart, Keira smiled up at him, but his expression was full of easy-to-read conflict. She understood. Yet, that night, as Keira resigned to not get his call, her phone rang. It was him.
That began a tumultuous, not-so-secret, secret relationship between Keira and Marco. When it ended for real, two-and-a-half years later, it was as if he’d fallen off the face of the universe. They’d ghosted each other…
Oh, she’d like to tie that one up in a tidy bow and shelf it but let me tell you— she was a mess over that man. Her first love, never to be compared against, replicated, or forgotten. Thank goodness. Here is where we sigh wistfully and continue with the flashback.
… until one day, three years later and early in her marriage to Darren. In the most unlikely of places, she had almost literally run into Marco in a big chain hardware store…
While Darren loudly discussed the paint choices with the department manager, and Violet, only two at the time, played with paint stirrers, Keira wandered towards the rack of magazines by the cashiers, reaching the first one she saw. In her haste to get away from Darren’s obnoxious voice, she tripped on the edge of the magazine rack. She grabbed the first thing in her path to stop her fall, a tower display of batteries. It wobbled, then tipped and crashed to the floor, scattering packages of double and triple A’s, D’s, C’s and the like. She debated whether to do the right thing, and clean up the mess, or grab her magazine and creep away, all to the loud guffaws of her ever-compassionate husband.
As she turned to walk, eyes on the pages of the magazine, she came to an abrupt halt at the sound of her name coming from a familiar male voice in front of her.
“Keira?”
