by Ford, Brynn
“I disagree,” he leaned forward, placing his elbows on the table, “I think there’s more to you than you know. I think you haven’t discovered what’s beneath all of those layers yet.”
“And what? You want to dig in and find out for me?”
His eyes narrowed with a sobering intent before he smiled with light behind the crystal blue, “You should never let anyone in enough to figure you out before you’ve figured yourself out.”
“I know exactly who I am,” I lied.
“Bullshit.”
“You’re an asshole.”
“Maybe. But I’m an honest asshole.”
I smiled at that, shaking my head.
“So, are you going to tell me your real name, Holly Blue?”
“Are you going to tell me your real name, Law?”
“Law is my real name.”
I countered with a chuckle, “Bullshit.”
He tilted his cup toward me in salute, “Touché. You’re right, it’s not,” he grinned, “Not legally, anyway. But no one calls me by my real name. Though I’m willing to bet that no one calls you Holly Blue.”
I smiled, “Wrong.”
He laughed, “Let me guess, it’s a nickname from your parents?”
“Wrong. So wrong.”
“Okay, then, it must be your husband.”
I smiled but didn’t verbally reply.
His grin looked positively devious, “Does he call you that in the bedroom?”
My heart involuntarily skipped a beat. He was overstepping the unspoken boundaries that strangers ought to follow. It should’ve creeped me out. It should’ve unnerved me or put me on edge. But it didn’t. Nonetheless, I pretended it bothered me.
“That’s incredibly inappropriate.”
“I tend to be incredibly inappropriate. It doesn’t bother you.”
I acted as if I were offended, “Don’t tell me what does and doesn’t bother me.”
“Okay, then I’ll ask you. Does it bother you?”
He had me completely disarmed. The man could sell a cage to a lion with his overwhelming charm and I couldn’t help my half smile.
“No.”
I was surprised at how easy conversation was turning out to be with Law. It was like chatting with an old friend. I already felt as though I could be honest with him and share without concern of judgment. It was such a strange feeling to connect with someone so quickly. Even with Vaughn, I felt like every day was a surprise with him, in the best way possible. It’s one of the reasons we were so compatible from the beginning. We had excitement and adventure in common. But this connection with Law was different. It was a connection of familiarity and ease.
I continued, “It’s just a nickname he gave me. There was a Holly Blue butterfly sitting on my shoulder and following me around in the butterfly garden where we got married. He thought it was beautiful and he’s been calling me Holly Blue ever since.”
“I like it. Blue suits you.”
“The color or the name?”
“I imagine both. I haven’t seen you in blue yet.”
Yet.
“My real name is Jasper Haven,” he held out a hand in introduction.
I hesitated. Sharing my real name felt like revealing my true self and in some sense that felt dangerous, taboo. I could decline to tell him my real name. I didn’t owe him my real name. But I felt like I wanted him to know me.
Finally, I put my hand in his, giving him a firm grip, “Desi Rhodes-Cooper.”
“Nice to meet you,” he smiled, though his hand lingered on mine for a beat too long. It sent a physical signal like lightning through my body that he wanted more from me than he would admit. I pulled my hand away.
I wasn’t shy so I told him exactly what I was thinking, “I feel like you’re flirting with me. Do I need to remind you I’m happily married?”
He narrowed his eyes at me, not in frustration, but in fascination, “That’s a little presumptuous, don’t you think?”
“Is it?” I asked, “I don’t buy that there’s no end game for you here. You met me just last night at your dark and ominous bar with it’s mysterious,” I finger quoted, “’Members Only’ area. Then, you text me just hours later, to ask me out for coffee.”
He chuckled through a sip of his drink, looking as though he may have spat it out comedically if he hadn’t been such a cool, calm, collected, got-his-shit-together kind of guy.
“Dark and ominous? Really?” he smirked, “I’m gonna have to ask you to elaborate on that one, Blue.”
“Don’t side step the question.”
He leaned back in his chair, sitting casually, “So maybe I’m flirting. Just a little. In fairness, that’s my default mode when I’m face-to-face with a gorgeous woman such as yourself. But there’s no end game. Not really.”
I sighed in frustration, “Okay. I don’t even know how to respond to that.”
“Then don’t.”
“Okay,” I shrugged, confusion surely printed all over my face.
There was a beat of silence, but it actually wasn’t uncomfortable.
“How long have you been married?” he asked.
I smiled, suddenly remembering the simple, but romantic ceremony Vaughn and I had on Independence Day, “Just about four months now.”
“Wow,” he lifted his cup in a toast, “Still honeymooning. Congratulations.”
I laughed a little, fiddling with the straw of my cup, “Yeah, you could say that.”
“Hmm?” he raised his eyebrows.
“We only met, like, seven and a half months ago?”
It came out as a question because I always got nervous sharing that little tidbit. People had a tendency to judge us poorly.
“Really?” he leaned forward again, crossing his forearms on the table, “Tell me more.”
He looked genuinely interested to know our story for story’s sake, rather than to build a case for judgement, which happened far too often. So, I didn’t immediately recoil at his request.
“Well, what do you want to know?”
“Everything.”
“Do you think you could be a tad more specific?”
“Start from the beginning. How did you meet?”
“Well, I had a job as a campus tour guide my senior year at UIC. You know, showing incoming high school students around the campus, convincing them to sell their right arm and leg to the college in exchange for an education or whatever.”
“Or whatever,” he repeated, beaming at me in interest for this story, "What did you major in?"
"Graphic design, but I haven't really done anything with it. I've been a little off track lately. But anyway, I was giving a tour back in March. Saint Patrick’s Day, actually. It was my last semester. I just graduated in May.”
“Congrats,” he said again.
“Thanks,” I continued, “Anyway, Vaughn was on campus for a meeting about grad school when I was giving a tour. He works in construction now, has since he was eighteen. But he’d just gotten a promotion at work to management and was thinking about going back to school for architecture.”
“So, you married a smart, older man.”
“Something like that,” I blushed, thinking about how Vaughn had swept me off my feet that day, “He is brilliant, yes. And older, but not by much. Just four years. He’s 26.”
“Hmm.”
“The rest is history, I guess,” I shrugged, suddenly feeling apprehensive about sharing the rest of my story.
“Oh, no, it’s not,” he urged, “tell me the whole story. I wanna know how this guy, Vaughn?” I nodded to confirm he’d gotten the name correct, “Managed to take you off the market so young.”
“Jealous?” I asked with a smile.
He looked a little too serious all of the sudden, but corrected what appeared to be a slip-up in his controlled façade, adding a hint of humor to his tone.
“Do you want me to be?”
“Seriously?” I chastised.
He moved on, “So, how did you
go from strangers to married in such a short time?”
I tucked a strand of hair that had fallen from my bun behind my ear, “Well, the day we met,” I paused, thinking of the most appropriate way to describe it to a stranger, “He asked me to meet him at a bar that night, to celebrate the holiday with green beer, of course.”
“Of course,” he laughed.
“So, I did. I had one green beer with him before practically begging him to come home with me. I fell hard and fast and I knew right away that I wanted to be with him. I just hadn’t realized how deep things would get.”
“So basically, one-night stand turned lifetime commitment?”
I grinned, “Yeah, actually. We started dating after that night and we fell in love. I never would’ve said that I believed in love at first sight until I met Vaughn,” I could feel my cheeks warm in love just thinking about my husband. He really was amazing and I really had been behaving like a glorious piece of shit.
“You glow whenever you say his name.”
“Do I?” the thought warmed me.
“You sure do. So, what was it then? Didn’t want a long engagement?”
I looked at the straw I was mindlessly toying with and just blurted out the truth before I could censor myself, “I found out I was pregnant in May. Probably happened the night we met.”
“Oh,” he looked genuinely surprised, “Congratulations,” the word tapered off at the end as he put two and two together. It was clear my belly wasn’t swollen enough to be seven, nearly eight, months pregnant. I didn’t want to drag out the truth in awkwardness, so I ripped off that bandage.
“I, um, gave birth to our baby girl on August 2nd. Named her Lucy. I was almost 22 weeks pregnant. She, uh,” I always struggled with the words, “She didn’t…I mean, she’s not –”
Law interrupted me with a gentle hand on mine where I held the straw in my cup, “Hey, I get it, I understand, you don’t have to worry about finding the right words here.”
I lifted my eyes to look up at him and was met with sincerity and kindness swirling behind his blue eyes.
“I have no idea what that must be like to go through, but I imagine you’ve had enough pity from strangers to last you a lifetime, so I won’t tell you I’m sorry for your loss. Instead, I’ll tell you congratulations. I’m sure Lucy was as beautiful and charming as you are. She was very lucky to have you as her mother.”
I literally had no response. That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard from a stranger when they found out about Lucy. I was sick to death of people saying, “I’m so sorry for your loss” and “Everything happens for a reason.” Because the truth was, at least for me, that my baby girl didn’t die for any good reason. She was stolen from us by death. And though the blanket responses and insincere sentiments from others were meant in kind, they often did more harm than good. Law’s recognition of Lucy’s life rather than my loss touched my soul deeply.
“Thank you for saying that.”
He smiled and slowly peeled his hand from mine, “You don’t have to tell me anymore if it makes you uncomfortable.”
I sighed, something inside me wanting to purge with this man who seemed to get it. Perhaps he’d experienced his own loss.
“The last few months have been really hard,” I started.
He watched me quietly, his eyes imploring me with support to continue at my own pace. He was actually listening.
I sighed, “Vaughn and I got in a fight last night. Not a fight, really. More just,” I struggled to explain, “I can’t talk to him about it, you know? That hurts him and I can’t handle that right now, so I ran away.”
He didn’t say a word, just watched and listened and I couldn’t quite read his expression.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be offloading this on you. You’re a complete stranger.”
“Am I?” he cocked his head ever so slightly to the side, “You don’t feel like a stranger to me.”
For some reason, his comment rang true to me, as well. He didn’t really feel like a stranger. Not now. He felt like a friend.
“I don’t think we’re strangers, Blue. Not at all. I think we just haven’t known each other very long.”
A soft smile spread across my cheeks, “I'll admit, it's nice to have someone to talk to.”
“I agree. Though I’m sure you have girlfriends you can talk to about it.”
My smile turned sad with the memory of the way I'd been slut-shamed by the girls I thought would be there for me through anything. They thought the only reason I married Vaughn was because I'd gotten pregnant. They'd told me they wondered whether the baby was really Vaughn's because I guess they thought I'd been sleeping around a lot, which wasn't entirely true. But they wouldn't take my word for it. Our friendships faded after graduation and none of them had been there for me during the most tragic event of my life, so I hadn't reached out since.
“No, not really,” I shook my head forcing my smile to look happy again, “I'm sorry, I'm kind of a bummer to be around lately.”
“Don’t apologize for going through what you’re going through. You don’t owe anyone your happiness. That pain is a part of you,” he took a drink, “You know, people often misinterpret the pain they feel as weakness. I’m not one of those people. I think pain is truth. It's pure. It's an experience that takes endurance,” his eyes grew heavier with intent as he spoke, “Pain is raw, Blue. It's the most authentically fucking exquisite emotion a woman can express.”
I chuckled, “I’m not so sure about that. Pain is suffering in my experience.”
“It can be, but I would venture to guess your experiences with pain are limited outside of this tragedy,” he let out a breath and leaned back again, “It’s what the pain does to you that matters. You can let it cripple you or revive you. I can tell you one thing. Men are weak when it comes to pain.”
“Oh?” I asked, genuinely curious about his thoughts.
“They can endure but it doesn’t transform them the way it does women. Only women possess the ability to experience torture and come out of it on the other side stronger than ever before.”
“I don’t know that I agree. I certainly don’t feel stronger.”
“Your pain isn’t over yet, Blue. You’re still in the thick of it. I fully believe this will transform you given time.”
My brow furrowed in skepticism. Law sighed leaning forward again and catching my gaze with his.
“Look, this may be against my better judgment, but I’d like to show you something.”
He paused, a conflicted look flashing across his features. He looked down at the table briefly before looking back up at me.
“What,” I hesitated to ask the question, “What do you want to show me?”
He licked his lips, “I’d like to give you a tour of our members only area at Black Ties.”
“Oh,” that didn’t seem so bad, though the way he said it made it seem like a big deal, so I had to ask, “Why?”
“Because I think it would interest you.”
The look in his eyes made me nervous. The look said that he knew he shouldn’t be offering whatever it was he was really offering. It said he was betraying his own better judgment. It scared me that there was a secret offer behind the one he stated. But it also made me too curious to say no.
“Okay,” I said after what felt like minutes of silence.
A smirk that any sane woman would classify as beguiling pulled at his features momentarily, before shifting into an almost sorrowful look of regret.
“I really need to get to work, we have an event going on tonight at Black Ties and there are some last minute arrangements I need to make.”
“Sure, I understand.”
“I’d like you to come tonight. Are you free?”
I was taken aback. I certainly hadn’t expected an invitation for this evening. I racked my brain for an excuse or good reason not to go, but I couldn’t think of one. Perhaps my ability to reason was clouded by the nervous butterflies in my stomach that
urged me to go find out what was so special about this place that made him so conflicted about inviting me.
“Yeah, I think I could make it.”
His smile was wide, “Great. I’ll have my assistant get something for you to wear.”
“Excuse me?”
“Dress code. Black tie required, with some exceptions, but you’ll see that tonight.”
“You’re gonna buy me something to wear?”
“Consider it a loan for the evening. What size are you? Four?”
“Oh, sure, with Spanx,” I joked nervously.
“I’m sure you’d look killer in a four, but I understand if given your recent circumstances you’d be more comfortable in a different size.”
“Okay, this conversation just took a sharp left turn into Awkardville.”
“I’m all about awkward, Blue. Awkward is a feeling that comes from new experiences. I think you’ll feel reasonably awkward this evening.”
What the hell does that mean?
His statement sent blood pulsing through my veins, “Size four works, I guess.”
“Good. We have a changing room upstairs, behind the bar. Arrive by eight and see the bartender, he’ll show you to the room and my assistant will leave a dress for you there. Once you’re dressed, wait for me at the bar and I’ll meet you to take you downstairs.”
“So, what exactly am I getting myself into here?”
His smirk spoke volumes, “Awkwardville.”
Chapter 5
Vaughn
I’d been struggling to concentrate at work all day. Everything felt off, like the Earth had wobbled off its usual path around the sun, veering off course and unsteadying everything around me. The emotional pain and building frustration of watching my wife slowly slip away was starting to catch up with me.
Everything was wrong last night and it felt that much worse this morning with Desi’s stupid fucking self-imposed distance.
It seemed obvious that Desi was swiftly approaching a breaking point. Once she did, she would either run to me and seek me out to save her or snap and retreat into her own misery, entirely out of my grasp. Either way, I felt like shit about what was happening.
