by Maria Geraci
She froze for a second. “Yeah?”
“I’m taking you out.”
“Like on a date?”
“That’s usually what taking you out means.”
“Well, it could also mean putting a hit on someone.” Oh no. She was going to start babbling. She found her panties beneath one of her cowboy boots and quickly began to dress.
He frowned. “What’s wrong?”
“Wrong? Nothing’s wrong. Everything was perfect. Better than perfect.”
He sat up. “Then come back to bed.”
She carefully sat next to him and pulled her knees up to her chest. He didn’t try to pull her into his arms and for that she was grateful. Last night had been epic. But she hadn’t anticipated what they’d say to one another this morning.
“I owe you an apology. For the other night. I…” she shook her head, “I don’t know what got into me. I should never have told you to shut up.”
“It’s all right. I understand.”
This nice guy routine of his was well and fine but no one was this nice. There was a chink in his armor. She just hadn’t found it yet.
“The other night, when we picked Henry up for soccer and you went to Panama City. You said you went to the hardware store.”
He slowly nodded. “Yeah.”
“But that’s not the whole story. I mean, I know it’s none of my business and you don’t have to tell me—”
“I went to the library,” he said. “To check out the periodical section where they keep old copies of Florida! magazine. I wanted to read your Perky the Duck article.”
He’d driven all the way to Panama City to read her article? “That’s…the sexiest thing anyone has ever said to me,” she blurted.
He grinned. “Yeah? Because I thought last night—”
She threw a pillow at him. “I said it’s the sexiest thing anyone has ever said, not done.”
He relaxed back on the bed. “So about next weekend—”
“What did you think of it? My Perky the Duck article?”
She felt him stiffen. Because she’d redirected the conversation, or because he was about to tell her something she didn’t want to hear? “The truth?” he asked.
“Of course I want the truth.”
He hesitated long enough that she almost thought he wasn’t going to answer. “I hated it,” he said quietly.
Her whole body ricocheted like she’d just been shot. Did he just say he hated it? No one hated that story! Even cold-hearted-publisher Ben Gallagher had tried to hide a watery eye after reading it.
“Excuse me?”
“I hated it because it was warm and funny and real, and reading it made me feel like you were talking to me. Only I couldn’t talk back. It was like looking into a one way mirror and seeing everything you’d become, but I wasn’t a part of it.” He let out a slow breath. “The truth is, I haven’t thought about you in twelve years. Not really. And now, the crazy part is that I can’t stop thinking about you at all.”
He couldn’t stop thinking about her?
“Wait. Did you just say you haven’t thought about me in twelve years. Not even once?”
He rubbed a hand down his face. “I don’t know if this is a good time to talk about this.”
“You’re the one who said I wasn’t leaving town until we had this conversation. Well, it’s now or never, Tom. Because believe me, as soon as I get my license back I’m out of here.”
A muscle twitched on the side of his cheek. “Remember the night of the senior awards banquet?”
“What has that to do with anything?”
“That night…” he shook his head. “Man, I was on fire. I won almost every award they gave out. Even that cushy scholarship from the Rotary Club.”
The memory of a packed high school gymnasium, Buela sitting on one side of her, Zeke, Mimi, and baby Claire on her other side, came flooding back. Allie had worn a purple dress and a new pair of sandals Mimi had helped her pick out at the outlet mall in Destin. She’d felt pretty and excited and full of senioritis energy—ready to leave one chapter in her life and begin another.
She had won the English award, and Nate Miller had won the science award, but Tom’s memory served him right. He’d scooped up every other academic award and had even been named top athlete. He’d looked so handsome in his navy blue blazer with the orange and blue striped University of Florida tie. She hadn’t been able to keep her eyes off him. Neither had anyone else. It was his night, all right. A tribute to Whispering Bay High’s star of the year.
“Of course I remember that night,” she said.
“Afterward, a bunch of us went to the beach. I’d swiped a bottle of rum from my dad’s liquor cabinet and we got pretty wasted on rum and cokes.”
“Buela and I went to the Denny’s in Panama City,” she said in contrast. “She used to love how they served breakfast even at night. She’d get the Grand Slam, although she could never eat even half of it, and I’d get the short stack with the strawberry syrup, bacon on the side. Which I definitely finished.”
He smiled. “You were always a good girl, Allie.”
“Getting drunk on the beach isn’t exactly bad ass. Every kid I know has done that.”
“Yeah, but not everybody gets their girlfriend pregnant.”
Bam! And there it was. The conversation she’d been dreading for over twelve years. But at the same time, she needed to hear it. She took a deep breath and forced herself to relax. She could handle whatever it was he had to say.
“You weren’t alone there, Tom. Lauren is just as much to blame.”
He shook his head. “No, she wasn’t.”
“But—”
“I’d just had the night of my life and I was dating the most popular girl in school. I didn’t have a condom with me, but hey, I was king of the fucking world. Lauren and I had had sex a few times, but never without protection. She didn’t want to do it, but I told her one time wasn’t going to get us in any trouble. She only went along with it because I talked her into it.”
Allie gulped. She didn’t have to imagine how persuasive Tom had been. Nor could she blame Lauren. Not when Allie herself had uttered those famous words of hers. Just Do Me took on a whole new meaning. If Allie had been in Lauren’s place, she wouldn’t have waited for a condom either. Stupid, but true.
“The next day Lauren broke up with me. Said she thought our relationship was moving too fast. And here’s the kicker. I was relieved because I was planning to break up with her before we left for college anyway, so she saved me the drama. I was a real prince, huh?”
Allie looked away from his gaze. There was something in his eyes that made it hard to maintain eye contact.
“So that afternoon I asked you to prom because I needed a date, and because I thought you were hot and we were friends and I knew we’d have a good time. But it wasn’t supposed go any further than that.”
She nodded. Their relationship had surprised her, too.
“And the more we hung out, the more I liked you. The thing is…I want you to know, even though we were planning on going to different schools, I wouldn’t have broken up with you at the end of summer.”
She felt her breath hitch. “But you did anyway.”
“That morning after you told me…” He shrugged, like he was too embarrassed to go on.
“After I told you I loved you?”
He nodded. “Lauren came to see me. She hadn’t had her period in over three months and she’d finally broken down and told her mom. The rest…well, you can figure it out. I could tell you that my dad put a lot of pressure on me to do the right thing, but that’s not why we got married. The way I saw it I had a couple of choices. I could let Lauren figure it out for herself. Go on to school like nothing had ever happened. Or I could be a part of my child’s life. Try to build a family. Try to make things work between the two of us. But to do that I had to completely cut you out of my life. So I made a decision and I stuck to it. I gave it everything I had. And the thing
is, I don’t regret it. Not a minute of it. I’d only have regretted if I hadn’t tried.”
What could she say to that? There was nothing she could say to that. He was who he was. He couldn’t help that. Just like she couldn’t help who she was, or the decisions she’d made along the way to this moment.
“You want to know what’s craziest about this whole thing?” he said. “I left Atlanta to move back here to be close to Henry. And now I’m thinking of moving to Tampa so I can be close to you.”
“What?”
“Steve Pappas offered me a job in Tampa. I don’t want to take it. But I don’t know if I can’t not take it either. Not if it means you and I might really have a shot at making this work.”
It felt like all the air had been sucked right out of her. “You want to move to Tampa? So you can be with me?”
“I loved Lauren. We had a good marriage but not a great one, I guess. I threw myself into my work and Henry, because, hell, that kid is worth anything. I would have kept going on if she hadn’t called it quits. For a while there, I was even pissed at her. What the hell did she want from me? But then, I got it. She wanted something better. She said I should wait for it, too. So I dated a little. And it was great at first, being single again. Having all this freedom. But I missed Henry too much, so I came back to Whispering Bay, and then you came along. Back into my life and it was like all those feelings I had for you that summer had never gone away. They just came rushing back. And I get it. I get what Lauren means about waiting for something better.”
“And you think that I’m that something better? Tom…you haven’t seen me or thought about me in twelve years, but after four days now you suddenly think I’m, what? The love of your life? We don’t even know each other for God’s sake! Not really.”
He held her gaze with a fierceness that this time Allie couldn’t look away from. “I know you’re loyal to the people you love. That you hate confrontation and when you’re nervous you talk too much. But it’s so damn cute I could let you go on talking for days even if you just said the same things over and over. I know you have no clue how beautiful you are, or what kind of effect you have on me, because if you did I’d be in a hell of lot of trouble.” He shook his head and laughed. “Shit. Look at me. I’m in trouble now, aren’t I?”
He took her hands in his and lightly squeezed them. “I know you can’t cuss to save your life and that no one but you could have a written a story about a half-dead frozen duck that made most of the south want to give up hunting.” He paused. “Want me to go on?”
She was flabbergasted. Speechless in a way that she’d never been before. Tom Donalan had just exposed his jugular. He’d basically told her he loved her. Without saying it, of course. But that’s what he was leading up to. It was her Ben and Jerry’s Chunky Monkey fantasy come to life. She should jump up and pump her fist in the air. Or do a happy dance. Or feel something. Shouldn’t she? But all she felt was sad.
“What do you want me to say to all that, Tom?”
“You know what I want.” He bent down to kiss her.
She turned her head to avoid his touch and the sadness quickly turned to anger. It was all she could do to not punch him in the nose. How dare he do this to her twice in a lifetime? She snatched her hands away.
He reached out for her again. “Baby, I—”
“No. It’s my turn now.” She jumped up from the bed and began to pace the room. “That day I told you I loved you? It didn’t matter that you didn’t say it back. I mean, yeah, I wanted to hear you tell me you loved me, too. I wanted to hear it so bad, but I knew you weren’t ready. And that was okay, because… my love wasn’t some conditional thing. But then when you told me you and Lauren were getting married? I wanted to puke. I wanted to hate you, but I—” She swiped a tear from her eye. How had that gotten there?
“I admit it. Okay? You broke my heart, Tom. You looked me straight in the eye and told me you thought you loved someone else. That you had this big responsibility to take care of your mistakes. Well, what about me?” she asked, her voice rising with each word. “Where was your responsibility to me?”
He looked stunned.
“So I went home and I locked myself in my room and I cried because all I could think of was myself. And how I felt. And Buela was banging on the door, trying to get inside because she could hear me crying. And she kept begging me to tell her what was wrong. But I told her to go away. And after a while, she did. And she must have gotten Zeke…because then he started banging on the door, too.”
Allie stopped her pacing. She’d forgotten all about Zeke trying to coax her out of her room. It was like she’d buried that memory along with a bunch of other stuff from that night. Obviously, Zeke hadn’t forgotten a thing. His animosity toward Tom made perfect sense now.
“But I wouldn’t let Zeke in, either,” she continued. “So I cried myself to sleep that night. And the whole next day I acted like nothing was wrong, even though she knew that was bullshit. All she wanted was to comfort me. And I…I wouldn’t let her. And then two days later, she was gone.”
“Allie, you didn’t cause your grandmother’s heart attack.” He stood and tried to pull her in his arms but she placed a hand up, warning him to back off.
“Don’t you think I know that? But the last two days she had on this earth…all she wanted was…. After Mom died, she gave up her whole life to come take care of me and Zeke. If it wasn’t for her, who knows where we would have ended up? And the one little thing she wanted from me I couldn’t give her because I was so fucking selfish. All I could think about was myself.”
His voice cracked. “We were kids, Allie. You couldn’t have known what was going to happen. You thought you’d have more time with her.”
“Yeah, well, life sucks. Tell me something I don’t know.”
“You blame me, don’t you?” he said quietly.
“No, Tom, I don’t blame you. I blame me. But, somehow you’re tied into it. At least…into that version of me. So, yeah, you’ve been terrific these past few days, and yeah, the sex was fantastic. I admit it. It was best sex of my life, too. But you and I are never going to be together because you’re always going to be a reminder of the biggest regret of my life.”
He flinched. But she wasn’t trying to hurt him. She was only trying to be honest.
“So that’s it. No second chances. No nothing? Is that what you want?” He sounded bitter, and a part of her wanted to tell him…what? That they could start over? Zeke was right. Tom wasn’t the guy for her.
“What I want is, for you to take me home.”
Allie crept through the kitchen door. She was surprised to find Mimi sitting at the table, drinking what looked like a cup of hot cocoa. Mimi put her hands up as if to surrender. “I tried to stop the girls, I really did. But you know the Babes. Toss in some margaritas and the instant they heard about the séance there was no stopping them.”
“Don’t worry about the séance. It’s not your fault.” Allie glanced at the clock above the stove. It was a little after six. “Why are you up so early? Or haven’t you gone to bed yet?”
“I’ve been waiting up for you.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. I want to hear all about it. Including where you’ve been all night.” She made a smirky face, then paused. “What’s wrong?”
“The right question would be, what isn’t wrong?”
Allie sank into the chair next to her sister-in-law. Mimi slid the cocoa across the table in silent offering. Allie picked up the mug and took a deep sip. Marshmallows with a hint of cinnamon. It would figure that Mimi made the best cocoa, too. Too bad chocolate couldn’t cure the mess that was her life.
Mimi fidgeted with the edge of a napkin. “So I take it the ghost didn’t show up?”
“The only thing that showed up was your Bunco group.”
“Ouch.” Mimi reached to get her cocoa back but Allie held onto the mug.
“I need this more than you do. As a matter of fact,” All
ie said, glancing around the kitchen counter, “do you have some more of that stuff you laced my coffee with the other night?”
“That bad, huh?” Mimi took a bottle of whiskey from the pantry and sloshed a little into the cocoa.
“Let’s just say the night was a disaster, all the way around.”
Mimi looked like she wanted a detailed explanation, but she must have sensed Allie’s weariness because she didn’t press her. “So what happens next?”
“The senior center comes down in a couple of hours.”
“Will you be there?”
“I almost feel like I should be. Who knows? Maybe something will still happen.” Ever the optimist, Allie. Maybe it was the pessimists of the world who won at the end. At least they didn’t get their hopes up. “But I’m not fighting it any more. I can’t justify trying to keep the building intact when it seems pretty obvious that there’s no ghost. Or at least, not one that makes sense.”
She told Mimi all about the music she and Tom had been hearing in their heads, starting with the Beatles Ob-La- Di, Ob-La- Da and finishing with last night’s Light My Fire. The only part she omitted was the crazy feeling that somehow Buela was tied into all this. She wanted to share it with Mimi but it all seemed so—
“Do you think I’m crazy? Oh, God. This is like the eighteenth time I’ve asked myself that same question, which means that yes, I probably am.”
Mimi smiled patiently. “And Tom heard it, too? If he heard it, then no, you can’t be crazy, unless the two of you are doing some kind of special drugs together?”
“He only experienced it the one time, although he knew the song in my head last night.”
“Weird. And…you still don’t know who wrote the anonymous letter?”
“Well, it isn’t Roger Van Cleave. He finally admitted it to me last night. Honestly? If I didn’t have a copy of that email I’d think the whole thing was a figment of my imagination.” She downed the rest of the cocoa. “The good news is I get paid today. So I can pay my fine and get my license reinstated.”
