My Last First Kiss

by Weston Parker

  We locked arms and walked out to the barns where the horses were eating. I spent the rest of the day working with them, giving them physical therapy, brushing their manes, and just being with them. It felt good like I was right back where I was supposed to be. There was still that unbearable aching in my heart from what happened with Ryan, but I found comfort from going through the motions at the stables. The animals helped my soul. They always had. I did my best to keep an upbeat attitude, to focus on what I was doing and let the relief of being home wash over me. Still, Ryan was constantly on my mind, and I knew it would be a while before that stopped.

  I thought about him, about how he’d turned on me when things got rough, about the smiles he had at the beginning compared to at the end. I thought about the good stuff, too, like going to dinner or kissing in the park in the rain. There had been moments where everything had felt like a fairy tale and then other moments where everything had felt like a nightmare. It had been too much, and I had given in to my need to come back home. There was a part of me, though, the one that craved the man I had fallen in love with, that wondered if I had made a mistake. I felt bad for not saying goodbye, and I knew that probably had hit him pretty hard, especially in the mental state he had been in since the story of his past came out.

  Most likely, he had tried to call me and probably more than once, but I had turned off my phone when I got to the airport in New York and hadn’t had the courage to turn it back on since I got home. I knew there would be messages from him, and I wanted to have the resolve to push through them without breaking down completely. As I went through the day, taking care of the horses and watching Alison play with one of the new ones, I wondered to myself if I would actually ever see Ryan again or if this was the end of our story.

  Chapter 49

  Ryan

  I had so much crazy going on in my head, I needed a way to release it before some poor soul walking past me on the street got the brunt of it. So, I joined Alec at the athletic club and took out my aggression on the racquetball court and on my unsuspecting best friend. With every swipe of my racket, I growled, hitting the ball as hard as I possibly could. It felt good to release some of the anger that had built up inside of me, but apparently to everyone else, I looked like a nutcase.

  “Hey, hey,” Alec said, putting his hands up in the air. “I would wave a white flag if I had one. You’re about to take my head off with that ball, and I swear if that racket flies out of your hand, it’s going to end up taking down one of the poor saps standing on the sideline.”

  I put my hands down on my knees and breathed heavily, giving in to his call for a cease-fire. Alec handed his racket to one of the kids on the sideline who worked there and walked over to me. He patted me hard on the back and chuckled.

  “So, uh, do you want to talk about what’s bothering you?” he asked. “Or do you just want to continue to try to kill me with the racquetballs? If I did something to you, a conversation would work a lot better than murder in the athletic club, especially in front of all of these people.”

  “I don’t want to talk,” I said, tossing my racket to the kid and walking to the side to get my towel.

  “Come on, man, you can’t hold this shit in forever,” he said. “I know you’ve had a rough go at it lately with that story of your past coming out and everything, but you’ve got to move forward, or you’ll never continue to build your company. I think you’re being too pessimistic anyway. I think in the end, that story coming out is going to do you some good. These old guys, the ones with the money, they like a good rags to riches story, and I think they’ll respect the balls it took for you to climb back up to the top.”

  “Man, I don’t give a shit about that story anymore,” I said. “It happened, I said my piece, and now I have to try to move forward and wait for the drama with the damn reporters to die down enough to see where I stand.”

  “So, what is it then?”

  “I miss Sara,” I blurted out loudly. “She’s fucking gone, and she didn’t even say goodbye.”

  “Ahh,” Alec said, nodding his head. “I forgot she left like that. I’m sorry, man. I know she was really important to you. I don’t blame you at all for missing her. She really cared about you. I could see it in her eyes that time we went out sightseeing. She gushed about you and about her feelings for you. It made me think for a second that I wanted to find me a woman like that, and then I remembered how much I like to be single.”

  “Yeah,” I scoffed. “I can’t see you settling down until you’re at least sixty, and even then, I think you’ll be patrolling the damn senior cruise circuit.”

  “Hey, I have put some thought into that.” He chuckled. “I want to know how long I’ll have options, and it’s looking pretty good out there. I go through the single girls, the divorced ones, and then on to the lonely widows. It’s a never-ending pool of women out there for me. You can have the same thing, man. You just have to loosen up a little bit.”

  “I don’t want that,” I said, shaking my head. “I want Sara, but I royally fucked it up so bad I don’t even know if I’ll ever see her again.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” he said. “These things have a way of working themselves out.”

  “If it were the first time she broke things off with me, I would say you were right, but this is the second time, and I sure as hell deserved it,” I said, walking back out on the court and waiting for him to take sides. “Everything had been so fucking perfect, dude. It really had been. I thought for sure this time she was going to stick around, that we were going to finally have a chance at things, and then I took shit out on her, and I regret every second of it. She was perfect.”

  “Yeah, she was quite the catch. You probably shouldn’t have thrown her back.”

  “I didn’t throw her back,” I groaned. “She jumped out of the fucking boat.”

  “Wow,” he said, laughing. “I mean I’ve been on your boat before, and it’s pretty nice.”

  “You’re a pain in my ass,” I said, shaking my head. “Like seriously a pain in my fucking ass. Do you ever take anything seriously?”

  “I do,” he said. “But right now, I’m just enjoying watching the pity party you’re throwing yourself. I don’t blame that unfortunate thing at all for making the jump into the deep blue sea. If I had to deal with your terrible attitude, I might jump and keep swimming, never looking back. You aren’t yourself, and it’s to be expected, but damn, dude. You really know how to put yourself in a worse place than you already were.”

  I shook my head and reared back, hitting the ball as hard as I could at Alec’s head. He dove to the right and landed on his back, looking over at me and laughing. I shook my head and took the next ball from the kid on the sidelines and hit another one and another, watching them bounce off the wall as Alec lay on the floor with his hands under his head just watching the show. Sometimes I wondered why I kept him around, but as he clapped for my monstrous attempts to get my anger out, I couldn’t help but chuckle.

  “Hey,” he yelled from the floor. “I think you got it all out. Come on, let’s head to the locker rooms and shower.”

  I hit one last ball and tossed my racket to the kid, walking over and helping Alec up off the floor. We headed to the locker rooms, and I took a quick shower to wash off all the sweat and met Alec in the changing area. We put our street clothes back on and threw our towels in the hampers. I walked, put my foot up on the bench, and started tying my shoe. Alec closed his locker and sat down next to me.

  “So, in all seriousness,” Alec said. “How intense had things gotten between you and Sara?”

  “Pretty serious,” I said, feeling an ache in my chest. “Pretty damn serious, at least on my end. I’ve done my fair share of dating and had my fair share of women, you know that. I was a playboy like the publications said. You know I never took that shit too seriously. But with Sara, it was different.”

  “How so?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said, sitting down on the bench and st
aring at the lockers in front of me. “I wanted to protect her all the time, keep her safe from everything and everyone who wanted to do her harm. I wanted to be with her whenever I could possibly swing it, and when she looked at me, it was like I had to be a better man if for no other reason than to give her a man she deserved.”

  “Wow, bro,” he said. “That sounds incredibly intense.”

  “It is, or was,” I sighed. “I’ve never felt that way about a woman before. I had never even come close to feeling that way about a girl.”

  “Not even the Russian?” he chuckled.

  “I never cared about her,” I snorted. “It was about the excitement and the fun. You know that. It would take a crazy person to have feelings like that for that woman. She’s insane, and you can’t trust her as far as you could throw her.”

  “So, would you say that with Sara, it was the dreaded four-letter word?”

  I sat there for a moment thinking about it, not saying a word. I knew if I hadn’t already fallen for her, I was definitely close. Everything about the way I felt about her screamed love, but it was hard to imagine that I could have lost something that important. It made it hard to breathe to even think about.

  “Look, man, I know I give you a tough time,” he said. “But if you love her, that’s a really good thing, something you deserve to have.”

  “It was something I had, remember?” I said. “I fucked it up.”

  “If it’s love,” he said, shaking his head. “You need to go to her, no matter what it costs. You need to win her back any way you can. Otherwise, you’re making the choice to be completely miserable for the rest of your life.”

  “I know,” I sighed.

  “And, if you do decide you love her, you make that huge, gigantic gesture, and you win her back, you have to remember one thing,” he said.

  “What’s that, love guru?”

  “You’ll still end up miserable for the rest of your life,” he said. “Because marriage is just a slow descent into death. It will be a quiet hell, but at least you won’t be alone in it. You’ll be able to torture each other and hopefully, if the cards are in your favor, torture some kids too with your bickering and hateful love.”

  Alec stood up and turned toward me with a toothy smile. He reached his hand down to help me up, and I took it, scrunching my forehead. I opened my mouth to say something but stopped myself, deciding to raise one eyebrow instead.

  “I feel like that was a pep talk, but then it got really weird at the end,” I said. “Are you advocating that I get her back, or are you advocating that I kill her? Your thoughts are really confusing me right now.”

  “I’m advocating free love,” he said, laughing putting his hands up in the air. “The hippies really had something to that, you know? No marriage, no commitment, just doing it wherever and with whoever you pleased. No crazy bitches knocking on your door and no walk down the aisle that eventually would lead to a walk into the attorney’s office.”

  I sighed and shook my head, grabbing my bag. I knew Alec disapproved of marriage. He had good reason. His own parents had a very nasty, long, and drawn out divorce when he was younger, but still, I kind of felt like he was being a tad melodramatic about the whole thing. But that was Alec, dramatic to the core about everything. Still, the first part of his advice actually made some sense. Could I go to her and make that romantic gesture? She had given me a second chance before, and I didn’t even have to beg, borrow, or steal for it. Just being me got her back into my arms. I just wasn’t sure if she would be willing to do it again, or if I was brave enough to throw myself out there for another chance. It could easily turn into yet another broken heart.

  Chapter 50

  Sara

  I woke up Sunday morning feeling a twinge of excitement for the first time since I had gotten back. It was the annual pancake breakfast at the Veteran’s Hall, something I had gone to every year since I was a little girl, and I had decided I was going to drag Alison to it whether she wanted to go or not. I knew she would regret it if she didn’t make an appearance. Alison had been moping around the ranch for days, trying to get over the whole break-up thing. I didn’t blame her for being so distraught, but I wanted her to start feeling better. The only way to do that was to get out of the house, off the ranch, and see something other than the horses. She loved being out among people and talking to everyone, so the pancake breakfast seemed just the thing to brighten her spirits and get her on the move to a happier life. I walked out to the stables and tossed Alison her tennis shoes.

  “Come on,” I said. “Put on your shoes. We’re leaving.”

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  “The annual pancake breakfast,” I said. “And don’t even try to make excuses. You’re going.”

  “Fine,” she said begrudgingly, knowing not to battle me when I was in that mood.

  On the way there, she was pouty like a child, and I couldn’t help but laugh at her. Once we got there, though, she really started to perk up and was having conversations with people she hadn’t seen in days. The townsfolk loved to hear about the horses, and she loved to talk about them. While she was preoccupied, I walked around checking on a few of my clients.

  “You’re back,” Mrs. Avery said. “We are so glad.”

  “Yep.” I smiled. “I’ll be reopening the practice first thing Monday morning. I don’t have any scheduled appointments that day, so I’ll be accepting walk-ins and house calls if they’re necessary.”

  “We’ll definitely spread the word,” Mrs. Avery’s best friend, Ida, said happily. “Everyone here missed you so much, and we were worried you were never going to come back from New York City.”

  “Yeah.” I laughed. “I could never live there. There weren’t any cows or horses to take care of, and I missed all of you so much. Oh, and I almost forgot, I even have a brand new mobile vet clinic I can use for house calls. So, if any of the older residents who don’t get around too well need me to come and do checkups on their pups or if there are any emergencies, I’ll have everything I need to work right there on the spot. I can even do minor surgeries in it if it’s that bad.”

  “That is so exciting,” Ida said. “It’s like you brought the city back with you!”

  “That will be so nice for the larger animals out on the farm,” Mrs. Avery said. “You’ll be able to better care for our livestock that way.”

  “Exactly.” I smiled.

  Everyone seemed excited about the new mobile vet clinic, and I smiled wide when I was talking about it. However, as I sat there looking at the women, part of me couldn’t help feeling guilty for using Ryan’s gift. He had given it to me when there was hope for us. It was the most important thing that had happened for the town’s animals since I’d opened the vet clinic. It would enable me to expand my business and take care of animals that might not make it otherwise. It wasn’t like I could take it back to him in New York, not that I thought he would accept it back anyway. He had said it was nonreturnable, and what was he going to do, add it to his private gallery of expensive cars in his private underground parking garage? He would never accept it back from me, so there was no reason for me to feel that way.

  When he had given me the van, he had told me that it wasn’t just for me, but it was for the community as a whole, a way for the community to grow and be stronger with my practice. It was definitely that, and I was damn well going to use it for the community. Those animals needed it, and I needed it to give them the best care I could. There were animals that provided these people’s livelihoods, and that van was going to make sure they continued to do so. Everyone switched the conversation quickly over to me meeting Oprah, and I had to laugh at their responses. It was pretty much what I had been thinking the moment I met her. However, as I stood there laughing and talking to the women, everything around us got quiet all of a sudden. I smiled at Ida and watched as she turned around, following everyone else. I stepped to the side and looked over at the door, curious as to what was going on. Then I saw Janson
standing there in that cowboy hat and leather jacket, and immediately, my stomach turned.

  I closed my eyes and sighed, shaking my head. I stepped back into the group, trying to conceal myself, but I knew there was nowhere for me to hide. How could I have forgotten about Janson? Seriously, three months before, he would have been my first thought when I considered going to the breakfast, but that morning, he didn’t cross my mind in the least. All I had thought about was how good it was to be home and getting Alison out of the house so she could start to heal from her break-up. The truth was, I had been so wrapped up in Ryan’s drama that I had forgotten all about my own.

  I’d ended up in New York City because of Janson’s threatening behavior in the first place. When things had started to fall down around Ryan, though, immediately all of my thoughts and attention went to him. Janson wasn’t there in the city to haunt me or keep reminding me of his ever-lurking presence, so I did what I always did and focused my attention on someone who needed my support and guidance. I felt like such an idiot. I had put myself back in the hot seat because I was too caught up in my own life to even take care to remember the things Janson had done to me. I knew it was going to be too good to be true to come home to a relaxing environment.

  I watched as Janson looked around the room, his eyes finally falling on me. He had known I was going to be there, which meant he’d known I was back in town. The people parted as he made his way through the crowd and over to me. He took me by the wrist and pulled me over to the side, looking up at everyone as they pretended to go back to their conversations.

  “Will you take a walk with me?” he asked.

  I didn’t know what to say. There was no way I was voluntarily going anywhere with that man. He had been stalking me for weeks and was the root of how I got myself into such a mess with Ryan in the first place. Not only that, I didn’t know what he was capable of, and from the look on his face, he hadn’t forgotten a thing about what happened.