That’s what I kept telling myself anyway.
Five after six, I pulled open the door to Java Brew, and the sweet aroma of roasted coffee beans greeted my senses. My gaze scanned the room for Luke, and the thrumming of my heart in my ears drowned out the noise as I scanned the room once again. Java Brew was filled with repurposed furniture and odd chairs painted in vibrant colors, and Mason jar lighting hung from the high ceilings. A few stragglers sat behind their laptop screens, but it was rather empty for a Friday evening.
Convinced he had stood me up, I was about to turn and leave when I spotted him. He was walking from the cash register with a coffee in one hand and a muffin on a plate in the other. Our eyes connected, and a small grin grew on his face. My heart flipped inside my chest. There was no turning back now.
Luke wore dark blue jeans with a red polo shirt. He looked delectable. His persona screamed danger to a fragile heart like mine, but for the first time since Bruce died, I wanted to see what else the world had to offer. I wanted to be seen in another man’s eyes.
“Hi.” I approached the table for two he had selected
“You came.” He pulled out a chair for me.
“I did.” I exhaled a breath that was trapped in my lungs before sitting down.
“Even though you tried to bail,” Luke joked and sat across from me.
“I did not,” I lied and shook my head as though what he said was an outlandish comment.
“Yes, you did,” he said. His eyes were glued to mine. Dark green irises peeked into my soul. “You called my office.”
Oh, shit. He knew. During my paranoia, I did call his office to cancel. When I never heard back from him, I assumed the receptionist was incompetent. I was wrong. “You didn’t call me back.” I raised an eyebrow.
“Nope.” He smiled and pushed the muffin in my direction. “I knew if I called, you’d make up an excuse why this was a bad idea. And by not calling, you felt obligated to show up.” His lips curled into a sexy grin. He was absolutely correct. “Can I get you anything?”
I licked my lips, feeling parched. “Sweet tea, please.”
“Coming right up.”
My foot bounced against the floor as I waited for Luke to return. Why was I so nervous? Why did I find myself staring at him and envisioning what his lips felt like? When he handed me the tall glass, I exhaled slowly and took a large sip. The cool tea was refreshing and gave me a reason to break eye contact.
“How’s AJ?” he asked when he sat down.
“Really good.” I smiled. “He and Scott have really hit it off, and I’m really glad he made a friend.” I took another sip of my tea. “And I just said really three times.” I closed my eyes and shook my head.
Luke chuckled and stabbed his fork into the oversized muffin. “I like that you ramble.” He took a bite and slowly pulled the fork out of his mouth. “And I like that I make you nervous.”
“You don’t make me nervous,” I lied, picking up my fork. “I’m just not used to having adult conversation.” I pulled off a bite of the muffin, and the buttery orange flavored cake melted in my mouth. “Aren’t you marathon training?” I said before taking another bite. “This can’t be good for that.”
“I am, and I’m not.” He smiled and took another bite himself. “I’ve been training for three years. I’ve never signed up for one.”
“That makes no sense. Why would you continue to run with no end game?”
“Because ...” He paused and watched as I took another bite. “I would have to stop eating things like this muffin.”
“It is a really, really, really good muffin,” I admitted.
“Really.” He chuckled.
“I told you I suck at adult conversation.” My cheeks warmed with embarrassment.
“Why is that?” Luke cocked his head to the side. His eyes watched my every move as though studying a painting.
“Because it’s only been me and AJ since he was two.” I shrugged. “I left this town and headed north, and each year we moved farther and farther away. We spent our days hiking and exploring. He was all I had; consequently, I’m a helicopter mom.”
“And his dad?” Luke said with what sounded like trepidation in his voice.
I swallowed the golf ball in my throat and sighed. “His dad . . .” My words failed me and instantly my thumb reached for my ring-less finger. I had to be honest with Luke. There was no point in lying about what happened. He would eventually find out that my closet was filled with skeletons. As I opened my mouth to explain what happened to Bruce, I was rendered speechless.
“Stephanie?” I heard my name being called, and it was as if a bucket of ice had been poured down my back. Slowly, I turned in my chair and was greeted with an old familiar face, a face that had spent the last four years hating me. Quickly, I stood with a smile, but her expression radiated anger.
“You have some nerve,” she said through gritted teeth. “After everything you put Bruce through, how can you sit here with another man as if nothing happened? As if you didn’t kill my son?” Her voice rose with anger.
Mortified, I bowed my head as she spewed her anger about me taking AJ away. My shoulders hunched over, and I felt myself shrinking. She was right. She had every reason to dump her anger and pain onto me.
I didn’t try to defend myself.
I didn’t utter a word.
I let her lash out until Alistair, her husband, laced his arms around her body. “That’s enough, Sue,” he said, and I found the courage to meet his eyes. “Leave her alone.” Slowly, I nodded at him, silently thanking him for saving me. He mouthed the words I’m sorry, but I shook my head. I didn’t need his apology. I was the one who should be sorry.
Once the door slammed behind them, I dared to turn back around and look at Luke. “Friends of yours?” he asked.
“They’re my in-laws.” I sat back down and ran my hands through my hair. My legs shook with fear as I held my head up with both hands.
Luke sat across from me, his arms rested on the table. I couldn’t look up at his face. I didn’t want to see what he was thinking. “Was that the baggage you were referring to?”
“Yes,” I said with a sigh of relief and rubbed my scalp with the tips of my fingers. “Bruce, my husband, their child, died in a car accident, and it was all my fault.” I said in one breath and looked up at his face. It was the moment of truth.
“I’m so sorry.” Luke’s face saddened. He reached out a hand to grasp mine, but quickly pulled it away, seeming unsure of himself.
“It’s okay. I mean, as okay as it’s ever going to be.” I shrugged.
“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. It doesn’t seem like first date material.”
I laughed uncertainly and reached for my fork. “Good thing this isn’t a date,” I reminded him.
“Don’t kid yourself.” His voice grew lower and stern. With the fork halfway in my mouth, I paused to watch his lips move. “This was a date. Well, at least until your in-laws came in.” His lips curled into a grin.
I thanked the gods for giving him a sense a humor.
“She has every right to be mad at me,” I admitted. “After the accident, I took AJ and we never looked back. We’ve been home for a month now, and though Alistair, my father-in-law, and I talk via email, Sue still hasn’t seen AJ.”
“Do you not want her to have a relationship with her grandson?”
“No, on the contrary.” I raised my hand in defense. “I would want nothing more than for them to have a relationship with AJ. I’d want her to tell him stories about his dad. But she’s still very angry with me, and I don’t believe she can hold her anger in while she’s in front of AJ. She can hate me, that’s fine. I will take it for the rest of my life. There isn’t anything she can say that’ll make me feel worse than I already do. But I don’t want her anger to reflect on her relationship with AJ.” Luke nodded. “Alistair’s working on it with her because he understands my hesitation, and I’ve told him that my door will alwa
ys be open for them. But everybody grieves differently.”
“You know,” Luke paused and sat back on his chair, “you’re not that bad at grown-up conversation after all.”
I laughed and took a sip of my tea. “The cat’s out of the bag now.”
“It really, really, really is,” Luke joked, and gave me a quick wink.
I pulled the plate away from him. “I think you’ve had enough,” I joked, holding the muffin hostage. “What about you?” I said when I felt his eyes burning into me. “Since you now know my deepest, darkest secret, what skeletons are you hiding in your closet?” Luke shook his head. “Ex-wife? Children? Crazy ex? Weird fetishes? You do look like a guy who has a thing for toes.”
Luke took a sip of his coffee, his hands hugging the mug for a few seconds as he tried to read my thoughts. “You’re really good at deflecting from uncomfortable conversations. You hide your feelings behind humor.” His gaze made my heart skip a beat. As cliché as it was, it was the truth. That way his eyes looked deep into mine, and then he scanned my face as though he was trying to memorize every part of it.
“Don’t deflect from my question.”
“You’re like an onion. Little by little I’ll learn how to peel off a layer.”
“An onion? You really want to compare me to an onion? Your secrets are so terrible that you’d rather compare me to a smelly, often disliked vegetable?” I felt the tension in my shoulders relax. “I don’t deflect. I simply want to know if there is some poor woman locked up in your basement, or whether I should be worried that someone wants to run you over with their car because you broke their heart.”
Luke chuckled. It was a light, throaty sound that made a shiver run down my spine. “I’ve been busy working,” he said without pulling his focus away from mine. “There were casual hook-ups here and there, but I never had time for anything serious. Med school took up most of my twenties, and then I wanted to go into pediatric surgery but realized that wasn’t for me.” He ran his tongue across his lips. “I’ve been so busy building my professional career that I haven’t had time for relationships. Not until now at least.”
I pulled my gaze from his and looked down at the almost empty plate. Nervously, I pushed the crumbs around with the tines of my fork.
“Don’t freak out.” Luke reached across the table and this time took my hand in his. His hands were soft, gentle, and warm from holding his mug.
“I wasn’t freaking out.” My voice was shaky.
“I don’t know you very well, Stephanie.” I liked the way he said my full name as opposed to my nickname, Steph. “But I like to think that I know you well enough to know when you’re about to freak out.”
I pouted my lips. There was no way he knew me.
“I’ve seen that look on your face before. Your eyebrows push together just a bit, and you scan the room as if you’re forming an exit strategy. It was the look you had when you came into the ER. The look you had when I went to the baseball game. It’s the same look you had when I asked you here,” he said as his thumb rubbed along my knuckles.
Slowly, I pulled my hand away. I hated to admit that when he touched my skin, it felt as if he was putting life back into me. As if I was a dead flower and he was the sun. He gave me the energy and the power to grow and bloom.
“I now know some of what you’ve been through,” Luke said as I bit my lower lip. “You’re not only a single mom with an awesome kid, but you’re also a widow, and dating probably isn’t a priority on your list, so we can take things slow. We can be friends and just hang out.” Luke leaned in and waited until I found the courage to look up at him. “There’s something about you that intrigues me, and I can’t seem to let it go.”
I swallowed back my nerves. He wanted to see where things would go. He was still interested, even after my bullshit.
He understood my trepidation.
We would take things slow.
I just couldn’t fall in love.
“You’re not going to say anything?” he asked.
“No.” I shook my head. “Because you might say I’m trying to deflect or find an exit strategy again.” A smile grew on his face, and my skin flushed with warmth.
Luke and I sat at the coffee house for two hours before we parted ways. I caved and gave him my phone number, and he gave me his. I told him I would check my schedule and let him know the next time I was available to see him. I walked out of the coffee shop with butterflies in my stomach and the hope of a new beginning.
This was dating.
I was dating.
5
Past
The darkness of my life suffocated me at dawn.
My eyes snapped open and my room was dark. It was three in the morning—I could tell without glancing over at the clock. It was the same time I woke up every morning. The two glasses of wine I drank with dinner had worn off and any chance of falling back to sleep was gone. So instead of trying, I stared at the wall as Bruce slept peacefully next to me. Each minute dragged on while my mind continuously replayed the past five years over and over again.
It usually started at the beginning, with our wedding and how happy I was. Tears welled in my eyes as memories flooded my mind. The way we hopped on a plane on a Tuesday afternoon and eloped to a little chapel in Vegas. I didn’t care about a fancy, over-the-top wedding; all that mattered to me was that we were together. I was ecstatic to be his wife. My heart pounded as he recited his vows. “Stephanie.” He said my name with such adoration. I looked up at him with the same love filling my body. His dark chocolate hair was brushed away from his face and his smile made his manly features soften. “I never knew what true love was until I met you. Every day I feel lucky to have you in my life. To see your smile light up my world. I find solace in your love, and I will spend the rest of my life cherishing every day with you.”
Never had so much love radiated from my soul.
Until the day my gynecologist placed Alistair Bruce Johnson III in my hands. It was such a big name for a little baby that we began to call him AJ the second he came into the world. I remembered how Bruce wrote his son’s name out for the birth certificate. He was proud to continue the tradition. His father, Alistair Senior, gave him his name, and now Bruce had passed it on to AJ. He was so honored to have a son named after him, and I was so in love.
A love that was all-consuming and like no other. My entire pregnancy, I was constantly wondering if I’d love AJ more and Bruce less or vice versa. But, the second my hands grasped that chubby little boy and Bruce kissed me, I felt complete. It was a love I had never experienced. A high so addictive that I found myself staring at AJ with Bruce and wondering how I’d gotten so damn lucky. Why had God chosen me to make this happy?
And then the happiness faded, and the affection I used to get from Bruce disappeared.
Feeling tightness form in my chest, I rolled over and looked at the clock. A quarter to four. I pulled the sheets off my body and climbed out of bed. Taking my running clothes and shoes from the chair in the corner, I tiptoed to the bathroom to change.
By four in the morning, my legs were stretched, and my headphones shoved into my ears. Closing the door behind me, I began a quick jog down the street. The houses on my block were all the same, center colonials with a few personal touches added by their owners. During the day you could see the vibrant flowers that bloomed from Mrs. Jensen’s garden. You could hear the birds chirping and the dogs barking in the yards. However, at this early hour, all the houses were dark as the sun hid behind the horizon.
When we moved in, our neighbors welcomed us with true southern hospitality: a welcome basket and an invitation for sweet tea and scones. But as the years passed, I slowly pulled away from them. There were no more lunches or play dates. I found every excuse to hide in my house. I didn’t need, or want, strangers to look at my once-perfect relationship and notice the cracks that had formed in the foundation. I didn’t want them to realize that my marriage was hanging on by a thread.
Forcing t
he thoughts out of my head, I kept my gaze locked on the asphalt ahead. The morning was crisp, and I filled my lungs, letting the cold air cool my body. I followed the path at the end of the street that led to a jogging trail through the woods. I increased the volume on my headphones until the music was blasting in my ears and I picked up the pace. I saw in a movie once that endorphins were supposed to make you happy, and happy people didn’t kill their husbands. I knew it was terrible to take marital advice from a movie, but I didn’t want to kill Bruce. I simply wanted to be happy.
So I ran.
I pushed myself until my hamstrings and quads were on fire. And when I couldn’t take it any longer, I fought for more. My lungs felt as if they would give up on me, and still I didn’t stop. There was something soothing about running. The first ten minutes involved my joints and muscles aching, pleading with me to stop, but the pain wasn’t enough to turn off my mind. It wasn’t until the third mile of sprinting, when my body was in such excruciating pain, that my mind shoved all my problems aside and focused solely on the muscles tearing under my skin.
It was there that I found peace.
By five in the morning, with seven miles behind me, I found my way back home. The sun was threatening to peak in the horizon, and I had twenty minutes to shower before Bruce’s alarm went off. Tiptoeing through the house, I hopped in the shower and washed away the sweat and grime from my run. I let the warm water alleviate the tightness in my muscles and shut off the water when I heard his alarm.
The Perfect Life Page 5
