In the Nick of Time

by Laveen, Tiana

  “Ohhhhh.” Her mother twisted her lips to the far left and paired it with an obnoxious smirk. “You know what I mean!” She looked from side to side, and lowered her voice, “Home to us, honey…away from this place!” She looked in back of her, as if fearing she’d soon be mugged, as if Firststone were some haven for the damned.

  “Taryn, Frieda said you’ve done very well and she has full confidence that with the right support system, you’ll make it without a hitch.” Her father’s plump, reddish brown cheeks spread wide as he grinned, showing his mouth full of teeth. Dad had a pleasant glow, the kind that made one feel he was trustworthy, as if you could hang your hat on his every properly enunciated word. She appreciated his show of positivity for it was a refreshing change. In the recent past, he’d done nothing but bring her down like a one-way trip to Hell, stomp on her aspirations as if they were cockroaches needing to be taught a lesson. Though his careless words weren’t intentional, the damn things still had the same result…left her feeling emotionally detached and drained. She at times avoided the father-daughter connection, not wishing to recombine their energies and see just how it would flow. It typically proved far more costly than she could afford, and she refused to incur the expense.

  “Yes.” She nodded as she hugged her arms, wishing they were Nick’s instead. “I believe this time is different. I can feel it.”

  “That’s good because I’d just die if I lost you.” Her mother’s dark, doe-like eyes watered up, breaking her heart. She gathered the older woman in her arms and gave her a big, warm hug.

  “Oh, Mom, don’t cry!” She smiled big, this time sincerely, as she stroked her mother’s back. Her fingers landed against butter smooth layers of black mink fur, giving her a bit of lavish contentment. Mom went nowhere in the winter months without a luxury pelt wrapped around her slender frame, and though the early yawns of Spring had sprung, the afternoon had been a tad breezy as the sun played a cruel game of hide-and-seek.

  …I bet Nick could find it.

  She snapped out of her arbitrary thoughts and pulled her mother closer, saying, “I’m here, I’m alive.”

  “The cancer, the drugs.” She sniffed. “…You away modeling all over the world and some of the shit, I mean, excuse me…” The poised older woman looked around the room, placed three fingers over her naughty mouth, causing Taryn and her father to smile. “…The mess you had to go through…it’s just too much. You’re my baby. I never want you to hurt.”

  “I know, Mom…I know.”

  She looked across the room and saw Nick going towards the door. He paused, tossed his plate in the trash, then continued his trek just as cool as he pleased.

  Where is he going? The party isn’t over and he hasn’t even spoken one word to me since it began…

  Without a moment more to waste, she took her parents by their respective wrists.

  “Nick!!! Nick!!! Wait!” she called out to him as he walked far away from her in more ways than one.

  He paused, as if contemplating the wisdom of it, then slowly turned in her direction. His face said it all; he’d been anticipating such a scene, her calling out to him like this, and he was dreading it. She didn’t miss his lack of a smile… Matter of fact, he looked rather perturbed. Yet, she shuffled past it, pushed herself forward.

  “Let me introduce you two to someone.” Dragging her parents the rest of the way across the room, she huffed proudly when she’d finally reached him. He held onto the doorknob with one hand and looked at her, his gaze lazy and empty. He was drowning in a sense of loss… She knew the man’s every expression, and his body language was unmistakable and now that she came up close, she couldn’t deny what she saw.

  His damn heart was breaking…

  Oh Nick, don’t do this… Don’t do this, baby…

  “Mom and Dad, this is Nick.” She kept her eyes on him, not daring to turn away just yet. “He is a friend of mine. He has been really helpful to me during my recovery.”

  “Nice to meet you, Nick.” Her mother smiled pleasantly, extended her hand for a shake. He hesitated, for just a second or two, then did the same. He even added a half-hearted smile, free of charge. The woman’s gold bangles beat against one another as she continued to squeeze the guy’s fingers. “We’re happy that Taryn was able to meet people here that were positive and helped her during this difficult time,” she added, her tone somber.

  She shot a glance towards her father. His large hands were clasped together and he made no motion to extend a greeting, a shred of warmth, or even a word of scraped together kindness.

  “It’s nice to meet you as well, Mrs. Jones. You have a beautiful daughter, and I’m not just speaking of her appearance. I’ve never met someone so optimistic and genuine before. She’s been very kind to me, and I wish her nothing but the best.” His response sounded unpretentious but sterile, sticky with unsaid and emotionally inhibited words. Yet, it was his smoothness of delivery that unnerved her the most; the same suaveness that had hooked her onto his fishing line, and reeled her into his surreptitious, risky world.

  Her mother’s smile widened as she ran her hand along her daughter’s back in a reassuring sort of way. She didn’t miss the twinkle in the older woman’s eyes. How bizarre…

  “That’s wonderful, and yes, my daughter is all of those things.” She held her chin high.

  “Dad,” Taryn said under her breath as she elbowed the man into place. She refused to allow him to continue this behavior. The rudeness flowed from him like smoke embers on a grill and she was tired of choking on the shit. The older man cleared his throat, shot her a fiery glance filled to the rim with resentment, swallowed the crap, then begrudgingly extended his hand.

  “…It’s nice to meet you, Nick.”

  Nick shook it heartily, remaining amiable, almost unreadable. “Likewise.” She could see in her sweetheart’s eyes he’d read her father like an open-ended book. He knew he wasn’t well received. “Well, I really need to get going. It was nice meeting you both.” He nodded, threw up his hand in a friendly wave of goodbye and offered an award-winning grin worthy of an Oscar. Then, he opened the door further to step out, to escape… to beat the source of his pending distress.

  So you really think I’m going to just let you walk out of here? Oh no, boy…you’ve lost your damn mind! How dare you treat me like this?!

  “Nick, hold on please.” She put her finger in the air, wishing to borrow a bit of his time, make it known in front of their captive audience. “Uh, wait… Mom and Dad, let me have a moment alone with him, please.”

  “Oh, yes, of course…” her mother stated, a slightly silly grin on her face, but before she disappeared, the woman tugged Taryn’s sleeve, forcing her close to her lips to whisper a thing or two in her ear.

  “He’s cuuuuuute! My goodness! What a looker!” The woman shot another glance over her shoulder at the man, as if to see if her opinion still held true.

  “Yes Mom, he’s very attractive but he’s a really good person, too. That’s what’s most important.”

  Her mother glossed over her sweet, politically correct words and kept on her merry way. “Does he model, too? He does, doesn’t he? Oh, never mind. Doesn’t matter.” She dramatically rolled her eyes. “It’s a darn shame he’s a druggie!” She sized the guy up once more, this time her scrutiny paired with a twisted, hypercritical grimace. “What a waste!” She shook her head as if sad news had been dropped at her pedicured feet clad in expensive high-heels.

  And as if her daughter wasn’t one of those vexatious druggies, too…

  The lady then pranced away with her father close behind, genuinely believing she’d said nothing inappropriate in the least.

  “Nick.” She grabbed the man’s arm, made him step out in the empty hallway. “What the hell is going on?!”

  Chicago’s, ‘Wishing You Were Here’ played in low strains over the speakers.

  “Nothing is going on, baby.” He attempted to stand there and lie to her face, make the watery words seem true bl
ue and upright. Keeping his back straight as a board, he damn near looked as if he were about to be sworn into office. Even though he wasn’t in uniform, at that very moment Nick looked exactly like what he was—a cop. His face wasn’t cold, but not oozing warmth and comfort, either. He looked serious, but not frightening. He intimidated her, but drew her in…

  What is going on right now in that head of his?

  The man may have had the entire state of New York snowed, but she knew him…she knew him like no other. She was the only person he let fully inside; she had a one on one with his inner workings. Oh yes, Nick was no longer a mystery in her eyes…

  “You tried it!” Her lips trembled as she bubbled with tormented emotions, losing her resolve. She’d attempted to monitor her volume as she spilled forth with a sea of ravenous anger. “Stop playin’ me, damn it.” She seethed as she pointed in his face, making her intentions clear. He swallowed, turned away, jammed his hands in his pockets, then faced her again as if coming to a final decision. Whatever it was, this time, it had better be the truth.

  “You know what’s wrong with me, Taryn.”

  “Say it…”

  “No! Just… just go on!” he spoke between gritted teeth, his face drawn tight, angry, blaming her and himself no doubt, too.

  “Say it,” she repeated.

  “I said, no!”

  “Tell me, now!”

  “I love you!” he screamed out, looking around as if surprised by his own voice. “I’m going to miss you…miss you so bad…” He lowered his tone, quieted and calmed a bit. “It hurts! Can we not do this, please? This goodbye bullshit! I can’t do this!” He spoke low, but his eyes and heart continued to scream at her.

  Catching his hands in hers, she pulled him to her. He resisted a little, but love made him heed her. He accepted his fate and rested his head on her shoulder, squeezed her tight against him. She could barely breathe as he stole her soul, did things to it, tried to make it stay there with him, captive to his own needs. She wished it could…

  “I love you and I’m going to miss you, too, baby. And know this…” She made the man look at her, eye to eye, heart to heart, as she held his chin in the palm of her hand. “The minute you graduate, Nick, and not a second later, I will be waiting for you. I can’t call you, it’s against the rules, and I can’t write you, either. But we can do this.”

  Like we ever cared about the rules… but that’s beside the point. I won’t distract him. Me being gone could be pivotal, help him along the way. I refuse to mess that up for him.

  “You’ve got two more months in here, and that’s it! You don’t need me to hold your hand anymore and I don’t need you to hold mine anymore, either. There’s no dependency here between us. It’s just pure, beautiful want! And that’s what makes this all the more beautiful.”

  His eyes shimmered, wet, glossy like a puddle after a hard rain… He stormed inside, wouldn’t let anyone but her see the lightning. Didn’t he know the sun was coming? He held his head high, shook from her grip, as if reading her mind. He pressed his thumbs into the hollows of her cheeks as he stared down into her eyes, making her weak at the goddamn knees. His eyes reminded her of the sky right after a harsh downpour—gray-blue, serene, real, authentic, here and lasting after the typhoon… In his eyes danced consternation, peril, but most importantly, love.

  Thick strands of lustrous dark hair fell forward, the locks more unruly than ever.

  “You are the most stunning thing in my universe. The most perfect creation.” His voice cracked like ice under a warm stream of water. “I know that we are self-regulating and on our own passages in recovery and life… That sounds so damn textbook, like I’m reading from our workbooks! I don’t know… I just, I know we don’t need to hold each other’s hand anymore… That’s not it, baby, that’s not it at all. Matter of fact, that was never my problem. My issue, Taryn, is that my love for you is a brand new thing, something I’ve never felt before. It’s real, it’s solid, it gets new life each and every day, becomes stronger and stronger with or without my consent. I’ve never craved a person like I crave you!”

  She blinked her damn tears away.

  No, Taryn! You just stand here… Don’t you cry, don’t you dare cry!

  “Your energy is off the fucking charts! It’s good, it’s genuine, it’s…amazing! You’re amazing!” His lips pursed as he swallowed a cursed tear trying to break free from the confines of the windows to his soul. “Can’t you see? You’re my best friend. I’m losing my best friend, goddamn it!” He took a deep breath, and so did she. Maybe they could breathe for one another when the air got too thick… when the world became too evil with negative congestion, too vile for pure oxygen to flow, and too condemning for love to take flight.

  “But I’m so happy for my best friend, baby. I know she is going to start all over and make it so much better than before.” He brought her even closer, pushed his lips harshly into her own, uncaring who saw or what happened… and then, he released her. A damn tear wet her cheek; she told it not to, but it didn’t listen. “I’m going to do this. I’m determined to make it, to stay clean, to claim my life and make the most of it.” She could hear the candor in his words, the willpower. He meant business. “I would have done it regardless of meeting you.”

  “I know. Why do you think I trust you so much, baby?”

  “Yeah? But it would have been a hell of a lot harder and my gratitude to you is what makes me die a little inside right now.” His teeth clenched as another wave of pain encompassed him—it was written all over his face. He fought himself right before her, refused to let go completely. They both held a slippery grip on emotional outbursts, and she feared she was losing hers.

  “’Cause I can never repay that shit! Never. I sure as hell can’t reimburse you for what you’ve given me; it’s a gift that keeps repeating itself even when I don’t deserve it. Take care of yourself…”

  “…I will.” Another tear fell and then another. “I love you, Nick…”

  “I know you do, and that’s more than enough. This isn’t goodbye, nope!” He smiled real wide as he walked backwards from her, his chin high and his voice full of hope and promise. “This is until next time.”

  “…Until next time.”

  “I’ll see you soon, baby. I’ll see the Love of my life, very soon.” He winked, turned on his heels, and threw up the peace sign as he walked away. Cool, calm, and collected…

  He was a walking hurricane all right, true to himself, down to his tumultuous core.

  She stood there by herself, watching him until he’d disappeared from sight. She understood that two months away from a lover was not the only issue; he’d explained himself quite well. For a person that has battled an internal war since they were a child, to finally find some semblance of positive relief and then have to relinquish it, even for five minutes, would be pure torture. It wasn’t only that she was leaving, but what she was leaving behind…

  You’re going to make it, Nick. We’re going to make it. You think I’m a gift? You’re my blessing shining so bright. You don’t always see it but I do. You simply have no idea just how much of a star you are…

  He swallowed yet another acrimonious mouthful of hot coffee. It made the kind at the station taste like a wondrous, rare, hard to find, and highly sought after South American premium blend. He glanced down at his watch, figuring he’d overstayed his welcome in the library, anyway. People floated about, and he’d been online trying to touch and hold what had once been in his backyard, but now seemed a million miles away… the city.

  Depravation chamber…

  Sighing, Nick logged off the Internet and sat back in his seat. Reading about all the mayhem going on in the streets had a new spin on it, now. The days had continued to warm, slowly but surely, but the winter still gripped the city with an icy hug every now and again. Crime always went down during the chilly days and teeth-chattering nights, especially one as brutally cold as this one. However, it seemed, over the weekend, a pocket of
insanity had burst like a rain cloud and shat all over the good people of New York. Criminals now must’ve been walking around with cordless space heaters and five layers of clothing, for they moved about as if it were a pleasant afternoon in July.

  When he read about the various cases, he could no longer read them as a common citizen. He couldn’t simply nod and think, ‘What a shame.’ No, he first wanted to know if he knew any of the bastards involved, arrested any a time or two. Who was killed? Who was hunted? Who was gutted or gunned down and left to die? One story kept resurfacing, time and time again. Brownsville had gotten the attention of what appeared to be a serial child abductor. He read the damn headlines with growing concern. Old memories resurfaced of little girls going missing, never to be heard from again. He despised his new handicap.

  What he hated the most, however, was how emotionally detached he’d become until entering treatment; for now, it seemed like he had no control over his feelings whatsoever. It had taken him a long time to train himself to that level, to look someone in the eye and tell them that their mother or child was dead, and not fall apart right then and there with the family. This new state was a drawback; truly it would do him no good.

  He blamed this, amongst many other things, on Taryn…

  He blamed her for falling in love with her, and her for falling in love with him…but it was a good sort of blame, and every time he thought of her, his lips curved into a grateful smile. She was forbidden to contact him, but she’d left him a little gift to get around that issue. He loved her sneaky ways…

  She’d written out sixty-one little cards. He was to read one each day that she was away, as a way for them to communicate, to be closer to one another in her absence. Initially, when he saw the little basket filled with the handwritten notes, he figured they’d be cutesy little sayings, nothing to keep the coldness from within from spreading, and to extend heat in its stead. His assessment of the woman’s special delivery turned out to be completely wrong. The first note grabbed him out the gate…