The Heart That Breaks

by Inglath Cooper

  Now he laughs. “Yeah. It includes that.”

  CeCe smiles. “Not cool.”

  He looks at me. “You good?”

  I nod. “Yep.”

  CeCe follows him to the front of the restaurant where he begins introducing her to some of the other wait staff. I watch her shake hands with them, notice how easily her smile comes when it’s not being censored for me. A blonde dude with a GQ face holds her hand longer than necessary. It’s clear that CeCe isn’t immune to its intensity, and it feels kind of weird seeing her melt a bit under it.

  I start taking glasses from the dishwasher and placing them on the shelf behind the bar. So she thinks the guy is hot. Whatever.

  ♪

  CeCe

  I think I’m gonna like waitressing. By nine o’clock, I have two hundred dollars in my tip wallet. I haven’t spilled a thing. And not one person has yelled at me. I’m beginning to see why Holden insisted on making this place first choice. Two hundred dollars in three hours. Not bad.

  And that’s not even counting the fact that Brad Paisley and his wife Kimberly are having dinner in one of the private rooms off the main area. Not part of my station, but cool nonetheless.

  From the looks of it, Holden has been knocking back some good money as well, the bar slammed non-stop. I haven’t really recognized anyone, except Brad Paisley, of course. Everyone here appears uber-successful at something or other. Hair and makeup are flawless. Suits are definitely high end. And the women’s shoes alone, purchase price all total, could make a ding in the national debt.

  Thomas comes in around eight to get the truck keys from Holden. He’s been downtown going bar to bar, trying to book some gigs. He took the bus over. The plan is for him to pick Holden and me up when we get off after eleven.

  Thomas agrees to head back to the apartment and take Hank Junior out for a walk since I am sure he’s about to pee in his fur.

  When the last of the customers leave the restaurant, I feel as if my feet have permanently molded themselves to the insides of my shoes. Cleanup takes an hour or better, and it’s after midnight before we’re done. Holden finishes before I do, and he’s waiting by the front door when I say goodnight to the other waiters and waitresses and head out.

  In the parking lot, Holden says, “I decided not to call Thomas since it’s so late. Okay with you to take the bus?”

  “Sure,” I say, and we walk to the curb, sitting down on the bench to wait. We’re the only ones at the stop, and there’s very little traffic on the street in front of us.

  “So how was it?” he asks, leaning back to stare up at the sky, his arms folded across his chest.

  “Actually, pretty amazing.”

  “You like?”

  “I like.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Don’t mention it.”

  I smile. “Did you know Brad Paisley came in?”

  “I took a bottle of champagne to his table. Dom on the house.”

  I bolt around to face him. “No fair!”

  “Fair.”

  “What did he say?!?”

  “Thank you very much.”

  “Is that it?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Were you nervous?”

  He raises his head to look at me. “He’s a person like the rest of us.”

  “A person, yes. Like the rest of us, no.”

  “How you figure?”

  “Just blazingly talented, that’s all.”

  “Agreed. Got a pretty wife, too.”

  “I’m sure you noticed.”

  “Do I look dead?”

  “Only a bit.”

  “Thanks,” he says with a surprised grin.

  “You’re welcome.”

  “How’d you do tonight?”

  “Crazy good. Three hundred and some change by the end of the night.”

  “Awesome.”

  “How ‘bout you?”

  “A little better than that.”

  “People must be generous when they’re drinking.”

  “Alcohol is a well-known lubricant for the wallet.”

  The bus rolls up and screeches to a stop. Holden stands and waits for me to step through the open door. We find a seat in the back, and we’re a few minutes into the ride when I make myself say, “Thanks for helping me get the job, Holden. I know I wouldn’t have if you hadn’t been there.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I think she liked your honesty.”

  “She liked your body.”

  He tilts his head to look at me with a raised eyebrow. “Yeah?”

  “Yeah,” I say, something warm unfurling in my chest.

  “Do you like it?” he asks, his voice warm and curious.

  “I think your head has been enlarged quite enough for one day.”

  He laughs. “It’s awfully easy to yank your chain.”

  “Is not.”

  “Is, too.”

  I huff a big sigh and turn my head to look out the window, but I’m smiling. Holden seems to have that effect on me.

  ♪

  Holden

  We get to the apartment to find that Thomas isn’t there. The truck is parked out front, but he’s nowhere to be found. And neither is Hank Junior.

  “Could he have taken him for another walk?” CeCe asks.

  “Probably. I’ll text him and see.”

  “Okay,” she says, fixing herself a glass of ice water.

  I tap the message into my phone.

  Me: Hey. Where r u

  Thomas: Looking 4 hank jr

  Me: What do u mean looking

  Thomas: As in I can’t find him

  Me: Wtf

  Thomas: A squirrel ran out when I was walking him and he took off

  Me: Seriously?

  Thomas: So

  Me: We took the bus. Where r u and we’ll help look

  Thomas: R u gonna break the news to CeCe

  Me: Yeah. Thanks 4 that.

  Thomas: Shit

  Me: So

  She’s left the kitchen, and I walk down the hall to her room. Feeling like I just swallowed a rock, I stick my head inside the open door. “Ah, CeCe?”

  She comes out of the bathroom, toothbrush in her hand. “Yeah?”

  “Thomas kind of lost Hank Junior.”

  “What do you mean lost?” she asks slowly.

  “He took off after a squirrel, and Thomas dropped the leash.”

  Her face loses its color. “How long ago?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Where is Thomas?”

  “Still looking.”

  She grabs a pair of running shoes off the floor and tugs them on. “Can you find out where he’s been so I can try a different area?”

  I call Thomas this time, instead of texting. He picks up on the first ring and tells me which streets he’s covered. “Why don’t y’all start with the ones closest to the apartment?” he says. “In case he headed back that way?”

  “Okay. Call you in a few.”

  We click off, and I glance at CeCe who now looks as if she might be physically sick. “Come on,” I say, squelching my pity and forcing myself to focus on finding the dog. “Don’t worry. He’s probably not far away.”

  We head down Fume Street. CeCe’s voice is high and sweet in the way she sounds calling for Hank Junior to come when it’s time to eat. We walk to the end of Fume, then cut across to Sharp and jog all the way down. I wonder how many people we’re waking up, then realize immediately that I don’t care as long as we find Hank Junior.

  Aside from calling him, CeCe hasn’t said a word. I see in the rigid set of her shoulders and the tenseness of her jaw that she’s barely holding it together.

  We’ve just started up another street when a porch light flips on at a house we’re about to pass. A woman comes out in a fluffy white robe and waves a hand at us. We both stop, and she bustles over, a worried look on her face. “Are you looking for a dog?”

  “Yes,” CeCe says quickly.
“A Walker Hound. White with black and tan markings.”

  “Oh, yes.” She shakes her head. “Animal control picked him up a little over an hour ago. I heard some barking and came outside. My neighbor, that crotchety old Mr. Lemmons, name fitting, I might add, had already called the pound because the dog had been in his yard for a half hour or more.”

  “But he had ID on his collar,” CeCe says, her voice breaking on the end.

  “I could see that, and I told the officer that we could call the number on the tag. He said he didn’t have time to wait.”

  “The phone number on that tag is my cell, and I don’t have it now.” CeCe looks at me with eyes brimmed over with tears.

  “Did you happen to see a name on the truck?” I ask the woman. “So we’ll know where to go to get him?”

  “Davidson County Animal Control,” she says. “I asked him where he would be taking him, and he said the main facility.”

  “Thank you,” I say to the woman, just as CeCe turns and takes off running down the street. We all but sprint the entire way to the apartment, and I have to admit I’m impressed with her stamina.

  I call Thomas as soon as we’re back in the parking lot of our place and tell him what we know.

  “Take the truck,” he says. “I’m still a few blocks away.”

  “Okay. I’ll let you know what we find out.”

  “Tell her I’m sorry, okay?”

  “She knows.”

  I end the call and wave CeCe to the truck. “Let’s go. Thomas said to take it and that he’s sorry.”

  CeCe nods, and doesn’t speak because she’s about to burst out crying again. I Google the animal control place and then tap the address into my GPS. It’s a good haul from us, and we don’t say a word the entire drive. She just sits straight up in the seat, staring ahead as if she’s willing the distance between her and her dog to melt into nothingness.

  The building is off the main road, and an intimidating gate blocks the entrance. The truck’s headlights illuminate the sign. NO TRESPASSING. HOURS OF OPERATION 8 AM – 4 PM

  A chain link fence surrounds the property, and a camera sits on one corner of the gate. “This place is locked up like Fort Knox,” I say.

  “There has to be some way we can get in,” CeCe says, tears in her voice. She slides out of the truck and jogs over, jerking at the padlock.

  I walk up behind her, put my hand on her shoulder. “We can wait here until they open.”

  She looks up at me, her eyes wide and hurt-filled. “But he’s in there.”

  “I know.”

  “What if they–”

  “He’ll be okay until morning,” I say, hoping like heck that I’m right.

  “We could climb the fence.”

  “And then what? We won’t be able to get in the building.”

  “Someone might be there.”

  “I doubt it since the gate is closed.”

  “I want to make sure.” She grabs the chain link and starts to climb.

  I grab her around the waist and haul her off, swinging her away from it. She slides to the ground in front of me, and I’m instantly aware of her breasts against my chest, her thighs pressing into mine. With one arm around her, I carry her to the truck. I open the driver’s side door and set her on the seat, facing me. “He’s gonna be okay,” I say.

  She starts to cry outright then, and I realize she’s been doing her best to hold it in since finding out Hank Junior was missing. Hearing her cry feels like someone just stuck a knife in my heart, and I push a hand through her hair and pull her up against me. Her cheek is against my chest, and I draw her closer, wanting to absorb her pain.

  I rub her back with one hand, my other anchored in her long, sweet-smelling hair. She widens the space between her knees, and I step in closer, some kind of crazy need sweeping up through me.

  She raises her face to mine, and I can’t stop myself from kissing her. It’s not the right time. And it’s not for the right reasons. I know this, but I can’t stop.

  I can feel how much she wants to escape from where we are, blank out what has happened tonight. I guess I do, too, or at least that’s what I tell myself. It’s a lot easier to know what to do with that than it is knowing what to do with the fact that I’m kissing her because there’s nothing in the world I want to do more right now than exactly that.

  ♪

  CeCe

  Nothing in my life has ever felt as good as Holden’s kiss. Not the top of my first roller coaster ride, right before the plunge. Or the first time I performed one of my own songs in front of a crowd. Not even the day my Uncle Dobie said he thought I had a future in country music.

  At first, Holden is gentle, kissing me like he’s not sure where the line is. I’m the one who deepens it. I loop my arms around his neck and pull him closer, opening my mouth beneath his and inviting him in. He accepts. I’ve never been kissed like this. Thoroughly. Completely. Expertly.

  And that’s what it feels like. As if Holden knows exactly how to coax, persuade, entice. A couple minutes of this, and my mind is blanked of everything but him. I explore the ripples of abs. His breathing quickens, and I trace the other side.

  He runs his hands down my back and under my bottom to anchor me up against him, as if he needs me to know what I’m doing to him. Knowing I’m not ready for what I’ve so clearly asked him for, I pull away and study his far too good-looking face, my chest feeling as if I’ve just run a marathon.

  “I’m sorry, Holden,” I say.

  He smooths my hair back from my face. “If this ever happens between us, it has to be for the right reasons.”

  Sanity begins to wash over me in a wave. And along with it, a tide of mortification. “Thank you.”

  He laughs. “Thank you?”

  “For taking my mind off Hank Junior for a few minutes.”

  “It was entirely my pleasure. Should I feel used?”

  “Maybe a little.”

  “It’s not so bad, being used by you.”

  I smile, then just as quickly feel the tears well back up and spill down my cheeks.

  Holden physically slides me to the middle of the seat and climbs in, shutting the door. He hooks an arm around me and tucks me into the curve of his shoulder. “He’s going to be all right,” he says. “We can wait here until someone comes to open up.”

  “You don’t have to stay with me.”

  “I want to.”

  “Why?” I ask, my voice muffled against his shirt.

  Holden glances out the window. “We had a dog when I was growing up. A yellow Lab named Lucy.”

  He’s silent for a bit, and I say, “Yeah?”

  “Our yard was fenced, but some of the kids in the neighborhood unlatched the gate one day when we weren’t home. She got out, and that night after we came back, we looked everywhere. The next morning, my mom called the pound to make sure she wasn’t there, and they said she wasn’t. We put up flyers and kept looking for days. Every day my mom called and gave them her description again. They kept telling her she wasn’t there.”

  My stomach drops, and I’m not sure I want to hear the rest of this. But I wait, unable to tell him that.

  “Someone my dad knew called and said he’d just heard we were missing our dog. He had seen a yellow Lab at the pound when he and his family went down to adopt a puppy.”

  I want to say something. I can’t because it feels like my voice is locked up inside me.

  “My mom and dad and I jumped in the car and drove to the pound as fast as we could. Mom showed a woman at the front desk Lucy’s picture, and just the look on her face made me run out of the place.”

  “Oh, Holden.”

  “We’d been calling for days, and they said she wasn’t there.”

  I hear the bitterness behind the words, and I can barely bring myself to ask, “Did they–”

  “The woman said they’d held her for the required period of time, but when the kennels became full–”

  I reach up and touch my fingers to
his lips. Tears run down my face, and I’m not surprised to see that the same is true for Holden. I lean in and kiss each of them away, my heart feeling as if it has splintered into a thousand pieces.

  We sit silent for what feels like a long time, me absorbing, Holden reliving, I guess.

  And then he finally says, “When I think about someone leading her to some room and taking her life while she’s wondering where we are. . .while we’re looking for her–”

  A sob rises up out of me, this image of Lucy more than I can manage right now. Sorrow for her and renewed fear for Hank Junior swallow me.

  Holden pulls me closer, and while I know I should be comforting him, he’s the one comforting me. “So that’s why I want to wait here with you,” he says.

  I’ve barely known Holden for any time at all. It feels like I’ve known him forever.

  ♪

  WE’RE QUIET FOR the next hour or so, arms locked around one another, like we both need this mutual infusion of empathy and understanding.

  The truck’s digital clock says 4:07 when Holden reaches beneath the seat and pulls out a notebook. I sit up and watch him remove a pencil from the spiral binding.

  “What is it?” I ask.

  “Just a thought for a lyric.”

  He writes a line on the blank page.

  So I got a few things I need to say

  He’s still for a bit before writing:

  Never thought my life would turn out this way

  His pencil is quiet again. This time several minutes pass before he writes down:

  Do you ever think about the choice you made

  And what those who loved her have had to pay

  Then he adds:

  Chorus

  What you took from me

  You can’t give back

  I wait for the next line, trying to guess what it might be. Several minutes pass before he writes:

  You took the sun

  You took the stars

  You took the ground beneath my feet

  The words are out before I realize I’ve said them. “You even took the air I breathe.”

  Holden looks at me and nods. He writes it down.

  You even took the air I breathe