by J. L. Berg
She laughed a little under her breath, amused by me somehow. “Splendid,” she said. “I’ll have to tell her you said that.” There was a momentary pause as she finished her last bite before she said in a nonchalant way, “I bet you had amazing pastries, growing up, didn’t you?”
The comment caught me off guard, the memories of James and Ben still so fresh in my mind. “What?”
“Sorry,” she said, that blush flaming bright red. “I saw your bio on your website. That’s creepy, isn’t it? But I was curious. And, well, where you grew up, I figured you would have had nice pastries in a house like that.”
I could see the panic in her eyes, probably in response to the panic in mine.
“Right, of course. Excellent pastries. You’re correct.”
She breathed out in relief, as I held mine. “I’ve always thought English pastries are so fancy compared to ours. Well, anywhere really.”
She began to ramble on about France and madeleines while I tried to carry on, politely nodding. I opened the cupboard, grabbed a cup and set it on the counter.
Suddenly, there was a loud crash.
“Oh!” Millie cried as we both looked down at my coffee cup in pieces on the floor.
“I’m sorry,” I said, frazzled, looking up at the counter, down at the floor, and back again. The counter seemed to wave, making my eyes blink several times.
“This isn’t something you can run from.” James’s words began to ring in my head.
“I think I’m gonna make sure I have everything I need for the car. Would you mind packing me some food to go?”
I couldn’t even look at her. What if she could see it in my eyes, sense it in my demeanor?
“Um, sure,” she said. “But are you okay?”
I nodded, already fleeing the kitchen.
“I’m fine,” I lied.
I was definitely not fine.
We made it through the long two-and-a-half-hour ferry ride to North Carolina with little to no conversation.
It was brutal, but I didn’t know what to say.
How did I talk to a woman I’d confessed my soul to just days earlier and act like none of it had happened? Besides James, she was the only one who knew about my diagnosis.
But she didn’t remember.
Honestly, it was probably better this way.
The moment the car engine flared to life, and we were given the signal to disembark the boat, I breathed a heavy sigh of relief. At least I’d have something new to stare at instead of the minivan full of kids currently parked in front of us. Although, the tiny screens in the seats, displaying the movie Frozen had helped pass the time, even if it was slightly excruciating.
“Do you need to stop?” Millie asked, her voice such a stark contrast to the deafening silence that had been ringing in my ears for so long that I nearly jumped.
“What? Oh, um, sure. Might be nice to stretch my legs or grab a spot of coffee.”
She didn’t reply but merely pulled off at the first gas station we came upon. “I’ll fill up while you run in,” she said.
The gentleman in me wanted to offer to do so for her, but the tone in her voice was clear; she didn’t need it. So, I simply nodded and made my way into the convenience store. The door dinged as I entered and I gave a polite nod to the cashier. There were a few others inside, mostly waiting in line to pay for gas or purchase items for the road. I recognized the father from the minivan that had been parked in front of us, dragging one of his kids through the aisle. She was in tears, a wet spot down the front of her pants as tears fell from her eyes.
“There was a restroom on the ferry. I asked you a dozen times if you needed to go!”
She sniffled, her voice small and meek. “I’m sorry, Daddy. I didn’t know I had to go until just now.”
The dad stopped mid-aisle, between the chips and crackers, as I stood frozen, unable to look away.
“How can you not know, Olivia? You are seven years old. Your four-year-old sister knows how to piss in the bathroom. Why can’t you fucking figure it out?”
With every word he spoke, his grip on her tightened, and her eyes grew wide. Panic filled the little girl’s features as if she seemed to know what was coming.
It was a scene I recognized all too well.
“Let her go,” I said between clenched teeth.
The father looked up, shock written across his idiotic face. “What did you say to me?”
“I said, let her go. You’re obviously scaring her, and you’ve made your point.”
He straightened to his full height, the little girl scrambling back behind him as he sized me up. I was about six inches taller than him and had about fifty pounds of lean muscle to his very impressive beer gut.
“This ain’t any of your business.”
“When you decide to manhandle your child in the middle of a convenience store, you make it my business.”
His eyes narrowed in on mine before he seemed to come to some sort of conclusion. “Come on, Olivia, let’s go.”
He brushed past me, a last attempt at one-upping the chump who tried to keep him from backhanding his kid in a public place. Grabbing the first bag of crackers within arm’s reach, I turned toward the counter and found Millie standing in front of me, her gaze warm and steady.
How long had she been standing there?
“The car is filled up,” she said, dragging her eyes away from mine. “I came in to grab a few things myself.”
“Right,” I mumbled. “Of course.”
With a clenched fist, I watched her step past me as I headed for the counter, feeling like the world’s worst fool.
Setting my crackers on the counter, I quickly grabbed a bottle of water from a nearby cooler and set it down in front of me as well.
“My dad used to knock me around like that. Yours, too?” the cashier said, not bothering to look up at me as he rang up my purchases. He was an older gentleman with more gray on his head than brown. He sported several tattoos, most of them weathered from years gone by.
“Yeah,” I said. “Something like that.”
He didn’t say anything more, just let out a long sigh as he looked up at me and handed over the small plastic bag with my things inside. I saw it then—the same pain I saw when I gazed into a mirror too long or reminisced with James about our childhood after one too many drinks.
It was the same pain that little girl would carry for the rest of her life.
Like a goddamn brand.
“Thanks,” I said before I walked away, still shaken to my very core. I didn’t wait around for Millie to finish. Instead, I headed for the car and soaked up the silence inside for those precious few seconds as I tried to push away the past.
Thankfully, by the time Millie returned holding a giant paper bag, I’d regained some of my composure. Seeing her fumble her way into the car with that bag didn’t hurt either.
“Did you buy the entire store?” I asked, taking the bag from her arms before she fell into the car.
“Well, not quite. But pretty close,” she said as I began to snoop around at what she’d purchased.
“Jesus, there is enough food in here to feed an army. Not very well, mind you, but still.”
“I have a bad habit of eating a lot of junk food when I travel,” she confessed.
“Don’t you travel for a living?” I asked.
Shit, was I supposed to know that?
“Um, yes,” she said, giving me a curious glance as she buckled in her seat belt.
“You mentioned it the other day at lunch with Dean.”
Her eyes lit up. “Right!”
Good save, I told myself.
In truth, I knew she’d actually just walked away from her job and felt like an absolute failure for doing so, but if she wanted to keep up this ruse, I’d allow it.
After all, she’d forgotten everything about that night.
I might as well, too.
“So, basically, you eat terribly all the time. Is that quite accurate then?” I
asked, pulling out a bag of beef jerky as I made a face.
She laughed. “Okay, so I don’t have the best eating habits.”
I couldn’t help it; my eyes roamed the length of her body. “Couldn’t tell from looking at you.”
That earned me a faint blush and a smile. “I work for this body. This is the result of hours and hours in the gym. I earn my junk food.”
“Well, what would you like first?” I asked, waving the beef jerky as she turned the ignition.
“Definitely not the jerky. Maybe something sweeter?”
“All right,” I said, diving back into her huge bag of treats. I grabbed three sweeter options and held them up.
She’d already navigated us out of the gas station and onto the highway once again, but she did a cursory glance in my direction.
“Yes,” she said.
“Yes?” I asked, splitting my attention between her and the three types of candy I had in my hands. “To which one?”
“All of them.”
I shook my head, feeling a smile tug at lips. “You really are a junk food addict.”
“Rip open those bags, my friend. Let me show you my ways.”
I did as she’d commanded, opening the large bag of peanut M&M’s first. “I’m not much of a candy guy,” I admitted.
“What? Who doesn’t like candy?”
I shrugged. “Me, I guess. I don’t know. I didn’t have it much as a child so perhaps I didn’t develop a liking for it.”
“That’s just crazy talk. Pop one of those M&M’s in your mouth, and hand one over to me.”
I did as she’d instructed, giving her a few as I grabbed one for myself.
“Now, place it in your mouth, like so,” she said as she placed a single M&M on her tongue.
A flashback of that tongue all over my body came racing back to the forefront of my mind, and I involuntarily cleared my throat.
“You’re not following instructions,” she said.
“Oh, right,” I said, popping a brown M&M into my mouth.
“Now, here’s where you have to decide what kind of candy person you are. Are you a cruncher or a melter?”
“What?” I laughed. “That’s ridiculous.”
“No, it’s not! Which one you choose can be very insightful to your personality. You ask weird questions about people’s loved ones…and I do this. So, Aiden, are you going to crunch it or let it melt?”
She turned her head toward mine for a brief moment, and I caught her smiling at me. I felt my stomach flip-flop from the force of it.
Jesus, she was beautiful.
“Melt,” I answered. Feeling the chocolate making a delicious puddle on my tongue.
“Exactly as I thought,” she answered before chomping away at hers.
“What? Why am I so predictable?”
She grabbed a few more from the bag I’d placed between us and tossed them into her mouth, and I couldn’t help but watch.
“You’re an artist, right? Naturally, you’ve got patience to spare; otherwise, every piece you did would be a huge disaster.”
I grinned. “Quite right.”
“Whereas I have the patience of a gnat, and bite into that M&M as fast as I can.”
“Okay, I’ll give you that,” I said, grabbing another couple from the bag. “But you know what this means?”
“What?” she asked.
“We can never share a bag of candy again,” I said, straight-faced.
She suddenly looked concerned. “Why?”
“Because you’ll eat the whole bag before I even get through two.”
She burst out laughing as I handed her several more, loving the sound as it filled the small space around us.
“Do you want to play Twenty Questions?” she asked, making my head nearly spin, the déjà vu hitting me hard in the gut.
“Do you want to play Twenty Questions?” Millie asked as she poured another round of whiskey.
“All right,” I said. “Pick an object.”
“What? That’s not how you play Twenty Questions!” Her voice sort of boomed throughout the small suite we’d shut ourselves in, and her eyes immediately widened as she realized just how loud she’d become. “Oops,” she whispered.
“It is, too!” I said. “You pick an object or person, and then in twenty questions or less, the other person tries to guess what it is.”
She looked rather unimpressed. “Oh, well, I don’t want to play that,” she said. “I just wanted to ask you twenty random questions. What’s that game called?”
“Uh, a conversation?”
“Yeah! Let’s play that!”
I tried not to look over at her, my heart hammering in my chest.
“Uh, sure. Do you want to go first?” I asked, unsure if sober Millie did in fact know how to play the real game or if she was just as clueless as drunk Millie.
“Okay, sure,” she replied. “Is the chocolate in England really as good as everyone says it is?”
I let out an amused sigh. Yep, just as clueless.
“Yes, these M&M’s taste like horseshit compared to our milk chocolate. And that’s coming from a guy who doesn’t even like candy that much.”
She rolled her eyes, but I could see a smile peeking out the corner of her pouty pink lips. “Asshole,” she muttered. “Okay, you’re next.”
I thought back to the first time we’d played this game, remembering everything we’d shared. One of these days, I’d have to teach her the proper way to play this game, but for now…
“What made you go into fashion?” I asked, already knowing the answer but wanting to see if it’d change without the truth goggles alcohol provided.
“I don’t know really. I guess I always loved design and the creative process,” she answered with a bit of a shrug.
I stared into her eyes, recalling her completely different answer only days earlier…
“I know it sounds cliché, but growing up here, I didn’t have a lot of options for clothes. There was only one store, Beachcombers. I would go there and pick out a dress or a skirt and then take it home and alter it. I even created my own homecoming dress one year, and I don’t know, I guess it just stuck. But here I am, ten years later, still doing other people’s designs while mine collect dust.”
Now, the question was, Who was she lying to? Me or herself?
“My turn again!” she announced, bringing me back to the present. “How’d you get into stone carving?”
I let out a long breath before answering, “Pass.”
“What? You can’t pass!”
“Sure I can. I just did.”
“That’s not fair,” she said. “How are we supposed to get to know each other if we can choose to pass on half the —”
“My brother taught me.”
Silence settled between us before I broke it, “Now, it’s my turn. When was your last relationship?”
“Pass,” she nearly squeaked.
I gave her a hard stare. “No passing. Remember?”
Her forehead furrowed, and she let out a few choice words as I grinned. “Fine. It was recent.”
“How recent?”
“No! It’s not your turn anymore.”
I let out a growl.
“Why’d you approach that man in the gas station?”
Now, she was really digging deep.
“Because he was an asshole,” I answered. “How recent?”
“Very.”
My fists balled at my sides.
“Did your dad treat you like that? Like the man with little girl?”
“That’s two questions,” I said. “And which one? I had lots.”
“What?” Her eyes widened.
“Nothing. Yes,” I answered flatly. “Did he hurt you?”
“Who?”
We were rapid-firing these questions so quickly; I thought we were both getting confused. But I was willing to give her information in exchange for answers in return.
Especially this.
Because this was
something she hadn’t even shared with me the night we supposedly bared our souls to one another.
This was sacred.
“No,” she replied before amending. “Yes. It’s complicated.”
“How?” I asked, not even caring in the least that it wasn’t my turn.
She seemed to pick up on that little tidbit and didn’t bother challenging me.
“He led me to believe…” She let out a deep sigh. “You know what? It doesn’t matter. This was a silly game.”
I reached out for her hand, causing her breath to hitch. “He led you to believe what?”
A single tear fell from her eyes. “He was my boss. I was stupid. It’s over.”
I wanted to ask if this was why she’d quit her job, but I didn’t.
Instead, I squeezed her hand and let her drive in silence for a while, knowing I’d do anything to make the pain go away.
Even if it meant forgetting everything I felt for her, because, now, it was starting to finally make sense. I was the distraction she couldn’t afford.
And she was right.
I’d break her heart just like he had, only it wouldn’t be intentional. Because, as much as I wanted to believe in our magical night together, as much as I wanted to believe it meant we were as destined as two souls could be, I was still speeding headfirst into a future she didn’t deserve.
And, as much as I didn’t want to break her heart, I knew it’d happen just the same.
Because I was a ticking time bomb, and like all explosives, I was bound to cause serious damage.
Twenty questions turned into forty, which turned into sixty and so on. Thankfully, the questions became less invasive as time went on, both of us exhausted after our lightning round of extremely personal questions.
Although part of me wanted to go back because, now that I had a sliver of information about him, I was craving more.
So much more.
And yet I knew I was treading on dangerous ground. In only a handful of days, I’d be gone, back in Florida, and this would all be over. So, why push this? Why try to get to know a man I’d never see again?
Because you like him, my inner voice pressed.
I let out a deep breath as the endless road passed by the window. We’d been on this particular boring stretch of North Carolina highway for what seemed like an eternity, but thankfully, we were almost to Mount Airy.
