by Tracey Ward
“None taken. Try having one. Trust me, it doesn’t make you love it more.”
“So, Wren,” American Pie says, touching my arm again, “I was headed to get a drink before swooping in and saving the day. You want one?”
I look around at what everyone is drinking and shake my head. “Everything is in cups. I’ll just go with you and get one myself.”
When I look at him I realize I basically just told him I’m afraid he’s going to roofie me, which I am, but I shouldn’t have said it. Not out loud. Luckily he doesn’t look offended. He just smirks at me.
“That was the idea. You coming with me.”
“Sorry, yeah, it’s not that I don’t—” But it is: I don’t trust him. I don’t know him. I don’t even know his name.
Not needing more explanation, he gestures for me to come with him. I fall into step beside him, noticing that we’re taking a long route that goes around my Italians.
“You introduced me to your friends but I never got your name,” I tell him.
“Right, sorry. It’s Jax. Kind of.”
“Kind of?”
“It’s not my actual name.”
I eye him shrewdly. “It’s weird to tell me that you’re giving me a fake name.”
He chuckles. “It’s what everyone calls me. It’s just not my real name. My last name is Jackson. In the military almost everyone goes by their last name. People shortened it and started calling me Jax.”
“So what’s your real name?”
He looks at me sideways. “Kenneth. Ken.”
“Jax is good.”
His responding laugh gives me goose bumps.
“What branch of the military are you in?” I ask, stepping up to stand in line next to him. It’s crowded and I have to stand close to him, shoulder to shoulder. I notice either he or one of the twenty other guys milling around smells faintly fantastic.
“Air Force.”
I’m jostled from behind and I stumble a half step forward. It’s nothing outside the hazards of being in a crowded area, but Jax takes a step slightly behind me, his body now half shielding me from the people behind us. If we’re crowded by them again, he’ll take the brunt of it. It’s a subtle gesture, like when a guy offers you his jacket or moves to the street side of the sidewalk when walking beside you, leaving you more protected. It’s an old form of gentleman that feminists find insulting but I see as sweet. Yeah, of course I can open a door for myself and I’m not gonna hate on a guy if he doesn’t do it for me, but I will give him bonus points if he does. I’m doing my part to be a lady, not running around flashing my goods like it’s Mardi Gras and beads are the cure for cancer, so I don’t see the harm in appreciating a guy who still knows how to act like a gentleman.
“Did you come to Germany for Oktoberfest or are you traveling around?” he asks, his new closer stance putting his mouth right beside my ear, his breath tickling my hair across the lobe.
“School, actually. I came to do a semester abroad.”
“Oh yeah? Where?”
“Heidelberg. Just south of Frankfurt.”
“I’m at Ramstein. It’s not far from Frankfurt.”
“We’re probably pretty close to each other.”
He’s bumped from behind, his body and scent cascading into me.
It’s him, I think definitively. He smells faintly fantastic.
I try to breathe the scent in deeply without looking like a freak.
“How long will you be here?” he asks me.
“Uh, four months. You?”
“Two years.”
“Whoa.”
“Yeah. It’s a long stretch.” He puts his hand on the small of my back to lead me forward in the line a little. “I’ve been here a year already so it’s really just another year to go.”
“Do you like it?”
“It’s a nice country,” he replies indifferently.
“Say it like you mean it.”
“I’m being diplomatic.” He smirks, ushering me forward again. “We’re up. If you let me buy your drink, I promise not to touch it—with my hands or my illicit drugs.”
“I didn’t mean to imply you’re a creeper.”
He waves me away, pulling several euro from his wallet and signaling for two beers. “Don’t apologize for being careful.”
I grin at him. “I never said I was sorry.”
“I guess you didn’t,” he agrees with a chuckle. He hands me my beer: frothy, golden, and beautiful. “So can this creeper ask what you’re studying?”
“Business.”
“International business?”
I nod my head, taking a sip of the beer and weaving back past the crowded line with him. “Yep.”
“Does the school in Heidelberg have a good program? Is that why you came here?”
“No, I came to Germany to get away. To see something new.”
To hide from the future.
I push the heavy thought down, smiling lightly to blanket it. “I’m going to college in my hometown, the same town I was raised in my entire life. It’s a great school and I love it, but I had to get out at least once, you know?”
“Yeah, definitely. You don’t want to live and die in the same fifty-mile radius.”
“Yes! Thank you. Not everyone gets that. Is that why you joined the Air Force? For a ticket out?”
“Nah. I joined the Air Force to serve my country.”
I’m a little floored by that—by the blunt honesty of it. The simple nobility.
“So you’re a lifer then?” I ask curiously. “This is it for you, this is the career?”
He flinches slightly, the look disappearing as quickly as it came. “Kind of. I’ll do my twenty, retire, then go civilian. What are you going to do with your degree in business?”
“No idea,” I admit, trying not to flinch myself. “I’m having a hard time figuring that out lately.”
“Forever isn’t an easy choice to make.”
“You made it.”
“I guess.”
The flinch is gone from his face but I can still feel it in the air around him. I think it’s tied to this topic. To the future. It’s a relief to know I’m not the only one with baggage in that department.
He turns to me, about to say something, but he stops when he catches me looking at him. I’m embarrassed he caught me staring but I don’t look away. Instead I smile easily, something about his eyes on mine making me sigh and settle inside.
His mouth quirks into that crooked grin. “You have a great smile.”
“That is an old, tired line.”
“Maybe the line isn’t tired. Maybe your smile is classic.”
I laugh at how cheesy that sounds, but then if it’s cheesy why am I blushing? And why am I still smiling my classic smile at him?
We’ve made it back to his band of brothers and he offers me his seat, the only vacant one for miles. The boy actually pushes my chair in for me as I sit down, and then moves to the other side of the table to stand across from me, behind Sanchez. I have to admit, I’m liking the view.
I’m hearing an awkward story about a German girl trying to get all up on Birchart at a bar, laughing at his terrible understanding of the German language, and making copious amounts of smiling, flirting eye contact with Jax, when I hear it.
My shame.
“I am the Rally Queen!!!”
I close my eyes and breathe out slowly. When I open them again, Jax is smiling at me.
“Someone you know?” he chuckles.
“Have they seen me yet? Is it too late to pretend I don’t know them?”
“Wren! We found you!” Mel screams.
Jax gives me a pitying look. “It’s too late.”
I swear under my breath as I turn to face my humiliation. Red-faced and disheveled, Mel and Ben come running down the aisle toward me.
“What happened to you?” Ben asks, his voice about ten decibels too high.
“Um, I went pee and you ditched me,” I remind him incredulously. “Th
at’s what happened.”
“We got turned around,” Mel explains breathlessly. “We saw this adorable T-shirt—”
“She saw an ‘adorable’ T-shirt,” Ben corrects.
“And we had to go get it.”
I look at her empty hands. “Where is it?”
“Oh, I didn’t buy it. It was stupid.”
“I thought it was adorable and you just had to go get it.”
“Me too!” she says, getting excited. “I thought it was adorable too. Should I go back and get it?”
“No, you shouldn’t. You should slow down a little.”
“No, no, no. We have to go to the rides now. It’s ride time!” she screams in my face.
“Wow,” someone behind me mutters.
“Okay, guys, yes,” I tell Ben and Mel, looking them both in the eyes for as long as they’re able. “Let’s go do the rides, but let’s stick together, okay? No more ditching Wren. Got it?”
“You got it! I was so worried when we lost you,” Mel says, becoming instantly solemn. She pulls me into a crushing embrace that nearly topples us both back onto the table behind me. “What if someone killed you?”
“That’s cheery, thank you. I’m fine, though, so let’s go do the rides, okay?”
“Ride time!” she cries, letting me go abruptly to jump up and down.
I turn to face American Pie and the gang, feeling a pang of regret. I’d really rather stay here, hear the end of Birchart’s failed romance, and smile at Jax than leave, but drunk, loud hos before bros, so I grimace and wave goodbye.
“Thanks, guys. It was nice meeting you all.” I look at Jax, memorizing the round blue eyes that will haunt my dreams for the next month. “And thanks, Jax, for saving me before.”
He raises his beer in a sort of salute. “Happy to help. Maybe we’ll see you around?”
I feel a spike of adrenalin at the thought. “I’ll be at the rides, apparently, so…”
I don’t have an ending to that sentence so it falls awkwardly between us on the table. All of his buddies are looking down at it with amused faces.
“Wren!” Ben calls, the Drunken Duo already leaving the tent and me behind.
“Bye,” I say, waving one last time and running after them.
This is a huge place, ridiculously so, and I know he’ll never find me. Even if he looks—which I doubt he will—the chances are slim. So I look over my shoulder, catching a glimpse of him one last time, and I find him watching me go.
“Bye-bye, American Pie,” I sing to myself, casting him one last smile.
END PREVIEW
You can purchase THIS IS THE WONDER here.
About the Author
I was born in Eugene, Oregon and studied English Literature at the University of Oregon (Go Ducks!) It was there that I discovered why Latin is a dead language and that being an English teacher was not actually what I wanted to do with my life.
My husband, my son and my 80lbs pitbull who thinks he's a lapdog are my world.
Visit my website for more information on upcoming releases, Tracey Ward
