“Catch me if you can,” I said, no idea where the fuck that came from or why I was standing there flirting with this woman while my watch ticked away.
I’d obviously missed my time and my distance.
Can’t… get… to you… to save… you…
My lip curled as reality washed over me.
“I’ve got to go,” I said. “Thanks for the smoke.”
“No problem,” she said. “Do me a favor and keep my secret.”
I started to jog and looked back at her again.
She sat in her car and didn’t move. She didn’t open the door and get out. She turned her head and something else struck me. Something so familiar it made me want to stop and go back to keep talking to her.
I looked down at my watch and realized how fucked up my time had gotten.
That meant I needed to punish myself.
Run faster. Run harder. Run farther than I planned to.
To make up for what I messed up.
I ran for another hour without stopping.
When I finally got home, my phone had missed calls and missed texts.
Jackie loved the song.
The acoustic cut was his favorite. He presented it to the band and they were all for it.
Jonny sent me a text with a beer glass emoji, a money emoji, and a face sticking its tongue out.
In other words - the song is a hit and we’re going to get paid for it.
And then there was a missed call from Cindi.
But no voicemail.
No text.
“Fuck,” I whispered.
I should have called her back. Right then.
Even if she wanted to cry. Even if she wanted to tell me she hated me.
She had the right to do so and she needed to throw all that anger and grief to me. Last thing I wanted was to be the reason for her and Noah to finally call it quits for good.
My thumb moved to Cindi’s name. I touched the screen and all I needed to do was touch it again and I’d call her.
At the last second, I put the phone down.
I wiped sweat off my forehead and looked toward the dining room at all the instruments.
‘Hey… Crosby?’
‘Yeah, kid?’
‘I like when you play that song for me. It helps me sleep.’
‘Good. Then go to sleep…’
I gritted my teeth.
That fucking song…
I walked into the kitchen and got a cold beer.
It went down fast and smooth.
So I had a second one.
When I got to the third beer, I went out back and stood on the deck, watching the last few minutes of the sun as it set.
I couldn’t get the woman in the car out of my mind.
The way she was smoking. Alone. Tired. Weary. Hurt. Beautiful. A hidden beauty. Pretty on the outside… but on the inside…
That’s when it hit me.
I knew who she was.
It seemed impossible though.
She was the girl that lived across from me.
Three.
Two.
My fingertips touched the stop sign pole.
One.
I had done it.
I made it to the stop sign before the time.
Which meant…
I would have saved him.
I shook away the thought and jogged home to take a shower.
The rest of the day, I worked in a blur of messing around with keyboard sounds and mixing effects. My eyes looked to a drawer at the desk that I hadn’t opened in a really long time. I didn’t open the drawer, no matter how tempted I was.
I talked to Jonny for five minutes and sent over some of the sounds I had been working on. He then played an updated piano part for the song. I thought it was too busy of a piano part, but he felt good about it. We agreed to record the song with both parts and leave it to Jackie to decide what to do.
He offered to buy me a beer.
I declined.
I told him I was going out for a run.
He told me I was an idiot.
I told him he looked fat in his flannels.
He hung up on me.
The second my feet hit the pavement twelve hours after my first run, I knew where I was going.
The neighborhood was made up of three or four busy main streets, a lot of side streets, and even more small developments with cul-de-sacs in each one. I never really figured out where I had and hadn’t run. That didn’t matter to me. I just went out and punished myself every single day of my life.
Tonight was a little different.
I knew right where I was going.
To find the woman in the car.
To find the girl that lived across from me.
I wondered if she remembered me. At the same time, I wanted to know who she was. And why she only lived across from me for a couple of months. Why she didn’t go to my school. And what happened with her painting.
It was the first time in a really long time that I was distracted from my normal thoughts. You’d figure I would run and think about music. Think about songs to write. Finding lyrics and patterns. Thinking of great intros and hooks and a chorus that would have everyone in their car, singing along.
That didn’t happen for me.
That wasn’t how I worked.
Being outside, running, it was my job to think about what I had done wrong. I know I could never fix it, but I could hurt myself for it for a long time.
I turned down the side street and ran faster. I came up over a small hill.
I spotted her car.
The only problem was that when I ran to her car, she wasn’t inside it.
I started to run again, not wanting to be the weird guy looking in people’s cars.
I crossed the street and stayed on the sidewalk.
A few seconds later, I heard the sound of crying laughter. When I turned my head, I saw a young girl on a scooter, kicking her left foot off the ground. Wearing a bright pink helmet with a set of pigtails sticking out from under it. That was completed by a large pair of glasses on her face. Behind her ran the woman from the car. She was in a light blue colored tank top with her bra straps showing. There was no hiding what was happening as she ran. Maybe I was an asshole for looking, but compared to the guilt I carried on my shoulders, looking at a pretty woman and her chest bouncing as she ran was really nothing.
Her hair was pulled back the same way as the last time I saw her.
I noticed that on her shirt there looked to be splotches of paint.
That intrigued me very much.
I kept my pace but kept my gaze upon her.
From her to the young girl on the scooter.
Back and forth.
It made sense she had a daughter, which probably meant she had a husband or a boyfriend.
The moment the words husband and boyfriend crossed my mind, she looked at me.
She stopped her playful run and instantly smiled.
She gave a wave and I turned, now coolly running backwards, hoping to everything that I didn’t hit a crack in the sidewalk and end up on my ass.
I waved back at her and then put my fingers to my lips as the silent sign for a cigarette.
She frowned and pointed to the young girl on the scooter.
I showed both hands as if to say I get it… and then I put my pointer finger to my lips to say shhh, as in I was keeping her secret, like she asked me to do.
I then turned and ran even faster.
I smiled.
She was fucking sexy.
It was crazy to think of her as a mother who secretly smoked in her car.
I had no idea why that attracted me to her.
My mind finally decided to give my half dead heart a slap.
She’s got a kid. She’s got a guy too. Keep running.
So that’s what I did.
I added a few more miles to my total and went home.
My nightly routine was the same.
Three beers. Regret. Staring at Cindi’s
last text and the fact that she called me. Knowing I needed to call her back. Knowing that there were never enough versions of I’m sorry to even begin to figure out how to move forward in our lives.
That’s when sleep would finally catch up to me and steal it all away.
At least I sort of knew who that woman was. She was the girl who lived across from me for a few months. And now she lived in a nice neighborhood with at least one daughter.
But that didn’t mean I couldn’t at least tell her I remembered her. Tell her I remembered her painting. And see if she remembered me playing guitar.
Hell, if anything, it gave me something to look forward to.
“And that’s a wrap,” Jonny said.
He reached into his flannel and took out a flask and helped himself to a drink.
He then handed it to me.
“No, thanks,” I said.
“Since when do you turn down a drink?”
“From a flask in your pocket, brother?” I asked, laughing.
“Whatever,” Jonny said. He took another drink. “That song sucked.”
“Of course it did,” I said. “It’s all garbage. Rhyming stars with cars and then she’s so far… and I drank at the bar… and then my heart is black like tar…”
He started to laugh. “Oh, man, we need to get you drunk and let you freestyle.”
“Yeah, that’ll boost my career,” I said.
I stood up and Jonny latched onto my arm. “Hey. You know you could do this on your own. You’re fucking talented.”
“And, what? You’re going to be my backup?”
“Why not?” Jonny asked. “We have the connections, Cros. Go from writing hits to playing hits.”
“Gets pretty hot up on stage, Jonny. You’d have to cut the sleeves off your flannels.”
He started to laugh.
Every now and again, Jonny would give me a push into wanting to start a band. It wasn’t the worst idea in the world, but the thought of me singing a song in front of people seemed too far off in the distance.
That part of my life was gone. For good reason.
I walked to the kitchen and thought about grabbing a beer. But I looked at the clock and knew it was time to run. I didn’t have to go for a run. I already did that this morning. And I hit the gym for two hours. My body ached. My muscles were sore. I just wanted to get drunk and fall asleep. I had the company to do so too.
Except one thing burned in my mind.
The woman from the car.
It was dumb. Really dumb.
But I kept seeing her face. Her eyes. Her hair. The paint on her tank top. The sight of her in the car, smoking, alone.
“You getting a drink or what?” Jonny asked as he walked toward the back door.
“I’ll be back,” I said.
“Where the fuck are you going? We have to celebrate.”
“We will. I’ll be back.”
“Cros?”
“I’m going for a run,” I said.
“A run? You’re in jeans.”
“So what?” I asked.
Before Jonny could say anything else, I hurried to the front door.
I was good at crossing lines and pushing boundaries. It made me who I was. It destroyed my life too.
Then again… what was the harm in just saying hello to someone…
5
JUST SOME WORDS…
NOW
Josie
“Wow, that looks amazing, Josie.”
There was one tiny downfall to living in the guesthouse of my brother’s house. That was Kait feeling as though she could just walk in whenever she felt like it. Rightfully so, it was her house too. But it got old. And fast.
I looked back and forced a smile. “This? No. I’m just playing with patterns.”
“I like it,” Kait said. “Can I have it?”
“Have it…?”
“For the studio,” she said. “Watch…”
Kait had super tight yoga pants on that didn’t hold back on showing off her body. Her tank top was super loose with a picture of a smiling sun on it. She lived her life as though a bra was optional each and every day, and that didn’t bother her at all.
She smelled like jasmine and honey as she touched the easel.
The painting really wasn’t a painting at all. I was simply just messing around, trying different colors and brushes, getting ready to go work on the mural for the Italian restaurant.
Kait turned the painting on its side.
“There,” she said. “That looks amazing.”
I leaned back and I had to hand it to her.
The painting looked good from the side.
She could touch dog crap in the front yard and it would turn into a kitten. Honestly.
“So, how much for it?” she asked me.
“How much? Seriously? You can have it.”
“I want to pay for it.”
“No,” I said.
“Come on, Josie. You’re a painter. An artist. Take pride in what you do.”
“I take pride in living here with you and Corey and Meadow.”
She laughed. “Now that wasn’t sarcasm, huh?”
“What?”
“I know Meadow was talking to you about smoking.”
“Yeah. I hope I didn’t mess that up too much.”
“You did amazing with her. She loves learning. She loves questioning everything.”
“Sounds like Corey,” I said. “He was a pain in the ass growing up.”
“He still is, Josie,” Kait said with a wink.
“I believe it. But he loves you. And Meadow. I never thought I’d see him like this. Then again, I never thought I’d see myself like this either.”
Kait slowly moved my paint supplies off a chair so she could sit. She touched my arm.
Fuck.
“You know, you never talk about it,” she said in a soft voice. “About him. About Denny.”
My heart twisted, and I felt heat rise to my face. “I don’t…”
“I know a lot of what I do is weird, but I grew up with an alcoholic father. And my mother was severely depressed. She tried to end her life more than once.”
“Oh, Kait…”
“Shhh, it’s okay,” she said. “I grew up feeling things inside me. Things that made me tempted to live the way they did. That’s why I chose this life. A life where I can balance my body and my soul. My energy. It sounds crazy. But it works. And I guess what I’m trying to say to you, Josie, is that by not talking about it, you’re holding it in. Even if you don’t think about it, it just sits there. It just sits there and waits for the right time - or the wrong time - to strike. That’s what I fear for you. When you feel down or sad and don’t know why… it’s those feelings.”
I nodded. “I appreciate that, Kait. I don’t think what you do is crazy. I think it’s amazing.”
“So, talk to me.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Yes, there is. You lost Denny. You lost the man you loved. You two were together for a long time, Josie. I know you said things weren’t going well at that time, but still… you loved him, right?”
“I have to get going, Kait,” I said, standing up. “I have to be over at the restaurant.” I glanced at my phone. “Oh, wow, I’m actually running late. Shit. I really have to go.”
I grabbed my bag and hurried to get out of the guesthouse.
I exhaled a breath and wiped the tears from my eyes.
There was nothing to talk about because nobody but me knew the truth.
I worked until I felt like I was going to start messing up.
The restaurant was mostly renovated, and both Anthony and Joe left me be. They were nice guys. Anthony was tall and skinny while Joe was short and round. They had a lot of money and were in no rush to open the restaurant until everything was perfect.
Which meant I had all the time I needed to make the mural perfect. Not that I expected to mess around or get lazy.
The initial idea of thi
s seemed annoying. But once I got there, saw the place and the size of the wall, it excited me. Actually, working on the wall brought a sense of peace to my mind and my heart. Hours ticked by without me even thinking.
“Here, let us feed you,” Joe said as he handed me a plate with spaghetti and meatballs on it.
“Tradition in our family,” Anthony said. “You’re family in this place now.”
“Thank you,” I said.
It was the best spaghetti and meatballs I’d ever tasted. The sauce was sweet but not sugary. I didn’t dare ask how they cooked it the way they did. Joe stood wide-eyed waiting for me to give my review.
I gave a thumbs up and he patted his round stomach. “I’ve got experience with that.”
“Enough experience for all of us,” Anthony added with a chuckle.
“That was the best meal I’ve ever had,” I said as I placed the fork down.
Joe lunged at the table to get the plate. “I’ll clean this up for you, Josie. When will you come back again?”
“Tomorrow,” I said. “I won’t leave you guys hanging.”
“We know that,” Anthony said.
“I’ll make you something else,” Joe said. “Lasagna.”
“You don’t have to feed me.”
“Family,” Anthony said.
“You’re going to get me chunky,” I said with a smile.
Joe belly laughed. “Never. And what’s a beautiful woman like you worrying about that for?”
“I’d better get moving before you propose to me, Joe,” I said.
Joe’s cheeks turned red.
“Now you made him blush,” Anthony said.
“She’s a beautiful woman with lots of talent,” Joe said. “And don’t mind me. I’ll feed you like family and never stop telling you you’re beautiful.”
“Thank you,” I said. “I will be back tomorrow to keep working on the mural. If there’s anything else you want me to add to it, don’t be afraid to say something. I want this to be here forever for you both. And your family.”
“We’re lucky that you’re here,” Anthony said.
“Such talent,” Joe said.
I finally managed to get out of the restaurant.
I was tired.
It had been a long day of prepping the wall and painting the first part of the border. I had been working on some sketches for the wall too. But those I didn’t show Anthony or Joe. I wanted them to see the finished product.
When I parked my car, I licked my lips, suddenly having a hankering for a cigarette and a chance to see the mysterious running guy. No shirt. Glistening sweat. Messy hair. Scruffy face. The way he could smoke a cigarette and then take off running.
Getting Over You Page 4
