by Natalie Wrye
I snatch up the note, breathing easier as I read:
Freshening up. Be back before you know it ;)
I read the note twice over, giving a grin before putting it down.
She leaves a winky-face at the end, and I grow hard at the thought of what’s next. Such a simple sign of mischief, and already, I’m thinking about round two. Or is it four?
I hear her in the adjacent room, taking a shower. I seriously consider sneaking in behind her, to do her washing for her instead, but duty dwindles at the back of my mind, reminding me of all the obligations I’ve been abandoned to come here for Del and her adorable daughter.
And hell, I can’t. First things first. Call Angie.
I sit on the edge of the bed, nursing one coffee-burnt arm while the other hurt one dangles uselessly. I reach over to the nightstand, grabbing the phone near the wall. I push a few buttons. Nothing left to do but wait.
While the speakerphone dials, I hold my arms at my midsection. I wonder what I’m going to tell Angie, but I don’t ponder for long. She answers the phone gruffly.
“Hello…?”
“Ang.” I sigh, exasperated. “It’s me.”
“Javi? What the actual hell?” Objects clatter on the other line as I listen. A bunch of expletives explode into the air.
“Where the hell have you been?” she continues. “We’ve been looking everywhere for you. Me. Langley. We thought you were freaking dead.”
I scoff, shaking my head sadly. “Not quite… but listen to me. This is important.”
I tell her about Delilah and Melanie, about my visit to take care of both of them.
I give her the name and address of Aunt Reba’s remote cabin, swearing her to secrecy, and prepare to hang up the phone when I’ve said enough. But Angie’s too tough of an assistant to let that be all. She calls out last minute, just as I am about to end the conversation, her shrill cry cutting into my thoughts. She screams through the faulty speaker.
“Wait a second! What are we going to do about the girl?”
I freeze. “Who?”
“The girl. Penelope something or other… At the senator’s dinner, you mentioned that she and her legal team might be the last people on Earth with any real info on Marco Morelli.”
Shit. Did I say that? I didn’t mean to.
“What’s her full name? I’ll call ahead of time and do some research on her…”
She pauses, waiting for an answer. An answer that I really don’t want to give.
“Look, Ang… I don’t even know how to say this.” I hesitate, collecting myself. I tell her before I can change my mind, the trepidation creating a sour taste on my tongue.
“Penelope Castalano? Are you fucking… I can’t believe this shit. She’s dead? And you knew? Does the rest of the Bureau know? Does Langley? I mean…” She stops talking, huffing heavily over the phone. I can see her now, probably palming a handful of her own shaggy, close-cropped blonde hair. She exhales deeply over the phone.
“Well? Did you get a chance to talk to Del? Did you tell her?!” she asks.
The question prompts me to grip my own hair.
“Ang, it’s actually not that simple.”
“What, several days together, and the subject didn’t even come up? Come on, bro. I mean, it’s you. This is what you do. How is it hard?”
The door of my bathroom slams open, and suddenly, a wind-blown Del appears at the entrance.
“You son-of-a-bitch.” Her voice is low, quivering, but her words are scathing from thirty feet away. She’s holding her robe closed with one hand, and I can see that more than just her voice is shaking.
“Del.” I stand up abruptly, knocking over the hot coffee in my haste. It spills scorchingly from its cup, splashing the phone (and me) with liquid, brown lava. SHIT! It burns like a bitch.
I trip over my own feet, crashing my knees into the mattress. I reach weakly for Del… but she is already out the door.
Through the pain, I try to speak. “Del, wait! Let me explain... See…”
She whirls towards me from the hallway, her eyes wet and truly seething.
“There’s nothing to see, Javi. I don’t have anything to say to the man who just broke my heart!”
She disappears briefly into the hallway closet, dragging a black bag out of the door. I watch her go, not knowing what to say, completely stunned into silence, and she slams the door to the next room, grabbing Melanie, taking everything she owns… and a piece of me with her.
Normal Girl
DELILAH
I want to hate him.
I’ve wanted to hate him… from the moment I laid eyes on him. I somehow sensed that he was different, that he held the secret to something special. And it terrified me.
It still does…. because he’s already under my skin, and it’s been less than two weeks since he’s been back. My defense mechanisms really did kick in; I can honestly say that I tried. But he’s made his way under there, and now I just want him out.
And this… this is the only way that I know how to do it. By flying back to San Francisco as fast as a 751 will take me.
Melanie’s and my one-way trip to back to the West Coast somehow takes forever, and in place of nerves, all I feel is numbness, a dull disorienting sensation that works its way from my core and to my tingling limbs. When I exit the plane, I barely feel the burn of the early springtime heat. The West Coast sun settles on my skin, and I breathe in the scent of the Bay, oblivious to everything but the intense feeling of loss that sets in my stomach like a leaded stone. It isn’t until I arrive at The Sweet Spot that I find some palpable feeling. The sound of a door opening and closing startles me and I leap to action, immediately leaving the stockroom, floured hands and all.
My heart stops when I reach the storefront floor, my body shutting down. My eyes pivot and smack right into a perfumed wall of blonde hair and high boobs, and in that instant, I know I am more affected by the woman in front of me than I was ever willing to bet. I am floored by my visceral reaction.
If I thought my trust in people was compromised, then I was wrong.
She fucking obliterated it.
A single tear falls down my lightly-blushed cheek, I breathe in the cool new April air that welcomed me back to the West Coast, and I breathe out the last remnants of my belief. I stare back at the woman entering my storefront threshold, my fingers shaking all the while. I wipe the lone tear away as she shifts on her feet, her high heels shaking one-by-one. She looks at me.
“How are you doing, Del?” she says, walking right up to me with little pause. She places one hand on the countertop filled with cupcakes.
“I’m pretty good, actually,” I respond to Carrie, now known as the ‘Worst best friend in the world.” I cross my arms. “And I guess I have you to thank for all of that.”
She fidgets even more. “For what?”
“For seducing my husband. Or what was my husband. For proving to me that good people and happy endings don’t exist.”
“What?” Carrie comes in closer. “Del, what are you talking about? I—?”
“Oh, don’t even try to explain, Carrie. I saw you. The both of you. On Darren’s Facetime. He picked up by accident when I called. And I saw you two together, talking, plotting to do God knows what behind my back. I didn’t stay on the call long enough to see.”
“To see what? The conversation I had with your coward of an ex-husband?” Carrie shakes her head. “He came to leave a message for you while I was getting ready for my date, Del. He’s leaving you. Both of you. He mentioned that the money was gone and that he was going back to live with his mother after his job found out. Found out that he’d embezzled their money… and lost it.” Her brown eyes grow sad. “Del, I don’t get it… Why didn’t you tell me?”
I throw up my hands, looking at the ceiling, fresh tears springing forth as my chest falls. I take a deep breath inward.
“Tell you what, Car? Tell you that the captain of the football team, the best looking guy in school
and the object of my fifteen year-old fantasies was a nightmare? A dud? To tell you that the life I imagined was the wrong one and that I had to separate myself from a man who took all of our money, his company’s money and blew it in the wind? To tell you that I had to rely on myself—as always, to save my daughter, myself, my business?” I exhale. “What am I supposed to say to you?”
“Anything. Say what you feel, what you think.”
“What I think? What am I supposed to think?” I explode at her.
“You’re not supposed to think anything!” Carrie screams out loud, almost making the small store shake. “Life doesn’t fit a script, a plan. You know that better than anybody and that’s all you’ve done for the past twenty-six years, Del. Since your parents passed. You planned. Plotted. Tried to map out every move for you and your sister. I understand the need for control when everything feels like it’s spiraling. But you’re not alone, Del.” She places both hands on the counter this time, leaning in. “So what, you don’t have Darren, Delilah? You have Melanie. You have your Aunt Reba. You have me. You have Penelope, even if she’s not here…” My tongue turns to sand at the mention of my little sister’s name. “And you have Javi,” Carrie continues. “Even though, you’re acting like you don’t. I’ve heard the way you talked about him, Del. Even if you were high off mint chocolate chip ice cream. When are you going to let someone take care of you for a change?” she says, mirroring Javi’s words.
Her tone is sharp, her hands pressed to the glass. A furrow finds its way to the middle of her face, and through chocolate-colored eyes, she gives me solace, understanding. Safety.
And with one look, a piece of Carrie saves a piece of me, putting together a puzzle piece I thought I’d been missing. I inhale softly.
“Ok, then I will,” I retort.
“Fantastic.”
“Great!”
“Go right ahead.”
“I will.”
“Fine.”
“Fine!” she says lastly, her pretty face full of frustrated outrage. Her cheeks are flushed, and her arms are crossed tightly at the chest. She looks like she’s going to stomp her foot in anger at any moment. It diffuses my temper by ten notches. The thought of it is nearly comical, and I almost can’t take her seriously right now.
I laugh, the sound warmer than I expect. More than fifteen years of friendship and nothing’s changed. I take in the beautiful vision of my best friend, shaking my head.
“Look at us. Arguing like a married couple.”
“Honestly, you may be the only real marriage I’ve ever had,” she responds.
I grin. “Wouldn’t be your first time with a girl.”
Carrie giggles, snorting. “I was in college, and you know that cock at an all girls’ small Catholic school was in short supply. Not sure if those encounters count.” She looks down at the counter, glancing back up at me. “Are we cool?”
“As a cucumber.”
“And you and Javi?” She leans forward, inching even farther. “Anything cucumber-like left in that dynamic?” My chest burns at the mention of his name. But Carrie pushes me, not letting the subject drop as I sink into myself, my sanity slowly slipping from my grip. I’d forgotten about him in these last ten minutes. A miracle. And I’d somehow forgotten about Penelope and her fate, one I’d long suspected, finally confirmed by the one man who’d I once started to trust. My skin prickles as the silence stretches.
“You care for this man,” Carrie states. It’s a statement, not a question.
“No! I mean, I thought so, but…” I stop talking. I don’t know how to finish that sentence.
“It’s okay to care for someone, Del. It won’t kill you.”
“Yeah… but it can almost make you wish you were dead.”
She shrugs. “That’s the risk we take, Delilah-cakes. Sacrificing pieces of yourself is always a risk. But the reward, Del… the reward is indescribable. It is untouchable, immovable. Nothing can wash it away.”
I don’t know what to say to Carrie. I don’t know how to tell her that my trust in Javi has been power-rinsed away.
I listened to her advice. I absorbed it like a sponge. And then I acted on it in one of the most forward interactions I have ever had with a man.
And now I regret it.
At least, that’s what I’m trying to convince myself. Maybe if I try hard enough, I can squelch the tingling on my lips (both sets of them) that takes place every time he looks at me. Maybe I can catch the butterfly that’s let loose in my stomach every time he puts his hands on my skin.
And maybe—just maybe—in enough time… I will forget him. Forget this craving. Forget this need.
I open my mouth to tell Carrie about Penelope when the bell above the front door dings, signaling a new customer’s entrance. I look up, past Carrie, only to find a tall man standing there, hair as black as ink, with a large and dangerous grin on his face. His nose is sharp and long; his eyes are large and brown—almost black. He has the face of a person out of place, a mischief dancing in his eyes that gives him the appearance of an unending youthfulness.
I almost expect a child when I meet his stare, noticing the swaggered irreverence of a cocky kid.
But what walks in is more man than boy, a broad-shouldered, smirking man of nearly thirty with strong arms and long legs. His face is strangely familiar. And all color drains from my own face, when I realize who he is, his features featured on every newspaper in the world.
Including the one I used to write for. I’ve written his name a million times, uttered it more than that. And when he smirks at me, I remember every single word I’ve ever scribbled about him. Every report. Every article. Every mug shot of the one and only…
Marco Morelli.
The Need to Know
JAVI
I amble towards the walkway without saying another word. I can hear Angie trailing behind me, the dirt and gravel underfoot crunching as she passes over, her small steps struggling to keep up with my own.
I stop when I reach the edge of the tan-colored railing and the gate that closes off the pedestrian walkway. I place my elbows on the edge of the raised steel, closing my eyes until I feel Angie beside me. I open them to look down at her.
“It’s estimated that hundreds of people have jumped to their deaths from this bridge, taken their own lives, completely of their own volition.” I hear the crashing of the ocean below us. I swear I can almost hear Delilah’s thoughts. I keep going. “Their reasons are as varied as the people themselves. And in that moment that they leap over the rails, those four frightening seconds before they collide with the water, I wonder: Do they know how many lives they’ve affected? How many people who they’ve touched, known—loved… who are irrevocably changed?”
I let the silence hang between us, listening to the Atlantic ebb and flow, the waves of the crystal blue water beneath the Brooklyn Bridge, which was once background music, a soundtrack to the song that was us. To me and Del. To this connection that fifteen years couldn’t erase, that distance couldn’t deaden.
“I’ve never been a spectator, Ang. I’m just no good at it. And I’m a spectator now, if you can believe it. Watching Delilah jump. Watching her tumble towards a deadly end. She’s hanging in that interminable four seconds before the crash, and despite everything between us…” I trail off. “I just can’t let her hit that water. I can’t watch her crash into the abyss. I won’t let her.”
I look at Ang, facing her under the muted glow of the amber overhead lights. I notice the shimmer in her eyes as she stares in the rocky distance, over the blue horizon that seems to stretch forever. My chest grows tight when a single tear drops from her blue eye, rolling silently down her cheek.
“You’re putting yourself in danger,” she states, her voice almost a whisper.
“I’m not,” I retort immediately. “I won’t. And I want her away from this, out of the risk she’s heading towards.” I swallow. “If she’ll let me.”
My gaze drifts towards the bridge, beaut
iful in its breadth—majestic. A floating masterpiece over water. I remember the times that I brought Delilah here, to the edge of the Brooklyn Bridge, where she was most comfortable, the water soothing her frayed senses. It was there that I chased the nightmares away.
The death of her parents. Their horrific accident.
I filled her night with the sound of waves, hoping to refresh the childhood memories she had shared with me, those recollections of happier times when her parents sought to calm her anxious mind. I was one of few who knew that the anxiety ate at her after their death, and it was only those remembrances that brought the calmness back, that centered her like none other.
I could put my arms around her and feel the peace enter into her. I looked at her then, the tension rolling off her in emotion-filled swells, and I slid towards her, coming to stand behind her frozen body where I skimmed my hands over her shoulders, down her arms, and to her hands. I held them—and her, wrapping my taller body around her petite one. Inhaling the scent of her hair and the ocean air, I hugged her to me, pressing her back into my chest, feeling her heartbeat and listening to it slow. She sighed, a motion I felt from head to toe, and I pressed my nose to her shoulder, letting my silence be all that she needs.
We stood there like that for God knows how long. I barely heard her when, at last, she uttered. “I never thanked you.” She nodded, almost to herself. “My hero.”
At the moment, I hugged her closer, and now I stand here, telling Ang of my plans. What I’ve done. What I will do. And in the midst of it all, I wonder how I ever let Del go, wondering if I could do it all over again.
A voice inside my head tells me that I can’t, and the same voice pushes me on the fastest plane back to San Francisco, the red-eye to California ushering me and my red eyes back to Delilah’s block.
Strange. I feel more at home on her street, sitting in front of her house, waiting for her than I do anywhere else in the world. I lay my head back in the front seat of my Audi, sleep beating against my eyelids, but I resist.
