by Allen, Dylan
It was just one weekend. My mother told me they hadn’t been invited. Nothing should have brought Kal anywhere near my house that weekend. But, my mother figured out my plan and its fatal flaw and she went in for the kill.
That lie I told is my biggest regret.
The biggest mistake I ever made. That, and not telling her that I loved her.
That summer, we found something special with each other. Something, we’d never find with anyone else again.
I was just a kid, but I knew it in my bones, then. I still know it, now.
“Remington, could you try not to look like you’re waiting for the executioner to drop a guillotine blade on your neck?” Joni drones as she walks over to the full-length mirror right beside the door. Her long, thin body is draped in a skintight black sequined dress that leaves nothing to the imagination.
“How do I look?” she asks and then turns her back to me so that I have a view of her perfectly round ass.
“Good,” I respond honestly, but without any real conviction. Her beautiful body isn’t enough for me, not anymore and my cock doesn’t stir.
“Good? That’s it? Remi, what’s going on? You haven’t seen me in two months and you haven’t even tried to touch me.” She crosses her arms over her chest and pouts. The evening hasn’t even started and I feel tired already.
This isn’t fair to either of us. When the wedding is over, I’ll talk to her. But for now, I want my sister to have the day she deserves, so I just smile apologetically and rub my temples.
“You look great. I just have a headache. Go on down, I’ll join you in a few minutes.”
Her eyebrows are raised in impatience. “I don’t want to walk out alone. People will think we had a fight.”
My hackles rise. “Why in the world would anyone think that? And why do we care what they think?” I stay planted firmly on the bed.
I don’t like being told what to do. Not by her and not because she wants to impress her completely unimpressive friends.
“We care because these people will be our social cohorts once you’re back in Houston.” She says this like it’s supposed to be enough of a reason.
I raise an eyebrow at her. “Oh, well, then of course. That sounds like a good reason to give a shit.”
“Be sarcastic if you want. I know how these things work. You’ve been out of the loop. I’m working really hard to establish us and it would help if when you are around, you do your part to develop the right image.” She acts as if I’m not around because I’m off on vacation and not because I’m busting my ass to graduate at the top of my class.
“Fine, let’s go,” I bite out and take her outstretched hand and leave our room to meet the rest of the party.
And when our hands touch I feel… absolutely nothing.
16
SURPRISE
REMI
“Remington, can you please put that thing down for five minutes and let me introduce you?”
My finger pauses mid-press and hovers over the keyboard of my phone. I slide my eyes to Joni and am met with her disapproving frown—what’s become her standard facial expression when she’s talking to me.
“Right, sure.” I quirk my lips in an attempt at a smile, finish scanning my email quickly, and then slip my phone into the inside pocket of my suit before I look at the man who she’s been talking to while I’ve been checking my email obsessively to see if there’s any news about my interview.
As soon as we stepped off the elevator she saw someone and rushed off in their direction. I followed absently, reading my emails as I walked. The room was packed and loud, the volume of the music warring with people shouting to be heard above it. But it was like white noise to me.
Society weddings like the one my mother was throwing for Regan were nothing but an excuse to party, get drunk and not feel like a loser in the morning. The only reason this one would be tolerable is because it’s my beloved sister’s party and I’d walk over burning coals for her.
Even though, I also spend a lot of time wanting to strangle her. I look around the room at the half-dozen bars where our nearly three hundred guests are drinking like fish, the ice sculptures, and huge garlands made entirely of roses and thank fuck my sister’s expensive-ass taste is about to no longer be my problem. And thank fuck her husband is even richer than we are. Or else, she’d have him in the poorhouse in less than a year.
“Remi—” Joni’s voice is a hiss and I finally turn my attention to her. She scowls at me and then plasters a huge smile on her face before she turns to face the man she’s trying to introduce me to. “Paul, this is my boyfriend, Remi. He’s a third year at Howard Law School in DC. He got into Georgetown, of course, but he’s obsessed with Thurgood Marshall so that’s where he went.” She says it like she has to explain my attendance at Howard. It is, of course, a lie. I never even applied to Georgetown.
“Remi this is Paul.” I look up with a practiced smile on my face and almost choke on my inhaled breath.
Behind the man Joni’s pointing at, is a halo of dark riotous curls that I’d recognize anywhere.
“Kal?” I say her name and my throat tightens around the word. Paul’s eyes widen, and he looks behind him like he forgot she was there. There’s a beat of nothing, breath, movement, sound all stop. And then Kal steps out from behind him.
I have imagined this moment, and yet, nothing could prepare me for the force of the longing that slams into my chest when I actually see her again.
I see her.
I miss her.
I want her.
“Remi.” Her voice is high pitched, breathy, and full of surprise that rings as false as that smile on her face.
I narrow my eyes at her. She was fucking hiding from me.
I clear my throat and force my expression to remain neutral. But inside, my mind is hurtling backward through time to the summer I spent with this girl. No longer a girl, not at all.
She looks… so beautiful. Her skin still glows like she’s been brushed in rays of sunlight. The space below her high round cheekbones not as full as they had been. But those lips are still bare, and they still make mine pulse just to look at them. They’re not in the soft set of the innocent she was that summer. They’re firm, determined, experienced.
Someone else made them that way and I feel my first of, what I know will be, many pangs of envy. I drink her in, trying to see if everything is as I remember it. One thing is exactly the same. She doesn’t look like anyone else here.
It’s a spring wedding. Everyone is in pastels and neutrals.
In a sea of pale pinks, buttery yellows, and icy blues, Kal stands out like an orchid blooming in the desert. Her slim, but curvy body is draped in a rich, candy apple red dress that is cinched around her waist with a gold chain. The dress leaves swaths of her dark honey skin exposed—at her shoulder, and at her waist. My fingers itch to touch her.
Her deep, wide-set dark brown eyes flare when our gazes meet and I see all the questions in her eyes. But I also see the same longing I’m feeling.
Holy shit, yes. My heart is going to fucking explode and I’m not sure I would even mind.
I was so not ready… I’ve dreamed. I’ve imagined. But all of that falls short to the reality of how beautiful she is. The noise falls away as I take her in.
And memories start flooding me.
Us in my car.
Us on her porch.
Us at CASA.
Us on the phone until the sun came up.
Us saying we loved each other in every way, except for with words.
Her leaving and taking a part of me with her that I’ve never been able to find again.
Fuck.
And she’s standing with the man Joni’s been talking to. The one she’s been trying to introduce me to. His arm rests casually around her waist, but there’s no mistaking the possession and intimacy in that touch. I can’t fucking breathe. Seeing him touch her makes me want to strangle him until he swears he’ll never do it again. I clench my fists a
t my side and force myself to stand still.
“Kalilah Greer, is that you?” Joni asks in a tone that makes it clear, she’s praying the answer is no.
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
We answer at the same time. But then, we just look at each other, again. My ability to speak seems suspended in the viscous tension that’s gripped me. Joni clears her throat loudly and I shake myself out of my stupor and remember where the fuck I am and I smile apologetically at all of them.
“Sorry, it’s just been a long time… I didn’t expect to see you here, Kal.”
Kal tucks a lock of her thick curls behind her ear and smiles at me. It doesn’t reach her eyes.
“Yeah… I didn’t realize who the bride was until we got here. Paul and Marcel are old friends. When we checked in and I heard the last name Wilde…” she presses her lips together like it hurts to say the name. “So, of course, I knew I’d see you.” Her throat bobs with the effort that steadiness in her voice cost her.
“I had no idea that she was friends with the great Remington Wilde. How auspicious—you’re quite the dark horse, aren’t you?” he says to Kal in a way that feels wrong. He’s smiling at her, his dark eyes twinkling, but there’s a thread of something in his voice that I don’t like. And it’s not just that he’s talking to her.
Before I can think about it much more, he turns to me. “Marcel is a good friend from business school, and your girlfriend,” he nods at Joni as if he needed to clarify which of the two women he’s talking about, “sits on the board of a charity with my sister. It’s just a coincidence that we’re all meeting at this wedding.”
“Yeah, what a coincidence,” I say with no humor. It’s more like a big fuck you from fate.
“So, are you here for the entire weekend?” I ask him, not because I care how long he’ll be here, but because I need to figure out when I can get Kal alone.
“Yes. We’re heading back to New York on Monday.”
I look back at Kal and she looks distinctly like a deer caught in the headlights.
“I see. Is that where you live?”
She nods and runs that nervous finger down the side of her throat. I want to trace its path with my tongue.
I have fucking missed her so much.
God. There are so many things I’ve questioned over the years. My choices, my purpose.
But just like the first time I saw her in that library—there’s no questioning us. There’s just something. An understanding, a connection that, no matter how much time has gone by, never needs refreshing. It just needs us to be in the same space. And right now, it’s screaming.
Kal’s expression is making me crazy because I can see she’s feeling everything I am. I wish I could talk to her right now.
“So, that’s where you’ve been all this time?” Joni asks and steps into my side, she intertwines our arms and grasps my hand. We never hold hands. I look sharply just in time to see the possessive glint in her eyes before she tosses her head and looks back at Kal.
Kal’s eyes dart up from our joined hands, and I don’t miss her scowl before she smiles stiffly at both of us.
“Yes. My mother and I moved to New York when we left Houston.” Her voice is soft. Too soft, like she’s having a hard time breathing.
“You okay, Kal?” I ask before I can stop myself.
Everyone looks at me and I smile.
“Do I not look okay, Remi?” she asks, her eyes stony.
“No. You look great. You’ve just changed… I guess.” I feel like such an idiot.
“You haven’t changed at all.” She casts her eyes toward Joni and then downward, so I can’t look into them. But, I don’t miss the accusation in her voice.
She’s jealous.
Even though she’s looking at me like she wants to knock my lights out, I can’t help but smile.
“Hey, Will.” And a surprised smile turns the corners of her mouth briefly.
“Hey, Carlton.” I hear that undercurrent of a laugh and fuck, it makes me happy.
“Darling, you never mentioned that you and Kal had nicknames.” Joni sounds like she’s three seconds from running from the room in tears.
I glance at Kal to find that she’s watching me and her eyes narrow slightly before she looks back at Joni.
“I was just a blip in his life. I’m sure he just forgot.” She says tightly and I want to laugh.
Fuck yes.
“Impossible, Lee. You’re unforgettable.” Paul smiles at me and there’s a glint of worry in his eyes. He may have his arm around her, but he knows he doesn’t have her.
“Anyway, hate to bust up your reunion,” he pulls Kal closer to him.
“You’re not.” I say coldly.
His smile disappears. “I see someone I need to speak with. Will you walk with me?” He turns Kal and steers her away before she can respond.
I look back over my shoulder as we make our way to the bride and groom’s table and find Kal also looking over hers. She doesn’t look away quickly, this time. Instead, she holds my gaze and I see everything then, everything I’ve wondered. Hope flares. We still have a chance and I’m going to take it.
17
WINDFALL
KAL
My head and heart are still spinning when I see Remi and Joni walking to our table. And then, Remi’s eyes find mine. It’s a jolt to my heart. I swallow the lump in my throat and force myself to look at Paul instead.
Whatever cruel twist of destiny reunited us at the worst possible moment in my life can go and fuck itself.
I was finally starting to think that maybe I had everything I wanted.
I nursed a broken heart for years after we left Houston. I threw myself into school and found a home in the sociology department at Columbia.
I was able to indulge my natural curiosity about other people in a place that encouraged studying their interactions.
It was the perfect training for journalism school.
Just a year ago, I landed the job of my dreams.
I met Paul on my second day at work. I work for one of his family’s magazine’s and and he’s the Chief Operating Officer of their publishing company.
They’re a large family. He’s the youngest of six. They didn’t mind that I was a nobody, that my mother worked as a nurse’s aide and lived in her third-floor Bronx walk up. They made me feel like part of the family and so, I snatched what he was offering me and held on.
Even though I knew, from our first kiss, that I was trading passion and love for stability and certainty.
He pursued me hard. Freshly in the grip of my determination to finally get over Remi, he had felt like a godsend.
When he told me we were coming to Houston for his friend Marcel’s wedding, I hadn’t even considered our paths might cross.
He lives in DC.
If I had known I was going to see him, nothing could have convinced me to come.
Just thinking about him makes my head and heart ache with the same intensity as the day he left them both bruised and battered.
He was the boy who taught me just how painful love could be. But, I’ve never stopped carrying a torch for him. I know that now because seeing him brought all of my feelings rushing back. Like a volcano that suddenly erupted, the wash of affection, desire, and longing took me by complete surprise.
And then, as if I jumped out of the fire into a frozen lake, it’s gone. And in its place stands ice-cold jealousy.
He’s standing there next to Joni. And all I can think is that she gets to fuck him. She gets to hold his hand and see him naked. All of that should have been mine.
It was a lifetime ago. He’s hers now. And, I’m with Paul. But to know that’s who he ended up with, seeing how right they look together, it hurts.
I turn those crazy thoughts off real quick. He’s nothing to me. A summer fling in the burgeoning youth of my womanhood.
I smile up at them as they join us at the table. I can’t believe these seating arrangements. I put it down to
my overactive imagination that I feel sure that it was deliberate.
Joni’s eyes are darting all over the room like she’s taking note of who is watching her and who dares not to.
Remi’s face is tense as he looks everywhere but at me.
He still looks like the quintessential college basketball player. Tall, well-muscled, and lean.
God, his light gray suit fits him like he was sewn into it and I hate that I missed the chance to watch him grow from the very fine eighteen-year-old to the drop-dead gorgeous man who looks like the tall, dark and handsome prince in every single fairy tale I’ve ever read. Right down to the small cleft in his chin.
And yet, inside all of that, wrapped in all of that perfection is the Remi I knew. The one who picked me flowers. The one who drove me out to the country so I could see the stars. The one who kept my journal and read the first stories I ever wrote.
The one who fucking lied to you, Kal.
“Remington, where’s your drink?” Paul shouts
Remi taps his temple and smiles with all of that swagger he drips and says, “I don’t need a single thing to stimulate this mind. I’m high on life, man.”
“Rubbish! Come let’s leave the ladies to it, walk with me,” Paul declares and then lurches out of his chair. He’s a terrible drunk.
Remi eyes him and then seems to decide it’s not worth the trouble to argue with him. He gets up. “Excuse us, ladies.”
I can’t bring myself to look at him.
“Kal, so tell us about your new windfall,” Joni shouts at me across the table, her smile curved vindictively.
I don’t understand how in the world Remi is dating her.
“Windfall?” I ask, attempting to sound bored, but really my stomach is roiling. I don’t want to be here alone with these women. I’ve purged my life of people like them, and I can’t stomach the petty one-upmanship they seem to thrive on.
