by Brea Viragh
Utterly clueless, I had no way to brace myself against his charms. How could I have gone through all these years of knowing him and not seen this key component to our dynamic?
I’d thought I was ready for him. I’d decided, no matter what August threw at me conversation-wise, I would parry and see my way through to the end of the aisle, bouquet in hand.
I was engaged. I had Duncan to consider, after all, and August and I were best friends from childhood—still were, despite the unfortunate five-year lapse. I now realized that just getting back on his good side wasn’t enough.
I should put a stop to this insanity. Now.
Instead I threw caution to the wind. And kissed him back.
CHAPTER TEN
My head spun. I felt like I was riding one of those out of control carnival rides, dipping up and down before abruptly halting and revolving in the reverse direction. Whirling until your stomach flips and exhilaration threatens to choke you.
His lips continued to massage mine with the feverish excitement of a first kiss. If I closed my eyes and focused solely on the feeling, on the delicious wonder of it, I could almost forget this was August.
Almost.
Hands traveled the length of my back before settling on my hips. My own fingers worked along the sides of his neck, the planes of those strong shoulders and sturdy form. Breath caught in my throat as my lungs struggled to work double-time. Frantic and pulsing, my body responded even as my conscience screamed.
“Isabel...”
My name again, said with heat and yearning.
I moaned. Almost sick with wanting him.
Oh no. Sick! The thought of Duncan lying at home in bed with the flu was a bucket of cold water. My mind snapped back into place and I was acutely aware of what I was doing. What we were doing together. At once the world stopped spinning and I knew I’d come too close to drowning.
A cool breeze passed between us when I pulled back, staring at August, his cheeks flushed and eyes dark with desire.
“Oh my God!”
I slapped my hands on his chest and took a step back, crunching over meadow grass. “You need to stop! Right now! This is a mistake.” As if you weren’t party to it too…
August moved with me and kept his palms on my skin, stroking up my back. “Maybe.”
“Maybe?” My voice rose to a glass-shattering pitch, and surely dogs across the county howled at the sound. “You said…you told me it was a dream.”
“Haven’t you ever heard the saying to be careful what you wish for?” He reached up, the pad of his thumb moving over my cheek. “I never thought it could be like this.”
“No. No, no.” I shook my head until a headache blossomed to life, still slapping at him with less force than exertion. August stared at me for a long moment without speaking.
I would be lying if I said I had never thought about what it would be like to kiss August. I was a human being after all. In those dark times when being single seemed like the worst condition in the world, I’d sit on my bed and imagine filling the gaping hole in my life with someone stable and dependable. Someone I knew would always be there for me.
Someone like August.
But it wasn’t fine for him to take advantage of me in the dead of night—or for me to let him. For me to want it as well. Poor Duncan. If he ever found out, he would be devastated. I felt horrible as my heart sunk to my feet.
“Isabel, I...” At last August removed his hands from my overheated skin and stepped away. “Look, I’m sorry.”
I sucked air into my lungs as though I’d found room to breathe again. The sudden drop in temperature made my hair stand on end and there was a low ringing in my ears. Crickets still sang out their tune as they had moments earlier, and frogs continued their serenade near the steam. The world was oblivious to my inner turmoil.
Everything remained the same, though my stomach roiled and the sick feeling of sudden change manifested itself in a slow fire sizzling through my veins. I didn’t mind variation, but this took things a step too far.
What just happened?
“You’re s-sorry?” I sputtered. “None of that felt apologetic to me. In fact, quite the opposite. It felt pent-up. Spur of the moment. Explosive, if I’m being honest.”
He sighed. “I’m just…I’m stressed out.” August glanced back at the house. “I shouldn’t have kissed you and I realized my mistake the moment it happened. It was nothing but stress.”
I shuddered at the words. “You’re damn right you shouldn’t have.” Should have. Wanted to. My mind spun in circles like an animal chasing its tail. Unable to grasp a single thing in the mire of my thoughts, I threw up my hands. “This is messed up.”
Shadows danced slowly around us under the light of the moon and I focused on the clouds floating across the horizon. I had to concentrate on anything besides August, whose presence blocked out everything else and drew me forward. Like a stupid moth toward a damn flame.
“August McKenney, you stop it,” I blurted out.
He chortled and the sound made me want to slap him. “I’m not doing anything. I’m standing here minding my own business.”
“I’m going to chalk the kiss up to stress. Nothing more and nothing less.”
I spoke more to myself than to him now, my feet carrying me into the edge of the dark woods and back out again. Twigs snapped underfoot, loud as the crack of gunshots in the quiet. I shook my hands as though trying to fling something off of them. “There’s too much energy in the air, and you…you lost your mind for a moment…”
“Will you stop running back and forth? You’re going to make me dizzy.”
I glanced back at him, standing there, a fairy prince bathed in moonlight. No, I thought with a vehement shake of my head. He looked like a man who’d overstepped his boundaries. Chastened, yes, but infinitely pleased with himself.
“Stress,” I repeated. “Nothing but stress.”
“Yes, I said that already.”
“I’m going back inside. I’m going to finish my meal and forget any of this ever happened.”
He spread his hands wide. “Consider it erased. I am sorry.”
“No.” I cut him off with a shaking finger. “You can’t be sorry for nothing. Nothing happened.” I marched back in the direction we’d come, still feeling a tingle on my lips. A ghost of a memory. “Nothing happened!”
His footfalls sounded behind me as we navigated the winding path we’d made, reversing through knee-high meadow grass. I hurried forward to escape the dream.
“You’re right, Iz. Nothing happened. I am ready to forget about everything that did not happen and get back to the madhouse.” August laughed with a touch of hysteria. I couldn’t tell which. “It’s been a crazy night.”
Soon the house lights grew in strength until they brought us into their wide circle of illumination. I wiped my mouth and turned to August a final time.
“Never again,” I demanded.
“Agreed.”
“I mean it, Augie.” When I used his childhood nickname, he knew I meant business. “Understood?”
“I understand, Izzy,” he fired back. “I’m going to stop apologizing for nothing,” air quotations, “and get back to normal.” He held his hand out. “Friends?”
I stared, imagining those fingers morphing to tentacles ready to drag me back into the depths of depravity.
Instead of shaking his hand, I smacked his fingers. “Put those things away and let’s go inside. I didn’t finish my food and I don’t want the roast to go to waste. Your mother went to a great amount of trouble to prepare the meal and I won’t have her think I’m not appreciative.”
August held the door open and I stepped through muttering to myself. “I need to take some home for Duncan. He’ll be disappointed if I don’t bring something back with me.”
“It’s a shame he couldn’t come tonight. I hope he feels better,” August supplied.
I shot him a pointed look over my shoulder. “Do you?”
Ha
lf of me wondered if things would have been different if my fiancé weren’t sick, if he had been able to come to dinner. The other half reminded me, in a tiny but authoritative voice, how everything happened for a reason.
“You two were out there for a long time,” Randolph remarked the moment we made it back to the table.
“Leave the kids alone.”
“We weren’t doing anything!”
Jennifer and I spoke at the same time, my response drawing a questioning look.
I blew a raspberry to cover my rising flush. “I wanted to walk out to the woods and look at the fireflies.” I sat down and drew the napkin over my lap. “I never saw them in California.”
Randolph turned to his son before addressing his own meal. “I hope you had fun and kept an eye out for bears. We’ve had a few sightings over the last month and I don’t want anyone getting attacked.”
Where was he five minutes ago?
“No bears,” August said. “I made sure to watch for teeth and claws.”
Gaze focused down, I tried not to inject innuendo into everything he said.
I wolfed down the rest of my dinner with enough speed to make a normal person sick. Meat and potatoes the texture of wet cardboard ground between my teeth before dropping into the pit of my stomach. Nothing like nearly cheating to ruin the best of meals.
Randolph and Jennifer continued to quarrel with each other long after August and I had returned. It was an almost pedestrian power struggle, normal to those who engaged in it on a regular basis. I wondered if I stared into a mirror of the future whether—I’d speculated so long ago—Duncan and I were scheduled to expire like the ill-fated McKenneys.
I focused on my plate until those little dancing lords and ladies were given room for their revelry. One bite at a time until the pattern was uncovered. On any other day I’d have been proud of my gluttonous accomplishment. Now I bordered on ill.
The instant the last bite hit my stomach I was on my feet with sincere thanks and sweet excuses flowing toward my hosts. There were things to do and a sick man at home. A busy day of work tomorrow and lots of consultations with the contractor. I told them anything I could think of to get me out of there faster.
Strict elders used to beat children for eating and leaving, the kind of rude behavior one learned not to do early on. However, given the situation, there was no way to stay without making a complete ass of myself.
Culpability be damned as I added this onto the pile of things I already blamed myself for. I seemed to be adding fuel to the fire daily. If nothing changed then I’d drive myself into an early grave with my mistakes.
“I am sorry but I really do need to leave.” I pointed at my wrist and the watch I did not wear.
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay for a little longer? I made chocolate mousse the way you like,” Jennifer offered. “Light and sweet.”
Like your son’s kisses.
“No, honestly, thank you.” I managed to croak out a final round of farewells.
Randolph drew me close in a hug until my head pressed against his chest. “Don’t be a stranger, now,” he told me. “You come over and see me any time you want. August will give you my address.”
I clung to him for a moment longer, blinking away tears. “Thank you. I would like that.”
August offered to walk me out to my car. It was the right thing to do, though the part of me still howling against the kiss wanted to tell him to shove it. The rest of me was numb.
I declined his offer.
If his parents found anything odd about my behavior, neither one commented. I received a healthy container of leftovers to take to Duncan and enough kisses on my cheeks to leave bruises.
No matter what happened, no matter what I said, I knew Randolph and Jennifer McKenney were two people who cared and always had. People might gossip about their family dynamics, but the two came together for their son and did everything parents should do—as long as one excused their constant arguments. They had watched me grow from a little sprout to a full-grown woman with her own stresses and mental insecurities.
If only they knew the half of it.
I tripped over my own feet and stumbled on my way out the front door, almost tossing the Tupperware container against the wall in a struggle for balance. My shin knocked against the antique side table and I limped out to the car. I would have a bruise there in the morning and it served me right. I deserved a thousand more like it for what I had done.
The beep from the key fob steadied me, as did the familiar smell of the interior, a combination of pine air freshener and stale french fries from the fast food bags I sometimes tossed in the back seat instead of disposing of properly. Sorry to say, there were more important things to think about besides cleaning out the car. Like how to hide my tiny indiscretion from Duncan.
I took a minute behind the wheel with hands at the traditional ten and two positions as I willed my heart to be steady. It pounded against the confines of my chest, threatening to burst, though I’m not sure whether from cold dread or disbelief. Crazy hearts…they never listen to reason. They blaze ahead doing whatever the hell they wanted and ignoring the consequences.
August kissed me.
My Augie, the kid who kept the training wheels on his bicycle until he was seven because I still had mine and he didn’t want to leave me behind. The teen who took time to help me with my algebra homework even though it put him behind with his own and he received a tongue-lashing from the teacher.
No, this was a bad time to think about tongues. Or any other body part able to slip into a person. So effortlessly, as though time didn’t exist around the two of us. There was only the slide of flesh on flesh. Tasting…
My body warmed at the memory of those hands on me and my stomach threatened to revolt, although it was hard to say which won out in the end.
Glancing back at the farmhouse, I saw shapes moving behind the curtains. I’d been sitting there too long and had them worried for my health. Little did they realize I’d lost my sanity long ago.
I stared at myself hard in the rearview mirror, the pale skin of my neck in stark contrast to the rosy glow dotting my cheeks. “You’re not permitted a rosy glow!” I screeched at the reflection. “Not unless it’s for Duncan.”
The key turned in the ignition and I threw the car into reverse and almost backed into a garden shed.
“It’s all for Duncan, it’s all for Duncan,” I repeated like a mantra.
It would do no good to bring this up with him, I decided. Everyone was allowed an itty-bitty mistake here and there, and I’d been taken by surprise. That was all. So it hadn’t really been my fault, not even when I kissed August back. It counted as a true transgression maybe by a hair's breadth. Maybe.
My fingers drummed on the steering wheel while I navigated the streets.
Nothing good ever came from worrying about things you can’t change, I reminded myself. In the morning everything would be new, and the unfortunate incident, as I was now calling it, would be in the past.
I hoped.
**
Four days later, and with no word from August, Duncan was back on his feet and determined to go to work. The sun outside shone with a potency guaranteed to cause skin cancer. I peered longingly out at the weather, knowing I wouldn’t be able to enjoy any of it with my long shift.
“I’m fine,” he maintained as I helped him with his tie. “A little woozy but at least I sit behind a desk. Nothing strenuous about office work unless you count the disgruntled phone calls, and I learned a long time ago how to handle those.”
I straightened the knot and gave him a pat on the cheek. I was proud of myself for not bringing August up once. Go me!
“True, but you know how I worry. I don’t want you overdoing it and being back in bed another four days.”
“I know you worry. You’ve been doting on me. It’s appreciated, if a little much.” Duncan shrugged into his custom-made jacket before peering intently at it and wiping a fleck of dust fr
om the lapel.
“Are you sure you feel well enough to go back to work?” I asked for the umpteenth time. My thumb went to my mouth and my teeth worked the shredded cuticle.
Duncan shot me a look over his shoulder before walking to the full-length mirror on the hotel door. “Stop asking. I’m a grown man capable of knowing what I can and cannot handle. Now, two questions.” He held up a finger. “One, do I still look handsome in this suit? I’ve lost some weight from not eating or working out.”
“You look sexy, honey. Very macho.”
“Thanks. And two, do we still have those leftovers?” Duncan puffed out his chest and checked his reflection in the mirror.
I jumped a little at the mention of anything connected to August. “No, we finished them off yesterday. I made you turkey and provolone to take instead.”
Duncan made a face. “It will have to do, I suppose. At least it’s protein.” He crossed back to me, putting his hands gently on my cheeks. “Stop being so jittery,” he soothed. “I’ll be fine.”
“I worry.”
“I know you do. Focus on something else. Go over to the house today and check on the progress. It might lift your spirits.”
“Or send them diving into the depths of despair. It depends on how much they got done.”
We hadn’t heard a word from Hank on the progress of the kitchen, although I felt confident it would be nowhere near completion. Things in my life had a habit of stalling. Or failing to even get off the ground, if I considered my career in music.
I took hold of Duncan’s hands as he made to move away. “I’ve been thinking.”
“About what?” He schooled his face into the mask of a patient man when I saw his desire to leave. Never before had I seen a man so willing to be at work on time.
“The wedding. I’ve been giving it a lot of consideration lately, and…” I took a breath. “…I want to move the date up.”
“You do?”
I did? Where did that desire come from?
I nodded vehemently. “Yes, I do. I was thinking about next month.”
