Somebody Else (Somebody, Nobody Duet Book 1)

by Jaxson Kidman

  I should have just come to talk to you no matter what. It feels a little backwards here getting your email off the soccer list and doing this. But I can’t imagine a world where I have a chance to talk to you and I don’t take advantage of it. Just to say hey. Just to let you know I’m alive. Just to let you know I’m always thinking about you.

  It’s amazing the ride life takes us on, isn’t it? One second you’re sitting there, having coffee in the morning sun, the world waiting for you to wake up and chase after it. Then the next second, the world seems to roll right over you. Leaving pieces of the coffee mug shattered on the ground.

  That was kind of deep for a quick hello email, huh?

  I’m not going to lie to you, Kins, it took me a little while to actually write this email. And I had a little help from a bottle.

  It was worth it. Just to type these words and sleep tonight knowing there’s a chance you might be reading them. And I know there’s a greater chance that you might not read this at all. Which I completely understand.

  I just want you to know that you look as beautiful as the day I met you, Kins. I now have two snapshots of you in my mind and my heart. The day I fell in love with you and what I saw today. The then and the now. And that’s okay with me.

  Sleep easy…

  Brice

  I closed the email and put my phone down on my nightstand. I slowly inched my way down the bed until my head rested on the pillow. The words were already locked into my mind as though I had studied them for weeks.

  It was really him. It was really Brice. And of all things, he’d found my email through the dumb soccer stuff because I helped Linda with Paige. And he thought Paige was my daughter. Logic should have told him that that was damn near impossible. Not unless he and I split and I went and got pregnant like right away.

  Did he think that?

  And wait a second…

  I was at the soccer field because of Paige. If he was at the soccer field, that meant he was there with a kid.

  Did Brice have a kid? A family? A wife? A…

  I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head.

  The questions were useless. Unless I asked Brice directly.

  My fingertips tingled with the temptation to write back to him. Just a quick, friendly email back. Just to say that I saw his email and I appreciated him reaching out. I could build up my life as quiet, calm, perfect. After everything Brice and I went through… there would always be a connection. A piece of forever was tattooed on our hearts.

  I caught myself sliding my right hand down my body. For a variety reasons, to be honest. Just the thought of Brice staring at me the way he used to. Picking out every little feature about me. Finding ways to make me gush and have butterflies like nobody else had ever come close to. The way I could still hear his voice in my head as though he were next to me reading the email. It made me tingle and made my toes curl. It was more than what it should have been. I wanted to feel guilty, considering I was next to Ben in bed.

  My hand stopped on my stomach and went no further. I wasn’t going to go down that road.

  But stopping on my stomach did something else. I slowly began to lift my shirt. My fingertips touched the soft, warm skin of my belly. I felt the doughy ridges that made up the scar on my stomach.

  A lonely tear escaped from my eye.

  Brice promised me I would forever be beautiful in his eyes. And that the scar would make sure we would never forget how great love and loss could be in the same breath. Because we weren’t supposed to lose each other too.

  But we did.

  And I was the one with the obvious reminder of it all.

  The pitch-black cat with marble green eyes arched her back and looked like a Halloween decoration. She stared at me, judging me. I often wondered if animals had a better sense of humans than we really knew. Meaning, did this cat know about the email from Brice? Did this cat know that I sat at the counter this morning with a bowl of cereal, reading the email so many times that the cereal got so soggy that I just dumped it down the drain and stopped at a drive-thru for a quick and unhealthy breakfast?

  “I’ve never seen her do this with a stranger.”

  I looked at Maria and smiled. “Just a little patience and coaxing. That’s all. Cats are very smart. They take time to build trust.”

  “Well, she’s always hissed and clawed at everyone. Carrie is very picky.”

  “What a great name, too,” I said as I gently rubbed my hand along the arched back of the cat. “Carrie. I love that for a cat.”

  “How is she though?”

  “She’s fourteen, right?”

  Maria nodded.

  “She’s healthy,” I said. “Everything looks great. As long as you don’t notice anything unusual, I wouldn’t worry about her age. I’ve seen cats live to be twenty and still run around like they’ve got all nine lives left to spend.”

  “That’s a relief,” she said. “She had a UTI not too long ago and that scared me. She would go into the bathtub… and bleed.”

  “Again, cats are smart,” I said. “She knew that going into the litter box wouldn’t get your attention. Right, Carrie?”

  I looked down at the pretty green eyes of the cat. Carrie began to purr and slowly turned.

  “I’m glad I found you, Dr. Anderson.”

  “Kinsley,” I said.

  “Oh, I thought your last name was Anderson.”

  “It is. My first name is Kinsley. Just call me that.”

  “Your name is beautiful.”

  I laughed. “Thank you. Do you have any questions for me?”

  “I don’t think so. I’m just happy she’s healthy.”

  “Well, it was a pleasure meeting you, Maria. And Carrie. You can check out out front with Deb and if you need anything, let me know. If you take a card, I have an emergency email that I try to check at night.”

  “That’s wonderful. Thank you.”

  Maria coaxed Carrie back into her crate and I exited the exam room to the back of the building. I went right for my office, which was more of a storage closet than anything else. But still, it was my office. At my vet practice. Living out a sliver of a dream of helping animals.

  I sat behind my desk and went right for my phone. There was a fleeting second when I thought about texting Ben to ask how his day was going. But I knew better. He didn’t answer personal texts or calls during work hours. Unless it was a dire emergency. He was laser focused on work with the intention of not bringing it home. Even though he did. But then again, who didn’t bring their work home with them?

  I opened the email from Brice again.

  Believe me, I had it memorized by then. Which meant my eyes just scanned the email. My brain and heart were having a meeting somewhere in the back of my throat, debating on my next move with this.

  The way the email made me feel…

  It seemed wrong to just ignore it. Yeah, things didn’t end perfectly between myself and Brice. But that wasn’t just on him. That was on both of us. We imploded and then somehow exploded.

  My phone touched the arrow that prompted me to either reply, forward, or print the email. I touched reply and a new box opened.

  To Brice

  From Kinsley

  NO SUBJECT

  The cursor blinked like a timer counting the seconds.

  Ignoring the email meant carrying on with my new, perfect, hidden life.

  Answering the email would change everything.

  My office door opened with a knock, the way Deb always did it.

  Her happy smiling face and big, black glasses appeared around the half open door. Her jet-black hair with one purple streak was pulled back in a messy bun.

  “Hey, Kinsley,” she said. “Everything okay?”

  “Perfect,” I said. “Why?”

  “You have an appointment waiting.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Right. I must’ve looked at the wrong date or something. Shoot. I’ll be right there.”

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Deb
asked. “You look distracted today.”

  “I didn’t sleep great.”

  Actually, Deb, I haven’t slept great in days. Not since I got this random email from the man I was supposed to marry and have a family with…

  “I’ll go on a coffee run. Is that okay?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Perfect. Thanks.”

  I stood up and put my phone down. But I didn’t close the email.

  Face it… from the second I saw Brice’s name, I knew I was going to reply.

  6

  A Fighter’s Heart

  Brice

  I rewired two ceiling fans at the bar and I was suddenly dubbed a handyman. The bar had enough work that needed to be done to employ a contractor full time, but Lucky went and ran his mouth to people in town and suddenly, I had side projects to work on, if I wanted to. Obviously, there were things I refused to do or couldn’t legally do without permits and licenses, but honestly, waking up every day and wondering what the hell I was going to do to kill time had run its course. I could rake leaves, but when you lived around a million trees, it was pointless to do. I had chopped up enough firewood to last me ten winters. I checked my phone so many times throughout the day, I ended up killing the battery faster than I thought possible.

  I knew how many days and minutes and all that shit since I sent the email.

  The version of myself from years ago, when I first met Kinsley, expected her to email right back. Just like the nights I’d stand outside her bedroom window, throwing rocks until I woke her up. Seeing her beautiful face poking out of the window, half pissed that I woke her up. How fast she was to sneak out of the house so we could go to Davis’s field and lie there under the stars. Holding hands. Tempting each other for more. The sticky summer nights. The cool fall early mornings. That first hint of spring after a lonely winter.

  It fucking crushed me that she never wrote back.

  The now version of myself knew this was the reality. There was no reason to respond to my email. No reason to talk to me. What happened was done. Our connection was somewhere else, depending on what you believed. Not that I was a guy raised going to church or any of that, but to imagine my only daughter just being gone… no way. She was somewhere. Maybe still only one minute old, trapped in that moment. Or maybe she grew with the passing time wherever she was.

  Either way, it was hard to think about. It pissed me off to imagine what could have been and what really was.

  I gripped the steering wheel of my truck tightly and gritted my teeth. Sometimes that was the only way to keep the intense pain and anger at bay.

  I was following Lucky’s nephew to Miss Herman’s house. My life had now become trying to help her get her cable box working. Apparently, if being known as a handyman wasn’t enough, word got out that I had owned a marketing business for a little while, which suddenly made me known as a tech guy.

  Not that I minded. I had no real plans on what I was doing in town or in life for that matter. I wanted to be close to Milo. I wanted to help April. From there, the water was murky. And thanks to Kinsley ignoring me, now it was even worse.

  I pulled into a steep driveway and parked my truck.

  I looked at the small cape cod and smiled. It was a tiny powder blue house that looked cozy as hell.

  It reminded me of my grandmother’s house for some reason. The color of it did. The giant stoop that led to the front door. The green bushes with little red berries on them. As a kid, there was a trick where you’d pick them off and gently squeeze them to make them gooey. Then you’d throw them as hard as you could so they’d splat on someone’s clothes or face. I used to throw them at cars until some guy stopped and threatened to beat my ass. What did I do? I threw one right at him through the open car window. He chased me for twenty minutes before giving up. I ended up hiding in a ditch way back in the woods and stayed there for hours, catching my breath, panicked, laughing my ass off.

  I used to take Kinsley to that same secret ditch too. There were some serious memories lingering around there. Some firsts experienced that Mother Nature oversaw.

  “Hell of a driveway here, Murphy,” I said to Lucky’s nephew.

  He was a good six inches shorter than me with a big round belly. He had a bright neon green shirt on with a construction logo on the left breast.

  He adjusted his hat. “I take care of the snow for her in the winter. It’s a pain in the ass.”

  “I bet,” I said.

  Murphy hobbled his way to the back door and knocked so hard, the door almost bounced off its hinges.

  “She’s hard of hearing,” he said. “Ninety-five will do that to you.”

  “Good for her,” I said. “And the cable isn’t working?”

  “She was probably cleaning and bumped a button or wire,” Murphy said shrugging his shoulders. “You didn’t have to come out.”

  “I have nothing else to do right now,” I said. “Idle hands, man…”

  “I hear that,” he said.

  The door opened and there stood a tiny elderly woman with bright white hair and a worried look on her face.

  “Margie,” Murphy bellowed. “It’s Murphy.”

  “Of course,” she screeched in a weak voice. “Look at you. Didn’t recognize you in your uniform. Who’s your friend here?”

  Margie looked right at me. Eyes squinting. Looking like a snake ready to attack.

  “This is Brice,” Murphy said.

  “Rice?”

  “Brice. With a B.”

  “Oh,” Margie said.

  “It’s nice to meet you, ma’am,” I said. “Lucky mentioned your cable was out.”

  “Are you from the cable company? You’d better not charge me for this.”

  “No, I’m not from the cable company,” I said.

  “He’s a fancy pants guy,” Murphy said. “With computers.”

  “Oh,” Margie said. She squinted harder. “You don’t look like a geek.”

  I laughed. “I’m far from it, ma’am.”

  “How tall are you?” she asked. “Six foot…”

  “Four,” I said.

  “You look built to be a boxer,” she said showing a fist. “And all those tattoos. My husband had tattoos like that. Never cared for them.”

  “Yeah, they don’t wash off, do they?” I asked.

  Margie smiled. “Well, come on in. I’m hoping I don’t miss any of my shows.”

  I broke through Margie’s hard shell and walked through the house. It was a shrine to thirty years ago complete with the smell of mothballs and last night’s dinner. The shag carpeting had red, orange and brown colors mixed together looking like the trees outside. Everything screamed old and everything smelled dusty.

  It took me about ten minutes to fix the wires that Margie swore she never touched, even after admitting that she may have unplugged a few to clean them.

  She was sweetheart of a woman and the kicker was when she tried giving both me and Murphy a five dollar bill each.

  “Go get a beer on me,” she insisted, forcing the crisp bill into my hand.

  “I work at the bar, ma’am,” I said.

  “Margie. You call me Margie now.”

  “I’ll do that if you take the money back,” I said.

  She smiled. “I think I like you. If I was sixty years younger… oh my…”

  “You’re going to make me blush,” I said.

  “A man your size doesn’t blush,” she said.

  I laughed and managed to sneak out of the house without taking the money.

  That killed all of an hour of my day.

  I decided to just head back home and find something else to do to kill time.

  I parked my truck just outside the cabin and stared for a minute.

  On an addictive whim, I checked my phone, just in case.

  I was getting tired of just in case. Almost to the point where I almost wished I hadn’t seen Kinsley or wrote to her.

  Then something popped up on my screen.

  An email.

 
; A reply.

  With no subject.

  Just our names.

  Kinsley to Brice.

  I can’t believe I’m writing an email to you right now. I’m sorry it took me so long to respond. I’m sure you can imagine how surprised I was to see your name. Funny story, I was actually outside looking at the stars when I saw your email come through. Don’t ask. That’s just me being me. Trying to figure out what stars were connected to make shapes and all that. I dropped my phone onto the grass when I realized it was you.

  It’s amazing how fast time goes by sometimes, isn’t it? Yet if I still try really hard, I can feel the sun on that little covered back porch. Warming up, shivering, and sipping coffee like nothing else in the world mattered.

  Look at me, already trying to talk about memories.

  That’s not why you emailed me.

  I’m actually not really sure why you emailed me. Or how this even happened. What you thought you saw wasn’t true, Brice. I’m not some ‘soccer mom’ or anything like that. The girl I was there with is named Paige. She’s my neighbor’s daughter. Well, I guess I consider Linda more of a friend by now after getting to know her over the last couple of years since we moved into our house. Linda had to work late, and Paige had a soccer tryout. So I offered to help her out. That’s why I was there. I guess that means I won’t be there anymore. I’m not sure if Paige will use that same field again, and even if she does, it’s not my responsibility.

  Wow, this feels weird right now… sort of comfortable.

  I don’t have a daughter. Or a son. I don’t even have any pets, which is probably strange because I always thought that as soon as I was ‘grown up’ I’d have a house full of animals. I’m laughing in my mind as I think that, because you used to think it would be like that Ace Ventura movie with me opening my arms and everything from dogs to lizards would come to greet me at the end of a long day.