by Katy Paige
She huffed, taking his money and slapping his change on the counter. “Weird for a man to see a rom-com all by hisself.”
“Himself.”
“Huh?”
“Himself. It’s weird for a man to see a rom-com all by himself.”
She curled her lip and narrowed her eyes. “That’s what I said.”
School wasn’t in session and he wasn’t her teacher, but Paul was compulsive about correcting children and he was about to try to explain it to her again when his phone blessedly buzzed, interrupting them. He knew it was Holly. He just felt it.
“Himself,” he said again, which elicited another disgusted look from the girl. He rolled his eyes. “Aw, just forget it.”
He fished his phone out of his pocket, but kept himself from looking at the screen, wanting to choose a good seat and get settled before he read Holly’s text and wrote back. The theater was dark and mostly empty, except for a few ladies in the front. Not wanting to appear like a creepy old man sitting by himself in the back row of the theater, Paul chose an aisle seat three rows from the back, sat down and then raised his phone.
It’s me. Are you there?
He smiled at his phone, running his thumb over her words, looking at the 860 area code of her previously unknown phone number and loving that she was suddenly only a phone number away now.
I’m here, he responded. Has yours started yet?
Not yet. Still previews. And hi.
Heya Holly. I’m smiling so wide right now, it’s ridiculous. Thanks for doing this.
Thanks for asking me.
How was your drive? he typed.
Fine. The theater’s only 15 min from my apt. You?
Good. Sunny. The Yellowstone River snakes along by the hwy. Lots of mountains. Makes for a nice ride.
It’s raining here. Perfect day for the movies. My drive wasn’t pretty, though. Just highway I-95. I really don’t like highway driving, but I was running late. I prefer back roads.
Back roads. I haven’t heard that expression in a long time.
You don’t use back roads in Montana?
Not like you do in New England. In NE there are a million ancient back roads you can use to take the scenic route or avoid traffic.
Exactly.
In MT, every route’s the scenic route and there is no traffic.
You really love it there? You don’t miss NE?
I do sometimes. At Thanksgiving and Christmas, mostly. Nobody does Christmas like Maine. That’s why I go home.
And to see your family?
He paused before answering, briefly considering how much he wanted to say.
Finally, he typed “It’s complicated,” but frowned at the words before erasing them. He didn’t want to send up a warning flag about him not liking his family or having problems with them. But the truth is: it was complicated.
Paul was a sixth-generation Johansson and his father’s expectations had always been very clear: Brown undergrad, Harvard Law, then partner in the family law business like his older brothers, Ted and Bennett.
But going into the family law business in Boston wasn’t what Paul wanted. He didn’t want to make that ninety-minute commute every Monday morning, only returning north to Maine on Friday afternoons. Keeping an apartment in the city. The endless hours of work. The cocktails and work dinners that went way too late. The women. He bit the side of his cheek as his father’s face came into focus, swiftly followed by his mother’s. They were still together after forty years, but it wasn’t a happy marriage. Hadn’t ever been a happy marriage.
How in the world could he explain all of that in a text? Why would he even want to? Hey, Holly, here’s a look into my incredibly wealthy, incredibly privileged, incredibly dysfunctional, unhappy family. Want to get to know me better? Yeah, right. What girl wanted that? Especially a girl who had lost her own parents but managed to hold on to strong relationships with her sister and aunt. No. Better that he gloss over it. He’d tell her all about it in nitty-gritty detail some other time.
Of course. To see them too.
Two brothers, right? Local?
Boston.
More local to me than to you, I guess.
His eyes narrowed, thinking of Ted or Bennett finding out about Holly and making a move on her just to spite him.
They’re in Shanghai as far as you’re concerned. And they smell. And have rotten teeth.
LOL!
I love making you smile, Holly.
Ooo! Movie’s starting here. Yours?
Not yet. No spoilers, now, Miss Morgan.
Just then the lights dimmed in Paul’s theater and he slunk back into his seat as the previews started.
Previews just starting, he typed. Then, Hey Holly?
I’m here.
That’s the thing…I wish you really were.
He stared at the screen, but she didn’t text back in the same rhythm they’d established a minute ago. Shoot. Had he gone too far? He waited a good thirty seconds and still no response, but he decided not to take it back or play if off as a joke. A card laid is a card played…and, anyway, he meant every word.
CHAPTER 4
Zoë stared at the little screen.
I wish you really were.
Goose bumps raised on her arm as her heart kicked into a gallop, but she only had a moment to enjoy the rush before guilt took over.
Yeah, right. If you only knew, she thought acidly, self-consciousness broadsiding her. She swore she could feel her scars throbbing.
She knew he was waiting for her to write back—she could sense it—but she didn’t know what to say. Her fingers gripped her phone tightly as she glanced up at the screen where Emma Stone, wearing a white sundress and bare feet, was sitting on an old-fashioned country swing hanging from the branch of an ancient elm tree with her face bathed in sunshine and her light red hair back in a ponytail.
That’s the sort of girl Paul wanted to be sitting next to, not Zoë.
She hadn’t been truthful about highway driving either. It didn’t bother her. It scared the holy hell out of her since the accident. Getting on the highway today for a grand total of eight minutes had made her hands sweat so badly, she’d had to pull over when she got off the exit, breathing deeply and drying off her dripping steering wheel with the hem of her skirt. She should have tried to be more honest, but she’d glossed over it, deciding to give him the lowdown another time.
Ugh, Zoë, she thought. You’re just a big liar, all the way around.
She stared at the words hard: I wish you really were.
Zoë’s heart and head agreed wholeheartedly.
She’d love to be sitting beside him. Unless Paul was grossly misrepresenting himself, he was a catch. Good looking, quietly successful, satisfied with his life, with deep friendships. Returning home a few times a year on a principal’s salary meant that he probably had a strong relationship with his family too.
What girl wouldn’t want that man sitting next to her?
On the flip side, why would a man—an amazing man with everything to recommend himself—be interested in someone with ugly, twisted scars on her face and body? Someone who’d unintentionally, but carelessly, allowed grave injury to befall someone she loved? Someone who had lied about her looks and important details of her life since the moment they’d met?
Zoë shouldn’t be looking for Paul. She should be looking for someone as damaged as she was.
She looked up at the screen and watched Emma, dressed in ’40s-style clothes, fry up eggs and bacon in an old-fashioned kitchen, chatting cheerfully to a basset hound at her feet while a radio played “The Very Thought Of You.”
Her phone vibrated.
Holly? It’s starting.
She stared at the phone screen, thinking for the hundredth time that she should cut bait and let Paul find someone as wonderful as he was.
I didn’t mean to freak you out, Holly. Write back? Please?
Zoë winced at the words. She couldn’t bear for him to t
hink he’d done anything wrong by being honest with her and by speaking from his heart to hers. Still, she couldn’t encourage a train of conversation that veered toward meeting in person either.
No problem! Doesn’t that swing look like heaven? she asked.
Emma reminds me of someone in that white dress.
My hair’s not red.
Yours is like sunshine.
It was. Once. She smiled at her phone, feeling a sudden warmth ignite and establish itself as a low burn in her belly. She took a deep breath and sighed.
You’re sweet, Paul.
You think so?
I do.
She turned her glance back up to the screen where Emma was swing dancing with a redheaded actor wearing a khaki-colored WWII uniform, before kissing him on the cheek and making him sit down for breakfast.
Do you like music from the 1940s? Big band music? she typed.
I do. You?
Very much, she confessed. I used to be a pretty good dancer too.
Used to be? Are your dancing days over? Or are you just looking for a good partner?
She bit her lip at the Glossing Ahead sign on the road in front of her. Again, details for another time.
You volunteering? she demurred.
I’m not a bad dancer. My mother insisted every gentleman should know how to dance. I was forced to take ballroom dancing.
Forced, huh? Sounds like you absolutely loved it! LOL
I didn’t mind. I got to hold hands with Evelyn Berry.
It was absolutely ridiculous that a strong slice of jealousy cut through Zoë, but it was an uncontrolled, visceral reaction. She hated the idea of him holding hands with some other woman. Any other woman. Of any age. At any time. Possessiveness hissed and spat, making her eyes narrow at the little screen in front of her. Her fingers moved like lightning.
Evelyn Berry? Where is she now?
Still somewhere in Maine, I guess. Why?
She better STAY in Maine.
Had she, now?
She had. (If she knows what’s good for her.)
And if she doesn’t?
Oh, Paul. A Maine girl versus a Mystic girl? It’s simply not a fair fight.
Holly!!
Zoë bit her lip and giggled aloud at her boldness. It felt so unusual, sounded so foreign and fine to hear her own voice laughing, it made her breath catch and tears sprang into her eyes. Sitting in a dark movie theater two thousand miles away from the man who meant more to her every day, she wanted to weep. He’d made her giggle. Giggle. It had been months since she giggled spontaneously just because she was happy. It felt so good that her eyes glistened with gratitude she wished she could share with him. Instead she glossed. Again.
Now stop distracting me. I have to figure out what’s going on here. I feel a love triangle brewing. She smiled as she pressed send.
You and me and Evelyn? he asked a moment later.
Bite your tongue.
How about you bite it?
She felt the burning in her stomach catch like fire on kindling and erupt upward past her chest to her shoulders, down her arms to her fingertips, which curled around her phone. Her heart pounded furiously at the suggestive question, feeling she was at a crossroads. Did she engage in a little sexy talk with him or shut it down? She couldn’t very well call them pen pals anymore if she bantered back, but damn it if she couldn’t help herself.
How about I do?
Oh, man, Holly. I REALLY wish you were here.
She shook her head, smiling sadly at the phone before turning it over on her lap and thinking, Me too, Paul. Me too.
***
Paul had absolutely no idea what was going on in the movie. What’s more, he was in total shock about what was going on in his body. His heart was thumping like crazy and all the blood in his head had rushed south as he read her words. He glanced down at the bulge in his lap, wishing it away. She’s a couple thousand miles away, buddy. Stand down.
How had that just happened? How had they gone from chitchat to sizzle? Evelyn Berry. Thank God for Evelyn Berry, about whom he hadn’t given a single thought in at least a decade. Holly had a little playful-jealous streak that was not only adorable, but a complete and total turn-on.
How about I do? Paul groaned softly and shifted in his seat, trying to find a more comfortable position to accommodate his aroused body.
He looked at his phone but she hadn’t written back again. Settling back in his chair to try to catch up with the movie plot, he knew one thing for certain:
He wasn’t going to be able to wait until Christmas to meet his Holly.
***
It turned out to be a pretty good movie, thought Zoë, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
The red-haired man in the beginning was Emma’s brother who went off to fight in WWII. He met another man, played by Ryan Gosling, who became his best friend, but who accidentally killed him during a particularly confusing battle scene. Ryan returns to the states after the war and looks up Emma to explain what happened, but she immediately knows him as her dead brother’s war friend and welcomes him into her life with warm, open arms. He falls so hard for her, he can’t bear to tell her the truth so they fall in love with this huge, terrible secret hanging over his head. And when the truth comes out—
Zoë’s phone buzzed as she made her way out of the theater.
So, what’d you think?
Texting while walking wasn’t Zoë’s forte, so she crossed the wet street quickly and ducked into Starbucks. She considered having a salted caramel latte, her favorite, but decided to have a less-fattening cup of regular coffee instead. She sat down at a small bistro table by the windows, which ran with rivulets of rain and made her feel very warm and cozy inside.
Stopped in at Starbucks. Raining cats and dogs here. I liked it. You?
It was good. Thank God the colonel confessed it was his gunshot that killed the brother. I was really squirming over his deception.
Reading this, Zoë flinched. Another reminder that she was lying to Paul. She shoved the feeling aside. It had been such a wonderful night; she wasn’t going to ruin it with self-recrimination. She could beat herself up later.
I know. I was worried too…like, That’s IT? You two BELONG together!
Sucker for a happy ending, Miss Morgan?
Absolutely. No question. No apologies.
Speaking of questions, can I ask one?
Sure. Anything.
I know it’s about 8:30 there and it’ll be almost 10:00 by the time I get home, but…
What?
Could I call you? When I get home?
Her breath caught and she took a careful sip of her steaming hot coffee then stared at the screen until her eyes started to burn.
She should write back no. She had already crossed a line by letting their conversation this afternoon hurtle over flirty into sexy. If she intended to let this go, now was the moment. This was the time to say No, Paul. No. You’re terrific, but you deserve someone better than me. I’m not who you think I am.
Wasn’t that the right thing to do? Wasn’t it?
It might have been the right thing to do at some point, she suddenly realized. But that point had passed.
Zoë wanted Paul.
She wanted him more than she’d wanted anything for two long, cold, sad years. She wanted Paul more than she needed to be a good person. She had no idea how to make sense of her and Paul, but she was very sure of one thing: saying no at this point was simply impossible, so she needed to make her peace with it.
I’ll be waiting, she typed, tucking her phone back in her bag and trying to ignore the confusing feelings in her heart.
***
Paul was lucky he didn’t get into an accident, driving like a maniac, well over the speed limit, to get home and call Holly. He parked his car in his gravel driveway and hustled up the stairs of his front porch, unlocking the door of the four-bedroom stone and clapboard house he had purchased when he moved to Gar
diner. It was easily one of the most expensive houses in town—in fact, prior to Paul’s purchase, it had functioned as the Yellowstone View bed-and-breakfast—but it was within means for Paul, whose trust fund tidily covered the expense. He knew he didn’t need the extra three bedrooms, but when he moved to Gardiner, he intended to stay there, and he still hoped to one day have little bodies populating those other three bedrooms. Someday.
The thing about it, though, was that even though he liked his house, it had never felt like a real home. The truth is that Paul had always lived in houses—large, proper, professionally-decorated houses with beautiful furnishings, devoid of warmth, focused on status and wealth and the importance of things. Even now, in the house he’d bought for himself, he didn’t feel like he was home. He felt like he owned a house that covered his head and offered a place to bathe and sleep. He’d done precious little to personalize the house after buying it, and any warmth that it had was a remnant of the previous owners who left just about all of the furniture…and hokey, western-themed decorations…and Cleo.
Cleo, a Yorkshire terrier deeply attached to the old B&B, was a contingency of the original sale: You buy the house, Cleo comes with it.
On cue, she trotted into the room, putting her little paws on his front leg and panting in excitement. She had been four years old when he purchased the house and the owners had stipulated that Cleo came with the house. No Cleo? No sale. They were moving to a retirement home in Florida that wouldn’t accept pets.
While Paul wasn’t real fond of tiny, yappy dogs, he had wanted the house, which had a strange New England feel to it, so he’d agreed to let Cleo stay on. She was a gentle, affectionate little thing and had worked herself into his heart, keeping him company on cold nights, curled up by his feet.
Running into the house, he settled down on the couch in the front room, catching his breath. Glancing at his watch, he found it was 7:35 p.m.; 9:35 her time. He could call whenever he wanted to.
“Whaddaya think? Should I call Holly? Huh?” he asked the little dog who looked up at him adoringly, wagging her tail.
Practically humming with excitement and nervous energy, he headed into the kitchen and poured himself a glass of iced tea. Then he opened the sliding door to a back deck that had a good view of Electric Peak in the distance.
