momentum

2007

Danny was her best friend, her confidant, her older brother. He was funny and smart and handsome, with an infectious laugh and a dirty sense of humor. He wanted to be a famous photographer and always carried his camera with him wherever he went in hopes of catching the perfect shot. He listened to old rock bands and drove a beat up Thunderbird with the windows rolled down because they were broken and couldn’t be rolled back up.

Claire called him in the middle of the night to cry and he listened. He ranted about his latest breakup with every passing, horrible girlfriend and she nodded and hugged him in sympathy. He made her laugh, made her feel perfect and beautiful, as though she could take on the world. He was her strength, her support.

She adored him.

They had met at school, in English class. He was three years older than she was at twenty-three, having put off completing his general education classes until it was absolutely necessary. They were friends right from the start and at first Claire had a mild crush on him, thinking him daring and sexy. Danny was a bit of an idiot, in school and when it came to women; he always found the women who were the absolute worst for him, who stole his heart and promptly tossed it to the ground, crushing it beneath their sharp high-heeled shoes.

It happened that today Danny was ranting about his most recently ex’d-girlfriend, whom he had split up with earlier in the morning. They were lying companionably side by side on Claire’s bed, arms folded under their heads.

“Caught her on the pool table, with some guy I’d never seen before,” he was saying darkly, glowering at the ceiling above them.

“Were they … you know …?” Claire asked carefully, her eyes wide with morbid curiosity. Danny glanced quickly at her and almost smiled.

“Might as well have been, the state they were in,” he answered grimly. Apparently the girl, Tanya, had arranged for Danny and herself to go to the movies that afternoon. Either she had lost track of the time or she’d forgotten their date, but she hadn’t heard Danny’s knock on her apartment door, nor had she remembered to lock it. Stepping inside, Danny had been greeted by the sight of a half-naked Tanya being embraced by a half-naked stranger.

“Mm, this must be that part of the day when I look like an idiot,” he’d said, gazing coolly at them both. “But boy do I look forward to it. Tell me, Tanya, because I must have forgotten, when did we break up?”

He’d hardly been surprised; he was a string of bad habits on his own. He drank, he smoked, he lied, he dated slutty women, he dated women with husbands and boyfriends, he put off going back to school, he was always late paying his bills, he never apologized for anything. It should only be right that he was followed by a string of bad girlfriends.

“Well … shit.” Claire frowned. “I’m sorry, Danny.”

Danny shrugged nonchalantly.

“Not like it was that big of a deal,” he said. “She was kind of cute, liked to laugh. I mean, we never really did have much in common. Went to movies together and that was about it.”

At this, Claire sat up, propping herself up on one elbow and narrowing her eyes at him.

“Danny, don’t you want to fall in love?”

Danny started at the question; his eyebrows shot up and he looked so comically surprised that Claire laughed aloud. He glared at her until her giggled ceased and she was silent once more.

“Not sure if I can, babe,” he said lightly, careful not to meet her eyes.

“That’s stupid. Of course you can.” Claire fell back, grinning, resting her head on her fluffy white pillow. One of Danny’s hands lay across his chest; she grabbed it and squeezed it tightly. “You just never try!”

Danny said nothing; turning their gazes back to the boring, flat white ceiling above them, they lay still, their fingers laced together loosely.

Claire’s ceiling did not have swirls or patterns or bumps in it, but was instead very smooth, very plain, and very boring. Claire gazed up at it, Danny beside her, holding her hand, and smiled secretly to herself, curling her fingers around his. How many days had they spent this same way, doing nothing but talking under the endless white ceiling?

The day was warm, sunny and bright, with the peaceful laziness of all summer days when school is out. Claire had left her bedroom windows open and a faint breeze flitted about the room, rifling papers, gently nudging a pen off her desk.

“I do try, though.”

Danny’s voice was quiet, hardly above a whisper. Claire slowly turned her head to look at him.

He was slightly taller than her 5’4’’, and he gazed at her steadily with stormy blue eyes, the color of the sea just before the rain. Something flickered in the depths of his eyes, something Claire refused to admit she even saw. She blinked and the spell passed; he laughed shakily and turned away.

“What?” Claire demanded, lifting an eyebrow. She sat up on the bed, legs folded, her head tilted to one side as she studied him.

“It’s nothing,” Danny answered. He grinned at her, turning over and lying on his stomach, squinting at her through narrowed eyes.

“Obviously not,” she retorted, slapping him lightly on the back. “Tell me!”

“It’s stupid,” Danny mumbled, sighing deeply.

“I won’t think it’s stupid. I promise.”

He turned his face to her, one eye closed, the other still squinting in consideration.

It's just ... your eyes ..."

"What about my eyes?"

"I can’t say …”

"Oh, come on. Just tell me!"

"It's stupid because I can talk about how pretty you are and how I'd totally bone you, but I can't talk about your eyes!" Danny burst out. He glared in frustration and flopped onto his back, glowering darkly up at the ceiling as though it had just insulted his mother.

Claire smiled and took his hand gently.

"Anything in regards to me is not stupid. But you can't start and stop a sentence like that, it drives me crazy!"

He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath. He opened them after a moment, meeting her eyes directly.

"Your eyes are the darkest, deepest ... they pull me in and I never want it to stop. It’s the most incredible … the most intense … God, I can’t do this.”

Her bangs were falling into her eyes as he spoke. Danny reached up and tenderly brushed them away.

“I can’t talk about the things that I like about you. It just makes me like you more,” he whispered.

Claire stared at him for a moment, feeling her stomach turn over; a faint flicker of hope sparked but she dared not consider that Danny meant what she hoped he meant. She instead adopted her best bewildered look and beamed in what she prayed he thought was bewildered delight.

“I like you too, sweetie,” she told him, running a hand through his short, sandy hair. “You’re my best friend!”

She could never really tell what color his eyes really were; sometimes they were the cloudy gray of a foggy London morning, sometimes they were the deep, clear blue of the ocean just after a storm. And sometimes, though very rarely, they were the bright, beautiful, flawless color of an emerald. Claire had wondered at first if his eyes changed with his mood but that theory had quickly been done away with after her first few weeks of knowing him. Maybe it had to do with the weather, or what he’d had for breakfast, or what color underwear he was wearing. Maybe there was nothing to it at all. But they were never the same, from one moment to the next, and it vexed her to no end.

“Your eyes melt me,” he said, interrupting her thoughts. And then suddenly he was kissing her, his lips soft and sweet against her own. She could very faintly smell alcohol and cigarettes; it was a wonder he wasn’t completely smashed, as was his habit when stressed and under pressure. Masking that, however, was Danny’s own smell – tangy and spicy and sweet and musky and perfect.

Everything was a pleasantly confused blur and Claire couldn’t tell what was up or down or right or wrong. She wasn’t exactly sure how it had happened, but she was on her back, Danny above her, kissing her fiercely. Or maybe he was the one on his back. Regardless, she didn’t want to think about anything except the feel of his lips against hers and the warming prickling spreading throughout her. He held her against him, running his hands through her hair, whispering her name. She clung to him, fearing that should she let him go, he would disappear into a puff of smoke and it would turn out that this whole day had been a dream. Her skin tingled where he touched her and she suddenly felt she would die if he ever stopped. Her heart was racing, beating so fast she worried it would rip itself out of her chest altogether.

“Claire, my Claire, my beautiful Claire.”

And then Danny broke away, looking at her for a very long time. His eyes were dark grey now, nearly black as midnight, burning with intensity and he seemed on the verge of saying something, seemed to nearly burst when he did not speak. Claire stared e at him for what felt like hours. Her brain whirled around Danny and she was unable to work it into her mind that he had really kissed her.

From what seemed like very far away, she heard a sweet, sad voice singing from her clock radio across the room; Danny swallowed hard, wringing his hands together and some part of Claire recognized that this was the first time in all their years of friendship that she had ever seen him nervous.

“What excuse should I make for this wave of pain? Even in the night I'm freezing alone in white snow. My love for you is my last courage,” sang the sweet voice from the radio.

Neither seemed able to move or to take their eyes off one another, his dark grey eyes locked onto her coffee brown eyes; she was finding it mildly difficult to breathe until the intensity of his gaze.

“My love for you is the last forever to me.” she whispered at long last, as the other woman from the radio sang. “That I could meet you was the first miracle to me.”