Letters from Marseille

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CHAPTER FOUR: A kiss short of a tryst…

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Gray sat down at his kitchen table and stared off at the ceiling above his bedroom door. It was in no way different from the rest of his ceiling but the spot of white had caught his eye as his mind wandered. He took his pen in his hand, a flicker of a thought quickly dissolving. He pulled the cap on and off with one hand, again and again, anything to keep his body moving but his mind empty.

Suddenly, the room shook from the sounds of the large stereo system next door. The girl in 204 had a fondness for opera or Vivaldi at four in the morning. It was now six and it just kept getting louder and louder. A week had passed since he’d received his first letter from Annie. Since then, he’s spent his days next door, helping hold up mirrors and canvases and bring over buckets of labeled paint. He’d repainted her walls over twice. By now, he imagined the room had started out much larger but the endless layers of paint had begun to close in the walls. He also had no idea how she slept, worked, with the smell of paints constantly under her nose.

After only a week, he had to throw away his favorite flannel shirt because Vivien was afraid of getting oil paint on the other clothes. She and Kenneth were always at work. He only saw them for dinner, which he was not allowed to miss, no matter how dirty or tired he was.

Still, he enjoyed the girl’s company. It was like that month Annie and he spent going to the old folks’ home on Tudor Street, listening to the stories of the people hoping a hint of humility would befall them. At least, that’s what the school hoped. Annie had left unscathed. He always wished he could return. Now, he spent most of his mornings cleaning up the museum basement she called a home. He thought of all the stories she’d buried beneath fresh layers of white paint and felt like crying. He couldn’t even think of one story of his own that he could turn into a book, a novella, a poem…

Great. My epitaph will read ‘He was born in Waterford. He died in Waterford. Three people cried,’ he thought.

Then, as another flicker of inspiration coursed through him, he began to write again.

“I could not imagine the waves of inspiration that overwhelmed her but they were relentless. They hit her at every moment, overriding her human nature. It made her cruel at times, no more deep than a sheet of white marble.

“But how I loved her.”

He looked at his words and frowned. What had begun as his understanding of her cluttered mind became a declaration of love. He barely knew her, he told himself, didn’t care for her in that way, but found himself making her the main character in his work. Dedicating his time and his thoughts to her. He hoped she would not take it as more than it really was, but he was happy to have a reader again.

He looked back down at his paper and, with newfound courage, continued:

“Oh how I loved her company. In body most of all, the sheer proximity of her. Her mind, her soul, it was not mine to keep nor would I ever claim it for myself. I could not handle the burden. It was too heavy, clouded, and foggy for any human to bear. And so I realized she was not mortal. She was heavenly, a symbol recorded through time but never understood, merely admired for its beauty.

“Yes, her soul was her own. But her body was mine, and I would fight anyone to keep it.”

And so, his first novel began.

--

Annie had gone home and folded up all her napkins into an envelope and left it on the kitchen counter for Eva to take to the post office on her way to work in the morning. Then she went to bed, shameful thoughts of Nick flowing through her mind. She stared up at the ceiling of glow-in-the-dark stars and gulped. She quickly jumped off Gray’s bed, feeling like she’d defiled it with her daydreams.

When Nick entered the Starbucks the next day, she avoided his eyes, his smile. The more she tried to avoid him, the more she thought of him and the guiltier she felt. This time, she didn’t wait for Gray’s letter to respond. During the Tuesday slow period just before lunch, she ripped out an empty page from the back of one of Jude’s coloring books and began to write.

Gray,

I thought time would numb what I felt when you left but it hasn’t. The new routines I held onto are gone. The reminders are back. The pain is worse. I’m sorry, Gray, but I don’t know how long I can keep smiling. It all feels so false.

I’ve made a list. You know my love affair with lists. It’s supposed to keep me composed while you’re away. I got my job now, which helps keep me busy. That’s it. It’s all I’ve done. I’ve never been haunted more by a freakin’ list.

I wish you were here. God, I wish you were. I wish you were here. I wish you were here.

“It’s a good song,” said a voice from above. “‘Wish You Were Here.’ It’s a good song. You like Pink Floyd?”

She looked up. Nick’s catlike eyes were smiling at her, though his lips remained in a stable line. She quickly balled up the letter and put it in her pocket.

“Your usual?” she asked, trying to get his attention off her.

“Nah, make it a latte. Why not try something different?”

She gulped, which he surely noticed. “Yea, why not?” she whispered back, more to herself than anyone. He sat down at the bar and waited for her to, hands shaking, fit the lid over the cup. When he reached for it, his fingers purposely touched hers and she gulped again, the saliva suddenly building in her mouth. She pulled away so forcefully that the cup fell over. The lid and Nick’s quick hands kept it from spilling.

“You alright there, doll?” he asked, raking a hand through his hair.

She swallowed one last time and turned to look at him, face to face. She could have said something smooth and flirtatious. She could have lied. But she didn’t. “Just writing to France,” she said softly, taking the crumbled letter from her pocket and smoothing it out on the bar lovingly. She refolded it and tucked it into her breast pocket, her heart calmer knowing it was safe.

Nick stared at her hands as she smoothed it out. “Right. I heard about that,” he said a little sadder. “How is—”

“Gray. His name is Gray. He’s… He’s in France. Of course he’s fine.”

“Yea, those can can dancers really know how to liven the spirits.”

“No, he’s not one of those tourists. He’s probably barely gotten out of the apartment. I keep telling myself he did it for me but sometimes I wonder if I—if I drove him away,” she said and looked up at his eyes. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be telling these things to customers I barely know.”

He sat up straighter. “You’re right! You barely know me!” He put out a hand for her to shake. “Name’s Nicholas Rossi. I’m 23 and a senior at U of V. Engineering major. You’ve met my only sibling, Catherine, and my father Stanford. My favorite color’s red, I’m Italian, and I hate dill pickles.”

She laughed and shook his hand. “Ann Whitson. Pleasure to meet you. I’m 18. I start U of V in the fall. I don’t know what I want to study. You know my family probably better than I do, I’ve been coming to this place for a decade, and I have a small, perverse obsession with Sno-balls and vanilla bean frappuccinos.”

He stared at her for a moment before his mouth started to curl into a smile. The way his eyes focused on her made her want to blush but she dug her nails surreptitiously into the back of her hand and she stiffened.

“What are you doing here, Nick?” she whispered, leaning in.

“This is where we always come for coffee.”

“No, I mean at the bar, talking to me, causing trouble…”

He didn’t take his smiling eyes off her. “Trouble, am I? You sound like my father.”

“Aww, next you’ll be calling me overweight and balding.”

He drew even closer to her face. She thought he was going to kiss her and tried to say whatever she could to get him to stop. Not because she didn’t want it but because she needed it, and that she refused to admit even to herself.

“Maybe. Does that turn you on?”

She paused and realized they were flirting. He wondered if she knew and had pushed the innuendoes over the edge, hoping to provoke a response.

“No,” she said harshly. “Older men have never been my taste.”

“Right.” He leaned back in his chair, suddenly very interested in his coffee. “Women like them younger. I forgot.”

She smirked. She could play sexual innuendos like the rest of them. “What, are you nuts? At our age, your so-called ‘younger men’ still wet the bed. And not in the fun way.”

His spirits rose. “Then what do you like?”

“Gray,” she whispered.

It was almost a reflex. She didn’t have to think about it, question it. She wasn’t even sure he heard it till he lowered his head in defeat and began to stand up off the stool.

“You going?” She hadn’t realized how much she’d miss his company.

“I’m not Gray, Ann. I never will be.”

And he left, his coat calmly over his shoulder. She’d wondered when she’d come back and realized that was exactly why he’d left so she’d think of him, so she’d want him back.

“Little bastard,” she whispered to herself.

Surely enough, he and his friends returned the very next day. He didn’t look at her, didn’t smile at her, only as he left to tell her he still wanted her. And, despite being ignored for the two whole days, she felt unbelievably wanted. It was a strange feeling having something, someone, to look forward to the next day.

--

He went to find her next door but the door was open and a man was standing inside, sorting through a mess of shredded canvases with his foot. Gray paused at the door, his hand gripping his notebook as if preparing for the attack. But the man caught his stare and sighed. He looked pained, not angry. Only an angry person could have destroyed all those beautiful paintings.

“Uh… I’m looking for the girl who lives here,” Gray asked, taking a careful step inside.

“Desiree?” the man said, his French accent lighter than even Vivien’s. It was most likely his second or third language. He also didn’t look familiar and so could not be the man she’d fought with in front of his door all those nights ago. At least now, he learned her name. “She is most likely on the roof. Though I warn you, she’s not in the best mood.”

He opened his arms to suggest she had destroyed her canvases. He then knelt down beside an intact piece dirtied by the floor. It was the image of a girl and her mother bent down on the shore of a pristine beach, poking at a starfish washed up by their feet.

“Why do you think she—” He couldn’t bring himself to say it. The thought of her destroying her creations was sickening, as if the mother in the painting suddenly drowned her own child.

“I assume she didn’t want me to have them.”

“Why would you have them?”

“I am her art dealer and sole benefactor.”

Gray took another step inside. “With her talent, I expected there’d be more than one.”

“There were – are – many interested but she refuses to show her work to the public. She would rather see them in pieces than in a gallery or in some ‘fat aristocrat’s bathroom.’”

“She… She didn’t seem capable of—”

“She is a sweet girl but a girl nonetheless.” He picked up another piece of canvas. He didn’t look up, just continued, “I recommend you find her. She should not be alone right now.”

Gray forced his eyes off the canvases and back towards the door. He numbly nodded and head out, his notebook sliding out from under his sweaty hands. He didn’t know which way the roof was so he only figured. He found the stairs and walked up six floors, the time lost in his mind. Next he knew, the cool bay breeze was blowing his hair into his eyes.

Then he saw her straddling the legs, swinging her stripe-covered legs dangerously between roof and sky. She was wearing a thin dress, knee-length. It had once been an elegant, strappy little black dress. Now, the edges had been cut off into strips and were being set free one by one into the city wind.

“Desiree?” he called out. The wind muffled his voice but she heard him nonetheless. He noticed the switchblade in her hand as he got closer and stopped. She went to rip another piece of her dress and wobbled back on the ledge. He dropped his notebook and ran to catch her. He lifted her off the ledge effortlessly and sat her down on the floor.

“Huh?”

“What, are you crazy?” he yelled. “Don’t scare me like that!”

Her face was empty, expressionless. Beneath that was a slimy, filmy layer of scorn. Her eyes were calm but her mouth soon turned into a scowl.

“Who told you my name? Andre? The little bastard!”

He scoffed and sat up against the ledge. “He thinks he did something wrong, that he’s why you tore up your paintings.”

“He did. He always does.”

“Is he one of your—” Ever since he met her, he found himself incapable of finishing sentences, avoiding words he knew but would never use back in Vermont. Lovers. Affairs. Bastard sons. But also, romance. Dinners by moonlight. Trysts. Dancing. It was such a shame that one world could not exist without the other.

“Is he like Luc?” she finished for him.

“Luc being the guy I met?” She did not like to use names. He’d introduced himself without knowing this. She’d never replied.

It took her a moment to answer, her calm eyes fixed on a spot of the floor as her hand flicked the knife slowly open and closed again. He had fidgety hands himself. They always had to be doing something for him to think. She finally answered, “No, see Luc works with him in the gallery. It’s how we met.” A flicker of a smile found her. “But Andre? Andre is married, with a woman his own age.”

He watched her jab the knife into the fingertip of her middle finger at the last word. He stole the knife away quickly. She didn’t try to steal it back. Her hands fell limp on the coarse concrete and she turned to stare off at the door.

“I can’t keep doing this, can I? Falling for unavailable men?”

He nodded energetically. Or older men either. She was 16 in his eyes, just a child. If he could only tell her things would change in two years. He knew it. When he was 16, he couldn’t imagine loving Annie the way he did now, having lost her. He couldn’t have imagined living in France, befriending people like Desiree. But he couldn’t tell her she’d change. She’d never accept it.

“He said you had other interested benefactors. Why don’t you just go to them?”

She leaned her head on his chest and continued to stare at the door. He awkwardly looked for a place to put him hands. He settled on her shoulder and hoped they didn’t make a splat-like sound when they met her bare skin. She wasn’t crying so he felt little need to be sympathetic. She knew she’d caused her own trouble.

“Why tear up the paintings, Desiree?” he asked, his voice firm though his soul had been shaken at the sight.

Her voice, however, started to quiver. It made her accent stronger but he still managed to make out the words.

“They were a gift for him, not for him to sell,” she said, her final words filled with disgust.

“Was he there when you ripped them up?” he asked in the same firm tone, hoping she’d reveal more and maybe feel a little bit better. After all, he’d had Annie to share his pains with and that always made it so much better.

But, at his question, she sat up a little more. “Why?”

“Did you tell him they were for him?”

“He knew!” She was getting defensive.

And so was he. “Damn it! I don’t know what to tell you, Dee. To forget about it? To not fuck up a married man’s life? To not screw up your painting, the only things I know you truly love, every time you can’t get what you want? I barely know you and I know they’re everything to you!”

She stared at him for a moment. He looked scared, awaiting an angry reply. She just stared him down for another moment, another painful gulp.

“You’re right,” she said, without an ounce of resentment or pain.

She, like everyone in the world, knew very well her own eccentricities, the stupid things she did and said. But, as Gray had come to realize, only she was capable of taking action when it was brought to her attention, rather than sinking into denial. He had to smirk. He watched her get up, imagining her a pixie on a mission to stop Captain Hook from killing Peter Pan. As the two images, the real and the Disney, joined into one before his eyes, his smile grew larger. Until he heard the door slam behind her and realized he had to hurry to catch up.

Upon the stairs, he realized he’d left his notebook tossed on the floor. The images of the broken canvases on the floor suddenly flashed back into his head and he ran back to pick up his discarded thoughts from the concrete. He brought them to his chest, hoping it would stop his fast-beating heart, then quickly returned to his hallway on the third floor.

He stood before her closed door. It was never closed. He didn’t want to check if it was locked. The opera had begun to black again inside. It could only mean one of two things: she was busy working on her next masterpiece or she was busy working Andre. Either way, he wasn’t going to intrude.

Back in his room, he could still feel the adrenaline melding with the vibrations of the opera next door. It was hard to be still after speaking with Desiree, let alone when confront with the knowledge of the darker parts of her imagination. So, his mind finally peaceful and free of Annie, he decided to go for a walk. It gave him time to think and he loved the French sun, the bay breeze. He traveled down rue de Martin onto St. Anton. There was a small Chinese restaurant at the next corner. The name was illegible thanks to weather, years, and a few layers of salty deposits from the bay. Desiree had taken him for a midnight lunch there last week. It seemed to remind her of home.

The owners were Chinese but were raised in France. So, they still didn’t speak a word of English. Luckily, Gray only wanted a Coke and a clean-well lighted place to sit and brood so he pointed to the can in the freezer, dropped some money on the counter, and sat down at one of the two empty waiting tables. The place was purposefully small with barely any places to sit so that the owner didn’t have to hire waiters or deal with crowds. People just ordered, picked up, and left. That was the way he liked it. So, when he came out and saw Gray loitering at his tables, he started to mumble obscenities in who knows how many languages to himself, unaware that Gray couldn’t understand a single word.

A tall man in a dark gray overcoat came into the store. Gray barely noticed his presence till he sat down in the chair in front of him.

“Andre!” he shouted, startled to see such a big man just plop down in front of him. “You scared the shit out of me, man!”

Andre laughed. “Ah, because your mind was… elsewhere?”

“My mind is always elsewhere.”

In half-formed words, he managed to reply quickly, “Then you must live in perpetual fear, my friend. How was she when you spoke with her?”

Gray stared at him for a moment. From his tussled hair and the fingernail markings on his cheek, he had obviously been with her. Then he realized that meant nothing. She wouldn’t tell him anything, not if she loved him. And, beneath those bushy eyebrows were the eyes of a man who truly wanted to know how she felt.

“She doesn’t want you to sell the paintings.”

“Well that I knew.”

“She says they were a gift for you, not for you to sell.”

Andre leaned back in his chair. “Her words?” he asked after a small moment of silence.

“Close enough.”

“Do not misunderstand, Gray. She did not mean for this to happen anymore than I. I loved my wife, still do. I’ve been married three years and, to the world, happily.”

“But you want Desiree.”

“I want her to be happy. And, as you can tell, that will not be with me.” His voice seemed distant, like he was used to saying it. Maybe to himself, maybe to Desiree…

“So?”

“So I want you to take my place in her bed.”

Gray spit out his coke. “Whoa! Hold it! I just met her a month ago. She’s just a friend. Besides, I have no business being in anyone’s bed. I have someone at home.”

“I am sorry. I merely assumed—”

“Wrong,” he interrupted. “Since when is neighbor French for prostitute?”

Andre stifled a deep chuckle. “Perhaps not her bed but maybe her mind. I have a wealthy patron coming in to see her work, what I’ve managed to sneak away to my gallery. She’s already working on some new pieces. If you could perhaps distract her while I sell some paintings, you know she’ll be better for it. She can barely keep her apartment as it is.”

“She loves her pieces,” Gray warned him. “You know that.”

“Yes, and she loves them above herself. I don’t care if she never paints again. I want her to be safe. She cannot go back on the streets!”

The thought of stealing from Desiree seemed sickening but at the same time, he understood the need to take care of her. He’d gone through the same with Annie, suffered years of her self-destructive behavior.

A couple came to sit behind Gray with a little baby boy. The owner started mumbling about how one mouse brings another and Andre laughed. Gray didn’t pay it any mind.

“You’re right. I don’t want her on the streets either. Actually, I don’t know if French streets are any worse than American ones but I’m not going to risk it,” he finally agreed. He grabbed one of the restaurant menus and a pen from his back pocket. He wrote down his phone number then leaned forward and whispered, “When you need to come by, I’ll take her out for lunch or something. I don’t know if she’ll notice, with so many paintings everywhere but—”

“When she notices, bring her to me.”

Both men stared at each other, equally aware of the circumstances of their agreement. Andre nodded and left. Gray watched him go, thinking he was watching himself ten years later and wondered if he would look that good in a coat.

--

Annie decided that while Marseille was her ultimate goal, she must first take care of the present, of the circumstances that seemed to stand between her and Gray and the woman he wished her to be. She couldn’t keep walking to work through mud, in Gray’s old rubber boots. She could barely walk in regular shoes, let alone something four sizes too big.

“I’d give you a ride,” Sarah said, “but do you have any idea how much fuel a car burns in a day? I couldn’t consciously do that to the environment. Why don’t you get a bike like me and Jude?”

“You have to pass through roads to get here. Real, solid, cement roads. I am not afforded that luxury. There’s no way I can keep getting here on two feet, let alone two wheels,” she’d replied. Sarah shrugged and went back to counting cups under the bar. They were low on grande-sized.

Suddenly, the door chimes rang and Annie straightened up, her eyes wide and expectant. It was Nick. Alone. He was usually the first one, usually accompanied by Cathy but now she spent most of her days – and nights – with Alex. It’d been a week since Nick had last spoken to Annie. She was due for another of Gray’s letters so the worry of a delay had occupied her mind too long to talk.

“Hey,” he said to no one in particular, looking straight towards their usual booth, his hand clutching his left bicep. Beneath his hand, she noticed a small white bandage. At least, it seemed small under his large, long-fingered hands. They were similar to Gray’s.

“The usual, Nick?” Sarah asked politely, paying no mind to his obvious pain.

“Yea, Sarah, thanks.”

Annie realized she was staring and snapped out of it. “I’ll get it!” she announced, a bit louder and more enthusiastic than she had planned. She took a cup before Sarah could get to it, mixed the latte quickly, and brought it to his seat at the booth. He was busy peaking under the bandage. He was one of those who expected to see it heal before his eyes, impatient. “What the hell happened to you?”

He seemed to avoid her eyes, slightly ashamed. He answered, “I had a bit too much to drink last night. Lost a few bets.”

She resisted the urge to laugh. “What sort of bets?”

“The sadistic, never-ending kind.” He went to lift the latte from the table, only to curse out loud in pain. “Fuck it,” he murmured and removed the bandage, too tired to pretend it didn’t exist. He revealed a large tattoo of a 50’s pin-up girl in red polka-dotted underwear. She couldn’t stifle the laugh any longer.

“Uh… looks painful.”

He laughed too. “And it’s not even the beginning of the list.”

Sarah had seen Annie sit down in front of him and took it as a hint to leave. She pretended she’d forgotten something in back and to go look for it. “Mind the front. Ann!” she shouted as she went. Annie nodded but didn’t take her eyes off Nick.

“What in the world would urge you to go along with a bet like this?”

“Why would anyone go along with anything? I was sure I’d win.”

He leaned back in the booth, curling the fingers into a fist. Open and close, open and close, his arm up and down... She watched his lean muscles flex, the tattooed skin stretching. She grimaced.

“That looks painful,” she said.

He laughed and reached over for the latte. “Thanks, kid,” he said. She went to stand up when he reached for her hand. “Stay a bit.”

“I’m working.”

He looked around at the empty café. “Well I knew that when I came in, darling. I also knew that we’d be more or less alone.”

“Forward, aren’t you?”

He leaned into her. “I actually prefer to play the game but unfortunately, in your case, it’s pointless. You already want me.”

She would have denied it, told him off, but rather than take his bait, she did the only thing that would stop the blood rushing to her cheeks. She settled back down into her seat and responded, without a single ounce of regret or second thought, “What of it? You interest me. Then again, I also think Rowan Atkinson is a hotty so I can’t be accountable for my horrible taste.”

He took another sip of his coffee. “Rowan Atkinson is a hotty. And, in case you were wondering, it’s mutual.”

“I hardly think Rowan thinks you’re hot.”

He tilted his head to the side and smirked at her. “You know that’s not who I meant.”

“You’re right. We’re going to be mature about this.”

“Never!” he yelled dramatically.

She slammed both hands on the table, unintentionally hard. The sound her hands made should have scared him. It didn’t. “Stop complicating this!” she said, trying hard not to laugh. “Okay Peter Pan. What do you suppose we do?”

His wide smile finally fell from his eyes. “Nothing,” he said sadly. He leaned in and whispered, “There’s a very large chance I won’t survive this week.”

She scoffed and crossed her arms. “Let me guess. You’re dying of cancer? You have a deadly alien virus? You are being hunted down by ruthless mercenaries?”

“None of the above. I’ve entered a bet that will most likely get me arrested and by happy coincidence, inadvertently killed… by my father.”

“Ah, I see.”

“So you will help?”

“Get you killed?”

“Avoid it actually. After all, you are the reason I made this silly thing.”

“Me?”

“Oh yes. I bet – well, it’d be rude to tell you.”

“You can’t just taunt me and not tell me.”

“Fine. I’ll tell you tonight. Come with me to Celluci’s.”

She thought of Gray sitting with her Starbucks. They had never been to a fancy restaurant, never been on a date, especially to Celluci’s which was expensive and preposterously classy. As far as she knew, Gray didn’t even own a dinner jacket. Nick didn’t seem like the type to either.

“No, thanks,” she said and got up. He didn’t try to stop her, a bit shocked that she refused his offer.

“Please,” he begged surreptitiously hidden beneath a calm and concerned tone. “I could use the company.”

“What are you talking about?”

“It’s the bet. I have to break into Celluci’s and make someone dinner.”

She raised an eyebrow. “I know for a fact Celluci has a shotgun under his hostess’ table. He trains them to use it on weekday nights. You can hear them practicing in the distance!”

“I didn’t say it’d be easy.”

“You’re insane.”

“How can you tell nowadays?” he said with a tilted smirk. “Please come.”

“I—”

“You don’t mean that.”

“How do you know what I was gonna say?”

“Because I can read you like an impressionist painting, Ann.”

“I don’t really know if that’s good or not.”

“Both and neither. Tonight. 2AM. I’ll leave the door open.”

“You’re breaking in?”

“Have you seen that shotgun?”

She laughed, covering her mouth with her hand. She shouldn’t be laughing at his probable misfortune.

“No.”

“You’ll come. I know you will.”

She stood up, shaking her head. She went behind the counter, putting the bar and stool and a good five yards between them. With her hands on her hips beside her apron, she shook her head again.

“You’ll come. You won’t be able to stop yourself.”

She scoffed again. She realized she’d have to get used to dismissive gestures with him. She couldn’t take anything he said seriously, not because he lied but because his truths were more outrageous than the jokes, at least to her.

“You will,” he repeated when she said nothing at all.

She smirked at his insistence, at his steady gaze.

“Who died and made you Hugh Hefner?”

“I believe,” he said, dropping money on the counter and re-pocketing his wallet, “I’ll see you tonight.”

And he left.

--

At 2AM, Annie stared off into the canopy of Gray’s bed. She’d gone to bed at 11:00, with every intention of sleeping as she was tired and had work again tomorrow. This she told herself over and over but it didn’t get the thought of Nick out of her head. She imagined him waiting at Celluci’s, red rose in one hand and a crème brulée in the other. Just waiting. His face, she imagined, full of disappointment. Waiting. Waiting…

Bile rose in her throat. She stopped drumming her fingers on her stomach and quickly sat up, riding a rush of determination. She tiptoed by Eva’s room, only to realize she was working the late shift again. Annie looked down at herself, ashamed of her desire. She saw her slippers were plush, not glass, and she began to think that she was not worthy of such things. Her Prince Charming awaited in Marseille, not Celluci’s. He was blonde with eyes like nebulas, not tawny and cat-like, smooth or ripe with devious age. Her prince, in her eyes, was still a boy. All she had to do was wait for him to mature. Gray had been thinking the exact same thing the day he told Kenneth yes.

Still, both waited for her.

And she wanted none.

She wanted to rest, to sleep, to dream for once. To forget them both.

Before she knew it, the door knob was in one hand, her keys in the other. She stared at the door for a few minutes, remembering all those times she’d rung the bell, Gray’s smile welcoming her in. She closed the door quickly and began to walk north to Celluci’s.

The walk was long, a good 30 minutes. The streets were entirely empty.

3:07, she arrived. Celluci’s was dark, upon first inspection. She’d never considered that maybe he intended to trick her. Maybe this was all a joke at her expense. Then she saw that the door was slightly ajar. She slipped in quickly and instantly heard a loud cutting in the distance, quick, thick blades pounding onto stainless steel. Someone was cutting green onions on the table instead of a cutting board. It had to be Nick. Celluci wasn’t so stupid. The sound changed so he must have switched to a cutting board just then.

She’d never been inside Celluci’s but even in the dim light coming from the crack of the kitchen window, it looked fancy. Every table had a bouquet of fresh roses, surrounded by tiny bowls. The bowls were filled with water and upon the surface of each floated a single, flat candle. The tablecloths were white. The chairs had antique carvings. The walls were red and a marble fireplace that had come with the building originally, now used to create a waiting area with plush black couches.

She walked towards the light in the far back of the restaurant. The cutting had stopped and she began to expect a knife wielding maniac to jump out at her. The she saw Nick’s face in her head, the look of desire mixed with earnest hope. She had never known eyes to plead, only sad eyes and happy eyes, sleepy eyes and eyes after 2AM study sessions in the back of the public library.

His eyes had been doubtful but his smile secure. His smile had drawn her in.

She pushed in the door but could not find his tempting smirk. She found him bent over the steel table, holding onto his hands over a small puddle of blood and parsley. As soon as she saw him, she dropped her keys on the counter, rolled up his sleeves and her own and led him over to the sink, careful not to touch the blood or the wound. She turned the cold water on and reached for a clean towel hanging over them.

“There’s a reason I’M always behind the counter and you get the booth,” she scolded playfully.

He didn’t say anything, didn’t even groan or moan or complain. He’d seen, and felt, worse. The cut had not been too deep but it passed just above the knuckles of his left hand. She wrapped the towel around his hand and set him down at a stool next to the counter. She turned back to the puddle of blood on the cutting board and sighed.

“Shit,” she whispered to herself. She looked back at Nick, amazed he wasn’t keeling over in pain. He just peeked under the towel, contemplating how it might affect the motion of his hand and fingers. She tried to clean up but the blood was forever embedded in the pores of the wood. She threw it out and thought about writing the not-so-poor Celluci an IOU. Then she remembered that if she wrote her name or Nick’s, they’d be facing breaking and entering charges.

She looked at him sitting hunched over on the stool like a little boy in Time Out. She thought of making him something, a glass of warm milk if anything.

“Hungry?” she asked, in case he’d already eaten. He looked up with tired eyes, eyes she recognized, and shook his head. He tried to feign a smile. It didn’t really work. She headed to the refrigerator nonetheless and found a bowl of cream and strawberries curiously sitting at the front. He had been waiting for her, only no roses, brulée, or tux. Just him in his jeans and black t-shirt. She admitted that, on him, she’d take a tight tee over a tux any day.

“I’m surprised you came,” he said softly.

“You knew I would,” she answered, setting the bowl down forcefully on the stainless steel table. She skipped over the stool and sat on the table, regardless of how unsanitary it might be. He laughed and set his good hand on her thigh as she brought the first strawberry to her lips.

He rose from his stool and spread her legs, anchoring himself between them. He tilted his head and looked at her sweetly, not lustfully.

She waited curiously to see what he would do next. She didn’t feel like resisting, just to see how far he would go. Would he kiss her? Would he feed her strawberries? Would he take her right there on the table, a perfect stranger?

Would she say no?

As the thought reached her and took over all other pointless thoughts, she realized she could never say no. Even if her mouth said no, her heart pleaded yes. And she gulped, loudly, the strawberry still in her mouth. She was unable to swallow its sweetness as if it was suddenly too large.

He looked away for a second as if he heard Celluci stir upstairs. She remembered he lived just one floor up. A flush was heard from the bathroom, a shuffle of slippers on wooden floor. He smiled and she took his momentary distraction as an opportunity to swallow the strawberry. He didn’t seem to notice the heavier gulp. He went to close the door to the restaurant but when he came back to her, she had slipped off the steel table. She stood, her hands in her sweater pockets, and they looked at each other for a moment, contemplating the space between them, its necessity and the annoying obviousness of it, poking at them to come closer.

“Annie, I—” he began but she looked away to a corner of the floor and started to make her way to it. The kitchen didn’t have much ventilation so she loved sitting on the cold tile floor, resting against the even colder steel cabinets. He followed and sat beside her, a good yard between them.

“How’s your hand?” she asked, slightly fearless, like the longer she was in his presence, the stronger she got, the braver she felt.

“I’ve had worse. I’ll be fine.”

“How much worse?”

“Stampede at a local concert. I was in the hospital for three weeks.”

She grimaced at the thought of him in a cast or bleeding and broken on a dusty floor. Then she imagined him flirting up the nurses. She wasn’t sure what that made her feel, just worried that she thought of that at all. “Ouch,” she mouthed, fearing her voice would give away too many of her thoughts.

“Nah, worse was the lecture I got from my mom. She was still alive back then.”

She’d begun to straighten out her pajamas under her sweater when she looked up quickly. “I’m sorry. How did she die?”

He drew in closer. His tone was empty, like he’d repeated her story so much it barely held meaning. Then she realized it was that he was fighting so hard to seem like he didn’t care. It was tearing at him. “Heart disease. But it was a few years back. It doesn’t hurt as much anymore. There wasn’t anything we could do to help.”

Lie, she told herself. He still cares.

She nodded. Her aunt Zeta had died of breast cancer three years ago. They had been close but time erased most of the memories they had together. She didn’t feel the loss of his mother. She felt the loss of her memory, and she hated how calm he seemed about it when she was desperate to reclaim the time lost.

They talked for some time, about their childhoods mostly. Nick was amazed she had lived in her own little thought bubble for so many years when he was forced to endure the gossip that flowed through his house for years. He talked about growing up with Stanley and meeting Cathy for the first time, his father remarrying… She talked of meeting Gray, seeing her siblings born and grow and run around like two twisters on a mission. They talked about school field trips, childhood diseases, scars and broken bones.

Annie pulled up her pant leg and showed him her greatest scar, a slash running jagged across her thigh. She quickly covered it again and refused to share the story, insisting it was too private. He didn’t bother her about it too much. He had mostly tiny scars from falling off trees and cars and once, onto a hot toaster.

Sometime around 6AM, the topic shifted to the future. Annie finally admitted, “I don’t want kids. I love them but don’t ask me to raise one. I can barely take care of myself.” Nick went to reply, his mouth open and awaiting the words to come out, his finger in the air ready to protest, when the sound of shuffling feet began to lower the stairs. She covered his mouth quickly with her hand and gestured for him to shut up and listen.

“Celluci,” she whispered. They jumped up and saw the balding old man in his X-Men pajamas, scratching at his thigh in mid-yawn. They stifled giggles and, after snatching their keys from the counter, ran out the front door. Celluci cursed in the background but their laughter tuned him out. He led her to his car, the ‘96 Toyota. And, as they turned the corner onto the parking lot and the car was in sight, he finally let go of her hand.

She jumped into the passenger’s seat and they sped onto 42nd street. Annie held her chest, over her heart, and attempted to steady her heavy breathing. Nick looked at her quickly as they rounded the curve. She smirked at him, then remembered where she now lived.

“Take a left up here,” she said, suddenly uncomfortable.

“I thought you lived—”

“I live at Gray’s now. It’s on the edge of Beverly woods. The log place?”

He answered quickly, “Yea, I know it.” He seemed calm at least but his eyes held the sort of disappointment Eva’s held when they told her they’d be skipping prom. Annie noticed, every time she mentioned Gray, his expression went sour, his truly sociable self retreating into him.

He drove quickly, a bit too quickly. He rested his left arm on the window ledge and drove with one hand. She wondered if he was a car aficionado by the cleanliness of his car, the care it was obviously given despite its age. She’d never met one. Her father had been driving the same car for the last decade but she’s sure there were McDonald’s wrappers under the backseat since day one. And Gray always knew he couldn’t afford one so he was smart enough not to obsesses over something he couldn’t have. She smirked as she usually did when she thought of him, with pressed lips and squinted eyes as if trying to see the memories better.

Nick caught a glimpse of her in the corner of his eye and gulped. He knew she was thinking of Gray. It was the same face she’d put those few times they’d talked of him all night. He swerved quickly onto the road in front of Gray’s and apologized for scaring her but Annie got the hint, almost a little proud to make him jealous.

They reached the log house by the woods. He went to enter the driveway when they noticed an old white car pulling up in front of them.

“Eva…” Annie whispered, her eyes slowly widening as she jumped at the same conclusions Eva most likely would.

“Who?” Nick asked, barely hearing her.

“Gray’s mother. She’s just getting home from work.”

“Oh… shit?” he answered wearily. He didn’t understand the circumstances.

Eva stood, her arms crossed, at the front door. In her white clothes, she seemed to stand out, unavoidable and unmistakable against the dark wood door.

Annie slowly exited the car, her hands sweating generously. She heard the sound of Nick’s car door open and close behind her, the sound of his shoes on the gravel. Soon, he stood beside her before Eva.

“Good morning,” Eva whispered, as if afraid to wake the nonexistent neighbors. Annie thought she still feared Gray would hear her.

“Eva, I can explain—”

Nick cut in. “Really, Mrs. Scott. I just found her asleep at the Starbucks and drove her home. Has she been working a lot lately?”

Annie didn’t even think of the lie. She just nodded as if she agreed. Gray’s voice was drowning out their conversation. Nick and Eva seemed to be exchanging pleasantries. She didn’t care that Eva had bought it. She cared about the image of Gray in her head, the look of awe and hurt on his face before he walked away from her. She imagined running after him and realizing her legs had melted into the ground. She saw herself pulled beneath the soil by cruel roots, her guilt and disgrace.

Then she felt Nick’s arms around her, bidding her goodbye, and it felt like she was being pulled up from beneath the forgotten soil. She smiled at him as he left.

Eva put her hands on Annie’s shoulders and gently pulled her back into the house before the little Toyota was out of view. And the world was back, in full color, only a little less expressive. It felt like all of her emotions had been left to drown in the soil as her body escaped freely.

She saw the kitchen in the distance, where she usually went to right when she got home, only to realize it held too many memories now. She didn’t follow Eva into it, merely headed up to Gray’s room. She’d left the light on when she ran out last night. She sighed and threw her boots into a corner.

She caught a glimpse of her reflection. She seemed paler, her eyes bruised by the night. She felt like all blood had been driven out of her by her eye sockets and she didn’t care, just let it happen. Because, whether she admitted it or not, a few moments ago she had been fine. She had not cared about sleep or food or a comfortable seat when she spoke to Nick.

She didn’t dare look back in the mirror so she fell face-first into the bed and collapsed into an empty sleep in mid-air.

--

TO BE CONTINUED!