by Louise Bay
“Okay, well, I don’t care that you like seafood.”
I looked at him and smiled. I should have put more trust in Phil—maybe we could have made it. If I’d let him in, dared to be me, it might have worked.
But it was too late now.
“I want you to be yourself,” he said.
A sharp pain pierced my gut. My previous boyfriends had all thought they were with their perfect girl, because that’s what I’d shaped myself into. It wasn’t their fault that they hadn’t known me. It was entirely mine.
“I’m sorry. I’ve had some growing up to do. Still do.” I had nothing to lose by being honest with Phil. “I’ve been afraid to share too much, scared you wouldn’t like the person I am.”
Phil opened his mouth to speak, but I lifted up my finger to stop him. I didn’t need any incentive not to tell him the whole truth.
“I wanted you to fall in love with me so badly that I worked hard to be a woman you could fall in love with. Does that make sense?”
Phil glanced at me, the ridge between his eyes getting deeper, and his jaw tightened. “What are you saying, that you faked it?” He smacked his clenched fist on the door. “You faked our relationship?”
I took a deep breath. This wasn’t the best conversation to have while driving, but I couldn’t stop now. “I just wanted to make you happy.” It was how my mother had always been with my step-father—the woman she thought he wanted. She’d done what she needed to do, but my circumstances were different. I had the luxury of being myself. “And not just you. All my boyfriends. But it was always at the expense of who I was. You helped me see that.” I rested my hand on his outstretched arm. “Now, I just want to be me. I want someone to like me, love me, marry me for who I am. I want to be able to order the octopus and not worry what you’ll think.”
“I don’t give a shit what you order.” He sighed and gripped the steering wheel with both hands.
I smiled. “It’s more than just seafood. You were right. You don’t know me well enough to ever have loved me.”
I’d never offered any of myself to him. I’d never given him my opinion, told him about my preferences. My likes. My passions.
I’d only ever done that with Blake.
“So what does that mean for us?” Phil clicked his jaw, and I wilted in my seat. I wasn’t used to men being frustrated with me. Memories of my father shouting at my mother before he left flashed through my head, threatening my newfound resolve.
But I wasn’t a child anymore and Phil wasn’t my father.
“I’m sorry. It means there is no us.”
Fifteen
Blake
I’d finally grown a pair of balls and suggested dinner to Mackenzie when I came to Boston for my next meeting with ARK. I’d hoped for a yes, had been willing to risk a no. Instead I got deflection, a non-answer. Had she hesitated before Kennedy shouted for her? Or was I imagining it? I replayed the scene in my head and my jaw locked. She’d had a chance to say yes before Phil arrived. Which meant I’d gotten a no from a people pleaser. She hadn’t been able to say the words and risk upsetting me. Heat filled my veins and I smacked the window frame with my fist. I’d only been something to fill her time in Oklahoma, which would have made sense if we hadn’t felt like so much more to each other. I was sure she knew that, felt the connection. Her reaction just hadn’t added up. Had she been playing me? Maybe I’d read this wrong and Mackenzie just wanted to get back with her fiancé, take the easy way out. I shook my head at her weakness. Maybe she’d learned nothing at all from her stay and she’d just go back to the same old patterns, and make the same old mistakes.
I began to pace across my bedroom floor. I couldn’t believe she was playing me. Then why hadn’t she said yes? I’d had plenty of time last night to suggest we keep in touch, perhaps see each other again. Why had I left it to this morning? I should have spoken up sooner. But I’d wanted to keep things in the here and now for as long as possible, and now I was paying the price. I pushed my hands through my hair. If I’d mentioned it last night, we could have talked through any fears or concerns she had. I shouldn’t have dropped it on her. Maybe she’d been worried that I’d fail with her as I had previous women? I could have explained how she was different.
It was too late now.
I needed to get out of here, start packing, focus on my future. This trip hadn’t provided the clarity I’d hoped. The drive back to Oklahoma City would help me put Mackenzie to the back of my mind and concentrate on what mattered most—my career.
I scanned my room for my suitcase. Where had I left it? At the foot of my bed I noticed the brown paper grocery bag Mackenzie had given me. I shot across the room and grabbed it, noting its weight as I picked it up. I’d been so intent on listening to Mackenzie and Phil, and then watching them drive off, I’d totally forgotten about the gift.
I unfolded the brown paper and reached inside, feeling around. Rocks? She’d given me a bag of rocks? I pulled one out and flipped it over in my palm.
* * *
The way you notice everything.
* * *
Words in black Sharpie were talking about me.
I smoothed my fingers over the stone. Did I? Did I notice everything about her? Had I been wrong to think that she felt what I did?
Normally I was criticized by women for not giving them enough attention. But Mackenzie seemed to live in vivid detail in my mind even when I wasn’t with her. It was as if she’d been scorched permanently into my brain. Something told me it was going to take me more than a drive back to the city to forget her.
I placed the stone on the bed, sat down and pulled out another.
* * *
Your tight butt.
* * *
I chuckled, my anger and frustration ebbing away as I remembered the delicious feel of her fingertips pressing into my ass. On the night after they’d all done the exercise with the stones, I stood in front of her naked and told her it was okay to like my body, okay to want me like that. And now, here she was, being bold, telling me all the things she liked about me. My stomach churned. Why hadn’t she just said yes to dinner?
I reached into the bag and grabbed another.
* * *
You want to change the world.
* * *
That was the thing I liked most about her but she saw that in me? It was true that I wanted to make a difference, and now I saw that if I wanted to fulfil that aim, it involved going to Boston. She’d helped me see that. I just had to decide if my ambition was strong enough to let me walk away from everything in Oklahoma City.
I took out another.
* * *
You love your family.
* * *
She’d done all this for me. She must have realized that what there was between us deserved more than just a few days. How could I have just let her walk away without giving me an answer? I should have at least heard a no from her—a decision.
* * *
You make me feel safe.
* * *
I smiled. I would protect her from anything.
* * *
Your beautiful body.
* * *
She had the most beautiful body I’d ever touched, tasted, enjoyed. And my body responded to hers as if they were two pieces of the same puzzle that fit together perfectly. Every touch, every quiet moan, sliced into me as if it were energy I needed to survive.
I pulled out the final rock.
* * *
Your heart.
* * *
It felt like she’d taken it with her.
None of this made any sense. I shook my head at the stones strewn across my bed. What did these mean? It felt as if the stones were her way of telling me she wanted to see me again, but then why hadn’t she said so?
I picked up each stone again, unable to contain my grin.
Again, I ran through our last moments together on the landing. She’d given me the bag before her ex had arrived, so would her answer to my suggestion of
dinner have been different if we’d not been interrupted? Would she have found the courage to say yes?
I’d willed our time together to slow down but instead it had sped up, and before I knew it, her luggage was being loaded into the truck and she was driving off with her no-longer-ex fiancé.
That she wasn’t mine, I might be able to accept, but that she was going back to someone she couldn’t be herself with stung. I’d never realized until Mackenzie that I could feel pain because someone else was unhappy. I wanted to bear her pain so she didn’t have to. It bit into my chest as if it belonged to me rather than her.
Was this what love felt like? Surely if it were anything less it wouldn’t hurt so much.
For the first time in my life, I loved a woman. Loved Mackenzie, and yet just stood there, watching her walk away from me with another man.
There was a knock on my door and I threw the bedcovers over the stones. “Come in,” I said.
Brianna appeared holding a small pile of laundry. “Mom wanted me to give you this.” She handed me the clothes. They smelled like summer flowers, like Christie. “And hey, we’re done. They’ve all left.” She clapped her hands. “They were a good group, right?”
I nodded as she took a seat in the rocking chair by the window.
“I was about to shower.” I needed to process this stuff with Mackenzie. I wanted to be alone. I pulled out my suitcase from on top of the closet and threw a pair of sneakers in the bottom.
“Thanks for your help with it all,” she said, ignoring my invitation for her to leave. I hoped she didn’t want to talk. “It was great having you around. You driving back to the city today?”
I nodded as I opened the chest of drawers under the window and took out my socks and a pair of jeans.
“Okay then, let’s talk.”
“Not now, Brianna. I need to shower and I’m guessing you don’t want to see my junk.”
“You’re guessing right, so keep your underpants on while we chat, dumbass.”
I rolled my eyes. Maybe I should skip the shower. I wanted to get on the road as soon as possible. If I got some distance between me and Christie, maybe the idea that I loved Mackenzie would start to fade.
Brianna traced the edge of the chair with her thumb. “I just wondered if you’d had time to think about all the stuff we did with the girls? Love Rehab, as they called it.”
What was she getting at? It wasn’t like Brianna to fish for compliments. Was she just trying to lull me into a false sense of security before talking to me again about my future? “I thought it was good. Well organized. It’s nice that you want to help them, and I think it worked for some of them.” The trip seemed to have fundamentally changed the way Mackenzie saw herself. That was until Phil had turned up. “I just hope your magic doesn’t leave them when they return home.”
“Maybe it will. Maybe it won’t. But there’s rarely an easy fix. People will still make the wrong choices, but I hope I’ve given them a glimpse into what they may have been missing and what they’re capable of. Sometimes it takes a while to put it into practice.”
Would Mackenzie realize that going with Phil wasn’t the right decision, it was just the easy route?
“And what about you? You learn anything about facing your fears and reexamining your goals?” she asked.
I rubbed my brow, my head full of all the things I had to think about. I shrugged.
“Look, I know I was hard on you before, but I don’t want you to let fear stop you from getting everything you want in life.” Brianna sat forward in her chair, resting her chin on her hands.
I turned to face her. “I know. I get that. Maybe I am looking for the easy route.” If I chose Oklahoma, would I be guilty of what Mackenzie had done by going with Phil?
Brianna looked out of the window. “It takes real bravery to give up what’s safe. It’s hard. But the higher you reach, the better the view. It’s true in all aspects of our lives—love and career.”
“It’s such a big risk.”
“Boston? So is Oklahoma City. Because it isn’t the life you really want, but it’s the pattern you’re comfortable with. And comfortable can be good but I’m not sure it can be great, not for you. You’re gonna have to take a risk to get what you deserve.”
She was right. Oklahoma City was exactly as she described—good but not great. And likely it would never change, never give me the opportunity to do what I wanted to do. Maybe Boston wasn’t that place either, but at least I wouldn’t have given up the fight. I’d still be aiming high. “You’re right.”
Without realizing it, Mackenzie’d left me one final gift. By leaving with Phil she’d shown me what not to do. I realized that staying in Oklahoma would be the easy way out for me. It wouldn’t get me what I wanted.
I scrubbed my hands over my face. Even if Mackenzie didn’t have the strength to choose the risky route, I did. I wasn’t going to be the one leaving Christie to go backwards. I wanted to move forwards, reach higher.
Saying no to something because I lacked courage wasn’t who I wanted to be.
“Does that mean you’re choosing Boston?” she asked.
I took a deep breath and I nodded. “It does.”
When Mackenzie had asked me to imagine turning down the Boston job, my world turned black. Now I’d decided to say yes, I felt lighter and full of energy. It was the right decision. It had just taken a while to see that.
Brianna grinned and slapped her hands onto the arms of her chair. “Sounds like you’ve made up your mind. Maybe Love Rehab worked for you, too.”
Maybe.
Brianna stood and made her way to my bedroom door. “Anyway, you stink, so get in the shower. Mom’s making pancakes.”
“Well, then you’d better leave unless you do want to see my junk.”
“You’re disgusting but I love you.”
I grinned at her. “I love you, too.” She headed out the door. “And Brianna?”
Her head popped around the frame. “Yeah?”
“Thank you,” I said.
She smiled. “Anytime.”
Sixteen
Blake
The early hours in Boston were so quiet, the city felt like a sleepy village rather than the busy metropolis it changed into in the day. Today was no different. Since arriving from Oklahoma, every day the temperature dropped a few degrees and this morning I pulled on my only long-sleeved running shirt. I’d need to buy some new clothes. Nothing from Oklahoma would see me through a Boston winter.
I’d deliberately chosen a rental apartment on the water, and about as far away from the Harvard campus as possible. The place hadn’t even been built when I’d lived here last. I was sure I’d enjoy the view if I was ever home long enough to appreciate it.
I wanted Boston to be different this time.
Of course the lab I’d found was all the way across town and I’d started running to work each morning before the sun came up. Each day I took a different route, getting to know the city I’d thought I would hate.
Turns out it was beautiful.
And days like today, when it was as if I had the city to myself, I wanted to run to Mackenzie’s place and have her share it with me. When I’d first started to run, the silence was like a white flag of surrender to thoughts of Mackenzie, but now I listened to podcasts and audio books. They gave me some defense from the constant rumination. As I arrived outside the lab, I pulled out my earphones, wound them around my phone and took the keys from the pocket of my shorts.
Instead of it feeling easier every day, I felt the loss of her more clearly as each day passed. I’d known her for five days and she’d left Christie, Oklahoma several weeks ago. I had no right to still be thinking of her. It didn’t make any sense that I’d still be wishing she’d taken me up on dinner or even now wondering what it would be like if we were dating, here in Boston. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be spending so much time at work.
As I unlocked the door to the lab, the catch clunked, the mechanism fitting together perf
ectly. Everything about this place was good. It fit. Everything since moving to Boston had worked. Coming back had been the right decision. I had no complaints, just a dull ache for a woman that wouldn’t go away.
I kicked off my running shoes and headed for the shower. It was five-thirty. I was later than usual.
I stepped under the hot spray and grabbed the shower gel. I’d managed to recruit a small but brilliant team who worked nearly as hard as I did. But I was always the first to arrive at the lab and the last to leave. The results we’d had up to this point were more than promising. I was on my way to having everything I’d dreamed about. Almost.
I may have to work a little harder but I was determined that at some point in the future, I would only rarely remember Mackenzie’s full lips, her round ass. I’d learn to let go of the sweet way she asked me to kiss her, or the knowledge I’d been the only man to have really known her.
I turned off the shower, quickly toweled off and dressed. It was in the lab that I could block her out most easily. It was one of the reasons I spent so many hours at work.
Fighting off thoughts of her exhausted me. Some days I was so angry at her for not turning away the man who didn’t know her, who had dumped her while she was shopping for wedding dresses. Other days, I missed her and the way she looked bathed in the Oklahoma moonlight. Today I was disappointed she’d not had more strength to take what she’d learned about herself in Christie and use it to chart a course that was more likely to make her happy.
I switched on the coffee machine and my computer and went to check the cultures that had been left overnight. Everything looked good. Perfect even, almost. I’d love to show Mackenzie the progress we were making. Her smile would look good around here.