by Lang Leav
I laughed.
“He takes a bite of his meal and spits it out,” Rad continued. “Then he says he would rather die than eat another bite of food that isn’t seasoned with salt. Of course, the princess reveals her true identity, and the king realizes the point she was trying to make before he threw her to the wolves.”
“I like that story,” I said.
“I knew you would.”
“I suppose salt has a negative rap, like sadness. We’re always told to watch our sodium intake or smile.”
He grinned. “I like that.”
“Actually, I kind of had this epiphany the other day.”
He raised his eyebrows. “You did?”
“Yeah,” I shook my head. “Forget it; it’s stupid.”
“Now you’ve got me curious. Come on,” he added when I shook my head again. He gave me an encouraging smile. “I’ll buy you a muffin,” he offered.
I laughed. “Okay, then.” I held up both hands in a gesture of surrender. “It happened after I read your book.” I stopped and chewed my bottom lip, trying to find the appropriate words to describe my revelation while Rad sat there with an expectant look on his face. “I’ve sat in on several interviews with writers, and not all of them strike me as tortured souls. So it got me thinking, because a lot of literature is about struggle. But I don’t think all writers are sad. I think it’s the other way around—all sad people write. It’s a form of catharsis, a way of working through things that feel unresolved, like undoing a knot. People who are prone to sadness are more likely to pick up a pen.”
Rad nodded thoughtfully. “And because they do, some will inevitably end up as writers,” he said.
“Exactly.”
“So we’ve had it backward this whole time.”
“Well, it was just a thought,” I said with a shrug.
“I like it.” He smiled at me, and I found myself smiling back.
Several cups of coffee later, the rain was coming down thick and fast. Only a few cold, soggy fries remained in the basket. The sky was growing darker. “I should head off,” I said, glancing at my phone. “I’m going to miss my bus.”
“I can give you a lift home,” he offered.
“Are you sure?”
“I don’t know,” he said playfully. “I think I am starting to have second thoughts now.”
We left the café and made our way to Rad’s car, doing our best to dodge the rain.
“You still drive the same car.”
“It hasn’t been that long since we last saw each other,” he said, getting in the driver’s side.
“But it feels like a lifetime ago, doesn’t it?” I slid into the passenger seat, and it was like entering a time capsule. “I suppose it’s because so much has happened since.”
We looked at each other for a moment, our expressions quizzical. Drops of water slid from our hair and fell onto the gray fabric upholstery. I felt along the seat, and that same tear was still there. Rad reached into a duffle bag in the back seat and pulled out a large beach towel, passing it to me. I dried myself as best as I could before handing it back. As Rad toweled his hair, a flicker of something passed through me. I wasn’t quite sure what it was, but for a split second, it felt almost intimate. “So,” he said, tossing the towel carelessly into the back seat, “where to?” I gave him my address as he pulled out of the parking lot.
“Do you know what’s ironic about writers?” Rad said, as we sat in heavy traffic. The sky outside was almost pitch black, and the rain was pounding steadily on the windshield.
“What?”
“Writers take things that are deeply personal, things said to them in confidence, often during moments of great intimacy, and strip them down into words. Then they take those words, naked and vulnerable, and give them to the world. Yet in spite of this, writers struggle more than most when it comes to sentimental attachment. They only write about things they’ve felt deeply. That’s the thing about writers—on one hand everything is sacred to them, but, on the other, nothing really is.”
“Is that off the record?” I smiled.
“Is anything?” he replied with a grin.
“I think you’re right, though.” My face grew serious. “Some of my colleagues have admitted to sacrificing their integrity for a really good story. I suppose the act of writing is in itself a form of betrayal.”
Rad nodded. “I agree. Writing is a conduit. It opens up a passageway into the past. Not just for the writer, but for the reader too. Both readers and writers are linked by the commonality of human experience.”
“Yeah,” I said. I looked at the figures walking on the street outside, their silhouettes warped by drops of rain sliding down glass. “But it’s always a little skewed. You can never relive a moment through writing. You can only retell it.”
“Yet things always seem less artificial when you’re looking back. Time lends it an authenticity that nothing else can.”
“I think it’s because we romanticize the past. We give it more than it deserves.”
The traffic began to clear, and we were quiet the rest of the way to my house.
I felt a twinge of disappointment when Rad turned the corner onto my street. I was enjoying our conversation and wished we could keep talking. “It’s just ahead. You can drop me here.” He slowed down to a stop just outside my house.
“Hey,” he said, turning to face me. “Want to keep driving?”
“Okay.”
Fifteen
I surreptitiously checked my phone in the pocket of my brown satchel. No text. I slid it back down into the bag with a sigh. I looked out the car window and smiled at Duck, who was getting gas for the car. I didn’t have to go into the office that day, and Duck’s morning lecture got canceled, so we decided to go for lunch. He came around and tapped on my window. I wound it down.
“Want anything?” he asked.
“Can you get me a Diet Coke?”
“Okay,” he said, kissing me as his thumb and forefinger gently snatched my chin.
As he walked away, I felt a stab of guilt, thinking about the night before. After we left the café, Rad and I drove aimlessly for hours, lost in conversation. By then, it had stopped raining, and the night air was warm and still. We had no idea where we were. None of the street names were familiar, but we didn’t care. It felt almost dreamlike, as though we had slipped into a new reality.
It was well past midnight when we realized how hungry we were. Thankfully, we found a twenty-four-hour McDonald’s with a drive-through. We ordered burgers and thick shakes that we ate in the deserted parking lot. Outside, the rain-drenched asphalt was an incandescent blur: hues of white, red, and yellow refracting the light from the nearby streetlamps and the golden arches overhead. Maybe it was the free-flowing conversation or the thrill of being somewhere unfamiliar, but it was hands down the best burger I’d ever had.
This morning, I was ready to tell Lucy about Rad, but she had to rush off to class. Now I wondered whether I should hold back from telling her. If I kept it a secret from Lucy, then perhaps I could justify keeping it from Duck.
The sound of the door clicking open snapped me back to the present. Duck got into the car and handed me my drink. Then he looked at me and smiled for the longest time. “What?” I smiled back.
“I really love you, Audrey.” He leaned over and kissed me softly on the cheek. “You make me so happy.”
“Audrey,” Trinh called, when I walked into the office Wednesday morning. She was sitting on the couch in the common area and motioned for me to come over. I sat down next to her.
“So how was your interview?”
I took a deep breath. “You wouldn’t believe this, but I know the author.”
Her eyes widened. “Colorado Clark?”
“Well, I knew him by the name Rad—no one calls him Colorado,” I explained.
“
Oh. How do you know him?”
I gave her a quick recap of the history I shared with Rad.
“Wow,” she said. “That’s really cool—especially about the snow globe. And then you deleted each other’s numbers?” Her eyes were unusually dreamy. “I mean, I’m not a romantic, but God, that’s like fate, destiny—whatever you want to call it. Don’t you think?”
“I suppose.” I didn’t know what Rad’s sudden appearance in my life meant. But it was wreaking havoc with my emotions. All the feelings of guilt that were tied to Ana had come rushing back. At the same time, the connection I felt to Rad was growing more intense by the day.
“I mean, what are the chances?” Trinh continued. “It’s almost like you were meant to meet up again.”
The following Saturday, Duck was away at a seminar, and Lucy had locked herself away in her room to cram for her first exam. The night before, she’d given me strict instructions not to disturb her unless it was an absolute emergency.
It was a beautiful, crisp morning, and I was out in the courtyard with the paper and a fresh cup of coffee. I was flicking through the Lifestyle section, wondering whether I should go and see a film, when my phone rang.
“Hey.” It was Rad.
“Hi.”
“What are you up to?”
“Just reading the paper.”
“Anything interesting?”
“There’s a documentary called Killer Clouds coming out soon. Apparently they are the most dangerous things in the sky.”
“Those fluffy, marshmallowy things?”
“You mean those angry, lightning-inducing, tornado-facilitating monsters.”
“Wow, I will never look at a cloud in the same way again.”
“They are the original wolf in sheep’s clothing.”
“Long before there were wolves.”
“Or clothing.”
Rad laughed. “Hey, are you doing anything today?”
“Nope. How about you?”
“Nothing. I’m kind of bored. Want to hang out?”
I thought about Duck and felt immediately guilty. I knew he wouldn’t like the idea of me seeing Rad again, but I couldn’t help myself.
“Okay.”
Rad came to pick me up about an hour later.
“So what should we do?” I said, when we were pulling away from the curb. “Want to see a movie? There’s one about the US economy that everyone at work is raving about.”
“That sounds like a good option,” said Rad. “It’s such a beautiful day, though; do you really want to spend it inside a cinema?”
“I suppose not.”
“What about a hike?”
“A hike? Are you kidding me?”
“Why, what’s wrong with hiking?”
“Nothing, other than the fact that it involves walking.”
We were silent as we thought of things to do.
“You know, it’s been, like, a million years since I’ve gone down to the trails. The weather is so great today I wouldn’t mind going for a ride.”
“On a bike?”
“I was thinking more along the lines of a horse,” said Rad.
“Oh.”
“Have you ridden before?”
“Sure.” I had no idea why I said that, since I had never ridden a horse in my life.
“Excellent! I used to ride a lot when I was a kid. I miss it.”
“Uh-huh,” I said, thinking back to Lucy’s tenth birthday when her parents had hired a pony and we took turns riding him while a lady led us slowly up and down the yard.
“My mum is mad about horses,” Rad continued. “We drove out west every weekend to the stables. I used to ride a horse named Periscope. He was a scraggly brown thing, but I absolutely adored him. He got sent away when I was about thirteen, and I was beside myself.”
“That’s strange. I knew this guy who went through the exact same thing.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, his name was Sodapop,” I teased.
“This is what I get for baring my soul to you.”
About an hour later, Rad pulled into a dirt driveway off the Central Coast with an overarching sign that read “Eureka Equestrian.”
Rad parked the car, and we got out, making our way over to the log building up ahead. A teenage girl in riding gear sat behind a glass booth.
“Hi,” she said. The tag pinned to her shirt read “Sally.”
“Hi,” said Rad. “We’d like to book two horses for an hour.”
“Sure. That will be seventy-five each.”
Sally led us to the stables, where a burly man in a plaid red shirt was running a hard wire brush over a handsome black horse. He looked up as we approached.
“Two for an hour ride on the Bereewan Trail,” said Sally, motioning to us. She grabbed a couple of helmets that were hanging on the side of the stable and passed them over to me.
“That’s a good track, especially for a day like this,” he said in a low, gruff voice. “I’m Bill, by the way.”
“I’m Rad; this is Audrey.”
“Hi,” I said, strapping on my helmet.
“And this is Midnight.” He patted the side of the horse affectionately.
“He’s beautiful,” said Rad.
“He sure is. You two ridden before?”
“Yeah,” said Rad. “I used to ride almost every weekend.”
“Great,” Bill replied.
“I’m a little rusty,” I said.
Bill nodded. “Okay, then, Rad you take Midnight.” He handed the reins to Rad. “And for you, Audrey, I’ll go and get Molly. She’s a little old and slow.”
“Sounds good.”
Bill disappeared into the stable and came out a moment later with a white mare. She had large gray patches across her body and big, doleful eyes.
“So how long since your last ride?” asked Bill, as he threw a saddle across Molly’s back.
“Um, a couple years,” I lied.
“How often were you riding?”
“Not too often.”
“Do you remember the basics?”
“Uh, I might need a quick reminder.”
Bill buckled up the saddle and placed the bridle over Molly’s head. Then he pulled up a stepladder and placed it on the left side of her body.
“This is a mounting block,” he explained. “Just step up onto it, put your left leg in the stirrup, and swing yourself up over the horse.”
“Okay,” I said and followed his instructions.
“That’s the way,” Bill confirmed.
“Holy shit,” I said, when I was sitting in the saddle. The sudden height was giving me vertigo.
“Are you okay?” said Rad. He had already mounted without any assistance and was now sitting back in his saddle like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“I’d forgotten how tall horses are.”
Bill handed me the reins, and I took them with nervous hands. “Okay, so when you want Molly to start walking, sit straight up in your saddle, put your heels down, and squeeze gently.”
I did as he directed, and Molly moved into a slow walk. I let out a yelp, and Rad gave me a strange look.
“You sure you’ve ridden a horse before, Audrey?”
“Of course I have.”
“You’re doing good,” said Bill. “Now, if you want Molly to go right, pull on the right rein and hold. Same thing if you want to go left. Got it?”
“Uh-huh.”
“If you want to go into a slow trot, give the old girl another squeeze and lift your butt off the saddle. If you want her to stop, sit down in the saddle and pull gently on both reins. She will also respond to ‘whoa.’”
“Okay.”
Bill let me walk Molly around the paddock until he was satisfied I knew what I was doing.<
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“Now, come to a stop,” he said.
I sat down into the saddle, pulled back gently on the reins, and said, “Whoa.” Molly came to a halt.
“Good,” Bill smiled. “All right, then, you’re all set to go.”
About ten minutes into our ride, I was actually enjoying myself. I had gotten used to the height and the motion as we bounced along in a slow trot. The scenery around us was stunning. A dense forest edged the trail and paved it with dappled light. Birds chirped in the eaves above us, and in the distance, we heard the faint roar of crashing waves.
“This was a good idea,” said Rad, as though reading my thoughts.
My horse, Molly, let out a snort. “She agrees.”
Rad smiled at me. “So how come you’ve got the weekend free? What’s your boyfriend up to?”
“He’s away at a seminar. W-Y-S-A.” I spelled it out. “It stands for World Youth Success Academy.”
“Sounds kind of like Star Trek.”
“You’re not that far off, actually. It preaches a holistic, new age kind of ideology. There’s, like, a career element to it, but most of it has to do with how you run your life—from your mind-set, spiritual values, even down to your diet—it almost borders on theology.”
“You seem pretty clued in.”
“I looked them up when Duck was trying to convince me to join.”