Shark Bite

by K L Montgomery

  Well, why would I say no? It’s not like I have anything else to do tonight, and I really want to know what this has to do with my brother. She doesn’t know him, does she?

  I pull in behind her at a little bungalow a little ways north of Lewes. It’s small but well maintained and painted a cheery yellow with bright blue shutters and trim. Like Megan, it’s vibrant and sunny with waving flowers in ceramic pots. There’s a bird bath lined with painted rocks in the flower bed closest to the house, and they each have a word on them like “Faith,” “Love,” “Hope,” and “Joy.”

  I’m still not sure why she invited me to her house. The time we hung out before, it was on my turf. My mind is racing with thoughts like “What if she’s planning to seduce me?” and I have to admit, I am one hundred percent on board with that. But there must be something else, right? She was so adamant before—but things can change in two years.

  “Hey, come on in,” she says from the porch, welcoming me inside before she shuts the door behind me.

  “So, what’s up?” I’m at a loss for any other words at the moment.

  “Do you want something to drink? I think I have some beer, and maybe a wine cooler or two in the fridge.”

  “Wine cooler?” My brows arch as I stare at her.

  “What? I thought you love the 80s. Want me to crank some Bangles or Duran Duran while we drink them?”

  I flash her a look that’s somewhere between a smirk and a scowl. “What’s this mysterious thing you want to show me?”

  “Here, sit down.” She gestures for me to join her on the sofa, and when I sink into the cushions I notice there are a couple of photo albums spread out on the wooden coffee table.

  “What’s this?” The photo albums look old, at least twenty years. Almost like relics from the 80s, to be honest. What, she’s going to show me her baby pictures? That’s just weird and creepy.

  She doesn’t say a word—highly unusual for her—and instead flips open the cover, then turns a few more pages before stopping with the book spread open. “Go ahead, take a look. Recognize anyone?”

  There are four kids in the sand, two boys and two girls. I immediately recognize the older boy is my brother Declan. “How did you get this?”

  “That’s me,” she says, pointing to the smaller of the two girls. “And that’s you.”

  The scrawny freckle-faced kid with a lopsided baseball cap pulled low on his face is beaming at the camera. She flips the page, and there’s another photo of me at what looks like a birthday party with pink and purple streamers and unicorn decorations. I’m wearing a Batman shirt and a party hat.

  “Don’t you remember?” she asks, her gaze pinned on me. The copper centers of her eyes are radiating out into the green.

  It all floods back to me, multiple waves crashing over me and pulling me under their tumbling tide.

  Meggie.

  I stand up, my heart feeling like it’s about to explode, and between the memories and the physical sensations, I feel like I’m being tackled by a 250-pound prop going full speed. My lungs might collapse under the sudden slam.

  “Shark?” She follows me with her eyes but doesn’t move from the sofa.

  My legs are carrying me toward her door, but I have no control over them. They’re acting without command from my brain, just doing their own thing. Fight or flight is a very real reflex, and my legs think flight is the way to go.

  “Where are you going?”

  I suck in a much-needed breath as I turn around to face her. But my lips and tongue haven’t made peace with any of this, and they seem to be on strike.

  Seeing that I’m frozen there, my brain not able to take charge of my limbs or mouth or any part of me, she finally stands up and walks over to where I’m standing. She grabs my hand, and I let her. I’m so numb I barely feel it.

  “Will you come back and sit down?” Her voice is small and meek, totally unlike Megan.

  Meggie.

  I’d completely erased her from my memories. Not because I wanted to forget her, but because I’d obliterated most of my life before I moved to Pennsylvania with my mom all those years ago—almost thirty years ago now. My very early childhood in Delaware and playing at the beach and hanging out in the arcade on the boardwalk with my brother—these were things I saw in old photo albums. Not things that happened to me. I hadn’t seen those pictures in ages now, and I didn’t remember there being a little girl in them.

  But I remember now.

  Meggie was my best friend. Her parents and my parents hung out together. Our dads met at some local business owners’ function, and it all just happened from there. Picnics, birthday parties, trips to the park, to the beach, backyard barbecues, chasing fireflies in the woods at night behind our house. I said goodbye to all those things when my mom packed up all of our belongings and moved us a few hundred miles away in Pennsylvania while my dad and brother stayed behind.

  “Are you okay?” she asks, and I realize we’re sitting on the sofa again, her head leaning on my shoulder. Her body is so warm next to me, and I smell her citrus and floral scent. Lime too, I think. Maybe some coconut as well. She smells like summer, and it only makes those long-repressed memories that much more vibrant and startling as they cascade like a waterfall inside my head.

  “I’m sorry,” is all I can manage to say.

  “You don’t have to be sorry…”

  “I had no idea.” My voice is getting stronger now. “Absolutely none.”

  “I didn’t either,” she admits. “I was showing my parents the newspaper with the photo of you, Matt and the kids from Beach Buddies, and my mother recognized your name when I said it. She said you went by ‘Shay-Shay’ back then, and I remembered you.”

  “Shay-Shay,” I mutter, the nickname bitter in my mouth. “Declan called me that.”

  He called me Shay-Shay, and my dad called me Kid. Now my brother didn’t really call me anything. Whatever bond we had as brothers was destroyed long ago.

  “I was so sad when you moved.” She squeezes my hand again. “I was devastated. You were my best friend.”

  Her words fall on me and are met with silence. I don’t have anything else to give her at this point. What happened when I left Delaware all those years ago is the same reason I’m single.

  I never want to create a family that I later destroy.

  Even now, I want to kiss her. I want to take her into my arms and feel her body pressed against me, absorbing that pain I still carry from that little freckle-faced boy, the one whose whole world was crushed while he stood by, helpless to stop it. The memory of us running along the beach hand in hand after we’d just vowed to get married someday echoes in my head.

  We were eight, and we promised each other forever on Rehoboth Beach.

  Now almost thirty years later, I know I’ll never be able to promise anyone forever.

  Especially not her.

  8

  I’m not begging Shark to stay. My whole body is trembling as I lean against his bulging shoulder. I swear I can feel his heartbeat in the vein that runs right through the shark tattoo on his bicep. But when he stands, and the draft he stirs up with his movement swirls around me, I know there’s nothing I can say to make him stay.

  Well, there may be one thing.

  I follow him to the foyer where he pauses. He’s torn—that much is obvious. He’s not going to go without saying goodbye. But he’s also not going to explain why my little show and tell experiment was so difficult for him.

  He stands there staring at me, the storm in his blue eyes raging. I reach out and grab his hand, taking it into mine like I did before, squeezing it again, hoping to convey that I’m here for him. We’re friends, right? Not just acquaintances or survivors of a one-night stand. We’re honest-to-God friends with shared childhood memories and overlapping footprints in the sand. Maybe we can’t have more than that. Maybe we could never… you know, actually date… but we could take this friendship that’s been growing since we were children and nurture it. Could
n’t we?

  “I don’t know what to say, Shark. I’m sorry if those pictures upset you.”

  “No.” He shakes his head, then bites his lip like he wants to explain but lacks the ability.

  “I didn’t mean to blindside you with it—”

  “I’m not upset, Megan,” he says my full name, and it comes pressed through clenched teeth that sound very much like “upset” to me.

  “I wasn’t expecting it either. I had no idea. I knew you as Shark—and I really didn’t even know your name was Shannon until the other day when we met Matt at his office. And if I hadn’t mentioned it to my parents, my mom never would have put two and two together either.”

  “It’s fine,” he insists. “But I should go now.”

  “I—” I don’t want him to go. I want to go back to the sofa and put my head on his shoulder again and feel his strong Shark heartbeat under my cheek. I want to stroke my fingers down his back and tell him that I wonder what would have happened if we hadn’t said goodbye all those years ago.

  That’s when I remember.

  One time…on the beach… It was after my cousin got married or something, and I wanted to play bride and groom. He didn’t know what I meant. So I explained it. Something like,

  “A man and a woman are really good friends—best friends like we are—and love each other, and they dress up, the woman in a white dress, and the man in a suit. They promise they’ll love each other forever. And then they both get rings, and they’re married.”

  His eyes widen. “Forever? That’s a long time.”

  “The perfect time,” I tell him. “So whaddaya say?”

  “Well, we’re just kids now…but when we’re grown-ups, okay.”

  “So, yes, you’ll marry me? And get me a ring?”

  “Yes, Meggie,” he promises me.

  And we pinky swear on it, then run along the crashing surf.

  He catches me staring off somewhere over his shoulder, the focal point of my memory reel that is playing those images of the little boy and girl running off across the sand while their parents watched and laughed. “Megan?”

  “What?” My eyes snap to his, and I wonder if he remembers that moment too.

  “Thanks for all your help with the rugby team,” he says. “I got us another sponsor too. I forgot to tell you. My family business, Kelly Carriage Company.”

  “Oh, that’s great!” I straighten my posture, trying to get back into professional mode. I guess that means I won’t be lifting myself up on tiptoe to taste his lips. Because that’s what I want to do right now. I shake off that feeling because whatever just happened between us—both two years ago, and almost thirty years ago—it’s over now. We’re on our third round of knowing each other, and this is the least intimate relationship of all the ones we’ve forged. We’ve spun the wheel three times, and this will be where the wheel stops.

  “I should ask Meric if he wants to sponsor, huh?” Shark’s eyes are sparkling again like the sun has come out to quell the storm that was brewing there seconds ago.

  “Yeah, duh. I’ll talk to him.” I wave my hand dismissively. “Oh, and Jason and Hannah—they own that bridal business. Even if they don’t want to sponsor the team, they might want to help with the carnival. Maybe they can do a photo booth with costumes for the kids? Wedding stuff?”

  There’s that little boy and girl on the beach again, the little girl dreaming of a billowing white gown and a handsome groom in a black tuxedo.

  His smile is all business now. “Good idea. I can’t believe this carnival is actually going to happen.”

  “Well, there’s a lot of work to do still, but yeah, we’re gonna pull this off,” I assure him.

  “Cool. So…I guess I’ll see you when I see you?” His lips purse ever so slightly as he looks at me, and I strain to figure out how he wants me to answer, but he’s not giving me any clues.

  “Yep. I’ll call when I have more news.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  He hesitates with the door open for a moment, lingering there like there’s something else he wants to say, and my body tenses, every single nerve leaning, balanced on tiptoe…

  What if he kisses me goodbye?

  “Okay then. Bye, Megan.”

  And then he’s gone.

  When the door shuts, I still can’t believe he’s gone for a moment. It’s like I still feel him there. Or I expect him to come back. I hear him get in his truck and pull out of my driveway, his engine rumbling all the way down the road. He’s really, truly gone, and I’ve never felt as alone in my house as I do right this second.

  There was some sort of energy exchange between us, and I still feel that electricity coursing through me, making all my fingers and toes tingle. I can’t explain it, but I know I’m never going to get to sleep tonight.

  I wonder if Lindy is up for some company?

  My best friend greets me at the door with pajamas on and her hair in pigtails. She’s so pregnant and adorable, she’s too cute for words. I pat her belly on my way in. “Hello, beautiful! And hello, beautiful or handsome, whichever you are,” I speak to her bun in the oven.

  “What do you want to drink?” she asks, yawning, as she heads into the kitchen. It’s almost completely dark outside—so it must be after nine.

  “Whatever, babe, I’m not picky,” I tell her, even though I’m totally picky. She knows this and will select the perfect drink. That’s just who Lindy is. Sure enough, she comes back with a Diet Coke and a wedge of lemon perched on the edge of the glass. She’s truly amazing, this lady.

  “You said you have news?” She sounds interested but flings herself on the sofa like it’s taking her last ounce of energy.

  “You sure you’re up for this, sugarplum?”

  She yawns again. “I’m totally up for some juicy gossip, girl. I just don’t know if the B-A-B-Y—” she points to her belly for emphasis, as if I didn’t get the spelled reference, “—is down with it.”

  “I’ll try to talk fast, but trust me, you’re gonna want to hear this.”

  She pulls a pillow onto her lap, presses it to her belly, then leans over it expectantly. “Go on…”

  I tell her what happened when I was at my parents’ house and they saw the paper with Shark, his teammates, and Matt Cameron in it. Then I tell her about getting out my photo albums and showing Shark the photos of us together when we were kiddos.

  When I finally stop talking and look at her, she’s asleep.

  I put her to sleep with my story!

  I huff out a long, annoyed sigh, even though I know my preggo best friend needs her beauty sleep, and take off down the hallway to find Meric. He’ll know what to do. I knock on the frame of his office door, which is ajar, but I don’t want to go barging in because I’m polite like that.

  “Hey, Megan, what’s up?”

  Lucius, Meric’s dog, looks up at me and barks twice to let me know I’ve been acknowledged. “Hi, Lucius.” Now he comes over to me, tail wagging, to give me some love. It’s our traditional greeting.

  I’m still petting Sir Shaggy Butt as I give Meric the deets. “Uh, your wife passed out on the couch while I was telling her my love life woes.”

  “Love life?” His dark brows arch up as he closes the window of whatever he was working on at his computer. He takes his hand off his mouse and swivels to face me.

  I laugh because I have absolutely no business calling it that. But Meric knows Shark better than Lindy does. So he might be the one I should actually be talking to.

  After that brilliant realization, I help myself to a seat on the small sofa anchoring the wall across from Meric’s desk. I fold my hands together in my lap and give him my most charming smile.

  “What?” He purses his lips at me, brows knitted together.

  “Well, I’m thinking you might be able to offer some insights…”

  “On your LOVE life?” His hearty laugh echoes down the hall, and Lucius wiggles in his slumber. “Come on, now, Megan, I think you know as well
as I do I’d be no help there.”

  “It’s about Shark.” I decide to cut to the chase.

  “Wait, what?” He stiffens as his eyes lock onto mine.

  “Well, we have a history, you know…”

  “You do?” He seems genuinely surprised.

  Wait…Shark didn’t tell him? “You don’t know about Shark and me…?”

  He shakes his head adamantly.

  “About us hooking up…?”

  He stares at me blankly.

  “He didn’t tell you?”

  I thought guys bragged to each other about their boinking adventures without fail. I thought that was one of the major tenets of guyhood, to spread word of your sexual prowess far and wide.

  “Sorry if you were expecting differently, but Shark isn’t like that. He doesn’t brag about his exploits.”

  “Exploits?” I repeat.

  “Well, whatever you want to call them.” Meric waves his hand dismissively like he’s hoping he cast a spell and this entire conversation will just go poof and disappear.

  Nope, I’m settling in for the long haul now, rubbing my hands together and getting warmed up. “Does Shark have a lot of exploits?”

  Meric scoffs, “I just told you he doesn’t brag!”

  “Give me your best guess.”

  “He’s been known to date fairly regularly,” he admits.

  “The same woman over and over or lots of different women?” I grill him.

  He shakes his head. “He’s not a relationship guy…”

  “Why not?” I insist. The words Meric used are the exact same ones Shark used himself after our night together two years ago.

  “I don’t know!” Meric throws his hands up in the air. “This whole conversation makes me very uncomfortable.” He glances at his computer screen like he really needs to look at some numbers for a while because all these sticky emotions are too much for him.

  I purse my lips and stare at my best friend’s husband, guilt pinging me like I stubbed my toe or something. “I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, but I’m trying to understand the guy…”