by Jenn Cooksey
By this time, though, Cole has gone from ignoring me to chuckling and shaking his head at me. “In the future, beautiful, never ask.”
“Little late on the advice, there, buddy,” I mumble and then hold a finger up when the line starts ringing. I also take a few steps away so I don’t have to try to hear over the guys continuing to discuss what sexual acts time and a half and double time are equivalent to.
However, when the ringing stops and all I hear is gut busting laughter, my gaze flies from my phone to hit Cole and the inordinately amused and rather cocky expression he’s wearing as he waves his phone in the air a little before putting it to his ear.
“I’m pretty exhausted, so…you’re gonna have to make me a really good offer. I think I’m safe in letting you slide on the references though.”
29
“I Love You For Sentimental Reasons”
—Erica—
“Oh, nu-uh! You have got to be kidding me!” I stalk over and hit Cole in the arm as he and his dumb friends get a good belly laugh at my expense. Beginning to laugh at myself too, though, with the fact that he is apparently my knight in shining tow truck; because really, I shouldn’t be surprised…he always was. Although with accepting that for the truth it is, another fact dawns on me and I can’t help but blurting out, “We’re supposed to be even! Remember?”
“Oh, believe me, I remember, but we weren’t even. I mean you didn’t exactly leave me a receipt, however I seem to recall thinking I owed you some change,” he informs me with a devastating grin to go along with some quick eyebrow waggling.
My eyebrows shoot into my hairline all on their own and feeling like my eyeballs are bulging from their sockets, they dart from face to face to see how his boyfriend and all his friends are handling what wasn’t even close to being an innuendo, but rather a bold, in your face declaration. It could be said that most of the guys probably look like me right now, with their mouths kind of hanging slack, except for Sean who mutters something like, “She should get that in writing,” and I’m stunned to see Payton nodding in what looks like quietly proud approval. I mean, Jesus Christ, how the hell am I supposed to respond to any of this? I cannot figure Cole out to save my life it seems, although now I’m feeling some major relief that I didn’t actually suck the first—er…well, yeah.
Then, of course, the numerous smart-assery comments and questions start. But Cole, God love him, simply lifts his eyebrows innocently and putting his hand in the small of my back, encouraging me to lead the way, he smiles and shuts them down, utterly and completely. “G’night, guys…”
“Your ass is so getting reamed for all of that…” Payton chuckles as the three of us move far enough away so that the whining and taunting is hardly audible over the other patrons’ conversations and the jukebox that’s playing an old Willie Nelson song.
“Yeah, I know. Ryan was foaming at the mouth there at the end though, and that alone makes whatever’s coming worth it. Which reminds me…” Instead of heading towards the exit, Cole turns the opposite direction and tilts his head as an indication to follow him. And I do, but when he stops in front of the cigarette machine, I’m the one who starts pouting and, frothing—just a little.
“Don’t waste your mon…ey,” I start, although all Cole does is smooth his hand over the top of the machine until he feels some nonexistent energy or something in a certain spot, and then he slams his fist down on it. My mouth falls open when out pops not one, but three packs of cigarettes. “What the hell?!”
First bending to retrieve my cigarettes and some other poor sucker’s, he then stands to hand one pack to me with a wink, but my goose bumps and further issue of being at a loss for words are the product of the deeply seductive octave his voice dips into when it speaks an inherently unabashed statement. “Sometimes, sugar, a little foreplay is all it takes.”
“Foreplay.”
“Mmhm. It might have knobs but that doesn’t mean yanking on ‘em straight away will get you what you want.”
“Oooh, yeah. Knob yanking is no bueno,” Payton comments with an, almost, um…girly grimace.
Cole rolls his eyes, grabs a book of matches from the stash piled next to the machine and tries to hand Payton the other two packs of cigarettes. “Here, stick these in your purse.”
“Alri—wait, I don’t carry a purse!”
A real grin spreads across Cole’s face as he tucks one pack in his shirt pocket, the other in a back pants pocket, and looks over his shoulder at Payton and me before he walks out of the bar, laughing.
“You’re mean tonight. Was he ever this mean back in the day?”
I stop for a moment to think and have to shake my head as Payton opens the door for me. “Not really. Not to me anyway. Unless you count pelting me in the head with tampons once. But, you know, I kinda needed ‘em at the time, so…”
We join Cole outside and immediately Payton begins rubbing his hands together and then pulls up the collar of his lightweight, blue plaid jacket. “Brrr, it got cold out here…” The indisputable commentary being underscored with every warm word made visible in the frigid night air.
“At least it stopped raining icicles,” I mumble from underneath the knitted cotton of my scarf, where I’ve burrowed my face as far as I am possibly able to.
“True, but if it’s okay with you two, I’m gonna wait in the truck with the heater on full-blast. You can either look at it as me being generous for giving you guys some alone time, or me being chiefly concerned with myself. I’d probably go with the second option because I’m not about to freeze my ass off while you’re tinkering with a car.”
“Sissy.”
“So be it. Gimme the keys.”
“Here, catch…” Cole tosses his keys to Payton and if it wasn’t for being able to see his breath too, you might think he’s standing in a completely different climate than his boyfriend and me. “So, where’s your car and what’s wrong with it?”
The opposite direction of where Payton heads, I point across and down the street to the gas station. “Oh, um…it’s over there,” we start walking and I add, “There isn’t really anything wrong with it, it just has a flat tire.”
“Wait a minute. It just has a flat?”
“Yeah, why?”
“I taught you how to put a spare on when you got your license, dummy.”
My face flushes when I realize he’s right, although now I sort of have to admit that I wasn’t exactly paying attention; I was more or less caught up in rejoicing on social media about how I passed my test without being docked a single point. Probably even more exciting was that my driver’s license picture had turned out atypically great…as far as driver’s license pictures go that is.
“Um…well, I—”
“You don’t remember anything I taught you, do you?”
My nose wrinkles up and I shake my head. “Mm-mm. Sorry?”
“Seriously? Not a single thing?”
I’m going to blame it on all the banter and subject matter earlier for why my mind again instantly leaps to the last night I shared a bed with him. For once my face doesn’t heat up, but, I do feel just a bit warmer than I had before. That is, before certain events from that long ago summer come together for another memory montage.
Although hardly enough to be measured, sexual tension stretches its way towards me, desperate in searching for anything where it might gain a foothold no matter how miniscule. Finding a substantial memory of worship, moonlight, and stars dancing on water to tether itself to, I swiftly find myself acknowledging that the very essence of our past relationship was based on intrinsic trust, yes, however, physical attraction wasn’t just heavily laced throughout any of our private interactions; it was explicit, and, absolute.
It makes me wonder how in the world I was so implicitly attracted to him as I was but never once realized it until now. Now of course being however many years too late to do anything about it. Thinking even further back, though, I remember a time when I did realize it, but didn’t know what to
do or how to go about finding out if he might’ve felt the same way.
My crush started when I was twelve I think and lasted probably over two years. Although somewhere in the middle of that timespan and after a more or less fruitless venture in the direction I was hoping to go, I figured it probably wasn’t worth risking our friendship to see if he’d be game in trying our hand at being something more than we were. Not to mention that an almost two-year age gap back then seemed more like two decades and was therefore basically out of the realm of possibility.
“No, there are, um…” I stop and catch his gaze to head-on meet the warmth of his brown eyes with profound affection and a dollop of regret swirling in mine, “There are some things I learned from you that, even if I wanted to, I’ll never forget.”
Solemn remembrance lights his features and for a brief moment, he just holds my eyes captive with his. “Well that’s, uh, good to know. But, it’s not what I meant…I’m talking automotive, sweetheart.”
“Then no, I don’t,” I shake my head and let go of a soundless sigh; his response and my newfound and yet quiet longing to revise the jilted pages of history that I know will never produce any kind of present or future reality confirms that neither of us are really feeling up to traveling through time any further tonight. “Which is why I asked the bartender for the number of a tow truck or mechanic…is that what you do now?”
“No, he gave you my number because I’m sorta the local Mr. Fix-it.”
“You mean like a jack of all trades, master of none?”
“Yep, exactly. Started out doing favors for friends when they were in a bind and then word got around, so it’s turned into an almost full-time job.”
“Huh.”
“Yeah, it’s not really what I ever pictured myself doing either,” he chuckles, “I like it though…keeps me busy and let’s me make my own hours so I can do what I want when I want. And, you evidently remember, I’ve always been good with my hands and I enjoy what I’m good at,” he tells me and stops at the trunk of my car.
Meeting his eyes and the teasing expression on his face, once again I don’t quite know what he’s thinking. Like is he flirting with me, or playing again? Or is he just being the incorrigible Cole from shy of a decade ago who can’t help himself? I guess it really doesn’t matter though. Whatever the case may be, the past can’t be unwritten and I’m finding that sentimentality and I are bound to be depressing bedfellows tonight if Cole and I keep going back and forth like this. “Uh, I’m gonna refrain from commenting on that one.”
He rolls his eyes at me, simultaneously holding out his hand and saying something that creates a peculiar sense of déjà vu in my head, as if I’ve said similar words or the exact same thing before. “Kidding! Jeez, Erica, have a sense of humor, would ya? And either gimme your keys or open the trunk yourself.”
Choosing to take the opportunity he’s given me to focus my attention elsewhere, I unlock the trunk myself. It creaks itself up only to reveal a few boxes and black plastic garbage bags of clothes; add in the TV, DVD player, computer, a couple pillows and new bedding along with some other odds and ends, a few groceries for tomorrow and toiletry-type necessitates that I’d packed in the backseat of the Grenada, the sum totals my insignificant belongings. The evidence of a full life obviously lacking here makes me feel even more like my existence has come to be worthy of little regard.
Cole’s serious expression when he takes it all in and then looks to me begs a silent question that I don’t feel up to answering. “Yeah, I pack light these days.” It feels as if he’s on the verge of speaking his query out loud, though, so I just begin pulling bags out of the trunk, thus he can get to the jack and spare tire housed directly underneath what I have to show for being on this planet twenty-five years. “Here, lemme just get…some of this stuff out of the way,” I mutter and pull another bag out of the way and drop it to my feet, glad, actually, that my choice in luggage brands is Hefty’s heavy duty two-ply, which means my meager wardrobe will be safe sitting on the oily slush-covered asphalt of the gas station for a bit.
He doesn’t say anything while I move things out of the way, but instead he reaches into his shirt pocket to hastily pull out one of the cigarette machine’s gifts to him and the book of matches he’d snagged from the bar.
“I thought you said you don’t smoke anymore.”
Fire sparks from the end of the match and he shrugs bringing it to the cigarette hanging from his mouth, his hands expertly cupping the flame in a wind-free zone ensuring a first-effort success. I watch him inhale deeply and breathe out again, mesmerized by him, the wistful familiarity of every movement he makes, and the toxic fog casting a blue tint to the cloud of carbon dioxide his breath releases as it wafts up and blends in to become indistinguishable from the night. Moving aside when he shifts to take my place in front of the trunk, I feel another rueful pinch in my chest. That is, until he takes one more longish drag off the cigarette and then gives it to me, freeing his hands to roll back the carpeted cover of the spare’s hidey-hole, and allowing me to suck in yet even more throwbacks of thought; these taking me to the night I first opened up to not only sharing this addiction with him, but myself as well and in ways I hadn’t shared myself with anyone before…or since.
“Alright, let’s get this show on the roa—aw, Erica,” he sighs, his chin falling to his chest in an almost defeatist way before looking over at me, “Your spare is missing.”
Not willing to believe him for some reason only known to God, I push him out of the way to look for myself, my face falling when I have to accept that he spoke the unequivocal truth. “Son of a bitch…welcome to my life. Now what do I do?” I grumble under my breath to myself before I begin hefting trash bags back into the trunk in severe frustration.
“Relax, sugar. Where are you staying?”
“I don’t even know,” the answer escapes me in a hopeless whisper.
Roughly, Cole grabs me by the elbow and jerks the bag out of my hands. “Oh, Christ, Erica. Tell me you don’t live in your car.”
“What?! No!” I yank my arm from his grasp and glare at him, mostly in embarrassment, but I can’t deny my pride being wounded by his assumption. “Why would you even think that?”
“Frankly, I don’t know what the hell to think. You show up out of the clear blue the night after what’s thought of by and large as the holiday that kicks off family time, but you’re completely alone, you’re still driving your grandma’s goddamned, broken-down Grenada with what looks like everything you might own shoved inside it, you’ve been holding back like you’re afraid of me and God only knows what else, not to mention that I used to know you fairly well too so I’m pretty safe in saying with every degree of certainty that you’ve been on the brink of tears more than once so far tonight, and now you’re telling me you don’t even have a place to sleep?
“To me, sweetheart, when I do the math those things add up to mean that you’re either running from something, someone, and or, you’ve somehow become homeless, but it’s beyond me why on Earth you’d choose to live off the land up here during what’s shaping up to no doubt be the coldest winter ever recorded for this neck of the woods. I mean, does the heater in this POS even work anymore?”
My head falls and my lungs release a resigned sigh. Both demonstrate how exhausted I’ve become trying to keep up this ridiculous charade of not having wildly mixed and deeply felt emotions over seeing him again. His response to that though is to grab my arm once more, forcing me to look at him and give him an answer.
“You know what, you’re right about all of it. Except that I’m not running and I’m not homeless.”
“You telling me the whole truth? ‘Cause I swear to fucking God, Erica, if I find out you’re running because someone hurt you, I’ll make that someone disappear.”
“You’d do that for me? I mean after all this time?”
“One word and there won’t even be a body to find,” he snaps, utterly self-assured and somewhat scary, his entire bo
dy practically vibrating in righteous anger at the mere idea of someone hurting me.
I can’t help but to feel touched, although there are two truths in which I can answer him. One of them of course being something I won’t say out loud right now in that aside from myself, the person who’s caused me more pain and damage than anyone…is him.
“Well, I appreciate the offer, I guess, but it’s unnecessary. I’m just in the process of relocating here for a job hopefully and I got lost in the dark trying to find the house I rented. I’ve never seen it in person or even been up here at all since the last time your dad took—” my words break off suddenly and I feel like smacking my forehead again.
His dad took the two of us fishing up here one weekend when we were little kids. I’d completely and totally forgotten about that until just this second, as well as the fact that his dad’s cabin is up here somewhere close by if my so far seemingly accurate memory serves. That is unless his father sold his place or something because I seem to remember something about him having a cabin in Lake Arrowhead and we’re actually in Crestline, about fifteen or twenty minutes outside of Arrowhead.
“You just now remembering?”
“Yeah…”
He sighs. “Me too.”
“What do you remember?”
“Me?” he asks, raising his brows and continuing only after I’ve nodded in answer. “Well, I remember thinking that for a girl who loved literally baking mud, you sure weren’t crazy about digging in the dirt for night crawlers.”
“Oh wow…that’s right. And your dad got so frustrated because you couldn’t cast the right way.”
“Yeah, I never did learn to really do it right. I just pretended I knew what I was doing.”
“I can picture your dad’s porch and that long winding hill going up to the road his house was on. It was the only house up there, right?”
“Yeah, but not anymore. Another house just finished going up.”