by Anne Jolin
Her hope crippled me time and time again, and left me like this.
Waiting for my iPhone to connect to Bluetooth, I hit shuffle on a playlist, turning up the dial up on my sound system.
Music helped me decompress.
Like the hand movements, it too grounded me.
My ill-timed run-in with Mr. Hart had left me feeling unbalanced and needing another physical high to even out my internal playing field.
With the emotions he provoked and my memories of Dean, I knew I couldn’t handle the type of high another man would bring me, not like this, not while the hope in the weak parts of my subconscious lingered so close to the surface.
My addictions were like trying to fill a bottomless pit that never became full. In the moments where I acted with hope clouding my judgements, I was subject to a risky level of vulnerability. One I had yet learned to manage effectively, despite Doctor Colby’s encouragements, and thus, chose to shut it down immediately, if possible.
Perhaps if I was someone who liked the gym, I would pound the quiver from my body with a hard workout or a run, but I didn’t. I hated the gym, and I didn’t know how to burn the need out of my system, not like that.
Instead, I shifted into drive and hit redial on my cellphone. The music replaced with ringing.
“Smith & Co Productions, Kevin speaking.”
“Meet me out front in ten minutes. Bring your coat,” I blurted, as his voice came on the phone.
“Char?” he asked, confused.
“Yeah. Ten minutes,” I repeated. “And shut down, because you won’t be coming back today.”
I hung up the phone, pressing my foot onto the gas.
Kevin was late, as per usual, and I checked my mail app while I idled outside the building.
Dave had responded to my email. He agreed to check in with me before allowing any workers into my apartment. He also let me know there was only minor damage to a small patch of insulation in the ceiling above my living room, but that it shouldn’t take more than a day to remove and reinstall. However, due to the damage in the rest of the building, the construction company would be onsite for the better part of a few months making repairs.
This was not something that appeased me, nor my heart.
Kevin climbed into the passenger seat, pushing my mess over. “What the hell, Char?”
“We’re going to the farm,” I told him, as I pulled back into traffic.
He groaned, pushing his head into the seat rest. “Not this again.”
Kevin hated the farm.
Actually, Kevin hated almost anywhere that people didn’t need to iron their clothes.
I made one stop at home, careful to watch for a black hardhat, and picked up what I needed from the safe in my bedroom closet.
“Can’t you get, like, a normal hobby to deal with your emotional baggage?” He rolled his eyes when we pulled into the driveway of the farm thirty minutes later.
Kevin was a yuppie. Born, raised, and proud of it.
“I mean, there’s knitting and there’s reading…” He looked over at me. “You like to read. I mean, reading is fun, right? You can read instead. You can even read with those earmuffs on if you want.” He gestured to the backseat.
I waved to Farmer Don on his tractor, continued for another ten minutes to the back of the property, and slid the SUV into park.
“You’re paying for my dry-cleaning,” Kevin whined as he folded out of the passenger side.
I rolled my eyes as I walked around the car, lifting the latch for the back door. Sitting down on the edge, I grabbed my Hunter boots from inside and slid my bare feet into them.
He leaned a hip against the open door and watched me with little amusement. I handed him the earplugs, thrower, and a case of pigeons.
“Are you even listening to me?” he pouted.
Removing the Remington from its case, I grabbed a box of shells. “New hobby. Dry-cleaning. I heard you.”
I positioned my hearing protection over my ears and motioned for him to stand behind me.
He did.
He knew the drill.
“This place is so gross.” I could still hear him whining through my ear muffs.
I pumped the shotgun.
Bang!
Bang!
“Seriously, what is wrong with you?” he shouted, and I looked over my shoulder at him.
He shuffled awkwardly in his dress shoes, looking at the dirt like it just might kill him.
I put my back to him again.
“Dean’s back.” Kevin gasped, and I shouted, “Pull!”
He obliged, sending a clay pigeon into the air.
Bang!
I pumped the shotgun.
“I have a date with Beau, the most perfect man alive, next week.”
I heard a curse as he broke one of the orange rounds trying to put it in the thrower. “I don’t see why that’s a—”
“Pull!” I yelled, cutting him off.
Another clay pigeon came into my sights.
Bang!
“Shouldn’t you be happier about that?” His voice was louder to overcompensate for the earmuffs he was wearing.
Rolling my eyes, I pumped the shotgun again, but this time, a shell casing got stuck.
“I made out with his head of security.” My voice was edgy as the words came out like a growl.
“W-what?” Kevin gaped from his spot behind me.
Cursing, I pulled the now empty twenty-gauge from where it was stuck and pumped the shotgun again to load it.
“And then I slapped him.” I laughed.
I didn’t need to see Kevin to know he was smiling like a teenager watching reality TV. He loved to gossip almost as much as he hated when we went shooting.
“Pull!”
Nothing came into my line of sight.
“I said pull!” I hollered.
Three clay pigeons shot into the air.
Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
I was fucked.
The coast was clear.
I half walked, half ran down the hall from my position at the stairwell, and didn’t breathe again until I slid the deadbolt closed on the front door to my apartment.
I was effectively hiding.
Dean hadn’t resurfaced at any point over the last six days, but that didn’t mean I’d stopped skulking around my building like a fugitive.
It was ridiculous and childish, but I didn’t care.
Dave had sent an email to all the tenants on Friday detailing the damage had been assessed, and work on the repairs would commence later this week. The crew would start with all the minor damage first, so those of us still able to reside in our units would be able to go about our usual routines relatively undisturbed.
Thus, my unit would be among the first to be worked on.
I’d reminded Dave that I wished to know all the ins and outs on when they chose to do the work on my ceiling, so I could find myself somewhere as far as Alaska, if not farther, to be gone that day.
I was grateful for the week’s reprieve, because despite my session with Doctor Colby and her encouragement, I still felt as though my emotions were too raw to be exposed to another assault.
I was gun-shy, and the coward in me wasn’t ready to grin and bear it just yet.
Besides, my date with Beau had finally come to fruit, and I was really quite looking forward to it.
He’d arrived home from the campaign trail this morning, and the first thing he wanted to do was see me. I’d be willing to bet that made me a very lucky woman, and quite possibly the envy of my entire office when Kevin announced it like the news over our staff meeting.
Kevin had been keeping a close eye on me since our trip to the farm and my subsequent divulging of the three men who’d surfaced in my life over a short period of time. It was appreciated, though his hovering made me nervous.
For once, I’d remained in my heels for the entirety of the day and kicked them off inside the entryway. Meandering to the k
itchen, I hung my coat on one of the bar stools and dumped my purse onto the counter.
My apartment felt different since last week, for the first time since I bought it. It was a place that had always been mine, but now, something had changed. Sure, men had come and gone, but this was different. It was like my apartment had started to wear my scars as its own.
I found the notion of it unsettling.
I unzipped the back of my work dress, shimmying out of it as I padded barefoot to the bedroom, eventually kicking it into a pile of discarded clothing on the floor. My last meeting of the day had run nearly an hour and a half over schedule, and as such, I was seriously behind on getting ready. As in, my date would be arriving to pick me up in less than an hour. Which was hardly adequate time for a woman to get ready, while keeping her sanity intact.
My shower was a quick one. I’d opted to forgo washing my hair, as I’d done so last night and I could use the extra time pouting in front of my closet, as I was doing now.
Looking down at Beau’s text message, I frowned and mentally ran inventory on my selection of little black dresses.
Beau: I’ll pick you up at 7pm. Dress nice.
Men were often vague at best, but this message was incredibly unhelpful.
Dress nice.
I tossed my phone onto the bed and it landed with a bounce as I glared down the hanging contents of my walk-in closet.
I dressed nice every day. I didn’t want to dress nice for Beau. I wanted to dress to stop his heart.
I’d spent the better part of the evenings in my adult life dressing to impress a man, and yet, each and every time felt like the first time. Like I’d somehow become a novice in dressing myself.
I’d had a barrage of men at my fingertips for years, increasing my bravado of self-worth, but all the while, I found it actually promoted bouts of self-loathing and encouraging the onset of manic lows. For it was too often men fell in love with the idea of me, a fantasy they’d created, only to be let down by a mere whisper of the reality of me.
Like an illusion of the heart, I wasn’t real. I wasn’t obtainable. I was a fraud.
All men liked beautiful women. However, most men liked their beautiful women like they liked their golf clubs: expensive and shiny, and only taken out when they wanted to play or impress their friends.
And maybe if I was honest, over the years, I’d played that up.
And maybe that was on me.
Most of the time, I got what I needed from them and they got something they wanted from me. Like Doctor Colby had said, a mutual exchange and sometimes even a relationship, but even I was learning now that I was looking for something from them that they could never provide. Something not even the best high could overshadow.
I was looking for me.
Because what I really needed, more than a good fuck or someone to make me come, was to feel at home in my own skin.
To feel like I understood the person I’d become.
I’d spent nearly a decade throwing myself off cliffs, because I didn’t know how to simply look out the window. I only knew what it felt like to go all-in and ride the high until I fell.
I’d become so perfectly disguised, a masterpiece of life’s unjust suffering.
Like all masterpieces were, I was admired but feared all the same.
Women fell apart at the seams and lined up for a chance to bed some of the men I’d dated in my lifetime. It had never been enough. It had never been sustainable. Neither them nor I had benefitted in the long run from my joining the leagues of those women. Yet still, so frequently I found myself in that role, playing that part once again like a well-taught starlet.
In the last days, I’d found myself beginning to wonder if perhaps I didn’t want to act that way anymore, but how did you quit? How do you quit the lie you told yourself for nearly a decade?
Addicts don’t quit overnight, and I had an addict’s blood, through and through.
“We’re not the same, you and me. I was never as strong as you, Charlie bear.”
The memory of my dead brother scolded me.
He’d been wrong.
We were the same.
I settled on a black dress with a hem that ended past my knees and fit like a second skin. It was low cut in the front, enough to be sexy without being slutty, and it had three-quarter length sleeves, which in my mind made up for the display of cleavage.
When dressing, a lady should choose but one asset to expose, never two. Beau had seen my backside at the gala, and tonight, I planned on showcasing my generous front side.
I paired the outfit with an original style tan Burberry dress coat should it rain, and matte red stilettos. Twisting my hair into a messy yet elegant chignon, I pulled a few pieces out to frame my face and finished the look by applying a blood red lipstick to my full pout.
Just in the nick of time, as luck would have it.
The buzzer to my unit sounded as I was transferring my necessities from the large day-to-day boho purse I carried to the smaller black Chanel I’d selected for tonight.
I hit the answer button on the base unit of my home phone. “Hello?”
“It’s Beau.” His smooth voice came through the speaker.
Instead of answering, I pressed the number to buzz him in.
I checked myself over in the hallway mirror, adding one more spray of perfume to my neck and wrists while I waited.
The knock came and I smiled at my reflection.
Sliding the deadbolt, I pulled the door open to find Beau Callaway leaning against the wall in my apartment building, wearing a pale grey suit and holding nearly two dozen long-stemmed white roses in one arm.
Looked as though he’d dressed to stop a heart or two himself.
“Hi.” I rested the side of my head against the open door.
He stayed put. “You look beautiful.”
I blushed. “Thank you.”
We remained like that for a beat, him leaning against the wall, watching me, me leaned into the door, watching him.
“Is white too boring?” He held out the bouquet and stepped towards me.
Shaking my head, I bent down and smelled the flowers. “White is perfect.”
“In that case, they’re for you.” Beau dipped down and kissed my forehead.
I wanted more, but his little touches made me feel important, so I took them, beating back the disappointment that he had yet to kiss me.
“They’re gorgeous, thank you.” I took them from his hands and kicked the door open a bit more to make room. “Do you want to come in? I’ll just put these in some water before we go.”
He gestured for me to lead the way and shut the door behind him. “Are they renovating your building?” he asked, as I chose a Mason jar vase from underneath the sink.
“No.” I winced, grabbing scissors from the knife block. “A pipe burst on the floor above me last week. The damage up there is pretty bad.”
Leaning a hip against the counter, he watched while I cut the stems one at a time, placing them in the vase. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Me too.” I looked at him and shrugged. “It happens.”
“Will you be put out of your place?” He looked around my apartment as he spoke. I gathered he was searching for gaping holes in the ceiling, like he’d no doubt seen on his way up.
I added water to the vase, rearranging the flowers while I spoke. “Thankfully, no. Just a small section of insulation will need to be replaced over the sofa.”
He nodded. “When will that happen?”
His tone was less curious and more matter-of-fact in the way business minded people often were. They had a ‘get it done’ mentality.
I was often that way too, though only with work. In my personal life, I could procrastinate with the best of them.
“They should begin repairs end of this week,” I told him.
He seemed pleased with my answer, and we made small talk about my apartment and his campaign while I finished, eventually setting the flowers on the bre
akfast bar and standing back to admire them. “They really are lovely, Beau,” I said.
Wrapping his arms around my waist from behind, he rested his chin on my shoulder. “So are you.”
I enjoyed his embrace, feeling the comfort spread through my system. “I guess we better go.” When I spoke, it was out of obligation, not because I didn’t enjoy standing in his arms in the middle of my kitchen.
“Mm. We’ll likely be late as is,” he said, and lifted his head, stepping back. “It was worth every second.”
Emotion raided me, so I simply went about shutting off the lights.
He waited for me to lock up before holding out his elbow to me. “Shall we?”
I slid my arm into his waiting one and smiled. “I’d like that.”
Beau was the perfect gentleman. In fact, in my experience, many great men were. The difference was he did it in a way that felt honest and as if it was deeply ingrained into his sense of self. He was the type of man who would lay his jacket down over a puddle so a woman’s feet wouldn’t get wet in her heels.
He was the end of an era of good ole boys.
Maybe even the last.
I leaned into his side as we descended in the elevator, and listened as he hummed to a tune I recognized but couldn’t put my finger on exactly. He waited for me to step out first from the elevator, and then the front door, before he led me to a black town car.
“Sir.” The driver nodded at Beau. “Miss Smith.”
“Hello,” I greeted him, before turning to my date. “Will you tell me where we’re going?” I asked as he opened my door.
He shook his head. “I’m afraid not, no. You’ll just have to wait.”
“What if I told you I hated surprises?” I settled into my seat, looking up at him.
Leaning into the open car door, he grinned. “I’d tell you that was too bad for you.”
I laughed.
He closed my door, and that’s when I decided perhaps I was a bit smitten with him.
He took the seat next to mine and casually held my hand as he spoke. “Tell me about this event in which I am solely responsible for turning your staff into… What was it you said?” He smiled, searching his memory, and I immediately thought it was cute.
“Monsters,” I finished for him.
“Ah, yes. Tell me.”