Rash and Rationality

by Ellen Mint

  Her face flushed bright red, Brandy looking about to say something. But she shook it off, and instead came back with, “That makes it okay? What? You’re offering a three-strikes deal?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “What do you mean? Huh? You just…you come here, you…” Brandy gestured to the bed they’d rolled around on until her blankets had wadded up on the floor. Damn. If he’d known that all of that would have happened, he never would have come to her apartment.

  Right?

  She snorted and cast her eyes to the ceiling. Oh, that wasn’t good. “You cry that she broke your heart. Acted like you were on your death bed. Vanished for weeks, wouldn’t even answer a text and, what? One call from her, one voicemail and you’ll run right back to her?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He knew he’d said the absolutely worst thing possible, but he couldn’t stop himself. She did that to him. Stripped away the artifice of charm and left him just as himself. No skill, no talent. A short Latino with half a degree and the inability to change a tire.

  The warble in her voice slammed a dagger through his heart. “Why did you come here? Why did you…?”

  “Because I-I wanted to see you. I missed talking to you.” And he meant it. He tried to get closer, to find some way to convince her that it wasn’t a slight against her. But Brandy wasn’t easily swayed, and she dodged him. That small movement, her actively avoiding him, added a pinprick to the already wedged-in dagger.

  Silence thundered through the room, shaking the windows and rattling the floorboards with its massive volume of nothing. The sonic boom of her silent tears could shatter a small town, and the shaking of her lip to hold back the sobs opened a pit to hell under his feet. “But not enough to choose me over a cheater, a fake…”

  “Hey, Janeth is…”

  “She was using you, and— Why am I even arguing this with you? Why can’t you see what is— Why can’t you just goddamn be with me?”

  There was no stopping the tears now, streams drenching her cheeks as she glared murder at him. He became all of two feet tall, his stomach churning into a thousand knots. “It isn’t that simple.”

  “Who says?”

  “Your husband,” he shot back, causing her snarl to snap into a gasp of pain. “Your first love. Your… How can I possibly compete with that?”

  Incapable of watching her crumble into the agony of remembering her husband, Marty did the cowardly thing and stared at the wall. A small plate with an etching from the Grand Canyon hung on it . Did she get it on a vacation with him? Their honeymoon? Another reminder that she’d already walked through the steps of love he’s barely started down.

  “You selfish asshole,” she spat. “If all you want is that perfect meet-cute, flawless courting and happily ever after, then why did you sleep with me? Why did you even let me think for two fucking seconds that I…that you could be with me?”

  You know why.

  I was weak. I was exhausted. I missed her beyond counting. I wanted to make her happy. I need her. I…

  “I don’t know.” He stumbled, the back of his neck burning hot from her fiery glare. She knew he was lying, but Marty couldn’t explain his chunked-up brain. One part of him knew that being with Brandy was pointless. She was his friend, the one he talked about dates with, not the one he whisked off on a three-day vacation to Paris.

  But another part of his soul banged around inside his chest. It seemed to have something it needed to tell him, but it couldn’t be heard over the years that had told him how romance worked. You don’t fall in love with your best friend. Everyone knew that.

  “Get out.” Her icy words shattered through Marty’s wall, finally whipping his head over. Brandy tossed his shirt at his feet and she wrapped herself up in whatever she grabbed. Even feeling two inches tall while picking up his shirt, he watched her naked body wrathfully vanish beneath a robe.

  A familiar stirring ran through him, but as she glared at his inaction, Marty shook it off. “I should have known when I saw the ring,” she said, like a lamentation to herself.

  Ring? What ring?

  He’d barely looped the shirt onto his arms before Brandy jabbed a finger to the door. “Get out of here, now. I can’t…”

  Taking the first few steps out of her bedroom, Marty turned and tried to beg. “Brandy, please. It was—”

  “Don’t. Don’t talk to me. Don’t try to act like it was nothing. Don’t wish it all away!” Her voice cracked as she ripped straight to the heart of him. “I can’t talk to you. I can’t look at you. I need you to leave.”

  His head tumbled down, the chin striking his naked chest as he didn’t have the energy or time to button his shirt. With laborious steps, he worked his way to the door. You’re going to leave it like that? You may never talk to her again!

  But it’s Brandy. She forgives me. We argue sometimes, I do something stupid…okay, this is epically stupid, then we get over it.

  Are you sure it’ll happen this time?

  Gulping, he ran his hand along the outside of the door. His body remained half in and half out. Before she could order him once more, Marty whispered, “I was afraid. I came over here because I thought that I might never see you again. I could lose you…forever.”

  Tears welled in his eyes, washing away the woman he missed whole-heartedly. She locked her arms around her chest, her hands digging in so tightly that her knuckles turned white. “And so you did,” she said and walked away from him.

  Broken, Marty slipped through the crack in the door and fell into an abyss of his own making.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “…and two chocolate donuts.” Marty tried to keep on a smile while putting in his order, but his face refused to obey. He’d known he’d fucked up the second he’d stranded himself outside her apartment, trying to figure out how to get home without his shoes. But, even with each potentially glass-infested step, he couldn’t say why. And Brandy didn’t seem in the mood to help him understand anything.

  Numb from the eyebrows down, he watched the friendly barista shimmy one donut out with tiny tongs. It had gold and silver stars embedded into the chocolate frosting. A special donut. One that she’d certainly like.

  “Wait,” he said, pausing the barista from reaching for a second. The look stared down the man who always got two, rain or shine. Because he always had someone to share with. And now… Marty winced and apologized, “Sorry. I only need one.”

  “Okay.” It was no matter to the woman bundling his small order into a bag and ringing it up at the counter. He’d skipped his usual fluffy cotton candy coffee for a cup as black as his heart. And two sugars, because Marty wasn’t a masochist.

  Digging open his wallet, he sighed to himself. The one good thing about his removal from Janeth’s online world was that he had more disposable income. It was in the ‘we can get two pizzas for dinner’ range, but preferable to before.

  “There you are,” a voice called to him.

  Marty groaned, wishing it’d been anyone else who said that. Wished it’d been one in particular. He glanced over his shoulder to find Eldon sliding in behind. “You know there’s a line,” Marty said, pointing behind two other people.

  “I’m not here for drinks.” Instead of the usual prim and uptight countenance that came naturally to Eldon, he looked like someone had dropped him in a wind turbine and he’d hit every wall on the way down. Running a hand over his splattered hair, Eldon insisted, “I need the ring.”

  “What ring?” Why is everyone on about a ring?

  That struck a sour chord deep into Eldon, who loomed above his brother. He looked about ten seconds from grabbing Marty by the collar and throwing him through the window. “Oh,” Marty groaned, the pieces slotting into place. “That ring.”

  “You’d better not have lost it…or worse.”

  Marty snickered and yanked open his bag. “Think I have a gambling problem? Betting on the ponies to see who’s got an ace up their…hoof?” It didn’t take him
long to fish out the box Eldon had strangely left in his keeping for reasons that he hadn’t gone into.

  For a moment, it seemed as if Eldon would simply take the box and be on his way. But, sure enough, his brother took a quick peek to make certain Marty hadn’t absconded with the sparkler for Elena.

  “Do you have a plan?”

  “Yes. No. I’m not… I don’t have time for this. She could be…” Eldon, the man of steel—in that he was rigid, flat, and gray as concrete—whipped his head around wildly. This was probably one of those brotherly things Marty should inquire about and offer advice, but after his last couple of weeks, it seemed like asking a bear how to drive stick.

  In his mad glaring and lack of explaining, Eldon stared at the small bag passed to Marty. “Only one?”

  Marty shrugged. “Since we’re not working the same shift anymore…” He tried to keep it breezy, uninterested in the comings and goings of a woman he worked with. But his heart crumbled to dust at the thought of trying to distance himself so far from Brandy.

  A warm hand cupped his shoulder, shaking the piping-hot coffee in the process. Marty glared at the unsteady liquid then turned toward his brother’s surprisingly concerned eyes. “Martin, what did you do?”

  “Nothing. I…I didn’t mean to hurt her. I would never, but you wouldn’t understand.”

  Eldon crossed his arms, his very important date forgotten in order to butt into his brother’s life.

  “She’s already been taken.” Marty reared back at the words escaping his lips. “Wow, that sounds bad. I mean, what do I do, just accept being second best for the rest of my life? Being the other guy because the first didn’t make it to the forever part?”

  As the words left his mouth, Marty braced himself for an Eldon foghorn lecture. Not only because he knew it’d be coming, but because he deserved it.

  But Eldon sighed, and in a gentle voice, said, “You romantic fool.”

  “You emotionless robot,” Marty cut back, his hackles sizzling at how quickly his brother cut him down.

  “Perhaps what you need is a cold bucket of sense dropped on your head.”

  “And what you need is a fire lit under your ass. Yes, I know what’s up with you and Elena. Mom’s been talking.”

  That caught his brother fully by surprise. The calculating look was wiped away to leave behind genuine pain. Damn it. Why did that seem to be Marty’s legacy lately? Everywhere Martin Dashwood went, misery appeared like mushrooms after an acid rain.

  Eldon dug through his pockets as if he’d left something important in there, but didn’t pull it out. “Then let me tell you, not as your brother, but someone too proud to admit what my heart wanted—you’re wrong. Your ideals, your…your childish dream of being some woman’s only happily ever after is wrong.”

  There it was. Every time they tried to talk girls, it always devolved to Eldon pulling out an actuary sheet for his best possible mate. Romance never factored in and love was a cheap ploy invented to sell chocolate. He’d never understand.

  “I don’t know why I talk to you,” Marty fumed, spinning on his heels and marching out of the door. He was so tired of people chastising him for his passion.

  “Marty,” Eldon whispered and the name froze him in his tracks. “What is more important? The cute story you write in a wedding article or the hand that holds yours for fifty years? The sweeping date you took her on to propose, or how she makes your heart throb every time you find her sitting beside you on the couch?”

  A cute smile with blue frosting caught in her teeth flashed through his mind. Her knee bouncing into his on accident as they debated Japanese rubber suit monsters. How she’d appear out of nowhere, a thermos of soup in hand, if he so much as complained about a scratchy throat. That he’d buy two umbrellas if rain was forecast, because she always forgot one.

  “Love isn’t…it’s not just romance. That’s a brick in the foundation, one I’m realizing I should have focused on. But there’s so much more to it. And maybe your castle isn’t perfect. Maybe the turrets don’t match and the bunting is tattered.”

  Marty stared at his brother as the strained metaphor snapped in half. Eldon seemed to sense it too, and he shook his head. “My point, don’t throw away a relationship you’ve built for years with laughter, kindness and love just because it’s not shiny enough.”

  What had he done?

  Reaching a hand out, Marty took his brother’s and the two gave a hearty shake. Maybe it wasn’t what he’d envisioned when donning his Romeo tights. Maybe it wasn’t a sweeping fairy tale romance sung by bards to look at his best friend and one day see more. But, for the first time in his life, he wanted what Eldon was blessed with. Not a girlfriend, but a partner in every sense of the word.

  “Oh shit,” Eldon cursed. He grabbed Marty’s watch and spun it around. “Is that the time? I have to go!”

  Eldon bolted for the door, but before he vanished, Marty called out, “Good luck with Elena.”

  “And don’t you muck it up with Brandy. Mamá adores her,” were Eldon’s parting words.

  All this time, everyone around him had known. His mother, his father, even his robot brother wanted them together, but Marty’d been too starry-eyed to see the moon in his life. Never again. He needed a plan, he needed to apologize, he needed…

  “Wait, I need a second donut after all!”

  He had no plan, no idea what to say, or if she’d even listen to him, but for the first time in weeks Marty wanted to sing. It felt like a slab of concrete named ‘foolish expectations’ had fallen off his shoulders, leaving him able to float above the sidewalk.

  Dashing as fast as his legs could carry him, he ran for the bookshop, donut bag in hand. It could at least serve as an ice breaker and peace offering while he tried to drum up the right words to explain how he felt. Why he was the way he was.

  Okay, that might take a few years and a therapist.

  But the idea was solid.

  Running through the door, setting the bell jangling to gift another angel its wings, Marty called out, “Brandy?” No one was at the counter, but he dropped his half-finished coffee cup in place. “Hello? I am a very frail old lady and require help getting a book down from the top shelf.”

  “Oh, okay,” a strange and unwanted voice piped up from the mystery section. Still hopeful, Marty turned to find a green polo and khaki pants strapped to an unknown kid somewhere in the late teenage to early college age. “Sorry? Where’s the old woman?” he asked in full-on naiveté.

  “Who are you?” Marty demanded, his hackles raising.

  “I’m Peter, the new guy. Mr. Fensin knows my grandmother through—”

  Marty waved the babble away. “Brandy? The woman who works today. Where is she?”

  “Oh, the one that quit.”

  “What?” She quit?

  “Yeah, just said she wasn’t coming back anymore. Got another job, I guess. I dunno. I was told to show up today and someone would train me. Wait, are you the M guy? He said it was like…Marvin? Are you Marvin?”

  She was gone? No. No, he couldn’t lose her.

  Not while there was still time. Not when he’d finally realized why he was so damn stupid and wanted to fix it.

  “Sure, I’m Marvin. Any chance you know where she went?”

  “Who?”

  For God’s sake, the youth today! “The woman whose job you took.”

  “One of the other bookstores, I think. The big one. You know.”

  No. But it didn’t matter. He’d do whatever it took to find her. Walk the floors of every bookstore in the city. Ask everyone he met for a sign of her. Beg for someone to help him find that other half of his heart he’d let be ripped from his body.

  But first… Marty dashed around the store’s shelves, grabbing up books as a plan formed in his head. Yes. That had to work. For once, his photographic memory might actually be of service to him.

  “Um,” Peter mumbled, watching wide-eyed as Marty filled his backpack with books for research. Fairly
certain he had a good start to make amends, Marty dashed for the door and swung in a circle to scoop up his coffee along the way.

  “Aren’t you going to train me?” the new kid shouted just as Marty stepped out onto the street.

  He turned around and gave him a thumbs-up. “You’re doing a bang-up job, kid. Keep at it and one day you might make manager.”

  “Really? Thanks!” the guy, unaware that they were all managers, chirped back.

  Clinging tooth and nail to the last string of hope in his life, Marty ran down the street with his hands wrapped around an arsenal of romance.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  A haze rose from the multitude of lights running along the track in the ceiling. It lit up the desolate black parking lot like a lighthouse crashing into the sea. Brandy sighed, staring across the darkness of five a.m. whispering through the suburban wasteland.

  “New Meat,” her manager, a man barely older than her, called.

  She spun in place, trapped behind a cash register as she waited for the doors to open to a stream of bleary-eyed customers. No doubt they’d head for the in-house café and only buy a book if it got in the way, but that didn’t seem to matter to the corporate overlords.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, eyeing up the uniform she’d be paying for with her first check.

  Her eyes darted to the half-finished cup of coffee left on the counter and she raced to hide it. But that didn’t seem to be the answer as her manager hoisted over a broom and said, “If you have time to lean, you have time to clean.”

  Seriously? She twisted her lips into a smile, as if that was the wittiest thing she’d ever heard. Without a single complaint, she dropped the broom to the polished floor and pushed a few specks of dust around. Placating the masses had never seemed so monotonous.

  The whole time, the manager stood over her watching. She tried to shake it off, in no mood for any man paying her attention, but she couldn’t exactly tell him off in her first week.

  “Surprised you’re not complaining about the hours. I know how those little shops operate.”