The Rules of Regret

by Megan Squires

  “I don’t think I want you to.”

  Torin’s steady movements faltered. “What?”

  I backpedaled five thousand feet. “Nothing.”

  “What do you want then?”

  Silence.

  “Darby?” Torin said again, planting his feet. “What do you want from me?” He bit down on his lip and I wished he hadn’t because it made me want to do the same to it. “Tell me what you want… because I’ll give it to you.”

  I looked up at him and he was gazing at me with an intensity that took me by surprise.

  “I want you to say what you’re really thinking instead of hiding behind songs and famous movie quotes. I want to know your thoughts, Torin, not some line that’s been spoon fed to you.”

  “You want to know what I’m thinking?” he said, vulnerability rippling out of his tone like a stone thrown into a still pond. It reverberated and rattled in my head and I felt the heat of his stare echoed in my gut. “Do you seriously want to know? Because I’ll tell you if you do.” I answered with my eyes held to his. “I’m thinking how much it sucks that I’m six years too late.”

  My hands fell to my side. The room turned into a Tilt-a-Whirl.

  “That’s what I’m thinking.” He inclined forward. His chest pushed against mine and it ached, feeling instantly heavy the moment we touched, like heartburn or something that made it impossible for me to swallow without experiencing the pain of it. “So do you want me to go back to my one-liners now?”

  “Yeah,” I croaked. Yeah, I wanted go to back. I wanted to go way back.

  Six years to be exact.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  The walk to the hotel was quiet. The garment bag carrying Torin’s new suit swished against him as we traveled down the busy city streets, and I tried to focus my attention on the way it crinkled with the movement, like the sound of someone rustling a newspaper or magazine. It was easier to zero in on that than it was to think about anything else because my brain was a vapid space of incoherent thoughts and hormone-riddled impulses. Garment bag crinkling I could process; everything else was questionable.

  “I bet you’re loving it here, right?”

  My feet scraped along the sidewalk. “How so?” I glanced up at the ominous structures around us.

  “This is your mountaintop, yeah?”

  “Yeah, actually,” I admitted, a little surprised that he could see that deeply into me. “It sorta is.”

  “I like that about you, Darby.” Torin switched the bag with his suit from one hand to the other, so it was on the opposite side of his body. When it was in between us, it felt like some sort of fabric-laden barrier. But now I was suddenly exposed and closer to him than I should be. Let’s be honest; I shouldn’t even be near him at all. I should be on one coast, and he should be on the other. We should have about 40 some-odd continental states in between us.

  But even that didn’t feel like enough distance, and I doubted it would change the way I felt right now. Absence made the heart grow fonder, right? Maybe being this close to him would have the opposite effect. Yeah, right. Who was I kidding? My fondness for Torin was reaching alarmingly unacceptable, skyscraper-like heights.

  “I like that you and I are so different,” he continued, unfazed by my lack of words, which was good, because I was still trying to relearn the English vocabulary since everything in my brain was sucked right out of it back during our impromptu slow dance.

  “Me too. I like that we’re different,” I agreed. Repeating his words was the safest option.

  A man chattering on a cell phone shouldered me as he raced past and I wobbled out of his way. Torin shoved me back to my spot with his elbow and laughed like he thought something about my clumsiness was endearing, which was a first because I’d always thought it just made me, well, clumsy.

  “As an architectural design major, I bet you have a lot of places you’d love to travel. Lots of ancient buildings to see, huh?”

  “No, not really.” I pushed my hands into the pockets of my jean shorts. “You can pretty much see everything on the internet. Real-time images and all.” I shrugged. “But I kinda want to see Boston Light.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A lighthouse in Massachusetts. The first lighthouse built in the U.S.” I found a loose string in the seam of my pocket and fiddled with it between my thumb and index fingers. “I don’t think it’s necessarily anything special, but I remember seeing a picture of it once in a book my sister had about lighthouses. I told myself then that someday I would see the real thing.”

  “That’s a sweet story.”

  “I know, it’s stupid.”

  “No,” Torin quickly said, like he could retract the insulting tone of his previous statement. “Not making fun. I think it’s really sweet. Like a world-renowned chef wanting to go to the first McDonald’s or something. Simple. Understated.”

  “I just like what it stands for, I guess.” I spotted the overhang to our hotel a block up, the maroon canopy strung above two gold poles that rose out from the ground. We halted at the curb and once the ‘walk’ sign flashed, stepped out into the street. “Lighthouses were used to warn sailors to change their positions so they didn’t hit land,” I explained, though I was certain he knew the functions of a lighthouse. I just felt like I should explain myself and my weird fascination with them. “I think I just like the idea of having some guiding light to direct my path.”

  We hopped back onto the curb on the other side and a taxi nearly sideswiped us as it took the corner on two squealing wheels. Torin protectively pushed at my back to steer me out of the way, and when his hand lingered at the base of it just above my waistline, I willed another car to come careening toward us just so his palm would stay put. “Guess you sort of have that already, though,” I said. “With your beliefs.”

  “I do.” He nodded. “But I don’t always follow those warnings like I know I should.” He jogged to catch the door to our building and held it open for me, completely ignoring the bellman, and he almost bowed as I passed through, trying to be a gentleman. “Because with you, it feels like I’m heading into troubled waters. And as much as I see the path I’m supposed to take, I want to veer off course so bad.”

  That wasn’t at all what I was expecting him to say.

  But he was right. This was uncharted territory: someone being so upfront and vulnerable. Though he’d been honest in the past—specifically when he confessed his thoughts to me after the night in the sleeping bag—this was the most transparent Torin had ever been. The most transparent anyone had ever been with me, in fact. I didn’t quite know what to do with it, but it felt like a gift.

  “Thank you.”

  “For what?” He pressed a finger into the elevator button at the north side of the lobby. The reception desk buzzed with a hum of chatter, combining with the rolling of luggage wheels on the marble floor to create a melodic beat of life carrying on around us. Which felt weird because it seemed like everything in my own life had temporarily come to a stop.

  “Thank you for telling me that.”

  The elevator doors slid open and several businessmen—probably politicians—funneled out, their polished European loafers edging us out of the way. Torin held up a hand, trapped the door open with a tennis shoe clad foot, and waved me through.

  “You’re welcome, Darby. I’ll tell you anything you want to know, but I don’t necessarily see what the point is.”

  Once inside, the doors closed, making a sucking sound when they did, and then the elevator jolted as it began its climb to our twenty-first floor.

  “There’s always a point to saying what you feel.”

  In that moment, it was like my statement lit something within Torin, and without warning, he jammed a finger against the number pad and the elevator jerked to an abrupt stop, practically whiplashing me as it halted its upward glide.

  “What are you doing?” My pulse kept climbing even though the elevator didn’t.

  “I need to go find a floral sh
op,” he said matter-of-factly, like I should know exactly what the cryptic declaration meant.

  “What? Why?”

  “I need to buy you like the fattest bouquet of flowers right now, Darby.” He laughed and it echoed in the tight space we were in, bouncing off the gilded walls. “Do you realize what you just said?”

  “I said it’s good to say what you’re feeling.”

  “Right,” he confirmed, nodding. “You’re going all soft on me. Trees and flowers. And I kinda like it. I’m chipping away at your structure and concrete.” The elevator still hovered somewhere between floors ten and eleven. My stomach hovered somewhere between my esophagus and my mouth. “Don’t get me wrong,” he continued. “I like that you’re hardheaded and stubborn, too.”

  “That’s not true, Torin. You said you’re not attracted to girls that are stubborn.”

  “Normally I’m not. And I’m not attracted to brunettes—err, redheads—either.” He cast a sly grin my direction. “But I’m attracted to you, Darby. And not just bits and piece of you—like I could just take the good and leave the bad.”

  “Sometimes it feels like there’s quite a lot of bad—”

  “Don’t say that.” He silenced me with a shake of his head. “There is not. But even if there was, there’s something about you that keeps drawing me to you. And it’s incredibly aggravating, because I told you I’m trying to do the whole straight and narrow thing.” Torin took two steps toward me and trailed a finger down my cheek, sweeping a strand of hair behind my ear. “You’re like the damn Sirens that tried to crash Odysseus and his men against the rocks. I’m seriously contemplating getting some earplugs and tying myself to the bed to get away from you.”

  “You want to be tied to the bed?” I gulped, trying not to envision that because it did spastic things to my asthmatic breathing.

  “That’s not exactly what I meant,” he murmured, a rosy blush crawling up his cheeks that made him look nervous, which was sort of irresistible. “I was referencing the Odyssey. You know, where Odysseus has his shipmates stuff their ears with beeswax and then has them tie him to the mast as they pass by the singing Sirens?” His finger rested by my earlobe. I didn’t know why it was still there. “I’m not sure why I said the bed. There is probably something else in our room you could tie me to.” His hand dropped. “Damn, that doesn’t sound any better, either.”

  I giggled quietly and covered my mouth, but Torin pulled my hand back the second I did so, almost frustrated by the unintentional act.

  “Don’t do that,” he said in a soft, hushed voice. “Don’t cover up something so beautiful.”

  I pressed into the elevator wall, my hands wrapping around the gold bar to provide some semblance of stability. I had every intention of leaving what happened between us in the dressing room there and not carrying it with me up to our hotel floor. But it wasn’t just these moments that I had to avoid; it was the moments that made me want to trade in everything I ever thought I needed in my life for something as uncertain as this. Someone as uncertain as Torin. “Who are you?”

  “Honestly?” Torin’s brow creased tightly and his eyes were almost hidden in the shadow it created. “I’m still trying to figure that out.”

  “Really?” His swift, unexpected answer surprised me. “Because you say things with such confidence, like you’re absolutely sure of yourself.”

  Torin slid onto the wall next to me, his head hanging low, his blond hair tumbling into his eyes. I really wanted to cut it, but I was beginning to think that was due to the fact that it would give me an excuse to run my fingers through the golden strands.

  He continued. “The things I’ve already discovered about life I’m absolutely sure of, you’re right. Like family and faith. But the other things—the things that I’m still figuring out about myself—they’re not so concrete.” Torin suddenly flipped around in front of me, his hands bracketing me on either side with intense control. “Like trying to figure out what to do with the fact that I’m pretty sure I’m falling for a girl that is probably going to end up with someone else.” His eyes roved over me and fastened on my mouth, like he was contemplating kissing me again.

  I’d kissed Lance literally hundreds of times, and I was even up to two shameful kisses with Torin, but the anticipation of this and the way his looked at my lips like he wanted to eat them couldn’t compare to any of that. Even if every kiss were added together, the weight in this moment would be more than those combined; more than all the kisses I’d ever experienced. Maybe even more than all of eternity’s kisses piled together. I didn’t think there was ever a moment in history more charged with tension and anticipation than this, because I was certain no one else could survive it. I’m surprised I was able to. Maybe I did learn a thing or two on that overnighter.

  Torin leaned in, his forehead pressed to mine, and I tried not to groan into his open mouth but it was impossible to keep it in. The tips of our noses touched first—lightly—then his hand lifted to my jaw and his thumb ran circles across my chin. He tilted my head up so our lips were an inch apart, lined up and ready for the other. His breath was warm and sweet and fell on my mouth with light pressure, like a tempting hint at how his lips would feel and taste, too. “Tell me what I’m supposed to do with that? With the fact that you’re like this damn mirage and every time I think I’m about to get close to you—about to realize my dream of you—it evaporates and I’m left completely deserted.”

  My head twitched and I licked my lips nervously. I shouldn’t have done that, because it ignited a fire in his eyes and faltered his breathing. “I don’t know.”

  Just as suddenly as Torin stopped the elevator moments before, he pushed off from the wall with one hand and turned toward the doors. Punching a number again with his finger, he said over his shoulder, “And that’s a problem, because neither do I.”

  ***

  “I’m going to read your book while you shower.”

  I could hear his voice through the crack in the door, yet the rain of water from the high-pressured showerhead mostly drowned him out. Though I didn’t normally leave bathroom doors open—even if only a sliver of an inch—while a boy that I may or may not be falling for sat on the opposite side, Torin managed to convince me. He’d had three water bottles to drink this afternoon and what if he had to pee while I was showering and primping for the gala? What was he supposed to do? Could I, with a transparently clear conscience, put his bladder through something as traumatizing as that? He wasn’t a camel after all, and couldn’t store water for very long. Apparently, I was cruel to think otherwise.

  I figured the real reason was that the sounds of me showering only added to the reality that I was naked on the other side, soaping myself up, just a half-closed door barricading the space between us. I wasn’t quite sure what I’d do if he actually did have to pee. I had three brothers, yes, but nothing about Torin felt like a brother, and I didn’t want to get to know him on that level. The sound of him peeing wasn’t something I really hoped to familiarize myself with.

  I ran my fingers through my hair, plopping a dollop of the hotel’s shampoo into the palm of my hand. It smelled like lemon and vanilla, and reminded me of a martini my mom used to make. She often drank, and every time she mixed something up, it was always a fruity concoction and she let me have a shot glass full of my own.

  But that hadn’t always been the case, and it struck me as odd how things could change so quickly. How just one event, one of life’s many circumstances, could change the way you viewed moral issues like giving your under-aged children alcohol. I guess you picked your battles. I wasn’t even sure my mom was strong enough to fight at all anymore.

  Tilting my head back, I let the water massage the shampoo out of my hair and run down my backside, pooling into a bubbly froth around my feet. Everything felt so fuzzy lately and I’d hoped the shower would bring some clarity. Like I could wash away the feelings I knew I had for Torin; like I could cleanse myself of the cheating I’d done, even if he didn’t a
gree with that label.

  I was so immersed in my detoxification that I didn’t hear the creak of the door, and didn’t sense Torin on the other side of the shower curtain until his voice breeched the quiet and nearly sent me slamming into the tiled wall, like being woken from a deep slumber by the shrill, sudden blast of an alarm clock.

  “Darby. Is that picture of her?”

  I didn’t answer, but knew exactly what he meant.

  “Because at first I thought it was you.”

  With my right hand, I twisted the knob on the faucet to the left, the scalding water leaving piercing beads of heat across my skin. It hurt, and I bit down on my lip to endure the pain. I’d become a master at that—at replacing one pain with another. Usually it was the empty growl that eroded my stomach that I preferred. That was my go-to. For now I’d settle for the burn.

  “Darby, can you get out of the shower and talk to me?” He thrust a white, fluffy towel into the gap between the curtain and the wall. “It’s time you talked about this.”

  “I don’t know if I can, Torin.” I grabbed the towel from his grip, but didn’t dry off. I held it to my face, the bleached cotton billows enveloping my small yelp of a cry that I knew he could hear. Even above the water. Even through the towel. He heard me.

  “Darby, please. Please talk to me.”

  I didn’t talk. I just cried, and I hated how weak it made me sound, because I didn’t like crying, and honestly, I didn’t do much of it anymore.

  “I’m coming in there with you, Darby,” he warned, and I didn’t doubt for one second that he wouldn’t. I’d learned that Torin was both a man of action and a man of his word. If he said he was going to do something, then it was a certain fact that he’d do it.

  Taking the towel from my face, I twisted it around my body, securing it under my collarbone above my chest. The shower curtain rings slid on the rail and just like in the dressing room, Torin’s hand pushed it back all the way. With his clothes still on, he stepped into the shower, wrapping his arms around me from behind, tucking his chin onto my shoulder. The way he held me and let me face the water so I could at least pretend to camouflage my tears in the streams that trickled down made me feel anything but weak, and I was grateful for it, and in awe of the sensitivity of this guy that I’d only known a few weeks. I honestly thought for a moment that I’d had him all wrong this entire time.