“Why? We’re just hanging out . . . on a date . . . just the two of us.”
“Yeah, no pressure,” I joke.
“Hey.” He stops before unlocking the front door to his quaint and perfectly painted home. “Do not think I’m going to pressure you for anything. I just want to hang out with you and show you how much I care for you.” He weaves his hand through my hair, and leans down to kiss my nose. “Nothing more. I promise.”
Flip. My heart beats quickly inside my chest. He’s making it harder and harder for me not to fall hopelessly in love with him.
“Okay,” I breathe while closing my eyes and leaning into him.
“Come inside and let me show you what I’ve done for you.”
Although I’ve known where Elijah lives, I’ve never been inside his house before. It’s neat and clean with everything is in its place. The family room is to the left of the front door and the dining room to the right. Straight ahead there’s a hallway which I assume leads to the bedrooms. I look around and take everything in. My nose wrinkles as I take in the smell of something familiar that I can’t quite place. “What’s that smell?”
“My Mom, she loves candles. She was burning a vanilla one today.”
Aha, that’s the smell. “I like your house.” I look over to the kitchen, and notice a frame containing a tiny hand print. Walking over to it, I notice there are five frames with hand prints all lined up next to each other.
“I forgot about them.” He shoves his hands in his pockets and shyly looks down to the floor.
Reading the hand written inscription at the bottom of each painting it has the date then ‘Elijah Dean Turner’ with his age for each painting. “Oh, this is so cute.” I keep walking down the line and get to the last one. It’s a pink hand print and it says ‘Gabrielle Faith Turner’ with two dates on the bottom of the paper. “Oh,” I sigh, knowing exactly what that means.
“She was six days old when she died.”
Crap. “I’m sorry,” I add.
“It was a long time ago. But Gabrielle will always be here.” He touches his chest, right where his heart is.
“How . . .” Should I even be asking this? Double crap. I should mind my own business.
“She died in her sleep.”
I don’t know what to say. And the worst thing is, I asked how she died. What an idiot. “I’m sorry,” I say again. The mood in the room is tense, and I want a restart from the moment I walked in the door.
Elijah offers me a smile, and I can tell it must be hard for him too. Luckily, he pulls it together before I cry for being such an idiot and drags me into his body. “I like you being here.”
“I like being here.”
He places a chaste kiss on my lips and says, “This way.” He holds onto my hand, and leads me out through the kitchen to a back room built onto the house. It’s like a bonus room, where there’s a huge screen TV taking up almost a quarter of the back wall. There are also cinema seats, a pool table, and a bar fully stocked with all types of alcohol.
“Yeah, our man cave.”
“Your poor mom, where can she go?”
“She’s got a reading nook in my parents’ bedroom. Anyway, here, take a seat. I have a movie marathon night planned for us.”
Dear Lord, please no horror and no shoot-everything-in-our-way action movies or even Star Trek . . . please no Star Trek. “Great,” I say though my voice is anything but pleased. Elijah turns to look at me with wide eyes. “I’m sorry, I should be grateful. Thank you.”
“Yeah, you should. First movie of the night is . . . no I won’t tell you, you can wait to see.” He sits in one of the cinema seats and pulls me down on his lap.
“I can sit there.” I sweep my hand beside him.
“But I like you exactly where you are.”
I smile like a giddy fool. “My seat isn’t very comfortable. It’s a bit boney.” I wiggle my butt and immediately regret my choice of words and my butt wiggle. “Oh shit,” I say completely horrified at what I’ve said. I smack my forehead with my hand and can feel my face scorching with humiliation. “I can’t believe I said that,” I say through a strangled whisper.
Christ, what the hell is wrong with you, Alice?
Elijah laughs so raucously I can feel his stomach vibrating. “That was,” he pauses to keep laughing, “ . . . the funniest thing EVER!” he shouts ‘ever’ through his gales of laughter.
With my hands concealing my face, I decide to stay like this until the inferno dies down, which at this rate will be never.
“I’m so sorry.”
“I’m not. Your seat is boney and you should move before it becomes even more boney.”
Oh God, please let the earth below crack open and swallow me whole. How damn humiliating.
Elijah tries to pry my hands away from my reddened face. “It’s okay, you don’t have to hide with me. I know what you meant.”
“I have to wear a paper bag over my head until like forever,” I say through my fingers.
“It made my night, I haven’t laughed so much in ages. Come on, take your hands down.” I shake my head. “Please?” he begs. I shake my head again. “Pretty please?” I shake my head repeatedly. “How am I supposed to kiss you if you insist on having your hands covering your gorgeous face?”
The red is receding, however the humiliation of what I’ve said is here to stay. I don’t think I’ll ever live this moment down. Slowly I take my hands down, but move my head so my hair is a veil across my face.
Elijah reaches up and tucks my hair behind my ear. “You’re way too beautiful to hide. And your eyes, I seriously love your eyes, although these lips . . .” He carefully skims the pad of his thumb over my lower lip, and I can’t help but mewl into his touch.
All my humiliation is completely gone now, and I yearn for him to kiss me. My eyes flutter shut and an involuntary moan escapes from my lips. But in this moment, I don’t care how I sound; I love him touching me. The way he caresses me is so soft and tender.
He entwines his other hand through my hair, and gingerly brings me down to meet his lips. I welcome them, I adore them, I absolutely love kissing him. He’s always so careful with me, as if I’m a delicate china doll. I can’t imagine anyone could be more perfect for me than Elijah.
He pulls away from our kiss, and I groan at the loss our shared connection. “I have to go get dinner ready,” he says in a rough, strained voice.
I’m aware of what this means. It’s his way of saying, if I don’t stop now, we’re both going to do something we shouldn’t. I get it, and I respect him even more for being so kind and considerate of me. “Okay,” I finally sigh after a long, drawn-out moment. I stand and let him get up. As he walks away, he growls and I almost feel sorry for him and his uncomfortable state.
I did say, almost.
“Can I help?” I call out as he starts bashing things in the kitchen.
“Nope, Mom told me what I have to do.”
I can’t help but follow him into the kitchen, where he’s wearing an apron around his jeans. I start to giggle at how damn cute he looks. “You’re so cute,” I say as I point to the hot pink apron he’s wearing.
“It’s Mom’s,” he defensively retorts, but with a smile.
“I’m sure it is.” Though my reply is filled with mirth and laughter.
Elijah swings around to look at me, his face full of surprise. He brings two fingers up to his eyes, then points to me. “I’m watching you, Brackman.”
I sit on one of the bar stools and lean on the kitchen counter. “What’s for dinner, chef?”
“A technically difficult dish, one I must concentrate on to ensure it turns out correct.”
“Don’t tell me, you got Subway and you need to unwrap it?”
“I’m truly hurt by such snide remarks. Seeing as you’re merely a visitor to my restaurant, I’d suggest you remain quiet and watch the Master at work.”
“Master . . .” I chuckle as I keep watching him in the kitchen.
; “And for your information, no it’s not Subway. It’s tacos!”
Wow, I’m impressed. He’s making tacos from scratch. Or so I assume. He takes a container out of the fridge. “What’s in there?” I ask.
“My Mom pre-cooked the meat and told me how to reheat it so I don’t give you food poisoning.” So far tonight has been filled with a lot of laughs, now being one of those moments. “What?’ he asks in a serious tone.
“I don’t want to be poisoned either.”
He works in the kitchen assembling the tacos and I watch him in awe. He’s got a piece of paper with all the instructions, and after each step he picks up the pen beside the paper and ticks it off. It really is so damn cute. “So tell me, Miss Brackman, have you got a bucket list of things you want to do?”
I crinkle my nose and shake my head. “I’ve never really thought about it.”
“Come on, isn’t there something you really want to do or experience?”
I look over toward the faucet and think about his question. “Well, I really want to be the principal dancer in either Swan Lake or The Nutcracker at Lincoln Center.”
“That’s not a bucket list thing for you, Miss Brackman. That will happen.”
“It’s nice you have so much faith in me. But only the best, the most elite, and the top of the field get an opportunity to dance for the American Ballet Theatre. And even then, they usually end up in a minor role, not the principal.” I shake my head, completely aware that although I want to dance for them, the reality is there’s only a tiny percent of a chance I actually will.
“Who passed her advanced level ballet thingy?”
“Ballet thingy?” I smirk. “That would be me.”
“And how many times did you attempt it?”
“Just once.” I know what he’s doing. He’s trying to give me the confidence to say that one day I will be the principal dancer as opposed to saying my chances are miniscule.
“I don’t ever want to hear you say you probably won’t be selected, because from my point of view, you have the best chance ever, being as talented as you are.”
“I suppose.” I shrug. But he’s right. I can do it. I simply have to work harder and longer and be completely disciplined with myself.
“Now, back to my original question. A bucket list.”
“I’d like to have a white Christmas. Considering we don’t get snow here, I’d love to go somewhere where there’s so much snow it comes up to my thighs. I want to go sledding and build a snowman and have fun in the snow.”
“How about this—when you turn eighteen, I’ll take you to New York for Christmas?”
“You’d do that, for me?” I ask. I knit my fingers together and lean my head on my hands.
He stops chopping the tomatoes and looks at me, “I’d do anything for you.”
Damn it, there goes my heart flittering away like it’s in love.
“I’d like that,” I reply as my stomach knots with excitement. Elijah’s talking like he’s going to stick around for a long time.
I’m loving every minute of being with him, and can’t wait for millions of more minutes.
We’ve finished dinner which, incidentally, tasted great. I start to take our dishes back into the kitchen. “I’ll do that,” Elijah says taking my plate out of my hand.
“Dinner was great, thank you.”
“You didn’t eat very much,” he says. “You sure it was okay?”
“Yeah, it was wonderful. I just haven’t been feeling very hungry lately. But dinner was beautiful. The least I can do to repay you for cooking is stack the dishwasher.”
“Oh, no way. Mom has a certain way of stacking it, and she’s taught Dad and me how to do it. If anyone else does it, she’ll know and she’ll have a go at me for letting someone else do it.”
“Hey,” I put my hands behind my back. “I do not get in the way of a woman and her dishwasher,” I say.
Elijah makes quick and easy work of the kitchen clean-up as I go and settle into a cinema seat in the back room. He comes out, apron-free, and sits beside me. “Tonight’s entertainment is something I’m hoping you haven’t watched a hundred times. And if you have . . . well, too bad.”
He presses play and the first name pops up on screen. Natalie Portman. “Oh my God,” I gush as I bring my hand to my mouth. I look over to Elijah who’s got a big, proud smile on his face. And he should. “The Black Swan.” He nods his head.
Transfixed by the movie, I watch it with admiration and love. My goodness, it’s a movie I’ve seen so many times, I almost know it by heart. It’s sad, though vibrant, and it sucks you in to the point where there’s nothing else in the room.
The movie is heartbreaking, soul crushing, while still being beautiful. By the time it finishes, I have tears in my eyes and my heart is racing at the last imperfect though perfect scene. “Is that really how ballerinas are?” Elijah asks when he stops the film.
“That was a movie about a ballerina with mental health problems. And mental health doesn’t just hit ballerinas.”
“Ain’t that the truth.”
I grab my phone from my pocket to find several text messages from Becky. I start chuckling, because all of them have got emojis of lips and kisses. She’s teasing Elijah and me. “She’s a nut.”
“Who is?” Elijah says while he loads another DVD.
“Becky. Look at these.” I turn my phone around so he can see the message and it’s the screen filled with lips. Under it she’s written, ‘pucker up for kisses, baby.’
“I know I have to live with her too, but damn.” He shakes his head and goes back to the DVD player.
I watch as Elijah smiles to himself. Something inside me recognizes that although Becky can be quite full on and in your face, he still likes her. And I like how he likes her, because it means, he’s trying to get along with the people who are important in my life.
The movie starts and I watch the screen with interest. “Where on earth did you find this movie?” I ask as the title The Red Shoes flashes up on the screen.
“I know how much you love ballet, and after an intense afternoon with my friend Google, I found this movie. So I ordered it with the knowledge that one day, you and I were going to watch it together.”
“Wait, what? How long have you had it for?”
“Remember the night we shared a cab home?” I nod my head. “The day after I found it, and bought it.”
I stare blankly at Elijah as he makes his way back to the seat and holds his hand out for me to take. “You did this, for me?”
“Of course,” he adds, turning to watch the movie.
“You’re something else, Elijah Turner.”
I can’t help but marvel at him, and the incredible man he is.
School is finally over and we’re in the third week of vacation. It was Elijah’s birthday yesterday, and we were supposed to go to the beach. But instead, he went to get his license.
Last night, Becky was over and Elijah came to show off his new wheels. His Dad bought an old car and restored it. Apparently, it’s something flashy, but cars don’t interest me. His parents gave it to Elijah for his birthday, so he came straight over to my place. All I know about the car is it has four doors, four wheels and it’s a pretty dark blue color.
When he asked if Becky and I wanted to go for a ride, Dad groaned, but told him he had to have us home in half an hour.
Elijah respects my parents, so he makes sure he follows their rules when it comes to me.
Today’s Thursday and Becky, Laurie, Elijah and I are going to the beach. “What time is Elijah coming?” Becky asks as she rubs sunscreen on her shoulders.
“He should be here in the next half hour. What time is Laurie coming?”
“He said he’s on his way.”
Everything within our town is no more than twenty minutes away. The local stores are literally about four minutes away by car. The town’s population is under three thousand people, and it still has that small-town feel to it.
“Hey, you know your Mom took me to get the pill?”
“Yeah, how’s that going?” I ask.
“I keep forgetting to take it on time. I have to set an alarm on my phone to remember.”
“Becky,” I groan and rake my hand over my mouth. “You don’t want to end up pregnant. You’ve got too much talent to end up throwing away your future ‘cause you get knocked up.” Why do I feel like her mother preaching to her?
“Hey, Laurie is still wearing a condom. I’m not telling him I’m on the pill, ‘cause then he’ll be all ‘I want to go bareback,’ and that shit is nasty and messy. He can clean up.”
“For God’s sake.” I plug my ears and pretend I can’t hear her. But I can’t unhear what she said. “Seriously, I don’t want to know.”
“Well you’re going to have to because one day you’ll be experiencing it for yourself. Speaking of which, when do you think you and Mr. Sexy Pants will be having sex?”
“Mr. Sexy Pants? Is there no one left you won’t look at?”
“Did you see those jeans he was wearing last night? Girl, his ass is mighty fine.”
I sit back on my bed and grab my phone to text Elijah. “Not talking about his ass, or when I’m ready to have sex.”
The moment my head hits the pillow, I become overwhelmingly tired, like I can close my eyes and fall asleep right away.
“No you don’t!” Becky shrieks at me while collapsing on my bed beside me.
“What?”
“You’re not ignoring me. I want to know when you two will do the deed.” She makes an O with her left hand, and pokes the pointer finger on her right hand in and out of the O. “Bump uglies.” She keeps making the stupid motion with her hands. “The horizontal mambo.” I roll my eyes and turn over on the bed so I can’t see her. “The international language of love,” her voice drops to a deep tone as she leans over and whispers in my ear.
“I’ll never be able to have sex now because all I’ll think about is you making a stupid gesture with your hands and all those dumbass names you’re calling it.”
Becky barks out in laughter. We hear a car pull up and Becky jumps off the bed and goes to my window. “Mr. Sexy Pants is here.”
Dying Wish Page 15