by Amelia Wilde
Her sisters should be here today. What else would they possibly have to do on a Sunday morning? I scan the crowd again and realize with a start that I’m looking for the Maria and Christina that I used to know. Kids.
That makes me laugh out loud. I’m not even sure I’d recognize them, after all these years. Her parents, yeah. I’m sure her father is still walking around with that bewildered look on his face, like how did I end up in this house full of women? Always a half-smile, that guy, like he had no fucking clue what was happening. He probably never knew what he would walk into, what with her mother and all her ridiculous ideas about how to make money. Like that paper route. Who ever heard of a woman in her forties taking on a paper route? I have, because Reggie’s mom did it.
They’d be older now, though. I have to shrug off the strangeness of not knowing. Swallow the guilt that takes me by surprise. I should have stayed in touch with her. I should have kept up with all of them. It’s like Reckless Falls. They all grew up and changed, while I wasn’t watching. There’s a new park at the waterfront, for God’s sake, and Cole Granger’s some magnanimous town influencer now, not a prankster who’s costing the school district thousands of dollars on cranes.
Still. I’m here, at least.
The first swimmers are hitting the shore, and the hustle snaps me out of what’s starting to feel uncomfortably like nostalgia. Reggie’s not first, but she’s not far behind, and the instant my focus is back on her, I can’t stop myself from cheering.
“Go, Reg!” I clap my hands like I’m a track coach, as her feet hit the sand. There she is, jaw set, charging toward the makeshift changing tarps they’ve got strung up between the shore and the bikes. “You’ve got this!”
She doesn’t look my way, but the corners of her mouth turn upward, just a little. Then she disappears behind the tarp. That’s a damn shame, because I would kill to see her peel that wet bathing suit off of her curves. I have to make a small adjustment to the front of my shorts. Jesus. Focus on her, not on what we’ll be doing as soon as I can get her alone—
It doesn’t seem like there’s been enough time to change, but Reggie’s already darting out from behind the tarps and strapping a bike helmet onto her head. She looks confident as hell. Toned. Tight. Damn good.
It actually hurts to take my eyes off her, but if I’m going to be cheering along the roadway, I’ve got to move. The older couple with beach chairs is already heading past me, and I tear myself away from the sight of Reggie climbing on her bike and sprint to the next spot, toward the bottom of the hill.
I’m bouncing up and down on my toes at the side of the road, and I don’t give a shit who sees me. This is the most exciting thing that’s happened in years, and it’s hardly even happening to me. Superyachts be damned.
There are switchbacks in the road, and moments later, I see the bikes. It’s hard to make her out through the trees, but I see her helmet flash and recognize it immediately. Holy shit. Holy shit! I don’t know how she did it, but she’s toward the front of the pack. There’s an ache in my chest when she flashes into sight again, because even in that one moment, I see the set of her jaw. I see ten-year-old Reggie pumping hard up the hill, never looking back.
Some things never change.
I can’t believe how great she’s doing. I’m cheering so loudly that the words are starting to run together, and it’s infectious. The people around me start to whoop and shout, clapping hard.
Reggie comes out of the woods at the top of the big hill, and there are only a couple other people on bikes with her.
It’s a downward slope, a little rise, and then on the other side of us is a climb. In a matter of moments, all these people are going to be charging up that hill. Reggie is going to absolutely kill it.
I lose it, just a little bit.
She whooshes down the hill, and I see her tire rise on the incline. I’m yelling at the top of my lungs, jumping up and down. It’s pure joy to see her like this, in her element, fucking flying.
People have been filtering in around me. I’ve been shouting like a madman for so long that they probably can’t help being excited as hell, and the biking is easier to watch than the swimming. A couple of teenagers move in closer to the road, craning their necks, and the couple from the beach, too. The woman turns to grin at me, opens her mouth to say something, and that’s when it happens.
It all goes down so fast that the woman doesn’t even see it herself. I only see it because I’m looking past her, straight at Reggie, when the wheel of her bike hits a little rut in the road, filled with water from the morning’s rain.
It hits at just the wrong angle and it jerks to the side, and my heart goes to my fucking throat. There’s a harsh squeak on the pavement, rubber against asphalt, and Reggie’s face is a mask of shock. She tries to jerk the wheel forward, away from the other people in the pack, but it goes too far.
“Shit!” I leap forward, pushing someone—I don’t see who—out of the way.
The whole thing goes over, and she lands hard on the road, her leg taking the brunt of the fall. The bike comes down several feet away. It just misses one of the other riders in the front of the pack.
“Hey, man!” It’s one of the youths, shouting at me from just off my elbow. When the hell did the crowd get so thick?
“Reggie!” I shout her name, and she turns her head toward me, biting her lip hard, hand reaching for her ankle.
Then, in a classic Reggie move, she looks back toward the bike.
There’s not enough time.
The riders are bearing down on her, coming fast off the downward slope, and damn it, she’s going to go for the bike.
She lurches forward, hopping up onto her feet, and in this moment, a couple holding hands strolls in front of me. They’re gazing toward the road like there’s nothing going on, like Reggie isn’t about to be run down by what looks like a hundred bikes.
It’s like the lake, only now she’s really in trouble. I shove at the couple, one arm out in a bizarre imitation of a football player, and move, running toward her like both of our lives depend on it.
22
Regina
Some lonely nights, when I’m lying awake, staring at the ceiling, my nerves jangling so hard after pulling a double that even three shots of Jack in a row can’t calm me, I fall into a kind of trance watching the numbers on my digital clock at my bedside.
“2:58,” I say into the dark. “If I fall asleep now, there’s still time to get a good night’s sleep.” I close my eyes, and then open them again. “2:59. If I fall asleep right now, I can still fit in three hours. There’s still time.” Then I breathe out and count it on my fingers, obsessing with each second that passes by until… “3:00. If I fall asleep now, I can still wake up refreshed. There’s still time.”
There’s still time.
“There’s still time,” I exhale in a half-strangled whisper. The pavement is cold and damp, and my tongue stings from where I bit it when I hit the ground. But none of that matters because there is still time for me to get back up on my bike and finish this race.
But I feel like I’m moving backwards, and every second that ticks past is another second where I’m not in first place. Where I’ve made a mistake—a stupid, amateurish mistake—that I should have never made. I was going too fucking fast for the road conditions, but I was first, damn it. I was doing it. And I still could. There was still time.
Summoning all of my strength, I lean forward, ready to haul myself up.
Something hard and warm crashes into me. “What the—” I twist, arching like a startled cat, and then hiss with anger as the distance to my bike suddenly gets longer instead of shorter. “What the fuck?”
“I’ve got you.” Adam’s voice is in my ear, and for a moment I lose track of where I am as I melt against his warmth.
But there is no time for this....
“Let go of me!” Adam’s arms are like iron around my waist, but the pack is coming. I need to get to my bike. I can still get out
ahead of them. “Adam!” I thrash against him, and manage to slip free thanks to my newfound strength. “Come on! I need to get to my bike!” I step forward with my left foot. I can still get to my bike. I can still pull ahead if I work really hard...
“Reggie!” he shouts as I slip out of his grasp. “Watch out!”
I yelp as he yanks me back off my feet. I slam backwards into his chest…and out of the way of the careening pack of bikers swishing past us so fast that my hair dances in the wash of displaced air.
“Holy fuck,” Adam breathes, still clutching me tightly to him. “You nearly got…”
I blink, and for a second my heart stands still. With a shaky inhale, I close my eyes and allow myself to replay it one more time in my mind, before I shake my head. “It’s okay now,” I tell him firmly. “Nothing bad happened.”
“Jesus, Reggie.” I can feel his heart thumping wildly against my back, as he holds me tight. “Take a goddamned breather, will you?”
“I can’t, there’s no time.” I’m starting to struggle again. “I didn’t get hurt, but I need to catch up now.”
“Reggie…”
“There’s still time for me to catch up.”
“Reggie, stop…”
“Adam, I can do this! Let me do it!” I shove him away and stagger forward.
And that’s when I feel it. The sharp, burning…wrongness in my right ankle. It knifes up my leg, setting the whole thing on fire before I feel it slip sickeningly out of place.
With a yelp, I stagger to the left, but I overcompensate, and brace myself to hit the pavement.
I never do. Adam, faster than lightning, always so goddamned fast at everything, lunges at the last second and gathers me smoothly back up again. I blink back hot tears that are half embarrassment, half anger, and all crushing disappointment. “I could still pedal, maybe,” I wince as he slowly turns me away from the course. “My other leg is fine. I can just do the one side and…”
“Sweetheart, no.”
“I could still do it!”
He blinks at me. “I have no doubt you could. But you’re hurt, and it’s hurting me to see you like this. Will you please let me take care of you?”
It’s not pity in his warm brown eyes. It’s…something else. He’s looking at me with such softness, such warm admiration and respect.
No one has ever looked at me like that before.
It’s too much. I try to look away, but the tears catch me. I feel my whole self collapse inward and crumple against him, and suddenly I am crying hot, vicious, angry tears.
“Fuck,” I sob, and I don’t even know why I am crying right now, but I can’t stop. Rage and disappointment roil together with embarrassment and defeat, and there are no words for what I’m feeling other than what bubbles up in my chest right now. “It’s not fair!” I sob.
I bite my lip and wait, tears pouring from my eyes and soaking his nice shirt—too nice for anything in Reckless Falls on a Sunday morning except church—waiting for him to tell me that I’m being ridiculous. It’s not fair? That’s something a child would say.
But Adam only smoothes my hair. He doesn’t try to argue like my mother would, he doesn’t try to diminish it, make me think of starving kids in Africa, or some shit like my Dad would. He just holds me and murmurs that I’m right. I’ve worked so hard for this. It’s not fucking fair.
When my tears slow, and the raw ache subsides, he puts his arm around me.
“Come with me,” Adam says, lacing it under my arm to hold me close.
I don’t say anything. I just let him slowly, so slowly, lead me away. I don’t know where we are going right now, only that it feels right that I’m going with him.
23
Adam
Reggie leans against the passenger-side window of my rental car. I put the key in the ignition and the car revs to life, and the next second the radio is blaring the Jaxson Blue hit of the summer.
“Shit.” I reach for the knob and smack at it. “Sorry. I was—”
“You were getting pumped up,” Reggie says, but her voice is tight with tears.
“I was excited as hell.” I want to tell her that I’m still excited, that there will be other triathlons, but she’s clearly heartbroken. I’m heartbroken for her. This should have worked out perfectly the first time, because Reggie deserves that. She deserves to be with the frontrunners. Hell, she deserves to win. She deserves all of it. My heart pounds with the injustice of that fucking rain this morning. If it hadn’t been for the rain, for the rut in the road, the way she landed.
I’ve never seen her cry before.
I drive carefully back to the B&B, not saying anything else. I feel conflicted as fuck. On the one hand, my heart aches for Reggie and her busted ankle and her lost triathlon. And on the other, my entire body is pulsing with an electric energy. I’m the one who got to be there for her. I’m the one who saved her from those other bikes. I’m the one who felt her in my arms, the length of her pressed up against me, and it felt so damn right...
“This isn’t my house,” she says wryly when I turn off the car after parking in the closest spot to the front entrance.
I put my hand to my mouth. “It isn’t?”
She makes a noise that’s like a little hiss, not really a laugh, just a stand-in for one, and reaches for the door.
I get out on my side and jog around to hers, but Reggie is already limping toward the front door. I don’t say anything about the fact that she left the car door hanging open. I just shut it and catch up to her, walking alongside her. No. Crawling.
It has to hurt like a bitch, but Reggie just clenches her teeth and makes her way into the B&B and toward the stairs. The silence between us is thick now. I don’t want to keep trying to make jokes. I know this is a crushing disappointment for her. But by the sixth step, I can’t take it any longer.
“Reg.” I say it softly, from where I ‘m following one step behind.
“What?” She says the word through gritted teeth, her knuckles white on the bannister, and heaves herself up one more step.
“Let me—”
“No.”
I press my lips together.
“Reg—”
“Shut up, Adam.”
I actually saved her life this time, and she has the nerve to tell me to shut up, even while sweat beads on her forehead.
“I really think—”
“I’ve got this.”
That’s the last straw. I step forward and sweep her into my arms, right there on the staircase, and start climbing. Reggie lets go of the bannister at the last possible instant and glares up at me.
“I said, I’ve got this.”
“Of course you do,” I tell her as I start up the stairs. “And I’ve got you.” She glares at me with a look that should reduce me to ashes. I pause, because I owe her this. “Reg, I—” The words are on the tip of my tongue, just like they always were back when I first knew her. We all said it so casually back then. I love you, but you’re a dumbass. I love you, but... This time, I swallow them down. They mean more than that now. “You’re incredible. You really are. But this is not the time to be a hero. You’re going to fuck up your ankle.”
“My ankle is already fucked up.”
“Hmm.” I pretend to consider this. “Let’s get to the room, and then we can have a little debate.”
I get to the top of the stairs and move quickly to my room. Carrying her is nothing. I’d carry her every day, if I could, it feels that right.
I have to get the door open one-handed, and while I’m doing it, Reggie stops resisting quite so much and wraps her arms around my neck, leaning her head against my shoulder. Inside, I lay her down gently on the bed. She winces when she makes contact with the comforter, which makes my gut twist. “Stay right here.” I use my best boardroom voice. “I’ll be right back.”
I take the stairs two at a time and sweep through the lobby, heading into the kitchen. I need ice, and I’m rifling through the freezer when a voice interrupts m
e.
“Mr. Zeller, you look like you’re in a hurry.” Xavier Tully leans against the wide metal prep table, looking for all the world like he belongs in New York City, not at a B&B in Reckless Falls.
“I am. I need an—” Just then, I see a stack of ice packs wedged in the back corner. “These.” I brandish the ice packs. “But I also need a first aid kit.”
He purses his lips. “Are you all right?”
I will be, once I can get back to Reggie. “Triathlon accident,” I say cryptically, knowing that Reggie isn’t going to want a fuss. I’ve already made enough of that. “Where’s the kit?”
Two minutes later, I’m bursting through the door of my room, forcing myself to calm the hell down. Reggie raises her eyebrows. “What did you find?”
“You can’t leave your ankle like that. I’ll take you in to the clinic in the morning.”
“No. I’m not going to the—”
I hold up one hand, and she stops. “This is not a time for arguing. Just relax.”
I fish a roll of pre-wrap tape out of the kit, and sit on the edge of the bed. Reggie’s ankle is already swollen and red, but I don’t think it’s broken.
“Adam—”
“Just let me—” I put a hand on her knee, rubbing it absently while I think back to my cross country days. She reaches for it, threading her fingers through mine, but when I look up at her, she’s got her head turned to the side, biting her lip.
It’s a simple tape job, but it feels like some kind of atonement. Every movement I make has significance. Weight. I want to be fixing more than her ankle. I want to be taking away all of her pain that has nothing to do with the injury.