The Moment of Letting Go

by J. A. Redmerski

  “Yeah, I saw you weren’t alone.” I admit that does make me feel a lot better, and I think he knows that judging by the smile of acceptance on my face.

  “And I never am,” he insists, going toward the fridge. “Orange juice? Milk?”

  “Orange juice is good.”

  He comes back with a half gallon in his hand and pours some into my glass.

  Maybe I’m just being overly cautious, as usual, letting my fear of heights bleed into everything else. I’ve never really been afraid of the risks associated with cliff-diving and storm-surfing and other things like that, but then I’ve never really been faced with them before I met Luke, either.

  Just the same, I don’t want to come off bitchy or maternal, telling Luke I think he shouldn’t do this and shouldn’t do that. It’s his lifestyle, and from what I’ve seen so far he seems to know what he’s doing.

  We enjoy a breakfast together at the bar and talk for a long time about his surfing and rock-climbing and cliff-diving, where I learn that if anyone is more prone to being injured, out of all of Luke’s friends, Seth apparently takes the trophy.

  “Nothing can kill the guy though,” Luke said. “He’s broken several bones, ruptured his spleen in a motorcycle accident, and almost drowned surfing.”

  “Geez, what the hell is wrong with him?” I asked.

  “Seth is just Seth—he wouldn’t know how to live any other way. But he’s generally safe, too. He’s just accident prone by nature, not reckless by choice.”

  But the extent of Luke’s injuries in the years he’s been into all this wild outdoors stuff is a broken toe and some scrapes and bruises.

  And this too fills me with a sense of relief.

  Not a full sense, but a sense nonetheless.

  Luke

  We finally get a break from the rain. I take Sienna out to the waves behind my house later, where we surf until the sun begins to set. She’s getting better at surfing, but I have to admit, I like it when she falls. It’s cute because she’s so dramatic about it sometimes, and she screams and laughs and I have another reason to either rush to her side and put my hands on her, or to hang back and make fun of her.

  “What’s wrong with you, girl?” I shout from my board over the sound of the waves. “No giving up early! Pull that bikini out of your butt crack and get back out here!”

  She cackles and then flips me off. She drops her board on the sand and plops down next to it. I paddle my way closer and walk out after her with my board secured underneath my arm. I sit beside her on the sand and we watch the sun begin to sink into the ocean.

  I think heavily about our conversation this morning—I’ve been thinking about it all day, in fact—and I feel really good about her acceptance of my lifestyle.

  What she knows of it anyway.

  “Luke?” Sienna says and I look over. “I just want you to know that just because I’m staying here and all that, you don’t have to drop everything else.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  She taps her knee against mine, both of us sitting with our legs drawn up, our arms wrapped around them, hooked loosely by our fingers.

  “Come on,” she says. “I know it wasn’t exactly something you planned, and I don’t expect you to set everything else aside that you normally do just to cater to me, you know what I mean?”

  I smile and tap her back with my knee.

  “I know, but I want to. You’re my guest, and I need that five-star rating.” I grin and look out ahead and add, “If you rate my services badly, I’ll never get another girl to stay here on vacation.”

  The sound of air bursting shortly from her throat is light. My grin deepens, satisfied I got the reaction I was looking for.

  “So is that what you’re gonna do when I leave?” she asks suspiciously, playfully.

  Turning my head to see her on my left, I just smile and shrug my shoulders.

  “I dunno,” I tell her. “I mean look how great things are going between the two of us. I could really get used to this kind of company.” It was meant to be laced with suggestion.

  She drops her bare legs into a crossed position and her shoulders slump forward. Her hands rest in the hollow of her lap. I love that black bikini—a little too much—how it hugs her perfect breasts, which would fit nicely in my hands …

  Shake it off, Luke.

  “Maybe I want to be your only guest,” she says cautiously, keeping her eyes on the fading ball of fire being swallowed up by the ocean. I can tell that was hard for her to say, the same way it’s been hard for me to kiss her—it’s something I always want to do, but I’m still testing the waters and I’m never sure how she’s going to react to it.

  “Honestly, I’d kind of love it if you were the only guest.”

  We barely look over at each other, but as briefly as our eyes meet, it’s plain that we’re both smiling.

  Suddenly I take a deep breath; the urge to take the plunge becomes important and hits me unexpectedly. The need to lay everything out on the table is finally at its peak, forcing me to the edge of the cliff as if for the first time. My heart is pounding, my shoulders feel tense, and my throat is dry. I see the drop-off out ahead, beckoning me. The urge to run to the edge and leap off has never been stronger, but the thought remains in the back of my mind that if I take that plunge I may never come back from it. I don’t want that to happen with Sienna, but maybe Seth was right. She is different—maybe she’ll surprise me.

  It’s in this moment that I decide to tell her what I’ve been not only afraid to, but have been trying to make sure if it’s even necessary. She likes me enough that I think it is.

  “You know what would be awesome?” she asks, snapping me out of my contemplation.

  “What?”

  “We have a sunset, an ocean, and a beach.” She smiles and leans over sideways, laying her head on my shoulder. “All that’s missing is a good drink.”

  “You want a beer?” I ask, agreeing.

  “Whatever you have,” she says.

  I lean over and press my lips to the top of her hair. “Then a beer you’ll get.” I push myself to my feet and hurry off through the sand back toward the house, leaving her sitting on the beach. A beer is a good idea, if not for anything than just to loosen me up some. Because I’m going to tell her tonight, when I go back out to sit with her on the beach. It’s odd, but even though I’m nervous as hell because I don’t want to scare Sienna off, I think I’m just as excited.

  I smile, thinking to myself all the way back to the house, because I have a really good feeling about tonight.

  But then the smile drops from my face when I walk in and Kendra is coming through the front door ahead of Seth, a look of anger—and betrayal—boiling in her face.

  Sienna

  Luke has been gone for longer than I expected. He seemed kind of excited when he jumped up on those sexy muscled legs of his and jogged his way through the sand to go get the beers.

  I start to leave the beach to find out if he needs help with anything—though I’m sure he can carry two beers all by himself—but then I decide against it. I’ve already invaded Luke’s life and home. There is no reason that I shouldn’t give the guy a few minutes of solitude.

  A few more minutes pass by and I’m lying on my back against the sand, watching the sky darken above me and the stars begin to come alive within it.

  Finally I get to my feet and head toward the house.

  I hear raised voices as I approach. Luke and what sounds like Kendra. The light is on the kitchen, pooling on the ground outside the back window next to the lanai. I walk closer but find my steps slowing down and my ears beginning to burn.

  And then I stop cold in my tracks before I take the first wooden step, and I can go no farther.

  Luke

  “Do you actually think,” Kendra shouts at me in a rage, “that when she finds out about us she’ll really make some kind of effort to get mixed up with you? No! She’ll have the excuse she needs to put you behind her when
she has to go back to wherever the fuck she lives! This is stupid! You’re being stupid!” Her hands are clenched into fists at her sides. She’s wearing a white flowered bikini top and a pair of cutoff jean shorts over the bottoms. There’s redness in her face, caused by being in the sun all day and probably from her blood pressure shooting through the top of her skull.

  Gritting my teeth, I point my finger right in her face. “This has gotta stop, Kendra! I’ve tried to be calm about this, always overlooking the obsessive attitude you have toward me—”

  “Obsessive?!” The word hisses through her clenched teeth, her chin rears back and her brown eyes pop wide open in her angry face. “I’m just looking out for you! I love you, Luke! I’ll always fucking love you! And I know bitches!” She points at Seth and then looks back at me. “Seth’s the only one of you who’s got it right! Fuck ’em and leave ’em so you don’t have to go through the dramatic bullshit of losing them! Whether they leave or they die; there’s no difference if you don’t care!”

  I throw my arms up above me and then lean toward her, roaring in her face, “But it’s not. Your. Life! It’s mine! You’re fucking insane, Kendra!” She flinches at my words, not afraid of me, but hurt by them and the ones she knows are soon to follow. Moisture begins to form in the corners of her eyes. “YOU NEED HELP!” I bellow, because it’s long overdue. “Stop using me as your goddamned crutch and get some professional help!” And then I go in for the kill. “If Landon could only see you now—”

  A white-hot flash crosses my vision as her hand falls hard across the side of my face. A hot stinging sensation moves outward across my skin when she pulls her hand away. Before I can even find the words to apologize, the front screen door is slamming against the side of the house and Kendra’s headlights are shining in on Seth and me.

  Seconds later she fishtails out of my driveway, her brake lights glowing red through the darkness until her car disappears around the bend.

  The dark silence left in the house is long and filled with even darker thoughts. I never wanted to treat Kendra that way and I feel like shit about it, but things needed to be said—maybe not that last part, but definitely the rest of it. Running my hand through the top of my hair, I take a deep breath and just watch out the front door for a moment, thinking that Kendra will turn around any second now and come back for another round because it’s expected of her.

  She doesn’t come back.

  “I followed her over here,” Seth says from somewhere behind me. “I knew she’d be pissed that you weren’t going with us on Saturday, but honest to God, man, I didn’t expect that. I tried to calm her down.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” I say distantly with my back to him. Then I turn around. “Look, I don’t want to deal with this right now.” I walk into the kitchen just a shot away to get two beers from the fridge. “Sienna’s waiting for me out on the beach and I’ve left her out there long enough.”

  “All right, I’m gone,” Seth says. “Just give me a call when it’s OK that I crash in my bed again.”

  “I will. Thanks, Seth.”

  Seth nods and leaves.

  I use this brief moment alone to gather my composure. I don’t want to go back out there with the girl of my dreams, oozing leftover chaos and bullshit.

  Letting the back screen door close behind me, I start to descend the steps of the lanai, but my heart stops and the air sticks in my lungs when I see Sienna sitting at the bottom of them.

  She heard.

  For a few long seconds that feel much longer, I can’t get any words out. Finally I make my way down the steps and start to sit beside her, but she gets up.

  “Sienna, I—”

  “You don’t have to explain anything,” she says kindly, with not an ounce of bitterness or anger or anything that might make this easier—just a lot of hidden pain that only makes it harder. “I-I really would rather if you didn’t explain, anyway, OK?”

  Disbelief and confusion take over.

  I set the beers on the lanai railing and step toward her.

  “But I need to explain it to you,” I say.

  She takes a step back.

  Shaking her head gently and looking down briefly at her hands, she says, “Luke, I just want to go back to Oahu, if you don’t mind giving me a ride to the airport.”

  “Sienna”—I gently take her arm, trying to stop her—“I swear to you there’s nothing going on with me and Kendra. I know it might seem like that with the way we argue, but—”

  She moves her arm away from my hand and my heart falls with my shoulders and my breath.

  “Then what was she talking about, Luke?” Pain lies in her face as plainly as I know it does in my own; her eyes are hard and filled with conflict and disappointment, but not with anger or resentment, which makes this so much harder for me. “What did she mean when she said ‘when I find out about you’?”

  Wounded—Sienna is the epitome of the word and just seeing her like this, it guts me.

  “Sienna, no, listen,” I start to say, wanting to wash that wounded look off her face before it deepens. I reach out to touch her cheek with the backs of my fingers, but she takes another step back. I sigh and go on. “Kendra wasn’t talking about her and me—it’s not about that—it’s … She was talking about what we do, the part of my life I’ve not told you about.”

  I get the feeling she doesn’t believe me, but for a moment at least, she’s listening. I still have time to fix this.

  But then suddenly she blurts out, “No, please, Luke,” and stops me again, a hint of pain rising in her voice. “I’m sorry, but I just can’t do this. It was never going to work anyway, and I think you know that: you living in Hawaii, me in California; this … whatever it is you and Kendra haven’t resolved—I can’t be a part of that not to mention the very different lives we live.”

  I swallow hard.

  “It’s probably better that we part ways now,” she goes on, “before we go too far.”

  I hear Landon’s words in the back of my mind again—I’ve never known you to run away from anything, Luke.

  Sienna’s words—it was never going to work anyway.

  Seth’s words—you know better than to get involved with a tourist.

  Even Kendra’s words—whether they leave or they die; there’s no difference if you don’t care.

  “OK,” I say quietly, giving up because I know it’s the right thing to do—I knew all along it would come to this moment, and to drag out the inevitable is the same thing as dragging out the pain. My gaze falls to my bare feet standing amid the prickly, unkempt grass of my backyard. “I’ll take you to the airport.” I never imagined such simple words could cut so fucking deep.

  “Thank you,” she says just as quietly.

  I step aside to give Sienna space as she ascends the steps and disappears inside the house to pack her things, the sound of the screen door hitting the wood frame lightly, as if she made it a point not to let it slam behind her.

  We don’t talk on the drive. Not once. I never feel her eyes on me from the passenger’s seat, or any indication that she might secretly want me to be the one who speaks up first—exactly the opposite: I get the sense she doesn’t want me to say anything, that if I do, it’ll only make things harder. The silence is shattering, as if everything we experienced together in her short time here, how close we became, has so quickly become nothing more than a memory. The pain I feel is more than crushing; it’s a burden that I know I’ll carry with me forever: I knew better than to open myself up to a girl like her—the perfect girl—because it never would’ve worked, just like she said; as much as I wanted to believe that it somehow could, that Sienna could overlook and accept my dangerous lifestyle, I know deep down that she won’t be able to. And so I’ll let Sienna go. Against all that’s inside of me, all the things I want to say to her to make her stay, I’ll let her go. And things will go back to normal.

  Normal … I hate normal; the thought of going back to the way things were before Sienna came
into my life with her faultless, infectious smile and eyes brighter than the sun—I don’t want to think about it.

  Maybe hate isn’t the word. I fear normal.

  Not until it’s time for Sienna to board her plane do we finally speak.

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to fly over with you?” It took everything in me to say those words and not all the things I really want to say. My heart is breaking into a thousand unrecognizable pieces; tears burn the backs of my eyes as I force them down; my chest feels heavy like a stack of bricks sits on top of it; my throat is beginning to swell and I can’t fucking swallow.

  “I’ll be fine,” she says.

  Silence.

  I look at the floor. She looks at the plastic seat beside her.

  “Luke.” She speaks up reluctantly. “I really did have a great time. I’ll never forget this … vacation.” It seemed hard for her to say that word, as if it didn’t feel like the right one. “Or how you helped me with my fear of heights. It really does mean a lot to me. I hope you know that.”

  I nod and try to force a smile, but I doubt it looks very much like one. Inside it’s the furthest thing from a smile.

  She reaches out and touches my arm. “Thank you for everything—and please tell Alicia and Melinda that I’m sorry I can’t be there to help anymore.” She leans in and presses her soft lips to the corner of my mouth, and I’m on the cusp of losing it, but for her sake I keep my head on my shoulders. “I hope everything going on in your life works out,” she says as she pulls away.

  I hope so too, Sienna … but somehow now that you’re leaving, I doubt it will.

  “Sienna,” I call out as she walks toward the gate.

  She stops and turns around.

  “Remember what I said about your photography.”

  I smile a little.

  She smiles back, nods, and walks away.

  TWENTY-TWO