Episode Forever Love

by Lauren Snow

  Things are different now. I’m older, he’s older, we’re more mature. I don’t know. It wouldn’t hurt to just toss it out there and see what he says.

  For the rest of my first day, he’s all I can think about. I can’t even eat lunch without him crossing my mind. 5 PM sneaks up on me with little warning. Dinah dismisses me and I rush home.

  Home. That’s where my boyfriend, Travis, lives. After my encounter with Jenson today, it’s like, Travis who? I almost forgot that we lived together. But we do, and he’s standing in the kitchen doorway with nothing but his sweats on and his abs out to remind me. Based on his stance, he was clearly waiting on me.

  “Nice of you to find your way home, Dorothy,” he remarks, with a lustful smirk. “I missed you.”

  Weird. Travis hardly talks like this. It’s almost like he knows he’s got competition.

  I say nothing and drop my bag on the living room floor. I plop onto the sofa and stare ahead vacantly. He comes up the rear and plants his hands on my shoulders, kneading them deeply and gently.

  “You alright? How was your day?” he asks.

  “It was good,” I say. “First day went well.”

  “Good. Anything special happen?”

  I sigh. “Not really,” I lie. “Aside from this surprise inspection they did.”

  “Really? Wow. I’m sure you were prepared, though. You’re a smart girl.”

  Prepared? Not in the slightest. Not for the inspection, and certainly not for Jenson . . .

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “Jenson. Back so soon,” Dinah jokes as I step into her office. I smile and take a seat in front of her desk.

  “Seems like just yesterday, doesn’t it?” Even though it wasn’t. I play along anyway, and scoot my chair closer to her. “So everyone knows I’m coming back today, right?”

  “Yes, they do,” she says.

  “Great. Once again, you guys have impressed me. There isn’t one bad mark about this clinic, and you’ve maintained that for all these years. So for that, you should be very proud.”

  “Oh, thank you, Jenson. Really.”

  “Aw, don’t mention it. Well, let me go and get started.”

  I rise from my seat and exit Dinah’s office to begin my rounds. All I can think about, though, is Therese. She’s been on my mind since I saw her the other day. I kept trying to sync the name with the face. I know we went to high school together. That much I’m positive about.

  Like last time, I decide to make Therese last on my list.

  “Knock, knock,” I say, doing exactly that on the lab door.

  She whips around from fiddling with a needle to look at me.

  “Uh-oh. I didn’t startle you, did I?”

  She smiles. “No, you didn’t. How are you?”

  “I’m good. Enjoying your new job thus far?”

  “I am.”

  Awkward silence. I glance at Therese’s name on my iPad.

  Therese Forman.

  I study that name long and hard. Then I study her face, trying to not to come off creepy. It suddenly clicks. This is the Therese Forman that I remember from my ninth-grade English class. The one who recited an amazing poem about unrequited love. I’ll never forget it. It was called “The Plight of a Shattered Heart”. At the time, I made fun of the title because it was so melodramatic. But the words. The words were strung together so eloquently. It was the most beautiful piece I’d ever heard. To deny that would be a crime.

  “Therese?” I say softly.

  “Yes?” She frowns at me, likely wondering what I’m getting at.

  I wag my finger at her as high school memories flood me at once. “Your poem,” I say. “It was . . . awesome.”

  Her frown deepens. “Poem?”

  “Yeah. You wrote a poem in our freshman English class called ‘The Plight of a Shattered Heart’. You don’t remember?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Wow. Well it stuck with me after all these years,” I tell her. “You have an astonishing way with words.”

  A coy grin cracks on her face. She tucks her golden brown hair behind her ear.

  “That’s funny. I wrote so many poems, I don’t even remember that one you’re talking about.”

  I clear my throat.

  “The miserly maiden gets carried hither and thither by her pain,” I recite. “Her sorrow is a hollow tide, breaking ashore, ebbing and flowing, reckless and inhuman in its intent. It’s cold. But still she fights it. She thrusts her fist against its chilly current and penetrates its stronghold. The lonely frosty waters swallow her from the inside out this time. It swells into her heart, cuts it in half. No hope of mending. The fragments settle to the pit of her stomach like dregs. She feels them stirring inside as she gazes across the room at her lover, the one that the stars have declared her to have. If only she can touch him.”

  Silence hangs in the air again. I glance at the floor and smile, amazed that I was able to spout off the poem so fluently. I look back up at Therese. She probably thinks I’m a creep for remembering something she wrote almost two decades ago. But the way she’s blushing right now, I don’t think that’s the case.

  “You alright over there?” I ask her.

  She smiles. “I am. I’m just . . . in shock that you remembered that after all these years.”

  “What can I say,” I shrug. “Some lines I probably butchered, I’m sure . . .”

  Therese giggles like a schoolgirl.

  “. . . but it was deep. There was raw emotion there and I liked that. And your vocabulary. I mean, pfft . . . very mature for a fourteen-year-old. You must’ve read a lot of poets. But I have to know. What inspired you to write it?”

  She looks off and hesitates for a moment. “Wow, now you’re asking me to recall the headspace I was in at the time.” She chuckles nervously. “That was so long ago.”

  I think she knows the inspiration, but doesn’t want to come out and say it. So I help her out.

  “Well you know, I used to hear through the grapevine that you liked me back in high school.” I purposely put her on the spot. I want her to open up to me. “Is that true?”

  Her face goes as white as a ghost. “Uh . . .”

  “You can be honest,” I encourage. “We’re adults here.”

  “I did like you,” she confesses. “And actually, I still do.”

  “So was I the inspiration behind the poem? Were you talking about me?” I tease.

  Her complexion gains color again.

  “Yes. Yes I was,” she admits.

  I’m honestly shocked by the revelation. When we were kids, Therese and I would bump into each other in the hallways or in class, say hi or bye, and go about our lives. I never got the impression that she liked me, even when I would hear otherwise from our classmates. If anything, every time I saw her, she would try to get away from me as quickly as possible. But that may have just been because she was too nervous to be around me. It all makes sense now.

  I applaud her for being honest. But would I be able to do the same? How is she going to react when she hears that I, in fact, like her, too?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The admission left my mouth faster than I could think it. I instantly regret letting the cat out the bag. But it’s too late. I put myself out there and there’s no taking it back. And what’s worse, I can’t really tell how Jenson feels about my confession. I can tell he acknowledged it, but that doesn’t mean he likes it.

  “I figured that,” he says.

  That can mean anything.

  So how do you feel about it? I want to say. Give me something. Do you approve or not?

  “Can I ask you something?” he says.

  “Sure.”

  “This might seem a little . . . weird. But how would you feel if I asked you to have dinner with me?”

  My gut writhes at the offer. The proposal sounds too good to be true. Did he really just ask me this?

  “Have dinner with you?” I throw the question back at him to buy myself time to think.

/>   “Yeah. Not like a date necessarily, but just a friendly dinner where we can catch up. I’m curious to know what you’ve been up to since high school.”

  Is he really? I’m a bit taken aback that after all this time, Jenson Lutz would take a sudden interest in my life. Had it not been for this chance encounter, we never would have crossed paths. Still, the urge to say yes is tugging at my insides. I’d be an idiot to refuse the proposal. This is like that moment where the guy you’re crushing on asks you to the dance. My natural impulse is to accept. But there’s one thing that’s keeping me from doing so: the fact that I have a boyfriend at home. I’d feel super sleazy if I did dinner with a whole other man, a man that I’m attracted to at that. How does it look to do dinner with an old crush? Not good, that’s how. I do have morals.

  I have to give Jenson an answer, though. He’s staring at me waiting for one. I can’t leave him hanging.

  “Sure, yeah,” I finally say. “Dinner sounds good.”

  I agree to it anyway. It couldn’t hurt, right? It’s just a meal between former classmates. No strings attached. Besides. This will be a chance for me to really get to know Jenson since I couldn’t do that in high school.

  “Cool. Take my number down.”

  I reach inside my lab coat pocket and get my phone. He takes it out of my hand, smiles at me, and adds his digits in my contacts himself.

  “Here you go,” he says, handing it back to me.

  “Thanks.”

  “How does Friday night sound?”

  “Friday’s good.”

  “Perfect. What time do you normally get off work?”

  “Five.”

  “Okay. Let’s shoot for seven. What do you like to eat?”

  “I’m not picky. I mean, look at me.” I do a sweeping gesture down my body to emphasize that I’m on the bigger side. People my size typically aren’t choosy when it comes to food.

  “Oh, c’mon, don’t do yourself like that. Just because you’re a little thick, you eat everything?”

  “Don’t I look it?”

  He chuckles softly. “No. You look amazing, Therese.”

  I feel my face grow warm. I never thought that I’d ever hear Jenson Lutz say those words to me.

  “Well listen, I should be getting outta here,” he says. “I gotta finish up this report and move on to the next facility. A nursing home on the other side of town.”

  He rolls his eyes just thinking about it. I chuckle at his plight.

  “Shoot me a text so I can lock your number in,” he says.

  I do just that, and hear a promising ping in his pocket. Good. He didn’t give me a bogus number.

  “This you? 585 . . .”

  “Yup. That’s me.”

  “Awesome. I saved you. Well Therese, I’ll see you ‘round.” He smiles and winks at me before he leaves.

  This is unreal. Twenty years ago, this moment would not have happened. I’m on cloud nine right now. My heart is fluttering, my extremities are numb, and my blood is moving through me like magma. I’ve never been this hot in my entire life.

  My supervisor, Dinah, enters the room without warning.

  “Hey there,” she says. “How’d it go?”

  My internal climate quickly transitions from being extremely hot to extremely cold. I freeze up when she asks me the question. Jenson and I hadn’t discussed anything inspection-related. Nothing at all. His purpose for being here derailed once he realized who I was.

  “It went swell,” I tell her. “He basically said everything’s good here. No complaints.”

  At first, Dinah just looks at me. Her eyes are trying to figure out if I’m telling the truth. Then she nods slowly.

  “Okay. Good. That’s what I like to hear. I knew you’d knock this out the park.”

  I manage a fake grin, and a fake laugh to go along with it.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Therese hasn’t been off my mind since the clinic. From the moment I left the place, to the ride home, to even right now as I drop my bag on the floor and sink into the couch after a long day. She’s all I’ve been thinking about. I can picture her bright smile, her bouncy brown hair, those gentle gray eyes. She’s literally the same person she was in high school except older and more beautiful. I always thought she was beautiful, though, even when we were teenagers. I just never told anybody.

  I’ll admit. I was that guy who had to be seen with the pretty cheerleader or the popular socialite. That was just the rule of the game. People like me couldn’t associate with people like Therese. I was tethered to vapid girlfriends back then. But I hated every second of being with them. No real substance, no character. Just an attractive face. Therese, on the other hand . . . there was always something about her that intrigued me. And when she recited that poem in English class, that sold it.

  I’m really eager to catch up with her over dinner and see what she’s been up to. I’d love to know how she landed in the medical field. I pegged her as a future writer or something. In a couple days, I’d find out what happened.

  Two days later . . .

  I text Therese to let her know I’m parked in front of her apartment building. She replies that she’s on her way down. My chest starts to drum. Why am I having this reaction?

  She comes out the door and my heart jitters with joy. I guess I’m just ecstatic to see her again. Never thought I’d feel this way. She gets in and looks around my car, amazed at what she’s inside of.

  “So this is what a Bentley looks like, huh?” she says.

  “I take it you’re a virgin when it comes to luxury cars,” I tease.

  “My virginity in any department is none of your business,” she bites back with a naughty smirk.

  I laugh. “We’re starting already, I see. This is gonna be a fun night.”

  I take her to this upscale restaurant downtown called Broil-Haus, owned by real estate giant, Hadley Frances. It’s one of my favorite places to go for dinner. Ambiance is unmatched, the food is to die for, service is stellar. I usually dine here alone. But this time, I decide to bring along a partner to enjoy it with me.

  The crowd is pretty light tonight, which is odd considering that it’s Valentine’s Day. But I wouldn’t contest it. The less folks, the better. I’m not antisocial, but whenever there’s a bunch of people around, it throws off my feng shui, or whatever you call it. My inner atmosphere is unbalanced. Yeah, that’s a good way to put it. Even in high school, despite me being Mr. Popular and surrounded by people all damn day, I used to feel weird when there was a surplus of humans.

  Therese and I stand behind the velvet rope that’s barricading us from the dining room. The hostess at the podium greets us. I tell her that I made a reservation for two in the exclusive Bistreaux Room. She unlatches the rope and allows us entry.

  “Yes, Mr. Lutz. Right this way.” She takes us to a secluded room toward the back of the restaurant, which is drowning in black décor and old-timey pictures. The table is encircled by a booth with dark suede seats. Hanging above it is an abstracted, ultramodern chandelier; looks like something that Picasso sculpted. Instead of traditional hard copy menus, there are two digital tablets on the table where we can make our selections. As many times as I’ve been to Broil-Haus, I’ve never been in this room before. It’s quite the sight.

  “Michaela will be serving you guys tonight, okay?” the hostess says.

  “Alright, sounds good,” I reply. The hostess smiles and leaves the room. “So what do you think of this place so far?” I ask Therese.

  Therese looks around with admiration. “A little stuffy for my taste, but it’s a gorgeous restaurant.”

  “Stuffy? It just takes some getting used to. Believe me, the more you eat at places like this, the less uppity it’ll seem.”

  We laugh as our waitress, Michaela, comes to greet us.

  “Hi guys! I’m Michaela, and I’ll be taking care of you tonight. Can I get you any drinks to start off with?”

  I look at Therese. “You drink wine, Therese?” She nod
s. I turn back to Michaela. “Bring a bottle of merlot, please. Chilled.”

  “Sure thing. I’ll be right back.”

  She leaves and Therese scrolls through her digital menu.

  “What do you recommend, Jenson?”

  “Hmm. That’s a great question. I personally love the garlic butter scallops and pan-seared salmon with asparagus. Their broiled swordfish is excellent, too. You aren’t allergic to seafood, right?”

  “I’m not,” she says, still looking over her options. “I think I wanna dabble in poultry tonight, though.”

  “Then chicken cacciatore is what you want,” I suggest. “The best chicken dish they’ve got hands down.”

  Therese nods with consideration. “Helpful hint,” she says.

  Michaela returns to the table with a bucket of ice, wine, and two glasses. She pops open the bottle and pours the both of us a generous helping.

  “Have you guys decided on anything?” she asks.

  “I think we need a few more minutes to figure it out,” I tell her.

  “Alright, not a problem. Well, if you need anything, don’t hesitate to push that red button in the corner of your screen.” She points to the ‘help’ button on my tablet.

  “Gotcha. Will do, thanks.” I take a sip of merlot.

  Michaela smiles at us and before she leaves, she says, “By the way, happy Valentine’s Day. You two make a lovely couple.”

  I nearly choke on my wine. Therese snickers at me.

  “But we’re not—

  “This isn’t a date—

  “Did you just assume that we—

  I could get none of those responses out because they were blocked by the merlot causing a traffic jam in my throat. Michaela left before I could even say anything anyway.

  “You okay over there?” Therese asks, clearly amused by my suffering.

  My eyes are watering like crazy. I wipe them clean with my napkin. “I just didn’t expect her to say that we’re a couple.”