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by J. R. Rogue

  That was not the case tonight. Tonight my eyes fixated on the trashcan beyond the glass of the front windows of my shop. Sticking out of the trashcan, preventing it from closing, was a bouquet of roses. The red pulled me in.

  I walked out the front door of my shop as if pulled by an invisible rope tied tightly at my waist. I wasn’t sure my feet were moving, I imagined I was just floating horizontally across the floor.

  The sight of the flowers made me feel numb. The melancholy that was coursing through me all day washed away.

  I lost an employee earlier in the day. It was for the best but I still hated to see her go. I was cutting her hours all year and she finally had to seek other employment. It was best for both of us but it was another reminder of my failure, another puzzle piece in place showing me the map of my life that was riddled with wrong moves and disappointments.

  After her departure, I spent the better half of the afternoon in my office going over numbers. Looking at the bright side of it all. She would be making more money, and I could save the money I really couldn't afford to pay her.

  Now it was six p.m., closing time, and I was faced with some new disturbance.

  I was so fixated on the flowers stuck in the trashcan that I hadn’t noticed the person sitting on the bench in front of my shop. When I walked out the door, sights set on the roses, I saw him in my peripheral vision and I jumped at his presence, then calmed when I saw that it wasn't who I feared had left the flowers.

  Reese stood as I pulled my hand to my forehead and rubbed at my temples.

  “I'm sorry if I scared you,” he said, his arms crossing, his jaw twitching.

  “It’s okay,” I exhaled. “I'm just having a bad day.” I glanced fleetingly at the trashcan. And it looked like it's about to get worse. “I'm guessing you know who those are from?” The air around him was jagged, alive, raging. I was afraid to move, thinking I may cut myself on it.

  “Yeah. I do.”

  His voice was boiling, but I did not flinch. It was not directed at me; he never scared me. We both knew where the roses came from. I didn't know which one of us would say it.

  I crossed my arms in front of me, mirroring his stance, waiting for words to be said. I didn't know what I wanted to hear. I didn't know when I started to shake. It was so slight, so small a movement, but Reese saw it. I felt his anger kick up a notch at the sight of it, so I stilled myself. When he spoke again his voice was so low I swayed forward just a fraction of an inch, involuntarily. My body searching for the sound of his words.

  “I told him to stay away from you. I can't do anything about him staying away from here. He has business next door,” he cocked his head in the direction of the office next to my shop, “but I made it clear that he needs to stay away from you.”

  “Are you my protector now?” I asked. “I've handled myself fine for the last couple of years. He has left me alone, you know.” And he had. These men from my past were suddenly back in my life, with no warning, and they were pissing me off and sending things spinning. I had enough to deal with.

  “I know,” he stared at the ground, “so I can't help but wonder if he is coming around again because I'm back. I feel responsible, so I needed to make that clear to him.”

  I moved from my locked in stance and walked to the trashcan. I pulled the roses from the bin and searched for a tag. There was none, once again. Frustrated, I shoved them back into the can, making sure they went all the way in. I turned back to Reese as the slap of the flap closing echoed around the abandoned street.

  I took note of his appearance then. He had on a pair of worn denim, with rips and paint splatter marking them. His dark gray t-shirt was also covered in bits of paint splatter. Over his shoulder was a leather strap. I saw a sliver of leather peeking out from behind his back. The backpack he was sporting hung low and heavy on his back.

  “What are you carrying?” I asked, walking back to him.

  “Just some supplies,” he answered, vaguely. Before I could question him further, he started backing down the sidewalk. “I should get going. I just wanted to let you know what was going on.” His eyes darted to the trashcan again and back to me.

  He started to walk away from me then, and this was probably the moment where everything changed. If my life were a movie the score would have changed, it would have been subtle, but deliberate. If my life were a book, the reader may smile a knowing smile.

  I don’t know what I called out but Reese stopped. His eyes darted up to the window of my apartment and then down the street behind me. He shook his head and spoke. “Okay, just for a minute.”

  I walked back to the door of my shop, letting him in, inhaling his scent as he walked past me. He smelled the way he always did. Like citrus lotion and clean shampoo. This was bad. Bad, bad idea. But I couldn’t stop now.

  We walked in silence through my shop, to the back, to the stairs, and then up them. My apartment was too dark, too quiet, too small for us when we walked in. I felt the walls pushing in on me. I walked into the kitchen and started pulling glasses from the cupboard while Reese walked around, looking at my belongings as though they were foreign to him.

  When a voice in my head once again asked what the hell I was doing, I reminded myself that I was grateful for Reese. Whether I wanted to admit it or not, the reappearance of my ex-husband in my life was most likely due to the fact that Reese had reappeared in our small town.

  He had been back for a while but no one knew, and now that word was getting around, Charles was coming back around. There was an unsettled score between them, and the thought of it all coming to head frightened me in a way I hadn’t been in touch with in a while.

  I put on a pot of coffee and looked for Reese in my home. I found him at the front windows, looking down at the street, his thumb and index finder absentmindedly rubbing a bit of the curtain back and forth between them.

  He jumped a little when I spoke and I couldn’t help but smile. He smiled in return and asked me to repeat myself.

  “Who stole your smile while you were away?” I asked.

  “What do you mean?” His brow furrowed, and he stepped away from the window.

  I walked to the front of the room, taking a seat on one of the stools by the window. “You’re not the same, you know?”

  “I should hope not.”

  He bit. I didn’t flinch. The bite was not for me. It was aimed internally. For every bit more beautiful he was in front of me now, he was that much more melancholy. It was a word that he was never meant to wear. I mused that I brought it out of him, and that made me sad, too.

  “I’m sorry,” he rushed. “It’s been a long day.”

  “I want you to know something, Reese,” my voice caught on his name. “I’m grateful for the way you talk to him. You talk to him in a way I wish I could. You talk to him the way he is, for what he is. I avoid him. I don’t stand up to him.”

  “You have every right to be afraid of him,” Reese challenged. “Don’t for a second think that avoiding him makes you weak.”

  “I know,” I said, raising the palm of my hand into the air. “It’s just, so few know about…about what happened. And I hate to say it, but I almost feel some sort of comfort now, knowing you are nearby.”

  “I’m always close by,” he said.

  And it was true. He worked next door. He lived a few blocks away. He had band practice across the street. “You said I should stay away. Maybe you need to tell yourself that,” I joked. Okay you’re flirting, Kat, what is going on here?

  He laughed then, and it was like a glimpse of the past. I thought about his hands on me and his laugh on my throat and his bare skin pressed to mine.

  “Maybe you’re right,” he said, pulling me from the past.

  “I want us to be friends,” I stated, surprising myself.

  Reese walked over to the couch in the center of the open room. My living room, my kitchen, and my dining room all bled into one another. Our voices echoed around in the space. The windows were shut tightly, k
eeping the real world at bay.

  “What does that mean?” he asked, leaning back into the plush fabric of my couch. He stared at the ceiling and questioned me again. “We’ve never been friends, Kat. It would just be, weird if we were now. After everything.”

  “Do you know how often I go out?” I asked, ignoring him.

  “No,” he said, looking away from the ceiling, straight into my eyes.

  “Never,” I answered. “I’m working long hours now. And I want to say that’s the reason I never go out, but we both know that’s not it. It’s an excuse I would offer a stranger. I used to go out to lunch and dinner with Sera when she was here. I felt safe then. Even when she has no clue that I need comforting, she comforts me. It’s just in her presence. She is part of my past and my present and my future. She represents all of it. But she doesn’t live here anymore and my father doesn’t live here and I just don’t go out. I might see Charles if I do. Do I worry that he will hold me down in some restaurant and assault me? No. It’s not about that. It’s about the safe place I have built around myself that he breaks into. Just the sound of his name on another person’s lips does it to me.”

  I felt myself getting worked up. The skin of my neck was scorching, probably red. My voice was rising. Reese was just staring at me, letting me let go. I had been a caged animal for two years, and I saw my escape hatch sitting right in front of me.

  “I need to get out of the house. And if I’m with you, he won’t touch me. He won’t even look at me. Tell me I’m wrong.”

  The air around us was swollen with too many unspoken words. “You’re not wrong, Kat,” he said, defeated. He stood then, walking a slow circle around my coffee table. I watched him as he worked his jaw, clenched his fists. Eventually, he walked over to the backpack he had set on the floor. “We have a show at the lake soon. You should come. I’ll send you the Facebook event link.” He didn’t sound excited. He sounded a little sad.

  I felt the opposite. I felt a thrill at the thought of getting out of the house, of dressing up, of getting away. “Okay,” I smiled.

  He didn’t look at me when he said goodbye and let himself out.

  The house was quiet when I made my way to the kitchen, desperate for a glass of water or a hammer to the head to stop the throbbing. I didn’t drink too much but I did mix alcohol. I started with beer then switched to cocktails, and that was never a good idea. If I didn’t get more H20 into my system, the following morning would be hell. At the base of the stairs, I found the front door open, moonlight casting my shadow onto the steps next to me. I squinted my eyes, searching the porch, finding Kat seated at the top of the steps that stretched out to the lawn. I abandoned my search for water and walked out into the cool spring Ozark air. I knocked lightly on the doorframe to warn her of my presence as I walked out slowly.

  She turned quickly at the sound and smiled up at me. “Hey, you,” she said.

  “Well hello, beautiful,” I said.

  She blushed at the endearment, still somewhat shy around me despite what I had done to her on the ride home. I was too bold, but her body reacted so exquisitely to my touch. I had never been with an older woman, but I knew there were those out there who craved the feel of a younger man, someone to make them feel a little wrong, a little bit bad. If Kat wanted that, and the rose hue covering her body from head to toe told me she might, then I would gladly give it to her.

  I sat down next to her, taking note of the goose bumps covering her arms as I glanced at her briefly, before training my eyes on the front lawn and to the large pond reflecting the moon off her pale skin.

  The silence enveloped us for a few minutes. The tension was delicious. I wondered if she was cursing her heart, if it was beating erratically. I sounded cocky, I know, but the air was charged. I leaned back on my elbows, relaxing, hoping she would follow my lead. Her shoulders were hunched up and I was afraid she would jump up and run inside at any moment. When she didn’t move, I reached out and lightly touched her forearm. She jumped slightly and turned to me, as if she had been in a trance.

  “Kat, relax. I’m not going to bite you.” I laughed.

  She softened a little and smiled in return.

  “And no this isn’t the part where I say ‘unless you want me to.’”

  She smiled in earnest this time at my joke.

  When she didn’t say anything the words dropped out; I couldn’t help myself. “Unless you want me to.”

  She laughed loudly into the night air. “Oh, God, shut up.”

  I loved her laugh. She was so open tonight. The music, my touch, and the liquor transforming her.

  “You know I had to,” I said. “You’re coiled up, wound too tight. Let loose a little.”

  “Um, well, no. I let loose plenty earlier. I think that’s enough for one night.”

  “I disagree.”

  “Of course you do,” she joked.

  “You disagree, too.” I reached out and ran two fingers along her leg, letting her skirt fall back a few inches.

  “Stopppppp.”

  She drew the word out. I pulled my hand away but kept my eyes locked on her. “Make me. Come over here and shut me up, Kat.”

  She looked ahead again. Avoiding me.

  I gave up and rested my upper body fully onto the deck. I watched the porch fan swirling above me. I closed my eyes when she spoke again.

  “It’s been so long since I’ve been touched by anyone other than my ex-husband. It scares me. You spend so long with someone, and you think it’s forever, but then it’s not. You couldn’t be more wrong and you wonder what’s wrong with you. You wonder if you can ever trust your own judgment again. I picked the wrong person to spend my life with. I picked the wrong person to want to start a family with. I’m unsure of when I’ll be over the mourning. Tonight I didn’t think about it, I mean, until just now.”

  She paused so I opened my eyes to the sight of her head descending into her hands. Her delicate fingers parted her red locks, clasping one another at the nape of her neck.

  “I hoped to be free of it all for one night. I just wanted to stop thinking about it, about him, about the mess I made and the mistake I made.”

  “Marriage,” I groaned. “Kat, fuck marriage. It doesn’t mean anything these days. Don’t beat yourself up over it. If I thought every person who married the wrong man or woman, every person who got a divorce, if I thought all those people were idiots, I would be the idiot. We all make mistakes in love and in life.” I was a walking billboard for mistakes.

  “Is this the part where you tell me how you’ve used a lot of girls but you feel really bad about it and that deep down you’re a really nice guy?” She arched an amber eyebrow at me.

  “I’m not a nice guy, Kat.”

  She laughed, and I grinned.

  I pushed off the deck and leapt down the steps in front of us to the lawn. I pulled my hands up and locked my fingers behind my head, stretching my back, my aching limbs. I turned to see Kat watching my every move. “Stop staring at me you creep,” I joked. “It’s embarrassing.”

  “Oh my God, shut up! Do you say everything that pops into that head of yours?”

  “Yes.” No; she didn’t want to know what I was thinking right now.

  “You’re such a kid.”

  No, I’m not. The things I would like to do to you are very much adult content. “At heart, yes. The way we all should be. Carefree, bumblebee.”

  She ignored yet another nickname I was trying out on her. “I don’t know how to be that way anymore.”

  “Lie,” I challenged.

  “What?” she scoffed.

  “Kat, quit acting like earlier never happened.”

  “Tell me something nice. Not sexual, not funny, not an act, not a game.”

  “I think those men who post on social media, or brag at parties, that their wife or girlfriend saved them are idiots.”

  She stared at me full on. Dissecting my answer. The moment stretched on; disappointment drew her brow and forehead into a
series of livid lines.

  I spoke again just as she tried to look away. “I think I envy them. I think I want to be saved sometimes.” I admit that sounded cheesy as fuck, but it was true.

  “Saved from what?”

  “Myself.”

  “Why?” She scrunched up her face “You’re not self-destructive or dangerous. You’re just young, and you’ll figure it out.”

  “We can die slow deaths at our own hands. My father has it all figured out.” I swept my arms around at the universe, at the sky. “Law school. Beautiful wife. Burgeoning business. Well-known name in a small town. I wonder what he would do with time travel. If he would change anything.”

  “I think most of us would.” She looked down from my eyes to the ground.

  “Would you take back that car ride?” I wanted that dark look to go away.

  “I finally get you to talk about something serious and you go back to that.” She rolled her eyes dramatically and fell back onto the deck.

  I thought back to my sister’s words. She is going through a divorce. You are too young for her. She’s too mature for you. After hearing the conversation she had with Chace in the house earlier, I wondered if she just felt guilty about her attraction to my friend.

  Chace was seven years younger than her. The same age difference lies between Kat and I. She argued to Chace that it mattered, and Chace argued back that it didn’t. I agreed with him, not with my sister. Age didn’t matter one bit when you were on the same page, when you really wanted each other.

  “I think, Kat, if you spent some more time with me, you’d find that life doesn’t always have to be black and white. That the feelings we often feel are not wrong. We don’t have to lay them down on a table for dissection. We don’t have to make a chart and pull out the red pen. Society’s notions don’t have to paint us a certain way.” I sat down in front of her legs on the steps. I saw her hands covering her face.