“Mmm,” he replied, shifting his arms around me in a protective hold. “It would have been a lot easier on both of you if I’d fallen out of love with you.” I was shaking my head, but he kept talking. “I hoped I had, after all that time. I wanted to. I tried to. When you came back, I told myself to stay away. I was engaged to Paige.”
“It’s my fault,” I admitted. “I made sure you didn’t stay away.”
“No, Heather. I was the selfish one. I hurt both of you. I tried to love her more, tried to pour myself into our relationship. Trying almost killed me. My heart couldn’t do it. I couldn’t live a lie. Paige is an amazing girl, but she’s not you.”
His words spread warm fuzzies over my whole body. My verbal response was more practical. “Speaking of Paige, what about her?”
He sighed. Even though I was leaning on him, I felt the weight of his chest figuratively leaning on me. “She knew how I felt about you when her and I first started dating. She knew I’d been in love once. Not the details, only that it ended badly.
“After she saw us talking in the field that day, when you first came to see me, she asked about you. Can’t remember what I said, but it couldn’t have made her feel very good because all I could think about was you. When you and I talked in the field, all my feelings for you came rushing back; I couldn’t stop them. I couldn’t understand how, after two full years of grad school, a three-month internship in another state, and a solid relationship and engagement, you still affected me that way. It was like we’d never been apart.”
“Were we ever really apart?” I wondered.
Our hands tangled together.
“I couldn’t talk to her about it,” he confessed. “I didn’t know what to say. She kept asking questions about the girl in the field and I couldn’t answer. She ended up leaving angry and instead of going after her like I should have, I remember feeling relieved she was gone. I knew I was in trouble.
“But I was always in trouble when it came to you. Trouble is my new nickname for you.”
Not that I associated kissing with trouble, but Trouble arched her head up to let him know just what type of trouble she wanted from him at the moment. He obliged, leaning his head down and pressing my lips with a warm softness that made my eyes roll backward.
Then he said, “I used to think no one in the world could drive me crazier than you. There was no way I would find someone else that made me feel the way you did. When we were together all those years ago I felt complete. Even when you wore Creed’s ring and I thought there was something going on between you two, I didn’t care. I looked forward to our classes together, when I could see your smile again, or hear you say something completely silly, or watch the way your hands fidgeted when you were nervous. It used to drive me nuts trying to keep my hands away from yours. Still does.”
“Why fight it, then?”
“Does it look like I’m fighting it? I couldn’t when I wanted to. Just so you know, I’m not letting you leave me again. Ever.”
“Is that a promise?” I teased, knowing full well the answer to that question. Under the best circumstances, Nick didn’t make promises.
“Come here, Trouble,” he teased back, catching on fast. He turned my body into his. Before our lips met, he looked me dead in the eye, and said two words I thought I would never hear him say. “I promise.”
So Teacher Jerry, my conscience, my counselor, my guardian angel, whatever you want to call him, he was right, the broken ones who become whole, feel the most complete measure of joy.
*******
We were resting at the park, my head on Nick’s legs, his back leaning against a tree.
“I want to tell you something I’ve never told anyone,” he said.
“Okay?”
“It’s about the night of my motorcycle accident. I was in the hospital for only a night, and then I was released the next day. But it was a night I’ll never forget.
“It was a rocky several hours for my parents. I would wake up, ask a few questions, and then fall back to sleep. Then wake up a little while later, ask the same questions, then black out again. According to my mom, this went on all night.”
He was tracing circles on my shoulder….
“But that’s not the part I remember. I also talked to my dead brother. The only thing I remember about the conversation is that he told me to stop messing around with my life.”
“Really?” I put in.
“Maybe that’s why I was okay with you having an imaginary friend.”
“Nice,” I said, and he laughed.
We were both quiet for a while, pondering on the past, wondering how all of our experiences led us to this one, complete, culminating time in our lives.
“That was the reason I chose to come out here for school,” he continued. “Because of what he said to me. I can’t tell you how many times I doubted my decision, wondered if I’d made a mistake by coming out here for college. But now,” he released my hand and cupped my chin instead, angling me toward him so I could see his face, and the playful sparkle in his eyes, “I guess my decision wasn’t half bad.”
“I know what you mean,” I managed to say with a straight face, playing his little game. “I’m still doubting my choice of schools.”
His eyelid rose in a teasing question.
I answered by laughing, and then scooted my back up his legs, brought my arms around his head, and then leaned in for an upside down kiss. Somehow when we finished, I wasn’t upside down anymore, which probably meant we’d gotten too carried away for a park. Luckily, it was mostly vacant.
My head settled back on his stomach and I stared into that attractive face of his. “I’m glad you talked to your brother,” I said.
“Sometimes,” he went on, brushing back the hair falling in my face, “I think we’d be surprised if we knew what’s going on on the other side of the sky. And how often the border is crossed.”
“Do you think my mom and your brother are friends?”
“Friends?” He shared a little smile. “I wouldn’t go that far.”
I laughed at his words. Still, I imagined them talking about us. My mom would say what a perfect couple we made, and Nick’s brother would agree, telling my mom that his little brother would not only take perfect care of her daughter, but would make me extremely happy in the process.
“Okay, I have a question for you,” I told him.
He silently waited.
“When’s the last time you picked up a guitar?”
“The last time you saw me pick up a guitar.”
“Exactly what I thought. That’s going to change.”
“Is it, now?”
My nod rubbed against his chest. For me, lying in his arms was everything I’d ever wanted. I’d wondered the course his feelings had taken over the past few years.
“When did you decide, Nick?”
His fingers never left my face as he took his time to answer. “My heart was always yours, that had never changed. A better question is when did I realize. The day in the basketball gym. I was thinking about you before you even showed up. And then, there you were. And you told me you didn’t like me. I don’t know if you’ve ever said anything more adorable.
“I knew it would be wrong to break Paige’s heart, but I also knew I couldn’t lose you again.
“And frankly, you need me more than she does.” I smacked his chest; he didn’t flinch. Only turned my guilty hand up to hold it. “And I need you more than I need her. Is that what you want to hear?”
“Close enough.” I turned my head and got a flash of his lopsided grin.
“The question is,” he went on, “do you want to be with me forever?”
I turned toward the sky and rested in his lap. “You built a fireplace for me.” I grinned. “Do I have a choice?”
“No. That home has always been yours, from the moment I laid the first red brick on the hearth.”
He plucked a dandelion from the ground and placed it in front of me. What could I wish for?
I already felt as if Heaven was bending down and earth was rising. Wanting nothing more than for him to love me eternally, I blew.
He hugged me from behind and blew out the rest.
Epilogue
Nick and I were resting in front of our fireplace, our skin licked by the warm flames. I’d finally gotten him to clean and restring the old guitar I’d found at a garage sale last week, and he was playing around with it tonight while we waited for our company to arrive.
“Play something for me,” I petitioned.
“I’ll play, you sing?”
“I told your sister, Emily, that we’d sing for her next time we came to your parents’ to visit.” Just yesterday Emily and I talked about it over the phone. I looked forward to Emily’s weekly calls, which began last year when she sent me a peace offering in the form of a care package with some of my favorite candy inside. She was still the sweet, doting little sister, to Nick and I both now. “But it’s your turn to sing.”
He cleared his throat and strummed a few notes. Goosebumps already infested my arms, and he hadn’t even started yet. That voice of his…it was raspy and sexy and so rarely revealed itself. I could barely listen to it without falling sideways.
“I’ve been thinking, it’s time to go see your father again,” he said after the guitar was put away and we cuddled in the oversize loveseat in front of the fire.
“You think?”
“Why not? One of us should get along with their dad.” Nick and his father’s relationship was still strained at best. But there were moments when his father’s love for him, as well as his own love for his father, would show through. Those were the moments I liked to dwell on.
“No, I just, I was thinking the same thing the other day. Will you come?”
“Was planning on it.”
I’d invited my dad over for dinner a few times, but he’d never come. He was a good guy, and he’d opened up his life to me. I liked his wife, Meg. Nick and I had gone to lunch with them once. It had gone well. To a small extent, I was a part of his life now. I guess he just wasn’t ready to be a part of mine yet.
“I don’t want to push him. What if he doesn’t—”
“Stop biting on your lip,” Nick interjected. “Only I can do that.” His lips went over mine to soothe them. “You carried his name for twenty-two years. He does. And if he doesn’t, so what? You’re not Heather Robbins anymore. You’re mine now.”
As if to claim his goods, his leg pinned mine and his body trapped me into the loveseat. And then he began to demonstrate the wicked gestures he was referring to when he’d said, Only I can do that.
“Stop, they’ll be here any minute.” I went to push him off but then he started whispering naughty ideas in my ear. My arms went around him and pulled him closer as if they had a brain of their own. He chuckled against my mouth and shifted me comfortably below him.
“Knock, knock,” Creed yelled from the entryway.
“That’s them,” I quietly yelled at Nick.
“It’s okay. They’re family,” he teased.
“Nick!” I wailed in a whisper, squirming under his arms and finally standing up. “You’re not funny,” I whispered while trying to hide my smile from him. I quickly fixed my shirt and righted my skirt as I walked toward the entry.
He laughed once and then lifted off the couch. “Maybe I’m a little funny.”
I took Creed’s hand and led him into the kitchen while Nick welcomed Liz with a hug and a kiss to the cheek.
We walked straight to the stovetop so he could taste my mom’s chicken tortilla soup recipe that I was still trying to perfect. I was so close.
“This is the closest you’ve ever been,” Creed said after a spoonful.
“I know; I’m almost there. Maybe cooking the chicken in a different type of oil, like sunflower or coconut.”
“Yeah, something to make it a little sweeter.”
“Yep,” I agreed.
“When is Max coming?” Creed asked with another spoonful.
“His flight gets in at eleven. So he’ll be here around midnight.”
Creed smiled. “I can’t wait to see him.”
“From our phone conversations, I can tell he’s excited to see you, too.”
The tradition was dinner, cards, and then a movie, always in that order.
Creed and I were permanent card partners since Creed and Nick never won together, and Nick and I creamed everyone we went up against.
After dinner, the card game was Rook, with Michael Jackson playing in the background. Inevitably, Creed was singing along in a high falsetto voice, very loudly and entirely off key. “Billie Jean is now my fluffer…”
“Now my fluffer?” Liz laughed.
But Creed kept singing, continuing to slaughter the lyrics. “She’s just a girl who names that I love the sun. But the chain is not my nun.”
Liz spewed out laughter.
Creed smiled knowingly. “Those are the words.”
“The chain is not my nun?” she chuckled out.
Creed explained the lyrics to her. “The chain is not a nun. Nuns don’t have chains.”
“Oh my-lanta!” she bellowed in amusement. “You’re so far off!”
“How does it go then?” he challenged.
Liz sang out the words, in a tone not much better than Creed’s. “Billy Jean in not my lover. She’s just a girl who claims that I am the one. But the kid is not for fun.”
We were all laughing now.
“That’s not what he says,” Creed disagreed. “Listen to it. You can’t tell me that word is kid. It’s chain.”
I failed to tell them they were both wrong. I was staying out of this one, too curious to see who would win an argument where neither was right. This would be fun.
We sat in silence, listening to the music, waiting for the chorus to come.
Billy Jean is not my lover.
She’s just a girl who claims that I am the one.
But the—
“I told you!” Liz wailed right over the music.
“Chain! Chain! Ohhhh!” Creed yelled at the same time. He leaned over and wrestled her to the ground, knocking the cards right out of her hand. They wrestled and laughed and Liz screamed in delight. After getting her in light pin-hold, Creed said, “That’s it, you’re getting the suck monster.”
“No!” Liz wailed back, cracking up to the silent point. “Not…the…suck…monst…”
The day Creed came to me when they had their first fight and he thought it was the end of the world, was the day I knew Creed discovered a different type of love than the one we shared. He and Liz’s was the type of love he’d been searching for, a love built not by habit or circumstance, but by choice and pure enjoyment; the type of love they both deserved. My prediction was that they’d have a happy life together, and the idea tickled me to no end.
They wrestled on the floor some more, they were in their own world, and they had completely forgotten about their audience. They were adorable together. Creed was such a loving guy, and Liz was all fun and sincerity.
Nick smiled over at me and winked. My laughter decreased to a smile. I loved his subtle expressions, his secret looks, the unspoken interplay between us. I reached for his hand and he pulled me into him. We snuggled, listening to the next song, “Human Nature” as it began playing through the speakers, while Creed and Liz rolled around our floor.
Happiness was so happy.
“What movie do you guys want to watch?” Creed asked a little while later.
Several suggestions were thrown out.
“Heather?” Nick asked, knowing the decision would be made quickly if it was mine.
“I don’t care,” I surprised him by saying. “Whatever. As long as there’s a happy ending.”
Nick turned to me, his blue eyes filled with promise. “With you, always.”
About the Author
JESSICA ROBERTS grew up in the San Francisco, California Bay Area where she spent most of her time playing sports alongside h
er six siblings. She was crowned Miss Teen California her senior year of high school, and went on to Brigham Young University where she graduated in Human Development. Her love of family, church, writing, athletics, and singing and dancing keeps her life busy and fulfilled. She currently resides in Utah with her husband and three children.
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