“I did.” I wonder is she can feel my blush over the phone.
“Are you at least going to introduce him to me before you guys go off globetrotting?”
“That wasn’t the end of the conversation,” I say. “Right after that high note, Lucas remembered that he didn’t have a passport. I have to get mine renewed too. So it’s going to be at least a few weeks before we can even book the tickets.”
I can definitely hear the pout in Becca’s voice when she replies, “They never mention stuff like that in the movies. But you guys are still going, right?”
“That’s the plan. But until then, we’ve decided not to meet again.”
Another squeal, but this one inspired by a lioness guarding her pride. “What’s the point in that?”
“If we just start dating, it’s not going to feel as special when we go to Paris. Not like if we went on a whim like we were planning. Lucas wants to keep the excitement up.”
“It was his idea?”
“He was just thinking out loud, but the more we talked about it, the more both of us liked the idea.”
Becca must be shaking her head in disbelief because I can hear her hair swishing against the microphone. “Then that’s the proof right there. You two are made for each other. Equally crazy.”
Then Becca takes a U-turn, always ending up at how stupid we are. How it’s never going to work. How we might forget about each other or meet someone else in the meantime. I wait for her to finish before saying what I’ve been thinking ever since this afternoon when Lucas and I said goodbye. We had been holding hands all the way from the table back to our separate cars. After our fingers slipped away, we exchanged smiles and drove in opposite directions. “You’re right. It’s crazy and stupid. But it’s also crazy, stupid romantic, isn’t it?”
“If it’s not all a horrible fantasy. I’ll tell you what. If all of this works out, I’ll work this into my maid of honor speech for your wedding.” Then Becca’s teasing slides back into concern. “How are you handling it? I mean being away from him?”
How am I handling it? Unexpected would be my adjective of choice. Not only can I not stop thinking of Lucas, the two of us in Paris, the days spent acting out all of the tourist clichés, the nights spent exploring other landscapes, I am also reconsidering my most recent choice to continue my studies at the local state university. I did the sensible thing: two years of core courses at the community college with the intent to finish my degree at a real university. I decided on a major in business. With the job climate nowadays, it felt a sensible choice, plus I would one day have to take over the diner from dad. But what if I didn’t have to?
After sharing that strawberry cake with Lucas, talking about our dreams and then that crazy proposal to visit Paris together, I’m tossing in bed when I should be sleeping. Reconsidering decisions that are not yet set in stone. What do I really want in life? Right now I want my brain to calm down, but it’s buzzing with caffeine. That’s why I called Becca in the first place.
“Hello?” Becca says, dragging out the last vowel. “Earth to Joy. I asked how you were handling it, but it seems you’re too busy dreaming about lover boy to even answer your future maid of honor.”
When I peek out from behind the veil of my thoughts, I take on her joking manner in an attempt to keep from giving too much away. “You seem very sure about your status in my imaginary wedding.”
“Don’t pretend like I’m not the perfect choice. Your study buddies aren’t going to know the first thing about throwing a successful bachelorette party, because it’s not something you can learn from a book. Just give up this fight. You’re not going to win.”
My laugh dissolves into a yawn. “Fine, fine. But only because I’m too tired to make a list of the pros and cons. We can get to the floral arrangements soon. But for now I’ve got the first of five midterms tomorrow. Call you after I finish?”
“You’d better,” Becca says. “I need more details before we can start cyber stalking this guy.”
I don’t ask if she is serious before hanging up. Probably half and half if I had to guess. The digital-green numbers on my alarm clock remind me that I can sleep five hours, but only if I close my eyes now, stop thinking about how I should have asked Lucas if that book of poems I found at the diner was his. Stop imagining a future with this boy who professed his love for me before we even met. Eyes open or closed, it doesn’t hinder my imagination from throwing paint across my mind’s eye, creating murals of meals shared over a terrace in Paris, plane rides in which I can rest my head on Lucas’s shoulder, the bakery I could open if I would just release a little of my tension and allow my dreams to carry me off into possibilities of happiness. But the darkness is a perfect backdrop for such visions, so it is another two hours before I drift off into unconsciousness.
Chapter 7
Lucas
What the hell was I thinking?
The day after our date is gray and listless. My body is at Smith’s Landscaping, helping a customer load their pick-up with mulch, but my mind is back in that chapel, staring across the table at Joy, suggesting we not meet again until the day of our flight to Paris. It sounded so romantic at the time, but that was before finding out it can take up to eight weeks to get a passport processed. Then we will have to buy tickets, and it’s not like I have enough money to just go to the airport and get on the first plane to Paris. As impressive as that would feel with Joy by my side, if we are going to stay at even a three-star hotel, I’m going to have to find a good deal on the flight. Which means weeks of searching.
All in all, it’s going to be months before we can possibly go to Paris, and by then who’s to say if she meets some other guy or even forgets about me completely.
“Why did I agree to stop going to the diner?” I ask myself, simultaneously thinking that if I did leave my poetry book there that day we met that it’s long gone by now. Even if I did go back, I doubt there’s a lost and found box where my book would magically be sitting at the top. Not that I would spend any time looking for it when every cell in my body would be on high alert for Joy’s presence.
“What was that?” The customer asks me. I’ve finished loading his truck and am now inside the office, printing off the man’s receipt. I didn’t realize I was talking out loud.
“Nothing, sorry,” I mumble, but suddenly remember something. “If you need any plants for your project, we’re running a special all month. Buy two get the third free.”
“Thanks,” he says and then he’s out the door, the chime ringing as it closes, drawing me back to two days ago when I first met Joy. The diner has the same type of chime above the door. Now every time I hear the damn sound at work, I’m going to think of Joy’s jesting face as she asked her father what he thought about my declaration of love.
I check my phone out of habit. Six more hours until the end of shift. Not that I have any plans to look forward to besides picking up take-out and heading home to the sounds of Jake’s computer games. I flip over to my contacts. Joy is there, given top billing by the heart icon she typed into my phone when she input her information. We exchanged numbers with the express intent to only contact each other once we’ve obtained our passports. Until then, no calls, no texts, nothing.
After getting passports, we can coordinate buying plane tickets, but the truth is that I want to surprise her by purchasing the tickets for both of us. I know the logistics will be complicated, as I don’t even know her last name or when she has free time, but I figure if I’ve got the balls, I can ask her father those details. If he doesn’t strangle me then and there, I might actually be able to pull it off.
“Hey, Lucas!” the boss calls out, snapping me out of my daydream of how she might wrap her arms around my neck when I surprise her with the tickets. “You drink too much at one of your slam poetry competitions last night?”
Revealing to my boss that I spend my free time dabbling in poetry is one of my greatest regrets. Billy means well, and it’s not like I’m the only one get
ting ribbed. He can take it as well as he can serve it.
“Just tired from last night. Your wife is like a dead fish in bed. Makes me do all the work,” I say, accentuating this statement by dramatically rubbing at my lower back.
Billy’s barking laugh actually makes a customer who’s just walked through the door jump enough that her keys jangle in her pockets. “Now I know you’re lying. My wife might have fifty pounds on me, but these jazz yoga girls could learn something from her. You know, in bed the way she can—”
“Stop, please,” I stop him. His wife is lovely. Often brings her latest baking concoction into the office for the boys to share. I just ate the last slice of her banana bread. That said, she reminds me of my Nana, and I don’t want to be imagining her bending in all the wrong ways while riding on top of Billy. I shudder and say, “You win, you sick fuck.”
Billy places a hand to his heart. “Nothing but the truth from this humble man. And nothing but hard grit from you. This lady here needs two dozen azaleas. See if you can’t be her muscle, you sexy poet you.”
My Joyless days pass like this, spring winds and blossoms giving way to skin tanned a cappuccino color by days under the blistering sun. Then, one Thursday evening in May, after a day devoted to transplanting crepe myrtles from our nursery yard to a customer’s, my passport is finally waiting in the mailbox. I tear into the envelope before even going inside. Inside the first page is my stupid face looking back up, declaring that I am a US citizen ready to take on the world. My passport is ready, which means so am I to finally buy the tickets with all the savings I’ve accumulated. I’m imagining how I can surprise Joy with the news when I step inside the little bungalow that I rent with my brother, Jake, and immediately feel that something is very wrong.
My visions of standing atop the Eiffel Tower with Joy drip away as I take in the damage. For anyone else, it might be hard to see the problem beneath the piles of rubbish Jake has left behind while playing his games. He hasn’t done anything since dad’s death, but I vowed to take care of him until he properly grew up. But not only are the clothes he usually keeps draped over the backs of the now naked missing, but more telling, his computer is gone. Only a single piece of paper is in its place:
Met a girl online. Gone to Florida. Sorry but I needed cash.
No.
No, no, no. I keep repeating the same word again and again as I rush to my room and look in the back of my closet where I keep all of my savings. Most people keep it in a bank, but I’ll just spend it if it’s there. I started this habit when I was a kid keeping a shoebox of loose coins, and it has kept ever since. Until now, that is, because my box is absolutely empty. All of the money for Paris is gone. I had almost seven thousand dollars in there. And it’s gone.
Fury at Jake flares up. I am pounding to my truck, determined to drive all night to reach Florida to find him, no plan of how I will actually do this, when my phone vibrates. Thinking it might be Jake for some reason, I check immediately. It’s Joy:
I hope you haven’t forgotten our promise. Can you meet tomorrow night?
A cloud rolls over my mind, the rain drenching my flaming anger. How can I tell Joy I lost all of my money and can’t go? She’s going to think I wasn’t serious about it at all. Still, I send a message back, saying I’d love to meet her. She suggests the diner at four tomorrow afternoon and our date is set.
I don’t sleep that night, knowing this will probably be our last date.
Chapter 8
Joy
I get to the diner an hour before my date with Lucas. I’m wearing a new dress that Madame Anna bought me when she heard the good news. It’s a lovely green that matches my eyes, and the material hangs off me like silk. My shoes are simple black pumps that pair with my dangly fake pearl earrings, my hair up in a complicated bun that took forty-five minutes to make it stay in place, and more make-up than I usually wear to even a friend’s wedding, I feel far too overdressed to be sitting in this booth lined with cracked red leather.
My father knows what’s going on. There’s no point in keeping this a secret; he’s my biggest supporter in this decision. Still, his constant glances back at me from the kitchen are making me self-conscious.
It’s going to kill me if Lucas doesn’t understand. I didn’t decide this lightly, but it is going to affect any idea of a relationship we might possibly have. That’s why I’ve decided to give him tonight.
The chimes above the door jangle, and I almost don’t look up. It’s twenty minutes before our arranged time, and my neck is already feeling sore from darting up each time a customer comes through the door, but this time I notice the figure is frozen in the doorway, a breeze wafting in and around the diner from the open door. The wind swirls around a few loose strands of my hair, and the light from the setting sun actually illuminates me in a warm slice of light. Lucas is looking at me like he’s just seen run into his favorite celebrity.
“You are absolutely stunning,” he says and then looks down at himself. “I wish I had known—”
I stop him by reaching my hands across the table and taking both of his in mine. I run fingertips over the callouses I feel on his palm.
Our date at the chapel was sixty-seven days ago exactly. Sixty-seven days of waking up knowing I wouldn’t be able to hear his voice. Sixty-seven days of wondering whether my memory was painting Lucas in a fairer light than reality’s truth. Finally we are face to face again, and I am ecstatic that he is even more gorgeous than I dared remember. This time, he is clean-shaven and wearing a nice pair of jeans and a button-up shirt, but it’s wrinkled, which actually makes me adore him more, because he’s the rugged type who wouldn’t think to iron his shirt even if he were to be invited to the White House.
“I have to tell you something,” I say too urgently. If I don’t get this out now, my insides will melt with the anticipation of his reaction. That will be everything. I might lose him in just a few sentences. But if I don’t…
“You have no idea how much I missed you,” he says before I can get it out. “I know it’s probably stupid. I mean, we only met twice before, and one of those times was only for two minutes when I said I was going to marry you. But, you know, I don’t care how ridiculous this all is, I just can’t believe we are finally back together and—”
“I’m going to Paris next week,” I say, cutting him off. None of the words were complex. They weren’t arranged in any sort of puzzling manner that could make someone question the meaning behind them. The statement was as plain as saying ‘Good morning’, but they bring Lucas’s eyebrows together like he has just been confronted with the world’s most confounding riddle. He doesn’t respond immediately, and I know it’s because he’s rolling the words around, getting a feel for them.
“You’re going to Paris next week?” he repeats back, probably hoping the simple repetition will squeeze the connotation out of them.
“I’ve been thinking about it a lot. Ever since our date at the chapel, actually. You told me I should study baking if that was my dream. Remember how you told me to chase my dream?”
“You’re going to Paris next week? You’ve already bought your ticket?”
“My father helped me buy it, even though he’s worried about the riots in Paris that are on the news lately. Anyway, that was after Madame Anna committed to helping with my tuition. I’m going to the same school that she trained at. It’s really all thanks to you.” I wish my voice sounded more comforting. I know how hard this must be hitting Lucas. I can only imagine that he’s also been going to sleep every night dreaming of the day we meet at the airport and take off for Paris together. That was our crazy promise to each other. And though I haven’t regretted it for one moment, life has swayed me in a different direction that I just can’t back away from.
Lucas sucks his lips in, the same way I do when I stub my toe and prepare to unleash a string of expletives that would make my father ask me if I’m really a girl or a sailor in disguise. Then he lowers his head, burying his face in his forea
rms, which are folded on the table. He is only down there for two seconds before he pops back up. His face in contorted into a smile that isn’t fooling me. It’s a false thing hiding something. I can only hope that the source of his pain is the future thought of missing me when I’m in Paris, and not a regret for having wasted these past few months waiting for a girl who is about to run off across the Atlantic.
“I’m sorry,” I say and reach out my hands. He doesn’t pull away from my touch, but he doesn’t reciprocate either. “I know this isn’t what we talked about, but when Madame Anna started talking about how she could get me a place in the school right away, I just couldn’t—”
“I actually just got my passport in the mail yesterday,” he says in a monotonous voice.
“I got mine two weeks ago. I guess getting it renewed is faster than getting one for the first time.” I hate when I ramble this way, so I try to get back on track. “But that’s great news. We probably can’t get on the same flight, but you can get a ticket as soon as you can. I’m going to be staying with a host family. It’s the sort of set-up that they recommend for foreign students who don’t speak French well. It’s supposed to help you learn faster.” I’m rambling again. “But while you’re there we can stay together. I mean, if you still want to that is.”
Lucas doesn’t say anything. He is regretting it.
“To be honest, I was afraid of meeting you today,” Lucas says with a sound of relief in his voice. “Terrified, actually. Which is crazy, because just twenty-four hours ago I couldn’t wait to get together again. Then I came home last night to find that my brother had stolen my money.” His head is back in his arms, his face hidden, his voice muffled. “I came home last night, saw my passport in the mail, and then, when I got inside, my brother was gone, along with all of my savings. I kept all my cash in a shoebox like an idiot and he took it, all so he could run away to Florida to be with some girl he met online. I don’t know how I’m going to pay my rent this month, much less fly to Paris.”
A Sweet, Sexy Collection 1: 5 Insta-love, New Adult, Steamy Romance Novellas (Sweet, Sexy Shorts) Page 3