“Tess.”
She looked up at him, her eyes searching his.
“I’m only going to be in the US for two more weeks.”
“I know.” She reached for his hand.
“Can we talk about when we can see each other again?”
“I can’t see you,” she blurted out. “I’ve got commitments in Miami and LA next week. Very important marketing people. Some actor wants to meet me, loved my book.”
Way to remind him of her priorities. What did he really expect? “I know. I’m not asking you to do anything.” He wasn’t disappointed. He was going to be tied up. He just wanted to know there would be time in the future.
“We’ll figure it out,” she reassured him. “Let’s just fulfill these obligations and figure it out.”
“Obligations?”
“Revete—my agent. She doesn’t know about us. For one, I’m not ready to tell her yet. I’ve committed to a year of extensive touring. My books are about single women living the single life, finding love—and this is happening way too fast.” Her phone rang right on cue. “Speaking of.” She held up her finger before swinging her legs and turning around to take the call.
“Yes, Revete, I know. I’ll be on time,” Tessa said.
Simon’s phone began to vibrate. He picked it up. It was Adrian.
Simon triggered the call. “It’s not an issue,” he said. “I’m taking the redeye. I’ll be back by 5 a.m. tomorrow.”
They faced each other while streaming in different conversations.
“What? Yes. I mean no! He doesn’t have to come and get me. I’ll meet him at the event!” Tessa ranted.
“Dude, it will be completed by then. I’m taking the weekend off. Goodbye.” Simon turned his phone off completely.
“No one is here, Revete! I decided to spend the day at Ocean Beach. Talk later, bye.”
Tessa put down her phone. “Now, where were we?” she cooed, taking his hand in hers.
“Obligations.”
“Yeah, those,” she joked, pointing to her phone. “Leave it to the phones to go off as we discuss this.”
Simon smiled weakly, wondering for a second whether he should even say anything to her. And then he decided that no matter how disaffected Tessa seemed to be, it should count for something. “I stopped seeing Max before I saw you in Vegas.”
His gaze fell to his hands. What did he want to accomplish by telling her this? They never discussed any of their personal lives outside of their time together. Even when he would call, it was always about him. Or her. Nothing of the outside world.
She blinked. “Max?”
“My girlfriend, remember?”
“Oh.” And then. “Whoa!” as she drew her hand back.
He sat, immobilized, his chest beginning to feel tight.
“Why did you have to do that?” she continued. “I’m not ready for that kind of responsibility.”
How dare she think that he would carry on a relationship when he was fucking someone on the side? Phone fucking, imaginary fucking, weekend fucking. He’d never done anything of that sort before this situation. At least he was honest about it. “I’m not a cheater,” he ended up saying.
“But you were when you started this,” she reminded him.
“Well, that’s why I ended it. She deserved more. She was wasting her time with me.”
“We’re just having fun,” she said and threw her hands in the air.
It was his turn to reach for her hand. It calmed them both down. They sat still facing each other, hands clasped and flat on the table.
“It had nothing to do with you,” he explained.
Of course, it did. In fact, he was hooked on the crash and burn of their meeting and their parting. Exhilarating and exhausting. At least to him. They were great together, but he wasn’t so sure about where he stood when they were apart. “Why are you getting all worked up about something that’s not even your issue?” he asked.
“It’s too much pressure on me, on us, Simon,” she responded. “I just know things never work out quite as you expect them to. I don’t want you to give up a good thing for this!”
She looked terrified, her eyes wide.
She stared at him and he stared right back.
“I didn’t feel for her. I did it for me.”
“Good!” She tilted her head back and exhaled loudly while bringing her hands to her face. “Because we live in different time zones. Your career is just taking off and so is mine. More importantly, we have something good here. Let’s not muddle it up for now, okay?”
“Now why would we do that?” he asked with a tinge of sarcasm. “Looks like you’re about to set some ground rules.”
“No ground rules. We’re adults,” she said, lowering her voice.
He felt unsure of what she was trying to say. Did she not want to continue to see him? Was she pushing him toward Max? What did she mean, exactly?
“How about this: Game of truth,” he said.
“What?”
He took her hand back and she began to rub her thumb on his wrist. It gave him tingles. “We should divulge one truth every time we see each other,” he said.
“Where’d that come from? One of your corporate team training sessions?” she teased.
He laughed. “Yeah, for sure.”
He circled the bench, then took a seat next to her and placed a hand on her thigh. He aimed for her nearness. And maybe a touch.
“Okay, want me to start?” she asked.
He nodded.
“I am really enjoying these times we have together, Simon.”
“But you hate next steps.”
She leaned into him before playfully swatting his shoulder. “Oh, come on. You’re so serious. Isn’t this where the fun is? Figuring each other out, determining what’s true and what’s not. And not worrying about next steps!”
“I guess,” he answered, disenchanted.
“I don’t have to know, Simon. I don’t have to know what you do when I’m not with you.”
“And I don’t have to know either,” he confirmed.
She nodded her head. “I promise I won’t ask. We both know what we’re doing, what we’re getting into.” She pressed her leg against his. “When it’s us, it’s us. No one else. We’ll keep our world safe.”
“Roger that,” he said, managing a smile. He liked their world. Their sacred space. And she was absolutely right. You never place all your eggs in one basket. For now, it gave him permission to help himself to what was right there in front of him. That morning, that afternoon. Those moments they had left together. Fun with a capital F.
#MeetMeHongKong
Tessa peered out excitedly as the Rolls Royce Phantom pulled into the driveway of the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong. Jetlagged and exhausted, with not a wink of sleep, she was just happy to finally be on the ground for a few days.
It’d been over two weeks since she’d last seen Simon. Her trips to Miami and LA had been fruitful but frazzled, with press tours and meetings and appearances over booked and hastily scheduled.
On the way from the airport, she savored the familiar sights she’d seen as a child. The narrow freeways, unlined and without any lanes, flanked on the outskirts of the city by makeshift homes, dilapidated buildings and hundreds of clotheslines with a rainbow of fabric swinging in the wind. The views contrasted as you moved in closer to mainland. Homes gave way to buildings and towers, large malls and beautiful greenery as far as the eye could see.
The check-in process was quick. In less than ten minutes, Tessa explored her suite, creating piles of clothing in different parts of the room and taking short breaks to sift through the books and magazines scattered around the living area. She took the time to admire the tastefully decorated surroundings; beige walls and furniture, streamlined and modern. An Asian inspired mural of cherry blossoms reminded her of the trips to Japan as a child. Chinese wooden screens engraved with gold dragons and warr
iors took her to another time and place, when heroes saved their heroines and gave up their lives for love.
Where was her hero?
Was he her hero?
The view of the Victoria Harbor was beautiful, old Chinese junk boats with colorful sails skittered across the dark blue ocean alongside yachts and speed boats. Skyscrapers rose out of the water and nestled themselves between the clouds.
It was hard to believe her entire stay was fully financed by her publisher. She was in Hong Kong to host a workshop on creative writing. All because of her first book. Her debut novel. The one she’d written and thought she would never publish. Three query letters and she had an agent. Two months of pitches and she had a publisher. Things had happened too quickly, and now she was on the road, enjoying the life of a world-class traveler.
It was times like these when she missed her parents. They would have been proud of her. Her father, a prominent doctor, had always encouraged her to do what she loved. No one would have been happier for her than him. She’d shared with him her love for poetry and song, made up stories about his patients as she sat in his office all day on weekends. He would listen, he would laugh and then he’d encourage her to sing them to her mother.
Once, when she was five, she’d taken a pick-up stick and punctured a hole in her older brother’s head. Her father had stitched him up right there on the kitchen table. She’d watched in awe as his deft fingers lightly pierced through Jacob’s skin, her mother gently holding her brother down as he clutched his sister’s hand.
They’d been a close-knit family. If there was one word she could use to describe her childhood, it would be peace. Her family had been normal. But the universe punishes complacency and security by turning your world upside down. One tragic accident and normal becomes two children with no parents. Was that why she kept running from normal these days?
As a diss to her past, she’d shed everything about herself and taken her life in an entirely different direction. She’d studied business instead of medicine, hoping to parlay what her parents had left them into more than just their legacy.
She failed in that sense. But she’d succeeded in everything else.
Jake had become her father. He had her father’s career and her father’s heart.
Hong Kong had been a vacation spot for their family. Shopping trips with her mother, conferences with her father. She hadn’t had a home for so long. This place brought back too much nostalgia. Even the car, something her father had obsessed about when he’d turned forty and was at the peak of his career.
Impulsively, she picked up her phone and dialed her brother. From her window, she could make out the layers of foam that formed on the tips of the waves crashing into the pier in front of her.
“Sis. You made it.” Jake’s voice never failed to soothe her.
“Yeah, it’s so beautiful here. I’m kind of sorry I discouraged Riley from coming along.”
“Well, it works out for me. We’re trying to catch a weekend concert at Ravinia. Talking Heads.”
“Eww. Poor Rye.” She laughed. “All that noise.”
She heard footsteps and people in the background.
“Right. Screaming with background music, as you say,” he teased.
“Where are you?”
“Making my rounds before calling it a day,” Jake answered. “On call all weekend. What are you doing over there? Taking some tours at all?”
“Playing it by ear,” she answered a little bit too quickly. “Adjusting to the time change, I guess.”
“Hmm. Okay. Well, be careful if you plan to tour on your own. Call when you’re back in town.”
“K.” Tessa stopped short of hanging up. “Jake?”
“Yup.”
More voices. She pictured him at the nurses’ desk, maybe writing down some notes. She could hear him flipping some papers.
“I’m sorry I put a hole in your head.”
Soaking in the luxurious sunken tub with music piping through the walled-in speakers, Tessa thought through her upcoming workshop. She’d meant to draft something during the long flight to Asia, but in between the meals and the movies, her mind had been a total blank.
What did she know about creative writing, anyway? She had a business degree, wrote superfluous words because they bombarded her brain, but she had no formal training, no other familiarity with the art other than this one book.
Her agent had told her to do what she did best—look good, live the life because she could, and channel her manic ways into riling up a discussion.
That, she agreed, she could do. She reached for her phone and began to type.
Creativity is not learned, it comes from within
Manifests in many ways, shapes and forms
Even the way you dress, the way you carry yourself is creativity, individuality
Don’t be afraid to think your thoughts, write them out
Darn it, she thought. Seriously? She was doomed.
She swiped left and pressed the WhatsApp icon.
A smile crossed her face. All those messages she’d saved, she’d gone through them many times before. Simon was back in England but hadn’t allowed a day to pass without a message, a Tweet, a picture. Most of them were pictures of scenery, beautiful locations, her favorite a cottage in the English countryside. She even decided to use those images to inspire her new book.
Yes, she was writing again. Funny how forgiving the drought becomes once the rainfall ensues. She had found her muse. Her main character was a man with a checkered past, hiding out in a small town in England. She hadn’t told Simon yet—you’re the bad guy in my new book.
They had a funny banter going.
“ET wants to call home.” He would say before following up with a phone call. And yes, they had now graduated into phone calls. Video calls, most of the time. Skype or Facetime.
“Elliot here,” she would respond.
It could be as quick as a, “Hi, what’s going on? What? No. And why is that?” to “I’m thinking of you, what’s new?” A word. A line. It didn’t matter, as long as they kept in touch.
She justified it to Riley as the best of both worlds. He wasn’t in her world, just passing through it, and it made her happy to know there was someone out there who didn’t want anything in return. Even bloggers were only paying attention to her now because of her fame. She knew this was life, but it still turned her off whenever loyalties came at a price.
No one knew how lonely her world was. Except maybe him.
The chime of the hotel bell caused her to sit up unexpectedly, the water in the tub swishing back and forth until it overflowed on to the floor.
“Shit,” she said. “They’ve got to stop with the A class service.”
Quickly, she grabbed the robe hanging over the towel rack, wiped her feet on the floor mat and ran toward the door.
“Hey,” Andrew said happily as he kissed her on the cheek.
“Andrew.”
She wasn’t surprised. She’d flown there with an army of people—she just hadn’t sat with them. And yet, she couldn’t hide her disdain about his appearance at her door. She made it obvious by peering outside of the room and glancing up and down the hallway to see if anyone else was there.
“Expecting someone else?” he asked.
“No, I—”
He stepped into the room and looked her over. Her bangs were clipped over her head, their ends dripping wet. “What?” she asked.
“How come you never modeled?”
His eyes looked rabid, hungry, tired, she didn’t know what. How was I ever attracted to that? “Not my cup of tea.”
Andrew walked to the couch and sat. “I figured since we have to look all lovey dovey at tomorrow’s function, we should do a little practice.”
She laughed out loud. “You lunatic. No.”
She began to walk past him, intent on finding a towel to dry her hair.
He looked around the room and sho
ok his head. “You need a maid, stat!”
Before she turned around, she saw him kneel to look through the pile of books on the floor. He picked up her Sudoku magazine and leafed through it.
“Shit, Tessa. You need to get a life. You’re in your head way too much. If you’re not reading, you’re reading about reading. Or playing games by yourself.”
When she returned, he grabbed the hem of her robe and pulled her toward him.
“Andrew! I said no.”
“You used to like practicing!” he laughed. “What’s changed?”
“Ha!”
With her luck, Simon would walk in right this minute. And then she was going to have lots of explaining to do. Even if they promised not to ask each other. If Simon was going to catch her with someone else, it would definitely not be with someone like Andrew.
“You’re turning into a hermit.”
“Not everything is about you.” She scoffed. “Or sex.”
“It used to be,” he said, planting himself on the couch next to her. She never had to worry about him. He had the attention span of a fruit fly. “Okay, beauty. Mind if we just hang out?”
“Okay, but just for a few minutes. I have somewhere to be in an hour,” she lied. She was afraid her excitement would give her away. She couldn’t sit still. She was ready to see the man she had missed for weeks.
Andrew ignored her last statement and reached over for one of the magazines on the round glass table. “Look at this. This was the shoot I told you about. In Milan.”
“Hmm.” She took a seat next to him, her legs folded under her lap, a towel now wrapped around her head. She gladly changed the subject. “You look better without the facial hair. And those pants, they look painful. I—”
Another chiming bell. This time, Andrew was on his feet before she could react. She heard the voice of the man she had been waiting for.
“Sorry, mate, I must have—” Simon looked past Andrew and saw her sitting on the couch. “Tessa.”
Eight Goodbyes Page 7