Lost in Flight

by Neeny Boucher

  “What happened last night, Dina? Gabby said you screamed the house down - about a cat.” Riley was trying not to laugh because the thought of Christina or anyone being scared of a cat was ridiculous.

  She looked nervously from side to side. “I’ll tell you, but no one else. Promise you won’t say anything and you’re not to laugh. Promise?”

  He pressed his lips together. “Okay. Promise.”

  “I-I-um was molested last night by Mrs. Gustafson’s cat,” she said.

  Riley broke his promise. He looked at her to see if she was joking and she wasn’t. She was staring at him in all sincerity with big horrified eyes. He blinked twice and put his fist to his mouth to stop laughing, but failed. “YOU WHAT?” Riley shouted and burst out laughing.

  “Shut up,” she hissed. “It’s true. That-disgusting–thing and you promised not to laugh and don’t tell anyone.”

  “Yeah, I’m sorry about that Dina, but it was completely unexpected. I’ve never heard of rape-y cats before,” he guffawed.

  “Well, it’s true,” she spluttered, “that thing got on me last night and-and bit my boobs.”

  Riley stared at her and shook his head. It wasn’t funny now. “Oh, really? No way. I’m going to have words with that thing.” Holding her boobs in his hands, Riley said, “These are mine.”

  “Are not,” laughed Christina, “they’re mine.”

  “Uh-uh,” Riley grinned, “we’ll have to share.”

  Riley woke up disoriented until he saw Christina lying beside him. He checked the time and groaned. It was 2 o’clock in the afternoon and they’d spent nearly the whole day in bed, with Christina’s family in residence. He’d always been a damn the consequences person, but he was hungry and he was going to have to face the music.

  He left Christina and got dressed as quietly as he could, then made his way to the upstairs bathroom. On exit, he bumped into Johnny, who folded his arms and scowled. “I don’t care which one of you it is, but someone is buying me a new bed.”

  “Okay, but we’ll have to buy Gabby a new one too then,” said Riley with a grin.

  Johnny’s face fell and he put his hands up. “No more. I don’t want to know anymore.” Pointing to his old room, Johnny growled, “Sister, remember?” Johnny left grumbling and headed for the shower.

  Christina was just waking up when Riley entered the room. “You hungry babe,” he said. “It’s 2 in the afternoon.”

  “What?” she said and sat up. “Holy shit, where did the day go?”

  He grinned and raised an eyebrow. “Come on, get up and we’ll go get something to eat.”

  She paused and looked at him. “Riley, you know I love you, right?”

  He froze and then nodded. She hadn’t told him she’d loved him in so long it was a shock. A good shock and even though he knew, hearing the words made it reality.

  Christina sighed. “I wanted to tell you that, so you know before I say what I’m about to say.” Ugh, Riley thought, he didn’t like the sound of that.

  She patted the bed and he lay down beside her, waiting for her to say what she was going to say. “Riley, is your tattoo about me? The one with the nightingale in the middle - the survivor’s club one?”

  He went still. She’d either put it together or Johnny had told her, but it didn’t matter. He was going to have to tell her the truth or walk away. Riley deliberated on his course of action and then opted for the truth. “Kind of, but mainly – yeah,” he said.

  “So, you think of me in the same way Johnny thinks about heroin?” Christina asked.

  Riley looked at her. “Dina, I’m happy to have this conversation, but not without coffee and something to eat. Why don’t you go have a shower? I’ll get us some coffee and food, and then we’ll do this.” She stared back at him and nodded.

  He went downstairs and walked into a room full of people who all pretty much knew that he’d spent the day in bed with Christina.

  “Good morning,” said Gabby with a smirk, “or should I say good afternoon?”

  Riley ignored her and then Jack said, “Riley, where did you come from?” The room went silent, Tessa stared at Jack, and Gabby snickered. Even Andy James had his head down smirking, staring intently at the computer.

  It was a strange thing watching the realization dawn on Jack’s face. Jack’s mouth fell open in a perfect O before he turned his face away. Andy and LiLi gave Riley sympathetic looks, but Jack wouldn’t make eye contact with him.

  Clearing his throat, Riley asked, “Can I get some coffee and food? Dina’s a bit hungry.”

  “I bet she is,” giggled Gabby and Jack’s face turned dark like thunder.

  Tessa got up and saved him. “There’s a fresh pot on Riley. Here let me help you.”

  She gave him two cups and piled some food on a tray. Giving him a kind smile, Tessa squeezed his arm and he got the hell out of there back to Christina. Christina was still in the shower, so he sat drinking his coffee and waiting for her. He wasn’t welcoming this conversation, but they needed to get some things out in the open.

  Christina came in and she was in her robe. She drank her coffee and started eating without saying a word to him, waiting for him to answer her questions. Riley took a deep breath. “I got that tattoo about three months after we divorced. I was… not in a good headspace. It was more about my survival than anything to do with you.”

  “Johnny has the dragonfly and Jed has the tree of life. We put things in that meant something to us. Jed’s is about balance. He lost everything when his life got out of balance. Johnny? Well you know. Heroin is his weakness. He put it on there to remind him what was important, so he would keep away.”

  Riley briefly made eye contact with Christina and looked away. Her eyes had gone huge and she looked vulnerable. “I know this might hurt you, Dina, but you want the truth. I put the nightingale in mine because I pretended you were dead.”

  He heard her indrawn breath and he closed his eyes. “It’s how I got back on my feet. You see if you were dead, then I had to move on. It was better than the alternative: you being somewhere and never coming back.”

  Christina started to sob, but he refused to look at her. He wanted this out and off his chest. It was his story and he couldn’t change it, even if he wanted to. In hindsight, he didn’t want to. This was as much a part of him now as she was.

  “I put the nightingale in the middle to remind me of us and that you were gone. I did some things I’m not proud of, Dina, after we split. I slept with more women than I can remember to get over you. I kept away from women with dark eyes though,” he laughed, “but it didn’t really mean anything. I didn’t find the connection I wanted.”

  He went quiet for a bit, staring straight ahead. “Then, I met this woman called Bianca. We went out together for nearly two years. It was serious. I was thinking about marrying her. She wanted to marry me. She wanted kids – with me and I really want kids. She wanted the house, the picket fence – the whole nine yards and she was easy to be with. We hardly ever fought and she was a good person. For a long time, I thought I loved her.”

  “Then Gabby happened,” Riley said, “and Johnny called you.”

  Riley shook his head. “It really fucked with my head. I went to Seattle with Johnny and waited with him at the hospital. I left before you arrived, but I wanted to see you – just to see if – you know I could put the past behind me.”

  “I waited downstairs and I saw you get out of the cab. You looked so shattered; I wanted to hold you in my arms. I knew then – even if we were over, I couldn’t marry Bianca. She deserved better than a guy who couldn’t love her completely because he had unfinished business with someone else.”

  “So, I broke up with her,” Riley winced at the memory. “She – was heartbroken and I couldn’t even give her a real reason why. I wouldn’t even admit it to myself, but you own me Christina, heart, body, and soul.”

  Riley rubbed his hands through his hair and stared at the wall. “I never planned on anything with you,
Dina. I was just going to avoid you or I’d have probably got drunk and come over to start a fight with you.” He laughed and so did Christina.

  “But then you beat me to it. You busted in on me and then I followed you back here. I just wanted to talk to you, but that, agh, didn’t happen.” Riley made eye contact briefly with Christina and looked away. “I hid your handbag so I had an excuse to come see you. You know, it was a pretty weird night. You passed out on me, Dina.”

  ‘What?” she gasped and he grinned.

  “Then we fought and I went to Seattle to get some distance, but you ended up there too.” He turned to stare at Christina. Her eyes were red from crying and he smiled at her. “It was hearing you sing and the planes, babe. After all that time, it was like you were back. You were you and I knew I was gone.”

  He held her hands. “Look at me, Dina” and when she raised her eyes to his, he said, “I love you. You are the love of my life. You know that and always will be, but…”

  “That’s never been our problem,” she whispered.

  He shook his head and smiled sadly. “No, babe. It’s never been our problem.”

  Wagging her finger between them, Christina asked, “So, what are we doing, Riley? You and me – what is this?”

  He shrugged. “I’ve talked enough. You tell me.”

  ********************

  Christina

  Christina felt like someone had squeezed her heart and made her raw. Listening to Riley tell his story made her feel sick and guilty. His choice of tattoo was the least of her concerns now and she wanted to give him comfort that whatever he did to survive was okay by her.

  “I did something similar, Riley. About you and me,” she said. He was staring intensely at her, so she looked down at her hands.

  “I pretended you didn’t exist as well. If you didn’t exist and I could avoid you, then it didn’t hurt to think about you. I regretted what I did almost the moment I did it. I still can’t think about it without dying a little inside. There were so many times I wanted to beg you to forgive me, so I could try to forgive myself, but I was too scared.”

  She looked up at him and he had the half-smile on his face that she loved. “After the divorce debacle – I couldn’t face you. I thought we’d said every horrible thing we could ever say to one another and that was it. You know – you’ve always been braver than me about your feelings. The only person I ever really talked about my feelings to,” she tapped her finger on his chest, “was you.”

  “It’s not that I didn’t care or feel. It was because it hurt too much and I’d have to own what I did. And I was wrong. You were right, Riley, about all of it and I was wrong,” she said and her voice broke.

  Christina smiled wanly at him. “I don’t have the sort of emotional courage that you do. You’ve always been so much braver and sure of what you want. I’m not like that and I just didn’t think about it. Worse – I blamed you. If I stayed angry at you then I didn’t have to analyze my own actions.”

  She sighed. “When I found out you were here in Shanwick… I knew. I always knew if we were ever in the same place, I couldn’t help myself. I had to see you. I wanted to be with you – even for a night. And I had to get horribly drunk to get the guts to do it.” He laughed and so did she.

  “Bonnie was so mad with me,” she said, making Riley laugh harder. “Aagh, but I didn’t care. I started walking – running actually – from the nightclub to your house.” Riley laughed so hard his shoulders were shaking and he was clutching his stomach. “Oh, it gets worse. Mandy and Bonnie chased me with bikers, and tackled me.”

  “Stop it,” he wheezed, “stop it.”

  Christina grinned and giggled. “I kicked one of the bikers in the leg and he sat on me until Bonnie, and Mandy could get me in the car.”

  “That explains it,” Riley chuckled, “man, you were a sight. You were covered in grass and dirt. I thought you’d been wrestling with someone.”

  She laughed and pushed Riley back on the bed, snuggling into him with her arm around his waist. He folded her into his arms and she lay with her head on his chest listening to his heartbeat. “I didn’t think I deserved another chance with you.”

  Riley kissed the top of her hair. “Yes – you do. We both do. Neither of us have been angels in this, Dina.”

  “My life hasn’t been, um, as exciting as yours,” she said and felt him laugh. “I studied and worked. Then… I worked some more. I didn’t travel like we always said we would. I’ve left the country exactly three times, all arranged around work. I’m really good at my job though, but I didn’t have much time for anything else.”

  “I’ve run from all other relationships” and when she felt Riley freeze, she hugged him tighter. “If it didn’t work with you, it wasn’t going to work with anyone. It’s not that I didn’t want to get married again,” she said with a straight face, “I thought maybe Denzel Washington would turn up and then I held out for Channing Tatum, but funnily enough, that didn’t happen.”

  Riley laughed. “Oh you did, did you?” And then he tickled Christina until she had to go to the bathroom.

  When she came back he was sitting up on the bed with his back resting against the heard board and legs bent at the knees. It reminded her of all the times they’d done this when they were teenagers. They’d spent hours talking, listening to music, making out, and getting interrupted by her family.

  Not a lot had changed and yet everything had. They were adults now and how their relationship developed from here would be framed as grown-ups, not hot headed, insecure teenagers. Christina snuggled up to him and he rolled over, wrapping his arm around her waist.

  She smiled. There were some things that didn’t need explaining between them. They knew what the other one needed.

  Christina said to him, “I don’t know how this works, Riley, but my life is better with you in it than when you’re gone. You were right about that. I did some terrible things to you, but I thought if I didn’t leave at the time I was going to die. I didn’t die, but I didn’t live much either.”

  She felt Riley smile into her hair and he kissed the top of her head. She closed her eyes and breathed him in. “Dina, the tattoo, I’ve always viewed it as a source of strength and inspiration, not weakness.”

  Christina put her finger to his lips. “Um, I’m not a massive fan of tattoos or tongue piercings, but I did like your hair longer and when you used to wear it up. I loved your freckles. I used to count them. I guess I’ll have to get used to the changes and tracing the loops, and spirals of your artwork.”

  He rolled over and stared at her. “You did – did you? Well I might have to grow my hair longer, but the piercing stays.” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “It has other - benefits.”

  Christina laughed and then went red. Yes it did. The memories made her cover her face with her hands, but he said, “Uh-uh” and they wrestled, which turned into kissing. “I’ll move to D.C. if you want me to,” but she stopped him and shook her head.

  Riley’s eyebrows disappeared into his hair, but she smiled. “Compromise. I’ve got things I have to take care of back in D.C., but if you were prepared to do a long distance relationship until I’m done, I’ll move to Seattle to make this work. It’ll probably take me six months to get everything cleared away, but after that… if you want me to, I’ll come to Seattle.”

  “Works for me,” said Riley, “I’ve got some things I have to do as well, Dina. I’ve got projects to finish and one of them I’m late on. I go off grid for a few months over winter, but we can keep in touch and meet up.”

  Christina liked the sound of that. She laughed and then started crying, and then laughed again. Riley hugged her tighter. “Shhh, baby. It’s okay. Whatever happens? You know. Let’s do this. Let’s try. I’d regret it, if we didn’t.”

  “And if it doesn’t work out?” Christina whispered.

  “Then we’ll know,” he said, “but at least we’ll have tried.”

  Christina nodded and kissed him on the lips
. “I love Seattle, baby. I’ve enjoyed it there so much, even with all the drama that’s been going on, but I still hate it here,” she laughed. “I don’t mind visiting every now and again, but I couldn’t stay here for much longer. This place – it drives me crazy. I worry that if I had to stay here any longer it’d affect my mental health - permanently.”

  Riley sat up with a strange look on his face and changed the subject. “You hungry? I am. Let’s go get burgers. You get ready and I’ll meet you downstairs.”

  He exited the bedroom as fast as he could. Strange, thought Christina, but didn’t give it much thought. She threw on some jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, a sweater and jacket with some of Riley’s sexy knickers underneath.

  When she went downstairs, Gabby clapped and said, “Bout time.”

  “Shut up short-stuff,” quipped Christina with a grin.

  “Hey – I’m not short,” retorted Gabby, “I’m concentrated awesome.”

  Christina grabbed Riley’s hand and started dragging him to the front door. Her “We’re going for burgers” was met by “Hey, wait up. We’ll come too,” but Christina pretended she hadn’t heard them. As soon as they made it down the front steps, Riley and Christina ran.

  ********************

  Riley had brought his old, red pickup truck and when she saw it she stared at him with a huge smile on her face. He’d done it up and given it a new lease of life. She ran her hands down the side of it like it was an old friend: an old friend that had had a whole heap of plastic surgery.

  He grinned and winked at her. “Still not driving it, babe,” which made her pout.

  They arrived at the bar-grill, which was right beside the Bikers’ bar, the Hub & Spoke, and opposite the nightclub. It amused Christina because it was like her time in Shanwick had almost come full circle. She’d found her way back to Riley from this place – even though it had been a strange and torturous route.