I watched until they were out of sight, wiping the tears off my face, and turning to walk back toward town. Toward the inn. Back to my room. I packed slowly, wrote painstaking notes about both the inn and Myra and Dane's nursery and spread them on my bed for Emily to find. Then I slowly walked downstairs and out the back door. I couldn't risk explanations. I couldn't handle any more goodbyes.
The drive hurt. Leaving Stars Landing felt like losing a vital part of myself. Like I would spend all my life missing it. But I had to go. There was nothing left for me there anymore.
Twenty-two
Cordelia
It was easier back in the city. In the way that I didn't feel like I was dying slowly. I let myself back into my office, turning on the light and finding it oddly unfamiliar. Everything was as I left it, the walls a crisp gray with large material idea boards lining them, pictures sticking out from the ribbon holders. My desk was a perfectly organized mess. The couch had my impossibly soft blanket folded on top. My little makeshift bed. There was still a tube of toothpaste sitting on the bathroom counter where I left it because my cleaning lady truly stuck to her guns about not moving anything to clean. She probably even mopped around the pair of heels I had left underneath my desk.
I spent an hour putting my things back where they belonged, getting it all in order, making it seem like I had never even left. Like I had never been to the little nowhere, nothing town of Stars Landing where I had left everything.
"It's not like you to quit," a voice said behind me and I squealed, turning with a hand to my chest where my heart was pounding hard.
There in my doorway was Elliott Michaels himself. He was my boss, James' older brother.
"Jesus," I said, taking a deep breath. "How did you even find out so fast?"
"I got a call from my brother," he said, moving into my space with the kind of confident ease that only successful men seem capable of. Like he owned the joint. Elliott Michaels was tall and lean in his expensive three-piece suit, his dark hair neat, his face perpetually unshaven, his blue eyes keen and unnerving. I always found him almost intolerably intimidating.
"So you came here?" I asked, my brows drawing together. This wasn't like him. He was the kind of man who summoned you, not came to see you. "Am I fired?" I asked, a sinking in my stomach. I had sort-of been planning on the traveling. It would help keep my mind occupied. He walked over to my desk, messing with the pens in my holder. "I didn't exactly quit you know," I defended myself. "I left all the plans. I had it all laid out for Emily and James. They really have no need for me to be there breathing down their necks. The job was technically done."
"I know," he said, turning away to look at my idea boards, his hands clasped behind his back, perfectly at ease while I was a ball of anxiety.
"Then you're here because..."
He turned back, a ghost of a smile toying with his lips. "My brother is worried about you. Apparently I owed it to him for landing the last job I sent him on to come and check on you. So," he said, sitting down in my chair like it was his own and watching me. "How are you doing, Cordelia?"
"I'm fine," I lied, rolling my eyes. "It was just time to get out of that town. I've never needed to stay somewhere that long before. I needed to handle business here."
It was a believable cover story. And it was one he could get behind as a businessman himself. He nodded and I knew I had him. "Well that's bullshit," he said, smiling at my discomfort. "But I respect your dedication to this lie of yours." He got up out of my chair and made his way toward the door. "I don't have another job for you to run away to for a while. I might have one in California in a few weeks though," he said and was gone.
California. Oh, the cruel cruel irony. Maybe I could run into more of Dane's pregnant one night stands. That would just be wonderful.
I sat down at my desk, turning on my computer and looking at the blinking message alert on my landline phone. Fifty-three new messages.
I could do it. I could sit there and listen to all those messages. I could take notes. I could make callbacks. I could check my email. I could type up replies. I could open my appointment book and pencil some new clients in. That was why I went back to the city- to let things get back to normal. For me, this was normal. I got up. I worked. I took short breaks for eating. And then I worked some more. Then just when I got into the swing of things, I was off on the road again. That was my life before Stars Landing. And that was going to have to be my life after Stars Landing. It would take time, but I could move on from there. I would stop thinking about the town. I would stop longing to pick up a phone and call the people who had been my friends for the past couple of months. I would try to stop missing Dane.
Maybe I would start dating. The thought felt like pouring alcohol on an open wound, but I needed the burn. The cleaning. If I didn't keep my cuts clean, they would never heal. I would never be able to move on. There were plenty of men out there. Men who would be better for me. Men who respected my drive. Men who accepted my insecurity and anxiety. Men who weren't slutty enough to have possible hoards of knocked up exes crawling out of the wood works just when I was getting settled in.
I looked down at my desk calendar, flipping the pages up to October. I put a big circle around the name of the month. I was going to start dating in October. Myra would be having her baby in October. Dane would become a father in October. So I needed to move the hell on in October.
The idea of dating sites and profile pictures and personality questions had me less than enthused at the idea of starting again, but it was the only way. It wasn't often in life that you just happened upon a good match in your every day life. I had been dating for longer than I cared to think about and only two of them were men I had met in the traditional fashion. A guy I dated in college who I met at the first and only frat party I ever went to. And then there was Dane. It just wasn't how things worked anymore.
September brought about California. I packed a suitcase of clothes. And a suitcase of books. Because I wasn't planning on leaving my hotel except for work. I didn't want to walk around, picturing Dane everywhere I went. Getting Stars Landing tattoos. Lounging on the beach. Hitting on women.
I was walking out of my impossible new client's office who thought it would be a great idea to paint the walls of her office a bright, eye aching hot pink color when I saw it. Plastered on a billboard- thirty feet in the air and twenty feet high: glorious, almost naked, underwear clad Dane Broderick.
I paused in the middle of the sidewalk, someone plowing into my shoulder as he stared down at his phone. You could make out the outline of his cock in the boxer briefs and I stifled a laugh, shaking my head. His penis was bigger than my entire body.
I ducked my head and hurried back to my hotel, cursing the universe and its blind cruelty until I fell into a fitful sleep. I dreamed of Dane, the real live flesh and blood Dane, standing in front of me and telling me he loved me, then actually shredding to pieces and floating away from me.
I woke up still crying in the morning and angry at myself for it. I was supposed to be feeling better. Wasn't that what the whole 'time heals all wounds' line meant? What stupid, sentimental, optimistic bullshit that was. Time healed nothing. Time was a fluid, man made construct. It didn't exist. So it couldn't fix anything. I was starting to wonder if there was even a way to fix a broken heart. Or that, if maybe, that was just a lie we told ourselves so we could have a life again. I don't think I have ever met someone who, when asked about their past relationships, didn't speak of one particular person with the sweetest sadness in their eyes. Maybe we all walk around our daily lives with someone's name sewn into our very stitches, the perfect seam we run our fingers over in private moments when no one else could see, when we could slip into the familiarity, trying to ignore the frayed edges. Then we got up and pretended that the life we made after them was enough, that a part of us wasn't always wondering, that we weren't always a little bit less than we had been at one time, that any other name could put a
patch over that one special thread.
Maybe the trick of heartbreak was not finding someone you loved more. Because that wasn't possible. Maybe the trick was finding the person you could love second best. Maybe that was as good as it was going to get.
I suppressed the knowledge that it would never be enough because I really just had two options left: try to find love again, or start collecting cats.
And I'm deathly fucking allergic to cats.
On October first, I had a date. And one on the second. And the third. And fourth. And every day after. Thirty-one days and thirty-one dates. Each one had me getting closer and closer to buying an enormous bottle of antihistamines and taking a trip to the ASPCA.
There were women out there who loved dating. Who liked the getting-to-know-you stage. There were women who got excited for a first date. Who fretted over their hair. Who practiced coy smiles and flirtatious laughs in the mirror beforehand.
And then there were women like me. Women who dreaded first dates as much as the anticipation of a dental visit. I threw on one of my standard two little black dresses. I wore reasonable heels. I wore bright red lipstick so no one got any ideas about kissing me. I talked about what they wanted to talk about and feigned interest. I tried to make my life sound less pathetic than it was.
I tried.
But I hated every moment of it.
And it wasn't even their fault. Most of them were really decent guys. Fair options. Seventy- or more percent compatibility. There was even an architect who was genuinely interested in my work. He was good looking with his blond hair and dark brown eyes. He was funny and kind and educated. He was a great option. But I never returned his call for a second date.
It was safer to date different men every day. Safer from what, I wasn't exactly sure. Having feelings for someone again? Or realizing that no one was going to stack up? Something between the two? Who knew. All I did know was that I never got to the point where I was excited about someone.
Then November came, cool and lovely. Maybe it was the dying leaves, the changing seasons... but I stopped trying to force my life to change. And then one day, three days shy of Thanksgiving, I got a message on the dating site. It was warm and witty and showed an adequate enough grasp of the subject matter of my profile. His picture was flattering and attractive. He called me and left the cheesiest, silliest pick up line on my answering machine and I found myself smiling like a fool all alone in my office.
Maybe this date could be the change I needed. So I fretted over my outfit and I was careful with my makeup. I had a swirling in my stomach as I hopped in a cab to the restaurant.
He was out front when I got there, impeccable in his gray suit. His light brown hair was swept back from his kind face, his blue eyes bright and open. "So," I said, turning to him as the cab pulled away. "How many times has that pick-up line worked before?"
"Well its odds are increasing," he smiled, opening the door for me.
"Tapas, huh?" I asked, looking at the sign on the door.
"Yeah, I think it's Spanish for 'you're going to leave here hungry and go get pizza'."
"So why don't we?" I asked, turning back away from the hostess.
"What?" he asked, smiling at me.
"Why don't we go get pizza instead?"
"I was trying to impress you with my knowledge of cultural cuisine..." he said, drawing the words out sarcastically.
"I'm blown away," I laughed, pushing the door open and stepping into the street. "Now lets go get something greasy and completely devoid of nutritional value."
He nodded, falling into step with me, his hands in his pockets like a teenager the first time they put a suit on. "So, Cordelia..." he started.
"Yes?"
"On a scale of one to Eponine," he said, making my head snap toward him, "how deep in the friendzone are you going to put me?"
I laughed at his cleverness, a real genuine laugh."I wouldn't," I insisted, but his raised brow and smirk cut off my sentence. Because he was right. That was exactly what I was going to do. Because he reminded me a lot of Devon. An older, slightly less cynical version of Devon. "Alright... maybe a four," I admitted and he nodded. "Nice 'Les Mis' reference."
"I should have known," he said, shaking his head distastefully.
"Known what?"
He turned slightly toward me, his profile classic and amused. "You only want me for my brain."
I bumped my shoulder into his, smiling. "Eh, you're body isn't so bad either." And just like that... I started to move on. It wasn't hard or scary. It wasn't full of fear or what-ifs. It wasn't shrouded with ghosts of the past. It was new. And exciting. And different.
Adam walked me back to my office and I felt the swell of uncertainty at the idea of a first date kiss. But he smiled easily, winking at me. "See you around, Marius."
I laughed at his retreating form. "Stay away from the barricades, Eponine."
I was still smiling when I let myself into my office, squinting slightly at the bright light I was pretty sure I had turned off. I shrugged off the strange feeling, sitting down at my desk and smiling into space. I felt good. For the first time in a long time. Things were going to be okay.
"I don't know who he is," a voice said, coming in from my storage room. "But I bet he doesn't make you come like I do."
I looked up, the smile falling from my face.
Mother fucker.
Twenty-three
Dane
I thought things would feel different. When the apartment was finished. Or when we knew the sex. When we picked out a name. But I still felt like I was living someone else's life. I felt like it was some weird, vivid dream. I felt like I could maybe wake up at any moment and find things as they were supposed to be: me curled up with Cordy, me planning a life with Cordy.
But every week that passed, Myra got bigger. My apartment became a home. A home where I was sleeping on my own couch in my own living room. Because there was no way I could climb into bed with a woman other than Cordelia.
I looked for her everywhere. When I was in the market, when I was at work, when I visited James of Em at the inn. But I never so much as laid eyes on her. It was like she was in hiding. It was like she was trying to stay away from me. Not that I could blame her. All it took the last time was me seeing her on the street, endearingly barefoot and still half tanked, and I couldn't keep my hands off of her.
Then I did something I have never done before in my life: I made love to her. It was slow and gentle, full of knowledge and longing, full of the realization that I would probably never get to touch her again. I wanted to keep her there all night. I wanted her every way I could have her until the sun came up and wrecked our perfect little privacy.
But then Myra came looking for me. Because I was supposed to taking the garbage out.
The look on Cordelia's face had pierced me, had made me feel something I had never experienced before. Shame. Guilt. Regret. But not for what I did. For what my actions had done to her. They had put that horror on her face. Because she thought she was doing the unthinkable: fucking a man with a pregnant girl at home.
If Myra hadn't turned around the building the exact second after I got my zipper back up, I would have run after her. As I walked Myra home, I heard James and Devon and I knew someone would find her. They cared about her. They would take care of her like I wished I could. I sneaked back out after Myra finally went off to bed. I don't know why. Maybe I thought I would happen upon her. Maybe I thought the universe would throw me a bone.
But all I found was her shoes. I climbed up the trellis, waiting for the sound of her to fade into the bathroom, opened the window and placed her shoes on the sill. Then I moved to sit down next to the window, out of sight, just wanting to know she was okay.
She came out a while later, the open bathroom door pushing the smell of her soap through the room and out the window. She snatched the shoes and then she let out this sound. It was a sound that I would never forget. It was
a sound that I lay awake hearing on a repeat reel in my head. A track I couldn't pull the needle off of. It was the sound of pure, raw, primal pain. I had done that to her.
And I would never forgive myself for it.
Then afterward, she was just... missing. She stayed closed up in that inn like a prison. Or an asylum. The one place she thought she would be safe from seeing me. So I stayed away. I sneaked around the side door by Em's bedroom when I wanted to visit. I was out of her sight.
I swear to fucking god, a slight breeze could have blown me over when I saw her in my apartment. With Myra. In the nursery. In general, I really respected Myra's independent streak, but just this once... I really wished she had consulted me about the nursery instead of going out on her own and innocently approaching a grieving Cordy who would have felt too blindsided to refuse.
I don't know why I didn't tell Myra about Cordy. We had done a lot of talking since she moved in. We talked about our pasts, my family, her experiences in foster care. We learned each other's likes and dislikes. We got used to the others rhythms. She was surprisingly easy to talk to. I could have told her about Cordelia.
But I felt like it would force her to feel guilty for the dissolution of that relationship.
Which wasn't fair to her either. So I put on a brave face and I pretended all was right with the world as I crumbled to dust inside.
She had her walls back up as she stood there. Her shoulders were pulled back, her chin was up, but her eyes were pools of desperation. She was just waiting for her chance to escape.
And then she did. The raw panic in her eyes making me want to go after her, but Myra was gushing about how amazing Cordy was and I just stood there listening.
The Stars Landing Deviant Page 19