by Erica Lee
She shook her head. “No. I was just used to always walking to the door to get you when we would go on… I mean.. old habits die hard I guess.” A slight blush entered onto her face, but I wasn’t sure if it was from embarrassment or the cool breeze.
“Who said chivalry was dead?” I asked with a laugh, trying to lighten the mood. “Seriously though. I didn’t know people still had such good manners. I guess I’m just used to the city.”
“Welcome back to small town Pennsylvania,” Alexis remarked, the smile returning to her face.
Once we were in the car, Alexis stared over at me before starting to back out of my driveway.
“What’s wrong?” I asked. “Do I have something on my face?”
“No. I just never in a million years thought I would ever be looking over at you in the passenger seat of my car again.” She cleared her throat, then added, “By the way, my mom wanted me to invite you and your dad over to help decorate our Christmas tree tonight.”
“That sounds great,” I answered quickly. “But I have a question… our parents… they aren’t…”
Alexis cut in before I could finish my sentence. “Dating? Oh God no. That would just be way too strange for me to handle. No. They are just really good friends, almost like family. Your dad has kind of become like a father figure to me the past few years.”
That made one of us he was a father to. Alexis must have read the look in my eyes because her voice softened as she began to speak again. “He really has come a long way in the past few years Tay. I know you guys never had a great relationship, but I think you leaving for good was a big eye opener for him. Once he realized that you weren’t coming back and didn’t have much interest in keeping contact with him, he started making changes. He really does love you. I just don’t think he knew how to show it after your mom died.”
“I’d rather not talk about this right now,” I returned more harshly than planned.
Alexis quietly apologized and we didn’t say much the rest of the car ride, but I couldn’t get her words out of my head. Maybe I always had been too hard on my dad. I had always blamed our poor relationship on him since he was the father figure, but the truth was, I hadn’t tried very hard either.
I thought back on the past week spent at home. We didn’t talk much, but every afternoon we had sat in his office together as we both worked on our novels. Every so often we would both look up from our work and he would smile at me. It wasn’t much, but it was definitely a start.
Getting lost in my thoughts made the trip to the bar go by quickly, and before I knew it, we were pulling into the parking lot. We sat in a booth and ordered hot wings and a pitcher of beer to split.
“Ok,” Alexis said suddenly, making me jump. “It’s time to talk. I know you are going to say no since you like to sweep your feelings under the rug, but as you might remember, I never let you get away with that before and I don’t plan to start now. What happened with your fiancé?”
“EX fiancé,” I pointed out. “And you are right - I’d rather not talk about it.”
Alexis rolled her eyes at me. “Ok I realize the break up is fresh so you might not want to talk about it, but you can’t keep it all inside. So at least tell me about her. What is she like?”
I made a face at Alexis’s request. “This is weird. I don’t think I should be telling my ex about the girl that I almost married.”
Alexis shrugged loudly. “I should have known you wouldn’t make this easy. Ok. Just to prove that it’s not weird, I’m going to tell you about my ex. My other ex of course. You already know yourself pretty well.”
I thought it was a dumb idea, but still motioned for Alexis to go on. I had to admit that I was a bit curious to hear what her dating life had been like after me.
“Her name was Karen. We dated for two years and actually broke up right around this time two years ago. She lived about a half hour from me in Kennywood. She was nice - pretty quiet and super emotional, like she was one of those people who cries at sentimental commercials on tv and doesn’t try to hide it. She was also more of a homebody than me. She loved small town life and never had any plans of leaving Kennywood.”
“So, why did you break up?” My interest was now piqued.
“She was actually TOO much of a homebody for me. When I said she had no plans of leaving Kennywood, I wasn’t just talking about moving. It was a struggle to even get her to drive the half hour to my place. The final straw was when I bought tickets for us to see the Christmas show in New York and she refused. I might like my life around here, but I couldn’t deal with never getting out of the state.”
I wanted to make a snide remark about the irony of that and comment on how much her tastes had clearly changed, but I knew that would just make me a hypocrite.
Alexis raised both eyebrows at me. “Ok. Your turn.”
“Stacy. What can I say about her? She is one of a kind. She’s pretty bossy and loves to be in control. She comes from a lot of money and probably wouldn’t need to work a day in her life, but is signed with a modeling agency because she enjoys the finer things in life. She lived in the city her whole life. That’s about it.” I ended my description with a slight shrug.
Alexis gave me a confused look. “This is the girl you were going to marry. Don’t you have anything positive to say about her?”
I looked to the ceiling. “She is close with her family, so that was a positive. But not in the way you always were. They kind of seem like they all are just trying to get something from each other, but they spend time together and that’s more than I can say for my dad and I.”
“Ok,” Alexis said slowly, drawing out the word. “Still not super positive. So tell me. What first attracted you to her? What made you want to date her?”
I looked directly into Alexis’s eyes for the first time that day and watched the way the light caused the blue color to shimmer. “She wasn’t you,” I admitted. “I wanted to start over, so I clung to the one person who was so completely opposite of everything I ever knew. She seemed to represent the life I wanted.”
A look crossed onto Alexis’s face, but I couldn’t place whether it was sadness or confusion. “I have a question for you Tay and I really don’t want to offend you, but do you love her?”
I cleared my throat. “I enjoy the life we have together. Or I guess I should say I enjoyed it. It was exciting and adventurous. It was the kind of life I had hoped for in New York… I guess.”
Alexis made another face at me. “I didn’t ask if you loved your life together. I asked if you loved her.”
“I was going to marry her Lexi,” I said with a shrug.
Alexis gave me a slight smile in return, clearly deciding to drop the subject. I was happy about that because the truth was, I was purposely deflecting her question. I had actually thought about that exact question a lot over the past week. Once the initial shock wore off, I realized I was more sad about losing the life I thought I knew than losing Stacy. It actually felt kind of freeing to not be under her control for once. I felt like I could finally breathe and be myself. But did that mean I never actually loved her? Who did that? Who dated someone for five years and decided to spend their life with that person only to realize the feelings they thought they had might not actually be there? Apparently me. I was more of a mess than I ever could have imagined.
Chapter 9: Alexis
I dropped Taylor back off at her house after lunch and then spent the next few hours working at the farm before Taylor and her dad were due to come back. I kept running the conversation from lunch over and over again in my head. I found it strange that Taylor couldn’t say that she loved Stacy. I wasn’t judging her for it. I loved and cared about Karen, but it took us breaking up for me to realize that I had never actually been in love with her. There was only one person I had ever actually been in love with and I couldn’t help but wonder if the same was true for Taylor. I knew I shouldn’t be thinking that way though. Taylor was right. She was supposed to marry this girl. There had t
o be something there. Even if there wasn’t, what did it matter? Nothing was going to happen between us. It couldn’t.
Within a few hours, Taylor and her dad were arriving back at our house. To my surprise, Taylor had changed out of her jeans and sweatshirt from earlier and was now wearing a red sweater dress with Christmas trees on it. She was always more of a casual dresser when I knew her and I had almost forgotten how mouth watering she looked when she dressed up.
I opened and closed my mouth a few times trying to think of the right words to say. “Well, aren’t you festive?” were the words that I finally settled on. Real smooth Alexis.
Taylor smiled brightly at me and I realized it was the first time she looked sincerely happy since being back. “I had to dress up for the occasion. You know this is my favorite time of year.”
I did know that, along with how many creams and sugars she liked in her coffee, the way her face lit up when the first snowflakes of the season fell from the sky, and just about everything else about her. It was everything that I always wished I could forget, but now I was glad that I hadn’t.
While Mr. Bradley set up the tree and added the lights, us girls started unwrapping the ornaments. My mom and I had a rule that we only put ornaments that had sentimental value on the tree, so every piece I unwrapped brought back another memory.
After a few minutes of unpacking, Taylor’s voice spoke softly from across the room. “You still have this?”
I turned to find her standing, holding an ornament she had made me soon after we became friends that read Taylor + Alexis = BFF 2003.
I smiled as I moved closer to her. “Of course I kept it. It was the first gift you ever gave me.”
It looked like tears might come to Taylor’s eyes as she searched for the words to say. “Alexis...I…” She looked around and turned red when she remembered that we had an audience.
My mom hopped to her feet. “I think I’m going to go make us all some hot chocolate.”
As she walked out of the room, Mr. Bradley followed. “I think I should assist you with that.”
I all but ignored them as I reached out to touch the ornament that Taylor was holding, lightly brushing her hand in the process and sending my body into overdrive. “What were you going to say Tay?”
This time a few tears did make it to the surface of her eyes, but she quickly wiped them away. “It’s just… I’ve never had anyone in my life who would care enough to keep something like this. I can’t believe you do after all this time.”
I reached out and used my thumb to push away a tear she had missed. I could have sworn Taylor let out a gasp when my hand made contact with her cheek, but I tried not to think into it too much. Taylor and I stared at each other for a moment, until her eyes caught on to something behind me and lit up. I reluctantly turned around to see snow falling outside.
Before I could react, Taylor grabbed my hand and dragged me outside. She didn’t seem to mind the cold as she danced around in the few flakes that were falling. It was absolutely adorable and I couldn’t look away if I tried. The way Taylor could be so serious sometimes and then act like such a child at other times was one of the things I always loved about her. I was starting to realize it was one of the things I still loved about her. Oh no. I needed to find a way to keep these feelings under control. I had seen Taylor less than a handful of times this past week and was already falling hard.
Yet, when she looked at me and excitedly asked if we could go sledding the next day if the snow accumulated enough, I smiled and answered, “I would absolutely love that.”
——————————
When I awoke the next day, I looked outside to find that at least a half a foot of snow had accumulated over night. I got myself dressed and ready, then sent Taylor a text asking her to come over. We had a big hill behind the farm that was perfect for sledding and far enough from the main area that we would be secluded from the customers when they started to show up later that morning. Within a half hour, Taylor was at my door, bundled up from head to toe in snow gear.
“So bad news. I couldn’t find my sled,” she said with a half grin.
“No biggie,” I answered. “We can just take turns using mine.”
I let Taylor do the first ride and when she made her way back up the hill, the widest smile had spread across her face. “That was amazing! It’s been years since I’ve gone sledding!”
I lifted an eyebrow at her. “Don’t you get even more snow up in New York?”
“We do, but there aren’t a ton of places to just throw down a sled. Plus, Stacy refuses to go. She thinks that sledding is unsophisticated and something that only poor people do.”
I had a few choice words that I wanted to say about Stacy, but instead I grabbed the sled from Taylor and took my turn. We went back and forth like this for awhile, until Taylor gave me a mischievous grin after one of her trips down the hill.
“You know. We could get this thing going a lot faster if we rode together.”
“We could get it going much faster,” I agreed, my heart pounding at the thought of being pushed up against Taylor.
“So, what do you say?” She asked. “Shall we try? See if us two old ladies can still squeeze into one of these things?”
Before I could respond, she was pulling me down to sit between her legs in the sled. It felt way too good to be sitting like this - much better than it should. I allowed myself to lean back into Taylor so I could take in the moment even more. I was close enough to smell her perfume, which surprisingly hadn’t changed since we had known each other. It still had the power to completely intoxicate me.
Before I could become completely lost in the moment, Taylor began a countdown and then catapulted us down the hill. She was right. We were moving much faster than I had moved on my own. We were actually moving way too fast though, both literally and figuratively, and it looked like we were about to come to an abrupt stop courtesy of a tree. If that wasn’t a metaphor for my life, I’m not sure what was. I closed my eyes, bracing myself for impact, but at the last second, Taylor tried her best to turn the sled, causing it to flip both of us off. Much to my dismay and pleasure, Taylor landed right on top of me. We both immediately began to laugh, our bodies shaking in tandem. Once the laughter subdued, Taylor’s face became serious as she stared into my eyes and carefully pushed some of the snow from my face.
She kept her hand on my cheek and before I could fully grasp what was happening, her lips were moving closer, and soon they were on top of mine. The kiss was tentative at first, but when an unexpected moan left my mouth, Taylor took that opportunity to deepen the kiss. The warmth of her tongue as it grazed against mine was in such contrast to the cool air around us that it sent chills through my whole body. I wrapped my arms around her neck and tried to pull her even closer, relishing the feeling of her body on mine as our mouths moved together. Taylor’s hips started to grind into mine in response and I thought I might be sent over the edge, even though there were layers of clothes between us. When Taylor moaned into my mouth, I was brought back to the reality of the situation. My ex girlfriend and I were currently making out behind my house. Said ex girlfriend happened to have just been broken up with by her fiancé a week ago. To make matters worse, I honestly felt like if it went on any longer, I might actually peak which was equal parts embarrassing and completely inappropriate.
I pushed her off of me a little more forcefully than I had planned, causing her to faceplant into the snow. She quickly sat up and wiped the snow from her face, the coolness clearly bringing the reality of what had just happened into view. I saw her face go from one of surprise to one of mortification.
“Lexi…” she started, staring at me intently. She opened and closed her mouth many times, then placed her face in her gloves and groaned. When she looked back over at me, she took a hand and pushed a piece of hair behind my ear, causing my body to respond all over again.
I went to say something, but Taylor put one hand up and shook her head. “Listen. I�
�m really sorry. I’m sorry I just kind of attacked you like that. But I’m not sorry that I kissed you. I haven’t had a moment like that in over seven years and I wouldn’t take it back if I could. I just hope you’re not sorry that you kissed me back.”
Her words made me melt. “Of course I’m not sorry I kissed you back. I’ve been dreaming of a moment like that for years.” She smiled at me, but I sighed to show her that the but was coming. “But I still know that I shouldn’t have. It’s going to kill me. Tay, my world fell apart when you left me. You shattered my heart into a million different pieces.”
To my surprise, warm tears started running down my cheeks and when I looked into Taylor’s eyes, she was also crying. “You’re not the only one who was heartbroken Lexi. I came home that summer thinking you were going to be going back to New York with me. You were the one who chose not to.”
A bit of anger crept in on me as I thought about the days when I was forced to choose between my life at home or my life with Taylor. “I know I changed our plans, but it wasn’t my choice to never talk again. I never thought there would be a time when I didn’t have you in my life in some way or another, but you walked away and never looked back. You forgot about me as you made this new life for yourself in New York.”
“I could never forget about you,” Taylor choked out. “If I had kept talking to you, it would have killed me. Every minute I spent away from you those first two years at NYU were torture. The only thing that got me through was thinking about the next time I could hold you in my arms and kiss you. Once it was clear that things weren’t going to work out between us, I didn’t have that to cling on to anymore, so I threw myself into my new life. It was the only hope I had of getting away from that hold you had on my heart, but it never happened. Even after all of this time, you still have it.”
Her words were perfect, but they didn’t change the situation we were in. I hated to be the voice of reason, but someone had to be. “That’s really sweet Tay. But it doesn’t change the fact that just a week ago, you were engaged to get married this month. Plus, you are going back to New York. We will only hurt each other again if we let this happen.