“Breathe, sweetie, or you’ll pass out.” I smiled condescendingly.
“You…you bitch!” she shrieked again.
“Original. Ten points for creativity.” I clapped three times to applaud her before casting a glance over my shoulder to check the elevator’s progress. It was stopped on the ninth floor – close, but no cigar.
“Baby! Come over here!” Cara called in a shrill tone. She crossed her arms over her chest and glared down at me. Though we were both wearing heels, our height difference was absurd – she towered a full foot taller than me, well over six feet.
When I heard the sound of a man’s approaching footsteps, I turned my back on her to face the elevators once more. I hadn’t seen his face except in profile yet, and I was pretty sure I didn’t want to. This way, I could pretend he’d grown a snaggletooth or maybe a really bad porn-stache in the years since I’d last seen him.
“What is it, Cara?” Sebastian asked, a note of frustration in his tone.
God, that voice. It was the same – a little huskier now, maybe. Deep and gravelly, but somehow soft at the same time. A rough caress, like melted chocolate over gravel. And, was it me, or did he sound just the teensiest bit exasperated by Cara?
It was probably me.
“This intern is a little bitch,” Cara nagged. “She spilled my salad and was rude to me. I want her fired.”
“Cara, cut the shit,” Sebastian said, his voice closer now. Only a few feet separated us. “I’m sure it was an accident.”
The elevator was on the thirteenth floor now. There was no escaping this unseen. Sighing resignedly, I braced myself for what was sure to be an utter catastrophe.
“Bitch! Don’t just ignore me! Tell me your name so I can call your supervisor and report you,” Cara sneered.
“Cara—” Sebastian began, clearly embarrassed by his girlfriend’s actions.
I spun around before he could finish speaking.
Our eyes locked immediately, and an involuntary gasp slipped from my lips as I took in his face. He was gorgeous – more stunning than any of the male models that frequently graced Luster’s pages – but he wore his beauty like a disguise to conceal the harshness that lay beneath.
One glance was enough to tell me – this was a man who lived with demons.
Time had lent both maturity and hardness to his features, and I knew that Sebastian the boy was long gone. In his place was a man – one who seemed electrically charged with a caged intensity, his harsh beauty both terrifying and enthralling. As a boy, he’d been full of charm, ease, and good humor; before me now, I saw a man who rarely laughed and who chose his words with care, a man with walls so high no one could scale them to see inside his heart or mind.
When we’d first met eight years ago, he’d been somewhat guarded – it had taken months for him to really open up to me. Yet I had a distinct feeling that this older Sebastian wasn’t only guarded, he was an impenetrable fortress of solitude and self-containment.
It made me instantly sad. I mourned for the boy who once was, and for the part I’d played in his destruction.
I watched as his gold-flecked irises widened in shock as he recognized me.
His gaze roamed my face, lingering on the smattering of freckles on my nose before sweeping down my body in an almost predatory manner. Once, he’d known every curve and imperfection of my body more intimately than anyone. His hands had touched every secret part of me, unraveled me, set me on fire, and brought me to my knees begging for release more times than I cared to count. I’m not sure what expressions crossed my face at that moment – probably nothing good — but his own feelings were concealed from my view. Besides the initial shock I’d seen in his eyes, I couldn’t read him at all.
The silence stretched for an uncomfortable amount of time. I could sense Cara in my peripherals, looking from me to Sebastian, but I couldn’t tear my eyes from him. I was drinking him in, yearning for a flicker of understanding or recognition to appear in those bottomless eyes. But, when they finally finished their perusal of my body and his gaze returned to my face, I was discouraged to find nothing but flinty anger and indifference in their depths.
I averted my eyes, unable to bear him looking at me like I was a stranger or, worse, someone whose very presence was abhorrent to him, and turned to stare at Cara. I cleared my throat and broke the silence.
“Lux,” I said in a shaky voice. “My name is Lux Kincaid.”
“Well, Lux,” she sneered. “You should pack up your desk cause you’re pretty much fucked once I call your boss. Right, baby?” she asked Sebastian.
I turned my eyes back to him fleetingly, wary of his response. His eyes hadn’t moved from me, and he didn’t answer Cara. He just stared at me with that intense, scrutinizing look, as though he were trying to see inside my mind. Vitali’s Chaconne played out its final aching notes from the overhead speakers, the violin echoing into silence as I stared back at him. When the final chord faded, to my absolute horror, I felt my eyes well up with tears.
I couldn’t be here, looking at him – at what I might’ve had. It hurt too damn much. I was about to make a run for the stairwell when I heard the blessed sound I’d been waiting for – the chime of the arriving elevator. Dashing the tears from my eyes, I spun around and stepped into the empty car. As I pressed the button that would take me down to the lobby, I was powerless to stop my eyes from wandering back to Sebastian.
Cara was hanging on his arm, pouting and whining about me, no doubt, but his hands hung limply by his sides and he made no move to comfort her. We stared at one other, two strangers bound eternally by a shared past of lies and broken promises, and I wanted to throw myself into his arms. I wanted to bawl like a baby and take it all back – all the distance and the hurt, the deception and shattered trust. I wanted to erase the past seven years and kiss him until he forgot how I’d destroyed us.
But I didn’t, and I never would.
Our gazes stayed locked, tears slipping silently down my cheeks, until the elevator doors slid closed and I collapsed back against the wall. I couldn’t seem to get enough air into my lungs, couldn’t quite bring the blurred elevator doors in front of my eyes into focus. Detachedly, I realized I was having a panic attack, but I was too overwhelmed to care much.
As the elevator began its descent away from Cara’s shrill voice and Sebastian’s inscrutable expression, my mind blanked of everything but one word, which I chanted internally like a deranged, hysterical mantra.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Chapter Six
Now
I walked, unseeing, the twelve blocks back to my neighborhood in Hell’s Kitchen.
Usually, I love where I live. It’s a funky blend of recent graduates yearning to stretch their wings beyond the clutches of academia, young overworked professionals fighting to make it in the dog-eat-dog New York job force, struggling actors who give up food so they can afford to live three blocks from the Theater District, and artists who work all day as waiters or baristas so they have a paycheck barely large enough to cover the cost of new canvases and oil paints. They fill the air with their youth and exuberance for life, and the neighborhood pulses with a vitality like nowhere else I’ve ever been. The atmosphere is frenetic with movement; people rushing down the avenues with their feet on auto-pilot and their eyes trained on their smartphones, jay-walking with an ease only a native New Yorker can master, with one hand clutching a latte and the other casually flipping off a beeping cabbie.
It’s the polar opposite of Georgia, where the only things more syrupy than the summer humidity are the sugar-coated southern manners that are laid on thicker than homemade vanilla cake frosting. The day I toured my apartment with the realtor I’d slammed into a stranger as I wandered down 46th, my tourist eyes tilted up to the sky to take in the soaring cityscape. I remember being filled with a nearly perverse sense of glee when the stranger simply glared at me and barreled by. In Jackson, such a collision would’ve turned into an
hour-long affair of apologies and small talk about the crop season, local weather patterns, and, of course, the latest gossip about whatever man had been spotted sneaking back into his own house at three in the morning with lipstick stains on his collar.
That Georgian out-for-a-Sunday-stroll pace I’d grown up with left me unprepared for the fast clip of the city, and I fear my first few weeks living here I’d wandered around like a lost little girl without her mommy — an image aided in no small part by my short stature and wide-eyed wonderment at the sheer scope of the Big Apple in all its glory. Still, for a southern girl cut adrift from her rural roots, I figured I’d done pretty well adjusting, considering the fact that after only a few short months of living in Midtown I could stiletto-sprint and cabbie-curse with the best of them.
And yeah, maybe twenty years ago it wasn’t safe to walk around my block alone at noon, let alone in the middle of the night. But now, the yuppie real estate agents who rent out space in the refurbished brick walkups describe my neighborhood as “up-and-coming” and its tree lined sidewalks and freshly paved streets are the home to some of the city’s best restaurants, boutiques, and coffee shops. Young couples push strollers alongside a diverse but mostly cheerful — by New York standards, meaning no one flips you off on-sight — populace of ballet dancers, artisan crafters, and harried first-year interns.
The first time I stepped foot here I knew it was the place for me and, since I work my ass off at a shitty job all day to afford the outrageous rent for my tiny studio, I try to enjoy the atmosphere as much as possible. On the daily twenty-minute walk from my apartment in Hell’s Kitchen to the Luster main office abutting Central Park on W 57th, I soak in all the sights and sounds of the bustling city. Maybe it’s the residual tourist left within me — or, more likely, the deeply-ingrained southern manners that even city living can’t quite wash out — but I know the street vendors by name, and I greet each of them as I pass.
Okay, fine, I’ll admit that the main reason I know their names is because occasionally I may or may not indulge myself at the food carts that litter the avenues… Can you really blame me when Salim makes the best chicken cheesesteak sub in the entire city? Perhaps even the entire world?
But today, as I wandered down the busy block toward my apartment I absorbed nothing — none of the bustling crowds, the delicious smells, or the crazed, camera-toting tourists hoping to score a table at one of the exclusive bistros on Restaurant Row. I was stuck in my own head, lost in thoughts of a past life that seemed, now, dream-like and distant.
Today, there was no jaunty wave for Salim as I meandered past.
No bashful, responding smile for the group of construction workers on their lunch breaks when they whistled and catcalled at my passing form.
No chitchat or laughter with the gaggle of women who sold fresh fruits and veggies at the small farmer’s market.
Nope. Today, it was straight to the liquor store: do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Who cared that it wasn’t yet two in the afternoon? Today I’d adopt my mother’s life motto.
It’s five o’clock somewhere.
After purchasing two family-sized bottles of Merlot, I wandered into Swagat, the small convenience store on West 44th that served as my one-stop-shop for snacks, gum, and the occasional pint of ice cream. Owned by the Patel family, Swagat was located just around the corner from my small apartment on 43rd and open almost 24/7, the counter manned most frequently by the ancient, taciturn family matriarch Mrs. Patel, who had to be approaching approximately three or four hundred years old if the myriad wrinkles lining her face were any true indication of age. With a shock of thick silver hair she kept pulled back tightly from her temples with a shiny tortoise-shell clip, a wiry frail frame that belied the spirit in her dark eyes, and cheeks wrinkled like an apple long past its harvest, she was now a mere shadow of the lovely woman she’d undoubtedly been in her youth.
Though her son and daughter-in-law owned the store, both worked second jobs during the day, leaving Mrs. Patel in charge until six each evening — just about the time I usually popped in on my walk home from work. Stationed in a once-plush but now somewhat time-weathered velvet maroon chair by the cash register, Mrs. Patel moved infrequently and conversed even more rarely. She was always dressed to the nines in gorgeous antique saris and vibrant silk dresses that looked handcrafted, the colorful gowns skillfully sewn with impossibly small stitches. The only chink in her elegant facade was a heavy brown crocheted throw blanket she swaddled herself in from the waist down, which warded against the chill from the large section of refrigerated beverages abutting the counter.
She was the grumpiest woman I’d ever come across in my twenty-five years on this earth, a fact I determined without ever hearing her speak a word. Mrs. Patel’s body language spoke loudly enough for her. From her constant refusal to make direct eye contact to the haughty lift of her chin, it was abundantly clear that the elderly curmudgeon hated working her post at the counter only slightly less than she hated communicating with her customers.
Namely, me.
Most often during our interactions, I’d hand her several bills as she bagged my groceries and hold a fully one-sided conversation with the old woman in hopes that, one day, she might respond. Last year, when I’d come in for the first time and experienced her taciturnity, I’d assumed it was due to a language barrier rather than outright dislike. But now I was almost positive she spoke English — mostly because she was always watching reruns of General Hospital and Days of Our Lives on the small television she kept tucked away behind the counter — leaving me with the inescapable conclusion that she simply hated me. Most often, our “conversations” felt more like a hostage negotiation between a hostile, uncompromising insurgent and a largely ineffective but stubbornly dogged young officer of the law. I couldn’t help but think I’d look fantastic in a badge — though those black orthopedic cop shoes were a definite deal breaker.
Take last weekend’s late night snack run, for example:
“Hey Mrs. Patel, how’s it going?” I’d said, approaching the counter.
Silently loading my bag — okay, you got me, two bags — of Cool Ranch Doritos and pint of Ben and Jerry’s Half Baked ice cream into a reusable cloth grocery sack, Mrs. Patel did not deign to return my greeting.
“It looks nice in here. Something’s different. Did you get a new display case for the gum? Oh, you have the green Tic-Tacs!?”
Shockingly, Mrs. Patel had no response other than to add my mints to the grocery sack.
“I like your sari today, Mrs. Patel. You look fantastic in turquoise. Where can I get one of those? Though turquoise isn’t really my color. Is that hand beaded?”
As I reached out a hand to touch the gorgeous small beads dangling from the embroidered trim of her sleeve, Mrs. Patel snatched her arm out of reach and growled — yes, growled — at me, before unleashing a menacing glare she’d perfected over the many centuries since her birth.
Okay, so she wasn’t thrilled with my existence. But hey! At least she’d acknowledged my existence that time. I was counting it as progress in our budding friendship.
Today, I was so wrapped up in my own mind that I didn’t even attempt a conversation. I bought three — yes, three — bags of Cool Ranch Doritos because this was a real emergency and, let’s face it, no one wants to face down a crisis without snacks on hand. Silently handing them to Mrs. Patel, I stared at the colorful array of lottery tickets hanging behind her head and tried not to think about Sebastian Motherfucking Covington or the facts that he was both dating a model and had the audacity to look like one himself. Seriously, karma was such a bitch.
Lost in my own thoughts, it took me a minute to realize that Mrs. Patel had stopped bagging my Doritos and was staring at me with a strange look on her face. Definitely not concern, but her weathered face showed, at the very least, a level of interest that I’d never seen in the year since I’d first come to Swagat. It took me a moment to register her expression as one of t
hinly-veiled confusion.
Wow, I really must’ve looked like shit if it was enough to catch Mrs. Patel’s eye.
I guess I probably did look a bit dazed — like Jamie had that time when we were fourteen and he’d accidentally shocked himself trying to fish a bagel out of the toaster oven with a fork. The prongs hit the metal and zap!
Instant brain fog.
Everything felt slightly removed, out of focus, as though I were watching my own life play out on a fuzzy dark projector screen while I sat in the audience eating popcorn with only a vague interest in what was happening to the heroine or where the plot-lines were going to twist next.
I met Mrs. Patel’s narrowed eyes and shrugged my shoulders at her before forcing my lips up into what I hoped could pass for smile.
From the way her face contorted in response, it wasn’t hard to guess that my lackluster grimace fell short of the mark. Her eyes flickered away from my face to study the exposed wine bottle tops peeking out from the paper bag I was clutching to my chest like a safety blanket, before returning to examine my features. A beat of silence passed between us before she opened her mouth and spoke. As in formed words, made conversation, actually communicated with me for the first time ever, which, I might add, left me dumbfounded and utterly unable to string together a coherent thought.
“Are you alright, Miss Lux?” she asked in perfect, if accented, English.
I started, shocked that she was — freaking finally — speaking to me after a year of resolute silence.
“I— uh, I’m…” I stammered, at a loss. “I’m fine.” I swallowed roughly, again fighting welling tears. You know those idiotic people who, when they’re upset and someone is even the tiniest bit nice to them, immediately burst into tears?
Say the Word Page 5