This Is the Wonder

by Tracey Ward

  “Why are you talking to me like I failed a job application?”

  “Because I’m fairly certain you wanted a job.”

  He slips on his coat, grinning wickedly. “Well, I wouldn’t have said no.”

  “Get out.”

  He leaves, but when I go to shut my door he reaches out to stop me.

  “Hold on,” he says. “Just so we’re both clear, if it weren’t for the guy in uniform this would have happened, right? We’d be naked by now?”

  I slam the door hard, throwing the lock immediately. My only regret is that his fingers weren’t crushed.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Two days.

  Jax calls and I seriously consider ignoring him, but it’s a bitch move and I’m bigger than that. I don’t run, I don’t hide, and if this is going to hurt then so be it. That’s life. If I didn’t want to run the risk of saying goodbye, I never should have said hello.

  “When is your flight?” he asks.

  His voice is horrible. It’s salt on the wound. It’s deep and slow, like he’s dragging time out. Laying it down and asking it to be still.

  “Day after tomorrow. Early.”

  “Can I take you to the airport?”

  I close my eyes, so touched and so reluctant. Jax standing tall and beautiful in the airport watching me walk away to get on the plane—just the thought of it threatens to bring tears to my eyes.

  “Wren?”

  “I don’t want to say goodbye to you,” I whisper.

  He breathes calmly but it sounds forced. “Let me take you to the airport tomorrow.”

  “I don’t leave until the day after.”

  “I’ll come get you tomorrow. We’ll have one more day. Give me one more day and then I’ll take you to the airport in the morning.”

  I hesitate. I want it so badly. I don’t know what he has planned but I want to find out. I trust him implicitly. I’d follow him to the ends of the earth and, really, has he steered me wrong yet?

  “Don’t say no,” he pleads.

  “Yes.”

  “Yeah?”

  I smile. “Yeah.”

  “I’ll be there in the morning. Early. And Wren?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You won’t be sorry.”

  ***

  There’s a brittle cold snap to the air the next morning. It stings my eyes when I step outside and freezes my breath in my lungs. It’s colder than I prepared for and I’m buried in four layers of clothing to try and stay warm as I stand outside waiting for Jax. I could stay inside but I’ve already said my goodbyes and I don’t want to say any more. Definitely not this last one.

  Mel cried. I promised her I’d come visit her in Texas, but I think we both know it’s wishful thinking and it only made her cry more. I worried I would too, but I didn’t. I was choked up as I hugged her for the last time but the tears never came and I’m thankful for that. I don’t like crying—certainly not where anyone can see. Mel wept enough for both of us, though, and when I saw Ben across the common area I waved goodbye. He smirked that player’s grin at me like nothing in the world matters, and then he disappeared. It’s pretty much exactly what I expected.

  Just as the first of many fat, fluffy snowflakes begin to fall around me, Jax’s car comes gliding down the road. He parks in front of me, throws on his hazards, and gets out to help me load my bags.

  “What are you doing standing out here in the cold?” he asks, lifting two suitcases like they don’t weigh more than I do. “You should have waited inside.”

  “I couldn’t stand to be in there anymore. I’m ready to go. All of this has been looming ever since finals and I just want it to be over.”

  He doesn’t look at me as he takes my last bag from my hands to load into the backseat. “You’re eager to get home.”

  “I’m eager to be done with goodbyes.”

  I don’t have a ton of bags. I travel light and all of it fits into Jax’s trunk and backseat easily. He has a small black duffle bag back there too, and my heart leaps at the thought of spending one last day with him. One last night in his arms. Under his hands.

  We pull away from the curb without a word and I don’t look back. Jax gets on the Autobahn and takes us out of town, heading north, but with the snow starting to come down in large downy flakes, he stays under the speed limits when they’re posted. I think of all the miles we’ve put under us driving in this car since I got here, and not once was I afraid. I was nervous the first time I rode with him, but since then I haven’t flinched. I trust him that much. I have that much blind faith in him.

  I don’t ask where we’re going or what we’re doing because I know he won’t tell me and it really doesn’t matter. I just want to be with him. Even if we end up driving around for the next twenty-four hours, I’ll still be content.

  The farther north we drive, the thicker the snow becomes. By the time we reach Frankfurt the snow is coming down heavily and the roads are getting dangerous. I trust Jax but I don’t trust strangers, and as the clouds darken the skies and the streets lighten with a layer of white, my hands start to tighten on the seat under me. Jax sees my reaction and he slows even farther under the speed limit.

  “I had a whole day planned,” he says quietly, his voice barely rising above the purr of the engine and the crunch of the wheels on the freezing asphalt. “We were going to go to Cologne. There’s a cathedral there. It’s really beautiful. The entire city was nearly destroyed in World War II and this church is one of the few buildings that survived the bombings. There are some nice restaurants nearby. We were going to have lunch there, then dinner in Frankfurt.”

  “That would have been nice.”

  He nods slowly, never looking away from the road. “It’s too dangerous now. The drive is too far in these conditions. I don’t want to do that to you.”

  “Thank you.”

  “There are a lot of places I wish I had time to take you to.”

  “You’re here for another year at least. You can visit them when I’m gone.”

  I see his mouth tighten as his fingers flex on the wheel. “I want to see them with you.”

  My heart leaps in my chest and I smile faintly. I stare out the window at the falling snow covering everything, the ancient streets and the new buildings. The old world and the new world being blanketed together as though they’re the same. As though they’re not separated by hundreds of years, hundreds of lives. Hundreds of stories that have played out between them, all of them the same but somehow different. Each one unique in its own right.

  Jax and I are nothing new. Our situation is the same as so many others that happened before us. What makes us different is how we live it. How we write our story.

  How we author our own fairy tale.

  I lazily roll my head toward him and smile. “I want to see Moscow with you.”

  He glances at me, surprised. “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah. I’ve always wanted to visit Russia. I want to do that with you. Let’s go tomorrow.”

  “I thought you had a flight to catch.”

  “But if I didn’t, would you go with me?”

  “In a heartbeat.”

  “So we’ll visit Moscow. Then where?”

  “Japan,” he says, no hesitation. “I want to see Japan with you.”

  “All of it?” I laugh.

  “Every square mile.”

  “That’ll take a while.”

  He looks at me steadily. “We’ve got nothing but time, right?”

  I smile encouragingly. “Right.”

  “After Japan?”

  “Greece.”

  “Warmer climate. Nice. I wouldn’t mind seeing you in shorts and a tank top.”

  “I look adorable.”

  He grins. “I bet you do.”

  “Next.”

  “Venice.”

  “Ugh,” I groan happily, throwing my head back against the seat. “So much yes. I would love to see Venice.”

  “With me,” he amends.

  �
�Only with you.”

  “Next.”

  And so we go for the next hour. The mood in the car lightens as we plan our long, meandering trip around the world. We see everything: Alaska, Bermuda, the polar ice caps, Panama, Scotland, Tahiti. New Jersey. Pocatello.

  Once we reach Frankfurt we find a restaurant near the hotel and eat schnitzel and pommes frites, my last for possibly the rest of my life. We take our time and order dessert, taking advantage of the German notion that a meal should be an event that is lingering and savory. They don’t rush you out with the check right away. They encourage you stay and sit, to eat and laugh and basically be like family while you’re there.

  As the weather worsens, Jax suggests we get orders to go to eat in the hotel room for dinner tonight. I don’t think for a second that he’s worried about driving in the snow, but I know he understands I am. Even if I didn’t go with him, I’d be worried about him the entire time, so I agree and we kill another half hour waiting for the order to be ready to go.

  And just like that, that wasn’t the last schnitzel of my life. Things are not as doom-and-gloom as I made them out to be.

  When we check into the hotel and get our stuff all squared away in the room, we stare at each other blankly. It is the first awkward moment we’ve ever had and it’s too weird. I hate it. I don’t want to feel like this with him.

  “Let’s go outside,” he says suddenly, picking up his discarded jacket and searching for his shoes.

  “Are you serious? It’s freezing.”

  “Do you have gloves?”

  “Yeah, of course. Somewhere.”

  “Find ’em. We’re going outside. There’s a park across the street for people to walk their dogs. It might be full of hidden shit but we’re going there.”

  “Why?”

  He stops to come stand in front of me, looking down at me earnestly. “Because if we sit up here we’re going to mope. It’s going to be sad. Do you want it to be sad?”

  “No.”

  “Then let’s go outside. Let’s make snow angels. Let’s build a snowman. Let’s have a snowball fight, hit a passing car, and get arrested, but please, for fuck’s sake let’s not sit up here and be sad.”

  A quick laugh bursts from the back of my throat. “You’re right. Let’s go.”

  We do all of it. Well, all but hit a passing car and get arrested. I do hit him in the nuts on accident and he goes down hard. I’ve never felt so guilty in all my life. I’m worried he might vomit on the snow. After a lot of cursing and a lot of deep breathing he eventually gets up, but that’s the end of the snowball fight. We fall back into the puffy powder and make our angels instead. We lie close enough together that our fingers touch when we swish our arms up and down, and when we stand up to check our work it looks like the angels’ wings are brushing.

  We build a snowman. He’s crooked. We name him Hank.

  “Hank is a little pathetic, isn’t he?” Jax asks, eyeing the odd mound critically.

  “He has two euro cents for eyes. He’s a poor bastard to boot.”

  “It’s good his eyes suck. He can’t see himself. Guy is a mess.”

  “I think he’s sweet.”

  “You’ve got a soft spot for damaged goods, don’t you?”

  I look up at him with a wry smile. “Obviously.”

  He snorts, shaking his head at me. “You’re heartless.”

  “So is Hank.” I begin to fish around in my pockets. “We should give him one.”

  “One what?”

  “A heart. His eyes are shot, he has no nose, his mouth is a stick. He deserves to have a heart at least.”

  Suddenly I remember my necklace. It’s nothing special, just a cheap worn brass medallion I got at a street fair back home in Idaho for ten bucks. I wear it because I like the weight of it and when I pull it off and remove it from the chain, I think it looks like the perfect size for a heart for Hank.

  “Wait,” Jax says, stopping me from pushing it into the snowman’s chest. He pulls out his wallet, digs around, and brings out a dark coin a little bigger than my medallion. He holds it up for me to see. “It’s a base coin. For Ramstein.”

  He puts it half over the medallion I’m holding to Hank’s chest and together they almost form a strangely shaped heart. We push them into the snowy recesses of our creation’s chest until our fingers can’t reach them anymore. Hank doesn’t look any better on the outside. He’s still a tragedy brought to life, but at least he’s whole.

  It’s too cold to stay outside anymore. We go in and head for the bathroom, both of us peeling off layers of clothing and tossing them aside with a wet slap! on the tile floor. It’s not until I’m standing there in just my underwear and a tank top that I realize what we’re doing. That I’m not alone. It seemed so natural and innocent to undress in here but when I look up at Jax I see him topless with his hands on the waist of his open jeans, about to push them down. His eyes are on me, drinking in the sight of my bare legs, my blue cotton underwear, my white tank top, and my hair wet and thick with ice from lying in the snow.

  He reaches out hesitantly, testing me, but I don’t flinch. His fingers thread through my hair and I shiver as ice shards slide from the strands and slip down my back. They splatter to the floor behind my naked feet and the chill turns my shiver to a tremble that I can’t control. His fingers are on my face, tracing the line of my jaw lightly. He watches them as they move over my skin and his breathing is heavy. Shallow. I watch the broad expanse of his chest rising and falling in a rhythm that makes me wild inside, unfettered and crumbling, swirling and rising in a mass of nerve endings with all the want in the world in their design.

  Jax’s fingers slide down my neck and I lift my chin to give him more of me. My heart crashes in my chest when he reaches my collarbone, when his fingers flare out and his palm comes to rest on the hard surface of my chest, the soft roll of flesh leading to my breast. He feels it—the beat of my heart and the quiver in my skin—and I watch his throat move as he swallows thickly.

  “Are you cold?” he asks, his voice rough and full of fractures.

  I nod my head, the movement a small convulsion in the large series of tremors traveling under my skin.

  Jax leans into me, his body almost touching mine as he reaches behind me to push the bathroom door closed. It falls shut with a whispered breath and a subtle click as Jax steps back. He turns and reaches into the shower, throwing the lever to turn the water on. He kicks it to high, all the way up until the water is scalding and heat begins to fill the room. Steam rolls through the air like smoke from a fire and it doesn’t take long before I’m warm again. Before the room becomes a sauna and the heat is passing through my skin and into my blood.

  I reach for Jax, gripping his shoulders and yanking him to me so hard his chest crashes against mine and I whimper at the pain of the jolt. He grips my hips and pushes me back until I’m against the wall and I have nowhere to go but forward. Toward him. I kiss his lips, lick them lightly, and he delves his tongue into my mouth without hesitation. His hands rise up, lifting my shirt and skimming over the smooth skin of my sides, then back down. When he does it again I lift my arms and let him bring the thin material up over my hand, between our mouths for just a heartbeat, then it’s gone and he’s back and his heat is everywhere. I struggle to breathe as he holds my hands up high over my head and drags his mouth down my neck. His breath is so hot, his tongue and lips wet against my skin, and it sends me to a place where this is all I know. There is no tomorrow or yesterday, there’s only here and now with this man and his mouth and his heart.

  His hands slide down my arms, releasing me, and then I’m gasping as he takes hold of me, as he fills his palms with my breasts and tilts his hips into mine. He runs his thumbs over me slowly, raising me, tormenting me, and I reach down to push against the rough, wet material of his jeans until it finally falls away leaving next to nothing between us. He rolls his hips into me and I arch my body deeper into his hands as my head rolls back and a small cry escapes
my throat. His lips are instantly on mine again, a small growl of excitement being pressed into my mouth as he takes hold of my hips and pushes against me again, forcing another strangled cry from my body.

  “Your voice,” he murmurs so coarsely I can barely understand him. His hands slide up my back to my shoulders as he crushes my chest to his and buries his face in my neck. “Goddammit, your voice, Wren.”

  I push my fingers into his short hair, pulling it and grasping for him. Then I lean forward and lick my tongue along the ridge of his ear, slip it slowly down inside as I let my breaths follow behind, desperate and eager, and he comes undone.

  He pulls open the door, the air from the other room frozen compared to the heat in the bathroom, then he takes hold of my thighs and lifts me until I’m straddling his waist. The only thing holding me up is him and his strength and the need in my limbs.

  He slowly lowers me onto my back on the bed. I watch as steam coils out from the bathroom, the shower still running, and it reaches through the room as Jax reaches for me. As he removes the last barriers between us and shows me what neither of us is ready to say.

  It’s too soon to say it, but it’s not too soon to feel it—to know it—and I do. As I look up into those eyes that do me in the way my voice does for him, the heat in my body hinged on his existence, I know it.

  I’m falling in love with him.

  And he’s falling in love with me.

  He makes me feel it in every nerve in my body, with every brush of his fingers, his lips. He makes me breathe it in with the heat and the steam as I gasp from the full force of it and I cling to him. All of him.

  As I give him all of me.

  Chapter Sixteen

  It’s snowing in Idaho. It’s all slush, not fully formed or crystallized with ice and shimmer. It’s gross. It’s wet. It’s annoying as shit.

  “I wish it would have snowed all night,” I told Jax as he navigated the freshly plowed roads to the airport. “Then maybe my flight would have been canceled.”