A Lover's Lament

by K. L. Grayson

  The attack occurred thirty kilometers south of Baghdad. This comes just two days after a string of bombings across Iraq have killed thirty-nine people, three of whom were American soldiers.

  I place a trembling hand over my mouth as thoughts of Devin race through my head. Is that where he’s at? Is he okay? Are his men okay? My adrenaline spikes, pumping nervous energy through my veins, and I scoot forward on the couch. Dropping my hand from my mouth, I prop my elbows on my knees and listen carefully, each word causing my stomach to twist in knots.

  A military spokesperson tells us that the four injured on Saturday were, in fact, American soldiers, and all are expected to make a full recovery. The two fatalities were not Americans but Iraqi civilians.

  Several emotions hit me all at once with a force so powerful I feel it in my bones.

  Fear.

  Anxiety.

  Relief.

  He’s alive.

  The breath whooshes from my lungs and I drop my chin, tangling my fingers in my hair. He could’ve been killed. His troops could’ve been killed. It’s possible that he was one of the four men injured, but knowing that all the soldiers will make a full recovery and no U.S. military deaths occurred helps to calm me down.

  But my fingers twitch, the urge to write him and reach out to him stronger than it’s ever been. More than anything, I want to know he’s okay and that his men are okay, which terrifies the hell out of me because it means I’ve let him in. Somehow, in this short amount of time, I’ve allowed my feelings to come out of hiding and I’ve begun to care about him. You never stopped caring about him, I think to myself.

  Squeezing my eyes shut, I push back the onslaught of emotions. How did this happen? Not only have I let myself get close enough to the one person who could hurt me again, but on top of that, he’s a soldier—someone who could easily be ripped away from me at any moment.

  “Katie?”

  The soft voice reaches through the fog, pulling me out, and I rub my eyes, determined not to cry. When I finally peek up, Maggie is watching me carefully.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah.” Straightening my back, I run a shaky hand over my face. “I’m good.”

  “Really?” she asks, her eyebrows raised. “Because whatever that was”—she waves her hand in my direction—“it wasn’t okay.”

  “Stop it. I’m fine. I just … that reporter …” Unable to get my words out, I finally give up and flop back on the couch. A couple of seconds pass and Maggie stays quiet, so I close my eyes, take a deep breath and say, “That news story scared the shit out of me. I’ve never paid much attention to the news. I’ve never had a reason to … until now.”

  “Because of Devin?” she asks. I nod my head, listening to her fingers tap the keyboard of her laptop. “Remind me what his last name is? Devin what?”

  “Clay. Devin Clay.” I pause, afraid to open my eyes because I’m sure I sound like a complete nutcase, and I don’t want to see it reflected in her eyes. “I know it’s silly. We haven’t talked in a decade, Maggie, but it’s like we never stopped.” My hand fists my shirt, right above my heart. “I can’t explain it, but I feel it … reconnecting with him was meant to happen.”

  “Does he have really short dark hair?”

  “No idea,” I quip, tossing my hand up in exasperation. I let it slump down covering my face. “I only know what he used to look like, and he hated short hair. It was always shaggy, but yes, it was dark.” Memories of threading my fingers through the curls at the nape of his neck flash through my head. “His hair was fucking sexy. It was rugged in a bad boy sort of way. I can’t picture him with short hair. I bet if he has short hair, then he’s probably not near as good-looking,” I rationalize, hating that I desperately want to know what he looks like. I want to know if his dark lashes still make his green eyes pop, and if the dimple in his left cheek still stands out the way it used to. “Yup”—my body relaxes—“I bet he hasn’t aged well. If I saw him, I probably wouldn’t feel a thing.”

  I know that’s a fucking lie, because it wasn’t Devin’s looks that I fell in love with. It was his heart and his mind and so many other things that I’m not going to list because I am not interested in a relationship, damn it!

  “Maybe you’d feel a little bit more than nothing,” she says suggestively. Flinging my arm off my face, my eyes fly open and I stare at Maggie. She glances down, smirking at me and then at her computer. “Because he sure as hell doesn’t look like a man that hasn’t aged well. Mmm-mmm-mmm. Nope, that soldier is sex on a stick.”

  “Maggie,” I breathe, my eyes painfully wide. “You can’t look him up.”

  She shrugs. “Too late, already did. Wanna see?” she asks, showing me her laptop.

  “No!” Popping up, I quickly shut her laptop. Maggie’s mouth drops open. “Good Lord, Mags, he’s going to think I’m stalking him or something. You can’t just do that,” I say frantically. “You can’t just look someone up like that.”

  “Why the hell not?”

  “I … I don’t know. You just can’t. It feels wrong.”

  “Oh, trust me,” she says, “It’s so not wrong.”

  “Okay. Well, maybe I don’t want to know what he looks like anymore because that’s not what it’s about for me. I’m not interested in anything more than what we are right now, which is two old friends who have managed to—”

  “Or maybe,” she says, pushing my hands off of her computer, “you need to stop worrying, stop thinking and just look. Maybe”—she opens her computer, which is still open to MySpace, and I cross my hands over the screen, shielding it from view—“the connection you feel toward Devin is strong, not because he’s an old friend but because he’s your lobster.” She waggles her eyebrows, a grin tipping the corner of her mouth.

  “Oh good God, Maggie.” Pinching the bridge of my nose, I take a deep breath, fighting the urge to strangle my best friend. She can’t do this. She can’t plant these crazy notions in my head. “He is not my lobster.”

  “Really? Your eyes light up when you talk about him,” she says. “He’s been able to pull things out of you with letters—fucking letters, Katie—that no one else could pull out of you. And just now when you were watching that news story, you nearly hyperventilated. Hell, I nearly hyperventilated just watching you.” She drops a gentle hand to my arm. “You two have a connection. I know you feel it because you’ve told me. And you’re right. It doesn’t matter what he looks like because that connection is there, and it’s real. But what if that connection has the potential to grow? What if that connection could blossom into so much more than friendship? What if you guys could not only get back what you lost, but gain so much more?”

  Damn it. How does she always know the precise thing to say to get me to change my mind? Doesn’t she know I’m not ready for this? I mean, I’m not ready for this … right?

  No, I know what I want and what I don’t want, and anything other than being friends with the only man to ever break my heart is something I definitely do not want. And if that’s the case, then seeing his picture won’t change anything.

  But what if it does?

  Shit.

  Slowly, I drop my hands. Devin’s picture fills the screen, and every last image of the teenager-turned-man I had conjured up in my head falls to the wayside because the real him is so much more than I’d imagined. My heart races as my eyes roam over his profile picture, which was obviously taken at the beach.

  His entire body is ripped, chiseled to perfection—much more so than the last time I saw him half naked. I can’t help but think that this is the type of body I read about in books. Board shorts sit low on hips. A thick, corded arm is slung over the shoulder of another man, equally as gorgeous in a rugged sort of way. As expected, Devin’s green eyes pop under thick dark lashes and pair perfectly with his straight nose and full lips, which are split into a breathtaking smile. He’s always had strong features, but they’re different now … more defined. And if that jawline isn’t enough to make
any girl swoon, the single dimple in his left cheek—the one that I’ve always loved—would more than do the trick.

  “Please tell me we can look at more pictures.” Maggie’s warm breath fans the side of my face, bringing me back to reality. I don’t even want to know how crazy the two of us would look to an outsider as we sit here drooling over a picture on a screen.

  “Absolutely,” I say, nodding my head.

  Maggie fist pumps the air. “Yes!” Clicking on the arrow, she slowly scrolls through pictures. There are several of Devin by himself, a few of him with some friends drinking beer and one of him with a girl. She’s a tall blonde with sparkling blue eyes. Her body is tucked in close to his, her left arm wrapped around his lower back. Devin’s arm is hooked around her neck in a kid-sister sort of way, but it does nothing to ease the tension in my stomach.

  My mind drifts to my last email and the very important question that I asked him. Is this his girlfriend, or maybe his wife?

  Suddenly, I want nothing more than to rush home and check my email. I know Maggie would let me use her computer, but my letters to and from Devin are just that … they’re mine.

  Biting the inside of my cheek, I continue to take in the various photos when a thought pops into my head. “Maggie?”

  “I know, I know.” She blows out a slow breath, her eyes glued to the screen. “You’re one lucky bitch.”

  “What if I’m not ready for this?” Her head snaps toward me. “What if I’m making a huge mistake?” I ask. Her eyes bounce around my face, uncertainty swirling in the depths of her whiskey-colored eyes.

  “But what if you’re not,” she breathes, her eyes imploring me to really consider what she’s saying. “What if this is a second chance? You’ve told me how much Devin meant to you and how crushed you were when he left. But what if it just wasn’t your time? What if the two of you needed to separate so that you could come back together, stronger and more solid?”

  “What if I let him in and he leaves again?”

  A slow smirk plays at the corner of Maggie’s mouth. “Then I’d rip his fucking balls off.” I offer her a tremulous smile and she sobers up. “But I don’t think it’d come to that. You want to know why?”

  I nod.

  “I think that Devin is probably a fairly smart fella, which is why he’s been writing you. Now, I don’t know exactly what the letters say, but you did tell me that he’s apologized more than once. I’d bet just about anything that he realizes he made a big-ass mistake—a mistake that he won’t make again.”

  I want to believe her—I really do—but there are too many ‘what ifs.’ Starting with, “What if I’m making a big-ass mistake by thinking he won’t hurt me again?”

  “Katie.” Maggie sighs, scooting forward on the cushion. “Life is one big chance. You can either choose to sit on the sidelines and always take the safe route, or you can jump into the game. I think you need to jump into the game. Fate has fucked with you enough, and this time I think it’s working in your favor … either that, or your old man is pulling some pretty big strings from upstairs.”

  My mind drifts back to the silent plea I made to my dad the day of his funeral.

  “You promised you’d never leave me,” I cry, making no attempt to wipe away my tears. My throat tightens, making it hard to talk, but I need to get this out. Lowering myself, I kneel next to Daddy’s casket, which is perched just inside the ground. His name, Christopher James Devora, is etched into the nameplate. My chest hurts—physically hurts—and I rub at it, trying to ease the pain.

  “I’m not sure I can do this without you.” My words break on a sob and I bury my face in my hands. “Show me the way,” I beg, my shoulders heaving. “Put me on the right path, and I promise I’ll follow it … I promise. But you have to give me a sign, Daddy,” I plead, finally gathering the strength to look up. Gently, I place my hand against the side of his casket, my fingers drifting over his name. “I need to know you’re with me.”

  Devin’s name was on that pen pal list for a reason—I know it was. Would I have formed a bond or friendship with any of the other soldiers, or did fate and something entirely too big for me to understand bring Devin back to me?

  Unspoken words linger heavy in the air, their meaning so powerful and intense that I’m too scared to speak them.

  “Maggie, I need to go.”

  “How To Save A Life” – The Fray

  I CAN’T STOP SMILING. EVEN if I could stop, I don’t know that I’d want to. I left Maggie’s in a hurry to get home, hopeful that I’d have a message from Devin waiting in my inbox. Plus, I was shaken over what I’d seen on the news and admittedly rattled by the realization that maybe—just maybe—he and I were supposed to come back into each other’s lives. And who knows, maybe we’re meant to be nothing more than friends, but I needed to get home and process it … process everything. I didn’t get much time to take it all in though because the second I pulled up my Gmail account and saw his name, I had to read what he wrote—and I wasn’t disappointed.

  His words put a big, goofy grin on my face. Oh, and the fact that he isn’t married and I didn’t inadvertently become an emotional mistress. That makes me smile too. A lot.

  After hitting reply, I sit and watch the cursor blink steadily on the screen. I want nothing more than to lay it all on the line. I want to tell him that news of the roadside bomb scared the shit out of me, and that in that moment, I was desperate to hear from him and talk to him—that I would’ve given anything to be able to pick up the phone and call him, just to make sure he was okay. I want him to know I was worried, to know that I care.

  But as my fingers continue to press against the keyboard, unmoving, my mind goes completely blank. Laughing at myself—because this Devin, and I know how to talk to Devin—I decide to do what comes easy …

  To: Sergeant Devin U. Clay

  From: Katie Devora

  Subject: Bye Bye Bye

  Devin,

  The Backstreet Boys, really, Dev? Did I not make you listen to that whole damn album every day that summer? It was NSYNC, not Backstreet Boys. Come on, don’t you remember my crush on Justin Timberlake? Honestly, this is just unforgiveable!

  Nice knowing you, soldier…

  Sincerely,

  Katie

  With a smile on my face, I hit send.

  Oh shit, I hit send!

  Clicking on his email, I hit ‘reply’ and try again, hoping like hell he doesn’t see that email and think I was serious. Way to go, Katie.

  To: Sergeant Devin U. Clay

  From: Katie Devora

  Subject: How to save a life

  Devin,

  Okay … I forgive you. Not just for mistaking NSYNC—the best boy band of the 90’s—for the Backstreet Boys, but because you’re a man and well, that was probably unfair of me to assume you could keep all those songs straight. My bad ;)

  And no, I don’t jam out to “Bye Bye Bye” when I’m pissed off anymore. I gave you a little clue, in the form of the subject line, as to what my go-to song is these days. I feel like the whole song is somehow about me, only I’m the one being saved.

  Now, to answer your other question, the one I looked right over. No, I’m not married and I’m not seeing anyone. I will be honest with you though. I did just recently get out of a long-term relationship.

  Pursing my lips in contemplation, I remove my hands from my laptop and thread them through my hair. Do I tell Devin that it was Wyatt I was engaged to? A part of me wants to leave that little bit of information out, but somehow it feels wrong—and I’ve had enough wrong in my life to last a lifetime.

  I was engaged to Wyatt. The details don’t really matter and maybe someday we’ll talk about it, but I recently broke things off and it didn’t go well. It probably makes me sound like a horrible person, but I wasn’t happy, and with everything that happened with my dad … well, life is just too short and I couldn’t drag him along any longer. I couldn’t do it to myself either. So I called off our engagement, and in case
you’re wondering, which is incredibly presumptuous of me, I’m doing really well with it. That’s how I know I did the right thing.

  Anyway, I don’t want to bore you with all of that. So you want to know something you don’t already know about me? There’s not much to tell, but I’ll give it a shot.

  Do you remember me telling you I work with my best friend, Maggie? We met in college and became fast friends. It sounds pathetic, but I don’t have much of a life outside of work and Maggie. And everyone loves Maggie—except Wyatt. They never did get along, but she’s gorgeous and funny, and she’s one of those people that lives by her own set of rules. She does what she wants when she wants to do it, and she doesn’t give a shit what anyone else says. She is the best girlfriend I could ask for, and I know that you would absolutely love her. I can totally picture the two of you shootin’ the shit over a couple of beers next to the fire pit, and trust me when I tell you that she can dish it out just as good as she can take it. I hope that one day you get to meet her.

  And you want to know my biggest fear, huh? That’s a tough one. Okay, before my father was killed, my biggest fear was death. I’m sure that answer sounds cliché, but it’s true. I can remember lying awake at night, and I’d start thinking about death and the fact that once we’re gone, we’re never coming back. No more sunsets on my favorite hill, or riding Mac in the rain. Never again would I feel the burn in my legs after running, or the ache in my chest after laughing too hard. It’s scary, thinking of all the things you’d never get to experience again. Some nights, when I would think about it too much, I’d have to get out of bed and go do something to quiet my brain.

  Anyway, after Daddy’s death, I’d say my biggest fear is no longer death itself but losing a person I care about. And not just anyone, but someone that owns a piece of my heart … someone I’m invested in. Losing my dad nearly destroyed me, and I’m not sure I’d survive something like that again.

  I told you mine, now you tell me yours. It’s only fair ;)