by S. Walden
The words lit up his heart. She trusted him. And suddenly the work ahead wasn’t so scary.
***
They sat side by side on the couch. He watched her from the corner of his eye. Her legs were crisscrossed Indian style, her arms folded over her chest. She was nervous, he could tell, so he decided to take the first step.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
She shook her head, even as her stomach growled over the noise of the movie.
“Oh my gosh,” she said, gripping her waist. She looked at Mark through wide eyes. “Apparently I am.”
“Well, I’ve got this shrimp couscous thing. Not sure if it’s something you’d like, but you’re more than welcome to it,” he said.
His grin was lost on her, though she vaguely remembered hearing those words before. She tried to pinpoint them but came up empty-handed.
“Okay,” she nodded. “But you know I like shrimp couscous.”
He left the living room to heat her a bowl. He came back with her meal, a fork, and a glass of Orange Crush.
“The orange crush is for me,” he said, handing her the bowl. “What would you like to drink?”
“Oh, I’ll just share with you,” she said absently.
She dove in, all but licking the inside of the bowl when the last of the couscous was gone. She thought she set a new record for devouring food and wondered if she wouldn’t have indigestion in a few minutes. And then the dense fog that clouded her brain suddenly lifted. She stared ahead at the bookshelf—all the books. Even more records. She searched for the words, what she said to him next, after she shoveled all the food into her mouth.
“I’m sorry I didn’t share.” She turned to him, and he saw the light in her eyes—recognition of a past event, an important one, that only the two of them could ever understand.
He plucked the bowl from her hand and tossed it on the coffee table. Then he reached for her and pulled her gently onto his lap. She bent her head just like before, tasting the garlic on her tongue and not wanting to offend him with her breath. She hid her face behind a curtain of golden hair that had fallen forward.
“First of all, I wanted you to eat the whole thing. I didn’t expect you to share. Second, you are far better at many things than I am Cadence, so stop worrying about the age difference.”
She giggled but kept her head bent.
“Third, say my name.”
She addressed his lap. “First, it was rude to not offer even if I didn’t wanna share. Second, I have to worry about the age difference because it’s a big one. You’re ten years older than me!” She paused and looked at his face. “Third, Mark.”
He didn’t wait for permission. He planned to ask but realized that’d take too long. He crushed his lips to hers. She tried to draw back, but he trapped her head in his hand, holding her there on his lap while he sought her tongue, tasting the biting sweetness of the garlic. He couldn’t wait for it to travel down, down through her body to rest between her legs. He wanted to taste it there, too.
“I love you,” he said into her mouth.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and squeezed tightly.
“I love you, too,” she said against his lips.
“I . . . I wanna love you again,” he whispered.
She nodded, and he stood up, carrying her to the bedroom where he loved her all afternoon. The words would come eventually, but in the next crucial days, they needed the physical connection—the physical renewal. They would heal each other with their hands and mouths first. Talking could wait.
“The roller rink?” Cadence asked, looking at the bright neon sign through the windshield.
Mark grinned. “Lame apology?”
“Apology for what? Keeping a huge secret or spanking the hell out of me when I got mad at you about it?” Cadence asked.
Mark sighed pleasantly. “Oh, Cadence. How I love you.”
She giggled. “I can’t roller skate. I mean, I’ve never tried. Never been to the rink. They went out of fashion when I was coming up.”
“Then you missed out, my friend,” Mark said. “Skating is the bomb.”
Cadence laughed. “That’s so nineties.”
“You better believe it.” Mark winked at her before getting out. Cadence waited for him to walk around the car and open her door. That took some getting used to when they first started dating. She couldn’t understand the big deal with opening the door herself.
“Will you just let me be a man?” Mark had said, and from then on, she waited.
“I’m nervous!” she squealed when they walked in.
It was exactly as Mark remembered—frozen in time. Confetti carpet and that smell of something old, worn, and well-loved. The music blasted from the speakers lining the walls and cluttered together in the four corners of the building. God, he hoped they’d get to play Four Corners. He won one time when he was in middle school—free skate day and rental. Oh yeah, and a Coke as well.
He paid for their tickets, then grabbed Cadence’s hand and led her to the skate rental counter. A stereotypical teen with acne-marred skin and a bad attitude stared at them, waiting.
“How’s it going, man?” Mark asked.
“What size?” the boy replied.
“I need a size 12 in speed skates. My girl here needs a 5.5 in regulars,” Mark replied. “Been at it a while today?”
“I don’t know,” the boy mumbled. He turned around and scanned his inventory. “Dude, I don’t have a 5.5. I only have a 6.”
“Oh, well,” Cadence said. Relief was evident in her voice. “I’ll just watch.”
“No way,” Mark replied. “You can wear a size 6.”
“They’ll be too big,” Cadence argued.
“Just try. You’re wearing thick socks, right?”
“No.”
“Well, try. I really wanna get you out there.”
“Why?”
The boy sighed heavily.
“Because I wanna skate with you,” Mark said.
“But I’m terrified,” Cadence replied.
“Dude, I gotta line,” the boy said impatiently.
“Give me the 6’s,” Mark said. He slapped the money on the counter and grabbed the shoes. They sat down on an empty bench and pulled on their skates.
“Mark, I don’t like this,” Cadence said. “I’m gonna fall and hurt myself.”
“Cadence, I won’t let you fall,” Mark replied.
She stood up and almost immediately, her feet went out from under her. Mark reached out, but he missed her by an inch. She fell backwards on her bottom, hurting her wrist in the process.
“This is what I’m talking about!” she cried.
Mark stood over her and helped her up. He rubbed his hands all over her bottom while he kissed her cheek. “Better?” he asked softly.
“Hmmm.” Cadence preferred to be noncommittal. She rubbed her wrist.
“Bend it backwards?” Mark asked. She nodded, and he took her hand in his and rained light kisses all over the inside of her wrist.
She pinched his cheek
“Come on, you little cutie. Be my skate partner. I won’t let you fall. I swear,” he said.
“You already did!”
“I meant out on the rink,” he clarified.
She peeked over the half wall. “That wood looks very slippery.”
“It’s gotta be. You wanna be able to glide,” Mark explained. “Let me tell you, back in the day, I tore it up out there.”
Cadence giggled. “Can you skate backwards?”
“Of course.”
“Can you do turns?”
“Yep. I can skate like the wind, too.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I can’t even tell you how many times I got in trouble and had to sit out.”
“For what?”
“Speed skating when I wasn’t supposed to. See, you can only skate so fast during regular skate times. Then they’ll pull everyone off the rink and let the crazies on the floor for speed skating. But
even then, you can’t skate recklessly. I wonder if they still do that.” Mark looked Cadence over. “You ready?”
She took a deep breath and nodded.
He held her hand and led her slowly to the nearest opening. He pulled her on to the waxed floor and watched her eyes go big.
“A little different from the carpet, huh?” he asked, smiling.
She nodded vigorously, then shook her head. “I can’t. Oh my God, I’m so scared!”
A few kids skated past her, one nearly bumping into her.
“There are a lot of people out here, Mark,” she said uncertainly. “Who the hell goes skating?”
“Didn’t you know it’s back in style?” Mark asked. He skated backwards slowly, pulling her along, letting her get used to how easy her skates rolled over the shiny floor.
“It’s not back in style,” Cadence argued. She felt her hands start to sweat. “All these people are dorks.”
Mark laughed and squeezed her palms. “Start to move your weight side to side. Left then right. Left then right.”
She obeyed, feeling even more vulnerable and certain she’d fall to the floor at any moment.
“Good,” Mark said. “Now put a little pressure on the ground and push off. Right then left. Right then left.”
She shook her head.
“I won’t let you fall,” Mark said gently.
“We’re coming to a corner. Oh my God, we’re coming to a corner!”
“Cadence, it’s all right.” He couldn’t help it: The look on her face made him laugh, and she narrowed her eyes at him. And then they went wide again as she felt herself turning.
“Lean to your left,” Mark instructed.
“I’ll die! I mean fall! I’ll fall!”
“I have you.”
She wouldn’t lean. She tensed as hard as she could, feet spread apart and toes pointing forward as he turned her around the corner.
“Why?” she asked desperately. “Why are you doing this to me?”
He pulled her to the carpeted “rest area” on the far side of the rink. She sighed relief as she sat down, pulling her feet in and hugging her knees. They sat side by side for a few moments observing the skaters. There were many, and Cadence noticed most were older. Nostalgia. A yearning for something old. Past memories that were everyday and ordinary while they were happening, but grew to something special and sorely missed as the years passed by. She could see it in their faces as they whizzed past her. A longing for yesterday because, in hindsight, it was so much better than the present.
“I gave you two really huge reasons not to trust me,” Mark said softly. “Once, when I broke up with you after our pregnancy scare, and then when I kept my past marriage from you. I hurt you in the most significant way, and I realized I have no right to ever expect that you’d trust me again. But I don’t want you to live in fear and doubt.”
“So you bring me skating?” she asked.
Mark smiled. “I wanted to share something with you from my past. Something really special to me. Before my dad died, he’d take me skating all the time. It was our thing. He taught me. We competed.” He paused, remembering. “Dad always won.”
Cadence listened intently.
“When you get good at it, you can pretend something bad is after you,” Mark went on. “And it’s chasing you, but you’re faster. It’s an awesome feeling, to charge around the rink, outskating that bad thing. A broken heart. A fear. A regret.”
Cadence took his hand.
“A death,” he whispered.
They were silent for a while.
“It’s freedom,” Mark said finally. “And I wanted to share that with you. I know it sounds cheesy, but maybe it can be our thing. I don’t expect that the rest of our lives together will be smooth and pain-free. I don’t expect that I’ll never hurt your feelings at some point in the future because I’m human, and I make mistakes. But I think if we can have a place to go to drop the baggage for a while, skate away from it, maybe that can give us perspective. It’s done that for me, especially after my dad died. I’d come here and skate all the time. Drop my baggage and just skate away. Even if I was just going in circles.”
“But I can’t skate,” Cadence pointed out.
“That’s why I’m teaching you,” Mark said.
“But what if I never get good at it?” she asked.
“I hope you never do, Cadence.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because then I’ll always get to hold your hand. I’ll always get to help you.”
The side of her mouth quirked up.
“I don’t want us to skate on our own. I never wanna skate by myself ever again. If I need to roll around this rink to forget about something hurtful, then I wanna do it with someone. I wanna do it with you. Whenever we fight, whenever we hurt each other, I want us to come here and skate together—drop the baggage together. Because two are better than one.”
Cadence wiped the tear from her eye. “Hey, that’s from the Bible.”
“I know.”
“Do you know the rest?” she asked.
“‘Two are better than one because they help each other succeed’,” he quoted.
“You didn’t study that in your religion course,” Cadence said.
“No. No, I didn’t.”
The light dawned, but it wasn’t time to reveal what she understood. She asked him instead to skate for her.
“Really?” he said, grinning.
And two seconds later, the DJ asked everyone to clear the floor for speed skate time. Mark helped Cadence to the nearest exit, kissed her lips, then returned to the rink.
“Prepare to have your socks knocked off!” he called. “I’m the best!”
“No way!” a kid to his right called. A middle schooler.
Mark glanced at Cadence and rolled his eyes. “You listening to this kid?”
She laughed and nodded.
“Dude, I’ll wipe the floor with you,” the boy said.
“I’d like to see you try,” Mark replied.
The DJ cued up Bobby Brown’s “On Our Own” from the Ghostbusters II soundtrack, and Mark burst out laughing.
“This is my skate tune, little man. You don’t have a chance,” he said, and then he took off, the kid right on his heels.
Cadence clapped as Mark rounded the corner, whizzing past her while he sang the words to the chorus. She couldn’t make sense of her conflicting emotions—lust for his fluid body and embarrassment for his over-the-top dorkiness. She screamed at him to speed up; the little kid was gaining on him. Mark looked behind him for a split second, turning his face forward just in time to narrowly miss a skater directly in front of him.
“Black shirt with the white letters! Slow down!” the DJ called from the booth.
Mark ignored him and took the corner too wide on one skate, giving his opponent the inside advantage.
“Shit,” he hissed, watching the kid take the lead.
“Hey! Kid with the red shirt! Slow down!” the DJ yelled in the mic.
“Listen to the DJ!” Mark called.
“Yeah right, old man!” the kid yelled behind him.
They picked up speed, dodging and weaving in and out of the other speed skaters, going round and round in a furious, reckless race. Cadence saw two employees sprint to the half wall. It was all over in a minute, and she burst out laughing. Mark and the kid rounded their last corner, neck and neck, charging forward towards the employees who waited to order them into time-out from the rink.
“We know!” Mark yelled, flying past them.
“Get off the floor!” one called to his back.
“Yeah yeah, we know!” he replied, stopping suddenly, and skating off through an exit.
“Grow. Up,” the other employee snapped as he skated past her on the outside edge of the rink.
“I can’t,” he replied, breathing heavily. “Why do you think I come here?”
She rolled her eyes and turned her back on him.
He looked around f
or Red Shirt, spotting him hanging near Cadence. He skated over to them and clasped hands with his opponent.
“A draw,” he said.
“No way, man. I beat you,” the kid replied.
“No, you didn’t,” Mark countered. He looked at his girlfriend. “Cadence, who won?”
“The kid,” she replied.
Red Shirt smiled brightly. “Buy me some nachos.”
“That was our agreement?” Mark asked.
The kid nodded. “I yelled ‘Nachos’ on the floor when I passed you.”
“You little liar,” Mark replied, pulling a five dollar bill from his wallet.
“Thanks!” the kid exclaimed, snatching it. “Call me,” he said to Cadence, then turned and skated to the snack counter.
Mark raised his eyebrows.
Cadence shrugged and held up a little piece of paper with a phone number scrawled on it. “He thinks I’m in middle school.”
Mark shook his head and laughed.
“You were sexy and dorky out there,” she said. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with that.”
He took her hand. “It means you’re supposed to do me when we get home.”
Cadence laughed hard.
“I’m sorry I ruined your skate lesson. I don’t think they’re gonna let me back on the floor today.”
“I have a feeling that happened a lot when you were younger,” Cadence said, letting him lead her to a bench.
“Uh, yeah,” Mark replied. He pulled off his shoes.
“Expensive to only go around the rink a handful of times,” she pointed out.
“I know. But my dad was just as bad, if not worse. We were banned for a month or so.”
Cadence giggled. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
“So we skated around the neighborhood instead until we got in trouble with the homeowners association.” He looked around the rink and sighed. “God, I miss my dad.” He scratched the back of his neck and looked at Cadence.
“I miss mine, too,” she said softly. “I mean, I miss the dad I knew before all this happened.”
Mark pulled her leg over his knees and untied her skate.
“Is it my fault?” he whispered.
“What? That my dad disowned me?” she asked.
He nodded.
“Mark, are you serious?”