by Emery Rose
Still an asshole, always would be, but an asshole who was in love with a girl and wanted to give her the fucking world. If only she would see that we were always meant to be.
I turned my head at the sound of Margot Woods’ voice and suspected she’d been talking for a while. “What’s that?”
“I said that you need to get out of my house right now or I will call the cops,” she repeated, her voice rising a few octaves, the shrill sound cutting through the peace and calm of this June day.
“I’m leaving. I got all the answers I need.”
She huffed, her heels clicking behind me as I strode to the front door. When I was on the other side of it, I turned, putting my hand on the wood to stop her from slamming it in my face. “I remember why I came.”
Her lips pursed, and her head tilted, curious despite herself. Sienna looked more like her mother than Scarlett did. Same nose. Same bone structure. But Sienna’s face was more expressive, her eyes not as dull and vacant.
“Your daughters love you. And from where I’m sitting, they’re the only good thing in your life. Start acting like a fucking mother before you lose them too.”
Her eyes flared but it was hard to tell if she was angry or not. Her face gave nothing away. It was so Botoxed, nipped and tucked, it looked like a mask she wore rather than actual human skin. It was sad as fuck. Vacant and empty, like her life. Who got all dressed up in designer clothes, hair and makeup and nails perfect, only to sit around—alone—in this mausoleum she called a house?
“Who are you to tell me anything?” Her eyes roamed down my outfit and she sniffed in disapproval, her nose in the air. “You’re still a no-good punk. What did my daughters ever see in you? The very idea of you makes me sick.”
I removed my hand from her door and it slammed in my face just as I’d suspected it would.
“Still causing trouble?” a man asked, hedge clippers in his hand, a smile on his face, more weathered than the last time I’d seen it, but the smile was the same. This man always had a smile and a kind word for everyone. Quite a gift, one I was starting to appreciate more and more.
“Hey Pedro.” I shook the hand he extended, his warm palm calloused and dry from all his years of working outdoors. “You good?”
“Yes, sir. Everything is good in my world. I have a new granddaughter now.” He pulled up a photo on his phone, pride and joy in his eyes as he showed it to me. “That makes three grandbabies for me. Two boys, one girl.”
“Good for you.”
“Family is everything.” He glanced at the front door then shook his head and sighed. “Too bad some people don’t know that money can’t buy happiness.” He glanced at my G-Wagen. “You finish the college?”
“Yeah, I did.”
“No more cleaning the pools for you, huh?”
“Nope.”
“I’m proud of you, Dylan.” He nodded, smile still firmly in place, his teeth so white against his suntanned skin. “You did good.” And with that, he got back to his gardening duties and I drove away, laughing to myself. Pedro barely knew me, yet he’d sounded genuinely proud.
I drove through town, past all the boutiques and restaurants and surf shops on the main street and past the pier and The Surf Lodge, its weathered wood getting a fresh coat of paint, and I wondered if Jimmy would be proud of me or if he would have hated that I’d stooped to conquer, that I’d played dirty to get what I wanted. I’d never know the answer to that but for all of Jimmy’s Zen and sage advice, he’d been a fighter too. And I thought he would have been cool with it, knowing that the cause was a good one. It was what I chose to believe, anyway.
I didn’t know what more I could do to show Scarlett that I loved her, that I would do whatever it took to make her happy.
Come back to me. Come back.
But she didn’t come back.
She fucking left my ass.
35
Scarlett
Four Months Later, Hanoi
These past few months had been eye opening. I had somehow managed to mend my heart just a tiny bit—although the stitches holding the seams together were crooked and there were times the pain took my breath away. The children I’d met and worked with have helped take my mind off of Dylan, even for just a short while. I learned that even with a broken heart, I’d been able to give a little of what’s left of it to these kids who had nothing. Sometimes you had to work through the pain and I tried—so hard. All I could hope for was that the work I’d done and the love and care I’d shown them would help them realize that they were worth something.
The future was unclear, and I wasn’t sure when I would find my new normal, but I had learned a lot about myself. I wasn’t my father’s daughter. Money meant nothing if you didn’t have love. Showing you care and giving a piece of yourself to someone in need was priceless. It also helped me realize what Dylan must have gone through when he was younger. When you came from nothing, you felt like you were worth nothing and seeing these kids who barely had enough food to eat, who oftentimes had no one to take care of them, made my heart ache for what he went through.
After what had happened with Sienna, I knew that my choices destroyed her. I didn’t know that she’d ever forgive me, but all I could do was try my hardest to prove to her that I never meant to hurt her.
I stopped walking, and all the noise from the motorbikes zipping past and the voices and laughter from the sidewalk tables outside the noodle shop and the raucous cheers from the bar next door, quieted. The pedestrians crowding the sidewalk and the streets clogged with mid-afternoon traffic ceased to exist.
I felt him. He was here. In this crazy, beautiful city of Hanoi with its French colonial architecture and smiling, friendly people and the Vietnamese street food I couldn’t get enough of. Made evident by the pho, spring rolls, and dumplings Oscar and I had just stuffed our faces with.
I looked across the street at the yellow façade of the small, slightly shabby, cheap hostel where I’d been staying for the past three months, and there he was. I saw him through the glass doors, his back turned to me. But I’d know him anywhere.
It was him. My mind wasn’t playing tricks on me. I felt him. The hairs on my arms stood on end and all the air was sucked out of my lungs.
“Keep walking.” I grabbed Oscar’s arm and dragged him down the street, turning my back to our hostel. Over the past three months, Oscar and I had bonded over our hopeless love lives, 80s movies, and debatable fashion sense. Today he was sporting a sarong with a tank top I’d designed and a man bun.
“What is wrong with you, girl? I need a siesta.”
“It’s… we can’t go in there.” I wasn’t thinking clearly. I released his arm and tried to breathe. “Actually, you can go in there. But I can’t.”
“Does this have anything to do with a hot, tattooed guy?” Oscar said slowly, his eyes widening as he watched something—or someone—over my shoulder. “Oh my God,” he said in a stage whisper. “It’s him.”
I should have never shown Dylan’s picture to Oscar. Now he was gawking. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to rein in my racing pulse. When I opened my eyes, Dylan was standing right in front of me, his eyes roaming my face and body while I did the same to him. He looked the same. Dark hair messy and disheveled. Scruff on his jaw. In a plain white T-shirt and faded denim. My eyes stopped at the Old Skool Vans on his feet then returned to his face. It was so strange to see him here. Out of our normal environment.
“Why are you here?” I asked.
“Why the hell do you think I’m here?” He scowled, his gaze drifting to the narrow tree-lined street I lived on--no wider than the alley I used to walk to work on--as approximately one thousand motorbikes flew past. Every time you crossed a street in Hanoi, you took your life in your hands and prayed for the best. There was no such thing as traffic rules or stopping for pedestrians. It was survival of the fittest out there. I bet this was Dylan’s personal hell. Too loud, too many people, too crowded. “I’m here for you.”
“
Dylan… I told you…”
He wrapped his hands around my upper arms. His warm, calloused palms on my bare skin, his nearness, the scent and heat of his body, made me dizzy. “Tell me you don’t love me, Starlet.
“Starlet. Swoon,” Oscar said, reminding me that he was still here, watching this play out like a bad 80s romcom. He put his hand over his heart and patted it a few times. “This is so romantic.” I glared at him. “What? I’m just all up in my feels.” He held up his hands. “Fine. I can take a hint.”
Oscar darted across the street, dodging the oncoming traffic and my eyes returned to Dylan. Now it was just the two of us in our own little bubble on a busy street in a foreign city so far from home. How did we end up here? Standing on a sidewalk in front of a Vietnamese mini-mart in the middle of Hanoi?
For a few long moments, we just stared at each other.
Dylan's penetrating gaze was focused solely on me. “Tell me,” he repeated. “If you can look me in the eye and tell me you don’t love me, I’ll leave.”
I looked him in the eye and opened my mouth, but no words came out. I cleared my throat. Words. I needed words. He smirked. “That’s what I thought.”
“This has nothing to do with not loving you.” I pulled away and took a few steps back, putting distance between us, my hands rubbing my upper arms where his hands had just been.
Dylan crossed his arms over his broad chest. Oh God, he looked so good. I wanted to throw myself in his arms and never let him go.
“Nothing short of you not loving me is going to keep me away.”
Dylan grabbed my arm and strode across the street, his body shielding me from oncoming traffic, not the least bit concerned about the motorbikes that were forced to go around him. He led me through the glass doors of the hostel, and across the black and white tiled lobby that smelled like bleach. He stopped in front of the elevator and punched the button, the traitorous doors opening immediately. Ushering me inside, he pressed the button for the fourth floor. How did he know my room number? “Dylan… we can’t…”
“Don’t tell me what we can’t do. I traveled halfway across the world for you. And I’m not fucking going anywhere until we talk this through.”
“I’m not having sex with you.” As soon as the words were out, I wanted to punch myself. Filters, Scarlett. What the hell. I was just putting ideas into his head.
Dylan snorted. “We’ll see about that, Mother Teresa. I’ve been living like a fucking monk.”
“Oh. So… you haven’t hooked up with anyone?” I asked as the elevator doors opened and he stepped out, taking a right as if he knew exactly where he was going.
Wrong way, Romeo.
He checked the room numbers and figured out his mistake quickly, doubling back and passing me. I stared at his back. He stopped outside the room I shared with Georgia who was also a volunteer and looked over his shoulder at me. “You planning to open it, or do I need to kick it in?”
With a sigh, I met him outside the door and unlocked it before the Neanderthal made good on his promise. Wouldn’t put it past him.
“In answer to your question, no. There’s been nobody. You?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Thank fuck.” He scrubbed his hand over his face and yawned. “I’m too jetlagged to beat the shit out of anyone today.”
A laugh burst out of me. “You’re ridiculous.”
He kicked off his Vans and flopped down on my bed with the comforter I’d brought from home, his head on my pillow, and patted the space next to him. There was barely enough room for two on that bed and he took up most of the space. I shook my head no.
“Get over yourself. Lie down next to me.” He folded his arms over his chest. “I won’t even touch you.”
As if I had no control over my own body, my feet carried me to the bed. I stepped out of my flip flops and lay down next to him, rolling onto my side, my head propped on my hand. He rolled onto his side to face me, and we were close. Too close. I could see the silver flecks in his black-rimmed irises.
“So you worked with kids?” he asked, as if he didn’t already know that. As if he hadn’t donated boxes and boxes of supplies to the childcare center. He’d sent them anonymously. Even though there was no return address, I knew they were from him. No one else would have done something like that.
I smiled, thinking about the kids. My volunteer assignment had been for twelve weeks and yesterday was my last day. Tomorrow I was leaving Hanoi to go traveling with Oscar and Georgia. I had a feeling he knew that my time here was up. “Yeah. I worked at a childcare center. The kids were great. We did a lot of art projects.”
“And your designs?”
“Still working on them.” I was starting to make money from them, but I suspected he already knew all of this. Cruz or Remy probably kept him updated. “Why are you here?” I asked again.
“I love you, Starlet. I’m no good without you. Come back to me. Or I’ll stay here. Whatever you fucking want.”
“I can’t.”
“Why the fuck not? We love each other. We belong together. You can’t tell me we don’t.”
“Nothing has changed. You’re still my sister’s ex-boyfriend. What we did was wrong.” Dylan had tried to make it right. I knew that. A few weeks after I got here, Ollie had called me and told me about his conversation with Dylan. Since then, we’d been texting and I was happy to have my friend back but like so many other things, it would never be the same. That wasn’t Dylan’s fault though.
“You say wrong and I say right. What I had with Sienna was bad love. It was toxic. Nothing like what I have with you. I can’t fix what happened, but the damage has already been done. Us not being together won’t change a damn thing.”
He was keeping his promise. Not touching me. But he didn’t have to lay a single hand on me to make me feel him. Just being this close to him, I was hyper aware of his scent and his body and the way his eyes darkened when he looked at me. I felt like he’d stripped me bare. I felt like I was more naked than I’d ever been with him. I should have looked away, but I couldn’t.
“Do you miss me the way I miss you? Do you dream about me at night? Do you crave me? Do you want me so badly that it’s physically painful? Do you, Starlet?” he asked, voice low and husky, going straight to my core. The air around us was charged, my body trembling with want and need. “Tell me.”
“Yes,” I whispered, my eyes filling with tears.
“I never thought I’d find someone like you. And now that I have, I can’t let you go.” He took my hand in his and guided it to his beating heart. “You’re here. In my heart. Under my skin. In my fucking head. And I can’t get you out. What’s more, I don’t want to. Tell me you love me.”
His eyes bored into mine, waiting for me to say the words. “I love you. But—”
He placed his finger over my lips. “No buts. There are no buts in love. You’re either in or you’re out. You’re not my second choice. You’re not a consolation prize. You’re everything I never knew I needed. You’re my number fucking one. You own me. And I’m not leaving here without you.”
“Do I have a choice?” I asked. The question was more for me than for him. When it came to Dylan, my heart didn’t stand a chance. I had never had a choice, it had always been him.
“Here are your choices. Choose me. Or choose me.”
Who was I fooling? No amount of time or distance would ever change the way I felt about him. I could run to the ends of the earth and it still wouldn’t make a difference. He’d always be there, in my heart, in my head, under my skin. “I choose you.”
“Good. Because I’m going to fuck you so hard, all of Hanoi will hear you screaming my name,” the charmer said.
I laughed and then he sat up and whipped off his T-shirt and the laughter died on my lips.
The space over his heart wasn’t blank anymore.
Epilogue
Scarlett
One Year Later
“Are you on your way home yet?” Nic as
ks as I drive along the coast with the top up and my windows rolled down. Dylan gave me the Mini Cooper convertible for my twenty-second birthday. It’s cream with camel leather interior and I love it.
“Dylan threatened to come over and physically drag me out of the shop if I didn’t leave in two point five seconds.” He’s still impatient. Still likes to call the shots and boss me around. Not that I always listen but tonight I did. Three months ago, I opened my own design studio, right next door to The Surf Lodge. I’ve been working long hours, and Dylan has been so busy with work that lately, it feels like we haven’t spent much time together. “So yeah, I’m on my way home.”
I smile just thinking about home, a beachfront Spanish style house that sits on a bluff and overlooks the Pacific Ocean. Even though it was love at first sight, I argued that it was too expensive. Dylan said you can’t put a price tag on happiness. It was his dream house so he bought it and we’ve been living in it for the past year.
“Wait. Why do you ask?”
“Oh. No reason,” Nic says. “Gotta run. Call me tomorrow.”
O-kay. She cuts the call like she’s suddenly in a rush and my music comes back on. It’s a perfect October night, the air still warm, and a big orange moon in the sky. The past year has been a whirlwind and it feels like I’ve barely stopped to take a breath. Except for my relationship with Sienna, which seems to be damaged beyond repair, but not for my lack of trying, life has been good.
One of the biggest surprises of the past year was when my mother finally asked my father for a divorce. He and Cecily are expecting a baby at Christmastime. Good luck to her. I don’t speak to him. There’s nothing to say. As for my mother, she’s become active on the town council now, and she’s finding her voice.
For too many years, my father had oppressed her, and made her feel worthless.
When she left him, she moved out of the house, claiming that she’d always hated it and moved into a beach condo. Over the past year, my mother has gotten to see a different side of Dylan and while I wouldn’t say they’re close, they’ve called a truce. She doesn’t call him a punk anymore and he tries his best to bite his tongue and be cordial when he sees her.