One Last Time: A Second Chance Romance

by Roxie Noir

  Delilah looks different. Her hair’s cut short, above her shoulders. She’s wearing heels with jeans, a light-colored tank top, lipstick. I keep staring, dumbstruck, and then her gaze finally makes its way to me.

  She’s surprised. Somehow, I’m surprised I got caught, but I’m frozen in place, can’t stop staring at her. Behind me, I hear the dull clack of balls knocking into pockets. Caleb says something, but I’m not paying attention.

  At last, I nod. Once. I don’t know what else to do. I spent the winter feeling like she’d kicked a hole through my chest. I got my first-ever C in a class. I felt a little better with spring, but not much. Every bit of progress felt like I was sewing myself together with a dull-tipped needle.

  Delilah nods back, and the moment she does a man materializes next to her. He sets a drink down on the table, and she looks up. Smiles at him.

  It feels like a hole opens in the floor, and I fall through.

  “Seth,” Levi says, and there’s a hand on my shoulder. “Your turn.”

  We finish the game. I lose catastrophically and couldn’t care less as I drain my beer, wishing there were more.

  “Next round’s on me,” I say. “Anyone else want something stronger? I could really use one.”

  “Sure,” says Caleb, grinning because he’s nineteen and not even supposed to be here.

  “No thanks,” Levi says, his face closed off, his beer only half-gone. “I drove you two, remember?”

  At the bar, I order three well whiskeys, drink one on the spot, take the other two back to the pool table where I lose again, even more catastrophically. More whiskey. Another game. I’m not a big drinker, so it doesn’t take long before I feel like I’m swimming through the bar, missing every shot, shouting at my brothers who are standing a foot away, slurring my words. Always keeping one eye on Delilah and that man, over at the table.

  And then he gets up. Goes to the bar. I put my cue stick down on the table and then Levi’s there, in front of me, sober and rational.

  “Don’t,” he says, quietly.

  I grab both his shoulders.

  “It’s fine,” I say. I sway. He doesn’t. “I just want to say hi. Make sure she’s doing well. Wish her all the best in her new life now and all that shit.”

  “Seth,” he says, but I’m already steering around him, aiming myself at her table.

  She’s got both hands around and almost-empty glass, mostly ice left. Even in the low light, I can see she’s slightly pink, a little unsteady.

  “You seem well,” I say, nothing bothering with hello as I use the table for balance. “Good.”

  “Hi. I’m pretty well,” she says. She looks at me like I’m a cobra, ready to strike. “I guess you graduated?”

  “Yeah, I guess you didn’t?” I say.

  “Not yet,” she says, her words edged.

  She plays with her glass, staring at me, moving it from hand to hand. Something clinks, and I look down.

  There’s a diamond ring on her left ring finger, but I don’t understand. I look at it, puzzled, trying to fit the pieces together but I can’t. She’s wearing a ring and it’s got a diamond and it’s on that finger and for the life of me, I can’t figure out why.

  Then at last, it clicks.

  “What the fuck?” I ask.

  She just clenches her hand into a fist.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” I go on. I can’t look at her, only at that goddamn ring. God, it’s big, and it catches the light, scatters it. Fucking sparkles. I feel like I’m falling into it. “Tell me that’s some cubing zamboni fake jewelry bullshit.”

  Delilah scoffs.

  “Of course not,” she says.

  “You got engaged?”

  She doesn’t answer, just rolls her eyes. Looks away.

  “How could you get engaged?” I ask, and now I’m leaning across the table. Too loud. Don’t care.

  “It’s a very simple process, honestly,” she says. The words feel like a blade.

  “You said,” I start. Stop. “Seven, no eight months ago you said you loved me,” I go on, and I might be shouting. “You said you were in love with me and we talked about how we’d be together and what we’d do after I graduated and —”

  People are turning, staring.

  “ — Now it’s now and you’re getting married to someone else?”

  “I guess I was wrong,” she says, cheeks flaming under the freckles.

  There’s a presence at my side, big, wide, and it says, “Excuse me, you need to —"

  “You’re a monster,” I tell her, my volume all the way up.

  “Because I met someone I loved enough to marry?” Hers is too.

  “Because you wouldn’t know love if it punched you in the face!”

  “All right, you need to leave,” the presence says. “Both of you.”

  “Sorry,” says Levi’s voice. “I’m sorry, he’s with us.”

  He grabs my arm, and I yank it away, finally look around: a pissed Levi, a tipsy Caleb, the bouncer like a stone wall.

  “I can fucking walk,” I tell them, and start for the door. Behind me I hear the bouncer say Miss, and people are moving out of my way.

  It’s cooler outside. The parking lot is half-full, the lights harsh, and Delilah spills out of the door behind me, already shouting.

  “ — Because I didn’t love you enough doesn’t mean I can’t — “

  “Who the fuck is he?”

  “None of your goddamn business!”

  We’ve gone from shouting to screaming, standing three feet apart.

  “Just tell me,” I say. “Who. The fuck —"

  The door opens and he comes out, looking like he’s just finished a nice steak dinner, not like he’s been ejected from a dive bar.

  “What the hell is this?” he asks.

  Polo shirt. Clean-shaven. Looks at me like I’m the pool boy.

  “It’s fine, babe,” Delilah says. “It’s nothing.”

  “You just got me kicked out of a bar,” he says, jerking a thumb over his shoulder. “That’s not nothing.”

  “Come on,” says Levi’s voice at my shoulder. “Let’s get you —"

  “You’re heartless,” I tell her.

  “Fuck off.”

  “There’s no heart in there,” I say, pointing. Levi’s got my other arm, his hand locked around my bicep. “Just a rock where it’s supposed to be.”

  The man in the polo shirt puffs himself, stands an inch taller.

  “Hey now,” he says, and I turn back to Delilah.

  “The world doesn’t start and end with you, Seth,” she says. Shouts. “I just didn’t love you.”

  “Seth. We’re going,” Levi says, and now there’s another hand on my other arm, and I stumble backward under their power.

  “You know what?” I shout. “When you decide you don’t love him either, give me a call because whether or not you love me, I sure know how to —”

  She lunges forward and slaps me. Silence rings through the parking lot, nothing but background noise from the bar. Delilah looks astonished, still holding out the hand she used as a weapon like she’s not sure what happened.

  “Are you serious?” I say. I can feel the spot where she hit me but it doesn’t even sting.

  “We’re going,” Levi barks, and he actually raises his voice.

  “No,” I say, and struggle against them. “Tell me, Delilah. You fucking tell me —"

  “Because I never loved you!” she shouts. “Is that what you want?”

  I stop struggling, and Levi and Caleb half-haul, half-carry me back to Levi’s pickup truck. They shove me into the back, perch me on a tiny jump seat, strap me in. I lean my head against the window and wonder if I’m going to throw up, and the last thing I see as Levi drives away is Delilah under the floodlights, her new man confused and impotent by her side.

  “Fuck you,” I mutter.

  Levi can’t take us back to our mom’s house while Caleb’s drunk and I’m trashed, so he takes us to the house he’s
renting. It’s small, but it’s off in the woods, so he likes it. He doesn’t have a guest room so he pushes aside his coffee table and gives us sleeping bags.

  And he takes mercy on us. He gives me water, makes toast. He sits both of us on the couch while he watches us eat. When we’re done, he puts his arm around me, and I lean into my big brother’s shoulder, Caleb on my other side.

  “How could she be engaged?” I mumble, over and over again. “How the hell can she get married?”

  When I wake up, I’m on the couch, a sleeping bag draped over me, a trash can nearby. Caleb’s on the floor inside the other. I’m twenty-two, so my hangover is gone with a cup of coffee and when Levi comes in, he’s merciful enough not to say anything.

  I never go back to the Whiskey Barrel, but that night, I go out alone to a different bar. I buy a woman a drink. Her name is Allison, and she smiles at me, laughs at my jokes, and at the end of the night she takes me home with her.

  She’s the second woman I’ve ever slept with, and I’m amazed at how easy it is. Later that week, I do it again: Natalie. Then again. Then again.

  It doesn’t fix what’s wrong with me, but at least I’m good at it.

  Chapter Forty

  Seth

  Present Day

  Delilah comes to a hard, full stop, her skis scraping the snow beneath them.

  Ten feet later, I finally halt, feet in full pizza position with my toes in and heels out.

  “You doing okay?” she asks, pushing of her poles and gliding up to me, then stopping with no fuss at all.

  “Great,” I tell her, and try for a charming, winning smile. “You having a good time?”

  “We can head back if you want,” she says, pulling her goggle from her face, a smile around her eyes. “You seem like you might be done.”

  She’s right. We’ve been skiing since the morning, and the sun’s now hovering over the mountains, all of Snowpeak, West Virginia bathed in light that’s still more gold than orange for now.

  It’s the second time I’ve been skiing in my life. Growing up, I had four brothers and there was no money tree in the back yard, so the one and only time I’ve been was for a friend’s birthday in college.

  Skiing is hard. I’ve fallen down more times than I can count, have a bruise blossoming across one knee, definitely did something funny to one elbow. I run and lift, so I’m usually prepared for physical activity, but muscles I didn’t even know I had are begging me for mercy.

  “How about I head back and you do a few more runs?” I offer. “You’ve been babysitting me all day, go have some fun.”

  “I wasn’t babysitting!” she protests, laughing. “You made it down that intermediate slope all by yourself, you’re doing great.”

  “I lost a ski halfway down, and after you got it back, it took me four tries to get back on my feet,” I point out.

  “That’s because getting up is the hardest part,” she admonishes, gently. “Aside from getting off the lift. I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve had face-planted doing that.”

  Well, it was zero this trip. I, on the other hand, skiied into a tree and fell over the first time I got off a lift while four-year-olds zipped past me like they were born to it.

  “Go,” I tell her, nodding back at the mountain. “I’m going to shower, grab a beer, and get in the hot tub. Come join me when you finish.”

  “Seth, are you incentivizing me to make it fast?” she laughs.

  “Just saying I’ll be slippery and wet when you find me,” I say, lowering my voice. I am, after all, literally surrounded by families.

  “And disappointingly off-limits,” she teases.

  “Says the woman who brought a white tank top to sleep in,” I remind her.

  Delilah’s eyes crinkle, her goggles on her forehead. Except for her eyes, her face is deathly pale with some sort of specialty sunscreen, and she looks a little like a strangely-colored raccoon.

  Still fucking gorgeous, for the record.

  “I didn’t mean to,” she says. “I thought I brought an appropriately black, oversized shirt, but I’m pretty sure it’s still on my bed waiting to be packed.”

  No matter what she intended, she still wore a white wife-beater to bed last night, over rainbow pajama pants. Yes, it was practically see-through. No, she didn’t wear a bra to bed, and yes, I think I deserve a gold medal for self-control.

  “Ski a couple black diamonds and then come find me,” I tell her.

  “All right,” she says, and offers herself for a kiss.

  The moment our lips touch, I slide away.

  “Fuck!” I mutter, trying to maneuver my feet into a triangle.

  “Use your pole!” she says, and there she is, gliding alongside me.

  I jab one into the ground and come to a stop. Then I give her a look, and she closes her eyes, laughs.

  “Right here, with all these people around?” I say, low enough that no one but her can hear.

  “Well, I’d rather keep it all for myself,” she says, and puts one gloved hand on my chest. Kisses me, both my ski poles firmly jabbed into the ground.

  “I can live with that,” I murmur when she pulls back.

  “You sure you’re all right?”

  “Just go enjoy yourself,” I tell her, and wave her away.

  I wait until she’s turned and headed back for the lift before I make my way very, very carefully and slowly, toward the end of the slope.

  Back in the condo, I toss my key onto the kitchen counter, leave my coat and ski pants in a heap, and collapse on the couch.

  I don’t move for at least half an hour, and secretly, I’m glad Delilah’s not here. It was bad enough that she practically had to hold my hand for most of today while I fell down a mountain, everyone else zipping by; she doesn’t need to see me collapse in an undignified pile.

  Especially since I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that I’m the first boyfriend she’s had to teach to ski.

  I push the thought away and do some mindless scrolling on my phone. I play some dumb games. Check Facebook. Text my brothers’ group chat about how much skiing hurts, and get back several sarcastic replies about my terrible free vacation.

  Finally, I get off the couch. Walking doesn’t feel wonderful, but at least I don’t feel like my legs are rubber any more as I wander through Delilah’s condo, turning lights on and off as I check the place out a little more thoroughly.

  Two bedrooms, two bathrooms: one in the master suite, one off the living room. A stone fireplace and leather couches; a small but gourmet kitchen; a balcony; a dining area.

  And tiny, tiny traces of him. A man’s razor in a bathroom drawer. A single sock in a closet, neatly folded, on a shelf next to a pillow. A cigar, probably stale as hell, in a kitchen drawer next to some spatulas. They’re all things that were obviously overlooked and left in corners, but those whispers of his presence tickle at my brain, like I’ve walked through a spiderweb and can’t get the strands off completely.

  Her life has whispers of him, but not of me. We were together for six years before she even met him, through high school and college. Big years. Important years, and yet I’m nowhere to be found. It’s as if she’s washed me away completely.

  My phone dings, pulling me out of it.

  * * *

  Delilah: I’m gonna do one more run & then head in. You still in the hot tub?

  Me: I will be.

  * * *

  She texts a bathtub emoji, and I put my phone back on the charger. Drink a glass of water. Rub my eyes, remember that I should shower before I get into the hot tub, and open a closet to find towels.

  It’s top-to-bottom white linen except for a single, solitary cardboard box on the floor. The corners are ripped. There’s black marker on the side, text scribbled out so hard that it’s unreadable. It looks worn, old, and it’s so incongruous in this otherwise sparkling place that I can’t help but bend down and open it.

  I don’t know what I’m expecting. Cleaning products, maybe. Old sweaters. A
broken toaster, though none of those expectations account for the weight in my chest as I pull back the cardboard.

  Haphazardly on top is a shining, pearlescent white book that says Mr. & Mrs. in delicate silver letters. The weight in my chest grows heavier, feels like it’s pulling on my lungs, and I swallow hard.

  I should put it back without looking, and I know it. I came to her and offered a blank slate. I’m the one who wanted to forget everything and start over. I owe her my ignorance.

  I open it anyway, already hating myself.

  The very first page proves me right. It’s them, in front of the altar, deep in a kiss. He’s wearing black and she’s wearing a white strapless dress, hair piled stop her head, arms and shoulders blank.

  I kneel on the floor. I stare, the weight of jealousy heavy in my chest, and I hate him. I hate him for swooping in and getting what I couldn’t have. I hate him for whatever he did to make her divorce him. I hate him for haunting her life still, with this album and the sock in the closet and the cocktail shaker she still has.

  I flip some pages. They’re just wedding pictures, but they’re hers, and I can’t stop myself. She’s happy, glowing, beautiful, and so, so young. I remember her this young. I remember her younger, the two of us just kids.

  Under the photo book is more, and I put the book down, glance in. There’s a jewelry box. Photo frames. Tchotchkes, a name plate, a throw pillow, and I should stop. She’ll be back soon, and I know -- I know -- I’m not meant to see this.

  Just as I’m putting the book back, the photo on top of the pile catches my eye: her and Nolan, standing in front of the fireplace, posing together. His arm’s around her shoulders and hers are around his waist, and she looks so perfectly happy and content that it shakes me to the bone.

  I put the book in, shove the box back into the closet, take some towels. I shut the closet door and then walk back into the living room, stand there, and look at the fireplace.

  Right there. They stood right there, so happy, posed for a picture. If I try hard enough I think I can see their footprints still on the floor, no matter how much I don’t want to.