After the End (5 page)

And I felt guilty as hell that it was.

The movie was good. Well, no, the movie was terrible, in that wonderful kind of way. There were explosions and aliens and overly buff men who went shirtless for no reason other than our enjoyment. In the end, right prevailed, as it always did, and no one important died. Even the dog lived. It was good. We walked out of the theater, still hand in hand, laughing over how awful the acting was. I was smiling, he was smiling, and for a moment, everything was perfect.

“Pie?” Brady asked, tugging my hand lightly. “Come on, I know this great diner. The coffee is strong enough to hold up a spoon.”

“Sounds like my kind of place.” Our steps matched as we wound our way through the evening crowd. “So, this is kind of embarrassing, but other than the fact you’re a party planner who hates overly fussy cocktails and enjoys fried cheese—”

“Which, by the way, is what makes America great,” he interjected with an impish grin.

I huffed out a laugh and nudged his shoulder with my own. “Fine.
Besides
the fact you’re a good American cheese-loving man, I don’t know much about you.”

He opened the door for me, a bell chiming lightly to announce our entrance. There were tables scattered around a long counter, the clank of dishes and hum of quiet conversation, and the delicious aroma of coffee. We got seated, and I ordered the promised peach pie, Brady adding a scoop of ice cream to his order.

“Well,” Brady said, sprawled out on his side of the booth, looking good in his tight black sweater. Not that he wasn’t perfectly aware of how he looked. His deep brown eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled at me, and he drummed his fingers on the back of his seat. “I’m a middle child. I went to school for biology for three semesters before I realized I couldn’t stand it, dropped out, and started working catering.”

“Wait.” A smile curled up my lips. “You were a science geek?”

“A very handsome science geek,” Brady shot back, poking a finger at me with a haughty look that only lasted through the beginnings of his laugh. Rubbing a hand through his hair, he shrugged. “I like knowing what makes people work. But now I use that knowledge for creating beautiful moments instead of cutting open frogs.”

Our coffee and pie came out and I dug into the sweet fruit. As promised, Brady reached over to steal my crust. I batted at his fork with mine, but he triumphed, grinning. I didn’t mind at all.

“How about you? Tracy mentioned something about a store?”

Shifting a bit, I fussed with my coffee, adding cream, keeping my eyes down. “Uh, yeah. I own a comic book store.”

People had different reactions to that. Mostly, I got laughed at. Yes, the grown man still spent his days talking about comic books. And Brady did laugh, yeah, but it wasn’t an unkind sound.

“Really? That’s kind of adorable.”

My eyes lifted to find him smiling at me. Something tight lifted in my stomach, a soaring kind of lurch, and I fiddled with my fork. “Adorable?” I murmured, quirking up an eyebrow.

“Yeah.” His hand stole across the table to find mine, that smile still doing weird flippy things in my chest. “Cool. Adorable. Kind of awesome. Take your pick of adjectives.”

“You really shouldn’t be this sweet,” I managed, kind of abruptly, though maybe it just felt that way because my cheeks were all red and I was barely able to keep from stuttering. “I just…. You’re the first person I’ve done this with in a really long time. And Aaron….”

And Aaron. Wasn’t that always the coda in everything? The start and the end and the fucking middle.
And Aaron.
Only there wasn’t any
and
anymore.

But instead of pulling away, instead of recognizing the whole Titanic-sized crater of mess I was carrying around with me, Brady just tightened his grip on my hand. Hanging on past what I thought any sane person would. “Tell me about Aaron,” he said, so softly, so
kindly
, that I really did start to cry then. Right in the middle of some stupid diner, over my plate of peach pie with no crust, I cried.

Just like that, Brady was sitting next to me, arm around my shoulders as he pulled me in close. “It’s okay,” he hushed, lips pressed against my hair. “It’s okay. I’m sorry. Shit. I’m sorry, Quinn.”

Making some terrible snorting sob, I shook my head. I rubbed the heels of my hands against my eyes, trying desperately to suck in air, to compose myself. “No. God, no, it’s not you. Jesus, I’m just a fucking mess.” I attempted a smile, shaky and blurry eyed looking up into Brady’s concerned face.

“Not a mess.” The backs of his fingers traced across my cheeks. It was like he didn’t even care we were in public, he was so focused on me. On us. “Just a guy who’s been hurting for a while.”

Another terrible snotty sound and I forced myself to pull back, to not use his shirt like a place to deposit all my tears. This was only a really nice guy I’d just met. He did not need me losing my mind all over him in the middle of a diner. “Yeah, well,” I mumbled, wiping my eyes on my sleeve. “Do, uh, do you want to get out of here?”

“Sure.” Smoothly, Brady paid the bill, grabbed his coat, and held mine out to help me into it. He was so damn graceful about everything, like it didn’t even faze him that I was blubbering everywhere in the middle of a whole bunch of people. It wasn’t until we got out onto the street, his hand firmly at the small of my back, that the mortification hit.

My God. I’d turned into a Regency romance heroine.

“I can’t believe I just did that,” I admitted, the cold air stinging against the wetness of my cheeks. I scrubbed them more vigorously, as if that could erase my embarrassment.

“What?” Brady asked, voice a low rumble as he let his hand slide more firmly around my waist, pulling me gently into him. “Had a little moment? It’s okay, Quinn.” He looked over at me, expression serious behind the soft smile. “I mean that. It really is okay. You can stop apologizing to me for grieving.”

Frowning slightly, I just leaned into him, letting the streets wash past me, the people, the noises, all of it. It faded away.

“I met Aaron while I was taking a shortcut across the college campus. I, uh, I was doing a presentation for their graphic arts classes. Aaron was out on the lawn with this giant broadsword.” A smile quirked up my lips and I breathed out a laugh. “He was waving it around and I just…. How do you walk away from that? This giant man with red hair and a sword, bellowing about the class system and the political structure of Rome. And he looked over at me where I was standing in this group of people who’d stopped to watch, and he smiled. And that was it, you know?”

Brady’s arm tightened around me slightly. “Yeah,” he murmured, thumb rubbing along my side. “Yeah, I kinda do.”

Feeling a bit worn out, I let my feet follow his until we were standing outside my place. “We didn’t really get coffee,” I offered, quiet, eyes darting up to him and back down again as I struggled to get my key to work. “If you want to come in, uh, maybe we can make some? I don’t have pie, but….”

As my voice trailed off, Brady just gave me a sad little smile. He reached out, gently tucking a strand of my hair back, fingers dropping to straighten the scarf he’d loaned me. “I’d really love to, Quinn,” he said. “But we’re icebergs, remember? Super glacial slow. And if I come in, I’m going to want to kiss you.”

A surge of heat hit me at that, at the way he was looking at me, at how close and gorgeous he was. Following it, though, was a twist of guilt, souring the anticipation and making my eyes drop. He was right there, gently nudging my head back up with two fingers under my chin. “I had a great time tonight,” he told me earnestly, gaze searching mine. “Look, you’re someone who’s still trying to figure everything out. I respect that. And I get that until you do, I’m going to be living with the ghost of your ex for a while. But I like you. We click. So I’m okay with just being your movie buddy for the time being.”

Taking a deep breath, I nodded. “I had a good time too, Brady,” I assured him. I reached out to fuss with his jacket, trying to laugh at my own stupidity. “Even if I was a total spaz.”

“Yeah, well, I like spazzes sometimes,” he rumbled, hands covering mine. We stood like that for a few beats, just warmth and closeness and the depths of his eyes.

I leaned in and kissed his cheek, softly, a bare brush of my lips against his skin. I felt him shudder in a breath under my hands, and he tilted his head to return the touch.

“Tomorrow?” he asked quietly, voice a breath against my ear. “Tracy’s dinner looms.”

I nodded, pulling back with reluctance and a strange, sick twist of relief at the distance. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

With one last smile, one last trail of his fingers against mine, he was gone. And I was alone again.

T
HE
cat got sick on the carpet.

I’d dreamed of Aaron. Nothing earth-shattering—but then again, when the world itself had ended around you, you didn’t long for the grand anymore. I dreamed of his weight in the bed beside me, of the warmth of his legs under the sheets next to mind. I dreamed I wasn’t alone.

And then the goddamn cat got sick on the carpet.

I woke from bliss to the cacophonous
retching sounds of Winston deciding the best way to wake me up was to redeposit his previous dinner on the floor next to my bed. For a moment I just lay there, staring at the ceiling, at the lazy turn of the ceiling fan. Just for a moment, I let myself miss Aaron so much it hurt to breathe.

Winston’s substantial weight landed on my stomach, sharp claws kneading me through the blanket. “Yeah, yeah,” I sighed, rubbing a hand through his fur. Winston arched up into it, a rumbling, rusty purr resonating through him. After a moment, with a head nudge against my arm, he padded over to the empty pillow next to me and collapsed into a furry circle.

So we lay there. Him and me, in a bed that was too big, me staring blankly at the ceiling and watching the fan turn. It wasn’t Aaron’s pillow any longer. Just an empty spot for the cat to nap.

Eventually, I had to move. I cleaned up after Winston, I made coffee, I lived. I went about my life. And the dream of Aaron faded, as they always did, because he wasn’t real. All that personality, that giant, beautiful man, had been reduced to a ghost.

Shuffling into the living room, I looked around, a bit at a loss. I had my coffee in my hand, the sun was peering through the windows, the couch was empty. It seemed a simple equation. But what did I
do
, really? What was the point of sitting? Of drinking the damn coffee, of staring out the window, of doing
anything
? Aaron couldn’t. Instead of warmth and love and laughter, instead of planning our weekend or reading the paper in cozy silence, it would just be me.

I did manage to sit at some point. The coffee was cold by then. It didn’t matter; honestly, I didn’t want to drink it. I wasn’t sure how long I sat curled up on
our
couch that was now
my
couch, but it was long enough that Winston decided to come and check why I wasn’t attending to his every whim. My bare feet were requisitioned as his new nap spot, and he blinked happily at me as his paws made biscuits with the air.

Finally, though, I pulled myself out of the world of shadows and half-seen ghosts. I went to the front door and pulled it open, expecting to find my paper curled up on the front welcome mat. And it was; my paper guy was very meticulous. No paper in the bushes for me. Then again, I didn’t have bushes, so that probably helped.

But next to the paper was a white bakery box.

Frowning, glancing around, I hesitantly picked both up, juggling them as I nudged Winston away from the open door and headed back inside. I wasn’t expecting a package, not that there was a label or anything to give me a hint what it might be. Probably not a bomb. I wasn’t exactly bomb material. Was anthrax still a thing?

After putting the box down on the kitchen table, I pulled a chair over and sat, chin resting on my folded arms, studying it. It didn’t appear to be ticking. And it was too small to hold a head of some kind. Maybe a hand. A smaller body part would definitely fit.

I really needed to stop watching crime television.

“Okay, O’Malley,” I muttered, rolling my shoulders back. “You are not afraid of a white box.” Right. No Brad Pitt moments here.

After tugging open the top, I stared down inside for a long beat, completely speechless.

Inside was a delicious-looking bowl of peach pie filling. Not a crust to be seen.

B
OTTLE
of wine in hand, I knocked on Tracy’s door. I was nervous. I was wearing a corduroy jacket over a T-shirt, I’d shaved, and I was
nervous
going to have dinner with my two best friends. Then again, it wasn’t seeing them that had my stomach in knots.

“Quinn!” Tracy opened the door, her trademark smile filling the room. She bussed a kiss against my cheek, hauling me in for a hug. “I’m so glad you came.”

“And he brought wine.” Annabeth was next, a calm hug following Tracy’s exuberance, both of them feeling more like home than anything else I had left. “My favorite. Someone’s trying to spoil us.”