Heart on a Shoestring (3 page)

I shaved off my beard and filled the sink with way more hair than I thought I had on my face. Traded my rugged look for a long-haired Jon Bon Jovi. Not for too long though. I stuffed everything I needed into a backpack and drove to the closest hair salon, told the lady to give me a Keith Urban look, then walked out like a new person hoping to high hell no one noticed me.

When I parked in front of Matt’s house a few hours later I inhaled and exhaled and forced myself out of the car. One step, two step, three steps closer to showing her one piece of who I really was. Scared the heck out of me.

I almost went back to the car, but Matt opened the door and narrowed his eyes, looked me up and down, and said, “Gavin, come quick. I think I’m dreaming.” 

Gavin stood in the doorway and smiled. “Normal looks good on you.”

I shook my head and walked passed them, straight to Ella. Weird seeing my little sister pregnant. She lifted her hand from her stomach to hug me, then tousled my hair. “Who ya trying to impress?”

“Just time for a change.”

She smirked as though she didn’t believe me. I never won any awards for lying or acting. Just for hiding.

Lydia walked over with a newborn wrapped in some kind of fabric contraption on her chest.

“Is that from Africa or something?” I said.

She laughed. “No. It’s a Boba Wrap. Never seen one before?”

Seeing a newborn wrenched my heart. Every time. Never failed. I often wondered if I’d ever be able to look at a baby without feeling horrible inside. Worse than horrible actually. The past haunted me in every newborn I saw. Every time. I tried to ignore the little hand all curled up and poking out of that fabric thing, but I couldn’t.

The past is the past. But really, is it ever? I spent years ignoring David Bennett. Years ignoring everything tied to him, including Ashleigh. The girl that ruined my life. Well, that’s not really fair. I ruined my own life by chasing her. And now I tried to ruin her life by ignoring her, by withholding the resolution she wanted. The ending I wasn’t sure I could give. But could I avoid her forever? The past is the past, yes, but it’s also part of who I am. Whether I liked it or not. My past was more of me than the future I wished it could be.

“Deep in thought?” Ella said.

I shrugged. Miranda walked in. Hair the color of a lime. Clothes like something out of Flashdance. I liked her. A lot. Fun girl. Amazingly brilliant. But why did she feel the need to hide her stunning beauty behind odd hairstyles and weird clothes? It didn’t make sense.

She ignored me until I walked over to her, took her hand, and apologized. A softness replaced her clenched jaw and she squeezed my hand.

“I want to take you somewhere,” I said. “Get away for a little. I planned an amazing vacation. You think Dee will be okay without you for a few days?”

“She will. But will we be okay with each other for a few days?”

I nodded, pleading with my eyes, hoping she would come away with me.

Okay, breathe Miranda. This is the same guy that looked like a freak yesterday, I told myself. A freak in a normal way. Now, he looked like something straight out of a Calvin Klein ad. I stopped myself from imagining it. Okay, so I didn’t stop myself. Wow. Okay. Breathe.

He asked again. “Will you come or not?”

“When?”

“Right after this party.”

“No.”

“Tomorrow?”

I shrugged. “Let me think about it.”

So, I’m not a judge a book by the cover person. Normally. My favorite books are obscure, have the least intriguing covers, and captivate me because of the story, not the models on the cover. But if I were judging a book by its cover ...
The Derek Rhodes Story
just moved up to the best sellers list in my world.

I do realize how superficial that sounds. And I’m not normally so shallow, but the guy was beyond gorgeous with all that hair gone. It shocked me. I tried not to watch him across the room as I talked to Ella and Lydia.

“You and my brother are still trying to tell yourselves that you don’t like each other?” Ella said. “You haven’t stopped staring at him since you got here.”

“What happened in his past that made him so strange?”

“Not sure. He went off to college and stopped talking to us for years. He could’ve been dead for all we know. He came back one day and looked like a different person. Long hair. Beard. Major chip on his shoulder.”

“What did he go to school for?”

“Marketing or business or something.”

I turned to Lydia as she bounced her baby in the wrap. “What did you name him? I can’t remember.”

She smiled at the baby and held his hand. “His name is Liam.”

I glanced at Derek. He glanced at me. Butterflies.

“What was Derek like in high school?” I said to Ella.

“Intelligent, but stupid.”

I laughed. “How so?”

“Let’s just say this. He was Prom King and voted Most Likely to Succeed, but behind the scenes he was a major pot head.” She turned to him. “He was popular, but maintained his grades and graduated top of the class. All while being known as ‘High Roller’ because he always found the best marijuana.”

I stared at her, possibly blinked a few times.

“I know it’s hard to imagine. When he went to college something happened to him. He hasn’t been the same since. Won’t tell anyone.”

“Wow,” Lydia said. “Where did he go to college?”

“Don’t know. He never told anyone. Strange, but we weren’t close at that point so I never asked much. We are closer now, but he won’t tell me what happened. Believe me, I’ve asked a thousand times.” She looked at him again. “I always hoped he’d find a girl to show him a different side of life. Help him live a little.” She turned to me. “He needs to laugh again.”

“No, no,” I said. “I’m not the girl.”

She grinned and shrugged. I shook my head as she laughed my unwillingness away. As much as I denied her prodding, I admit he intrigued me. A mysterious man who needed to learn to live. Yes. Exactly the kind of thing I liked.

A challenge.

I walked over to him. Engrossed in a conversation about concrete and gravel with the guys, he didn’t notice me. I linked my arm with his and smiled. 

He looked down at me, unlinked his arm, and said, “So you’ll go?”

I nodded. “On one condition.”

He stepped aside and led me to the kitchen. “What?”

“Once we get there you have to answer every question I have without hiding the truth.”

He walked around the kitchen in two circles, then stopped, put his hands in his pockets, and said, “Sorry. I can’t do that.”

“Then I’m not going.”

He shoved his hands deeper into his pockets. “I will tell you some things, but not all.”

“Why do you want to go on vacation with me of all people?”

Matt walked in. “Look at you two love buttons.”

“More like one ferromagnetic magnet repelling another paramagnet who seems to only have a North Pole and can’t seem to align himself with the South Pole of the ferromagnetic magnet.” I took a breath. “Actually, no, maybe it’s just a case of diamagnetism.”

Matt stopped whatever he was doing, hand mid-air, eyes peeled back, and waited for Derek’s response.

“It’s not diamagneticism.” Derek said. “My electrons are not spin-paired. And don’t be so sure of yourself. You’re not ferromagnetic either. If our subshells were completely filled with electrons then we wouldn’t be able to affect each other as much. But we do. We are just normal paramagnets. Take us away from each other and we may lose our power, put us together and we may push and pull, attract and repel, but we’re not diamagnetic and I don’t know about you, but I think there’s some kind of external magnetic field here that helps us become magnetic.”

Matt laughed. “Wow. Okay. Well, um, more power to you both. I will be in here with the humans.”

I smiled. “You know your chemistry.”

He nodded. “I know chemistry when I see it.”

Maybe my magnetism speech convinced her to be spontaneous with me, whatever the case we ended up at her apartment after the party. I sat on her bed and watched her pack twenty six shirts, fifteen pants, eight shorts, six skirts, forty-two dresses, eleven leggings and tights, nineteen pairs of shoes, six bottles of hair dye, a ton of jewelry, and an entire suitcase devoted to makeup and hair products. I didn’t say a word. Smiled, nodded, and placed her seven luggage contraptions next to my solitary backpack filled with one brown shirt, a pair of pants, my bathing suit, a toothbrush, and one clean pair of underwear. 

She sat in the passengers seat and exhaled. I shut her door, sat down beside her, and said, “You do realize we are only going to be gone a week, right?”

“I like to be prepared.”

Understatement of the century.

We drove a while until we hit tons of traffic. After sitting there staring at bumpers, we decided to stop and get something to eat. GPS led us to a Red Lobster in Maryland. We ordered, blinked at each other, and ate.

“You haven’t said a word since we left.” She smoothed her lime hair into a pony tail. “Where are we going anyway?”

“A cruise.”

“Are you serious? That’s one of my biggest fears.”

“A cruise?”

“Um, yes. Remember
Titantic
?”

I laughed. “Well, we’re not going on a ship so don’t worry.”

“Do you have any fears?”

“Heights.”

“Heights? As in airplanes or ladders?”

“Both.”

“Tell me why you want me to do this.”

“Because we both need a vacation and you happen to be my closest friend right now.”

“More like your only friend.”

“Pretty much.”

“Unlike you to be so agreeable.”

“Unlike you to be so sarcastic.”

She smiled.

“So, you ready?” I said.

“No.” She put her elbows on the table and leaned forward. “Not until you answer a question for me.”

“Depends on the question.”

“It can’t. You have to answer or I’m not getting back in your car.”

“What if I picked you up and tied you down?”

“Kinky, huh?”

“Do you flirt with everyone or do I get special treatment?”

She hesitated. Unsure of which answer would upset me the most. I gave the waitress my card and watched Miranda put her hair down again and braid it.

“Do you ever sit still?” I said.

She straightened her shoulders, closed her eyes like someone about to do a yoga session, and stayed like that until the waitress set the check on the table. Miranda popped up and snorted like a pig on steroids. The waitress jumped and knocked over a glass of water, then walked away in a huff. 

“What the hell was that?” I said as I signed the bill and gave the girl a fifty dollar tip. “I’m starting to think twice here.” I shook my head. Her child-like spirit refreshed the dying parts of me. After living alone in a desert at the bottom of an empty well, I needed a drink. Too many years hiding. Too many years wasted. Her stubborn pride annoyed me, but the more time I spent with her the more I remembered life before David Bennett stole the very breath from my lungs.

“You gonna answer my question or what?” she said, with no intentions of giving up.

“Sure.”

“Why did you go off to college and not even tell your family what you were doing?”

“How do you know that?”

“Ella said you never told anyone where you went. Just disappeared.”

“Honestly?”

She nodded.

“The tip of that iceberg is simple. I was ashamed.”

For the first time since I met Miranda, that brisk autumn day when my sister got married in a field, we held eye contact for longer than two seconds. She analyzed my eyes for clues as I admired the flecks of gold stretching across hers. We didn’t stop staring into each other until an old man fell beside our table. His cane hit my leg and Miranda knelt beside him before I even realized what happened. 

I checked his pulse, then pressed my ear against his nose. His chest stopped moving and I felt no breath on my skin. Pulse non-existent. “Miranda,” I said. “Go to my car and grab the little red lunchbox-looking thing from under the passengers seat.”

She jogged off as I pressed my palm into his chest and shoved my body weight into the poor man. After thirty chest compressions I positioned his head, pinched his nose, and exhaled a gentle puff of air into his mouth, then started compressions again. Miranda returned and dropped the AED on the floor beside me. I took it out, bypassed the promptings, and gave Miranda scissors. “Cut his shirt down the middle.” I motioned to everyone hovered around. “Please move back. I need everyone to take a step back.”  I took off my button-down shirt and wiped his chest dry, then placed two pads on him and attached the cables. A young woman, maybe the man’s daughter, gripped his hand. “Ma’am please step back. I can’t have you touch him right now.” She listened as I pressed the button allowing the AED to analyze the heart rhythm. Once it finished I told everyone to stand back again and I pressed the orange button to activate the shock. Back to compressions.

Sirens blasted through the restaurant. People cleared a path for the EMS. I delivered a quick speech. Told them what I did. Patient slightly responsive. Then I grabbed the AED and walked to my car. Fast. Completely unaware that I had forgotten Miranda until she sat in the car beside me, shut the door, and put her hands in her lap.

I turned the keys in the ignition, watched the man’s stretcher-cradled body slip into the back of the ambulance. Had been a while since I’d done that. Something about it felt ... almost ... wrong.

Miranda’s hand cut through the summer wind as she put her blue toenails on the dashboard, tilted her head back, and closed her eyes. The sun glistened on her cheeks as I veered back onto the highway, inhaled deeply, and shifted into third gear. With the click of a button the sunroof opened, casting warmth on our faces. Miranda opened her eyes. Looked at me. Smiled.

I looked away, afraid of what I might find if I stared too long in her direction. She opened the glove compartment and rummaged through the envelopes. All hundred and seven of them.

“Any pens in here?” she said.