Hell on Heels (21 page)

Walking through the open door, he stopped and looked at me.

I mean really looked at me, like he was studying me.

“You doin’ okay with the holidays and all?” He remembered about Henry.

That was nice.

I shrugged.

“Tell your parents I said hi?”

This caught me off guard. It seemed like such a casual thing to say.

“Sure,” I told him.

Reaching out a hand, he grabbed the front of my parka and gently pulled me to him.

“Merry Christmas, Charlie,” he whispered.

His lips brushed mine, slow and nostalgic.

Then he let me go and walked backwards down the hallway with a smile on his face.

For the first time, I watched him go. When he disappeared into the stairwell, I went back inside.

Leighton arrived a few hours later with all her luggage direct from the airport and Greek takeout. We completed a marathon that consisted of the first three
Saw
movies and decorated our Charlie Brown tree, which Leighton complained was not ugly enough.

I went to sleep that night feeling a little more like me than I had in a long time.

C
hristmas had been brutal, as it always was for the Smith family, my family.

Four chairs at the dinner table, but only three still held loved ones.

Four hooks on the fireplace, but only three stockings.

There was a lifetime of memories in that beach house, some bad but mostly good, and it took our three hearts together to survive each wave of reminiscing as it hit.

We all missed Henry, but it was my dad who seemed to suffer the most.

He was quiet, chewing down the edge of his glasses while we played cards and told stories. When he laughed, it had an emptiness to it that made my soul ache just a little bit more. I knew his misplaced guilt got heavier as the weather got colder.

Mom and I visited Henry on Christmas Eve, burying two Poinsettias in the snow at the base of his tree. We knew they’d wilt and die quickly with the chill, but we didn’t mind. Back when he loved Christmas, he’d cover every square inch of the house with them.

“It hurts to miss you so much,” I’d told him, my knees in the white.

“I know, Charlie bear.”

His voice had picked up in the wind, and even though Doctor Colby said it wasn’t him, it still felt like him.

“Watch over them for me, will you?” he asked.

I’d pressed my lips to the frost covering the bark and promised him, “Always.”

“That’s my girl.”

“Merry Christmas, Henry,” I whispered.

My tears had become ice in the snow.

“Merry Christmas, Charlie bear.”

The twenty-fifth came and went.

I left my parents with goodbyes and boarded a first-class flight to Mexico on the afternoon of the twenty-sixth.

Work had been obscene. I didn’t think I’d seen so many holiday parties in all the years since I’d started Smith & Co Productions. As a rule, and as a company, we did not plan any events between Christmas and the New Year. Of course there had been exceptions over the year, but typically we did not. It was something I found important, that my staff spend that time with their loved ones. They worked hard and we made good money. Mostly, I knew how precious time was, and I wanted that time for them.

As such, on the twenty-third of each year, our offices closed. Tina and Tom remained in the city, as both their families were local, and they offered to manage the emergency line while I was out of town. Every time they offered, I graciously accepted.

It was the thirty-first, six days into our vacation, and we were at Cancun’s best New Years Eve party on the beach.

Half naked bodies pulsed to the beat of the music, and a man on stage hollered out the five-minute warning to countdown.

“I’ll go get the champagne!” Leighton yelled into my ear, and I nodded. “You stay with him.” She laughed and pointed to Kevin.

He was feeling no pain and was currently on a small dance podium attempting to outshine two bikini-clad women. This, of course, was entertaining, because Kevin danced like an injured leather jacket. Limbs everywhere.

Leighton returned with three glasses of champagne, and I pressed the cool glass against my forehead. “It’s so hot.”

“I know.” She fanned herself and reached up to tug on the hem of Kevin’s barely there board shorts.

He looked down at us and grinned. “Get up here!” he screamed and shook his ass.

“No way.” Leighton laughed and held his flute up to him. He grabbed her by the wrist instead, hauling her up onto the little stage.

It was a miracle her champagne and his managed to stay mostly in the glasses.

She squealed and slapped at his arm. “Kevin!”

He twisted his upper body to the beat, not a care in the world, and looked down at me. “You’re turn.”

Putting my hand in his, I let him pull me up between the two of them.

And we danced.

We danced so hard our thighs burned and we dripped with sweat.

I was sober.

They weren’t.

And that didn’t matter.

Kevin and Leighton were my people.

You know what I mean, right? The ones who notice that behind the makeup, your eyes are tired, and behind the laughter, your heart is heavy, and all the while know that your mind is no less in relentless pursuit of adventure.

Those were your people.

Those were the people who really mattered.

The announcer started to count down and the crowd joined him.

Ten.

Nine.

Eight.

Seven.

Kevin pulled me into his side and I wrapped my arm around Leighton’s shoulders.

Six.

Five.

Four.

I wondered if this year perhaps I wouldn’t find the man I wanted, but the woman I wanted to be.

Three.

Two.

She was something I could make happen. Someone I could love.

One.

“Happy New Year!” I shouted, as the party erupted around us.

Leighton kissed my cheek.

I kissed hers.

Kevin kissed me on the lips.

I kissed his.

Leighton kissed Kevin on the lips.

He kissed her.

We all clinked our champagne flutes together.

“May 2017 be the year I do nothing but shag and make money!” Kevin screamed.

We toasted again.

Leighton went next. “May 2017 be the year I never use internet dating again!” she shouted above the crowd.

Kevin and I laughed, but we toasted again.

My turn.

“May 2017 be the year I let go.” I didn’t yell mine; instead, I simply said it out loud.

“I’ll cheers to that, babe.” Leighton clinked her glass on mine.

Kevin rested his head on my shoulder. “Me too.”

The classic tune of Auld Lang Syne gave way to a newer beat and the dance floor was flooded with bubbles. The elated crowd started to pulse again, as the New Year had been officially rung in.

My hips swayed and my hands twisted their way into the air.

There was something powerful about not being able to hear your own thoughts over the music. You had nothing to do but move.

Get lost in the rhythm and enjoy a natural high.

My face was red and my hair was wet by the time we moved back to the bar.

“I’ll have a slippery nipple.” Kevin winked at the very good-looking, very straight bartender and I shook my head.

“Get me one too!” Leighton shoved his arm.

I leaned forward and tapped her on the shoulder. “I’m really hot. I’m just going to go down to the beach for a few minutes.” I had to practically yell it over the noise.

She frowned. “Are you okay? Do you need me to come with you?”

“I’m fine.” I shook my head. “Just hot from dancing. Keep an eye on Casanova.”

I motioned to Kevin with a chin tilt and she nodded. “Okay, we’ll be here or back at the little podium thingy.”

“Okay.”

Turning my back to them, I moved through the crowd. It was easy. Everyone was moving towards the dance floor, but I was moving away from it. Finally, the heat of the crowd lifted as I took the stairs down to the beach.

The breeze picked up and felt refreshing on the warmth of my skin.

I loved the beach.

Wandering not too far from the resort, I walked closer to the ocean and sat down in the sand.

It was cool from the night air and I fisted my fingers into it.

Life had a funny way of testing you.

My test was grief.

Grief was like a freight train. It runs you down, and after, you do the best you can to pick up the pieces of what’s left and put yourself back together again.

In nearly a decade, I hadn’t found all my pieces.

Maybe that meant I failed my test, or maybe it didn’t.

The more aware I became of who I was, the more I was sure that life’s tests didn’t have an expiration date. Some people passed or failed theirs right away, while others took years just to know they were being tested.

That was me.

I’d had more in common with the beach than I’d ever really known. Just like it, I’d kept my head buried and let the souls of thousands of others walk through me.

I didn’t want to be like the sand anymore. I wanted to be like the ocean.

I wanted to be my own.

I wanted people to love me, but fear me, simply because who I was demanded that respect from them.

The ebb and flow of the tide would be my sanctuary, where my grief and acceptance would come to pass.

Yes, I was a lot like the beach.

My past was in the sand and my future was in the waves themselves.

“Char! Is that you?”

I turned my head to see Leighton and Kevin stumbling towards me in the dark.

“It’s me!” I called back.

They ran, plopping down, one on each side of me.

“I’m exhausted.” Kevin rested his head on my shoulder.

Leighton sighed and placed her head on my other shoulder. “I’m getting too old to party.”

I laughed.

“You good, Char?” Kevin asked.

Leighton wrapped her arms around one of mine.

“I’m getting there.”

We sat there for hours, watching the tide roll in before we dragged ourselves to our villa, to bed.

“Happy New Year, Charlie bear,”
Henry whispered in my dreams.

I was happy.

I was still wounded, but I was happy.

And the first four days of 2017 were spent in the sunshine eating everything that wasn’t good for us.

All killer, no filler
, as Henry used to say.

Valentine’s Day, the Hallmark holiday, the holiday that women everywhere seemed to either love or hate, no in-between.

I was spending mine with Beau Callaway, so that ought to tell you what side I fell on for this particular year.

After I returned home from Mexico, life resumed its usual hectic lullaby. January was consumed with a last minute event for shotgun nuptials, and thus, I hadn’t seen much of any of The Charleston Three, as Kevin had so dubbed them.

They no doubt lived lives that didn’t entirely revolve around me, or I them, and that was okay.

Doctor Colby said it was a healthy integration of lives.

I was so inclined to believe her.

So, when Beau called last week and asked if he could take me out for Valentine’s Day, I’d eagerly accepted his invitation to spend some time together.

He was picking me up at my office.

“You look like a heartbreaker, Char,” Kevin drawled from his position in my desk chair.

He helped me decide between three dresses, eventually settling on a slightly above the knee blood red dress that was low cut in the front, with a crisscross lace up to keep the ladies in their assigned seating.

I turned from side to side in the mirror. “Are you sure it’s not too much?”

The black platformed pumps made my round butt sit perky in a way that I loved, but I was worried the dress was too bold for Beau.

“It’s not too much.”

Kevin and I both swung our heads to the doorway to see Beau leaning against the frame, in a black suit with a grey dress shirt and holding two-dozen white roses.

“Hey.” I smiled.

He walked towards me, pressing a hand to the small of my back, and kissed me.