Love Me Tomorrow (6 page)

Please stop speaking freak-a-zoid
.

“That’s good,” Ruby muttered, grinning at the two of them, visibly pleased with herself. “My Levi needs more friends, I worry he won’t have enough people to take care of him.”

“She’s quite a character.” Jake smirked as Ruby pretended like she’d stopped listening. “And very sweet.”

“For an ex-gangster’s-gun-moll slash Vegas showgirl, yeah… she’s kinda sweet… in her own way.”

Jake took a few steps back, signaling for Levi to follow. “She was pretty frightened and confused before you showed up.”

Levi nodded, looking down at her and feeling terrible that he hadn’t been there for her.

“I think all is clear, but getting her to the hospital for some tests will confirm we didn’t miss anything. My real concern is whether she fell or fainted.”

“Okay, sure, though she does suffer occasional bouts of vertigo, which is why we have the nurse in the first place.”

“She goes through a lot of them, huh?” Jake asked.

“Unfortunately, yes.” Levi glanced down, catching her doing a horrible job pretending not to eavesdrop. “She can be a handful.”

Jake scribbled something else down in his tiny notebook.

Craig called out for help with the gurney from somewhere at the front of the house and Jake ran off.

Levi watched her for a moment as she stared up at the ceiling of her living room. He could tell she was anxious. She’d had a not-so-unnatural fear of hospitals since nearly dying in one all those years ago. In all fairness, Levi didn’t particularly have the warm-n-fuzzies for them either, and she’d landed back in the hospital many times over the years due to bronchial issues which continued to plague her.

Ruby was terrified she’d go into the hospital one of these times and never come back out. He had that same fear, but kept it to himself.

In the time it took them to get Ruby onto the gurney and loaded into the ambulance Levi called his handyman to come out and fix the front door. He gave Jake his cell phone number and asked him to call in the event there were any complications. He hated not getting into the back of that ambulance with her, but he wanted to stay behind and make sure they secured the house before he left.

As the ambulance pulled away, he made a second call to inquire about finding Ruby yet another nurse. He was a little relieved to get the voicemail of the home health service as they were well acquainted with both Levi and Ruby. To say her reputation preceded her was an understatement, but he was also pretty irritated no one had called to inform him that Ruby had let the previous nurse go. That was bullshit and he’d have plenty to say about it. Levi was aware he was upset and a little emotional, neither of which were likely to aid him during the confrontation that was coming.

He stood on the front porch, shivering as the sun was beginning to set, allowing a slight chill in the air to set in. All he could do now was wait—one of his least favorite things. That familiar sense of helplessness came over him and Levi fought hard to force it down.

There wasn’t time for irrational fear now.

He needed to be the rock that his Ruby could cling to until this storm finally passed. He turned and went back inside the house, pushing the door closed behind him, deciding to keep himself occupied by straightening up while he waited.

Distraction over distress had always gotten him through the tough times and today would be no different.

Chapter Three

Levi was aware that he was being silly—waiting outside the box office of the Cinema Paradise at Main and Elm for a guy he was fairly certain wouldn’t show up. Watching a brown leaf scraping along the sidewalk as the wind forced it into movement, he laughed to himself, thinking it was a fairly accurate representation of his love life. Pinning all his hopes on Jake the paramedic to resuscitate his lonely heart was likely asking too much for one man, but Levi couldn’t seem to help himself.

He stood, huddled under the huge marquee which jutted off the building and looked like the grill of a classic car—gentle curves and distinct lines emblazoned in red and gold neon. It was an impressive feature that covered half the sidewalk. The Arabian Nights, Moroccan-themed architectural style was stunning both inside and out. The theatre itself was every bit the escape into a fantasy land as the movies that were projected upon the big screen.

Levi glanced through the glass into the lobby taking in the deep red and gold carpet and the elaborate gold-gilded concession stand. Moviegoers had paid ten cents back when the Cinema Paradise first opened its doors in 1924. The theatre had undergone an extensive restoration back in the early nineties, and the end result had given new life to a beautiful and unique part of Wilde City’s history.

Glancing at his watch yet again, Levi realized his nerves were making it difficult to distract himself. In the three days since Levi had first encountered Jake, he had a terrible time trying to focus on much else. The fact he hadn’t heard from Jake the paramedic, despite having given the man his cell number during all the Ruby-drama, had Levi leaning toward the conclusion that any connection he’d detected between the two them had been completely imagined.

Yet here he stood, pacing back and forth out in the cold air, reeking of desperation.

“So unattractive,” he muttered to himself before blowing warm air onto his hands while wishing he’d had the forethought to grab the pair of gloves from his car.

All negativity aside, part of him was hoping that he was wrong and Jake would show up after all. One-sided or not, Levi had never felt anything like this for an otherwise perfect stranger. There had been an instant connection on his end and he was anxious to find out if it would still be there now, or had it already run its course. It seemed inconceivable either way he looked at it. Now that his professional career was finally beginning to take off, it wouldn’t suck to have a… someone.

He wasn’t a greedy man, Levi just wanted
the one
, someone—and not like Ruby who’d had more ‘ones’ than he could count using all his fingers and toes combined. Truth be told, none of Ruby’s men had ever treated him poorly, but he’d gotten so used to having men come in and out of his life as a child that he wondered if that hadn’t scarred him in some unseen way. In spite of wanting to find ‘the one’ he feared deep down that once found, his ‘one’ would end up leaving him the way all of Ruby’s had abandoned her.

He cringed at that thought, glancing around at the people passing him by on their way inside the theatre, wondering if they knew he was getting stood up.

“Very cold hands,” he muttered, shoving them into his jeans pockets.

He was aware it was silly, not walking the half a block back to his car to grab the damn gloves but he couldn’t seem to force himself to leave, fearing Jake would show up and think Levi hadn’t bothered to come.

His extremities had begun to go numb due to the twenty degree drop in the temperature that happened throughout the day and he cursed cold-fronts in general, declaring them an agent of the devil and a sure sign of the impending apocalypse.

Stupid Beelzebub and his rotten shenanigans, no wonder the fucker had been banished to hell.

Frostbite was no laughing matter considering Levi had grown attached to all his bits and baubles. He stopped pacing for a moment, remembering that movie about the rugby team that crashed in the snowy mountains and were forced to eat their dead teammates in order to survive. He was pretty sure he wouldn’t have it in him to do that—
maybe
—if it were like people he didn’t know, he could perhaps eat them in that situation. But how do you go home after getting rescued and explain to their very confused loved ones exactly what happened to your dead teammate’s right butt cheek?

Apologies, but we got a bit peckish up there and baby had back, m’kay?

Awkward doesn’t even begin to cover that conversation. Butt cheeks don’t typically wander off on their own, right? He looked around, expecting to get an amen or something, then shook the ever-encroaching insanity from his head.

“Can’t for the life of me imagine why someone hasn’t snatched me up yet,” he said under his breath. “Keep your crazy to yourself, cracker.”

His ass bleeped so he reluctantly reached into his back pocket and pulled out his phone. Valerie had sent him a text with an attachment, which was never a good sign. Levi tapped the screen, opening the photo that came with the disclaimer:

Hope your mystery date is doing this to you.

A .gif popped up of two guys fucking doggy style. They’d sped the frame up so much that it looked more like a perverted Looney Tunes cartoon than anything intended to actually arouse.

He turned off the phone altogether wondering why he put up with her nonsense. He decided to give Jake five more minutes before throwing in the towel and going in alone. It then occurred to him to stop being so hard on Valerie. How rude, really, all she wanted to do was get him laid. He wasn’t exactly a saint, by any means—though lately it just hadn’t seemed worth the effort.

The sensation of being watched came over Levi and when turning to his right, he spotted the lady sitting inside the ticket booth who was staring at him. Her pity-expression was unmistakable. She knew he was getting stood up, too. It was humiliating enough that she’d asked him to verify three times that he wanted to purchase
two
tickets for the movie this week.

So yeah, he typically came to the movies by himself.

Was it necessary to act as if the world had spun off its axis at the thought he might actually have a real date?

The thing that he’d never understood to begin with was why people got so hinky about going to the movies alone? He’d have never thought anything of it if other people hadn’t made such a big deal about it. Valerie acted as if going alone to a movie theatre was worse than catching an STD. Why anyone required a companion to go sit in a darkened theatre, where conversation was typically frowned upon, was beyond him. Add to that fact, when watching a movie, people were supposed to be looking up at the screen, not at the person sitting next to them, so Levi was at a loss over the whole thing.

Levi’s eyes bugged out slightly, seeing the ticket booth lady grinning at him like a total freak. Then she started pointing at him and he began to get pissed, thinking she was now making fun of him for getting stood up.

Totally f’in rude!

He screamed and nearly jumped out of his skin when someone grabbed his shoulder and said, “Hello.”

Levi’s reaction had in turn scared the crap out of Jake, who had taken a few steps back while clasping his hand over his heart as if attempting to keep it from popping out of his chest.

“Shit, dude,” Jake said, starting to chuckle.

“Sorry… so…
gah
… sorry.” Levi reached over, briefly taking Jake’s hand to punctuate his apology with a gentle squeeze.

“Think we should take our act on the road?” Jake asked, nudging his head to Levi’s side.

He turned to see the ticket booth bitch was laughing her ass off at the two of them, all but hunched over as she wiped her eyes which had apparently teared up in amusement. She was shaking her hand at them as if that was supposed to suffice as some sort of an apology.

It was at that point Levi started to laugh as well.

Jake shook his head. “Let me go grab a ticket, so we can get out of this cold.”

He looked every bit as dreamy as Levi remembered, potentially even more so considering three days absence had definitely made his heart grow fonder.

He fished his wallet from his back pocket and pulled out two tickets. “I’ve got you covered.”

Jake’s eyebrows arched, signifying he was surprised by that. “You were pretty confident I was coming then?”

“You’re welcome.” Levi grinned, handing Jake one of the tickets while adding sarcastically, “Most men find me irresistible, so you showing up is not so much of a shock.”

Jake pulled open one of the massive glass and brass doors, insisting Levi go in first. “I see, and I thank you for the ticket and insist on purchasing the popcorn and beverages.”

“You have yourself a deal, mister,” Levi said.

“Had for the price of movie theatre snacks?” Jake hissed. “I’m disappointed, Levi. I’d planned on having to work
much
harder to impress you.”

“I’m a concession stand slut from way back,” Levi said, sniffing and puffing himself up while pulling up on his britches.

Jake laughed, taking Levi by the arm and leading him through the lobby and into one of the lines at the concession stand.

Walking through the doors into theatre was like being enveloped in opulence. The wood beams and ornate detail throughout the interior were actually molded plaster which had been painstakingly refurbished during the remodel. Levi imagined what it must have been like for the average-Joe back in the day, before the internet and ease of travel had been developed.

Must’ve been like walking into another world
.

“You didn’t have to wait outside for me in the cold, FYI,” Jake said as they waited patiently for the people in front of them to decide what snacks to get. “I could have found you inside.”

“I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to find me without a little help considering I wasn’t unconscious or flailing about on the ground bleeding out.”