Remember When 2 (18 page)

   I stammered at an apology, but he was already on his feet, tossing out too many bills onto the table before grabbing his jacket and storming out the door.

   I sat, stunned, taking a moment to recover from the death stare and raging tirade he’d just aimed at me. I’d never been witness to either before, and if I didn’t know him as well as I did, his barely controlled malice might have even scared me. I knew he posed me no personal harm, but I didn’t know who that guy was in the body of my old friend Trip, turning those sweet blue eyes cold, angry at the world and speaking in a voice that wasn’t his.

   It took an extra minute before my body remembered how to move as I exited the booth and met him outside. He was sitting at the curb near a pile of black garbage bags on the sidewalk, smoking a cigarette. Considering the basis for our little misunderstanding, I shouldn’t have been standing there thinking about how hot he looked while dragging on his Marlboro. But he did, so I did.

   He took a long pull off his cig, and I watched the tension drain from his body on the exhale. I gave out a shaky breath myself.

   “So you smoke now?”

   He was calm, almost shy, as he returned, “No. My character does. It kinda sucked me in. I’m quitting once we’re done filming.” He stood and pulled a box out of his jacket pocket. “Want one?”

   I’d never been a regular smoker, but I’d been known to indulge in the occasional ciggie every now and again. I slipped one from his offered pack and he lit it, cupping the end around the flame with his free hand, his fingertips grazing my chin.

   I took a drag, only spurting out a small cough and wincing at the taste on the first pull. Then it was like riding a bike to continue smoking the rest of it.

   “I think you misunderstood me in there,” I started in, gesturing to the diner behind us. “I didn’t mean-”

   “I know what you meant. I’m sorry. I don’t know why I took it the way I did.” His expression was sheepish, his tone placating. “I wasn’t yelling at
you
.”

   “Coulda fooled me.”

   He aimed hopeful eyes in my direction, embarrassed by his outburst. “I’m really sorry, Lay. There’s no excuse for my behavior.”

   There wasn’t. Except maybe all those drinks he’d consumed over the course of the evening. But I knew Trip was genuinely ashamed of himself, and it was time to let the poor guy off the hook. “It’s okay. I’m sorry, too. I didn’t mean to call you gorgeous.”

   Trip opened his mouth to say something, but stopped when he registered what I’d just said. We stood there staring at each other for a moment, until finally, he burst out laughing and I joined him, relieved to have broken the tension.

   We recovered from our chuckling, and I got serious to add quietly, “I’d like to think I know you well enough that I can get away with saying that. You know that’s not all I think of you.”

   His expression softened as he replied, “I know. It’s fine, coming from you. I forget that that’s a compliment in other parts of the world.” He took a long pull off his cigarette with lips that were just made for smoking and swiped a hand through his unruly hair.

   Hell, cancer be damned. The move was so James Dean and he looked freaking hot.

   I will remind you that I’d just been given permission to think that.

   “Out there,” he went on, pointing to California as if it were around the corner, “it’s all anyone cares about. Appearance is like a religion to those people.”

   By “those people”, I knew he was referring to the Powers That Be; the studio heads, directors, and casting agents he was forced to cater to, kiss a bit of ass, and smile through their show-pony appraisal. It had to be maddening to have to act so compliant about something so shallow, so exhausting to have to go through that just to get a job. A job not solely based on his abilities or talent or work ethic, but whether or not he looked the part.

   Even with that aggravation, I still thought that he’d developed a rather short fuse. “But even still. Why are we fighting? This isn’t us.”

   I shivered at having used the word
us
. The implication that there was actually any sort of
us
to refer to. Our past
us
had been pretty great, but I didn’t know if I had any basis to compare who we were with the people we had turned into. I didn’t quite know what this present version of
us
was.

   “Don’t you know?” he asked softly, and I was momentarily staggered at the thought that he’d read my mind, until I realized I had asked him a question out loud.

   He looked at me then, pure longing in his eyes... eyes which were travelling the length of me slowly, from the tip of my head right down to the pink nailpolish on my toes, before gliding back up to rest on my face. I actually felt the look along my body as though it were a physical touch, my skin tingling with the caress of his idle review. “When you want something you can’t have, it can get... frustrating.”

  
I’ll bet.

   I made myself meet his eyes, despite the obvious peril, and saw the panty-dropping smirk he was aiming full-force at me. I tried to convince myself we weren’t actually doing anything wrong even though said panties had pretty much melted clean off my body and disintegrated into thin air.

   “So, you’re frustrated?” I asked.

   “Very.”

   He continued devouring me with his lazy grin, his sensual tone, and his smoldering blue eyes. Obviously, he was unsatisfied about more than just a decent movie role.

   “Yeah. Me too.”

   Our eyes locked, each of us burning for the other, wanting so badly to bridge the gap, but waiting for the other one to make the first move. I could have had him right then, could have crooked my finger in his direction or taken half a step toward his beautifully obliging form and had him respond accordingly. And had I received any sort of invitation from him, I would have done the same.

   But neither one of us took that chance.

   Fact was, we were both promised to other people. No matter how much I thought the underwear model was wrong for him, no matter how peeved I was at Devin at that moment, no matter how much history Trip and I had between us... we both knew damn well the difference between right and wrong.

   Sharing some memories? Fine. Flirting just a little? No problem. I’d already written off our kiss at the hotel as an involuntary reaction. A habit. Like smoking. A sense-memory long forgotten, brought back to the surface once we found ourselves in the same room together after so many years. Cigs were made to be sucked into my lungs; Trip’s mouth was made to suck my lips.

   Both were equally as dangerous to my heart.

   After the hotel, we’d just needed a few extra days to break out of the pattern, and now we were simply testing the limits of our resistance, pushing ourselves to see just how far we could bend without breaking. It wasn’t easy, but we both knew that going out of our way to wind up back in each other’s arms would be taking things too far. Feeding the addiction.

   Because this time it would be intentional.

   I dropped the cigarette to the sidewalk and smothered it with my shoe. Trip threw his in the street, and then I hailed a cab.

Chapter 18

FINAL DESTINATION

   Trip had insisted that he escort me home, even though the
TRU
was right down the street from the diner. He wouldn’t take no for an answer, explaining that he only had a couple more nights in town and wanted to spend some of that limited time with me. On the ride back to my apartment, we’d gotten caught up in a conversation about his family, so we sent the cab driver on his way and stood out on the sidewalk to continue talking. I wasn’t surprised to find that his mother still lived in that great big mansion up in Norman Hills. I
was
surprised to find that most of her time was being consumed with the task of caring for her sick husband.

   Apparently, Terrence Chester Wilmington II had spent the better part of the past decade in and out of the hospital, dealing with a slew of medical problems due to all that heavy drinking over the years.

   Trip tried to impart the news to me casually, but I’m sure it had to be tearing him up inside. I knew all too well how difficult it was to love someone who’d made your life so hard. Believe me, with a mother like mine, I knew.

   Sometimes, you get to thinking that it would be easier for everyone if that someone was just gone—
poof!
—vanished from the Earth, so you could just go on with your life, perfectly fine without them. Out of sight, out of mind. But it doesn’t work as cleanly as that. Because then comes the guilt of even thinking such a thing about someone whom you’re supposed to love. And then you get angry all over again that
they
can’t seem to find it in themselves to love
you
unconditionally back.

   When do you quit wishing for things to be different? Months? Years? Decades? You think that if a sufficient amount of time goes by, it should be enough to help you stop caring anymore. But it doesn’t. Ever.

   I changed the subject, trying to wind things down, hating the idea of ending our evening, knowing it was well past time to do so. There was just so much catching up to do and nine years was a long time to cover within a few, stolen hours.

   We considered going for a walk around Washington Square Park, but nearly abandoned parks in the middle of the night weren’t normally the safest place to be in the city, even though we knew that in all probability, the most dangerous people we’d run into would be the drunken frat boys walking home from the bars. The jazz club at the street level of my building would be too loud, we’d already been to a diner, and the coffee shop around the corner wasn’t even open yet, so I figured we’d just have to do our talking right there on the sidewalk in front of my apartment.

   But then, because I’m an idiot, I found myself inviting him inside.

   Okay. Let me just stop right here and say that I know what you’re thinking. And I get it, really. Like, why would I go and put myself in such a dangerous position? Wasn’t I just guaranteeing that Trip and I would wind up rolling around in my sheets the second we got in the door? So, yeah, I hear you, I really do. But the simple fact of the matter is this:

   Trip Fucking Wiley asked to see my apartment.

   I had convinced myself by that point that I was older now, stronger, better able to resist him. I was sure I could handle myself accordingly. Hell, hadn’t we just proved that outside the diner? This was a once-in-a-lifetime reunion with not only the greatest boyfriend I’d ever had (aside from Devin, of course), but the last night I’d get to spend with a very dear old friend. Plus, I was never in the habit of telling that boy no.

   Especially since he was very, very good at getting me to tell him yes.

   So, I found myself leading Trip up the echo-chamber stairwell, all three flights of clangy steel and solid concrete that led to my apartment. I managed to get my shaking hands around my keys and unlocked the door, leading him inside with a sweeping motion of my arm. “Welcome to the penthouse.”

   He chuckled, then strolled into my humble abode, taking in the space with a peremptory glance around my living room. A vision of my dream passed before my eyes, picturing the scene that had played out right there on that very futon. I banished the image from my mind as he wandered into my kitchen and started laughing.

   The rest of my apartment was as tastefully decorated as I could manage, but my kitchen was like a pop culture museum. It was the one room I allowed my inner child to indulge. Some of the stuff I had hoarded away years before and had simply dug out of my father’s attic when I got my own place. But I was quite the shopper in those days, too; whether it was a garage sale in Jersey or popping in to check out one of the many quirky shops in NYC, I’d managed to buy back a few additional pieces from my childhood. The entire space above my cabinets was crammed with toys and games and stuff, and some of it had managed to trickle down into the rest of the room.

   Trip tapped at the Makit & Bakit “stained glass” rainbow suction-cupped to my window, ran his hand over the Wonder Woman cookie jar on my stove. He rifled through the basket of action figures on top of my microwave, giving Stretch Armstrong a good pull before arranging He-Man and Strawberry Shortcake into a compromising position on the counter, fairly pleased with himself. He spotted the Star Wars calendar on the wall and jabbed a finger at the square marked “
Trip
TRU
11:00
”.

   “And so it begins,” he smiled out, looking right at me with a cocked brow.

   I was leaning in the doorway, smiling back, and all I could think was:
It began long before that, pal
.

   He turned, smirking, and I felt the alarm bells going off. He started coming
right for me
, and I was caught unaware as I watched him step purposefully in my direction. I froze in that split second… before realizing that he was merely brushing by me on his way into my bedroom.

   I shook my head, trying to jog my brain back into thinking platonic thoughts, and followed Trip into my room. I wasn’t surprised to find him doing a perimeter check.