Estranged Heart

Twelve

Elijah

Arriving home, I get out of my car and rush inside. My clothes are still damp from . . . Why do I not know his name? I can’t keep calling him Flower Shop Guy.

I don’t remember Landon referring to him as anything other than Stacey’s husband. He’s married and was acting as much a fool as I was. We were being careless in public with barely a single brain cell working between the two of us. He touched me and I was tongue tied. Then when he kept saying words Landon used to, I lost all logic and kissed him. Fuck, it felt good too. He was warm and perfect in my arms. We pressed tightly together and the feel of his heart against mine struck something inside me, causing hot flames to flicker between us.

Wrong doesn’t even begin to describe what we did. His ring digging into my skin wasn’t enough to stop me either. I haven’t felt that whole in a long time. He was a stranger but felt like a missing piece to my puzzle that broke off the day I lost Landon. He’s not him. He’ll never be. No one can replace what I lost. I was lonely, grieving, and a mess. He was nothing but a distraction that I needed in order to escape the hell I’ve been trapped in.

Every time he’s around me it’s like a current is pushing us together, and I can’t explain why but I want to stay as close to him as possible. No one has ever held my attention that long other than Landon. I didn’t think anyone else ever could, especially not this soon. As good looking as the stranger is, that’s not what draws me to him. In fact, I can’t explain what it is that makes me feel so at peace and settled when he’s near.

Only three months have passed since I lost my husband and I’m already kissing someone else. What the hell has gotten into me? My heart was both breaking and smiling at what he said and did. They were such insignificant things and yet I could feel Landon in all of them. Him tapping his fingers on his wine glass, how he kept humming random tunes whenever we weren’t talking, and the books he chose before I recommended him one.

He was funny too, in a different way. More a dry, sarcastic humor, but it made me laugh all the same, and for a little while I forgot anything bad had happened—that I’d lost everything. He brought all the light with him when he entered my store and it followed behind him when he left. The dark cloud that had loomed over me the last few days is back, growing larger and heavier. Why do I feel as if I’ve suffered a loss all over again?

Turning on my phone, I connect it to the charger and strip out of my clothes. Missing the hamper on the way to the shower, I don’t turn back to pick up the clothes and instead turn on the water. Once it’s warm enough, I step into the tub and close the curtain, allowing the steam to wrap around me. With my eyes closed, I stand under the relaxing stream and press my hands to the wall, leaning forward. I stay this way for a while before finally washing up.

Once the water runs cold, I shut it off, step out, and reach for a towel on a nearby rack. It smells like Landon. Everything does when it comes out of the dryer. I haven’t run out of his favorite detergent yet, and won’t for a while. Landon loved buying everything in bulk.

“You never know when you won’t be able to go to the store,” he used to say. He’s gone, but his words still follow me everywhere and so do our memories together. Touching the towel and bringing the flowery scented fabric to my nose only has the guilt stabbing at my chest more. I kissed someone else. I held him in my arms and don’t think I would’ve stopped if he hadn’t. If he’s ever that close again, I’m afraid it’ll happen a second time, and why do I badly want it to?

Squeezing my eyes shut, the towel bunches in my closed fists. It’s too soon. All of it. Too much, too soon. I’m trying to find the men who killed my husband, and have a funeral to finish planning. I don’t have time to think about another man. To want and crave him. Dropping the towel on the sink counter, I bend down and pick up my clothes to put them in the hamper.

Landon would have done it for me. I think picking up after me gave him some type of satisfaction and he also hated leaving messes for too long. He liked perfection. He also liked taking care of people, but never wanted to be taken care of himself. I tried so many times. It was one of our struggles. We couldn’t always meet each other halfway with everything. He was very stubborn and particular. But he was also selfless and kind-hearted.

I don’t know who the man from the flower shop is. I only know that he smells like sunshine and felt good against me.

Sighing, I dress in a pair of sweats and grab my phone. Several messages wait for me but none from the police station. Have they given up on finding out what happened to my husband? Do they not feel getting justice for him is worth all the trouble anymore? I can’t let this all go as easily as they can. Everyone says to move on, but it’s hard knowing my husband’s life was cut short because someone else felt they deserved to live more. They should’ve lost their life. Not him. They’re the main reason he’s gone.

I respond to all the messages from friends and co-workers before pulling up a search engine. I type in the name of the clinic Landon used to go to. His doctor’s office is attached to a hospital. A different one from the place I was taken to the day of the explosion. It’s the first time I’ve been a visitor at a hospital since my mom died and I don’t know if I’m ready to go to one again. Not after all the bad memories I have of being in them. Swallowing hard, I save the address. I have to do this for Landon.

I’ll go first thing in the morning and ask for all his test results and records. I’ll also collect the names of every employee who ever handled any of his tests, results, and care. Where I’ll go from there I don’t know yet, but I have to start somewhere. Someone found out his blood type and figured out he was a match somehow. It had to have started there.

Sitting in bed, I set my phone on the nightstand. Crawling under the covers, I turn on my side, staring at the picture of me and Landon sitting on the same dock of the lake I went to today. I see only him there while I trace the glass of the frame, but when I turn off the lamp and close my eyes I see someone else. He doesn’t go away when I fall asleep either, and is waiting for me in my mind when I wake up, smiling while asking me to get in the water.

“Bet I can change your mind.”

Why do I get a feeling he was talking about more than getting in the water? Why am I hoping he was?