30. … Another Door Opens
… Another Door Opens
HENRY
Once the gallery closed, the other artists and I, along with Corbin, Kelly, and Paige, bopped off to a nearby bar.
We were there no more than ten minutes searching for a high-top table that could fit us all when, above the din, came the twinkling notes of a familiar song I hadn’t listened to in ages.
“We Need a Little Christmas” rose in volume through the speakers.
It was karaoke night, and magically, there on the stage was Aidan.
Practically floating, I excused myself from the group before he even finished singing. Pushing through the crowd, I schooled my heartbeat.
Fans, or at least people who recognized him from his movies or popular social media pages, swarmed him when he hopped down from the stage. I hung back, taking him in, adjusting to what it felt like to be breathing the same air as Aidan Smith again.
I expected indignation to surge beneath the surface of my skin. I resented him still for not showing up to Great Aunt Isla’s funeral, didn’t I?
When he noticed me, he smiled, and any hurt feelings fell to the wayside. The past would not protect me here. “Henry,” he said.
My own name gave me goose bumps. “You’re in Manhattan,” I said. We had too much history for niceties.
His eye wrinkles, noticeable even in the mood lighting of the overcrowded bar, surprised me.
At his temples, hair showed the first signs of retreat.
There was even a small scar on his jaw where he must’ve nicked himself shaving once and the skin never healed quite right.
Time was taking its toll on him, too. He had a past, experiences, a life that I did not know about other than what I’d read online.
“I arrived a few weeks ago,” he said. “Shouldn’t you be at your show?”
It was clear he didn’t know what time it was. He wasn’t drunk, but there was the distinct scent of brown liquor on his breath. I was hit by the memory of him at the Groove Grotto, stripping in front of everyone to Angela Lansbury.
“It ended a half hour ago. A bunch of us came over here to extend our celebration of my major sale,” I said with my eyebrows raised.
His blush was so bright it registered even in the darkest corner of the room.
“I would’ve come over to you, but I didn’t know if you’d want me there.
It was your special night. I didn’t want to draw any attention.
” His eyes drifted toward a group of giggling middle-aged women waiting on him to be free.
“I snuck in, bought the piece, and snuck out. I couldn’t let an original piece by my favorite artist sell to anyone else,” he said, glancing down at his shoes, which were some unidentifiable brand of expensive leather.
“I appreciate it,” I said, but it came out stilted. There were too many other sentiments filling my mind.
A mass of new people crowded into the bar. The temperature hiked, and personal space diminished.
“Shall I show you where I plan to hang the piece?”
I blinked at him, confused by his confident invitation. “I don’t think I can get on a plane right now.” Last I heard, he was based out in Los Angeles fielding auditions.
“Good thing we won’t need one. We can walk.” He bit the inside of his cheek to not say more.
“What if I told you my feet hurt from standing all night?” I asked, leaning into the flirtation.
“I’d tell you that I’d carry you the whole way.” He smiled again, and I melted.
I proffered my apologies to the other artists as I grabbed my peacoat from the back of a chair, too swept up in the magic to care if I was being rude.
Corbin, having made eye contact with Aidan, grabbed my forearm. “Oh my God, ” he whispered.
“Don’t even think about trying to slip me your headshot right now.” I grinned demurely and trotted after Aidan into the cold Manhattan night, where the slightest flurry of snow zigzagged around us.
“Snow? In December? Didn’t you say…” Aidan began.
“I remember what I said.” Because I did. I remembered all of it. Every second saved and replayed in my mind for almost two whole years. “There are exceptions to every rule.”
Aidan bent in front of me on the sidewalk. “Hop aboard,” he said, offering me a piggyback ride.
“I was joking,” I said through a laugh.
“I know, but I’m not. Climb on.” I don’t know if it was the wine or the rush of a sale or the childish frenzy of hormones swirling inside me, but I did as he instructed. New York looked postcard perfect from up a few inches higher.
Ten minutes later, we were in Greenwich Village, turning onto Perry Street.
This block was seared into my mind from youthful viewings of an HBO show I hid away in my room to devour.
Aidan set me down and produced a key ring from his pocket, clipping up the steps directly across the street from a stoop where a Manolo-loving, tutu-wearing fictional woman once kissed several men good night.
“Wait, seriously?” I said. A gilded 69 was painted over the doorway we passed through. “Renting?”
“I own now,” he said.
“You bought an apartment? You only made two movies.” I followed him up the stairs.
“The network liked me so much that I signed an exclusivity contract with them for several more movies that came with a really hefty up-front payment.” He stopped in front of apartment 5 and keyed us in. “And I made a wish…” He smiled back at me. The business card vibrated in the pocket of my pants.
His place was a darling two-bedroom unit with two working fireplaces, a clawfoot tub, and Art Deco sconces that felt both vintage and modern. The walls, however, were bare, and there was a lack of practical furniture. “Still acquiring pieces.”
My artist’s eye repainted the walls in shades of lilac and mauve.
Vintage couches and end tables sketched and slotted themselves into the space with enough room for Presto and Chango’s large enclosure.
Aidan caught me doing this and smiled. Even after all that elapsed time, he could still read my mind.
My cheeks flamed. I trailed him into the hallway where he’d marked a space for gallery lights to be wired in.
“You bought one piece, but you’ve left space for two,” I said.
“The second is for the portrait you made of me,” he said, eyes shifting toward me. “If you still have it.”
I paused for a second, allowing him to squirm while possibly envisioning me burning it like an effigy in an overdramatic ritual.
“I do still have it,” I admitted finally.
When I went to retrieve the mannequins from the cheap New Jersey storage unit I rented, I stumbled upon the crate I’d packed it in.
At first, I thought about using it for the exhibit.
Then, I considered selling it online to some Christmas movie fanatic.
Ultimately, I left it where it was to collect dust and residual memories.
He sighed before adding, “I’m willing to pay for it.”
His true meaning clattered between us like a dropped dish.
“I’m sorry for not being there at Isla’s funeral,” he said.
“It’s in the past. She knew you loved her. I forgive you,” I said. Because my resentment had been feeble at best. Grudges were no longer in my nature. “Alexa has not been so forgiving, however.”
“Her wedding…” he said regretfully.
“She was fond of you. I love her, but it takes a lot for her to find fondness in her heart for someone new.”
“Is it too late to send a gift?” he asked.
“I don’t believe it’s ever too late for anything,” I said around a sudden lump in my throat.
His fingers flexed then fell as if restrained from touching me. Whatever invisible shackles he had locked around his wrists frustrated me to no end.
He asked if I wanted anything to drink. In the airy kitchen, he got us two mugs (he had not unpacked his glasses yet) full of water. Any other drink might’ve read like I was fishing for an invitation to stay. This was already beyond my wildest dreams.
“Where have you been living?” he asked with a keen interest, leaning back against the granite countertop. He still had the width of a linebacker, but his posture had lost some of its practiced rigidity. He moved more like water now, flowing into rooms, ebbing out of others.
“Uptown. Hamilton Heights,” I told him. “Quite the trek from here.”
“The red line?” he asked. “If it’s the 1 train, the station is right on Christopher.”
“Still, upwards of fifteen stops.”
“Thirty minutes. Maybe a little more if there’s a delay.”
“I’ll still have to walk up from 145th. It’s after midnight.”
“It’s 12:07. Barely after midnight.”
“Still,” I said. The verbal parry was new for us.
In the intervening years, he’d given up his unfiltered directness.
I missed it, but at the same time, I didn’t.
I had to pay closer attention to him—what he was saying by not saying it, the way his toes were pointed toward me in the designer shoes he’d never taken off at the door. And yet—
“I’ll need to be going soon,” I said, setting down my mug, overwhelmed by his reappearance and the returning magic.
“Don’t go. Please,” he said, fully sober.
“Aidan…” His name held the same sugary coolness it always had.
“I’m here because I don’t want to miss another funeral or wedding. I don’t want to miss another day, another hour, another second. I don’t want to miss you anymore, Henry,” he whispered around a broken exhale.
“You’ve missed me?” I asked, though the answer buzzed between us.
“Every single day.” His gaze was resolute.
“Even on the days you didn’t call?” I asked.
“Especially on the days I didn’t call,” he said. “I didn’t call because the more I called—the more I heard your voice—the more I missed you. I didn’t come back for Christmas because I worried that if I did, I’d stay. I needed to let you go to make you proud. Have I made you proud?”
Tears filled my eyes as I stepped closer, seconds away from levitating. “You have.”
He cupped his hands gently around my face as if they’d never not been there.
“I love acting. I love making movies. One day, maybe I’ll write my own like the story I wrote for our window display.
I’ve found my purpose. I’ve checked step five off my list. I want to start over on step six. With you. If you’ll have me.”
He emptied his pants pocket. The key ring he used earlier to get us into 69 Perry Street splayed out all golden and shiny on the counter beside him. There were four keys on it: two identical sets. His unspoken question peppered the air.
The timid, expectant smile on Aidan’s face with brand-new laugh lines etched around it dispensed fresh hope into my heart. There he was again, ready now, my true love .
Without hesitation, I said, “I will.”
I backed him up against the counter and kissed him, one hand on his newly weathered face, the other claiming the key ring. I ran the pad of my index finger along the dents and cuts on the closest key, memorizing its rise and fall as I memorized the familiar yet different taste of Aidan’s mouth.
Every key in the world has a lock in which it aligns the pins and triggers the bolt.
Our next kiss felt like the door to our relationship gliding open again, welcoming us both back into the golden glow of the home where we belonged.