Chapter 15 #2
Maybe he has. While we wait for the bill, I tell him about the Waterfront Block, mentioning the studio, but telling him I only built it after talking with Stu, the music producer, who said he could use space to record outside the big bad city and all its influences on bands made up of hard-partying twenty-somethings.
I drive us back to Rolling Hills, and as I’m walking back to work, I pause next to his truck. “Listen, Griff, I’m only saying it because I don’t know when you’re going to grace us with your presence again. But…thanks.”
For a moment, my brother doesn’t say anything, just rests a hand on the roof of his truck. Then he looks up toward the east wing and its scaffolding, where workers stride in all directions, then back at me. “I always wished I felt half as much as you did, Eli.”
I’m so surprised, for a moment I’m speechless. Then I clear my throat, shoving my hands in the pocket of my coat. “You have feelings, Griff, as much as you think you don’t.”
Griffin shrugs. “I don’t think I’m capable of loving someone the way you are. I hope you figure this shit out, Eli. And I hope it’s with Reese. I like her.”
As he drives away, I can’t help but wonder if that’s the most I’ve heard my brother talk about feelings in our whole fucking life.
I make it through poker night that night, with Seamus and our friend Winona asking me when I’m going to bring Reese to one of our games and Ben asking me about how it went with Stu.
I make it through toddler T-ball prep the next day, too, which frankly, is all-consuming with the tears and screaming.
But by the time my commitments are through, I’m jittery as hell, still mulling over Griffin’s suggestion.
I need to burn off steam. Or at least distract myself.
I could call Seamus, see if he’s up for the batting cages, but I’m not in the mood to chat.
In fact, my mood is growing fouler with every minute that passes and my phone sits there text-free.
I decide to go for a run. Never mind my ass is already whooped from those toddlers this morning.
It works, too, at least at first. It’s a ten-minute run at full speed down the road from the staff apartments to the water.
Most of that is alongside our golf course, which is dotted with carts and golfers taking advantage of the beautiful crisp fall morning before the snow comes next month and everyone switches to cross-country skiing and snowshoeing.
Maybe I need to pick up more hobbies. Maybe that would fill the goddamned void in my chest.
But not even my runaway brain can compete against the grueling pace I’m keeping, so I’m actually feeling close to clear-headed by the time I hit the gravel path that runs along the Quince.
I inhale the crisp air, my heart thudding in my chest as I round onto the gravel of the waterfront path, sweating like a bastard by the time I hit the first curve.
I’m looking out over the smooth flow of the Quince—the low stretch of rock along the bank, and the lift and twirl of sparrows in the bare-limbed trees along the water, so I don’t see the other person running toward me—not until we smash into each other.
The only thing letting me know it’s a woman is their size and the cry they make as their shoulder jabs painfully into my solar plexus. Somehow, we manage not to fall over, mostly because I awkwardly grip their shoulders to keep them from tumbling backward.
Then I realize the person I’m holding on to is my ex-wife.
All the foul mood in my brain I was running from comes flooding back, hard enough to knock the breath out of me.
I let go of her like she’s a hot potato.
“Thank you,” she says, propping her hands on her hips, breathing hard. Her chest lifts and falls with each one in a way that probably would have driven me wild years ago.
Maybe even weeks ago.
“For what?” I ask, incredulous. I’m breathing hard too, and I swipe my forearm over my forehead to keep sweat from dripping into my eyes. “I nearly tossed you into the Quince.”
“No, you kept me from falling over. But maybe you would have liked that.”
It takes me a minute to understand that she’s making a self-deprecating joke. The Kelly I knew doesn’t make those.
The Kelly I knew was a different person than the one she is now. Married to someone else.
My stomach churns like I’ve swallowed glass. How does she still have this effect on me? “I don’t want to throw you in the Quince, Kelly.”
“I’d understand if you did. I haven’t been at my best since I’ve been here.”
Is she being nice? I take her in as if for the first time.
She’s wearing her sleek black hair swept up in a high ponytail, with a black headband covering the tips of her ears.
She looks beautiful, but for the first time in a long time, I think this only objectively.
She doesn’t have the wavy, slightly wild when undone dirty blonde hair I think about.
Her porcelain skin is devoid of freckles; her ice blue eyes have none of that softness that warms up my chest.
Fuck, Reese, why the hell won’t you text me back?
I realize I haven’t said anything, so I run the back of my hand over my upper lip before placing my thumb and forefinger on the edge of my hip.
“Kelly, I didn’t know all this was going to happen when I ran into you guys back at ho—” I look away.
I was going to call the place we lived together home, even though it doesn’t feel that way at all anymore.
It’s just because I’m talking to her. I think.
“At the storage locker. I wasn’t angling for anything. ”
“I know,” she says softly. “It’s Neil. He gets ahead of himself.”
I nod. “I don’t hate him, unfortunately.”
She huffs a little laughter. “Yeah. Everyone loves Neil.”
That’s a weird response, I think, especially because of the way she’s gone kind of stiff. But I don’t have time to think about it because she says, “Are you and Reese coming to the bar tonight?”
My jaw pulses. I should say no. We’ve got plans. Together. But I don’t know that we do. “Undecided,” I say, noncommittally.
“Eli…” Kelly takes a step toward me, and I’m surprised my first instinct is to take a step back. I don’t, because that would be weird. But I still flinch when Kelly lays her hand on my arm. It’s cool on my bare skin and makes me want badly to shrug away. “I’m sorry.”
I do pull my arm away then, as much from surprise as anything. But I press my elbow against my chest, making like I’m stretching. “What for, Kelly?” I’m already too tired to play any games with her.
“For being a bitch since I’ve been here.”
My eyebrows fly up. Never once have I known Kelly to admit to behaving badly. When we were married, after fights she’d initiate, she’d kind of sidle up to me and start talking about mundane things. That was her way of showing me she wasn’t mad anymore. But she’d never own up to anything.
I think of Reese then, how the one time she snapped at me back when we were in Jewel Lakes after a shitty day at the restaurant she worked at, she’d felt so bad she cried.
It had made me wonder just what had happened to her in the past to make her think that wasn’t just a normal part of two human beings being close.
I never wished Kelly would have done that, but she never confessed to being at fault. Or at least, she never used to.
“I’m uncomfortable,” she admits, folding her arms. “I never wanted to come here. It was all Neil. Well, you saw it. And now that I’m here, you and Reese…I didn’t think…” She hesitates. “Anyway, you look happy. And Neil is so preoccupied with the show and…other things. I’m not at my best.”
I’ve never seen her like this—awkward and unsure.
No, that’s not true. When Kelly and I first met, she was sweet.
Young, innocent. Ambitious. But that latter quality grew legs.
It went from being inspirational to ugly.
She grew possessive with her stories at work, sure the other reporters were trying to steal her leads and opportunities.
Bitter and hard when they won promotions and accolades without her.
She once asked me if I thought she was pretty enough for a national news anchor role.
That had struck me as the saddest thing, especially since nothing I said seemed to matter to her.
I see that desperate insecurity flash over her face now, just the tiniest flash before it’s back to one more distant, more pensive.
“I think I thought things would be different—more relaxed—when I stopped being onscreen myself. I thought I’d feel good, taking myself out of the game while I was on top.
Switching to producing. But I miss it. I miss that thrill of chasing a story, being first on the scene.
Do you remember, Eli, how you used to drive me to those stories? ”
She reaches for my arm again, and this time I do step back.
“I miss lots of things,” she says, holding her rejected hand like it’s been burned.
But the way she’s holding it reminds me of Reese. Of how she rubs that fucking ink on her wrist. How she tried to hide it from me when we first met.
My mind is so messed up, my feelings and words so jumbled in my chest, that I almost don’t hear the buzzing of my phone, strapped to me in the little pack on my waist.
I pull out my phone, awkwardly. It’s just my running app, asking me if I’ve finished running.
No, I’m not finished. Not even close.
Still, it’s a good out. I hold up my phone. “I’m sorry, Kelly. I have to take this.”
I don’t even wait until I’m out of sight before finding Reese’s name and dialing.