Chapter 23 Burning, Bagels
BURNING, BAGELS
ORAZIO
She’s everywhere and I hate it.
In my backyard, sprouting like a dandelion weed that I once wished on.
She shows up with this big smile for Jessa, roaring and ready to go with whatever stupid exercise the knight has planned for us.
I keep picking at her, spraying poison with my words.
But it’s as if someone blew her seeds all over the yard and she’s rooted herself for good.
In my shop, although she was only here once. Every time I bend over to cuff a trouser leg or pin a skirt hem, I see her, standing there, looking at me in the mirror with a confused expression. Because she didn’t remember me. Didn’t see me.
In the library, where she trades sneaking glances with Harley. She’s going to ruin him, if she keeps stringing him along. His soft heart never hardened like mine with age. It will break, and I won’t be able to comfort him, because I’ll be muttering I told you so.
In Mad Mug, where she eats lunch with my friends on the days we don’t train. She laughs, and covers the twinkling sound with her hand, as if she feels the need to hide her joy. It infuriates me. I can’t even get a mid-day coffee in peace anymore.
Even in Arcadia, I scent her on the wind. Cloying vanilla and teasing sugar. It’s impossible, my imagination playing tricks on me. It’s either that or the Woods are mocking me with the taste of her in the air. She hasn’t been here since I found her wandering.
Worst of all, she’s in my dreams. Her younger self taunts me with the last good memories of my childhood. Her older self does the same, reminding me of the last time hope pumped through my veins. It’s a secret memory I’d rather forget, of her sneaking glances at me across a rumbling subway car.
It was an accident, running into her. I would have called it fate, had it ended in a different outcome.
I’d rushed to catch the 1 after my apprenticeship ended for the day, needing to make it to Penn Station as soon as possible, and slipped in just as the doors were closing.
I’d flopped into the lone empty seat at the center of the car, and when I finally lifted my head, my heart stalled in my chest. She was older, but I knew she was mine.
That’s where the dream usually starts.
There’s suspicious recognition in her eyes, but she doesn’t say anything as her ear-muffed head falls on the shoulder of the man next to her.
He presses a kiss to her forehead, and the first fissure spreads through my soul.
Her ungloved hands cross on her lap; two rings glint, stacked together on her left ring finger.
Married.
Not mine.
His.
A second fissure cracks. My inner beast roars, pounding at my chest.
They get up two stops later. It’s not the one I need, but I follow anyway.
I call her name, and she pauses, glancing back, perplexed.
Her golden brows knit and her pink lips part, and I think she’s going to say something—hope for her to acknowledge my presence.
But her husband slings a protective arm over her shoulder, ushering her towards the stairs to the street.
I call her name again, but she ignores me.
Another train arrives, and the crowd swallows them in the rush to exit. Someone knocks into me, and in the moment it takes for me to right myself, I lose track of her.
Panic.
There are too many people—too many scents in the sea of black parkas for me to know which way she went. With a racing heart, I stumble up the stairs.
I burst through the exit turnstile and lope up to the street corner.
Taxi’s honk and the steam from a halal cart hits my face as I spin in place, trying to catch a whiff of her to follow.
But it’s too late. Harsh winter air hits my cheeks, and I’m left, a bolt of fabric tucked under my arm, as the masses swirl around me.
How could her soul not recognize mine?
I blink hard, trying to refocus my exhaustion-blurred eyes on the needle I need to thread. The fiber bounces off the eye for the thirtieth time and I growl, tossing both onto my worktable.
I can’t focus because I haven’t gotten any sleep. And I haven’t gotten any sleep because I’m plagued by her.
The clock on the wall shows it’s only 10:02 a.m., too close to my noon appointment to escape to Arcadia and shift to blow off steam. But I could flip the break sign on the door and grab a coffee.
At the bagel shop, of course, because I can’t go to Mad Mug anymore without catching Jessa’s evil eye or a glimpse of blonde curls.
My hands dig into the pockets of my slacks and play with the loose change jingling there as I walk.
It takes four minutes and thirty-two seconds to get to the run-down mom-and-pop shop.
The store has seen better days—the butcher-block cutting boards behind the register have a dip in them from years of wear—but you can’t get a better bacon, egg, and cheese on an everything bagel anywhere else in town. Or a cheaper drip coffee.
The bitter smell mixed with the overwhelming stench of yeast hits my nose the second I walk in.
It’s the end of morning rush, so there’s fifteen people mulling about in front of the display cases, waiting for their orders.
A few tourists muse over the specialty cream cheeses, one of their noses scrunching at the lox spread.
They turn to the person in line behind them to ask a question and—
My dress shoes make an obnoxious squeak against the tile as I come to an abrupt stop. Half the heads in the shop turn; human gazes bounce over me, and upon realizing I’m nothing special, hop back to watching the sixteen-year-olds behind the counter throw bagels into brown paper bags.
“Orazio!” Marie, the old shop owner, calls out.
Her voice has the raspy edge you get from smoking for forty years, along with the overly enunciated and elongated vowels of her heavy Long Island accent.
She hobbles out from behind the baskets of bagels, arms outstretched.
“I stopped by to show you the pictures of my granddaughter’s wedding the other day, but the shop was closed.
Stay here, I’ll grab my phone from the back. ”
She talks as if I have a choice to turn around and leave, but I can’t, especially with the pair of crystal blue eyes shooting daggers at me.
Marie’s a quirky human, her and her husband both are, but they’re nice enough, and welcomed me and Jessa with open arms when we both opened our shops in town.
She, however, cannot read the room to save her life.
The woman rushes towards the office at the back of the store as I step into line, right behind my blonde plague.
She’s a tiny thing, barely reaching my shoulder.
I watch her through my periphery, never giving her direct eye-contact. A fact that clearly bothers her, given the miffed huff she expels through her nose. She probably expects me to initiate a conversation.
That’s not going to happen. I don’t want to talk to her any more than I have to.
I’m only entertaining this farce for Jessa and Harely. There’s no way she can be ready before August, and I fully expect whatever plans they have to fall apart by the time our birthday comes around.
A phone is shoved into my line of sight, and a too-bright picture of Marie’s husband in his custom suit I made for his granddaughter’s wedding shines up at me. The man is beaming in the forest green three-piece tux.
“He looks hot, right?” Marie snickers. She flicks her finger over the screen, rolling through some more pictures of the wedding party.
“You dressed him good. I wasn’t sold on the green at first, thought it’d be too flashy.
But with Millie’s husband wearing his white uniform and their bridesmaids wearing the green too, it worked great. ”
“I did match the screenshot you gave me,” I mumble.
“Oh yeah. You know, I forgot I gave you that,” Marie says, swiping again.
“Look at this one. Her husband’s a sweet guy, smart too—he’s an officer in the Navy.
But he’s not a real looker, huh? It’s a shame you set up shop after she met him.
I wish I had another grandkid to set you up with.
You’d make me some cute great-grand babies. ”
I stiffen at the mention of children, meanwhile Alice shifts uncomfortably next to us, clearly eavesdropping. She’s trying to get a better angle to see the pictures Marie’s waving around. But when she finally sneaks a glance though lowered lashes, her whole body goes rigid.
“Hey, Marie?” someone calls from the back of the shop. “Can you come back here? The mixer’s acting up again.”
Marie clicks her tongue and rolls her eyes. She shoves her phone into her back pocket as she shuffles away. “I’ll show you the rest the next time you come in.”
“That’s not necessary,” I say, but Marie waves me off over her shoulder.
“Give this one a large even if he asks for a small, got it kid?” she yells, pointing at the teen working the register before disappearing through the swinging kitchen door.
The teen gives her a thumbs up before motioning for Alice to order. I follow, stepping up behind her to keep the line moving.
“Um, can I get an egg-everything with veggie cream cheese, a sesame with regular cream cheese, and a poppyseed, toasted, with butter? To go, please.”
A frown deepens the corners of my lips as I recognize Jessa and Harley’s orders. I’ve picked them up on many Sunday mornings before.
“You know the butter will melt, right?” the teen at the register asks. Their grimace speaks to having been yelled at one too many times by people who get unnecessarily angry about what happens when cold butter meets hot bread.
Alice’s head tilts, as if it never crossed her mind to get frustrated with someone over the outcome of her own choices.
“Yes…” she drawls out slowly.
“Then that’ll be $10.25.”
“Damn, I was close. Thought it’d be an even ten.” She slaps a ten down on the pink countertop and then digs around her purse for a quarter. This place prefers cash. Did she know that, or is she just the type to carry it around?
“The specialty cream cheese is an extra twenty-five cents now,” the teen says.
“Sorry, I know there’s a quarter in here somewhere,” Alice says, chuckling awkwardly as her arm rummages around in the large tote she’s always carrying around. The teen stares at her blankly and the line behind me grows.
My fist curls around the quarter in my pocket. Impatience gets the better of me when that nervous laugh hits my ears again, and I toss the coin onto the counter.
“Here,” I say. “Stop wasting everyone’s time.”
Alice freezes, arm swallowed past her elbow by her canvas tote. Her head lifts and turns, and our gazes clash for the first time since I walked in the shop. Her brows knit. The divot that forms between them is no longer than a standard top-stitch, the early days of a future wrinkle.
There’s a slow blink of confusion as she takes me in. And then something shifts.
No, I don’t like that look at all.
There’s a soft sadness there. A deep melancholy.
My insides churn.
Why is she looking at me like that?
Meanwhile, the cashier swipes the cash off the counter and the register dings as they access the drawer. The old machine spits out a receipt.
Alice breaks our stare.
“Thank you,” she mutters as the cashier rips the paper and hands it to her. It’s unclear if the thank you was directed at me or the teen, but it’s likely the latter.
“We’ll call out when it’s ready,” the teen says, and Alice walks into the mulling crowd. “What can I get for you?”
“A small coffee. Black,” I say, handing over four singles. The coffee is three. The kid will keep one. “Ignore Marie.”
My tone is curt, purposefully so. I want to get the hell out of here. My neck is overheating with annoyance from being in the vicinity of her. The teen’s swallow is audible as they nod.
I scratch at the overgrown beard lining my jaw as I wait for the kid to pour my coffee. The coffee I don’t even want anymore.
When they slide the Styrofoam cup over the counter, I grab it and take off. I ignore the two pinpricks of hatred searing the back of my head and shove open the door with my free hand. I move so fast that the glass barrier nearly slams shut to block out Alice’s call.
But it doesn’t. And her twinkling timbre calls out my name.
“Ori—”
I keep walking, pushing myself down Main Street. Her quick steps follow; there’s three of hers to every one of mine.
“Ori, stop,” Alice huffs. “I have something to ask you.”
“I have no answers to give you.”
“It’s important.”
I ignore her.
“God, you’re such an ass.” I catch her frustrated mutter before her hand snatches the sleeve of my rolled-up button down. My pivot is lightning fast, yanking my arm free of her grasp. She flinches, stepping backwards.
“What?” I growl.
Her expression flips through several maddening emotions before settling.
It’s quick, but I catch them all. Shock.
Fear. Anger. Determination. It always lands on that last one.
Her lips set in a fierce line. Her jaw ticks.
She grows inches in aura, even though she stands at a meager five-four.
Her feet shift into a wider stance, like she’s bracing for a fight.
She also looks tired. There are bags under her eyes, and they’re bloodshot, as if she spent all night crying.
I hate it. I hate the way it’s on the tip of my tongue to ask what’s wrong. But I can’t—I refuse to open myself to her.
“I need to know what happened the day I left Arcadia. I’ve got some of my memories back, but not that one,” she says. “It feels important.”
I step forward, leaning in so close that I’m sure she can feel the heat of my breath on her nose.
“You broke a promise,” I say. And then years later, you broke me.
Jessa was wrong when she yelled at me to get my shit together. To join them in this pursuit of a woman who will ruin us.
I don’t want Alice. I don’t want the person who rejected me in the worst way possible: by choosing someone else.
I want my fucking life back.
I walk away. Alice doesn’t follow.
Of course she doesn’t fucking follow; I was always the one following her.
I toss the full to-go cup into the first trash bin I pass.