Chapter 9. Maxim
MAXIM
God, I thought they’d never leave. Our friends spill into the street, leaving the faintest echo of their laughter and conversation behind.
I can tell David’s into Kimba. I wish him luck, but I’m too preoccupied with a second chance I never thought I’d get.
Can it be called a second chance when there was never a chance before?
I’m still, on some level, processing that the girl I was so drawn to four years ago is this even-more-beautiful-than-before woman here in Amsterdam, in my favorite brown bar, watching me with the same kind of stunned excitement buzzing through my body.
“Your friends are nice,” Lennix says, popping a triangle of gouda into her mouth.
“They’re not.” I laugh. “But they were on their best behavior tonight. They can fake it when pretty girls are involved.”
“The night definitely took a turn when you guys came around.” She smiles, pushing a chunk of straight black hair behind her ear. “It’s spring break and they’re looking for hookups, so your friends might get lucky. Well, not with Viv.”
“I hope not with you. I was kind of hoping I’d have you all to myself.”
She doesn’t laugh. Or smile even. She looks up from the cheese board and levels an intense stare at me.
“Is that what you want?” she asks, her voice more casual than her eyes. “A hookup?”
If she’s asking if I want to fuck her, then of course.
If she’s asking if that’s all it would be…
who knows? Nothing ever felt typical where this girl was concerned.
Not the way we met. Not the things I learned about her.
Not the way her image, her voice, that throaty laugh would revisit me in the middle of a lecture or even while I was kissing someone else.
“I want to get to know you,” I tell her, answering and not answering as honestly as I can. “Tell me what’s been happening with you the past few years.”
“Yes, well, let’s see. I was, as predicted, grounded until graduation.”
We share a quick glance and a chuckle.
“I’m not surprised,” I say. “I wouldn’t want my seventeen-year-old daughter getting bitten by dogs and tear gassed and stuck in a holding cell with a bunch of grown men and prostitutes.”
“I didn’t get bitten by a dog.” She surprises me, reaching out to push up my sleeve and touch the scar on my forearm. “You did.”
Her fingers on my skin make my breath shorten and my body harden. Really? One touch and I’m ready to blow?
“So from grounded to graduation.” I stroke my fingertip over her thumb where it still rests on my forearm. I don’t miss the quick catch of her breath, but I keep talking. “Then college?”
“Uh, yeah.” She traces the labyrinthic pattern of my fingerprint. “Arizona State.”
“Major?”
“Public service and public policy with a concentration in American Indian studies.”
“Cool.” I squeeze the hand still resting on my arm. “What do you want to do?”
“That’s the million-dollar question. Maybe get my master’s. I’ve been offered a pretty prestigious fellowship, which would require I serve in some field-related area for a year, or I have a great job offer from a firm in DC.”
“What kind of firm?”
“A lobbying firm. For some reason, I think I may end up in politics.” She eyes me closely. “I remember you went to Berkeley. That was…undergrad?”
“Undergrad and my master’s. I just finished my PhD in climate science.”
“Wow. So Doctor Kingsman. I would never have guessed.”
“What would you have guessed?”
She squints one eye and hums, considering. “Business maybe?”
“I double majored in business and energy resources engineering at Berkeley, so you’re not far off there.”
“Why those fields?”
“Just seemed smart to have a business background.” I don’t add that my family’s company has been a Forbes lister for decades.
“And the energy resources?” she asks. “How’d you come to that?”
“I’m fascinated by the climate. How we can reverse all the crap we’re doing to ruin this planet. Most importantly, how America can become less dependent on fossil fuels. Our leaders are so damn shortsighted, leaning on oil and gas as much as we do. It’s not sustainable.”
“Is that why you were there protesting the pipeline?”
“Yeah, something like that.” I rush on before she can probe any further. “So still figuring out what you want to do with the degree, huh?”
“I know I want to change the world. I’m just not sure how yet.”
I’ve never heard anyone more confident saying they don’t know something.
She says it like she is the question—like as soon as she determines her plan of action, the world will be putty in her hands to shape and mold into something better.
I could laugh in her face, call her naive, but I don’t because I feel the same way.
“I get that,” I reply, linking my pinky finger with hers on the table.
“Sometimes my goals and dreams feel too big. Like you really think you can convince a nation to change its ways? And the answer is always yes. I don’t know how either, but yes.
” I force a chuckle, growing uncomfortable under her unwavering regard. “Is that arrogant? Presumptuous?”
“Yes, but I think revolution requires a certain degree of hubris.”
“Who said that?” I ask, racking my brain for a reference for the quote.
“Oh, I did. Just now.”
Well, impress the hell out of me.
She lifts her beer with the hand I’m not holding and yawns into the glass. “Sorry. I guess jet lag is starting to kick in.”
I stand, pulling her to her feet, too. “Let’s get you home, or at least your home away from home. Let’s get you to your hostel.”
When we step outside, crisp, cold air greets us on the street.
“It’s much cooler than I thought it would be,” Lennix says, chafing her bare arms. “Glad it’s a short walk.”
“Yeah, the weather here can be unpredictable and cool until it’s not.” I tug my leather jacket off and drape it around her shoulders.
“Oh, no.” She starts to slide the jacket off, but I stop her.
“Look.” I point to the long sleeve of my T-shirt. “I’ll be fine for a few minutes.”
She nods, reluctance and gratitude in her smile.
It’s a straight shot to her hostel, but I take us down a side street to stretch out our time. That and it puts us along the Amstel River, a romantic promenade if ever there was one.
Moonlight refracts from the glassy water. The slightest breeze, the breath of night, lifts Lennix’s hair, and I’m reminded how it seemed she commanded the very elements that day in the desert.
“You really were remarkable at that protest,” I say, breaking the companionable silence we’ve been walking in.
“Huh?” She looks up at me, her leisurely stride never breaking. “What?”
“At the protest that day. You spoke with such conviction and passion.”
“So many things were taken from us,” she says, her voice hushed but strong. “They tried to strip our language, our land, our home, our family. Even our traditions.”
I listen, wanting to hear her much more than I want to hear myself.
“To me, to many of us, activism is as holy as the ceremonies we almost lost because it connects us to the land and to our ancestors. It’s how we join their fight.
We take our place in the line of generations who will resist.” A snort of cynical laughter escapes her. “Even when it seems like a lost cause.”
“It’s not.” I grab her hand and tuck it into the crook of my elbow, shorten my steps to match hers. “Don’t ever think that.”
She glances up at me, searching my face before nodding, smiling.
“Why Amsterdam?” she asks, shifting the focus to me.
“Well, Europe is far ahead of us in clean energy. For whatever reason, Europeans are less resistant to the energy shifts we need. I came here to study the progress they’re making.
How the governments educate the populace and persuade them the changes are necessary.
The Dutch are really forward-thinking, especially when it comes to wind. ”
“You’re kinda smart, aren’t you?” She grins and tightens her fingers on my arm. “PhD and all.”
“I promise not to make you call me Doctor.”
“I think I will, Doc .” Her grin widens, and the humor is like a candle lit inside her, illuminating all the things I like most about her face. The pride in the jut of her chin. The strength to the set of her jaw. The kindness, intelligence, and curiosity in the metal/mettle silver eyes.
I break our stride, look down at her, and cup one side of her face in my hand. It’s cool against the dry warmth of my palm.
“Ask me how many times I’ve thought about you since that protest.” My voice scratches gruffly against the cool silk of the quiet night.
She stares up at me, and at first I think she’ll wave off my question, pretend this is normal, what’s happening between us. But she doesn’t do that. She doesn’t pretend or wave it off. She meets it head-on and answers with unflinching honesty.
“Maybe as many times as I’ve thought of you.”