Chapter 87
I should not have taken Sarah’s hand.
If my goal was to minimize the confusion and insanity in my head, then taking Sarah’s hand was about the worst thing I could have done. Present-day Chance knew that well.
But I couldn’t blame it all on the little kid inside of me.
The current Chance, while he was taking time to evaluate things with Layla, still had a bit of a charmer streak to him.
For better or for worse, that Chance relished the opportunity to seduce and charm beautiful women; it was a fun game to him as much as it was something serious to think about.
And though this part of me was fading, it was still present.
So it was that for literally the rest of the day, I spent my time with Sarah, playing a sort of hunting game in New York City, trying to go to all of the places we had never been to before.
This took us to a variety of museums, bars, and restaurants; it took us to the State of Liberty and the Empire State Building; and it even took us to Chinatown.
We acted like tourists, because for at least a couple of days, one of us was a tourist.
In the initial stages of the date—which, I had to be honest, there was no reason to call it anything but that, the way Sarah was smiling at me—I felt extraordinarily self-conscious about my behavior.
I didn’t hold Sarah’s hand any longer at first than to help her up, and even when she put her hand on my arm to reassure me, there was nothing that I did to engage.
I was too paranoid about seeing Layla and forgetting myself.
A few hours in, though, around the time that we went to the Statue of Liberty, I lost my inhibitions.
It wasn’t like I suddenly started kissing her and sweeping her off her feet; I didn’t do anything more than put my arm around her.
Rather, either I began to accept or I started to rationalize that as a single male who had not promised Layla anything, I had a right to do this.
But just because you have the right to do something, does that mean you really want to do it?
I ignored that thought, even as it cropped up every so often, and lost myself in the moment with Sarah. This was what I had always hoped I’d get the chance to do. This was what I had always yearned for.
And for what?
To sleep with Sarah? To date her? To call her the one?
The last two definitely weren’t happening, at least not for some time. The first one could have on that evening, but talk about something that would have opened a can of worms—or a barrel of worms. I had a feeling if I wanted to, I could have done so.
For now, though, after we’d viewed the sunset from the Empire State Building, when she asked me what to do, standing before me with a smile on her face and narrowed eyes—the kind of look that was practically begging for a kiss—I didn’t kiss her.
“There’s a lot we could go and do,” I said.
I think she was getting impatient with me, but the longer I could delay doing something that would potentially fuck with my head more, the better.
“We could go walk around, could grab dinner, could go ice skating, could—”
“Yes, that!” she said. “Let’s go skating! I don’t get to do that overseas.”
“Sure,” I said as I started walking to the downtown skating rink. “Gotta take advantage while you can, right?”
Like take advantage of your window with Layla? You know, the one that might be open for just a couple more days before she heads to Chicago. Or before she just decides she’s tired of playing your waiting games.
The two of us walked very close to each other; Sarah let her hand dangle, as if she wanted me to take it. I mostly kept my hands in my pockets.
I was very aware that the conflicting emotions and desires in my head probably made me look a little crazy. I was also aware that looking crazy was also something of a self-defense mechanism against myself; why would Sarah want to involve herself with someone as crazy as me?
Don’t justify yourself. You chose to meet up with her. You chose to keep hanging out with her. Whatever happens with you and Layla and Sarah is entirely your fault and in your control. So you better start taking ownership before things go too far.
When we got to the ice skating rink, Sarah actually grabbed my arm in excitement and dragged me forward. I laughed in response, but it evolved into something of a nervous laugh. The more she held my hand or touched me, the more this was going to be difficult to pry myself from.
I wonder what had changed for her. Maybe it was the revolt against her father that made her question everything.
Maybe she was like me, having to address the inner child in her that yearned and begged for something.
I knew she said she had moved on pretty quickly after our “breakup” from our “relationship” at a young age, but maybe she had just been lying.
Maybe she’d had her own shit to deal with.
In any case, we quickly got our skates on and moved around the ice rink. Sarah was a very good skater, comfortable going faster than most after a few minutes of getting ice skates underneath her.
She was also overly encouraging, coming up from behind and pushing into me to make me go faster.
“Come on, Chance!” she said, giggling. “I’m only in New York for a little bit! Come fly with me!”
“Alright, alright,” I said, picking up the pace and moving my skates down.
I leaned my body forward as the two of us sped by just about everyone else. She nodded to me, as if daring me to race her. My competitive juices got the better of me; I was a fighter by nature, but it was perhaps better said I was a competitor by nature.
“Two laps, let’s go!” I said, getting a jump start on her.
The advantage didn’t last long, though, because Sarah soon caught up to me. I was fast, but she had just a little more speed. The one thing I did have she didn’t, though, was a little gamesmanship.
Right before she passed me, I grabbed the back of her top and pulled her in.
“Hey now!” she shouted.
“You didn’t say anything about what the rules were!” I shouted over my head as I went past her.
My lead lasted for about ten seconds. Then, unexpectedly, I felt her grab my jeans pockets—a perhaps not so subtle way of grabbing or feeling my ass—before she pulled me back.
“Two can play that game, Chance!” she shouted.
It quickly devolved into a game of grab, weave, and speed ahead. We made our last bank to the straightaway, and I gave everything I had. I grabbed to her jacket, held her, and sprinted ahead at the last second.
I won. But I almost went too fast, because I had to skid and press myself up against the nearby wall before I smashed into it or someone else. Half a second later, Sarah did the same, sliding right up onto me, her body close enough to…
“That was a hell of a race,” she said.
“Too bad you lost,” I teased. “I think loser should have to do something.”
“Yeah?” she said, locking eyes with me.
Oh shit. She thinks I’m about to kiss her. She thinks I’m going to pull her in.
“What are you going to make me do, Chance?”
Her eyes were fluttering before me. My heart was beating so hard it felt like I had heartburn. My breathing was heavy, and it had nothing to do with the race we just ran.
I bit my lips, which I realized made them wet, suggesting even more that I was going to kiss her. I thought of how long it had been since I’d kissed her… how I’d lost her… how I’d felt so unjustified, so robbed of what could have been… and here I had it…
And you go down this path, you lose everything you’ve worked for. You lose everything that you wanted to move slowly for. All because you went too fast with someone else.
“I’m going to make you buy me a drink,” I said, pulling my head up.
Sarah barely held her disappointment. I couldn’t blame her. In her spot, I would have expected a kiss too. If it had been literally any other situation, not only would I have kissed her, I would have done so passionately and intensely.
But…
I kept thinking about Layla. I kept thinking about my adopted parents and my actual parents.
In the moment in which I could have kissed Sarah—and I didn’t mean the buildup to it, I meant the actual split moment in which I chose to lean back instead of forward—those were the thoughts that dominated my mind.
The people who have shown they love me. Not the people who say they love me or who might love me.
“OK,” she said. “Where do you have in mind?”
The tone in her voice was like I had deflated a balloon. But I felt like I’d made the right decision. I didn’t think Sarah was going to be my friend after this, but at least now I could move on.
Well, that was the idea. In practice…
“Let’s just walk around and find a place.”
She regained her smile back, perhaps now even more determined to kiss me than she was before. If before, she had just seen it as an inevitability, it now seemed like my delay had only made it a challenge to her.
“I love that idea,” she said, patting my chest in a not so subtle move.
We moved off of the ice and put our regular shoes back on.
I tucked my hands in my jeans again, but she put her hand on my arm.
I should have known that my rejection of the kiss in that moment would have only made Sarah more interested in me, but it was much too late to go back and more firmly reject her.
We walked around a few blocks, at which Sarah commented on how New York City was so different as an adult. That much was very true; experiencing it as a child compared to an adult was like being in two different cities. It was certainly a lot more freeing than not.
I was about to suggest a bar named O’Malley’s when I looked inside and saw something I couldn’t believe.
Layla was sitting there talking to an older man. Both of them had smiles on their faces. Both of them were dressed well—not in the way a woman would dress for a night out, but well enough to impress. The older man was saying something which caused Layla to nod her head in excitement.
It looked like a date, especially the way the man leaned forward. I was… I was…
I had never expected this. Of all of the things that I had expected to end our dalliance—and it wasn’t even the end per se, but it sure felt that way—I didn’t think her going to see someone else, much less an older man, would be that.
I suppose that it could’ve been someone from her new company coming to make an official offer, but why would they do that on a Saturday evening?
Why would they have flown to New York City instead of just placing a phone call?
I began to feel some of my old demons with anger rising.
Why would Layla have begged for me back if she was just going to go out with some old geezer?
Why would she have made these desperate pleas to me when she was seeing other men?
If Chicago was such a deal breaker for us, why wouldn’t it be for seeing someone old enough to be her father?
“Chance?”
Sarah’s soft voice snapped me back. I couldn’t…
I couldn’t be out here right now. I definitely couldn’t walk into that bar with Sarah on my arm, but I wasn’t in much of a mood to be with Sarah either.
I was just too fucked in the head right now, too unsettled by what I had seen, to make any moves on her while also considering the consequences.
The best thing, the only thing I could have done right now to avoid catastrophe, was to just step away.
“Sorry,” I said. “I… I should get going.”
“Wait, you’re sure?” Sarah said, now more hurt than upset.
“Yeah,” I said. “There’s… something I didn’t tell you yet. Edwin Hunt died a couple of days ago.”
“Oh, Chance,” she said, moving in for a hug. “I know. I just didn’t want to say anything in case you didn’t want to talk about it.”
“I appreciate it,” I said, stroking her hair and holding her to me, even as Layla only needed to turn to see us like so. “I just… it’s a bit of a mindfuck, and I thought I could put it aside—”
“You did for the most part.”
“But I couldn’t now for whatever reason,” I said.
That was a white lie. I didn’t give two shits about Edwin Hunt right now. Even if I did, it certainly wouldn’t have stopped me from making any move.
“I understand,” she said. “When can I see you again?”
I bit my lip. I needed to see Layla in the coming days. I needed to know what this was, but I also needed to figure out where we were going and if I could get us to where we both wanted to be.
“Tuesday?” I said, thinking I could see Layla on Monday, get a sense for where we stood, and then cancel with Sarah if need be.
But unfortunately, life wouldn’t allow for things to be that simple.
“I leave for Oxford on Tuesday,” she said. “I’ll be back in the summer, but I’m kind of hoping that you can do Monday.”
Fuck me. Well… see Layla in the morning and Sarah in the afternoon. Or just don’t see Sarah at all. Don’t even bother.
“It’ll be last second,” I said. “Don’t keep your day open just for me, but I’ll see what I can do.”
“OK,” Sarah said.
An awkward silence lingered as I think she assumed I was going to end the night with a kiss, at least on the forehead or the cheek if not the lips. I waited for her to step back and wish me good night.
Eventually, I just patted her arm awkwardly, wished her well, and told her I’d be in touch.
I waited until I turned the corner back to my apartment, about ten minutes walking distance, to slap myself and grab my head with both of my hands. What the fuck was I thinking?!? What the fuck was I getting myself into?!?
Maybe accepting the coffee date was fine. Maybe just meeting for that one hour would have been bad, but it wouldn’t have been terrible. But to spend all day with her? After I had said the night before that I needed to ask Layla to be my girlfriend after everything with the funeral blew over?
This was the worst part of me rising up and taking control.
The insecure side of Chance that needed the validation of women to make up for his past had risen up and taken control of me.
If I were more secure, I would have enjoyed my hour with Sarah, wished her well, and told her we could be friends.
But no. I had let my personal weaknesses take over me so that I could “make up” for being the twelve year old rejected for not being a true Hunt.
The fucked up part of it was there was no actual making up for it. I couldn’t go back in time and make the younger Chance happy. That was my past, and I couldn’t change it, I couldn’t avenge it, I couldn’t make up for it. I could only learn from it.
I was just thankful that I’d managed to avoid doing anything too horrible.
I swore that I would have that conversation with Layla before I saw Sarah.
Because if I saw Sarah and I hadn’t defined things perfectly, then my insecure side was going to define things—and I didn’t think I’d like that very much.
I just hoped that Layla still felt the same way I did.