Chapter Twenty-One
“What did Bruce say?” asked Catherine as she leaned back against the table and crossed her arms over her chest. Her features were stern and serious, her blue eyes sharp.
The last time Angel had seen her friend so solemn was last year when Catherine had turned forty years old.
It was a number she had been running away from most of her thirties and instead of celebrating, she had held a memorial service. All of the guests had worn black.
But her seriousness was warranted. Two meetings with Bruce in the space of a month were as serious as things could get.
“He’s upset, of course,” said Angel, remembering the thumping vein near Bruce’s temple and how his jaw had been tight and clenched.
“He said I ignored him_blatantly, apparently_and went on with my relationship with Samantha. He said I should’ve been more careful and foreseen that Samantha was going to use me.
Apparently, he thinks she was feeling invincible enough to do what she did because of our relationship. ”
After Samantha had rushed to Angel’s house in the middle of the night with a bag of almonds as a gift, Angel hadn’t thought twice about Bruce and his stupid policy_not that such an official policy even existed.
But still, Bruce had been right to warn her against a relationship with Samantha.
If Angel had just listened to him and cut things off with her as a doctor would cut off a diseased limb, then Angel wouldn’t have fallen over the cliff called love.
A feeling she was desperately struggling to rid herself of.
How did a person get rid of the fuzzy, warm feeling of love after it wrapped itself around every cell in their body? It wasn’t like Angel could just hack the feeling away or tear it out like she could pluck out a rogue strand of an eyebrow. Only time could ease the love-sick feeling.
Yet she didn’t have the patience to wait.
“Do you think she took advantage of your relationship?”
“No.” Angel didn’t even have to think twice about it. She knew for sure that Samantha wasn’t the type of person to take advantage of another. Setting her neighbor’s roof on fire was a reckless, careless mistake. That was her problem; she didn’t think before she acted. “Not at all.”
“Well, I don’t think Bruce’s got any right to tell you who you can and cannot see.”
“You’re right. He doesn’t.”
“But…” Catherine drew the word out long and slow.
Angel knew there was going to be a ‘but,’ especially considering that Catherine was extremely logical. Probably even more so than Angel_that was saying something.
Bracing herself for it, Angel sighed and said, “But what?”
“Not everyone thinks like us. We understand the consequences of actions more so than anyone else because we fight them every day. A cigarette tossed out the window, a shard of glass dropped in a field, an oven left on. Small things that seem so inconsequential to someone else, but not to us. We understand those consequences because we see houses go up in smoke from them every day.” Catherine pushed herself forward, away from the table.
“Samantha knew what she was doing was dangerous but she_”
Angel couldn’t bear to hear what Catherine was about to say, so she interrupted her. “Well, I’ve ended things with her, alright? You can save whatever lecture you had for another day.
She wondered if Samantha would ever stop being a sensitive topic in her life. Even when the love faded, and they became nothing more than two people who knew each other, would her name still send a fire into Angel’s belly?
“Alright.” Catherine winked at her as she ambled across the kitchen to the fridge.
Opening the door, she stuck her head inside and scanned its contents.
There were two Tupperware containers resting on the second level, both belonging to Angel.
One of them had a turkey sandwich in it and the other was filled to the brim with blueberries. Brain food.
“You have to start bringing your own lunch to work,” muttered Angel.
She had no energy to fight Catherine over her food this morning.
Last night she’d barely slept. The nightmare had come as it always did, but there was a distinct difference, an alarming change.
It wasn’t the green-eyed girl sitting on the desk, but rather a terrified-looking Samantha, her hair blending in with the flames, her honey-colored eyes pitch black with fear.
“Next year,” stated Catherine as she took a huge bite, swallowing up at least half of the sandwich. “Do you remember my friend Jackie Friedman?”
The name was familiar. Angel could picture a short, square woman with thick fingers adorned in gem-studded rings and a hearty, infectious laugh. They had met at Catherine’s fortieth birthday party and Jackie had worn a black lace veil over her face.
“I do. Why?”
“Well, she’s volunteering at the Goodwill center downtown these days after she got that hefty check from her dead aunt. Something about giving back when the universe gave her so abundantly. Anyway, she said a woman came by yesterday and dropped off a box of fire dancing supplies.”
Angel’s heart was suddenly beating a little faster.
“Everything from rings to costumes to a badly scorched staff,” continued Catherine. Her gaze locked on Angel’s face as if she were waiting for a reaction.
But Angel’s reaction was internal. Not only was her heart beating fast, but her stomach was all knotted now and her hands were becoming increasingly clammy. A reaction that was completely unjustified.
Catherine added, “Jackie said the woman had hair as red as fire.”
“Samantha,” managed Angel. “Was it Samantha?”
With a shrug and another bite of the sandwich, finishing the entirety of Angel’s lunch, Catherine put the container into the sink, and wiped her hands on her blue slacks.
“Who else could it have been? She’s the only redhead I know that does fire dancing in the whole of Orange County. Maybe the whole of America.”
“She’s giving it up,” said Angel softly.
Of course, Samantha had decided to give up the one thing she loved.
It wasn’t just a hobby; it was her passion.
She might’ve been careless and irresponsible and sometimes didn’t think further than the street, but she wasn’t thoughtless and selfish. Just the opposite.
“She is,” said Catherine, and came to stand beside Angel.
For a moment they both stood in silence, eyes ahead, focused on the picture of a pigeon wearing a beanie that sat framed above the fridge.
It was a gift from Frankie’s ex-girlfriend, Bella, and it used to hang up on the wall in his bathroom.
But he just couldn’t bear to look at it and had re-gifted the frame to Mitch, who had put it up right above the fridge just to annoy Frankie.
Catherine nudged Angel with her shoulder.
“You know, when I was thirteen, I adopted this dog from the animal rescue. Her fur was the color of caramel and she had extra bits of fluff around her shoulders. I called her Bubbles, and she was a rescue dog and had gone through some trauma when she was just a puppy. I loved her to death, but she bit everyone. Charlie, my younger brother, even had to get stitches on his arm once. It wasn’t even his fault.
We were play-wrestling and Bubbles was trying to defend me…
” Her voice trailed off and she took a deep, steady breath in as if she were reliving the memory and experiencing the tight pull of heartache.
Even Angel experienced a flush of goosebumps all over her body. It was obvious where the story was going, but still there was a knot of anticipation. Maybe she could change the end of the story, morph it into one with a happy ending, if she just tried hard enough.
“One day, I was walking Bubbles and there wasn’t anyone on the street and so I thought, why not let her off the leash for a bit?
She loved to run free, and our yard wasn’t that big.
It seemed like such a good idea at the time.
But there was a little girl playing outside of her house just down the street.
I hadn’t seen her, or I never would’ve let Bubbles off her leash.
Anyway, the little girl lost a sizeable chunk of her calf, and I lost my best friend. ”
Angel was on the verge of tears. Whether her tears were for little Catherine and her beloved dog or the little girl who got hurt, she wasn’t sure_possibly for both of them.
“My point is,” sighed Catherine, “Sometimes we know that something is dangerous, but we overlook it because we love it more than anything.”
“I’m sorry about Bubbles,” said Angel and wiped a single tear rolling down her cheek.
Clearly, she was feeling ridiculously emotional this morning.
Maybe she was suffering from a serious bout of heightened sensitivity since she was due to start her period at some point.
Or maybe the story about Bubbles had hit the right nerve. “I’m sure she was a lovely dog.”
“She was. And so is Samantha_not a dog, of course, but a person. That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier when you cut me off.
Samantha knew what she was doing was dangerous, but she wasn’t doing it with any sort of spite or bad intention…
but rather out of love. She loves fire dancing, and I think she might even love you more. ”
“Love me?” blurted Angel. She hadn’t allowed herself to consider such a thing at all. It had only seemed possible that Angel had been the one to fall in love. “Why would you say that?
Footsteps suddenly thumped outside in the hallway and before Catherine could answer Angel’s very important, very critical question, Frankie walked into the kitchen. “What are you two up to? Hopefully making some_”
“Get out!” exclaimed Catherine and pointed a sharp finger in the direction of the hall. “We’re talking about tampons and periods.”
Frankie’s face scrunched up in a look of disgust and he quickly backtracked and disappeared out of sight.
If Angel wasn’t completely dumbfounded at Catherine’s statement, she would’ve added something about the bloody moon cycle just to further gross Frankie out, but she could hardly speak.
At least Catherine didn’t make her wait any longer.
She turned to Angel and said, “I saw Samantha’s face when you broke things off with her.
Every part of her broke. She looked destroyed when you left, and not because of the fire she caused, but because of you.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone lose themselves, or at least a part of themselves so visibly.
I swear her hair was less bright by the end of your conversation. ”
A deep breath ran from Angel’s lips until her lungs were empty, as if she had been keeping it in for who knew how long.
She ran her fingers through her hair_a crutch.
When she was nervous or angry or frustrated, she always dragged her fingers through her blonde hair, enjoying the soft feeling against her skin and the pull of the fragile but somehow strong strands of her hair.
“I love her, too.”
A smile crept up on Catherine’s face, slowly, as if in slow motion, and then she clapped her hands loudly together and bounced on the balls of her feet. “I knew it! Ha. I knew it.”
“But I’m trying to un-love her,” muttered Angel, more to herself. It wasn’t going very well. On the contrary, un-loving someone was harder than falling in love. All you had to do to fall in love was accidentally trip and you were there. To un-fall, now that was the problem.
“Why?” frowned Catherine.
The answer had been so simple a few days ago when the fire had blasted over Matty’s roof.
It was that moment when Angel’s anger had been dialed up a notch too high because she had glimpsed a future where she was constantly looking over her shoulder to make sure Samantha wasn’t bringing chaos into the world.
But she felt different now, and the future she had imagined then wasn’t a future at all, but rather a tiny, inconsequential fragment of what could’ve been a beautiful relationship.
One with spontaneous morning sex and paddle adventures, and late-night confessions and stolen glances.
Angel shrugged, “I don’t know.”
~~
When Angel pulled up in her driveway late that afternoon, her eyes immediately caught sight of a box sitting on her doorstep.
A package she didn’t order.
With her curiosity piqued, Angel quickly parked the car and made her way over to the doorstep. It was a rather big box as boxes went, but when she bent down to pick it up, she was surprised by its weight. No more than ten pounds, give or take.
“What are you?” she asked the box as she held it under her left arm and unlocked the front door. Checking for a note or a sender’s address, she carried the box to the kitchen and set it down on the counter.
“Who sent you?” she asked and without waiting, grabbed the kitchen knife and cut it expertly open.
Angel suddenly laughed out loud.
How could she not when inside the box were ten pounds of raw almonds nestled within it? A note sat on top. Reaching for the paper, she unfolded the note and read it: I hope you never have a nightmare again. Love S.