Chapter 6 #2
He stands a few feet away, and I’m afraid to move closer. Neither of us says anything. It goes on for so long that the sounds of the leaves rustling in the breeze, the occasional bird call or chirp, and a squirrel going off at us from a distance start to feel comical.
I finally get brave enough to drag my eyes from the ground up to Luca’s face.
Sometime in the past few minutes, he shoved his hood back without me noticing.
He’s just as magnetic and arresting as he is every single time I’ve seen him, with striking green eyes, thick lashes, a strong nose, and that slightly ironic tilt the scars give his mouth.
His hair is mussed from the hood, and I have to pretend like I’m not dying to rush over to him and rake my fingers through it to straighten it out.
Or that I don’t notice how his faded jeans are an incredible pairing with that hoodie, and how they do wonders for his strong legs.
Which don’t need wonders.
Because they’re already wonders.
I couldn’t summon up an appetite for anything but recrimination and self-pity while I’ve been not sleeping, not eating, and not fixing anything out here, but suddenly I’m filled with a voracious hunger.
Luca’s chewing gum. Aggressively. And every chomp and flex of his jaw tells a story of nerves.
Why the hell does my brain go straight from he’s so beautiful, and I’m so glad he’s here because maybe that means there’s hope for the hopeless, AKA me, straight to that loud gum chewing would probably annoy people, but he could do it next to my ear all day long or spit it straight into my mouth, and my life would be complete?
I’d make a I haven’t had enough to drink today since that’s straight-up thirsty comment, but that’s beyond thirst. That’s parched. Like wandering in the desert with no water for days, absolutely dehydrated, and needing to be hooked to an IV immediately level of depraved.
He clears his throat and stops mashing the gum, but my ovaries are still practically smoking.
“The crows liked your gift.”
“That’s… I’m really glad.” I go to step off the porch and nearly miss it completely. I recover, ungracefully, by taking one long stride forward like I meant to not use the stairs. At least I don’t fall on my face.
“There’s one pair. The female brought a necklace for her mate.
They haven’t returned it back to me, but I expect a few gifts will be brought to the deck soon.
They usually leave things by the feeders.
I went and dispersed all the jewelry throughout the woods.
I didn’t want to make it too easy, so I hid some under leaves and behind rocks.
I also hung a few pieces off of branches. ”
“Wow. That’s brilliant. And also dedicated,” I say.
He wraps his arms around himself like he needs that form of self-protection to ward me off.
It’s the worst form of penance there is, seeing his pain reflected fever bright on the surface of his eyes that are beyond green now that the sun’s shining perfectly on his face.
“It gave me something to do while I was thinking.” He pauses, doing the thing where his lips purse out to say something, but nothing happens.
On me, it looks like fish lips. On him, it just looks straight up sinful. “Are you expecting company?”
I was so fixated on Luca that I didn’t even see or hear the second car turn down the driveway. He turns quickly, pulling his hood back up.
“I ordered pizza,” I answer.
“Ahh.”
“I thought I looked too awful to go out in public, so I got delivery.” It would be nice to stop talking.
Then again, I’m sure he can see that I’ve been riding the hot mess express with a round-trip ticket.
My hair is a knotted nest of terror, and I haven’t showered or even washed my makeup off from yesterday.
Considering I went with a full face of makeup that was quite goth-inspired, there’s been a lot of black smudging all over the place.
The tears probably took care of most of the foundation, but I know I’ve got the raccoon rings and streaks going on.
Plus, I’m wearing leggings and an old ratty sweater.
It’s my favorite, but I’d never let it see the light of day.
I’ve had it since I was a teenager. It has my high school’s football team logo on it.
“I thought I could maybe drown my sorrows in cheese and pepperoni, but that’s never worked for me before.” The car creeps down the driveway with as much care as Adam’s did.
“You should try ice cream,” he deadpans.
“I mean all food.” I keep my eyes on the car while he has his back to it.
Is it weird having a conversation like this?
Not really. Not after everything that’s already happened between us.
“When I get really upset, the last thing I want to do is eat. The anxiety that clenches up my belly like a big sack of stones kind of works against it. But also… I had no groceries.”
The car stops, and the driver’s door opens. A lanky teenager gets out, but he’s all big smiles as he pops the trunk and produces the world’s most epic pizza box.
I can’t help it. I laugh. He laughs. I’m afraid he’s going to drop the box since it’s so massive and he’s doing the thing where his whole body laughs with him. I rush over and grab the other side. It’s heavy. It’s not deadweight, but twenty-eight inches is a lot of food.
Luca is nowhere to be seen. He probably walked around the side of the cabin or went through the front door.
“If you want to just set it down here on the porch…”
We lower the box together. It takes up so much space that I start laughing again. Almost the whole little front deck is covered by the pizza box. I prepaid, but I have a twenty in my pocket, which I hand over, saying, “Thanks so much. I hope it wasn’t too much trouble finding the place.”
“Nah. We deliver to rural areas all the time. I’m used to the fire numbers and geo locations.”
“Thank you again. Have a safe trip back.”
He nods and flashes me a smile that pretty much draws up his whole lean face with it. “Thanks. Enjoy the pizza.”
After the car disappears down the driveway and back down the road, Luca steps out of the cabin. He freezes when he sees the box, gaping at it. “Garp! What the hell is that?”
I’ve never actually heard anyone say garp before, but he somehow makes it incredibly sexy.
Focus. On anything but him. “A twenty-eight-inch pizza,” I reply.
“You really went for it then.”
“I thought it might be funny. I’ve spent money on worse things.
Like coming out here. Like hiring someone to give me all the details of your life.
Like… okay, yeah, we’ve been over this a few thousand times already.
” I pick up the box by myself, but freeze.
“How are we going to get this through the door?”
“Angled slightly. Here. Let me.” He holds out his arms, and I transfer the box into them, every bit as ungainly as expected. He doesn’t drop it. He has no problem making his way at just the right angle so the box doesn’t tip the pizza all over the place while he gets through the screen door.
Inside, the place is sparsely furnished. The cottage is wide open, with a tiny kitchen, a round wood table, a floral sofa, a small TV, a tiny bathroom, and one small bedroom at the back. It’s probably not more than three hundred square feet.
Luca sets the box down easily on the table.
We both stare at it.
I break first, laughing at how it takes up more than the whole table.
He laughs too, reluctantly at first, but then the rich, rolling sound of it takes over the husky start.
I laugh until my eyes start tearing up. I have to stop or I’m going to cry, and that’s going to turn into sad tears followed by ugly crying. And not about the pizza.
My emotions are a mess.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, brushing my knuckles over my eyes.
“Me too,” he murmurs.
My head snaps up. “What do you have to apologize for?”
“For the past two and a half decades? For losing myself. For parts of me ceasing to exist.”
I flip the top of the box open. The pizza looks exactly like a pizza. Just jumbo-sized. If we flipped it out of the box, it would probably cover the whole table’s surface just about perfectly.
I get two plates from the cupboard and hold one out like a peace offering.
“That just happens when people age.” Right.
So says I, who wasn’t even born when all this went down with Luca and my dad.
“Saying goodbye to the past isn’t necessarily a bad thing,” I mutter, my face getting red.
Fantastic. That should look glorious with the raccoon makeup.
“I understand it was a disagreement. My dad doesn’t see it that way, but if you…
err… if I talked to him, I think he’d be open to changing his mind.
You don’t have to apologize to me. It’s all good. ”
“It’s not, though.”
“It’s not, but you know what I mean.”
I work on pulling out one of the pizza wedges. It’s so big that it fills up my entire plate. After not eating all day, my mouth waters. I guess it helps to have your appetite stimulated by someone who smells divine enough to eat.
That and the fact that Luca’s peace offering has worked wonders for my anxiety.
“What’s more gut-wrenching than looking back at the past and knowing you left things unresolved, and it hurt someone badly? That they never properly moved on?”
I just about drop my plate on the floor. Cue anxiety back up. Big time. “You can’t be responsible for someone else.”