Things We Didn't Say - By Kristina Riggle Page 0,43
Red. My college drink of choice. Cheap, but it has flavor. It will do just fine.
I can already feel my heart lift at the prospect of that foam touching my lips, the cool tang of the beer, the unwinding of my shoulders that will begin. I’ll give one to Michael, hell, even to Mallory, and we can sit together and feel less crazy while we await word. It’ll be like a peace offering.
I’m smiling to myself at the register, and when the guy asks me for ID I start rooting through my pockets.
My wallet is not in my coat pocket.
The man stares at me, tapping the counter with his fingers, drumming out his impatience. Someone behind me readjusts his purchases in his arms. I start rooting around in my pants pockets, even the back pockets, which I never use. My fingers touch a bill, and I hope it’s a twenty or at least a ten, but now I have to convince him I’m twenty-one because . . .
As I look up to think of an excuse for not having ID, I catch sight of myself in a huge distorted mirror above the counter, the kind meant to spot thieves in every corner of the store. My head is huge in the center, the store disproportionately wide around me. I’m hemmed in by bottles.
“Sorry,” I tell the guy, and I run out the door.
I sprint down the block, away from the store, all stores, all bars, back to the neighborhood, panting with the unfamiliar exertion. I round a corner and slip; my feet fly away from the ground, and I come down hard on my side.
That’s when I notice the sleet has started. The sidewalks are collecting shiny pools of ice, nearly invisible in the dark. I pick myself up, and for a moment I lean against a tree, until I stop shaking.
I resume my walk back to the house carefully now, so it takes a good deal longer to return. I can’t feel my lips now that the wind has kicked up. My hair is damp with snow and sleet.
When I get to the porch I’m trembling again, though exactly why I can no longer say. I fish through my pockets, only to find I left not only without my wallet but without my keys. And my phone is inside.
I press the doorbell before I remember it’s broken. I knock as loudly as I dare, but there’s no answer. I peer in the front window, over my desk. The lights are off in the whole downstairs.
I knock once more, then curl up, shivering, in the chair on the porch, waiting for someone to wonder where I am.
Chapter 16
Michael
I hand Mallory a pair of my sweats out of the laundry basket on the floor of the bedroom. With the drawstring waist she should manage okay.
She accepts them and glances at the bed.
It’s the same bed we had, the one we purchased together just before we moved into this house. Casey and I did buy some new sheets, but that’s the same bed, the same mattress.
I see Mallory still staring at it and wonder what exactly she’s remembering.
“You can’t sleep in here,” I blurt out.
“I wasn’t going to ask. What, you think I came here to seduce you?” She smirks now. “You wish.”
Despite this, she pulls off both my old wool sweater and her T-shirt in one swipe, not bothering to turn around or leave the room, exposing her lacy red bra.
I turn my back to her. “Jesus, Mal.”
“Oh, like you haven’t seen them before.”
I hear a soft fall of fabric, and I know she’s dropped the bra to the floor.
Oh, dammit.
I sit down on the other side of the bed, facing away from her, not just because she’s undressing in front of me, but because my stupid penis is springing up like it’s party time.
It’s been a while for Casey and me. A hungry man is not picky about his meal.
And if I’m honest, sex was one way in which Mallory and I were very, very compatible.
I think of the unsexiest things I can imagine. I think about work, that always does the trick at the worst possible times.
But work makes me think of Kate.
“It’s safe now,” Mallory says, chuckling.
Not hardly. I say, without standing up, “Go on downstairs, I’ll get you some blankets for the couch.”
She doesn’t move, and for a moment I’m terrified she’s going to come around to my side of the bed.