Three Christmas Wishes - Krista Wolf Page 0,72

hadn’t done in about a decade. Then he hopped in, revved her up, and took off, even spinning the tires on the way out of the hotel’s parking lot.

“You really thought I’d get rid of my baby?” he smiled.

“I thought I was your baby.”

“You were my other baby,” he grinned. “My best baby.”

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah yeah…”

We tore through the rain-slick streets, made even blacker by the reflection of night as we cruised through town. In the meantime, I took in my ex-boyfriend as he sat beside me. He wore the same ripped blue jeans and faded jacket I remembered him in, only everything was broader and more nicely filled out. His hand rested on the steering wheel with casual comfort, as if he’d been born with it in his palm.

“I can’t believe it about Elizabeth,” I said somberly.

Warren’s jaw twitched a little as he slowly nodded. “Me neither.”

“I mean, when was the last time you talked to her?”

“Had to be a year,” he sighed. “Maybe a little more. I ran into her at the pancake house where she worked sometimes, but more often than not it was at the bar.” He paused solemnly. “Or rather… bars.”

We fell silent as we passed through a main stretch of town. The buildings looked the same, the facades mostly unchanged. But the signs in the windows were different. The businesses themselves, totally alien to me.

“What happened to Rudy’s?” I asked.

“Closed.”

“And the lumber yard?” I pointed to an open stretch of darkness.

“Gone too,” Warren said simply. “Big box stores,” he shrugged, by way of explanation. “Couldn’t compete.”

“I see.”

The more I looked, the more I couldn’t recognize anything at all. One by one, the restaurants had become gas stations and banks. The florist was razed. The donut shop was now a fancy coffee house, filled with couches and furniture and strange-looking people.

“Wow, look at this place,” I breathed. “I mean… what the hell?”

Warren turned to glance at me, mildly amused. None of this seemed to phase him. The billiard hall was suddenly a laundromat. We passed the corner store that we used to hang out at as kids, stealing candy by the fistful. It had been replaced by a new pizzeria.

“This is fuckin’ depressing,” I said.

“Why?”

“Because everything’s…”

“Changed?”

“Yeah.”

He shook his head. “Well it’s been seven years, Kayla. You didn’t expect the town to sit here waiting for you to come back?”

“Actually, I guess I did.” The streets rolled by, looking strange and foreign to my tired eyes. I let out a short, acid laugh. “It would’ve been nice, anyway.”

“Yeah, well it doesn’t work like that.”

Through the rain we drove, neither of us willing to talk about Elizabeth… or about the other elephant in the room.

Luke.

When it came down to it there were a thousand questions I wanted to ask Warren, but we had plenty of time. To save on airfare, I’d arrived two whole days before the funeral.

“So whatcha been up to?” I asked casually.

“Work, mostly.”

“Still fixing cars?”

“Fixing up hot rods now,” he acknowledged, “but yeah.”

I hesitated for a moment, which created an awkward silence. “Are you still at Tommy’s?”

“Uh huh,” Warren nodded. “Only now it’s a different place, a different name.”

I looked over at my handsome ex, admiring all the things that had made him attractive in the first place. The years had agreed with him. Rather than age him, they’d made him stronger, more mature. It made him sexier, if anything.

“I guess nothing stays the same, does it?”

His knuckles went white as he turned the wheel again, guiding us through the far side of town. A warmth stole over me, and I started remembering what it was like to kiss him. To just slide my arms over his shoulders, and recall the feel of those calloused hands on my body.

“Is that the drive-in?” I squinted.

“It was.”

The big marquee eventually emerged, through the sheets of rain and the slicing of wiper-blades. The old sign was broken and empty. Shrouded in darkness.

“Shit,” I breathed. “I mean, I figured that at least would be able to—”

“Business dropped off not long after you left,” Warren cut in. “The place lasted a few more years, maybe three or four, and then they built a giant multiplex with stadium seating about ten minutes outside of town.”

I lowered my head sadly. “That sucks.”

“Yeah. Netflix and movie-streaming were hurting it bad enough, but the multiplex was the nail in the coffin.”

He turned again, this time into the old drive-in. The little ticket booth was empty, the gate long-since snapped off. We