My eyes widened, and he smirked with another little shakeof his head. One dimple.
“Ah,yathink you knoweverything,Kins, but I betyadidn’t know that, didya?”
CHAPTER 12 |
Giving In & Possibilities
PATRICK
We met forthe second time when we werethirty.
I thought about it a lot; the night thatchanged everything. The night that solidified my separation from the only womanI would ever love.
It happened three weeks after Kinsey had brokenup with me. Three weeks after she had just ended things without so much as atear. Christ, I had seen the girl cry over a fallen hot dog, but she broke upwith me with less emotion than a goddamn rock. It was a front, I realized whenI was older and less angry, but that didn’t matter then. Not when I was twenty,not when I was stupid and brokenhearted.
After three weeks had gone by, I still hadn’tcollected enough of my pride to call her, nor had she called me. I could justsee it in my mind: all the guys she was out partying with, doing things thatweren’t in her character, and I convinced myself that she was a changed person.The person I knew never would’ve broken up with me, never would’ve let weeks goby without asking how I was.
During one of those particularly spiteful days,when I couldn’t stand being inside my own head, I was hanging in the RiverCanyon Park with a couple buddies, when Christine rolled up in her daddy’s car.She wiggled her hips all the way over to me, draping herself on my arm, likeshe was making herself at home.
“Hey Pat,” she said, pressing herself againstme.
I despised being called Pat. “Pat” wassomething you did to dogs, but I neglected to correct her. That was somethingI’d also regret for tenfeckin’ years.
“Christine.”
“So, you’re single, huh?”
“Took you this long to find out?” I wasgenuinely surprised. News traveled fast in that town, and after three weeks, Iwas pretty sure all of Connecticut knew when River Canyon’s greatest love storywas snubbed out.
Her nails dragged along my inner forearm, herfingers intertwined with mine.
Her bony fingers felt wrong and knobby, and Ididn’t close my hand around hers. Yet, I didn’t pull away.
“I only just got home from visiting my familyin Jersey,” she explained, but I didn’t care.
Nah, I was too busy noticing the way herpebbled nipples felt against my arm. Too busy acknowledging an awakening in myjeans, as my eyes roamed the tops of her breasts, bubbling over the neckline ofher low-cut shirt. Too busy paying attention to her hand, pulling mine to thehem of her short skirt, brushing my fingers against the smooth skin of herinner thighs.
She hadn’t come to give her sympathies orrekindle some old friendship of the past.
Nah, she came to claim her prize, because sheknew she was going to win.
Christine stood on her toes, pressing my handcloser between her legs. She ogled me, gauging my reaction. My face wasn’tgiving her one, but it didn’t have to. She noticed the shifting of my legs, thebulge straining against the zipper of my jeans.
“I have a bottle of vodka in my car. Youwannago drink it with me?”
Long story short: I said yes.
Longer story short: She had lied about thebirth control, and I was too wasted to think twice about it.
So, I thought about it a lot, that pivotalmoment in my life that forced me to grow up faster than I had intended. Aboutwhat I could have done differently, about what any of us might have donedifferently had we known exactly what the consequences would have been. Butthen, I’d look at the kid who always made me laugh, despite it all, and I’dwonder if I would even want to do anything at all.
For a long time, I’d say to myself, “Paddy, youmade your stupid choices, and your marriage is shite, butyagot yourself a wonderful girl out of the deal, and that girl is your life. Atthe end of the day, that’s all that matters, andyadid the right thing.”
But then, ten years after I exchanged vows withthe manipulative witch of River Canyon, I sawher,and I knew there was one thing I would have done differently: I never wouldhave let ten years go by without seeing her face.
Hell, I don’t even knowwhatI would have done to change the outcome of those missing years, but anythingwould have been better than lying on that fold-out couch, wondering what shewas doing. Who she was seeing. If she was happy.
I hoped to Christ she was happy. One of usdeserved to be.
