Jack
I look up as the changing room door opens. We’re doing another item on Dany’s list.
“What do you think?” she asks.
She spins around in a little ballet move. I clear my throat as all the blood leaves my head and goes southward.
“It’s good,” I say. My voice is a low growl. “Good,” I say again.
I’ve been losing sleep over this woman and she doesn’t even realize it. This moment is going to haunt my dreams.
She’s in a fluttery yellow dress. The front is held together by ribbons and the shoulder straps are tied in little bows. She looks like a present. For me. A present for me. I could tug in exactly three places and the dress would fall to the floor. Do women realize that ties and buttons are enticements to fuel men’s imaginations?
“I’m getting it then,” she says. She spins again and the dress poofs out. I catch a glimpse of lace underwear. I groan.
“Pardon?” she asks. She’s wearing a floral head scarf and little hoop earrings. Wedge shoes. Lots of bracelets and color. She looks nothing like the prim and buttoned-up woman I met all those weeks ago.
But I still feel the same draw. No matter what she looks like. I still feel drawn to her.
I close my eyes. I know I’m fighting a losing battle.
What am I going to do when she gets to the end of her list? It’s like a big, glowing clock ticking over my head. A countdown to when I’m going to lose her. Except I don’t even have her.
And I can’t have her.
“What did you say?” she asks.
“I said you should get them all. They all looked good.”
After she’s bought half the store. I carry her shopping bags onto the street.
“Let’s get lunch. I want to go back to Chet’s,” she says.
I flinch reactively. “No way. No more bar fights.”
She laughs. “Kidding.”
I shake my head.
“We could get street food. I’ve always wanted to—”
“Try street food.” I finish for her.
“Am I that predictable?” she asks.
“Predictable?” I think of her surprise announcement outside my truck after bungee jumping. I swallow. “Never,” I say. “You terrify me with how unpredictable you are.”
“That’s good,” she says. “I wouldn’t want to bore you.”
Then she frowns. Suddenly, I can feel her sadness. It’s a strong current below a deceptively smooth surface. I don’t know how I missed it before. When did this happen? Why?
I curse Shawn. I remember as well as she does that he called her boring. It hurt her. A lot.
“It’s not possible for you to bore me,” I say.
She looks down at her shoes.
“You alright?” I ask. I nudge her with my elbow.
“When I finish my list…”
My throat tightens. That ticking clock threatens.
“When I finish my list, what if I go back to being who I was? I won’t always be running around, being spontaneous. I might go back to being what I was. Back to being…I don’t know.” She shakes her head.
It’s not only sadness. There’s distance there. A chasm opening between us.
My shoulders tense. I want to reach out and shake her, grab her and pull her across the drop. Pull her to me.
Instead, I say, “Let’s go to the kebab stand on the corner of Fifth and Main.”
She looks at me. I feel my face burn under her scrutiny. I dropped it. I dropped the ball.
She tucks away the question. “That sounds amazing.”
“Alright.”
We walk down the street, our shoulders brushing, the back of our hands touching. I want to reach out, pull her around and kiss her. Tell her she never has to finish her list. That she can keep on being the Dany I know. That she doesn’t ever have to be anything she doesn’t want to.
That I love her.
Good lord, I love her.
I’m terrified of it.
Too scared to admit the truth. To myself or to her.
“Why do you like renovating buildings so much?” she asks, oblivious to my struggle.
I take a moment to pull myself back together. To wrap up those feelings and hide them down deep.
“Do you want my pat answer, or do you want the truth?” I ask.
She looks over at me and lowers her brows. “Why do you have a pat answer?”
“Because most people don’t want to hear the truth. It’s uncomfortable. It’s not really appropriate for every day.”
Her mouth purses into a little pink peach.
“I get that. But I want the truth. You won’t make me uncomfortable,” she says.
I look down at the cracked gray sidewalk. Funny thing, I’ve never shared my true reasons with anyone.
It’s harder to draw it out than I thought.
She reaches over and gently takes my arm. We start walking, moving forward together. The city moves around us, cars driving by, stores open, restaurants serving lunch. We’re in our own bubble.
“When I was young, I lived with my mom on the west side of Stanton,” I begin slowly.
“Across the tracks?” she asks.
“Yeah. We lived in the Redwood Development.”
“Oh. Ohhh,” she says. Her voice cracks.
I almost stop my story there. She knows what’s coming. Everyone knows what happened at Redwood.
She doesn’t press, she doesn’t say anything more.
After a while I continue. “My mom worked three jobs. I didn’t know my dad yet. I didn’t know about Sissy. My mom. She…” I stop. This is hard to say. “She hated being a mom.”
“No,” says Dany.
“It’s alright. I understand. She didn’t hate me. She hated being a mom. I wasn’t what she wanted. I made life hard.”
“It’s not your fault she had you,” Dany says. She sounds angry in her defense of me. I smile.
“No, I got it. I was a hellion. I didn’t help around the house. I wasn’t good at being part of a family. As long as she had me around, she suffered.”
“Is that what she said?” Dany asked.
I shake my head no. Not until the end. I just knew, like any child knows when their parent doesn’t exactly want them. I’m not cut out for family life. That’s always been clear.
“Anyway. When I was ten, my mom was upset that I wasn’t pulling more weight around the house. She wanted me to stay home and clean up while she slept. Instead, I snuck out to bike around town and smoke the cigarettes I’d shoplifted.”
Dany stays quiet. But she keeps holding my hand and pulling me forward.
“I was mad at her, so I stayed out longer than I should have. When I got back—” I choke on the word.
“It’s alright. I know,” she says.
Of course she knows. Everyone knows.
But I have to say it. It feels necessary to finally tell someone the truth.
“When I got back, the first building had already collapsed and the fire had spread to the rest of the complex. Fifty of the seventy-one people that died were already dead. My mom was on the pavement. I found her, choking on the smoke in her lungs.”
“Oh no,” says Dany.
“I begged her to be okay. For the first time in my life, I told her I loved her. With her dying breath she said, ‘You did this. Your love is suffering.’”
Dany stops. When she looks up at me, there are tears in her eyes.
“That’s horrible. She’s wrong. That’s wrong,” she says.
“It’s alright.” I pretend to shrug it off. “My aunt took me in. It was fine. Now you know. I renovate buildings so families, poor or otherwise, never have to die because of shoddy building practices. I build so that a kid like me doesn’t have to lose”—I clear my throat—“lose anyone he…”
“Loves,” she says.
“Sure,” I say.
A tear falls down her face. I lift my finger to wipe it away. When I do, I realize that I’m crying too.
Good god. I’ve never cried over the fire. Never. Not during. Not after. Not at the funeral. Never.
“Sorry,” I say. I clear my throat and wipe at my face with the back of my hand. I choke the tears back.
“Don’t,” says Dany. She catches my hand in hers.
“What?” I ask.
“Don’t. You can cry if you want,” she says with a wistful smile. “Tears are truth.”
Then she moves closer and wraps her arms around me. Her head rests over my heart.
I put my arms around her as well and we stand there in the afternoon sunlight in the middle of downtown Stanton holding each other.
After a minute she looks up. Her eyes are clear. I think mine are too.
“How about that kebab place?” she asks.
“I’m starving,” I say. Glad that I don’t have to talk more about the fire.
I wonder. Would Dany understand that her helping with the Rose Tower bid will finally allow me to get the absolution I need?
If I had come home earlier, I could’ve saved my mom. I’ve been making up for that mistake my whole life. If I can build this development, a safe home for working families, maybe my penance will finally be complete.
My shoulders relax.
We start to walk again, and I decide maybe I can tell Dany that I want more. Not a family. Not marriage. Not anything about love or feelings. Not yet. But more. We could continue on as we have been. Having fun, making love, living each day as it comes. So that what we’re doing doesn’t have a looming expiration date.
“Guess what?” she asks.
I stop. There’s something in her voice. I turn. Her eyes are lit up.
“What?” I ask.
She smiles. “The doctor says I only need two more treatments of chemo. Then I’m in the clear.”
“What? That’s amazing.” I whoop. Pick her up and swing her around. She laughs then beats at my chest.
“Put me down. Put me down.”
I grin and set her on her feet. She beams up at me. This is the best news.
She’s going to live. Live. I didn’t realize until this moment how scared I was that she wouldn’t.
“That’s amazing,” I say again. “We need more than kebabs. We need a celebration dinner. Champagne. Cake. Deep-fried Snicker balls. Whatever you want to—”
I cut off. There’s a man hurrying toward us.
It’s Shawn.