“It’s okay, Wes. It is. I’m not pressuring you. I want to go. I need to go and,” she gestured to the air as if something existed there, which might explain her desire to go now, “when the moment arises, I grab it.”
Unfortunately, she couldn’t explain to him a lifetime of such whims. She lived on the cusp of the breath, awaiting the next inhale. The knowledge that death crept ever near lay always coiled in the back of her mind.
Crystal opened her purse and pulled out a wad of cash. She didn’t have a bank account, which Bette told her was irresponsible, but she’d never claimed to be anything else.
“Two hundred,” Crystal said, placing the bills on the counter.
Wes frowned but didn’t argue.
She filled out the forms, paid the money, and took the glossy brochure with pictures of Lake Superior sparkling against a backdrop of rocky cliffs.
Wes was quiet as they walked back to the car and climbed in. When she looked at him, he seemed to be fighting tears.
“Hey,” she grabbed his hand. “Don’t be upset, Wes. It’s okay if you can’t go. We’ll plan another one. I just have to do things when they come up. That’s my nature. My reckless nature, according to Bette, but…“ She paused and tried to choose her next words in a way that wouldn’t alarm him. “We’re not guaranteed tomorrow. You know? Remember when we first met, and I told you I try to live every day like it’s my last? Well, I’m doing that. This is me doing that.”
Wes nodded and climbed behind the wheel. He said nothing as he drove to her apartment..
“I’ll see you next week, then?” she asked, her heart thundering in her chest.
His silence hadn’t upset her at first, but as the minutes dragged on, she tensed.
“Wes?” she demanded when he didn’t turn to look at her.
He shifted his eyes to hers. He looked devastated, as if a terrible tragedy had befallen them.
She blinked at him, startled. “Wes, I don’t understand.”
He swallowed and forced a smile.
“I’m good. Yeah, I’ll see you next week.” He leaned forward, not bothering to unlatch his seatbelt, and kissed her, catching only the corner of her mouth.
Crystal climbed from the car, and Wes didn’t look at her as he pulled away from the curb.
Crystal packed a duffel bag, moving listlessly between her closet and dresser, throwing shorts, tank tops and a bathing suit in a pile on her bed.
She thought of Weston’s eyes, the tight bud of his mouth. He hadn’t been angry. No, it had been sorrow in his features, but why hadn’t he spoken? The man with so many words, with words like a steadily moving stream, had said nothing. He’d left her on the sidewalk without even a parting glance.
She shoved the clothes in her bag and grabbed the brochure on the table beside her door.
On the inner flap, a couple kissed across their kayaks.
She frowned and shoved the pamphlet into her bag.
Her excitement at signing up for the adventure had dissipated with her thoughts of Weston.
She walked across the hall to Garret’s apartment and knocked on the door.
He pulled it open, wearing a red button-down shirt open at the collar. Tight black jeans hugged his sinewy body.
“Crystal, my love, come in, come in. I just opened a bottle of Chardonnay. Have a glass.”
Crystal followed Garret into his immaculate apartment. Garret didn’t suffer dust or disarray. She heard his vacuum power on every morning at seven a.m., despite more than a few neighbors’ complaints. The landlord would never reprimand a tenant for excessive cleaning.
“How’s the new stud?” Garret asked. “I saw him leaving your apartment the other morning, sneaking out like a fox from the henhouse. My goodness, that luscious hair. I thought of inviting him over so I might run my fingers through it.”
Crystal laughed and took her glass of wine, perching on one of Garret’s bar stools.
“He is delicious, isn’t he?” she asked.
She wanted to engage in the easy banter she and Garret usually shared about their various lovers, but a knot had formed in her stomach. The wine only seemed to send it roiling.
“I’m going out with Barry again tonight,” Garret said, sitting on the other stool. “Don’t ask me why. He’s a terrible kisser, but he’s funny. Best ab workout of my life just listening to him talk. My mother always said a man who makes you laugh is a keeper.” Garret made a gagging face.
“I like Barry,” Crystal said, thinking of the man Garret had brought home the week before.
He was not Garret’s usual type. He stood a foot shorter than Garret and had a mop of curly blond hair, a nose splashed in freckles, and he’d been wearing corduroy pants. Clothes that Garret called the curse of heterosexual men.
But Barry wasn’t heterosexual. and though he dressed badly, kissed badly, and didn’t match the Calvin-Klein-men’s-underwear model types Garret usually dated, he had a smile that turned angry dogs into puddles of mush at his feet. Really, Garret had seen it with his own eyes, and told Crystal all about it.
“I thought gay men were free from falling for the responsible, safe type,” he complained. “Hear that, Grandma?” He looked skyward. “I’m gay. Even a respectable, kind, trustworthy man won’t produce any Kasper babies.”
Crystal grinned and took another sip of wine. Garret’s joy sent the little knot unraveling, if only slightly.
“Don’t dismiss him yet, Grandma Kasper,” Crystal called. “There’s always adoption.”
Garret sighed and grabbed a bottle of vodka from the counter, taking a swig.
“I need a nip of the hard stuff to stomach that idea. But tell me, darling, Crystal. Where is your hunk on this Friday afternoon? Surely he hasn’t left you to the company of your cats and a TV dinner?”
“I don’t have cats,” she snapped playfully, throwing an oven mitt at him.
He caught it and quickly returned it to the little hook beside the oven.
“He left,” she sighed. “I booked a trip to the UP for the weekend to go kayaking and… he couldn’t go.”
Garret watched her for a moment and then leaned both elbows on the counter.
“Okay, spill your guts, Miss Childs. You’re telling me you’re taking a last-minute, carelessly romantic trip that includes waterfalls and heart-shaped cliffs and Dream Boat isn’t joining you?”
Crystal stood and walked to the window. The street Wes had driven down only an hour before stood empty.
“Yeah, he said he had a meeting this weekend. I’m fine. I’ve been wanting to go. I’ve driven by that travel place a half dozen times and today was the right day, you know?”
“Oh yes, I know all about your spidey sense,” he told her.
“So I made Wes stop, and we went in and I booked it. I thought we’d go together. I wanted to, but he said he had a meeting in Traverse City and he couldn’t stay here through the weekend, which is fine. It is,” she insisted at the look on Garret’s face. “But then he was so quiet on our drive home and he barely kissed me goodbye. It felt… I don’t know. Like I’d screwed something up. And since when do I think like that?” she demanded, spinning away from the window.
Garret smiled and shrugged, moving to the couch and patting the space beside him.
She sat down and snuggled into his armpit.
“Since you fell in love,” he murmured.
Crystal sighed, leaning forward to set her glass on the table.