“No, I am not drunk. I’m mad.”
“Oh, good, because for a moment there I thought it was going to be something unusual.” He stepped back. “Come in.” It was an automatic gesture. He didn’t think anything of it until she walked past him into his darkened living room. That’s when it hit him. She was in his house. Exactly where he wanted her to be. And he had no idea what to do next.
The only light came from his kitchen, where he kept the hood light over his oven on at night. She looked around, nodding slightly to herself, as if his space was exactly what she expected it to be, like there was a fine, crisp scent of privilege here that she didn’t like.
“Is this about the big thing you wanted to tell me?” he asked, slightly afraid that it was. One big thing left to tell him, and then she wouldn’t want anything more to do with him?
She turned to face him, her brows lowered. “What?”
“Last week, you gave me a cake, told me you started baking because of me, then said there was some big thing you were going to tell me later. Is this later?”
“No, this has nothing to do with that. Why would I be mad about that?”
He sighed. “I don’t know, Julia. When it comes to you, it’s all guesswork.”
She began to pace. “I was fine here until you went all humble on me. And you almost had me, too. I almost trusted you.” She made a scoffing sound. “And you accuse me of being conniving.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about what you said today.”
He rubbed the side of his face. The blond stubble of his beard made a scratchy sound. “Refresh my memory.”
“You said that I’m only letting you in because I’m planning to leave. And then you walked away from me.”
“Ah.” He let his hand drop. “That.”
“I wasn’t saying that at all, which I would have told you if you’d stuck around. But it doesn’t matter that it wasn’t what I meant. Because, so what?”
He was beginning to think it wasn’t his sleepy mind after all. She really was making no sense. “Excuse me?”
“So what if I was only letting you in because I’m planning to leave. Why would that matter to you? You’ve been trying to get into my pants ever since I came back, and you were going to let something like my leaving get in your way? It didn’t get in your way last time.”
His head suddenly felt hot. She’d struck a nerve. “For the record, you know as well as I do that I could get into your pants at any time.” He took a step toward her, so close his chest grazed her breasts. “Because I know exactly how to do that.”
“So do it now,” she said, obviously trying to be brave, but her voice faltered a little.
“I want in here, too.” He put his finger to her temple.
“You are there.”
“What about here?” He put his hand on her chest, over her heart. Her heart was racing. Was it anger? Fear? Lust?
She suddenly took a step back. “You’re not going to do that to me again.”
“What?”
“Weasel your way into my heart. Charm me and make me think it’s for real, that it’s forever. It took years to get over it last time. You are not going to insinuate forever to me again. You’re not going to promise me anything, and I’m not promising you. So that ‘Stay, because you’re nowhere near where I want you to be’ crap isn’t going to work. Do you know how much easier it would have been if you had just promised me one night? That night? Do realize how much I hated you for making me think you loved me?”
“Julia …”
“No. Promise me one night,” she said. “Don’t promise to love me. Don’t ask me to stay.”
To hell with nobility. He reached for her and kissed her. It was all at once passionate, as if there was too much in him to contain. He was immediately swept up in it. It took no effort, the difference between swimming on your own and being washed away in a flood.
His hands went to the hem of her shirt and slowly pushed it up. When his hands brushed over her bare breasts, her back arched. He broke their kiss. Her fingers automatically tightened in his hair, as if wanting him back. “Jesus, you came here without a bra on,” he said.
He backed her against the wall, and soon her shirt was over her head. She started moving restlessly against him. It made him groan. He clamped a hand onto her hip and surged against her. She met his rhythm flawlessly.
He reached down and unbuttoned her jeans, and she tried to help him push them down while not breaking their kiss, but their lips kept separating. Finally he simply used his foot to slide them the rest of the way down, and she stepped out of them.
“You want one night, I’ll give it to you,” he said as he picked her up and carried her to the couch. “But it’s going to be one hell of a night.”
He stood over her, staring down at her so hungrily that she made an attempt to cover herself. His hands went to the waistband of his pajama bottoms and pushed them down, not taking his eyes off of her. He put one knee on the couch beside her. She swallowed and put her hand up to his bare chest. “Wait, Sawyer.”
He hung his head, sucking in breaths. “What are you doing to me, Julia?”
“I meant, wait because I have to get the condoms out of my jeans pocket.”
He lifted his head, surprised. “I wasn’t lying. I can’t have kids.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.” He got up anyway, completely unself-conscious, and went to her jeans. He dug out the condoms and made quick work of putting one on.
“No more waiting,” he said as he covered her body with his.
“No more waiting.”
It had never been like this with anyone else. They held on to each other as if the force of their bodies coming together could make everything that had ever separated them disappear. And it did, for a short period of time, time he wished he could stop so he could live inside it for the rest of his life.
Afterward, breath gone, clinging to each other so hard they would leave marks, Sawyer, whose head was buried in Julia’s neck, managed to say, “Contrary to my lamentable lack of restraint just now, I have actually learned a few things since I was sixteen.”
She gave a sudden laugh.
“And as soon as I have the strength to get up, I’m taking you to my bedroom and showing you.”
IT WAS morning, but still dark in his bedroom when she woke up. Sawyer watched as she blinked a few times and turned her head on the pillow to find him staring at her.
Her hair was rumpled, the pink streak curling around her ear. She took a deep, defeated breath. “I thought I had every-thing figured out.”
“Do you think promising you another night might clear things up?”
She smiled, but didn’t answer.
He brushed one finger lightly against her forearm. He saw the moment she realized he was following the lines of her scars. She immediately pulled her arm away. He pulled it back.
“Why did you do this to yourself?” he asked.
She watched him as he watched his finger trace the lines. “It was my way of dealing with the depression and isolation I felt. I didn’t know how to cope, and all my anger was turned inward, so this is what I did. Don’t think I’m naturally this enlightened. That’s years of therapy speaking.”
He met her eyes. “Do you ever think of doing it again?”
“No. In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m very good at expressing my anger these days.” She shifted slightly, then winced a little.
“Are you okay?”
She cleared her throat. “It’s … been a while.”
Was it wrong that that made him happy? He didn’t care. It did. He’d spent a lot of time wondering about what she was doing in Baltimore, thinking about who she was with. He knew so little about that part of her life. “Why didn’t you come back to Mullaby, Julia?”
“I didn’t think there was anything left for me.” She rolled her head back on the pillow and stared at the ceiling.
“Didn
’t you ever get homesick?”
“I’m homesick all the time,” she said, still not looking at him. “I just don’t know where home is. There’s this promise of happiness out there. I know it. I even feel it sometimes. But it’s like chasing the moon—just when I think I have it, it disappears into the horizon. I grieve and try to move on, but then the damn thing comes back the next night, giving me hope of catching it all over again.”
He’d never heard her so raw and honest. Julia, who always kept her feelings to herself. “Is that the big thing you were going to tell me?”
“No.”
He groaned. “You’re killing me. Is it something good?”
“Yes.”
He put his hand on her thigh and started moving his way up. “Better than last night?”
“There’s no comparison.” She put her hand on his, stopping the movement. “What time is it?”
He lifted himself on his elbow and looked over to the clock on the nightstand. “A little after nine.”
She hesitated. “In the morning?”
“Yes.”
She gasped and jumped out of the bed. She went to the heavy curtains and threw them open. Morning light immediately cut into the dark room. When the spots left his vision, he found himself staring at her naked body, silhouetted in the window. He was riveted. She made his stomach tight, his head light.
“I can’t believe it’s morning! Why didn’t you tell me? What kind of curtains are these?” She grabbed the offending material and looked at it closely. “I thought it was night!”
“They’re insulated light-blockers. I’d be blinded every morning if I didn’t have them.” He sat up against his pillows and put his hands behind his head. “I really enjoy this side of you, but I think you’re giving my neighbors the best view. Why don’t you turn around?”
She quickly stepped away from the window and covered herself with one of the curtain panels. “I can’t believe I just flashed your neighbors. On a Sunday morning.”
“I know I saw the face of God.”
“I’ve got to go,” she said, eyeing the door.
“No.”
“I have to make the day’s cakes at the restaurant. I’m so late. I’m usually there and gone by now. Where are my clothes?” She looked around, then said, “Oh, downstairs.” And she darted, naked, from his room.
He smiled and got up. He took his robe from the back of his door and put it on as he walked down the stairs after her.
She was quick. She already had on her jeans and her shoes, and was pulling her shirt over her head. By the time her head poked through the collar, he was there, backing her against the wall by the door.
“We’re back where we started. I think this is a sign that we need to do it again.”
“If you let me go, I’ll bake you a cake.”
Suddenly there was a knock at the door, directly to the right, which startled Julia so much she let out a small scream.
Sawyer winced and rubbed his ear.
“Who is that?” she whispered.
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t answer it. Maybe they’ll go away.”
“And call the police because there was a woman screaming in here. What’s the problem? You don’t want people to know we’ve been together?” He turned and went to the door before she could answer, because he was afraid of what that answer might be. Even after last night, she was still water in his hands. He didn’t know how to hold on.
Sawyer opened the door. When he saw who was standing there, he thought, Oh, damn. This wasn’t going to help things at all.
“Hi, Sawyer,” Holly said as she walked in. “Was that you screaming like a girl?”
Holly stopped when she saw Julia. There was an awkward moment when the three of them, cramped in the small space by the door, didn’t say anything, just stared at one another.
“Holly,” Sawyer finally said, “you remember Julia Winterson?”
“Of course,” Holly said, giving Sawyer a pointed look before turning to Julia and smiling. “It’s nice to see you, Julia.”
“You too. I’m sorry to run, but I’m late.” And in seconds, she was gone. Again.
Sawyer closed the door and turned to his ex-wife. “I forgot you were coming by.”
Holly kissed him on the cheek and walked through his living room to his kitchen and began to make coffee. He followed her, remembering the feeling he had when he first asked Holly to be his girlfriend in sixth grade, that intense I’ll-finally-get-to-hold-her-hand feeling. She was his best friend all through school. He valued her. He respected her. But he didn’t know if he was ever in love with her. That night with Julia on the football field should have told him that, but he’d been too afraid to give up on the future he’d planned.
He was the one who had ended the marriage. Holly would have stayed once they’d found out he couldn’t have kids. In fact, she’d become almost manically determined to stick it out. She’d brought home information on adoption and tried to be enthusiastic. Kids were an integral part of their plan, but he realized she wanted them so much because what they had together wasn’t enough. It never had been.
“You finally did it,” Holly said when he walked into the kitchen. She was scooping coffee grounds out of the can. “I can’t believe it.”
Sawyer pulled out a stool and sat at the counter. “What are you talking about?”
“Don’t play dumb with me.” She looked over her shoulder with a grin. She looked good. Happy. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, revealing that her face was fuller, rounding out her normally sharp cheekbones. She’d put on weight. “I know you too well. You’ve had a thing for her since we were kids. And you finally got her.”
Sawyer sighed. “I’m not so sure about that.”
Holly’s smile disappeared. “Oh, hell. I didn’t …”
“No, it’s not your fault. You look fantastic, by the way.”
“Are you really okay with this? With me getting married again? With this?” She put her hand to her stomach.
“I’m happy for you, Holly. I truly am.”
She snorted and turned back to the coffee. “I think you’re only saying that because you got some last night.”
Sawyer slid off the stool and walked to his office. “I’ll get the papers for you to sign.”
LIQUID MORNING light was rippling through the open balcony doors when Emily woke up. She had no idea what time it was, but she felt she’d only been asleep for minutes.
The note.
She turned quickly to the bedside table. The note was still there, where she’d left it.
She picked it up and stared at it. She was tempted to even put it to her nose.
Was she going to do it? Was she going to meet him?
Win said he didn’t blame her for what her mother had done, but how could she know for sure? What were his motives? She wouldn’t know until this had played itself out.
Her mother was the bravest person she had ever known, yet even she hadn’t been able to face down her past.
So Emily would.
She would do something her mother couldn’t do. In order to find her place here, she had to set herself apart from who her mother had been, but she also had to try to make it right. How exactly she was going to do that, she didn’t know. There was a nagging part of her that suspected Win might know, that his interest in her wasn’t as simple as he wanted it to seem. But then, her interest in him was pretty complicated, too.
She thought about the history loop he’d talked about. Here she was in the same place her mother had been, at about the same age, and involved with the Coffeys in a way no one approved of, just like last time. There had to be a reason for it.
She got up, the note still in her hand, and walked to her dresser for shorts and a tank top. She was getting used to averting her eyes to avoid looking at the frenzied butterfly wallpaper, getting used to the soft fluttering sound it occasionally gave off. Getting used to it meant she was fitting in, according to Julia.
/> Either that, or she was officially going crazy.
When she reached the dresser, though, she suddenly realized there wasn’t any sound that morning. She looked up and took a surprised step back. The butterfly wallpaper was now gone. It had been replaced by a moody, breathless wallpaper of silver, sprinkled with tiny white dots that looked like stars. It made her feel an odd sense of anticipation, like last night. Grandpa Vance couldn’t have come in last night and done this.
Did it really change on its own?
It was beautiful, this wallpaper. It made the room look like living in a cloud. She put her hand against the wall by her dresser. It was soft, like velvet. How could her mother not have told her a room like this existed? She’d never mentioned it. Not even in a bedtime story.
She dressed quickly, distracted, and went downstairs. Thankfully, Grandpa Vance had already left for breakfast, so she wrote him a note telling him she’d be at the lake.
She didn’t mention who she was meeting there.
Once on the sidewalk, she was about to get in her car when she heard her name being called in the morning quiet. Already jittery, she jumped in surprise and dropped her car keys. She turned quickly to see Stella walking toward her from next door. She looked strangely overdressed for that time of morning, in a strapless red dress and heels. Her wide face had fading blotches of makeup on it, and her exotic eyes were tired. She looked like she’d had a bad night. Or maybe a very good one. Emily couldn’t decide which.
“Have you seen Julia?” Stella asked as Emily knelt to pick up her keys. “I just went by J’s Barbecue and she wasn’t there.”
Emily stood. “I haven’t seen her since yesterday. But I did hear her leave in her truck around one o’clock this morning.”
Stella looked confused. “I wonder where she went.”
Emily shrugged. She tried to act casual, like she wasn’t doing anything wrong. Which, of course, she wasn’t. What was the matter with her? Why was she so nervous?
“Julia almost never uses her truck, and she never goes out that late. I’m worried about her.” Stella started picking at her red fingernail polish. She shifted her weight to one hip and asked, “Do you think she’s been acting weird lately?”