“What do you mean, you don’t want to know? I know all about your previous escapades.”
“Yes—but I don’t. And, honestly—I really don’t want to know about that aspect of my life. There’s you now, and that’s all that matters.”
“So, the same goes for me?”
He nodded. “Yes. As far as I’m concerned—you had amnesia as well, forgot all other lovers but me, and now we’re even.”
“That’s ridiculous, you know that.”
“I’m a ridiculous kind of guy,” he shrugged. “And you love me for it.”
The air changed swiftly as we both froze.
The look of surprise sweeping across his face lead me to believe he hadn’t meant to say it, but it had been said.
The “L” word.
Turning to him, my heart beating like a jackhammer, I replied, “Yes. I do.”
* * *
“I can’t take credit for this next trick. Well, at least not all of it,” he said quickly as we pulled up to the darkened street corner.
“Okay,” I answered, looking around for some sort of clue. “Are you going to buy me some cocaine? Take me clubbing or get me a tattoo?” I asked, glancing at some of the unsavory establishments in the neighborhood.
I wasn’t quite scared—I’d lived in an area much like this before. Granted, I’d been slightly harder around the edges back in those days, but I’m sure if it came down to it, I could still throw a punch. Or stand behind August and give him moral support.
That sounded like a better option.
“That would definitely make it a memorable day, but no. Not today; sorry. This is just where we’re going to grab lunch.”
“Really—you shouldn’t have.” I laughed, wondering where in the world we could possibly eat around here. I didn’t see any restaurants, unless you counted the convenience store on the street.
I wasn’t a high-maintenance girl by any means, but I was averse to food poisoning and those nasty hot dogs in the window of the run down store looked like they’d been there since Bush was in office.
The first time.
“Come on, oh ye of little faith,” he said, opening his car door with a grin that basically told me I was a big chickenshit. Taking a deep breath, I pushed my own door open and waltzed out with my head held high. We met on the curb.
“Where to?” I asked, acting far more confident than I felt. We’d gone from my version of the happiest place on earth to the ghetto and I was trying to figure out how this worked into my best day ever.
But I took his hand and followed. Because I trusted him. Finally.
We walked to a little apartment complex a block down. It reminded me a lot of the shoebox hole in the wall I’d rented the year I met August. The one I’d been too afraid to show him. The one he’d never judged me for.
The place I fell in love with him.
There were no curtains in the windows here. Just bars. Rows and rows of bars. It reminded me of a prison—a real one, and I wondered if the people who lived there felt the same way. Jails weren’t the only forms of imprisonment. Sometimes life could feel just as cold and endless as those cold metal bars.
I remember staring out through my ratty curtain windows, way back when, wondering if I’d ever find a home of my own—someplace worth wanting. I’d worked a dead end job with no way out and all I saw were barricades and closed doors ahead of me. August had shown me there was more to life than a pile of no’s. He’d taught me there could be kindness in the eyes of others and if I wanted to make more of myself—I could.
Even if it was just as a barista at a coffee shop.
He’d always been happy with me the way I was…until money had driven him to want more. More from life and more from me. Now he was different, and all I saw were pieces of the old August finding their way back again—when life had just been him and me and nothing else.
It gave me hope for the future.
Hope for our future.
I held his hand as we climbed the steps to the third floor. There was no elevator, which made me wonder how they managed to get away with such out-of-date construction. But looking around at the leaky ceilings and the worn carpeting, I remembered what it was like to live in a place like this.
The forgotten zone.
No one cared whether your water worked or if roaches scattered along your floor at night. This was where the poor lived—where they were lost in the system and left to their own devices.
I remembered it well.
It made my heart bleed.
Four doors down, August finally came to a stop. My palm felt wet in his hand as I nervously pulled it away to wipe against my jeans. I waited as he knocked on the door, standing slightly behind him but to the side, as if that made some sort of difference in my pride factor.