Playboy Pilot(19)

“Do you know where you’re flying to tomorrow?”

“Dubai. I checked my schedule while you were in the shower before.”

“They don’t tell you until a few days before?”

“No. They plan months ahead of time. I just don’t like to know.”

“You don’t like to know where you’re going?”

He shrugged. “Eventually, I know. I mean, I have to know before I get into the cockpit. I guess there’s just no reason to check in advance.”

“Don’t you ever want to make plans ahead of time when you know you’re going to be in a certain city?”

“Not really.”

“That’s odd, Carter. You know that, right?”

“Never said I was normal.”

We walked for another fifteen minutes, eventually coming across two random chairs set up at the water’s edge. There was no one around. Carter pulled my hand over to them and repositioned the chairs so that they were facing each other.

“They were set up to watch the water.”

“I know. But why would I look at the water when I have you to look at?”

We both sat. At first our feet were right next to each other in the sand. But as we started to talk, Carter rubbed his feet up against mine. The pad of his foot massaged my ankle. It felt good, so I returned the favor. Our feet stayed intertwined as we chatted.

“So tell me, Kendall Sparks. Why are you on this trip? What is it that you are trying to find?”

I was embarrassed to admit the truth. I didn’t want Carter to know how shallow and desperate I was. How much control money had over my life. “If I told you, you would think I was horrible. That I needed therapy for what I was likely going to do.”

“I’m sure I wouldn’t.”

“You would.”

“Would not.”

“We’re all fucked up in some way. All have secrets to keep and crosses to bear in life.”

I scoffed. “Maybe. But I’m more fucked up than most.”

“I doubt that.”

“Well I’m more fucked up than you. You have a great job, own a place in Florida, and know how to enjoy life.”

“Is that what you think? That your story is more fucked up than mine and you’ll look bad?”

I nodded. “Maybe.”

Carter looked up at the sky for a while and then started to speak quietly. “I was sixteen when I met Lucy Langella. She had long black hair, big blue eyes, and wrote poetry. We were together for more than two years. She was my first, and for a long time, I really thought she would be my last. Thought I was in love. Told her I loved her even.

During our senior year in high school, she started to change. She never wanted to go out, and she slept a lot. It was senior year—parties, friends, sports, road trips—I wanted to do it all. For a while I could get her to do things with me, but it became harder and harder as the months went on. She started to have some crazy mood swings, too. It got to the point where I had no idea what Lucy I was going to get when I went to her house. So I slowed up on going to her house. Basically, I was eighteen and thought she was becoming boring. She had been a better student than me, and when we first started dating we had talked about both applying to the University of Michigan. When the time came to send out college applications, she didn’t even send any. By the time we graduated, she rarely went out, and being around her was a total downer.

The summer before college started, I knew I had to break it off before I moved three hours away for school. When I did it, she cried for a week. I felt like shit because all she kept saying was, ‘You told me you loved me. You told me you loved me.’”

Carter stopped talking for a minute. Then he cleared his throat and continued. “My first day of college, I’d just finished classes and brought a girl I’d met at orientation back to my dorm room. We ended up in my bed, and my cell phone kept ringing while I was screwing a girl I’d just met. Thought college was the greatest thing in the world that day.” He scoffed and shook his head. “The next morning, I looked at my phone and saw that all the calls had been from Lucy. I didn’t call her back. Another day passed, and I was in bed with my new girl when it started happening again. My phone was ringing over and over. But when the name flashed on my screen, I noticed it was my mother. I knew if she called that many times, something had to be wrong. So I picked it up. She was hysterically crying.” Carter stopped again, staring down at our entwined ankles in the sand. “Lucy had committed suicide. What I thought was boring was clinically depressed.”

I gasped. “Oh my God, Carter. You couldn’t have known.”