Steady as the Snow Falls(35)

She talked until her throat hurt, and her voice went hoarse. And at some  point, his hand rested beside hers, close enough that their fingers  periodically grazed one another's. It was a perfect moment in a collage  of misfortune. A sick man and a wounded woman, both restored in the  presence of one another's brokenness.





TEN





AS THE WEEKS went by, they formed their own rhythm. November crept into  December, and with it, came more snow, more cold. Beth spent most of her  days with Harrison, and some of her weekends. Nothing went past an  unspoken point. They rarely touched. Sometimes they didn't talk at all.  Beth observed, and Harrison lived, and it was as if they were in their  own world of white. She knew what was happening, and she couldn't stop  it. She didn't want to stop it.

Beth was falling.

Falling.

And falling.

Beth was falling for Harrison.

A glance of his eyes, the hint of a smile; his voice as it drifted along  the air. Harrison's thoughts projected with a certain look that made  her mind go blank and her words falter. The way her body sparked to life  when he was near. How he echoed in her mind long after she left his  presence. Beth was reborn in the eclipse of Harrison.

Ozzy became an afterthought, but he shouldn't have.

The smattering of Christmas lights and decorations around town had  multiplied in twos and threes. Beth stopped on the busy sidewalk, one  shivering form paused in motion while lives pulsed around her, their  feet as fast as their heartbeats. It was negative ten degrees out with  the wind chill, and frozen air left her mouth as she breathed, the tips  of her ears stinging even under the cover of her thick hair and a  stocking cap.         

     



 

She tipped her head back and looked up at the lights strewn from  streetlamp to streetlamp, white blinking in black. Beth felt something  she hadn't in a long time. Confident. Shifting her gaze to the  businesses with their doors and windows aglow, Beth pushed her hands in  the pockets of her winter coat and crossed the street to The Lucky Coin.

It was her final shift as a bartender for The Lucky Coin, a fact that  exhilarated her, and in the farthest setting of her heart, made it  twinge, just a bit. Just enough to let her know it hadn't all been bad.  It was a parting that should have taken place a while ago, but Beth had  worked at the bar since she was eighteen. Eight years of her life were  spent there. It wasn't easy to go. There were times when knowing the  right thing to do, and actually doing it, were not necessarily a  packaged deal.

With it being a Wednesday, most of the regulars were at the bowling  alley across town for league night. Because of that, Beth was hoping for  an uneventful night to end her employment with the Peck family. When  she walked through the door and saw only a handful of people lined up at  the bar, she hid a sigh of relief. There was an instant of a flyaway  heartrate when she wondered if Ozzy would be at the bar, but it was  clear he was not. She hadn't seen him since Thanksgiving night. That was  good, but also suspicious.

Loving all fried foods, the smell of French fries that welcomed Beth was  one she would miss. Beth hung up her jacket and hat in the hallway in  the back of the building before meeting Deb behind the bar. Deb's  greeting was cooler than Beth expected, but she pretended not to notice,  effortlessly getting into her routine of serving customers, restocking  what needed to be, and keeping the area clean.

"The bathrooms need paper toweling and toilet paper," Deb said in passing.

Beth set down the beer she'd gotten for one of the customers and frowned  at Deb's taut back as she took the man's money and put it in the cash  register. The shutting of the drawer was sharp, her hurt showing forth.  The fall colors and homey atmosphere deadened somehow, turning from  cheery to ominous. Beth was not welcome anymore. She felt the  brittleness of exclusion in her bones. As she walked to the room that  was loosely used as the owners' office, Beth wondered if Deb was upset  that she was leaving, or if it was more-if Ozzy had said something. She  didn't trust him to tell the truth. He couldn't even tell himself the  truth.

It doesn't matter. You have four hours left, and then you don't ever  have to step foot in this place again-or talk to any members of the Peck  family, if you're lucky.

With toilet paper and paper towels in hand, Beth marched to the  bathrooms. Her nose crinkled as she stepped into the men's. It smelled  like urine and chemicals in the tan-walled room. She knew Deb cleaned  them at least twice a week, but it appeared to be due. After she  refilled the paper products, as a peace offering to whatever battle was  unknowingly being waged between her and her employer, Beth asked Deb if  she wanted her to take care of the restrooms.

Deb looked at Beth like she didn't know her, and didn't like what she saw. "You broke Ozzy's heart, Beth."

Beth felt her nerve-endings tauten. Golden eyes delved into blue,  challenging her to deny it. Telling her not to bother. "He broke mine  first."

Her stiff shoulders went limp, and Deb rubbed a hand against her short  dark hair. "I understand how needy and controlling Ozzy can be. I know  you can't be together, but I see how the breakup is hurting my son. I  also know it's illogical to blame you, and I selfishly wish you were  still together. For my benefit, and my son's."

You don't know your son, whispered across her lips, but she closed her mouth against it.

Deb sighed and wiped at the counter with a rag. "Maybe you quitting is  the best thing that can happen. Yes. Please clean the bathrooms. It's a  slow night. You can go home early. You'll still get paid for the hours  you aren't here. Consider it a parting gift."

"Thank you," she said in a wooden voice, her limbs as stilted as her words as Beth left the bar area.

She blinked her eyes against the stinging burn as she went about  sanitizing the bathrooms. Beth heard the door to the bar open, caught  Ozzy's voice, and bristled. It wasn't her fault he couldn't move on,  that he refused to let their relationship go. It wasn't her fault his  mom didn't like that they'd broken up. So much guilt was shoved onto  her, all because Beth made choices that others did not want her to make.  The guilt was thick and heavy, an unwanted blanket. Her life didn't  feel like hers.         

     



 

Beth told herself it was.

She told herself to not let others make her feel bad, and when she  strode out the door of The Lucky Coin for the last time, making sure to  avoid Ozzy's stare, she told herself it was the best decision for her to  make. One more shackle unlocked. One step closer to being who she  wanted to be. She would prove to herself, and everyone else, that she  could do whatever she wanted. She could decide to write, and she could  decide to be happy, and she could decide to fall in love with a sick  man.

Finally, Beth was seeing. Everything was up to her.

As she reached the Blazer, the air turned frigid, gusts of it snatching  at her hair and pushing against her. The barely perceptible sound of  boots moving over packed snow touched her ears. Beth would have missed  it if she hadn't been listening for it. No one else was out, not even  the headlights of vehicles shone on the street. The sudden temperature  drop was an announcement, a signal of an unwanted guest, as if nature  thought to caution Beth. She knew before she looked that she wasn't  alone. She knew who was behind her without facing him, and she wasn't  even surprised.

"Just tell me one thing."

Beth closed her eyes and counted three breaths. The quivering in her  frame belied the calmness she fought to find. She wasn't scared of him,  but Beth was wary. She set her shoulders to bravery and faced the dark  stain that would not leave her white world. Thinking of Harrison helped,  and she pictured his determined chin, his eyes as bottomless as a well.

Her voice was surprisingly firm as she told him, "I will get a restraining order against you if you put a single finger on me."

Ozzy held up his hands. "I'm not going to touch you."

"What do you want?"

Weariness had grooved creases beneath his eyes. With his faded jean  jacket, red-tipped nose and cheeks, he looked cold, but his body  remained immobile. His eyes were clear and bright, like a sunset on  fire. When he took a step closer and Beth pushed her back hard into the  vehicle, wishing she could sink through the metal and into it, Ozzy's  brows pinched together. He dropped his hands. The vehicle was frozen,  searing through her coat with icy heat.

"You're afraid of me."

This was the alternate Ozzy. The side that cared, and felt deeply, and  had childlike sweetness. The one who had big ideas and a disarming  smile. The Ozzy who wouldn't hurt her. This Ozzy was fleeting, and she  saw less of him more and more. His personalities were making her dizzy.  How many minds could live inside one man?

"You say it like you can't understand how that could happen. I don't  know you anymore. I don't know who you are, but you aren't Ozzy. How  could I not be leery of you? You're a stranger." Beth clutched the keys  inside one palm, careful to keep the sharp part pointed out, a small  weapon that would buy her time if she needed it.