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She was right. Real love was cancer. All it took was one blink, and it would spread inside you like wildfire and consume you.
But that was okay, because I had a feeling that unlike cancer, real love didn’t die. Ever.
SPARROW
Six months later
“THREE…FOUR…FIVE blueberry pancakes,” Lucy shoved the paper plates in my direction, and I bent forward, handing them to the two women who stood at the front of the long line to our food truck. Jenna and Barbara. They were legal secretaries, and they came here twice a week. Would visit more, if it weren’t for their waistlines, they said. They always bought a few extras for other people in their office. Or at least that was their version of things.
“Thank you, Birdie. You know something is good if you think it’s worth the calories even after you eat it.” Barbara laughed through a snort. “Now I just have to muster the courage to get on the scale. I’ve been avoiding it like plague ever since I found out about your truck.”
“Oh, don’t even go there.” Jenna giggled, swatting Barbara’s behind. “These girls need to come with a warning. I’ll end up with type two diabetes if things continue this way.”
Barbara and Jenna scurried along, leaving me to serve the next people in line. A woman and a man. They looked in love and I tried hard not to hate them for it.
“Go help Lucy.” Daisy shoved me to the side all of a sudden.
I wrinkled my brow. We worked in a particular way, and never changed positions. I made our special batter before we opened up and took the orders, Lucy made the actual pancakes, and Daisy helped both of us where help was needed. But I didn’t need her help.
“I got this,” I said, but it only made Daisy pull me by the sleeve toward Lucy and the small kitchen.
“You can’t stand here.”
I pushed her away with my butt, “Why can’t I…” But there was no need to finish the sentence. I already knew. My heart dove so low, I could feel my pulse thump in my toes. If winter were a feeling, this would be it. Everything froze, and I felt ridiculously unprepared. Shivers ran down my back and arms, raising the hair on my arms.
Something foreign washed over me, not unpleasant, but not exactly good either. It’s like he grabbed me by my throat and pressed hard, depriving me of oxygen, yet made me feel so incredibly alive. I didn’t breathe, blink or move. Just stood there and watched him, mouth slightly open. Eyes slightly wide. Heart completely broken. My monster.
“Are you still serving?” A woman in line scowled, and Daisy immediately took her order.
I continued standing there, unable to budge even though I wanted to, bad. I wanted to walk over, say something.
I wanted to talk to him.
I didn’t want to talk to him.
He didn’t even notice the truck yet.
Over the past few months, I had taken every precaution to avoid the local papers and Internet sites. I did everything, other than migrating out of the country. My darkest nightmare was to stumble across a picture of Troy with one of his Catalinas on his arm. I knew it would crush my soul into dust. Physically, I was fine. My temple was healed, and so was my foot. The cast was off, and I had even started running again. But inside, emptiness ate away at every corner of my being. No amount of blueberry pancakes was going to fill that void. Trust me, I’d tried.
Lucy paced over to me, pointing the spatula at my face. “Go. Talk to him. Stop being such a wuss.”
But I couldn’t. He stood next to a man twice his age. They both wore sharp suits and were engrossed in deep conversation, probably work, and I didn’t want to interrupt. Yes, I was still his wife. I never had filed those divorce papers, didn’t give a damn about the money I so-called deserved. Troy hadn’t made a move to end our marriage either. But it seemed like we were together centuries ago. In a way, I almost feared he was a completely different person.
The man and Troy shook hands, and then the man spun on his heel, slowly fading into the crowd. Troy walked in the opposite direction, toward our truck. My breath caught in my throat. I looked around. There was no way he was going to notice me. The line was two blocks long and there was a good distance between us.
But Troy strode directly and purposely to the end of the line, fishing his cell phone out of his pocket and messing around with it, a smile on his strong face.
“Jesus,” I muttered.
“He knows.” Daisy grinned, still serving the people I obviously couldn’t communicate with anymore.
I was standing in her way. The window was too narrow for the both of us, but she knew how much I wanted to see him again. Needed to see him again.
