Aunt Gert nodded and scribbled on her pad. “One passable cod sandwich coming up.”
She finished writing down our order and started toward the kitchen.
Eve shook her head in grudging admiration. “I want to be her when I’m eighty. Geriatric goals.” She turned back to me, elbows on the table, leaning forward. “Okay, spill. What are you thinking?”
“I’m still not sure,” I waffled. That was not true. I knew what I would choose. If I had the guts.
Eve tilted her head and surveyed me, sudden comprehension flashing across her face. She knew me too well. “You’re going to see Rory.” It was not a question.
I nodded. “I think I have to see him,” I said quietly. “I’m afraid I can’t move forward if I don’t. I’m stuck holding on to the past because I don’t want a future without him. Maybe if I see him I can finally let him go...”
Eve whistled. “Risky move. It could backfire.”
“I know, but avoiding him for seven years hasn’t seemed to work. I think I need to face this thing head-on. Who knows, maybe our life together will be horrible.”
“And if it isn’t?” Eve argued. “Will you spend the rest of your life agonizing because it really was amazing and you can never be with him again?”
“At least I’ll know. I won’t have to wonder anymore.” I sounded surer than I felt. “I think the not knowing is the most painful of all.” I wasn’t convinced that was true, but it sounded good.
Eve shook her head. “That boy has always been your kryptonite.”
It wasn’t that Eve didn’t like Rory. Quite the opposite. They’d grown very close in the years Rory and I had been together. She’d loved Rory like a brother and had been gutted when he left. But she resented what seven years of pining for him had done to me. If I couldn’t have Rory, she wanted me to at least have a life. She twirled a saltshaker on its edge on the Formica tabletop, scattering grains of salt across the table, then frowned, considering. “I guess it’s worth a shot. Maybe it will be awful. Maybe he’s disgusting now.” She visibly brightened at the thought. “What if he just sits around the house in his tighty-whities with a can of Rainier balanced on his beer gut?”
I looked down, a smile tugging at the corners of my mouth. “That would be, um... unexpected.” Rory was passionate about sports and physical exercise. He was a physician for a professional sports team for heaven’s sake. I couldn’t imagine him with a beer gut. “I guess I’ll find out,” I said evenly, though my heart fluttered at the thought of seeing him again.
“Order up.” Aunt Gert marched through the kitchen door and slid a fish sandwich with potato salad in front of Eve. She plunked my soda down. “Anything else?”
“Gert, I’m trying to convince Lolly here not to get her heart broken a second time,” Eve said, taking a bite of fish sandwich. “You got any words of advice?”
“Eve knows all about the lemon drops,” I assured Aunt Gert. “I told her everything.”
Aunt Gert tipped her head, considering Eve for a moment. Her pillbox hat gave her a jaunty air. She turned her gaze on me. “You’regoing to see the boy you love.” It was a statement. I hadn’t told her about Rory, but she didn’t miss much. No flies on her.
“I think I have to. He’s my greatest regret.”
She pursed her lips. “Be careful. That can be the hardest thing, I think.” She gazed across the dining room, her voice growing soft and faraway. “To see someone who still holds your heart, but get to see them for only a moment. It’s a taste, almost worse than nothing. Almost. The only thing worse than that single last day is not having it at all.”
I stared hard at her. She spoke as if from experience. “How do you know?”
She brushed off my question briskly. “When you’re in your eighties, you’ll know a great many things too.” She shot Eve an arch glance. “Geriatric goals,” she said tartly.
Eve choked a little on a piece of potato salad.
Aunt Gert looked from Eve to me. “Use your last lemon drop to settle the final question in your heart,” she said firmly. “And whatever happens, let it lead you toward your bliss.”
The bell over the door jangled as two new customers came in. Gert called a greeting to them and hurried over, order pad at the ready.
Eve took a sip of water and met my eyes across the table. “Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked.
I nodded, feeling shaky but resolved. “I’m sure.”
That night I took the last lemon drop. I lay stiffly in bed sucking the lemon candy to nothingness, heart pounding with anticipation and anxiety, waiting for sleep. Wearing my best pair of silk pajamas, I was freshly showered, legs shaved, and hair brushed to a chestnut gleam. I knew all my preparations probably wouldn’t matter, but I wanted to feel ready. Could I ever really be ready for something like this? I felttremulous and eager and terrified all at once. I had no idea where I would be when I opened my eyes. I had no idea the shape of my life there. I only knew, somehow, in a way I could not describe, that I had to do this last thing. If I wanted to move on and lay these blighted dreams to rest, I had to see him once more. In the dark, silent hours of the night, as I finally drifted off to sleep, there was only one name on my lips, bittersweet as lemon candy. “Rory Shaw.”
27
Something soft yetfirm was poking insistently into the small of my back. I blinked blearily, struggling to orient myself. Where was I? Just then a strong male arm curled around my middle and pulled me back against a lean, warm body.
“Oh!” I squeaked, scrambling to a sitting position, cheeks flaming as I realized what exactly had been poking me. The man lying next to me rolled onto his back, stretched, and smiled lazily. My heart leaped. Rory. I was in bed with Rory Shaw.
