“Besides, it was obvious to anyone with a pulse,” she continues undeterred. She is shameless. “No one has chemistrythat strong unless they’re putting in some overtime, if you catch my drift.”
Ryder makes a choking noise from the front seat. I could strangle him for leaving me to weather this elder abuse alone. He needs to stop hiding behind that headset.
She swivels sideways in her seat, studying both of us for clues. “When exactly did things turn romantic? If I had to guess, it was during the love scene. It was written all over your faces.”
I huff a breath. “Now Mildred, I hardly think this is appropriate—”
“She called me Mildred!” she squeals, smacking Ryder’s arm with a cackle. “I’ve struck a nerve!”
“If you look out the window to your right, you’ll see Cypress Gardens, a botanical preserve known for showcasing many of South Carolina’s native plant species and marine life,” Ryder interrupts in a transparent attempt at distraction. “It’s even more beautiful from the ground,” he says a beat later, his voice caught somewhere between memory and regret. I can feel him trying to catch my eye, but I keep my gaze trained out the window.
Millie will not be diverted. “Clearly there’s some unfinished business here. The sexual tension between you two is thicker than a slice of my mama’s French toast! I’m happy to play mediator,” she offers slyly, doing a little shimmy in her seat.
“I’m sure you are.” I never thought I’d find myself longing for the more nuanced prying of Dr. Wynn. “I think you’ve watched the movie one too many times.”
“And I thinkyoumight need to watch it again.”
Ryder clears his throat, finally coming to my rescue. “Sorryto interrupt the, ah,fun, but from here you can see how the hurricane managed to wash out this entire section of Seafolly.”
I look out the window to survey the damage, the extent of the destruction leaving me subdued. Entire neighborhoods have been washed away by the storm surge, sand and debris now blanketing what was once coveted oceanfront real estate. The irony is not lost on me that ten years later, we’ll be leaving Seafolly the same way we left our relationship.In ruins.
“If we kept flying inland this direction, we’d end up directly over Melody’s family farm,” Ryder intones, still playing tour guide. “Do you remember that night shoot, how punchy we were? When Jason fell asleep on that bench and no one could find him?”
“You mean the night you ‘borrowed’ that rubber snake from the animal trainer and spring-loaded it into a drawer so it flew out at me mid-scene?” I say dryly, referencing the infamous blooperLost Letterfans are so obsessed with. Of course, what they didn’t know was how fiercely we’d been at each other’s throats at the time, how my honey-coated laughter had been laced with venom.
Millie makes anmmmnoise, like she’s tasted something yummy. “Jason Hamilton, now that man is a dish. They don’t make ’em like that anymore. Present company excluded, of course,” she says, patting Ryder’s arm, and I watch him struggle not to lose it. “I’ve seenKissing for Keepstoo, you know—I like to pause it on the scene of him in his skivvies. Lord have mercy.” She makes the sign of the cross. “Tell me, did you have a fling with him too? Can’t say I’d blame you!”
I need off this plane.
“Yep, I’m like the town bike. Everyone’s had a ride.” I’veofficially hit my limit of invasive questions, and I’m fresh out of polite smiles. Suddenly crashing this plane doesn’t sound so bad.
“Why don’t you tell us about Mickey?” Ryder breaks in, sensing my impending eruption.
It’s just the right question to ask. “We grew up together, did I mention that? We were childhood sweethearts. When I went off to college, he made me promise I wouldn’t meet someone else.” She chuckles, and I can hear the smile in her voice. “But he needn’t have worried because I never had eyes for anyone but him. There was no one like Mickey. He was a big dreamer, always had the grandest plans. And they always seemed to work out; he was lucky that way. And he could make anything fun. Even in the early days when we were dirt poor, he’d put a picnic together with bread and cheese and cheap wine and find some new place to take me. He turned everything into an adventure.” Her voice turns wistful. “It’s one of the reasons I love your movie so much. It captures that feeling of young, reckless love so well. It makes me feel eighteen again.”
She turns around and catches my eye, and I don’t bother trying to hide the emotion on my face. She sends me a small smile, like she knows what I’m really upset about, like she can see right through me. “Anyway, Mickey passed away twelve years ago, and you know the worst part about it? I lost my best friend. All the fun, the jokes we told a million times, the silliness…it’s just gone. They don’t prepare you for that part.” She shakes her head, blinking a few times. “I try to keep myself occupied, do things I know he’d get a kick out of. Like this. He would’ve loved this.”
Silence fills the cabin, and I have no idea how to follow up a speech like that. I don’t think Ryder does either. Chatty Mr. Tour Guide has clammed up.
Millie waves a hand like she’s swatting away the weight of the memories. “But enough about me, back to you two. Why didn’t it work out?”
I groan. “You just had to ruin the moment.”
“Come on, you have to give mesomething. Give an old woman a thrill! I have so little to live for.” Perhaps realizing she’s getting nowhere with me, she turns her spotlight on Ryder. “When did you fall in love with her?”
I’m about to shut this whole thing down when he suddenly starts talking.
“There was something there from the first day we met,” Ryder says quietly. He’s staring straight ahead, and it’s a particular torture that I can’t see his face. “She came in for the audition, and it was like the wind changed. She woke me up. She made colors brighter.” He shakes his head slightly. “I’ve never experienced anything like it, before or since.”
Heat crawls up my face like a sunburn.
“We weren’t together right away. Actually, we were at each other’s throats for a while,” he admits. “I wasted a lot of time. But then things…shifted.”
“You fell in love,” Millie says with a sigh.
He finally turns to look back at me, the corner of his mouth lifting in a heartbreaking smile. “We did.”
Millie hums a contented sound. Meanwhile, I’d like to eject from this plane. Painful memories claw at my insides, desperate to get out, and I’m just as desperately trying to keep them bottled up.
