Rider’s Block

31. Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter thirty-one

"Tucson Too Late," Jordan Davis

I t would be my luck to end up in a middle seat right now. Smooshed between people who are sprawlers. Even though I paid for priority boarding. Fifty dollars, right down the drain.

But everything that happened this morning felt like the state of Colorado was wrapping its vines around my ankles, trying to prevent me from leaving.

This morning when I woke up, instead of just a treat and a note I also found a cute cowboy hanging out on my front porch. With the treat in hand, of course. We had a surprisingly normal morning, given the circumstances. He still seemed only marginally fazed that I was leaving. Sad, but not discouraged. His facial expression was hard to pinpoint. Everything about him was resolute. The goodbye barely even felt like a goodbye, looking back. I mean, to me it felt like a goodbye. And the way he kissed me sort of felt like it could have been a goodbye, but when I went to say the actual words, he kissed me again before I could make it halfway through it before pulling back, looking me square in the eye, saying, “We’ll talk tonight.”

I got in my car feeling a little dizzy. And I’m going to blame the second flat tire of the trip entirely on him. I was barely out on the county road when my failure of a rental decided to give me one more middle finger before I turned her in.

The silver lining of the situation being that Eric came within five minutes of me calling him, and I got to hug him again. And kiss him again. He loved that I popped another tire. Said it was poetic justice. I rolled my eyes while I gave him another tight squeeze once he was done fixing my car for me, again, placing my head against his chest. I think he could tell I was getting a little sad. He kissed me goodbye, again, repeating—once again—with complete confidence that we’d talk later that night. I might have hugged him a little longer.

So, with that whole fiasco I put an hour-long dent in my carefully prepared two-hour window of getting to the airport early.

And of course, turning in the crappy car wasn’t easy. My favorite humorless, red-rimmed glasses lady was at the desk again, and when she asked if there were any incidents with the car my conscience took over and I couldn’t not mention the flat tire. If it had just been the first one, I might have gotten away with it, but fresh off of needing yet another spare this morning I couldn’t not admit it. Which led to a whole mountain of paperwork, my favorite.

By the time I finished the paperwork I was feeling a little snarky and mentioned that perhaps I could have used an SUV after all, and she didn’t really appreciate that comment. But the whole exchange took up valuable time that I didn’t realize I desperately needed until I got to the security line.

I barely made it to the gate before they closed the doors, and had I not sprinted across the entire terminal—yes, the entire terminal, you’d think it’d be more of a regular occurrence at airports but nope, I got many stares—I would have missed my flight entirely.

So now I find myself smooshed between two very large, very unfriendly-looking guests who were very put out that I chose their middle seat to vacate.

Longest. Flight. Of. My. Life.

Didn’t help that I just kept staring down at Eric’s name on my cast. It only took a small rotation to see Penny’s name. Then Dean’s. Then Christine’s. Trevor also signed it. I was starting to tear up a little by the time I got to Nancy’s and George’s signatures. My mood lightened up a bit seeing “cousin Max” scratched along the outside wrist. No one ever confirmed or denied how he was actually related over the length of my trip.

But this is the right thing. I can feel it in my bones. Leaving sucks, but if there’s anything I’ve learned studying romance from afar, it’s the value in knowing what you want first, and then finding the person who aligns themselves with it. You can’t be part of a partnership if you don’t have anything to give. I don’t know why I need to go home, but my bones know that I need to.

***

True to his word, Eric calls me about five minutes after I arrive home. But what shocks me is how much his voice feels like home, even as I stand in the middle of the book piles in my bungalow that have historically brought me more comfort than anything. When I walked through the front door, I felt peace. But when I heard Eric’s voice over the phone, the initial amount of peace I felt seeing the book stacks felt like a sprinkle to his downpour.

We talk about all of my mishaps and the fact that I barely made it to the flight. I was waiting for some smug comment about how it looks like the universe wanted me to stay, but he doesn’t say anything like that. Nope. Just my subconscious.

He tells me that he and Dean spent a long time planning the date with Penny today. “Not as good as our date,” he says and I can just mentally see his chest puffing out, “but it’s pretty solid.”

“Oh, so that was a date?” He’s never really called it that before so it’s cute hearing it from his mouth now that I’m thousands of miles away. But sure.

“Of course it was. But so were our late-night writing sessions. And when we would dance. And the mornings I got to have breakfast with you. All dates, Red.”

“You know,” I say, not even slightly offended but he left too good of an opening, “dating someone tends to require consent from both parties…”

“Didn’t want to scare you off, baby, but I’ve told you before and I’ll keep telling you and—more importantly—showing you that I’m all in on this whenever you’re ready. We’ve got nothing but time. Now, tell me, which rental company is this? I’m going to go write a bad review…”

We spend an hour talking about nothing and everything at the same time. It feels different than when we worked together on my book. When we were working together, it was to accomplish something. We had a shared goal, something that tied us together. But this? This is just shooting the breeze. Sharing seemingly insignificant details just for the hell of it.

By the time I look down at my phone nearly two hours have passed and both of us are yawning. Chester makes a noise that I know and love to be the sign that he needs food. Eric must hear it too (I’m surprised the neighbors didn’t, honestly) and asks to FaceTime so he can see what my feline companion is like. So we do. And watching Eric fuss over who was previously the only important male in my life—besides my little brother—has my heart melting just a little bit more.

After a few more yawns and reconciling the time difference, we call it quits. Eric tells me he’ll call tomorrow, and there’s a war in my heart on whether I want him to follow through with that or not.

On one hand, I’m expecting him to lose interest…to get busy and peter out. I’m expecting him to refocus on winning, on the ranch, on training horses again. Anything that’s right in front of him. I’ve prepared myself for the inevitability of it, but I can admit that it would break my heart a little.

On the other hand, what if…what if he doesn’t? What if he does call me tomorrow? What if he keeps putting in the effort? What if he…. what if he actually does want to be with me?

I go to bed on the mental seesaw, wondering which one I’d prefer. The answer is obvious. Deep in my subconscious. I know I’m scared, and I know why I’m scared. I just hope my fears aren’t the thing that sends him running.

***

My first three weeks back in California feel like a montage from a movie. I’m home, everything is familiar, my routines reinstated. I mean I have my damn smoothies back, for goodness’ sake. I eat my favorite sandwich every other day. Factually every other day. Not hyperbole. I’ve had more wheat bread and sprouts in the past twenty-one days than I have in my whole life.

But just like a movie montage of a war hero coming home with a new perspective, everything seems a little…different. Small things. Nothing majorly significant. But just impactful enough to put me in a funk.

Having my morning smoothie back feels like nirvana for the first week, but having a smoothie without a motivational sticky note attached to it makes it fall a little flat. And my sandwich is good. Really good. But I find myself watching that same adorable teenage couple flirt at the counter and missing watching two very specific other people develop a love story I got to be a part of.

It’s frustrating.

I always considered California to be my home. This is my state, this is where I related to the culture the most. This is where I originally found peace, my sperm donor be damned.

But after a summer spent around a dinner table with the same group of people every night, my two-person bistro table just feels a little weird. Even though Chester has taken it upon himself to eat right along next to me. Olivia kept him well fed, but for my fat cat standards I think he could use to gain a few pounds, so I’ve taken to letting him have some of my (googled and pre-vetted cat-safe) food options to eat with me. It only takes a week for him to start plumping up.

Olivia and I have started to hang out a little more, which is a silver lining I didn’t expect. We always hung around each other, but rarely ever just the two of us. But we’ve gotten coffee or wine together quite a bit since I’ve been back.

Lucky for me, she knew all about Dean’s obsession with Penny. We spent a solid three hours talking about the side of the story she knows compared to the side of the story I know. All our facts line up perfectly, so we both had an immense amount of satisfaction when I called Penny to get the play-by-play after their date.

And then when I called Dean to hear about it from his side.

They’re so in love they don’t know what to do with themselves.

Even Eric has a big grin on his face whenever he talks about how Dean walks around like he’s the king of the world these days. And I know he has a big grin on his face because he’s continued to FaceTime me. Every night. Like every night. Without fail.

If I’m really being honest, what’s kept me from a full-blown spiral is that Eric kept true to his word. And yeah, I don’t get a sticky note from him in the mornings, but that beautiful mountain of a man must have learned somewhere that women love a consistent good morning text, because without fail—as if he has one set up and automated—I wake up to “Good morning, Red. Kick some ass today,” or “Good morning, Red. Roper misses you almost as much as I do,” at an ungodly hour of the morning.

He hasn’t wavered in the slightest, but my resolution is. I’m at the point where I don’t even really know what my resolution is anymore.

Why am I running away from this?

I ask myself this as I’m walking into the doctor’s office to finally, finally , get my stupid cast off. It’s been an absolute pain living on my own only having full use of one hand, but I’ve made do. Eric, in a way that is uniquely his own, also started mailing small trinkets to me. Not a ton, but just enough to make me feel thought of. The first gift was a sparkly belt from Penny’s store. Even though I will never wear it, it’s sitting on top of my dresser, open and visible. But what really got me was the package of squeezable peanut butter…so that I wouldn’t have to open a jar with my one hand. I almost started crying. Whether because of the gesture, or because of how he managed to know at the time all I wanted that day was a PB&J I’ll never know, but with my only peanut butter stuck in a jar I thought I’d have to go to the store to find something else. He knew and beat me to it.

But all that comes to an end today. Today I am free of my cast!

I’m in the waiting room refreshing my email for the fifth time to see if my publisher has heard anything back yet when the door dings its little bell as it opens up, and the last person I’d want to see walks through the front door. But it’s who’s walking next to him, reaching up to clutch his hand, that has my heart bottoming out.