Broken Fairytales (25 page)

I watched her smile widely at him and lean down to whisper something else to him before I turne
d around and left the kitchen.
In that moment, I envied my sister’s carefree nature with guys. I’d never been able to do that. Maybe my life would be easier if I just let go on
c
e and a while – when it actually counted.

The party was so cr
owded that I felt overwhelmed
all of a sudden
.
The music blasting overhead was not my taste, so the heavy hip-hop beat bore into m
y skull, making it ache dully.
Combine
d
with the fact that I was suddenly ve
ry hot in my jeans and tank top,
and every brush to my skin had me jerking away from the
offending person in annoyance, I knew
I needed to get
some air
.

Seeing a door to what I hoped was the back porch
, I made my way slowly to it.
I
had to keep squeezing between people to push through.
I finally closed my hand around the knob and turned it hard,
feeling relief when I opened it. T
he cool damp air that was left after the rain washed over me.

I closed the door
tightly behind me and
surveyed my new surroundings.
In the far corner, there was a couple making out on the porch swing that creaked and swung every time the
y
moved
,
and at the other end there
was
a group of guys sitting around a table
,
playing cards.
We were two stories up, s
o I could see the beach below.
It seemed deserted,
but
the sand
was
probably too wet to be comfortable to walk in.

I took my beer and settled myself halfway down the steps on a small landing
wh
ere the stairs
turned and ended at the sand.
Down t
here
I was isolated from the people on the porch
and the party
,
which was almost as good as being
at
home
.
The
pulsing base and laughing partiers
were just
a quiet murmur in the background
. As
I slowly
sipped my beer
,
every few minutes I would hear
a long creak from the porch swing or a laugh from one of the guys at the table, but for the most part, all was quiet. 

I had just finished my beer
,
and was debating
whether or n
ot to fish my iPod out of my pocket
,
when
the door to the porch ope
ned.
I
could hear two people talking.
One of them was Molly, her distinct accent coming across loud and clear.

“You’re not okay,” she was saying.

“I’m fine,” came the voice of the guy she was talking to.

“No, you’re not.
I can tell, Zack.”

Zack?
Coffeehouse Guy
Zack?
I strained my ears in an effort to hear what they were talking abo
ut. Was it a lover’s quarrel?
Were they
really dating?
Is that why she was asking me about him?

“Molly, g
o inside. Just leave me alone.
I need five minutes okay.”

“Come on, Zack, talk to me. I know you’re pissed.
That was a really insensitive thing for those guys to say, but how could they know.” She sounded like she was pleading with him.

“Let it go, Molly.
I’m fine.”

“Fine,” I heard her say
and th
en heard the door slam as she
presumably went back inside.

“Dammit,” I heard Zack say, as the flat of his hand made contact with the railing, causing a loud slap. 

I heard him pause for a second
before I heard the distinctive click of a lighter as he lit a cigarette
. Then
before I knew what was happening, he was charging down the
steps, not seeing me sitting several
feet below him.

“Oh,” he said, as recognition set in and
he noticed me
.

“Hi,” I said, for lack of anything more inspiring.

“Hey.” He ran his fingers through his dark hair, and I figured he’d keep going dow
n to the beach, but he didn’t. “That’s
my spot.”

“Excuse me?”

“Sorry,
I was coming down here to sit. It’s my spot.
You know, the place where I go when I want to drown out the rest of the world?”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I said, starting to get up.
“I didn’t realize these stairs were claimed.”
I knew I sounded a bit irritated
,
but he was forcing me out of
my
spot, so I
was
irritated.

“Oh, no,” he said quickly, putting his hand out, and I stopped in the middle of rising to my feet.  “You can stay.”

“Ok
-
ay,” I said
slowly, sitting back down
, my irritation falling away
and confusion replacing it
. 

He sat on the bottom step, perpendicular to me, his
worn sneakers
al
m
ost touching the side of my thigh
, his arms hooked around his knees
.
I noticed he had another tattoo on the inside of his forearm but couldn’t make out what it said. There were four lines of script. As I leaned forward to read them, he shifted so his hands were resting behind him, and I could no longer gawk at his tattoo.

I looked up at
him, not sure what else to do.
He looked
upset as h
e took a deep drag on his cigarette and closed his eyes as he blew out the smoke, like it was a release of some sort.

He opened his eyes,
giving me an appraising look.
“Do you want one?” he asked, gesturing to his cigarette.

I shook my hea
d. “No thanks.
I don’t smoke,” I said, even t
hough I stared at his cigarette intently.
It was brown,
not white like I was used to.
It also smelled like spices a
nd incense.
Normally, I hated the smell of cigarette smoke, but his smelled good.

Zack caught me staring.
“It’
s a clove cigarette,” he said. I just nodded.
“You don’t
smoke
? I’ve seen you smoke.
”

“I know
, b
ut I don’t really.
It was just that one time.”

He leaned back against the step behind hi
m and looked out at the ocean.
“Suit yourself,” he said, taking another drag
, as I took notice of the tattoo peeking out of the sleeve of his white t-shirt
.
It was a design of some sort that I couldn’t make out
, and I suddenly wanted to push up his sleeve to see what it was
.

“So you’re staying here
this summer
?” I asked
, trying to spark some sort of conversation with him.

“No, not anymore
.”

I nodded
, not sure what he meant
.
Had he gotten kicked out
of the house
?

“My dad owns the house. He grew up here,
and his parents gave it to him and my mom
when they couldn’t take care of it any longer. We used to come here every summer.
Then
my parents
got divorced
when I was in high school
, and my mom still wanted to come to the island in the summer, but she obviously didn’t want to come here, so she bought a smaller house a few blocks away
.
My dad rents
out
this place throughout
most of the year
, but he and his wife come out here occasionally
.
”

I was a little floored with how much he’d just shared with me.
In the few times that we’d spoken, I didn’t think he’d said that many words in any of our conversations, let alone in one statement.
I was riveted and suddenly wanted to know all about him.

“So this was your spot when you were growing up?” I asked, still not sure what he’d meant by that comment.

“
My parents fought a lot, and t
his was where
I wo
uld come when I got upset. So yeah, it’s kind of my spot
.”

I nodded
, fully understanding what he was talking about
. “It’s your spot.
I can go
if you want to be alone.”

“No,” he said quickly. “It’s okay. You can stay. Some company might
actually
be nice.”

I could
n’t
escape the sadness that was l
iterally oozing out of his eyes.
I rec
ognized it from the
other times
I’d seen him. It was like it never quite seemed to leave him, even when he was playing an upbeat song or making a joke.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I offered, know
ing that sometimes it just helped
to get things off your chest.

He shook his head. “Not really.
But
thanks for asking.”

He ran his hand through his hair again and looked out at the ocean.
I noticed his dark hair
curled a bit at the ends.
I wished I could tell what he was thinking.
In the distance, thunder rumbled, causing me
to lift my head in the direction of the sound
, wondering if another storm was on its way.

“What’s your name?
” he aske
d
.

When I looked back up at him, he
seemed to
relax just a little.
“Emily
Cole
.”

“Emily
Cole
,” he
repeated.
“Finally, I know the name of the girl from the
coffeehouse
who keep
s
showing up out of the blue
.”
His eyes g
ot playfully
wide as he said that
.

“I’m sorry?”
I
asked, wonderi
ng if I’d heard him correctly. If I ha
d, that meant he
remembered me.

“You don’t remembe
r meeting me, do you?”

I bit my lip for a second, won
dering if I should tell him the truth
.
“No,” I said, slowly. “I do
.”

“Yeah?
You didn’t say anything when we talked at the beach.”

Talked, flirted, whatever.

I shrugged. “You didn’t either.
I f
igured you didn’t remember me.
I’m not exactly memorable.”

“
On the contrary,” he said, taking a lo
ng drag off
his cigarette
, holding the smoke
in his lungs
for a few beats before blowing it out slowly
.
“Yo
u’re actually quire
memorable.
You’re
also very mysterious.”

“So are you,” I countered
, not knowing
what he meant, but I liked it. I wasn’t sure anyone
had ever described me as mysterious
. I honestly enjoyed that he hadn’t thought I was sweet or cute
.
It was a nice change.

He smiled, and it lit up his eyes. I remembered how much I’d liked his smile when I first met him. I was glad he was smiling as opposed to looking so despondent.
He seemed so different
than the light-hearted guy
I’d encountered a month earlier
at the coffee shop, and I wondered what had changed
. 

“
Okay
then, I guess we’re even,” he said.

“I guess we are,” I said, knowing
I was flirting just a little.
“Okay, but really, how am I mysterious?”

He shrugged.
“Well, you keep popping up
places, especially when I’m not expecting to see you. I’m intrigued. Plus
you look li
ke you have a secret
. I’m curious
about what it is
.”