Sweet Forty-Two Read online

  It was barely seven in the morning as I turned into the parking lot of E’s tavern. Georgia and I had ridden the rest of the way in strained silence. Just when I’d thought I’d learned a great deal about women from spending so much time with Ember, I felt like Georgia was speaking a different language. The attitude she displayed with her mouth was at odds with the vulnerability in her eyes. CJ mentioned that her dad was kind of a loser, so I chalked it up to daddy issues.

  “Here we are. That blue car yours?” I headed toward a Chevy Cavalier.

  “That’s me. He’s not my boyfriend, by the way.”

  I put the car in park. “What?”

  “Dex. He’s not my boyfriend.” She reached behind my seat and pulled her small canvas backpack into her lap. The smell of mint still lingered on her pale skin.

  “Oh. Well ... what the hell was that all about last night, then?”

  She rolled her eyes. “He’s just a jacked up ex-jock with Narcissistic Personality Disorder.”

  “Aren’t they all?”

  “That friend of yours, Bo, isn’t, right?”

  “How’d you know Bo was a jock?”

  She shrugged. “It would have been a damn waste of those shoulders if he wasn’t.”

  “Well,” I laughed, “I think he was the quarterback.”

  “Of course he was.” She rolled her eyes, not mockingly, but seemingly to cue me into her thoughts on high school caste systems.

  “But didn’t you leave the bar with him?”

  “Who?”

  “Dex.”

  “Sure,” she smiled as she opened the door, “I leave the bar with a lot of people, Regan. Dex, though ... I didn’t go home with Dex. I walked him to a cab. Follow me back up the highway. K?”

  “Will do.” I barely got out the end of my sentence as her door slammed to a close.

  Craving spearmint gum the whole way, I followed Georgia’s ten-year-old car up I-5.

  Once we navigated into La Jolla, her car took left turn after left turn, it seemed, until we were dangerously close to the water. Turning left down one more road, there were buildings to my left, and nothing to my right. Air. And, apparently, a cliff.

  Georgia pulled up in front of a white building with a garage on street level. Next to the garage, in the same building, was what appeared to be a small bakery. There was no name on it, and the lights were off. I pulled up behind her, checking my surroundings once more, before succumbing to the glaring reality that I’d never be able to afford this place.

  “Yo,” Georgia rapped on my window, “we’re here, rock star.”

  I got out and looked up at the top floor, which held large picture windows. “You ... this ... this is the place?”

  “Yeah, follow me.” She pulled a key from her pocket and headed up the stone stairs that wrapped around the building, making the entrance in the back.

  Once inside the narrow entryway, I saw an “A” on the door to the right and a “B” on the door to the left.

  “This is the one that’s open.” Georgia stuck the key into the “B” apartment lock and opened the door, letting me in first.

  Light.

  God, the light. Windows from the front and side were like broken dams, flooding the room with bright Pacific sun. The large rectangular space looked more Cape Cod than La Jolla. The floors were bamboo and the walls were distressed wood planks, painted white.

  Blue.

  The back wall looked blue, but that was a window that canvassed the perfect sky and ocean. Their meeting point was the furthest point in my new living room. There was a small galley kitchen to the left, and I assumed a bedroom and bathroom on the right, but I just stood at the window, breathing in the enormity of it all.

  “I can’t afford this.” I shook my head and turned my back to the view, not wanting to torture myself.

  Georgia met me at the window, wrapped her tiny hand around my bicep and turned me around again. “You haven’t even asked how much it is.”

  I wondered if she could feel my pulse pick up as she stood silently gazing out the window with me. Her hand still wrapped around me.

  “The ocean might be blue, G, but it bleeds green. You lived on the other coast, you know that.”

  “Did you just call me G?” She looked up, but wasn’t blushing like she did when I’d caught her checking me out in my shorts earlier.

  “I did.” It slipped out, but felt natural. Maybe it was because that’s typically how CJ referred to her.

  The skin around her eyes creased a little, as if she were smiling, but her mouth didn’t turn up. “Please take it.”

  “How much is it?” I winced, bracing for the huge price tag. I had a shitload of money in savings, but wasn’t interested in blowing through it inside of a year on rent alone.

  Her head tilted to the side as her eyes narrowed in thought. After half a second she spoke. “How much can you afford?”

  “That’s hardly an answer.”

  “It most certainly is an answer.” She started bouncing on her toes like she was a child waiting in line for a balloon animal.

  I sighed. “It’s not an answer to that kind of question.”

  “And why not?”

  Our conversation was making me dizzy.

  “Don’t get all flustered. Let’s go ask the owner of the building.”

  “Oh, they’re here? I figured since you had the keys they wouldn’t be here.”

  “We’re early, remember? Sunrise headstands and whatnot?”

  I laughed. “Yeah.”

  Georgia slid her hand down my arm and locked it around my wrist as she led me through the apartment. This was the brightest I’d ever seen her. Excitement looked good on her.

  She dropped my arm as she knocked on the door to apartment A, bouncing from foot to foot. Knocking one more time with a huge smile on her face, she animatedly rolled her eyes, and fished another key from her shallow pockets.

  “Did you say you lived across the hall?”

  She turned the key. “I don’t have keys to anyone else’s apartment...”

  I felt more confused with each second I spent with her. She was like this Rubik’s Cube that changed patterns around each turn. Impossible. I wanted to try to solve her, though. I hadn’t sorted out if that was a good thing or a bad thing before the door flew open.

  Her eyebrow arched, teeth biting back a huge smile.

  What?

  I stood with my mouth open, eyes searching the apartment behind her, and she laughed. “This is my building, Regan.”

  What?

  “You live here, yeah...”

  She stepped back, holding the door open and waving me in. “My building as in, yes, I live here, and I own it.”

  While the layout of this apartment was the same as the one across the hall, it was fully decorated. A cream colored couch was up against a bright aqua wall. Fishing line ran the length of the apartment, suspended five or so inches from the ceiling. There were four rows of it, and woven between them were bright sheer scarves. Yellows, blues, greens ... I felt like I was in some sort of fairytale.

  My words were coming out a few seconds apart. “The whole building? How in the hell? What?”

  She giggled. For the first time in the few short days that I’d known her, she let out what could only be described as a giggle. I didn’t call her on it, though. She’d have kicked my ass.

  “Yes, the whole building. It was my dad’s. He bought it like twenty years ago. When he died, I got it.”

  This was the first I’d heard her talk about either of her parents.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize he’d passed away. CJ didn’t tell me.”

  My pockets were all bunched up inside, fumbling my attempt to nonchalantly do something with my hands. I always had to be productive with my hands, especially in awkward situations. Music was the perfect outlet for that, but this was hardly the time for a violin solo.

  “No worries, I just told CJ last night, anyway. Not his fault.” Georgia walked deeper into
her apartment and held her arms out. “So, you see, this place is nearly identical to yours. My dad had it all as one space, but six months ago I had it renovated into two units. I didn’t need all the space. And, the rent will help with ... life.”

  “What about your mom?”

  Her shoulders stiffened for a split second before her exhale. “Gone.”

  “I’m so sorry.” I met her at her picture window. My hand hovered over the small of her back, but I hesitated, instead brushing it across her shoulder blades.

  “Don’t be. It is what it is. This view is perfect, though, isn’t it?”

  I breathed in reverence at the identical view to the apartment across the hall, allowing for her change in subject. “Yeah, about the rent...”

  “Five hundred.”

  “Ha!” She jumped at my loud response. “No fucking way. That’s insane.”

  “No,” she snapped, “that’s not insane.”

  Her face was all screwed up, happiness swirled with something distant.

  “Sorry.” I exaggerated my response as if I were on the playground.

  The lines around her mouth relaxed. “No, I’m sorry. I’m not kidding. Five hundred. The apartment has sat empty since I renovated. I haven’t trusted anyone else to take it.”

  “Trust? You met me like two days ago.”

  Georgia turned for her bedroom, talking to me over her shoulder as she shuffled through her closet. “Yeah, well you’re CJ’s cousin. I trust him with everything.”

  “I have to tell you,” I called back, “I half expected black walls with neon spray paint everywhere or something.”

  “That’s awfully assumptive of you.” Georgia came out wearing a long black skirt and a blue t-shirt that had a faded design I wasn’t going to be caught dead staring at for too long. She was wearing flip-flops that highlighted the stark vertical difference between the two of us.

  “You’ve left me no choice.” I grinned. “I met you when you were wearing short shorts and combat boots, then I’ve seen you for two nights at the bar wear basically nothing at all. Now, this...” I gestured to the most conservative outfit I’d seen her in yet. “Can you blame me for expecting anything but this?”

  “Well, you see,” Georgia got toe-to-toe with me and lifted up on hers so she could whisper in my ear, “I’m never sure what I’m going to be from one minute to another.”

  I placed my hands on her shoulders, holding her at arm’s length. “You speak in riddles.”

  “Do I? Maybe you hear in riddles.” She stepped back, shoving some things into her backpack.

  “That bakery downstairs ... is it ever open? Who owns it?”

  “Which do you want me to answer first?” She seemed annoyed.

  “The second.”

  “I do.”

  “You own it?” My eyes may well have bugged right out of my head.

  She shrugged. “Yep, I’m full of all kinds of surprises.” She seemed to be trying to wink with her voice, if one could do that, but it fell a little short and my stomach dropped a little.

  “When is it open?”

  “It’s not, really. I don’t have a ton of time to run it properly. Just mainly for catering and stuff.” She was growing flustered by the second. Who knew a bakery could be such a sore spot? “Do you want the place or not, Regan?”

  I wasn’t sure if living across from Georgia was what I wanted to do. Well, it was what I wanted to do, but I didn’t know if it was right. I didn’t have a clear read on her, and she caused all kinds of feelings to stir up inside me that I definitely wasn’t ready to feel. I was curious. With each second that passed I wanted to get closer to her than my brain was comfortable with.

  “Why do you trust me so much?” was the first sentence out of my mouth.

  “You haven’t tried to get in my pants.” She slid her backpack over her shoulders and looked at me as if she’d said the most normal thing on the planet.

  “I’ve known you for, like, a minute.”

  “Precisely. You’re good, Regan. I need some good around here.” It was as if a grey scarf had slipped from the ceiling and surrounded her eyes as she spoke.

  “I’ll take it.” That was the only thing to say.

  Georgia walked toward me and slowly wrapped her arms around my neck as she squeezed me close. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  “I ... you’re welcome.” I went to set my hands on her lower back, but her backpack stopped me, so I settled for the curve of her hip.

  Not a bad compromise.

  Georgia’s muscles froze, and for a moment her eyes locked on mine. I didn’t want to pull my hands off of her hips in reaction, so I left them there. And took a deep breath because I felt the overwhelming urge to kiss her. It could have been the relief and excitement of finding the perfect apartment, but more than likely it was the lavish garnet color painted across her smile. She was smiling. Slightly, but it was there. The color in her lips seemed to make its way up to her cheeks.

  She’d been looking at me with her eyes only, not moving her face from the level of my chest, but when she tilted her chin upward, her expression fully exposed and vulnerable, everything got too real.

  I had to kiss her.

  In the span of my emotional volley, she cleared her throat and took a step back. My hands felt cold as she shimmied her hips away from my hold.

  “Okay, so you remember how to get back to Mission Bay? I’ve got to go north, so I can’t drive you back.” She moved to the door.

  “I remember. When can I move in?” I asked this in the hopes that my line-crossing moment hadn’t just lost me the best apartment I’d ever seen.

  Georgia handed me a key. “Any time. Get me the first month’s rent whenever. See ya.” She stretched way up on her toes, gave me a quick kiss on the cheek, smiled, and bounded down the stone stairs.

  As I closed her door and unlocked what was now mine, it hit me. While I’d seen Georgia bounce across the line between excessively seductive and perfectly badass, the only time I’d seen anything soft and bright from her was in her interactions with her coworkers and with CJ. The girl that leaped over the bar and gripped CJ into a squealing hug was the same girl that offered me the apartment in her building.

  She trusted me. Seemed relieved I hadn’t tried to “get in her pants.”

  “Crap,” I whispered to myself as I gazed out what was now my picture window.

  Pressing my forehead into the single-pane of glass I let out a low groan.

  I’d just been friend-zoned by Georgia.

  Living in her building certainly was going to be a ride. Maybe Lissa was right, after all.

  We’ll see...

  Georgia

  My breathing didn’t get ahold of itself until I was a good two miles away from the apartment. He’d wanted to kiss me, and under normal circumstances I would have allowed him to. But, by design, he was going to be living across the hall from me. I needed friends, according to my therapist. I wondered, though, if she’d meant that I should rent an apartment to someone I was incredibly attracted to.

  Probably not.

  But, given the resignation that I’d be alone for the rest of my life, I thought it would be okay to have someone nice and good looking living across the hall. Just to remind me what being human feels like. Even if I could never act on those feelings, it would be nice to feel them. While I still could feel, that is.

  Merging onto the highway, heading North, I had to take a cleansing breath to erase the cool scent of the hazel-eyed, brassy-haired hottie from my senses. It was time to focus. To prepare.

  A half an hour later I was pulling into the parking lot of Breezy Pointe. Sounds pleasant, right? A small town on the coast, maybe? A picnic spot where one might spend careless Sundays in the sand?

  It was designed that way. To make you think a million happy thoughts before you walked through the doors and were confronted by every awful thing you wanted to fix.

  “Hi Wendy.” I smiled to the sixty-five-year-old nurse at the desk. I
didn’t see her too often, as I usually came right after my shifts at E’s, and she worked the day shift.

  “Georgia Rose, how are you?” Her voice held a hint of the southern sweet tea she carried with her from Texas when she moved here last year. She always said my name like Jo-ja. I loved it. “You didn’t come last night?”

  I shook my head. “Bad night the night before. I...”

  “Needing a break is okay, Sugar. We all need them. Given the last few months you’ve had ... well, I’m glad you got some rest.” She was allowed to call me Sugar all she wanted. She had a heart big enough for the both of us.

  “Thanks. Can you check to see if she’s ... available?”

  Wendy nodded as she handed me the sign-in binder. She picked up the black phone, pressing a few buttons as I stared at the cheap art posters on the wall behind her. For a place that costs so much money, you’d think they might want to buy something other than a screen print of a shitty sunflower field. I vowed to call my photog friend, Kate, in Illinois this week to ask her to send me some canvas shots.

  “Georgia.” Wendy’s tone indicated this was not the first time she’d called my name. I was busy making plans to pretty up the place I’d been spending more and more time as the days wore on.

  “Sorry, what?”

  “You can head on back.”

  I took my visitor badge and smiled through the sad gaze she gave me as I wandered to the locked door for the unit.

  After being buzzed in and giving a silent greeting to the nurses at the desk, I made my way down the hall.

  1826.

  I paused at the familiar door, tracing the curves of the numbers with my eyes as I caught my breath. Typically, I’d be able to visit her in her room. Still with a nurse present, but at least in her own space. Not today, though. Not after Saturday night left me shaken and with a bruise on my wrist. It’d been over a year since she’d had an episode like that.

  Just one more locked door separated me from the visiting area. Another nurse greeted me at the door and escorted me in.

  “How is she today?” I checked my backpack and jewelry at the nurses’ station before going further.