Push(98)

Thanks for not pressing it.


Sure. Like I said before, only share what u want 2. The rest is NOMB.


But it is your business, Emma.


What is?


This part of my past. My mother.


Why?


Because it’s the reason I’m so f*cked up.


More f*cked up than me and my stepdad?


Yes.


The word stops me in my tracks.


Impossible.


It’s true.


I’ll still love u no matter what kind of f*cked up it is.


Promise?


Promise.


That is the best word ever.


His response makes me smile.


Will it be the last f*cked up thing u tell me about yourself?


Yes.


Promise?


Promise.


That IS the best word ever. :)


See you at 6:00. I’ll wait by the car.


I love you.


Promise?


Promise.
* * *

At six o’clock sharp, I gather my bags and head down the elevator alone. When I see David standing by his car, I instinctively reach up to my chest and pull the dog tags and raven pendant up and out of my dress. I am sliding them back and forth along their chain as I walk toward him. His eyes follow my fingers, and by the time I reach him, he is wearing a smile.
“Hey,” he says, pulling his hands from his pockets and reaching for my hips. “Nice dress.”
“Glad to know you remember it,” I say.
“How could I forget?” he says with a lopsided grin.
I put on my best puckish smirk. “I kicked some ass at work today.”
“How’s that?”
“I argued some design points, and they listened to me and made a bunch of changes because of it. It felt pretty damned good.”
“That’s excellent,” he says just before he plants a kiss on my mouth. It is deep and incredible. Just like always.
“It kinda was,” I say after he pulls away. “I feel like it was the first time I could really prove that I’m good at what I do. You know?”
“Yeah,” he says with a grin. “I’m proud of you, Emma. And I hope you brought Matt to his f*cking knees.” I laugh out loud, knowing that it was more of a compromise than a slaughter.
“Let’s just say that by the time I was done, everyone was begging for mercy,” I tease. His face lights up, and a small laugh escapes his throat.
“Atta girl!” he shouts as he jumps up on to the hood of his car. What the f*ck is he doing?
“David, what are you doing?” I shout up at him. He spreads his arms out wide, and he lifts his face toward the sky.
“My girl kicks ass,” he yells up into the sky. Everyone on the street is looking at us, and I want to sink my face into my hands out of embarrassment. But instead, my cheeks flush, and my mouth rips into a gigantic smile. “And...” he adds, looking down at me and quieting his voice, “she promised she will always love me—no matter what kind of f*cked up I am.”
“It’s true,” I say to a lady walking past me. I give her a little nod and add, “I did say that.”
“Good for you,” the lady says, picking up her pace. “Bunch of crazies,” she adds when she thinks I am out of earshot.
“That’s true, too!” I shout over at her.
David is laughing at me as he hops down from the hood of the car and opens my door for me. His smile is deafening.
We drive across the river to one of the neighborhoods just outside the city. In the car, David asks me to recount all of my stellar arguments this morning, as well as the reactions from both Matt and my supervisor. I have a good time embellishing the story with a few obvious fabrications. At one point in my story, my supervisor even offers me a job as chief operations officer just because I am so f*cking smart. David knows which parts are true and which are not, because he laughs at precisely the right moments. By the time we get to the restaurant, I feel swollen with pride.
The lovely little Italian place has brown craft paper and a votive candle on every table. We eat our meal and talk more about work and the end of last night’s poker match. David tells me about how Carl scorned him for missing most of the game because of a girl. Then he said he played Carl under the table for an hour or so before they packed up and headed home. David settles the bill, and we walk to his car.
“Let’s go sit somewhere outside and look at the stars,” I say, knowing that at some point he might tell me more about his mother. David says that it’s a great idea, and we drive to Addison Park again. We park in the same gravel lot and walk the same dirt trail until we reach the big rock pile and climb to the top to overlook the city. I’m thankful to be wearing flats today instead of his shit kickers. The view is even more beautiful than it was all those weeks ago.
“I know I said it in my text, but I really am sorry that I left you hanging this morning,” he says as we sit down. “I wanted to tell you about my mom, but I knew there wasn’t enough time and I shouldn’t have said what I said and then cut off the conversation. It was stupid of me to have brought it up like that, but you were talking about the whole sleepy smell thing and it just kind of came out.”
“It wasn’t stupid, David. I was stupid. I shouldn’t have called you my bright little bird last night. That wasn’t fair, especially since I don’t know anything about her. You looked so...I don’t know...so disparaged when I said it. I thought you might run the hell away and never come back. But then you lay down in my bed, and I didn’t know what to do. And then this morning, when you said that she was broken inside...I don’t even understand what that means. I am hurting for you, David, and I don’t know why.”