Sweet Forty-Two(42)

“Ha. Ha. It’s not like I leapt to my death, or something. Dial it down a little.”

We sat in silence for a few minutes, eating the muffins and sipping — or in his case, slurping — the coffee.

“These are gluten-free, too?” he asked after eating his third muffin.

“I told you, the whole bakery is.” I snatched a muffin before he ate them all.

“Why? Do you have celiac or something?”

“You know about that? I’m impressed.”

“I pay attention to news and shit.” He nudged his shoulder into mine as he laughed.

The more time I spent with him, the more my assumptions of him were stripped away. Is that how it worked? Would it work the same with me? I couldn’t decide right then if I wanted him to have his assumptions of me dismantled. Whatever they were.

“I don’t have celiac, but I know people who do. And, frankly, you just don’t need wheat for a number of reasons I don’t want to get into at eight o’clock on a weekend morning.”

Regan shrugged and continued slurping his coffee. Seriously, what was with that?

“Do you always drink your coffee like that?” I asked, clicking my tongue in irritation.

“Like what? With my mouth? Swallowing?”

I brought my cup to my lips and mimicked the slurping sound.

“That was a bit dramatic,” he scoffed.

“You’re right ... it was.” I raised my eyebrow at him and he lightly smacked my shoulder with the back of his hand.

“All right, all right. Sorry. I have no idea why I do that.”

“Has no one said anything about it to you before? It’s really quite offensive.” I laughed, setting my mug on the wall.

Regan went silent for a minute. When I looked over at him, he was staring at his hands. You’ve got to be kidding me.

I cleared my throat. “Rae?”

He nodded. “It’s okay.”

“Doesn’t look like it.”

“Well, she died...” He winced through that whole sentence, nearly closing his eyes by the end of it.

I sighed, my window of distraction officially slamming shut. “Tell me.”

“We were out on a trail ride,” he started.

“No,” I cut in, “I don’t need to know about that. Tell me about her.”

I knew how hard it could be to talk about how people used to be, but for me, it provided a sense of comfort that the memories existed at all. I’d take the bad if I got to have all of the good that came before it.

I think.

“I don’t know if I can...”

In the span of my drift off into my thought process, I’d missed that Regan had taken down his hair and tucked it behind his ears, snapping the elastic around his wrist repeatedly.

“Just ... just tell me your favorite thing about her.” I leaned my shoulder into his and left it there. His muscles were tense. Hesitant.

He laughed sort of silently. “She came out of nowhere. Tiny, bossy, and full of certainties.”

“Certainties?” I tucked my knees into my chest.

“Yeah, she was filled with this stone-solid conviction. When she was passionate about something, she wouldn’t let go. It wasn’t in-your-face ... it was ... this quiet resolve. She was ferocious. She’d been through more than you and I both before I’d even met her.”

I doubted that, but let him continue with his story.

“I’ve been in love before, but with her...”

“You’ve been in love before?” I pulled my head back and scrunched my forehead.

He smiled. “Oh, of course. Love is great. Swept off your feet, and all of that? I love it. The first time I was in love was with Kylee Graham in seventh grade. She always wore flowery dresses, and I was certain I’d marry her.”

I bit my lip as I smiled. A thirteen-year-old Regan Kane, in love and making plans to marry. His cousin would consider such thoughts treasonous to the brotherhood of men.

“Anyway,” he sighed wistful thoughts of Kylee into the sea air, “Rae was the first time I felt grown up love.”

“What’s the difference?”

He looked up and then closed his eyes. “It rewired my insides.”

A hole the shape of my mother’s smile seared through me and choked the air away from my throat. I let out an exhale as though I’d been punched in the gut. Because I had, by his words alone. I was left struggling for the comfortable air of my cynicism.

“I know. Intense, right?” He smiled and took a silent sip of his coffee.

“Keep slurping it,” I blurted out.

I needed him to be real, still. Flawed in the volume of his drinking. Loud enough to override the palpable rawness of his allegiance to the doctrine of love.

“When I was in high school I pictured a future with a few girls. With Rae, I felt it here.” He patted his stomach, leaving his fingers to bunch around the fabric of his shirt.

“How long were you together, again?” I couldn’t remember if he’d told me, but I was losing traction on reality.

“Barely two months.”

“Wow.”

“Mmmhmm.” He ran a hand through his hair.

“Did she feel the same way?” I knew I was trudging into mucky personal territory, but come on, we were talking about his dead ex-girlfriend as it was.