Austin
“I hate that there has to be a goodbye so soon,” I say with a sigh. I know what comes next. It’s played out in my head a few times already.
“Same here, but I won’t last out here. I really thought I would, but the small town living just isn’t my thing. It’s definitely a nice change from the city life, but I haven’t adjusted well. The good news is that I got my old job back, so at least there’s that.”
“Yeah, I suppose that’s true,” I continue.
“Well, I guess this is it,” Brendan says to Scarlett as he leans in for a hug. I can honestly say I didn’t see this coming.
“Call me when you get back,” Scarlett says. “Promise?”
“I will call you,” Brendan replies.
“I love you, babykins,” she yells as he walks through airport security.
“Love you more, snookums!” he replies with a quick wave and a hand cupped over his mouth.
I laugh at the two of them and their relationship. “Are you sure you’re going to be okay without your sidekick here?” I ask Scarlett.
She turns to me and wraps her arms around my neck. “I think I’ll be just fine.” Scarlett presses up on her toes and scrunches her small nose against my cheek as she kisses me. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
“I thought he was happy with the job he got at the plantation?” I ask her. “It didn’t even last two weeks, though.”
“Um,” Scarlett says. “So, Ellis Freedom started ‘hitting on’ Brendan, I guess. Brendan got super uncomfortable and put a stern stop to it.”
“No ma’am, are you serious?” I’m trying to picture this scene in my head, but I’m getting uncomfortable just thinking about the exchange in a work environment.
“Brendan then proceeded to ask Ellis if that was the only reason he gave him a job, and Ellis didn’t appreciate the accusation too much seeing as he does not, in fact, have an interest in men. He was just being friendly, I guess. That’s the story in a nutshell.”
“Wait a minute,” I tell Scarlett. “I don’t mean this in a rude or discriminatory way, but don’t people who are attracted to those of the same sex have a radar or something about that stuff, or is that only a myth?”
“I have no clue,” she tells him. “I think it depends on the person, but Brendan has never had good luck determining who swings for which team. This isn’t the first time he’s gotten himself into this type of situation, and it probably won’t be the last.”
“Poor guy,” I tell her.
“He’ll be okay. I’m almost positive he told work he was taking a month off so he could force me to move down here and get the hell out of Boston. The man doesn’t like to break a sweat, and he doesn’t like shorts or a town that doesn’t have a bar where he can ogle his desire.”
“If that’s the case, that’s quite a gesture he made for you.”
“We’ve been friends a long time. We stuck together in a city that could swallow us up whole if we let it, and have always had each other’s backs.”
“I’ve never had a friend like that,” I tell her.
“You do now,” she says nudging her shoulder into my arm.
We walk out of the airport into the blazing, hot sun and head toward my truck, which is a few blocks away, but I’m not going to make it that far without questioning her last comment. “Scarlett … are we just friends?”
She looks over at me with one eye squinted from the sun. “Austin Trace, it’s not like you asked me to be your girlfriend. What else am I supposed to refer to you as?”
I laugh at her reason. “I wasn’t aware people in their twenties and thirties still put labels on relationships.”
“Ah, yeah, it’s kind of a big deal. What if I only wanted to be fuck buddies?” she asks. I’d like to tell her that if any girl suggested that to a man, they’d probably take the opportunity over a relationship, but I’ve been there and done that, and it’s not as thrilling as it once was.
“Well, if that were the case, you wouldn’t look at me like I’m saving your life every time I go to kiss you,” I inform her.
“Oh please, you’re just cocky and think that’s what’s going through my head.”
“Fine then, what are we?” I play into her guessing game.
“I’m not sure,” she says.
“Then, answer me this … what made you stay here rather than going back home with Brendan?” I’ve been wondering about this. She never told me whether she was staying or going. She never decided. She informed me Brendan was leaving, and that’s the only time she brought the subject up.
“It wasn’t you. Don’t worry,” she says with a straight face.
Hoping she’s just being snide, I wrap my arm around her and slide my hand down to just graze her ass and give her a loving pinch. “What was it then?”
She jumps at my pinch then slaps my hand. “I said, I didn’t stay for you.” She smiles at me, but it’s the kind of smile where I see the devil in her eyes.
“You have commitment issues, huh?” I press.
“Nope.”
“Okay then, Scarlett, will you be my girlfriend?” I ask, feeding her exactly what she wants to hear.
“Nope.” She continues walking with that smile still present, but I stop, completely baffled and confused by this woman. “You’re too late.”
“I’m too late?” I repeat. She’s obviously messing with me, but she’s holding the serious card longer than I might have, and I don’t like it.
“Yes.”
Scarlett peels her phone out of her back pocket and hits a few buttons. “What are you doing?” I ask her.
“Calling an Uber. I have to be at work soon.”
“My truck is right over there. I can take you back to the hotel, but really, you’re going to play me like this?”
“Like what?” she asks.
“You’re toying with me, Scarlett. You’re doing that thing chicks do when they make up excuses instead of just spittin’ out the damn truth.”
“I am not.”
“Be my damn girlfriend, then?”
“Not when you’re going to talk to me like that, I’m not.”
I groan and rake my fingers through my hair, losing my sense of control with the amount of frustration she’s causing me. We haven’t talked about our “feelings” per-say, but I also didn’t think we needed to. Things seemed fairly clear to me these last couple of weeks.
“Wait a minute,” I wrap my hand around her arm. “You said you didn’t have to work today.”
“Oh yeah,” she says.
“What is going on with you?”
“I just forgot to wash my hair,” she says, still trying to find an Uber in the area.
I laugh. “Okay, fine. Do what you want. When you want to tell me what you’re being all pissy about, I’ll listen.”
“Pissy?” she asks. “Are you kidding me?”
“I feel so dang lost in this conversation right now. I don’t even know how we somehow managed to get into what feels like an argument over whether you’re my girlfriend. Did I miss something?”
“Nope, sounds like it’s pretty clear on your side too.”
“Look, darlin’, this has been fun these last few weeks. I’ve enjoyed our time together, but you’re making my head spin right now, so if you ain’t gonna tell me what’s wrong, then I’m gonna have to let you be until you want to talk.”
She finally stops and turns toward me. “I got a call from one of the top hotels in Boston. They’re offering me an interview for a management position. Before I took the job down here, I had applied to like a hundred hotels in the area, desperate to find something so I wouldn’t have to relocate.”
“Ah,” I say, feeling my heart drop to the pit of my stomach. “Basically, what you’re saying is, we’ve been fooling around, having fun. You were hoping it was something more. I never said it was anything more for me, and you just got a job interview you can’t pass up. Any smart person would be stupid to deny it. Am I right?”
“How many times a day do I have to tell you that you’re so smart, Austin.”
“Don’t go patronizin’ me,” I tell her.
“Then don’t pretend like you have me all figured out,” she snaps back.
“Don’t I, though?” I ask her.
“No, you don’t know a damn thing.”
“I know a few things, just to be fair,” I mutter.
An Uber car pulls up to the spot where we’re arguing and she doesn’t say another word before climbing inside. I follow her, though. This isn’t over. “What are you doing?”
“Chasing you,” I tell her. The second the words come out of my mouth, I hear Pop’s words in my ear.
“I’m not the girl who needs to be chased, and your truck is over there,” she tells me, pointing across the street.
“Yeah, well I don’t think I know what the hell I’m doing, or who the hell you even are at this point, so it can stay there a bit longer.”
The Uber driver seems unaffected by our argument, but this sucks. We haven’t argued about a damn thing since things heated up with us, and now out of nowhere, it’s like she hates me. I loved that she was open and honest about everything, but now I’m seeing a totally different side of her, and I’m questioning if she’s just that damn good at hiding shit, and whether I really know who she is.
We’re about a mile away from the hotel where she works, and I can’t think of a thing to say. “I’m sorry I made you chase me,” she says.
“You didn’t make me do nothin’,” I tell her.
“I don’t belong down here,” she tells me.
“Well, do you belong up there?”
“I don’t know. That’s the truth.”
“Do you need some time to get your thoughts together?” I ask her. If she needs space, I’ll give her space. The last thing I want to do is act like a crazy boyfriend, especially seeing as I’m not her boyfriend thanks to my lack of labeling capabilities and my apparent inability to understand our relationship.
“Actually, will you walk me home?” she asks. The way she asks isn’t in true Scarlett fashion. She’s all quiet and meek. She must be lost in her head somewhere if she’s acting like this. I don’t know this side of her at all.
“Of course I will.” Even if it’s to say goodbye, this girl has me so wrapped around her finger, I’d probably be dumb enough to go jogging through the woods with a pair of heels on too.
The car pulls up in front of the dirt parking lot that leads to the hotel because Ubers aren’t allowed up to the front of the property unless someone has a lot of baggage. It doesn’t make sense to me, but Ellis doesn’t make much sense to me as a person either, so I won’t waste too many brain cells trying to figure it out.
We hop out of the car and silently walk down the dirt path. I want to take Scarlett’s hand, but I don’t know what’s going through her head. All the sudden, it feels like we’re back at square one. I step around to her other side where her broken wrist is and lift it up. I trace my fingertips over hers as if I were only looking for swelling. “What are you doing?” she asks.
“Being a creep,” I tell her.
“If you want to hold my hand, I’ll hold your hand,” she says.
“Do you want to hold my hand?”
“I never stopped wanting to hold your hand, Austin.”
She walks around the other side of me and takes my hand, holding it tightly. While I want to think this is a good sign of things to come, it also feels like it could be the beginning of the end. What could I have done differently? Nothing. Seriously, nothing except ask her earlier if she wanted to be my damn girlfriend. Aside from that, I honestly don’t know what I did wrong. Am I that big of an idiot? I was enjoying the moment, not thinking about stupid shit like titles. I just wanted to be with her, laughing and enjoying whatever it was that was happening.
We walk up the front steps of the plantation and I open the main door for Scarlett to walk through.
“Hi, Miss Scarlett,” the young front desk girl calls out as we walk by. Scarlett has been training her for the past couple days so she can handle some of the busy shifts and relieve Scarlett from having to take them all on.
“Hi, Sonia,” Scarlett says with a quick wave.
We’re just about at the back door when I hear my name being called.
I turn around and I don’t want to believe what my eyes are seeing, but this town doesn’t hide anyone or anything. “Well, I’ll be a thorn on a tick’s behind,” she says.
“Ma.” I’m unenthused, as she might expect me to be. “What are you doing back here?”
I forget Scarlett’s with me for a moment as I’m trying to keep my head from exploding with inappropriate things to say to the woman who forced half our family into the ground. Thankfully, Scarlett is already versed in my past so it isn’t a secret, but I don’t need this particular rendezvous at this exact moment.
Regardless, I walk toward her, keeping Scarlett’s hand locked within mine.
“George and I decided to come stay here for a spell and visit with Laurie-Cate. Of course, we would have liked to see you too but that’s hard to do when I’ve been prohibited from speaking to you.” She elegantly sweeps her feathered bangs away from her eye, giving a show of her apparent facelift. Her dreams have finally been answered I guess, and it’s like her previous life never happened. I have spent years wondering if she even misses her dead daughter, never mind the man who would go to the ends of the earth for her.
“Well, good for you,” I tell her. “I best be goin’ now.”
“Who is this?” she asks, looking over at Scarlett. “Oh, I recognize you. You work here, don’t you?” This is the first time Scarlett hasn’t spoken up when asked about her presence. Her hand is gripping mine tightly, and I’d pay to know what’s going through her head. In any case, I just want to get the hell out of here before Ma says something I’ll regret.
“This is my girlfriend, Scarlett,” I tell her. “Have a nice stay.”
“Austin,” Ma says as I’m turning back for the door. “There’s something I want to say to you.”
I’m Pa’s boy through and through, and I have too much respect for the wrong people in this world, so I turn around and look this woman in the face while holding my tongue with all the strength I have. “What’s that?”
“You can do much better than some floozy front desk girl, don’t you think?”
My blood boils as I process her words, and I open my mouth, ready to let all my rage loose on her. “You know—” I try to say what I’m thinking, but Scarlett shockingly interrupts me.
“I’ll have you know, Ms. Trace, I am not some floozy front desk girl. In fact, I have a business degree from Boston University, and five years of hotel management experience. I’m sure that’s more than your lovely stepdaughter, Laurie-Cate, can say for herself. Am I right?”
“First off, little miss, my name is Mrs. Gilly; Mrs. George Gilly.” She holds up her ring finger for all of us to see the thousands of dollars dumped into one measly diamond. “And, Laurie-Cate is an outstandingly brilliant woman any man would be honored to stand beside.”
“Ah,” Scarlett says. “Is that why you wanted your son and stepdaughter to get married?” Scarlett’s voice echoes throughout the entire lobby, and while I should be mortified, I’m proud as hell of this girl with the biggest goddamn mouth I’ve ever seen.
“Oh. My. Word. Gracious, you are a tart, aren’t you? This is what you want for your life, Austin?” Ma looks Scarlett up and down as if she were trash.
“We only just started dating, Ma, but let me tell you something. If this girl wanted me next to her for the rest of her life, I’m pretty sure I’d be okay with that,” I scoff with anger. “You go on back to your new family, and leave me the hell alone. You hear?”
“At least I have a family,” she says. Thankfully, Scarlett yanks me away and pulls me toward the door before I can do or say anything else.
We’re outside and I still feel like I’m suffocating. “Hey,” Scarlett says. “Look at me.” She places her hand on my face. “She is not worth your anger.” I’m boiling inside and I know I’m must be redder than a tomato right now. I can hardly catch my damn breath. “Breathe.”
I look into Scarlett’s eyes and everything else around me fades into the distance. She’s got these soulful, hazel eyes mixed with the colors of a crisp autumn day. That, and her hair’s blowing in the breeze, sweeping over my arms as she holds onto me like she feels what I feel. How is it, she’s got a hold of me, and yet, I can’t let go of her? “I want you to be mine, Scarlett. I’m sorry I introduced you as my girlfriend back there, but it’s what I want. Truthfully. Even if you go back to Boston, I want you to be mine. You’ve had too much of an impact on my life in the past month for me to forget you.”
Scarlett takes my hand and leads me around the bend to her studio apartment. She pulls her key out of her back pocket and lets us inside before closing the world out. She pushes me down onto her bed and crawls onto my lap, then loops her arms around my neck.
“I’m sick of making decisions, Austin.”
“That’s all life is,” I tell her. “Plus, it’s just an interview for now. But, if you want it, I want you to get it.”
She tightens her arms around my neck and kisses me softly as her hair billows around my ears. Her scent, her touch, it’s everything I never knew I needed from a person.
Scarlett pulls away just enough to look me in the eyes. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“And I don’t want to hold you back,” I tell her.
“Then it looks like we’re in a bit of a pickle,” she says with a fluttering faint smile, in her best Southern drawl.
“In a pickle?” I question.
“Isn’t that what y’all country folk say down yonder?” she continues.
Even in this dreadful moment, this girl finds a way to make me laugh. “Oh, darlin’, stick to y’alls Bahston talk.”