Nya

“You have got to be fucking kidding,” Jade said three days later.

If Jade’s eyes, ones that were as wide as I’d ever seen them as she looked at me over the edge of her glasses hadn’t told me what she thought, the words certainly would have. In the course of our long friendship I had only heard her swear once.

That she did so now told me that my story had indeed been as insane as I feared.

But if she thought that was crazy, what I was going to tell her next would blow her mind.

“You haven’t answered, which suggests to me that you are serious,” she said a moment later.

“That’s what happened,” I said.

She frowned, pushed her glasses up, and seems to be deep in thought. “Wait, so you really did have a one-night stand with the guy who’d just beat a federal racketeering indictment. Got shot at. Went to the guy’s house and had rabbit sex with him. Came back to your house, had rabbit sex with him. Got your house broken into. Went back to his house, where I assume more rabbit sex occurred. Took him to your parents’ house. Hung out at a mob bar with him and his mob brothers. Met his creepy-ass father. Got kidnapped and then he brought you back here.”

“Yeah, that’s about it,” I finally said.

She furrowed her brow, looked at me with a lacerating gaze.

“And that’s not the end of the story, is it?” she asked.

Her voice was edged with wariness, something that didn’t surprise me. We’d been friends long enough that she knew me, probably knew what I was going to say next.

“So, I think I…” I trailed off, looked away then looked back at Jade. “I know I love him.”

I said the last words quickly, feeling strange for sharing these feelings with Jade and not Patrick, knowing that I shouldn’t have them, knowing that there was no way I could pretend I didn’t.

I looked at Jade, who stared at me silently, something that made me quite suspicious.

“You haven’t said anything. You never don’t say anything, Jade. Say something.”

Jade gave me a quick smile, took a sip of water. “It’s understandable, I guess,” said.

“What do you mean?”

“You had a really intense experience, so it’s easy for those emotions to get all jumbled. I mean, this is not your everyday thing, so I could imagine that spending time with him would soften your heart toward him.”

She nodded, trying to convince me or herself, I wasn’t sure. “Yeah, it’ll pass. Just give it a couple days and you will look back on this with the appropriate distance and perspective. And you’ll have a great story that you can tell your grandchildren one day.”

When I had sought her out, decided to tell her what happened, I had expected this, thought that she would tell me something similar—hoped that was the case. But after she spoke, I waited for that agreement that told me she was right, waited to feel something that would make me sure that she was.

I didn’t.

“Nya, don’t try to force it. It’ll pass,” she said.

I looked at her. “I don’t think it will,” I said.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Before, I thought the same thing. That this was just one of those things that happens,” I said.

Jade laughed. “Things that happen to you. This would never happen to me,” she said.

I rolled my eyes. “As I was saying… Everything you said should be true, but it’s not,” I said.

“What do you mean it’s not?”

“What I mean is, everything you said was true. That was an intense experience, and insane one, not something I’m eager to repeat. Well, except for the rabbit sex part.”

Jade laughed, pushed her glasses up again, and I continued. “But the rest…”

I stood, the restless energy in my body making it impossible for me to sit.

“The rest is…not that. I mean after the adrenaline fades, you’re not so much thinking about how someone shot at you. It seems kind of crazy to say it out loud, but a lot of the time I spent with Patrick was just that: spending time with Patrick. I got to see, you know, him, see him.”

“Nya, you got to see what he wanted you to see, and more importantly you got to see some things you never should have.”

There was truth to what she said, but not in the way she thought. I remembered the moments at the bar, the tension between Patrick, his brothers, and his father. How angry and frustrated and hurt he’d been that last night when he’d sent me away.

He hadn’t wanted me to see that, but I had, and I couldn’t ignore it, couldn’t pretend that Patrick was some oddity in my life that I would soon forget and not the man who’d shown me so much of himself, the man I loved.

I couldn’t tell Jade that, but I still found myself defending him.

“You know, that’s not really true. He never tried to put on a pretty face for me. In fact,” I said, a lazy smile starting to play on my face, “if anything, he would go out of his way to present the worst possible image of himself.”

“So he was an asshole?” Jade said, her features twisted.

I smiled at her. “Sort of, but in the most charming way,” I said.

Jade shook her head. “Do you hear yourself? See yourself?”

“Obviously I can’t see myself, Jade,” I replied.

“Well I can,” she replied. “Nya, you’re tough as nails. And you’re practically gushing over this guy. You know, the one who almost got you killed?”

Some of my enthusiasm waned, and I could feel the smile leaving my face. She was right, but even though I had told myself the same thing for what felt like a million times now, it hadn’t changed the fact that I loved him.

“Look,” Jade said.

I looked over at her, saw one of the more serious expressions I had ever seen on her face. “It’ll pass. So you love the guy. So what? He’s gone, and that little experience is over. Behind you,” Jade said.

“I’m glad it’s so simple for you. That you understand exactly what I should do,” I said, not hiding my anger.

“You want me to apologize? Tell you I’m sorry for getting into your business, discounting your feelings?” she asked, but she didn’t wait for me to answer. “I will not. I came close to losing you, and that can’t happen.”

Her lips were turned down, her eyes dark, growing damp. I knew how much she meant what she said.

I reached over, hugged her quickly, and then pulled away.

“I’m fine. Or I will be. Besides,” I said, remembering his last words to me, how deliberately cruel they’d been, how they’d been designed to push me away for good, “he’s gone, and I don’t think he’s coming back.”

I couldn’t keep the tinge of sadness out of my voice, something I knew when Jade reached over and squeezed my hand.

“That’s probably for the best. You’ll see that. And don’t worry. It’ll be all right.”

Jade stayed for a little while longer, and we chatted and laughed like always, but when she was gone, I remembered her words, compared them to the loss, emptiness in my chest.

She said I would get over it.

I feared she was wrong.