***
I watched through the living room window while Rein parked her car behind my truck under the carport. I didn’t say anything as I got up from the couch where my mother was dozing against the arm rest. I stepped around Bella, who lingered in the den between the living room and kitchen with one of her dolls and her numerous colorful outfits.
I opened the front door just as Rein hopped up the steps onto the porch, and I stepped outside into the cold, pulling the door closed behind me. In nothing but my Henley shirt and jeans, the cold was fierce.
“Hey,” I said to Rein, who studied me with an intense stare.
“Hey.”
“Thanks for coming. Sorry if she guilted you into it. She swiped my phone when I wasn’t paying attention. She might be sick, but she’s still as sneaky as ever.”
“She didn’t guilt me,” Rein said. “I wanted to come.”
“You did?”
Rein nodded. “I haven’t seen her in a long time, and I don’t know if I’ll get another chance.”
Right. She was here to see my mother, not me. She moved to go around me, but I caught her wrist as she reached for the door. “I’m also sorry about yesterday afternoon. I should have spent the day with you and Bella, not on the phone. I screwed up.” I held out my phone to her. “Hold on to this for me so I won’t have access to it tonight?”
She looked from me to the phone in my hand. Her hesitation made me think for a moment that she might shoot me down, but after a few prolonged seconds, she took the phone out of my hand and put it in her pocket. “All right. Can we go in now? It’s freezing out here.”
I smiled and opened the door for her.
I brought her into the living room after she took off her jacket and boots. My mother was rubbing sleep from her eyes and pushing herself off the sofa as Rein was bombarded by Bella, who shouted her name and made a fuss about showing Rein her doll. Rein, always polite, showed keen interest in all the doll’s outfits until Bella grew bored and resumed playing. Then Rein went to my mother and pulled her in for a tight, long hug.
I hung back and watched, unsure of what was expected of me.
When the two women parted, my mother cupped Rein’s cheeks in her hands. “It’s so very good to see you, my dear.”
“You too, Arlene.” Rein squeezed my mother’s shoulders. “I wish you had told me. I would have been here. All I do is go to that stupid gallery every day. I have so much time.”
My mother gave her a sad smile before patting her cheek and letting her hands fall to her sides. “A young woman like you has more important things to do than tend to me. Besides, I was perfectly fine on my own until a few weeks ago. Come, have a seat. We ordered the food already, and it should be here any minute.”
The pizza guy came on cue three minutes later, and I paid him at the door and brought the pizza in. Bella flocked to it like a chicken to feed and grabbed a piping hot slice before I had the lid opened all the way. I passed her a plate and napkin and asked her not to get anything on her grandmother’s carpets or furniture. Bella agreed with a mouthful of cheese and crust.
The rest of us dug in too, enjoying the greasy food as well as the company. I was delighted to see my mother eat an entire piece, and she seemed to enjoy it too. She scarfed it down in less than five minutes while Rein filled her in on how her art business was doing.
As it turned out, it wasn’t as successful as Rein had led me to believe. She was a proud woman, so I understood why she hadn’t told me that she wasn’t really making any money. By the sounds of things, she was stretched pretty thin financially. If her parents hadn’t left her the apartment after they passed away, she wouldn’t have been able to afford rent anywhere else.
My mother assured her that good things were likely around the corner. “The best things always come after the hardest struggle.”
Rein licked pizza sauce off her thumb and nodded. “I know. The struggle can end any time.” She chuckled.
“Do the two of you remember the time you had your first kiss?” my mother asked suddenly.
I looked up at her sharply, trying to convey with my eyes that this subject wasn’t up for discussion. She looked past me at Rein, who was nodding.
“Yes. On the swing that used to be on your front porch.”
“After a school dance,” my mother added.
Rein nodded wistfully. “I remember the yellow dress I was wearing.”
“Me too,” I said. “It had frills on the sleeves. And lace along the hem.”
Rein blinked at me. “You remember that?”
“Sure I do.”
I caught my mother smiling as she looked back and forth between us. She saw me catch her, and she dropped her gaze to her lap. “I have a lot of fond memories of the two of you in this house, but nothing tops that night. She was upset with you because you never worked up the nerve to ask her to dance. Do you remember, Brayden?”
“High school dances were intimidating,” I said defensively.
“You were being a baby.” Rein stuck her tongue out at me.
I rolled my eyes. “Sorry that I was afraid to ask the prettiest girl in school to dance with me. You both know how terrible of a dancer I was. Am.”
“You’re a good dancer,” my mother and Rein said in unison.
“No, he’s not,” Bella chimed in from her spot on the floor.
The three of us burst out laughing, and the joke alleviated some of the tension between Rein and me. Thinking back to that kiss on the porch had me feeling exactly like the nervous seventeen-year-old kid I had been. Rein had been sitting beside me on the swing, her hip pressed to mine, and she was looking up at me with wide eyes and slightly parted lips. I could smell her candy-scented body spray, and I remember how badly I wanted to taste the sparkling lip gloss she wore.
When I finally worked up the nerve to kiss her, I hadn’t been disappointed. The kiss was sweet, tender, and a little pathetic, but perfect nonetheless.
I caught my mother yawning after another hour passed. Rein saw it too and said she had to go home. She had an early morning. She hugged my mother and kissed her cheek, and then I walked her out to her car.
Which refused to start.
After ducking back into the house to grab my keys and to tell my mother that I would be driving Rein home, I met her back outside and we both piled into my rental truck. The heat kicked on, and I reversed around her little red coupe parked behind me and out onto the street.
I was walking her to her front door all too soon. I didn’t want the night to end. I was enjoying having time with her—time that I knew was fleeting. I was constantly aware of the ticking clock above my head, reminding me that soon, very soon, I would be heading back to Florida with Bella.
After I buried my mother.
Rein’s closeness offered a familiar comfort that made those thoughts less dark. Her smile and her voice gave me a sense of hope that I hadn’t felt in a long time.
Rein unlocked her front door and stepped inside. She kicked off her boots, shrugged out of her jacket, and walked inside without looking back at me.
“Hey,” I called as I followed her in and closed the door behind me to keep the cold out. “I’m going to need my phone back.”
Rein spun on her heel, her dark hair fanning out around her. “Then come and get it,” she teased, pulling it from her back pocket and waving it in front of me.
I reached for it, and she yanked it away. She giggled and scrambled backward as I reached for it again. Then I caught her sleeve and pulled her to me. I wrapped my arm around her lower back, holding her body against mine, and stared down into her brilliant eyes.
How had I ever walked away from her?