Chapter 43

He heard her voice and he was out the door, coat trailing behind him because he couldn’t be bothered to pause while pulling it on. If he could have afforded a cell phone, he would have been on the line with her the entire time just to make sure she was alright.

It was that damned boy.

Ryan had known others like him. Born into a lifetime of expectations and privilege, of a sort, and no consideration that there might be any other way to go about things. They thought the answer was something done by rote, like graduating high school or buying a car. They didn’t know what a true privilege it was to be called. Once they were called, heaven willing, they gained a new perspective on things and generally sorted themselves out.

Before that, though, they were completely intolerable.

He gunned the engine a little more. It was fifteen minutes from the apartment to the Olive Garden in Newark. He was going to see if he could shave that a bit. Fortunately, he had a modified engine between his legs and reflexes that would make a cat cry. Speed limits be damned—the traffic cops could kiss his spotless Irish a*s.

Maryland turned into Delaware. He had made it halfway down Chestnut Hill Road when the next traffic light turned red. He swore fluently and slammed on his brakes, skidding to a stop. He had forgotten how many bloody traffic lights there were on this road. There was one car in front of him. None coming in the other direction.

To hell with the rest of them.

He pulled around the car with a loud squeal and a strip of rubber left on the pavement. A glance behind showed him the face of a completely bewildered driver and a persistently empty intersection. His lips curled back in a satisfied grin. Three minutes later, he turned onto the last road and saw the restaurant in the distance.

 

 

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Aleda was back in the bathroom.

She couldn’t stay there forever. Soon—very soon—Ryan would be there and she would be able to leave. He’d told her he would come. She didn’t know how long it would take. But she couldn’t stay in the bathroom. Nate would start to wonder where she was, for one thing. Oh, merciful heaven, what was she going to say to him? Had he really just asked her to get engaged? Or… promise to get engaged? She still didn’t know what that meant. As far as she knew, you were either planning to get married or you weren’t.

Bloody hell… married.

She didn’t want to get married! Not yet! Not to somebody she’d known for less than a year! And he was still out there, waiting for her to come back from the bathroom and give him some sort of answer. She paced restlessly across the cold tile. At least it wasn’t a real diamond. Just some cheap ring he’d probably bought at Claire’s. A fake ring for a fake engagement.

She looked around self-consciously. There were a few other girls in the bathroom, and they were starting to look at her oddly. She pretended to be fixing her hair. Just for an excuse as to why she was still in the bathroom after several long minutes instead of returning to her date. But there wasn’t really anything she could do with her hair. It was down in its usual loose curls, and if she messed with that too much it would frizz out beyond all recognition.

How long had it been? No more than five minutes.

It just seemed longer.

If she went back, she would have to face Nate. As much as she hated the idea of leaving him there without a word, she couldn’t even imagine what she could possibly say to him to make it any better. She had already called Ryan; he was already on his way. Even the excuse that it was too late to do anything else didn’t suffice, because her mind had not changed at all. Yes, she was running again. But she didn’t know what else to do.

From what she remembered of the layout of the restaurant, there were a few partitioning walls between the bathroom and the table. Unless he was watching closely for her to come back—which he very well may be, since it had been so long—she should be able to make it to the lobby without being seen. She took a breath and left the bathroom, then walked as far as she could down the little hallway. Peering around the corner she could just see Nate sitting at their table. He was munching on his mashed potatoes. She waited until a waitress went by with a large tray of plates in her hands and walked quickly across the gap. She looked back again when she had made it to the other side of the gap.

Still looking at his mashed potatoes.

The lobby was a few more feet away, right in front of her. She found a seat in the alcove. All she could do now was wait.

 

 

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The restaurant was packed. It just went to show. You tell people to act special on one particular day, and nobody even questions it. They just go along with all the other sheep and do what they’re told. Take your girl out to the local Italian restaurant chain and buy her dinner. Everybody’s doing it.

Which made it even more ironic that he was there with all the rest, pulling into a packed parking lot in a form-press plaza. The fact that he was doing so in a black 1950 Velocette made him a little bit happier.

There was no way he was going to find a parking spot in this mess. He scowled at the lines of oversized cars and pulled directly onto the sidewalk in front of the entrance. It didn’t matter. He didn’t plan to stay very long. As soon as he’d stopped, he jumped off of his bike and strode to the entrance, pulling his helmet off as he went. The people still waiting in the lobby for a table stared at him, but he didn’t even notice. Aleda sat on the bench in front of him, purse clutched anxiously in her lap. She smiled faintly when she saw him. The relief was visible on her face.

“Thanks for coming,” she said. She stood up and pulled the strap of the purse over her shoulder. “You made good time.”

Ryan smirked. “I skipped a couple of red lights. Is everything okay?”

She looked down and nodded. “Yeah. I guess. Well… no, not everything. It’s… weird. And complicated.”

“Weird I can handle. Complicated I’d rather avoid. Are you ready to go?”

Aleda chewed her lip. There was no way she could just leave like that. Just disappear.

She looked up into jade green eyes. “Can I just have a minute?” she asked.

He nodded. “Take as much time as you need. But you still need that ride, right?”

Aleda made a noise. “Oh, hell yes. I’ll be two seconds.”

He studied her a moment as she moved to return to the main section of the restaurant. “Don’t forget your coat,” he said. “You already have one of mine. I’m not sure about letting you have another.”

She blushed a little, but his eyes were smiling. She shook her head and kept going.

 

 

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She took a deep breath and tried to think of what she could say. She’d rather not say anything, but that wouldn’t work this time. Before she knew it she had turned the corner and Nate was there in front of her, sitting at their table. He stood up when he saw her and bridged the few feet that remained between them.

“What happened?” he asked. “You were gone for, like, fifteen minutes!”

Aleda ducked awkwardly away from his outstretched arms and slid onto her chair.

 Nate wasn’t done.

“What about the promise ring?” he persisted, sitting back down. “I tried to give you something nice and you just ran off. Is everything okay?”

She turned and looked at him sadly. “I’m not sure,” she admitted. “I just… we’ve been dating, what, five months now? It’s too soon. I mean, you just spring this one me and expect me to answer you and it’s not just something I can decide right off the top of my head. …Look, I have to go.” She reached out and snagged her coat from the seat. At least half of her meal still sat on her plate, but she found she wasn’t particularly hungry anymore. The sight of the overprocessed chicken and pasta now nauseated her.

Nate stood again and hovered over her with awkward attentiveness, blocking the way back to the lobby. “What are you talking about, Leda? We’re in the middle of dinner!”

Movement caught her eye. Her gaze flicked from Nate’s face to an inch to the right. She could see Ryan standing a few feet away, watching them attentively. Damn. So much for avoiding ‘complicated’. If only he had stayed in the lobby. She looked back at Nate.

“I-I’m sorry. I can’t stay here,” she told him. She pulled on her coat and zipped it up. “I’ll talk to you on Monday, okay?”

He started to say something else but she ducked around him. Ryan turned when she did and started to walk towards the entrance. Nate turned, too. He saw Ryan.

“Wait a minute!” he called out. “You’re leaving with him?”

Several other people looked over at them.

“He’s giving me a ride,” Aleda explained.

“Yeah, right!” Nate scoffed. Aleda cringed. More people turned to stare at them. “I don’t trust that a*****e! And what about all those times you told me what a jerk he is?”

“Don’t do this, Nate,” she pleaded. “Please?”

“No! I’m not just going to sit here and watch my girlfriend leave with another guy! Especially not on Valentine’s day, for crap’s sake! I gave you a promise ring, Leda! And the first thing you do is go off with this jackass!”

Aleda snapped. “I’ve known you for barely six months, Nate! And you give me a ring? You think we’re ‘supposed to be together’? It doesn’t work like that! You can’t just make up a script and expect everybody to follow it!”

She took a deep breath. He was staring at her in shocked silence… and so was everybody else in the restaurant. She looked at Nate one last time and walked past Ryan. “Let’s go,” she requested tiredly. She rubbed her eyes and tried to sort out all of the things that were going through her head. Ryan followed close behind, guiding her to the lobby and out the door. She laughed out loud when she saw the motorcycle parked haphazardly on the grass. With all the absurdity of that night, it seemed like a perfect fit.

He soon had her strapped into the spare helmet and pulled the motorcycle upright. Her skirt gave her a little bit of trouble, but she was able to twist it up and around her legs so that she could sit comfortably on the bike. She wasn’t dressed for this. She was wearing a skirt and heels, and a coat made more for looking nice than keeping out the cold. All she could do was burrow into Ryan’s back and ignore the cold biting into her hands and feet. Her hands got the worst of it. She had brought no gloves that night, and she had no choice but to hold onto Ryan so that she wouldn’t fall off.

A frozen eternity later, they were pulling onto Aleda’s street. Ryan left the motorcycle around the corner, even though her parents wouldn’t be home for a while yet. She hurried inside. The warm air in the house felt wonderful. She kicked off her heels and went immediately to the kitchen to heat up some milk. She had to get warm.

Ryan sat down on the couch in the living room while she was busy in the kitchen. There was a blanket folded across the back of the couch. He pulled it onto his lap; it was warm. When Aleda reappeared from the kitchen he held it up to her.

“Here,” he said. “This should help.”

Aleda set the two steaming mugs on the small table next to the couch and curled up next to him, her chilled feet tucked under her. She accepted the blanket gratefully and wrapped it around herself. She paused for a moment, then looked up at Ryan. He took one of the mugs from the table and handed it to her. He took the other and stared down into the hot chocolate, a fleeting rueful smile passing across his face. Of course it would be hot chocolate.

They sat like that for a little while, comfortably sipping hot chocolate and trying to remember what it felt like to be warm.

“So what happened tonight?” Ryan finally asked.

Aleda grimaced. “He tried to give me a ring,” she said. Ryan looked at her sharply. “Not that kind of ring,” she clarified. “A promise ring, he called it. Like being engaged to be engaged.”

He looked down at his hands for a moment, thoughtfully. “’Tried’?” he asked. She nodded.

“Yeah, I… Shoot, I don’t know what it’ll be like even a few months from now, or what I’ll be doing,” she said. “Let alone years.” She shook her head. “Why would he do something like that?”

“Well, he took you to the Olive Garden on Valentine’s Day, and I’m guessing those pink flowers are his,” he pointed out disdainfully. “Maybe he figured it was the thing to do.”

“People do that sort of thing? Hand out fake rings on silly holidays?”

Ryan laughed aloud, a rare sound. “You’re starting to sound like me,” he said. Aleda grinned, too. She finished off the rest of her hot chocolate and yawned.

“Oh! That reminds me,” she said, and jumped off the couch, blanket trailing behind her. She disappeared up the stairs and came back a minute later with a familiar leather jacket. “I, um, kind of kept this last week,” she said. “Sorry about that. Here.”

Ryan took the jacket, shaking his head with a slight smirk. His nose twitched.

“Have you been using this?” he asked.

Aleda blushed a deep crimson. “Er, yeah. A little. It’s kind of chilly up in my room, and… well, it’s a really warm jacket. You don’t mind, do you?”

“Not in the least,” he said. “At least one of us was getting use out of it.”

She made a face. “Yeah, yeah. You’ve got it back, now.” She threw herself back onto the couch and huddled under the blanket. “Hey, Ryan?” she asked suddenly.

“Yeah?”

“What am I going to do about Nate?”

That made him pause. “…What do you want to do about Nate?”

“I don’t know anymore,” she said. “I mean, one minute he’s sweet, and funny, and really nice, and the next minute he just… spazzes. Gets weird. I do like him. But… I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”

Ryan sat silently for several seconds, thinking. “I doubt he’s going to take it well, that you left like that,” he said, finally.

“I know, I know. I’m running away from things again,” Aleda said. “But I’m not the one who just tried to give my girlfriend of five months a fekking promise ring! I’d say that’s a good thing to run away from!”

“Well, you are running away,” Ryan agreed. “And you’re also blaming other people for the problem.” Aleda scowled at him. “But,” he added. “It really is the little idiot’s fault, this time. So I guess I can’t give you a hard time.”

“I appreciate that,” she said with a smirk. “But it still doesn’t tell me what to do.”

Ryan sighed heavily. “It sounds to me like he doesn’t really know you at all,” he said. “I guess you’ve got to decide just how much you like this kid. If you’re not happy, then it’s not worth it.”

She nodded, and yawned. After a few contemplative minutes she dug in the couch and came up with a television remote. She switched it on. Cartoons, of some sort. It was a nice break from all the complicated, messy headaches she had been encountering lately.

They watched it in silence for over an hour.

Ryan glanced down at her and saw her eyes drifting shut. It had been a long day. He smiled softly and got up from the couch, careful not to jostle her. He tugged the empty mug out of her hands and fetched his own. When he came back from putting them in the dishwasher her eyes were closed completely and she had stretched out over his spot as well.

“Aleda?” he whispered. “Aleda?”

No response.

He shook his head in amusement. He found the remote and used it to switch off the television before sliding his arms under her and lifting her like a feather. He carried her up the stairs and into her bedroom, the blanket still draped over her, and laid her on the bed. She looked so peaceful like that. Like she had forgotten all of the troubles of the day. She mumbled something in her sleep as he hunted for the light switch. Ah, there it was. He flipped it off and paused for just a second, looking back at her sleeping form. She mumbled again and turned over, and he could see her eyelids flicker in a dream. Her lips twitched upwards.

“Mnnfgl, Ryan…”

He froze.

She was still asleep.

He hurried out of the room and down the steps, pausing only long enough to make sure everything was put away. The mugs were in the dishwasher; he pushed her high-heeled shoes into a corner. There was nothing that he could do about the blanket that was meant to be draped across the couch. It was draped across something else right now. He grabbed both coats and locked the front door behind him.

No telling when her parents would be home.