How the hell did you find meI unlocked the bolt and cracked the screen door open, just enough for one eye. I rested my head against the doorjamb and tried to untangle my expression and get my eyes to look in the same direction.
I've been hiding miles away
Maybe you don't know it
I still think about you every single day
What is it?
Why are you drunk?
I'm not..I was sleeping or crying or something so my eyes are red. What is it? I repeat. The expression is clear now. Annoyance.
Bridget, I can smell your breath from here. I can't imagine what it's like at the top of the steps so for my own safety I think I'll stay right here.
Good idea. I slammed the door shut and walked away, back down the hall to the kitchen and out through the back porch where I resumed my residency in the sunshine trying to feel anything but what I was feeling right now.
FUCK. His head appeared at the gate, his arm reaching over to flip the latch.
Your nap looks like it needs a refill.
Naps are a singular activity.
Not where I'm from.
Where you're from people kiss fish on the lips and wait for the bear to see his shadow on Groundhog day.
Right so growing up in that kind of twisted environment, trust a man when he tells you he knows you're drunk.
I laughed in spite of myself and I put my hands over my face. He pulled them away.
Bridget, anything you want to talk about, I'm here.
That's the problem. You're here. I depend on you to be able to talk to.
You have lots of people you can talk to.
Not like this. I wasn't looking away anymore. It takes him forever to be serious. Finally.
Everything will be fine.
How do you know?
Because it always is. Because it has to be. Because things work out and if they don't something else works. I don't have all the answers. This is faith. You either believe or you go crazy. Which is the better way, this (he held up my empty glass), or this (he put the glass down and put both hands over his heart).
I don't like change, Jacob.
Oh, hell, I know that, princess. I am growing old while you make good on these promises.
I want to be sure.
Life holds no guarantees.
Well, it should. Haven't we earned that much? I'd like guarantees and fortune tellers with credentials and a place in the sun, smile plastered on my face.
He laughed. How many drinks, exactly?
One. Just one.
Hell, what a lightweight. You need a little Newfie in you.
I need a big fucking Newfie in me.
There's the blush, moving at a thousand miles an hour up from his collar to spread across his face, flip up over his ears and make it up underneath the blonde hair. Score. He is as red as a poppy and grinning ear to ear at last.
Maybe later. After you brush your teeth. Your breath is shaking my faith in being able to kiss you without my eyes watering.
Wait until you get treated to my morning breath tomorrow, Jake.
You're too damned little to be so rotten. The fish back home ain't looking so bad now, you know that?