Page 38 of Moving Forward

I’ve never been so proud of myself for getting drunk. It took me three and a half beers last night to finally work up the courage to call her. Luckily, it turned out better than I could have ever hoped. My incessant dreams have finally come true—she’s mine. Or at least that’s what I hope our kiss meant.

And shit, that kiss.

Thank God I wore my looser jeans or else she’d be learning pretty quickly just how much I want her—preferably naked and in my bed with me inside her. That would probably scare her off, something I’m hell-bent on avoiding.

She shifts slightly and wraps herself tighter around my arm. I glance away from the road to kiss the top of her head. I really hope she isn’t against public displays of affection. Because damn, I could kiss her every second for the rest of my life.

“What are you thinkin’ about, Peaches?” I ask quietly. I wish I could crawl into that mind of hers. When it comes to emotions, she’s an open book, but her thoughts are locked away like hidden treasures.

“About people in cars,” she tells me without hesitation.

“What about them?” I ask, merging into another lane to avoid on-ramp traffic.

She’s thoughtful for a moment. “I’ve just always wondered what the life stories are for the people in the other cars. Sometimes I make them up in my head. It’s just—it’s a weird thing I do.”

“I like it,” I tell her, earning me a bright smile. I point toward a car as we pass it. “Tell me about them.”

She turns her head to get a better view. It’s one of those vans with a stick family on the back window. Four of them: a man, a woman, and two daughters. “I choose to believe they’re heading down for a day at the theme park because the mom . . . I’ll bet she’s a Louise . . . took a day off from her law practice. The dad . . . Gerald . . . is a stay-at-home dad. He takes the kids anywhere and everywhere and attends all their games and school functions. He’s even the room dad for the younger daughter’s class. The older daughter is a tween, starting to go through that rebellious phase, so Gerald and Louise decided they needed to have a family day while they still can.”

“That doesn’t sound like a bad scenario.” We both watch as the van races away, the little stickers getting smaller and smaller. “Rebellious phase or not, it sounds happy.”

“I think so. I like to think if I give them a hopeful story, then maybe the positivity will transfer. Like energy. I don’t know, maybe that’s stupid.”

I squeeze her knee. “Don’t say that. Nothing you say or do is stupid, and you shouldn’t be embarrassed. You’re a lot better of a person than I am.”

She shakes her head. “And you can’t say that. Bad people are bad at heart. You’re good at heart, no matter what your past looks like.”

It’s amazing how even if I can’t see into her thoughts, she can read mine. “Were you one of those rebellious kids?”

She laughed incredulously. “Do I look like I would have been a rebellious kid?”

She’s wearing yet another sundress. Her goal must seriously be to kill me. Luckily this one has more coverage, so my concentration isn’t too far gone. Her hair, aside from the tangles I made, falls down her back in perfect curls that I desperately want to run my fingers through. Her eyes are bright and wide, sparkling along with her smile. No, this girl was never rebellious. She’s practically an angel.

My gaze drops to her reddened lips, still swollen. She shivers when she notices, and lays her head back on my shoulder. “The most I ever did was sneak a cookie after bedtime. What about you? Were you Mr. Devil-and-Horns?”

Something like that. “When I was younger, no.” Older? Yes. Hopefully I have more time before I have to delve into my past. “I used to sneak out a lot at night, though. I’d sit on my grandpa’s boat—well, now it’s mine. I’d usually fall asleep. Before Grams caught on to what I was doing, the police got called a few times.”

“You scoundrel,” she scolds jokingly. “The boat was your grandpa’s?”

“Yeah, he had it and then it was my dad’s, and my dad, well . . . I’ll tell you about him another time. In the end my grandpa got it back.”

There were a few times growing up that I missed not having a dad. Like when I first started practicing for baseball and my grandpa couldn’t help because of his arthritis, or when I’d have to buy a grandfather’s card on Father’s Day. On the morning the boat reappeared, tied to the dock with a little note that said, Dad, here’s your shitty boat back, I decided that my dad wasn’t worth missing, let alone thinking about. Lucky me I realized that before I met him.

The boat was shitty when we found it that day. It looked like it had survived a hurricane, then a tornado of seagull shit, followed by a torrential beer rain. With all the damage, we were afraid it might sink. But shitty or not, I was attached to the thing. Mainly because it was so special to my grandpa.

Max traces the lines on my palm, drawing me from my thoughts. “It’s a beautiful boat, Cain. I think your grandpa would be proud.”

“Thank you,” is all I can say back. Sometimes there are just things you need to hear in life and that is one of them. I swallow and focus on our game. “What about that car?”

This one is an older couple. Max studies them closely. “How about you take a shot?”

“They fell in love in high school and have been together ever since. He’s a gardener and she likes to write sappy romance novels,” I answer quickly.

Max pivots her head to bite my shoulder lightly. “Yeah, great try. Leave it to the pros. See, they fell in love in high school, yes, but they eventually broke up and met other people—who they loved just as much. He has three kids and she has five. But later, their significant others died of old age. Seeing that their father was unhappy, even in his garden, the man’s children found out the location of the woman’s next book signing. Through the years they’d heard stories about her. She’s the one that got away. When they saw each other at her signing, they realized their love for each other had never died, and they ended up getting married a few months later. Now they’re on the way to see her grandbabies.”

“That’s a happy spin on a depressing tale,” I note.

She shrugs. “I think that’s how life is. You have to tilt your head a little bit to see the perfection.”

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