Page 48 of Her Pretty Words

Change of plans. I lift a brow.

“I have these…moments in the shower?—”

A grin stretches across my face. “Please tell me more.”

She rolls her eyes. “I make up fake scenarios where I confront him about everything he’s done.” She tucks the loose piece of hair behind her ear. “I want him to feel all the pain he’s caused me. I want him to hurt.”

“If that’s what you need to do, then do it. But do you want my opinion?”

She nods hesitantly.

“Your words are precious. Every single one that leaves your mouth is a treasure, and quite honestly, Wally doesn’t deserve your pretty words.” She doesn’t correct me calling him the wrong name.

“The words I have for him are far from pretty.”

“If they’re coming from your lips, they are.”

She lets out a long trail of vulgar words and then smiles at me as if she’s proven her point.

“Sounded divine to my ears,” I say.

Her eyes narrow on me and then she’s off running. She guides us on a different path than the one we usually take along the beach. She runs toward the center of the island, on the wide sidewalk which is divided into two lanes by a line of yellow paint. One for bikes and the other for walkers.

Yellow wildflowers bloom on some of the bushes, there’s even a swampy part that we pass with a sign that saysDo not feed alligators. $500 fine.I’m running on the opposite side of Macy so I’m closer to the swampy water, in the rare occasion that one decides it’s hungry for human meat.

I glance down at my watch. We’ve already ran a mile and a half, and she hasn’t needed a break once. My lips split into a smile, full of pride for her. Her stamina has remarkably improved. She will no doubt outrun me soon.

We return the way we came, both of us occasionally slow to a walk so we can catch our breath. She leads me to the shoreline which is covered in thousands of shells. Her eyes are on theground, a crease between her brows in concentration, then she kneels and picks up a bright pink scallop shell.

She’s in deep concentration, unaware that I’m taking this opportunity to admire her beauty. The roots of her hair are painted with sweat and her cheeks are pink. I want to drop to my knees every time she picks up a shell and smiles, if only to embody the ground she’s so fascinated by.

When she seemingly has the perfect collection, she leads me back to my yard. “It’s time to liven up your house,” she says, turning to me. She could paint it chartreuse, and I’d let her if it made her happy. “Could you hold these?” She places dozens of shells in the palms of my hands and then opens my door and heads straight for the drawers in my kitchen. She opens one after the other.

I chuckle. “Is there something I can help you find?”

She pulls out a bottle of super glue and marches up to me, grabs my arm, and leads me to my mailbox. She’s on a mission.

“We’ll start here,” she says. “Your mailbox is the only one on our street that’s plain white.” She points to different mailboxes. “Look, that one over there is shaped like a dolphin. And the one next to it has flowers painted on it.”

I bite back my amusement and nod my head like this is serious business we discuss. She grabs a shell from my hand and holds it up for me to see. Then, she demonstrates putting glue on it, then pressing it onto my offensively plain mailbox. She holds it for about a minute, then moves onto the next one. I set the bulk of shells on the ground, then grab one to glue. We do this for almost an hour until my mailbox has been fully decorated. She claps her hands together and nods her head with approval. Then she sighs. “I have to go work on edits now,” she says, dreadfully.

I walk her to her front door, and she hesitates before going in. I haven’t seen her this happy in a long time, and I don’t want to let it go, so I say, “I’m calling in that favor you owe me.”

She eyes me warily.

“I couldn’t help but notice how nicely decorated your house is, especially your bedroom. So, I want you to decorate mine.”

She cocks her head and asks, “When did you see my room?”

“How do you think you ended up in bed that night.” I leave out the part about her being drunk.

Pink creeps into her cheeks and then she looks down. “Um, we didn’t do anything, did we?”

“Of course not. You were drunk.”

I pull open the door for her and she brushes past me. “I usually finish editing around three. I’ll call you when I’m ready to go to the store.” She grins up at me, and I smile. The expression was a rarity for me until I saw Macy at the airport, and now it’s seeming to be a common occurrence when I’m in her presence.

Macy is a child in a toy store. She wizzes in and out of aisles, holding decorations up for me to approve. When she presses her lips into a firm line, I know the item she’s holding is one she wants me to say yes to. I do just that. So, that’s how I became the owner of a floral cookie jar. I can’t remember the last time I even had a cookie.

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