Page 6 of Play the Field

When the doors opened to the chilly, underground garage, I let out the breath I’d been holding in and stepped onto the asphalt.

I dug into my jeans pockets, the denim lightly scraping against my hand as I fished out my car key. Clicking the unlockbutton, my black Mercedes Benz flashed its headlight from a few feet away.

I flung open the sports car’s trunk and tossed it in my duffel bag. The slam of the trunk sent a shiver through me.

What the fuck am I doing?A lump grew in my throat as I walked around to the driver’s side door.

My body thudded into the black leather seats, the smell of a new car rushing into my nose. I bought the car after my injury. But living in the city and drinking the way I had been, I hadn’t used it much at all – just over three hundred miles on the odometer.

Gritting my teeth together, I opened my phone and pushed the car’s ignition button.

The text chain with Daniel stared back at me.

I let my fingers type, no longer stopping the words from flowing from my brain to the screen. The text read:

Hey bro. Can I come stay with you? Need to get out of my routine.

I wished I could say more. But everything else that needed to be said would sound better in person.

After a moment of contemplation, I let my finger fall onto the send arrow.

With an anticlimacticwhoosh, the text sent.

I let the air slowly release from my lungs, a gust of air slipping out from between my lips. New Winford was the only safe place for me… even if it meant running into my ex.

5

CLEO

The sizzling vegetablesin the skillet felt like a lullaby; the soundtrack of my mom’s house. My eyelids drooped as I watched her jump from the stove to the cutting board on the small peninsula where I sat.

“Thanks for coming to help.” She lifted the wood board and slid the cut-up onions into the hot pan.

I sucked in a breath, the spices tingling my nostrils. “No problem, meal prep day is a big deal.” It probably didn’t hurt that I didn’t have much else going on. But even if I did, I always tried to make time for her.

Spatula in hand, Mom stirred the ingredients together. The smell of curry filled the room as she worked. “Anything new at the store?”

“Nope, same old. Business has been slow.” I shrugged as I looked around the house. “Missing it?”

Whipping around, she rolled her eyes. “My life is so much calmer without having to share a bookstore with your dad.”

After he passed, Mom handed the keys over to me. She had no interest in running that place without him – even if it was a wildly stressful day-to-day life. Plus, I’d had ideas about theplace for years and I could finally try some of them without my dad’s input.

A silence settled over the kitchen, only the rumbling of the exhaust vent and the crackling skillet broke through. Until eventually, Mom bit her lip. “But I’d give a lot to have one more day with him in that place. Even if it did smell a little mildewy.”

I looked up at her, her mind angered back to those late evenings closing up shop. Her eyelids grew heavy at the warmth of the memory.

“Well, a dehumidifier handles that problem pretty quick.” I teased.

Startling back to the stove, Mom winked. “And that’s why we put you in charge.”

For a few minutes, her full attention stayed on the stove. Just watching her, I could see the memory of my dad lingering around her. A part of me wondered if I’d ever feel a love like that. The kind that haunts you once it’s gone.

Maybe I already have.I swallowed hard at the thought. If Cat was it for me, I had a lonely next few decades ahead of me.

Biting my lip, I pulled out my phone’s notes app. I scrolled down to a list titled “Ideas I’ll Never Write” and found my way to the bottom after a few liberal swipes.

My finger hesitated over the keyboard, trying not to indulge the paranoid thought that my mom was staring me down from the stove. Every time I blinked, my mind filled with the images of a developing story. The plot came to me in those moments of darkness behind my eyelids.

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