Page 16 of Always Be an Us

And then his lips pressed on mine, his lower lip in between mine teasing me into tasting him too. And then once I did, once I nipped his lip, all bets were off. His tongue came out to play, licking the seam of my lips and sucking my lower lip. I couldn’t think, could barely breathe.

All I knew was that I wanted more of it. And more of everything.

Desire curls through my body even now, and I lean back against the wall.

What would have happened if Grandpa didn't call out at that moment? Would he have kept kissing me? Would that hand around my waist have moved down to cup my ass, bringing me closer to him? Maybe I would have felt a hint of the bulge around his–

"Emma Jane Crane!" My Grandpa calls for the second time. "What on earth are you lollygagging out there for? I need your help with getting this damn fish flayed in time for dinner."

"Coming, Grandpa," I call back, feeling frustrated at the heat coursing through my body.

Damn him for that kiss.

And damn him for making me want him like this.

Because of him, I'm over here fantasizing about a man whose name I don't even know, who came up here yelling at me because his daughter ran away from home.

“Where’s your little friend?” Grandpa asks when I join him in the kitchen.

“She went home,” I respond. “Her dad just picked her up.”“Oh. Good thing they didn’t stay for dinner, not sure this fish is enough for the four of us.”

As I help Grandpa skin the fish, I wonder about the man’s relationship with his daughter.

Amelia didn’t look too happy when he showed up, and she looked even less happy to leave with him. Not to mention the fact that she lied to me about her age and whether her parents knew where she was.

Does he really keep her locked up all day, or was she exaggerating?

Being cooped up isn't healthy for a child. Why did he do it? And why did her mother allow it?

The knife nearly slips from my grasp when I realize it.

Amelia likely has a mother, which means that the stranger likely has a wife.

Is she still in the picture? Indignation quickly follows that thought. "Why on earth is he kissing me if he has a wife?"

"Did you say something, honey?"

I glance at Grandpa who looks up from his spot stirring the gravy. I cough and shake my head. "Um no, gramps. It’s nothing. I was just talking to myself."

"Oh. Don’t make a habit of that now. I’ve heard if you talk to yourself long enough, other things start to talk back."

I smile. "You’re so superstitious, Grandpa."

"You live as long as I have and see the things I’ve seen, you’ll learn to be a little superstitious. Otherwise, things just don’t add up." He points his ladle towards the door. "Just look at the Pink Hotel and all the trouble that place has gotten into."

"What do you mean?"

"Well first with the robbery, and then with the Pink Pearl going missing. Then years later, when they were trying to get back on their feet again, there was a devastating fire." He shakes his head, a pained look squeezing across his face. I know he’s remembering my parents and how they died in the hotel fire. The memory still brings an ache to my chest every once in a while, and it’s clearly still painful for him too. My Grandpa typically looks at least twenty years younger than he is, but in those handful of seconds, his wrinkles seem to multiply and he looks every bit of his eighty years.

"Just a whole lot of bad luck for no damn reason," he concludes quietly.

"You have a point there." I nod, covering up my own sadness with a weak smile. He smiles back, but it’s even weaker than mine, his face still haunted, forcing the trauma back to the forefront of my mind.

I beat it back with happy thoughts of them, smiling and dancing in the kitchen, my dad playing with me in the living room, tossing me higher in the air while my mother scolds him.

I don’t like to think of my parent’s death as solely tragic. There was something romantic in the fact that they died together. I like to imagine that they took their last breaths, wrapped up in each other’s arms.

Like the story of Madam Thornley and her lover Victor. Tragic but beautiful as well. Maybe that's why I have such messed-up ideas about love and tragedy being intertwined.

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