Page 43 of Damaged

“Fine.”

My throat constricts anxiously. He doesn’t ask me how I am. He doesn’t want me out here.

I set my elbows on the railing and stare out at the city with him. The hotel’s garden is below, and there’s a wedding reception taking place. The sound of music and indistinct conversation drifts up through the string-lit palms.

“That’s sweet,” I say.

He scoffs. “What’s sweet about it?”

“Oh, come on… Do you seriously hate weddings?”

“What’s to like about them? A whole evening for a crappy dinner and mediocre drinks, and then you listen to the same thirty songs they’ve been playing at weddings for the last fifteen years. And it costs some poor young couple fifty-thousand dollars to do it. It’s pathetic.”

“I highly doubt they’ll be playing ‘Apple Bottom Jeans’ tonight.”

“You’d be surprised.”

We watch the reception for several seconds before I speak again. “Weddings aren’t about the crappy food and drinks, James. They’re about love.”

“Oh, don’t give me that.”

“Ah. I see. You don’t like love either?”

“No. I don’tbelievein it. There is oxytocin—a chemical in the brain that makes you feel affection for a mate in order to reproduce. It often gets confused with this cupid bullshit that corporations promote to sell books and movies and clothing. And… very expensive weddings.”

“Suddenly it makes sense why you’re so gloomy all the time. So what if it’s just oxytocin? A chemical in the brain. Isn’t everything? Ambition. Success. Pleasure… It’s all just chemicals.”

Got him. James is quiet and gives a little shrug. “Fair enough. I’m just smart enough to avoid the chemical that doesn’t get me anything in return.”

“Have you felt it?” A warm wind suddenly blows. It blinds me for a moment and ruffles the thick hair on James’s head. When I clear my hair from my eyes, I can see his green eyes looking at me, as bright as the lights of the city.

“Love?” he asks.

“Yeah.”

“No. Like I said…” He taps his temple. “Too smart.”

“Too smart for love. Wow, you’re some genius.”

“You don’t have a billion dollars to protect.”

“You sound like a dragon sitting on a pile of gold.”

“Unlike a dragon, I can spend it. But what has love ever gotten you? You speak pretty highly of it, but you’re single, so every romantic love you’ve ever had didn’t work out in one way or another.”

I recoil my head in offense. “Screw you, smart guy,” I tease, but James is right. I’ve always defended love, even after what Jake did to me. I promised myself not to let my heartbreak turn me into some love-hating bitter woman.

I’m not going to let the deceit of one loser forever alter my view of love. But what James just saiddoeshurt, because it’s true. So far, all the love in my life has been a failure. It’s gotten me nothing.

I’d be better off without it.

“It’s nothing but a trick,” James says, looking down at the wedding. “Your biology trying to make more babies. And most of the world falls for it.”

“You should go down there and give that speech. But you don’t know the bride and groom. You don’t know how they look at each other. How they think of each other. Haven’t you seen those couples with a love so bright you can’t keep your eyes off it?”

“I’ve seen fools walking towards the edge of a cliff, sure.”

I shake my head, and we both stare out in silence. There’s something about the noise of the city and the wedding that doesn’t make it awkward. We just stand next to each other, looking and listening to the world as the wind plays with our hair.

---