Page 65 of Another Love, Another Time
I look down at my beer and start to peel the label off. Would River be okay with him knowing? If he really wanted to, he could look up the file, so I decide I’ll tell him. Mackey is not a gossip.
“That was River. She was my date, and… I got distracted. That’s when she was attacked. After that, she cut me out of her life, not giving me a chance to explain.” I correct myself, “Well, she did give me a chance to explain, but I lied to her, not wanting to hurt her. She wouldn’t see me after that. I tried to call her hundreds of times. After graduation, she left and joined the Army. I have only seen her once since then.”
“Man, that’s fucked up,” he responds.
“I know, and that’s not even the worst. Or, maybe not the worst, but what was topping the cake was that on graduation day, I wasunpacking my bag from prom. Her clutch from that night fell out. She had asked me to hold on to it, and inside was her phone and a letter addressed to me.” I’m still looking down at my beer.
“What did the letter say?”
I ignore him. “The thing with River is, I always knew she loved me, and I always knew that I loved her, but she was insistent that we meet and date other people. That way, when we finally decided we wanted to be together, there would be no question that she was who I wanted to be with. I did what she wanted me to do. I dated other people, but no one could ever compare to her.”
“What was in the letter?” he asks like he already knows.
I laugh, but there is no humor in it. “She said she finally wanted to be with me, that she was ready. You see, we planned to attend the same college, and she wanted to start there as a couple.” I shake my head.
“Fuck that. That sucks. So, what had you distracted? Why were you not there?”
I look at him. “The one person she would never forgive me for getting with.”
“Who’s that?”
“Her cousin.”
He winces as if in pain. “Man, that sucks. Well, maybe you all can build your friendship here. Maybe this is a good thing. You can both talk through your shit. I don’t know how that girl of yours will handle this, though. You know what she did to your last partner.”
“River doesn’t take shit from anyone. I’m not worried about her.”
“Maybe River isn’t as tough as you think she is.”
“You don’t know her like I do. I’ve only seen her cry a handful of times, and we were best friends for eighteen years.”
“Well, you know her.” He doesn’t say anything for a minute, and then he asks his next question, “So, did they ever find out who attacked her?”
“No the police messed up the DNA collection, so they were never able to find anyone through DNA. I guess River didn’t give a good enough description to narrow down the suspects. Nobody was ever picked up for it, and the case went cold.”
“You haven’t seen her since she left for the Army?” he asks.
“Just once, but she avoided me the whole day.” I shake my head, not wanting to remember that day. He senses I don’t want to talk about it either.
“So why is she back?”
“I’m not sure. I’m guessing her mom needs her, and I guess River’s contract was up with the Army. I bet she decided to move here to be closer to her mom so she could help with anything she needed.”
“Is her husband here with her?”
I’m tired of him asking questions I don’t know the answers to. “I don’t think so. We didn’t get to talk a whole lot, but she didn’t bring him up.”
He shrugs. “That doesn’t mean anything.”
“If he were here with her, I think our moms would have said something.”
Mackey’s quiet for a minute. “What do you want out of this?”
I cock my head to the side. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, what do you want out of this?”
“She’s married, so I guess just friendship.”
