Page 44 of Holiday Unscripted
“Me?” She points to herself as she skates around me and then backward. “I don’t have a problem. What’s your problem?”
“My problem,” I start, skating away from her, also backward, “she’s about this high”—I motion with my hand to her exact height—“has blondish hair and green eyes.” She tries not to smile.
She stops skating and I stop in front of her. “My eyes are blue green.”
I look down at her. “I know exactly what color your eyes are, Elizabeth,” I assure, and it’s like it’s just the two of us on the ice and not the twenty or so who have now started skating around us. “When you are really happy, they turn like a light green.” She doesn’t say a word. “When you get angry, they are more blue than green. When you are mischievous, the bottom of your eyes are a light blue and the top of your eyes are almost a golden. When you are really fucking happy about something, they’re a darkish blue in the middle and then they get a greenish, almost gray around that. But what I love the most, is the dark blue that is on the inside is also on the outside ring. It’s fascinating and also the color I always try and make sure you have.”
I can see her chest rising and falling, but before she can say anything, the sound of a whistle blows and the two of us look over to the side. “Okay, we’re going to do a couple of pickup games,” Zack says, skating onto the ice. “The teams are posted.”
We play hockey for two hours, and by the end of it, I need a shower so bad. “You stink,” Elizabeth declares from beside me.
“Why do you automatically assume it’s me?” I ask her as I untie my skate. “It could be you.” I pull off my skate and she doesn’t say another word to me as we get dressed and then get in the truck to head home.
They are having a pizza party at Zack and Denise’s house in two hours. When we pull up to the house, I get out and grab my bag before walking up the steps to her waiting at the door. “If you would give me the code, I could have been inside and put Whiskey out already.”
I put the code in, and she walks in after me. “I got the dog,” I tell her, dumping my bag and kicking off my boots before heading to the back of the house and letting Whiskey out.
“I’m going to take a shower,” she yells toward the kitchen, and five minutes after letting Whiskey back in, I’m also stepping into the shower.
I get out, grabbing a pair of shorts and a T-shirt before going downstairs. I don’t expect to find her sitting on one of the stools drinking a beer, her hair piled up on top of her head. She’s wearing a black shirt that goes off her shoulder, and it looks like it goes down to her mid-thigh, her legs are bare and one is crossed over the other. “I’m not going for pizza,” she declares and I walk over to the fridge and grab my own bottle of beer. “I already called my mother and told her you were icing your pride because you lost the hockey game.”
“It’s a team sport, I didn’t lose the game, the team lost.”
“You know what I heard from that sentence?” she asks me, and puts down the beer. “You lost and I didn’t, that is the only thing I heard.”
I lean against the counter in front of her, twisting the cap open, tossing it on the counter beside me. “Why did you leave?” The second the words are out of my mouth, her eyes fly up to mine.
“What are you talking about?” she asks me, her hands wrapping around her beer.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about, Elizabeth. Why did you fucking leave?” I knew we would be having this conversation, I just didn’t know it would be happening now. Even though, after all the years I’ve had to think about how I would have this conversation, it never started out like it just did.
“I didn’t leave.”
“Okay, fine.” I take a pull of my beer. “I guess we can’t discuss this like two mature adults.”
“Why did you ignore me?” Her question shocks the shit out of me and all I can do is stare at her. “That day you came over to the house and you totally fucking ignored me. Didn’t even look at me.”
“You left my bed and didn’t even have the decency to fucking wake me up and say goodbye.” My voice rises. “Hey, last night was good. Even if you didn’t want to continue it”—I stare at her—“you could have at least told me instead of just leaving.”
“I didn’t fucking leave.” She slaps the counter.
“I woke up and you were gone.”
“You thought I left?” she says, shocked that I would come to this conclusion.
“I woke up and you were gone. If that doesn’t scream up and gone, I don’t know what will.”
“Yeah,” she agrees, “not to leave, dumbass. I wanted to make you breakfast in bed and you didn’t have anything in the fridge, so I went out to grab a couple of bagels from your favorite bagel store.” My head rears back as if she hit me. “And then when I got back, you were gone. I thought you went out to work out or something. I stayed there until noon and then left.” Her voice goes soft. “Then I saw you that night and you ignored me, wouldn’t even look my way. I thought you regretted it but didn’t want to tell me.”
“Are you crazy?” I shake my head, admitting to her what I’ve admitted to myself over the years. “It was, hands down, the single best night of my life.”
CHAPTER 17
Elizabeth
THE GREATEST GIFT OF ALL
I sit on the stool in front of him, my body shaking with anger and then more anger. My hands bunch into fists on the cold counter. “Are you crazy?” He shakes his head and then I hear the words I think I’ve waited seven years to hear. “It was, hands down, the single best night of my life.”
