Page 13 of Burning for Alexander
I’d stupidly fallen for a stranger on the internet years ago and fucked it up. And even though we’d never met in person, and I’d never even learned his real name, I still compared my connection with anyone I dated to him.
DrunkenPoet.
I gritted my teeth and forced him out of my head for the millionth time.
“Yeah, okay,” I forced myself to say. “I’ll host your friend, as long as she understands my crazy work schedule. She needs to be willing to be ditched at a moment’s notice.”
“Yeah, yeah, she’s cool. Girl who solo hikes the big peaks isn’t afraid of alone time, you know?”
We exchanged a few more words before I arrived at my next inspection site and had to end the call. He promised to give Kaidee my details so she could get in touch with me directly.
By the time I entered the machine shed at the orchard, I’d forgotten all about it. But that night, when I stepped out of a long, hot shower and moved into the kitchen of the log home I was renting so I could reheat leftovers for dinner, my phone buzzed with a message from Max’s friend.
Kaidee and I texted back and forth about her upcoming visit, and by the time we’d made arrangements for her to stay in my spare room for a couple of weeks, I was feeling optimistic. She seemed friendly, interesting, and chill, as well as completely fine looking after her own entertainment. She said she looked forward to learning more about my job so she could tell her third-grade students all about meeting a real-life firefighter.
I clicked into her Instagram and saw jaw-dropping photos of vistas, hikes, early wildflowers, and her smiling face. She was beautiful, but not in a cover-model way. More in a girl-next-door way. Something about her felt safe and easy, and I looked forward to getting to know her.
And maybe puttingDrunkenPoetout of my mind once and for all.
5
ALEX
IndexEcho:How’s the head this morning, sunshine?
DrunkenPoet:Broken. How did you know I was drinking?
IndexEcho:Late-night haiku about waffles. Hard agree about syrup geometry, BTW.
_____________________
“Don’t do it,”my sister warned, pointing her cocktail straw at me across the bar.
I emptied the rest of my cosmo and held up my glass to toast. “Shall I compare thee to a winter’s night? Thou art more frosty and more full of spite. Rough codes do shake the darling buds of May, and firemen’s breath doth blow special effects permits away.”
My voice was soft and slurry, which perfectly matched the warm numbness movingsluggishly through my veins.
“You did it,” Ella said in disgust. “Don’t we have a rule about this, Alex? You quote poetry, you owe me a shot.”
“Uh,no. That rule only applies if I quote lyrics from transformative modern poet Taylor Swift,” I said smugly. “I don’t make the rules. Mattie does.” After a pause, I added, “All you are is mean.”
“Goddammit,” Ella muttered. “He’s throwing it back to theSpeak Nowera. I’m calling Mattie.”
Tavo took another sip of his Shirley Temple and giggled as if he’d had any alcohol at all. “I think it’s cute. Alex’s poetry thing.”
Ella shook her head while she held her phone out in her palm, the ringing loud on speaker mode. “Not cute. Pathetic. When Anders Creighton broke up with Alex sophomore year in college, he was on a Fireball shots and e.e. cummings kick. It was not pretty.”
Ohhh, e.e. cummings. Love me some e.e.…
I sucked in a breath and gave it a shot. “chief kincaid… (if that is your… real name)…your eyes are… two blue… extinguishers… that put out… my spark…”
Ella clapped a hand over my mouth. “No. Be done.”
I blew out a breath and slumped. “Anders wouldn’t have written me up for a faulty?—”
My sister Mattie’s voice came over the speaker so loudly I jumped and knocked over my new napkin holder.
“What the fuck, sister-from-hell, I’m asleep.”
