Free Vital Sign by J.L. Mac

connections with just a couple of intuitive stares at one another. I didn’t come here to feel this. I didn’t come here to feel anything .
    “I should probably get dry and head back to my motel room,” I say , holding up my blue surfboard keychain like it’s proof that I have a room to go to.
    “Right.” Zander turns and slides the big glass door open and I follow him in.
    The place is a goddamned testament to all things summer paradise. If I thought that the outside was impressive, the inside is extraordinary.
    Everything is decorated in a light, airy color palette. White furniture, glass tables, hardwood floors the color of white oak. There’s a fireplace built into the far wall. I can’t imagine him ever using a fireplace except for the coldest days of the year, but it damn sure looks nice. I can picture him sitting in front of that fireplace, watching the flames lick at the chimney above it. The walls on either side of the mantle have small built in alcoves that he has put various decorative things in.
    Or maybe his wife did.
    It occurs to me that this man may be married and it makes me bristle. If he’s married, then why does his wife get to keep her husband? Why does her husband get to avoid death but mine couldn’t? It isn’t fair. It isn’t right.
    And just that fast, Bitter Sadie has joined the party.
    “Bet your wife is glad that you were able to g et my husband’s heart,” I say plainly, doing nothing to hide the resentment I feel.
    Zander is stand ing in front of some wicker trunk near the sliding glass door. He opens it and pulls out a folded white beach towel, then holds it out to me, expressionless.
    I walk towards him and reach forward , gripping the plush towel in my hand, but he won’t let go. He tugs it forward and I step close enough to smell him. Masculine and musky, laced with testosterone, sweat, and the vague scent of soap. My heart stills in my chest and I bite the inside of my lip hard, resisting the urge to lean in and press the tip of my nose to his neck just to take in his heavenly scent.
    “Not married,” he says , still showing no clear expression, but his eyes are his tell. They burn white hot and send a message loud and clear. He’s not taken and there’s an invitation in his smoldering gaze.
    I tug lightly on the towel in his hand but he holds it captive for a moment longer before releasing it. Some part of me wishes he’d kept holding it in his vice-like grip. Some part of me wishes he’d hold me in his vice-like grip. I imagine I wouldn’t feel so lost in Zander’s arms. I imagine I’d feel at home. It’s a dangerous train of thought that I am quick to shove aside. I can’t go there. I won’t go there.
    Jake. What about my Jake?
    I utter his name inwardly and just that quick, the melancholy that has become my “normal” rushes back in. I can’t risk forgetting Jake. Nothing could ever be worth that, not ever the man in front of me who I’m certain, if given the chance, would wipe away my past. The prospect of that is a hybrid of heaven and hell. I can’t let go. I can’t forget. If I forget my past, I’ll forget Jake right along with it, and that’s a fear of the greatest proportion. I go to sleep every night fearing that by morning, I will somehow have lost another little bit of my love. It’s the most unrelenting sort of agony. It’s a battle against time and space. It’s a battle between the past and the future and I’m wedged between the two without an obvious escape. Even if I were given an escape, I can’t be entirely sure that I would take it. I think I’d let the battle swallow me up as a casualty; the part of me that silently hopes fears that I’d let it.
    I d on’t know what to say about his little show of intrusive dominance with the towel. What an ass? I can’t even convince myself of that line of bullshit. He isn’t an ass. I liked it and I daresay that I would feebly cave and let him do it again if he tried. I hate me.
    I unfold