Free Remembering Phoenix by Randa Lynn Page B

not a very pleasant person.”
    I find Steel Magnolias on a movie channel and turn it on. It seems fitting for the occasion.
    “So I’ve noticed. Are you a Ouiser?”
    Her mouth goes agape. “You’ve seen Steel Magnolias ?” she asks in disbelief. “I’ve watched it a million times in the past two years.”
    “I have. It was my mom’s favorite. I was the good son who watched her favorite movies with her.”
    She looks at me with those big, green eyes as they start to shimmer with unshed tears.
    Shit. Don’t cry, Charlie.
    “That’s really sweet,” she whispers.
    “What can I say? I’m a good guy.” I hope this makes her laugh.
    Please laugh, Charlie.
    Her mouth kicks up at the corner. A sound comes out of her and it’s like angels are singing.
    She laughs. She really laughs.
    Keep laughing, Charlie.
    “I love when you laugh.” Great job, Slayter. Way to act like she doesn’t affect you.
    She stops laughing suddenly and stares at me blankly for a moment.
    “I often forget what it’s like to laugh.”
    “You should laugh every single day,” I admit. “You’re even more beautiful when you laugh.” There you go again, letting your mouth overload your ass.
    “Stop.”
    “What?”
    “Stop that—saying I’m beautiful. I’m not beautiful and I’m not going to fall in love with you.”
    Whoa. She said the L word. Not in that context, but she still said it.
    “Who said anything about loving me?”
    She lets her mouth hang open for a moment before speaking. “No one. I just felt it was important for you to know, I am incapable of loving anyone. Ever.”
    “You don’t need to love me if you let me kiss you again. I’m good with just kissing…and maybe more.”
    She laughs again, and dammit, there’s a twitching going on and it’s brutal. Brutal yet amazing.
    Shit.
    “Can we just watch this movie? Shirley MacLaine and Olympia Dukakis make me laugh.”
    “We can watch it on repeat, then.” I wink at her. I could be crazy, but I swear I just saw her cheeks grow a little redder.
    We watch the movie. No, I lie, s he watches the movie and I watch her. I’m lost in watching her laugh, seeing her eyes squint with laughter when a really funny scene happens, until the doorbell rings. I snap out of my unabashed staring and run to the door, grabbing the pizza. I throw a wad of cash at the delivery guy, and tell him thanks. I probably gave him enough money to pay this month’s bills, but I don’t care. I need to see Charlie laugh more—now.
    “Pizza?” I ask, putting the box on the coffee table.
    “Sure.”
    I grab a slice and take a huge bite off of it, and hand Charlie a slice. “Uh,” she says, taking the greasy pizza. “I have plates. Napkins, even.”
    “No need to waste good China on pizza. Eat.”
    We eat our pizza in comfortable silence. She nibbles at her pizza, her one slice to my three.
    “That was good, but I’m full.”
    “You ate one slice.”
    “It was a big slice.”
    I shake my head at her. “I could eat the whole pizza by myself. Probably why my abs disappeared.” She eyes me up and down until she catches me watching her watchingme, then she turns her head away from me quickly. “I caught that.”
    “No idea what you’re talking about,” she says, staring at the television. She tries to stifle a grin.
    “Why the black, Charlie?”
    “What?” She shakes her head, smiling. “You’re extremely random.”
    I point to her clothes. “You’re always in all black. Why the black?”
    “You really want to know the answer to that?”
    “Absolutely.”
    She takes a deep breath. “Because colors remind me of happy , and that’s not me.”
    “Why isn’t it?”
    “Is that really even a question?”
    I scoot closer to her, throwing my arm on the couch behind her head. “Yeah it is.”
    Charlie slowly turns her head and looks at me before turning back to the television. “I’m not answering that.”
    “No one said you had to. I just want to know more about you. Even