Free Living Lies by Kate Mathis

tonight.”
    “Is that what you were thinking?” she asked coyly to hide her apprehension.
    “What’s the matter?” Danny asked, pulling to a stop in front of the Fish Market.
    “Nothing.”
    He turned to face her directly. “Is something wrong?”
    “It’s just that I don’t think your friends liked me and … um …”
    “Why would you think that?’ His brows pull together in a tight furrow.
    “Oh, I don’t know.” Melanie said sarcastically.
    Danny shook his head. “I don’t think they care who I date.” He smiled. “You’re cute.”
    “What about all the other girls you’ve had there?”
    The image of Danny and Carolyn streaked across her mind.
    He breathed out heavily and ignored Ted motioning them to the entrance. “I like you. You’re beautiful and smart and I wonder why you’d waste your time on a guy like me. Mel, we all have our insecurities. I could tell you that I like you more than any one of those other girls. It would be true, but it wouldn’t erase them.” His rough hand tenderly caressed her cheek and he leaned forward to kiss her. “Are we okay?”
    “Yeah, but I’m still not sure about your apartment.”
    “Fair enough. I hope Carla doesn’t mind.”
    Melanie laughed, figuring he wasn’t serious but she wasn’t totally certain.
    An old warehouse adjacent to the harbor served as both restaurant and market. Melanie crossed the clean, white linoleum to the refrigerated glass cases that displayed fresh seafood. Sport fishing propaganda hung on the exposed brick walls with the remnants of many coats of paint still clinging to the corners. Along the back wall above the cases was a chalkboard menu of sandwiches, pastas, salads and lobster dishes, all fresh and made to order. Melanie chose a tuna on whole wheat. She had never been much of a fish eater and that preference intensified as she looked over the rows of silver, pink and blue fish dead on ice, their big, bulging eyes staring out blankly and their mouths still open from the fatal intake of oxygen.
    “Carla, did you know that Dan is the best rugby player our university has ever seen?” He didn’t wait for a response. “Yeah, I’ve caught a few games throughout the years. Tough sport. Dangerous. You should see how the other teams go after Dan. Last season against UCLA, didn’t you crack a rib?”
    Melanie flinched.
    “It’s really not that bad,” Danny said.
    Melanie’s eyebrows raised automatically. “Danny, I know how many classes you missed last season.”
    For almost two weeks straight Melanie Xeroxed her notes, leaving them with the professor so Danny wouldn’t fall behind. She’d been extra diligent, troubling over her handwriting and abbreviations. She was ready to breathe fire when she discovered he’d shared her notes with others in the class. She confronted him the day he returned and demanded, with as much force as she could muster given his repentant, beautiful eyes, that he not do it again.
    Tonight when she looked into those same regretful eyes she knew they were sharing the same memory. His hands enclosed hers and a grin danced across his serious expression.
    “Did I ever thank you for all your help while I was laid up?”
    “I’m not sure I gave you opportunity.”
    “That’s no excuse. Melanie, I am sorry and thank you for seeing me through these past semesters. I appreciate how much you’ve helped me.”
    “You’re welcome.”
    “Are we going to my place, tonight?” Danny asked, as Ted and Carla looked on.
    Ted cleared his throat. “Well, I think I’ll go pay the check.”
    “I’m staying with Ted, so you can have our room,” Carla whispered before joining her fiancé.

    Danny had left early for a full day of rugby practice, so Melanie lay in her bed dreaming up excuses to get out of her family’s Sunday dinner. It was going to be tricky. She’d wrangled out of last week’s and her mother never allowed two cancellations in a row.
    “Hi, Mom.”
    “Hi, Honey, I expect you here