Three, Two, One (321)

Yes, I think to myself. He’s dreamy. Both in the book and out of it.

“Who is the person you love most in this world?” I ask the audience, reading from chapter twenty-three in my book. That conversation is what changed me. Changed us. Because Ark drew a line when I couldn’t.

I don’t look up until I’m done with the entire passage, but when I do, every set of eyes in the store are on me.

“Thank you,” I whisper into the microphone.

I try to make a hasty escape, but then the store manager is back, grabbing a hold of my hand and leaning into the microphone. “Miss Marshall will be signing books at the west end of the store. Please purchase your book prior to getting in line. Thank you!”

She turns to me and the digital cameras click. Flashes flash. My eyes see spots. And when I open them, for a split second, I think I see him in the back.

But the residual spots blind me and when they finally clear as I’m walking to the west end of the store where my signing table is set up, the apparition is gone.

I take my seat at the table and a few of the store workers are first in line. I greet them and smile. I listen for their names and then write something witty in each book, enjoying the friendly banter as I pass them back.

It’s a nice feeling. But my mind is occupied with how I got here.

How did I get from where I was to where I am?

Why do I constantly have to ask myself this question?

After JD killed himself, I don’t remember anything but screaming. My screaming.

And then Ark’s pleading, as he rushed to JD and held him in his arms, just repeating the words, “No. No. No,” over and over again.

Ark was covered in blood when they picked him up off the floor. Someone had draped a blanket over me, even though I was wearing my coat. And all I kept thinking was, It’s so hot, I think I’m in hell.

I smile at the fan in front of me. “Yes, of course you can have a picture.” I stand and she makes her way over to the photo op banner my publicist had made specifically for this event. It’s a picture of the book cover and the Denver city skyline in the background.

After that I try not to think about JD too much. I still cry over him. It’s hard not to. He owned one third of my heart. I don’t think it will ever be possible to replace the missing piece he still holds.

I think about Ark instead. It took me weeks to get any answers, and the FBI was very reluctant. But they finally admitted Ark was undercover. Had been undercover for four years. And that the job was over and he’d moved on.

That broke my heart again. It made me think that it was all a lie.

That’s how I started to write my book. Because I needed to remind myself some of it was real, even if those parts only belonged to JD. I needed to remember Janine too, whom they never found, but her baby was in the records the FBI confiscated from Gabriel’s compound up in the mountains. They said that’s where I was kept too. But I have no clue. I don’t think about that time. Instead I think about Janine’s baby, who was reunited with her true family once they got through all the fake adoption records.

“Can I ask you a question?”

I look up at the young woman, holding out her book for me to sign. “Sure,” I say back with a smile.

“Why do you call it Three, Two, One? I know you have a lot of references in there to the numbers. But is it like a countdown?”

“Yeah. That’s all it is. Just a countdown.”

Three soulmates.

Two broken hearts.

One last chance to set it right.

“Oh,” the woman says, slightly disappointed. “Well, thank you so much.” She takes her book and smiles at me. “I love this story. I love the fact that they all end up together. I think JD loved her more, but I’m glad she got both. They filled her up, like she said. They both completed her because they were so different.”

I nod. I can feel the sting of tears. “They did,” I say. “You’re right.”

My book is fiction. And I can end it any way I want. So JD never died. Ark never lied. And everyone lived happily ever after.

After that I keep my attention where it belongs. On the people in front of me. I still scan for Ark’s face in the crowd, but by four o’clock when the last person steps up to have their book signed, I can’t avoid the obvious.

He never came.

I sign the book, smile, take a picture, and then hand it back. I thank the fan for coming to see me on such a cold and wintry day, and wish her happy holidays.

And then I stand and stare out the window where the snow is falling in large round flakes. The same way it did that night everything fell apart.

I walk away from the table and grab my bag from my publicist. “Do you need a ride to the airport?” she asks me, clearly concerned with my somber mood.

“No, thanks. I can manage.”

I turn and make my way towards the back of the bookstore where my coat is hanging in the employee break room. I’m just turning the corner of the hallway when a voice rings out.

“Miss Marshall?”

I turn. “Yes?”

The last girl in line is jogging down the book aisle towards me. “Sorry,” she says, out of breath. “I forgot! A man was in line with me a while ago, but he said he had to leave and would I pass this along.”

She holds out a sealed envelope.

I stop breathing for a moment. “A man?”

“Yes,” she says. “Sorry, I forgot.” And then I take it from her and she waves goodbye. “Happy holidays!”