I nod, fishing in my purse for my smartphone. I'm not good at this part. I don't know what to say as we walk away into the world again. Our brief encounter will become a fond memory in weeks and the details will be so muddled in a year that I'll struggle to recall his face. I glance at him again. No, wait. I won't forget that face. He's as handsome as any man you'd see layered in a beautiful suit on the pages of a magazine. His hair is cut short, but it's still long enough that a woman's yearning fingers can get lost in it. His jaw is sharp and bold, yet there's a tenderness woven into his smile that is disarming.
He steps towards me, his hand leaping to cup my cheek. His eyes catch mine in a warm gaze. "You're amazing, Kayla. Truly. Amazing."
My lips part slightly as if I'm going to say something back but the words don't come. I just stare at him wanting to soak in every detail.
He leans down and slides his lips over mine in a tender kiss. "I'll never forget you," he whispers against my lips.
"I'll never forget you," I repeat back into his beautiful mouth. I won't. This is a man no woman could ever forget.
Chapter 3
"You can stay here as long as you want." Alexa reaches to hand me a trio of soft, white towels. "You can use these to have a shower now, and then you'll always find some in the cabinet in your bathroom."
I'm grateful for the hospitality, but more than that I welcome the literal and figurative embrace she's given me since I walked through her door fifteen minutes ago. She wasn't expecting me. Her face was a twisted mix of joy and confusion when I stepped off the elevator and into her arms. Alexa Jackson is one of my closest friends. She knows my heart. She understands the sacrifices I made when I left New York three months ago to go back to Boston.
"Where's Noah?" I ask, not necessarily out of curiosity, as much as greed. I want her all to myself for the day. It's Tuesday, which means she'd normally be at school, teac
hing her young students about history and science, but it's spring break so her time is mine.
Her face softens. "He's got a few shoots today and then he's meeting his father for a late lunch."
I sigh in relief. Alexa's fiancé is an in demand photographer. Although his core business is now centered on children and infants, he does an occasional spread in a magazine. He's talented, accomplished and very eccentric. My time with him has been limited up to this point but now that I've taken over their guest room, I'll be seeing a lot more of him.
"Do you want to talk about Parker?" The effortless ease with which she says his name tears through me. I haven't been able to utter his name since he walked out of our apartment. I've avoided every image or reminder of him.
I lower myself to the edge of the queen sized bed I'll be calling my refuge until I can sort through my life. "There's not much to talk about."
She settles next to me, her hand reaching for mine. She cradles it gently in her lap. "Is it over?"
I hear the words clearly. I don't react. I just stare at her hand and the large diamond ring that is catching the natural sunlight streaming through the window. She's going to plan her wedding soon. She'll marry the man of her dreams and her life will start on its course towards a happily-ever-after that she rightly deserves. I deserve it too though and now I have to confess that my prince charming pulled the rug out from under me without any warning.
"Did you have a fight?" She presses.
I can't blame her for wanting to know. The last time we spoke was barely more than a week ago when I told her of my plans to visit New York with Parker in tow. I wanted to hold his hand in Central Park and feel his lips brush against mine while we soaked in the view atop the Empire State Building. I wanted his body to give me pleasure in a bed in a decadent hotel on the Upper West Side. I wanted to experience life with him.
I squeeze her hand slightly drawing strength from the familiar touch. "Parker left me." The words float off my tongue and into the stillness of the mid-morning air. "He left me, Alexa."
Her eyes dart to my face and I watch as they race over my features. "No, Kayla. He wouldn’t do that."
"He did," I bite back in a tone that speaks of the pain. It's the same overwhelming pain that I've been carrying within me for the past week. "He's gone."
"What happened?"
I draw in a quick breath hoping that it will offer some inspiration. "I don't know. He just said he wasn't happy."
"He wasn’t happy with you?"
I nod. I'd replayed Parker's words over and over in my mind since he told me he wanted to find himself and his own happiness. The words were a poorly crafted excuse for him to start fresh without me. They stung just as much as if he would have told me he stopped loving me.
"He begged you to come back to him a few months ago." She holds my hand tighter, squeezing it more. "You left everything here to go be with him."
"I know." I swallow hard. "He told me he couldn't live without me."
Those were the exact words that Parker had muttered through the phone when he'd called me just a few months ago while I was just settling into my life in Manhattan. We'd broken up time and time again after meeting in high school. My heart always knew that we'd find our way back to one another and when he finally called that wintery evening to profess his unwavering devotion, I had packed up everything to be with him. Now, only twelve short weeks later, he was gone and I was back in New York.
"Maybe he was just panicked because he loves you so much."
They're words meant to placate women with broken hearts. The idea behind them is romantic and charming and conjures up an image of a man so overwrought with the knowledge that his heart belongs to a certain woman that he can't bear it. It's not a notion that is seated in any kind of reality. Parker didn't leave me because he loves me. He left me because he's a worthless piece of shit and is too immature to be honest about his feelings.