Forget Me Not by Julie Soto
31
Ama
THE DAY AFTER THE WEDDING
On Sunday morning, there’s an email in my inbox from Sacramento Magazine, asking to do a feature piece on me and the Hazel Renee wedding. Just under it, TheKnot.com has asked for an exclusive.
It’s a lot, to see it all come true. This is exactly what I wanted, only I thought I’d have full mobility and that maybe I’d get to see the wedding in question, but regardless, I’m on my way.
I just never thought I’d be curled up the next morning, wishing I hadn’t kissed Elliot Bloom—that my one regret would be Elliot, again.
There’s a knock on my door at nine a.m., and I let Mar in with her box of donuts. She’s chatty and excitable, reliving all the wonderful things from yesterday.
“Can I hire you on?” I ask, interrupting her. “Photography will always be your main purpose, but can I give you an assistant job?”
Mar shrugs. “You know, I really liked yesterday, but I don’t think it’s my thing.” She smiles at me over her coffee cup. “But Jake, on the other hand …”
“Ugh. No.” I close my eyes.
“Yes, Ama. He’s obsessed with this whole thing. Think of you when you were young. Didn’t you do stupid shit in your first years?”
A white handkerchief flashes in my mind. The sting of bruised knuckles. “I know I did.”
“Give him a chance to grow out of his jackrabbit anxiety stage,” Mar says. “It’ll be good for you to have an eager kid just itching to run to CVS for you.”
I nod, chewing my chocolate old-fashioned. “So … What did you promise Michael to get him to come help yesterday?”
“No, no, no.” She sets her mug down. “You think I came over here to tell you to hire Jake and complain about my ex? No. I want to know what you and Elliot are up to.”
“Nothing,” I say. “There’s … He was there for me yesterday big-time. But …” I hesitate, but there’s no ugly part of me that Mar hasn’t seen. “I kissed him and he ran.”
Her eyes widen before she can catch herself. She picks her mug up again. “Okay. Okay, that’s … Okay.” She sips, trying to keep it in. “So that’s actually what you did. Essentially.”
“No. No, he proposed last time.”
“And what did that kiss mean if not a proposal, Ama?”
My chest tightens. It reminds me of his mother’s wedding, when he asked where I thought we were headed if not marriage.
“Because,” Mar continues, “I know you didn’t kiss him just to hook up again. And I know you’re smart enough to know he’s not going to want to just pick back up—”
“Am I?” I drop my head in my hands. “Am I smart enough? I feel very … unsmart.”
Mar is silent until I feel I can look at her again. She lets me just chew on my lip and think for a bit until she says, “What do you want? If there were no consequences to your actions, what would you want?”
“To be with him,” I say softly. I sniff back the tears that spring.
“For how long?”
I press my lips together. I look up at her.
I pull into the Blooming parking lot at nine thirty. They open at ten on Sundays, but I can’t wait for this. I drove over with my left foot on the pedal since my right is in a boot. I haven’t showered. I’m not even sure I brushed my teeth.
I crutch my way over to the front door, and after I peer in to see if it’s dark, I hobble over to the parking lot. His truck is here. I pound on his side door to the showroom.
When the metal door swings open, I lose my breath at the sight of him. He’s in one of my favorite Henleys and the tight jeans that I can barely fit my hand into. He blinks down at me before opening the door wide to let me in. I squeeze past him, my crutches clicking on the floor in the silence.
“What’s the occasion?” he says, frowning down at the boot.
Once I’ve leaned the crutches on the wall, I turn to him. “I made a mistake.”
His lips press together. “We can forget about the kiss.”
“Not last night. Kissing you was very purposeful,” I say. “A few years ago.”
His eyes dart between mine before he crosses his arms and waits for me to continue.
“I kissed you because I miss you. Because I still want you.” My heart pounds, and I watch him swallow but remain still. “Because I shouldn’t have left your mother’s wedding, and I shouldn’t have given you the gift of the Franklinia and then made you feel like we weren’t even close to talking about forever. Because we were. We were forever. I just didn’t want a marriage.”
He stares down at the workbench—the old weathered one that feels like him in this studio of bright fluorescents and white walls.
“You told me, and I didn’t hear it,” he says. “It was my fault.”
“It wasn’t.” I step forward on my good leg, and he reaches out quickly to steady me. He wraps his fingers under my elbow, and I place my hand over them. “I wasn’t ready. You were my first relationship, and I’ve grown up knowing that you don’t only get one. But … I only want one.”
He slips his hand from my skin, and before he can run—before he can say anything—I tuck my bad leg behind me, and I kneel onto my right knee. I look up at him from the floor of the back room where we used to make love, from the place I first fell in love with not only his work but him, and I say, “I only want you. And I’m ready now.”
I can’t read his face. My eyes are pricking, and he’s getting blurry. So I clarify, repeating his words. “Marry me.”