“Be sure that you are.” She dismissed me with a kiss on the cheek, flaring her nostrils when she got too close. “Go get a shower,” she said, starting out of the room and down the stairs, stopping at the hallway entrance toward the studio. “And get my door fixed.”
She left me alone, stuck in that room with the echoes of some stranger’s laughter and the stinging memory of Aly’s touch, her scent filling up my head. It wasn’t the white noise I wanted to hear when the day had begun, but it still shifted my world on its axis. It still made me feel that whatever my world had become, I was still able to make it drift from me. Only this time, I didn’t want to lose hold of it.
I touched my cheek where Aly had slapped it, and was surprised to find it no longer hurt. Not sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing, I headed down the hall to take my shower.
You show yourself
Slowly.
Like layers pulled back.
A dandelion in a storm.
Each soft, gossamer petal
That hides, conceals
Plucked free.
One
By
One
Until there is only the hard stem.
Until there is nothing beautiful left.
Six
There were only five people waiting in the lobby—still quite a few for such a small law office. Fine marble floors shined so sharply that I caught a glimpse of my reflection as I moved around the people waiting, not noticing much but the heavy scent of coffee coming from the break room beyond the lobby and the almost overwhelming scent of perfume that the legal secretary Rosie wore.
It was nearing noon and Rosie, manning the receptionist’s desk, was talking to one of the associates, while those clients already waiting either poked at their phones or stared off into space, looking lost and bored at the same time. I ignored them all as I marched across the lobby towards the inner offices.
I was there to prove a point, determined in fact, and when I moved into the main hallway I paid scant attention to Rosie who stood from the desk, calling after me as I headed straight for the office at the end of the corridor. “Miss King. Wait, you can’t go in there…”
She was several feet behind me, but the echo of her heels was sharp, like the crack of a whip and they came to an abrupt stop as I walked right into Ethan’s office unannounced.
“Mr. Willis, I’m so sorry,” Rosie was saying, attempting to pull on my elbow to get me out. Ethan, though, glanced up from his desk which was piled with stacks of opened folders covering almost every inch of the warm wood surface. When he saw me, though, he stood, the slightest of smiles overcoming his initial look of irritation at being interrupted.
I only noticed being the center of attention when Ethan cleared his throat, shooting his gaze behind me to the small table in the corner and the three suits that sat around it.
“Aly,” he said, greeting me with a smile that twitched just the tiniest bit. “We’re kind of in the middle of something.”
But I couldn’t move, caught up as I was in the spontaneous decision to fly across the Causeway and get here to prove Ransom wrong, that I could feel crazy alive with someone else. That urge had only grown stronger, the need for it heightened as I moved through Metairie, then into the Business District. It seemed I could only breath after I had parked on the street, then when I saw Ethan’s surprised expression as I barged into his office.
He was always doing things without thought, had often encouraged me to act with the same free impulsivity. Now that I had, I couldn’t help but worry that I’d chosen the wrong day, the wrong time, the wrong reason to be impulsive.
“Ethan,” I started, hoping he could see the quiet frenzy that had my hands shaking. I needed him and I was a woman that didn’t like needing anyone. But Ransom… Non. Fuck Ransom. This was his fault, all of it. Winding me up until thought became secondary, until I acted as careless as he did. “Ethan, I’m sorry,” I tried again, pushing back my shoulders.
Ethan seemed to see something in my features that told him I couldn’t wait. “It’s lunchtime anyway,” he said, nodding Rosie out of his office before he walked away from his desk and glanced at his team sitting around the table. He stood next to me, fingers slipping on my wrist as he spoke to them. “One hour, guys and then we’ve got to get this done. I’ve only got a few days before I head to New York.”