You Are Here (8 page)

I tried laughing off any mortification, but I was still embarrassed. Surprisingly less than I expected, though.

“I’m fine, Charlie,” I said, my eyes wide when I heard the nickname emerge. “I mean, Charlotte.”

With her hand over her mouth, she tittered. “My grandma used to call me Charlie!”

“Sorry?”

“No, I don’t mind at all, it’s just she was the only one who would use it. My dad thought it was funny, but always called me Charlotte, and my mom hated it. She was still mad they didn’t name me Gloria after
her
mother who died before I was born. Anyway,” she said, waving a hand as if to usher the subject back to the present.

“So, what’s the deal?”

At that moment, another man came through the door with the intent to actually use the facilities. He stopped cold, his eyes growing wide in shock and performed a rapid about-face. Drew looked at us and stifled a laugh.

“How about heading back to the waiting room?” he suggested, his face a bit flushed as he pulled open the door.

I looked him in the eyes. They were shining again, warm and amber.

“Come on,” he insisted, gesturing us out. We quickly darted out, heads down, and walked down the hallway until we stood just outside the waiting room. I could feel Sofia and Fred staring at me through the glass, and I purposefully ignored Sofia’s multiple signs of the cross. Charlotte stood next to me and leaned in closely, waiting.

“I get … premonitions sometimes. I call them ‘previews.’”

Silence met my hushed admission. I watched her face as she mulled it over. Drew stood behind her, his skepticism blatant.

“I know how it sounds,” I whispered. I had grown comfortable with the idea that what I’d been seeing would happen, but I could never guarantee that anyone else would buy it. Why sugarcoat it?

“A premonition?” she asked, carefully.

Drew sipped his coffee loudly. I shifted, a little embarrassed, and perhaps more self-conscious than I wanted to be.

“Of what?” Her voice dropped in volume to match mine.

“If you can believe it,” I began, “you’ll be one of the two matrons of honor in my wedding.”

Drew snorted and walked around us and into the waiting room. His entertainment was obvious though he shook his head. “Maybe your previous life was in a carnival,” he mumbled.

“Drew, don’t be a dick,” Charlotte hissed, but Sofia snapped something at her in Spanish. Charlotte turned back to me, considering my claim for a moment. “Count me in, lady. Sounds fantastic.”

I grinned, huge and goofy. I nodded and shrugged my appreciation, but she grabbed my hand and squeezed.

Have I mentioned my future husband’s name starts with a G?

~

Charlotte and Drew insisted on treating me to their favorite Italian place for dinner as if she needed to make up for cancelling lunch. It wasn’t hard to agree, though I fully planned to steal the check and treat them.

The restaurant was an utterly cozy place, very quaint, with exposed brick walls and dark wood tables. The staff treated us as if we were joining their family dinner, which I enjoyed more than they knew. Wine was set in front of me, but my mind kept swirling like the ruby liquid around my glass.

Greg? No, doesn’t fit his face. Gary? Ugh, that’s not it. Gideon? Stupid. It wouldn’t be the same as my last name. Garrett? Not quite. Gabriel! Crap. This isn’t working.

“Lucie?” Charlotte asked with a smile, extracting me from my brainstorming session. “Where are you?”

I was caught. “Uh, daydreaming?”

“Okay,” she said carefully, her eyes sparkling, before diving headfirst into her curiosity. “So, are you ever going to elaborate on these
previews
you have?”

I stared at her, unsure how to respond. Honestly, I was surprised she was interested.

“Do you really want to know?”

Her head was already nodding before I even completed the question. Eyeing Drew, I noted he was silent, calm and pretending not to care. By the way his eyes surreptitiously cut to my face every few seconds, however, I could tell he was as curious as his wife.

Vacillating as to how to begin, I thought for a moment and finally tasted my wine. The zing zipped down my throat and heated up my spine. I licked my lips.

“Well,” I said, still cautious, “it’s disorienting. I can’t always gauge what I see, because I have no reference for a lot of places. I don’t know why, or what they mean, but generally they are an encouragement, I guess. Not just for me, really, because it’s never
just
me.”

Charlotte sat back and downed the last of the sangiovese in her glass. “I was in the one you had at the hospital, right?”

I nodded.

“Tell me.”

I hesitated, but slowly stirred up the courage and did just that. I omitted the baby’s name so as not to influence, but also to check the validity of my ability, despite the probability of waiting for years to find out.

Drew choked on his wine. Charlotte rolled her eyes and heavily patted his back as he recovered.

“I should learn and keep my mouth shut. Like, always.” I settled my face in my hands and rubbed my eyes.

“Pfft.” Charlotte clearly disagreed. “Drew has been asking almost daily when we’re having a kid.”

“I have not!” He cleared his throat a few more times and still, his voice was scratchy. “You are just as impatient.”

She laughed outright. “That is pure crap, love. I mean, I’m okay with whenever. I just don’t want to live in our cramped one-bedroom apartment with a baby. So I wish this preview came with an address,” she joked, winking at me. “Besides, practice is half the fun.”

Drew’s eyes crinkled with his smile, but his embarrassment overpowered with a surprising display of red cheeks. He rallied with a quip. “I do like to practice. As often as possible.”

Charlotte rewarded him with a kiss, her fingers lingering on his cheek longer than her lips on his. They shared a look and were instantly alone in the world.

Turning back to face me, Charlotte zeroed in on me. “Boy or girl?” The question was delivered like a bullet.

“I don’t know!” I lied.

“Oh my God!” Drew burst, a bit spectacularly. “All that and you’re going to hold out on us?”

Charlotte didn’t even turn to look at him, sitting tall and smiling triumphantly at me. “See?” she mouthed.

“I have to piss,” he announced and stalked to the rear of the restaurant.

She hadn’t moved, just waiting.

I played along, staring back at her, but I caved. “Boy.” The single word was barely a breath, so if she heard it, I didn’t know.

Either way, she understood and her eyes confirmed it, smiling before her mouth could follow suit. “I knew it.”

While they did ask a couple of other questions about my ability, the majority of the evening was rather lighthearted. It was comforting to find we all got along really well even without the buffer of Vivi and Nash. They were funny and sweet people and I was glad to have met them. They seemed to genuinely like me for me, and I knew I would never in my life deserve the friends I’d made. They believed in me before I believed in myself. They cared for me while barely knowing me. And though my frame of reference was blocked, I imagined this must’ve been what real family was.

Grey

Erupt

Normally, I would be precisely on time for any meet. However, at 7:13, I sat in a cab debating what in the hell I was doing. I gave the driver a twenty to shut the fuck up and let me sit for two seconds, staring at the looming Hancock Center. Horns blared outside, other cabs whizzing by.

You owe him nothing. Leave.

Before I could stop myself, I pushed the door open and closed it behind me. As I made my way into the restaurant, my ears seemed to shut down—I couldn’t hear a thing except my labored breathing.

I sat on the sidelines of the wrestling match between my body and my fucked up logic. Rooted to the ground in the bustling waiting area, I swept my gaze left to right in anticipation of Nash and Vivien. I forced my way to the edge and stood against the wall as I anticipated every question he would have. Where the hell have you been? What about your dad? Why didn’t you answer my fucking letters?

You are not who he remembers.

Abruptly, a welcome clarity seared through the center of my head. A buzzing electricity ricocheted through my chest and my limbs. Just as the deafening chatter of patrons, the clanging of glasses and general rumble of the restaurant once again registered, my body reached a bargain with my mind. I had just shoved off the wall in preparation to run when an iron grip took my shoulder.

“Grey!”

Fuck.

Our table was a booth, thankfully, but in the center of the action. My eyes darted all over the restaurant, checking for exits. I was so engrossed in this struggle between pain and protocol that Nash had to clap his hands directly in front of my face to snap me out of it.

“Earth to Grey,” he said with a laugh. “You’re here, but you’re still not here.”

You have no idea.

I forced my attention back to the couple across from me. I could do this. I coerced my expression into a genial smile, apparently giving Nash the cue to start in on me.

“So?” He lobbed the word at me, expectantly.

My chest felt hollow. “So what?” I hedged.

You chose to be here
, I reminded myself as I braced for torture. That damn memory of the keg party stirred up enough of something
to coerce me into this terrible decision.

“So
what
!”

I thought he was going to jump out of the booth. This level of volume was not unusual for Nash, however. Vivien laughed lightly and tipped her ice water to her perfectly painted ruby red lips.

“I can’t believe you’d say that to me! Come on! I mean, dude. The last time you returned a call, you were being shipped out for some assignment you couldn’t say anything about. I guessed Africa, but you wouldn’t say.”

Philippines.

“There isn’t much about my time in the army I care to talk about,” I said evenly, though my expression barely maintained neutrality. “It wasn’t as if I wanted to be there, exactly.”

I heard a modest Louisiana cadence taint my words. I calmed the rush of dread with a deep breath.

“Whatever.” He blew it off. “You’re out now, right?”

He tried to continue the interrogation, but the waitress interrupted. While Vivien and Nash pored over the menu, I methodically scanned the restaurant again. A baby was crying on the far side of the dining room. A young couple three tables to my right quietly argued over her supposed location the previous night. A tall, rough-looking tourist with one hell of a beer belly stood blocking the nearest exit.

I brought my attention back to the waitress just in time to avoid more clapping in my face. I ordered a New York strip, medium rare, with a baked potato, and handed her the menu.

“So what about you, Nash? How long have you two been married?”

His face brightened with his signature thousand-watt grin.

“Four years! That is, four years in October,” he said, taking the opportunity to put his arm around his wife.

Nash smiled at her, squeezing her shoulders with one arm. He leaned in and whispered in her ear. Her eyes floated slowly from the ceiling to a spot in her lap while her mouth curved into a devious smirk. A throaty chuckle escaped her lips. Nash’s lips moved along her earlobe. They might not have noticed if I just left.

When Vivien got up to visit the ladies’ room, I stood along with Nash. My body continued to betray me. Regardless of what I was now, the concept of being a gentleman remained hardwired.

“So, I always wanted to ask, but I never, uh … you never seemed to want to talk about it.”

I didn’t have to wonder to know exactly what he was referring to. And I was not open to discussing the topic.

“No,” I said firmly.

“Grey, you never wanted to go into the army,” he argued. “Your dad—”

“He wasn’t my dad,” I corrected sharply, before I could stop myself.

He sighed, only slightly defeated. “I know you guys never got along too well, and in the end, I guess it makes sense, but—”

“I’m not having this conversation.”

He considered me carefully, my mind bracing to stop the memory he was insistent on discussing.

I looked down, closing my eyes. My breathing was uneven. What the fuck was happening? My past was all but nonexistent a couple of days ago. Clearly, believing that had been an expert illusion. I was under attack and losing.

“Grey,” Nash pleaded. “I just want to understand what happened to my brother.”

My eyes opened with his plea.

“You’re still my brother, you asshole.”
Drew’s voice, obscured and tinny-sounding by the shitty voicemail recording, knocked about in my head. He was so angry as he howled himself hoarse, wondering aloud why I left. Asking why I wouldn’t call back. Telling me what a dick our
dad
was being to everyone. Before he had finally hung up, his sobs sounded like seizures. That had been when I decided to disconnect my phone, making me the only soldier around who didn’t have one. Perhaps that was part of what got me singled out for recruitment.

I refocused on Nash, whose fingers snapped directly before my eyes. His forehead was creased and his face had flushed with aggravation. “What the hell is with you? I’m just trying to talk to you, man. I mean, I know guys don’t
talk
, but Jesus.”

My entire body sagged. I felt heavy and drunk, my muscles laced with lead and my eyes unfocused. My armor was disintegrating against my old friend’s unstoppable assault. I had nothing left.

“Your brother is dead, Nash. He doesn’t exist anymore.”

For the first time in his life, Nash Bonnar looked absolutely terrified.

Just then, Vivi returned to the table. She froze when she laid eyes on us, staring in confusion. Nash didn’t move to let her back into the booth.

She ping-ponged her attention between the two of us before wondering aloud, “What the hell happened in the last five minutes?”

I had lost this battle, so there was no need to play “normal” anymore. I pulled a hundred from my wallet and threw it on the table as I left.