Birdie (23 page)

Wes

The emptiness grows heavier
with each step I take home. I’m so deep in thought and the walk back takes so long, Katy’s sour cream is a milky puddle by the time I hand her the purchases. She makes a face at me.

“I would’ve skipped the sour cream if I knew you were walking,” she says.

I look at her and I know. It’s so sudden, so final, so unexpected that I shakily take a seat on our worn leather ottoman and rest my forehead on an open palm.

Katy notices my unusual position and quits fretting over the sour cream to kneel beside me. “What is it?” she asks, putting the back of her hand to my forehead. “Are you feeling sick?”

I wish she wouldn’t. My throat feels like it’s stuffed with cotton. I need to say the words. Her hand, which so lovingly is caressing my temple in worry, will become something to dodge.

I say the words quickly, pull it off like a Bandiad.

“We can’t get married, Katy.”

Her fingers still on the side of my head before they start trembling. She yanks her hand back and clutches it in her other to feign control. I know her so well. I don’t want to but I owe her the courtesy so I look up and into her brown eyes. They are incredulous but turn to a sad mist when she reads my expression.

She must see the finality in it. The truth.

“What happened on the walk? Before you left, everything was fine.”

“Before I left, everything was not fine. I was still pretending to be fine. It was on the walk that I was honest with myself and now I’m being honest with you.” I try not to grimace at that statement. How honest should I be? Would mentioning Birdie be the right thing to do or would that just add a layer of mean to an already harsh truth?

“Are asking me to postpone the wedding, or…”

My face grows grimmer, my lips are pursed into a flat line.

Katy nods listlessly. “I see.” She stands and walks out of the room. I don’t move. We’re not done.

I wait a few silent beats –
one…two…three…four…

She walks back into the room. Stomps, more like it. Her face is now a furious shade of red to match her fiery hair.

“Who is she?” she demands loudly. “Is there someone else? How can you just decide we’re not in a relationship anymore? Who is she?”

I want to say it’s Birdie. I want to give her something to grab onto and strangle. Something that makes the hurt tangible, but I know it’s not Birdie. Not exactly.

There are emotions raging inside of me but while I walked I realized it wasn’t Birdie I needed. It’s true that in my mind she’d been the standard to which I held all the women I’ve dated since. That what we shared remains unrivaled. And I knew I had to tuck that away as a nice memory and build something completely different with someone else. I
knew
this.

But when I saw Birdie again, it was like a jolt, waking me up from a dazed, routine life. Talking to her every week on the phone made me remember that I needed more.

But Birdie can’t give me what I need anymore than Katy can. Katy can’t churn inside me what Birdie does when her eyes linger on mine. She can’t fire off all my synapses, make me feel warm from my head to my fingertips, make my mind dizzy from her touch, or run in sync with me on a thought. And Birdie can’t be with me wholly. There’s always an edge she’s withholding, she’s always dancing just out of reach. Katy is present here with me every single day. Her mind, body, her heart are wrapped around me and dropped into my hands without a second thought.

Birdie is the catalyst and as I watch Katy’s features twist in rage I know that without Birdie, Katy and I would have gotten married. That much is true but I now question
how
long it would have lasted, not
if.
That much is also true.

I decide to spare her the extra layer. I don’t want her to have a physical barrier because knocking it down won’t change anything and it will just drive her type-A, checklist, perfectionist, problem-solving self insane.

I look at her sadly. “There’s no she.”

“No? You aren’t fucking someone else?” she shoots at me venomously. Her look has already decided that I am.

“No, I’m not fucking someone else.” I heave a weary sigh. “All I can say is I’m sorry. It’s not fair to you for me to break things off now but it would be even more unfair to
both
of us to go through with a wedding I’m not sure about.”

The crying starts at that point, a blubbering, leaky affair that ebbs at times to let rage in. I answer every question she throws at me. How long have you felt this way?
Four months.
Who’s going to tell my parents?
I will. Face to face.
Why did you lead me on for three years?
I didn’t. I didn’t know it would turn out this way.
Are you sure you want to end it?
Yes.
Do you know you’re not getting a second chance if you change your mind?
I know.

Do you still love me?

…
not like you want me to.

Birdie

I don’t see Katy
again until Friday, which makes the remainder of my week at Pine Oak Library bearable. Linda tsked tsked at the staff meeting that she called out sick. My relief makes me feel guilty. Everything makes me feel guilty. I’m so slick with it, it drips off me and makes my smiles fake. It makes me have to ask the customers to repeat their questions. It steals my appetite and I spend my lunch hours alone in my car re-reading book pages because I can’t concentrate and can’t stop thinking.

And hurting.

Losing Wes again hurts. And I didn’t even have him this time.

I’m packing the last of my desk into a box when Katy comes in. Her fair complexion can’t hide anything going on her body whether she’s red with anger, pink with embarrassment, tinged blue with cold, or flushed with alcohol. Right now her nose is rosy and wet and her eyes are pinked and framed with dark circles. I hiss in a breath. She does look sick. In true Katy style, she dragged her herself to work before she was fully recovered.

I try not to think about this past Wednesday night as I turn to her and leaned a hip on my desk. “You still look pretty sick, Katy,” I say. “Maybe you should sleep it off until Monday.”

Katy shakes her head. She opens her mouth to say something then thinks better of it. She’s clutching a thick tissue in one fist. She rests that fist on her forehead and her eyes squeeze shut and her mouth stretches thin in an attempt not to cry.

She sniffs deeply and uses the back of her hand to catch her tears without ruining her make-up.

“I’m not sick,” she confesses in a watery voice. “The wedding is off.”

My knees buckle and my hand reaches out and catches the back of my chair for support. I glance wildly around the staff room but no one else is here. She means to do this here. Now. At the library.

I stiffen my legs and try to steady my pulse which has suddenly turned erratic. My voice catches on nerves. “Katy. I…I don’t know what to say.”

This makes her tears fall faster and she pounds a fist on my desk in frustration.

I gulp. All I can give her is my honest apology. “I didn’t mean for this to happen. I didn’t know you were his fiancé when I started working here. I just, I didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t want to go by Birdie at work so I used my middle name. And please don’t blame Wes. Please don’t call off this wedding. I asked him not to tell you. He wanted to and I asked him not to…”

I trail off because I realize Katy is no longer crying but watching my face intently, her eyebrows knitting together more tightly with each word that falls out of my mouth. She’s taking it in like this is news to her and I groan deep inside.

“What. The. Fuck.” She draws each word out angrily and I take a shaky step back because she has the look of a woman on the warpath. “Birdie? Your name is Birdie?
The
Birdie?”

A knowing creeps over me and makes my head light. “He didn’t tell you,” I realize in a quiet voice. Katy sweeps a hand over my desk sending the items I hadn’t packed flying. The stapler hitting the metal of a potted plant creates a ding loud enough to draw Mark in from the back break room.

“Are you Wes’s ex girlfriend?” she demands in a shrill voice.

I’m shaking my head in regret but answer “Yes” to her question. Mark is watching us in confusion.

“
He
called off the wedding. I knew he was cheating. I
knew
it. I can’t believe you!”

Now my head shaking takes on a fervor. “No, he never cheated. We never did anything. He loves you!”

“No, he doesn’t love me! He doesn’t want to marry me! He didn’t bother to tell me that Birdie fucking Clements was my co worker. Oh my God, I told you things!” Her face morphs into disgust. At me. It sears me and I welcome it. Because I deserve everything she’s throwing at me.

“I’m so sorry, Katy. I’m so, so sorry.” I keep repeating the apology but I can tell it’s useless and for my benefit because her faces grimaces with each one like it hurts. I stop talking. 

“Shut up, Anne! Birdie! Whatever you call yourself!” she yells. “You’ve ruined
everything
!” She lunges for me and Mark finally steps in, still dazed but understanding enough that I’m about to get socked in the face. He restrains Katy easily enough who has melted into sobs against his shoulder.

Linda comes in from the main floor, looking bewildered. “What the devil is going on back here?” she demands. “The customers can hear shouting.” Her face changes as she takes in the scene before her, seeing Katy in a tangled mess of hair and tears against Mark’s chest. “Katy, are you well?” she asks in a concerned voice.

Katy pushes off Mark angrily. “No!” She pulls her cell from her pocket and starts furiously jabbing buttons. My stomach clenches. I can’t even warn him about my blunder. I don’t have his phone number. He doesn’t have mine. We never took it past Wednesday nights, foolishly thinking that the boundary made what we were doing okay.

Seeing Katy crying and yelling and broken illuminates everything. Nothing about it was ever okay.

I pick up what I can from the floor and pile it onto my desk. I grab my box and sling my purse over my shoulder. There’s still six hours left in my last shift at this library but they’re forfeit now. I have to leave.

“If Wes doesn’t come to drive her home, make sure one of you gets her there safely,” I say under my breath to Mark and he nods. His eyes are sympathetic, not sure who’s in the right and who to feel for. I place a hand on his shoulder before walking out of the library.

Birdie

I shouldn’t be here.

I sit on a bench in a crowded hallway facing the door. Swarms of students scurry in front of me in skinny jeans, scarves, and lots of bangs. Even on the boys.

I feel old in my boot cut jeans, simply gray tee and a long braid that sits over my shoulder.

A young woman with olive skin and a bouncy dark bob stops in front of the door and raises on her tiptoes to look through the window.

I already did that. No one’s in there.

She frowns, reaches into her backpack and shoves a sheath of papers underneath the crack in the door before hurrying on.

I stretch, trying to get the crick out of my lower spine. These benches aren’t made for marathon sit sessions. My cell beeps again. It’s Tim.

Well???

I punch back that I haven’t seen him yet. And to quit with the texts. Every time I get one, I lose a little of my resolve. His constant need for updates is making me well aware of the time passing. Awareness of time passing is usually a cure for stupid brash hair-brained ideas and this is all of those things and more.

I haven’t spoken to Wes in two months. Which means his marriage is one week away if it’s still on. The date has been pressing on my mind, growing with intensity the closer it crept until I couldn’t take it anymore.

I had to tell him before he was officially out of reach that I have been inflicted with idiocy for seven years and that I want him back. I have to know if they worked out their roadblock. I have to give him this option before he marries Katy.

I don’t even know if he’s at work. I stare at his office door, the one that has been dark for hours. My Gardetto’s and Diet Coke, the only snacks I brought to this spot, have been fully digested and my body is demanding more sustenance. But I’m not leaving this perch. I’ve seen the movies. The second I do, he’ll arrive.

Oh, shit, he’s arriving.

He’s walking with two people who look like colleagues. They’re not typical college-aged looking and one horribly beautiful woman is in a suit and heels.

I rise as they approach and he looks up and notices me right before reaching the door. His eyes widen slightly before he turns to the two people and says something quietly to them. He unlocks his office door, ushers them inside, and then turns to face me.

I try to smile but my face is trying to display all the emotions coursing through me right now.

“Coworkers?” I ask.

“Yeah. I have a meeting.” He looks at his watch. “Now actually.”

“Then I’ll be really, really brief.”

He crosses his arms and looks at me expectantly. I lick my lips and take a deep breath. With all this waiting I did, you’d think I’d have spent it preparing a speech but I thought it would be more heartfelt if I winged it.

Apparently I’m still inflicted with idiocy.

I open with, “Don’t marry, Katy.”

He raises his eyebrows but says nothing.

“I should have never called things off all those years ago. I was scared and going through a lot of stuff and we were basically kids and everything was too much…” I sigh. “I’ve had seven years to try and make it right and I’m sorry I’m speaking up in the eleventh hour with seven days left on the clock but… don’t marry Katy.”

He rubs his chin and takes in my hurried plea. “Birdie…it was a pleasure getting reacquainted on the phone. Like time had stopped, you know? But there were reasons we never went past Wednesday night and my engagement wasn’t the only one. The wedding is off, but that is not because I’m clearing a path for anyone else. I’m taking time to figure out what I really want. What I need.”

I lower my eyes. “I understand.”

Wes smiles and squeezes my shoulder. “You take care. Okay?”

I smile back. A little too brightly. And start walking away backwards. “Yeah. Sure. You too, Wes.”

He turns and slips into his office for his meeting.

And I get the hell out of there.