Sunrise Fires (13 page)

I needed them. And without them I missed him wretchedly. In the quiet times when there wasn’t some obligation pulling at me, when my mind was at rest, I ached for his touch, his kiss, his sex. Just the sound of his voice would have made our separation more bearable.

Sometimes I lay in my bed in the quiet of the night and try to remember what his breathing sounded like. I had old recordings of his voice on my phone from when we had used a walkie-talkie app, and I listened to those over and over again. I even researched a way to save them to my hard drive and rescue them from my phone; time wasted, as I never found a solution. He was trapped on that phone. I found myself clinging to that old worn-out thing, refusing to upgrade, refusing to switch to the company phone as my primary, just because he was there, on that crappy outdated technology. I cuddled with it at night, playing his voice and getting angry when there were hiccups. Sometimes the battery died surreptitiously or the phone unexpectedly reset itself, and when these things happened, I’d fly into fits of anger and want to fling it across the room. I knew better, though; breaking that phone meant losing him. No, I wept instead, and I waited until the phone cooperated, lying awake in the darkness and reaching for those moments when he held me, when he loved me, when his fingers stroked my hip, or when his hand passed over my cheek.

And then the sun would rise, and Huntington’s was there. I was driven. I would whip the Huntington’s flagship into submission for making me leave him. The staff was afraid of me, but the store was immaculate. Corporate was impressed with the numbers and public impression of the brand name. I had redefined myself in the old way: professional success was my hallmark. I was good at that.
Maybe I wasn’t so good at relationships. Maybe Ryan had been a fluke,
I thought, as my old insecurities resurfaced. The distance between us had stretched my emotions to a tight thin hair, ready to snap at the realization of my deepest fears. In the back of my mind, a small voice wagged its finger at me and told me that it had been right all along, that Ryan would abandon me like so many men before him. I tried to ignore the voice. I buried myself in my work, and Huntington’s wasn’t in any shortage of that. I had to hold on just a bit longer. Soon enough, Oktoberfest would be here, and when I saw Ryan, everything would be clear. My fears would have to wait until then. They’d been standing on the edge, listening hard for any confirmation that they had been right in the first place, but I could keep them at bay, until Oktoberfest at least.

And then he called.

Unexpectedly, on a Wednesday evening, in the third week of August, he called. I nearly swallowed my Adam’s apple as I answered the phone with nothing more than a croak.

“Jen?”

I cleared my throat. “Ryan? Is that you?”

“Yeah, babe, it’s me.”

My breath caught in my throat, and tears instantly fell. It had been a week since I’d gotten more than a banal email checking-in, and his voice struck my ears with such warmth. I missed him suddenly, as if an entire decade had passed, and all of the missing from that decade had been added together and dropped on me in this one instant. “Ummm…” I sniffed, trying to compose clear ideas. “Uhhh…hi…hi, baby. Oh, my God, I’ve missed you!”

“I’ve missed you, too. A lot.”

My heart pounded in my chest, thumped in my ears, turned my legs to jelly. “I’m…uhh…wow…just…getting home from work and…hey…what time is it there? It must be the middle of the night.” I reached for some tissues and tried to covertly blow my nose. Breathing deeply, I slowed the flow of tears and began to regain control.

“Yeah, it’s past three in the morning.” His voice cracked.

“What is it?! What’s wrong, hun?”

“Jen, there’ve been some things going on here…” He paused so long I began to worry that the call disconnected.

“Ryan?”

He exhaled heavily onto the line. “Babe, I don’t want to get into it. I wish you were here, though.”

“Oh, hun,” I gushed, “I wish that, too.” My eyes burned anew. I blinked back the tears and took a deep breath. “Soon enough, hun. Soon enough. Oktoberfest in September. A couple more weeks and—”

“That’s why I’m calling,” he interrupted. “Jen, babe…”

The silence on the line was ominous. My stomach turned to lead, my throat tightened. “Honey, what is it?” I spoke slowly.
This was it.
I knew it.
The end was happening
, I felt it. He didn’t want to say it. “Tell me.” I braced myself and willed the contents of my stomach to stay put.

“Jen, I’m not coming. I can’t—”

I dropped the phone and stood there, stunned, frozen in disbelief. This really was it! Angry, furious, resenting him, hating him, abhorring the job, loathing Dullberth, devastated—I was crushed. I couldn’t breathe, and yet the sobbing began again, violently this time, choking my throat, aching to be released, but no sound came. My cheeks ran rivers, my nose a bog. I fell to my knees. Fumbling for the phone, I grabbed it and listened. All I could do was listen. My throat would not work for anything but to cough up more tears. The line was quiet. I sniffled, swallowing a noseful of snot and getting a grip on myself. “Ryan?! Ryan?” I was frantic. How could he do this? I had been so vulnerable, so honest, so raw…and still, even knowing how it would hurt me, he had backed away anyway. It was too much for him. I knew it all along. I was stupid to come here. “Ryan!” I screamed into the phone.

Silence.

And for the next two weeks, still more silence.

My life was so full of silence that it was deafening.

I’d called him back that day three times, but twice, the call couldn’t go through, and he never picked up on the third time. I called in sick for three days, unable to get up, unwilling to participate in this charade any longer. Each day I would get up and try to get ready for work, but it seemed ridiculous. This job had cost me Ryan. Was it really worth it? How many fishing poles did I need to sell to make
that
okay? Eventually, a pert little German sales girl showed up to ensure that I was okay and see if I needed any medicine or if I needed to go to a hospital. I dismissed her, but the next day, a woman from corporate called, wondering what happened to me. The store. The store. The store. It was always about the profit margin. Fuck. Fuck this whole thing. I can’t believe Ryan made me come here. I can’t believe Dullberth twisted my arm. I can’t believe I let them. I cried incessantly. I spread the tissue paper company’s profit margin that week. That’s for sure.

The apartment walls were thick with his voice, with the call: ‘I’m not coming.’ The grey carpet was fitting for the drab melancholy that seeped into my entire being. The rest of the world was muffled. I listened to it as it passed, but only heard it through the foreground of ‘I’m not coming.’ Why not? Why wasn’t he coming? He had fallen out of love in less than three short months. I was sure of it. I had been right all along. I knew this would happen if he didn’t come with me. I had said it would happen. And Mark! Damn him for saying it: ‘If you were my girl…’ But I wasn’t his girl. I was Ryan’s, and I wanted it to stay that way. If he had asked me to, I’d have quit this job for him. If he had asked me to, I’d have…I’d have…fuck…I’d have done anything to prevent this.

Talia called and e-mailed. I answered, but only because she’d wring my neck if I didn’t. She tried to ‘talk sense’ into me.

“Call him back.”

“I did call back. Three times that day! It’s been weeks, Talia, and I don’t hear
my
phone ringing!” I huffed, still infuriated that my fearful inner voice had been right all along. “And why would I call him now? So he can hurt me again? So he can spell out exactly why he doesn’t want to be with me anymore? Fuck that. Fuck him!”

“Jen, seriously?!” She huffed, exhaling heavily onto the line. I could picture her rolling her eyes. “Is it
that
melodramatic?”

I chuckled through my tears. “Yes,” I pouted. “Yes, it fucking is. He was the love of my life—”

“And yet he’s not worth a phone call?”

“I’m not worth one to him!”

“He called you. You hung up on him.”

“I dropped the phone. Maybe he hung up. I mean…I had a meltdown. I…I….”

“Call him, Jen.”

“When are you coming? How about you come keep me company since his sorry ass won’t?”

“That’s how we’re gonna handle this? He’s a sorry ass, and I’m supposed to be some stand-in?” She huffed again and let it hang in the air.

“Was that a real question?”

Silence.

“Goddamn it, Talia. He fucking broke my heart. I’m not calling him to beg for more heartbreak.”

She sighed. “So to be clear, I’m not gonna be your stand-in lover.”

I laughed through my tears. I snapped my fingers. “Damn. And I was really counting on that.” We both laughed appreciatively. My God I loved her. What an amazing friend she was! Even after a decade, I still felt like we had so much to talk about and learn from one another. We made plans for her visit in November. She’d bring Jackie; they’d stay at my place. We’d all work really hard to drown my sorrows.

*   *   *

Contrary to any expectation I had, preparations for Oktoberfest began in late August. The largest of the tents took weeks to build and prepare. They were able to seat thousands at once and that didn’t even count the outdoor seating. I could feel Munich beginning to swell with people and activity, even in the early weeks of September. I had arranged to have a vendor’s booth out by the Hofbrau-Haus tent, hoping to capture the eye of Americans that would be drawn to the Hofbrau name. Then it was as simple as a few brews, and they’d be talking about our products and our booth with their Oktoberfest co-tourists.

In the weeks that led to the celebration, I was busier than ever and thankfully so, because the sting of Ryan’s phone call had not lessened in the least. Each night, I fell into bed exhausted, barely able to think about my phone or drop more than a few tears before passing out and beginning again the next day. The bustle of Oktoberfest was infectious. After the huge tents went up, more and more brew houses arrived and set up tents. Eventually, vendor booths started going in, and services such as telephone booths and taxi stands stood up. Signs, posters, maps, and advertisements were hung all over town, making the place look like it had been ticker taped with images and slogans. And by the end of the second week in September, there was a buzz about town; the hushed anticipation of thousands of voices electrified the air. The place felt poised to burst, and with up to six million attendees expected, it just might do precisely that.

I had expected to take a vacation for the final two weeks of the three-week event; it was supposed to have been Ryan’s time. I, of course, had cancelled my vacation, but the swill of his rejection kept me flip-flopping between an apathetic emo and a driven, focused professional. I suspect my staff was confused or intimidated or both. Regardless, our vendor booth was set and stocked. The store was stocked, and the warehouse was packed in preparation; all staff were either scheduled or on standby to cover every day of the event. We were ready, right up until the very first day when it became clear that we weren’t.

The store was a madhouse for the entire three weeks. We were awash with tourists. Merchandise was flying off the shelves faster than we could restock. Never before had I had to decide between stocking and customer service, but the loss of either might’ve meant loss of sales. Too slow at the register, and people lose interest in hopes of returning to the event sooner; no merchandise on the shelves, and people don’t find something they’d like to spend their money on. Gross sales were through the roof on things like sports team apparel; carabiners from the Bundesliga, rugby, and other sports; and patches, key rings, and so on. Any merchandise small enough for a suitcase seemed to be what we needed to stock. We stayed late every night, restocking and even moving larger displays aside to allow for more of the ‘hot’ items to be stocked in preparation for the next day’s rush.

I was busy, but I should have been so busy that I couldn’t think straight. I wasn’t. My body ran itself into the ground from the store to the booth and back again deep into the wee morning hours before starting all over early the next morning. For three weeks, I ran without stopping, and yet I couldn’t find enough to keep Ryan from my mind. There wasn’t enough running or physical exhaustion to stop the thoughts from flooding in. I found myself wondering if he came anyway whether Germany was the draw and not me. Maybe he was at Oktoberfest, but taking the place in as a tourist, a free man. Maybe he was there with another woman. Maybe he brought the guys along. I scanned the faces of my customers. Surely, he wouldn’t be so brazen as to come into my store, but still I couldn’t help myself. When I manned the Huntington’s booth, I searched the crowds for any signs of him. A few times I thought I smelled his cologne, and I whipped my head in the direction the scent had come from, but he wasn’t there.

It was grueling. And each day ended in anger, frustration, and heartbreak. Every day I felt that phone call hanging over me: ‘I’m not coming.’ Why? How come he couldn’t give us a chance? I thought we were magical. I genuinely believed us to be a special kind of couple, something that only comes around once in a lifetime. And I didn’t want three years to define the beginning and end of that for me. I wanted my lifetime thing, and now, he had stolen that from me.

Oktoberfest passed but the feeling didn’t. It gripped me. He gripped me. Always at the back of my mind was the feelings of doubt and the persistent
what-iffing
. What if I had stayed home? What if I had never let this offer even land on my desk? A simple ‘no, thank you’ would have kept me safely there with him in our beautiful status quo. What if he had simply agreed to come with me? He would be here right now, and I’d not be trudging through this existence alone. What if Mark was right and Ryan just needed to be man enough to ask me to stay? Why hadn’t he asked me? Why didn’t he need me enough to beg me to stay for him?