“Makes sense. That’s awesome,” I said, hoping I sounded happy for him.
Clicking heels sounded on the pavement behind me. I turned to face Elena, a woman around my age with sleek black hair in styled waves. Her makeup was visible but tasteful, her dress bright and flattering.
“Hey, baby!” she said to Frankie, cheerful. Then to me, “Hi, I’m Elena.”
“Great to meet you,” I lied.
As I shook her soft hand, some sort of chasm broke beneath me, pulling me down, spiraling around my gut and squeezing like a python. Elena appeared composed, loving, in control of her life, and of course Frankie didn’t want to upset that. Of course not.
“How’d y’all meet?” I forced out.
Frankie’s face lit up. “Through my mom. She came over here for a work thing last year. I always thought she was cute.”
“We’re moving in together when Frankie gets back,” Elena said, and they exchanged nervous, adoring glances. “We’re so excited.”
I could feel myself falling deeper into the chasm as they took each other’s arms.
“That’s awesome,” I repeated. “Congratulations.”
“Hey,” he started. “What if I give you a loan?”
Elena tilted her head toward him, confused.
“No, no, no, no.” I put up my hands in embarrassment, then realized I was still holding the brochure. I stuffed it in my purse. “I gotta go to work. I just, um. It was nothing. I’ll figure it out.”
“Hey,” Frankie said again, and opened his arms.
I hugged him hard, pinching my eyes against tears.
“Frankie?” I whispered. “Could we keep this between us?”
I felt him nod. We let go.
“It was great to see you, Cass.”
“You, too, Frankie.” It was. “Good to meet you, Elena.”
She waved and I walked back toward the playground to my car. The tears came, quiet and thick, putting out the fire of nerves I’d felt earlier. They also dissolved the positive heat I’d felt, the sizzling go for it feelings that had lifted me through the events of the past week.
Nothing was any different from before.
I started to see my future. It wasn’t too hard to picture, really.
I would wake up and test my blood sugar.
I would go to my shift at The Handle Bar, pass out, wake up, do it again.
I would keep pushing to make The Loyal a real band, until I got too tired or broke or both.
If I got lucky, I would find a new, mindless desk job, listening to musicians who were better than me on my commute.
Maybe if things got a little better, I would get a cat or a dog, or maybe if things got a little worse, I would move in with Mom. I would probably be paying off my medical bills and student loans until I had gray hair, or until I gave in and finally went to law school.
And, hey, no fake marriage meant I wasn’t doing anything illegal. Everything was the same. No harm, no foul.
I reached the playground, but I couldn’t bring myself to get into my shitty Subaru just yet. I looked at the swings where I used to pump until I was flying, looping at 180 degrees, positive in my little girl head that any second I would float off the swing and into the sky.
Luke
We’d pulled into the Cucciolos’ driveway, and Cassie had walked up in her jean shorts and unlaced Converses, with her hair falling out all over the place, her eyes on Frankie. She’d looked different from the woman I’d met behind the bar, the woman who knew exactly what she was doing and fuck you if you didn’t like it. She reminded me of a photo of her I’d seen on Frankie’s wall the other night, a little girl in a watermelon swimsuit, building sand castles. She was saying something like two thousand dollars extra a month, and at the mention of money, I couldn’t help it. I stayed next to the garage door and listened.
I still didn’t know how I was going to pay Johnno five thousand dollars in three months, and I was losing time. I had considered a loan from the bank, appealing to their patriotism by pretending I needed it to put a down payment on a house. Help a poor soldier out. Hell, I’d pretend I was married for that one thousand dollars extra a month.
I started running after her after she turned out of the driveway, toward a little playground down the street. Her words struck a note. After detoxing, it took me months to find a minimum-wage job with regular hours. Even then, it wasn’t enough to cover a life. It was half of why I enlisted. I had two years’ tuition to repay. And now I had Johnno to consider. When I caught up with Cassie, she was wiping her face, her shoulders hunched, about to get in her beat-up white Subaru.