I walk forward and gently tug at my dress, enjoying the feel of the weight in my hand instead of thinking on the ever-present weight in my heart. Cool air slips over my skin as I enter the ballroom where everyone who is anyone in American politics is milling about, reaching for their champagne, hors d’oeuvres and perpetually out of reach moral compass. That’s a lie. They aren’t reaching for their moral compass, they chucked the damned thing right out of the window when they entered this business, just like I did. Difference between them and me is I miss its guiding presence in my life and am actively seeking it. They rub all the right elbows and cultivate all the most beneficial connections to have. Security here tonight is so tight the room practically squeaks under the heaviness of all the pretension milling about. I peer around and marvel at how this scene used to impress and excite me. Now it’s a cringe-inducing reminder of the woman I am trying very hard to recover from being.
I never meant to become that woman.
Glancing around, I begin looking for the table I’m assigned to. I wind my way through the crowd, praying Bethany was correct when she had relayed who I’d be stuck chatting with for the duration of the night, “No one particularly significant” to me, she’d said. Thank God. I’m in no mental state to be stuck wearing my campaign manager hat tonight. Navigating through a sea of tuxedos and silk, sequins and chiffon I hear a familiar voice.
“No,” I gasp quietly.
It’s not the familiar voice of a colleague or a politician I know. It’s familiar like the ache in my chest. It’s familiar like cruel reality and a painful past that refuses to change of its own accord. It’s familiar like stolen kisses and young love from some time ago in what seems like another life. History, yes, but not forgotten. Not even close.
Never.
I would know. I’ve tried. This voice has the telling, lilting accent uniquely Louisianan and belongs to the only man on the planet I have ever fallen wholly and devastatingly in love with. The way he talks—it’s as though he is hiding a laugh in a conversation. He’s always just waiting for the opportunity to laugh that way that makes my cheeks hurt, my belly cramp and the hairs on my neck stand on end. He’s infectious, magnetic. It’s only unfair he isn’t laughing all the time. I think the world would be better for it if he did. And he’s been irksomely alluring this way for his whole life.
“Sylas,” I whisper to myself.
My heart had convinced me it was unlikely he would be here tonight but when I saw him interviewed on a cable news program, my brain warned me he very likely would be here, particularly given the fact that he’s a wounded vet who now runs a very successful nonprofit. Since I last saw him, BCF has taken off and expanded their services and locations. Sy must be so pleased. He sounds so happy, looks so happy too.
That’s what his work does for him and it has shifted into high gear in terms of reputation and popularity. What’s more is I had in fact helped this turn of events along, though no one knows. I had no role in his being invited tonight but I had pulled strings, mentioned his charity to multiple politicians and encouraged folks on the hill to take note and hopefully a vested interest in his worthy cause if for no other reason than to build on their own public image. No one will ever know about any of my behind-the-scenes efforts though. His work is growing, his name becoming known, his story being told as I knew it would even if I had not injected his reputation with growth hormone. Couple his charity work, and his history, with the fact he’s incredibly easy on the eyes and it comes as no surprise he has recently been featured on cable news multiple times following a Twitter mention and hefty donation by Congressman Travan. I watch all news networks on a split screen in my office, keeping them on mute unless something or someone catches my eye and less than a week ago, he had certainly caught my eye on screen, charming the panel of journalists he’d been chatting with on the show while discussing his work and how it all came about. He was so at ease, so authentic, so himself.
So over me.
I can’t say I blame him. It was by design of course. None of this knowledge warms my bed at night though. Knowing my culpability in the state of my relationship—or lack thereof—with him doesn’t make the chasm in me less sizable.
I’m slightly squished between two collections of people chatting so I twist my torso to look behind me. I know I shouldn’t. I know that for the sake of self-preservation I should move my ass right along to hide at my table until this event is well and over and I can make a discrete exit. I’ve been accused of lots in my adult life but being the poster girl for self-love isn’t one of them. So I turn, I watch. I’m not certain how long I stand here staring at him and the woman on his arm but as though he has sensed me looking on, his warm, rich, honey-brown gaze swivels my direction and everything stops. My breathing, my heart, the world.
His eyebrows furrow then smooth out chased away by a soft smile I’ve known nearly all my life.
I can’t breathe. Breathe!
Instantly my fingers begin fidgeting the way they do when I’m truly off kilter and full of anxiety. I watch him disentangle himself from the conversation he was having with people I don’t bother to place. He makes easy, smooth strides toward me while I make hard work of just breathing. “Hey you!” I say, greeting him warmly, as though my whole heart isn’t composed of dust blowing around the dry plains inside my chest.
“Raegan,” he sighs. “Good to see you,” he nods and side hugs me—side hugs me! It’s a gesture that causes a deep fissure in my soul to form. Or maybe it had already been there but simply overlooked given the multitude of crags and cracks and broken bits there. I imagine the place looks like mars by now. Cold, dusty, arid, desolate, devoid of all signs of life. Only eleven months ago things were far different and side hugs were decidedly off the table. “I wondered if I’d see you here but I hadn’t heard anything from your momma or mine about you bein’ here tonight.”
“Yeah, I’m sure my mom didn’t know,” I somehow manage to explain without crumpling right in front of him and his rudely gorgeous date. “I check in once a week or so and I try to avoid talking about work,” I go on, wrinkling my nose. “I had no idea you would be here tonight!”
I haven’t stalked your nonprofit’s social media pages in several weeks though. Small victories. I keep that bit to myself though.
“Yeah, definitely not in Kansas anymore.”
“Or the swamp as it were,” the blonde on his arm adds flirtatiously and it makes the jealous woman inside reach for her knife.
“Oh, trust me you’re definitely still in the swamp just a different variety.”
They nod and an awkward silence settles over the three of us. I clear my throat and move things along, both eager to escape and linger in his presence. “You two came on behalf of your nonprofit, right?” I ask careful, to not sound as though I’m begging him to dispel any notions of the woman on his arm being his girlfriend or worse…
Fiancé? Wife?
“I’m being rude. Raegan this is Christine. Chris this is Raegan. We grew up together,” he smiles and explains to her.
Raegan? Chris? We grew up together? Our history summed up in four unimpressive words. And since when does he refer to me as Raegan and not just Rae? And Christine is Chris? He didn’t even answer my question. Ouch.