In the Unlikely Event

by L.J. Shen

I’ve never seen someone like him before. He is beautiful, true, but that’s not what stands out to me. He is radiant.

This guy can move me without touching me, and touch me without laying a finger on me.

He raises his aviators and flashes me a smile that can hold up the entire universe with its magnitude.

“You burn under my fingertips, Rory. How do I give you up?”

Life is too short not to kiss the one you want.

“The second part of my name—Doherty—means unlucky. Yet, Mam claims the luck of the Irish is with me.” “So why is this part not ironic anymore?” I ask. “Because I don’t feel so unlucky right now.” He moves his eyes from the road, his gaze finding mine.

I hate that he’s smiling. I hate that his smile makes every inch of my flesh tingle. But most of all, I hate that he illuminates all my senses, like a drug, and soon, I’ll have to quit him.

“Have you ever been in love?” I lick my lips. “Ask me that question tomorrow before you go.

“Just admit that I can kill you, too,” he says from across the room now, both of us lying on the floor, staring at the ceiling. “Why?” “Because you’re stealing my breath, so you’re already halfway there with the killing part.”

“Stay, Rory. It’s kismet. Tell me you didn’t notice the rain stopped when we kissed yesterday.”

“It’s not the right time to be together, I agree. But if we meet again, under any circumstances, any time in the future, we’re making this work, Rory. Feck spouses. Feck boyfriends and girlfriends. Feck the world. If kismet happens, we are letting it happen, no matter what, you hear?”

Yes, I kept things from Aurora. But she went the extra mile and ripped things from me.

I had the luxury of spotting her as soon as I walked through the doors this evening. I needn’t a single glance to recognize her. She is, after all, tattooed in my mind, permanent and painful.

“Napkins.” I look up, musing. One word. Five tons of history crammed into it.

Her eyes are on my face, reminding me why I couldn’t let go, even when my entire world crumbled. Some people raise you up, and some people pull you down. And Rory? She pulls me in every possible direction and angle, leaving me tattered.

“Surrender,” I whisper. “I want us to surrender to this, Rory, like you promised all those years ago.”

The napkin didn’t mean nothing. It meant everything.

Loving someone is willingly accepting that they can destroy you.

“What do you care about, then, Malachy Doherty?” He smiles, takes my hands in his, and kisses my knuckles, his purple, magnificent eyes still trained on mine. “You.”

“Mal,” I breathe. He slowly looks up. I see bad things have already slipped into his broken interior. “Have you ever been in love?” I ask. A huge smile breaks on his face. It is true and big and real, and it can keep me burning forever. I know as long as I see this smile every day, I will never be cold. “Funny you should ask. Yes, yes, I have been. I still am. It started eight years ago, in the most unlikely event, and it has no expiration date.”

I’m not stupid. I knew from the get-go this had a very low percent chance of ever working out. Still. Still. You fall in love with a girl named after two Disney princesses, and you believe in the unbelievable, because…well, Disney and shit.