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Monday Puzzler
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Monday Puzzler for July 23: Oh, No! They Didn’t Do That, Did They?
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Everything was packed. heroine walked around the cabin, double-checking and looking for any reason not to get in the car and go. But her things were all stowed in her luggage, which was stacked by the door.
“I guess even though you won’t be here all day,” hero said, hovering and looking as miserable as she felt, “you should probably get to ask me another question. I’ve kinda lost track.”
So had she because, during the idyllic and slightly surreal past few days, her old life—no, her real life, dammit—had seemed to fade away. “I think I’ve got everything I need. There’s really nothing left to ask about that fits within the parameters you set.”
As she’d no doubt hear about within two minutes of her piece crossing boss’s desk. Then again, the woman was such a mad fangirl of hero’s, maybe she would find it fascinating he put mayonnaise on his hot dogs.
“Time for my question then, huh?”
“Yes, and it’s your final shot, so make it a good one.”
She braced herself for some outrageous question. Had she ever masturbated in public, or some such ridiculousness. Even hero would have to think hard to top whether or not she’d ever faked an orgasm, or if she’d pretended past bedmates were him.
But there was no smile, no dimples. “Would you stay if I asked you to?”
Heroine felt as if the air had been sucked, if not from the entire room, at least from her lungs. “I don’t… What?”
“I’m asking you to come home and give us a chance, babe. A second chance.”
“My home is in California,” she said in reflex, without thinking first.
Hero sighed and leaned against the bunk bed frame. “Your job is in California. You have a residence there. But the people who love you are here.”
People like him? If he was trying to get away with confessing his love without actually saying the words, she wouldn’t let him weasel out of it. And, honestly, even if he said those three small and scary words out loud, would it make a difference? Could it?
“There are a ton of newspapers and magazines out of Boston, you know.”
“And you can sit in front of your computer anywhere. If you’re so sure we have a future, why can’t you move to Los Angeles?”
The depth of sorrow in his eyes widened the crack in her breaking heart. “I can’t be that far from my family. I love you. There, I said it. I love you, but I can’t move to California.”
I love you, but… heroine took a deep breath, then stared down at her hands. “And I think I might be in love with you, too, but I can’t walk away from the woman I worked my ass off becoming.” Heroine was amazed the words coming out of her mouth sounded like those of a reasonably rational adult, while inside she was a teenager again, sobbing into her stuffed animals while Lisa Lisa sang about being all cried out. Even though heroine had done the leaving, she’d thought at the time she’d never be all cried out.
“Well,” hero said in a flat voice, pushing away from the bunks, “at least this time I asked you to stay.”
“And I asked you to go with me.” In an effort to keep the impending tears at bay, she double-checked the bags waiting to be carried to her midget rental.
“Heroine.” Hero grabbed her wrist and didn’t let go until she looked him in the eye. “I don’t think we have a future. I know we do. I want to marry you and have kids and be a stay-at-home writer dad while you take Boston journalism by storm. I want to wake up beside you every day for the rest of my life.”
The tears broke through her will and flowed over her cheeks. Being Mrs. Hero and so-and-so’s mom and babe didn’t sound as bad as it had almost twenty years ago. But she wasn’t sure she was done with being Heroine yet. She hadn’t been faced with a choice this confusing and potentially devastating since the last time she’d left hero. And the worst part was not having the slightest clue whether or not she’d made the right choice then. If she hadn’t, wouldn’t she be an idiot to make the same mistake again? But she’d been pretty happy, more or less, in California, right up until she’d been tossed unceremoniously back into the bosom of the hero's family. So how wrong could it have been?
Her temples started throbbing and heroine buried her face in her hands, maybe to stem the tears, or maybe to block out the kicked-puppy look in hero’s eyes.
“I’ll put your bags in the car,” he finally said, and the moment for choices seemed to have passed. “You should dry your eyes and then say goodbye to the family. . . .”
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It took her three tries to fasten her seat belt and it was a miracle she kept the car on the road, because she couldn’t see a damn thing through the tears.
It would pass, she tried to tell herself. Just as it had before. Once she was back in her chic apartment with a spa day behind her and a promotion ahead of her, the pain would fade into slight, nostalgic longing.
She hoped.
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Finally the hero's family's debris had been stowed or tossed away, and there was nothing left to do but leave behind the place hero had just spent the happiest two weeks of his life.