Page 72 of Give Me Love

I narrow my eyes, likewhy is this a big deal?My chest inflates with some weird kind of hope.

Why does this make me happy?

“Maybe you didn’t then?” I say.

Her eyes bounce between mine—gray, blue, beautiful.

“Is that possible?” I ask.

“Why, though?” she says. “Why didn’t I love the man I was living with? I just never… I made him cheat.”

I laugh once. “Did that fucker tell you that?” It pisses me off more and, I swear to God, if I ever run into him again, I’ll beat his face in for making this girl think she’s the reason he couldn’t keep his dick in his pants.

She looks confused at the humor I find in this.

“A real man wouldn’t do that, and I’m not too sure he loved you as much as he makes you think he did.”

“I don’t understand,” she says as people pass by.

I reach my hands out and grab her arms, unfolding them from her and linking our fingers together. I move us to the side and look over her pretty tear-stained face, and I tell her what I witnessed growing up. “When a man loves a woman, he fights for her. He works his ass off every day to make sure she knows she’s loved even if she doesn’t do the same.” I glance down the road before looking back at her. “That wasn’t a man in love.”

Her eyes go down to our fingers. I like the feel of her skin against mine, and I want more of it. I yank a tad and wrap them around my waist. She lets me, and I hold on to her, breathing in her scent—rain showers and lavender fields.

“How do you know this?” she asks quietly, hesitantly from our embrace.

My mind thinks back on so many moments of my mom and dad. Dancing in the living room, him throwing her over his shoulder at the drug house, empty liquor bottles where he’d drunk himself to sleep because she left and he tried to fight the urge to go find her. Yelling and screaming and making up.

My parents’ love was a whirlwind that destroyed everything.

But it was love. In its truest, rawest form.

“Because I witnessed it,” I murmur.

Three people walk into the shop, and Kathrine pulls away from me. She sniffs and wipes under her eyes.

“Duty calls,” she says. “How do I look?”

“Fine,” I say.

She laughs. “Just fine? Gee, thanks.” She rolls her eyes, and there’s that pretty smile.

She starts to walk, and I grab my hat from the road before I follow. “You hanging out for a little while?” she asks as we get to the door.

“If that’s okay with you?”

She gives me a closed-lip smile. “I’d like that.”

I nod and open the door for her to go inside. “Well, after you then.” I take a seat at a table as she waits on the people, and then another woman walks in.

She’s hippie-like and holds several bags, one with a for sale sign hanging out. She looks to be struggling, so I stand. “Let me help you,” I say.

She smiles at me. “Thank you so much. I thought I had it all, but it got heavier as I walked.” She laughs, and I see Kat give us a sideways glance.

“Where are we going with this?” I ask.

“This way, please.”

I nod and follow her through the beaded curtain and down a hallway. “Really, thank you for this,” she says, looking back at me.

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