Page 62 of Dying to Meet You
“I’m going to run a few miles. You up for it?”
She thumps her tail and jumps off the couch.
I’m not convinced that Lickie would save me from a murderer, but having her at my side makes me feel less alone.
Outside, I stretch as I decide where to run. Not the Western Promenade—that’s where Tim and I used to run. Lickie and I set off in the other direction, through the city and toward the back cove.
There’s a breeze coming off the water as I curve around the peninsula, but my heart is thumping, and I’m sweating through my running shirt.
I love Portland. I don’t want to be afraid of this place. What I wouldn’t give to rewind my life ten days or so, when my biggest problem was an unexpected breakup.
By the time the light fades, I’m running toward the waterfront, where Commercial Street is humming with tourists. I need this. I need to see people whose lives aren’t a dumpster fire. I hear the sound of a bartender shaking up someone’s cocktail, and a woman’s laughter.
I don’t exactly fit in with the waterfront vibe tonight—I’m sweaty and panting like a bear—but nobody even looks my way. They’re too busy eating lobster rolls and drinking craft beer at the dockside bars. That’s the draw of Portland. It’s a working harbor, with trawlers coming into port every morning and fresh fish for sale. But it’s still cute and historical.
We’re a little smug about it, to be honest. We understand why the tourists like it here, but we roll our eyes at them just the same.
As I approach Docksiders Bar and Grill, I feel a flicker of unwelcome nostalgia. This place is where I met Harrison when I was a nineteen-year-old fool.
“We were all nineteen-year-old fools,” my therapist once said. Which is probably true, but it doesn’t make my memories any rosier.
To make things even worse, strains of “Beast of Burden” by the Stones come filtering out of the building. The song is another powerful trigger for thoughts of Harrison.
When I first met him, he was the scowling cook on the other side of the pass-through, nagging me to garnish every basket before it left the kitchen. “Hey—new girl.Gallagher.” He always used my last name, like an army drill sergeant. “Parsley. Lemon. Tartar sauce.Everytime. And when your orders are up, you need to grab them in ninety seconds or less.”
I was a little afraid of him. The hours were long, and the smell of fried clams clung to me no matter how often I washed my hair.
On the plus side, Cal—the owner—was a great guy. The tourists were generous with their tips, and there was live music most nights of the week.
The music made the job feel a little less like military duty and a little more like a party. My fourth night working at Docksiders the featured band was called Most Definitely. I thought it was a stupid name, but they sounded great.
My eyes were drawn to the bass player, and then got stuck there as he added his deep, soulful voice to the chorus. There was something familiar about him, but also something darkly appealing.
Then it finally dawned on me that the same man who swayed to the beat as if the bass were part of his body was my kitchen nemesis. And that I was staring at him with my tongue practically hanging out.
Flustered, I forgot the order I’d just taken from table ten. So I had to go back and ask again. The rest of the night went pretty much the same way, because I kept watching Harrison play when I should have been doing my job.
To this day I don’t understand it. Harrison wasn’t my type. In fact, I didn’t even have a type. I was too naïve to have refined my taste in men. But if you’d asked me what kind of guy I wanted to date, I would have pointed at one of the clean-cut boys from Chatham Prep. Someone like Hank Wincott. Or one of his nerdier friends, anyway.
But every Thursday after that—as I ferried steaming plates of fried fish and lobster rolls back and forth across the restaurant—my eyes always seemed to land on Harrison and stay there. It’s a miracle I didn’t drop half my orders, the way I used to drink him in. I liked the way he closed his eyes in the depths of a song, his forearms flexing deliciously as he played, his hips swaying.
Some of their songs required backup vocals, and those were my favorites. “Beast of Burden” quickly became my favorite song, because I could hear Harrison’s deep-voiced harmonies on the chorus. I got goose bumps every time.
It’s not like I had the guts to talk to him, though. So my crush wouldhave died a quick death if he hadn’t approached me one night after my shift. I stepped outside to drain my water bottle before heading home and found him standing on the dock. “Hey, Gallagher—cigarette?” he’d said, peeling his lithe body off the shiplap wall and offering me the pack.
“I don’t smoke,” I’d answered primly. Because I never was cool.
“Huh,” he’d said. “I’d better quit then.” He crushed the pack in his hands, as my jaw dropped. Then he hurled the pack toward the nearest wastebasket. It sailed right in, too. “Want a beer? I feel like we should get to know each other. We spend a lot of time staring at each other.”
I was too surprised to speak—stunned that he called me out for my wandering eyes, and doing so in a way that made him sound culpable, too. It was bold, but also kind.
He took my silence as a yes and reached into a little Igloo cooler at his feet, pulling a Corona out of it. He offered it, much like he’d offered the cigarettes. I hesitated, and he wiggled the bottle in my direction. “Don’t make me give up alcohol, too.”
With a laugh, I’d taken the dripping bottle from his hand. The truth was that I hated beer. I’d spent the first year of college clutching Solo cups at parties, taking only an occasional sip.
But that night the cold, bitter liquid felt different going down. It tasted like victory. The air smelled salty and brand-new, as I stood there talking with Harrison about nothing and everything. My architecture program. The Roman Colosseum. Music. His favorite bands—most of which I’d never heard.
I don’t know how long we lingered. Everyone else had trickled out and gone home by the time Harrison asked me out for dinner on my next night off. “We can stare at each other in a different restaurant,” he said, while I blushed furiously.
