A Clean Slate. Laura Caldwell

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СКАЧАТЬ dog shaking water off its coat, the gesture he made when he was trying to clear his brain of something he couldn’t make sense of.

      “Jeez.” He stared at my hair, my face, my clothes. “What…ah…what happened to you?”

      He made it sound as if I’d been mauled by wild dogs.

      “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean it like that. You just look so different, especially from this morning.”

      Was it only that morning that I’d stood in front of his apartment, frenetically pushing the buzzer?

      “You look great, though.” His words came fast now, almost tripping over themselves. “You look better and beautiful, and I’m glad to see it, and—”

      Just then the woman I assumed to be Therese wedged herself into our conversation and cast a look of disdain at me, then one at Ben for good measure.

      “Hi,” I said, as politely as possible. “I’m Kelly.”

      “I know who you are.” She raked her hands through her sandy, streaked hair and shot me an expression of pure disgust.

      I felt myself falter. It had been such a shock to be so close to Ben that I’d forgotten for a second that I’d met this woman sometime over the last five months while I was hounding her boyfriend.

      “I need to use the powder room,” Laney said in a too loud voice. “Kell?”

      “Sure,” I said, grateful beyond belief.

      “Are you all right?” Laney asked once we were in the safe confines of the tiny pink bathroom. She gripped my shoulders and peered at my face.

      “I was just surprised, that’s all.” It was true, and I was also surprised to find that I didn’t feel like falling apart. I didn’t feel like crying or shrieking. I had just been so startled to see him, the guy whose kids I thought I’d have, whose underwear I thought I’d wash for the rest of my life. How strange it was to have known him so intimately—to know the way he squeezed his toothpaste tube into a triangular roll and the way he liked to have his forehead rubbed when he had a headache—and yet not to have a relationship with him anymore.

      Laney hugged me, then proceeded to give me a rousing pep talk about not letting him get to me, how I was gorgeous and smart and starting a new chapter in my life that didn’t involve him.

      By the time we made it back to the bar, I was better. We ordered another round, and I was just starting to enjoy a chat with Jess about their honeymoon plans when Ben interrupted.

      “Can I have a second?” He shot me his meaningful look, the one he’d probably given me on my birthday before he’d handed me my walking papers instead of a diamond solitaire.

      Jess patted me on the shoulder as if to say good luck, then left us alone.

      “So.” Ben looked me up and down again. “You must have had some day.”

      “A great day, actually. A little shopping with Laney.”

      “And a new haircut.”

      I said nothing. Did he really want to talk about my hair?

      “You really look amazing.”

      “Thanks.” I hated myself for being flattered.

      “Well, anyway,” he said, with another doggy shake of his head, “Therese asked me to speak to you about today.”

      I looked over my shoulder at his girlfriend who was pretending to be engrossed in a conversation with Steve, but I could sense her antennae pointed in our direction. “Yeah, I’m sorry about that.”

      “This coming over to my place really has to stop.”

      “I know. It’s done. It won’t happen again.”

      He gave me a look of patent disbelief. “Seriously, Kell, Therese is getting upset. This can’t keep happening.”

      His mouth continued to move, talking on and on about how poor little Therese could barely sleep, how I needed to get on with my life, et cetera. The more he talked, the more I wanted to laugh, because right then the thought of waiting for Ben at work or calling him repeatedly or buzzing his apartment was ludicrous to me. He’d dumped me, the asshole, and although I still had a hard time wrapping my mind around that, I wasn’t stalker material. I couldn’t believe I’d ever gotten close to it.

      Finally I interrupted him, putting a hand on his arm. “I can’t even remember doing those things you’re talking about, but I promise you, it won’t ever happen again. I’ve had a little memory problem….” I let my words trail off, suddenly unsure whether I wanted to admit to anyone other than Laney my loss of memory. Would people think me crazy? Was I crazy?

      “What are you talking about?” He actually looked concerned, his gray-brown eyes worried and blinking, and that expression got to me. I found myself telling him the whole story of my day, explaining that I had no recollection of us breaking up or the way I’d been unwilling to let him go.

      “Are you joking?” he asked a few times, his eyes skeptical now, as if this might be another one of my crafty ploys to get him back.

      “It’s true. I can’t remember my birthday or anything after that until today. But I feel okay.”

      “Well, shouldn’t you go to a doctor or something? Get yourself checked out?”

      I made a show of holding out my arms, looking down at my legs. “Everything else is intact, so…” I shrugged.

      “I don’t know.” He fingered the dark-brown freckle on his right cheekbone. That freckle had always made him self-conscious, because it resembled a speck of dirt, and people were forever telling him he had something on his face. But I used to love that spot. I’d kiss it whenever he walked in my door.

      “You do look good.” His eyes trailed over me again.

      I wanted to make a snappy retort, something like Yes, I look damn good and you’re not getting any of it, but I kept quiet.

      “So how’s Bartley Brothers?” I didn’t want to talk about us or my memory any longer, but wanted to occupy Ben for a while, just to piss off Therese. “How’s Attila?”

      “Demoted. He’s pushing paper,” Ben said.

      “No!”

      Ben nodded. “Lots of people are getting moved around or let go.”

      “Yeah, so I heard.”

      “Well, obviously. You’d know that since you…”

      “Got fired.”

      “Right.”

      There was an uncomfortable pause.

      “So tell me what happened to Attila,” I said.

      Ben launched into a story about Attila being investigated for insider information right around the time of the budget cuts. From there, our conversation СКАЧАТЬ