Page 36 of The Burning
“You can ask Kathy to hold them for you while you look around more if you aren’t done shopping.” I pointed to the silver Airstream.
Karina looked where I was pointing, and Kathy waved. “Hey, Martin! How are you, honey?” she yelled to me.
Karina’s expression changed. She was now watching me closely and walked with me, right on my heels, as I approached Kathy, whose hair was pulled back in a ponytail, the roots gray but the tail red. Her wide eyes were colored with thick blue eyeliner and her nails were painted all different shades of the rainbow.
“I’m good. Getting some flooring and trying to head home before it gets too hot. How are you? How’s Randy?” I asked.
Kathy smiled at the mention of her husband’s name. “Yeah, it’s a hot one.” She looked up at the sky. “Randy’s good. Hasn’t changed a bit—never does. I’ll tell him you said hi.”
I got straight to the point for Karina so we could both move on with our days.
“Can my friend leave her pots here until she’s ready to load her car?” I asked.
Kathy nodded. “Of course! Why didn’t you tell me you were Martin’s friend? So nice to meet you! I would have given her a discount!” Kathy wrapped Karina in a friendly hug that I knew she would be thrown off by and definitely wouldn’t enjoy.
Karina managed a smile as she gently untangled herself in the most polite way. “Nice to meet you.”
I didn’t think Kathy noticed that Karina had moved farther away from her to avoid further physical contact, but I sure as hell did. In some ways Karina was so predictable; in others she was a complete loose cannon.
“Go ahead and leave the plants. I’ll watch ’em for you until you’re ready to leave. No problem!”
I picked the pots up and put them just behind the cash register before Karina could even think about telling me not to. An Army family approached the Airstream, checking out a row of hanging flower baskets, and Kathy excused herself to greet them by name. She was like that: she could meet someone once and remember their names, where they’re from, what they bought or eyed before.
“Thanks. You didn’t have to do that,” Karina told me, her tone clipped.
I looked up at her as she was tucking a loose piece of her light hair behind her ear. Her face was bare and a little red from the sun. She wasn’t going to look at me if her life depended on it.
I hated games, but if she wanted to play, I’d play. And to be fair, I’d started it at the hospital—she was just continuing it.
“See you around,” she said flatly. It pissed me off instantly, but I didn’t look at her as I turned my back to her and started to walk the other way. I waved my hand in the air in hopes of getting a rise out of her.
I had no reason to stay a second longer. Even if she got over me helping her brother enlist, there were too many dark corners to shine lights in when it came to the two of us. It’s not like she would ever actually be able to trust me. Not me, not anyone. I’d heard it a million times now.
I got about three steps away before she said my name, and I thought about acting like I didn’t hear it to save both of our sanities, but I couldn’t resist.
“Yeah?” I said, barely turning toward her.
Let’s get this over with, Karina. No drama.
“It’s just so weird that you’re here.” She pulled at her lips, and I dared to meet her eyes. “Are you alone?”
I nodded. Why was she asking?
She tucked her hands into the pockets of her gray cotton shorts. We stood in the grueling sun and didn’t say a word. I tried to stop myself from reading her, but I slipped and studied her expression, her nervously twitching lips. The anxiety I could feel from her was tugging at me, pulling me in.
“Areyoualone?”
Why couldn’t I walk away from her? I was a man of control; I lived for it. Yet I couldn’t just walk away from Karina.
She nodded. “Don’t you think it’s weird? That I’m here? If you come here all the time? I didn’t know that. I was just trying to get out of the cookout that Elodie invited me to, and I never really do stuff like this. You know I don’t just seek out random markets in the middle of nowhere. But I did, and here you are . . .”
What did she want from me? Some sign that I believed in fate? That her stories about the stars and the moon made destiny bring us here to make up and be together? She’d had a chance, many chances, to listen to the universe about me, but she’d run.
My instincts screamed to get the fuck away from there.
Abort the fucking mission, Martin.
Apparently, I loved wasting my time. And so did she.
