Jen Safrey - Ticket To Love

“I think it would be better if you came in and let me give you a new bag.”

“Oh, no, I couldn’t put you out again.” She seemed more flustered than she ought to.

“You’re right,” Harry said. “The best thing for you to do, obviously, would be to gather up all your groceries in your arms and just go on home. Here you go. Can you put this mac-n-cheese in your purse? And you can probably fit this in the pocket of your shorts.”

Acey laughed. “If you try to slide that banana in my pocket, you’ll be seeing me in court, cowboy.”

Harry was mortified. “I didn’t mean that as a—as a, you know…”

“Hey, I know,” Acey said. “I’m just teasing you. You’re right. I can’t really walk home like this. I’ll make it quick.”

“Don’t,” Harry said, but changed it quickly to, “I mean, you don’t have to.”

He led her up to his apartment for the second time in their brief acquaintance. They had just finished piling groceries on his kitchen table when a clap of thunder crashed, so loud that her hands flew to her ears. Then she checked around the room. “God, I thought that hit us.”

He liked the way she said “us.”

Then, as if from a giant overturned bucket, rain dumped down, pouring over the windowsills. Harry jumped to close a window and Acey closed the other one while the drops slammed into the glass like BB-gun pellets. Harry said, “I can’t let you go out in this. I hope you don’t have anywhere you need to be.”

“No, it’s my day off.”

“That doesn’t seem too unusual for a Saturday.”

“It is where I work.” Acey sank to the floor and crossed her legs lotus-style. “Saturday’s busy from dawn till dusk. I’ve been there five years, and I finally got the seniority for Saturdays off.”

“Where’s this?”

“Focaccia’s.”

“Oh, up the street? The pizza place? I haven’t tried it yet.”

“You’ve been here a few months and you haven’t been there yet? What’s your problem?”

Harry laughed. Acey was so in-your-face—so open and honest. “I’ve been eating tons of sandwiches. Heros, that is. I guess I never was much of a pizza person.”

“Who’s not a pizza person?”

Harry shrugged.

“Come by and order a large pie with everything,” Acey continued, “and I guarantee you will become a pizza person after the first bite.”

“Does your boss pay you for advertising like this?”

“It’s not advertising, it’s just the truth. It’s the best in New York.”

Harry thought that even if Acey had said it was terrible pizza, the worst ever, he would still have planned a trip there. Purely for the service.

The two fell silent for another few minutes. Harry was the sort to enjoy companionable quiet but it seemed his talkative guest might not be, so he said, “Would you like some music?”

Acey brightened. “That would be great.” Then she frowned. “Oh, but not if you’re going to put on some twangy country stuff. I can’t stand it.”

Harry walked to the stereo and flipped through his CD collection. “Were you born here, Acey?”

“Born in Queens, then my family moved a whopping ten miles to Valley Stream when I was about four.”

“So then, what does a city slicker like you know about country music?”

“Loads.”

“Uh-huh.” He paused. “Y’all watched Urban Cowboy a couple of times and that’s it. Am I right?”

Acey looked guilty. “Okay,” she admitted. “But how much do I have to hear to know I don’t like it?”

“I’ll tell you a secret,” Harry said, sliding a CD in and pressing Play. “I don’t like country music, either.” The first chords of a Bruce Springsteen hit filled the room.

Acey grinned. “Now that’s more like it, cowboy.” She looked down at his boots. “That is some secret. I bet you’d have to turn those boots over to the Texas authorities if I ratted you out.”

“I trust you.”

“Mistake number one.” She laughed. “Actually, I’m joking. I’m good with secrets. Got any others you’d like to spill while you’re at it?”

Was it his imagination, or did she look as if she really knew something? Could she know him? No, he wasn’t nationwide famous. He’d just been locally famous back home. But her teasing tone had an undercurrent of something. “Nope,” he told her. “My life—as it is now—is an open book.”

“My younger sister writes books.”

“Really?” Harry sat down on the floor also, leaning his back against the sofa. “Have I heard of her?”

“No. She hasn’t sold one yet. But she’s really good. She writes mysteries. It’s only a matter of time before everyone knows the name Stephanie Corelli. Then we can move into a bigger place. Or she can just buy me my own.” Acey grinned.

“You live together?”

“Yes. Sisters and roomies. She was my only roommate my whole life, actually. I went to community college, and when I was…done, we moved out of our parents’ house.”

He noticed her hesitation, but didn’t comment. “You’re very close, then.”

“Yeah. It was just the two of us growing up. What about you? Any brothers or sisters?”

“Two younger sisters. They’re in Texas, along with everyone else in my family.” Harry stopped. He didn’t want to get into this topic, get into how his sisters thought he was crazy to leave Texas, how his parents insisted he was not in his right mind, and how he’d yelled back that for the first time in his life, he was.

Acey waited. Harry supposed she wasn’t used to conversation with someone like him. Most of the people around here talked like she did, fast and loud and boisterous. It made Harry hyperaware of how he thought out every sentence before he spoke. It wasn’t a Southern thing, either—it was a conscious effort to be more deliberate in word and action. He opened his mouth, but was interrupted by another bone-cracking thunderclap.

Acey stuck her fingers in her ears again for a moment, then said, “I hate thunderstorms.”

Harry got halfway up, snapped on a lamp next to the sofa and sank back down. “Didn’t your parents tell you it was God moving the furniture?” That was the line he remembered from one of his well-meaning nannies.

“They tried to sell me some story like that but I didn’t buy it. So Dad got me this book on weather, and I looked it up. I still have to tell myself every time that it’s just this big sound of a shock wave made when air is compressed around the lightning. Knowing how it happens makes me feel a little less scared.”

“Sounds like your Dad knew what a clever kid he had.”

“I think he hoped I would turn out to be something. I did always have big dreams and intentions, but I have a problem with follow-through. That’s what Steph says.”

“What does Acey say?”

“Acey says, got anything to drink?”

“I know a subject change when I hear it. What’s your poison? Soda? Beer?”

“A beer would be excellent.”

Harry went into the kitchen, opened two bottles and brought them back into the living room, where Acey was staring out at the rain. Harry handed her a bottle and clinked his with hers. “To skinned knees.”

“And Southern hospitality,” she said. They both tilted their heads back and drank. “So,” Acey said. “Somehow you know about my job, my sister and one dumb hang-up I have. Start talking.”

“Oh, is it my turn now?”

Acey made a horrified face.

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding. I like listening to you. You’re funny. In a good way,” he said, as Acey raised her bottle threateningly.

“At least tell me about your job. Is it freelance?”

“Yes, I’ve done a few projects now, most of them successful.”

“What are you working on today?”