Of course, that time we had someone else with us, so we weren’t alone.
Gloria.
Fuck.
I realize my mistake as we stand there, Colt holding onto the door and catching his breath again. Why the fuck did I bring him here?
He said he wanted to catch up, and I thought of this place, a cool spot to show him, the quietest place I knew in the neighborhood. It seemed like a good idea in the moment, showing him something familiar from our past but a million times better, like everything in New York is better than fucking Arkansas. We can talk up here without having to yell in a noisy, crowded restaurant.
If we went to a quiet one, we’d still have servers interrupting us and then wanting us to leave so they can seat their next guests. That’s if things go well. If they don’t, and we decide this is all a huge mistake, we’re not locked in for a meal.
That was the real draw, I have to admit. We can stay as long, or as short, as we want. There’s no closing time up here.
But now that we’re here, I wish there were. That there was something to stop me if I can’t handle this, if I start to make a mistake. That someone would interrupt, and I could choose that as a good time to stand up and leave, even if the meal isn’t done.
“Can I close this?” Colt asks, gesturing at the door. “Or will we get locked up here and have to choose between slowly freezing to death or jumping?”
“You can close it,” I say. “It won’t lock.”
He lets it close, but he tests it anyway, as if to make sure I’m not lying when it’s too late to do anything about it if I am. I’m not sure I’d trust him that far, and he’s never really done anything to make me think I can’t. I’m the one who hurt him all those times.
At least physically, I did all the damage.
“God, I need a cigarette now,” he says, chuckling to himself at the irony. He goes to the edge and looks out over the city below.
I join him at the low railing around the top of the building. It’s nowhere near the highest building in the city, but it doesn’t need to be. The view is spectacular, from the street lit up with cars below to the sprawling urban cityscape twinkling like a hundred million Christmas lights.
“Pretty cool, huh?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says, shifting his weight in my direction. “Really fucking cool.”
We stand there for a minute, just looking out on the view under the clear, cold night sky.
“I didn’t know you could see stars in the city,” he says, tilting his head up. “I always heard you couldn’t.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Sometimes more than others. Want to sit?”
I go and get the waterproof picnic blanket I stash up here and lay it out. It’s not thick enough for warmth or padding, butit’s better than nothing. I lay it at the edge, and Colt sits down on it, resting his shoulder against the railing.
“You quit?” he asks, pulling out his cigarettes. “Will it bother you if I smoke?”
“No,” I say. “I only quit a couple years ago. In fact, give me one.”
“You sure?” he asks, his brows rising.
“Yeah,” I say. “For old time’s sake.”
“For old time’s sake,” he echoes, then slides a cigarette from the pack. He tucks it between his lips and pulls out a pack of matches to light. I watch the flame flare and die in the wind, then another, then another.
Finally, I scoot close and cup my hands around the flame for him. Some dumb part of me wonders if he did that on purpose, but then I remind myself that he was the one who always rejected me. Just because he followed me up here doesn’t mean anything. Last I heard, he was still with Gloria.
“What happened to the old Zippo?” I ask when he finally gets his cigarette lit and leans back.
“Apparently matches are cool again.”
“Who told you that?”
“My job,” he says, smiling. “I work for a distribution company. Lame, I know. You can laugh.”
