Page 7 of All The Broken Pieces: Vol. 1

Chapter 7

Vi sits across the table from me. The dark lacquered top reflects her beautiful face. Exotic. She was the hot one, I was the hippie, and Zara was country with a K. I’m not talking superficial, like women that start saying ya’ll and wear overalls. She was everything I’m not. There was a wildness in her soul that couldn’t be tamed.

We were a good balance, the three of us. I anchored Zara. Vi widened my worldviews and made the exotic appealing. Made me see how I could be so much more. And Zara gave me the courage to chase freedom. To actually have the guts to not only dream, but reach out and grab it. She had a way of making anything sound possible.

When she died, I battened the hatches, leaned hard on Zach, and waited for the hollowness in my chest to fade. When he died, I don’t know what became of me. The woman sitting in a bar on a school night is not the woman he married. It’s not Zara’s old roommate either.

Vi stares at me with those piercing dark eyes. Her hair is expanding with the evening humidity. The door to the bar is open to the street. There’s a steady hum of cars and evening air cooling the place. Some people might call it a dive, but I love it. Vi found it a few months back.

The exterior is unassuming on main street in Huntington Village. The AC is dead or never was. The light fixtures cast an amber glow. A few fixtures are original, dating back a hundred years. The bar is from the same era—the roaring 20’s. Its massive mahogany wood is gleaming, set across the room from us. There’s a spattering of tiny cast iron tables with velvet tufted seats that surround the bar with matching cheater booths lining the walls. Curtains and all. A blue and white art deco tiled floor is original and runs right up to the brass footrest that lines the wooden bar.

Three local guys with white t-shirts clinging to their skin wear vintage high waisted pants and play live music from the era, mostly jazz. It’s strange, what a couple of brass players and a bass can do. The place hums. It’s as if it’s alive, breathing across the century, telling the tale of women who came before me. Sat in my seat. Got hammered by life. And lived on.

The music makes my body sway. Or maybe that’s the drink. Jack. Ice. Nothing fancy. I’ve been holding the whiskey glass halfway to my lips and staring at the trumpet player. He’s got dark hair that’s slicked back with sweat. His shirt clings to his body as he plays, eyes closed, his body moving to the music.

There are couples pressed together on the dance floor, moving their feet in sync with the music—doing dances that are beyond me. There’s one couple, a guy with a familiar face with dark hair that he keeps pushing out of his eyes. His piercing blue gaze sparkles when it meets his dance partner’s. Her long curls swirl as he whips her around and then yanks her back, quickly. If it wasn’t this dive, I’d swear that was one of the Ferro guys. The older two look alike. I’d think they were twins if I didn’t know better. But this can’t be him. Why would he be here in this dive?

Vi’s thick accent finally cuts through my thick thoughts of the rich and famous when her pointy toed stiletto meets my shin. “Hello-o. I’m talking to you.” Her dark brows shoot up her face impatiently. “I know something rattled you today. Talk.” That word sounds like it has a few W’s in it. Tawwk.

Sighing, I place the glass on the table. My eyes shift between the musician and Vi. “There’s nothing to talk about.”

“Bull. Shit.” Her red nails gleam in the dim light. She’s always polished. Looks perfect on the outside. Inside is a hot mess. Not that I’m judging, because I’m not. She was in the car with Zara when she died. Vi blames herself even though it wasn’t her fault. At all.

“Seriously. It’s nothing. The same old crap. I had to post the Spring event. I scrolled.”

Her eyes grow large. This isn’t the first time I looked at Facebook since the funeral, but every time I do it results in days of tears and an emotional tidal wave that crushes me flat. Vi spits out, “You didn’t.”

“I did.” Except I’m not flat this time. I’m still upright and breathing in a bar. “And it’s still the same. Everyone is still dead. I’m here. You’re here. I’m a bitch. You’re crazy. And that sums things up.” I’m lifting my glass to my lips when she snatches it away.

She snaps her long-tapered fingers at the waiter. “Coffee, please. Now.” She redirects her gaze at me. “You’ve got to pull yourself together.”

I snort. “Look who’s talking. You think you can see ghosts.”

She stiffens, her spine going ramrod straight. “I can. And since when did you get all judgey?”

The waiter places a white coffee cup in front of me and fills it with steaming black liquid. The scent hits me hard. Memories of lost laughter bounce inside my skull. When we were in college, the three of us would stay up all night, drinking coffee at this little shop that was on a street in the Village. It’s gone now, but the memories remain. They cling to life no matter how hard I try to let the past die.

Disgusted, I push it away. “I’m not. It’s just that—” I break off. It’s not the lump in my throat, because it’s not there. I feel dead inside. It shocks me that the music can penetrate my mood. That I feel the rhythmic hum despite myself.

Vi tilts her head to the side. “It’s just that what?”

“Years have passed. I feel like my entire life has ghosted out. It’s not there anymore, but I’m still here.” I’m staring at the mirror behind the bar while I speak, unable to meet her gaze. “Still here, but not.”

“Out of all people, don’t you think I know how that feels? I lost them too.”

My gaze flicks to hers. It’s mean, but I say it anyway, “He wasn’t your husband. I don’t even know if he was mine. That trip. It was so last second. It felt, I don’t know. I shouldn’t have pushed him to do something. Zara was fate, but Zach was on me.”

Vi chokes, slams her glass down, and gets this possessed look in her eye. “That was not your fault.”

“Everyone said it was.” I reach for my glass of whiskey and she doesn’t stop me. “It’s that time of year again, which means the story is going to run.”

“Jesus Christ, is that what has you twisted up?” Her anger turns, juts out at press that aren’t here. “They’re bullshit stories from hack reporters. Besides! No one believes that.”

The newspapers say I killed Zach. They present a different angle each year. Once they even had proof of the murder weapon that I’d tossed into the sea. I murmur, “My students see it. They call me—”

“I know what they call you. I work there too. Have you heard what they say about me?” She presses her hand to her chest before flicking her wrist away from her body, fingers spread wide with irritation. “Fuck it. I can’t talk to you when you’re like this.” She stands, opens her purse and digs a few bills out. Throws them on the table.

The urge to tell her about the picture overwhelms me. It’s the reason for my foul mood. The reason why I don’t want to go home. It’s too hard not to sit down in front of the computer and look for it. “Vi, wait.”