Demanding Ransom (35 page)

“Yeah,”
I mutter. “You must.” I pull away slightly.

“Hey.”
Ran wraps his other hand around my wrist. His voice and eyes are soft. “Listen.
I’m sorry. That’s gotta be really weird.”

I stare
up at him, the flashing lights blinding me.

“I’m sorry
if I said something I shouldn’t have.” His hand still holds mine. “I’m just
trying to put pieces together, you know?” The pad of his thumb runs circles
across my wrist. “And it felt like you were a pretty big piece.” Crimson sweeps
onto my face and I turn my head so he doesn’t see it. It’s hard to hide from
someone when every part of you is trembling up against them. “Maybe that was
just wishful thinking.”

“Yeah.”

We don’t
talk for the next few songs and I think my last statement, even though it was just
one word, is replaying in Ran’s head because every once in a while he’ll look
down at me with this pained expression, like I’ve taken something from him by
saying it. Like I’ve shattered some dream. I wish I could tell him just how
much was actually taken, but I can’t. I can’t go down this road with him.
Perfection can’t be recreated, and that’s what my time with Ran was. Perfect.

The club
is at full occupancy, which forces Ran and I even closer, to the point where I
don’t even have the space necessary to look up at him, and instead have to rest
my head on his chest, sandwiched up against him. The lull of his heart in my
ear, the damp sweat from his shirt on my cheek, and the way his minty breath
smells as he exhales into my hair makes every part of me ache. It’s odd that so
many sensations that should be incredible on their own can combine together to
feel torturous. Because that’s what this is. Torture. Being so close to Ran,
knowing he still has a glimmer of feeling for me, and knowing that it’s something
I’ll never get to experience again produces a gaping hole inside my chest. Like
there was an exact spot that he’d filled up and now it’s been torn out of it,
leaving a ragged emptiness in its place. I know I’d corrected him when he said
there was a Maggie-shaped void before, but I take that back now. There’s a part
of my life that once existed just for Ran, and now that’s missing, and it hurts
like hell.

“Hey.” I
feel the cool rush whispered against my forehead. “Want to get out of here?”

More
than anything.

“No,” I
say, “I can’t. I’m Trav’s designated driver.”

Ran
glances across the room. “If I can find someone sober to drive him, will you
change your mind?”

“I don’t
know—”

“Hey,
Anthony!” Ran waves a hand above the crowd and locks eyes with a skinny guy
sporting a black beanie and a white tank. He gives Ran a swift nod and weaves
toward us through the bodies pulsing to the music.

“What’s
up?” He nods again, that casual greeting that guys always do. I remember a time
when Cora and I talked about how weird it was that guys greet one another like
this, when girls often squeal and hug instead. I tried the chin-lift, head-nod
thing a few times, and it’s definitely reserved for the boys. I can’t pull it
off. “You need something?” Anthony takes a sip from his cup, and it looks like
soda.

“You
been drinking?”

“Nah,
not tonight. Got a big midterm tomorrow. Need a ride?”

“Yeah,
but not for me.” Ran holds out a hand and I pull Trav’s key from its storage
spot in my skirt pocket. It’s odd that something as skimpy as this would even
have pockets. “Make sure Trav gets home okay?”

Anthony
nods and takes another swig.

“You can
put your bike in the back,” Ran instructs. “But I’ll need to borrow your
helmet.” He smirks my direction and my heart crashes wildly within me.

“I don’t
ride,” I yell over the noise, but Ran pretends not to hear me, so I say it
again. “I don’t ride motorcycles, Ran.”

“Yeah,”
he says, his crystal eyes taunting me. “I remember.”

“What
else do you remember?” I’m shouting now, and the music in the club is at max
volume, making it difficult to hear and think.

“Why
don’t you spend a little more time with me and you can find out?”

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN

I lower
down in my seat and cup my hands around the warm mug. The steam tickles my nose
as I draw in a slow sip of the hot chocolate. Ran’s been looking at me for
several minutes without speaking. The fire stretching out of the logs in the
fireplace behind him flickers and creates an orange backdrop against his frame.

“Thank
you for letting me get out of there.” Ran’s lips press to the rim of his coffee
cup. “That’s not really my thing.”

I take
another hot sip. I don’t know how he can say it isn’t his thing, when
everything about the way his body moved clearly indicated that it should
totally
be his thing.

“Why
would they plan that for you then?” I ask, trying not to think about his
dancing skills. “Isn’t tonight supposed to be a celebration of you going back
to work?”

Ran
drags his hand across his brow and my eyes pull to the faint, white scar that
creates a one-inch long divot on his forehead. His bruises are gone. His arm is
out of its sling. Everything looks healed, restored. The outside shell is
near-perfect, never giving away his life-threatening accident. The accident
where he fell asleep while transporting my little sister to the med center for
fluids. The accident that occurred because he stayed up all night with her,
comforting her as her tiny body retched and purged. The accident that happened
because Ran, a stranger, took on the duties that belonged to my
mother—the mother who was too drunk to be bothered with her sick child.
The accident that caused Ran’s blunt head trauma and stole away two months of
his life. My sister got her fluids. She healed. Ran got a helicopter ride, a
one-month stay in the hospital, and a hole in the plot of his life’s story. It
doesn’t seem like a fair trade-off.

Many
people say that he got a second chance at life, but I don’t buy it. We get one
chance. That’s it. You can’t go back and fill in the gaps. You pick up where
things left off. Ran pushed me to do it with my mom—to start over and try
things again. Look how well that turned out. Sometimes you just have to move
forward and accept the fact that something you once had is gone.

Ran
settles his mug on the wooden tabletop. “Why would they plan a night of
drinking and clubbing when I’m not interested in either of those things?” He
twirls the cup around by the handle in circles on the surface of the table. “I
don’t know. Maybe they thought that part of me might have changed due to the
accident.” His eyebrows lift. “I’m not sure. But honestly, I did it more for
them than for me. They want something to celebrate—a reason to party. Me
going back to work seemed like a good enough reason.”

“I
guess.”

“What do
you mean, you guess?”

I hide
behind my mug and take another drink. “I guess it’s okay to let them exploit
your amnesia for their benefit.”

He
shakes his head and a lock of dark hair slips onto his forehead. “They’re not
exploiting me, Maggie. Everyone loves a good second-chance story—this
sort of thing is soap opera fodder. Guy gets in car crash, loses two months of
his life. Will he remember who he once was? Will he suddenly regain his lost
memory?” Ran speaks like he’s reading lines to some movie script. “People eat
this sort of thing up. It’s like I’m Jason Bourne or even that guy from
Groundhog Day. Why not give them their show and let them enjoy it?”

“Because
it’s not a show, it’s your life, Ran.”

He tilts
his head. “I get a do-over.” He slinks his back against the chair and runs his
index finger over his lip. “Not many people get do-overs in their life.”

My
stomach lurches. “But what if everything in your life was the way you wanted it
and you didn’t need a do-over? What if it was perfect just the way it was?”

Ran
squints his eyes at me and pulls in a breath. “I don’t know,” he says after a
reflective pause. “I think in that case, it would be pretty awesome to
experience perfection twice.” I don’t think it’s intentional, but as he says
it, his eyes fasten on my mouth, and he doesn’t try to hide the fact that he’s
staring right at my lips. I bite them and tuck them into my teeth to try to
shake his gaze, but it doesn’t work. It only makes him stare more.

“What is
your last memory?”

Several
more patrons enter the quiet coffee house, the chime on the door dinging as it
swings open and a rush of cold air sweeps into the building. The fire flickers
against the wind. Ran follows the people’s movements with his eyes while he
chews on the inside of his cheek like he’s taking out his nerves on it. I wait
for a reply, and with each passing moment my pulse picks up speed.

He
brings his eyes back to mine and his jaw tightens. “When I asked you to leave
my house.” Ran coils his hands around his coffee cup and then stares into it
like he’s memorizing his own reflection in the brown residue that collects at
the bottom. “When I took a look at your leg, and overstepped my boundaries by
pressing you too hard about your mom.” He won’t look at me. “That’s what I
remember, Maggie.”

I choke
on the breath I was inhaling. I don’t get it. If that is the last thing he
remembers about me, why is he sitting here with me now? Why would he want
anything to do with me if that’s how he thinks things ended between us?

“You
know how I knew you were lying about there not being anything between us?” His
eyes snap up suddenly and the lump jumps into my mouth, filling it with bitter
acid I’m forced to trap behind my lips so I don’t retch all over the table.
“The way you acted back at my house—back with Nikon. That is not how our
next interaction would have played out, Maggie.” Ran tosses his head back and
forth. “There had to be more in between. You don’t go from yelling at someone,
telling them to get out, to a lighthearted interaction like that—acting
like nothing happened.”

I summon
any type of resolve I have left in my shattered heart and hold back the tears
that climb into my eyes.

“Am I
right?” Ran reaches a hand across the table, like he’s waiting for me to take
it. I just look down at it, then up at him. “Please tell me I’m right.”

“I have
to go.”

Ran nods
and blinks slowly, deliberately. “Fair enough.” I’m shocked when he stands to
his feet and doesn’t challenge me. He holds out a hand once more.

“Really?
That’s it?” I stand without taking his hand and tug the hem of my skirt down.

“You
don’t owe me anything, Maggie. If you say there was nothing between us, I
believe you.” His hand is still outstretched. “If you say that was it, then
that was it.”

My lungs
rattle in my chest and I’m biting so hard on my lip that I just about pierce
the flesh. Why does it feel like I’m losing him all over again? If the
emptiness inside me was already there, it’s not like it could get any emptier.
You can’t subtract from what you don’t have. But that’s exactly what it feels
like. Like more pieces are torn from me. Like the possibility of Ran suddenly
remembering everything is snatched away. Like hope is gone. And losing all
hope—that’s more than just feeling empty. That’s the feeling of despair,
when even a shred of hope doesn’t have the chance to survive.

“I’ll
drive you home?” Ran collects the two helmets resting at the base of his chair
and holds one out for me.

I don’t
protest, I don’t put up a fight or tell him how much I despise motorcycles.
Instead, I follow him out of the coffeehouse, seat myself behind him on his
bike, and wrap my arms around his waist, clinging to him with all I have as we
wind through the city streets and coast onto the freeway toward my dorm. I cling
to Ran, I cling to this moment, and I cling to the hope that I know doesn’t
exist, unwilling to trade it for the despair that is blooming inside my vacant
chest.

***

“Good
morning, Tom.” I rap on the door with my knuckle and he rotates around in his
seat, slow and steady, like he’s a turtle, taking his time. His hands, frail
with wrinkles and purple age spots coating them, tremble against the handles on
his wheelchair.

His
cracked lips curl into a small smile. “It’s about time, Margaret.” He waves me
over and taps a crooked finger on his cheek. I deposit a soft kiss in its
place. “Been a while.”

“Yes,” I
nod. “Four days. How are they treating you?”

“Still
feeding me slop and the damn cable is out again.” Tom lowers his shaky hand
back into his lap and twists one over the other. The loose skin is slack under
the pull of his fingers.

“Could
be worse,” I say. “And Caroline? How’s she?”

Tom’s
eyes disappear into a grin. “Great as ever, that one. She’s a keeper.” He’s
staring past me, and I’d think he was looking at the crack in the ceiling if I
didn’t see the memory reflected in his eyes. I wonder if it’s actually real, or
if it’s something he’s fabricated, because from what Ran said, Tom’s
relationship with Caroline is a figment of his imagination. But the peace that
washes over his features makes me wonder if that might be enough—just
having these made up memories of her as his truth. The look on his face sure
indicates it might be.