No Retreat: The Novel (excerpt)

Sean watched the trees go by the window while he listened to her drone on and on to someone named Barry. He tried to understand the one-sided phone conversation but he couldn’t figure out how she could be so animated about payroll files.

Flipping his spent cigarette out the window, Emily stopped her conversation long enough to give him a disapproving look and opened up a small empty compartment in the middle console of her BMW. “If you must.” She said before going back to Barry.

Sighing, he thought about lighting up another cigarette. Maybe he would take a drag every time she used a Latin word in her endless legalese discussion. However, he instantly thought better of it when she used three in one sentence.

Sliding down in his seat, he leaned his head against the window half listening as she moved the conversation to incriminating personnel reports.

***

Finally, they turned off the parkway into the wooden area that had been lining the highway for miles. Civilization began to appear on the roads as she turned down several of them, never breaking her conversation. He could tell she came to this place frequently. More often than not, the roads she turned on were barely visible until they were right not top of them and there was no discernible marker he could see.

What he could occasionally see between the spaces of trees already losing their leaves in the early autumn weather, were ornate fences, impeccably manicured hedge rows, and large houses with circular driveways, occasionally with fountains in the center. By the time they arrived at their destination he was still trying to puzzle out why rich people were so averse to backing out of their driveways. 

He was going to ask Emily as she parked the car at the apex of their own circular driveway (he tried not to be disappointed theirs didn’t have a fountain. It was only a small copse of trees and some bushes.) but she still hadn’t hung up. She grabbed her Louis Vuitton suitcase and, without a backwards glance, wheeled it towards the front door. Sean took his time getting his duffel bag out of the trunk while he looked around. When he finally turned back towards the house, the door was open and Emily had disappeared inside it.

He stepped inside the foyer and let out a low whistle. He assumed that this place wasn’t as opulent as some of the other houses they had passed but it was richer than his blood. He was impressed and more than a little envious that this had become ordinary to someone like Emily. Shrugging, and hiding the movement as if he was just adjusting the duffel bag onto his shoulder, he dismissed his jealousy. It didn’t matter who brought who here. Now he could say that he had the connections to be staying in places like this for the weekend. Proud of himself, he followed Emily down the hallway.

He tried to follow her into a master bedroom at the end of the hall, but only inches away, she closed the door in his face.

Rubbing his nose like he had been hit, he decided to take it upon himself to take the bedroom across from hers. 

Who knew how long her phone call was going to be. Emily had barely stopped talking when she picked him up from the train station, just called his name and gestured him to place his bag in the popped trunk. That was it. And that been almost an hour ago.

It was strange he remarked to himself, plopping his bag on the bed, ignoring the bottles of scotch clinking against themselves. They were in constant texting communication together even though it had been years since they had been in the same room with each other. There was a sense of familiarity and intimacy that came from knowing each other since college twenty years ago in those typed sentences. But in real life, looking at her from the train platform he thought to himself as he walked towards her, who was she? He wasn’t surprised by how she looked, he saw her IG and Facebook posts so that wasn’t anything new. Plus, she was aging well, as they say. Her rich cushy job at a law firm must afford some cosmetic secrets so she wasn’t much different from that 17-year-old girl he met. She certainly didn’t seem to be sporting grey hairs at her temple like he was. Or the wrinkles he had seen for the first time a couple of months ago by her eyes.

However, being around this living, breathing, 3-dimensional person he hadn’t seen in over five year, he was slightly uncomfortable.  It felt like he didn’t know how to act around her anymore.

She obviously didn’t feel the same way. She had barely looked up when he slid into the passenger seat beside her. Someone only does that when there is no need for polite pretense.

And it isn’t something you do when you’ve missed someone, he thought grimly.