PIER 22
Sarah clamps her eyes shut and shakes
her head. "I can't."
"Whattaya mean, you can't?" Matt
seizes hold of her hands. Their coldness is a shock to his system, yet
he clutches them even tighter.
"That woman," Sarah gulps, "the one
you think is in me -- she's not. This is all I am. It's all I've ever been,
it's all I'll ever be."
"That's not true--"
"It is true! Only now I realize it.
I'm never going to be able to climb out of Molly's shadow ..." Her gaze
has wandered off, out towards the water. Matt follows it with his own eyes.
"Stop talking like that," he says
firmly. There is an unexpected note of desperation in his voice that makes
him realize just how badly he wants her to believe what he is saying.
"I can't!"
"Yeah, you can! Jeez, Sarah, do you
think I'm making this up? C'mon, gimme some credit here! That woman is
in there. I've seen her, I know her. Otherwise I wouldn't ..." He cuts
himself off with a heavy sigh.
Sarah flinches, as though she is
going to look back at him but won't allow herself. "Otherwise what?"
"Forget it." He tears his eyes away
from her and fixes them back on the water, shimmering with the light of
the shadowy moon.
"No, tell me."
"Sarah ..." He chokes back the lump
that has mounted in his throat. "It's not the right time for this."
Neither of them says anything for
a moment, but then suddenly Sarah blurts out, "You know what I've learned?"
"What?"
"There's never a right time for anything.
You can wait and wait and put things off, but that perfect moment is never
really gonna be there. It'll only happen when you create it."
He risks a sideways glance at her
and sees her doing the same. For the briefest instant, their eyes catch.
Matt is more than tempted to keep looking at her -- maybe forever -- but
he can't, not if he's going to say what he wants to say.
"If that woman wasn't in you," he
says, "if she wasn't you, then--then I wouldn't care so much about any
of this stuff. It wouldn'ta hurt so damn bad watching you fall apart over
Brent, not if ... not if I didn't care about you as much as I do."
Sarah turns slowly to him, as if
this were exactly what she expected to hear, but Matt is certain that he
sees a twinkle of amazement that he actually said it.
"Matt," she says softly, "I ... do
you really mean that?"
He draws her hands, still held in
his own, to his chest. "Yeah. Absolutely. You are--you're amazing. All
this anger you've got bottled up, I wish you could let it go. I wish you
could ... move on."
She looks up at him uncertainly.
He feels her tightened hands relaxing against his chest, beginning to melt
into him like they have before. The stars buzz against the night sky with
life, with hope--
"I need to go," Sarah says suddenly,
jerking away from Matt. He reaches out for her again, but her feet are
taking her out into the parking lot and his own refuse to move. Watching
her go, wishing he could chase after her, he stands there alone.
Still alone.
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