December 2005, NYU

“A couple’s glove? Come on, Chanty, that’s old school. Not to mention cheesy.”

Chanty snapped her head to the direction of the voice. “What are you doing here?”

“Like you, I’m shopping,” Liam said. “I bought something for you. A Christmas gift. Wanna see it?”

“The best Christmas gift you can give me is to leave me alone,” she said, dropping the two pair of red gloves in her basket. She walked away from Liam without a word.

Liam figured he didn’t say the right thing. He took the white scarf from his shopping bag and approached the store’s personnel. “Can I return this? It just got turned down.”

2013

Liam was desperate. He needed to think faster than the speed of his car. He wanted to call Zach for help but then he remembered it was Zach who told him he should take Chanty somewhere like the amusement park. It did scare the shit out of her to the point of throwing up. But it didn’t work. There was no magical moment.

Or maybe Zach was just exaggerating. There was no way Julianne could have fallen for such a trick as well.

They were driving down a less trafficked road and he only realized it when Chanty said, “I don’t think there is something for a date around here.”

Shit. She was right. The only place the road led to was an old cemetery.

That’s it! A cemetery. Nothing could be spookier than that! With renewed hope, Liam increased the speed.

“Why are we here?” Chanty asked when he stopped the car outside the old cemetery. “You’re not trying to introduce me to a dead aunt or something, right? It’s really not the time for this, Liam.”

The fear in her voice heightened his hope. “Don’t worry, Chanty. We’ll do something exciting.”

Her head snapped at his direction. “You’re not planning to force yourself unto me, right? Because if you do that, let me just tell you that I know karate. I really do.”

Liam’s laughter rang out. “Of course not! This is not the time for that,” he said with voice full of meaning. He made a motion with his head saying, “Come on. Get out of the car.”

She hesitated, but unbuckled her seatbelt.

Good. It was a good sign that she somehow trusted him. Liam climbed out of the car and met her outside.

“If you are planning to do some cheesy A Walk to Remember scene, it’s not working, Liam.”

He laughed for the second time. It was cold tonight, but not chilly enough to keep them from getting inside the cemetery. Unlike Zach who could easily get spooked, Liam was rather brave when it came to places like this one.

Taking her hand, he led her to the broken gate of the cemetery. It was not a big one. It was old and poorly maintained in fact, one of the reasons why there were no guards roaming around. Anyone could freely enter without being held back.

“Liam, what’s your plan, really? You’re not here to spook me out, right?”

Okay, she got him on that one, but it was no time to back off. He was getting excited. “As a matter of fact, I was hoping for that.”

“Okay, I am spooked. What do you want me to do now? Hug you to death until we get out of here? I’ll do that. Let’s just get out.”

Liam chuckled. “As much as I would like that, I think we better move along. I like a quiet place for a date and I think this is the perfect place.”

“We can always go home. It would be quiet in the house tonight. And there will be wine and food.”

He squeezed her hand. “It’s going to be okay. Look, people come here often. Let’s just go on.” He took out his phone and turned on the flashlight mode. “And then there was light,” he uttered with a grin.

The cemetery did really get a few visitors now and then because there were pieces of trash everywhere. He saw a few cans of beers, chip wrappers and others. Liam deduced that teens often went here to do their weird activities.

“What are we gonna do here, then?” Chanty asked, looking around and stepping closer beside him.

“Let’s see if we can find ghosts,” he joked.

“Liam!”

“Relax. Okay, since we’re here, why don’t we do something?”

“Like what? Stargazing?”

He crunched up his face. “Too cheesy, you think?”

“Yeah.”

Liam looked around the dark place. The trees were not even moving. It seemed that everything in the place was dead. “Why don’t we look at the gravestones? Let’s talk about the life of the dead. Up for the challenge?”

Chanty frowned in the darkness. “I don’t see any fun in that.”

He led her to the nearest tombstone and pointed the light. “Melody Brennan. She was seventy-five when she died.”

“Obviously, she died of old age,” Chanty uttered.

“Or maybe she entered the wrong door and died of a heart attack.”

“What door?”

“A stripper club.”

Chanty chuckled. “Yeah, right.”

“She saw her husband.”

This time she laughed.

He led her to another tombstone just a few feet away. “Tessa Miller. Hmm, young. She died when she was twenty-five, just a year ago.”

“I bet she’s a stalker.”

Amused that Chanty was playing along with his game, he looked down at her and asked, “Why?”

“She stalked Henry around and Angelica found out about it and she killed her.”

Liam laughed. “Nice one.”

“Too bad for her though. She’s really young. She had a lot to look forward to,” she said in a more serious tone.

“Maybe she was able to do all the things she was supposed to.”

“Okay, next.” This time, it was her who led him to the next tombstone. “Thomas Fuller. Oh, he died fifty years ago. He’s been here for a long time.”

“I suppose he got killed in the war,” he said.

“Yeah, I think so too. Okay, next.”

“Samantha Roberts. Just died recently. Thirty.”

“This one died when she found out Zachary Astor is finally engaged for real.”

Liam laughed. “I don’t think anyone would die for Zach. They actually get over him fast.”

“Really?”

He thought for a while. “Yeah, sure, they really do. Except Samantha.”

Chanty giggled. “Next.”

“Cameron Goodman,” Liam read.

“He died when he met Cameron.”

Liam looked at her with a smile. It was good to know that she could joke about Cameron at this state. “Why?”

“He felt so ashamed that someone with the same name could have the bad luck of having the same last name.”

He laughed out loud. “Cameron really is unlucky to have that name. He should change it.”

“He actually likes it,” Chanty answered with a grimace.

“He does?”

“Yeah, he likes it. Says it has a nice ring to it.”

“It doesn’t.”

“Yeah, it’s weird.”

“Next,” he said, pulling her to their next target. “Samantha Dela Cruz. She was…forty when she died two years ago.”

“I think she died somewhere tropical.”

“Yeah, this time Cass killed her.”

“Cass?”

“They went to the Philippines for their honeymoon twice, right?”

“Yeah, I guess I remember that.”

“Cass may have met Samantha on their first honeymoon. Killed her on the second.”

“Why is that?”

“Because Samantha wouldn’t kill Philip? She could have asked me, actually. Would be happy to do that.”

Liam laughed. “Okay, we should probably stop talking about our friends killing other people. We might be next.”

“Okay, next.”

Chanty never thought she’d enjoy the trip to the cemetery. After going through almost fifty tombstones of the dead and making up stories about them, she had laughed and even cried (when they found three tombs of a mother and her two children).

“How are you feeling?” Liam asked as they made their way back to his car.

“I’m actually feeling great. Thanks, Liam.”

“No problem. Sorry about the ride though. I didn’t think it would end that way.”

“Just don’t take me there again.”

“Maybe I’ll take Willie. You can come. You’ll buy our drinks and wipe our sweat.”

He seemed excited of the thought and she felt guilty all over again. Was this the right time to tell him the truth? But he didn’t even believe her when she tried the last time. And things could get better in a day or two. Cameron hadn’t made contact, probably busy clearing his name about the article in the newspaper. And he was dating Beth the bitch. Things could get better for him and he just had to realize that.

I’ll wait, Chanty uttered in her mind. And then I’ll tell him, she added, stealing a glance at Liam’s smiling face.

“Thanks, Liam.”

“You already said that.”

“But seriously, thanks. You were able to help me forget about my own story tonight.”

“We created a lot of stories to cloud your worries, didn’t we?”

“Yeah, quite a lot,” she giggled. “And thank you,” she added again. Thank you for being the answer to my problem. Thank you for being there.

Again, she was reminded of the words Angelica told her earlier. “What is it?” he asked when he saw her face. They had reached his car by then.

Chanty hesitated.

He let go of her hand and walked to the hood of his car.

With uneasy steps, she followed him. He looked ridiculous in that shirt he bought, she thought. But she also noted that he looked rather handsome tonight. Well, he had always been handsome and she knew that. But he was the different kind of handsome tonight. She had seen his face a lot for years, especially in college, and she had never thought she’d see him the way she was seeing him now.

“Angelica told me something today.”

He frowned as he crossed one leg over the other as he leaned against the hood of his car. His arms crossed over his chest. “What about?”

Chanty looked down, placed her hands in the front pockets of her pants. She was silent for a long moment before she looked up to meet his gaze. “She told me you’ve had feelings for me since NYU.”

The shock on his face was apparent. And so was the truth.

Chanty’s mouth hung open. “It’s true?”

Liam blinked a few times. He opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again and closed it once more. His face colored a little and he involuntarily coughed on his last attempt to say something.

“Liam,” she called. “It’s true?” Chanty was amused now. He was still coughing.

“Give me a moment,” he uttered, his face very red now.

Chanty chuckled as she watched him gather his composure--or perhaps his courage to face her.

“Yes.” His word shocked her nonetheless. She never expected him to admit it, really. She thought he’d deny it and tell her Angelica was just being her usual self, making up stories and thinking way out of reality.

This time, it was her turn to blink a few times. She found it hard to believe that the man standing before her had past feelings for her years ago. As far as she could recall, he never did anything that had suggested such a thing. “Really?”

His face was serious now and the flush was slowly fading. He was looking at her intently. “And you never, not for a second, guessed it?”

Slowly, Chanty shook her head.

He scoffed. “You must have been too in love with that jerk to even notice.”

“But, Liam--” Chanty didn’t know what to say. She couldn’t formulate the right sentence. “But…You…But you have always. You have always been such an ass!”

“Zach has been an ass. Not me. Even Angelica noticed it!”

“She did?”

“Why did you think we invited you to come with us countless of times to the club? Why did we go to that road trip just to annoy you? Come on, Chanty, I wouldn’t even spend a minute talking to you if I didn’t have feelings for you.”

She took in a sharp intake of breath. “I really didn’t…then why didn’t you tell me!” she accused.

He scoffed again. “Come on, tell me. What would you have done then?”

“I could have…I could have,” she blinked a few times. “I don’t know.”

“See? That’s why I didn’t tell you.”

“Wait. So that night--”

“Yes. It might have been a mistake on your part, but it was the best night of my life.”

He said it too bluntly and too seriously that she felt so guilty she couldn’t remember half of what happened that night.

A long silence reigned between them as they just stood there, outside the creepy old cemetery, looking into each other’s eyes.

Chanty thought he was going to lean away from the hood and kiss her right there and then. Or maybe she hoped he would. But she knew that could not happen while the big lie was between them. Knowing that he had had feelings for her didn’t mean he still felt the same. His past feelings could only be the reason why he wanted Willie. And maybe it was because of those past feelings that he felt he they could have a chance--that he could like her again. But would it still be the same?

Before anything could get any further, Chanty blinked the magic away. She cleared her throat and said, “Let’s forget about that. Everything’s changed. We all changed. Shall we go?”

She started for the car but he grabbed her gently by the arm as she passed by.

Her heart started to hammer against her chest like crazy.

Inside her mind, Chanty knew she could pull away and continue walking to the car and everything would be over. But no, she didn’t. She let him pull her toward him. She felt his cold breath touch her bent face. She couldn’t look at him because she didn’t know what to say.

Liam held her chin with his other hand and tilted her head up with a gentle pull.

“It didn’t change, Chanty. I thought it did, but I guess it never did,” he whispered just inches away from her face. Chanty’s eyes involuntarily lifted to meet his. Everything he wanted to say was there. Everything. “The only change I love so far is that you’re no longer with Cameron. And the only change I am hoping for is that you stop seeing me as just the guy who used to piss you off years ago. Having said that, I guess nothing really changed in my part.”

It seemed that her breath was snatched out of her and if it would last for another minute, she would be among the people buried underneath the ground in the cemetery behind them. Liam just freaking confessed something big to her.

“You know,” she said, her voice cracking because of its near-whisper state, “if you have said that to me ten, five, or four years ago I wouldn’t believe you--not one word.” She swallowed. A big part of her brain was telling her she was doing something wrong. She shouldn’t be saying these things right now. What she should be saying was the truth! But she found herself staring at Liam’s eyes and saying, “But as I’ve said, things changed.”

The transformation of his face from worry to relief was a sight to Chanty. And when he crushed his lips against hers, she reckoned he understood what she meant.

For Liam, it might not be their second real kiss, but for Chanty, this was their second that she could remember. It was not a hungry kiss. It wasn’t urgent either. It was slow and long.

His arms wound around her and hers around him.

And then it changed.

She felt it when his hand started to move, gripping and caressing. She felt it when her hands went around against his chest, up his shoulders and around his neck. She felt it when she stood on her toes to deepen the kiss. She felt it when he lifted her up on the hood of the car. She felt it when she parted her legs and trapped his body between them. She felt it when he slid her hips closer against his.

But he stopped. He leaned his forehead against hers, their chests heaving to catch their breaths. “Not here,” he whispered.

“I guess it’s time you say ‘yes’ to going home,” she breathed out.