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But it would happen. I’d make sure of that.
I opened my eyes and felt a stab of jealousy as I thought of Darragh in Scotland; then I promptly hated myself for being a petty bitch and feeling anything but pure happiness for her. She deserved that more than anyone else. And I did too. And one day I’d get that adventure as well.
I’d closed my eyes again in hopes of finally falling asleep and staying that way for a good chunk of time, when my cell bounced and vibrated beside me. I snatched it up so fast my wrist banged against the corner of the laminate-pressed, cheap-as-hell bedside table hard enough I cursed like a sailor.
“Darragh?” I hadn’t even bothered seeing if it was her before calling out her name. But it wasn’t as if I had hordes of friends or family calling. It was literally just her I socialized with voluntarily.
I sat up and grinned when her face popped up on the screen as the video chat connected fully. I didn’t even care that it was pixelated as hell. I was just so happy to see her and hear about all the adventures she’d already had in, like, one day.
“How long are you supposed to feel like ass from the jet lag?”
I laughed at the first thing she said and felt that gnawing hole in my chest start to fill again, yet the older I got, the more I felt like it would never really fill. I’d never fully be complete. When I thought I’d have a family of my own one day, a faceless husband who loved me, little babies who looked like us, it gave me a semblance of completion, yet it also held a detachment. Maybe I'm just a hopeless mess.
It was like I was staring at this ball of dough that was my life, and I had no idea how to mold it into how it was supposed to be.
“You’re asking the wrong chick. I haven’t left the city, let alone been on a plane.” I grinned, laughing out loud as the screen kept freezing and delaying, Darragh’s face morphing into a strange expression before speeding up fast as the connection caught up.
“It was rhetorical.”
I rolled my eyes in good humor, and Darragh laughed.
“You’ve only been there twenty-four hours. I’m sure it’ll take a few days for your body to get acclimated.” I could see a little bit of her B-and-B room as she sat on the bed. I wanted to ask for a little video tour right now, anxious to live vicariously through her.
“Yeah, you’re probably right. I crashed as soon as I got here and woke up twelve hours later to it being pitch-black in the room and a heinous cramp in my lower back from not moving position for hours upon hours.”
“Did you at least feel better?”
She snorted. “No. I felt like crap and am so groggy. Then I couldn't sleep until the sun started to rise, at which point I went back to sleep and woke up with only enough time to spend like an hour at the public records office before the old lady working the front desk kicked me out.”
She was moving around a lot, and I had to assume she was gearing up to do more exploring. With her being six hours ahead of me, she’d probably already done so much exciting stuff while I was here, lying in bed and staring at the yellow-tinged ceiling.
“So it wasn’t the most productive day, but I did find out a little bit, which is exciting and better than nothing.”
I felt genuine happiness and elation fill me. I sat up straighter in bed and grinned. “That’s fantastic! So what did you dig up?”
I could see she was as exhausted as I felt and, hell, probably looked too.
“Well, when I say I found a little bit, it was basically just the birth records of my grandparents and mother. They were residents here and had no family aside from each other.” She got this weird expression on her face, and I could practically see her rolling what she’d just said around in her head. “That’s weird, right? Like only the three of them. No cousins. No nieces or nephews or siblings or anything like that.”
I shrugged and wished I could have been some kind of help in making her feel better. I could see the deflation on her face, though. “I think that can be normal in circumstances,” I said, hoping showing her some kind of silver lining might make things seem less hopeless. “I mean, look at me. Aside from my cracked-out mother, I’ve got no one else in the world but you.” At least my words brought a small smile—albeit a sad-looking one—to her face.
“You’ll always have me.” I smiled after she spoke. “But needless to say, I didn’t find out much more than that. And with it being Sunday tomorrow, they won’t be open. And there are so many possible hits I could get if I have enough time to weed through all the documents and files.”
I shifted on the mattress, letting my back slide down so I was flush with the bed, my head pounding something fierce from lack of sleep and the full weeknight I’d had. I held the phone propped on my chest and scrunched up my nose.
“Good Lord, this angle makes me have three chins,” I mumbled and sat up again, my head promptly pounding once more and cursing at me. I held the phone away from me, but it didn’t help the chin party I currently had going on. Finally I said, “Fuck it,” and just let the phone sit on my chest. I focused on Darragh again and grinned. “Before you say it, because I can see it on your face, yes, I’m listening, and yes, I heard everything.”
She grinned broadly, and the phone image of her shook slightly as she adjusted herself on the bed.
“So what are you doing the rest of the day? It's only, what…?” My mind was mush, so I actually had to count the hours off on my fingers. “Five?”
“Yeah, dinnertime. I guess on Saturdays, businesses here close early, if they even open at all. Pretty sure bars are open until calling hour, which is like sunrise,” she joked.
I started laughing, which pissed my headache off, but again, fuck it. “Wish I was there. We could have hit up the pubs. Wait, there are pubs there, aren’t there?” I knew the town she was in was tiny and a good distance from any major part of Scotland.
“A few, which should be weird, because the town is so small, but they are more like family-owned restaurants where people go to get trashed regardless.”
“Any cute guys? Maybe you’ll fall in love there.” Even I heard how whimsical I sounded and promptly gagged, which had Darragh snorting in amusement.
