Second First Impressions(39)
I turn and see my reflection in the window of the rec center. Renata can work small miracles. Maybe I can picture myself, standing outside a bar, raising my hand in greeting as a man walks toward me. Ruthie? Nice to meet you at last. You look nice. “Thank you. I think so too.”
Teddy is now in front of us, hands on knees, panting.
Renata instructs him: “I want specifics on the physical sensations you’re feeling. I haven’t jogged since the eighties. Or the seventies. The sixties.” She racks her brains. “Ever.”
“Like a warm burning, but it’s so good,” Teddy puffs, rubbing his hands on his thighs. His clothes are steamed onto his body now. “Like I can’t get the air deep enough. I’m all hot, I can’t see straight.” He’s talking down to the pavement. My presence is still unacknowledged.
What an unexpected treat to see color in his cheeks and glittery specks of sweat on his brow. Is this exact kind of breathing what I’d hear through our wall? I have never thought as much about sex as I have in the past few days. I try to pull my shirt back into place and Renata spanks me with her sunglasses hard enough that they break.
“Get that,” she says to Teddy, and he seems only too happy to collapse to his knees. “When we get back, I’m going to dictate a letter for you to type up. We’ll address it to the current creative director at Céline. Dear Sir. Quality is down on your sunglasses.”
“Sure,” Teddy says, gathering the pieces. Then he finally looks up.
All I can think of to say is, “Are you recovering?”
He’s really not. The makeover has astonished him. His eyes are on the deep triangle of breast skin exposed to Renata’s solar nemesis. Arms, waist, hair, he’s not even blinking as he moves from one part to the next. His chest is rising and falling.
Right in this moment, I’m extraordinary.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I’ve been hanging for five o’clock all day,” Melanie tells me as I lock the office door behind us. “Finally, I get an invite to your place. Time to get this show on the road.”
“My place isn’t exciting,” I warn as we walk up the path, but she’s not interested in my boring caveats and excuses.
“Hello, I still live down the hallway from my mummy and daddy. You’re a grown-up lady in your own house. And I. Am. Excited.” She jumps into the courtyard, spends a bit of time looking at the tortoises in their enclosures, then knocks on Teddy’s door.
“He won’t be there,” I tell her as I unlock my own door. “And he’s not invited, remember?”
She turns his door handle and pokes her head inside. Great, so now I’ve got to worry about his lack of security on top of everything else? She calls, “Hello? Teddy, are you decent?” We hear nothing but silence.
Teddy has been … nesting? He’s got a battle-scarred leather armchair with an afghan throw on it. There’s a coffee table that he definitely found on a roadside somewhere. He’s put my Women’s Health magazine on it and has a plain white bowl filled with candy. Has he copied my furniture layout? I take a few steps in. On the crumbling plaster wall, he’s drawn a huge flatscreen TV with a marker, complete with brand logo: TEDDY VISION.
“Lucky his daddy is the landlord,” Melanie observes. “What a dump.”
“Believe it or not, this is a big improvement.” The way he’s folded his little blanket makes my heart feel weird.
Melanie leans in farther behind me. “Aw, look. There’s his turtle tank. He was scared TJ would get pneumonia out in the yard when he gets him back.”
It grates when she acts like I might not know something about him. I dug that tank out of the storage closet myself. “Yeah, I know.”
“It’s so cute how bad he misses his boy. Oh my God,” Melanie gasps, and I’m sure she’s seen something truly scandalous. She finishes with: “He’s borrowed Reptiles and Amphibians for Dummies from the actual library. He’ll be a cute dad one day, don’t you think?”
He’d parade his baby around like his perfect little trophy.
“In the far distant future, when he’s grown up himself.” I tug Melanie out of his doorway. “Come away from there. Let him have some privacy.”
When we go into my cottage, she says, “It’s exactly like he described it. He said it’s like Pooh Bear’s house in a tree. No wonder he’s always trying to slither in here.” She knocks on the wall I share with him. “You are next-door neighbors with a hot boy. A silly, weird one, but undeniably hot. How does that feel?”
“It mainly feels irritating, but in a nice way.”
“How?” Melanie is smiling and perplexed.
“Like when my oven timer goes off and he tells me through the wall that he had a dream that I was cooking him a lovely dinner.”
“He dreams about your cottage,” Melanie says blandly. I keep a bowl of candy on my coffee table— exactly where Teddy put his— and she takes one. “And he can keep on dreaming where you’re concerned.”
“I’ll get some snacks.” I stayed up late, pre-preparing a snack platter, all the while warning myself that Mel might cancel. After all, she’s young and fun. I’m about to reveal a 1950s-housewife level of effort. “Want to sit in the courtyard?”