If You Only Knew(97)
“Why don’t I ever hear you playing?” I ask.
His fingers stop moving, and he shrugs. “I play sometimes. You just might be at work when I do. I don’t know.”
I believe I’ve just been lied to. “Well, will you play for me when we get home? I’d love to hear you.”
He gives me a look.
I’m not stupid. I’ve crossed a line. First of all, I just said words a man hates to hear—when we get home. Technically, we’re not living together, despite being in the same building, despite sleeping together every night but two these past couple of weeks. And secondly, I asked to hear him play... Not the first time I have, and not the first time he’s said no. You’d think a pianist would play the piano, wouldn’t you? Especially, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, for his girlfriend, and he did call me his girlfriend. Evander is a witness.
The silence is getting to me.
“Jenny,” he says at a stop sign. “Remember when I said I was recreation only?”
“Yes. I also remember when you said you were gay as far as I was concerned, which I believe I have disproved.”
“I meant it about the recreation thing. We’re friends with benefits, okay?” His voice is gentle.
Shit. Already, there’s a lump in my throat. “So that rules out piano playing, does it?”
“Among other things, yes.”
“Like the locked room upstairs? Listen. I’ve read Jane Eyre. That better be a red room of pain up there, and not your ex-wife.”
“What’s a red room of pain?”
“Never mind.” Though I’m fairly sure I know the answer, I can’t seem to help myself from asking the next question, either. “What about being my wedding date when Kimber and Jared get married in a few weeks?”
“I don’t do weddings. You know how you women are. You read all sorts of things into it, then trample each other to catch the bouquet.”
I nod, doing the old it’s fine, really, I don’t mind a bit, hey, who needs a date to a wedding? We chicks love going stag.
Most men don’t relish weddings. It’s fine. Leo and I have only been together a short time. He’ll get there.
“So guess what?” I say brightly. “I saw my father’s mistress today. File that under the heading of small world, because she’s the mother of one of my brides. In fact, the bride herself once got hand-me-downs from Rachel and me.”
Leo, always interested in my personal problems—though he never shares his own—glances at me sharply. “Wow.”
We’re home again. Loki rises stiffly and burps in my ear. I turn off the ignition and stay put, my hands still on the wheel. “So she recognized my name, and now I know she knows I know. You know?”
“Uh...sure.” He smiles a little. “Were you okay, seeing her?”
“It was shocking. A little distressing.” I swallow.
It made me miss my dad, oddly enough.
Leo tucks a strand of hair behind my ear, his eyes intent on the task. “Would you like me to come to your apartment and you can tell me about it and cry on my shoulder, and then we can fool around?”
“It’s kind of our thing, isn’t it?”
He smiles again, that heartbreaker smile, because, hand to God, that’s the best smile I’ve ever seen, so wide and unexpected, his whole face transformed, and that slightly tragic shadow flies out the window when he smiles.
No doubt. I’m in love.
Rachel may be right. This is a disaster waiting to happen.
Rachel
A few weeks after my weekend in the city, a package arrives. It’s a gift-wrapped book from a little bookstore the next town over—Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay. There’s a handwritten note card, too. How rare is that? “Thought you might like this. —Gus”
I know the premise of the book—the serial killer who only offs the bad guys—but I never had the guts to watch the show on TV. Neither did Adam, who has no tolerance for gore.
I think Gus is probably wrong. I’ve never read that type of book. But the fact that he thought of me—is thinking of me—is a little pearl in my day. A day which could use a whole string of pearls, because the girls have had springtime colds for six days now, and they view blowing their noses on the same level as having their hands held over an open flame. I’ve smeared Vicks VapoRub on their chests and the soles of their feet—it works, trust me. I ran the humidifier and cuddled and made chicken soup and got up in the night when Rose cried because “my tongue is hard!” Gave them long baths and ran the shower so the room would steam up. Slept in the guest room with Grace the night her cough was a little scary, took her to the pediatrician the next day with the other two to rule out pneumonia. Somehow, the cold made Charlotte revert back to pants-wetting, so I had to change her outfit four times one day, and she insisted on wearing the red turtleneck which is so hard to get off her extremely round head, and she screamed when it got stuck.
And still, I managed to keep them happy.
So today, when all three are finally mostly over their colds and back on their regular sleep schedules, I pour myself a glass of wine and sit down on the screened-in sunporch. It’s that time of early June when the sun sets over the Hudson in a long, lingering fade of pink and yellow, and the birds serenade each other in long ripples of song.