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Ian clattered around at the bar longer than he needed. “I can’t be here and not talk to you,” he said still at the bar.
“What?”
“I came here because I want to talk.”
“You haven’t been here five minutes. Talk.”
“You know what I mean. I don’t want to not talk directly about what’s going on because of what I told you in your office. I don’t want to feel like you’re judging everything I say. I just want to talk to you. To Rachel. The way I always do.”
“You didn’t mean what you said?” I asked.
“See, that’s what I’m talking about. I can’t speak openly with you if I have to be careful and be fake. I’m not used to that with you.” Ian walked over to me and handed me what had to have been every last bit of the JD. He sat down next to me. He had a full glass of Scotch and no ice.
We gulped the drinks down like we were in a race.
“So you meant what you said in the office?”
Ian turned to me. “Every word.”
“Then why did you marry Scarlet? Why did you leave me at the pier like that? If you knew you felt what I felt? Why did you try to make me feel crazy?”
“I love Scarlet. And I said I would marry her, so I did,” Ian said. “I don’t come from people who do otherwise. That’s not me. But I don’t love Scarlet the way I love you. I don’t know how to be without you.”
“Are you sure this isn’t just about Xavier and me? That seeing us together did something to you.”
“It did open my eyes. But that’s not it. I know what this is—what I’m feeling.”
“So what’s the next step?” I asked this more as a dare than a desire. I didn’t know what I wanted to do, but I needed to hear whether Ian had a plan. Maybe that would make me understand.
“Well,” he started, looking at his duffle bag, “I can either sleep here or at the Marriott downtown where I made a reservation.”
“Where do you want to stay?”
Ian turned back to me and pushed one of my curls behind my ear. “Right here,” he said. “I don’t want to go anywhere.”
Ian and I sat up all night talking. He poured himself another Scotch and I sipped from the other side of his glass. Like we always did when we got drunk on my couch, we relived every moment we’d spent together since college. Only this time, Ian admitted to each time when he either wanted to reach for me or thought he was falling in love with me. And there were so many times. So many more times than I could’ve imagined. I always thought Ian was an amazing man. And finally I could admit that when we held hands on the beach during spring break or fell asleep on his couch when I helped him paint the walls in his first apartment, I pretended that we belonged to each other. I’d had no clue that he had been thinking the same thing. But the male mind doesn’t work like the female mind. Ian said that knowing how much he loved me didn’t make it easier to try to sleep with me or ask me out on a date. It made it harder. He didn’t want a thing with me to be like a thing with everyone else. And if it didn’t work out, he didn’t want to go on the list of guys who’d done me wrong. And then never hear from me again.
We laughed about how many people had been right about us all along. Made a pan of brownies and fell asleep on the living room floor.
At some point in the night, though, my neck started hurting and then my back and then my knees and then I had to get up. I just couldn’t find a comfortable position beside him.
I sat up and watched Ian sleep. His stomach rose and set with each breath. He’d already taken off his wedding band. A blond streak the width of a sandwich bag tie was the only sign of his past. I didn’t believe what was happening. Couldn’t have predicted it just twenty-four hours ago.
I took one of my chenille throws off the back of the couch and put it over Ian.
I went into the bedroom and got into bed.
I said my prayers for the first time in a really long time. I prayed for Grammy Annie-Lou. For me. For Scarlet. I knew that while I was in this dream place, getting something I really wanted, she was somewhere crying with a broken heart. It didn’t matter what I thought about her. I knew the pain she was probably feeling. I didn’t like the idea of anyone going through that.
I went to sleep and dreamed of King and me on one of our adventures. Only he was a puppy and I was a little older than I am now. We sat on a rock on the side of Winslow River that was farthest from the house where Grammy Annie-Lou, hanging sheets up on the clothesline, looked miles away. I fed King cornbread from my pocket. I pitched two rocks at one time into the river and watched the ripples cross one another.
I was awakened by Ian getting into bed with me.
He snuggled in close to my back and buried his lips into my neck. He kissed me gently.
“Is this real?” I asked.
“I hope so.”
