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I barely do one-night stands anymore. I’ve resigned myself to the idea of being alone.
Only alcohol makes me think otherwise, makes me consider a woman for the night.
But I’m not drunk now.
And I can’t help myself around her. I need to know her.
“Why didn’t you call me? The real reason,” she asks.
I sigh. She deserves an explanation.
“My mom’s sick. She had an episode that night. I went to the hospital just after you left.”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“Pulmonary edema, right now. Before, it was another heart condition.”
She’s still trying to decide if she should believe me. What’s happened to her that she’s so scared of opening up? Who hurt her enough that she won’t trust me?
“One date, Natalie,” I say again. “And then the ball’s in your court.”
She thinks about it for a second before she nods.
“One date can’t hurt,” she says. It sounds like she’s trying to convince herself.
She picks up her wine glass to take another sip.
“It’s a lot to deal with, with your mom being so sick,” she says.
I nod. “Her health has always been a challenge. Even with the best doctors and care there is, I always wonder if this is it, if this is where I lose her.”
“I’m sorry,” she says, and her sadness is like a cloud of rain over us. “Losing someone you love is painful.”
“You speak from experience,” I say. She has sorrow etched on her face.
As if she realizes she sank into a hole, I watch her compose herself again.
“She sounds like she’s a fighter,” Natalie says.
I nod. “The doctors often say they don’t know how she beat the odds.”
“I hope she keeps beating them.”
It’s nice of her that she genuinely wants my mom to get better. I want to know what happened to her—who did she lose? I can tell from just watching her she knows grief but she knows how to hide it. She carries it like a second skin. She’s used to pain. It awakes a protective side in me. I want to shield her. I want to save her from hurting again.
What the fuck is wrong with me? Since when do I care this much about someone I don’t know?
“Why did you do the auction?” she asks, changing topic. She’s perfectly composed again, every trace of sorrow gone. She’s good at this.
“It was for charity. A few of us on the team are single, and three of us volunteered. I thought it could be fun.”
“What was the cause?”
I feel like an idiot when I answer her. “I can’t remember. I wasn’t in the best mood.”
She raises her eyebrows at me but a smile plays around her lips. Her eyes laugh at me.
“I know, I know,” I say and shake my head. I tug at my tie.
