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“But he never called.”
“Yeah.” She took a pancake and placed it on a plate and looked at it, seemed to lose her appetite.
“You don’t want to scare Vic away,” I said, and I could see that I was right, even though she didn’t want to admit it.
“Call him,” I said again, more firmly. “Just to talk, hear how he is, see if he says something. If he doesn’t, no harm done. You didn’t put yourself out there, nothing like that, you just made a call, to chat, you can do that, right?”
She stood up straight, suddenly.
“You’re right, I can just call him to talk!”
She smiled. “How did you get so wise about all of this stuff?”
I had to laugh. “As if! My personal life is a complete mess!”
“Things with Dax?” my mom guessed.
I went to get myself some more coffee. I walked over to our window, which looked out on the street and the old trees growing on the sidewalk. It was my favorite feature of our apartment, the sight of greenery and the tranquility it conveyed. I could sit by the window and watch the birds in the trees, sometimes, there were squirrels too. It was like having a garden. A quiet corner in the middle of one of the busiest cities in the world.
“He called, asking me to go out for coffee one day this week, but I couldn’t get away,” I said.
“How do you feel about him now?” she asked. “Do you want to get back together with him?”
“Not really.”
It was the truth. I didn’t want to think about Dax. I had spent all week at work, brooding about what had happened with Matthew in his office on Friday afternoon. I had not seen him since then. It had been over a week, and he had not spoken to me, sent me texts, I had not so much as received a work assignment from him. After all the work he’d been giving me over the past few weeks, it seemed unusual and even strange. I thought he might be away for work.
But then one day, we happened to be in the same elevator on the way down. He’d nodded a greeting at me, but I might have been anyone. Another colleague was in the lift with us, and I thought he probably wanted to be discreet and not talk to me in front of anyone else. But when the elevator stopped on the ground floor, the colleague got out and walked off quickly and it was just the two of us, alone, for several moments. He’d seemed awkward, fidgety, like he didn’t know what to say, as if I made him uncomfortable.
I had to get out of there. As I walked off, my heart was beating fast, and I could feel my insides churning with emotion. I didn’t know what to make of it. Why was I having these emotions around Matthew? I realized that I’d hoped he would act differently towards me, be nicer, more kind. But I’d forgotten that Matthew wasn’t a kind man. He wasn’t nice. That wasn’t him at all. When it came to feelings, he was all buttoned up. Even back in college, come to think of it, he hardly ever opened up, or talked about what was important to him. I tried to get him to be more comfortable around me and I’d noticed how, after a couple of hours of doing some mindless activity, like going hiking or boating or something, he would all out of the blue, say something meaningful, or revealing. But when I asked him about it, he would clam up and the moment was lost.
He seemed even more guarded now, more cautious around people. As CEO, I suppose he had to be conscious of how he appeared to others, his colleagues, and co-workers. Getting involved with an employee was obviously a bad idea.
That Friday afternoon had been a mistake. But it had happened, a kind of blowing off steam for both of us.
Nothing to be done about it now.
I couldn’t believe he thought Gabe and I were sleeping together in college. I thought everyone had known that Gabe was gay, he was always going out with men, getting involved in these dramatic love triangles with plenty of intrigue. One time, he was seeing one of the lecturers from another department. It was a secret affair because the lecturer was married. Gabe really liked him though, and he asked me to help him by making the other guy jealous. There was a party at their house, and I had to go with Gabe, pretend to be really into him, like touching him. At one point, Gabe even kissed me, when he thought this guy was watching. He hadn’t talked to me about it beforehand and that annoyed me, I didn’t want to kiss Gabe, who knew where his mouth had been! And kissing was intimate, I didn’t just kiss anyone. But it was a quick smooch and over in seconds. It certainly was effective as the other guy became agitated and took Gabe outside to have words with him. I didn’t know what the poor wife thought about that. I left the party soon after, having played the role Gabe had given me. I saw a lot of Gabe back then. We were both on the tennis team and often went away to matches and tournaments against other colleges. We weren’t the top-ranking players on the team, which meant there was less stress on our performance and commitment to the team. Both of us were on the secondteam and were frequently paired as doubles partners, which meant we had to know each other’s game well.
“How are things going with that boss of yours?” my mom suddenly asked, coming up behind me, waking me up from my reverie.
“Oh, better, I guess.” I hadn’t told her about sleeping with him that night in the office. I wasn’t hiding it from her, but I knew she wouldn’t approve.
I didn’t approve of it either.
But I could move on. I knew sometimes, things happened.
I helped my mother clean up the kitchen and as I opened our bin, I suddenly remembered the night we broke up at the lake party. I had blocked it out, since then, not wanting to think about a night that had brought me so much pain. The things Matthew had said to me had been so hurtful, no one had ever spoken to me like that before. It had happened late at night, long after dark. We were supposed to leave for the party in the afternoon, but the day before, Matthew told me about a test he’d forgotten about. He said he would come later, catch a ride with someone else. It was a big party and there were a lot of us going up to the lake. It would be the last big party before finals, and we were keen for some time off before we knuckled down to study.
Gabe and I drove up with a group of friends. They made a huge bonfire outside, we drank and talked, and I’d gone to lie down at some point. The next thing I knew, Matthew was there, calling out my name in a loud voice. Gabe was next to me, but I couldn’t even remember him coming into the room. I had fallen asleep that quickly.
Gabriel had tried talking to Matthew, but he’d ignored him.
“I want to talk to you,” he’d said, pointing at me. I got up and we went outside. I was cold and I was barefoot, half-asleep. I was frightened and confused by Matthew’s behavior. I had never seen him like this before.
“I thought you weren’t like the other girls, like other people,” he’d said, his voice shaking. “I thought we had something.”
I tried to speak, and he wouldn’t let me.
