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She put her hand on mine then, and looked me right in the eye with a clear, lucid gaze. I felt like she was looking deep into my soul. “I was mean,” she said. “And I’m sorry.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “We all have our raw patches.”
As we ate, I realized that I hadn’t spoken to another human on such a deep level for a really long time, apart from Ted, the psychologist, and even that was mainly about the games. Clarissa and I used to talk, back in the beginning, staying up all night sometimes. But I hadn’t let anyone this close since then.
“I had a hard time with Caleb,” she said, after a while. “He didn’t cheat or anything, but he never hid the fact that he found other women really hot. He’d point out all the time how others were slimmer than me, or sexier than me, or better dressed than me. It got to me after a while, slowly. It chipped away at my confidence and self-esteem, even before Maddy came along and destroyed my figure.”
“Your figure isn’t destroyed,” I said.
She shrugged. “Thanks.”
“However, if I may say so, this Caleb sounds like a complete and utter fucking asshole.” I kept my expression serious, trying to make her laugh. She did and it was like warm sunshine pouring on me. “I could have him killed if you like. I’m a billionaire sports star, you know.”
She laughed again. Maybe just have some of the Bills’ Mafia use him to break a table,” she said. “And film it for me. So, I can watch it. On a loop.”
“Your wish is my command.”
We finished our lunch in easy silence, people-watching and enjoying the atmosphere of the homey little café. Then we thanked the owner, had more handshakes and kind words from him and his wife. We got ourselves out onto the hot sidewalk, and that’s when Mary-Beth did something really surprising.
She took my hand.
I squeezed her delicate fingers and she squeezed mine back. We strolled along, towards the strip of antique shops. I gave a friendly wave to a fan who’d pulled out his phone as we passed and was filming us.
“Is this okay for you?” I asked. “People may be thinking we’re together?”
She shrugged. “I don’t mind. We’re all over the media anyway.” She glanced up at me with a sassy smile. “I have to admit, I looked online the next morning. I was fucking hot in that dress.”
“You were fucking hot in that dress,” I agreed. And then I took another risk. “And you were fucking hot out of it too.”
It felt so good, holding her hand. We were communicating so much through that touch, without the clunkiness of words. She rubbed my arm with her other hand and smiled up at me.
And then it happened. We both moved at the same time, drawn together by that magical force between us. She lifted her chin and our lips met. That kiss spoke so much – there was so much heart and soul in it, and my body pressed strongly into hers, with heat and passion and tenderness at once. Then we broke apart, and she rested her head on my chest for a moment. Then we moved out of the way of an elderly lady with a shopping cart.
“Well, that happened,” she said, looking up at me with a twinkle in her eye.
“Yep, that would appear to have happened,” I said.
She squeezed my hand again, and we strolled on down the street. We didn’t talk about the kiss, or what it meant, or any of that – and I didn’t let my brain start churning it all over. For once, I just enjoyed the moment.
We spent some time looking in the window of the first antique store we arrived at. Then we had to let go of one another’s hands, and it felt like a wrench. I held the door open for her and ushered her in ahead of me, then watched her sashay across the space, making a beeline for a beautiful and grand drawing room bureau.
It was hard to believe that she wasn’t the most confident woman in the world, underneath all that sass and style. No one would ever have guessed she was insecure inside. Suddenly I wanted to tell her everything – about me and Clarissa, about my doubts over staying in the NFL at my age, about my worries over my relationship with Kayla… I wanted to hunker down with her in a candlelit room and lay my head on her shoulder and tell her all the things that I’d held inside me for so long.
She turned and looked at me then, startling me out of my reverie. Her face was flushed with excitement at the contents of the store, which was mainly eighteenth and nineteenth century pieces, to my untrained eye. She smiled at me, walked back and took me by the upper arms, fixing me with a serious look.
“Now, mister,” she said, low under her breath, as a dealer made her way over to us. “You are not rich. You are not famous. You are not here to give them the biggest sale they’ve had all year.”
“Sounds like I should just let you do the talking.”
“Yep,” she said. “Well, you can talk, but just follow my lead.”
As I watched her warmly greet the dealer and ask about a watermarked silk ottoman, I was filled with admiration and respect for her. What a woman. Right then, whether she was off limits as a lover or not, it didn’t matter. I just wanted to be near her, in whatever way was okay for her. I’d follow her lead in the store, and at that moment I’d have followed her lead in life too, wherever it took me.
13
MARY-BETH
As I put a second coat of dusky rose pink paint on the wall in Apartment 2, my mind wandered back to the day before, and my day with Alex. I was seeing him again in a short while, and my stomach was getting that intense, full, sexy energy feeling, even as I tried to ignore it and get on with my work. I was also feeling a bit shaky and my heart kept pounding – with nerves and caffeine probably. (I’d tried to compensate for lying awake last night thinking about Alex with two strong macchiatos this morning.) We were holding a photo shoot for my online magazine in this apartment in a little while, and everything had to be ready – for one thing, the paint had to be dry. Luckily, it was a beautiful June day and I had all the sash windows open and a powerful breeze blowing in.
