The Secrets She Keeps

by Jolie Moore

  “Obviously. I still can’t believe you told Lucas before me.” Daisy was trying to hide the hurt and insecurity. She was doing a piss-poor job. “You’ve known him for all of ten seconds in the cosmic scheme of things. I’ve known you, what, fifteen years now. It’s like that counts for nothing.”

  “I…I don’t know why I told him. But it doesn’t matter anyway.”

  “Why? Where is he anyway? I thought you guys were…I don’t know…back to dating or something.”

  “That’s over,” I said. He’d as much as said so weeks ago. “It’s not exactly dating. More like sex without strings.” I made a gesture with my hands passing by each other. “Lucas and I are different planets in different orbits.”

  “Maybe?” Daisy lifted her shoulders in a shrug. But it was clear she didn’t believe in a future for me and Lucas. She was throwing me a bone.

  I shook my head very slowly. “No chance.”

  “Wow,” she said. “I know you wanted there to be something. I’m sorry, but you deserve better.”

  “I’m feeling very judged right now.”

  Daisy was quick to push up her sunglasses, and really look at me. I pushed up my own. This was one of those moments when I wondered if men served a purpose on this earth. Because I could see the love she had for me. That she’d be there through thick and thin, marriages, sickness and death and divorce. I couldn’t say the same of a single man in my life.

  “I’ve never been in a position to judge anyone. You know that. I’m sure you did what you needed to do in that time and place. I’m a little sad that you didn’t think you could trust me with it. But that’s about me. And not everything is about me.” My best friend paused a long time. I could see her throat working to hold back recriminations, swallow tears. She pinched at her nose. But the movement didn’t work. Daisy pulled a tissue from her purse and dabbed at her nose. Finally, she spoke. “What did Simon say?”

  “That he was sorry I couldn’t tell him at the time.”

  “I kind of thought you liked Lucas.”

  “I kind of really did. I wanted to come out of hibernation for him. But maybe I put too much stock into that. Thinking that a guy was going to come in and save the day.”

  “Don’t. Just don’t let the mess with him push you back into the dark. I’m glad that you’re coming out with the truth. The reason doesn’t really matter.” We watched children wave to us from the trolley. “Where is the catalyst of all this honesty anyway?”

  “I have no idea. We were supposed to drive to Ojai for the weekend. But he called off work Friday and who knows…”

  “You haven’t texted him.”

  “From talking to patients I think men are bad at break ups. They sort of melt into the ether. It’s not like he didn’t tell me it couldn’t work out. I’ll spare him the nagging injured party texts.”

  “So why were you going to Ojai?”

  “If sex in the city was good sex in the mountains would be better, right? Isn’t that what drives the human race?”

  Daisy matched my formality. “Then maybe you should seek that out elsewhere.”

  As if on cue a man who could have been from central casting as the “hot guy” walked by. He actually lifted his shirt and wiped sweat from his brow. Noticing us, he nodded his head in greeting and said, “Ladies.”

  I couldn’t help myself. Laughter shook my whole body, escaping in an inelegant snort and giggle combination. Daisy was right there with me. I joined our elbows and we stood to go.

  Chapter 32

  Lucas

  “How was your weekend?” I asked, coming into Nari’s office without an invitation. I glanced at the clock on her desk. We had a good twenty minutes before the first appointment, though I was sure I’d seen a couple early bird patients warming the waiting room chairs.

  “Are we seriously going to do this?” she asked.

  I had a weird sense of déjà vu with that question. “Do what?”

  Nari threw back her head in what only could have been exasperation. “Pretend that there’s anything between us. Invent reasons to talk. Lucas, I got your message loud and clear. Now if you don’t mind, I need to look through these reports before nine.”

  Feeling something inappropriate looming, I pushed the office door closed. “What message?”

  “Silence can be deafening.”

  What the heck was she talking about? I’d been on a plane two of the last four days. She knew about the alphabet soup of TSA, NTSB, FAA and the long list of regulations regarding cell phones on planes, right? “I was with my parents.”

  “That’s lovely, Lucas.”

  Lowering my voice, I said, “I’d have rather gone to Ojai with you.”

  “Can we not prolong this? You said you couldn’t be with me. We made plans to go to Ojai, and you disappeared off the face of the earth or went to Vermont. Either way, I think we need to cut this short before we hurt each other any more.”

  The proverbial light bulb went on. “You didn’t get my note.”

  “Note? Are we in eighth grade? No, the popular girl in the front didn’t pass back your latest missive.”

  I got it then. She was hurt or pissed or both. She cared. I kind of wanted to smile, except that would have hurt her or pissed her off more. Instead I walked behind her chair, her eyes on me the whole way. There it was, flipped upside down, the note I’d taped to the back. Carefully, I removed the small rectangle that held my handwriting in addition to an ad for an anti-stroke drug.

  I spun her chair around and handed the note to her. “Here.”

  She snatched it out of my hand. Read it. Placed it carefully down on her desk, all without a change in expression. “I have a nine o’clock patient. I need to look at her test results. If you don’t mind.”

  I left her there. Because I didn’t know how to say what I wanted. I needed to go work up the courage.

  Ten hours of seeing her walk by with efficiency, talking to nurses about clinical matters, nearly sent me over the edge. I’d missed a weekend of going to sleep with her, waking up with her, being with her. I followed her out.

  “Nari!” I called as she walked to her truck.

  She paused. I could practically see her vacillation from fifty yards away. She stayed put and I loped over to her, hoping I didn’t look as goofy as I felt. “Can you drive with me to Tahoe next weekend?”

  “Tahoe?”

  “Will and Laura wanted us to come up for the weekend.”

  “Us?”

  “You were expressly invited. I’m extending that invitation.”

  “This can’t be a regular thing, but I’ll see it through with you.”

  Those four intervening days were torture. But I manned up and muddled through.

  The green machine and I picked up Nari for the short ride to the airport. That ride, parking the car, the shuttle ride, and the quick flight to Reno were all in polite silence. I was nervous. I didn’t really know what to say. Nari was as cool as a cucumber. Her big designer tote was filled to the brim with brightly colored fashion magazines. She paged through, made notes, and added sticky tabs like a professional shopper. But I had to admit she looked spectacular. The lace peeking between the buttons of the silky blouse she was wearing made me shift in my seat more than once. I’d have begrudged her those magazines if she hadn’t been so damned good at making casual look sexy.

  If she didn’t have something to say to me, I wondered more than once on the trip and the ride to the bed and breakfast why she was there with me. If Laura hadn’t asked me to bring Nari, maybe I’d have taken her up on the idea that we stop seeing each other. Being this close and knowing there was an end in sight was starting to be torture.

  When we pulled up to the rustic-looking lodge, I started doubting myself big time. I’d looked at the website a thousand times. I had vacillated between the two-room suite and the room I’d eventually booked, a three hundred square foot room with the king sized bed and whirlpool tub. I expected an objection when I checked in. When the innkeepe
rs took us up two flights to the room. When Nari plopped her black leather weekend bag on the bed. But I got nothing. We got a lesson on how to light the river rock fireplace. How to use the whirlpool came next. Then we were alone with a big pine bed and a view of the lake.

  Nari rubbed her arms. I blinked slowly before I realized there was a chill in the room. My mind and body were so overheated that the forty-degree temperature hadn’t registered.

  “Let me light a fire,” I said. My phone rang and I pulled it from my pocket. “It’s William.”

  After a brief exchange of pleasantries, my biological father got to the point. He wanted us to meet them in the morning. I scribbled down an address on the pad near the desk and hung up.

  “They want to meet after breakfast,” I said.

  “Okay.” Nari said. “I guess we need to see this through.”

  I pressed a button on the phone. “You up for dinner?”

  Nari crossed her legs. Laceless Converse sneakers covered her feet. She removed a bobby pin from her hair. “Can we order in?”

  “I’ll be back.” Turned out we couldn’t order in, but twenty minutes later, I had take-out from the Italian restaurant down the road.

  “You didn’t have to do all this,” Nari said as I set out steaming plates of Portobello mushroom ravioli and vegetarian lasagna.

  “I wanted to,” I said.

  “I think this needs to be our last weekend together,” Nari said.

  I set down the cutlery very carefully. This had been coming. I knew it, but unrealistically thought we could skirt the issue. I couldn’t ask why because I knew why. I was stuck where I was and the facts of her past weren’t going to change.

  “But I love you,” I blurted out. I hadn’t meant that to come out now or in that way. “I think I’m falling in love with you,” I amended. I don’t know why I’d said that. I hadn’t even fully worked it out in my head. I’d been thinking it on the flight back from Vermont. Every day I’d seen her in the office. When I’d picked up the dinner. But I’d never ever meant for it to come out. It’s wasn’t fair to her. To me. To us.

  Nari stood from the table. She’d changed into some soft looking pajamas when I’d been gone. She stepped out on the terrace. I sat and ate some of the ravioli, and a bit of the lasagna. By the time I took a first bite of the torta della nonna and she hadn’t come back. I looked and she was standing there, looking at the huge lake. The moon shone through the trees, highlighting her hair.

  I made my way through the sliding glass doors. “Are you hungry?”

  “I’m never hungry, Lucas. I don’t think I’ve been hungry in years. I know how human physiology works. I eat to live. Given my metabolic rate, it takes seventeen hundred eighty-four calories a day to survive.”

  “How many have you had today?”

  “That coffee and muffin at the airport. About six hundred.”

  “Come eat,” I implored. I wrapped my hand around hers and gently tugged her back in the room. I closed the door and turned up the fire. She ate mechanically, brushed her teeth and pulled back the covers. I tucked the remaining food in the fridge. I took my time unpacking a few items, showering the day’s stress away. I pulled on a pair of fresh boxers and came back into the room.

  I turned out the light and joined Nari in the bed. Shadows danced along the ceiling and wood-paneled walls as the firelight flickered. I extended my arm. Almost as if by instinct, she moved closer. In a matter of moments, she tucked herself into my side, her nighttime loose hair spilled against my chest.

  I traced the fine hairs along her hairline. Rubbed the pads of my fingers along her brow. Nari’s breathing quickened a bit as I moved to the band of her pajama top. I slid my hand under the loose fabric. Toyed with the bones of her hips, the hollow of her navel.

  A puff of breath pursed her lips. I couldn’t resist the invitation. I ran my tongue along first the top lip, then the fuller bottom.

  Nari had never been about teasing or soft touches. She cupped the back of my neck and pulled me close. Our breath mingled, then our mouths melded. Her tongue met and dueled with mine. When I broke contact, we were both winners. I lifted the top over her head, skimmed off the thin knit pants. I tried not to fall on her naked body like a dog on a bone. But I was hard. I pulled one nipple taught with my thumb and forefinger, watching it harden. The firelight bathed her body in a reddish orange glow, only heightening the flush of arousal staining her.

  A moan like a cry escaped Nari, echoing off the pine-paneled walls. I couldn’t wait any longer. I pulled a condom from the shaving kit on the bedside table, sheathed myself and tried not to crush her with my weight. I ground my cock between her legs, against her clit. In moments, we were both out of breath.

  I wanted to hold off, make this last as long as possible. But I couldn’t. “Nari…”

  “There’s always this, Lucas. Always this. Please. I need you inside me.”

  I didn’t wait to RSVP. I tried slow, but slammed in fast. With each thrust, high pitched moans escaped Nari. Her responsiveness nearly made me explode. But I gritted my teeth, fitting my hand between us, pressing a thumb to her center until she lost the rhythm. The tiny quakes and tremors made me lose control. With two or three more thrusts, I emptied into her. I think I’d probably declared my love for her again. But I’m not quite sure what had come out of my mouth. It had been disconnected from my brain for a minute or three.

  I lay my forehead against hers for longer than I could count, trying to gather my wits about me. Bracing my elbows on either side of her, I lifted slowly.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. My hair had rubbed an abrasion onto her chest.

  “It’ll heal.”

  One shove and I was up. I placed a hand on her hips, bracing her while I pulled out. I took a long time in the bathroom, cleaning up, washing my hands. Looking at the man facing me in the mirror.

  Nari hadn’t put her little sexy pajamas back on. She’d turned on her side. Firelight flickered along the long smooth skin of her back and side that wasn’t concealed by thin bits of knit and lace. I lay back down, turned to her.

  “You know what totally sucks?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “I think I love you too.”

  Something like adrenaline flooded through me. Though I lay perfectly still, I knew if I stood up and left the room, I could have completed a run around Lake Tahoe without missing a step. But I didn’t move, didn’t run that victory lap. Because that wasn’t what I’d thought falling in love would be like. Even in my movie and television-free household, common themes on love snuck in. Fairy tales had always ended in happily ever after. Chick flicks my sister had twisted my arm in driving her to always had happy endings. Even action stars rode off into the sunset. But Nari and I weren’t doing any of these.

  We were two people in love and it sucked. Big time.

  The morning was intimate and awkward at the same time. Nari pushed some eggs around her plate in the hotel’s breakfast room. I ate like I’d never see the inside of a dining room again. I needed fortification for the day, though. William had been very quiet and I was waiting for the other shoe to drop, some kind of bombshell like another kid or cancer. I didn’t know which would be easier to take.

  “Do you have the address?” Nari said, lazily flicking through her phone. I don’t think she’d ever done that before. Ignored me. She wasn’t one of those people who was with you, but wishing she were somewhere else until now. I wondered where she wished she was. No, I didn’t want to know. The answer probably contained the name Andrew.

  “I have an address, but I’m not quite sure where it is.” I passed a paper over to her.

  “Let’s go. I’ll plug it into my phone.”

  She was up and in the parking lot before I could blink. I downed the remainder of my grapefruit juice and thanked the owners for breakfast.

  When we passed the notice about entering federal land, Nari tapped her foot. “Do we need a permit to be here?”

  “If we pass a ra
nger or whatever, I’ll ask what the deal is.”

  “Fine.”

  The road, if it could be called that, wove through tall pines. The smell almost reminded me of home. I pulled into a lot where the road ended. “What does the GPS say?”

  “This is it.” Nari lifted her leg, eyeing her three inch heels. “Maybe these shoes aren’t going to work.” I tried not to think about last night. About how the whole package “worked” for me. I was amazed at the way she always looked wonderful no matter what. Today was some fitted dress with a little fur collar and sunglasses. It was classic Jackie-O. Or more like classic Nari-Y.

  Nari shoved the shoes in her purse and I helped her from the car. “You really going barefoot?”

  “Doesn’t seem like another option. I’ll be fine.”

  She made her way down the path a little ways before slipping. I grabbed her right hand in mine and tucked the other around her waist. The path spilled out on the sandy lakeside and there was Laura, Will, and a woman wearing a suit.

  “We’re so glad you found it,” Laura said, hugging each of us. Something poked through my shirt. It was then I noticed she had a bouquet in her hand.

  “Are you getting married?” Nari asked.

  Laura was too choked up to talk, only nodded. William came over and shook my hand, kissed Nari on the cheek. “We walked and talked nearly all night after we left your apartment.”

  “We found what we’d been missing,” Laura said, finding her voice. “We can’t thank you enough for bringing us back together.”

  “Your guests are here. Are you ready?” the suited woman said.

  They both nodded, and Nari and I stood back, a little apart from the threesome near the water.

  “What you taught me, Laura, is about forgiveness. Forgiving you. Forgiving myself. I loved you then. I love you even more now.” William’s words were heartfelt. They hit me in the gut making me think I could use a little bit of his compassion.