“Ok,” she bends, unlocks the door, and straightens.
I hand her the book. “Ok.”
“It’s unlocked now,” she looks at me.
“I see.” I turn my phone off. The moon silhouettes her face and I feel like a teenager, bringing a date home, hands clammy and nerves jumbled. It’s been a long time since I felt this way, terrified and thunderstruck by a woman.
“Can you get inside ok?” I look down at her, those beautiful eyes. Those berry-red lips. Those glasses, sliding down her nose. I reach forward, gently pushing them up with the tip of my finger.
Her breath catches.
I lean forward.
“Do you-” she stops herself, takes a breath, and tries again, “Do you want-”
I bend down, my lips a hair away from her. I breathe deeply, her body so close to mine, her lips less than an inch from mine, those dark eyes peering into mine, and I feel like I am staring at everything I ever wanted, right here, right now, in this woman.
“Yes,” I breathe against her mouth, the scent of wine and woman warm and wet against my lips, “I do.”
I breathe deeper, brush my lips just slightly above hers, “but not tonight.”
“Oh,” her breath catches, her eyes on mine, dark and deep in the moonlight.
I brush my lips against hers again, closer this time, feeling their soft texture beneath my own. Her lips part, a soft sigh coming from her mouth and I remember the wine, two bottles between us, and lift my head.
I reach for her hand, the soft skin bright in the moonlight, fingers curled around a thick volume entitled Burn the Patriarchy. I caress the back of her hand, her skin satin and silk beneath my touch.
“Goodnight, professor,” I whisper, the words barely audible between us, seeming to linger in the summer evening air, caught in the lilac scented moonlight.
I take two steps back, watch her turn the door handle and step inside, stumbling slightly on the doorstep and glancing briefly at me before shutting the door.
I step down the stairs, glance at the stars and swear under my breath.
It’s a long walk home.
14
Jane
Oh my god, I’m so hungover.
Well, no. Actually. Not hungover. Not hungover at all, actually. Just mortified.
Mortified.
I wake up and the sun is pouring down on me through my windows. Staggering to the bathroom, I see the front door is locked, my bag is on the table where I usually leave it, and, I give myself a mental pat on the back. I even managed to brush my teeth before going to bed last night.
And it’s not like I blacked out.
Oh no.
I remember everything.
Specifically, I remember going to Dory’s, drinking and eating well into the night, walking home with David, complaining about my shitty childhood, getting to my house…
And inviting him in.
Which I would never normally do.
But that’s not the worst part.
The worst part is remembering what he said.
“No.”
Well, actually, he didn’t say no.
He said, “Yes, but not tonight.”
Which is what beautiful men say when they want to gently let down plain women. It’s up there with, “I value our friendship too much,” or “I’m not in that space yet.”
I mean, he couldn’t exactly have said, “Dinner was great, conversation was fantastic, and I like you as a friend.”
I shake my head. Of course, I’ve heard those exact words before, from other men. Well, from one man. One time. Years ago. But it still stings.
I strip off my t-shirt and step into the shower. The water is cool and I welcome it against my flushed skin. He did kiss me, which was unexpected. A pity kiss, probably. A token gesture to tell my friends about.
I grab the shampoo and lather my hair, aggressively scrubbing my scalp.
He’s probably done this dozens of times. Let women down gently. How could he not? I can’t imagine the number of panties, phone numbers, and evening invitations that are thrown his way.
And he’s not a jerk.
I tilt my head back under the flow of water, my eyes closed beneath the gentle pummel.
He’s not a bad guy, despite all my assumptions and expectations.
He’s kind and funny and often very sweet. A great listener.
Jesus. I shake my head, rubbing my hands over my face beneath the water, shampoo dripping down my shoulders.
The world’s most eligible bachelor.
I turn off the water and step out of the shower, grabbing a towel to wrap around myself as I head into the kitchen and turn on the coffee pot.
No wonder I fell for him. I was destined to fall for him. He was designed to make women fall. Perfectly engineered to ruin my life.
My mother’s voice runs through my head. Some people were born lucky, Jane. Not women like us.
Some people were born gorgeous, and successful, and fun, and smart, and lovely.
And then there are the rest of us.
I peer into my fridge and see its barren shelves. I walk to my closet, preparing to throw on some clothes and head to the grocery store when it hits me.
My car is still at his house.
Shit.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
I don’t even have a day or a week or however long I can get away with not seeing him again to collect myself, to develop my casual laugh. Ha ha ha. Dinner was great. Sorry I hit on you. Drunk me is a big slut, ha ha ha. I’m not in love. Everything is fine.
Damn.
I grab a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, throw my hair in a ponytail and reach for my phone.
The only way I can pick up my car is if I bring a buffer, and I know just who to call.
15
David
My phone wakes me and I know it’s Angelo. No one else, not even my mother, would call me at this ungodly hour.
“Hello?” I mutter, one arm draped over my face, blocking out the sunlight. The duvet is wrapped around my legs and the warmth of the light streams through my windows. I notice that I didn’t shut my drapes last night, a first for me. I can’t remember the last time I left my curtains open when I was in the house. My paranoia over photographers taught me from an early age to make sure they had no access to private images.
“Why the fuck aren’t you returning my calls?” It’s Angelo alright, loud and irritated and sounding very, very busy.
“When did you call?”
“I called three times last night. Where the hell were you?”
I rub my hand over my face, early morning beard prickly against my palm. “I was out.”
“Out? Out where? Did you drive down to Boston?”
“No. Out in town.”
“What town?”
I turn my head, watching the tops of the trees sway in the morning breeze, light blue sky filtering through their tips. “Out in Midnight.”
A pause. Angelo is digesting.
“What the fuck is there to do in Midnight?”
“I had dinner.”
“With whom?”
The trees are moving slowly, leaves overlapping and caressing each other. I watch the patterns of sunlight dance across my floor, filtered through the window.
“With a friend.”
“How do you have friends? You’ve been there a month.”
“I’ve made friends.” I think of Jane last night, her dark eyes, wine-red lips, easy laugh and clever jokes. The sunlight continues to dance and I wonder if she’s lying in bed, sleeping off our indulgent meal, or sitting on her porch, reading that feminist tome from her friend. Or perhaps she’s watching the leaves against the morning sky, enjoying their dance and sway and thinking of me. The thought makes me smile.
“Hello?”
“I’m sorry, what?” I realize Angelo is still talking, his deep voice agitated across the phone lines.
“I said, who the hell are these friends?”
“A professor.�
�
“I thought you said friends,” Angelo said, emphasizing the ’s.’
“Well, just one.”
“So you’re having dinner with one friend.”
I nod.
“It’s a woman?”
“Hmm mmm,” I yawn and stretch. Maybe that small donut shop on main street is open. Now that I know where Jane lives, I could swing by with coffee and a couple of chocolate-glazed. I grin, remembering my walk home last night, enjoyable in the warm summer evening, despite my inconvenient erection. I don’t make moves on intoxicated women, especially when I’m intoxicated myself. I run my hand over my stomach, feeling my cock twitch, and I tap my fingers lightly against my belly button.
I grin.
We’re both sober now.
“Jesus, David.”
“What?” I sit up, Angelo’s irritation bellowing through the phone.
“I said, do you even know this woman?”
“I’m getting to know her,” I say, my own frustration rising along with my voice. “Hence, the dinner.”
“You know-”
“What’s going on, man? Are you so bored in L.A. you have to play long-distance chaperone?”
“I’ve seen this before, David. I told you.”
“Told me what?”
“David,” Angelo’s voice is low now, the syllables of my name pronounced slowly and with deliberate care. I have heard him speak this way to interns, young actors, and overly aggressive PR representatives. “You have made a radical change in your circumstances. You are coming off a ten year contract. You have moved to a place where you don’t know anyone, but everyone knows you. I would recommend-”
“I would recommend you stop calling me so early,” I interrupt him, trying to sound serious, but yawning as I do.
“It’s 9 a.m. on the East Coast. I checked.”
I laugh to myself. Six months ago, I would have finished my workout and had two meetings by now. Today, I’m naked in bed, planning on buying coffee and seducing a woman over donuts.
“Angelo, I’m fine.” I hear his intake of breath and before he can interrupt, I continue. “I’m enjoying my time off. I’m enjoying the community, the feel of a small town. And,” I make sure to emphasize the point, “I am enjoying the script you sent me.”
That last part is a lie. I haven’t even looked at the script. It’s still inside its padded, manilla envelope, marked Overnight Express, and sitting on my kitchen island.
“You are?”
“I am.” I yawn again, hoping he’ll buy my lie. “I haven’t finished it yet, and I have some notes. I’ll let you know when I’m done.”
Another pause. I can feel him calculating on the other end of the call, weighing the outcome of his words, processing various directions the conversation can take.
“Ok,” he says, calmly and much to my surprise. “That’s good. Finish it and let me know what you think.”
He hangs up.
I glance down at my phone again. There’s an unread text from that same, unknown number.
Glad you walked her home.
I shake my head. Maybe it’s one of Jane’s neighbors, some local tech wizard who hacked my number. I’m mildly irritated at the thought of having to change my number again, but shrug. It’s hardly the first time.
Then again, maybe it’s someone Jane knows. A friend, perhaps? Someone who got my number off of her phone when she wasn’t looking?
Did you leave Jane a book last night?
I text back.
Three dots appear beneath my message.
No. Jessica did.
Hmm. I flip my phone over, toss back my blanket and stand up, heading to the shower.
At least we know it’s not Jessica.
16
Jane
“Where are we going, Jane?” Penelope stares at me as I rush past her on my balcony, moving swiftly towards her car. Her hand, still lifted as if to knock, remains in the air as she watches me.
“I have to pick up my car.” I open the passenger side door of her ancient Volkswagen and can’t help but smile at the retro faux-wood paneling. Penelope is many things, but a lover of new technology is not one of them.
“Ok. But where is it?” She follows me off the deck, walking around the front of her time capsule and slides into the driver’s seat. She turns to me as I get in, one hand resting on the stick shift, the other on the wheel, both of which are hand-painted with puff paint in various shades of neon. A pair of fuzzy die hang from the rearview mirror.
“Before I tell you, I need to know you’ll be cool.” I stare at her, making uncomfortably direct eye contact. Trying to at least. I realize too late I’ve left my glasses in the house, and things are a little blurry up close.
“Jesus, are you ok? What’s going on?” Penelope leans forward. “What did you do, Jane?”
“I did-I did-” I stutter, take a deep breath, and continue, “I showed poor judgement last night.”
“Shit, do you need, like, a lawyer? Should we call Kate?”
“Why would we call Kate?”
“Well,” Penelope shrugged, “I don’t know. Whenever I have a panic attack about taxes or math, I just think of calling her. Lawyers are in the category of taxes and math.”
“No, but,” I pause, looking at her. “How often do you have panic attacks about taxes and math?”
Penelope rolls her eyes, “I’m a self-employed artist. How often do you think?” She shakes her head, “But back on track. What’s going on? What was your poor judgement?”
“I did something I shouldn’t have done,” I look down at my hands, pressing my lips together. “Something terrible.”
Penelope is silent, leaning farther forward, practically sitting in my lap. I can feel her eyes bearing into the side of my head.
“I…” I lick my lips. “I kissed someone.”
“Fuck, Jane!” Penelope rears back, slapping her hand against the wheel so hard it sets off her horn. We both jump at the sound. “For fuck’s sake, I thought you killed someone!”
“What?” I look up, “Why the hell would you think that?”
“You can’t find your car, you’re all freaked out, you only called me?”
“How does that make you think I killed someone?”
Penelope exhaled loudly, waving both hands in the air, “Hello? Of all the people we know, everyone else would tell you to go to the cops. I’m the only person you know who would respond with, ‘He probably had it coming. Let’s cut up the body and feed it to my neighbor’s hogs.’”
“Good lord, Penelope,” I lean back slightly, my back against the passenger side door. “Good lord, is that really what you would say? If I told you I had killed someone?”
“I was mentally calculating the cost of a chainsaw.” She sighs and shakes her head, both hands on the steering wheel. She turns to me, a look of almost disappointment on her face and for a moment I wonder if she isn’t the slightest bit upset that I’m not involving her in a homicide. “So you kissed a guy?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, that’s great!” She smiles and pats my arm, like a mother congratulating her child on an A in science class. “Good for you.”
“No. Not great for me.” I shake my head.
“Why not?” She turns again, eyes wide. “Oh my god, is he married?” She gasps loudly, “Is it the Mayor’s husband?”
“What?” I sputter, staring at her again. “What the hell is wrong with you? Why are you coming up with these ridiculous ideas? Why would I kiss the mayor’s husband?”
“I saw you talking with him.”
“At last year’s Christmas party?”
Penelope nods.
“About his retirement plans?”
She nods again.
“And his gout?”
She pauses, shrugs, “Well, I don’t know. I don’t know what your type is.”
“I did not kiss any member of the local government body.”
Penelope looks at me, eyes narrowing briefly befor
e going wide, “Oh shit, was it a student?”
I sigh and close my eyes, tilting my head agains the back of the seat.
“Truth be told, that is particularly hard to believe,” Penelope is still looking at me. She purses her lips. “No offense to your students, but come on. I’ve seen them. You could do much better.”
“I have not kissed a member of the student body.”
“Ok.” Penelope nods, more to herself than to me. She turns forward, eyes peering through the windshield. “No murder. No adultery. Nothing under-aged.” She reaches a hand to rearrange her fuzzy die. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Jane, but I’m really struggling here. Whoever you kissed, why was it such a big deal that you need me? And what do you expect me to do for you?”
“I need you as a buffer.”
She turns again. “Like, physically?” She looks down at herself, “I mean, I can try, but I’m not exactly athletic.”
“I need you as a conversational buffer.”
“Oh,” she nods. “Sure, I can do that. What, like distract someone while you get your car?”
I nod.
She smiles. “No problem. Who is it?”
“David Jacobs.”
Her eyebrows shoot up. Jaw goes slack.
I wait.
Silence.
I wait.
“David Jacobs?”
I nod.
“The. You. But.” She stutters, like a cellphone with bad reception. Single words jerking out of her open mouth.
“We will go to his house-”
“Oh my god.”
“-where you will make small talk-”
“Holy shit.”
“-in case he comes out of his house-”
“ohmygodohmygodohmygod.”
“-while I get my car.”
“Holy fuck, Jane.”
“Ok?”
“Ok.” She nods. “Ok. We’re really going to his house?”
“Yes.”
“Can I go inside?”
“No.”
“Can we- Can I talk to him?”
“That’s the reason I called you. You’re going to distract him, while I retrieve my car.”
Jane Air Page 11