by Maria Xystra
“Maybe?” I catch myself asking what should be a sure statement. Trying to avoid another argument with him, I turn to walk away. He reaches for me with both hands and turns me to face him again.
“Lex, are you sure about this?”
“Just leave me alone, Cole!” I start to move but he won’t let go.
“Talk to me, god damn it!” he searches my eyes for a sign, for a clue of what I’m thinking.
“What do you want me to say?” I raise my voice as my anger reaches my head. “Yes, I might see him again! He didn’t do anything wrong!”
In my attempt to defend Alex, I see Cole’s eyes widen and the muscle on his jaw is evidence of him losing his patience. I swear, if we were at school, I would gather up all my strength and headbutt him! The more you push me Cole, the more I push back. “It’s entirely my choice, you know! And you have no say in this! I might see him again, yes! I might date him, I might even fuck him! I’ll do whatever I want, and it will still be none of your business!”
If Cole was a cartoon, smoke would be coming out of his ears. Proof: he lets go of my arms and punches the wall next to us with all his might.
Stunned by his reaction I freeze in place.
His effort to calm himself down is obvious as he runs both hands through his hair. I, on the other hand have had enough of his charades. As I start to leave – for the gazillionth time – his voice comes to me in anguish.
“I just want to look out for you, Lex.”
“And by looking out for me you mean invade my privacy and make decisions about my life?” I bark at him. “I don’t think so!”
“Why are you being so stubborn?” he says exasperatedly.
“Why are you being such an ass?”
A moment of awkward silence surrounds us.
“You mess with my life, I’ll mess with yours,” I try to end the conversation with that.
Cole chuckles and his anger melts away.
“You don’t think I’m serious?” I challenge him. Apparently, he finds my threat funny.
“Challenge accepted, Tipsy,” he gives me a crooked smile as I narrow my eyes at him. “Game on,” he says as he lifts his eyebrows with his face splitting into a huge grin.
I walk slowly to him and reach around his neck. With a seductive smile I pull his face closer to mine.
“Oh, we’re already at half-time, baby.”
CHAPTER 18
As Sam, Parisha and I stroll around the Santa Monica pier on Sunday afternoon with funnels and ice-cream in our hands, I realize how much I’ve missed this. Every time Parisha visits, we practically drop everything to spend the day with her. Being a model, she travels a lot but whenever she gets the chance, she comes to LA to see us.
Originally from New York, she came to study Psychology at UCLA, until she dropped out when she landed a big modeling deal. It’s always been her passion to glide down catwalks and her dream was to see her face on huge billboards. And she’s halfway there. Sam and I were heartbroken when she dropped the bomb on us during sophomore year. But still, we were thrilled to see her chasing her dream and making it a reality.
We used to be the most incompatible bunch at university. Sam was my roommate and Parisha was the girl next door. Her roommate was usually…camping in the library so she used to come over to our room whenever she wanted company. An aspiring model, a meticulous party organizer and a bewildered bartender – that was me. We practically had nothing in common; Sam was constantly chasing an event and Parisha left no model casting pass her by. I was a rebel, in a dark, dark, place, running away from my life in Florida and shying away from any kind of social activity.
Now, four years later, Sam and I see each other every other day and we’ve made it our ritual to promenade the pier every once in a while, especially when Parisha is in town.
“So, that was Layla,” Sam says as she hangs up. During her phone call, she kept casting wary looks in my direction and refrained to numerous ‘uhums’ and ‘yeahs’.
“Yeaaaah?” I prompt her to share what she appears hesitant to.
“She’s… she’s just not coming,” she informs us with a shrug.
“Why not?” Parisha inquires through a mouthful of ice-cream.
“She…um…she has a date…”
“With who?” Parisha continues, but her interest gets quickly disrupted by a group of football players passing by.
Sam becomes noticeably uncomfortable and looks at me apologetically.
“With…someone she met at the club last night…”
“Who?” the dark-skinned model insists.
“Um…” Sam hesitates and looks at me again. “Cole?”
My heart misses a couple of beats and then starts thumping feverishly through my chest.
Parisha froze with her ice-cream half way to her mouth. She met my eyes and for a moment none of us spoke as we exchanged glances.
“What?” I shrug at the looks of sympathy I got from my friends, pretending that the information did nothing to affect me.
“Are you OK, baby girl? Do ya wan’ me to punch her nose ‘till it goes through the back of her head??” Parisha says in one breath.
“How do you know?” Sam turns to her in surprise.
“I know everything, sweetie-pie!” the black gazelle replies with sass.
“Lexy is the one who should have been with him!” Sam turns to her and states as a matter-of-factly.
“I know, right!” Parisha quickly tunes in.
“But she won’t admit she likes him!” Sam accuses me with a thumb in my direction, and they continue their exchange as if I’m not there.
“Tsk! That’s so typical of Lex!” the other girl states.
“Yeah, I know…but still, it’s kind of dange-”
“Yeah, I know it is,” Parisha agrees, well aware of my …vamp situation.
“But she should try!”
“Agreed! She’s so stubborn!”
“Guys, guys, I’m right here!” I cut through their amazingly fast chat. They both turn to me and then back to each other, continuing to ignore me for the next few minutes in which they analyze all the pros and cons of a relationship between Cole and me.
Meanwhile, I am churning inside. An unexpected idea pops into my head – payback time.
“Do you have Layla’s address?” I ask Sam. They stop their blabbing and give me cautious looks.
“Uh-oh,” Sam starts. “What do you have in mind?”
“Are we crushing their party?” Parisha gets excited in a flash.
“No…this will be so much better.”
By the time the girls leave and Alex comes to find me, my prank is perfectly planned, waiting to be executed.
As I fight to hold my burger in one piece, Alex surprises me with a sincere look and an abrupt change of mood.
“I owe you an apology…well, two as a matter of fact,” he starts.
“Hm?” I chew quickly on my bite.
“Well, first of all, for leaving in such a rush the other night. When we were at ‘Nirvana’…you know I wouldn’t leave unless it was absolutely necessary. A friend of mine needed me to pick him up-”
“Yeah, car trouble, right?” I recall.
“Right.”
I nod in understanding and he continues.
“And…one for last night. I was…well, truth is, I kind of drunk-dialed you?” he looks at me apologetically.
“Don’t worry about it,” I offer. “We’ve all been there.”
He chuckles nervously, and I follow suit.
We end up taking a long walk along the beach as the sun sets on the horizon in an explosion of colors decorating the LA sky.
“So, do you ever get homesick?” he turns to me and subtly takes my hand in his.
As a first reaction I immediately thought of drawing it back, but I refrained from doing so as Sam’s words come into mind. You have the right to be happy. You should give it a shot. Of course, she had someone else in mind when she said that but let’s not dwell on that.
“I mean,” he goes on, “don’t you miss…New York, was it?”
I pick up on his tone and try not to tense at the implication.
“Not really,” I avoid eye contact. “Everything I care about is here, so what’s there to feel homesick about?”
“But how could you just leave it all behind? Just like that?”
“How could I not!” I grasp at the opportunity to unlink our hands and spread my arms wide open. “Look at this!” I refer to the place, the beach, the sky. “It’s like…magic!”
Alex laughs at my excitement.
“And New York is just…blocks, yellow cabs and tall buildings?” he muses.
“Central Park makes up for it,” I steal Parisha’s line when defending her hometown. When I decided to change my identity and put together a new background story, she was the one who suggested New York as the city I supposedly grew up in. Besides, Parisha’s stories about it never fall short.
“How about you?” I turn the spotlight on him. “Do you miss Seattle? Or Florida?”
“Not really. I haven’t had the chance. I’ve been travelling a lot lately so I’m not really homesick yet,” he answers casually.
“You go back and forth?”
“Not really… Well, I do, yes… But I don’t really get far from the West side.”
I nod but my perplexity must have been obvious through my knotted brow, so he continues.
“I still have some unfinished business in Seattle,” he says, and we leave it at that.
For the rest of the walk back, while rather skillfully dodging personal questions about my past, I’m still in the process of deciding whether I really like the guy or not. A part of me finds him kind, interesting and smart. I can’t help but smile at the way he gets fascinated when talking about old houses and other restoration projects he’s worked on. The other part though, kind of wonders if I’m doing this simply out of spite because Cole told me to stay away from him.
Reaching my car, I get the feeling that Alex is contemplating something. As I unlock my door, I register that it’s that awkward end of the date moment. Instinctively, I glance at Alex standing behind me through the window glass. A scene from my dream replays in my head and I hesitate to turn around in order to avoid any kind of move he might have in mind.
“So…I guess I’ll see you around?” he says and opens my door.
“Sure,” I reply and climb in the driver’s seat.
“I’ll give you a call…after I get back. I’ll be out of town for a while.”
“OK. Talk to you then.”
The moment he walks away from my car, I start the engine and slowly start to drive out of the parking lot.
A feeling of…uncertainty settles within me. I think I feel kind of bad shying away from him at the end. After all, what’s the worst that could happen if I just leant in for a kiss? I cast a glance through the rearview mirror to find Alex slowly walking away with his full attention on his phone.
CHAPTER 19
Monday morning comes with an early meeting – thankfully, in my office. As the people from the various departments go over several data and records, I tune out and daydream about everything and nothing.
“Lexy? Lexy?” Luke’s voice snaps me out of my reverie. “You’re up.”
I stifle a smile at the thought of last night’s devious plot, make sure my phone goes straight to voicemail and get started with my presentation.
Having my back to the windows and the city view, I talk to my colleagues and vividly explain my points. Reaching my final slide, I catch movement outside my office with the corner of my eye.
A furious Cole barges into the floor and stomps purposefully towards my office door. I repeat my last word a couple of times and everyone frowns at me. I dare not look outside the office again. Finishing the meeting, I practically plead with them to ask as many questions as possible. Prolonging the meeting is the best solution I can come up with to delay my upcoming doom.
Luke, on the other hand, sees Cole and hurries to give an end to the meeting, much to my discomfort. I savage my lips as one by one, my coworkers leave us alone.
“I’ll go see what Mr. Theron is here for,” Luke informs me, as he smoothes his tie.
“OK,” I mumble and sink into my chair.
Quickly though, I realize that hiding in my office and waiting for him to come inside, is not the best way to go. And that is because when Cole lifts his arm to show Luke that I’m the one he’s here to see, he’s carrying…a bouquet of flowers.
I self-consciously step out the door to meet him in the safety of the hallway. Luke still lingers near him. Cole turns abruptly to face me and holding my gaze he speaks to Luke.
“Could I speak with Ms. Davis alone, please?”
“Of course!” Luke hurries to answer. Great! Why don’t you add some fries and a salad and serve me on a platter!
By the look Cole gave me – and is still giving me –, I half-expected my life’s best moments to flash before my eyes.
“Let’s head into your office,” he suggests – more like commands.
“Let’s…,” I clasp my hands together in front of me, “not!” He gives me a half-smoldering, half-warning look. Staying in the hallway will prevent him from yelling at me…hopefully!
I try to swallow past the lump in my throat and brace myself for his upcoming outburst. Instead, he visibly relaxes his tensed body, and begins.
“So…did you have a nice weekend?” he acts nonchalantly as he plays with the bouquet ribbon.
“Hmm?” the ridiculous high-pitched response was all that came out.
“Did you…do anything…interesting?” he drags his voice. “Say…yesterday?”
“Yesterday?” I quote.
“Yesterday evening?” he prompts.
“Yesterday evening?” I repeat.
He smirks and inhales deeply.
“Oh, yesterday evening! I went out with the girls,” I inform him casually, consciously leaving out the date I had with Alex.
“And then…?”
“Then I went home, I had a shower, I watched a movie… What about you?” I try to turn the focus on him.
“I had an important meeting!”
“With Layla? Is that what you call it now?” I say without thinking. Shit!
He chuckles and shakes his head.
“And the weirdest thing happened! The florist I ran into when I was about to leave Layla’s apartment had a delivery-”
“Oh, my God! Are you serious? A delivery? How is that even possible! A florist delivering flowers? That is weird!”
“From me, Lex!” he cuts my ironic blubbering.
“You sent flowers to yourself?” I ask him in mocking disbelief. “That’s so…pathetic!”
“Not for me,” he says and shoves the bouquet in my arms.
“Oh, for me! You shouldn’t have!”
“You shouldn’t have!”
“Meeee? What…what do you mean?” I feign innocence.
“Don’t play dumb, Tipsy,” he warns in a singing tone.
“I was just looking out for you.” And this is where the well-rehearsed, full of sarcasm, poem starts. “I did it for you, I wanted to make sure you made the right decision, I made the decision for you…it’s OK to let someone have your back every once in a while!”
His face splits into an adorable, full-dimples-on-display smile.
“Hm, cute. So, basically, you admit that you were the one who sent them,” he simply states.
“I thought we already established that,” I extend my hand to tease him in a ‘not-as-clever-as-you-look’ way, but I quickly retrieve it, ending up with quite a funny gesture. “You…” I want to finish with ‘silly’, but I end up saying “you!” again.
“And you think that was OK why?”
“Hm? Let’s see. You had a date with a girl, you had dinner, you had …shmndd… with her, the least you could do was send her some flowers. So, practically, I was helping you. So, yeah, I think it’s OK.
”
“Wait- We had what?”
“Dinner? Focus!” I whisper loudly.
“And then we had what?” he asks amused.
“You know…mnnblep?”
“What?”
“You…ffffucked her!!”
Cole giggles at my comment. Without realizing it, I hold my breath and wait for his answer. Will he deny it or confirm it? Do I really wanna know? Yes, no! Yes! …Please say you didn’t.
“So, what if I did? If every girl I fuck gets flowers, florists would be really rich!”
Now, this turns the game around. Not only did the flowers never get to Layla, he seems to be amused and way calmer than I expected. The comment about the number of girls he sleeps with catches me off guard, and I realize that at the back of my mind, I was hoping his notorious ‘playboy’ image wasn’t all true.
“Great! So, go make some florists rich and let me get back to work,” I state and start leading him towards the elevator, pressing the button for it to come.
“Don’t you even think that this ends here,” he threatens me. When I hear the ‘bing’, I shove him inside and press the button for the ground floor. And because I simply can’t ignore the opportunity, I quickly press as many buttons as I can and draw back. I smirk at him maliciously and wave. “Enjoy the ride.”
However, in the speed of lightning, he reaches forward and grabs my wrist pulling me inside the elevator. I land on him. His rock-hard body, along with the blend of his aftershave and masculine scent, make my heart skip a beat and a chill travel down my spine. The attraction is so palpable…does he feel it too? He keeps me close and, grinning mischievously, he declares: “Now I will.”
I push back and pointedly cross my arms over my chest. The car starts descending and I turn away from him, to face the doors and wait for them to open. I can’t fight the smile creeping on my lips as I think about the tricky way he turned my prank around.
At the first ‘bing’, I try to leave but he quickly pulls me back again.