“These aren’t parameters. They are prison walls,” I pleaded. Was he still so insecure about our relationship and me having doubts that he needed these parameters? I wanted to shake his gorgeous shoulders so he would see how serious I was about us. With or without formal agreements.
Instead, I took a deep breath. And then a couple more. He wouldn’t respond to emotional pleas about my feelings. I tried a different route. “As a lawyer, you probably spend most of your time dealing with the gray in a contract. As much as you can lay out conditions on paper, you can never be comprehensive over time. Things change internally within a situation, and things change outside that impact a situation. On top of that, when you have a relationship, as you said, there are too many factors that can’t be measured easily. I’d rather have the freedom to figure out our relationship, as things come up, rather than hold ourselves to outdated, indeterminable standards.”
Glumly, Andrew looked at me, his jaws clenched as his mouth formed an unhappy line. He stood up from the bed, letting the blankets fall away from his body. “You may want the freedom to figure this out, but I just want to know so I can set my expectations.”
Tilting my head to consider him, I took a few more deep breaths. Our relationship was too fragile to survive irrationality and miscommunication. Cautiously, I ventured, “Why do you need to manage your expectations? Why not go into this with high ones?”
After several heartbeats, Andrew sunk back onto the bed, his elbows on his knees, as he looked at the colorful rug underneath his feet. “You’ve always been more optimistic than me.”
“You don’t think there’s potential here?” My heart was sinking with each word that came out of my mouth. I wasn’t an expert at reading people or situations, but I didn’t think that I was awful at it either. Who talked about failing at the beginning of a relationship?
“That’s not true. I do think there’s some potential,” said Andrew, still to my rug.
Now, I was getting mad again. What messed-up mixed messages was he sending me? Let’s move in together. But oh wait, this relationship is going nowhere. Let’s get hopeful. But oh wait, not that hopeful—mildly okay is more the speed. One step forward, three steps back, a couple steps sideways, and let’s spin around until I’m on my butt looking like a fool.
I glared at the top of Andrew’s head in a fit of pique, waiting for him to look up so I could call him out for his heartlessness. But when he did look up, I lost my anger. Because it didn’t look as if he was heartless. In fact, he looked as if he had too much heart.
Realizing what I was reading in his eyes and looking highly embarrassed, Andrew tried to shrug off the conclusions that I was drawing. Shaking his head, he stood up to pace. He looked cornered, and my heart bled for him…for us.
Tension radiated from him as he walked the length of my studio apartment. Or more like prowled. He seemed furious that I wasn’t collapsing at his feet and his so-called contract, but most of all, I could see the heaviness of resignation weighing on him. Andrew was primed to fight or flee, and I was scared he would give up on us.
Equally, I was scared of making the wrong movement, of saying the wrong thing. But when I imagined living another ten years without Andrew, I was terrified of what would happen to me. Can you fall apart twice and still be able to pick up the pieces?
As if the words were torn from him, he said harshly, “I know I have all of these material things now—nice clothes, a car, a house. What if that’s not enough? What if you realize that beneath all of that, I’m still the messed-up kid from Colorado whose dad was a criminal? Sometimes, you can’t outrun your past.”
I stared at him. This new Andrew, whom I had re-met a month ago, was confident, sexy, and used to getting his way. There had been so many positive changes that I hadn’t fully seen the prickly, lonely, lost boy that I had met a lifetime ago.
At that moment, I realized how deep his scars were. This wasn’t about growing up poor and could be fixed with money. Andrew was still dealing with the emotional trauma inflicted by a dad who made him feel worthless and the judgement that he suffered for years from people in our town who couldn’t see beyond his parentage. Maybe he would always have insecurities about his self-worth. Was I ready to handle this for the rest of my life?
It was a surprisingly easy decision.
Putting my figurative big-girl panties on, I slowly approached him until we were close enough that our breaths mingled. “Your dad sucks. It would be great if you had a different dad. But, we don’t get to choose our parents. Some people aren’t as lucky.”
Andrew’s eyes sharpened, as incredulity and angry acceptance rippled through his eyes.
My heart threw out the filters and shelters that my brain had built to protect myself, as I spoke without knowing exactly where I was going. “You see, I have really high expectations. The highest. I would like a house in the suburbs with a yard, white fence, and k-kids. I have already put all of my eggs-pectations—” I laughed nervously, but Andrew didn’t seem amused. His eyes were still narrowed, as if I were a shady witness on trial. “Um, well, my expectations have already flown, and I can’t tamp them down.”
After a moment of expectant waiting, Andrew spoke slowly and deliberately, his tone unreadable. “I don’t get your analogies. Are you saying that you’ve thrown whatever hopes you have for us away? And who are you looking to buy this house with?”
“Argh!” Exasperated at his stubborn refusal to see the good things in front of him, I threw my flowery blanket at him.
Andrew barely spared a glance at the discarded blanket, though he did take the time to look over my now-naked body, lit up by the morning sunlight streaming through my clearly-not-so-blackout curtains. To his credit, after the brief perusal, he trained his eyes on my face. My eyes were not so disciplined, and even in the midst of a fight, it did not escape me that one part of him was excited for the blanket to fall.
In a raw voice, Andrew asked quietly, “Do I not meet your high expectations?”
“Argh!” Grabbing a nearby pillow off the couch, I threw that at him.
“What are you doing? Stop throwing things at me and explain yourself.”
Another pillow went flying through the air.
“I don’t get it. What am I missing?”
Thump. A third pillow landed against Andrew’s chest. I would have thrown more, but the sight of naked, confused Andrew holding three pink pillows with fringe and pompoms tore laughter from my throat.
Andrew looked as if he had tumbled down a rabbit hole into an upside-down wonderland. He probably thought I was deranged.
Meanwhile, I thought he had never looked cuter or sexier. Which is why I smacked the pillows out of his hand and practically leaped into his arms.
And that was a major mistake. Because it made both of us perfectly aware that we were naked, and that he was pressing up rather urgently against me. Echoing his groan at the deliciously distracting contact, I tried to pull back.
Andrew’s arms tightened around me, his head resting against my uncombed hair. It was the sexiest, most comforting hug that I’ve ever participated in. There was nothing comparable or more intimate than being skin to skin. I could feel his strong heartbeat against my chest, the slight tickling of his chest hair against my soft skin, irritating and arousing me.
“You’re blind, you know?” I whispered against Andrew’s neck, feeling him shiver where my warm breath touched him.
“No, I’m not. I have twenty-twenty vision.”
“The fact that you say that makes you even blinder. I meant, I don’t care about your past or who your dad is. I want you.” To underline my words, I nipped him on the neck and immediately used my tongue to soothe the little red mark. Andrew stilled beneath me, except for that insistent part that grew impossibly larger against me.
Did I ever think naked hugging was comforting? That was crap. This naked hugging was making me uncomfortably on edge.
Burrowing even deeper against my hair, he said in a hoarse vo
ice, “Ting Ting, I don’t want anything to destroy this relationship. I’m scared of losing you. I don’t want to get addicted to having you around, only to have you leave me for some white picket fence in the suburbs with another guy. I want reassurances. Because I would choose you every day. If you’ll have me.”
I leaned back to force him to look at me, to believe my words. “Keep whatever was in your past that made you into this driven, caring, good person, and don’t let the rest destroy our relationship. Let’s not make the same mistakes as before. I promise not to doubt us and not care about what others think, if you don’t push me away. Andrew, I want a future with you. All my eggs are in this basket, I’ve counted all of the chickens, I’ve milked all of the cows, and made cheese out of the milk, and eaten all of the cheese. All that to say: there’s no going back for me. I choose you. Every day, every moment, with every part of me.”
My neighbors must be cooking onions right outside the door as punishment for the noise that we made last night, because how else could I explain why my eyes were prickling and we were both blinking rapidly?
In typical, understated Andrew fashion, he muttered, “That’s good to know. Couldn’t you have just said that earlier?” But the lightness driving out the storm in his eyes severely undermined his restrained words.
“I did tell you. Remember the basket of eggs-pectations floating in the air?”
“Right, right. Completely clear. You should work on your analogies. Baskets, milk turning into cheese. Also, use more pronouns. Like ‘I would like to have a house with you. I have high expectations for us. How did I ever survive without your amazing cock?’” he teased, walking us backward toward the bed.
“My fingers are pretty good substitutes.”
Andrew stumbled, his eyes blazing. In a guttural voice, he demanded, “Show me.”
“Another time,” I promised, blushing at the thought of him watching. To hide how much that image turned me on, I grabbed his face to rain frantic kisses wherever I could reach. His lips, his shadow of a beard from not having shaved yet, his earlobe where he was sensitive.
Andrew chased my lips, slowing down the pace, teasing me with passionate yet unhurried kisses. This was a different Andrew, patient as if he had all the time in the world. As if we had all the time in the world to be together.
At the edge of the bed, he slowly lowered us, taking care not to break contact between our bodies. So close that I could feel the movement of his lips, he bargained, “How about a low-maintenance house with a fence, and we’ll buy vegetables at a farmer’s market? I want to be realistic about how much time we’ll have.” He sucked the bottom of my lips, drawing out a moan from me. “Because I fully intend to keep you very, very busy doing other things.”
True to his word, Andrew proceeded to show me just how he would keep me busy. It turns out, I had lied. My fingers were no substitute whatsoever for his fingers nor his mouth nor that very hard, deep, all-consuming part of him that he used to fill me over and over again.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Tia
May 10, 2010 (never sent)
Andrew,
I was looking at classes today. There are so many interesting ones that I could take. I’m surprised that I’m excited. I think I’m going to sign up for something impractical, like painting. Who knows? I may turn out to be the next Picasso.
Yours,
Tia
Bliss.
There was no other word to describe those first two weeks of December. Except maybe, unconditional, profound, utter bliss. There was a newfound contentment and settlement in my relationship with Andrew. Not “settle for a second choice.” No, “settle” as in, we had found our home within each other, surrounded by a bone-deep sense of rightness.
For Andrew, the doubts that he initially felt seemed to fade with each day that we spent together. He lingered over coffee, he teased, he was self-deprecating without being defensive. He seemed finally at ease.
Once a week, Andrew flew to Chicago for work. He would fly on the six a.m. nonstop on Tuesday mornings, and land back at Logan at ten p.m. on Wednesdays, exhausted from the marathon meetings and work that he crammed into those two days. The other days, he worked from my apartment or a local café while I reluctantly headed off to campus.
I never realized how indecisive I was or how inefficient I was at work, until I had Andrew to hurry home to. Instead of worrying about what I would say in an email to my department chair, or second-guessing a model assumption, I zoomed through my day. It was as if being around Andrew had fine-tuned me.
The first Saturday after Andrew had moved in, I dabbed some bright red lipstick on top of my ear, grabbed my easel, art supplies, and giant thermos of chai, and headed out to the Charles River to meet up with Pippa.
It was easy to spot Pippa, as she was wearing a crown of flowers and a bold red scarf, in a sea of black- and gray-clad runners. A giant unibrow had been painted across the middle of her forehead.
“Frida Kahlo?”
She nodded happily, twirling and shaking her flower crown at me. Pippa glanced at my brown, boxy suit and raised an elegant eyebrow. “I thought we agreed the theme this week was famous artists. You look like you’re going to work and want everyone to forget you have boobs.”
Amused and exasperated, I pointed to my fake bloody ear. “See this?”
“Ohhh, you’re van Gogh. I like it!” Costumes out of the way, Pippa gave me a big hug. Normally it took me a couple cups of tea and a glass of wine before I could properly ignore passersby, but today, nothing could get me down.
“I’ve missed our weekly boozy tea parties, Pippa,” I told her as we quickly set up the easels on the grassy area next to the river. “You need to plan your world travels around our tea parties and stay in Boston more.”
“Bah, when there’s nothing exciting happening in my life, I have to travel to find something amusing,” she said, one hand holding a tiny teacup and the other a water bottle that smelled suspiciously like a mimosa. “So tell me, is Andrew great in bed? He looks it, you know. All that dark and handsome broodiness.”
“Pippa!”
“Tia! It’s been so long that I just want to live vicariously through you. Does he eat you up? Are his hands magical? Does he dirty talk? C’mon, spill, pun sort of intended.”
Shaking my head, I bit the inside of my jaw to keep from grinning like a Cheshire Cat. Just remembering how he had spread me like a feast inside the shower this morning was enough to make me discard my scarf. Who knew Boston winters could be so warm?
“Wow, that good, huh? So how long are you planning to keep him?”
Confused, I asked, “What do you mean? I think we have a real chance to make the marriage work this time around.”
Incredulous green eyes stared at me. “Really? You think there’s a future with Andrew? I know you’re married still, but I figured that once you got him out of your system, you’d proceed with the divorce.”
“Why does he just have to be someone I use for sex? Why can’t I want to be with him for him?” My heart hurt for Andrew. If this kind of belittling and being reduced to his looks was what Andrew faced, no wonder he wanted a pseudo-contract to spell out our expectations. No wonder he had been blind to the fact that I wanted to be with him.
I knew Pippa wasn’t intentionally mean, but darn it if I was going to let my best friend write him off. “Andrew is amazing. He has so many great qualities. He’s smart and ambitious, he can be funny, he’s thoughtful, he feels deeply, and he takes care of his mom.”
Face frozen in a seemingly permanent incredulous look, Pippa countered, “There are tons of guys who fit those qualities. Those should not be unicorn traits. Those should be baseline expectations.”
Beyond frustrated, I near shouted, “Sure, statistically, those are not rare qualities. I just—I don’t know how to describe Andrew’s … I love the vulnerability that he tries to hide, and I love that he allows me to peek inside of his walls. I love that he’s been able to defy sta
tistics and be what he is today. I love the way that he needs me and is comforted by me, because I think that I’m really good for him. Just as he lifts me up and makes me realize that I am powerful and special. Pippa, he’s it for me. He’s always been it for me. I don’t know why he’s it. I just know that Andrew engages something within me that has nothing to do with sex or surface quality. It’s as if my soul recognizes his, and he’s able to unlock this scary depth of emotions. Yet, I know that he’ll keep me safe.”
Eyes softened, Pippa looked at me sympathetically. “You’re still in love with him, Tia. Have you told him?”
“Not yet.” Smiling tremulously, I laughed, feeling suddenly free. “I’ve been scared of falling for him again, except I’ve already fallen. Why are you looking at me like that? You should be happy for me.”
Her sympathetic expression turned into a grimace, before she busied herself with chucking her tea, followed by large gulps of mimosa.
“What now, Pippa? Your turn to spill.”
Pippa drank the last of her mimosa, her face contorted in misgivings. “Are you sure you want to hear this? You look so happy. Maybe it’s better if you go home to Andrew now.”
“Yes, I want to know if people are gossiping about me or Andrew.”
“You know I’m on your side, whatever you decide to do,” Pippa said.
“Tell me, Pippa,” I insisted.
“Okay, fine. I was in Chicago for a client meeting. I stayed at the Lenox Hotel. It just opened. Very chic, really dark on the inside—”
“As much as I usually enjoy hearing about your travels, I still don’t get why you’re telling me this.” The sinking feeling in my stomach was swiftly replaced by irritation.
Give Love a Chai (Common Threads Book 2) Page 20