Can't Help Falling

by Cara Bastone

  “Connection?” he scoffed again. “You don’t know her! You met her once. What kind of connection could you possibly have? The unbreakable bond of how much you both enjoy gravy on your turkey?”

  She huffed out a furious breath. When she spoke, it was with dangerous slowness to her sagey, southern lilt, a deceptive laziness where an East Coaster might have overarticulated. “I’m trying to tell you that literally the exact same thing happened to me as just happened to her. My mother couldn’t take care of me when I was thirteen years old and she signed me over to a family member. Just like that, she was gone from my life, and I was plunked headfirst into Brooklyn.” She crossed her arms again. “See the connection now?”

  Tyler had no comeback for that. He’d heard the word connection and pictured Fin waving her hands over a crystal ball with Kylie’s face reflected in it. He scrubbed a hand over the back of his neck again, at a loss for what to say.

  “I could actually help you, Ty. Her. I’m not just sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong. The girl and I have a kinship. Or, we could, if you don’t stomp all over it.”

  Even with the indisputable facts right there in front of him, Tyler didn’t concede the point. He felt ornery and exhausted. Frankly, he was sick to death of not understanding Kylie. Of being so constantly in the dark with someone he truly loved. He didn’t understand teenage girls. He didn’t understand what it felt like to have no parents in his life at all—though his hadn’t exactly been an after-school special. He didn’t understand how scary learning Brooklyn might be, and he was starting to suspect he didn’t understand women at all.

  It irked him that Fin, just by dint of who she was and how she’d been born, might have a speedy little highway of a shortcut to understanding and bonding with Kylie.

  Honesty, he reminded himself. It was his only course of action.

  “Fin, please try to understand my perspective here, all right? I have no idea how to do any of this. As in, I barely know how to talk to her, and here I am, charged with making all sorts of decisions for the girl. Case in point, who I let spend time with her. I have no experience with that at all except for my own gut.” Which he was barely trusting these days. “I’m not trying to be an ass. I’m not trying to hold what you said to me at the baseball game against you, but tell me. Why, why, would I let Kylie spend time with someone who I’ve already decided is bad for me to be around? That makes no sense at all! This isn’t wounded male pride talking here. This is me making a judgment call. I’ve decided not to let my little sister spend time with someone who is capable of cutting others to shreds with just a few cruel words. Call me crazy, I guess, but my decision actually makes sense to me!”

  Fin’s mouth opened and closed for a moment in a way that Tyler had never before seen. She looked utterly flummoxed. Her usual impassive, all-knowing expression was wiped clean from her face, replaced with this gaping-fish thing she was doing. It was incredibly satisfying. If he’d had the energy, Tyler might have snapped a photo for his fridge.

  “I don’t treat other women that way,” she eventually said.

  Tyler had to laugh at what he deemed the sheer ridiculousness of that proclamation. “Oh, so it’s only half the human race that you treat like shit? That’s supposed to make me feel better about you spending time with my little sister?”

  She looked like she was going to respond right away, but instead she turned her head and looked out the small window above his sink. There was a small glass ornament dangling there that Mary had given him, but she didn’t appear to be seeing it. Her eyes were lost and distant. When she turned back to him, Tyler got the distinct impression that he was actually going to be conversing with her, not with whatever words she thought would convince him.

  “Tyler, do you have any idea what it’s like to be a woman walking around this city? To get asked out by men you don’t want to go out with? You reject them and sometimes, sometimes, they’re nice about it. But I’d say ninety-five percent of the time, their embarrassment or anger or outrage turns them into assholes, okay? Do you know how many times I’ve been called a name because I’ve politely turned someone down? Called a name simply because I don’t feel the same way about them as they do about me?”

  He felt the blood run out of his face as the truth of her words registered. She was a beautiful woman, and he’d been around the block enough to have witnessed some truly foul behavior from his male compatriots to know that she wasn’t exaggerating. But still. “You thought I’d treat you that way?” He was flatly flummoxed, aware enough to realize that his blank shock stank of ignorance to the issue at hand. “I thought you were being incendiary when you said that I was punishing you for turning me down. But you meant it. God. That’s not what I—That’s not who I—Fin, I’m not a monster. I know how to take it on the chin. If you’d rejected me politely, I would have been polite right back.”

  For the second time in their conversation, something like guilt flashed across her face. Then her chin came up and a firm sort of resolution took guilt’s place, the set of her mouth turning stubborn. “Well, I don’t take my chances with that, Tyler. I make myself very clear with a man. So there is no misunderstanding. And if he’s shocked into silence or has to immediately limp away and lick his wounds, then all the better for me to make my getaway unscathed. Maybe it makes me cruel, but it also keeps me from getting called a bitch, or getting yelled at in public. Or getting followed by some guy or another.”

  “Men have followed you after you rejected them?” Tyler asked incredulously.

  Of course, her expression said to him and Tyler’s fierce decision over what to do about Fin started to crumble at the edges like yellowed newspaper.

  “Dammit,” he grumbled, dropping his chin into one palm and drumming his other fingers against the kitchen table.

  “What?”

  He glared at her. “I don’t want to see your side, Fin. I was much happier just feeling like I was right.”

  To his surprise, she laughed. After a second, she pushed off from where she’d been leaning on his counter and pulled out the chair across the table from him. It was an adversarial position she’d chosen. The chair that someone sitting down for a negotiation would have selected. But still, she was sitting at his table with a begrudging smile on her face and Tyler felt more of the paper crumble.

  “That’s how I felt when you showed up for Thanksgiving with a beard and hair in your eyes,” she admitted.

  “What?” he asked, confused.

  “You normally look like such a Ken doll,” she said and waved her hand through the air, a casual indictment of his entire visage. “But you showed up to Thanksgiving looking scruffy and—”

  “Scruffy?!” He straightened up in outrage. Maybe he’d looked a little less put-together than usual, but he’d never looked “scruffy” a day in his life. “I did not look scruffy. Yes, maybe my hair could have used a trim. But I didn’t have a beard.”

  “You say beard like it’s some sort of shameful growth.”

  “Men who grow beards have something to hide,” Tyler said decisively and to his surprise, Fin laughed again.

  “Sebastian wears a beard. And in my professional opinion, he’s the least deceptive person on earth.”

  “Sebastian is a freak of nature.”

  Fin chuckled at that as well, so Tyler didn’t feel the need to clarify that he’d said it lovingly.

  “If it wasn’t a beard that was on your face then what was it?”

  He thought back to Thanksgiving and remembered that in the fog of getting Kylie to Brooklyn he’d forgotten to shave that morning. “That is what happens if I don’t shave my face every twelve hours. It’s my curse that my facial hair grows so fast.”

  “Sounds like it would be easier just to let it grow.”

  “And hide my beautiful face under a bush? A face bush?”

  This time her laughter was not begrudging at all. It
was sparkling and genuinely humored. “You consider a beard to be a face bush?” She chuckled again. “God, that’s vile.”

  “Good. You’re finally starting to see things my way.”

  At that, her expression sobered. “I guess I am.” She drew a quick, unseeable shape with one finger over the top of the table. She huffed out a breath, as if she were about to do something she really didn’t want to do. “Look. I was rude, abrupt and maybe even cruel to you at that ball game. I understand why you might be skeptical of the time I want to spend with Kylie. So, why don’t we compromise and have the three of us hang out together for a while? If you’re still uncomfortable with my presence in her life, I’ll back off. If you deem me to be acceptable, then Kylie and I can be friends.”

  Tyler was quiet for a minute, mulling over her words. He didn’t want to be the kind of guy who folded after three jokes around a kitchen table, and he still felt that he had good reason to be wary of Fin. On the other hand, even if it was reluctant, he did sort of understand her point about rejecting men. She was a painfully gorgeous woman and he figured that learning how to deal with men effectively in order to keep herself safe was most likely something she’d taught herself long, long ago.

  “I know you think I’m a jerk, Ty. And to you, I was. But do you really think I’d be a jerk to her? I—” She broke off and Tyler stilled when he realized that her eyes were shiny with emotion. Gone was the impassiveness he’d come to associate her with. As far as he could tell, there was nothing clairvoyant happening in this current conversation whatsoever. This was two people sharing normal words. “I had a complicated upbringing. And I think that in lots of ways, it prepared me to help out kids who’ve also had complicated upbringings. I could be good for her. I know I could.”

  He drummed his fingers again, irritated at himself for folding so easily. He suddenly threw both hands up in the air. “Oh, fine. I guess it wouldn’t kill me to spend some time just the three of us.”

  He nearly reeled back from her when an explosively happy smile burst across her face. It changed the shape of her features from long and carved with shadow to suddenly round and high. Her teeth were a slice between her full lips, reflecting light and joy. And those big, achingly light eyes of hers had practically disappeared, all squished down into almost nothing. He was amazed that a woman so beautiful would have such a goofy smile.

  It disarmed him.

  He smiled back at her, but in a contained, cautious way. He wasn’t ready to be disarmed around her. He figured that if he’d learned anything from the ball game, it was that she was never fully disarmed herself. It would do to remember that she was a woman with plenty of weapons. And she wasn’t scared to use them on Tyler.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “WHO ARE WE going to pick up?” Kylie asked as their cab raced north on Flatbush Avenue, the pavement inky and slick with an ugly early-December rain.

  Tyler startled from his reverie and turned to Kylie, kind of shocked that she’d spoken to him. She wasn’t exactly what one would describe as chatty.

  “Remember that woman from Thanksgiving? Serafine? She’s coming to the game with us.”

  Kylie’s eyebrows rose, showing just how perceptive she was. “She’s a big basketball fan?”

  Tyler shrugged. “I guess she just wanted something to do on a Friday night.”

  It had been two days since Fin had dropped in on Tyler, and the two of them had arranged for her to accompany them to Kylie’s first Nets game.

  Tyler’s editor had been up his ass about getting to the games in person and he certainly wasn’t ready to leave Kylie at home with Fin, so he’d wrangled three reasonably good tickets and informed Fin that they’d be picking her up at 6:30 for the 7:30 tip-off. He didn’t usually take a cab to the games, but he figured it was probably about time that Kylie traveled aboveground through Brooklyn.

  “So... She’s not your girlfriend, then?”

  “Um. Ah. Definitely not.” He might not have volunteered this info normally, but she was being chatty and he felt compelled to share. Tyler found himself quickly summing up the situation. “I asked her out a while ago but she was super not into it. After that, my crush on her just kind of withered and died.”

  “So, you’re friends now?” Kylie’s skeptical expression said everything her simple question didn’t.

  “We’ll see, I guess. You can tell me after tonight if you think we’re friends.”

  For some reason, that seemed to brighten Kylie up just a bit. She looked intrigued, more interested in that than anything else since she’d come to live with him. “Cool.”

  They pulled up to Fin’s curb and there she was standing. In the rain. With no umbrella. Tyler jumped out of the cab but she waved him away, opening the passenger-side front door and sliding in. Tyler frowned as he watched two men pause as they walked past, turning their heads so that they could watch Fin get into the car.

  “Hi, everyone.”

  Tyler got back in the cab, a scowl on his face. “I would have called you when we got here. There was no need for you to wait in the rain.”

  Her braid was a wet slick over one shoulder and her cheeks were almost scarlet with the cold, water beaded on her eyelashes. But her smile was as radiant as it had been at his kitchen table. “I’m fine. How’s it going?”

  “Would you pump the heat in the front seat, please?” Tyler leaned forward and asked the cab driver. His question served the dual purpose of getting Fin some warm air and also jolting the driver out of his openmouthed perusal of Fin.

  After a moment, Tyler became aware of his little sister’s eyes on the side of his face. He glanced at Kylie in time to see her looking back and forth between him and Fin, an interested expression on her face.

  He scowled. Damn. Maybe it had been dumb to let her in on his short, tumultuous history with Fin. Now he was going to be under observation the whole basketball game.

  Fin looked between Kylie and Tyler, as if trying to figure out what was going on.

  “Good,” Kylie answered, a bit delayed. “It’s going good. Are you a basketball fan?”

  “No,” Fin said with a resolute head shake. “You?”

  “No,” Kylie said, shaking her head. “I follow women’s soccer mostly.”

  “Really?” Tyler asked. This was news to him. His job was to follow professional basketball, but he loved sports of all shapes and sizes. He’d watched some women’s soccer before, enjoyed it too.

  Kylie nodded, her typical sullen expression threatening at the edges of her mouth. “Not much over the last few months.”

  “We can DVR it if you want. I get all the sports channels.”

  She shrugged, like it didn’t matter to her either way, but Tyler couldn’t help but feel like he’d struck gold. He didn’t care how tired he was after this game. He was googling women’s soccer until the sun came up.

  The silence in the car lasted all the way until they got to the Barclays Center.

  He paid the driver and then herded Kylie and Fin around, away from the crowds, to a private entrance where he was able to flash his press pass and their tickets to get them inside in less than five minutes.

  He had to admit, it was nice to feel at least a little bit cool in front of his skeptical sister and his biggest hater.

  He got to feel cool again when they walked down a long, private hall, reporters and basketball players alike calling his name as he passed. It had been a while since he’d been there.

  He shook hands, did a few backslapping man-hugs, and refused his usual seat in the press box, showing his mediocre tickets for the three of them.

  “Seems like people really like you here,” Kylie said as they made their way to their seats.

  Tyler couldn’t help but laugh. “You don’t have to sound so surprised, Ky.”

  She slanted a glance at him, and he couldn’t interpret the expression on her face.


  He stood back to let both Fin and Kylie walk up the aisle in front of him, but caught sight of the scowl on Fin’s face. He tapped her shoulder, taking care to touch mostly coat. “Everything all right?”

  She frowned more. “There’s so much man energy in here.”

  He laughed at her assessment. “You would have preferred the ballet?”

  “I’ve never been. But from what I’ve seen on YouTube, ballet is a graceful, athletic sport.” She sniffed, like she’d slam-dunked on him.

  The thing was, Tyler completely agreed with her. And he probably knew more about the world of professional dancing than she could have possibly gleaned from perusing YouTube. Unless she’d really been scouring old YouTube channels and found...

  No, he inwardly grimaced. Those videos were thankfully buried in the bowels of the internet. She’d have had to be a psychic to find those.

  He outwardly grimaced. Right.

  Figuring the fourteen-year-old and the clairvoyant could find their way to their seats just fine, he turned away from them and looked down at the basketball court. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen it from this vantage point before. Usually he was up in the crowded press box, swigging a beer, slamming some dinner and joking around with colleagues. This midlevel view was new for Tyler. It wasn’t so bad, he supposed.

  “Man energy,” he mumbled to himself as he looked around at the crowds. There were almost as many women here as there were men. Kids too. It was a family atmosphere. Then he reflected on their walk through the back tunnel. All the men who’d greeted him, every pair of eyes that had seemed to stick to Fin’s face and body as they’d walked past. No one had said anything to her, of that he was almost certain, but was that kind of attention enough to put her in a foul mood?

  Shampoo commercials led a person to believe that a woman enjoyed having her every movement tracked by men who were willing to lay down in traffic for her. But maybe it grew tiresome over the years. Or—he turned and looked up at the crowd behind him, spotting Fin and Kylie settling in—maybe, in the right circumstances, that kind of attention was even threatening.