by Claire Adams
“I can imagine,” Alissa said in a caring voice. “I want to make sure you are ready for something else more serious.”
“I didn’t even think about it until you came around,” I said honestly. “The thought wasn’t really in my consciousness, but I know I care about you very much, and I am extremely attracted to you. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about you, and that is enough for me to know I can’t let you go.”
“I’m glad to hear you say that,” she said, kissing my cheek.
“To be honest, Christina tore my heart out and then stomped on it,” I said, laughing. “I was pretty torn up for a while, and I was avoiding even thinking about relationships like the plague. But I know I am ready to try again, if you are willing to be a bit patient with me.”
“I am probably the most patient person you know as long as you communicate with me,” she said, smiling. “I really feel like almost everything in life can be solved through communication. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I know there are just some serious assholes out there who have zero respect for the women they are with, but in most cases, it doesn’t have to be a fight or a surprise. Obviously, Christina was unhappy with something inside of herself, which wasn’t your fault at all. What she didn’t do was communicate that to you so that you could be aware and adjust yourself to help her through it. Instead, she flew off the deep end, and I wonder how she thinks about herself now.”
“I’m sure she isn’t happy with herself,” I replied. “But that isn’t my concern anymore. The place where I could help her was abandoned a long time ago. And I’m okay with that now.”
“I really thought I would never settle on dating someone seriously.” She laughed. “I’ve had one hell of a time finding a guy that I just clicked with. I have a really old school, romantic idea about relationships and marriage, something that my sister doesn’t have. She is so free-spirited, so okay with finding the right guy through trial and error. I believe that relationships take work, good and bad, but in the end, they can be some of the most beautiful things in your life.”
“And painful,” I responded.
“Very true,” she said. “I find at my age, one of two things have happened. Either guys are still in that play the field mode, with little to no interest in any kind of adult relationship, or they have been burned so badly that they have no idea what it means to be in a relationship. Girls are just as bad, though. There are very few women left that think the way I do. Most of them are like my sister, free roaming and not interested in the old school partners kind of relationship. It has definitely been a pain in the ass to find someone.”
“With as sweet as you are, I figured you would have men knocking down the door,” I said, smiling.
“I kind of gave up on love, I guess,” she said. “I figured that eventually, it would come, and if it didn’t, then oh well. I was working on my career, going through life, and just doing me. That is, until you called me up.”
She smiled and poked me in the side, laughing. I loved to hear about the way she thought about things. It was extremely refreshing, and she made me feel good about how she felt about me. It was like I was chosen, and that made me feel special. Everything seemed to be falling into place just as I hoped it would. It was definitely unexpected, but I was glad that it happened. It had been a very long time since I felt happy and at ease, and that was exactly what I felt like at that moment. I pulled Alissa closer to me and wrapped my arms around her, kissing her on the forehead and reaching for the remote to turn the volume back up.
“Wait,” she said, reaching out and touching my hand. “I think it’s important that we talk about a few things first. We can’t pretend that our relationship isn’t a bit odd, as far as our parents being married. We also can’t pretend that this doesn’t affect your daughter as well.”
“As far as what other people think about us, I don’t care,” I said with a sigh. “I am sure that our families will be fine with it, as long as we are happy. As far as everyone else, they will make up their mind one way or another. There is no stopping them on that one.”
“Okay,” she said. “I agree with that part. I know my sister and my mother will be supportive, so I’m not worried about anyone else’s thoughts. What about Kayla? I’m not sure that now is the right time for us to talk to her about this. It’s a delicate situation, and with the possibility of her mother randomly showing up, I think it could make this really hard. However, she is your daughter, and I will support whatever decision that you make.”
“I’m definitely not ready to have this discussion with Kayla,” I said, sighing. “I wish things were different, and she could be happy for us, but I know that it would probably be very hard for her. She has been really happy lately, but it’s still early, and I’m worried that something like this could shock her back into her depressive and angry mode. She still doesn’t understand that her mother and I are not getting back together. It’s all very emotionally draining for her, especially since she can’t connect the pieces.”
“I agree with you,” she replied, shaking her head. “She’s emotionally unstable, and I wouldn’t want this to be the cause of pushing her back over the edge. Besides, things are very new for us. In reality, we don’t know what will come from all of this. As much as we would like to think it will be perfect, we are both smarter than that, and we know that things don’t always work that way. It would be better for us to see where we go as a couple before letting Kayla and the world in on our secret.”
“I agree,” I said, kissing her forehead. “I kind of like the idea of having your undivided attention, anyway.”
“Me too,” she said, smiling.
That smile was definitely going to get me in trouble, and I was looking forward to it.
Chapter Sixteen
Alissa
It had been several weeks since Ryan and I had made things official, at least between the two of us. We’d made sure to make time to spend together, with the help of Kayla’s babysitter, who was now back on duty watching Kayla whenever Ryan needed her. At first, it felt strange sneaking around behind everyone’s backs, spending time in unlikely places, but after a week went by, I was liking the alone time more and more. It gave us both a chance to really focus on each other and get to know each other on a level that most people weren’t able to. We didn’t have the clamor of outside voices poking their nose in, and although we knew it was only temporary, we loved having a drama-free relationship where the only two people that we had to watch out for were each other. It was definitely something I wasn’t used to.
So many men along the way had been the kind that would look out for themselves before they ever thought about me. Ryan was different, and he made sure that I was okay and comfortable at all times. We hadn’t told Kayla that we were dating yet. We were still getting acclimated to that ourselves, and we wanted to make sure that no one, especially Christina, was going to screw that up for us. She hadn’t come over to the house yet, which Ryan had been waiting on, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t show up. Hopefully, we would be able to get Kayla used to the idea of Ryan and me dating before her mother came in and pulled her back into her grasp. I knew that I would look like the villain to Kayla. She had no idea what her mother had done. I accepted that, though, and knew that eventually she would understand.
Everything had happened so fast that we really didn’t have much of a plan. We were just enjoying our time with each other in the hopes that everything would sort itself out in the end. The subject came up a lot, and we ended up pushing it off just a little longer. I was starting to question whether we were doing it for our own selfish reasons or to protect Kayla. I guessed it was probably a little bit of both.
It was April, which meant it was gorgeous outside, though on the hotter side of things. Ryan and I grabbed an early dinner at a small café on the edge of town, making sure that we didn’t run into anyone that we knew. In reality, we weren’t really people who were big into public displays of affection, so it would be
easy to explain why we were out together. Still, it wasn’t something we wanted to deal with anyway.
Afterward, we drove over to the Desert Botanical Gardens and decided to walk around, taking in the beautiful plants and exotic insects. It really was one of my favorite places to go, and I was really happy to have Ryan to share it with. He seemed interested in every plant, reading the signs and commenting on how they looked. Butterflies were all over the place, and I couldn’t help but giggle when one landed on Ryan’s shoulder. He was such a manly man, and to see that delicate, winged insect on his shoulder made me think of how he was with Kayla: sensitive and careful.
“If I were designing this place,” I said, looking at the flowers surrounding the sculptures in the middle. “I would choose to go with the heat as a theme. It seems so odd to me to have water sculptures in the center of all these desert blooms. Water is the last thing that any of these plants are familiar with. I feel like they were put there to make the viewer more comfortable and less hot.”
“Or more inclined to go buy a $6 bottle of water from the gift shop,” he said, raising his eyebrows. “Which, if that’s the case, they’re brilliant.”
“Okay, Mr. Landscape Architect, what would you do?”
“Well, first, I would get rid of the desert,” he said, laughing. “No, I would rainbow the flowers more if I could. I appreciate the fine detail of having sections dedicated to a single color, but once you are in the midst of it, they all just kind of mesh together. When you are looking at different colors, they are producing stimuli to different emotional parts of the brain. If you create a rainbow effect, the person is able to see the differences between the flowers, which is where their true beauty lies.”
“Wow, who knew there was so much psychology in plants,” I said seriously.
“Think about it the same way as colors in a room,” he explained. “You wouldn’t paint a baby’s room red, because red is a stimulant. You would want cool, calming colors, like pastels, right?”
“Yeah,” I said, nodding.
“So, it’s the same thing, only on a more precise scale,” he said. “You want to draw the viewer’s eye in on something specific, which in this case are the different species of flowers. By making all the flowers the same color, you are skipping over the unique attributes of the different species and taking in the abundance of that color. Your eyes find nothing different as you scan the range of view. With different colors, your brain shifts, thus forcing you to pay more attention to what you are looking at.”
“Well, you taught me something today,” I said, smiling. “That’s really interesting.”
We walked over and sat down on a bench next to the blooming cacti. I scooted close to Ryan, and he put his arm around me, leaning over and kissing the top of my head. I loved when he did that. It made me feel special, like that was an intimate thing for him to do. As we sat there, I watched the different people mill through the space and couldn’t help but notice the sweet couples walking along, holding hands.
“Aww, look.” I laughed. “We’re one of the cutesy couples at the park today. I have to say, I never thought I would be half of a cutesy couple.”
“Me neither.” He chuckled.
“You see that couple there? The older ones? Watch how he handles his wife. He is so delicate with her. They have obviously been together for a very long time, and he still shows her how much he loves her. That is the romantic in me, the part of me that wants to grow old with someone.”
“Or they just met in the nursing home, and he is planning to cop a feel later,” Ryan said, chuckling.
I elbowed him in the stomach and leaned my head against his chest, laughing at his comments. We really were a cute couple, wrapped up in each other, and hanging off every word the other one spoke. We had become the couples I used to hate, but now, I realized my hate came from jealousy, not disgust. I just tried to lie to myself about it. As we sat there people watching, I looked up and noticed that Ryan had drifted off somewhere else. He got really quiet, and his shoulders stiffened, almost as if he were uncomfortable. I reached up and ran my hand across his cheek, but he didn’t seem to notice. It was the first time he had ever done that before, and it bothered me a little bit.
“Hey, mister,” I said, nudging him. “Where did you go?”
He took in a deep breath and looked over at me, breaking from his serious face and smiling. He put his arm around me and took in a deep breath, closing his eyes and tilting his head toward the setting sun. I wasn’t sure where his mind went, but wherever it was, it wasn’t to somewhere nice and pleasant.
“I’m sorry,” he said, letting out the breath. “I was just thinking about how I never did things like this with my ex-wife. She wasn’t interested in slowing down. We had a tempestuous relationship from the start, always full of deep emotions, mostly on her part. Ups and downs and all of that. I guess I thought that was normal, that when you loved someone, you just dealt with that kind of stuff and hoped for the best. It was confusing for a young man, and at the time, I didn’t really have my father to go to. He was still in shock from dealing with my mother’s illness. The last thing I wanted to do was go to him for relationship advice. So, I went with it, and there were good times and bad times.”
“I’m sure there were,” I said, smiling. “Every relationship is like that to a certain extent. I guess it just depends on the couple and how much they can really handle before breaking.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, shaking his head and stretching. “I don’t mean to bring her up like that. I’m sure the last thing you want to talk about while we’re on a date is my ex-wife and how our relationship went.”
“No, don’t apologize,” I said, turning to him. “You were married to Christina for many years, and that is a lot of history. On top of that, she is the mother of your child. I can’t expect for you to never think about her. I know that this a lot for you to take in, me being the first serious relationship outside of your marriage. I’m sure it’s only natural that you compare things to your marriage. It’s new and different. It was kind of like when my mother started dating your father. She told me that he would bring up your mother from time to time and then feel the need to apologize. She told him there was no need to apologize. It was his deceased wife. She didn’t do anything wrong, and my mother couldn’t expect him to just stop caring for her because she was in the picture.”
“You are too sweet,” he said, leaning over and kissing me on the lips. “Let’s go look at the bird sanctuary.”
“All right,” I said, watching him stand and then allowing him to pull me to my feet.
As we walked along, I watched his face wander back and forth between the present and the past. I would be lying if I said that it didn’t bother me that he thought about her while he was with me. Even though I had a feeling that he wasn’t thinking pleasant thoughts, it was still a bit unnerving. In the back of my mind, I couldn’t help but worry that starting a relationship with a man who wasn’t totally over his ex might be a dangerous thing. The only person there was to get hurt in that scenario was me, and I really didn’t want to be hurt by Ryan, unintentionally or not. However, what choice did I have? It was ridiculous of me to think that he would never think about her, and I knew over time, it would happen less and less until it was never brought up in his conscious thoughts.
As he grabbed onto my hand and led me toward the bird sanctuary, I took in a deep breath and smiled, shaking the thought from my mind. I was letting her win right then, allowing his ex to take up even a smidgen of space in my mind. There was no way I was going to let her scare me away from Ryan, even if it meant that eventually, I had to have a talk with him about it. For now, though, I just wanted to enjoy being with him and shake the anxiety right out of my stomach.
Chapter Seventeen
Ryan
Kayla’s babysitter asked if she could take her to the zoo for the day since it was so nice outside. Immediately, I agreed, knowing she would absolutely love it, and it would give me a
chance to spend some more quality time with Alissa. I texted her and told her to come over and wear something comfortable. When she arrived, she looked adorable in a short pair of khaki shorts, a tight T-shirt that showed off her figure, and a baseball cap with her ponytail pulled through the back of it. She couldn’t have dressed more perfect than if I had told her where we were going beforehand. I walked over and cupped her face in my hands, kissing her deeply and feeling her lean into me, her hands running up my chest. On second thought, maybe I should just keep us there locked away in the bedroom for hours. I pulled away and shook that thought from mind, determined to share with Alissa something that I really loved.
“Where are we going?” She looked excited and nervous at the same time.
“You’ll see,” I said, bright-eyed as I shut her door and walked around to my side of the car.
She hounded me the entire way there, asking me questions and getting frustrated when I refused to answer them. There was something adorable about her and her anxiousness to know where we were headed. Her innocence was definitely shining through, and I found it absolutely endearing. As we pulled through the streets surrounding the city, she looked around wildly, trying to figure it out. I chuckled as I pulled through the parking gate and parked the car, looking out at the baseball stadium in front of us. It was huge and looming, and I could feel the excitement of the game already hitting me hard. It was Triple A, but I loved these games more than I loved the major league games. It was literally a situation where anything could happen, and these guys really played their hearts out. I had met a few of the guys in years past and found out just how little they actually made playing in the minor leagues. I knew that they did it strictly for the love of the game and the chance to make it to the big leagues. That was really awesome to me, doing what you loved regardless of the money. I guessed that even if landscaping was a modest income, I’d still do it. I loved my job, even when it was demanding and stressful.