Prince Charming and the Little Glass Bra

by Annette Archer

  “Luke, wait.”

  “I shouldn’t have burdened you with this, Christina. Sorry. I don’t usually talk about myself with anyone.” Then he took Mandy’s leash and said something that stung her. “I won’t bother you with the personal details of my life any more. Come on, let’s go to the park.”

  4.

  At the park, Luke took Mandy out onto the wide grassy area past the swings and produced the frisbee they had brought. The dog went wild whenever he threw it, chasing it down, chomping it out of the air, bringing it back to Luke so he could throw it for her again.

  Christina sat on a swing and held tightly onto the chains as she rocked back and forth slowly. He had shut down on her so completely. Had she said something wrong? He had told her something so private, so personal, and she must have done something to mess it up. It had to be her fault. It always was.

  There weren’t many people at the park at this early hour on a Sunday. She figured that as it got closer to lunchtime more people would show up for outdoor picnics or just to let their children play on the monkey bars and the see-saws and the really awesome wooden playset built to look like a castle. For now, though, it was just her and Luke and Mandy, and a small group of kids with their parents.

  She was thinking about what she could say to apologize to Luke when Mandy was suddenly pouncing on her lap, nearly unseating her from the swing. She was panting and smiling at Christina, and those ears of hers just demanded a good scratching. Christina ruffled them with both hands and then she was rolling around on the ground with the dog while Mandy barked and growled playfully.

  Christina looked up to find Luke standing over them, his hands on his hips, and an odd smile on his face. She and Mandy exchanged a glance, then they both got up onto their feet.

  “Uh, sorry,” Christina said. “I got a little carried away with her. She really loves to roughhouse.”

  He shook his head and looked down at his feet. “No. I should be the one to say I’m sorry. Look, back at the coffee house…I’m really not used to talking to people about wanting to be a writer. Dad always groomed me to take over for him as president of the company. Mom always had her art pursuits to keep her busy. No one was ever interested in what I wanted to do. So, I guess I got a little sensitive about it.”

  She stared at him. Was he saying the whole misunderstanding was his fault? His fault, not hers?

  He laughed. “I guess having all the money in the world can’t get you the things you really want, right?”

  “I wouldn’t know,” she said immediately, and just as quickly she wished she could take the words back.

  But he nodded like she had said just the right thing. So she dared to put her other foot in her mouth. “Are you any good?”

  He blinked. “Well, I’m good at chess. Great at poker. I’m okay with a ping pong paddle too, if you’re into that.”

  “No, dufus,” she said, suddenly at ease around him again. “I mean, are you any good at writing?”

  He shrugged. “I think so. I haven’t found a publisher yet that thinks so.”

  She shifted from foot to foot. Mandy leaned into her, as if encouraging her to go on. “Could I maybe, you know, see some of what you’ve written?”

  His face turned hard and she realized she’d asked too much. “It’s okay,” she said. “You don’t have to. Maybe if you want to someday, you will?”

  Relief washed over him. “I think I’d like that, Christina.”

  Their eyes met. She felt a tension up and down her spine as her breathing got faster and time seemed to slow down. He leaned into her. She was being pulled toward him, and her mouth parted ever so slightly and she could see the pulse in the hollow of his throat and she knew what was going to happen next—

  Mandy jumped up inbetween them, the frisbee in her mouth.

  Whatever spell Christina had fallen under shattered to pieces. The world began to move again. Time lurched forward. They stood there, looking at each other and smiling uncertainly.

  “I think Mandy wants us to play with her some more,” he said in a low whisper.

  “I think you’re right.”

  Still, they stood there, until Mandy jumped up again, and again, and again.

  “Okay, okay girl,” he said as he grabbed the frisbee in her mouth and tried to pull gently away while she growled and dug her paws in. “Oh, you want to play like that, do you? You a tough girl? Are ya? Huh? Huh?”

  Christina put a hand over her mouth to cover the smile as she watched him playing with his dog. He acted so grown up and responsible most of the time. But then other times she caught the glimpse of the real him. Like now. This was a man she could see herself falling hard for.

  Someone she could never, ever be with. He was a prince and she was a pauper. Rich man, poor girl. They might be friends, but they would never be anything more than that.

  She’d just have to be happy with being his friend. Well, his friend and his dogsitter.

  “Come on, Christina!” he called to her. “We can take her!”

  Laughing, she jumped in next to him, stealing the frisbee and running off with it, making Mandy chase her. Then she’d throw it to Luke and he ran off with it, Mandy barking maniacally, loving every minute of their game.

  Christina enjoyed herself all the rest of the day, through a quick lunch bought at a nearby deli and then into the evening. They didn’t leave the park until sunset. And Christina forgot all the worries that usually plagued her daily life.

  Until it came time to go home.

  Her curfew was midnight. Christina knew that was a long time to be out on a Sunday night with school the next day, but she doubted that her aunt even noticed… or cared, for that matter. The only thing that Virginia cared about was that insane paycheck that Luke was giving her for being his dogsitter.

  Was that the only thing he wanted her around for? It seemed, sometimes, that there was more to it for both of them. Like this morning when he accidentally stepped into the bathroom while she was showering. Or the electric feeling she got every time she touched him. After all, he could have picked anyone to be a dogsitter. He’d only seen her once before picking her for the job, and that was when she had run away like a frightened little girl from the dress shop. She rolled her eyes at herself while remembering. When she’d run away, and left her bra behind.

  She was smiling faintly, her thoughts all about Luke, as the taxi stopped in front of her Aunt’s duplex. She got out and thanked the driver by name. It was always the same taxi driver and she had done this so many times now that she was beginning to think of the man—Gus was his name—as a friend. She wondered how long this would last, how long she would be invited into the personal world of Luke Averton.

  It suddenly occurred to her that she was hoping it would never end.

  All the lights on their side of the duplex were on. Christina wondered about that until she opened the front door and found the reason. Aunt Virginia was sitting at the kitchen table, puffing away at a cigarette. She glared at Christina.

  “Where have you been, you little brat?”

  Christina stopped still in her tracks. “But, Aunt Virginia, it’s not midnight yet. You said—”

  “Don’t you tell me what I said!” Virginia punctuated each word with a stab of her fingers, the cigarette dangling between them. “I know what I said. Where were you today?”

  “I was…I was with Luke. Dogsitting.” She couldn’t help it. Her lips started to tremble. What had she done?

  “Oh, I know where you were. You were in the park over on Hudson Avenue.”

  “Well, yes, we went there with his dog Mandy and we—”

  “You are not to go out with that man! Do you hear me?”

  “Aunt Virginia, we weren’t going out. We brought his dog to the park for some exercise.”

  “Don’t try to deny it. Ethel from next door told me she saw you two there. She told me what she saw. That man is trouble, you understand me? The only thing he’s good for is a paycheck! You bring home his m
oney, and you do not even think about taking up with him! I won’t have it!”

  Tears stung Christina’s eyes. Why was her aunt trying to ruin this for her? Luke was a friend. He was a good man, and a great friend, and Christina had dared to hope that maybe there was something more between them or that there could be someday or…or…something.

  “You don’t understand,” she tried to explain.

  “Oh, I understand perfectly.” Aunt Virginia took a second to snub out the one cigarette and then light another. The ashtray was already full. “You think I don’t understand how a self-centered mind like yours works? You think you can seduce this guy and marry into money and leave me all alone and broke! After everything I’ve done for you. You ungrateful little scab! You don’t deserve him! He’s old enough to be your father on top of everything else.”

  Christina’s blood heated behind her tears and she couldn’t believe it when she snapped back at her aunt. “He is not! He’s only eight years older than me. I asked him. And he likes spending time with me. He likes me!”

  She realized that she’d gone too far when her aunt smiled in a wicked way. “So, you are thinking about trying to hook up with him. See? I knew it!”

  “No, no,” Christina tried to deny it. “He’s not like that. I’m not like that, I mean, it’s not like that!” She was stumbling over every word and she just didn’t know what to say.

  Virginia was turning something that had been so wonderful into something ugly. Christina wanted to sob. Her hands clenched into fists and she couldn’t keep her emotions in check any longer.

  “You are a mean old hag! I’m not doing anything wrong! And what’s more, I think he does like me, so there!”

  “Oh, you poor deluded infant,” Virginia said. “Do you honestly think a man like Luke Averton could ever like someone like you?”

  Christina couldn’t take it anymore. All her life this woman had put her down and insulted her and made her feel like dirt. She didn’t want to be here.

  Not anymore.

  She ran to her room, past her aunt who was still babbling at her and up the stairs to the small little room that had been her world for as long as she could remember. She slammed the door behind her.

  Throwing herself down on her bed she buried her face in her pillow and screamed as loudly as she could.

  She didn’t know how much longer it was before she fell asleep. In her dreams she lived in Luke Averton’s mansion. He was with her, and she was happy.

  5.

  Her Aunt was sleeping in the morning when she got up and left for school. Christina didn’t bother trying to wake her. She was still torn up over last night. She was mad and upset and, being honest with herself, she was confused.

  She hiked her bookbag up higher on her shoulder and straightened her t-shirt. It had been a short night. After a few hours of sleep and some very pleasant dreams, some of which still made her blush, she had woken up slowly. Her aunt’s words had come back to her and she had begun to pick everything apart and wonder if maybe her aunt was right about her.

  What was she doing? Was she actually thinking that Luke Averton could ever have feelings for someone like her? Seriously? He was rich, smart, good looking, and so far out of her league that he might as well be on another planet.

  She felt so stupid.

  School was four blocks away from where she lived. By the time she made it there she had convinced herself that she had been a fool. Luke had hired her to do a job for him. That was all.

  She kept her head down and walked through her morning in a fog. She went to each of her classes and did all of her work and then went to lunch not remembering any of it.

  The afternoon went a little slower. By the time the bell rang to end her day, her feet felt like they each weighed a ton. She didn’t want to go outside and meet the taxi she knew would be there waiting to take her to the Averton mansion. She knew she had to do it. She’d promised, not to mention her aunt would expect her to do it.

  She ground her teeth. Shouldn’t she just tell her aunt that she was too old to be bossed around?

  Christina sighed. If she did that, she’d find herself kicked out and then what would happen to her? It wasn’t like she had anywhere else to go.

  So out she went to the parking lot behind the school and sure enough, there was Gus waiting in the taxi for her.

  Gus was a short man, balding on top, with a wide and genuine smile. He opened the door for her now and she could see that he noticed the sour expression on her face.

  “Hey there,” he said. “What’s wrong?”

  She got into the back and laid her head against the cushioned seat. “It’s nothing, Gus. Just take me to the Averton place, please.”

  “Sure, sure,” he said, behind the wheel already and moving out into traffic. “I can see you’re upset, though. Hey, why don’t you read that letter. That might cheer you up.”

  “Letter?” She popped her eyes back open and looked down on the seat on both sides of her. “There’s nothing here.”

  “Eh? Oh, sorry. Forgot to put it back there. Here.” He passed her a white envelope through the small slot in the security window between the front and back. “He asked me to give it to you, all personal like.”

  “He?”

  She knew who he meant, though. She opened the envelope now and pulled out several folded pages. She recognized Luke’s neat handwriting immediately. Confused, she started reading.

  She was more beautiful than she realized. Every day was brighter because of her. Of course, he couldn’t tell her that. His world existed within a tight set of rules and discussing your feelings was strictly against those rules. In the end he managed to find his voice and tell her everything. He never could have done it without her gentle encouragement and her quiet strength. This is the story of how she changed his heart, and his life.

  Christina blinked at the words as she read them. It was a story. A story that Luke had written. He had told her that he wanted to be a writer, but when she asked him about it he had gotten very defensive and shut down. Was this his way of trying to apologize to her?

  Her hands shook as she read through the rest of it. She knew this was a very personal thing for him. The fact that he had shared this with her meant a lot.

  She just wasn’t sure what.

  The story wasn’t complete. She read through to the end of the fourth hand-written page just as the taxi pulled up into the circular drive in front of the mansion.

  There was no way of knowing what would happen next, was the last sentence.

  She wanted to know more. She wanted to know the ending.

  Luke was a really good writer.

  She didn’t even realize it when the taxi stopped. Gus had to knock on the window to get her attention. She folded the papers back up and put them into their envelope. For a moment she held it in her hands and wondered why Luke had given this to her.

  She thanked Gus and made her way into the mansion, met by the housekeeper on her way out. This was the way her afternoons always went. She was left alone in this big house with Mandy for hours before Luke came home. Some nights he never came home at all.

  “Hello, Christina.”

  Today, he apparently came home early.

  “Luke, why are you here?”

  “Last I checked,” he said, “I live here.”

  He was standing in the doorway that led to the sitting room, dressed in jeans and an old blue t-shirt that hung loose around his waist. It was the most dressed down she had ever seen him. Usually, he was dressed up for work. Even when they had gone to the park with Mandy this past weekend he’d been dressed up, sort of. She’d begun to think he didn’t own any other kind of clothes.

  He moved away from the doorway, toward her, and she felt her breath catch. She couldn’t help it. What was he doing? Why did she feel this way, when she had already decided there was nothing between them? Nothing at all. Nothing at…

  His hand reached for hers and she waited for his touch, that electrifying touc
h that always sent shivers up her spine. If this was nothing, then she would never find something better.

  But then, instead of taking hold of her hand, he gently pulled the envelope with his writing in it away from her loose fingers. He held it up between them. “What did you think?”

  She swallowed and gave herself a mental shake. “Your story?”

  He nodded. “Yes. I wasn’t sure about showing it to you, honestly. I’ve, well, never shown anything I’ve written to someone.” He laughed and she watched his eyes sparkle. “That’s crazy, isn’t it? I have notepads full of stories up in my room and no one’s ever seen them.”

  “Really?” she heard how surprised she had sounded. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound, you know, like that. I really liked what you wrote. Is there an ending? I mean, it kind of stops in the middle.”

  His eyes pierced her. She found herself staring deeply into them.

  “You really liked it?” he asked.

  She nodded. It was all she could do.

  Then he was leaning into her. Christina’s heart was beating faster than a hummingbird’s wings. Was he going to…?

  She pushed up on her toes, lips parting open, eyes wide, unable to look away from him. They were so close now that his hand brushed against hers.

  Electricity flowed across her skin, over every inch of her. She heard him gasp in a breath and then her eyes were closing and their lips were touching and that same electricity snapped between them as his soft lips pressed gently against her mouth.

  The kiss became intense as her mind buzzed and hummed and her blood heated through her entire body.

  Oh. Wow.

  She didn’t remember the kiss ending. She was just suddenly standing there, her fingers feeling across her tingling lips, looking up at Luke. His eyes questioned hers, his pupils dilated and bright. “Did you feel that?” he asked her.

  “Yes,” she whispered. “What was it?”

  He licked his lips with the tip of his tongue and she wanted nothing more in the world than to feel that kiss all over again. “I don’t know what it was,” he said. “I’ve never felt that with anyone else.”