Red Blooded

by Caitlin Sinead

  “Shit, Peyton. I want...I want...things that I can’t have too. But, I can’t let Ruiz down. He’s done so much for me and the least I can do is be professional and focus on my work.”

  “What are you talking about? You’re uber professional.”

  He stares at me and rolls his lips together. “Well, I’m trying to be. But I’m not the most patient guy.”

  Could he be talking about me? My heart slams into my breastbone as I lean forward. “What is this horrific, unprofessional thing that you want so badly but can’t have?”

  His eyes cast down my neck and to my chest. He swallows. “I...”

  I lean toward him just a little more. His lips are so close. I want them even closer. I want every fiber of Dylan’s being to be closer.

  But instead, he stands and takes two steps back, knocking a lamp over.

  “Shit.” He bends down and messes with getting the lamp back on the table. Once it’s situated, he turns back to me as he wipes his face. “Look, Peyton, the election is just a few weeks away. Just wait, okay?”

  “Do you want to wait?” I stand up and step toward him.

  “This isn’t about what I want.” He steps backward again and splays his hands out, palms to the ground. “None of this is about me. But you have to wait to look into your dad.”

  Oh, he was talking about my dad. Am I completely misreading him?

  I sigh and pull my hair back as I sit back down. Great, I almost kissed a guy who doesn’t want to kiss me. Best scenario: he feels it’s his patriotic duty not to kiss me. Worst scenario: he resents me so much for setting his career back, it doesn’t matter that he probably thinks I’m at least kinda cute. Either way, we’re forced to hang out together for the next few weeks. If I made an actual attempt to kiss him and he had to actually rebuff me, that would make for a fun, not at all horrendously awkward, few weeks.

  I cross my arms. “Don’t worry, Dylan. I’ll keep myself in check. Like you said, it’s just a few more weeks. Then we’ll be free of this.”

  Then, you’ll be free of me.

  He smiles, this nice, simple but glorious grin.

  I turn away.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Today I sat Peyton down. I told her one day she’ll meet a nice guy who smiles at her just right. But before she gives her heart to him, she needs to figure out three things.

  “Okay,” she said, hugging her knees and squishing her features in an I’ll-indulge-you-because-you’re-dying face.

  “First,” I explained. “Make sure he can cook.”

  “Well, of course,” she said, making circles with her pointer finger to urge me on.

  “Second,” I said. “He has to make you laugh.”

  She shook her head, her hair flipping. “No, Dad. Isn’t it sort of sexist to say that the guy needs to make the girl laugh? I can be funny too, you know. We have to laugh together.”

  “Well,” I said, resting my hand on my stomach as I tried not to laugh. “You have a point there.”

  “I’ve been reading Mom’s women’s studies book,” she said, chin high.

  “Ah,” I said. “Well, okay, second, you have to laugh together.”

  She nodded.

  “And third,” I continued. “He needs to appreciate everything about you. He doesn’t need to like everything, but he needs to appreciate it. As do you with him.” I clasped my hands together. “It’s okay, I’ll wait while you write all this down.”

  She smiled and pointed to my laptop. “Even if I didn’t know you were going to write it down for me, well, for me and the world, I think I’ll remember this.”

  * * *

  Media whirlwinds after I’ve had three hours of sleep make me pretty tired. After I take an un-godly long-ass nap, I wake up to clinking and clanking in the kitchen. I take in Dylan’s pre-furnished apartment, the space that will serve as a weekend retreat, and a prison, as I walk to the counter.

  “Doesn’t look like you spend much time here.”

  “I don’t spend much time here. I’m usually following some girl around,” he says with a wink.

  Yeah, a wink. “You’re cleaner than I would have thought.”

  “What about me says that I’m messy?” His fingers press against his chest, before he gets back to making the stir-fry, which has the whole apartment smelling like warm meat and sizzly tomatoes. Lunch. I prop myself up on the counter. His gaze brushes against my bare knees for a moment before he looks back at me. “I’m pretty organized, actually,” he says, concentrating awfully hard on the stove.

  “Is any of this stuff yours, besides the clothes?”

  He nods to the bookshelf as he takes a taste of the contents in the pan. He licks his thumb. “I have a few books I like to have around.”

  I jump off the counter and head over to the bookshelf.

  “Peyton,” he calls with a sharpness I’m not used to. “Um, this is almost ready.”

  I turn around, confused. “No it’s not.” His eyes are wide and he’s moving his hand, coaxing me back into the kitchen.

  Oh. There’s something on the bookshelf he doesn’t want me to see.

  I spin back on course. Sure enough, there’s that familiar maroon spine.

  “You’ve read The Troubling Transition?” I keep my voice as level as I can even though my skin is on fire. Sure, millions of people have read that book. But I don’t want Dylan to have been one of them. I don’t want him to know that I had a sparkly purple backpack when I was fourteen or that I had a weird phase where I liked spiders when I was eight or that I called log cabins “log cabinets” when I was five. Okay, fine, seven.

  I swallow as he sprinkles some spices on the chopped tomatoes in the pan. “Yeah, when I found out your mom was the pick, I read it.”

  “And now you can’t part with it?”

  He turns so fast that he burns himself on the pan. “Shit.” He stares at his wound. I rush over and pull him to the sink. I thrust on the cool water and position his arm under it. My chest presses against his side as I reach across his body to hold his hand in place. I love how much of me is touching him. Which makes me hate it too.

  “Thanks,” he says, except it’s more of a low grunt. Our mouths are so close. He leans forward, his chest expanding slowly against mine. He licks his lips with this intense gaze on me that has me wanting so much more than just this chest touching, although that’s pretty great too.

  I slowly stand on my toes to get closer to him. His breathing is so heavy, I can feel it.

  He shakes himself and turns around to get a towel.

  I cross my arms. “You should keep it under the water longer.”

  “I’m fine,” he says in a rough voice. He pushes the towel aside and goes back to stirring. It’s awkwardly silent, except for the sizzle and scrapes of the spoon. Finally, he says, “Why are you so upset?”

  I want to kiss you and do other naughty things to you, but I can’t.

  “Lots of people have read that book,” he says.

  Oh, he’s still talking about the book. I click my fingers against the counter. “It’s just, well, now you know all this embarrassing stuff about me.”

  He does his weird side grin that makes my heart hurt. Why does he have to be so fucking adorable?

  “I didn’t think there was anything that bad in it.” He’s still grinning though, like he’s remembering all the embarrassing stuff.

  “Well, it wasn’t about you, was it?” I snap and point my finger at him. “And maybe you should have asked me before you read it.”

  “Peyton, it’s a published book, it’s not like—”

  “Fine, whatever,” I growl and cross my arms because I hate that he has a point. Anyone can read it, even him. I have no say.

  He goes back to the tomatoes, but instead of tur
ning his back to me, he stands to the side. “Come over here.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  “So I can talk to you while I make this.”

  I come over.

  “There wasn’t anything embarrassing in that book.”

  “Again, that’s really easy for you to say. I don’t recall reading a part about you writing a eulogy for your cat with a purple crayon or you getting red in the face because you were angry at a boy who kept stealing your pens and telling people you put in tampons upside down.”

  He laughs. “That was funny. I mean, who comes up with that?”

  “Tristan,” I say laughing.

  He adds some chopped onions to the pan and swishes things around with a wooden spoon as they sizzle. “It’s weird, thinking Tristan’s the same guy in The Troubling Transition.”

  “Yeah, my dad didn’t really capture the whole story.”

  Dylan’s absorbed in his cooking when he says softly, “It seems like he thought you’d end up with Tristan.”

  “Well, my dad was right about the crush thing. Or, I guess, you know, the guy who told me he was my dad.” I lean against the fridge.

  Dylan points the wooden spoon at me. “Peyton, he was still your dad, okay? I mean, whether you’re a product of artificial insemination or something, he’s still your dad even if he’s not biologically your dad.”

  “Artificial insemination. Why would they keep that from me?”

  Dylan shakes his head. “I don’t know, I’m just saying, whatever is actually going on, don’t forget what you and he had.”

  “You think you know what we had.” My fists clench and the heat returns to my skin. “Everyone who read that book thinks they know. But they don’t. You don’t.” I clutch at the pin and rub it between my thumb and pointer finger.

  “I don’t know, but you do.” He’s close to me, his chest rises and falls more quickly than it should. He reaches for me. He hesitates, but then his hand is on my shoulder. He squeezes and I completely forget what we were talking about. “Peyton, what happened with Tristan?” Oh, that.

  “He had a little crush on me back then. He feels bad about all his stunts now. He stopped doing stuff after my dad died. And then, a few weeks later, he apologized to me.”

  “Oh?”

  Dylan’s waist is only about three inches from my waist.

  “I told him to fuck off. I said our friendship was annihilated.” I smile. “But he kept at it. He brought me cupcakes at my swim meets, he texted me random movie quotes he knew I’d like. Eventually, I broke down. We became friends again. And then...more. But, it wasn’t right, we didn’t work well that way for a lot of reasons. So, we went back to being friends.”

  Dylan steps back. “You really don’t want to be with him?”

  “No.” I say it like a knee jerk. “I told you, he’s great, he’s one of my best friends, but it’s not like that. I’m old fashioned—I want to be monogamous.”

  Dylan licks his lips. I stare at his lips longer than I should as he talks. “Yeah, but if he was willing to be with just you, that’s what you’d want. To be with him?” His face is as serious as stone.

  “No,” I say. “It’s more than just our philosophies on sex. There are bigger issues. For example, he has no idea how to cook. That’s a deal breaker.”

  Dylan doesn’t smile. He goes back to the pan and shifts the bits around. Shit. I was thinking about what my dad had said, his advice about men. I was trying to make a joke. I wasn’t thinking about the fact that Dylan’s cooking right this minute. Why did I say that? What happened to me keeping myself in check? I rub my face and mumble something about going to the bathroom.

  By the time I’ve calmed myself down in the mirror, Dylan has the bowls on the table, along with a memo from Lisa about Sylvia’s funeral on Monday.

  “There will be reporters there,” Dylan says.

  I hide my face in my hands.

  “It’ll be fine. Just smile politely at them and keep walking. You don’t want to look rude or evasive, but you don’t want to be talking to them before or after you go in. It’ll look like we’re trying to score political points.”

  “Okay,” I say. “Nod, smile, move on.”

  “Exactly,” he says, his side grin back.

  I have to tamp down the warmth in my chest again. I have to nod, smile, and move on.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Peyton woke me up one morning with an orange juice. She stood over me as I sipped it.

  “You can write the book,” she said.

  “Are you sure?” I asked as the citrus bit at my tongue.

  She crossed her arms and looked out the window. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  * * *

  After Dylan is sufficiently satisfied that I’m prepped for the funeral, I pull out my textbooks and notes and study for hours. I sit on one side of the couch highlighting facts about ancient tribes and twiddling with calculus problems while he sits on the other side, his legs stretched over the ottoman, his long fingers sliding along the screen as he takes in the news of the world.

  Clouds threaten rain as we sip tea and put soft music on and it’s just what I needed.

  As dinnertime descends and our stomachs grumble, he heads out for pizza. While he’s gone, I finally change out of my pajamas into one of the dresses I packed. A college student getting a start on her day at 6:00 p.m.—not so strange, right?

  I’m reading about how second wave feminism influenced politics when he comes back, drenched. As he sets up the pizza, I get a towel from his bathroom and toss it at him. “Thanks, but I’ll just change.”

  He pulls off the sticky, wet shirt and tosses it into his laundry. His black undershirt clings to him. Damn, do his shoulders look good as his arms flex. All these little wonderful dents and shadows curve while he rummages around for clothes in his drawers. Heat rises in my chest and my lady parts. And all he’s doing is rummaging through underwear.

  Shit.

  My face burns when he turns around and locks eyes with me. I turn away. Tiny sounds of the clock and his dryer’s low hum grow louder as everything else is quiet. His shoes squeak as he heads to the bathroom.

  I busy myself with opening the soggy pizza box and putting the slices on plates so we’re all ready when he emerges.

  He sits down at the table. We eat, but he looks at me as he chews. When he swallows, he says, “My parents had trouble keeping a pregnancy, and my mom always wanted a girl.” He says it like he’s reading a press release. Factual. “She had infant dresses in my closet. Every time she had a miscarriage, she’d buy another dress, for the next one. But then she got me. You’d think she’d be happy to have a baby at that point, and eventually she was, but she cried that first week and swaddled me in infant clothes with pink ribbons on them until my dad went to the store to get ones with soccer balls.”

  My pizza hangs midair. “Why are you—”

  “When I was six,” he continues, still with a flat, reportorial tone. “My mom explained Mary’s Immaculate Conception by saying that baby Jesus shouldn’t have existed but then, voila, one day he did. She said many people prayed for him to come for years and God granted it. So, my six-year-old mind figured if I prayed really hard for a yellow lab, then God might ‘immaculate conception’ one for me.” Finally, he smiles and looks at his pizza. “Yes, I used that phrase as a verb in my prayers to God.”

  “‘God, please immaculate conception me a dog,’” I say, my hand covering my laughs.

  “Exactly.” He grins as he chews. I take another bite and wait for him to explain why it’s story time all of a sudden, but here he goes again: “When I was five, I said I wanted a purple cat for Christmas and I stopped believing in Santa when we got a black cat. When I was ten, I caught the garter at my cousin’s wedding and had to put it on a 45-year-old woman’
s thigh. When I was twelve, I ate too many Skittles before a soccer game and puked up the rainbow all over the field.”

  I laugh. “Taste the rainbow, for a second time.”

  He smiles. “It’s not so good the second time.”

  I put my elbow on the table and rest my head in my hand. “Why are you telling me all this?”

  “Because you’re right. It’s not fair that I know all that stuff about you, but you don’t know anything embarrassing about me.”

  “Tell me more. But it doesn’t have to be embarrassing.”

  “Okay,” he says. “When I was fifteen, I liked a girl in my class who wanted to volunteer with a local campaign. I told her my dad was friends with Senator Ruiz. I mean, that would get me in, right? She went with me to a few events before deciding it was boring. But after those events, I decided she was boring. I was hooked. And, for a long time, no girl made me feel the way campaigning makes me feel.”

  My veins are warm and shaky. I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t even know if anything is going on.

  Perhaps it’s time to pivot?

  “Let’s see if this whole story has actually blown up.” I grab my phone and search Google for my name.

  “Wait, Peyton, that’s probably not a good idea. Just trust me, it will die down.”

  I ignore him as I read the Washington Post story, which actually highlights the fact that I had to run from my dorm room. Most other stories are sympathetic to me as well. They talk about how my handler pulled me along. Dylan clears the table.

  “Need help?” I ask, as I keep scrolling and skimming the screen.

  “No,” he says, but he’s watching me.

  And then I see it. After a few stories about trust and genetics and my dad, there are several bloggers wondering if there’s more to my handler than meets the eye. In less than a day, fascination has changed from genetics and my dad to, well, Dylan. “Dylan Torres, a member of Ruiz’s close-knit circle, was assigned to help manage Peyton Arthur’s relationship with the media. But some are saying the pictures and footage hint that something more might be going on.”