After Hours

by Anina Collins

  I looked down into the dark brown liquid in my mug and mumbled, “Yeah, usually, but I’m doing black this morning. I figured I needed it straight up so I could wake up faster.”

  My feeble attempt at a joke didn’t register with her, and she sniffled and sobbed more. “I know you don’t like us together, do you? Did you tell him that?”

  The plaintive sound of her voice made my heart contract for a moment. I didn’t know what had happened, but it did involve Alex. She didn’t have to worry about what I thought, although it was clear she did. My epiphany from the day before now had the chance to be more than just helpful to me.

  “I’m fine with you two together. You’re a good friend of mine, and Alex is my work partner. Two good people deserve to have fun, and if it’s with one another, then that’s even better.”

  I may not have believed every word of that one hundred percent. Maybe sixty or seventy percent. That was a vast improvement from just a few days before, though, so I was making good progress. I just wished my words could help Bethany, but as she covered her face and began to cry behind her hands, I knew they hadn’t.

  Reaching over, I gently touched her arm and quietly asked the question I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer to. “What happened?”

  She dropped her hands to reveal her mascara had once again lost its fight against her tears and was running down her cheeks. I quickly grabbed a napkin from the holder at the edge of the table and handed it to her.

  “Don’t cry. I’m sure whatever happened will be okay.”

  “I thought we were having a good time. I thought…I thought he liked me, Poppy. I really like him.”

  Her words became harder to understand as the tears returned and syllables got lost in her sobs. Part of me hated seeing her crying there in front of me, but another part of me—and not a part I was particularly proud of—that part wanted to know the details of what happened to make her cry over Alex.

  Thankfully, the good part of me kept the evil part at bay so I didn’t blurt out half a dozen questions to satisfy my curiosity. “It’s okay, honey. Let it out.”

  I’d always found that advice helped at least give me a reason to think crying my eyes out was okay. I hoped it would help her too. I wasn’t entirely evil.

  She looked at me with her bloodshot eyes rimmed with defeated mascara and shook her head. “I don’t know what happened. We were having a good time. At least I thought we were. We had dinner a few times and I thought we’d sleep together tonight, but then he told me right out of the blue after we got to my apartment tonight that he thought we should slow things down.”

  Some tiny area of me deep inside where the parts I’m not particularly proud of hung out rejoiced at hearing they hadn’t slept together yet. I knew I shouldn’t have cared, especially after my recent epiphany, but I did. It was petty and sort of sad, but I did.

  And then Bethany spoke the words that made me ashamed.

  “Why would he do that? What’s wrong with me, Poppy?”

  The last remnants of jealousy I’d felt over her with Alex disappeared with that one question. Every woman in the world has thought that or asked that out loud to her friends at least one time in her life. What’s wrong with me? It cut to the heart of every fear a woman secretly carried with her every day of her life.

  What’s wrong with me? I hated hearing that coming out of Bethany’s mouth as she sat there after a night of crying over that very question because that’s what it was. She may have seemed to be crying over Alex, but it was bigger than that.

  She’d spent hours crying because she thought there was something wrong with her. I may have been a pretty rotten friend to her in the past, but I had a chance to be someone much better and I wanted to be that.

  “Bethany, listen to me. There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re beautiful, smart, fun. Any man who has any sense would see you’re great.”

  She wiped the tears from beneath her eyes and smeared her makeup past her eyes to her hairline. “Then why doesn’t Alex see that?”

  I had no idea why he didn’t. I reached for a napkin and wiped the mascara and eyeliner from the sides of her face as I tried to find the words I knew she needed to hear. “I don’t know, honey, but he’s crazy if he can’t.”

  Fighting back more tears, she said in a tiny voice, “I really liked him, Poppy. He’s not like any other guy I’ve ever dated. He’s smart and strong, and I knew we were complete opposites since he’s so quiet and I’m so outgoing, but I thought he liked that about me.”

  Opposites. More and more it seemed everyone was the opposite of Alex. I knew how Bethany felt, even though I’d never dated him. She admired how different he was from her and liked being around someone who complimented who she was with who he was. Now, though, his apparent rejection of her felt like a rejection of everything she was.

  Like those differences had suddenly become something bad she wished wasn’t so much of who she was. I understood all too well.

  “I’m sure he did, Bethany. He only said he wanted to slow things down, though. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to see you anymore.”

  She hung her head and sighed. “I know what slow things down means. I’ve heard it before. We’ll go out a couple times a month and each time we’ll seem to have a good time, but he’ll always seem to be happy with just hanging out or having sex and never want more. I’ve been here before.”

  I hated the idea that Alex would be one of those guys like she described. He was better than that, wasn’t he? I wanted to believe he was the man I’d built up in my mind.

  “Maybe it will be different this time. Alex is a good guy. I don’t think he’ll be that way with you.”

  Honestly, I didn’t know what he’d be like. I hadn’t expected him to be like this with her and move into slow down mode so early in their relationship. I knew I had been seeing things through that ugly green haze of jealousy, but I thought they’d begin dating and he’d fall head over heels in love with her.

  Why wouldn’t he? She had everything men loved, and as she’d said, she was his opposite and that usually attracted a man to a woman.

  Bethany blew her nose in a napkin and looked at me with a pleading stare. “Would you talk to him for me? I know he thinks the world of you. I can’t tell you how much we talked about you when we were together. He raves about how much he values your insight with the cases you guys work on and I know he would listen to you. He said he’s never had a partner who knew so much about him.”

  Valued my insight. That should have made me feel great, but it didn’t. I hated that he described me in all work terms. Just as I’d feared, he only saw me as his work partner. Nothing else.

  And he’d never had a partner who knew so much about him? I had to wonder who he’d worked with in the past since I barely knew anything about him.

  “Please, Poppy. I really want to try to make a go with things with him. You know him so much better than I do, so will you talk to him for me?”

  Why did anyone think I knew Alex better than they did? My father knew about as much about him as I did, and compared to Bethany, I was practically a stranger in his life. His mailman probably knew more about him than I did.

  As much as I dreaded the idea of talking to him about her, I couldn’t say no with her looking at me like I was her one and only chance for happiness with him. I pushed down the demons inside me plotting her romantic demise and did the only thing the good parts of me could.

  I said I’d help.

  “Okay, but I think you might be overstating how close we are. Really. When he says I know a lot about him, I think he means he knows a ton about me, not the other way around.”

  Tears filled her eyes again, and she grabbed my hands to squeeze them tightly. “Thank you so much, Poppy.”

  I smiled and told her it was my pleasure to help a friend as the good and evil parts of me began their latest war inside my brain. It was their favorite battlefield, especially when it came to moral issues. On the one hand, good me wanted to he
lp Bethany get together with someone I knew she liked a lot. On the other hand, though, evil me knew if Alex already had gone to the slow down place in the relationship, it wouldn’t take much to make him want to end it completely. A few well-chosen words on my part and Alex and Bethany would be no more.

  I knew what I’d do when the time came, but those evil parts of me sure did sound like they had the better idea.

  Pushing all that aside for the moment, I did what I could to cheer her up and on her way. “You better get going. You have work in a little while, and you don’t want to walk into The Eagle looking like that. You know how tongues wag in this town.”

  She wiped under her eyes again and nodded. “You’re right. I’m going to go home and take a nice hot shower before I go to work. Thank you so much for being such a good friend, Poppy. I was worried when I came here that you wouldn’t even talk to me since you haven’t answered any of my texts or phone calls in the last few days. I thought you were mad at me because Alex and I had decided to go out.”

  Instantly, I felt ashamed for how I’d acted. “No, it wasn’t that at all,” I lied. “Howard has been on my back about getting more work to him lately, so I had to hunker down and get it done so I don’t lose my job.”

  A look of relief washed over her, and she stood from the table to leave, smiling for the first time. “I should have known that. Alex asked me what I thought could be wrong last night at dinner and I told him I thought you might not be happy about us together. When he didn’t tell me I was wrong, I thought for sure you’d said something to him about it.”

  I stood and brought her into my arms in a genuine hug. “I would never do that, Bethany. You’re my friend, and I’m sorry I wasn’t around the last couple days. I’m just glad I could be here for you this morning.”

  “Thank you so much, Poppy.” Leaning away from me, she wiped the last of her mascara from her cheeks and smiled. “I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

  “Okay. I don’t know when I’ll get to talk to Alex since I still have to focus more on my articles for my editor, but I promise I’ll speak to him. Don’t worry. Things will be okay.”

  She hugged me again and thanked me before leaving. As I closed the door behind her, I felt a twinge of guilt about hedging when I’d get to talk to Alex about them and lying outright about having to focus on my newspaper work first.

  To make myself feel better, I messaged Alex for the first time in days and hoped he wasn’t as stubborn as I was.

  Hey, I’ve been in the writing cave but I’m ready to come out now that I’ve finished my work for my editor. The Grounds at 8 this morning?

  Less than ten seconds later, his text back to me made my phone vibrate in my hand. I looked down to see he was already up and raring to go.

  I was beginning to get worried about you. I have news about the case I want to talk about. See you at 8.

  The difference between him at six in the morning and Bethany couldn’t have been starker.

  Two hours later, I walked into The Grounds for the first time in days and felt like a changed person. I didn’t know why since the coffee shop hadn’t changed in the least, but I was different. Nothing a little change in perspective can’t fix.

  Two women sat at our usual table, so Alex was at the one next to it. Yet another small but notable change. I saw two coffee cups sitting on our new table in front of him, so I walked directly to where he was and sat down.

  “Good morning. I’m happy to see you back,” he said in a way that made me look twice at him. I wasn’t sure I liked what I saw.

  He didn’t look tired like he’d been up for hours parsing the words of someone he cared about or wondering what was wrong with him. There were no dark circles or bags under his eyes, and he didn’t look like he’d quickly gotten a shower before running out of the house to meet me.

  In fact, Alex looked rather refreshed this morning. I didn’t know exactly why, but that bothered me. Was I angry he had gone out with Bethany at all? Angry that he didn’t seem to want her as much as she wanted him? I wasn’t sure I had a valid reason to be angry at anything other than what he’d said to me before I jumped out of the car, but as I stared at him looking far too rested and enjoying his morning coffee, all I knew was I was angry at Alex.

  “Looks like you had a good night’s sleep,” I remarked, instantly hating how snarky I sounded.

  Clearly confused why I’d snapped at him about how well he’d slept, he opened his mouth to speak but said nothing. Shrugging, he finally said, “I guess. Are you okay? The last I saw of you was that nasty look you threw at me just before you jumped out of the car, slammed the door, and stormed away.”

  Now seemed as good a time as any to get my cards on the table, even if I’d decided not to put them all out there for him to see, so I took a sip of my coffee made exactly like I loved it and said, “I didn’t like what you said, so I left. Nothing more than that.”

  Not exactly a friendly way to tell someone what was wrong, but it was the best I could muster without having all the misplaced resentment I was feeling over how well he’d slept last night spill out in some bizarre rambling diatribe that would do no one any good.

  Alex studied my face long enough that I grew uncomfortable, so I turned away and pretended to watch a couple on the other side of the restaurant who were obviously having a similar morning to ours, except the woman had decided not to hold a thing back. In hushed tones that only made what she was saying more interesting to those around her, she reamed out the man across from her as her hands spoke volumes with their jerky flailing.

  As I witnessed the disintegration of their relationship right there in The Grounds, I heard Alex say something and turned back to see a hopeful look in his eyes. Curious to know what had brought that about, I asked, “What did you say? I missed it. Sorry.”

  “This morning must be the time for apologies. I said I was sorry for what I said to you in the car the other day. It wasn’t what I ever felt about you and our working together, and I don’t know why I said it. Sometimes I hear things and they filter into my thinking, but I don’t think of you like that.”

  “Like some hapless tagalong Dr. Watson to your Sherlock Holmes?”

  I hadn’t planned to be so honest about how he’d made me feel when he said those things, but now as I sat there across from him as another couple waged their own relationship war, I suddenly felt like I wanted to throw more cards on our table. If he didn’t feel that way about working with me and had obviously just picked it up from what I’d told Bethany, then how did he feel?

  It was about time for him to come clean too.

  Uneasy because I’d put him on the spot, he gave me a forced smile and said, “You are not that, Poppy.”

  Now it was time to go for broke, so I asked the question that had rolled around my head for far too long. “Then what am I?”

  He didn’t answer, so I continued with even more questions. “You didn’t seem to think much of my helping you when you said those things, so what is it, Alex? We aren’t anything but work partners. That’s clear. But what am I in this partnership?”

  For a moment, Alex looked more uncomfortable than I’d ever seen him before. He winced like he was in pain and shifted in his seat before he opened his mouth to speak and nothing came out. Clearly my questions weren’t easy for him to answer either.

  Finally, he cleared his throat and said, “I think of you as far more than just someone I work cases with. I’ve never had a partner who knew as much about me as you do. There’s something about you that makes me open up, even though it’s not my nature at all. I lived alone in that house not really talking to anyone for years, and then one night you showed up to ask my help and I didn’t want to live like that anymore.”

  “So we’re friends in your mind too?” I asked, stunned by what he’d said so far.

  “I thought so. Didn’t you?”

  I shook my head and told him as much of my truth as I could without admitting how much I cared for him. “I know next
to nothing about you, Alex. You say you’ve never had a partner who knows as much as I do. How is that possible? All I know is you used to be a Baltimore cop and you moved here after your wife died. After all these months, I still don’t know much else about you.”

  “That’s not true. You know how I take my coffee and that I only drink it in the morning. You know I drink scotch neat. You know I don’t like country music.”

  “These aren’t really big things to know about someone, Alex.”

  “I can’t think of anyone else who knows them.”

  “I’m willing to bet Bethany knows a lot more than that about you.”

  I didn’t mean to say that, but it slipped out and then once the words had left my mouth, I couldn’t take them back. In just a few misspoken words, I’d shown him what had been at the root of my anger with him.

  I looked away feeling more exposed than I could deal with. I didn’t want to look into his eyes when he realized all I’d been was jealous. That’s all it had been, and now as I avoided his piercing gaze, I wished I hadn’t said those words.

  “Bethany knows what she wants to know, Poppy. She’s nice to spend a little time with every so often. You know, to break up the time alone. She wants more than I can give, though. But she doesn’t know me better than you do. Nobody does.”

  I didn’t know if that was the best thing he could tell me or the saddest admission I’d ever heard since I still didn’t feel like I knew more than the surface of Alex Montero. If I knew him better than anyone else, I couldn’t help but see now that he kept the world at arm’s length, letting no one in. He hadn’t changed from that sullen guy I first met in Derek’s office or that angry soul who’d threatened to shoot me for trespassing on his property.

  “Well, I still don’t think I know much about you compared to what you know about me, but what’s most important to me is that you respect me for what I bring to this partnership because if you don’t, then there’s no point in us working together anymore.”

  My mouth suddenly became devoid of all traces of moisture as I waited for him to answer. I hadn’t meant for it to sound like an ultimatum, but it had come out a bit more stridently than I intended and I’d basically told him it was time for him to put his cards on the table.