The Kissing Game

by Marie Turner

  “It’s hard to tell, could be any minute or a couple of hours.”

  “That’s unacceptable,” Robert butts in, shaking his head. “Is not the primary objective of the physician to do no harm?” He glares at the nurse. Poor woman.

  “Yes, um, of course, but I can’t prescribe her morphine myself, and her next dose isn’t scheduled yet. I’ll get the doctor right away.”

  “Yes, I recommend you do that,” Robert says.

  As the nurse grabs her bags and departs, Robert follows her, and I suddenly worry he will do something rash. With everyone gone from the room, minus the now silent patient on the other side of the curtain, I lie there wishing and praying for pain relief as though it were the only thing in the world. Before I begin my second round of “Dear God, Dear God, Dear God,” Robert is already back in the room, a short young doctor following him like a sheep.

  He approaches me while Robert stands over both of us, a judge over a trial. The doctor soon injects me with the succulent of the gods.

  Robert asks, “How do you feel now?”

  “Great,” I answer because I do. Fire and brimstone all gone.

  The doctor tries to ignore Robert’s presence, which is like ignoring a fire-breathing dragon hovering over your shoulder, if that dragon were beautiful.

  “You’re a fortunate young woman, Caroline,” he says, disposing the needle and his gloves in the trash can. “For someone who’s just been shot, you look remarkably alive; aside from that stitched hole in your stomach and back and the drain tube in it, you could look almost normal.”

  I don’t like the sounds of “a drain tube” but decide not to focus on the negatives of the situation, especially while I’m floating on a river of clouds. The doctor waits for me to speak. I can’t muster words. My mouth feels detached from my face, so he continues.

  “You’re going to be with us here for a few days, just to make sure you don’t develop any infections, but you’re lucky,” he says, using his fingers to count. “You got to keep your stomach, your spleen, your liver, and both kidneys. You lost just the tiniest portion of your large intestine. Regardless, I’m sure you’ll live a long, healthy life, provided you avoid jumping into the path of anymore oncoming bullets.”

  He and Robert exchange words before he exits.

  Before long, Robert sits down next to me and scoots his chair up close. The hospital bed beneath me floats as he whispers, “I think now might be a good time to tell me why the Chairman wanted to kill you.”

  He waits for a response. God, he’s beautiful. Oh, that. I had almost forgotten. Robert doesn’t know everything yet. He hasn’t been told.

  “I broke into the Chairman’s house,” I whisper.

  Robert’s eyes remain on my face, but he cannot hide his curiosity. “Why?”

  “Grand failure,” I say. “I broke in to get the tape back, but it didn’t work …You have the eyes of a beautiful woman.” He really does.

  He frowns at me. “Why would you do such a ridiculous thing?”

  “I was trying to keep you from getting tired, and now the Chairman has security footage of me breaking into his house, and now I’m going to jail,” I say calmly, but really, somewhere down beneath the fluffy clouds is a sober me screaming in fear. “How long do you think I’ll be in prison?” I ask Robert.

  “You mean ‘keep me from getting fired.’”

  “Yeah, I’m so sorry about that.”

  “But why would he want to kill you for breaking into his house?” Robert wants to know.

  “He thinks I saw something I shouldn’t have. It’s a long story, but the short version is he’s into some seedy business, child pornography,” I whisper the last two words.

  “What makes you think so?”

  Just then the clomping of footsteps catches my attention, and I notice Ted in the doorway. He stands there holding a bouquet of yellow daffodils.

  “You’re awake,” Ted says striding toward me in full-on Ted Bundy-esque sweater and jeans. Robert still sits there beside me, the look of annoyance at being interrupted. I can’t help but notice the contrast between the two men. Sure, Ted looks attractive, scholarly even in his off-white sweater, but Robert looks all the more glorious in comparison, even with his wild hair and stained shirt.

  “Hi,” Ted says to Robert out of courtesy.

  Robert nods as though Ted’s interruption has just wrecked the day.

  “I brought you some clothes. Your apartment door was still open, so I figured you could use some stuff. I hope you don’t mind. Toiletries, clothes, slippers, stuff you might need,” Ted explains, setting a bag down on the counter.

  “Thanks,” I say. “That was sweet.”

  Robert thrusts himself up from the chair beside me. “Let’s put those in water.” He extends his hand to take the flowers from Ted who releases them as though they were kittens Robert might drown. Ted and I observe as Robert takes the plastic hospital-standard pitcher, fills it with water, and places the flowers inside. He sets them on the counter and turns around, blocking the flowers from view.

  “What’s the verdict?” Ted asks me.

  “The bullet went through her, no internal organs damaged. They put a drain tube in and stitched her up. She’ll be let out in a few days,” Robert answers for me. I wonder if he knew this information before I did. Hospitals have rules about only informing family members, so I consider whether Robert bullied the information out of someone.

  “You need a ride back home after you’re released? I can borrow a car and come get you,” Ted offers with the eagerness of a boy scout.

  “I’m giving her a ride home,” Robert clarifies.

  “You are?” I ask.

  Robert nods at me.

  “She could probably answer for herself,” Ted clarifies, glancing back at Robert.

  “She could,” Robert says.

  I hear a snicker behind the curtain.

  “Before I forget, I also brought your cell phone. It’s in the bag. There’s a bunch of messages on there,” Ted says. Suddenly the thought of Ted going through my apartment and looking at my cell phone seems a little serial-killer-esque, but the daffodils have already won me over.

  “Thanks for coming, and for the flowers. You always have a way of showing up at the right times,” I say to Ted, who seems woefully aware of Robert’s presence. As if to annoy Robert, Ted takes my hand and says, “I’m so glad you’re okay. There were a few hours there when I thought you weren’t going to make it. How’re you feeling?”

  “Like I’ve been shot,” I say. “But good. The pain medication feels as if it will last for forty years.”

  He nods. “You’re lucky. You could’ve died.”

  “I suppose.”

  “You know that bed and breakfast still awaits us,” Ted says. “We can still go.” His feelings seem all warm and bent in my direction. He smiles and squeezes my hand.

  A voice inside me tells me to check on Robert, so I glance at him just in time to see his blue eyes catch the light and look fiery. There seems a chink in his armor.

  “We can talk about it later, Ted,” I say. “But thanks for coming, bringing all my stuff. I was so busy bleeding that I didn’t think to grab anything before the paramedics took me away.”

  Ted chuckles. Robert doesn’t. I sense a reckoning.

  “I should get some rest,” I say, seeking to send Ted away.

  “You should,” Robert asserts bossily.

  “I’ll leave you to it, then. Sweet dreams,” Ted says as he bends his head down and kisses me on the forehead.

  The two glare at each other as Ted leaves the hospital room and Robert moseys his way over to the chair next to my bed. Sitting down, he looks at me with a kind of intolerable bleakness, as if no amount of cheerfulness or hopefulness could turn the situation around, and I wonder if he’s returning to the mean boss Robert I used to know. For several long seconds, he chews on his inner lip. Next he looks over his shoulder as if to assess whether our hospital roommate on the other side of
the curtain is sleeping or awake. The patient’s movement on the bed gives Robert his answer.

  “What’s this about the bed and breakfast?” Robert asks blatantly, but before I can answer, he continues. “Don’t tell me you and little Teddy are…?”

  “No, no. He’s just a friend.”

  “A guy who takes you to a bed and breakfast is not just your friend.”

  “I’m telling you, he’s just a friend.”

  Robert frowns at the sheet covering my torso. He contemplates for several minutes before speaking again. “I think you should come live with me after you get out of the hospital, at least for a little while,” Robert states, all business. “And I thought I should phone your mother and tell her what’s happened, but I didn’t have her contact information. She might want to come out and see you. She could stay at my house.”

  “No, no. We are not telling my mother. She will freak, and I don’t want her to worry.” Of course, I don’t tell him that she can’t afford the air-fare and neither can I.

  “Regardless, you should stay with me.” This time it is more of a demand than a question.

  “It’s really not necessary.”

  “I insist.”

  “Okay,” I reply, feeling the crashing of mountainous seas in my stomach at the prospect of living with Robert for any length of time. I imagine his bedroom closet full of boxed shirts.

  “I promise to be a gentleman,” he says apologetically.

  “I know.”

  While I wrestle with the thought of living with Robert—my mind alternating between wondering and fantasizing—I begin to receive a throng of visitors. Cory arrives with a book entitled Don’t Mess with a Redhead. “What is the book about?” I ask him. “No idea,” he replies. “Just thought the title was appropriate.” Todd brings me makeup and a mirror. So sweet. And Henry brings me my desk nameplate, which used to say “Caroline” but now says “The Carolinator.” Henry explains that it’s a variation of “The Terminator.” “Am I fired?” I ask, and Henry nods. “But that’s not why I’m giving you the name plate—it’s supposed to mean you’re an ass-kicker!” I like the nameplate but I’m pretty sure getting shot doesn’t make me an ass-kicker.

  Robert stays by my bedside almost continuously over the next couple days while I receive visitors, drift in and out of sleep, and get wheeled off to be tested in another part of the hospital. He only breaks from his vigil to go home, shower, and change clothes. On the third day, he’s gone most of the day, I assume because he’s readying his house for my stay.

  Three days after entering the hospital with a bullet wound in my stomach, a nurse wheels me out the front door toward Robert’s BMW. It’s one of those late bright San Francisco afternoons when the hazy fog shields the sun but gives the impression of warmth with a stiff chill. I stand and walk the final steps to Robert’s BMW as he rushes around to open the door for me.

  When I sit down, he looks at me as if he were a tattered man who just found his way off some deserted island and into civilization. Inside the car, he tells me, “I have a spare bedroom.” I’m not sure why.

  “I really don’t need to stay at your house. I’m fine on my own.”

  “We’re not going to discuss it.”

  “I’m fine, you know.”

  “I know.” He barely grins at me, a rare event. “You hungry?”

  “Famished.”

  “Good.”

  The misty sky is the color of steel as his car trembles through the streets of San Francisco toward the marina. We pass through Market Street, where the skyscrapers block out the light. He drives toward the water, where the old refurbished wharf buildings lean away from the street as if leery, and into to Robert’s neighborhood, where the trees wear happy hats of green leaves and the houses tuck neatly next to each other. He pulls his car into the garage, and we stride inside his house together, Robert carrying my bag.

  Inside on his dining room table, I see he has laid out a meal from Napoletana’s Pizza, the best pizza in San Francisco. How did he know I love Napoletana’s Pizza? An unlit candle sits in the center, surrounded by two wine glasses and a bowl of fruit salad. He sets my bag on the counter and gestures toward the table.

  “You ready to eat?”

  “You know, I’d love to shower first,” I say.

  “Can you?” he asks. “With the …” he gestures at his stomach.

  “Yeah. I’m mostly healed.”

  He carries the bag for me into his bathroom and sets it on the counter. There’s that moment of awkwardness when he says, “I’ll just wait for you in the dining room.”

  I close the door to his bathroom, which is spacious and metallically modern, a large skylight overhead. I have my option to sit in a Jacuzzi bath or take a shower in the stall. I opt for the shower, being careful to avoid direct spray on the bandages on my stomach and back. With my hair wet, I emerge from the shower. As I change my bandages, I see the skin is pink around the stitches, but other than that, one would never know I’d been shot. I slip on slim-fitting jeans under a silky shirt and button-up sweater. I take time to slather extra deodorant under my arms, put a little makeup on, comb my hair, and brush my teeth thoroughly. Looking in the mirror at my freckled face, I say, “Why are you freaking out?”

  I make sure to hang my towel neatly on the rack and clean off the counter before I step out. Just then, Robert is striding down the hall, and we nearly bump into each other. The narrowness of his hallway suggests a small house, but it’s actually a palace compared to my apartment. Pausing in the hall, Robert wears jeans too, a white t-shirt, no socks. His hair looks stressed. He’s the epitome of sex in a dark hallway.

  “How did it go?” Robert asks, looking interested in my shower-time events. I find it impossible that someone so beautiful could care.

  “Fine.”

  “Here, let me take that from you. I’ll show you your room before we eat,” he says grabbing the bag from me. I follow him down his hallway a few paces before he pushes open the door. On the one side of the room is a desk, and on the other is a bed against the wall. On the far wall, a massive window reveals a meticulously maintained garden beyond with tightly trimmed hedges, a rock garden, a tiled bench, and a fountain. He sets my bag down.

  “Thank you,” I say. “It’s ridiculous. I don’t need to stay with you. I’m totally fine now.”

  “Well, you saved my life,” he says, “by standing in the way of that bullet. You should at least let me repay you by taking care of you for a few days.” He takes a few steps towards me and reaches for my hand while my heart feels like an automatic egg beater. My boss is holding my hand. His other hand takes an electric path down the side of my face, wiping aside a wet lock of hair.

  “I promised I’d be a gentleman,” he says forlornly while his finger takes a troubled route down the side of my neck and traces the swoop of the neckline on my silky shirt, the tip of his skin barely touching my own. I feel like I’m flying. He’s so tall and beautiful and perfect standing there in front of me that I can hardly conceive it.

  As he removes his hands from me and backs away, the departure aches. He turns, and I follow him down the hall toward the dining room, thinking our pizza is no doubt cold. I have wild thoughts as I tread, my mind sweating with worry and smoke.

  “Robert,” I say feeling as though I might choke from lack of oxygen. He pauses and turns around in the dark hallway.

  “Yeah?”

  “I didn’t mean it, you know, what I said.” We stand only a foot apart, maybe less. The darkness of the hallway puts beautiful shadows on his face.

  He narrows his gaze at me, waiting for me to continue.

  “When you came to my apartment door, and I said ‘I hated you.’ I didn’t mean it. I just wanted you to go away,” I explain, “because Collin had a gun.”

  Robert nods, doesn’t move.

  “Because I do, you know,” I say, feeling like a nitwit. Why can’t I get the words out? I shiver, perhaps because my hair is wet.

  “You
do what?” he asks.

  “I do love you,” I say without looking at him. I hear him exhale, and I feel naked though I’m fully clothed.

  “Like a friend?” he asks, looking narrowly at my face, his perfect eyebrows nearly touching into a concentrated frown.

  At his comment, I chuckle but sound more like a gust of air. “No, not like a friend.” In the distant front window, the fog rolls in, the light fading as the sun sets outside. I feel the swells of blood in my veins.

  “Like what then?” He grins and crosses his arms in front of him, as if refusing my passage down the hall without an answer. “Like a puppy? A pet hamster?” he asks.

  “Stop,” I say. “Not like that.”

  “Do you want me, though? That’s the real question.” He takes that one last step toward me, and I instantly feel the hallway plaster on my shoulder blades behind me. “Do you want me the way I want you?” His lashed blue eyes look nearly dark green in the light, the vein on his temple pluses, and his lips part slightly. His chest rises and falls swiftly while his hands barely clasp my waist. “Ever since you walked into my office for that first interview, your long red hair, your beautiful freckles, that blue dress, I’ve hardly been able to think about anything else. It’s been utterly maddening.”

  At his words, excitement knocks the wind out of me and my hands cup his neck, feel the silkiness of his hair, but he’s faster than I am—his lips are already touching mine and his whole body is a powerhouse of tension combined with tenderness. He reaches around to my back, careful to slide his hand high above my bandage while the other hand clutches the backside of my jeans, squeezing and nudging me toward him. The electric heat of his hands feels brilliant and I’m suddenly heady with desire. He feels so tall and strong and stiff. He tastes like breathless moans and want. I have the urge to wrap my leg around him, but before this thought registers, I feel his hand slide down over the backside of my jeans, feel him lifting my leg as if to open my thighs and wrap me around him. With my other let still planted on the floor, I hook my leg around his thigh and hear him groan. It’s so strange to hear him make this noise. It’s impossible, a miracle, like the discovery of heliocentric theory that the earth revolves around the sun rather than the other way around. Someone moans, and I think it’s me this time because I’m contemplating how desperately I want him. I can feel him holding back, unwilling to press himself fully against me. Finding this frustrating, I use my hands to fist the bottom of his white t-shirt on either side of his waist and yank up. He accommodates me by throwing up his hands and allowing me to lift it over his head and toss it to the floor.