Practice Makes Perfect

by Sarah Title

  He sat on his chair and put his head on his desk. I should go home, he thought. The universe is against my getting any work done today. But he had office hours and later he was supposed to track down Mary Beth Brakefield, the Realtor who had sold him his house and, coincidentally, sold the Wood Street house to Pembroke. And she sat on the town-and-gown committee that was deciding the ultimate fate of the house. Mary Beth’s brother, Jake, flipped old houses for a living. Henry and Jake weren’t close—Jake was kind of macho and Henry was kind of not—but Jake was engaged to Grace, and Henry was friends with Grace. He planned on using that tenuous small-town connection to push Mary Beth into siding with the Wood Street restorers on the committee. Then he had to track down Helen and have an awkward conversation about her feelings and why she’d been acting so quiet lately, when normally Helen was the loudest person in the room.

  Maybe coffee. He had had some coffee at home, but maybe he needed more. And maybe he could stop by the library on the way back from the Daily Drip, the worst-named coffee shop in the state of Kentucky and the only one in Willow Springs. Helen said she had some stuff to show him from the special collections, and she didn’t want to copy it if she didn’t have to. Fragile old documents. It made his heart go pitter-patter. Unlike conversations about feelings.

  “Professor Beckham?”

  Just when his body had decided that, yes, more caffeine, then fragile old documents, then feelings, his first appointment of the day showed up. He waved her in and dug around his desk for his calendar. Ah yes, the History 215 student who wanted to argue that the hypermasculinity of early twentieth-century boxing was actually thinly veiled homoeroticism. Or was she the one who wanted to argue about the B on her paper? Whatever it was, she was on time, which was a nice change, and he pushed thoughts of caffeine and documents and Helen aside to listen to his punctual student.

  Chapter 3

  Her student assistants were covering the desk, her web bibliography for Grace’s English 240 class was done enough for now, her exhibit on the Pembroke Hellbenders—the first integrated college basketball team in Kentucky, and also currently the worst—was just waiting for the start of basketball season to go up.

  So Helen had a moment to breathe.

  Breathe.

  The problem was, she couldn’t breathe. Oh, sure, the normal minimal required amount of oxygen to maintain biological functions was happening, no problem. It was the relaxing, turn-off-your-brain, slowdown-your-heart kind that was MIA.

  If only her problems were strictly professional.

  No, she’d always had a pretty easy time managing her professional stress. She had good relationships with the humanities and social science professors, and had mostly gotten them to treat her like a colleague instead of a research assistant. Some of them even considered her valuable, and not just because she had a key to the archives and could let them in off-hours. She did committees and professional organizations and student advising—it was all just a matter of being organized. She got stuff done, dammit.

  And it was satisfying, but it wasn’t always challenging. She realized, after sneaking to a signing at a bookstore in Lexington for one of her favorite guilty-pleasure writers, that she had creative muscles that weren’t being stretched by librarianship. She needed to do something that would use her smarts but was totally un-academic.

  So she wrote a novel.

  It was that easy! All she had to do was work in secret during early morning hours and eschew all extracurricular social commitments, and voilà: romance novel. So easy.

  And now it was done and she had actually sent it out in public, but she still hadn’t gotten up the nerve to confess her romance-writing secret to anyone she cared about.

  She had enough trouble being taken seriously at Pembroke—she wasn’t a real professor, just a librarian. Add romance novelist on top of that? Forget it. She could kiss tenure good-bye. No amount of academic publishing (and she had cowritten two books on research in the humanities) would undo the damage one smutty book would wreak on her CV—even if she didn’t put it on her CV.

  And what would her parents say? She loved them, and they supported her—they’d bought dozens of copies of her two books on research in the humanities, and they were dentists—but there was no way. Getting The Talk from her mom when she was seventeen (wishful thinking, Mom, and a year too late) had been bad enough. Knowing they were reading a book of her sexual imaginings? Her father would never make eye contact with her again.

  And she could just hear her mother now. You can write these love stories but you can’t give me a grandchild?

  Worst of all, what if it never got published? Then people would always be asking her about it and she’d have to explain that not only did she write trashy books, but she wrote trashy books that weren’t even very good.

  No. It was better for everyone that it was a secret. Not winning the contest was a blessing, then. Her secret was safe. Whew.

  Of course, she’d taken Psych 101 back in the day. She could see that maybe her unwillingness to be open about her book was affecting her writing. But, no. That letter from the editor said she liked it. Not enough to buy it, but she liked it.

  She just had to write better sex.

  Helen needed resources. She was good at finding resources. And she had a moment to breathe. And, conveniently, she had brought her personal laptop from home so there was no need to involve Pembroke property in her research, or the IT department if they suddenly became interested in search histories.

  Like the good librarian she was, she pulled up Google. How to write about sex.

  She scrolled through. Links to articles about bad sex writing (not necessary), parodies of purple prose, and a few links she didn’t want to click on at work, even from her own personal laptop. She wasn’t even going to deal with page two. She fiddled with the key words, found a couple of promising results. She should just bookmark them for later, when she wasn’t at work. But then she started reading one on the website of a romance writer she really, really liked. It was a list. “Top Ten Tips for Hot Hot Love Scenes.” Just ten things. She could just read the first few. The first five. Or, it was only ten things. Just a quick break . . .

  * * *

  Henry was about to knock on Helen’s office door, but it was wide-open. He stood in the doorway for a second, thinking she would see him, but whatever she was reading on her laptop had her full attention. He watched her for a second, taking in her bad posture, how she was fiddling with the ends of her hair, her foot tucked under her, her knee resting on the desk, her laptop crowding out the keyboard of her computer. IT definitely would not approve that setup.

  Whatever she was doing, she looked cute doing it. (Obviously, she was reading something online, he could see that. But whatever she was reading, she looked cute.) He shouldn’t be thinking about her like that. Helen was his friend, and just about his favorite thing about Willow Springs. She wasn’t cute. She was beautiful and smart and funny, and he liked her the way he liked all of his friends, which was with a deep, abiding respect and nonsexual distance.

  Also, he didn’t have many other friends.

  It was just a few weeks ago now, but the memory was so vivid it might as well have happened yesterday. Helen went out for margaritas with Lindsey. They’d had a great time, apparently, because the night ended with Helen leaving him a slurring message about needing a ride home. He was home with his guiltiest pleasure (Ancient Aliens on the History Channel—if that got out, all of his credibility would really be gone), so he picked them up. He poured their drunk, giggling asses into his car, where they proceeded to shriek and cackle and make the least subtle sexual innuendos he had ever heard. It should have been annoying. But he liked Lindsey; she had a way with words, although he felt a little bad for her next-door neighbor, Walker, who seemed to be the brunt of most of her innuendos. And he liked seeing Helen totally wild and free. Her hair was wisping in the open windows. She was always enthusiastic, which was just a nice way of saying “boisterous,”
which was just a nice way of saying “loud,” which didn’t seem to go with the always appropriately dressed, well-mannered, totally professional librarian he knew her to be.

  That night, she was also a little handsy. If he hadn’t been driving—and if she hadn’t smelled like a blender—he would have liked it. Nothing too scandalous, and nothing to impede his assigned duties to get them home safely. But every time Helen let out that big, boisterous laugh, her arms would flop and her hands would land somewhere on his person. His shoulder, his knee. It was a little distracting.

  And then Lindsey got out of the car and told them to get a room.

  “Ha,” he said.

  Helen just looked, well, stricken. Then she giggled. Then she laughed. Then she rolled down the window all the way because she said she felt nauseous.

  She hadn’t even rejected him—he hadn’t offered anything to reject. But that moment, with the heavy silence and the night air and Helen’s hair blowing crazily in his peripheral vision, it felt uncomfortably familiar. Every nerdy guy had one: that girl who asked for your homework, then laughed in your face when you asked her to prom; showing up for the first IRL after lots of great online convos, only for her to get an emergency call from her roommate.

  Not that he hadn’t had some great girlfriends in the past. He was still friends with his high school girlfriend. Her kids called him Uncle Henry. He dated. He dated quite a lot, thank you. He’d gone on a date just last week. The woman smelled like cat litter and cigarettes, but it was fun. He didn’t plan on calling her again—a mutual decision—but at least he’d discovered a new restaurant.

  And Helen had laughed when he told her the story.

  Whatever Helen was reading now, it looked like it was bothering her. Her face was screwed up in concern and concentration, and she started running the ends of her hair over her lips as she read. He’d never really looked at Helen’s lips before. It was . . . distracting.

  Not distracting for her, though, since she didn’t even hear him walk into the room (OK, so he’d snuck in quietly) and stand behind her to read over her shoulder. He couldn’t see it all, but he could read the bold pull quote in the middle of the screen.

  Remember: The most erotic scenes involve all five senses; sound and smell and taste are just as important as sight and touch.

  “What?”

  He hadn’t meant to say it. It just slipped out. Because the last thing he’d expected Helen the Librarian to be reading was a text about crafting erotic fiction. Even though she was a librarian. She looked up all kinds of stuff. Maybe it was for an English class.

  Whatever she was doing, he definitely surprised her, because she squeaked and slammed her laptop closed and turned to face him in one quick move that almost toppled her chair in a tangle of legs and wires.

  He caught her chair and righted it, and he caught her eye as well. She stood up, shielding her closed laptop from him.

  “Hi,” she said breathlessly. “Where did you—”

  “I was standing at the door, but you didn’t see me. Or hear me. Or . . . smell me. Helen, what the heck were you reading?” He laughed, teasing her for getting caught doing something he was pretty sure wasn’t part of her regular Pembroke workload.

  If the fifty shades of red she turned was any indication, it definitely was extracurricular.

  “Nothing,” she said, turning back to her desk and shoving her laptop aside.

  “Sure didn’t look like nothing.” He reached for her laptop to try to tease her some more.

  She slapped his hand away. “Forget it!”

  His smile froze on his face. She was really pissed. “Helen, I’m just kidding. You can read your pervy stuff all you want. I don’t care.”

  He was going for a keep-it-light-in-an-awkward-situation tone. It did not make her face look less mad.

  Smooth, Beckham.

  Then her mad face crumpled and she plopped down on her chair, her head in her hands.

  “Hey, hey.” He squatted down so they were face-to-face. He’d made her cry. He’d taken an awkward situation and turned it into a crying situation. He hated seeing people cry. He should probably just go before it escalated. What situation came after crying? Did he even want to find out?

  “I’m sorry, just forget it, OK?” She snuffled into her hands.

  “Helen—”

  “Please, Henry. Just drop it.”

  Henry prided himself on being a sensitive guy, the kind of guy who respected women’s experiences and recognized the institutional misogyny of the patriarchy. But even he would rather have a root canal than deal with tears. So, like a coward, he took Helen’s proffered excuse and backed out of her office.

  He should call Grace. Grace could handle feelings. But what would he tell her? Grace, I just left our best friend crying in her office because I think she has some kind of sex problem and I caught her reading about it at work and I made fun of her for it.

  “Uh, I’ll call you later,” he said from his cowardly position in the doorway.

  Helen nodded, or maybe that was just from her blowing her nose. Whatever it was, he backed off, as requested, and went to drink his coffee alone.

  Chapter 4

  The storm outside raged and roiled, matching the things he was doing to her insides. Those magic fingers were everywhere. She wanted to open her eyes to make sure there was really only one of him, and that he really only had ten human fingers. Because how could they trace a line down her arm and across her belly and down her legs and across the bottom of her feet all at once? He seemed to be reaching inside her body, touching her from the inside out. It felt good. It smelled good. It sounded good.

  * * *

  Helen stared at her computer screen.

  All work and no sex make Helen Lee a dull writer.

  All of the elements were there—the plot was aligned, the storm was raging, it was the perfect time for Rennie and Hawk to finally consummate their relationship. The fingers and the feelings, they all started out great. But then just sort of... fizzled.

  “This is not a metaphor for your love life,” she muttered. George looked at her accusingly from his perch on the ottoman. “Sorry,” she apologized. “Oh my god,” she said to the dog and herself. “I am now apologizing for disturbing my dogs.”

  She stood up—disturbing Tammy but not apologizing—and stretched. Sinuous muscles, reaching . . . it all sounded so cliché in her head.

  Probably because it was cliché. When was the last time she had actual sex with another person? Months. She thought back, trying to pinpoint the day.

  Visiting Professor left at the end of last semester. But toward the end, he was more focused on shoring up his connections than shoring up her connections. She couldn’t actually remember the last time they’d had sex before he left.

  So . . . when was the last time she had memorable sex with another person?

  Tammy shuffled over to Helen’s now-vacated warm spot on the couch.

  But come on, Helen thought. You don’t need to have constant hot sex to write about hot sex. And didn’t she want to separate herself from her writing persona? God, if people thought her love scenes were taken from real life . . .

  Although their lack of steaminess told her that they probably were taken from real life.

  She flopped her sexless body on the couch, earning another accusing look from George.

  Great. The only males who looked her way were canine.

  Time to give up, she thought. Not forever, but definitely for tonight. This pity party feels good, and I don’t have to work tomorrow, so I’m going to drink that bottle of wine and talk to my dogs about how they’re ruining my sex life and my writing life, but I love their shmooshy, droopy faces all the same.

  * * *

  Henry shifted the bottle of wine to his other arm and knocked on Helen’s door. He had almost fallen on his butt on the way up the stairs, which was the constant hazard of old houses, but he loved them anyway. He knew the third step was wonky. He was just too distracted to
actually remember that.

  Too distracted that she might not let him in.

  Or she would let him in, and she’d cry again.

  He took a deep breath—Be a good friend, he told himself—and waited for Helen to open the door. He knew she was home; her car was in the driveway and all of her lights were on.

  Also, there was loud Donna Summer music playing. Helen had an inexplicable love for disco music, which puzzled Henry to no end. He also knew that she only broke out the disco when she was feeling sorry for herself.

  He knocked again, louder, and he saw a shadow stumble toward the door. The curtain was sloppily shoved aside, and there was Helen’s face, wearing a lot of sparkly makeup and a very surprised expression.

  He knew it. He should have called first. But something was bothering her, and had been for a long time, and he was determined to get to the bottom of it. This sparkle-faced pity party confirmed it.

  Something was wrong with Helen.

  He would fix it.

  Even if she cried.

  He saw Shadow-Helen walking slowly away from the door, but it was too late. He knocked again.

  This time, she opened the door.

  “Oh, hi, Henry.”

  “Hi, Helen.” He couldn’t help but smile at her so obviously fake enthusiasm. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. Just. Uh.”

  “Can I come in?”

  He brushed past her and got a contact high from the wine on her breath.

  “Do you want a drink?” she asked.

  She tipped the wine bottle into her glass, filling it less than halfway. And then the bottle was empty.

  “Um . . .” She offered her glass to him, but he shook his head. He took the glass from her hand anyway, as she stumbled toward the couch.

  He wasn’t proud of this, but he was glad that she was drunk. Helen got real talky when she was drunk. He would get to the bottom of her malaise in no time.

  He set the glass on the coffee table and sat down next to her on the couch. She crossed her legs and looked at him. “So, ah . . .” Her being drunk did nothing to ease the awkwardness of starting a conversation about feelings.