by Mary Malcolm
Why are boys so dumb? “Seriously, John?”
“Lucy, why didn’t you tell me you had a boyfriend?” Again, he indicated Eli.
“Him?” I asked. My body stiffened over the mere thought of Eli as my boyfriend. “He’s not my boyfriend. He’s nothing…I mean,” I stammered looking toward Eli. “He’s…”
“I’m just a friend,” he finished, though I couldn’t deny the scowl on his face. “If everything is fine here, I need to get going. Lucy, we will talk about our other friend later. I can’t stop you from going into work today, but since you’re sick, I think you should stay home.”
This time it was me scowling. “I feel fine.”
“Lucy, if you’re sick—” John stopped talking when my scowl landed on him.
Eli opened his mouth as if to say something else, but then closed it. “I’ll see you later,” he said before getting into his car and driving off.
I wrapped my hands around my arms and braced myself against a sudden gust of wind. “What kind of car is that anyway?”
“It’s a Cougar. Not exactly the hippest car, but at least my mom’s letting me borrow it for the day.”
I smiled. Not at the fact that he borrowed his mom’s car, but because he’d been jealous seeing me with Eli. I’d never had a guy jealous for me before. “It’s fine. Do you mind taking me to my car?”
John grinned and the redness subsided as he motioned toward the car.
****
My morning was a mountain of past-due paperwork with no more discrepancies and a department meeting where Seth told us all there had been too many errors, and unprofessionalism would not be tolerated. Our meeting was held in a generic conference room with absolutely no embellishments of any sort. Seemed Seth’s ability to do as little as possible carried further than just his desk.
He marched back and forth in front of us. A little vein popped on his forehead each time he said an exclamation-point word, so it quickly became difficult to take him seriously. Natalie leaned over and whispered, “We have these meetings once a month. It’s always the same lecture about unprofessionalism. I think that’s why Diana left. She said she couldn’t work for someone who managed like he does, and yet gave us lectures like this.”
Seth stopped pacing. “Natalie, is there something you would like to add?”
Everyone turned toward her. “No, sir. Filling in our newbie on how important professionalism is to you.”
“Good.” He nodded and continued his pacing and lecturing.
With him once again fully engrossed in his own voice, I leaned toward her and pointed to Seth. “Look, he’s about to trip.”
She watched him stumble, then grab for a chair to steady himself. Natalie giggled and gave me a questioning look. I grinned. Like a magician giving his act away, I pointed down. “His shoelaces have been untied all morning. He’s been pacing back and forth, and the more agitated he’s gotten, the shorter his stride. He was bound to step on one.”
Seth turned around to see who interrupted this time. Our chairs knocked together as we tried to appear as quiet and normal as possible. He glared pointedly at each of us before continuing with his vein-popping lecture.
I coughed to hide a giggle under my breath and sketched mindlessly on a piece of paper for the rest of the meeting. He ran out of steam right around lunchtime; by then the paper was filled with doodles. I stuffed it in my pocket and headed up to the sixth floor, hoping to find out what I could about Bonnie.
No one knew Bonnie Kent all that well. One person described her as having dark hair and being a bit on the chunky side, another said she wore glasses and lost a lot of weight from a recent diet or illness. It seemed I wasted my entire lunch break looking for a ghost, until I finally ran into the temp taking her place.
“Bonnie? I heard she’s taking a few weeks off to stay with some family out of town,” she told me.
“Yeah? Who did you hear that from?”
“Oh, you know. People talk, gossip really. It’s like everyone’s excited when they have anything to say.” She took a bite from a celery stick. “I have her address if you need to reach her. One of the girls was bringing her a makeup order, so she left it for me to send her stuff.”
“That would be fantastic,” I told her. “Thank you. It truly is important.” I copied down the address. “Will you be staying with the company once she’s back?”
“Naw, I’m just a temp. I transfer a lot.”
“Well, thanks all the same.”
In the elevator on the way back down to second-floor data entry, I tried to call Eli, but my phone cut out. Glancing at my cell, I saw that I still had ten minutes before lunch was over. I pressed the lobby button and detoured toward John instead.
“Hey, beautiful,” he said for the second time in a day.
“Hey yourself,” I replied, my cheeks heating under his perusal. It was nice to feel hopeful about having a relationship with him again. He was my type, unlike Eli. I mentally shook my head at the thought that anyone would mistake him for my boyfriend. Eli was a pretty boy. One of those trophy boys you take to parties or to your parents’ house—if you have parents who care about such things.
I counted my lucky stars I had an aunt who didn’t.
John was me through and through. Artsy, strange, nerdy. A little awkward and not afraid to show it, yet oddly at peace with who he was as a human.
Totally me.
Except that increasingly I didn’t have any idea who I was, and daily I found my peace slipping farther and farther away.
“You have a good lunch?” I asked.
“Would have been better with you.” He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. Even with my short-short hair, he found the little bit I had out of place and smoothed it back. It felt so intimate, so lovely.
“Maybe dinner?” Things had been bad over the past couple of days, and I wanted to make them right. If only he had told me sooner that he saw me with Eli. It would have saved so much frustration on both of our ends. I still didn’t know who drove the green car, but I’d rather believe it was a random accident than some deranged killer out to get me.
“Dinner sounds good. What are you in the mood for?”
“My aunt’s making a pot roast.”
His eyebrows shot up. “Oh, I thought you meant you wanted to go out somewhere.”
“So you don’t want to?”
“Hey, no, I mean, yes. It’s just…”
“What?”
“Your aunt is a little intimidating.”
I remembered last time. Then, for a moment, I thought John was a wuss for being scared of her. How could anyone be scared of Dee? Embarrassed, sure, but scared? “She’s protective,” I said.
“Very. But intimidating isn’t a bad thing. I think it’s kinda cool. She’s a tough broad. I can imagine her taking on anyone. You remind me a lot of her.”
“I do?”
“Yeah.” He leaned down and kissed my forehead. This time it didn’t feel weird or awkward. It felt nice. Intimate. A shared secret between the two of us. Like the hair tucked behind my ear.
It warmed me.
He reached up to tuck my hair back again, but this time I knew it was an excuse to touch me. I let him. Feeling giddy inside, I told him what time to come by the house and went back upstairs.
****
I gave myself a couple of hours from when I left work until John would come by for dinner. I also called Aunt Dolores with a heads-up during my afternoon break. She was extremely excited. A little too excited, to be honest.
“I’m home,” I called, racing in the door. I had so much to do to get ready. Normally I wouldn’t try so hard to impress a guy, but after this morning, I wanted to doll up for John.
“Hey kid,” Aunt Dolores shouted back. “I’ve cleaned up a bit, sent Ana to the store to pick up stuff for dessert, and we decorated the house today.”
I skidded to a stop in the foyer. Ana. Shoot. I forgot. Not that she’d try to steal John or anything; he wasn’t her type.
Unfortunately, Ana was every guy’s type. Bobby wasn’t the first boyfriend of mine to end up falling for her. She never went for any of the others, but I had a long history of losing men to my best friend.
She had that unidentifiable ethnic look, the one that made her possibly Asian/Hispanic/Middle Eastern or some other exotic amalgamation. Her dark hair stayed straight, thick, and always shiny. The light green of her eyes contrasted with her dark skin—and it wasn’t even her looks that made the difference, that’s what sucked.
Personality-wise she was sweet and loyal. Not all the time, of course, she wasn’t perfect by a long shot; but she also wasn’t some pretty bitch who thought herself above everyone else.
And despite a long trail of men constantly throwing themselves at her, she had a very level head and never acted as vain as she had every right to.
Shit, I thought, racing up the stairs. Well, no helping it. John would meet Ana tonight, and either it would go well or it wouldn’t. No, it would go well. I needed it to go well. I knew John liked me, and I knew I liked him, so actually the question was how into Ana would he be?
I shook the thought from my head as I stripped down to nothing and jumped into the shower. “I will not be a petty, insecure female. I will be proud of who I am. I will not compare myself to others.” I said my mantra over and over again in the shower as I shaved and did my best to undirt the day.
“I will not be the woman who constantly worries about what men think,” I said, brushing out my hair before applying the spiking gel. I pulled on a skirt, then discarded it for something more comfortable, something more me. I went with funky jeans and a vintage T-shirt I’d found at a flea market. Finishing with a hint of mascara and gloss, I looked in the mirror and grinned.
Girly, but still me.
I raced back down the stairs. “Aunt Dolores, what do I need to do?”
She waved her hand in my general direction but didn’t look up. “Chill, relax. Go sit. Be pretty and wait for him to get here.”
I rolled my eyes.
The door opened and my heart cracked against my ribs until I realized John would knock. Why did I have to be so infatuated with this guy? “Ana!”
“What?”
She walked in carrying two grocery bags. “What’d you get?”
“Strawberry shortcake stuff and supplies for mixed drinks.” With the last part she raised an eyebrow at me.
“Hey.” I laughed. “I’m not a lush.” I just happened to relax a little more with a few Bellini Tinis in me.
She started toward the kitchen. “Ana.”
“What?”
Try not to be so sexy? Try not to be yourself? I kinda like this guy so could you please be a bitchy hag just for one night? “Um, nothing.”
She laughed and tossed her head, hair cascading over her shoulders. “Nervous much?”
“Yes,” I said, watching the last strands fall into place. I am a proud warrior woman, I chanted in my head. My beauty lies in my— Oh, bull crap. I’m a typical woman, and like any typical woman I wanted to be the princess in someone’s eyes. Or at very least the prettiest girl in the room.
“Don’t be nervous. You’re fantastic. He’ll like you, or he’s not worth your awesomeness.”
Again, I rolled my eyes. Said by someone who never in her adult life bought her own drink. “You know what it’s like.” I sat on the arm of the sofa and watched Aunt Dolores and Ana bustle around the kitchen. “New guy, new feelings. I don’t even know what I think of him, but I’ve already told him about what I do.”
Aunt Dolores stopped chopping potatoes and turned to me. “Wait, what?”
“I don’t know what I think of him. That doesn’t make me less nervous, though.”
“No,” she said, eyes wide and mouth pulled tight. “The other part.”
“I told him.”
“No! You can’t just tell people. You don’t know him, Lucy, we’ve been over this. Why did you tell him?”
I felt a little like a Shrinky Dink under her hot stare. “I-I don’t know. I…he…” All the excitement I’d had about seeing John, about spending time with him kind of puddled away. “I’ve told other people, Aunt Dolores. Why is it such a big deal I told him?”
She removed her apron and walked toward me. “Because you don’t know him, not like you think you do. People can hurt you when you tell them your secrets.”
I knew that too well. Bobby had been living testimony of that. I looked to Ana and knew from the way she wouldn’t look at me she thought the same.
“John doesn’t want to hurt me. He still liked me after I told him. I’m an adult now. I understand having to hold back when I was a teenager, but now I have to base my decisions on the people I’m around, not on some wide-set rule. There are even people like me on TV, like on that one show, the guy in the FBI?”
Dee sat next to me on the couch and put her hand on my knee. “Still.” She said nothing else, only that definitive word. Like because I said so or some other non-argument meant to stop all communication dead in its tracks. I felt like a teenager again.
Ana sat next to us on the couch. “He’s probably fine,” she said. “We’re being dramatic.”
I liked that she said “we,” the royal we.
Aunt Dolores looked skeptical. “I wish you could understand.”
“Make me,” I said. “Is there some reason I shouldn’t tell? I mean, other than being treated differently?”
A knock sounded at the door. Ana stood. “He’s here,” she said, taking charge. “We’re going to have a good night. What’s done is done, and there is no reason for us to think anything bad about this guy we haven’t even met yet.”
“Aunt Dolores met him. She liked him.”
“See? It’s decided then. You”—she pointed to Dee—“go to the kitchen. Finish up.”
Aunt Dolores grumbled under her breath but obeyed like a stalwart soldier.
“And you,” she said, pulling down my top to show more cleavage and pinching my cheeks hard. “Stand here and look pretty while I get the door.”
What was it with everyone telling me to look pretty tonight? If I didn’t know they loved me, I’d develop a complex.
Butterflies wiggled in my stomach as Ana walked from the living room to the front door. “You must be Lucy’s friend.”
“Nice to meet you,” said a familiar voice.
“You have to be freakin’ kidding me,” I groaned not so quietly as they came into the room. Ana walked in first, giving me a thumbs-up. I shook my head and pursed my lips. “That’s not him,” I hissed once she was within hissing range. Her eyebrows knitted in confusion and she turned back around.
“Eli,” I said by way of unwanted but formal introduction. “This is Ana. Ana, this is Eli. He’s one of the detectives I met the night Mr. Winters died.”
“Ohhh,” she said in what I’m sure she wanted to sound like a knowing voice but was totally unconvincing. “Nice to meet you finally. Lucy has told us so much.”
I jabbed my elbow into her arm. “No, I haven’t,” I said to him. “What are you doing here?”
“I told you I’d see you later. We need to talk about your”—his eyes darted from mine to Ana’s before he finished in a pencil-tip sharp way—“friend from earlier.”
“That friend is not a problem tonight. My other friend,” I said, being as blunt as an eraser, “the one you met in person, is due here any minute.” Grabbing Eli by the arm, I guided him back toward the door. In a voice sounding more like the hiss of a sprinkler head than my own, I said, “And since he already thinks we’re together, it would be very, very helpful if you could adios yourself for now. I promise I’ll call you later. Or we can talk tomorrow.”
Aunt Dee came out of the kitchen wiping her hands on a towel. “John, so good to see you again… Wait, you ain’t John.” To me her eyes spoke volumes. They said, I know you have a penchant for causing trouble. I get that you can’t help that, but please, for the love of Santa Vino or whichever saint blesses the sanity
of aunts who know no better than to take in crazy nieces, please tell me you haven’t started exchanging men the same way you exchange jobs? For everyone else her voice simply said, “Lucy, who is this young man?”
This was not happening again.
“Aunt Dolores, this is Eli, the detective I’ve been working with. John is due here any minute.”
She frowned in my direction. “Did I raise you to be rude? Invite your friend in for dinner. We have plenty.”
“No, he has to go,” I said, not wanting to deal with these two together in a room. Not when I lusted after John like a teenager in puppy-love, and when being around Eli left me feeling unbalanced and disoriented.
Eli stepped past me. “Actually, I’d love to stay. Dolores, so nice to meet you,” he said, shaking her hand.
“Likewise.” She blushed and smoothed her hair. Oh Lord!
I looked to Ana for help, but she only shrugged.
“Actually, don’t you have to be somewhere tonight, Eli?” I asked again, hoping he would take the hint and run with it.
“Nope, not at all.”
So much for my hopes.
Dolores hooked her arm around his and led him into the kitchen.
“Ana! Help me!”
“I don’t know what to tell you!”
Another knock sounded at the door.
Chapter Seven
“Well, I can see why Detective Reyes was on your bad side,” Officer Len said, holding back a grin. “That doesn’t seem very professional of him.”
“Not at all,” I said, feeling disgusted all over again. “But things only got worse from there.”
****
Had there been a skinny naked clown wearing combat boots and handing out Grey Poupon-slathered cookies, dinner could have been more awkward, but that would have been about the only instance that could make things any worse than having Eli and John together at the same table.
John still didn’t trust my “friendship” with Eli, as spoken by the frown plastered to his face, and Eli looked more than happy to make things as uncomfortable as possible for John. Why, oh why, couldn’t I have just one simple night? It was as if I had two men fighting over me, which absolutely wasn’t the case, so I didn’t know their problems.