Just Like That

by Nicola Rendell

  6

  Penny

  I snap Lucky’s complimentary EpiPen into Russ’ rock-solid thigh and then overturn the entire contents of my purse onto the sand. I drop to my knees at his feet, searching through the heap of scratched sunglasses, shriveled apples, weirdly hard tangerines, and battered travel-size tampons, until I find the tiny plastic bag that contains my emergency medicines. Inside the bag are a few beat-up old halves of Xanax, a few Advil, lactose pills for Maisie—hell hath no fury like that woman after she’s encountered a dairy product. I pinch through the pills, but I don’t see any Benadryl. I won’t give up that easily though, and I bite down on half the flap with my teeth to open it up. As I do I realize he’s been watching me the entire time, and now he’s smiling this cocky hey-baby smile. The man is unbelievable. Not even a brush with sudden death can shake his mojo.

  I get the bag open, but there’s not a pink oval to be seen. “Lucky. Benadryl. Stat.”

  “Penny, what do I look like? A pharmacy?” He picks up the spent EpiPen and tucks it into his cargo shorts. He hovers above us, nose whistling as he breathes and watches. I happen to know he’s a retired prison guard, and right now he’s showing his tiger stripes. He takes a glass of ice water from the table and hands it to Russ, while with the other hand he takes a sip of my mango margarita. I glare at him, and he starts picking his teeth with the end of my cocktail umbrella. The guy’s a regular Susan B. Anthony.

  In lieu of Benadryl, I place two Advil in Russ’ palm. He gets them down on the first gulp and then drains my glass of water. I watch him carefully, mesmerized by one sexy swallow after another.

  Which means his throat isn’t closing up, thank goodness. What a throat, though. Just look at that Adam’s apple.

  Penny!

  I scooch forward between Russ’ legs so I’m brushing up against his pants on either side. The way the sunset hits him, and the angle of his legs, gives me a perfect look at his absolutely to-die-for bulge. “Better?”

  He sniffles and wipes his nose with his knuckles, and then blinks a few times, nice and hard, the way people do when they get too much wasabi on their sushi. “Totally good. Totally.”

  I get up further on my knees and put my fingers to his jugular and count the beats of his strong, solid, heartbeat. “Do you feel wheezy? Itchy? Heart palpitations?”

  “Spend a lot of time on WebMD?”

  I don’t, but Maisie does. The last time I had a minor case of post-nasal drip she diagnosed me straight into throat cancer. “Impending sense of doom?”

  He laughs a little. “I’m good, Penny. Promise.”

  It’s good news, but we’re not out of the woods yet. I’ve lived in Port Flamingo all my life. I’m no stranger to the phrase I didn’t know I was allergic to…!

  “You had no idea you were allergic?”

  Russ crunches a few pieces of ice in his perfectly white teeth. “None. I’m not a huge fan of fish, is all.”

  “Not a huge fan!” I give him a shove. “Why didn’t you say? We could have gone to the A&W for burgers. I’m not picky.”

  He lifts one rugged eyebrow. I notice it has a hairline scar through it, and I flash to some scene from his past in which he was defending the honor of a now-forgotten girlfriend, fighting some brute by a dumpster while he roared things like, “You better learn some respect for women, you asshole.” “Didn’t want to disappoint you, darling.”

  Gulp.

  But the romance is broken up by Lucky, who has about as much sense of the moment as a wrecking ball. He trundles out toward the water, holding his cell phone up to the sky, tilting it back and forth trying to get a signal. “This goddamned town. The rest of the country is streaming Real Housewives all goddamned day, but us poor fools have to dick around holding our phones up in the air like we’re trying to catch a passing plane with a mirror. Fuckers.”

  “He doesn’t say much,” I explain to Russ, “But when he does, he’s on point.”

  “I’ll say.” Russ crunches on some more ice cubes, watching Lucky waddle down the beach.

  “I’m getting bupkis, Penny! Bupkis!” Lucky hollers. A handful of tiny crabs scatter in every direction, hurling themselves into the wet sand for cover.

  Lucky signals for the plane a few times, but I know when we’re beat. They don’t call Port Flamingo a “cellular Bermuda triangle” for nothing. I scoop everything into my purse, including Russ’ shoes and socks and about half a pound of sand, and I struggle to my feet.

  “Going somewhere?” Russ asks, his voice all gritty and dark.

  “I’m taking you to Urgent Care, no arguments.” I wrap my arm around him—all muscle, no fat—and dig my fingers into him to get him to stand up along with me. This he does, but only by planting his hand on the table and sending everything on it flying.

  “I’m good. Seriously. Don’t worry about me.”

  “Shush. I almost killed you. I need to clear my conscience.” I crouch down to pick up the bottles of Cholula and Tabasco, and then raise my eyes to him.

  “Fine,” he says, offering me his hand. “But only if you wait with me. No fucking way am I hanging out at Urgent Care when I could be getting to know you, too.”

  Meep! “Deal.”

  Lucky trundles back, still with his phone out in front of him, pointing at contrails in the sky. He stares at me and scratches his shaved head, which makes a noise like he’s using a cheese grater on a block of Parmesan. “You sure about Urgent Care, Penny? You’re sure?”

  Yes, I’m sure, but I know what he’s thinking, which is pretty much the same thing I’m thinking, too: The hospital is only three hours away if you don’t hit traffic and keep the cruise control at 85. And, I’m sure we could find some other way to expose ourselves to every infectious disease known to man and some only known to marine biologists. And, Don’t I have a better way to spend the next four hours than on stained waiting room chairs with 20-year-old National Geographics to read?

  Still, it’s the best worst option. Sunshine State Urgent Care, which used to be a Domino’s, and then a Pizza Hut, and then a Papa John’s. But it’s close, it’s cheap, and I don’t think they’ve killed anybody. Probably.

  Russ leans into me, pulling me close, and presses his nose into my hair to take a deep, savoring breath. He tightens his hold on me as we make our way across the beach. When we get to the sandy asphalt path, I slide my hand into his pocket.

  “Whoa, tiger,” he says.

  Under my fingertips, I feel them. Not the keys, no, and not the crown jewels either… but the boxer briefs. “Keys! Where are your keys?”

  He reaches into his other pocket and hangs them out in front of me, the keychain looped over his girthy finger.

  “Don’t let me stop you, though,” he says gruffly, near my ear. “Might be something in there that could use your hand.”

  He looks down at me. I look up at him. Everything gets a tiny bit shimmery, and all the noise of the beach goes quiet—the seagulls, the honking barges on the Port, everything. It’s only me and him, barefoot in a municipal beach parking lot next to a trashcan being scavenged by seagulls. But the way he’s making me feel, we might as well be on a dance floor in the Bahamas. “You sure you’re okay?”

  He steps into me, pressing me against the Suburban. “Want me to prove it?”

  I once read an article in Cosmo entitled, “It’s Actually Chemistry: Why Some Couples Have Sparks That Could Literally Set the World on Fire.”

  Exactly, Cosmo. Exactly.

  “Get in the car, handsome. Let’s get you checked out.”

  7

  Russ

  On the front window of the Urgent Care, I can see the outline of now-removed vinyl letters: FREE DELIVERY $15 MINIMUM.

  She lurches wildly into a parking spot, marked with a sign for Delivery Drivers Patients Only. I take my shoes and socks from her purse. The socks, though, they’re loaded with sand. The most logical thing would be to toss them in the back seat, but I just met her. I don’t want to be that douchebag who
wears loafers with no socks. So I shake them out and put them on.

  She puts the Suburban in park. She never moved the seat, and she’s perched on the edge of it like she’s driving something way too big for her—a Caterpillar or a Mack truck. She unlatches the door and thrusts herself against it, flinging herself outside. I make a move to open my door, but she stops me. “No, you don’t!” And then she hustles around to my side with such fury I can hear her flip-flops slapping right through the shut windows. She starts to point at me, looking stern.

  So I let her have a taste of her own medicine and point right back at her, because goddamn it, opening doors is my job.

  She gives me a sassy shoulder lift and a finger wag. But by the time she’s come around to open my door, she’s giving me that great big All-American sweet smile. I rock my feet back and forth to get them into my shoes and tell her, “You’re cute when you’re trying to be bossy.”

  Her hand moves almost automatically to her cheek, covering a spreading blush, like a sudden sunburn. Hell, yes. “You’re insatiable.”

  “I haven’t even gotten started.”

  She takes her place beside me and wraps her arms around me again. It’s not like I’ve got a broken leg—I can totally walk. But she feels so fucking good like this, I’m not about to complain.

  We get to the front door of the clinic, and I beat her to opening it, my reach much longer than hers, and her arms all wrapped around me like they are.

  She slips inside in front of me. At first, I’m hit with a wave of pizza smells, but that’s followed by an overpowering wave of something synthetic and sweet. I notice every single damned outlet has one of those air freshener things sticking from it, and on every flat surface is a paper bowl filled with dusty handfuls of potpourri.

  On the far end of the waiting room is a big guy in a John Deere hat, checking his rash against a poster that says, “DOES YOUR RASH LOOK LIKE THIS?” On the other side, a little boy is sitting next to his mom. She’s scrolling half-heartedly through her phone, and I notice a paperclip hanging from his nostril. And I now understand what Lucky meant when he asked, “You sure about Urgent Care, Penny? You sure?”

  “How far did you say the hospital was?” I whisper into her ear.

  She answers with a strangled, tickled laugh, but then gives me a stare, like she’s warning me to behave myself.

  At the check-in desk, the footprint of an old register is still totally obvious on the Formica, sliced in half with a thick panel of bulletproof glass.

  The lady behind the counter is dressed in scrubs decorated with ladybugs. Her mascara is so thick that her eyelashes form five big clumps over each eye. She looks up from the computer screen, and her bifocals slide down her nose.

  “Help you?”

  “Yes, hi,” Penny says, leaning into the glass, making the counter press against her stomach. Christ. “He ate some calamari, and I had to inject him with an EpiPen,” she explains, totally matter-of-fact, like this shit happens all the time. “His mouth started to feel funny, and he got short of breath, and…” She raises her eyes to me and trails off as I pull her closer. I watch the heaving of her chest and slide my fingers into her back pocket.

  She blinks once, and then twice, and tips forward on her toes into me. We aren’t standing like strangers. There’s no distance between our hips; there’s no polite bubble anymore.

  “Going to finish that sentence or…” asks the nurse.

  “What was I saying?” Penny replies, a little flustered.

  “Hives,” I tell her.

  “Oh, right.” She huffs and turns away, like she can’t look at me and speak at the same time. “And he had hives around his neck.” She caresses her neck with her fingertips. As she does, it’s like some primal desire kicks on inside me. I want my mouth on that throat. “Here,” she says.

  There.

  “And here,” she adds.

  There, too.

  The nurse doesn’t give two shits about our unspoken double entendres, though. “Can he speak for himself, honey, or are we gonna keep playing telephone?”

  We both turn to face her as she slides her glasses back up her nose with one finger, making the tarantula legs look even bigger.

  “Are you having trouble breathing now?” she asks me. “Itchy skin, dizziness, fainting, an impending feeling of doom?”

  Penny snickers next to me and glances up at me to say, Told you!

  I shake my head. “I’m good.” Then I lean into her ear and whisper. “But I’d be better if I were kissing you. Got it?”

  Penny hangs on to the check-in counter, like her knees just gave out.

  “Got it?” I ask her, full volume.

  “Oh, yes,” she says, half-breathless. “I do.”

  The nurse makes some notes on a clipboard. “Have a seat. We’ve only got one doctor on tonight, and he’s dealing with a bit of a…” She pauses and looks up at the ceiling. “…situation, so it could be a while.”

  “That’s fine with us.” I let Penny take a little more of my weight on her shoulders, showing her how small I want to make her feel. The nurse slips the clipboard through the slot in the bulletproof glass. I write down my name and slide it back through.

  And then I pull Penny close, hand to her hip, and we head for a bank of chairs in the corner of the waiting room.

  * * *

  Her concern about me is totally fucking adorable. I’m not used to this sort of thing, but I could sure as fuck get used to it. After getting me a paper cone cup of water from the cooler, she sits down and turns to me, pivoting in her seat, bare thighs on the upholstery. “Want anything from the vending machine?” she asks, taking my cup from my hand and placing it inside hers.

  I glance over at it. Surprisingly, because I’m pretty much sure every goddamned thing in this room was made when Reagan was still in office, the vending machine looks pretty new, and so does everything inside it. I pull my wallet out of my back pocket and give her a twenty. “My treat. Told you I was taking you out.”

  She shifts her lips off to one side and glances at the cash. “I can buy us Jujubes, Russ. It’s the least I can do.”

  “Nope. I won’t tell you what I want until you take this, so…” I take her hand and open it, pressing the bill into her palm.

  “Now who’s bossy?”

  Just wait until I get you in bed. “If I don’t tell you what I want, we could have a repeat of earlier. You might feed me Nutter Butters, discover I didn’t know I was allergic to peanuts either, and we’ll have to go through the whole dog and pony show again.”

  She gives me a soft punch in the arm. “Sorry.”

  “Will you stop it?” I pull her closer, crowding her space. “I’m kidding.”

  “You could have died.”

  “I feel like a million bucks.”

  “Big man on campus.”

  “Get used to it.”

  Nostril flare, lip bite, drags her eyes away. Shiiiiit.

  I nestle my hand at the small of her back as she stands up, feeling the warmth of her skin under her tank top. I catch sight of her panties, barely visible under the fabric of her shorts. She’s in a white thong under there. Christ.

  “All right,” she says, relenting and finally taking my money. “So what do you want?”

  “Guess.” You. I want you. So fucking badly.

  She groans and steadies herself on the chair. “You like salty or sweet?”

  “Can’t a guy like both?”

  And I swear to God, I hear her whimper as she turns to go.

  I can’t stop looking at her. Every fucking inch of her is better than the last. The line of her ass, the curve of her hips, the soft skin of her arms and legs. Before she can turn to catch me staring, though, I pick up the nearest thing at hand—a copy of Better Homes and Gardens with the address info cut out. “Grow Your Best Hydrangeas This Spring.” Dated 1998.

  A few minutes later, she returns with two bottles of water and her arms full of stuff. Dots. Oreos. Sour cream and onion pota
to chips. A granola bar. Cheddar popcorn. Cracker Jacks.

  “I like a girl who likes her snacks.”

  “Snacks are my religion.” She opens up the Dots. She puts a red one in her mouth and watches me. I take a yellow one.

  “You like the lemon ones?”

  “Hell, yes, I do. Lemon, then orange.”

  “I like the pink ones, then the red.”

  “The lime are gross, though,” she adds.

  I nod. “Completely fucking inedible.”

  She wrinkles her nose as she laughs, and eases back into the stained old seat. “So, picking up where we left off, before you almost died… What brings you to Port Flamingo?”

  Right, back to it. The job question. I can tackle this one of two ways. I can go straight at it and tell her the truth: I’m here find dirt on your mayor because I’ve got a guy who wants to turn this place into the next Pebble Beach, or I can go a little softer. “I’ve got some business with a guy who’s got some real estate plans. But the real reason is that my aunt lives here. I haven’t been down to visit since I was a kid.”

  “Oh, really!” she says, beaming. “Who’s your aunt?”

  “Sharon Baytree.” I rip open the bag of Cracker Jack and offer her some.

  Her mouth drops open. “Shut the front door.”

  “Know her?”

  “Know her? She wears linen, smokes weed, grows lewd vegetables. I want to be her. She’s awesome!” She shovels a respectable handful of caramel corn into her mouth, making her cheeks puff out.

  “That’s her. But what about you?” I ask. “Obviously, you live here. But what do you do for a living?”

  She wipes her hands on her thighs, and flecks of caramel tumble off her skin. “I work for Visit Port Flamingo. Tourism, PR, advertising. Answering rude comments on the internet. That kind of thing.”

  I glance out at the swaying palm trees at the far edge of the parking lot. “What’s the marketing strategy for paradise?”