The next morning I woke up to a knock at my door and a roaring sensation of being knocked over the head with three bottles of wine. I stumbled to the door, praying the knocking would stop.
“Who is it?” I called, trying to rub the ache out of my head.
“It’s Telly.” I let her in and returned to the bed as soon as my feet could carry me back.
“I feel like shit,” I groaned and covered my eyes.
“I thought you might. It’s ten o’clock.”
“What?” I shot up and looked at the clock. It was almost time to check out and head back to the city. “Did I miss breakfast?”
“Pretty much. I brought you some toast and Excedrin.” I leaned back on my pillow and began nibbling on the toast.
“No coffee?” I said. She revealed a Venti-size coffee cup.
“You’re my best,” I said and took the cup from her.
“What are you going to do when you see James?” she asked. I shook my head.
“I’m not sure. Part of me wants to tell him the truth, but I think I have to keep playing the trusting girlfriend.”
“You are going to break up with him, right?”
“Yeah, but I’m hoping to inspire some serious guilt.”
“Did the PI get pictures or video?”
“Yeah.”
“Good, if you don’t have proof they will turn the story around on you like that.” And she snapped her fingers.
“That reminds me, he sent a report.” I went over to my laptop and logged onto my email. There it was. The subject read, Johns Report 1-1. I clicked it open to see the file and used the password Li214 to open the attachment. The report accounted for both Friday and Saturday. According to the PI’s description, James and an unidentified blonde woman arrived at his house by a dark blue SUV around six in the evening. They left the house together by foot at seven-thirty, not returning until after nine. Neither was seen leaving the house again until ten the next morning.
I scrolled down and saw about ten pictures of the two of them coming and going. Some of the pictures showed them walking arm-in-arm. One of them looked like he was kissing the side of her face. None of the pictures showed them kissing mouth to mouth, but the fact that she didn’t leave his house all night was a sure sign they’d spent the night together. The evidence was clear. I uploaded the photos to a one-hour print shop and packed my things to go home.
I was so angry with James, angry that he was such a good liar, so deceptive that it made me sick. The need for retaliation surfaced, even if it was just a kick in his balls. He certainly deserved it. At the same time, I felt relieved. My mission had been accomplished, and I could finally move on from the trouble that had plagued me since the night I came home from Las Vegas. Then, I was sad. My operation was exciting and dangerous. It gave me a sense of passion that I hadn’t felt in so long. Now, it was over.
The drive home was quiet. The pounding from my headache subsided and was replaced by the pounding of my thoughts. Telly dropped me off at my apartment after we picked up the prints. Aside from the news of the report, it had been a really great weekend away with my best friend. A peak into the new life I was going to lead.
I flipped through the pictures, contemplating confronting him immediately or later. My guess was the woman might still be at his apartment, and I was ready to catch him in the act. My pulse quickened as I went up the stairs to his building. Someone was leaving the building, which allowed me to walk right in without having to buzz him from outside. Even better, I could really surprise him now. Bastard. Every step I took fueled my rage more and more until finally I made it. I banged my fist against the door hard and loud. Marvin barked like a ferocious beast on the other side. James answered.
“Marin!” he said surprised. I pushed past him into the apartment and looked around. No sight of anyone.
“You’re back early,” he said.
“I have to talk to you,” I said. James shut the door.
“Everything okay?” he asked. I looked up the stairs and there I saw a leggy blonde in shorts and a tank top. My jaw dropped. As dumb blondes go, she took the cake. I mean what kinda girl on the side walks downstairs when the girlfriend comes home. She smiled, which infuriated me. I glared at James, but he started leading me toward her.
“Marin, this is my sister, Amanda. She’s visiting from New York,” James said.
I turned to him, then to her.
She beamed and stuck out her hand. “Marin, it’s so nice to finally meet you. James’ told me so much about you,” she said.
I gaped, breathless, as I shook her hand. Amanda? His sister? Huh? It was not what I expected when I stomped over. I was too quiet for too long, so I conjured a bright smile.
“James’ sister, Amanda! Wow, what an unexpected surprise.”
“I wasn’t sure if it was too early to introduce you to my family. So when you said you had a conference in San Diego this weekend, I took that as a sign to keep it quiet,” James said. It made sense, the text, the embracing walk, the unmentioned visit. It all added up.
“Well, I’m sorry to have barged in on your visit,” I said feeling stupid, but also excited to continue my feat.
“No, I’m glad you came by,” James said.
“How long are you in town?” I asked Amanda.
“I leave in the morning,” she replied.
“Oh that’s too bad, now that we’ve only just met.”
“Why don’t you have dinner with us tonight?” she said.
“No, I don’t want to intrude.”
“You won’t be. It’ll be fun,” James said. I looked at Amanda who, for some reason, wouldn’t stop smiling.
“Okay, sure. What time?”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Family Ties
I met James and Amanda at Bacco, an Italian restaurant that Amanda was fond of. We shared a nice bottle of wine and Amanda told me all about her life in Albany. She was a patent attorney who lived with her husband Evan and their four-year-old daughter, Addison.
“So, what was James like growing up?” I asked.
“Well, for a long time he was the baby,” she said, as the oldest by four years, “and he followed me and Andrea around all the time. If we were playing hide and seek, he wanted to play hide and seek. If we were playing dolls, he wanted to play with dolls too.” James’ cheeks were freshly flushed.
“Dolls huh?” I turned to James. He cleared his throat robustly.
“I was really little.”
“He was adorable and so polite too. He was a football star in high school, but was friends with everyone. Now look at him, a successful physical therapist living in San Francisco with a beautiful girlfriend,” Amanda said.
I smiled at James who was still blushing.
“But,” she said, looking at James. “You’ll always be my little brother.” She leaned over and gently rubbed his cheek.
My phone buzzed. It was Telly for the second time in ten minutes. I ignored her call again.
“How come Andrea didn’t come visit too?” I asked.
“She’s stationed in Australia,” James said.
“Stationed?”
“She’s an officer in the military. She’s up for orders pretty soon. Hopefully back to the states,” Amanda said.
“Oh, wow,” I said.
James and I had a lot of conversations, but never talked much about family. Maybe that was my fault. I usually avoided the subject of family so I didn’t have to talk about my own.
“I talked to her last week on Skype,” James mentioned to Amanda.
“Oh, yeah, I talked to her earlier in the week too.”
“It’s nice to see you’re all so close,” I said with an adoring smile, but feeling a little jealous that I didn’t have the same fuzzy feelings about my family. I loved them all very much, but close was not a word I would use to describe our relationship.
“Do you have any brothers or sisters, Marin?” Amanda asked.
“An older brother,” I said and took a s
ip of my wine.
“Does he live close?”
“Yeah, about forty-five minutes.”
“That’s nice. You must see each other all the time.”
“Not too much, holidays mostly. He’s very busy.” I smiled, hoping she would drop the topic, but nope.
“Oh, what does he do?”
“Cancer research.”
“Fascinating. You must be so proud of him,” she leaned in and batted her eyelashes.
“Couldn’t be prouder.” Not! I forced a smile. Telly called again. It was a welcome interruption and I excused myself to the ladies room and huddled in a stall.
“What’s up, Telly?” I whispered.
“Why are you whispering?”
“I’m in the bathroom at Bacco. I’m having dinner with James and his sister.”
“What the fuck! Didn’t you confront him about the other woman?” she asked.
“His sister is the other woman.”
“Eww, gross. Incest?” she said.
“No, Tell. His sister is the girl in the pictures. She’s visiting from New York. That’s why they were so close and she stayed at his apartment.”
“Holy shit! Are you serious? That means he didn’t cheat on you.”
“Nope.”
“Well, I guess it’s still game on.” Yeah, but hanging out with James’ wasn’t a game I wanted to play.
“So what’s up? Why did you call a dozen times?” I stepped out of the stall.
“Oh, uh . . . you got a second?” Her tone changed from aggressive to passive.
“Yeah.”
“So, yeah . . . I kinda slept with Will the other night,” Telly said.
“I knew it. You’re such a liar,” I said.
“I know. I’m sorry, but listen. He’s calling me to go out again. I don’t know what to do,” she whined. In every other area in her life she was levelheaded and in control, but when it came to matters of the heart, her sense was somehow missing.
“No, Telly. How many times have you done this to yourself?”
“I don’t know. Four or five?” she said as if to downplay their number of breakups. Before I could say another word, Amanda walked in.
“I gotta go, Telly. I’ll call you later,” I said.
“No, wait! Marin, you need to—”
I ended the call and looked up at Amanda. “Hey.”
“Hey,” she said and walked to the sink. “I came in to check on you. You’ve been gone for a while.” She ran her hands under the running faucet.
“Yeah, my friend’s having a little crisis.” I held up my phone and shrugged.
“I’m sure it’s nothing you can’t handle.” She smiled.
I joined her at the sink. “I hope so.”
“From what James tells me you’re a good friend and good girlfriend too.”
“He said that?” I asked keeping my head down. I couldn’t look her in the face.
“He really likes you, you know? It’s kind of a big deal. He’s not the type who’s eager to give his heart away.” That makes two of us. “James is a really good guy, and I’ve seen him get hurt before. Be careful with him, okay?”
“Okay.” I smiled with a shrug as if I had no intention of being reckless with him. Why did she feel the need to tell me that? Was it a courtesy to me or to James? Could she see through my façade? Or was she just being a protective big sister? Whatever the case, she made me uneasy.
Later when James dropped me off at my apartment, I told Amanda it was nice to meet her, and I hoped we could meet again sometime soon. I was being polite, of course. The late hour and unexpected events of the day were exhausting, and I couldn’t wait to be alone in my apartment.
I called Telly on the way to work to find out what she did about the infamous Will.
“I went out with him last night,” Telly said, as if it was no big deal.
“What?” I stopped in my tracks. It was one thing for her to have a little reunion fling in Napa, but it was quite another to start seeing him on the home front.
“Telly, why did you do that?”
“You hung up on me remember? I needed you to talk me out of it.” For a lawyer it was a terrible defense.
“You’re really gonna have to start listening to your own good conscience.”
“Too late now.”
“What happened?”
“We kinda had sex,” she said.
“What?” I stopped in my tracks again. At the rate I was going, I’d never make it to work.
“I know, I know,” Telly whined.
“You know I’m all for you having these flings, but if you told me any ounce of truth about you and Will, then this is a very dangerous venture.”
“I know. What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I tell him no?”
“Because you haven’t learned your lesson yet.”
Telly let out a frustrated grunt.
“Do you want to learn it all over again?” I asked.
“No,” she said.
“Well then, you can’t see him anymore. Say you won’t see him again.” Silence hung on the line. “Telly?”
“Okay. I won’t see him anymore.”
“Good, problem solved.” I approached my office building and quickly realized there was a huge crowd standing outside. My vision expanded revealing several police cars and a fire truck.
“Telly, hold on a sec.” I took the phone away from my ear. “What’s going on?” I asked a woman standing in the crowd.
She turned to me and said, “A fire broke out on thefourth floor.”
“Oh, my God! Was anyone hurt?” I asked.
“A couple people were taken to the hospital. I think they’re okay. Probably smoke inhalation.” I could hear Telly trying to get my attention by yelling through the phone, and I put it back up to my ear.
“There was a fire in my building,” I said.
“How bad?” she asked.
“I can’t tell. Doesn’t seem too bad.”
“Any cute firemen?”
I looked around, spying a small group of San Francisco’s finest. “Yep.” I smirked.
“I’ll be right there.” Telly hung up without an ounce of sarcasm. Before I could get her back Katie appeared at my side, worry covered her face.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Yeah. I arrived just as the fire truck did.” We stared up at the building, looking for some indication of the condition of our office.
“So now what?” I asked.
“We go home. They shut the building down for today. It could be the whole week.”
“Oh, no,” I said. “What about our appointments?”
“You better start calling your patients. I’ll call you when we can go back to work.” Katie seemed annoyed at the situation. On the outside I sympathized with her, but on the inside I was excited and relieved to get an extra day to myself. My relaxing weekend away turned out to be somewhat stressful. I peered over the crowd, wondering if everyone else was secretly thrilled about getting to close up shop for the day. Then, I spotted a familiar face. Telly was schmoozing a group of firemen. I made my way to her, noting the increasing waves of laughter with each step. She was obviously laying on her lucky charms and they thought she was delicious.
“Marin!” She waved me over. “This is my best friend, Marin. Marin, this is Jake, Doug, and Sebastian.” She pointed to one smitten fireman after the other. They gawked at her as she handed each of them her business card. “If you need a divorce attorney, I’m your girl!”
They turned back to stare at Telly every few steps as they returned to their truck.
“How did you get here so fast?” I asked.
“I was on my way to the office only a couple of blocks away.”
“When you said you’d be right there, I thought you were kidding,” I said. Telly stared at the suited-up firemen still loading into the truck.
“Sweetie, San Francisco firemen are no joke.”
“You feel like playing hooky?” I smiled and did
a playful dance.
“Wish I could. Hey, maybe I can start a fire in my office?”
I let out a small chuckle and told her to catch up with me later. Not knowing what to do with a whole day to myself, I decided to treat it like a Saturday. I cancelled my appointments, picked up groceries for the week, then went for a long invigorating jog around the park. The US Half Marathon was still months away, but with my recovering knee I needed all the preparation I could get. Before I knew it, it was three in the afternoon and I had nothing left to do. I settled on my couch with the paper and a glass of iced tea. I had just gotten comfortable when I heard it, Drip, Drip, Drip.
The sound of a leaky faucet.
Thinking I probably didn’t shut the water off all the way, I went over to the kitchen to investigate. The faucet was all the way off, which meant it was a leak that needed to be fixed. No problem, right? Wrong. Not only did I not know anything about fixing faucets, but my landlord always took his sweet time getting to repairs. I once spent two weeks without a working stove, causing me to gain five pounds from all the take out I was forced to eat.
No way I was going to let the sound of dripping water disrupt my sleep and run up my water bill. Holly was handy and so was Chad, but both were completely unavailable to me. Then I remembered . . . I have a boyfriend. I picked up the phone to call my beau. Since I had yet to catch him in the sack with someone else, I figured I might as well take advantage of the situation.
“Hey, you. What’s going on?” He sounded happy to hear from me.
“I need your help with something.”
“Sure, what is it?” he asked eagerly.
“My kitchen faucet is leaking. Do you think you could help me fix it?”
“Yeah, no problem. I’ll come over after work and bring dinner too.”
“What a relief. Thank you so much.” I couldn’t hate the fact that he was so accommodating.
I turned on some music to disguise the dripping sound, then read until James came over, which he did promptly at five-thirty. When I answered the door he held a bag of takeout in one hand and a tool bag in the other. He wore jeans and a grey t-shirt that hugged his swelling biceps.
“Dinner and a wrench. You’re my hero.” I smiled and gave him a little kiss as he walked in.
The XOXO New Adult Collection: 16 Full Length New Adult Stories Page 213