The Woodworker

by Westlake, Samantha

  Shay stuck her tongue out again, this time directed at me, but she released her death grip on my legs. I brushed myself off, hoped that the girl hadn’t transferred anything sticky to me, and headed inside, towards the spare bedroom.

  A couple of weeks had passed since I’d moved residences, again, now settling into Lisa’s home. I promised her that I’d be out soon, and she kept on responding in kind with assurances that I wasn’t overstepping my bounds in the slightest. I’d toured a couple apartments, but none of them felt right to me. They all seemed too small, too sterile, too bleak and empty. I couldn’t see myself in a single one of them, couldn’t see myself as another mass-produced worker in a stamped-out, mass-produced little box.

  I had, at least, managed to snag another job. It wasn’t nearly as glamorous as my old one at Integrated Technologies – I helped a small advertising firm manage its clients, mostly real estate agents who just wanted to see their faces plastered on as many billboards and bus stops as possible – but it brought in at least enough money to pay my meager expenses. Lisa refused to accept any money for letting me stay indefinitely in her second bedroom, but I tried to help out by picking up groceries and trying my hand at some cooking.

  “Shay! Are you bothering Auntie Ellie again?” Lisa emerged from the living room, a duster in her hands. She directed a mock glare down at the little girl, who beamed without a hint of embarrassment. “She’s had a long day of work, and she needs a few minutes before you tackle her.”

  “Really, it’s okay,” I said, even as Shay turned and headed off to find some other source of entertainment. “She doesn’t bother me.”

  Lisa raised an eyebrow. “Please. You need to stop treating her like a normal adult, like she’s a project for you to manage. She’s a kid! Shouldn’t she make you want to loosen up and be silly?”

  “I’m not really one for silliness.” Never had this been more apparent than over the last few weeks. I couldn’t seem to find much enjoyment in any comedic entertainment. Lisa had tried putting on some of “the funniest age-appropriate movies that she’d found,” but I barely cracked a smile. Even as Shay had rolled across the living room floor, shaking with peals of unrestrained laughter, I’d remained sober.

  I didn’t want to admit, refused to acknowledge, that it was because of Rick. The man was a shallow, petty ass who was afraid of taking even a single blow to his precious, dented, dirty excuse of an ego. Who refused to enter any sort of competition, even when it gave him a chance to show off his true passion? Even for the thing that he was the best at?

  “Any ideas for dinner?” Lisa asked, changing the subject to distract me from my funk.

  I tried to pull myself back up to the surface, out of my thoughts. “I’m starting to run out of recipes that I learned,” I answered, trying to avoid speaking his name. “How do you feel about takeout?”

  Lisa frowned, and I knew she was going to argue that we ought to choose something healthier – but Shay must have been listening from the other room. “Takeout! Takeout!” she screamed, charging back in and throwing herself once again to tangle her limbs around my legs. “Yes!”

  I heard a sigh come from Shay’s mom, but she didn’t argue. Maybe she still felt a bit sorry for me. I didn’t want her feeling that way, but I also wasn’t above taking advantage of it when it gave me an edge.

  “Fine,” she gave in. “Oh, and the mail came. Auntie Ellie has a couple letters waiting on the table in the front hall.”

  This time, I was the one to stick my tongue out at Lisa’s retreating back. She knew that I didn’t especially appreciate the nickname. Shay, still wrapped around my lower limbs, giggled.

  “Let’s go,” I told her, patting her on her small and skinny shoulder. “To the front hall.”

  “To the front hall!” she echoed, charging ahead.

  I followed after her, found a couple letters waiting for me on the little table near the front door, next to Lisa’s bowl of keys. After I moved back here, leaving Rick’s house, I immediately had my mailing address updated and arranged mail forwarding. It was both a distraction from my current situation, and a way for me to avoid any awkward return to Rick’s house to collect letters that ended up with him.

  The first couple letters were bills and spam mail. I groaned at the bills and handed the spam down to Shay to tear open. The last letter, however, made me pause. It felt thick, stuffed with several sheets of paper, and I recognized the sender’s name – the San Diego Fine Woodworkers’ Association.

  That’s right – I’d sent in Rick’s entry into their Design in Wood competition under my name. Yes, I could admit, at least to myself, that I did it under my name instead of under Rick’s because I was afraid of how he might respond…

  I stopped sighed to myself. Maybe I had known that doing so was a bad move, that it would be poking at Rick’s insecurity. The man was strong, handsome, and confident, but everyone had their weaknesses. Perhaps I’d been a bit hasty in assuming that he’d win, that all his worrying would be for naught and I could rub it in with a good “I told you so.”

  And then, I’d imagined, he’d growl angrily at me – but through a smile, as he reached out those big strong hands to wrap around me. He’d pull me in for a kiss, one that promised all sorts of delicious and delectable things to come later that night, things that weren’t made in a kitchen but instead in a bedroom…

  I looked down at the letter. Do I open it? Do I swing by Rick’s house and drop it off? Do I use it as an excuse to see the man, talk to him again, maybe see if he was missing me? Or do I lose it, throw it away so I could keep on pushing him out of my life?

  I knew that, if I didn’t open the letter, the thought of its contents would torment me all night. With a little groan, I ripped off the top of the envelope and pulled out the folded pages from within.

  “Dear Richard Morgan,” I read from the top of the first sheet, “We are pleased to inform you that-“

  I stopped. Pleased. That was good, right?

  “We are pleased to inform you,” I continued reading after a deep breath, “that your entry of ‘Stag’ has been selected as one of the finalists in the Design in Wood competition. This should be considered a great honor, as only seven of the thousands of entries we received made the cut to become finalists. The final judging will take place at the San Diego Fine Woodworkers’ Association annual gala, where a winner will be announced. Enclosed, please find two complimentary tickets to the gala, along with additional pertinent information…”

  I stopped again, lowered the letter. Shay paused in ripping up the spam mail I’d handed her. “What is it?” she asked.

  I frowned. “One of my friends made it to the final round of a competition,” I said.

  “Oh, like a spelling bee?” Shay made a face of exaggerated concentration, eyes screwed up and eyebrows pulled together. “I did one at school. I got second place, and I got ice cream for it.”

  “I don’t think there’s ice cream as a reward for this one,” I said, my brain disconnected from my mouth. “It’s a woodworking competition.”

  “Isn’t that what the guy you were living with did?”

  I looked down at her in surprise. “How do you know about him?”

  “Because I’m a good listener,” Shay said proudly. “And you really liked him but then you screwed it up, and he was an idiot.” She frowned. “Actually, my mom called him a word that I’m not allowed to say.”

  “I don’t know if you were supposed to be listening, then,” I stammered, as I tried to find some sort of adequate response.

  She pretended as if she didn’t hear my weak attempt at scolding. “Maybe you need to talk to him and say that you’re sorry,” she suggested. “That’s what I had to do when I made Brandon mad at me because I said that he was bad at math.” She paused. “He was bad at math, but Mom said that I couldn’t just tell people that they’re bad at things. Is that what you did?”

  “No,” I said. “I entered him in a competition that he didn’t want to join.
”

  “Is he going to win?” She looked pointedly up at the letter still in my hands.

  “I don’t know,” I confessed. “He might.”

  “Will he forgive you if you tell him that you’re sorry and tell him that he might win?”

  I sighed. “I don’t know that, either.”

  “Could you give him something so he’s no longer mad at you?” Shay tried next. “When Jackie got mad at me, I gave her some of my Halloween candy. It made her happy with me again, and I gave her the really gross grape flavored ones that I don’t like, anyway, so it was okay.”

  “I don’t think that giving Rick candy will make him happy.”

  “So what does he like?”

  Unbidden, I found my mind’s eye flashing back to that morning when he dragged me into his bed, when I showed him the design for the website that I’d created. He hadn’t been upset then about me inserting myself into his business! If the next few minutes after I showed him were any indication, he was incredibly appreciative. I couldn’t help but remember the heat of his body as he pressed against me, the strength of his arms as he pulled me onto him, the determination and arousal on his face as he took me…

  “Well?”

  I blinked, tried to drag myself out of my steamy and totally-not-child-appropriate thoughts. “I’m not sure,” I hedged.

  Shay frowned at me, looking as if she didn’t believe my denial. “Well, you should find something that he likes, so you can apologize to him. And then you can go back to living with him.”

  “What, you don’t like having me here?”

  I meant it to come out light, as a joke, but Shay’s frown didn’t abate. “I like having you here, Auntie Ellie,” she told me, standing up and looking up at me, “but I think you’re sad that you’re here. And maybe if you apologize to your friend and make him like you again, you’ll be happier.”

  I didn’t have any response to that, and she bounced away, down the hall to go play with her toys. She left me standing there, tickets to the Woodworkers’ Association gala in my hand, my thoughts filled with Rick, missing him even worse than I’d felt at any point in the last couple of weeks.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Rick

  * * *

  The first time my phone rang, I missed it completely. I had earplugs in as I used a power sander. I pulled the wooden sphere, destined to become a wine stopper, away from the fast-moving belt. The whine of the sander died away, just in time for me to hear the phone’s last ring. It clicked over to voicemail just as my fingers closed around it.

  I looked down at the screen and got a shock. Eileen had called me? Why?

  I waited a minute, seeing whether she’d leave a voicemail, but I didn’t get a notification. I considered calling her back, but I didn’t know why she’d want to talk to me. Maybe she’d butt-dialed me by mistake.

  That made me think of her butt, and I briefly lost focus. I finally snapped myself out of it, picking up the half-finished wine stopper. It needed more sanding, and then I’d give it a thin coat of protective sealant and attach the cork. I was angry with Eileen, I reminded myself. Just because I kept on thinking about her body at inopportune times, just because I practically heard her smart, sassy voice in my head when I wasn’t blocking it out, didn’t mean that I wanted to talk with her.

  I turned back to the sander. This time, I heard the phone start ringing again just as the band started spinning, and I flicked the machine off. I reached over and picked up the phone with one hand as I flicked the earbuds out with the other. They fell to dangle around my neck.

  Eileen, calling again. Maybe it hadn’t been a butt dial.

  I briefly considered not answering, making her leave a message. I was still angry at her, I reminded myself, even though the anger had faded over the last couple of weeks. Yes, she’d betrayed me, but I could start to see how she could convince herself that it was for the best. And the heat of anger that had initially flared inside me had slowly died, replaced by a dull ache that seemed to make every day a little less bright. Sometimes, I came out of my workshop and stepped into the living room as though I expected to find her there, sitting on the sofa and working like nothing had ever happened between us.

  The phone kept buzzing in my hand. Finally, just as I sensed it was about to again go to voicemail, I swiped my thumb across the screen. “Hello?”

  “Rick?” It was her. Not a butt dial.

  “Yeah.” I didn’t know what to say, so I figured I’d let her go first. Maybe this was a booty call, her offering herself up to me to get me to forgive her. Yeah, because that totally seemed like something Eileen would do, I groaned internally, pressing my palm against my forehead. Get it together, Rick!

  “How are you?”

  “Fine.” What sort of answer was she looking to hear? I would sooner die than admit that I missed her, that my whole life had felt emptier since she left.

  “What have you been up to recently?”

  “You know. Just working.” All I’d done was work and sleep, trying to push myself further with my woodworking, take on as many projects as possible so that I wouldn’t have time to think about anything else. Aside from the occasional beer with dinner, I hadn’t had a drink in weeks. No visits to the bar. No chasing college undergrads. I’d powered through all the orders from the website and then kept going. I had enough hand-turned plates, wine stoppers, spoons, cutting boards, and other implements to last for months of orders. “What about you?”

  “I…” she trailed off, and I wondered if she’d been about to say that she was doing well before changing her mind. “I got a new job. I’m staying with my friend Lisa.”

  “From the market, when you first met me.” The short little Asian woman, the one who impulsively pushed us together.

  “Right.” I heard Eileen sigh. “Okay, I hate dancing around the bush. I got a letter from the Design in Wood competition, and you’ve advanced to be one of their finalists.”

  I froze. Of all the things I’d been expecting her to say, that wasn’t one of them.

  “Rick?” she asked after another second or two of silence. “Did you hear me?”

  “Yeah, yeah.” I tried to think. “Why did you find out, not me?”

  “I had my mail forwarded, and they sent me a letter. Seems pretty old school, but I guess that’s woodworkers for you. When I found you, you weren’t using technology much, so I guess I’m not surprised that other woodworkers are the same way.” She sounded a little teasing.

  “What else did they say?” I was still shocked by the news, trying to accept it. I was a finalist? I hadn’t just been knocked out, they hadn’t lost my entry as I sometimes hoped when I lay awake in bed at night?

  “They said- you know what?” she interrupted herself. “It would be better if we met in person. They sent along tickets that I need to pass to you.”

  “Okay.” I tried not to think of seeing her in person again. I tried to tell myself that this was just a hand-off, not a chance for me to see her again, to have her lightly tease me with that sense of sass that was pure Eileen, not a possibility for me to let my libido overcome my frustration with her and carry her off like a Viking claiming a damsel as his prize.

  “Okay,” she repeated. Did she sound a little surprised that I’d agreed to see her? “Do you want to grab lunch today? We could meet downtown?”

  “Sounds good to me.” I glanced up at the clock on my workshop wall. “How about Zia’s sandwiches, half an hour?”

  “That works for me. I’ll see you soon, Rick.” My name was strangely soft in her mouth. She hung up before I could reply.

  I lowered the phone, looked at it. Several thoughts fought and squabbled with each other inside my head, each one jockeying for front position.

  I was a finalist in the Design in Wood competition. I hadn’t been eliminated. I could still win.

  Eileen was going to see me. She wasn’t just going to swing by and hand the letter over to me, then vanish from my life. She wanted to have lunch
. Did that mean that she still thought of me?

  I told myself that I was being ridiculous. She was the one who’d betrayed me, broke my trust. I shouldn’t give a damn what she thought of me. I’d told myself that I didn’t want anything to do with her.

  I’d lied to myself. I missed her, wanted her back. Even if I’d never admit it out loud, much less to someone like Niall or his new bartender girlfriend Bethany, I missed her. I’d thought that I’d stop thinking about her in time. I thought that my desire for her would fade.

  It hadn’t faded. It kept growing stronger, until I could barely stand it.

  Half an hour. That gave me plenty of time to get downtown. I looked down at my outfit – the usual, sawdust-stained jeans and a flannel shirt – and briefly considered changing.

  I decided against it. I was going to show up as myself, see whether there was any indication that Eileen still had feelings for me, or if she’d completely moved on. Knowing her, I was certain that she’d be professional, cool, and totally over me. She’d have handled moving out efficiently and smartly, just like she handled everything else in her life.

  I tried to not feel like too much of a screw-up as I went to meet her. Remember, you’re the one mad at her, I tried to remind myself as I pulled open the door to Zia’s, hating that I felt my heart thumping rapidly in my chest. Stop freaking out. You’re the one in control.

  I convinced myself – up until I spotted her, sitting there waiting for me.

  Of course she’d gotten there five minutes early, beaten me there. And of course she looked amazing, dressed simply in a shirt and jeans, somehow managing to still outshine any supermodel. The jeans wrapped closely around her legs and showed them off, while the shirt was just loose enough to hide the curves of her chest, only giving me tantalizing hints at what I knew lay beneath when she stretched out her hand towards me.

  There was a moment of awkwardness as we greeted each other. Was a hug inappropriate? A handshake seemed too cold and impersonal. What I wanted to do, a little part of my heart cried out, was sweep her up in my arms. I couldn’t do that, though, so I settled for a gruff nod.