Finding Mr. Right Next Door

by Sarah Ballance

  The syrup went down the bathroom sink, and he escaped to the safety of his room.

  …

  Six hours later, Matt headed to Elsie’s by his damn self. To his surprise, within a couple hours of his shower, the dishes had been put away—though where he’d ever find anything was Lexi’s guess—but not because Lexi intended to go with him to Elsie’s as planned.

  She’d finished so quickly because she wanted to see Dave. For the second day in a row. She did ask Matt to send Elsie her regards, and pointed out that Matt rarely saw his grandmother alone, so basically she’d made an excellent case that made him look like a jerk for calling her out for bailing on the visit.

  Elsie—who insisted that he call her by her first name, because apparently that somehow made her younger—had sold her house and checked herself into a retirement facility for the sole purpose of carousing with men. And she hadn’t exaggerated that point. Matt had had the displeasure of walking in on her once, after knocking, after she’d instructed him to come in. Never mind Ed while he gets his pants on, she’d told Matt. He doesn’t have anything you don’t.

  Two things had changed that day. One, Matt had realized that whatever medication his grandma had been on in the last few years had worked wonders, because almost three decades before, when Matt was born, arthritis had crippled her to the point that she’d barely been able to get around—a far cry from recent years, where she was actually getting around.

  Two, he hadn’t been back since without Lexi. He always let her enter the room first, because if anyone had to lay eyes on another naked male octogenarian, it might as well be her. He figured in another fifty or so years she’d be looking at one, anyway, whereas Matt had no such thing on his bucket list.

  Today, Lexi-less, he knocked with utmost hesitance.

  “Come in!” his grandma’s voice called in return.

  He shook his head. She never asked who was there. “It’s me.” He paused, then in a lower voice, asked, “Are you naked?” He earned odd looks from a couple of residents making their way down the hall, but he’d take that over naked grandma any day.

  “Commando,” she responded, just as the door swung open. “But not naked.” She glanced from side to side, her white puff of hair not moving with the effort. “Where’s Lexi?”

  He tried to think of an excuse that would fly and failed. So he went with Lexi’s. “She’s on a date.”

  His grandma opened the door wider and ushered him in. As far as retirement facilities went, the place was pretty nice. It was homey, with apartment-like suites. Elsie announced her plans to move there on Matt’s eighteenth birthday, which was shortly after he’d graduated from high school. He’d been relieved that she’d be surrounded by people.

  He never dreamed they’d be naked.

  Apparently, being around people her own age had worked wonders for her health.

  She stood now with her hands on her hips, a backdrop of family photos and floral prints cluttering the walls behind her. Matt’s attention always went first to one of him as a baby with his parents. The rest, it seemed, included Lexi or her parents, and the realization that Lexi would eventually have her own family—one that didn’t include him—hit him like a punch to the gut. He couldn’t think of anything worse than losing her.

  “Well, then,” his grandma said, “if Lexi isn’t here, you’re just going to have to get me my condoms yourself.”

  Or maybe he could.

  Matt blinked. “Excuse me?”

  “Don’t give me that look, young man.” She gathered the hem of what looked like a nightgown and eased into a chair. “You know rates of STDs are rising among the old folks. Up fifty percent, last I heard.”

  Matt knew no such thing. EMS training be damned, he didn’t want to know any such thing.

  “And they provide them here,” she continued, oblivious to his shock, “but you know how much they charge us?” Elsie looked toward the door and yelled, “Gladys, what is it for the condoms now?”

  “Two fifty,” an elderly voice returned.

  Elsie smacked her own thigh. “That’s right. Two dollars and fifty cents. Each. You’d think they’d give them away. Do you have any idea how much extra they charge at this place if you need medical attention? You’d think they’d want these old geezers breaking hips left and right.” To Matt’s absolute horror, his grandmother lightly punctuated her revelation by pumping her hips in the chair.

  “I can never unsee that,” he muttered. Louder, he asked, “Lexi brings you condoms?” He didn’t really want to know, but he didn’t want to wonder if he’d misheard, either.

  Elsie stared down her nose at him, the bright blue frames of her glasses perched crookedly. “Did you say Lexi was on a date?”

  “Yes.”

  “With someone else?”

  “Well, she’s not here with me,” Matt pointed out.

  “I hope she’s not using my condoms,” Elsie mused.

  However unintended, that wasn’t just a low blow. It was a physical one. “That makes two of us.”

  His grandma turned once again and yelled, “Gladys!”

  This time the other woman teetered into the room, tennis balls muffling the scrape of her walker against the floor.

  “Land’s sakes, Elsie,” Gladys said. “Why don’t you text me?”

  Elsie patted her head, just missing the glasses perched there. “I can’t find my glasses.”

  “They’re as plain as the nose on your face,” Gladys deadpanned. Her own gown had somehow gotten hung up on her walker, giving the impression of a thigh slit that was probably worthy of a red carpet. Matt could only hope he had their energy, as it were, when he was that old. But today, he didn’t want details.

  He didn’t ever want them.

  “Never mind that,” Elsie told her with a wave. “How’s that granddaughter of yours? My boy just broke up with his girlfriend—”

  “Grandma—”

  “None of that now.”

  “Elsie. I did not break up with my girlfriend.” Which he was sure she knew, considering she’d not long ago laid into him for not settling down, at which point he’d told her if he’d wanted a relationship he’d have one. At the time, he wouldn’t have considered it, but in that moment his fingertips still tingled from the time they’d spent under Lexi’s shirt, and he still hadn’t shaken his desire for her. He felt like a stranger in his own skin, unsure what he needed, only knowing that he couldn’t have it. Not unless he could go back to the moments before Lexi said she had to have that stupid fence, back to the decades he’d spent in the kind of bliss that could belong only to ignorance, but then, what could he change? He wanted Lexi to be happy. He just hadn’t realized she wasn’t.

  “Excuse me, son, for trying to spin things your way.” Elsie’s admonishment barged through his thoughts, and for once he was grateful. To Gladys she said, “So he was dumped. Is your granddaughter still single?”

  Well, maybe not grateful.

  “Yes,” Gladys beamed. “And due any day now. My fifth great-grandbaby!”

  “I’m good,” Matt said quickly, holding up a hand. “And congratulations. Nothing has changed with Lexi, though.” Great. Now he was lying to his grandma and her equally colorful friend. And apparently had been lying to himself, because where had that thought come from?

  “She’s on a date,” Elsie countered.

  “She’s out with a friend,” he corrected, despite her having used his own phrasing.

  “A girlfriend?” Elsie made a tsking sound, then blurted, “You know, they need to use condoms, too.”

  “How does that work?” Gladys asked. “Two girls using condoms. Are they for the toys?”

  “I don’t know,” Elsie said, “but safe sex is safe sex.” To Matt, she added, “She’s like a daughter to me, you know.”

  A condom-delivering daughter. Matt shook his head. E
very grandmother-slash-mother should be so lucky…if only he didn’t have to witness it. “Do you need anything, Gr…Elsie?” he asked. Then, realizing his mistake, said, “Never mind. I know what you need. I have to go for now, but I’ll tell Lexi you’re looking for her.”

  “You do that, son,” Elsie said, her hand catching the corner of her glasses as she reached to hug him. “Well, I’ll be. As plain as the nose on my face.”

  Gladys huffed. “I told you that much.”

  Elsie rolled her eyes behind the repositioned blue frames and pulled Matt close, whispering, “Don’t you let that girl go.”

  “It was just to dinner,” he assured her. Or maybe himself. “Maybe a movie. It’s fine.”

  And it was. But his grandmother’s knowing look haunted him long after he left the retirement home, doing all he could not to make eye contact with the residents…at least until he managed to put their teeming sex lives out of his head.

  Matt and Lexi were fine.

  Chapter Ten

  Matt was definitely not fine.

  If he had any sense, he’d have left the house. Instead he sat there, watching the clock, wondering what Lexi was doing. The unfortunate part was that he had a pretty good idea with whom she was doing whatever, and it was killing him.

  He hadn’t imagined that moment between them earlier in the kitchen. And she wasn’t wrong to ignore it. But he didn’t know how either of them could pretend it didn’t happen. If she’d only laugh, agree that yeah, that was definitely weird, and start one of those stupid movies she liked, maybe for good measure toss some popcorn at his face, everything would be fine.

  Once she moved on, things never would be the same between them, but he needed them to be okay. He could live with okay.

  In the meantime, he was so distracted by the clock that he sat through thirteen minutes of an ad on his music app because he hadn’t noticed the skip option had popped up. Frustrated, he tossed his phone onto the sofa beside him. He thought about taking Waffles for a walk, but it was nearly nine at night and Waffles wasn’t the active sort. He was more of a warm boulder that required five pounds of food each day, and Matt had enough troubles without picking a fight with a dog that nearly outweighed him.

  Eight fifty-five.

  Fifty-six.

  When headlights finally swept the wall seventeen minutes later, Matt jumped from the sofa and walked out just as Lexi and Dave stepped onto the porch. Lexi’s eyes flared wide, then narrowed, suspicion darkening them to an intriguing shade of cobalt.

  “Can I help you?” she asked. It was a striking rendition of a customer service voice, which meant she was pissed, and he should probably sleep with his eyes open, just in case. But the damage was done. He had nothing to lose.

  “I was worried,” he said. To his credit, it was the truth. He nodded at Dave, who seemed somewhat wary when he returned the gesture.

  “If you’re so worried,” Lexi said, “maybe next time I should arrange a police escort. Oh, wait.” She crossed her arms across her chest. “This dad routine is getting old, Matt.” She turned her back on him to face the cop. In a much nicer tone, she said, “I had a great evening. Thanks for allowing me to tag along.”

  “It was my pleasure,” Dave said. He threw another nod in Matt’s direction before saying to Lexi, “I’ll text you?”

  “Please do,” Lexi said. She watched him get in his car, offering a final wave, and didn’t look at Matt again until Dave was out of sight. Finally, she turned to him. “What. Are. You. Doing?”

  Despite the literal hours he’d spent thinking about this moment, he realized he wasn’t sure what to say to her. That his world seemed to spin a few degrees left of center when she was off falling for some other guy? That she meant too much to him to ever risk what they had, so why was she out there doing that exact thing? And wasn’t that the crux of it? Everything was in her hands, and he had nothing to do but watch every precious piece of it crumble, because he couldn’t any more hold on than he could let go.

  She watched, expectantly, her ruined front porch moment with Dave probably at the forefront of her mind.

  Matt knew he was out of line. He just didn’t know what to do about it. He kept everything casual, his fierce loves only those of his job, his mutt, and his friendship with Lexi. And now he saw her, but was it because her plans threatened to upend his life? And even if this growing awareness for her was real, why now? There wasn’t a thing in the world he could say to justify it to himself, much less her. And what would he say?

  That he was so terrified of losing her that he didn’t know how to ask her for…what? A chance? The thought made heat prickle his skin.

  “Is it really that easy?” he asked. He wasn’t sure what he meant, or what he wanted her to say. “You just join an app and a week later you have a date and just like that it’s real?”

  “Whether it’s real has nothing to do with you, Matt. That’s between him and me.”

  They stood there, her words lingering, the moments they had left between them so heavily numbered that every passing second seemed to echo and thud with unbearable finality. And in one of those miniscule slivers of time, or perhaps over a lifetime of them, he knew he couldn’t leave the questions unspoken.

  He wouldn’t be the one who let go without first taking a chance.

  He could agonize what was or should be right. He could spend all day trying to figure out his motives. He could worry for days about why everything had suddenly changed. But none of that mattered.

  Because everything had changed, and she had every right to that. And maybe one day he’d find peace in such a monumental shift, but right now he had a narrowing window of time with her, and he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life wondering what he’d missed.

  He took a step forward, causing her to tilt her head. “What’s real, Lexi?”

  She looked up at him, unmistakable heat flaring in her eyes, softening the edges of her narrowed gaze. She might be annoyed with him for interrupting the tail end of her date, but the passion newly glinting in those fields of cornflower hadn’t sparked with that guy.

  This was all for Matt.

  She stood taller, not the least bit waylaid by his question. “It’s an adult relationship. Shared goals. Plans. Dreams. Taking a chance that something amazing is waiting.”

  “Something amazing?” His heart pounded, like it knew. “Something like this?”

  Before he could think, he was kissing her. Not the kind of event that happened and was done, but something that exploded into driving need, like every emotion he’d ever had for that woman demanded to be recognized in that moment.

  And she stunned him.

  She didn’t melt. It was more of a fiery surrender, a palpable shock that ricocheted between them, a longing that splintered and uncoiled until it found a tenuous resting spot on this new ground they’d charted. Everything he knew in that moment he felt through her. The softness of her lips. The sweet whisper of her breath. The instant surprise eclipsed with a quiet whimper. But undeniably, untouchably, the moment she kissed him back. The gravity of what he’d done hit him then, with all the subtlety of a shovel to the forehead, and he wasn’t sure if it was she who nearly brought him to his knees or the force of his own regret.

  Not because this was the best damned kiss of his life.

  But because he’d just ruined everything. He’d crossed that line and ruined a lifetime of Lexi and Matt.

  She hesitated, and he felt it to his bones. Startled and beyond screwed, he broke free. With no distance between them, he muttered an oath, his lips dragging against hers as he spoke, her blue eyes fixed dangerously on him. Resigned to the fact that she was already plotting to render him nutless, he asked in a graceless demand, “Was that real enough for you?”

  It took everything he had to form words. To breathe.

  He felt her trembling in his arms and fully expe
cted her to lay into him.

  If only she would.

  Instead, her voice shaky, face flushed, eyes wide and brimming with something he didn’t care to define, she simply said, “Is that all you’ve got?”

  He stared, not sure he’d heard her right. He was two inches from her, and he was 98 percent sure of the fact that she’d just intentionally grazed his erection with her fingertips. She’d developed a real habit of that lately, only this wasn’t a carnival in front of a few hundred people. This was personal.

  “Lexi…” He couldn’t find any more words. It was the worst possible time to say the wrong thing, but he wasn’t sure what the right thing was. Probably walking back to his room and closing the door and pretending this never happened, but not even an actual saint could walk away from this woman.

  His next move didn’t come close.

  He didn’t walk.

  He dove in.

  In one smooth motion that utterly defied the flailing in his head, he walked her backward into the house, fumbling with the latch, both of them nearly falling over the sofa-sized dog that waited just inside. He regained his balance and kicked the door shut, knocked off-balance a second time when he managed to slam his ankle on the corner of the wood. He recovered and didn’t give it a second thought, because holy hell, this was Lexi. His fingers wound through her hair, her name on his lips, he swore every word he knew and then some that this wasn’t really going to happen.

  But it was.

  They slammed against the wall, his arms around her taking the brunt of the impact. He freed one, then the other, snatching at her shirt, her bra, closing his mouth on the first nipple he saw. The moment, the taste of her, was a reckoning. Her fingers tore through his hair, her head making an unceremonious thump when she arched against the wall. With the impact, a nearby picture crashed to the floor, sending shards of glass flying, but all he could think about was the sensation of that tight nipple piercing his tongue. How she wriggled against him, gasping, riding him through his pants, about to finish him that way.