Meet Me in Manhattan (True Vows)

by Judith Arnold

  Ted allowed himself to be hauled to his feet. He shot Erika a long-suffering look. "Not only can I grout a bathroom, but I can also change a tire," he said. "I'm the most handy guy in this room.

  "And you can ward off ghosts, too," Erika said, then exchanged an amused look with Kate. "What a guy. You'd better hang onto him."

  "'Yeah," Kate said. "Just in case I ever have a flat, or a ghost."

  "Or a bathtub in need of grouting," Ted reminded them both before following Kate through the room to the back door, away from Erika.

  Just as well, he thought as he stepped outside and the cold evening air slapped his face. He shouldn't be coming on to Erika when he was at a party with Kate. He shouldn't be caressing the nape of Erika's neck when he was sleeping with Kate. He shouldn't be thinking the things he always thought when Erika was in the vicinity.

  Especially since she clearly had no interest in him. If she did, she wouldn't be advising Kate to hang onto him.

  What was that song he sometimes heard when his parents had the radio tuned to oldies rock? If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with.

  He supposed he could do that, he thought as he wove his fingers through Kate's and paused by the side of the garage to kiss her. But the lyrics that remained with him were from the song they'd been listening to in the rec room.

  I'm too sexy for my love ...

  He wouldn't tell Kate she was too sexy, because she wasn't.

  And he wouldn't tell Erika she was too sexy, because even though she was, that was something she didn't seem inclined to believe.

  ERIKA HAD NEVER GONE TO A WRESTLING MATCH at the high school. She never had the time. She was always racing off as soon as the final bell rang, hurrying to her car and driving down to the stable to squeeze in a riding lesson before the sun set. But that afternoon it was raining, and she didn't feel like practicing in the indoor corral. The indoor air tended to get musty, and the horses kicked up sawdust and sand that left her nose congested and her eyes watery. She put up with a lot in her training regimen-willingly, happily-but when Allyson mentioned that she and a few other girls were going to check out the wrestling meet after school, Erika decided to skip practice and join them.

  Just out of curiosity. Just for a change of pace. Just because.

  She met up with Allyson and the others after their last class and strolled down the hall to the gym. "You'll have to explain everything to me," she warned Allyson as they reached the gym's double doors. "All I know about wrestling is that goofy stuff on TV, with the guys on steroids breaking chairs over each other's heads."

  "This is a little different," Allyson said dryly, then laughed. "I don't know too much about the sport, either. But it's fin to watch."

  "It is?"

  "Allyson likes to check out the guys," one of the other girls teased.

  Allyson didn't argue. "They wear these skin-tight singlets that don't hide much. You'll see."

  Erika shook her head and grinned. Allyson was so much more into guys than Erika was. Not that she was averse to admiring buff male bodies should the opportunity arise. That afternoon, apparently, the opportunity had arisen.

  She followed Allyson and the others into the gym. The bleachers weren't exactly crowded; no more than a hundred students sat along the polished wooden benches that extended out from one cinderblock wall, and a fair number of them were unfamiliar to Erika. She surmised they were from the visiting team's school.

  Allyson, Erika, and the others climbed halfway up the bleachers and settled in a row on an empty bench. Down below, the gym floor was covered by a large blue mat with a broad circle printed on it. "The wrestlers have to stay inside the circle," Allyson told her. "They lose points if they step outside the circle. See?" she added, turning to the other girls. "I know more about wrestling than just how cute the guys look with their rippling muscles on display."

  Rippling muscles on display. That sounded like fain to Erika.

  A few more students trickled into the gym and climbed onto the bleachers. The visiting team filed into the gym through a locker-room door and Erika gave them the once-over. She paid less attention to their physiques than to whether they looked mean and tough and capable of trouncing the Mendham High School boys.

  Maybe. Maybe not.

  Their fans in the stands greeted them with a cheer that sounded pretty anemic. A few dozen fans couldn't very well roar like a stadium full of crazed football lovers. Their cheers echoed off the hard walls, the high ceiling, and the steel rafters spanning the gym overhead, and then were swallowed by the much louder cheering of the Mendham fans welcoming their team as they marched proudly from the locker room into the gym.

  Erika recognized a couple of them-that huge guy at the end of the line was in her English class, and he looked a lot more fit in his uniform than he did in the baggy, droopy clothes he wore to class, which seemed chosen to conceal his enormous bulk. Erika had always assumed he was fat. He wasn't exactly skinny, but he boasted more muscle than flab.

  At the opposite end of the line, leading the team in, was a short, skinny boy, an underclassman, Erika was pretty sure. She couldn't think of any seniors as small as he was. Unlike the uniform of the heavyweight wrestler, which stretched as taut as an overinflated balloon on his hulking frame, the featherweight wrestler's uniform puckered slightly under his arms. The uniforms reminded her of pictures she'd seen of men's swimsuits in the Roaring Twenties. Narrow shoulder straps, a U-shaped neckline that revealed a serious lack of hair on the chests of the Mendham wrestlers, the form-fitting fabric ending at mid-thigh. The singlets were so snug on most of the wrestlers, they looked as if they'd been painted on.

  Ted Skala looked damned good in a singlet, she noted.

  She'd known he was a wrestler. One of the team stars, in fact. Unlike some of his teammates, he didn't have a compact, powerful build. His limbs were long and lean, his shoulders bony. Because he was thin, his muscles seemed more clearly defined. He stared straight ahead, refusing to acknowledge the cheers of the Mendham fans as he moved with his teammates to the home-team bench.

  "They don't wear regular sneakers, huh," she whispered to Allyson.

  "I think those shoes are more flexible."

  The shoes the wrestlers wore resembled high-tops without the padding and the thick soles. Not very flattering, but Erika supposed that if she and Allyson were there to ogle, she could focus her ogling higher, on the wrestlers' sturdy legs and solid torsos. Or, in at least one wrestler's case, on his lean limbs and bony shoulders.

  An announcer called the first wrestlers to the mat-the tiny featherweight boys. They scampered around inside the circle, grabbing each other, twisting each other, flopping, flipping. One was on top, then the other. Despite their diminutive size, they were obviously strong, using leverage and agility. When Allyson cheered, Erika cheered. When the other wrestler seemed ascendant, she scowled. The referee hovered over them, whistle in mouth, watching their moves almost voyeuristically.

  "This is interesting," she said when the first bout was over, with a win for the Mendham featherweight.

  "Not exactly like show jumping, huh," Allyson replied.

  Indeed, it wasn't. It wasn't like any sport she'd ever watched. The wrestlers were a team, but they competed solo. There was a rawness to their bouts, something profoundly elemental. No equipment was used, no bats, no balls, no sticks or pads, and instead of helmets they wore what appeared to be glorified ear muffs strapped over their skulls and under their chins. Given the intimacy of the wrestlers' combat, she imagined that unprotected ears would be vulnerable to injury.

  Another pair of wrestlers began their bout. The whistle blew. A buzzer sounded. They rounded each other, gripped each other's waists, bent and stretched and contorted. The visiting wrestler won that bout. His victory was greeted by a smattering of joyful hoots from the visiting school's fans.

  "Our next bout will be at one thirty-five," the announcer said. Erika instinctively glanced toward the wall clock above the locker r
oom door, then realized the announcer was referring to the weight class, not the time. Turning back to the mat, she saw Ted Skala rise from the bench, strap on his ear-protecting head gear, and stride to the mat.

  He was wearing a game face, not the smile Erika was used to seeing whenever they crossed paths in school or at parties. His jaw was set, his gaze steel-hard. His opponent was a couple of inches shorter and much beefier, his neck as thick as Erika's thigh and his shoulders round with muscle.

  "Go, Ted!" a voice a few benches below Erika cried. Craning her neck, she spotted Ted's girlfriend Kate, blond and beautiful and leaning forward, her arms wrapped around her knees and her head tilted to one side so her hair spilled delicately over her shoulder.

  Ted ignored her.

  Erika watched. There was something almost erotic about the way Ted and the other boy came together, their bodies so close, their arms wrapped around each other, their legs intertwined. Erotic yet ferocious. The other boy looked strong enough to pick Ted up and slam him to the mat, but Ted was sly. He was quick. He broke out of the other boy's embrace, stretched, reached, and suddenly the other boy was down. They tangled together at the center of the circle, Ted straddling the other boy, the other boy trying to writhe free, Ted scissoring his legs, winding his hand around the other boy's shoulder.

  He was sweaty and supple and sinewy. And surprisingly strong for such a lanky guy.

  The referee got down on his hands and knees next to the two wrestlers. He angled his head, he leaned in and out. He gauged the other boy's shoulders, measured with his eyes how close they were to the mat, and counted to three. He blew his whistle; the buzzer sounded. Ted released the boy, stood, and backed away, breathing hard.

  "That was a pin," Allyson unnecessarily informed Erika.

  "I figured that out."

  "The earlier bouts were decided on points. It's cool when you get a real pin. Ted is so good."

  Erika had figured that out, too.

  The meet continued, but none of the other bouts held Erika's attention the way Ted's had. The bigger boys made louder thumps when they hit the mats. They grunted more, perspired more, shook the gym more. But they lacked Ted's grace. He'd looked like a dancer on the mat. A calculating dancer, one who seemed to rely on his brain as much as his arms and legs to best his opponent.

  She could relate to that. Some sports were pure instinct, but she had always found riding as intellectual as it was physical. Riding was a dance between her and her mount. Whatever the horse did, she had to adjust, rethink, strategize.

  She'd sensed Ted's mind churning the entire time he'd been wrestling. He'd been fierce, aggressive, but never out of control, never acting reflexively. At least that was how he'd appeared to her. He'd stepped onto the mat, appraised his opponent as if the guy were a problem he had to solve, and then he'd solved the problem.

  Then he'd sat down, not even acknowledging the applause of the people in the stands. He'd removed his headgear and wrapped a towel around his neck. He'd rubbed the towel over his face and through his hair, then twisted to reach for a water bottle on the floor behind the team bench.

  His face was still intense and unsmiling, she observed. Even after his match was finished and he'd vanquished his opponent, he still had some fight in his eyes. He shut them as he guzzled water from the bottle, the bone in his neck bobbing with each swallow. Finally rehydrated, he closed the bottle and his gaze met hers.

  His eyebrows rose slightly, and the corners of his mouth twitched upward. And then, in less than an instant, his game face returned and he swiveled back to face the mat, shouting encouragement to his teammate who was currently out in the circle, grappling with a guy whose long arms reminded Erika of a gorilla's.

  Maybe the reason she found the remaining bouts less interesting wasn't that the other wrestlers weren't as skilled or as clever as Ted. Maybe it was that a part of her mind had wrapped itself around him, the way he'd looked at her for that fraction of a second. She could no longer concentrate fully on the wrestlers on the mat, not when she was distracted by Ted's back, the ridge of his spine visible as he hunched forward and rested his forearms on his knees. The breadth of his shoulders. The tendrils of his hair curling at the nape of his neck as the sweat dried from them.

  She'd always thought Ted was a fun, easygoing guy-and he was, most of the time. She gathered that he was a decent artist. She enjoyed being around him, talking to him, laughing with him.

  But there was more to him, much more. There was determination. Calculation. Strength. Aggression. The hunger to win.

  After watching him wrestle, she would never be able to think of him the same way.

  And-even more unsettling-she would think of him. Ted Skala had lodged himself in her mind, and she wasn't sure he would ever leave.

  Whoa. Erika Fredell had come to a wrestling meet.

  Ted wasn't delusional enough to think she'd come specifically to see him wrestle. She'd probably come because she was suffering from an unexpected spasm of school spirit, or because her friends had dragged her with them. Or because she had nothing better to do.

  Except he knew she did have something better to do. She had her horseback riding. She did that every afternoon after school. Why had she taken today off?

  Not to see you, asshole.

  He took another deep slug of water from his bottle, ran the towel over his still sweaty face, and watched the one-sixty-sevens go at it. The heavier the weight class, the less finesse. They didn't need finesse. They had brute strength. As one of the skinnier guys on the team, Ted was all about finesse.

  He was used to being the smallest guy. The youngest boy in his family, he'd been an easy target for his three older brothers. He'd learned how to run fast, and when he couldn't run fast enough he'd fought back as best he could. But how could a squirt like him fight back against guys like his brothers, who were all so much larger than him?

  His dad must have detected his talent for fighting, or else simply wanted to improve his odds of not getting flattened beneath George's or Adam's or josh's big, fat fists, because when he was five, his father enrolled him in a wrestling program. His oldest brother, George, was already a wrestler, and Ted had always enjoyed watching the sport. It wasn't just self-defense; it wasn't just a puny kid trying to stay alive in a family of big, domineering older brothers. Wrestling was fighting with rules, fight ing with dignity. And fighting someone your own size, which really appealed to Ted.

  So he'd started working with a coach and taking lessons, and after a few years he'd gotten good. It no longer mattered that he was small and skinny. By the time he was eight, he could take down pretty much anyone. Well, not his brother George, but anyone who challenged him, the bullies and turds whose sole reason for existence was to make life hard for everyone in Ted's primary school.

  When he was out on the mat, the universe was reduced to just the space within the circle. Him, his opponent, and the referee. There was something pure about it, something both profoundly physical and surprisingly intellectual. Wrestling was like playing chess, except your body was all the pieces rolled into one. You had to see three moves into the future, you had to know what your opponent was going to try before he tried it-and sometimes you had to resort to unadulterated force. Wrestling demanded unwavering concentration. Nothing distracted Ted when he was on the mat. Nothing existed but the moment.

  If he'd known Erika was in the stands, would that have changed? Hell, he knew Kate was there. She was his girlfriend, and yet he hadn't given her a thought. If she'd been cheering for him, if she'd been fluffing her hair and smiling beguilingly at him, he hadn't known and he hadn't cared.

  Now ... now he was aware of Erika a good ten rows behind and above him. She was undoubtedly watching the one-hundredsixty-seven-pound guys tussling. Ted's match was done and she'd probably deleted it from her memory bank. There were more interesting things for her to focus on.

  But he could hardly focus on his own teammates. He drank some more water and told himself the heat in his body
was a residue from his match, not a reaction to her. It couldn't be a reaction to her. She was just a girl, a classmate.

  Forget about her, Skala. She is so out of your league.

  He did his best to tune into the rest of the meet, slapping each teammate's hand as he came off the mat, regardless of whether he'd won or lost. Wrestling was individual combat, but it was also a team sport. Every member of the team had to be there for his teammates. And despite his knowledge that Erika was in the gym, an awareness that hummed inside his brain like white noise, Ted was a team guy. He was there for his wrestling brothers.

  Mendham wound up winning the meet. After the battle of the heavyweights, his team shook hands with the other team-false courtesy, but the coaches made their wrestlers pretend that once they left the mat, they and their rivals were all one big, happy family-and then Ted and the rest of the Mendham team retired to the locker room. They listened as the coach lectured them on where they'd done well, where they'd fallen short, when their next meet would be, and what school they'd be wrestling. Ted took it all in as best he could, but his brain was still humming.

  Once the coach was done with his speech, Ted headed for the shower room. As he stood beneath the shower's hot spray, he noticed a red welt on his upper arm and recalled the way his opponent had pulled at his skin. Ted had suffered his share of broken fingers and strained muscles from wrestling. A welt was nothing.

  Kate would be waiting for him outside the locker room, and he tried to lock onto that thought as he dried off and got dressed. Maybe they could drive down to Village Pizza and buy a couple of slices. His mother would give him hell for eating pizza so close to dinnertime, but Ted was starving. A wedge of pizza wouldn't put a dent in his appetite. Whatever Mom placed before him at the dinner table, he'd wolf it down. She knew the only time he didn't eat was when he was upset about something, and he wasn't upset now. He was kind of jazzed, actually.