Inhale, Exhale

by Sarah M. Ross

  An hour later, Christian and his friends were still at it, and no one even realized I was still there, so I slipped inside the main house to say hello to his mother. She was a sweet woman, and I enjoyed spending time with her. She already considered me the daughter she never had and told me so often. She gave Christian and me a lot of freedom now that we were both out of high school, never batting an eye if she saw my car in the driveway overnight or if we were out all night.

  “Hi, Mrs. Kirkpatrick!” I greeted the woman, who was in the kitchen mixing a meatloaf together.

  “Oh, Jillian dear. I didn’t know you were coming over today. It’s so nice to see you. Are you staying for dinner?” She leaned over, giving me a kiss on the cheek, careful not to let any of the goo from her hands transfer to me.

  “No, thank you. I only came over for a few minutes to spend some time with Christian, but he’s practicing again.” I stole an Oreo from the jar and sat at the counter watching Christian’s mom crack eggs and mix the slime into the meat.

  “Ah, and he doesn’t even know you left, does he?”

  I sighed. “No, I doubt he does. You know how he gets, all wrapped up in his music.”

  Mrs. Kirkpatrick rolled her eyes. “That boy drives me crazy. I don’t know how you put up with him. He’s twenty-two years old, has never left the South, and yet still thinks he’s going to ‘make it big’ with that damn music of his. That boy has put me through the wringer growing up. And after his brother…” she trailed off. After a moment, she shook off whatever thoughts she had and continued. “I feared he’d turn out the same. I thank God every day he found you. I swear you’re the one thing holdin’ him together.”

  I smiled, reaching for a second cookie, and poured myself a small glass of milk. “He loves me. And he really is tryin’ to be the person I know he can be.”

  “Sweetheart, I carried that child for nine months, taught him his ABC’s and how to drive, and gave him more love than I knew I had in me. But I’ve just about worn out my patience with him growin’ up. I hoped with you goin’ away to college, he’d want to join you. And when that didn’t happen, I thought he’d at least start wanting to find a place of his own. But if that child,” she pointed her wooden spatula at the garage door, “doesn’t get a real job and some motivation to be an adult soon, I’m going to have to put him over my knee like when he was six.”

  We both started laughing, only stopping when a slamming of the door caused us to jump.

  “Hey, there are my two favorite girls.” Christian brushed a kiss on my cheek before grabbing two cookies and heading to the fridge for milk. “Dinner almost ready, Ma? I’m famished!”

  “In about an hour. Why don’t you go take Jillian here on a nice, romantic walk? The sunset is beautiful tonight.”

  I hopped off my stool and rinsed out my milk glass, placing it in the strainer. “Actually, I need to get going. My mom expected me a half hour ago. We’re going to my grandma’s tonight to help her pack up some things since she’s movin’ over to Savannah in a few weeks, and I want to spend as much time with her as possible before then.” I turned to Christian, grabbing his hand in mine. “Walk me to my car?”

  “Sure.”

  We linked our fingers together, swinging our arms slightly as we walked. Neither of us spoke until we reached the car.

  “Hey,” Christian stepped closer, pinning me to the car and nuzzling my neck. “Wanna ditch work with me tomorrow and take a drive out to our spot?”

  I closed my eyes, trying to ignite the same passion with Christian I had felt in my dream from the other night. I tilted my head back to give him more access to my neck, and he eagerly began to kiss his way down while his hands quickly slid under my shirt. I closed my eyes to enjoy the moment, but all I felt was annoyance that his jagged fingernails were scratching into my skin.

  “You know I can’t ditch work. I just started today.” I pulled his hands out from under my shirt and placed them around my neck, but he pulled back.

  “Come on, we haven’t had a whole day alone to ourselves in weeks.” He pressed up against me, his hot breath against my cheek. “I’m tired of sneaking a few hours here and there. I miss you, baby.”

  “I was here two nights ago,” I reminded him, barely resisting the urge to roll my eyes. I could smell in his hair that he’d been smoking up and getting high again, and it made me a little queasy. I leaned against his chest, irritated. “And maybe if you spent more time with me than your so-called band, it wouldn’t be an issue.”

  Christian took a few steps backward and threw up his hands. “Oh great, here we go again.”

  “And you’re smoking pot again? After everything you went through when your mom found that dime bag and threatened to kick you out?”

  “It was one joint with the guys. One. I needed my mind to relax so I could write. I’m not going to start up again.”

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you. I’ve had a really bad day, and I didn’t mean to take it out on you.” I gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and opened the car door. “I’m going to go home. After I come back from Gamma’s, I’m going take a long bath and go to bed. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  Christian shook his head, closing the car door. “How about we go camping next weekend? Just you and me—alone for seventy-two hours?”

  I hated camping—the bugs and sore back from sleeping in a tent—but with the way his eyes were lit up with hope, I couldn’t say no.

  “Yeah, sure. Sounds fun.”

  Laying in the bathtub three hours later, I tried to lose myself in the memories of when I first started dating Christian: the way he made me shiver with just one glance of his crooked smile, or the way my body ignited when his lips were on mine. But every time I closed my eyes, my thoughts drifted to the dream, and my heartbeat picked up its pace.

  Maybe I’ll go to sleep early, see if I have any more dreams.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Seventeen hours. That’s how long I’d been staring at this damn computer screen. My ass was numb, my eyes burned, begging me to take my contacts out, my stomach was screaming at me to eat something, and my blood was pumping so much caffeine I might as well have inserted an IV directly into the vein. I stood and stretched. My weary sigh was the only sound this hour of the night besides the hum of the server in the next room.

  Every other employee had gone home to live their lives and be with their families hours ago. I was the single putz who remained. JT had gone home at ten, claiming his mom needed help. It was bullshit, and he was probably somewhere getting laid right now, but I couldn’t hold it against him. At this point—as pathetic as it was—I was living vicariously through him and I knew he’d share all the details with me tomorrow. At least one of us was getting some.

  But the code was done, and, knock-on-wood, it was working. It was one in the morning, and I wanted nothing more than to hit the Wendy’s late-night drive through and crash on the couch to my Tivo’ed episodes of Tosh.O and pass out.

  I walked a few steps toward the bathroom to take a piss, shocked by how heavy my body felt. Practice in the morning was going to be brutal. Being sedentary for so long killed me, and I had a crew competition in a few weeks that, at this rate, I’d never be ready for.

  After returning to my desk, I was ready to call it a night and power everything down when I saw the little envelope icon on the bottom right of my screen. I’d neglected to check my emails for most of the day, wrapped up and absorbed in coding. I knew I needed to at least check them now and make sure there was nothing that needed my immediate attention tonight.

  Scanning through the barrage that could all wait until tomorrow, I noticed I had five messages from Connie, each with a title more frantic than the last.

  “New employee setup?”

  “Have you completed this yet?”

  “Why isn’t the NE SU done yet?”

  “Grant–are you ignoring me?”

  “We need to talk.”

>   Well, fuck. I’d been so absorbed in my project that I’d totally forgotten about the setup I promised Connie I’d do. I scrubbed the back of my neck with my hand to keep from punching the screen. This was ridiculous. There were a half-dozen other people working in the department who could have taken the ten minutes necessary to do the setup, all of whom worked below me. I went to Carnegie Mellon University, graduated with honors, practically ran this division, and my coding kept these systems operational. Why the fuck was Connie fixated on me doing the setup when anyone else easily could have? I practically ran the department while most of the other assholes I worked with probably didn’t do shit today, other than sneaking around the content blocker to check their Facebook pages or watch porn on their iPads. I could hear my teeth grinding, something I only did when really pissed, and tried to take a breath to calm myself.

  This was bullshit. I hadn’t even met this girl yet, and already she was on my bad side. She got Mommy to call in favors ‘cause she couldn’t get a job on her own, and now Connie expected me to jump to her aid the second she waltzed through the doors? Oh, hell no. This spoiled little sorority bitch could wait her god-damned turn like everyone else at this company.

  Kicking out my chair, I heard it crash into the desk behind me as I hit reply to the last message Connie sent me. She may have been the senior administrative assistant, but she wasn’t my boss, and I wasn’t going to take shit from her for doing what I was actually supposed to be doing today.

  After typing out a rant, I paced the room for five minutes trying to calm down, and then read over it again before hitting send. Shit. Now I was the asshole. I deleted everything and went for simple and succinct.

  “Another project took priority. Will be in late tomorrow, but will do the set up first thing when I get in. –G”

  I hit send and powered down before gathering my keys and walking out, mindful to set the alarm before I went. All during my drive home, and even as I ate my spicy chicken sandwich and slurped down my Frostie while laughing along with the ridiculous videos Tosh presented, my mind wouldn’t relax. I couldn’t stop thinking about this yet-to-be-seen girl who had charmed Connie, seduced JT, and made me so pissed I began grinding my teeth again after five years with a mouth guard to stop the bad habit from my childhood. She was under my skin, and not in a good way.

  Well, one thing was for sure: I wouldn’t fall into the same trap as everyone else. This girl was nothing but trouble.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “I see we didn’t scare you off after your first day,” Connie greeted me. I clutched my to-go coffee cup as I walked through the front doors and furrowed my brows.

  Am I late? Was she waiting for me?

  When I finally had made it home last night, my mother never mentioned hearing from Connie, so I assumed I wasn’t fired yet. Not that I had much hope of surviving the week, but at least I lived to see another day.

  I woke up with the sunrise; my nerves had prevented me from settling into a deep sleep for most of the night. I decided to go for an early-morning run along the beach to de-stress. The whole time I ran, I repeated the mantra, “I can do this, I can do this.” It worked like magic, and now I had half-deluded myself into thinking I was ready to face the day.

  I smiled at Connie, hoping my grin would convince her—and me. “Oh, it was fine. No problems at all.”

  I couldn’t very well admit I sucked big time at this job. If Connie hadn’t heard I was a colossal screw-up by now, I’d have another day to prove myself so I didn’t get fired. I needed the money to pay for books this fall, and I couldn’t stand to see my mother’s face if I did get canned.

  “Well, that’s wonderful. I’m glad you’re catching on so quickly.” She paused, pursing her lips like she was sucking on something sour. “IT said they were sorry they didn’t get to you yesterday, but they’d be by first thing this morning to hook up your computer and get you your login information so you can get started. Afterwards, I’ll have the girls up front know you’re ready to answer the calls on your own.” She patted me on the back, smiling widely with confidence I wished I shared.

  As I settled into my cubicle and put on my headset, I let out a deep breath and prepared for another long day.

  I slept like shit. My late-night dinner had given me mild heartburn. I tossed and turned, knowing I had to get up early. My coxswain would kill me if I showed up late to practice. My crew team had its first meet of the season in a few weeks, which could qualify us for the National Championship, so I needed to be in top condition.

  The alarm on my phone jolted me awake, still in my clothes, spun sideways on the bed with my head and one socked foot hanging off each side. I really needed to change my ringtone. Hearing Cartman from South Park screaming, “Oh my God! They killed Kenny! Get out of bed!” was no longer funny at the butt-crack of dawn. My head was throbbing, so I downed four aspirin and a bottle of Gatorade before I took a scalding hot shower to wake myself up.

  I met my team at the marina by the Lanier Bridge, which crossed the Brunswick River. We were still waiting on JT, who was notoriously late but usually brought donuts.

  “What’s up, Grant? Haven’t seen you around much,” my coxswain, Luca, asked. He was a grad student as well, studying political science. I’d known this group of guys since I started my graduate work. We were like our own fraternity, and while I loved them like brothers, I’d barely seen them during the off season.

  “Yeah, I’ve been crazy busy at work. And stuff with my dad has been keepin’ me busy.”

  “That sucks, dude. You should come up to campus with us this weekend, we’re having a mixer with the TAs from the Humanities department. Do you remember how drunk Dr. Ulin’s TA Becky got last year? I believe there were lampshades and a goat involved by the end of the night.”

  I spit out the sip of Gatorade I’d just sipped. “I forgot all about that. What did they call her for the rest of the year? Baaaa-cky? God, even her students called her that, poor girl.”

  “Yeah, she swore she’d never drink again after that night. Tequila shooters starting at noon will do that I guess. So are you gonna come?”

  “You might just see me there. C’mon, let’s get this boat in the water. I need to be at work in an hour.”

  Luca called the crew together once JT finally showed up, and I took my spot in the sixth position. I’d rowed several different types of boats as an undergrad, but now I only had time for the eight-man sweep team, which was a personal favorite anyway. We rowed it twice this morning, once up and once back, our time improving slightly the second go-round. The workout was exactly what I needed. A steady course of adrenaline coursed through my veins, and with a second shower, I strolled into my office a new man forty-five minutes later.

  I booted up the three desktop computers that controlled multiple servers in my office and opened up my laptop. It pinged repeatedly with flagged messages titled “help” or “I don’t know what I did wrong.” I minimized the browser instead and went in search of coffee. I could already tell it was a double espresso type of day.

  When I returned, I checked to make sure my algorithm was still working and not reporting any errors and quickly scanned my emails. I had several new ones, but only one caught my eye. It was from Connie and contained only three words: Please do so.

  Awesome. Not even ten o’clock and I want to strangle someone. Fuckin’ fantastic.

  I stormed out of my office, determined to get this ridiculous task and ridiculous girl out of the way so I could get back to what really mattered. I darted toward the sales team cubicles, knowing she most likely would have occupied one of the empty ones in the back corner.

  I turned left, walked ten steps, and stopped. There, bent over with long, wavy hair cascading over her currently upside-down head, was a woman. She was bent in half, mumbling incoherent things while her long, slender fingers searched the floor for some escaped item. I couldn’t help but smile, seeing her trying to balance her bottom half on the chair while her top half threatened to t
opple to the floor. Her hair veiled half of her face, but the sliver I was able to view only caused me to want to see more.

  She was beautiful. Some girls are girl-next-door pretty, some model hot, some sex-kitten sexy. But to be beautiful, it took a combination of all three. This girl had it in spades.

  My feet moved forward a few steps before I even realized it, but I didn’t fully approach. I walked just close enough to make out the sweet resonance of her currently frustrated voice.

  “Damn you, get back here. Shoot!” She leaned even further over in her chair, raising the back wheels off the ground as they threatened to tip over. I wanted to take a step forward and wrap my hands around her waist to hold her steady, maybe swipe my thumbs across the inch of flesh exposed at her back where her shirt had risen up. I imagined how soft it would be, that smooth, creamy skin, and I began to harden.

  Well, fuck. I couldn’t go over there now. I’d come off as some sort of creeper introducing myself with half wood. I took a few steps back and ducked into an empty cubicle while I adjusted myself. Was this the new girl JT had told me about? The one Connie kept yelling at me about and caused me such a headache? My mind wanted to hate her, but my body had other plans. I was drawn to her. I wanted to know more about her.

  “Please be a ditz. Please let whatever comes out of your mouth make me forget how beautiful your body is,” I whispered under my breath.