by Kate Meader
Yeah, yeah, the metaphor sucks.
“This is pretty fantastic,” she says, chewing around a bite of perfectly cooked steak.
“You can thank Hello Fresh.”
“God, how much are they paying you?”
I grin. “Perfect for the busy professional.”
“I’ve been meaning to tell you to cancel that subscription for Donna and Sully. I can take it over.”
“I’m happy to treat them for a while.”
She opens her mouth to argue, but the look I give her puts a stop to that. Charlie Love has a hard time with compliments and nice things.
“Thanks, that’s really kind of you. Though Donna is probably thinking of ways to poison him because he’s having an affair.”
I almost choke on a rosemary potato wedge. “Sully?”
She raises a hand. “He’s not but he’s getting out of the house every day—which is what she wanted all along, incidentally—and now she’s suspicious. He must be up to something.”
I wonder if I should tell her what I know, but worry she might accuse me of interfering again like she did when I signed them up for the meal plan. Instead I change the subject.
“So why did you become a wedding planner?”
Elbows on the table, she cups her chin and flutters her eyelashes madly. “Why, so I could live vicariously through my clients while I wait for the one, silly.”
I wince, remembering our first meeting. “I was a jerk. James’s news had thrown me, and I felt like I was behind the eight ball, with everyone in on the big secret. I’m sorry.”
She shrugs, like she’s heard criticism of her profession before and it’s no big deal. Considering my own career choice gets a lot of flak, I should know better. I hate myself a little for piling on and making her feel less than awesome.
“You’re forgiven,” she says. “To be honest, I just love organizing events that will rock my clients’ worlds. My Super Bowl parties in college were legendary, and then my first job after graduation with a really useful English and communications degree was in events management. After a while, I realized that I wanted to tie that to something more meaningful—and no event is more meaningful than two people coming together to unite their lives. It’s special and I love being a part of it.” She bites down on her lip and picks up her wineglass. “I know. You think that’s ridiculously sentimental.”
“I think it’s wonderful to do what makes you happy. And your happy becomes someone else’s happy.”
She leans forward. “Until?”
“Until what?”
“Don’t you want to qualify that with ‘until the happy hits the fan and turns to shit’?”
I might have said that a month ago. “Fifty percent of marriages fail but that leaves fifty percent of marriages that succeed. My parents are still going strong. I have high hopes for James and Gina.” So Grant and Aubrey didn’t make it, and as for me and Becca…I dodged a bullet for sure.
“To the fifty percent,” she says, raising her glass.
“To the fifty percent.” Whichever half that may be. “There’s ice cream for dessert, but I thought maybe we’d watch a movie first.”
“I’d love that.”
I lead her to the sofa set up in front of the screen with projector, then click play on my laptop. I settle in and she snuggles right into me, her heels kicked off and her legs curled underneath her body.
“Cold?”
“A little,” she murmurs, so I pull a blanket over her bare legs, memorizing the sight to keep me going for a while.
She perks up when the film’s title comes up. “Rear Window?”
“It’s your favorite.”
“It is,” she says, clearly overcome that I remembered.
If you haven’t seen it, Jimmy Stewart plays Jeff, a photojournalist laid up with a broken leg who has nothing to do but watch his neighbors through a telephoto lens. One day, he spots what he thinks is evidence of a murder. The film has a million layers, revealing something different to me every time, but at its heart it’s a rip-roaring suspense movie.
Ninety minutes later, we’re getting to the thrilling climax, and I’m pretty close myself with the way Charlie’s wrapped around me, tucked under my chin. Her breasts are soft against my side, which makes me the opposite of soft. Every time she gets excited by something on the screen, she expels a quick breath that flutters against my neck and grips me tighter.
Ahem, back to the movie. Grace Kelly’s character, Lisa, has just broken into Thorwald’s apartment to look for evidence of Mrs. T’s demise when the villain/likely wife-murderer returns. It’s one of the most heart-pounding scenes in cinema because Jeff (broken leg, remember?) can only watch in impotence as it unfolds across the courtyard. I know Grace Kelly will get out of it—she’s the hero’s girl after all, and I’ve seen it a million times—but with each new viewing, I’m punched in the gut. We’re all Jimmy Stewart in this moment, stymied by broken limbs, real or metaphorical, watching helplessly, unable to do a thing as events around us impact our immediate lives.
“I love this scene,” Charlie says. “I love how he comes to the realization.”
“What realization?”
“That he loves her.”
Every hair on my body does a military salute. Now I know this movie inside out. Throughout there’s this tension between Lisa and Jeff—she’s the society girl in haute couture, he’s the world-weary photojournalist who won’t settle down. He’s crazy about her, of course, but he doesn’t think she fits in his world. By the time they’ve solved the crime and she’s out of danger, she’s wearing jeans and he’s resigned to his love for her. The end.
But I never thought too hard about the moment when it happens, the second when he goes from ignorant bliss to full-scale panic. Yes, she’s in peril, but it’s not just that. His entire future is at risk—a future he’s now imagining without her in it.
Watching Jimmy Stewart watch Grace Kelly in danger is to watch a man having a painful, life-changing epiphany.
“I never thought of it like that.” My voice sounds rusty.
“All through the movie, he’s so closed off, so separate from everyone. Dictating the plays, pulling the strings, but just then, he can’t. He’s powerless. And in this scene, she’s the action hero. She’s the one making things happen. His world is out of control, and it’s about to change irrevocably one way or another.” Charlie smiles at me, and I think I smile back at her. Something painted on and clown-like. “I imagine it’s what love must feel like. Terrifying and revealing all at once.”
My heart is in chaos, yet I manage to croak out, “You’ve never been in love?”
She looks away. “I thought so once. I was on the brink of falling…”
“But?”
“I’d hoped that revealing myself in pieces would make it easier.”
“On who?”
Her grin is utterly heartbreaking. “On us both, I suppose. But my truth wasn’t so palatable.”
There’s no disguising her hurt and I want to kill this Craven bastard with my bare hands. But his loss…“I can’t imagine your truth is so hard to swallow. You don’t scare me, Charlie Love.”
She reaches over to my laptop and hits the space bar to pause the movie, then shifts and straddles me under the blanket. Gently, her hands caress my face, feeling her way over my brow and cheekbones and jaw. Who knew reverence could be so sexy?
“Sure about that, Max? What did you say that first time we met? Desperate to get hitched. Women like me and Mitzi and probably Gina must give you the heebie-jeebies.” She fake-shudders, which makes me laugh, but does nothing to relieve the tension tautening every cell.
My hands cup her ass, seeking control in the familiar, a way back to a time when I knew what I was doing. We stare at each other,
letting the moment surround us and draw us in.
I’m falling for this woman, and it’s just as she said. Terrifying and revealing, all at once. My palms are itchy. My heartbeat is close to heart-attack levels. I’d like to throw up, please. If this is what love is like, I want no part of it.
I don’t want my happiness to lie in the hands of another person. I tried it. It sucked. Being a change-phobic stick-in-the-mud might be boring but it’s hella safe. Expectations remain at a minimum, no one gets hurt, and we’re all good buds in the end. I’d rather collect friends than scornful ex-lovers or scar tissue around my heart.
“You okay, Max?” Her sharp green eyes seek out weakness. I refuse to give in to her. Not yet.
Instead I move her so she’s flush against my erection. “Not really. Help a guy out?”
Her clever fingers move to the button of my shorts, a reprieve of sorts. “Let me see what I can do.”
Chapter 18
“A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person.”
—Mignon McLaughlin
Max
I wake up with a start to find my toes being licked by that little monster, Cujo. He’s been on his best behavior since Charlie came over last night, even remaining relatively quiet while I fucked her on the kitchen counter. (Our ice-cream trek turned into something else.)
The sheets are still warm, so she hasn’t gone far. I can hear movement in the direction of the kitchen, and I wait for it to hit me.
The itch.
Usually, I’d be feeling scratchy about now if a woman was still hanging around in the morning, but not with Charlie. I like her here. I like her, period.
A voice in the back of my head replaces “like” with another L-word and I shut that fucker down. Can’t a man have a moment of peace before he falls headlong into the abyss?
I grab sweatpants and head out to the kitchen. Charlie is there, again in my shirt—so cute, so sexy, so mine—reading her phone screen.
“Morning, Charles,” I murmur.
“Oh, hi.” Her eyes are bright, with not a hint of regret or her usual guardedness. She runs a hand over my abs and slips two fingers below the waistband of my sweats, pulling me closer. On tiptoes, she gives me a quick kiss. It’s hardly anything, and I love it.
“Coffee?”
“Please.”
Cujo trots about, getting underfoot, generally making a nuisance of himself. I take a seat at the kitchen island and let the domesticity of it all soak in.
“I hope you don’t mind, but I fed him,” Charlie says, her hands moving deftly to the Keurig.
“One born every minute.”
“What?”
“Sucker. He’s getting fat, so I have him on a diet.”
“What are you talking about?” She hunkers down to rub behind the ears of the dog, which gives me a nice view of the valley between her breasts. Cujo gives her the sad eyes, like it’s the first time anyone has showered affection on him in weeks. What a huckster.
“He’s skin and bone,” Charlie declares.
“Don’t indulge him. As soon as Mitzi’s back, he’s out of here.”
Standing again, Charlie leans against the counter, coffee mug in hand, her beautiful legs a vision to behold. “Now tell the truth. Why did she really dump the dog on you? I feel like there’s more to this.”
So do I. I’m fairly certain I spotted her in Lincoln Park one morning last week, but she was gone before I could catch up with her. She’s not answering her phone, and I’ve given up checking in with her doorman. I figure there’s a life lesson in here somewhere and I’m halfway to learning it.
“Maybe I was a little too casual with her feelings. I’m usually very careful to manage expectations.”
She eyes me over her coffee. “It’s easy to lay down ground rules at the outset but people aren’t robots who follow a preordained script, are they? Managing expectations might be working gangbusters for you but there are two people in any—um, exchange of bodily fluids. You can’t predict how someone else will react no matter how much you insist it should go one way. I see it with couples I work with all the time. I’m sure you do as well.”
“Sex does complicate things,” I say sagely, liking this analogy between our respective professions. “Wedding menus, too, I imagine.”
“But it doesn’t have to. The sex, anyway. Conflict over a wedding menu might be trickier.” Her grin sets me on fire. God, I love her smile. “You don’t need to worry I’m going to chase you down in the park and unload small animals on you. Well, maybe a ferret, if you do something that really pisses me off.” She sets her mug down and throws her arms around my neck. I swivel on the stool and wrap my legs around her. My hands naturally wander to that gorgeous rear of hers.
“Want to head out for a no-expectations, I-need-eggs brunch?” I ask. “Or I could make us something, and we could stay in all day and watch movies?”
She blinks at that, stiffens in my arms. “If this is how you treat your hookups, I can see why they might get confused.”
But it’s not. If anyone is confused it’s me because this is not my usual MO. How do I convince Charlie that we’re worth a shot? I’m about to open my mouth to make my case when I hear a gravelly voice behind me.
“Morning, kiddos.”
Charlie’s eyes fly wide, flick to me, then to the new arrival—Sully. Damn, I’d totally forgotten he’d be stopping by this morning. “What are you doing here?”
Cujo answers the question by heading straight to Sully, leash in his mouth. I usually hang it on a hook near the door so I’ve no idea what voodoo the little shit is performing to retrieve it.
Sully bends down and attaches the leash. “What does it look like? I’m walkin’ the dog.”
Charlie now realizes that she’s standing in my kitchen, wearing my shirt, with me draped all over her. She removes herself from my space, and my body mourns the loss of her…I was going to say “warmth” but it’s more. It’s so much more.
“This is what you’ve been doing for the last two weeks? Donna thinks you’re having an affair, you idiot!” Then to me: “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You weren’t all that happy when I interfered the last time. I figured he’d tell you if he wanted to.”
“Every couple has their secrets,” Sully says, standing and leaning against the kitchen island. “Looks like I’m not the only one.”
“There’s nothing going on here, Sully,” she says, “so get that matchmaking glint out of your eye.”
Sully winks at me. Oh, man, don’t do that. Charlie won’t like that. “Fair enough, girl. Any coffee going?”
“Make it yourself, Mr. Secretive. And you’d better tell Donna what’s going on. She’s worried.” Charlie takes herself out of the kitchen, but her bad mood lingers like a bad smell.
“You should have told her, buddy,” I say. “Both of them.” I don’t like being in the middle of things but it’s my own fault for sticking my nose in.
“You and I need to talk,” he says gravely. He checks out the hallway to my bedroom, where Charlie just went.
Damn. I’d thought he would approve but he’s evidently not happy about it. He knows I’m nowhere near good enough for her, that I can never live up to her vision of perfection when it comes to marriage.
Not only does he know this, I am also so knowledgeable on the subject I should have a diploma. Master’s in Bad News for Charlie, magna cum laude.
A minute later, Charlie click-clacks into the kitchen in those killer heels and that trench. She looks absolutely stunning, all golden limbs and a sex-tossed cloud of hair I’m taking full credit for. I work myself into a lather not getting an erection in front of her father.
“You’re leaving?”
“Yep. Wouldn’t
want to break up this good thing you have going here.”
“What about brunch?” I ask at the same time Sully queries, “Why are you wearing a raincoat?”
“It’s going to rain,” she says, her tone ominous. “Enjoy your Sunday. Sully, talk to Donna.” And then she’s gone.
“That girl knows how to make an exit,” Sully says.
“That she does.” Feeling grouchy that I’m stuck with Sully and not his sexy daughter, I move toward the Keurig. The man and I still need to have that talk, and like a Band-Aid, it’s better we rip it off in one fell swoop. “What’s on your mind?”
He rubs his mouth, then utters the last thing I want to hear right now.
“I need a divorce.”
* * *
—
Shit, this cannot be happening. I think I’d rather have heard the man ream me out for banging his daughter. I take a breath, then another.
“Okay, tell me why. And bad cooking isn’t grounds for divorce in Illinois.”
Sully closes his mouth on hearing this, then takes a moment fumbling for a different excuse. “We’ve reached the end of our road, Max. Getting sick made me realize that I’ve been treading water for some time now. I’m not happy, and I don’t think Donna is.”
“Boredom isn’t grounds, either. Every marriage settles into a groove that often migrates to a rut. At a certain point—”
“At my age, you mean?”
“At a certain point,” I repeat, “you recognize that the life you’ve built together has value. It also has bad cooking, occasional sniping, and long stretches of boredom. You thought all the work was done, but the age of you or your marriage doesn’t give you a pass. It still takes work. Let me ask you this. Do you still like your wife?”