Always Only You

by Chloe Liese

  I meet her hand so that our fingertips touch. “You just said the thought of us being in a relationship is laughable.”

  “I didn’t say that,” she says gently. “I said that deducing from a photo that we’re in a relationship is hilarious. Darlene of all people should know better than to assume that much from a paparazzi shot.” She tips her head, her eyes dancing over my face. “You thought I was saying I found the idea of us hilarious.”

  I slide my fingers further across the table, until they’re woven with hers. “Yes.”

  She squeezes my hand in her grip, making me glance up. “But that isn’t what I said. And if ever you meet someone who means literally what she says, it’s me, Zenzero.”

  “I understand. That makes sense.” I’m weathering a boomerang of emotions, but I try to smile and show her I believe her. Because I do.

  With a final squeeze, she withdraws her hand. “So. In the spirit of that, I’m going to be direct—”

  The waiter shows up again. Worst possible timing. Ever.

  I’m left hanging, the future of my love life discarded to place a lunch order. It’s not entirely surprising. Food is serious business to Frankie. Turning, she tells him what she wants, snaps her menu shut, and sets it in his arms. I order, too, and we both watch him until he’s gone, leaving us alone in our secluded corner of the restaurant.

  “You were saying?” I offer. Trying desperately not to sound…well, desperate.

  “Right. I have some questions and concerns. First, what do you want from someone when it comes to having feelings for them?”

  “Well, I’m not talking about someone, Frankie. I’m talking about you.”

  She bites her lip. “Yes. That.”

  “That?”

  “Just—” She waves her hand impatiently. “Talk. Elaborate.”

  “Well, if you felt how I felt, I’d want to date. We could keep it between us until you were comfortable telling other people, given work.”

  She nods thoughtfully, her fingers tangling in her necklace. “Ren, I’m attracted to you. I care about you, respect the hell out of you—” Frankie narrows her eyes. “What are you grinning about?”

  Hearing her say it, I’m euphoric. I feel how absurdly wide my smile is, so I set a hand over it, and shrug.

  “But, here’s the deal. I haven’t wanted a relationship in years.”

  “Years?”

  “Stop repeating me. Yes, years. I’ve avoided it like the plague.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  She puffs air out of her cheeks and drums her fingers on the table. “Historically, in relationships, people’s patience wears thin with me and my circumstances. I’ve noticed I’m happier, that my self-esteem and well-being are better, when I’m alone. So, I’ve sort of released the idea of being a white-picket-fence and two-point-five-kids person.”

  “Well, that’s fine. I want my house on the beach, which you like; a dog, which you have; and five kids which—”

  “Five?” Frankie’s eyes widen comically. “Jesus, Bergman. My yaya hurts just thinking about it.”

  “Your yaya?”

  “I told you, stop repeating me.” Shutting her eyes, she breathes deeply and says on her exhale, “I got sidetracked.”

  “That’s my fault.” When she opens her eyes, I try to meet them. “Can I ask you something?”

  She nods.

  “Have you ever felt like I treat you that way?”

  “No,” she says immediately.

  My heart does a celebratory somersault.

  “But…” Frankie spins her necklace and watches me carefully. “We haven’t been in a relationship.”

  “But I’ve wanted to be.”

  Her fingers pause. A blush pinks her cheeks. “It’s not the same.”

  “You’re right. So let me promise you, here and now, that I will never view you as a burden or a problem to be surmounted. You’re a person, Frankie, one that I’m wild about. And any hardships, anything difficult in your life, well, I’ll just be grateful that I get to be with you as you weather it.”

  “Until it gets old,” she says flatly. “Everyone starts out talking like you, Ren.”

  I try not to let it hurt. I have to remind myself that her doubt and distrust aren’t about me. They’re about her past and how it hurt her. For someone whose thinking is as analytical and pattern oriented as Frankie’s, the past is the best predictor of the future.

  “Okay,” I concede. “I know that it might be hard to trust me, that I will never see you that way. I understand it might require time to experience that. So, if you’re willing to give me a chance to earn your trust in that capacity, I’ll be content. We can go slow, take our time. The only thing I ask for is exclusivity.”

  She balks. “Of course, I’d be exclusive.” Reaching, she smacks my arm. “What kind of asshole do you think I am?”

  “Well, I don’t know what the kids are doing these days.”

  “The kids? Ren, I’m older than you.”

  “By a whopping one year.”

  She rolls her eyes.

  “I just…” I sigh. “I just need faithfulness. That’s it.”

  Frankie snatches a roll from the bread baskets, rips it open, and smashes some butter into it, entirely focused on her task while she mutters under her breath.

  “What are you grumbling to yourself?” I ask her.

  Frankie gives me a withering stare and says around a bite of bread, “As if I’d want anyone else if I had you.”

  Affection unfurls inside me as her words settle, warm and deep in my heart. “That’s a very nice thing to say, Francesca. And you do have me.”

  The way she looks at me, her fear and vulnerability gut-wrenchingly close to the surface, is like a blow to the chest. As is so often the case with Frankie—and I’ve noticed this with my sister, Ziggy, too—her mind sees the world incisively, with a raw analysis that most of us avoid. Frankie cuts straight to the heart of love’s vulnerability. And while most of us like to comfort ourselves with the delusion that love is bliss, it’s not called falling in love for nothing. We love, entranced by the breathtaking view, and we fall, not knowing where we’ll land.

  Our food is set before us, plates turned to an exact angle for best presentation. Waters filled. Then we’re alone again.

  Frankie stares at her food and sighs.

  “Hey.” I touch her gently, slipping her hand inside mine. “How are you feeling about all of this?”

  She meets my eyes. “After last night, when you told me, then you left…I thought about if I could do this, if I wanted it.” Her eyes soften, and her shoulders round, like she wants to curl in on herself. “And all I could think was about how much I missed you. I wished I was with you. So that’s why I’m here, because right now, I can at least tell you with complete sincerity, that I want to be with you, and I feel like I’ll want to be with you more and more. But I also have to be honest, Ren. This is scary.”

  “How can I make it less so?”

  She smiles softly. “Be honest with me. Be honest with yourself. When it gets to be too much, tell me.”

  “It won’t, Frankie.” I squeeze her hand. “I’ll show you that.”

  “Well, that’s that, then. But until we’re out of the playoffs or we win the Cup, we act like we always have at work—completely professional. As long as the season runs, no matter what we do personally off-hours, nothing changes in how I treat you in front of others.”

  “What about if someone finds out while you’re still with the team? Do you want to wait until after the season?”

  Please say no. Pleeeease say no.

  “Hell no,” she says, waving a hand. “We’ll be professional at work, and if anyone guesses why I’m spending time with you outside of it, it’s not like I risk losing my job for it anymore. I’m leaving the team. It’s no one’s goddamn business what we do. I mean…does that work for you?”

  I smile at her. “Absolutely.”

  “Good.” Frankie smiles to herself and c
uts into her meal. She’s quiet as she works her way through her food, and just as I’m starting to worry about the silence, about the places her thoughts have taken her, I’m stopped by the gentle press of her foot next to mine beneath the table.

  The tiniest gesture.

  But it feels impossibly significant.

  19

  Frankie

  Playlist: “Crush,” Tessa Violet

  I don’t know why I play footsie with him under the table. I don’t know why it feels so relieving to confess that I feel vulnerable, that the prospect of intimacy terrifies me, because one day he could do what others have done before and hurt me.

  What I do know is that as we eat and I replay his response in my memory, my heart beats calm and steady, an unfamiliar warmth centering beneath my ribs, radiating to tender, forgotten corners of my body.

  I know that sunlight on Ren’s hair shines like a weathered copper penny, that some fragile bud of happiness blossoms inside me as we eat in comfortable quiet. He’s willing to prove his trustworthiness when he shouldn’t have to, and I wish I didn’t need that from him. I wish I didn’t see people as guilty until proven innocent. But the past has been a harsh teacher, and its lesson isn’t easily forgotten—I don’t get hurt when I adopt a self-protective outlook.

  “So.” Setting down his fork, Ren leans back and lounges in his seat, hands behind his head.

  “So.” I slurp the last of my root beer, then frown down at it. When I glance up, he’s smiling at me. “What?”

  He shakes his head. “What do you plan to do between the season ending and starting law school?”

  “Well, not too much. Study, read, catch up on sleep. Maybe get a hip replacement.”

  He drops his hands, his eyes widening. “Frankie, you didn’t tell me your hip was that bad—”

  “Easy, Ren. It was a joke. A bad one, obviously.”

  Ren scrubs his face, then rakes his fingers through his hair. “Okay, I’ll catch up. Autoimmune diseases and major surgeries are fair game for humor.”

  “It’s not major surgery. The new technique is minimally invasive. And yeah, I have a sense of humor about my medical dossier. You know the saying. ‘If you don’t laugh, you’ll cry.’ So, I crack jokes.”

  Our waiter comes by with a fresh root beer. “Oh.” I glance up at him and smile. “Thanks.”

  He turns beet red. “S-sure, miss.” Spinning away, he’s gone before I can say anything else, like “Can I see the dessert menu?”

  What? I have a sweet tooth.

  Ren clears his throat, prompting me to turn back to face him. His eyes dance over my face. “I had no idea that was all it took to earn that kind of smile from you.”

  I wrinkle my nose. “What?”

  “Root beer. And here I thought it was the gummies.”

  “You got those for me?”

  Ren tips his head. “Of course, Frankie. I knew you liked them.”

  “Oh.” I fiddle with my fork. “I thought you just liked them after trying them at my house.”

  A beat of silence holds between us. He leans in and wipes my lip clean.

  “Ketchup,” he says quietly. Then he sticks his thumb in his mouth and licks it clean with a pop.

  Preschool Jesus with a Carpentry Awl, my wires are crossing. And as he leans close, he hits me with his spicy, clean scent. I stare into his kind eyes, absorbing his sheer size and proximity. I decide Ren is living temptation. I want under him. Yesterday.

  I can’t meet his eyes for long. They see too much, they travel too far under my skin and stir up feelings that make me shiver and gulp for air. That gently smiling mouth says he can go slow. Those pale cat eyes say I want you for dinner.

  “Frankie,” he says.

  “Hm?”

  “Will you come over tomorrow night?”

  “Yes,” I blurt.

  And I may literally jump you when I arrive.

  “Good.” Lifting a hand, he signals the waiter. “Because I miss Pazza.”

  “Hey. A girl likes to know she’s wanted for more than her adorable dog.”

  He smiles. It’s a new smile. A secret smile. “Then let me reassure you. I want you for much more than that.”

  Gulp.

  “But as I said, there’s no rush or pressure,” he continues. “On either of us. Physically. Emotionally. We’ll go slow, just spend time together.”

  “Oh, I feel zero pressure. Going slow isn’t necessary.” And I swear to whoever is the patron saint of sexual satisfaction—trust me, there is one, Catholics have patron saints for everything— if that man doesn’t seduce me the moment that I walk into his house tomorrow, I’m going to lose my mind.

  “Great. You can come over tomorrow night. I can cook, and we can just relax.”

  Cook and relax. That sounds promising. Like Ren’s version of Netflix and chill.

  “That works. But let it be known, I’m going to expect you to pay visits to my humble bungalow, too. I like my hobbit hole.”

  “Sure. I’ll spend time at the bungalow. Only thing I’m not sure about is overnights. I need a king-size bed. I don’t fit on those queens.”

  “I—what?” I stumble over my train of thought. Sex is one thing. Sleepovers are another. Sleepovers mean cuddles and bonding. Intimacy I haven’t accessed for years except for when I let Pazza smoosh me with her “hugs” on the sofa and I feel the ridiculous amount of love you can harbor for an animal creature.

  “So, uh—” I clear my throat behind a fist, trying to look not entirely freaked out. “You’re planning on overnights?”

  Deep breath, Francesca. One step at a time.

  Ren pins me with his cat eyes. “You’ve seen me work every moment I have under the lights, Francesca. I plan on being similarly dedicated when the lights are out.”

  Holy soaked panties.

  He looks up at the waiter when he arrives at our table. “Can we have the dessert menu? Thanks.”

  “You’re getting dessert?” I croak. I chug some root beer and try to snap out of the sex haze. “What’s Lars going to say? He’ll smell those simple carbohydrates on your breath. Then it’s game over.”

  Ren grins. “Not for me. I know enough by now to understand that if I’m eating with you, dessert’s in order.”

  “You’re buttering me up.”

  “Hardly. I’m just trying to put a smile on that lovely face with the help of a little culinary indulgence.”

  I level him with a sharp look. “Don’t count on too many smiles. I think I’ve hit my quota for today.”

  His grin deepens as sunlight spills through the restaurant. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Taryn, our water aerobics instructor, whips her body through the pool, her limbs knifing fluidly as if water’s viscosity is just an urban legend rather than indisputable physics. “Let’s go, ladies! You’re pussing out on me.”

  Annie snorts to my left. “I don’t think she should be saying that.”

  “Nope,” I pant. God, these treading water segments. “That’s asking to get sued.”

  “You’re quiet tonight, Frankie. What’s up?”

  I shake my head. “Just winded.”

  “Which wouldn’t be a problem if you came to water aerobics with any kind of regularity.”

  “Eat me, Annabelle. I have a demanding job. And not all of us have fifty pounds of pregnancy buoying us up in the water.”

  Annie gasps, then slaps the water toward me. “How dare you! This is stamina that I’ve built. And while my excess fat stores and uterine fluids are less dense than water—”

  “Stop.” I almost gag. “And never say ‘uterine fluids’ ever again.”

  She rolls her eyes. “My point is, I’m kicking this treading water challenge’s behind because I’m in shape, not because of the baby.”

  “Okay, Annabelle.”

  “Francesca, I swear—”

  Taryn clears her throat. Loudly. “Do you two mind?”

  We smile sheepishly and say in tandem, “Sorry.”

  Once
Taryn’s attention is directed at the seniors using those flotation devices that I’d give my left tit for right now, Annie glances over at me. “Something’s up with you. I want to hear about it.”

  Dammit, why must I be so transparent? Ma’s always said I wear my moods on my face, which brings us to another benefit of scowling—it hides everything else that you’re feeling.

  Ever since lunch, my gears have been spinning, my brain won’t shut up. My anxiety’s roaring at full throttle, and if I could wring my hands without drowning right now, I would.

  I’m not good at transitions and changes. I’m terrible at facing newness. I’m worse at anticipating everything that could go wrong. This threshold I’m about to cross with Ren typifies all of that. Thus, the freak-out.

  “I had a long day,” I tell her. “You know how I get. I zone out when I’m wiped.”

  “Hm.” She sniffs. “And here I thought it would be a good idea to go get shakes and fries after we finished class—”

  “Okay! I mean, I could carb up after this.”

  She narrows her eyes. “And tell me what’s going on while you’re at it.”

  After another twenty minutes of water aerobics hell and a quick shower to rinse off the chlorine, Annie and I drive to our nearby go-to dive diner. Once we have our goodies, we settle into a corner booth.

  Sitting with a sigh, Annie lifts her legs, propping her feet on my side. “Do you mind?”

  I gently pat her swollen ankles. “Of course not. So. How’s the lab?” I ask, struggling with the ketchup bottle.

  Giving up, I hand it to her. She pops off the lid and hands it back to me. “Exciting. Challenging. But it’s also the same frustrating bullshit as always. Lots of mansplaining. Trying to get myself heard and respected. Pregnancy requiring special considerations in the lab for my safety hasn’t helped, either. I swear, if I were a guy, I would not be having this hard of a time getting funding.”