by Nella Tyler
“So, you went to the funeral. You broke up with Adam. You came home and got yourself roaring drunk, puked your guts out all night and now you’ve decided to throw away your job and any chance of a future that’s respectable. Stop me when I’m wrong.”
“Stop. You forgot the part about going out to the restaurant where Adam and I watched our dinners being caught from the river. The river was cold, frozen, and there was no one about. It was the sort of tableau that matched my life at the moment.
“You also forgot the part about my coming home and throwing my wedding tape into the VCR. I heard my husband’s voice again for the first time in years. I probably played it fifty times. That,” she emphasized, “was when I got drunk. As for the rest of it, you’re pretty much on the mark. With the possible exception that I am now a clay artist.”
“Are you, indeed? And, do you plan to make a living from this?” Tim was being deliberately sarcastic. She knew his style.
She had always liked his style. It was jocular and filled with irony. One thing Tim could always do and that was to make her laugh. As a matter of fact, just having him here was brightening her spirits. She quickly checked that emotion and went back into the darkness.
“What do you want with me, Tim? I suspect you always had a warm spot in your heart for me. Am I wrong?”
“Hell no. There’s no warm spot. I’m head over heels in love with you. Have been since probably the first week I met you. I told you in the kitchen; I’m putting everything out there on the table and you can do what you want with it. You can reject me, in which case I’m still going to hang around just because I care. Or, on the outside chance that you don’t reject me, I might choose to turn on the old Tim charm and see how far it will take us. What do you think?”
Her vein of cruelty ran deep. “Am I supposed to fall in love with the man who uses an alias?”
“Isn’t that sort of the pot calling the kettle black?”
She thought about that. “Two points, you got me on that one.”
Tim drank some of his coffee, holding his big hands around the cup to warm them. “So, how did you leave it with this Adam fellow? I don’t think he’s a bad sort of guy.”
“And, just how would you know that?”
“Well, in the interest of putting it on the table, I’ll fess up right now and tell you that I’ve talked to him.”
“Have you now?” Mackenzie was puzzled, trying to remember a time when Adam would’ve possibly met Tim. “Would you mind telling me just when that was?”
“Well, it will be breaking the bro code, but when you went into that dark place after Lucy died, he was pretty worried about you. He really didn’t know who to turn to. He didn’t want to haul you off to the hospital, the bad publicity and all… So, the sonofabitch set aside his integrity long enough to log onto your computer and on to the dating site. That’s where I found him, although at the time, I thought it was you.”
Her mouth was open. “Do you mean to tell me, he was spying on me?”
“I’m telling you right up front. The guy is crazy about you. He was willing to do something against his own honor, even if it meant losing you if you found out about it. That’s one helluva guy, Mackenzie. I’m not sure that I would’ve even done that.”
“So, what did you tell him?”
“Well, he doesn’t know that I’m Harry, to begin with. That much is obvious. I figured if he could lower himself to invade your privacy, he probably wouldn’t keep my secret very long. So, I kept that part to myself. Basically, I told him to give you some space. I told him that you were too damned moody for your own good, not to mention that you’re a stubborn woman, and that the best thing he could do to help you was to let you go.”
Stubborn, am I?”
“If you don’t know that about yourself by now, we’ve got more work to do than I thought.”
“And just what happens here if I don’t want to talk about this? After all, this is my life, my house, and my coffee that you’re drinking, not to mention my bed that you’re planning to sleep in.”
“I took the blue one.”
“Whatever.” Mackenzie’s mind was rolling. On one hand, she was really pissed at Adam and his temerity at invading her privacy. On the other hand, she forgave him because he had few options, not knowing much about her friendship with others or what made her tick after David died. She was even a little ticked off with Tim, that he had masqueraded as the infamous Harry and now had chosen to stay with her. That took a lot of gall.
“Just let me know when you’re done being pissed off, so we could get onto the healing part,” Tim put in.
“Just what is it that you have planned? I mean, should I lay in some supplies for the long haul, or what can we conclude this tonight?”
“As I said, that’s entirely up to you. Let’s start with some truth. Could you ever see yourself with me?”
“Give me a second, just to understand what it is that you’re saying. Up until about fifteen minutes ago, Harry was on his way over to my house. Now, I have suggested to Harry on a number of occasions that he ask me out. Harry skipped over the question and refused to go there.
“And now, you’re sitting on my sofa, except you’re not Harry. You are Tim. You say that you’re head over heels in love with me, if I quoted you correctly.” He nodded. “So, one would have to ask why you didn’t invite me out on a date while you were Harry?”
“Are you really this simpleminded? If you found out that Harry was me, you would never have talk to me, online or off. I felt like I was the only one who really got you. You are willing to confess to Harry the deep, dark inner secrets that you wouldn’t confess to Tim. Can’t you see how critical it was that I remain Harry? If Harry disappeared, you had no one to talk to. No one you could confess to. I was serving a purpose, not for me, but for you.”
Mackenzie heard him out and nodded. “You’re right, you know. Actually, Harry was sort of like a secret therapist. I felt free to talk to him about anything. Not so much because he was Harry, but because it was anonymous. He couldn’t find me, and I wouldn’t find him.”
“Then why did you want Harry to ask you out?”
“I don’t know. I guess at some point, I began to like him. I began to feel close to him – after all, he already knew my innermost secrets, as you called them. That’s a sort of intimacy, don’t you think?”
“Tell me, then. Have you told Adam all the things you’ve told me?”
“Of course not.”
“Why is that?” Tim shifted on the sofa, facing her now and set his cup of coffee on the table. “I repeat. Why haven’t you told Adam all the background that you shared with me?”
“I suppose I thought it would ruin me in his eyes,” she admitted. “I have this thing about perfection. I want to do the right thing at the right time and for the right reasons, you know?”
“And you think this is original to only you? Don’t you think everyone wants to do the right thing?”
“I’ve never thought about it.”
“And therein lies your problem. You never think beyond yourself.”
It was like a slap in the face, in fact Mackenzie abruptly fell backward against the sofa cushions. “Jesus! Don’t hold back, Tim, tell me what you really think of me.”
“I just did.”
“I suppose that’s another one of those things that you laid on the table?”
“You haven’t answered me.” Tim’ trained his face on her eyes. He wanted to read every nuance of her expression when she answered him. This was an all or nothing sort of proposition. He didn’t want to be cheated of his potential moment.
Mackenzie shifted a bit on the sofa, considering his question. “Tim, I was definitely interested in Harry. The fact that he turns out to be someone I already knew complicates things. Could I fall in love with you? I really can’t answer that. It’s going to take me a while to transition Harry’s qualities on to you. That’s the risk you ran in your masquerade, you know.”
He nod
ded and gestured as if it was a gamble worth taking. “So, what’s part two of your answer?”
“I suppose if you’re asking me if I would like to date you, then I would have to answer yes. After all, you know where all my secrets are buried and where my warts are hidden. If you still want to see me, knowing all that, it would seem that it would make sense to date you and see where things go.”
“And Adam?” Tim was relentless. He wished Mackenzie’s boyfriend had been someone, no anyone, except Adam. He’d been fairly impressed with the fellow and didn’t want to cause him more harm than she had already done.
“Adam? I sent him away. He deserves someone better than me.” Those words were said with finality. She didn’t blink.
“And, does that mean that I don’t deserve someone better than you?”
Mackenzie’s mouth dropped open as she considered his words. “You make a good point, Tim. The only difference is that you already know the bad sides of me, and yet you’re still here. Adam doesn’t know them all. He has a son. If you bring someone into his world, his son will be affected by them. It doesn’t seem fair to me to expose a child to a woman who could be so intentionally cruel as I was to Lucy.”
“Are we back to playing that old song? Okay, if it makes you feel better to feel sorry for yourself, then go ahead and do it. But I’m not going to listen to it.
“You know, in the light of day, Lucy knew that you loved her. She knew what the hell you were going through with this online dating and all the weirdos you ended up with. She didn’t want to pry, she was staying in the background, waiting to catch you when you fell. You would’ve come around, eventually.
“I could see it in you anyway. You were getting tired of the whole phony dating people thing. You are about to come back down to earth. You would’ve been there for her in a month or two. You just needed to take your time and doing it.
“You’re not a bad person, Mackenzie. You’ve just been a little too selfish is all. Everyone does that from time to time. Now you’ve paid the price. You let a perfectly decent guy, no let me rephrase that, you pushed a perfectly decent guy right out of your life. You can make all the excuses you want, but it boils down to the same thing.”
“So, where do we go from here?”
“Well, I have an idea.” Tim leaned forward, picking up the cushions that lay between them and threw them on the floor. He reached forward and pulled Mackenzie by the arm toward him. He put one hand behind the back of her head and bent low as he kissed her. It was not a brotherly kiss, anything but. He put everything he had into it – all the daydreams, all the sleepless nights, they all went into that one single kiss. It was an all or nothing kind of experiment. “Where’s your bedroom?”
She looked at him, silent. She contemplated his face for a few moments, determining whether he was serious or not. That was when the rebellious Mackenzie nodded, reached over to turn off the lamp and took Tim by the hand into her bedroom.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Mackenzie stood next to the bed, facing Tim fully. As he watched, she began to undress, beginning with her slacks. He watched, his mouth opened slightly as his breathing increased. Aside from the fact that she was wearing regular clothes, this was his fantasy coming true.
She stood before him now dressed in a T-shirt and white panties with lace on the edges. She licked her lips, staring him straight in the face and then reached down for the hem of her T-shirt, pulling upward and over her head. She wore no bra and her breasts beckoned toward him, their nipples hard and inviting.
She motioned with her finger for him to come closer, which he gladly did. “Take my panties off,” she whispered to him. Tim was hard and his mind had gone into oblivion were only he and Mackenzie existed. He swallowed hard and inserted his finger into the waistband and then slowly pulled downward. Like a kid opening a Christmas gift, his eyes grew large as he pushed them to the floor and she consequently stepped out of them. She stood naked before him, a dare lighting her eyes. He smiled and nodded.
Mackenzie turned and pushed down the comforter and sheets on her bed. Turning back to face him, she sat back onto the bed and laid back slowly against the pillows, parting her legs slightly and leaving nothing to his imagination.
Tim’s throat was dry, and he knew this was the do or die moment. He walked around to the opposite side of the bed and watched her face as he began to undress. He was a bit self-conscious, but that was old habit and he knew that all his dieting and workouts were paying off in this very moment.
He slipped off his socks, unbuckled his belt and then let his pants fall to the floor. His shirt came next, his fingers fumbling as they tried to open each button quickly. He stood now in his undershorts. “Do you want to take mine off?” he asked her.
“Turnabout is fair play,” she murmured and leaned forward over to his side of the bed, one arm extended and her fingertip inside his waistband. Instead of merely pulling them downward, she slid her finger back and forth, left to right as she lowered them. This allowed her to touch him, his manhood, in fact his very essence. She watched his face as her finger stroked his skin, the vixen in her surfacing. He was breathing heavily and soon stood naked and protruding in front of her.
“Do you want to turn out the light?” she asked softly, pointing at the lamp on his nightstand.
Tim nodded and fumbled for the switch. He heard her laugh, a wicked sound in the darkness that then found them.
With one hand, he found the bed and lifted his knee for purchase. He rolled onto it, finding her soft breast next to his arm as he lay down. She rolled closer to him, her leg going over his thighs. Tim thought he would explode. He reached for her waist and clutched her between his large hands, lifting her to hover over above him. “Open your legs,” he ordered her.
Mackenzie stiffened then. And, she began to struggle. “No! I’ve change my mind. I don’t want to do this.”
Tim heard her words and while he was brokenhearted, he knew they were the words he had expected. His Mackenzie was true to the core. She would not sleep with him. She did not love him. She loved David first and now she loved Adam.
Tim lowered her to the bed beside him. He reached down and pulled the covers up until they were both wrapped beneath. He slid one arm beneath her and pulled her close, moving her head to lay on his chest. “Just let me have this much,” he whispered. “Just let me stay tonight.” In the darkness he felt Mackenzie nod.
* * *
In the morning, Tim was gone. Other than to hold her as she slept, he had been the perfect gentleman. Her clothes were still on the floor, although they had been folded into a stack. She looked at this and realized that he truly did love her. It was a gesture of love that he would tend to the evidence of her submission, and disguise it to look as though they had never planned anything more than to sleep together, side-by-side as friends. A tear rolled down her cheek as she realized how fortunate she was to have to such good men in her life, neither of whom had been her husband.
She picked up the clothes and tossed them in the garbage. She found something more pleasant to wear and took them with her into the bathroom where she showered, brushed her teeth, applied her makeup and got dressed. She walked down the hallway and went immediately into her craft room. There, with the exception of short trips to the kitchen for a snack, she immersed herself in the therapeutic power of self-expression.
She watched instructional videos and tried to mimic the creativity she saw on the screen. Although she did her best at it, she could see she had a lot of practicing to do. She decided to make a pair of earrings, mixing the clay colors and then carving out two identical yet inexact shapes. She baked them and then drilled a hole for the finding that would permit her to hang them upon wires. Last, she polished them, the effect resembling a semi-precious stone.
She was quite pleased with her efforts and looked up to see that the day had gone and darkness once again had fallen. She flipped off the lights and closed the door to her craft room.
She found a movie
on the television in the living room and pretended to become involved in it. From time to time she thought about the computer and wondered if he had left her a message. Finally, when it was time to go to bed, Mackenzie turned on the computer and logged in to the website. Sure enough, there was a message from Harry.
My dearest Mackenzie,
I think someone wrote something about unrequited love, but for the life of me I can’t remember now whether he was for it or against it. I can tell you, for my part, that last night was a bitter victory. I wanted you so badly, not just then, but forever. That was the bitterness part.
But my Mackenzie is a better woman than that. Although she doesn’t see it clearly, she does care very much about others. She has an organic loyalty to those she loves. Yes, you may love me in a special sort of way, but it’s not the sort of way that makes a lifetime of living together work. That, my dear, you have reserved for Adam. I will always love you, and I always will be here for you. I will never show up at your house unannounced, but perhaps you will invite me to your wedding one day.
My victory is that I celebrate you, the woman you are, and the knowledge that I had the great honor of loving someone who was truly worthy. Now, get off this damned site, close your account. You have no business being here.
If you need me, you know how to find me. I don’t think I’ll be on here much longer, either. My kind of lady doesn’t belong here.
Harry/Tim
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Mackenzie spent the next few weeks doing all the things she always thought she wanted to do when she had time. Now, she had the time, but she had lost the desire to do those things.
The craft room had sat empty for two weeks now. She hadn’t even opened the door. Yes, she loved playing with the creative toys, but they had lost their power to fulfill her. She had done as Tim had asked and closed her account on the dating website. He was right, at least about that one thing. She didn’t belong there.