Sometimes I liked to know what he planned to make. Sometimes I liked to be surprised, watching the twists each piece took. Since most of his work was abstract, no matter what words he used to describe it, my imagination still never matched his final result.
I turned back to Friends and enjoyed it for all of ten minutes before he set down the wood and picked up his laptop, his forehead scrunched and fingers flying.
“What are you doing?” I asked when the mouse clicking and the keys clacking went on for about five nonstop minutes.
“I had an idea when I was working on the wood. I don’t need a bigger sample size from the Fake Girl experiment.”
“Don’t call her that anymore. She’s me.”
“Whatever. You know what I mean.”
Yeah. I just wish you knew what I meant.
“I’m going to set up profiles on different sites that are me, no ‘curating’ the details. None of this is going to work if I don’t describe myself accurately and they end up all surprised and appalled by the fact that I’m a sports nut or whatever.”
My stomach clenched at the idea of him putting his true self out there, in all its irresistibleness. Given all the other great things about him, not one girl was going to have a problem with his sports-watching. “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said. Because it wasn’t, for me. “Women are tired of guys who do nothing but play video games or watch football. And baseball is worse because there are more games.”
He looked at me like I was touched in the head. “Of course I’m going to put down other stuff I’m into.”
“But even mixed in with other things, putting that stuff down is going to be like a red flag if it’s showing up in your main interests at all. Let me help you with a new profile.”
“Nope. Your help got me a fistful of lame dates. I’m going from nothing”—he held up a closed fist to indicate zero—“to this.” And he did a victory fist pump.
“But I really—”
“Nope.”
“But you should—”
“Nope.”
“I think that—”
He shoved another loaded chip into my mouth. “Quiet. Watch Friends. Although I don’t know how you can stand it. That Ross guy is the only tolerable character on the show.”
“He’s the worst. He’s so boring.”
“Really? The guy with the real job in the sciences is boring?”
“Ugh. The way . . . he talks . . . is so . . .” I said, in an imitation of Ross Gellar’s speech patterns.
“Whatever. He’s funny too. And he’s good to Rachel. How come she finds him so sexy if he’s such a loser?”
My eyebrow rose. “You know an awful lot about this show for someone who can’t figure out why I’d be watching it.”
“Shut up,” he said, his fingers busy at his keyboard again.
“You really should let me help—”
“No. Watch TV.” And he shoved another chip in my mouth, ending the argument.
I ate it. But as I listened to him work on his laptop, it occurred to me that I felt totally miserable for someone who was eating her favorite food and watching her favorite show in the entire world.
* * *
I used my copy of his key to let myself into his apartment early Tuesday morning.
“Will!” I hollered. His bedroom door opened, and he padded out in gray pinstripe slacks, but barefoot and shirtless as he ran a towel over his wet hair.
The view was better than Tetris nachos.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, his voice muffled under the towel.
“I need your opinion on an outfit,” I said.
He popped his head out. “You what?”
“I’m meeting Jay today at lunch, and I can’t figure out what to wear.”
He gave me a long stare, his glance running from my curled hair, over the pink dress I’d picked, down to my tan wedges. “You look nice. But isn’t this what Sophie is for?”
“She picked a different outfit for me last night, but I changed my mind about it this morning. She went for fun, which is good for a date, but I need something that would be appropriate for the office too. And also not boring for a date. So what do you think?” I did a slow turn, holding my breath until I could see his face again. It was my favorite dress, and not even kind of appropriate for the office. It covered everything that needed to be covered for work, but the dress screamed party, not project manager.
“I know it’s hard, but try looking at me like I’m a real girl. Imagine if you were meeting me for the first time, what would you think?” And that, of course, was the whole sneaky point of coming over before he left for work this morning. Another desperate plan to get him to think about me the way Jay might.
“I don’t think any ladies would be wearing something like that in my office.”
“I’ll figure out how to make it work for the office. A jacket, maybe. But what do you think for a lunch date? Does it say I’m fun?” And that I have amazing legs that I earned the hard way? And a great summer tan that’s still sticking around?
“It says . . .” He cleared his throat. “Sure. It says fun.”
“So if you saw me in a bakery cafe in the business district with a bunch of people, men and women in suits, I’d stand out in a good way? I’d look like someone you’d want to get to know?”
He paused for a long moment, and his eyes darkened before he glanced away and toweled his hair some more. “I’d say Jay will think that, yes.”
That was as good as it was going to get, but it was pretty good. There was maybe some progress. “I should go,” I said. “I’m heading in early so I can take a longer lunch in case it goes well. Wish me luck.”
“Text me when you’re done so I know not to send out a SWAT team or something.”
“Sure.” I let myself out and grinned all the way to my door.
“Rome wasn’t built in a day,” Sophie had reminded me the night before when I called to tell her that my plan wasn’t working after all. “You definitely have his attention. Now you need to change the lens he’s looking through. Eventually he won’t be able to go back to seeing you as a sister or even a friend.”
And maybe it was better for it to happen gradually. It might be sensory overload to have the full force of Will’s attention all at once. As I slipped back into my apartment to change into what I was really going to wear, something cute but more subdued and light-years more office-appropriate, a shiver danced down my back. Yeah, intense Will was nothing to mess with. The slow build was definitely the smart play.
Chapter 13
“How was lunch?” Sophie asked.
“Kinda great,” I said. “He’s pretty fun.”
“So are you going out again?”
“I don’t know. Doesn’t seem fair.”
“Because of Will?”
“I think I just heard you roll your eyes at me.”
“You deserved it. Kinda great lunch with a fun guy and you’re going to pass on this one too?”
“Yeah. I’m not really available. Not emotionally, anyway.”
“But you are in every other way. You’re available to have fun. So you should. How is it unfair for you to have fun with this guy if he’s also having fun?”
“I don’t know. Everything is really confusing right now. At least ten times a day I feel bad for manipulating Will with all this stupid scheming. I’m not sure I need another guilt trip for Jay, leading him on when I know it can’t go anywhere.”
“So don’t. Tell him up front that you’re only looking for something casual. As for manipulating Will, I guess you’re going to have to sort through that on your own, but I stand by my previous argument. You can’t make him do anything he ultimately doesn’t want to do.”
“Yeah, but showing up in an outfit and pretending I’m going to wear it out to get his attention is different than just being around and doing our thing. It’s . . . dishonest, maybe? And very junior high now that I’m hearing myself say it out loud.”
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“So commit to being real. And if you feel like it’s scrambling your brains, take some distance. Give yourself space from him for a couple of days and see if you’re breathing easier, if it gives you any clarity.”
“Part of me wants to do that. And part of me is worried about this clock he’s put himself on to get married. It’s like having the Jeopardy! theme song on a constant loop in my head, all urgent and naggy.”
“You think a couple of days will make that much of a difference? Anyway, not that you should see this as a manipulation thing, but maybe it’s good to give him a couple of days to miss you. You’re always together lately. Go out with Jay, do a craft by yourself, rent some movies, do anything but hang out with Will and see if it gives you perspective, a chance to rethink your approach, make sure it’s what you want to do if you keep questioning it so much.”
“Jay did ask me about dinner tomorrow night.”
“Check you out! If he’s asking you out for the next night and not even trying to play it cool, then he must feel like lunch went spectacularly well. Wait. He’s not clingy, is he?”
“No. Just up front. Which is more than I can say about myself lately.”
“You know I’m on record in support of you laying it all out for Will. But you’re not going to do that, are you?”
“I can’t. And you’re right. I need a couple of days to rethink all this, see how it feels.”
“Do you also need a date with Jay?”
“Yeah.” She whooped, and I shut her down with a stern warning. “I’m making it very clear to him that it’s a strictly fun thing.”
“Which is exactly what you need. And I need to grade some midterm exams before I drown in them. If you ever don’t hear from me for more than two days, I’ve been suffocated under a pile of tests.”
“Speaking of that. You’re a workaholic. You need to breathe. Did Jared call?”
A long silence met me.
“Sophie? That means yes and you don’t want to talk about it.”
“You’re right.”
“Really? Dang. He seemed like such a good fit for you.”
More silence.
“Uh-huh. What else aren’t you telling me?”
She cleared her throat but didn’t say anything.
“Sophie! You talked, and it was really good! And you don’t want to tell me because I’ll nag you even more about laying off of work! Yay!”
“If you know everything I’m going to say, why am I even on this phone call?”
But it wasn’t enough to deter me because I could hear her trying not to laugh. “Details! Now.”
“I don’t have a lot. We talked for an hour. I haven’t had a long phone conversation with a guy in forever. It’s always texts about when or where we’re meeting. And it was pretty fun.”
“So when are you going out?”
“I don’t know! Neither of has time this week, but I have a feeling we’ll talk again soon.”
“I want a turquoise bridesmaid dress.”
“Shut up,” she said, and we hung up laughing.
I dithered for a few more minutes, but finally I sent Jay a message. “Dinner tomorrow sounds good.”
When Will texted me to come over and watch game six of the World Series with him the next night, I wasn’t sure if I was sorry or glad that I couldn’t do it. But a big part of me was glad I didn’t need to sit beside him for three hours acutely tuned into every breath he took, like that creepy old ’80s song. Being away from him let me breathe more freely.
And I was even less sorry once Jay and I sat down to dinner. It was a fun night. He was easy to hang out with. He’d picked a steakhouse for dinner, and the TVs in the corners showed the game, although the sound was off. He entertained me by providing the commentary, only it had nothing to do with the actual game. He narrated made-up thoughts the players might be having about whether they were developing some serious hat hair and if they should have worn their man-Spanx under their uniforms.
It helped that he was cuter than I’d remembered. His hair was a warm dark blond and long enough to curl but not to raise eyebrows in a professional setting. The tips of his bangs brushed the top of his eyebrows, which framed dark-brown eyes. They reflected his intelligence and crinkled when he smiled. They crinkled a lot, and when his mouth got into the act, his teeth were white and almost straight except for a slightly crooked canine, which made his smile mischievous.
At the end of the night, I was kinda sad our date was ending. But not sad enough to invite him over. Definitely sad enough to say yes to another date so I wouldn’t have to be sad anymore about dinner ending.
Wednesday night I told Will when he called that I couldn’t hang out with him because I was hanging out with Sophie. He sounded miffed, but that was probably because he’d wanted me to keep him company while he did laundry, something we did together often. I went over and helped her with her grading, organizing and alphabetizing the huge stacks so she could put them into her computer faster, all the while doing a dramatic reenactment of my date with Jay.
“He sounds hilarious,” she said. “Can he be my future husband too when you’re done with him?”
“Definitely.”
“I really like this system,” she mused, pulling another stack of papers toward her.
“Alphabetizing? It’s revolutionary.”
“Ha. No, I meant the thing where you go out with dudes first, and then I can decide which ones I want to take a crack at. It’s a totally efficient filtering process.”
I snorted. “For you!”
“Right. That’s what matters here, isn’t it?”
I smacked her and kept on alphabetizing.
But Thursday when Will texted, I didn’t have it in me to reply, mainly because a migraine had climbed into my skull and started excavating it, concentrating especially hard on hollowing out the area behind my right eye. The spots had appeared when I was halfway home from work, and the nausea had hit as I’d unlocked the door. I’d made it to my guest bathroom and thrown up twice, then crawled out into the dim hallway and lain there, my phone chiming every five minutes in the pocket of the jacket I couldn’t even move to take off. I didn’t want to pick my head up again or I’d puke.
That was the only thing that kept me from banging my hard head against the floor over and over again. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I only got migraines when I was dehydrated. I always remembered to drink plenty of fluids when I was running, but the past two days had been really busy with nonrunning stuff, and sometimes it didn’t occur to me that I still had to hydrate.
Normally it wouldn’t be a big deal because Will always made me drink a whole bottle of blue stuff when I was at his place for this very reason. And now, I wanted to die because I hadn’t remembered to flip the faucet on and save myself from this misery.
My phone chimed again. Third text from Will. That meant it had been fifteen minutes from the first one. He did it sometimes to be funny until I answered him, but there was no way I was shifting to get the phone and igniting my brain with lightning. A few minutes later I heard him outside my apartment.
“Hannah? Why is your door open? Hannah, are you okay?” he said, already inside. “Hannah?” His voice was urgent, and I could hear him moving from the living room. “Hannah!” he yelled when he saw me, and I winced in pain at the volume. He dropped down beside me, his hands moving over me, shaky but determined, his voice tense and low. “Talk to me. What’s wrong?”
I swallowed. “Migraine,” I whispered, and a tear slipped out, even though my eyes were closed.
He bit back a curse and immediately took his hands off me, knowing that jostling me would make it worse. “It’s okay, Hanny. I’ve got you. Just tell me why you’re on the floor. Did you fall? Did you bump your head?”
“Nausea,” I whispered.
“Okay,” he said, his voice calmer. “Hang in there. I’ll fix this.”
He rose and stepped over me into the bathroom, rummaging through my medicine cabinet until he turned
up an over-the-counter migraine medicine. “I’m going to go get one of my Gatorade bottles with a sport cap so you can get some water to wash these down without sitting up. I’ll be right back.” I heard him flipping the blinds in the living room to keep any light from leaking into the hall. Then I heard his retreating footsteps, and not even two minutes later, he was back at my side.
“Drink this,” he said.
I couldn’t. I couldn’t even tell him no. A tiny protest came out of my throat, and even that hurt, a new cymbal crash behind my eye.
“Hanny, sweetheart, I know this hurts, and I know the pain sucks, but we have to make this go away. You need water and some painkillers. Just drink enough to swallow these pills, and when they kick in enough that you can pick your head up without vomiting, we’ll get the rest of the water down.” Cool plastic touched my lips, and his voice stayed low and soft, coaxing. “Come on, sweet girl. Just sip. Please.”
I took a few swallows.
“Good. Now we’ll do a couple of pills.” He held one up to my lips, and I tightened it, instinctively rejecting the chalky taste I hated. He stroked his thumb softly at the corner of my mouth, like I was a baby he was tickling into a smile. “I know this is hard. But you have to. You need to feel better. Come on. It’ll be down before you know it.”
I opened up, and he popped the pill in, following it with the water bottle, and when that stayed down, he coaxed me into doing it again. His voice was so soft beneath the static noise migraines always made inside my head, but I swam through the sound to focus on his words, making the medicine go down and willing it to stay there.
When he’d convinced me to take the second pill, he settled back against the wall, his legs stretched in front of him somewhere past my head. I closed my eyes. “You can go,” I said, knowing he wouldn’t. He’d been through this with me a few times before, and I could never make him leave. And I never wanted him to. But there was something about hearing him say he wasn’t going anywhere that helped even before the medicine kicked in.
Always Will Page 12