Welcome to my latest endeavor - Boys for Breakfast. It's a complete work in progress and with a toddler, it gets very little attention. I'll let you know when I update, though! :)
xo, B.
Chapter One:
I tugged my luggage down the street in a foreign town and in a rain that didn’t seem to ever want to stop. My heels clacked on the cracked and broken sidewalk, and my once perfect hair smelled of airplane and mousse and was hanging lifelessly around my shoulders. My white trench coat – once a perfect choice, chic and oh so smart – now only showed every single speck of mud that I had crossed through on the way to my destination.
Why he had to live so far away from the ever loving airport was beyond me … especially when he traveled as much as he did. Between the train and the walking? This was obviously serious love.
My suitcase was heavy.
My umbrella was most assuredly not keeping the rain off my shoulders or even the wind out of my face.
My freshly brushed in the airport bathroom teeth chattered.
I checked the address on the building I was passing. Almost there.
I kicked myself yet again for not taking a cab, but it hadn’t been raining when I stepped out of the train station, and I was always game for a walk in a new city.
That was before I realized that I had packed 800 pounds of silk shirts and foundation.
That was before I realized that in Spain? Rain is like little pellets of crappy.
Finally, finally, I realized I was there.
Off a main road, down a quiet street, and past six buildings – I was finally there. I opened the door, smiled at the unassuming doorman and glanced around for the lobby restroom. Once inside, I took stock of the damage.
I tied back my errant curls.
With tissue, I wiped away my running mascara.
I sprayed myself again with a free perfume sample that I had picked up from heaven knows where. With a shrug of my shoulders, I realized that hey, it didn’t smell too bad.
I untied my trench and shook the shoulders out a little. In a huff, I decided to take it off completely. I shivered a little as the cool air hit. My polka-dotted, three quarter length shirt was nothing against the crispness of the fall air.
Even in the bathroom.
Even in the heated bathroom.
Spain.
I checked my earrings.
Yep. Still there.
I checked my rear.
Yep. Still looked good.
I was stalling.
Maybe you would, too, if you had flown across the world to surprise the man you’d most recently realized was indeed worth it … after the most epic, all out, mad for months, war of an argument you’d both ever had … three months ago.
Maybe you’d stall too if you hadn’t spoken since then.
Maybe you’d stall too if it was all your fault.
I smoothed down my pants, stowed my jacket over my luggage and put my game face on.
This kind of thing happened every day, right? Women schlepped their shit all over the globe for men. Right? I accidentally rolled my luggage over my toe and winced as I walked to a bank of elevators.
He’d been living in Spain now for three months and wasn’t planning on leaving for another nine. The initial plan had been to visit him here and there, and have him visit me every now and then. We’d make it through.
That was the plan, anyway.
And then I’d royally screwed up and well ... Now I was waiting on an elevator that was taking it’s own sweet time and my armpits were starting to itch with nervousness. I could practically smell the anticipation. And it didn’t smell like my free perfume. It smelled like fear.
Almost like it happens in the movies, I was suddenly in front of his apartment door wondering how it had all happened. Of its own accord, my body convulsed and I swallowed down bile. I was precisely point three seconds away from throwing up my airplane catered dinner on the old carpet in the quiet hallway.
This was a bad idea.
This was one of those ideas that only end well in sappy romance novels, or Nicholas Sparks movies, or to anyone or anything else, but me.
This was one of those times where you should call first. Email first. Text first. Anything, but show up on the doorstep of the man you’d totally given your heart away to, and then, oh yeah, yanked it right on back on a Tuesday afternoon in the middle of a Golden Girls rerun.
I swallowed again.
I couldn’t help it, okay?
This shit was scary.
I took a big girl breath. And then another. And one more for good measure. And then, in order to not look like the scary, crazy lady stalking a closed door, I knocked. And then I knocked again.
Music I hadn’t realized was even playing suddenly stopped and I realized it was fight or flight time. My heels remained rooted to the spot. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t move. I stood there, sweating, swallowing, heart hammering.
I heard movement on the other side of the door and realized that through the peephole, I was being evaluated. I forced a smile.
Deadbolts shifted and I prepared myself.
Girded my loins.
Curled my toes.
Prayed to the gods above and clenched my suitcase a little harder. My manicured nails dug into my palm.
Shit was about to get real.
And then it happened. And I should’ve guessed, because this is the kind of movie that happens to me. The horror kind. Carrie. The Exorcist. Rocky V. Titanic on a full bladder.
A voluptuous brown haired siren answered the door in a shirt that most assuredly wasn’t hers. Her bare legs were lit up from the windows behind her and she just stood there. Staring at me, staring back at her.
“Hi,” I croaked. I took a deep breath, cleared my throat and forged ahead, smile plastered on my face like one of those maniacal clowns at county fairs that never really had the true makeup training that they needed and really just existed to scare the holy hell out of small children. “I’m here to see Locke. I must have the wrong address, though. Sorry.” I shook my head and started to leave.
“Wait, wait,” she said, calling after me in her thick, perfect and sexy Spanish accent. Of course she was Spanish, and gorgeous, and had legs for days … and wore Locke’s button ups and nothing else to answer the door.
I stopped and stood stupidly in the hallway, my trench sliding off the top of my suitcase and my purse sliding awkwardly down my arm. “I’m sorry?”
“’e’s coming,” she chirped. A sly smile worked its way across the red lips in front of me.
Oh damn it all to hell.
This is why people call first.
And then, he was there. All thoroughly mussed and handsome and everything that I thought I loved. His sweatpants dragged on the wooden floor and his old college t-shirt stretched across his broad chest.
Oh damn it all to hell.
“Scarlett?” Locke’s rough voice drifted out into the hallway, where I was still standing.
Awkwardly standing.
“Yeah. I’m so sorry. I should’ve called before …”
Before what? Before … busting the limit on my Amex? Before … packing every piece of lingerie in my drawer? Before … confidently boarding a plane bound for Spain of all places? Before … interrupting what I was sure was fantastic Spanish sex?
Yes.
Definitely before that.
“Is everything okay?” He was graying at his temples. I just realized. What a terrible time to realize that he looked as delectable as always. What a stupid, terrible time.
I cleared my throat.
Again.
“Of course. No. Everything is fine. I just … Um. Well, I just wanted to surprise you, I guess … So …”
Weak. I know.
He sucked his lower lip in between his teeth. Oh, those lips.
“So …” He drew out the so, probably in an effort to figure out what I was doing in front of him … in Spain. “So … Do you have a place to stay?”
My gaze shot to Miss Spain 2013 and indeed, I realized, I did have a place to stay, and it certainly wasn’t here.
“Yep. I do. Listen, I see this isn’t a good time. I should’ve called first. I’m sorry. I’ll just go.” I made to leave. I kicked the bottom of my suitcase, making it jump ahead of me on the padded hallway carpet.
“Ambrosia – could you just excuse us for a second? Scarlett, hang on.”
Locke stepped in the hallway after me as I mused over the fact that Ambrosia had a name and of course it was Ambrosia. I watched as she shrugged her shoulders in that aloof way that made her seem pretty much untouchable. The over-sized button up she wore slid down one perfectly sculpted shoulder. The door closed softly behind him and then suddenly, there he was, just as I had initially wanted him.
Alone.
In Spain.
Like a train, or like a ridiculously fast roller coaster ride, or like a wild horse – this was something that couldn’t be stopped. This was a whole bunch of bad wrapped up into a few quick breaths and that stomach churning nausea that is typically only caused by bad Chinese food or the bloody operations on the Discovery Channel.
“What are you doing here?” His words bit out.
Good ol’ Locke Sullivan. Always good at cutting straight through all of the bullshit … like pleasantries and I love yous.
So it was time to man up.
So we weren’t going to have chocolate churros.
And so I wasn’t going to get to sleep off this jet lag or shower off this airport smell before I was called out.
So it wasn’t going exactly according to my plan.
What ever did in my life?
I straightened up, shifted on my feet, righted my suitcase. Finally, I looked him in the eye. “I was wrong,” I said simply. “I was so wrong.”
“You’ve got that right.” Ice was thick in his words. “So you flew all the way here … just to say you were wrong? You could’ve done that on the phone, Lettie.”
“I missed you.” Stupid. I was rendered stupid with the use of his nickname for me.
“That’s about three months too late.” His brow furrowed at me and his arms crossed and all I pretty much wanted to do was feel that five o’clock shadow rub down my neck. “You should’ve called before you got on that plane.” Accusation was running rampant in this hallway.
“Yep.” Bitterness coiled deep in my belly as I thought of Ambrosia in Locke’s shirt. “It took me about two seconds to realize that when Ambrosia opened the door. You sure get on fast …”
Stop it right now, I chided myself. Things were definitely headed in the wrong direction.
“Where I get on, or off, for that matter, is no longer any of your business. YOU made that perfectly clear.” He leaned up against the wall and even though I was all bitter and angry and six shades of jealous, I still wanted to climb up him.
For the record, I thought he’d fight a little for me.
Which is why, for the record, it took me three months to get my ass in gear to apologize.
“You’re right. I came to apologize.” I pursed my lips much like old librarians who get pissy with noisy patrons.
He eyed my suitcase speculatively. “Looks like you came to do more than apologize.”
Observant little shit. “I hear Spain isn’t to be missed. Touring. Sight seeing. Museums and parks. You know.” Blessedly, I stopped the word vomit. I rolled my eyes at myself.
“Do you have a place to stay?” He raised his perfectly groomed eyebrows at me and something inside of me shivered.
“Yep,” I lied. I lied so hard, I kind of thought hell would swallow me right on up.
“Where?” Succinct. Totally Locke Sullivan. Bluff caller. Totally Locke Sullivan.
“Near the airport.” I lied again. I freaking lied again.
He let me off the hook, thank goodness. I don’t think he would've bought the International Holiday Inn. “How long are you staying?”
“I’m on the earliest flight out, believe me.” Of their own accord, my eyes traveled back to his closed apartment door. Ambrosia was in their somewhere. Ambrosia was in there somewhere, wearing Locke’s shirt. I hated her.
A low chuckle came from somewhere within him. “She’s just a friend.”
I could only shrug my shoulders. Of course she is. I bet she was totally wearing underwear, too. “I should go.” I’m sure I’d find my dignity somewhere back at the airport ... preferably with some chocolate churros. I pulled my trench on and tied the sash tightly across my waist. I prayed it wasn’t raining anymore. Whatever. Spain sucks.
“That’s it?” He smiled at me in that annoying way and suddenly, something inside me snapped.
I’m just a girl you know.
And girls, well … sometimes we aren’t BFFs with Reason.
“No. That’s not it. I flew all the way over a damn ocean for you, Locke. To apologize to you. After three months of radio silence, I fly over an ocean for you and then what? Ambrosia? Ambrosia?! Some kind of Spanish temptress answers your door and you’re all … you … and … damn it! Why didn’t you fight for me?”
And with a snap of two fingers, or a click of some heels, it all came out.
I would forever blame the bad airplane vodka.
His eyes were wide and he shoved his hands into his sweat pants pockets. “You made it perfectly clear that you didn’t want to be fought for.” He was grinding his perfect teeth.
I think my heart broke a little.
“I also say I don’t like pasta, but you know what, Sullivan? I eat that shit anyway.” Why are boys stupid?
Suddenly, he was incensed. Heavenly days, he was beautiful when he was incensed.
“You know what, Lettie? I’m not fluent in Girl Lingo. You want me? You’re going to have to tell me. You apologize? Fine. You want me to fight for you? Then don’t tell me that you don’t want to see me – ‘even if you were on fire and I had a fucking garden hose.’ Jesus!” He ran his hands through his already messy hair. It was longer than it had been in that space of the before. In the low light of the hallway, it almost looked black.
He had a point. I did say that.
I only shook my head. In agreement? I don’t know. Purely for something to do to fill the silent, deadly, messy void.
“You’re right.” He was right.
“Stop being all ‘I’m sorry’ and ‘you’re right’.” He banged his fist against the wall. Neighbors would surely perk up – if they hadn’t already. I’m sure we were quite the scene in an otherwise quiet hallway.
I quirked an eyebrow back at him. I was sorry, and well, he was right. This shiz was going nowhere.
“That night? The night at George’s house? It was that Christmas party? I don’t expect you to remember, but that was the night for me. The night I was all in.” I gripped my Samsonite luggage handle like it was a freaking lifeline. “You guys sat around in the living room and passed around the guitar. I knew in that moment – no one else for me.” I stared at the carpet. It had an argyle pattern with orange and black squares.
“I remember,” he said softly, his voice rough.
“And then … things just went pear shaped. Summer happened and Spain and Sonya.” I chewed my lip as I thought desperately about Sonya. She was what I was wrong about. I pretty much hated Sonya just like Ambrosia.
Locke groaned. “If I hear her name come out of your mouth one more time – I swear, Scarlett.”
Circles. We were going in circles.
“I know!” The truth was I was tired of saying it – tired of thinking it, tired of playing it over and over in my head like some sad love song on repeat.
He seemed to sense the circle. “And so, you thought you’d just hop on a plane and it’d be roses?”
I actually laughed. What was I thinking? “Well, I certainly didn’t think it would be this.” I toyed with the sash of my coat. “Listen. Really. I should go. Maybe …”
I didn’t know anything about maybe.
“Maybe, what?” He reared his head back and stared me down like I was crazy.
I was crazy. Who in the hell else do you know that would just hop on a plane and show up on a doorstep unannounced?
“Maybe this is just too far gone.” I gestured between the two of us. Somewhere inside of me, I believed it. Just a little part of me. A teensy part.
“Is that what you think?” His voice was whisper soft.
I cleared my throat. “It’s not up to me, I suppose.”
He sighed and glanced back at his door. “I, uh, I won’t be free for awhile.”
It whooshed back at me like the force of a tsunami, and I reared back on my heels. Oh. Ambrosia. “Of course,” I said shaking myself out of a haze of his whispers and blue eyes and maybes. “No, I totally understand.” This sort of fake laugh that sounded sort of hysterical came out of my mouth. From where, I have no idea.
He glanced at his watch. “She should be gone by five. I’ll come to your hotel. Text me the address?”
Summarily dismissed, I’d say. He was dismissing me. Typical. “Yea. Sure.” I turned to go, an internal battle raging so loud within me – hell no I wasn’t texting him my hotel address and then knowing I totally would – that I almost missed it.
“I’m glad you’re here,” he murmured.
Suddenly, even with the rain, the schlepping, the ruined coat, the Spanish Super Goddess … Suddenly, I was glad, too.
Chapter Two:
“Did you text him where you were staying?” My friend Laurent was in the middle of her work day at our offices in Lower Manhattan - Sampson and Scheel. We were party planners. Professional partiers … that’s what my dad called us. Sometimes, he was right.
“No.” I pirouetted across the bad carpet. “Ambroooooosia,” I drawled out, my tongue thick and still stuck on how knock-out gorgeous she was. “Mother ever lovin’ Ambroooosia.” I paced back and forth like a caged panther in my room at the Barcelona Airport Hotel.
I was wearing the socks that my grandmother knitted for me last year for Christmas and I didn’t care one bit about my raised voice that was probably carrying right on through my door and into the hallway.
“Easy tiger. Don’t forget – you did this to yourself.” She was probably sitting at her desk, rocking her chair back and forth in that annoying, incessant way she is so good at. “And didn’t he say they were just friends?”
“She was in his shirt, Laur, and I’m also going to go out on a limb here and say she didn’t have on panties.” I rolled my eyes at the tacky abstract sunset painting hanging crooked on the wall. “Ambrosia.”
“How do you know it was his shirt?” I could hear her sigh through the phone. I know what she was thinking. This sounded like Sonya 2.0.
The name, once again, felt icky in my head. “His initials were on the breast pocket.”
Laur sucked in a breath. “Sooooo tacky,” she whispered.
In my pacing, I accidentally kicked the edge of the fake wood desk and promptly let loose a stream of curse words that would make my great aunt Gertrude blush and my dad cheer.
“And her hair, Laur. It was all wavy and perfect. It was Jen Aniston on Friends – post Brad Pitt marriage, but pre-Angelina Jolie.” I sagged back against the bed.
“Post Pitt and pre-Jolie?” I had done it, I had awed Laurent.
“Yep.” I smacked the P. “Perfect hair.”
“That bitch.”
Laur and I had aspired to be two things in our lives: Karaoke stars and Jen Aniston post Brad Pitt and pre-Jolie.
“Yea. She can probably sing, too. Can’t all Spanish women? Isn’t that like a rite of passage or something? Singing Spaniards. No wonder Locke was all up in her kitchen.” I stared down at my peeling pedicure – Scarlet Red – my favorite.
“Can we cut through your papi problems for a second here, and focus on me? Savoy left again last night. Is it wrong that I was glad to see him go? He took up too much space in my bathroom. And his drawer is overflowing with man hair care.”
Savoy was Laur’s on again/off again boyfriend. Mostly, he was off again because he traveled so much, and I’m pretty sure that’s the trait Laur liked most in him.
“You gave him a bathroom drawer?” Now that was something to give me a moment’s pause. That was simply a sign of commitment that I didn’t think Laurent capable of. And then my mind snapped back to Locke and my current and devastating hatred of Ambrosia.
She rambled on and on – this time about Peter – who was coming over tonight for drinks and probably a whole lot more. I sat on the hard bed and nursed my now broken toe and broken ego.
Eventually, Laur guessed that nope, I sure wasn’t listening about Peter, and no, I didn’t know what time my flight got in the next evening. I told her I’d find a cab. Hell, I found my way to Spain. I’m sure I could find my way home from LaGuardia.
I tossed my phone onto the bed and stared out the window. I had no idea what I was even looking at. I didn’t choose this place based on the view. I chose this place because Trip Advisor said it had the best Continental Breakfast, and if there’s one thing I know about my beaten down self-esteem it was that food would somehow play a factor in my recovery.
I sighed and did this wobbly chicken dance convulsion thing that I expected to help rid myself of the nasty that was creeping up inside me. I crossed my arms and thought about that damn Sonya.
She was a secretary at Locke’s firm. She was kind of smart, kind of pretty, and kind of all over him … all the time. Her clothes fit a little too tight, her shoes were a little too small, and her hair was a little too big. She wore gold and silver jewelry at the same time, earrings that turned her lobes green, and her fake nails were just a sweet touch too long.
And Locke? Being the gentleman that he is? Being the man that always took the high road? Rose above? Locke let it happen.
And then it started to grate on me.
The cookies for no reason.
The invitations back to her place for drinks.
The fingers dragging across his shoulders for just a smidgen too long and her goopey eyes and tongue lip licking.
Frankly, I felt sorry for her on a whole bunch of levels, but I was pissed, too.
I was pissed that Locke was letting it happen.
I got really good, really fast at flipping him shit about it.
“Those from your lover?”
“Heading to your lover’s house tonight?”
“Did you tell her you have a girlfriend?”
Like needles – tiny, tiny little needles that don’t ever do anyone good, like Botox – it dug in at me. Not the fact that she was practically throwing herself across his desk. No. It was the fact that he was practically moving the paperweight to make room for her.
And then, one day when Pissy and I were so well acquainted I couldn’t shut her off anymore, I walked in on Miss Thang leaning against his desk, twirling her burnt blonde hair between her nicotine stained fingers. And for a split second, I saw it cross his face.
The bastard was eating it up with a spoon. A small spoon. But a spoon nonetheless.
And then I snapped in every unreasonable way a girl can. Ohhhh, it was ugly. There were tears – Sonya’s – not mine – and there was a whole bunch of yelling.
Then, there was the garden hose reference. Even if I was on fire and he had a garden hose – I wouldn’t want him to come near me.
How do I think of that shit?
I stormed out of that office like I knew he’d follow me.
Golden Girls was playing on the TV in the lobby and the doorman was chuckling. Funny how you can remember stuff like that.
I fought with my purse straps, tugging and yanking the errant bitches back onto my shoulder and quietly smirked. I sure showed him. Suuuuure did. I showed him so hard that he’d be calling me any minute now.
Any minute now turned into three months of ice cream eating, sleepless nights, and a drunk first class trip to Spain.
My phone beeped on my bed and I almost didn’t look.
Hotel?
I checked the clock. Ten after five. I shook my hands and dropped my phone and paced a couple of times like I was thirteen again and talking on my light up neon phone with Jeremiah Harding about going to the junior high dance. I’m not collected enough for this kind of thing. I don’t have grace, I don’t have charm, I don’t have impeccable timing, or any kind of social skills. I don’t even wear matching socks half of the time.
But I did have a mini bar.
I swung open the refrigerator door and took stock. Suspiciously, I eyed my phone on the bed over my shoulder. I’d make him wait.
I sorted through – there was cheap wine, cheap beer, cheap, cheap, cheap.
I looked on the top shelf and found cheap vodka, cheap whiskey, and cheap tequila.
I unscrewed the cap of the mini tequila and threw it back, chasing it with a couple of peanuts that I was surprised to find. Kind of the same thing as licking salt. Right? I shook my head a few times and repeated the process. The peanuts were honey roasted and the tequila went down much too easily.
Call it all liquid fortification.
Liquid courage.
Liquid stupidity.
I picked up my phone after shot two and opened my messages. Locke-Shmock.
The Barcelona Airport Hotel.
I swallowed hard and burped up a little peanut.
Be there in thirty. Room number?
Oh hell. His response was all direct and immediate and damn him.
I looked at my reflection above the fake wood desk. Early morning flight? Airplane for six solid hours? Airport again and Spanish rain? Ambrooooooosia? All conspiring against me. My hair was stuck to my head kind of like it does when I don’t shower for four days, my pants were wrinkled, and now, on top of all of that? I had peanut breath.
F the rain.
F Spain.
F Ambrosia.
And F the stupid dress pants.
312. See you then.
I have no shame. I picked up another small bottle of brown liquid that I supposed was some kind of whiskey and twisted off the top. I flipped open the lid of my 800 pound suitcase and pulled out my pajama pants. I tossed my hair into a ponytail, sunk back the whiskey and tossed the bottle into the plastic trashcan.
It wasn’t long after I had changed into one of Locke’s old shirts (obviously, handing out shirts to errant women is one of his man marks), that I found QVC in Spanish. In the middle of Paula Deen’s set on cookware, someone knocked on the door. It’s a good thing, too, because I was about to buy some bakeware that I’d never use.
I trudged – there really is no other word here – to the door, the mix of tequila and whiskey making me fuzzy. My feet felt like cinder blocks and I thought my knitted socks looked amazing. Briefly, I thought maybe it would be best if this altercation didn’t happen when I was tipsy, but then I realized – hey – things definitely couldn’t get much worse.
The door swung open and there stood Locke in all of his man finery. Of course his jeans fit him in all the right places.
I did this head-nod-thing in greeting that was totally graceful, I’m mostly sure, and opened the door for him to come in.
He looked around the room a little, seemingly completely at ease, which I hated him for, and seated himself in the fake wood desk chair. I slumped onto the hard bed. Now that he was here, and now that I was here, I didn’t really know what to say.
“What are you doing here, Lettie?”
The man never starts with the easy stuff.
“I already told you. I came to apologize.” The whiskey/tequila/peanut combination was churning in my tummy. None of this was going to end well; I could feel it in my bones.
“What were your plans after your apology?” He crossed those man hands across his chest and I really did truly try to not be distracted by those shoulders. I really did try.
“I don’t think I had gotten that far.” That part is actually the truth. I kind of thought I’d sweep me up and beg me to never leave him again. That’s how I played it out in my head – like some Harlequin romance book cover.
He eyed my opened suitcase speculatively. “Looks like you were planning on staying awhile.”
“I fly back tomorrow,” I challenged him. He doesn’t get to know that I had taken a week of vaca for him. At least now, I’d have time to get my lip waxed when I got home. I’ve been meaning to do that for weeks.
He cleared his throat in that way that he always did when he was about to drive a point home with me. Usually, it was about the finer points of Chinese food versus Italian for dinner, or the baseball game versus a walk in the park. This was so much more serious and I found myself bracing for the impact of his words. “So it was going to be an apology and then a turn around and leave? I don’t believe you, Lettie.” He chewed that fine lower lip, and then added, almost so I had to strain to hear, “I don’t want to believe you.”
Part of me thinks that I need to be in some sort of Anger Management class because of this man. “No, Locke. I was planning on staying. I was planning on you accepting my apology and figuring out a way to move forward with you … together. And then some Spanish Jennifer Aniston opens your door with YOUR SHIRT ON and she smiled that smile at me – I know that smile, too, Locke Sullivan, don’t you for one second think I don’t – and that’s when I realized it was time to change my plane ticket home.”
I sat back down and stowed away my pointy finger. When had I stood up?
“She’s just a friend.” He licked those lips and his eyes pinned me against the fake wood headboard.
“Bullshit,” I spit back.
He sighed heavily. “Did you notice the rain when you came in? The driving rain? She was caught in it – knew I lived nearby, and I let her wait it out in my apartment. While she was there, we worked on a few business related things and then she left for her own appointment at five. Nothing more, nothing less. She’s a friend.” He ran his fingers through his hair and looked at me.
“I’m sorry,” I said again, this time with an air of indifference. How many times? How many times does a girl have to apologize around here?
“I accept your apology.” He stared hard at me.
Well, then.
“Thank you.” I stared back at him. “Where does that … leave us?” I thought about the cheap wine in the cabinet. It didn’t sound so bad right about now.
He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. The way he was staring me down was maddening. Those were some bedroom eyes if I’d ever seen them. “I think that depends on you.”
On me? What? “Pardon?”
“Can you get over it? Sonya? Ambrosia? Women in my life that are just friends?” His lips popped up in a smirk.
I swallowed my urge to argue. Futile. It was futile. And hadn’t I already said my piece? Back with the garden hose? I’d be alright with not repeating that whole entire experience. “What if I said I could?”
“Then we should talk about what that means for us.”
I got this feeling from him – one that people opposite the table must feel on a regular basis. I felt like he was closing a deal. Like everything was going the exact way that he had planned it. And damn, that made me mad.
“If we were together and I surprised you at your front door and Ambrosia answered in your shirt? There would be no recovering from that – friend or no.” I crossed my own arms. I'm not an investment deal.
“Duly noted,” said with a straight face. He knew how it looked. I think. I hope.
“You liked it when Sonya gave you so much attention. Admit it.” I bit my lip. It hurt, but it also kept me from talking any more – which wasn’t a bad thing because my words were kind of slurring.
“I liked her chocolate chip cookies. I admit. Who wouldn’t?” His eyes widened.
They were good cookies.
“And?” I wasn’t going to budge. I think my stubbornness came from the churros I had on the way to the hotel. Damn they were good.
“You show me a man that doesn’t appreciate female attention.” He stood and walked over to me and sat down.
Too close.
Much too close for me to think clearly.
“You show me a girlfriend that doesn’t get possessive.” Score one for this girl.
Those blue eyes zeroed in on me and I knew I didn’t have much fight left in me.
“Why didn’t you call me?” I knew I sounded whiny. I get it. It had been killing me for three months, though. Each day I’d wake up for sure that it would be the day he’d pick up the phone. The days turned into weeks – and still nothing. Eventually, the space was just too wide. The gap too large.
“I thought I was giving you space.” His fingers found the small piece of ankle uncovered by my socks. “Don’t girls need space?”
I wanted to believe him. I really did. But I called bullshit with the roll of my eyes.
“Christ, Scarlett! I was busy! I had to get stuff together for the move here and I was mad. I was damn mad at you. You came to my office, put on this great show for everyone and stomped out. Do you know how long it took for that shit to die down? Weeks. And Sonya! Sonya doesn’t work for my department anymore. If you would’ve just said something in a logical, mature way – maybe I could’ve fixed it right away! Maybe I could’ve moved her before you told me you’d set yourself on fire before you came back to me.” He was all pacing and cranked up and I didn’t like it. I didn’t like even more that he was right.
I didn’t say once that I had a problem with her – I was just the Queen of Passive Aggressive-land.
“I’m pretty sure I apologized already.” Queen of Passive Aggressive-land and Princess of Pissy. That’s me. Someone should get me a tiara.
He sighed one of those deep sighs again and looked at me. Really looked at me. Either he was looking straight into my soul, or I had peanuts in my teeth.
“Too long, Lettie. It’s been too long.” He reached for my hand and my heart clenched and my ears roared. He brought my fingers to his lips and closed his eyes.
And that’s when I climbed into his lap and kissed him with the force of cheap tequila, cheap whiskey, expensive plane tickets, and broken hearts. And by God, Locke kissed me right back.
All of the fighting, all of the ice cream late nights, all of the stale frozen pizza for breakfast, all of the bad hair days and bad life days … all of it was worth it for just those few short seconds in the space of coming back together.
We weren’t quite all sunshine and daisies … but his lips were back where they belonged and for the first time in three months, I kind of felt like I was back where I belonged, too.
Chapter Three:
Locke spent the night.
Like I said. I’m weak.
For a moment there, I thought maybe if I just shut my eyes tightly enough, or if I sighed in just the right places, things might just be what they once were. You know, in those first few months? When everything was just perfection? Like the night we were sitting at that dining room table in Little Italy and the only thing we could think about was when we would be laying in bed together later that night? When he looked over his wine glass at me as he ordered and it felt like he was appraising me … and not the menu? When his fingers reached across the table and lightly – just ever … so … lightly … traced over my grandmother’s ring on my finger? I wore my red coat that night, and on our way home, he stopped me in the middle of a crosswalk. In the middle of the people passing through, cutting around us, and in the middle of the traffic noise, he told me I was beautiful.
Maybe if I traced up and down his back slowly enough … dragged my nails lightly enough … pushed him to slow down, to relish, to remember those first few days together …
There was a day we shared in the park. It was raining. I think we might’ve been on our way home from work, and I think I had on my yellow rain boots. I was in this big hurry. My hair was already a mop – soaking wet and my fingers were freezing. But he slowed me down, tugged at my waist, pulled me closer to him. And there, in the middle of the park – he showed me what it was to go slow.
Here in this cheap hotel room, where I could only smell the bad soap in the bathroom and could hear the icemaker in the hallway – this wasn’t the Locke I had loved.
No.
As my foot dragged up his calf, and as his lips found mine once ... maybe twice, I realized that this wasn’t him at all.
It wasn’t until the flight home, when I had completely gorged myself on bad airplane food, too many carbohydrates, and one too many glasses of wine that I finally figured out that no, no it sure wasn’t enough for me.
A girl likes to feel like she’s the only one.
Even if the other option is a girl with burnt, fake blonde hair and an ill-fitting pencil skirt.
A girl likes to feel like she’s the most important, the most sacred.
Even if the other option is the Ambrosias of the world.
A girl doesn’t like to feel like she’s just an option.
You know, I’ve determined throughout the course of my dating life that there is a certain need, on my part, to let things go on my own terms. When I couldn’t control Locke at his office with that white-trash whorebag, I went into a tailspin. For three months, I moped around and waited for him to call me.
And then he didn’t. And then, I took a chance on love and flew to see him.
And you know what? He was still the same guy. He was that guy at the party that everyone loved to be around. When the hair flopped into his eyes and he pushed it away, he was the guy at the party that every girl wanted to take home. And it didn’t hit me, you know? It didn’t hit me until I was halfway home from the airport in some dirty cab that smelled like the corner deli … olives and pickled grossness.
Locke Sullivan didn’t need me.
And that was the most freeing thought – I wanted someone that needed me. I wanted someone that needed me every single day. I wanted someone that missed me, called me, loved me. And that man wasn’t Locke.
And that’s exactly how I felt as I lugged my 800 pound suitcase back home in the dark. I felt like I was settling with a man that kind of thought I was kind of interesting, and really thought I was just easy … someone to hang on his arm at business dinners, someone to make polite conversation with at various functions, someone to moan at just the right time, sigh at just the right time, and “finish” at just the right time.
I flipped the light on in my little studio apartment in Hell’s Kitchen and turned on my Bose Soundlink. Things were going to get real … real fast.
I tossed my hair into a pony and dropped my suitcase handle inside the door. Bruce Springsteen started singing about Glory Days and I pulled my plant out of the sink. I chewed my lip and contemplated calling my mom.
For what? I mused.&n
xo, B.
Chapter One:
I tugged my luggage down the street in a foreign town and in a rain that didn’t seem to ever want to stop. My heels clacked on the cracked and broken sidewalk, and my once perfect hair smelled of airplane and mousse and was hanging lifelessly around my shoulders. My white trench coat – once a perfect choice, chic and oh so smart – now only showed every single speck of mud that I had crossed through on the way to my destination.
Why he had to live so far away from the ever loving airport was beyond me … especially when he traveled as much as he did. Between the train and the walking? This was obviously serious love.
My suitcase was heavy.
My umbrella was most assuredly not keeping the rain off my shoulders or even the wind out of my face.
My freshly brushed in the airport bathroom teeth chattered.
I checked the address on the building I was passing. Almost there.
I kicked myself yet again for not taking a cab, but it hadn’t been raining when I stepped out of the train station, and I was always game for a walk in a new city.
That was before I realized that I had packed 800 pounds of silk shirts and foundation.
That was before I realized that in Spain? Rain is like little pellets of crappy.
Finally, finally, I realized I was there.
Off a main road, down a quiet street, and past six buildings – I was finally there. I opened the door, smiled at the unassuming doorman and glanced around for the lobby restroom. Once inside, I took stock of the damage.
I tied back my errant curls.
With tissue, I wiped away my running mascara.
I sprayed myself again with a free perfume sample that I had picked up from heaven knows where. With a shrug of my shoulders, I realized that hey, it didn’t smell too bad.
I untied my trench and shook the shoulders out a little. In a huff, I decided to take it off completely. I shivered a little as the cool air hit. My polka-dotted, three quarter length shirt was nothing against the crispness of the fall air.
Even in the bathroom.
Even in the heated bathroom.
Spain.
I checked my earrings.
Yep. Still there.
I checked my rear.
Yep. Still looked good.
I was stalling.
Maybe you would, too, if you had flown across the world to surprise the man you’d most recently realized was indeed worth it … after the most epic, all out, mad for months, war of an argument you’d both ever had … three months ago.
Maybe you’d stall too if you hadn’t spoken since then.
Maybe you’d stall too if it was all your fault.
I smoothed down my pants, stowed my jacket over my luggage and put my game face on.
This kind of thing happened every day, right? Women schlepped their shit all over the globe for men. Right? I accidentally rolled my luggage over my toe and winced as I walked to a bank of elevators.
He’d been living in Spain now for three months and wasn’t planning on leaving for another nine. The initial plan had been to visit him here and there, and have him visit me every now and then. We’d make it through.
That was the plan, anyway.
And then I’d royally screwed up and well ... Now I was waiting on an elevator that was taking it’s own sweet time and my armpits were starting to itch with nervousness. I could practically smell the anticipation. And it didn’t smell like my free perfume. It smelled like fear.
Almost like it happens in the movies, I was suddenly in front of his apartment door wondering how it had all happened. Of its own accord, my body convulsed and I swallowed down bile. I was precisely point three seconds away from throwing up my airplane catered dinner on the old carpet in the quiet hallway.
This was a bad idea.
This was one of those ideas that only end well in sappy romance novels, or Nicholas Sparks movies, or to anyone or anything else, but me.
This was one of those times where you should call first. Email first. Text first. Anything, but show up on the doorstep of the man you’d totally given your heart away to, and then, oh yeah, yanked it right on back on a Tuesday afternoon in the middle of a Golden Girls rerun.
I swallowed again.
I couldn’t help it, okay?
This shit was scary.
I took a big girl breath. And then another. And one more for good measure. And then, in order to not look like the scary, crazy lady stalking a closed door, I knocked. And then I knocked again.
Music I hadn’t realized was even playing suddenly stopped and I realized it was fight or flight time. My heels remained rooted to the spot. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t move. I stood there, sweating, swallowing, heart hammering.
I heard movement on the other side of the door and realized that through the peephole, I was being evaluated. I forced a smile.
Deadbolts shifted and I prepared myself.
Girded my loins.
Curled my toes.
Prayed to the gods above and clenched my suitcase a little harder. My manicured nails dug into my palm.
Shit was about to get real.
And then it happened. And I should’ve guessed, because this is the kind of movie that happens to me. The horror kind. Carrie. The Exorcist. Rocky V. Titanic on a full bladder.
A voluptuous brown haired siren answered the door in a shirt that most assuredly wasn’t hers. Her bare legs were lit up from the windows behind her and she just stood there. Staring at me, staring back at her.
“Hi,” I croaked. I took a deep breath, cleared my throat and forged ahead, smile plastered on my face like one of those maniacal clowns at county fairs that never really had the true makeup training that they needed and really just existed to scare the holy hell out of small children. “I’m here to see Locke. I must have the wrong address, though. Sorry.” I shook my head and started to leave.
“Wait, wait,” she said, calling after me in her thick, perfect and sexy Spanish accent. Of course she was Spanish, and gorgeous, and had legs for days … and wore Locke’s button ups and nothing else to answer the door.
I stopped and stood stupidly in the hallway, my trench sliding off the top of my suitcase and my purse sliding awkwardly down my arm. “I’m sorry?”
“’e’s coming,” she chirped. A sly smile worked its way across the red lips in front of me.
Oh damn it all to hell.
This is why people call first.
And then, he was there. All thoroughly mussed and handsome and everything that I thought I loved. His sweatpants dragged on the wooden floor and his old college t-shirt stretched across his broad chest.
Oh damn it all to hell.
“Scarlett?” Locke’s rough voice drifted out into the hallway, where I was still standing.
Awkwardly standing.
“Yeah. I’m so sorry. I should’ve called before …”
Before what? Before … busting the limit on my Amex? Before … packing every piece of lingerie in my drawer? Before … confidently boarding a plane bound for Spain of all places? Before … interrupting what I was sure was fantastic Spanish sex?
Yes.
Definitely before that.
“Is everything okay?” He was graying at his temples. I just realized. What a terrible time to realize that he looked as delectable as always. What a stupid, terrible time.
I cleared my throat.
Again.
“Of course. No. Everything is fine. I just … Um. Well, I just wanted to surprise you, I guess … So …”
Weak. I know.
He sucked his lower lip in between his teeth. Oh, those lips.
“So …” He drew out the so, probably in an effort to figure out what I was doing in front of him … in Spain. “So … Do you have a place to stay?”
My gaze shot to Miss Spain 2013 and indeed, I realized, I did have a place to stay, and it certainly wasn’t here.
“Yep. I do. Listen, I see this isn’t a good time. I should’ve called first. I’m sorry. I’ll just go.” I made to leave. I kicked the bottom of my suitcase, making it jump ahead of me on the padded hallway carpet.
“Ambrosia – could you just excuse us for a second? Scarlett, hang on.”
Locke stepped in the hallway after me as I mused over the fact that Ambrosia had a name and of course it was Ambrosia. I watched as she shrugged her shoulders in that aloof way that made her seem pretty much untouchable. The over-sized button up she wore slid down one perfectly sculpted shoulder. The door closed softly behind him and then suddenly, there he was, just as I had initially wanted him.
Alone.
In Spain.
Like a train, or like a ridiculously fast roller coaster ride, or like a wild horse – this was something that couldn’t be stopped. This was a whole bunch of bad wrapped up into a few quick breaths and that stomach churning nausea that is typically only caused by bad Chinese food or the bloody operations on the Discovery Channel.
“What are you doing here?” His words bit out.
Good ol’ Locke Sullivan. Always good at cutting straight through all of the bullshit … like pleasantries and I love yous.
So it was time to man up.
So we weren’t going to have chocolate churros.
And so I wasn’t going to get to sleep off this jet lag or shower off this airport smell before I was called out.
So it wasn’t going exactly according to my plan.
What ever did in my life?
I straightened up, shifted on my feet, righted my suitcase. Finally, I looked him in the eye. “I was wrong,” I said simply. “I was so wrong.”
“You’ve got that right.” Ice was thick in his words. “So you flew all the way here … just to say you were wrong? You could’ve done that on the phone, Lettie.”
“I missed you.” Stupid. I was rendered stupid with the use of his nickname for me.
“That’s about three months too late.” His brow furrowed at me and his arms crossed and all I pretty much wanted to do was feel that five o’clock shadow rub down my neck. “You should’ve called before you got on that plane.” Accusation was running rampant in this hallway.
“Yep.” Bitterness coiled deep in my belly as I thought of Ambrosia in Locke’s shirt. “It took me about two seconds to realize that when Ambrosia opened the door. You sure get on fast …”
Stop it right now, I chided myself. Things were definitely headed in the wrong direction.
“Where I get on, or off, for that matter, is no longer any of your business. YOU made that perfectly clear.” He leaned up against the wall and even though I was all bitter and angry and six shades of jealous, I still wanted to climb up him.
For the record, I thought he’d fight a little for me.
Which is why, for the record, it took me three months to get my ass in gear to apologize.
“You’re right. I came to apologize.” I pursed my lips much like old librarians who get pissy with noisy patrons.
He eyed my suitcase speculatively. “Looks like you came to do more than apologize.”
Observant little shit. “I hear Spain isn’t to be missed. Touring. Sight seeing. Museums and parks. You know.” Blessedly, I stopped the word vomit. I rolled my eyes at myself.
“Do you have a place to stay?” He raised his perfectly groomed eyebrows at me and something inside of me shivered.
“Yep,” I lied. I lied so hard, I kind of thought hell would swallow me right on up.
“Where?” Succinct. Totally Locke Sullivan. Bluff caller. Totally Locke Sullivan.
“Near the airport.” I lied again. I freaking lied again.
He let me off the hook, thank goodness. I don’t think he would've bought the International Holiday Inn. “How long are you staying?”
“I’m on the earliest flight out, believe me.” Of their own accord, my eyes traveled back to his closed apartment door. Ambrosia was in their somewhere. Ambrosia was in there somewhere, wearing Locke’s shirt. I hated her.
A low chuckle came from somewhere within him. “She’s just a friend.”
I could only shrug my shoulders. Of course she is. I bet she was totally wearing underwear, too. “I should go.” I’m sure I’d find my dignity somewhere back at the airport ... preferably with some chocolate churros. I pulled my trench on and tied the sash tightly across my waist. I prayed it wasn’t raining anymore. Whatever. Spain sucks.
“That’s it?” He smiled at me in that annoying way and suddenly, something inside me snapped.
I’m just a girl you know.
And girls, well … sometimes we aren’t BFFs with Reason.
“No. That’s not it. I flew all the way over a damn ocean for you, Locke. To apologize to you. After three months of radio silence, I fly over an ocean for you and then what? Ambrosia? Ambrosia?! Some kind of Spanish temptress answers your door and you’re all … you … and … damn it! Why didn’t you fight for me?”
And with a snap of two fingers, or a click of some heels, it all came out.
I would forever blame the bad airplane vodka.
His eyes were wide and he shoved his hands into his sweat pants pockets. “You made it perfectly clear that you didn’t want to be fought for.” He was grinding his perfect teeth.
I think my heart broke a little.
“I also say I don’t like pasta, but you know what, Sullivan? I eat that shit anyway.” Why are boys stupid?
Suddenly, he was incensed. Heavenly days, he was beautiful when he was incensed.
“You know what, Lettie? I’m not fluent in Girl Lingo. You want me? You’re going to have to tell me. You apologize? Fine. You want me to fight for you? Then don’t tell me that you don’t want to see me – ‘even if you were on fire and I had a fucking garden hose.’ Jesus!” He ran his hands through his already messy hair. It was longer than it had been in that space of the before. In the low light of the hallway, it almost looked black.
He had a point. I did say that.
I only shook my head. In agreement? I don’t know. Purely for something to do to fill the silent, deadly, messy void.
“You’re right.” He was right.
“Stop being all ‘I’m sorry’ and ‘you’re right’.” He banged his fist against the wall. Neighbors would surely perk up – if they hadn’t already. I’m sure we were quite the scene in an otherwise quiet hallway.
I quirked an eyebrow back at him. I was sorry, and well, he was right. This shiz was going nowhere.
“That night? The night at George’s house? It was that Christmas party? I don’t expect you to remember, but that was the night for me. The night I was all in.” I gripped my Samsonite luggage handle like it was a freaking lifeline. “You guys sat around in the living room and passed around the guitar. I knew in that moment – no one else for me.” I stared at the carpet. It had an argyle pattern with orange and black squares.
“I remember,” he said softly, his voice rough.
“And then … things just went pear shaped. Summer happened and Spain and Sonya.” I chewed my lip as I thought desperately about Sonya. She was what I was wrong about. I pretty much hated Sonya just like Ambrosia.
Locke groaned. “If I hear her name come out of your mouth one more time – I swear, Scarlett.”
Circles. We were going in circles.
“I know!” The truth was I was tired of saying it – tired of thinking it, tired of playing it over and over in my head like some sad love song on repeat.
He seemed to sense the circle. “And so, you thought you’d just hop on a plane and it’d be roses?”
I actually laughed. What was I thinking? “Well, I certainly didn’t think it would be this.” I toyed with the sash of my coat. “Listen. Really. I should go. Maybe …”
I didn’t know anything about maybe.
“Maybe, what?” He reared his head back and stared me down like I was crazy.
I was crazy. Who in the hell else do you know that would just hop on a plane and show up on a doorstep unannounced?
“Maybe this is just too far gone.” I gestured between the two of us. Somewhere inside of me, I believed it. Just a little part of me. A teensy part.
“Is that what you think?” His voice was whisper soft.
I cleared my throat. “It’s not up to me, I suppose.”
He sighed and glanced back at his door. “I, uh, I won’t be free for awhile.”
It whooshed back at me like the force of a tsunami, and I reared back on my heels. Oh. Ambrosia. “Of course,” I said shaking myself out of a haze of his whispers and blue eyes and maybes. “No, I totally understand.” This sort of fake laugh that sounded sort of hysterical came out of my mouth. From where, I have no idea.
He glanced at his watch. “She should be gone by five. I’ll come to your hotel. Text me the address?”
Summarily dismissed, I’d say. He was dismissing me. Typical. “Yea. Sure.” I turned to go, an internal battle raging so loud within me – hell no I wasn’t texting him my hotel address and then knowing I totally would – that I almost missed it.
“I’m glad you’re here,” he murmured.
Suddenly, even with the rain, the schlepping, the ruined coat, the Spanish Super Goddess … Suddenly, I was glad, too.
Chapter Two:
“Did you text him where you were staying?” My friend Laurent was in the middle of her work day at our offices in Lower Manhattan - Sampson and Scheel. We were party planners. Professional partiers … that’s what my dad called us. Sometimes, he was right.
“No.” I pirouetted across the bad carpet. “Ambroooooosia,” I drawled out, my tongue thick and still stuck on how knock-out gorgeous she was. “Mother ever lovin’ Ambroooosia.” I paced back and forth like a caged panther in my room at the Barcelona Airport Hotel.
I was wearing the socks that my grandmother knitted for me last year for Christmas and I didn’t care one bit about my raised voice that was probably carrying right on through my door and into the hallway.
“Easy tiger. Don’t forget – you did this to yourself.” She was probably sitting at her desk, rocking her chair back and forth in that annoying, incessant way she is so good at. “And didn’t he say they were just friends?”
“She was in his shirt, Laur, and I’m also going to go out on a limb here and say she didn’t have on panties.” I rolled my eyes at the tacky abstract sunset painting hanging crooked on the wall. “Ambrosia.”
“How do you know it was his shirt?” I could hear her sigh through the phone. I know what she was thinking. This sounded like Sonya 2.0.
The name, once again, felt icky in my head. “His initials were on the breast pocket.”
Laur sucked in a breath. “Sooooo tacky,” she whispered.
In my pacing, I accidentally kicked the edge of the fake wood desk and promptly let loose a stream of curse words that would make my great aunt Gertrude blush and my dad cheer.
“And her hair, Laur. It was all wavy and perfect. It was Jen Aniston on Friends – post Brad Pitt marriage, but pre-Angelina Jolie.” I sagged back against the bed.
“Post Pitt and pre-Jolie?” I had done it, I had awed Laurent.
“Yep.” I smacked the P. “Perfect hair.”
“That bitch.”
Laur and I had aspired to be two things in our lives: Karaoke stars and Jen Aniston post Brad Pitt and pre-Jolie.
“Yea. She can probably sing, too. Can’t all Spanish women? Isn’t that like a rite of passage or something? Singing Spaniards. No wonder Locke was all up in her kitchen.” I stared down at my peeling pedicure – Scarlet Red – my favorite.
“Can we cut through your papi problems for a second here, and focus on me? Savoy left again last night. Is it wrong that I was glad to see him go? He took up too much space in my bathroom. And his drawer is overflowing with man hair care.”
Savoy was Laur’s on again/off again boyfriend. Mostly, he was off again because he traveled so much, and I’m pretty sure that’s the trait Laur liked most in him.
“You gave him a bathroom drawer?” Now that was something to give me a moment’s pause. That was simply a sign of commitment that I didn’t think Laurent capable of. And then my mind snapped back to Locke and my current and devastating hatred of Ambrosia.
She rambled on and on – this time about Peter – who was coming over tonight for drinks and probably a whole lot more. I sat on the hard bed and nursed my now broken toe and broken ego.
Eventually, Laur guessed that nope, I sure wasn’t listening about Peter, and no, I didn’t know what time my flight got in the next evening. I told her I’d find a cab. Hell, I found my way to Spain. I’m sure I could find my way home from LaGuardia.
I tossed my phone onto the bed and stared out the window. I had no idea what I was even looking at. I didn’t choose this place based on the view. I chose this place because Trip Advisor said it had the best Continental Breakfast, and if there’s one thing I know about my beaten down self-esteem it was that food would somehow play a factor in my recovery.
I sighed and did this wobbly chicken dance convulsion thing that I expected to help rid myself of the nasty that was creeping up inside me. I crossed my arms and thought about that damn Sonya.
She was a secretary at Locke’s firm. She was kind of smart, kind of pretty, and kind of all over him … all the time. Her clothes fit a little too tight, her shoes were a little too small, and her hair was a little too big. She wore gold and silver jewelry at the same time, earrings that turned her lobes green, and her fake nails were just a sweet touch too long.
And Locke? Being the gentleman that he is? Being the man that always took the high road? Rose above? Locke let it happen.
And then it started to grate on me.
The cookies for no reason.
The invitations back to her place for drinks.
The fingers dragging across his shoulders for just a smidgen too long and her goopey eyes and tongue lip licking.
Frankly, I felt sorry for her on a whole bunch of levels, but I was pissed, too.
I was pissed that Locke was letting it happen.
I got really good, really fast at flipping him shit about it.
“Those from your lover?”
“Heading to your lover’s house tonight?”
“Did you tell her you have a girlfriend?”
Like needles – tiny, tiny little needles that don’t ever do anyone good, like Botox – it dug in at me. Not the fact that she was practically throwing herself across his desk. No. It was the fact that he was practically moving the paperweight to make room for her.
And then, one day when Pissy and I were so well acquainted I couldn’t shut her off anymore, I walked in on Miss Thang leaning against his desk, twirling her burnt blonde hair between her nicotine stained fingers. And for a split second, I saw it cross his face.
The bastard was eating it up with a spoon. A small spoon. But a spoon nonetheless.
And then I snapped in every unreasonable way a girl can. Ohhhh, it was ugly. There were tears – Sonya’s – not mine – and there was a whole bunch of yelling.
Then, there was the garden hose reference. Even if I was on fire and he had a garden hose – I wouldn’t want him to come near me.
How do I think of that shit?
I stormed out of that office like I knew he’d follow me.
Golden Girls was playing on the TV in the lobby and the doorman was chuckling. Funny how you can remember stuff like that.
I fought with my purse straps, tugging and yanking the errant bitches back onto my shoulder and quietly smirked. I sure showed him. Suuuuure did. I showed him so hard that he’d be calling me any minute now.
Any minute now turned into three months of ice cream eating, sleepless nights, and a drunk first class trip to Spain.
My phone beeped on my bed and I almost didn’t look.
Hotel?
I checked the clock. Ten after five. I shook my hands and dropped my phone and paced a couple of times like I was thirteen again and talking on my light up neon phone with Jeremiah Harding about going to the junior high dance. I’m not collected enough for this kind of thing. I don’t have grace, I don’t have charm, I don’t have impeccable timing, or any kind of social skills. I don’t even wear matching socks half of the time.
But I did have a mini bar.
I swung open the refrigerator door and took stock. Suspiciously, I eyed my phone on the bed over my shoulder. I’d make him wait.
I sorted through – there was cheap wine, cheap beer, cheap, cheap, cheap.
I looked on the top shelf and found cheap vodka, cheap whiskey, and cheap tequila.
I unscrewed the cap of the mini tequila and threw it back, chasing it with a couple of peanuts that I was surprised to find. Kind of the same thing as licking salt. Right? I shook my head a few times and repeated the process. The peanuts were honey roasted and the tequila went down much too easily.
Call it all liquid fortification.
Liquid courage.
Liquid stupidity.
I picked up my phone after shot two and opened my messages. Locke-Shmock.
The Barcelona Airport Hotel.
I swallowed hard and burped up a little peanut.
Be there in thirty. Room number?
Oh hell. His response was all direct and immediate and damn him.
I looked at my reflection above the fake wood desk. Early morning flight? Airplane for six solid hours? Airport again and Spanish rain? Ambrooooooosia? All conspiring against me. My hair was stuck to my head kind of like it does when I don’t shower for four days, my pants were wrinkled, and now, on top of all of that? I had peanut breath.
F the rain.
F Spain.
F Ambrosia.
And F the stupid dress pants.
312. See you then.
I have no shame. I picked up another small bottle of brown liquid that I supposed was some kind of whiskey and twisted off the top. I flipped open the lid of my 800 pound suitcase and pulled out my pajama pants. I tossed my hair into a ponytail, sunk back the whiskey and tossed the bottle into the plastic trashcan.
It wasn’t long after I had changed into one of Locke’s old shirts (obviously, handing out shirts to errant women is one of his man marks), that I found QVC in Spanish. In the middle of Paula Deen’s set on cookware, someone knocked on the door. It’s a good thing, too, because I was about to buy some bakeware that I’d never use.
I trudged – there really is no other word here – to the door, the mix of tequila and whiskey making me fuzzy. My feet felt like cinder blocks and I thought my knitted socks looked amazing. Briefly, I thought maybe it would be best if this altercation didn’t happen when I was tipsy, but then I realized – hey – things definitely couldn’t get much worse.
The door swung open and there stood Locke in all of his man finery. Of course his jeans fit him in all the right places.
I did this head-nod-thing in greeting that was totally graceful, I’m mostly sure, and opened the door for him to come in.
He looked around the room a little, seemingly completely at ease, which I hated him for, and seated himself in the fake wood desk chair. I slumped onto the hard bed. Now that he was here, and now that I was here, I didn’t really know what to say.
“What are you doing here, Lettie?”
The man never starts with the easy stuff.
“I already told you. I came to apologize.” The whiskey/tequila/peanut combination was churning in my tummy. None of this was going to end well; I could feel it in my bones.
“What were your plans after your apology?” He crossed those man hands across his chest and I really did truly try to not be distracted by those shoulders. I really did try.
“I don’t think I had gotten that far.” That part is actually the truth. I kind of thought I’d sweep me up and beg me to never leave him again. That’s how I played it out in my head – like some Harlequin romance book cover.
He eyed my opened suitcase speculatively. “Looks like you were planning on staying awhile.”
“I fly back tomorrow,” I challenged him. He doesn’t get to know that I had taken a week of vaca for him. At least now, I’d have time to get my lip waxed when I got home. I’ve been meaning to do that for weeks.
He cleared his throat in that way that he always did when he was about to drive a point home with me. Usually, it was about the finer points of Chinese food versus Italian for dinner, or the baseball game versus a walk in the park. This was so much more serious and I found myself bracing for the impact of his words. “So it was going to be an apology and then a turn around and leave? I don’t believe you, Lettie.” He chewed that fine lower lip, and then added, almost so I had to strain to hear, “I don’t want to believe you.”
Part of me thinks that I need to be in some sort of Anger Management class because of this man. “No, Locke. I was planning on staying. I was planning on you accepting my apology and figuring out a way to move forward with you … together. And then some Spanish Jennifer Aniston opens your door with YOUR SHIRT ON and she smiled that smile at me – I know that smile, too, Locke Sullivan, don’t you for one second think I don’t – and that’s when I realized it was time to change my plane ticket home.”
I sat back down and stowed away my pointy finger. When had I stood up?
“She’s just a friend.” He licked those lips and his eyes pinned me against the fake wood headboard.
“Bullshit,” I spit back.
He sighed heavily. “Did you notice the rain when you came in? The driving rain? She was caught in it – knew I lived nearby, and I let her wait it out in my apartment. While she was there, we worked on a few business related things and then she left for her own appointment at five. Nothing more, nothing less. She’s a friend.” He ran his fingers through his hair and looked at me.
“I’m sorry,” I said again, this time with an air of indifference. How many times? How many times does a girl have to apologize around here?
“I accept your apology.” He stared hard at me.
Well, then.
“Thank you.” I stared back at him. “Where does that … leave us?” I thought about the cheap wine in the cabinet. It didn’t sound so bad right about now.
He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. The way he was staring me down was maddening. Those were some bedroom eyes if I’d ever seen them. “I think that depends on you.”
On me? What? “Pardon?”
“Can you get over it? Sonya? Ambrosia? Women in my life that are just friends?” His lips popped up in a smirk.
I swallowed my urge to argue. Futile. It was futile. And hadn’t I already said my piece? Back with the garden hose? I’d be alright with not repeating that whole entire experience. “What if I said I could?”
“Then we should talk about what that means for us.”
I got this feeling from him – one that people opposite the table must feel on a regular basis. I felt like he was closing a deal. Like everything was going the exact way that he had planned it. And damn, that made me mad.
“If we were together and I surprised you at your front door and Ambrosia answered in your shirt? There would be no recovering from that – friend or no.” I crossed my own arms. I'm not an investment deal.
“Duly noted,” said with a straight face. He knew how it looked. I think. I hope.
“You liked it when Sonya gave you so much attention. Admit it.” I bit my lip. It hurt, but it also kept me from talking any more – which wasn’t a bad thing because my words were kind of slurring.
“I liked her chocolate chip cookies. I admit. Who wouldn’t?” His eyes widened.
They were good cookies.
“And?” I wasn’t going to budge. I think my stubbornness came from the churros I had on the way to the hotel. Damn they were good.
“You show me a man that doesn’t appreciate female attention.” He stood and walked over to me and sat down.
Too close.
Much too close for me to think clearly.
“You show me a girlfriend that doesn’t get possessive.” Score one for this girl.
Those blue eyes zeroed in on me and I knew I didn’t have much fight left in me.
“Why didn’t you call me?” I knew I sounded whiny. I get it. It had been killing me for three months, though. Each day I’d wake up for sure that it would be the day he’d pick up the phone. The days turned into weeks – and still nothing. Eventually, the space was just too wide. The gap too large.
“I thought I was giving you space.” His fingers found the small piece of ankle uncovered by my socks. “Don’t girls need space?”
I wanted to believe him. I really did. But I called bullshit with the roll of my eyes.
“Christ, Scarlett! I was busy! I had to get stuff together for the move here and I was mad. I was damn mad at you. You came to my office, put on this great show for everyone and stomped out. Do you know how long it took for that shit to die down? Weeks. And Sonya! Sonya doesn’t work for my department anymore. If you would’ve just said something in a logical, mature way – maybe I could’ve fixed it right away! Maybe I could’ve moved her before you told me you’d set yourself on fire before you came back to me.” He was all pacing and cranked up and I didn’t like it. I didn’t like even more that he was right.
I didn’t say once that I had a problem with her – I was just the Queen of Passive Aggressive-land.
“I’m pretty sure I apologized already.” Queen of Passive Aggressive-land and Princess of Pissy. That’s me. Someone should get me a tiara.
He sighed one of those deep sighs again and looked at me. Really looked at me. Either he was looking straight into my soul, or I had peanuts in my teeth.
“Too long, Lettie. It’s been too long.” He reached for my hand and my heart clenched and my ears roared. He brought my fingers to his lips and closed his eyes.
And that’s when I climbed into his lap and kissed him with the force of cheap tequila, cheap whiskey, expensive plane tickets, and broken hearts. And by God, Locke kissed me right back.
All of the fighting, all of the ice cream late nights, all of the stale frozen pizza for breakfast, all of the bad hair days and bad life days … all of it was worth it for just those few short seconds in the space of coming back together.
We weren’t quite all sunshine and daisies … but his lips were back where they belonged and for the first time in three months, I kind of felt like I was back where I belonged, too.
Chapter Three:
Locke spent the night.
Like I said. I’m weak.
For a moment there, I thought maybe if I just shut my eyes tightly enough, or if I sighed in just the right places, things might just be what they once were. You know, in those first few months? When everything was just perfection? Like the night we were sitting at that dining room table in Little Italy and the only thing we could think about was when we would be laying in bed together later that night? When he looked over his wine glass at me as he ordered and it felt like he was appraising me … and not the menu? When his fingers reached across the table and lightly – just ever … so … lightly … traced over my grandmother’s ring on my finger? I wore my red coat that night, and on our way home, he stopped me in the middle of a crosswalk. In the middle of the people passing through, cutting around us, and in the middle of the traffic noise, he told me I was beautiful.
Maybe if I traced up and down his back slowly enough … dragged my nails lightly enough … pushed him to slow down, to relish, to remember those first few days together …
There was a day we shared in the park. It was raining. I think we might’ve been on our way home from work, and I think I had on my yellow rain boots. I was in this big hurry. My hair was already a mop – soaking wet and my fingers were freezing. But he slowed me down, tugged at my waist, pulled me closer to him. And there, in the middle of the park – he showed me what it was to go slow.
Here in this cheap hotel room, where I could only smell the bad soap in the bathroom and could hear the icemaker in the hallway – this wasn’t the Locke I had loved.
No.
As my foot dragged up his calf, and as his lips found mine once ... maybe twice, I realized that this wasn’t him at all.
It wasn’t until the flight home, when I had completely gorged myself on bad airplane food, too many carbohydrates, and one too many glasses of wine that I finally figured out that no, no it sure wasn’t enough for me.
A girl likes to feel like she’s the only one.
Even if the other option is a girl with burnt, fake blonde hair and an ill-fitting pencil skirt.
A girl likes to feel like she’s the most important, the most sacred.
Even if the other option is the Ambrosias of the world.
A girl doesn’t like to feel like she’s just an option.
You know, I’ve determined throughout the course of my dating life that there is a certain need, on my part, to let things go on my own terms. When I couldn’t control Locke at his office with that white-trash whorebag, I went into a tailspin. For three months, I moped around and waited for him to call me.
And then he didn’t. And then, I took a chance on love and flew to see him.
And you know what? He was still the same guy. He was that guy at the party that everyone loved to be around. When the hair flopped into his eyes and he pushed it away, he was the guy at the party that every girl wanted to take home. And it didn’t hit me, you know? It didn’t hit me until I was halfway home from the airport in some dirty cab that smelled like the corner deli … olives and pickled grossness.
Locke Sullivan didn’t need me.
And that was the most freeing thought – I wanted someone that needed me. I wanted someone that needed me every single day. I wanted someone that missed me, called me, loved me. And that man wasn’t Locke.
And that’s exactly how I felt as I lugged my 800 pound suitcase back home in the dark. I felt like I was settling with a man that kind of thought I was kind of interesting, and really thought I was just easy … someone to hang on his arm at business dinners, someone to make polite conversation with at various functions, someone to moan at just the right time, sigh at just the right time, and “finish” at just the right time.
I flipped the light on in my little studio apartment in Hell’s Kitchen and turned on my Bose Soundlink. Things were going to get real … real fast.
I tossed my hair into a pony and dropped my suitcase handle inside the door. Bruce Springsteen started singing about Glory Days and I pulled my plant out of the sink. I chewed my lip and contemplated calling my mom.
For what? I mused.&n