The After Wife

by Summers, Melanie

  I walk out of her room and sit down on the small built-in couch to read. But instead of opening my book, I think about the little girl who probably fell asleep in about ten seconds flat. She is the best reason I can come up with to take things with Liam at a tortoise-slow pace. Yes, doing nothing is the best thing I can do for all three of us.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.

  ~ Andre Gide

  I’ve been giving love a lot of thought lately, and I’ve come to some undeniable conclusions. For example, the difference between falling in love when you're twenty versus falling in love when you're forty is that when you're twenty, you're a lot more willing to compromise. You’re so desperate to make it work, you’ll do or give up almost anything. When you're forty, however, and you've been through what I have, you understand what giving up parts of yourself really means, and you're no longer willing to do it. It’s got to be a ‘here I am, take me or leave me’ sort of thing for both parties. That way, if it doesn’t work out, or your significant other doesn’t happen to outlive you, you still know who you are and are happy to live with her.

  At this age, you also understand the importance of using logic as well as lust to make your decision because you've given your heart away and lost it once already, so you know what that truly means. Now, I'm not saying I'm definitely in love with Liam, because I may not be, but on the other hand, I might be. So, if I am going to consider starting all over again, I'm going to do it right this time. Which, in my case, means knowing who I am, what I love, and precisely what I am unwilling to compromise.

  To that end, I have started a list of things I love. This isn't one of those ‘Must Have’ lists in which any potential mate must either match up perfectly or he’s out. It’s more like things that I will unreservedly continue to enjoy after any type of commitments are made.

  I like going to kitchen parties. I like the music, I like the desserts, I like the beer. So, instead of pretending I don’t, I’m going to start going to them as often as possible (like tonight).

  I have no idea what I am to Olive, technically, but I like her almost more than anyone else I know, and I want to do whatever I can to make her life better for as long as possible. (Total deal-breaker should Liam and I crash and burn, but remain friends, and I find someone else.)

  I like Cheetos better than popcorn, and sometimes I like Cheetos for supper. (Actually, this one is a deal-breaker, so now that I think of it, this list may be one of those awful “Must Have’ lists.)

  I love to dance around the kitchen while listening to cheesy pop songs, folk music, up-tempo, classical, and the occasional jazz tune. (And I suppose this is a bit of a deal-breaker, because I want to be with someone who will dance along with me, or at the very least won't look at me like I’ve grown a third boob.)

  I love Indian food—butter chicken, coconut rice, as much naan bread as I can get, and a nice cool mango lassie to wash it all down. (Not a deal-breaker because I can happily eat it alone.)

  I love spending an entire day doing nothing but reading—especially when it rains, but also when it's too hot to do anything else. Or when it’s bitterly cold outside and I have a mug of hot tea. Or when it’s evening. I guess I just love to read. (Deal-breaker, but only if a man made a habit of interrupting me.)

  I like the fact that I'm making a list because it means I love myself.

  Liam will finish with the house at the end of this week, and although it’s going to be a massive relief to have the entire place finished, it’s also scary because it means that I may have to up the pace of ‘finding Abby,’ so as not to wait so long that I lose Liam in the process. There’s such a thing as waiting too long, according to Lauren, who gave me the ‘I knew you’d overthink this’ speech, followed by the ‘do you know how hard it is to find a good man when you’re over forty?’ speech. I told her that no, I didn’t, but neither did she. That seemed to shut her up.

  But she’s not wrong about the fact that I don’t have an endless amount of time to either make my move or forget about it forever. Because of this, it may be prudent to test the waters a little with my potential friends-to-lovers romance. And what better place to do that than at the pub?

  As soon as I walk in, I spot Liam. His eyes light up and he points to the chair he’s saving next to his. I walk over, not even bothering to hide my smile. As I wind my way through the crowd, I remember the first time we saw each other and how repulsed he seemed. Huh. That’s not exactly what we in the romance industry would call a compelling ‘lovers meet’ scene. It would have been much better had he stared just a little too long, or had we actually spoken that evening, if he’d have mixed up his words or looked down at me with a sexy grin while he rubbed the back of his neck. But seeming to be horrified? That’s not exactly a good sign.

  Instead of immediately sitting with Liam, I give him the ‘can I get you a drink’ gesture. He shakes his head and points to the pint in front of him, so I head over to the bar, where Peter is preparing a tray of drinks

  “Hey there, Abby! You finally decided to grace us with your presence,” Peter says.

  “I did. Turns out people aren’t as bad as I thought,” I answer with a grin.

  “Beer?”

  “Let’s go with something stronger this evening. Long Island Iced Tea, please.”

  “Sure thing, I’ll bring it over to you.”

  “That’s okay. You’re busy. I can wait here.” I need a minute to possibly rethink the flirt test to see if the Liam waters are warm.

  “It’s my job. Now go sit down before someone else takes the spot Liam’s been saving for you for the last twenty minutes.” He gives me a wink.

  Of course. I wind my way through the crowd at the bar, stopping to say hello to everyone I know, which allows me to stall, but doesn’t allow me to think. Screw it, I’ll have to wing it and see what happens. As long as I don’t do or say anything irreversible, I’ll be okay.

  When I take my seat next to him, Liam says, “Finally. Do you know how many women I’ve had to fight off so you could sit here?”

  “Like, one?” I ask with a grin.

  “Okay, so that’s a pretty accurate guess,” he admits. “Eunice is here alone tonight.”

  “Where’s the mayor?”

  Leaning into my ear, Liam mutters, “Give it a minute, she’ll tell you.”

  His breath tickles my neck and I laugh a little harder than I should.

  Peter walks over with a tray of drinks. He puts mine down and waggles his thick eyebrows. “So? You two finally saw the light?”

  I’m about to say no, but Liam answers. “Oh, yes. We’ve been going hot and heavy for …” He turns to me and gives me a wink. “What is it, love, four weeks now?”

  “Yup.” I grin at him, then smile at Peter. “I can’t get enough of this guy.”

  I feel more eyes around the table landing on us. Liam seems to be soaking in the attention as he puts an arm around me. “We can’t keep our hands off each other. Probably leave early tonight so I can get her back into bed.”

  I nod, trying not to laugh. We turn to each other. “We should go right now, actually. It’s been over two hours.” I trail a finger down the front of his shirt, but only as far as the middle of his chest. I watch as his pupils grow large, feeling my skin warm up.

  “Has it really been that long already?” He swivels his gaze back to Peter. “She’s insatiable.”

  I force a grave expression on my face. “To be honest, I’m just using him for the sex.”

  Liam barks out a laugh, then gets it under control. “But don’t feel bad for me, I don’t really mind at all.”

  Peter narrows his eyes at us, obviously wise to us. “Couple of idiots, the pair of you. You should be shagging instead of sittin’ here. It’s like that saying about how youth is wasted on the young.”

  He walks away shaking his head, while Liam and I laugh. I try not to notice how disappointed I am when he ta
kes his hand off my shoulder.

  Liam leans in and speaks quietly in my ear. “Sorry. I hope you don’t mind me bringing you in on that joke. I just couldn’t help myself.”

  I turn, and now his face is so close to mine, our noses are almost touching. Giving him a conspiratorial smile, I say, “Don’t be sorry. That was just plain fun.”

  He turns and picks up his beer. “Good. I would have felt bad if I’d made you uncomfortable.”

  “Not at all,” I say, hoping he’ll lean back in. When he doesn’t, I have three very long sips of my iced tea. “Not a bit, really. Besides, all these Meddling Matildas deserve it.”

  He smiles, but it’s more of a friendly smile this time. “Maybe it’ll teach them to stay out of peoples’ love lives for once.”

  “One can hope,” I say, having another couple of gulps. “You know, if this were a romance novel, we’d have a fake relationship just to get everyone to leave us alone.”

  “Would we?” he asks.

  “Mmm-hmm. In our case, it would be a whole opposites-attract angle—handsome, rugged Canadian fisherman-slash-contractor falls for uptown American writer.”

  “Handsome, eh?” he asks with a little smirk.

  My face flushes so hot, I wonder if I’m starting menopause early. “I didn’t mean you. I meant a character in a novel.”

  “A handsome, rugged character based on me …”

  “I didn’t mean it. I meant if we were going to pretend to be a couple.”

  His blue eyes dance with laughter. “But you said it, and there’s no one else listening, so …”

  “Oh, I get it. You’re messing with me now, aren’t you, you bastard?”

  “It’s hard not to, you’re easy pickings.”

  “I am not easy, sir,” I say, pretending to be offended.

  “Is this our first fake fight?”

  “Yes, but don’t think we’ll be having pretend makeup sex.”

  “What a shame. I think I’d like that,” he says, shaking his head.

  A high tone flickers out of a flute from the end of the table and Liam turns from me and lifts his violin to his chin. The moment is over, and I’m glad to have a second to gather my thoughts and catch my breath again. That definitely felt like real two-way flirting. Eunice, who is sitting on the opposite side of the horseshoe, gives me a knowing smile. Oh, I have a witness. She definitely saw it, too.

  By the time the first set of songs is over, I’ve almost finished my second drink, which means nearly three ounces of alcohol have gone to my head. Liam is turned away from me talking to James Campbell, his part-time moving partner, and I find myself staring at his back and fighting the urge to reach out and touch it.

  “Hey Abby,” a male voice comes from the other side of me. I turn to see Colton, who has slid into the seat beside me. “How’s it going?”

  “Good. I thought kitchen parties were for old people.”

  Covering his mouth with his hand, he says, “I’m trying to find more clients. It’s fall clean-up time, which means I could make a lot of scratch if I hustle.”

  “Excellent. So, you’re enjoying the work then?”

  He shakes his head. “No, I hate it. It’s so boring, I want to shoot myself. But I still can’t afford to move out of my parents’ house.”

  “Bummer,” I say, then finish my drink. “Say, if you hate landscaping, why don’t you do something else?”

  “I don’t know what I want to do.”

  Suddenly, I turn into tipsy career-counselor Abby. “Well, what do you love?”

  “Gaming. Streaming videos of me gaming. Watching other streamers.”

  “Anything else, in the non-gaming world?”

  “Nope. Not really.”

  I tap my forefinger on my chin, trying to look wise. “You know what? When I was a teenager, the only thing I wanted to do was read.”

  “I don’t really like reading.”

  “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” I say, swaying a little in my chair. “Now, back to me as a young woman. The only job I could have got reading was as an editor, and editing is the worst thing in life. So when I finished school, I decided, hey, if I can’t make money reading, why not be a writer instead?”

  I give him a satisfied smile which he exchanges for a blank look. I’m tempted to knock on his skull and ask if anyone is home, but instead, I help him follow the thread to the end of the brilliant idea. “Maybe you could write games instead of playing them? That way you’d always have games you wanted to play.”

  Colton grins and nods. “I think I’d like that.”

  “Good stuff. Glad I could help.”

  He glances across the room, then says, “Oh, I should catch Eunice before she leaves. They have a huge yard.”

  With that, he gets up, leaving me to feel smug at my helpfulness.

  * * *

  Two hours later, Liam walks me home. It’s cold out and I’m very tipsy now. We’ve just bid good night to his friend Jake, the guy who gets the bluefin tuna license.

  “God, I can’t imagine fishing for tuna,” I say. “I mean the smell alone must be awful.”

  He grins at me, and I see a twinkle in his eye. “There are more irritating things than a bad smell. You should try spending months renovating some nutty American lady’s house.”

  “Oh, so I’m nutty now?”

  “You’re taking offense to me calling you nutty?” He feigns surprise. “The real insult in that sentence was when I called you American.”

  “Ouch!” I let my head snap back dramatically. “Hurtful. I thought you hosers were supposed to be so nice.”

  “Nah, we just pretend so we can get tourists to come spend a few bucks here.” He looks up at the night sky. “And so no one invades us.”

  “Solid plan.”

  Liam tilts his head to the side. “It’s worked so far. We’ve managed to get by all these years with a minuscule defense budget just by being polite and apologizing lots.”

  “Is that all there is to it? I should really take that idea straight to Washington.”

  “Could be hard to pull off at this point.”

  “Good point.” I nod, trying to look very serious. “We’d need an entire rebranding from superpower to nice neighbors.”

  “You’ll have to just study up and become a Canadian then.”

  “I just may have to. I’m assuming there are politeness exams …”

  “Yup. Every Tuesday night down at the school. They teach you all twenty-six different ways to say sorry, the top fifty situations that aren’t your fault that you should apologize for, as well as phrases like, ‘you go first,’ and ‘no that’s fine, after you.’”

  We both give up on pretending we’re serious at the same time and have a quiet laugh together.

  A chill runs up my back from the cold air. I shiver a little, and out of the corner of my eye, I see his jacket sliding off his arm, then he turns to me and places it on my shoulders.

  I pull it tightly around me and thank him, my voice taking on a ridiculously sultry tone that causes me to clear my throat. The coat smells like Liam, and I have a fleeting wish that the scent will stay on me when I climb into bed soon.

  “The nights are getting colder.” He remarks as we saunter up my driveway.

  “Yes, they are.” I am hyper-aware of his proximity to me now, and I wonder if he’s noticing it, too. He must feel it. But what if he doesn’t? What if this is just how he is with his friends, and he really is physically repulsed by me? What the hell, might as well find out.

  Swallowing hard, I say, “Liam, I’ve been wondering something. Have you ever heard of a meet-cute?”

  “Can’t say I have.”

  “Hmm, okay then. Do you think two people who meet, if one of them, say, finds the other one sort of repulsive, that he could later decide she’s not actually that gross and that maybe she’s attractive?”

  By the time I’m done rambling, we’ve reached the front steps. I turn and look up at him, only to see a confused
look on his face.

  I touch him on the chest, and say, “Don’t worry about it. I’ve had too much to drink. I’m not making any sense.”

  “No, you are,” he says, nodding. “You’re referring to the expression on my face the first time I saw you.”

  I blink a few times, glad I’m not sober.

  “That wasn’t repulsion, believe me,” he says in a low tone.

  “Then what was it?”

  “Fear.”

  We both stand perfectly still, staring at each other, and I’m pretty sure my expression is saying, ‘KISS ME DAMMIT.’ A gust of wind kicks up and blows a lock of my hair into my mouth. I pull it out, then wince out of embarrassment. “That wasn’t very sexy of me.”

  “I thought we were just going to be friends,” he says, his face growing serious.

  “I thought so too,” I murmur, tilting my head up toward him.

  He licks his lips, then seems to second guess what I think he was planning to do. Clearing his throat, he says, “You … have had a lot to drink.”

  “Yes, I have.”

  “So, I will see you into your house, and bid you good night.”

  I grin, doing my best to cover up the disappointment that’s weighing me down all of a sudden. He opens the screen door for me, then holds it while I unlock the door. I turn back to him with a toothy smile. “Okay, good night then.”

  “Good night.”

  I walk inside while he quickly descends the steps to the sidewalk. I’m just shutting the door when I hear, “Abby?”

  Opening it, I see he’s still down on the sidewalk, which means he is not about to kiss me. “Some things are best done sober.”

  My heart starts pattering about ten seconds before my brain figures out what he means. He means there’s hope here.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  You can't always get what you want...