Not Pretending Anymore

by Penelope Ward

  I popped the pink M&M in my mouth before pouring some water to take two of the actual pills. Then I picked up the phone and texted Declan.

  Molly: Got the one you left in the Advil bottle. Made me smile :-)

  He responded with a photo of himself getting ready to bite into a big hunk of cheese.

  Declan: Say cheese.

  Molly: When in Wisconsin…

  Declan: You feeling okay?

  Molly: Yeah. Why do you ask?

  Declan: The Advil?

  Oh. Duh.

  Molly: Just a headache. Stressful day.

  A couple of seconds later, my phone rang.

  I picked up. “Hey.”

  “Everything okay?” Declan sounded concerned.

  “Yeah. Nothing terrible. Just visited Dad. He wasn’t feeling well, but at least he hasn’t had to be hospitalized. Now I have to go to work tonight, and it’s the last thing I want to do. I’m so tired, but I’m going to jump in the shower and push myself to go.”

  “You don’t ever call out, do you?”

  “No. I feel too guilty about leaving my co-workers high and dry at the last minute.”

  “I bet they do that to you all the time.”

  I took a moment to ponder that. “You’re right. It happens way more than it should.”

  “You’re long overdue. I think you should call out and just rest tonight.”

  I bit my bottom lip. “I don’t know if I could go through with it.”

  “Yes, you can. And I hereby declare today National No Fucks Given Day. I think it should be celebrated at least once a year. Today is that day for you. Mark the calendar to remember it next year.”

  I laughed. “And what does this holiday consist of?”

  “Whatever the hell you want. That’s the beauty of it. So take the night off. Give yourself a break. Seriously, when was the last time you called out of work?”

  “Never.”

  “You’re kidding. Never? Not even once?”

  “Literally never. I have never called out of work in my entire life—not because of sickness or anything else.”

  “Molly. Fuck. It’s time. You owe it to yourself. Do it. Call the hospital. Do it now and call me back.”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Yes. I am dead serious. I know it will be hard for you, but it’s a good exercise in putting yourself first. Sometimes that’s necessary. Didn’t that therapist you see want you to be less rigid? This is the perfect exercise for that. Now, go make the call, then take a nice, hot shower to decompress. Call me back after. I need to know you actually did it.”

  I took a deep breath in and let it out. I couldn’t believe I was considering it. If Declan wasn’t pushing me, I would never have thought to do this.

  “Okay.” I exhaled. “Okay. I’ll call them now.”

  “Good girl. I’ll talk to you in a bit.”

  After we hung up, I stared at the phone for a while, having an internal debate. But then I came to the conclusion that the longer I debated, the less notice I’d be giving my colleagues, and that was bad. So I forced myself to make the call.

  My hand trembled as I dialed the number. When my co-worker Nancy answered at the nurses’ station, I forced out that I wasn’t feeling well and wouldn’t be coming in for my shift tonight. It hurt my chest to lie. She sounded sympathetic and said I must really be sick if I was calling out, because I’d never done so before. I didn’t say anything in response to that, because I couldn’t lie any more than I already had. I simply thanked her and hung up. But after, I felt…a small sense of relief.

  I took the long, hot shower Declan had suggested. I probably didn’t need to shower now that I wasn’t going in to work, but he was right. It did relax me, and by the time I got out, I no longer felt as guilty as I had before.

  After I dried myself off, I dialed Declan back.

  He answered, “Have we lost all our fucks yet?”

  “We have. Or at least we’re trying to. It’s done. It was very uncomfortable for me, but I feel a lot better since I showered.”

  “Woohoo! Welcome to the dark side.”

  I chuckled, twirling a piece of my wet hair. “What’s next?”

  “You’ve got the entire night off. The possibilities are endless.”

  I knew Will was working at the hospital tonight. He’d probably text me as soon as he realized I’d called out to see if I was okay. Would I lie to him, too? I suppose I could be honest and tell him I wasn’t really sick, just needed a mental break. That was the truth.

  There was a knock at the door.

  “Hang on. Someone is at the door.”

  When I opened, I found a delivery man standing there. “Delivery for Molly?”

  I narrowed my eyes. “I didn’t order anything.”

  “I did,” Declan said in my ear.

  My jaw dropped. “Declan, you what?” I took the bag from the man and ran to get my wallet, but he held his hand out. “Tip is taken care of.” He nodded. “Have a great night. Enjoy.”

  The smell of marinara wafted in the air. I knew that smell. This food was from my favorite Italian place down the street.

  “How did you manage this? I didn’t even know Nonna’s delivered.”

  “I called while you were in the shower. And…well, they deliver if the owner’s daughter has a crush on you.”

  “Ah.” I felt a twinge of jealousy and shook my head to ward it off.

  “I knew you’d sit around for hours debating what to eat. So I made it easy. It’s not my gnocchi, but it will have to do. Besides, I couldn’t find any place fast enough that delivered breakfast for dinner.”

  “I’m too spoiled with your French toast anyway. No one could top it.” I sighed as I opened the bag and took out the aluminum containers. In addition to the gnocchi, he’d ordered me cheesecake. “Declan, seriously, this was so sweet of you. I can’t even—”

  “Okay, so dinner’s sorted. No Fucks Given Day is in full effect. Now we have to figure out the rest of your night.” He paused. “I assume you want to be alone if you’re not feeling great?”

  He might have wondered whether the man I was dating would be coming over. Declan never asked how things were going with Will, so I never offered the information. Did it bother him? There were things I avoided asking him too—like if he’d met anyone or screwed anyone since arriving in Wisconsin. Perhaps he was aloof with me because he didn’t want to share what was going on with him.

  “Will is working tonight,” I reported.

  “Ah. Good. Okay. Well, I can’t be there to keep you company either, of course, but I can still provide compelling dinner conversation.”

  I smiled. “That sounds perfect.”

  Declan stayed on the phone with me for over an hour while I ate the delicious dinner he’d ordered. While we’d talked briefly a few times a week since he’d gone, I hadn’t spent this kind of time with him in a while. And it made me really miss him.

  After we got off the phone, I was on my way to my room when I took a little detour, instead opting to enter Declan’s room and lie in his empty bed. To my surprise, even though he’d been gone a month, his sheets still smelled of his cologne. I hugged his pillow and nodded off, feeling rested and truly cared for.

  ***

  Later that week, Will visited my apartment for the very first time. You’d think in all the weeks I’d been seeing him, he would have come by at least once. But I’d never suggested it while Declan was living here, and I’d done a great job of avoiding the situation like the plague. So him coming over was long overdue.

  When I opened the door, Will looked so handsome and held a huge bouquet of flowers. He handed them to me before pulling me into a hug. “Hey, gorgeous. How are you?”

  I sniffed the arrangement of lilies and hydrangeas. “I’m good. Thank you so much for these.”

  “Well, this is a pretty big occasion, finally getting to see your apartment.” He looked around. “Nice place.”

  “Thank you.” I walked over to my
sink and pulled a vase from under it.

  Will leaned against the counter as I arranged the flowers. “You said your roommate recently left, right?”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat. Will obviously never knew my mystery male roommate and Declan were one and the same. I hated lying to him, but I couldn’t risk admitting everything now.

  “Yeah… He left, and now I have to find someone else. But he paid the rent through the end of his original commitment, so I still have a couple of months before I have to find someone.”

  “Well, this will be a nice break from having to share your space,” Will said as he continued to scope out the place.

  “I definitely prefer living alone, but finances mandate that I have a roommate.”

  Will flashed a sympathetic look. “I get it. It’s expensive to live in the city, and this is a nice place in a great neighborhood. Before I paid off my student loans, I always had to have roommates, too.” He smiled. “In any case, I’m happy to have you all to myself tonight.” He reached out to draw me close. “Come here.”

  I thought he was going to kiss me, but instead he flipped me around and placed his hands on my shoulders.

  “What are you doing?”

  “You seem tense. I want to help.” He began to massage.

  I closed my eyes and relished the feel of his strong hands on my neck and then my back. I thought about how lucky I was to have these hands on me; they brought life into the world almost every day, and now they were taking a break from that just to make me feel good.

  “You know what sucks?” he asked as he continued to rub my shoulders.

  “What?”

  “I really wish I could cook. I have this urge to make you dinner tonight—to take care of you—but I can’t cook to save my life.” He lowered his hands and circled his knuckles against my lower back.

  It felt damn good. I closed my eyes again. “You have so much going for you as it is. If you were a great cook on top of everything else, that would almost make you too good to be true.”

  He laughed. “I don’t know about that.”

  “I do.”

  “I have an idea,” he said, turning me around to hold me. “How about we order from that great Italian place down the street, and I’ll pretend I made it? I’ll serve it to you.”

  My face felt momentarily hot. Food from Nonna’s reminded me of my remote dinner with Declan. Not sure why I felt guilty, but I did. But that was silly. I needed to just enjoy this moment.

  “I think that sounds amazing,” I finally said.

  When Will left to go pick up the takeout, I used the bathroom and refreshed my makeup. I put on some of Will’s favorite jazz music, and as the minutes passed, I began to feel excited about his return.

  After he got back, Will plated our takeout, insisting that I let him cater to me while I sat at the table.

  “Why are you being so nice to me tonight?” I asked.

  “Because I know you’re under a lot of stress, and I want to take your mind off it,” he said as he used tongs to scoop out linguini. “I work so much, and our schedules don’t always match up, so I need to take advantage of any opportunity I get to show you how much you’re starting to mean to me.”

  That made me feel warm inside. “You’re starting to mean a lot to me, too.”

  Will brought our plates over to the table. “Wine with dinner, right?”

  “I would love some.” I stood. “I can open it.”

  He held out his hand. “No, I’m serving you, remember? Let me.”

  He walked over to the counter and took two bottles of wine he’d purchased out of a paper bag.

  “I wasn’t sure if you’d be in the mood for red or white. So I bought a sauvignon blanc and a cabernet.”

  “White is great.”

  “You got it.” He winked.

  I pointed. “Opener is in the second drawer to the left.”

  Will grabbed the opener and took out two of my nicer wine glasses. Those were the ones I reserved for guests, so I supposed it was fitting to use them tonight.

  “Huh,” he said, examining the glass.

  “What?”

  “There’s a pink M&M in one of these glasses.”

  My heart clenched. Declan had showed up to say hello—or maybe fuck you to Will. This evening was probably the longest I’d gone without thinking of him.

  Will put the M&M in his mouth and chomped it. That seemed wrong, symbolic in some way, like he was eating the last of my lingering feelings for another man.

  He approached with the two glasses of wine. “Here you go, lovely.”

  “Thank you.” I took a long sip.

  We listened to jazz as we devoured the delicious food. As always, we talked a lot about work during dinner.

  After, Will refilled our wine glasses before we moved over to the couch. It was relaxing to just sit with him and listen to music without having to say much.

  “Can I confess something?” I asked, looking at his gorgeous face.

  He grabbed my hand. “Of course.”

  “I used to have the biggest crush on you—before we started dating.”

  Will smiled and squeezed my hand. “I love that.”

  “It was mainly based on your looks and my admiration for how you handle your patients. But my impression of you is nothing compared to the reality. You’re a good doctor, but more than that, you’re a great man, Will.”

  “Well, see? Now I have to kiss you.” He leaned in and took my mouth with his.

  The taste of wine immediately registered as our tongues danced. Will was an amazing kisser. When I finally managed to pry myself off of him, I rubbed my swollen lips.

  He set his wine glass down and pulled me in to rest my head on his chest. He kissed the top of my hair. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

  My voice was muffled as I spoke into his chest. “I don’t know… I’m excited. Excited for the future, I guess, but also scared of the next several months in terms of my father.”

  He rubbed the top of my arm. “I think you need something to look forward to.”

  I looked up at him. “What do you mean?”

  “Let’s make a pact. If things are going well with us in six months, we’ll take our vacation at the same time and go somewhere amazing.”

  He wants to go away with me? “I can’t tell you the last time I took a vacation,” I said.

  “It’s been a couple of years for me.”

  I felt giddy. “Where would you want to go?”

  A smile crossed his face. “I’m thinking something like…Hawaii. What do you say?”

  Hawaii? Hawaii with Will sounded like a dream. But there was one not-so-little problem. I wasn’t sure I could afford it.

  As if he could read my mind, he said, “I’d be paying, of course.”

  I shook my head. “You don’t have to do that. I can save for it. I—”

  “I want to. That’s not up for debate. If I can’t spend my money on someone I care about, who can I spend it on? This will be an epic trip, and I don’t want you to have to worry about the financial aspect. I just want us to have fun.”

  My mouth hung open. “Well, I don’t even know what to say.”

  His brow lifted. “Say you’ll come with.”

  “Yes!” I sat up to hug him. “Yes, of course I will—assuming the situation with my dad allows.”

  “I don’t want you to stress about that either. If we book tickets, I’ll get insurance in case we have to change our plans.”

  Amazing. Will seemed firmly in the commitment camp tonight, and it felt like I’d won the lottery.

  CHAPTER 25

  * * *

  Declan

  I wasn’t quite sure what to do with myself.

  It was Thursday evening, and I didn’t have to be back at work until Tuesday morning. Labor Day was typically a three-day weekend, but Border’s Dairy had also closed on Friday to give their workers a gift since they’d had a record-setting year of profits. Of course, I could work through
it, like I did most weekends, but the last week or so I’d been feeling pretty down, and I figured maybe I should get out for a change of scenery. A woman in the accounting department had invited me to go to some big lake with her and her friends. She seemed nice and was good-looking enough, but the last thing I needed was to get involved with a third woman.

  Julia and I had kept in touch, and she’d been bugging me to take a trip back to Chicago for the long weekend. She’d even gone so far as to say she’d make it worth my while, which should have had me jumping at the opportunity since it had been forever since I’d gotten laid. Yet it did the complete opposite. The time away from Julia had made me realize we didn’t have a long-term future. I didn’t think about her all the time like I should have—unlike the other woman in my life whom I should not have been thinking about, yet consumed my daily thoughts.

  Molly.

  Six weeks away from her had made me realize what I felt was no joke. I’d always been a driven person—able to see where I wanted to be in six months, a year, and even five years. But since I’d left Chicago, I couldn’t figure out where to go for the fucking weekend. I could no longer imagine where I wanted to be in six months, because it was too painful to imagine that wherever it was, Molly wouldn’t be with me.

  Rather than sit in my hotel room and wallow, I decided to take a walk. There was a bar a few blocks away. Maybe I’d go in and grab a beer. The Spotted Cow had looked like an old-man’s bar from the outside, but inside, the place was filled with women. In fact, as I moseyed up to an empty stool at the corner of the bar, I realized I was pretty much the only man here.

  The bartender was probably in her early sixties. She had flaming red hair and the brightest green eyes I’d ever seen. She placed a napkin in front of me.

  “You’re not from around here, are you?”

  I hadn’t said a word yet, so her assessment wasn’t based on my accent. I shook my head. “I’m not. But how did you know that?”