“I guess you’re right, but I can’t stop thinking about getting her into bed,” I said.
“Yeah, she is a beautiful, young woman. Damn,” Ben said.
“You’re married.”
“Yeah, Becky knows I have a crush on Julie. She also knows I would never in a million years stray from the vows of my marriage. We are very secure.”
“Good for you. But we are talking about my problems here.”
“Fair enough,” Ben said. “Just stop beating around the bush already. Tell her how you feel and see what happens.”
“What if she says she isn’t interested?” I asked. “Then it becomes weird every time we see each other. She would now know that I’m attracted to her.”
“When has that ever been a problem for you? I’ve seen you flirt with and give women those horny eyes until they were totally ready for you, only to ignore them later and leave the bar. You have a power that you don’t even know anything about.”
“What are you even talking about?” I asked. He wasn’t making sense.
“See?”
“The difference is that I’m her boss. If I do this flirty thing you are referring to, I am pretty much guilty of overstepping some sort of boundaries that might make her feel uncomfortable. And then she will quit and leave. I don’t want to do that to Zoe. And I don’t want to do that to me, either. I’ve felt so much better since Julie has been around. Even the guys at work are noticing.”
“Yeah, I’ve noticed too. You do seem happier.”
I took a drink of beer and turned my attention back to the game. It was getting warmer, despite heading later into the evening. I’d asked Julie to stay later tonight and she was glad to do it. I would pay her a very nice bonus. She deserved it.
“So, you do have a dilemma,” Ben said. “I wish Becky was here. She is way better at this relationship stuff than I am. Why are you asking me?”
“I just felt that I needed a man’s perspective. Besides, hasn’t any of Becky’s wisdom rubbed off on you by now?”
“No,” he said. “Not really.”
We shared a laugh and touched our beer bottles together as we both tried to focus on the game for a few moments. But my thoughts kept churning over and over again trying to decide what I was going to do. I would see Julie that night and I knew I was at a breaking point. I wanted so badly to tell her, or I might just try to kiss her. There had been so many moments where I’d come so close and had to consciously hold myself back by excusing myself to another room to pretend to do something else. I needed this to happen. I could feel it being the next step in a logical progression.
“Shit, I don’t know what to do,” I said.
“You will figure it out. I believe the right thing will come to you when you least expect it. And then all will be right with the world.”
“You have no way of knowing that.”
Ben paused. “You’re right. I don’t.”
I laughed for a moment and finished off the beer. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen that night, but I figured it would be something interesting. Later, as I drove home, I really felt the anticipation kicking in. I dropped Ben off and then drove the six blocks to my place. As I pulled into the garage and shut off the engine I found myself feeling more nervous than I had felt in a very long time. I wanted to just march in there and declare my feelings for Julie.
But when I finally got inside the house, my mind went blank. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.
I found the place quiet with Julie sketching something on a big pad at the kitchen table. It was a little after eleven in the evening, so Zoe had been asleep for several hours. Julie looked up at me with a smile when I came into the kitchen.
“Hi,” she said. “How was the game?”
“It was ok. We lost,” I said. “It might have been one of the worst performances I’ve ever seen by our Cubbies.”
“Ah, I’m sorry to hear that. I’m afraid I don’t follow baseball that much anymore.”
“What sports do you follow?” I asked curiously as I sat down beside her.
“I love hockey, soccer, and football of course.”
“Of course,” I replied. “How was Zoe?”
“She was good. A little sad that you weren’t here to do dinner and bed time with her, but she was fine. She is such an angel.”
“Ah, don’t let her fool you. She has her days where the dark side emerges.”
Julie smiled. Oh, that perfect smile.
“I’ve seen it a time or two, mostly when she loses at a game. She can’t stand it. I’m not sure, but somehow it makes her feel fragile, like she isn’t good enough.”
“Yeah, all that started after Amanda passed. Zoe just became so guarded and so afraid of showing anyone that she was less than perfect. It’s an issue of control. That’s what her therapist said once. She saw a counselor for a few months afterwards to help her cope with things.”
“Ah, I see,” Julie replied. “Well, she is doing remarkably well overall I would say. And I think she will grow out of that eventually. Losing a parent as a child has to shake you to your very core.”
“Yeah, it does. I appreciate how understanding you are. Not a lot of people are. They just see a kid being a total brat and after a while they tend to give up on her.”
“Well, I would never do that,” Julie replied.
I could see the warmth in her eyes. She was telling the truth.
“No, I wouldn’t think so,” I said. My voice lingered a bit as my eyes met hers and we had a moment of connection. Our eyes locked on one another and stayed there, as if exchanging information on a purely emotional level without words. Yeah, that was definitely there. Wow… I could feel it vibrating through my synapses and awakening another part of myself as I broke the gaze and glanced down at the pad on the table. There was a drawing of two people walking out of a restaurant on Main Street. The level of detail was amazing.
“Wow, that is fantastic, Julie,” I said. “Where did you learn to draw like that?”
“Thanks. I’ve been doing it since I was a kid, actually. Over time I’ve just developed my own style. And there it is.”
“Well, it’s excellent,” I replied. “You paint as well?”
“Yeah, I paint and I do some sculpting also.”
“Have you ever had any shows?”
“Nah, it’s pretty hard to get a show set up, or a gallery,” Julie replied.
“I imagine nowadays you can probably make a ton of money online with this sort of stuff, right?”
“Um, yeah. You can, but you really need to know what you are doing as far as marketing. I’ve never been that great with that stuff. I don’t even have a website together anymore, but that is another thing I’m working on. I just haven’t had the time to devote to it, you know?”
I could hear that Julie felt a bit unsure of herself when she talked about actually selling her art work. I found myself wondering if she had any issues in the past that left a bad taste in her mouth when it came to actually promoting her work. I’d heard that the most successful artists were not the best, but the best at selling what work they did have. Maybe that was Julie’s problem as well. It just so happened that I knew some people who could help her. But first, this art discussion had given me another idea.
“Hey, there is an exhibit this weekend for an artist named Kyle Sheridan. I’ve heard he is a great painter. Would you like to go? Maybe grab some dinner on the way?”
Julie smiled and leaned forward slightly. She smelled delicious. “You mean, like a date?”
I hated that she put me on the spot like that, but I’d mustered the courage to say it in the first place so I wasn’t going to back down now. “Yeah, a date.”
She nodded. “I’d love to.”
I couldn’t believe those words were coming out of her mouth right then. A feeling of total warmth and relaxation washed over me for a second followed very closely by waves of tingles that spread from my toes up to my neck in a random haphazard pattern. It had ha
ppened. I’d made my interest known and secured an actual date for Saturday night.
“That’s great,” I said. “I’ll need to clear it with Katy to see if she can let Zoe just spend the evening there. It shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Fantastic,” Julie said. I could see in her eyes that she was happy I’d asked her out. I’d found a common ground, something we could connect on and have fun with even if there weren’t sparks of romance flying, and luckily from what I could tell, romance was definitely in the air.
I had a moment right then where I felt so happy that I wanted to grab her and take her in my arms, to make sweet love to her erupting with total passion on that table. But the moment quickly passed and we continued to chat a bit about types of art and what Julie hoped to accomplish with her own career.
When she finally went home a little after midnight, I worried about her. I wanted to call her to make sure she got home safely, but I did no such thing. I had taken the first step, but there could be no moving things forward at an accelerated rate. I had to just let things develop naturally.
I was no longer tired, as I had been after the ballgame. No, I was happy and a bit wired. I poured myself a few whiskeys and walked around the living room looking at the pictures on the wall and thinking that in a few days, I would be out on an actual date with this amazing woman. It had actually happened for me. And it hadn’t been weird at all.
If anything, it had been totally chill and relaxed. I asked and Julie accepted. The gleam in her eye when I asked her would play over and over again in my mind. I loved seeing that sweet look on her beautiful face.
When I finally laid down in bed later that night it was heading close to two in the morning. I began to think about how the date would go. What would I wear? Would I just let it be simple conversation? Would I put a little flirting in there to remind her that I was still romantically interested in her and we weren’t heading off to the dreaded friend zone. I’d heard nasty horror stories about that place. I couldn’t have that.
I closed my eyes and soon drifted off to sleep, where I slept peacefully for the first time in several weeks.
Chapter Twelve
Julie
I was actually out on a real date with Ricky. I couldn’t believe it. The whole thing had been set up and had happened so quickly before my eyes that I just didn’t understand what I had been so scared of before. Sitting there in Ricky’s kitchen, we’d been having a nice conversation bonding over the subject of art. He was surprisingly interested and knowledgeable about the subject, and then out of the blue he just asked me. I didn’t hesitate at all. I said yes right away. And that was it. There was no big deal, nothing weird between us. We resumed our conversation and things were easy between us.
That night as I drove home, I felt the excitement growing within me, until I was about to burst. I didn’t want to, but I knew there was no getting around it. I had to tell Tessa. So, when I got home I told Tessa the news. I thought she was going to have a nervous breakdown she was so happy. She instantly started jumping up and down and screaming for joy. I didn’t know my dating life meant that much to her. It was hilarious. She was a great, supportive friend. “Well, now we can get a bit thicker into things,” she said. “And I expect you to tell me all the juicy details about what is going on. I want you to pretend you are writing a romantic blog and describe it to me vividly. No, actually I want you to start a blog and describe everything vividly for everyone. The world must hear about this. You must give the people what...they… want...”
She had me laughing until I was almost in tears.
The rest of the week went by pretty easily. Ricky and I got along like always and occasionally we would mention our date and I could tell that the nearer that time drew, the happier he got. And so did I. It felt strange to me that it was finally happening. The buildup and suspense had been killing me for almost two weeks. Yet, there was a part of me that wished this event was still an unknown, like it had been, both because I missed that nervous excitement, and because no risk had yet occurred for either of us. There was no chance to be hurt, or to look foolish.
But now it was here. We were at the art exhibit together and so far it really just felt like it was very natural. Ricky picked me up at my place and from the moment he did, everything was fun and easy. We just got along so well and we’d built up a decent level of rapport already during the past few weeks that I’d been working for him. Maybe that was it. In a way, it just didn’t feel like a first date at all. It felt like we already knew each other so well.
When we first entered the exhibit, I was very impressed with the display and the showmanship of it all. I’d been to many exhibits in the past and most of them were more or less the same, but here at the Artist Corner, which was a relatively new gallery, you immediately felt like you were entering something special, a wonderful world where you were destined to have a very unique experience.
When we first walked in, there was a man dressed in a sleek, white suit holding a glass of champagne. He tipped his head slightly and handed us each a glass of bubbly as he welcomed us into the exhibit. After taking the champagne, we entered under an archway that appeared to be gold, or at least gold plated. It was metallic, but the glittery sheen lit up the entire entranceway. I couldn’t help looking up at it as I walked past. It was beautiful, yet disorienting.
“Wow, this is really something,” Ricky said. We were coming out of a narrow hallway into the main room. Inside this main room was a setup of about thirty paintings, all arranged around the perimeter of the room with a few rows in between. Music that was almost too loud poured from the speakers bolted on the rafters of the high ceilings and I suddenly felt like I was actually inside of some sort of nightclub.
“Yeah, it’s intense,” I agreed. I sipped my champagne. It was sweet and delicious. “I wonder how expensive this champagne is.”
“It’s probably the cheap stuff,” Ricky replied. “But you know, I’ve had the good stuff and the cheap junk, and I really can’t tell the difference. I’m not sure if that makes me unenlightened, or if I’m just not falling for their marketing scheme.”
“I would say the latter,” I replied teasing him. “But truthfully, I can’t tell the difference either.”
Ricky laughed. We came to a painting that struck my fancy and I had to stop to look at it. It showed a man’s face twisted into some kind of rage as he screamed into a tunnel that was totally dark, but at the end was filled with a rainbow of light with a car’s headlights in the center of the circle.
“What do you think this one is supposed to be saying?” Ricky asked.
“It can’t just be an odd picture?” I joked. “Does it all have to have some special meaning?”
Ricky adopted a stuffy art critic’s demeanor. “I’ve always heard that they do and it’s our job as purveyors of fine art to come up with some kind of a fancy and deeply insightful explanation for the artist’s bared, tortured soul. And it means something different to everybody. What do you think?”
I laughed at Ricky’s assessment. He was being cheeky, but he was more or less right. “Well, I always like to think that the artist had a specific statement in mind, but as an artist myself I know that sometimes it really is just an image that comes to mind out of nowhere. We sit down and try to recreate what we are seeing in our minds, but afterwards what it really means is open to anyone else’s interpretation.”
“Interesting,” Ricky said. “I feel privileged amongst the other patrons tonight to have an actual artist viewpoint on things.”
I felt myself blushing slightly. “Thanks,” I said. “Any unique things that you want to know, just ask. But I should point out that I’m just one artist and I can only attest to my own viewpoints and what works for me. This artist may be completely different. It’s quite possible that they meant something very specific with this piece, some unique statement, or they may have nothing to say with each piece they do. Everyone works differently.”
“I’ve always wanted to do s
ome art, but I’m just not that talented,” Ricky said. “I can’t draw, paint, sculpt, or anything really. Although I did write some songs back in high school.”
“Well, there you are. That’s definitely artistic.”
“They were not good,” he laughed.
“That’s open to interpretation,” I said. “If they accomplished what you wanted them to and they said what you wished them to say, then they were good. Whether they were commercial sounding or had a high entertainment value for the masses, that is open to debate. You should never let such things stop you from creating. That’s what art is really all about. And no matter what, if it is honest, you will always find an audience for it.”
“I see,” Ricky said with a warm smile. I could tell he loved to hear me speak about artistic expression, which is the thing that I am most passionate about. His eyes would light up a little, his facial expressions would soften, and I could really see that hint of pain that was always present disappearing for a brief moment.
We sauntered over to another painting. It was a bit more abstract. The top of the canvas was layered with what appeared to be a serene landscape. It was a cabin by a small lake, with a large, silver moon looming behind it that covered everything in shadows and greyish light. It was peaceful and serene, the type of place you would love to go get away for a while from everything.
The bottom half of the canvas was a picturesque sunset, but it was drawn upside down with lines of pink and various shades of reds bleeding together as they tried to run from the canvas. The two images merged together to create something beautiful. I found it very peaceful.
“And what do you think about this one?” I asked.
Ricky looked at the painting for a moment. I could tell he was really gathering his thoughts. He rested his hand on his chin and peered into the painting deeply, squinting his eyes as he shifted his gaze from the bottom to the top and then back again.
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