Going Up_A Novella

by Tawna Fenske

  I stare down at him for a moment, taking in the thick, tattooed arms, the dark scruff on his chin, the broad shoulders that look like he not only carves headstones, but digs the granite from the quarry with his bare hands.

  Does granite even come from a quarry? I’m a drink slinger, not a geologist. I have no idea.

  I hesitate, then slide down the adjacent wall and stretch my legs out perpendicular to his. They don’t quite touch, but almost form the letter V. Or L. Or maybe just a right angle. I might be getting dizzy, and I wonder if I should put my head between my knees.

  “So, Lexi,” he says in a tone so low and soothing that my head stops spinning for a second, “what do you do for a living?”

  I contemplate making something up like I invented the cop husband. A girl can’t be too careful trapped in close quarters with strange men. Or in a bar with leering male patrons, which is why I wear the fake wedding ring. I usually remember to take it off, but I forgot today in my haste to pick up Bartholomew.

  Bartholomew!

  I almost forgot the furry creature entrusted to my care. The whole reason I’m in this building to begin with. Ignoring Noah’s question, I turn to the cage on the floor beside me and peer through the slats on top.

  “Are you okay, buddy?”

  Beady eyes blink up at me, and he twitches his whiskers in response. I smile as he raises his tiny paws in prayer pose before he starts to clean himself.

  “What do you have in there?”

  I look back at Noah to see him watching with a childlike curiosity. I’m starting to wonder if the guy might be harmless, after all, and the warmth in those deep-brown eyes gives me an odd little belly shiver.

  “A bushy-tailed wood rat,” I tell him as I wriggle one finger through the bars on the door. “Also known as a packrat. I’m watching him for a friend who’s a veterinarian.”

  “A packrat?”

  I nod, knowing it sounds a little crazy. “Shelly—that’s my friend—she rescued him as a baby. He was orphaned and had an injured foot, so he couldn’t be re-released. Shelly ended up keeping him.”

  Noah looks fascinated, and there’s something endearing about a big guy with such a delighted look on his face. “Is he friendly?”

  “Very. He was bottle-fed as a baby, so he’s really tame. Want to meet him?”

  Noah looks uncertain, and I wonder if he’s freaked out by rodents the way I’m freaked out by small spaces. And strange men. And—God, I’m a mess.

  “Yeah,” he says. “As long as he doesn’t bite.”

  “Definitely not.” I unlatch the door, and Bartholomew ambles out, whiskers twitching. His body is the size of a pair of balled-up tube socks with a tail, and he trots to a spot beside Noah’s boot. Glancing around, Bartholomew sits up on his hind legs to take in his new surroundings.

  “Look at that little guy!” Noah laughs, and the “aw, cute” tone in his voice tells me he’s definitely not freaked out. I remember what he said about his sister accusing him of having a soft, squishy heart. Apparently, he wasn’t kidding.

  “I’ve never seen a packrat before,” he says as Bartholomew rests his paws on Noah’s denim-clad shin and looks around. Noah holds very still as Bartholomew hesitates, then hops up onto his leg.

  “I can grab him if you’d rather not have him climbing around on you,” I say, but Noah shakes his head.

  “It’s fine,” he says as Bartholomew trots up his leg like a balance beam, then stops to inspect the button on the front of his jeans. I start to shoo him away before it occurs to me I shouldn’t reach for a stranger’s crotch.

  “Is it okay to pet him?” Noah asks.

  I nod, and my mouth goes a little dry as Noah strokes one massive palm down Bartholomew’s back. It must feel good, because the packrat gives a happy little shudder and settles in.

  Noah laughs. “He’s so soft. What do packrats eat?”

  “Seeds and berries, mostly,” I tell him, grateful he’s not weirded out about this. “Blueberries are his favorite. And mushrooms.”

  Noah smiles down at Bartholomew, who has had enough petting and scuttles out from under Noah’s palm. The packrat parks himself on Noah’s broad thigh and sits up to begin his ten-thousandth bath of the day. He starts by washing behind his ears, and it’s pretty much the cutest thing ever.

  I glance at Noah to see him smiling, and there’s a rush of warmth in the center of my chest. When Noah looks up at me again, a funny little bolt of energy shoots from my spine to my fingertips.

  Stop ogling the guy and focus, Watson warns. He could be dangerous.

  He seems perfectly nice, Harlow counters. Just enjoy his company.

  “So, Lexi. Looks like we might be stuck here a little while,” Noah says. “Want to tell me about yourself?”

  I hesitate. Do I? In a way, it’s encouraging that he asked first instead of firing off a string of personal questions. It’s also cool that he wants to know about me instead of launching into a monologue about himself.

  Even so, I’m guarded around men I don’t know well. I learned that one the hard way.

  But I square my shoulders, determined not to be that girl. The one who’s spooked by shadows, suspicious of everyone with a penis. If I’m trapped in an elevator with a guy whose tattoos alone must have a thousand stories to tell, shouldn’t I make the most of it?

  I clear my throat. “Do you know the game Two Truths and a Lie?”

  He cocks his head to the side, a gesture that reminds me of Bartholomew when I hold up an unshelled sunflower seed. “I think so. Usually an icebreaker thing at parties and team-building stuff, right?”

  “Right.” I feel a little silly, but there’s no judgment in Noah’s expression. He’s looking at me with undisguised interest, so I keep going. “You share three things about yourself. One has to be a lie, and the other two the truth. The other person has to guess which is which.”

  He looks thoughtful for a moment. “Okay. Do you want to go first, or should I?”

  “How about you go?” It’s partly that I need time to think of something, and partly that I’m genuinely curious about a guy who’s built like The Rock but is presently stroking a small rodent with the gentleness of a doctor soothing a scared kid.

  “Okay,” he says. “I blew out my knee playing college football and had to quit my senior year. That’s number one. Number two, I went to law school. And number three, I have severe herpetophobia. That’s a fear of snakes, not herpes.”

  I give an unladylike snort laugh, which makes him smile. I study his face, trying to get a read on which item was the lie. I know nothing about him except what I’ve observed in the last ten minutes. There’s something thrilling about that.

  “Okay,” I begin, crossing one leg over the other. It sends Bartholomew skittering off Noah’s knee and back in the direction of the cage. Before he gets there, he seems to realize the world isn’t ending, so he scuttles back toward Noah and boosts himself up onto the big thigh once more.

  I catch myself smiling as I meet Noah’s eyes again. “You’re huge, so I’m going to guess the football one is true,” I say slowly, “which means one of the other two must be the lie.”

  He says nothing. Just holds my gaze without a word. Man, this guy has the best poker face I’ve ever seen. Not that lying is an admirable trait.

  I lick my lips and consider the remaining two declarations. “Those tools there don’t look like something a lawyer would use,” I point out rather unnecessarily. “So it’s tempting to go with that. But that’s what makes your second statement just odd enough that it could be true.”

  There’s the faintest flicker of amusement in those brown eyes, but no smile. Not yet. I keep my gaze on Noah’s face.


  “As for snakes, I guess that’s a pretty common phobia,” I continue, “which is why I should probably disclose that this cage actually has two compartments, and the other half holds Shelly’s pet garter snake, Cly—”

  I don’t even get the name out before Noah is on his feet, sending Bartholomew scuttling back toward the cage. I start to laugh but stop myself when I see the terror on Noah’s face is absolutely, completely genuine.

  “Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” I say, touching a hand to my chest. “That was mean. I promise there’s no snake. Here, look.”

  I swing the cage door wide, showing him the interior that holds only Bartholomew’s things. There’s a small cardboard hut with a Bartholomew-sized door, along with a food and water dish and a sparkly silver ball Shelly provided for stimulation. But no snake.

  Still, Noah looks uneasy. He settles himself back on the floor, checking first to make sure he’s not about to sit on Bartholomew. The packrat waits patiently in the corner until Noah stops shifting around, then bounds over and hops back on his lap.

  “Really, I’m very sorry,” I assure Noah, feeling guilty. “I didn’t expect that kind of reaction.”

  He smiles, though it’s a little weak. “I guess now you know number three isn’t the lie.”

  “Either that, or you’re an exceptionally good actor.”

  He says nothing, but the lingering snake fear in his eyes is enough to tell me the feeling was real. Sympathy pools in my belly. “Don’t feel bad,” I tell him. “I’m spooked by lots of things.”

  “Not snakes.”

  I shake my head and consider telling him what things do spook me and why. But I hold off.

  “Back to the game,” I say. “Apparently, it’s the law school or the football that’s the lie.” I study him, wondering if he’s the sort of guy to play it safe or be full of surprises. His face is calm and kind and—if I’m being honest—really handsome.

  What the hell was that blond chick’s problem?

  “Law school is true,” I blurt, surprising myself.

  Noah smiles, surprise registering on his face, too. “That’s right,” he says, taken aback. “How did you know?”

  I shrug, secretly pleased with myself for getting it. “Lucky guess,” I say, even though there’s more to it than that. I don’t want to say it out loud, but somehow I feel like I know this guy. That’s dumb, since we’ve been acquainted for less than half an hour. But still, there’s something about him that grabs hold of my heart and whispers, “Oh, hello—it’s you.”

  I shrug and try to look casual. “So tell me about the law-school thing,” I say. “You said you’re a stonemason. There must be a story there.”

  “There’s always a story.” He smiles, and I get the sense there’s a lot more to Noah Donovan than meets the eye. “You’re right, though. I never played football.”

  “But you did go to law school?”

  He nods once, looking bemused. “I didn’t say I finished,” he says. “I made it through one year. Willamette Law. I had a partial scholarship and everything.”

  “What happened?”

  “Nothing tragic or dramatic or anything,” he says. “I was earning tuition money by laying tile, and I had this epiphany one day.”

  “Which was?”

  “That I didn’t want to be a suit,” he says. “That I love working with my hands. That I love creating things and imagining things and feeling the satisfaction of whacking the shit out of stone with a chisel.”

  There’s a gleam in his eye that wasn’t there a few minutes ago. “You sound like you love it.”

  “I do.” He grins wide, showing the most impressive set of dimples I’ve ever seen on a man. “I love coming up with new designs. I love turning something cold and static into something beautiful. I love getting to travel to find the right stone or to do commissioned projects out of town. And love that I wake up every morning and get to do something I’m passionate about.”

  His smile is contagious, and I find myself returning it. “Do you ever regret not finishing law school?”

  He shakes his head. “It was always my dad who wanted me to be a lawyer, but that just wasn’t for me. I never looked back.”

  “That’s awesome.” I think about my job making fancy cocktails for a living. About the funny twist in my career path after I earned a degree in psychology and then sat back and asked myself, “Now what?” I think of the sense of belonging I feel at the bar, even though most of my friends have jobs with offices and impressive job titles. Has Noah reached that level of peace with his career path, or does he have to defend his choice to family and friends?

  I wonder, too, how big his dreams are. Does he want to work for himself eventually, or is he already doing it? He looks like the sort of guy who might have his own company. Maybe we have that in common. It’s on the tip of my tongue to ask when he speaks first.

  “So what do you do for a living?”

  There’s still a part of me that wants to hold back, but I decide not to. After all, he was forthcoming with me. More than he had to be.

  “I’m a mixologist,” I tell him, trying not to blush at the pretentiousness of the word, or the fact that it’s not the whole truth.

  “What is that, exactly?”

  “It’s sort of like tacking PhD onto a bartender’s job title,” I explain. “It’s someone who specializes in spirit-and-flavor pairings. Someone who knows about herbs and elixirs and liqueurs and a million other little things that can turn a regular old cocktail into something magical.”

  “Nice.” He smiles in a way that tells me he gets it. That even if he’s not a cocktail snob, he hears the passion in my words. “Sounds like you love your job.”

  “I do.” I start to add more. To tell him about my dreams for the bar and where it’s all taken me in the last year. But I stop myself, not wanting to volunteer too much. Not wanting to get all gushy and passionate and personal.

  He has a girlfriend, and you have a fake husband, Watson cautions. Let’s not get in too deep here.

  Oh, for crying out loud, Harlow mutters with an eye roll.

  “Your turn,” Noah says, startling me. “Two truths and a lie.”

  He grins again, and my stomach flips over. It dawns on me that I let him go first because I wanted time to think up my own lies and then spent the whole time listening to every word he said. I’m not normally so enraptured by other people’s stories.

  “Let’s see,” I begin, stalling for time. “I’m an only child.”

  I blurt it out before I can think strategically about my other two answers. That one’s true, so I need to come up with something good for my next two. “I hiked the Oregon section of the Pacific Crest Trail ten years ago. And, um—I’m obsessed with watching the History channel.”

  He looks at me for a moment, which gives me a second to replay my words in my head. It takes a good ten seconds before I realize my mistake. “Oh crap,” I say. “I forgot to tell a lie.”

  He bursts out laughing, a whole-body laugh that makes his massive frame shake. Bartholomew drops to all fours and clutches his leg like a bull rider, his whiskers twitching with uncertainty. Noah reaches out and strokes a hand down the creature’s back, and instantly, the packrat stills.

  Can I admit I’m jealous of a rodent?

  I lick my lips as Noah’s laughter subsides. “Sorry, I got so carried away sharing things that I got distracted.”

  “No worries,” he says. “I think it’s cute.”

  I can’t tell if cute is code for neurotic, but I’m encouraged to try again.

  “Okay, so I have a degree in psychology.” I take a breath, determined not to screw it up this time. “I’ve climbed Mount Kilimanjaro,” I say slowly. “An
d thanks to a fifth-grade teacher who drilled home the importance of studying anatomy, I can name every bone in the human body.”

  He looks at me for a long while, assessing. Then nods like he’s come to some conclusion. “If hiking the Pacific Crest Trail was true in that first round, I’m inclined to think you’re pretty fearless,” he says.

  I give an unladylike snort. “Definitely not fearless,” I blurt before I can stop myself.

  He looks at me oddly, then nods. “Fearless might not have been the right word. Adventurous,” he tries again, and I have to admit that’s true, “which makes me think two is also not a lie.”

  I don’t say anything, but my heart is pounding. I’d like to pretend it’s the excitement of the game, but who am I kidding? This is Two Truths and a Lie, not Capture the Flag.

  The only reason for my increased heart rate is the intensity of the way Noah is looking at me. Like he sees me—really sees me—which is stupid. He has a girlfriend. I have a—okay, I don’t really have a husband.

  Should I confess that?

  No. I’ve already uttered my lie, and besides. I don’t know this guy very well yet. Not well enough.

  “The story about the teacher and the anatomy is so specific that it almost has to be true.” He looks thoughtful a moment, studying me. “Then again, you could have added all the detail to throw me off.”

  “Anything’s possible,” I say, secretly thrilled with how much thought he’s giving this.

  “The psychology degree seems perfect for a bartender,” he says. “Mixologist, I mean.”