by Havana Scott
“Do I keep this file?” Mrs. Gio holds the file in my line of view through the doorway, as though I’d distinguish it from the other hundreds of manila folders. “It’s your runner.”
“My runner?” I peer at her through my glasses.
“Miss Verano, age twenty, the one who fled on her first day?” Mrs. Gio’s tone is filled with speculation. “The one who returned a week later to visit you after hours?”
“Ah.” I give my middle-aged, meddling secretary a dismissive glance. I appreciate her looking out for me, but sometimes, it’s none of her God-durned business. “Yes, keep it for now.” I know it’s empty, but trashing it will feel like I’m deleting her from my life altogether.
Mrs. Gio gives me another smirky look. Women’s intuition is fucking scary as balls. “Dr. Lee, it may be none of my business, but I’d feel irresponsible, not to mention remiss, if I didn’t warn you to be careful with these young girls.”
“Women, Mrs. Gio—young women. Please.”
“Young girls,” she insists. “I was their age once, and I can tell you that even a slight look of interest in their direction from a handsome, charming doctor like you is enough to make them feel like things are more serious than they are.”
“I know, Mrs. Gio. Why do you think I hired you?”
She ignores me and keeps talking. “Most of them are away from home, vulnerable, finding out who they are. The last thing you need is one of them falling in love with you.”
“They’re all in love with me, Mrs. Gio, in case you haven’t noticed. Every day I get mystery love notes on my windshield. On my windshield, Mrs. G.” The thought of them stalking my car is creepy and disconcerting at best.
“No, doctor, they’re infatuated, which is understandable. In this town filled with boys their age, you’re like a rockstar. What I mean is one of them getting attached, believing she’s in real love with you. You don’t want that, Dr. Lee.”
And why don’t I want that? a little voice whispers in my ear.
Not that I don’t agree with her, but who’s to say that I can’t fall in love with a much younger woman—fourteen years younger—let’s just say for shits and grins.
Though I agree—I don’t want to fall in love. Not because of an age difference or because I don’t like being in love—I do—but because I can’t give a woman what she wants. Alice deserves more than half-ass attention. Human behavior and compulsions are my addictions. They’ll win every time. It would take a very special person to bring me back from the dead after a long day of analyzing patients.
Blondie may be able to do that now, but what happens when I figure her out?
When she’s no longer a mystery to me?
“I hear what you’re saying,” I tell Mrs. G. “But there’s nothing to worry about. Miss Verano and I are just friends.” Even that small lie makes me cringe, as I close my browser and the last of today’s open files. Friends with benefits who keep running from each other, but still.
She’s the only woman in three years I’ve allowed myself the luxury of imagining as my girlfriend. Why I get possessive over her when we’re together, I have no clue. I don’t do it over anyone else. It must be an alpha male thing.
“Be careful just the same,” Mrs. Gio says, channeling Mary Poppins. “You don’t have to do anything wrong. You can be the victim of their lies. All it takes is one jealous, overstressed girly to claim that you misled her, made her believe you were interested in her, blah, blah, and then it’s your word against theirs.”
“Duly noted, madam,” I say to her. “Thank you for looking out for me.”
“I’ve raised four boys into men. You’re like my fifth.”
“That’s…very nice of you to say.” I’m touched that she would care so much as to compare me to her sons. “But again, nothing to worry about.”
She smacks Alice’s file into the file cabinet to make it fit and closes the cabinet door, locking it for the night. Gathering her purse and lunch box, she tidies up the fashion magazines in the waiting room on her way out. Because of Alice, I might be adding Popular Science to that pile. “Just doing my job. Have a nice evening, Dr. Lee.”
“You, too, Mom.” I wink at her. “See you in the morning.”
Once I lock up and head outside, the desert dryness hits me like a convection oven. Time to break out short sleeves for the summer months. Maybe I should try a bowtie, a millennial beard, or something trendy to impress Alice, though the absurdity of that smacks me hard. One, she might not care, since she’s not into fashion, and two, I’m almost certain she’s gone for good.
I spooked her with my revelation.
Crossing the lawn toward the parking lot, I wonder what she’s doing now and if she’s given any thought to our lunch together or swept it all under a rug.
I’m almost to my car when I spot another folded note sticking out from my windshield wiper. Suddenly, I see a pair of sneakers sticking out the other side of the GT. A girl sits waiting for me on the landscaped edge of the parking lot next to the cacti where I like to park. I’ve yet to see the mysterious note-giver and hope she’s not imbalanced or depressed. Mrs. Gio is right, I don’t need more crazies, as much as I hate that word.
Slowing down, I step around the front of the car. The legs attached to the sneakers look familiar. Then I see the golden hair and those eyes. “Blondie?”
“Hey.” She gives me the saddest of smiles.
“What are you doing here? You okay?”
“You told me not to show up at your work, and I didn’t think going to your house would be right, so I’m just here.”
“But it’s a hundred degrees outside, hon. You could’ve texted me and waited indoors somewhere.”
“I needed to see you, Roman.”
Roman again. I fight the urge to do a little dance, maybe throw in a dab for added effect. Why does it warm my heart that she uses my actual name now? “Do you need a ride home? Let’s talk in the car.”
“I can’t do this.” She stands, brushing off her shorts. Her legs look amazing. I stiffen at the thought of wrapping them around my body, holding her hard up against the wall, making her come then come again. “I came to tell you I’ve missed you. I’ve been working hard in class, dealing with robotics lab and that one guy who’s a pain in my ass, but then I come here, and see this…”
She holds up a folded note, the kind I’m used to seeing on my windshield. “Wait, you’re not the one leaving those, are you?”
“Would I leave love notes on your car, Roman?”
“No, but…” Okay, that was a stupid thought. I never should compare her to the women who do that again after I called her mature. “Can I see it?”
She unfolds it and reads it aloud, “I think about you all the time, Dr. Lee. You’re so fucking hot…please call me,” adding the phone number. “Do you call these people back?”
“No, of course not. I throw them away as soon as I get them. In fact, you can rip that one up yourself if you want. Alice, I get this all the time.”
“Well, then I can’t see you anymore,” she says, shaking her head. “I can barely handle knowing that I might be falling for you, but when I see shit like this, I know I’m not strong enough to handle your throngs of women.”
“I don’t have ‘throngs of women.’ I don’t have anyone but you, if you can call it that. Did something happen?”
“Besides school?” She scoffs a laugh. “Besides the pressure, besides my father, besides my GPA, besides this?” She flicks the note. “Besides you?”
“That sounds like a bad thing.”
“It’s not. That’s the problem.” She holds onto the car’s hood for support. “There’s literally nothing wrong with you. You’re smart, gorgeous, every woman wants you, you’re sexy, and fuck, Roman, you do things to my body I’ve never felt before.”
“But?”
There’s always a but. And while most of the time, I’m good with breakups—they’re the natural time to move on—I’m not okay with this one. I thin
k it’s time she knew how she shakes me up.
“Alice, you’ve affected me like no one else. You have. For two weeks, I’ve waited for you to call me, text, come by and see me, and now that you have, you get upset over a silly note and don’t make sense?”
She grips fistfuls of hair. “Because I’m so torn. I’m looking for excuses, Roman.”
“Excuses for what?”
“To stop myself from falling for you!” she nearly shouts. “I thought if I came here after all this time, I’d see that I’m over you, or you’re nothing special, or I was only infatuated. But I see now that I’m not. I know the note is a stupid thing, but it made me crazy. Like, crazy, at the thought that someone else might steal your heart.”
“Blondie…” I let my bag drop to the ground and reach for her. She lets me draw her into a tight hug. Smelling her hair awakens all the cells I’d quieted while working these last two weeks. “Look, I know you have a lot on your plate. You’re close to graduating, you’re worried about school, your GPA, the world out there… Trust me, I get it.”
“It’s not just that,” she mumbles against my chest. “Don’t you ever think about your parents? If they couldn’t make it, then what are the chances of us making it?”
“With each other?” I ask.
“With anyone!” she cries. “Love is bullshit. Look at all the marriages falling apart. Come on, Roman. Do you really think a couple can honestly last in this world?”
I do. Not every relationship works, but some are amazing—with just the right ingredients in just the right recipe. “You have to make it work. You have to fight for survival, like the Doctor and his companion.”
She chuckles against my chest but shakes her head anyway. “That’s a TV show.”
“But it’s a metaphor for real life, hon. Look at me.” I lift her chin to gaze down at those blue eyes. I am so, so glad she came by to see me, even if it’s goodbye. “I’m not going to tell you what to think right now. You need to decide for yourself. And I promise I’ll be good with whatever you decide. But if—if—you decide we should stop seeing each other…maybe some time after you graduate, once things ease up a bit, maybe we can start all over?”
I feel a pang in my chest I’m not prepared for.
Why am I getting wrecked over the fact that this might be it? Who else will look up at me on her knees with that exact same expression, same sky blue eyes, looking so utterly beautiful? Who will talk Doctor Who with me? Who’ll wow me with her knowledge of robotics and electrical circuits?
“But Roman, after graduation comes an internship, then getting a job. It never ends. There will always be something stressing me out. I just don’t think I’m made for…relationships.” Love—she wanted to say love, and it kills me.
Do I love her?
I’m not sure, but it sure as hell feels like I do.
She stands there looking so pained, her eyes filled with so much confusion, I can’t help but think that maybe she’s hoping I’ll stop her. Take charge of her actions and make her change her mind. I can do that. I want to do that. I want to completely own her, if it was ever possible. But I can’t.
“Blondie, I hear what you’re saying, but everything about your body language right now says you don’t want us to stop seeing each other.”
“I don’t, but why would you want to keep seeing me the way I am, Roman? I’m a fucking mess. I have issues to work through, and I’m too busy to have a boyfriend.”
“I’m too busy to have a boyfriend, too.” I smile, playing with the ends of her straw-colored hair. She breaks out a staccato laugh. At least I got her to smile.
“Is it because I’m young, and older guys are attracted to young women? Or because I like sex, and that’s the perfect relationship for you? Just be honest with me.”
“First of all, that’s not fair. I love way more about you than just your body. And second, I’ve been wanting to talk to you about all this, but you’re the one who keeps running.”
Giving me a hurt look, she shuts her eyes with a guilty pout. “Then, why?”
“Why? Because holy shit, we’re perfect for each other! Even our flaws are the same,” I laugh, shaking my keys with every point I make. “We’re both afraid of getting involved, and neither of us believes that love can overcome, because we’ve both been hurt.”
“But how do I know I won’t regret it later?”
“You don’t. We don’t. It’s a risk you take, just like everything else.”
She stares at me. We’re on the edge of something, but I’m not sure what. She’s so vulnerable right now, it’d be wrong to kiss her, but I’m almost out of fucks to give. It was wrong from the beginning, it’s been wrong all along, and I just want her so bad, it fucking hurts. Even my patience has its limits.
Fuck you, life. I always play by the rules, analyze thoroughly before considering. Well, I don’t fucking feel like it now. For once, I want to act on my instincts, because guess what—they’re probably right.
“But you will regret not taking the chance.”
I don’t wait.
I pull her in.
Kissing her through salty tears that stream onto swollen lips will forever go down as one of the most memorable moments of my life. In her tears, I taste her torment, her confusion and pain. I taste her love, and I even taste her hesitation. She melts into my arms, hanging onto me limply, breathing in every kiss, as though they were made of oxygen, relinquishing control of this lost situation.
It’s a huge step for her, and it’s a huge step for me, this throwing caution to the wind thing. Funny, as I help guide her through her emotions, I feel like I’m guiding myself through, too. I tell myself if she’s strong enough to do this, then I am, too. If we’re both wrong and headed for disaster, so be it. We’ll go down in flames together.
11
ALICE
If, four weeks ago, someone would’ve told me that my B in robotics lab would lead me to drown my sorrows at Taco Paco, and there I’d meet the man responsible for knocking my determination to be miserable on its ass, and that man would be, not only fourteen years older than I am, but also my smoking-hot, “off the record” therapist, and I’d still be seeing him twenty-eight days after our one-night hookup, I’d have laughed so hard.
But life has a way of slapping us with unplanned situations.
And currently, the situation and I are on a date.
That’s right—me (Alice Verano) and Roman (Dr. Lee), are plunging into uncharted waters. There could be sharks, hurricanes, or pirates on these waters, but I won’t focus on that. I’ll focus on the blue skies and glittering oceans. I’ll focus on breaking out of my insular world of robotics and taking a risk, just like I did that first night.
Sitting behind Barcelona, a tapas-style Spanish restaurant I’ve heard about but never been to, I feel alien. All these people out having a good time with their heels and their summery dresses. Granted, I’m wearing the same, but I’m a fish out of water. We sit on a bench where I lean against him underneath strings of patio bulbs, watching people walk by. I haven’t gone on a real date in two years. I was eighteen, and my date, Quint Taylor, from Humanities, expected me to invite him into my apartment, all because he’d bought me a meal at Applebee’s, even though we’d had zero chemistry. Awful.
Being with Roman, however, is a whole other ball game. I can’t stop telling myself, Look at you…out with an older man in his smart clothes, snazzy glasses, having fun and being all “adult.” We’re not hiding, either. We’re out where people can see us, and I’m not a secret. When he kissed me that day in the parking lot after I stupidly tried convincing myself he was no good for me, I knew we’d turned a new leaf.
Tonight, we had a great dinner and talked mostly about how we got into our careers, what events in our childhood led us to our paths. For him, it was losing his grandmother. When a classmate’s grandmother also died, his teacher paired them together, so that Roman could provide “peer grief counseling,” and a psychologist was born. For me, it
was the movies. Everyone thinks it’s my father who dragged me down the engineering path, but really it was watching action movies and wondering how the heck they made everything look so real using a combination of computer graphics animation and robotics.
I knew then I wanted to make cool stuff.
My fingers are laced through Roman’s as he talks about his parents and how strict they were with him. Sometimes he feels he made the wrong career choice, but most of the time he knows he could never do anything but help people. It’s the college he’s not crazy about. “I want to get out of Tucson one day,” he says.
“Where would you go?” I ask, knowing the answer will hurt. Chances are we will not end up in the same place together unless he’s going to live near Tesla in Palo Alto.
“Vegas. Denver or Aspen maybe. Love the skiing. California?” he says. “My sister lives out there. I don’t know. The point is, Tucson’s got me feeling claustrophobic. My friends are all married with kids, I’m divorced, no kids…and just…I don’t know.” He squeezes my hand.
He leaves it right there.
I know we haven’t delved into his personal life yet. That’s my fault for avoiding the conversation before. “You started to tell me a while back,” I say, caressing each of his fingers, noticing how different our skin and muscle tones are. “But I had to go.” I had to escape is what I had to do, but I’m ready to hear it now.
“I remember.”
“So, tell me.”
He draws in a slow, cleansing breath and continues scanning the people walking by without making eye contact with me. “I was married once. Long before you.”
“How long?”
“Ten years. Divorced three years ago.”
“Ten years?” My eyeballs pop out of my skull, roll off the deck, and plunge into the water. Now, I’m blind and shocked. I can’t imagine him being married that long, and just like that, our age difference feels significant. “So, you were twenty-one when you got married. Holy crapmonkeys.” I do a quick calculation in my head. “That means I was seven when you got married. Oh. My. God.”
