by Joey W. Hill
She should do it by phone, because it was impossible when she was with him. But each time she picked up the phone, she’d remember him standing behind her at the Conservatory, his breath on her throat. Or him bringing her to orgasm on the stage, his gaze riveted upon her. The aftercare he’d done, wrapping a blanket and himself around her, holding her, calling her love. Him swimming in a polluted pond to rescue a boy’s boat, his pleased expression when he saw the boat free and the boy’s relief. His hair slicked back on his head and body shivering slightly in the cool air.
"You do not seem like the Taylor Swift type to me."
"Hmm? What?" She broke out of her absorption to see Harris studying her with a peculiar look on his face.
"You’re humming ‘Today Was A Fairytale.’" Light dawned in his expression. "You’re thinking about Des, aren’t you? Spiderman. His subs always seem to get that starry-eyed look when they have sessions planned with him."
What a perfect way to underscore a point, like a dull edged knife sawing through her middle. “Des and I aren’t like that,” she said with forced casualness. “He showed me some rope stuff once, so I’d understand it better here. I’m just happy we’re on schedule and things are unfolding so well for the performance.”
Harris gave her a dubious look but moved off the topic and back to the dry tech run they had coming up tonight, when their student stage hands finished their classes for the day.
She had no one to blame but herself for his or anyone else’s doubts, including her own. But that was the final straw. She’d visit Des at his work. He couldn’t do anything to overwhelm her defenses at work, right?
It was time to get to the bottom of this in whatever convoluted, awkward way was needed. God help her, and poor Des. He’d be glad she was walking away. The thought only made things worse, but also confirmed what she kept telling herself. Her heart could refuse to listen, but her brain knew the truth.
She needed to abstain from romantic relationships of any kind. Period. Otherwise this hamster wheel of redundant emotion would drive her to insanity.
Julie pulled up to the job site. Harris had fortunately known where Des was working today so she hadn’t had to alert him with a text. While she told herself she wasn’t going to lose her resolve, now that she was here, faced with the actual task of having the discussion, it seemed more daunting. And ludicrous. She’d had an overreaction fueled by too much thinking and her dysfunctional and overly dramatic personality.
Being confronted with an army of men working on the new construction site didn’t help. Their pickups and vans clustered around the house like a drive-in movie. Hammering, sawing, power tools and men’s voices created a drone like bees around a hive.
She noticed a half dozen children of varying ages gathered on the sidewalk, watching. Two straddled bicycles, one held a skateboard and another was on roller skates. The remaining two were on foot. The myriad transportation options available to the young. She idly imagined skateboarding to work if she eventually found a small place near the theater.
Which she would do if she was planning on a long term stay in Matthews, which she wasn’t. The thought wouldn’t have occurred to her, if not for a couple over-the-top experiences with a skinny, young roofer who didn't seem that skinny or young when his strong arms were holding her, or he had her captured in his ropes.
Which was exactly why she was here and needed to go through with this, even if she had to have the discussion in front of a battalion of wide-eyed grade schoolers and sweaty men in tool belts.
She'd parked near the kids. Since she had the windows down, she heard several of them call out. "Do the Slinky. Slinky!"
As she glanced back at the house, she discovered the roofing crew coming down the ladders. They must be taking a scheduled break. She took it as a sign, one that made her feel better and worse about the chances for her private conversation that couldn’t wait.
She looked to see if Des was one of the men coming down and didn’t locate him. Then she lifted her gaze to the roof and did.
He was by himself, standing straight and tall as if he wasn't on a steep incline that looked miles above the ground. When he raised a hand to acknowledge the kids, they whooped in response.
His hair was tied back under a bill cap, and he wore a gray T-shirt with some kind of logo on it over his jeans. Standing on one leg and then the other, demonstrating the balance of a flamingo, he removed his work shoes and socks. Putting the socks in the shoes, he tossed them off the roof, letting them thud to the ground.
"What is he…" She’d left the car and was a few feet from the knot of children. None of them noticed her, their eyes all on Des. A blink later, she understood why. Her heart jumped into her throat.
Up on the spine of the roof, he levered himself into a nimble handstand, his back to his audience. He held the pose for several beats, then slowly let his feet come over his head, down toward the roof’s slope. It seemed like an impossible angle for anyone's spine, but then everything speeded up. His feet came down to complete the full backbend, and he used the propulsion to catapult him swiftly to his feet and forward into another handstand, but this time he didn’t pause. Julie bit back a cry.
As he kept going, building speed, he did look like a Slinky going down a set of stairs. Three times, and he was at the edge of the roof. He somehow slowed his forward progress enough to hold himself up in a handstand again. He twisted around and his body swung toward the house like a trapeze artist, his toes finding purchase against the siding. He hung there for a second, then pumped his feet out and he let go, dropping two stories to the ground, light as a cat. As the kids cheered, he did a standing somersault and took a bow in their direction.
Julie noticed some of the other contractors chuckling and waving at him, that gesture that communicated yeah, you’re a crazy bastard. This was apparently all routine. Since the kids had called for “the Slinky”, she guessed it was.
As the children moved off, the show over, she saw Des’s attention shift and find her. His brown eyes lit with pleasure, which made her want to ignore all the warning signs of a crushed heart. That was why they called it a crush, right? Because the heart could be frozen, pulverized and served up like a snow cone.
He put his shoes and socks back on, and said something to a couple of the guys. A few wolf whistles followed him across the street, which he answered with a quick flipped bird and a comment she didn't catch but they did, laughing him off. She heard them using the same name for him the kids had.
“Slinky?” she said as he approached with that relaxed, sinuous walk he had.
“Yeah, it kind of stuck. I actually thought about it as a scene name, the Kinky Slinky, but it was too campy. And I’m not really into scene names. I like just Des.”
"Good decision. What else did they say?" She nodded toward the men.
"The usual. Tell her when she wants a real man, they'll be here waiting. And that you're way too hot for me, which that part is true."
She flushed, even as she felt silly for the unsophisticated reaction. "What did you say back?"
"To the real man thing? That you didn't have any use for a guy choking on his own broken teeth. What are you doing here? Just couldn’t wait one more day to see me covered in work filth?”
“Oh, you’re nothing next to the homeless guy behind the theater. He hasn’t bathed since Y2K.”
“I’m surprised you could keep your hands off him.” He smiled, but his brown eyes were suddenly far more focused on her. “I’m going to get you dirty, so you’ll just have to deal. You’ve been avoiding me, and you're the best looking thing I've seen all day.”
“Um…since you’re working with a bunch of equally grungy men, I think I’m insulted.”
“Come here." Ignoring that, he slid an arm around her waist and pulled her to him with that effortless overwhelming strength that didn't give her breath for refusal before he was kissing her. Yes, he was dirty, but beneath it, he was Des. She pressed her body against him, reveling in his hand
s pushing into her hair, taking control, possessing her from head to toe.
When he lifted his head, she blinked and blurted it out. Desperately. "I can't do this anymore."
He drew back and studied her expression. "Do what?"
"Let you overwhelm me with the Dom thing and the rope thing and these kinds of kisses that only happen in The Princess Bride. And how old are you anyway? For real? You won't even tell me that, because this doesn't mean anything to you.”
As his brow furrowed, she bit her lip and revised. “I didn't mean it to sound like that. Of course it means something to you. It's your art, like a religion, and I'm like a canvas or an altar. I should be grateful for any moment I get like that, because how many women get the chance to be worshipped? To totally be the center of a man's attention to that depth and intensity, ever. It's an incredible gift, like going on a once in a lifetime trip or doing something on your bucket list.”
She shook her head fiercely, denying herself. “But I don't want the once in a lifetime trip. I want the whole lifetime. I want eggs for breakfast, or pancakes or cereal. I want those kinds of decisions with someone I love, not jumping out of an airplane or saving baby seals in Alaska, though I don't want seals hurt. What I'm trying to say is that, for me, quiet moments are just as breathtaking as adrenaline shit is to other people.”
His lips parted to speak, but she rushed on. “Yet in those intense moments, you invite me into your soul, which is a huge wow factor. But I don't know if you want me to stay. And next week, next performance, next session, it will be someone else, another woman you take to the same level of ecstasy. Some part of me says to ignore it, to ride the same train, refuse to allow it to be more than that, but see, that’s where I always fuck up. I can’t settle. I want more, and I’m afraid you’re not a ‘more.’
“You’re a drug masquerading as a ‘more,’ and I’ll get addicted to it. Every man has a shoe drop factor, when you realize they’re too good to be true. Your problem is you are too good to be true. I'll be in your soul watching other females go through like a revolving door. I’ll wither and die there.”
She closed her eyes, stepped back from him. “I'm a private person, a possessive person. When I decide I'm falling in love with someone, I don't want to share the house with anyone else. I'm not that friendly. Yet everything you're doing to me, it's so incredible, and so I wonder if I'm letting the decisions I've arrived at after so much careful thought derail the chance for something incredible, even if it is temporal. I'm not strong enough to handle my heart getting crushed, Des. I'm not. And everything about you says you're capable of crushing my heart. You're too much, too amazing, too…beyond anything I ever expected to be able to call mine, so I know it can't be right or real…"
She took a breath. “And all of this is why I shouldn’t be doing a relationship with anyone, let alone you.”
She’d finally run out of words before those fathomless brown eyes. This was the part where he could tell insane, babbling woman it was okay, they could just be friends. And that would be that. Or maybe she'd learn she hadn't done it in time and her heart would be crushed anyway.
"Thirty-five," he said. "Thirty-six in three months. That’s how old I am."
She stared at him. He was somehow holding her hand, his thumb rubbing her palm, her rabbiting pulse. "No way," she said. "You're in your twenties."
"Thought you were getting a much younger man, did you?" His lips curved but there was no humor in his eyes. Her words had made an impact and she realized his touch was as much firm hold as caress. "I've always looked about ten years younger than I actually am. Arrested development. It was a bitch when I was seven. Must be why the kids in the class nicknamed me Fetus."
"Great. Like most men don't already have the advantage in aging; you got the extra helping."
"Most gifts like that come with strings attached." He tipped up her chin before she could pursue the faint bitterness she heard in his tone. She was too worked up anyhow. She realized she was shaking and so did he.
“Hey,” he said, dropping his hands to run them up and down her arms in a soothing manner. “It’s okay.”
She shook her head. “I really liked what happened on stage that night. I wanted more of it. But I don't want to become whatever the term is for someone who's strung out on sub experiences. And I don't want to go down a road with someone whose interest in me… It’s like the ‘everyone is special’ argument. If everyone is special, no one really is, according to the literal definition. I want to be special to someone. I want to see a look in their eyes that says I'm the person that makes their day better. I'm the one who lights up the room for them, even if it's just a sixty watt bulb. Actually, I prefer it that way. I don't want to be this grand explosion of light and passion that happens for one rope session or for a short, unforgettable relationship.”
She curled her fingers in his shirt. “I want to be the person who will always keep the porch light on for the other person, and he knows that, he can count on it. I'll put a night light in the bedroom so he can find his way to me without stumbling in the dark.”
She didn’t want to blind her soulmate. She just wanted him to know he’d always be able to find her heart, because the light they shared would be soft, steady and strong, like love itself. And why was she telling this to Des, when she knew he wasn’t willing to go that far with her? Was she using him like some kind of bizarre confessor?
“Take a breath,” he said, drawing her attention from the whirl of her thoughts to his serious face. “You’ve been spun up over this for a while now.”
“Yeah. Since…well, it’s been building since the orchids, really. You have a really bizarre effect on me. I wasn’t going to get involved with anyone ever again. That was the promise I made myself.”
“That’s a shitty promise,” he observed. “Like promising to shut your hand in a car door once a week.”
“Not if falling in love feels ten times worse than that. The car door would be preferable.”
“Good point. I’ve never let myself fall in love. Never thought I could afford it. Turns out, we’re not given much choice about that, are we?”
Her gaze flicked up to his face, not sure what he meant and not getting any further clues from his neutral expression, because he changed the topic. Somewhat.
"When I came in to meet with Harris this week, I watched you. Doing something right is in the details, and, more than that, in loving those details, the subtle ways they add to a scene. You have that. That’s how you’ll make the show come alive and become something memorable. It’s not about pyrotechnics or the big flash. I like that about you.” He stroked her hair over her shoulder, ran his thumb along her collarbone. The sleeveless knit tank she was wearing allowed him to slide his thumb beneath it, tease her bra strap.
“There’s very little about you I don’t like or find pretty terrific, except your absence. Seeing you here today was like a birthday three times over."
“See, you’re doing it again,” she accused. “Making me feel so special, like you—”
“Hey.” He tightened his grip, commanding her full attention. “You are special to me, Julie. You’re giving me a lot of good information, but you’re not listening. Or rather, I think you are listening, but there’s so much static from your past relationships, my message isn’t getting through.”
She wanted to get her back up at his impatient tone, but he wasn’t done. “Sounds to me like you’re saying you need a guy to court you, not just stumble into it. You don’t want him leaving himself a clear path of retreat by never openly declaring his intentions.”
“I guess that’s asking too much of the average guy,” she said bitterly, thinking he was mocking her.
“It is. There’s nothing average about you, Julie. You should be demanding something exceptional. You want subtle but you also want sincerity. Courage.”
He cradled her jaw so she had to meet his eyes. “Say it. Honestly, from the gut.”
He was doing that Dom thing, dr
awing her into his gaze, holding open that door inside her soul that couldn’t lie to him. That couldn’t lie at all.
“Yes,” she said quietly. “I'm done with anything less.”
He nodded. “That’s a hell of a lot different from giving up on love. If you’re going to have your guts torn out, it should be for a guy who’s worth it, not a loser who doesn’t know how to appreciate the gift of love.”
He returned to the light stroking of her collarbone and bra strap. He didn’t say anything further, either to deny he was that guy, or confirm he wanted to be in the running. Probably because of that wall she sensed within him before and could feel rising now. Only this time, from his words and expressions, she suspected he was struggling with it. Which didn’t make her as eager to throw up her own defenses. What an idiot she was.
“At one time, the first step in courtship was asking permission to write to the person who interested your affections,” she ventured. “Then you moved to carriage rides and walks in the park. It was more balanced.”
He considered that. “So, in a way, dating services where you meet online and get to know one another through email first are connecting to a historic tradition.”
One of the things she liked about him—among many things—was that he could shift topics with her, all while retaining the original motive driving the conversation. His gaze flickered with heat now, proving it.
“If I kissed you again, would things be better balanced?”
"It might. You're a decent kisser." She adopted a nonchalant look rather than that of an eagerly panting puppy, though it took an effort. His dark eyes gleamed and he slid an arm around her.
"Liar. I'm a hell of a kisser, love. I can make your knees weak."
"If my knees wobble, it’s because I haven’t had lunch. Just for the record, I'm not trying to be pathetic or clingy. It would really piss me off if you thought that. I'm trying to be rational and calm, except I don't really do rational and calm. I'm just—"
"Shut up a moment."
Her attention flicked up from the hole she was staring into his throat, and his mouth was on hers again. Slow, exploratory, deep. She was still worked up enough she tried to wrench away, thrust at him, but he clamped a hand on the side of her throat, the other at her waist, and held her fast, refusing to let her throw him off.
