Not my best move. I did, however, capture the birthday moment in pixels with Spring crying and the evil lobster, sans rubber bands, covered in frosting. The picture even captured Billie’s expression that said, Don’t take this picture. I learned only later what the expression meant.
When the screaming died down and we made it back to the room, Spring was ready for bed. And I was, too. I apologized to her and she suggested that a chocolate doughnut for breakfast would make her feel better. Having already imagined her mother’s disapproval, I agreed. Spring had her bath and we started a story, but she fell asleep. It had been a full weekend. I watched her slide into the covers, and just like at home, she looped an arm over her pillow. I kissed her cheek, left her room and went to see if Billie was just as sleepy as Spring.
Walking into the den where the fireplace was blazing, I didn’t see Billie right away. It could have been the two glasses of champagne sitting next to a bottle of fuchsia nail polish that distracted me, or it could have been seeing Billie’s clothes folded neatly on the bed. She sat on the couch under a blanket with a toe poking beneath the bottom.
“Billie, nail polish and champagne?”
I waited.
“Billie?”
She was asleep. I sat next to Billie and sipped at the bubbles, with my feet at the fire and my glass moist with condensation. After spending much of the day in the cold, the heat felt good. When Billie nuzzled into my side, it felt even better than the fire. For a moment, I felt paralyzed. Billie’s touch felt like something from more than a good friend. I assumed it was my imagination, but I also didn’t dare move. Looking down to my glass balancing against my chest, I trembled.
Her hand reached to caress my chest and I took another sip. Her touch warmed my heart, then curled my toes. Perhaps the six days and ten hours had been a hint at things to come and not a passing tryst. I turned my head and caught a sleepy smile on her face. Taking my glass, she sipped and then leaned in to kiss my cheek. If ever there was such a kiss to my cheek, I couldn’t recall. Her warm breath, her wet lips, the way she stroked my chest… “Billie?”
She kissed my lips. “Yes?”
“Are we ready for this?” My champagne quivered. She kissed me again. “I am.” There was another kiss. “Are you?”
Maybe. “Yes, I promise.” I felt her heavy breath. “Is this right?”
“How does it feel to you?”
I listened for Spring. She was asleep and I knew she was so exhausted that she wouldn’t be getting up.
No longer able to keep my feelings for Billie inside, I felt the dam burst. We slipped into my bedroom and began to touch each other, as we never had before soft, feather-light brushes; firm, kneading caresses. There were deep kisses that melded us together, probing motions that drew our bodies closer than it seemed possible; flights of exquisite pleasure that somehow didn’t tip over until we were utterly ready.
As I listened to the water lap the shore, I realized that I was setting out on uncharted seas. Never had I felt such a shudder as the one I had just experienced, and it scared me. While our bodies rolled together, Billie was in my head. And and somewhere in the world between, I lost control. When we finally finished, I rested, unable to voice the emotions I had experienced. We cuddled, while I stroked her hair. With the moon in the window, I saw her red hair sprawled across my pillows. The moonlight left a silken sheet across her ivory skin. I kissed her stomach beneath her bellybutton, creating shadows of night down her thighs.
If morning hadn’t arrived, I could have stayed there forever.
I awoke before the sun and stared quietly into the lines of Billie’s sleeping face. I loved her. There was no question in my mind. I ran a finger over her ear, removing the red strands from her cheek. I wanted to watch her sleep. I wanted to take in everything about her. I wanted to be with her in every way possible.
Feeling my touch, she opened her eyes.
I allowed my finger to run down her face, across her chest and rest against her soft stomach.
“Hi.”
“Morning.”
Billie smiled. It was the most beautiful smile I had ever seen and I wondered how I hadn’t noticed this before.
“Let’s get some coffee,” she said.
“Not yet. I want to look at you.”
“Then can we get some coffee?”
“Then I’ll get you whatever you want.”
She smiled and shook her head.
After a long minute, she said she had to get up and walked to the bathroom naked. After she closed the door, she opened it and stuck her head back out. “That was nice,” she said. Then, with a smile, she shrugged and closed the door again.
Around lunch, we received a knock at the door. A dozen lavender roses had arrived for Spring and Billie, my two favorite women. Who wouldn’t love the flowers? Spring didn’t.
“They remind me of my mother.”
I looked at Billie, then sniffed the flowers. The heavy scent of rose and lavender sprigs brought back memories of the funeral home. As I filled our coffee cups and whispered my theories to Billie, Spring plucked every lavender rose petal and left twelve leaf-bearing stems.
I almost panicked and thought this would be how our happy trip ended until Spring hopped into the chair next to us.
“Can I go to the kid’s craft hour? They make things.”
After agreeing, Billie took Spring to the craft class, while I lit two simple vanilla and sandalwood candles and chilled another bottle. This time, it was sparkling grape juice, as I shouldn’t be drinking much while Spring was awake. On the top of the ice, I added the lavender rose petals. As Billie and I sipped the cool liquid, I painted her toenails and fed her strawberries although some of the juice ran down her stomach and required extra attention.
The ice melted and turned the water purple.
I’d never been a person who wanted a moment to last forever. There were too many potentially great moments ahead to want anything of the sort. But lying there with Billie, feeling her nestled into me closer than I ever remembered feeling any person before, and thinking about Spring happily creating an abstract sculpture out of seashells or something, I wished I could stay in that very place for as long as humanly possible.
I should have wished harder.
As quickly as I fell in love, I learned that I didn’t have company in the experience. What made me think a few moments of intimacy and vulnerability amounted to love especially with Billie? What made me think that what just happened between us negated everything I already knew about her?
On the way back to the City, we stopped for gas, and Spring and Billie went to use the restroom. I went inside to pick up some gum and saw Billie talking to a man.
“The weather was atrocious this week,” he said, gesturing with his sunglasses. “You should be here in early May. The weather is beautiful and the ocean is amazing..”
Billie laughed. “Oh, I bet you’re right. So, you know the area?”
“Know it? I own a big chunk of it!” He laughed.
Spring ran up to Billie and grabbed onto her leg to hide behind her.
“Is this your little girl? You’re a cute one,” he said to Spring and then turned to Billie. “She’s beautiful, like her mother.”
“Oh, she’s not mine…no, definitely not mine.”
“Well, it was delightful meeting you.”
The man put on his sunglasses and headed out.
Billie watched him leave and I could swear she was going to make a dash for him. Then she took Spring’s hand and walked out the door, not even noticing that I was ten feet away.
In the car, things didn’t get any better. Her cell phone rang.
“Don’t answer,” I said. “Let’s be unavailable.”
“I can’t be unavailable. Hello, Billie Daniels? Hey!”
I eased the car into the slow lane to make it easier for her to hear her caller.
Billie laughed the same laugh from the gas station. “No! I can’t do that. Well, maybe…”
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I looked in the rearview and saw Spring staring out the window.
“Okay. Okay. I’ll call you by Wednesday.”
When she ended the call, my first impulse was to interrogate her, but that’s what I would have done if I hadn’t matured into my 30’s. I waited for her to say something about it instead.
She didn’t volunteer and I waited until we made it back to the City. My gut churned the entire time.
Unable to restrain myself any longer, as we got onto the FDR, I said, “Who was on the phone?”
“It was a friend of mine from… well, I can’t remember. But he has like a 600 IQ.”
“Oh. What did Mr. 600 IQ want?”
“For me to come to his place in the Hamptons.”
“I heard you say no, but it didn’t sound like, ‘No, thank you.’ It sounded like you said you’d call him. Why would you have to think about it?”
“I didn’t tell him whether I was going to go or not.”
The air left my body. I felt betrayed.
There was another 20 minutes of silence. During that entire time, I conducted a phantom argument with Billie, imagining her trivializing the time we’d just spent together, telling me that it was just another roll in the hay, advising me that she’d like me to be available for the occasional screw when no one else was around.
I checked the rearview,and noticed that Spring had fallen asleep. “This isn’t going to work,” I whispered to Billie. “I don’t want you coming around anymore.”
From the corner of my eye, I could see her head tilt in my direction. “What are you talking about?”
“We can’t have you flitting in and out of our lives. It’s terrible for Spring. She’s crazy about you.”
“Don’t you think you’re overreacting just a tiny bit?”
“Yeah, I do, which is precisely my point.”
“Dylan, this was a nice weekend. Don’t ruin it.”
“Billie, I’m serious. I can’t do this with you. Not anymore.”
“I’m not continuing this conversation. You’re being irrational.”
“Maybe I’m being emotional, but I’m not being irrational. I just got a glimpse of my future and it involves getting punched in the gut a lot. I’m ending that scenario right now. ”
Somewhere, another plate dropped.
I dropped Billie off at her place without either of us exchanging another word. Fortunately, Spring slept through all of it.
All I wanted was for Billie to say she was sorry and that she didn’t mean it. I understood old habits, and if she had acknowledged that she was simply responding by rote, I would have instantly accepted that. But she didn’t do that. In fact, she didn’t say another word to me. Not only wasn’t she sorry, she wasn’t even sure what all the fuss was about.
Spring was still asleep when we got home and I carried her to her bed. I went to the living room and sat down in front of the dark television. The couch felt foreign, and I felt like sitting on the ground and burning off 300 sit-ups.
The light on my answering machine blinked and I hit the button.
“Dylan, hello… This is John Waverly. I’m interested in having a conversation with you about some things that are happening over here. If you’re still interested, call.”
The next morning, Spring and I went through our normal morning routine, and I walked her to daycare. The sounds of the City ran together with my thoughts and by the time I reached my office, I hadn’t realized that I was still holding Spring’s barrette in my hand.
There on my desk sat the picture of Spring, Billie, and Santa. I picked up the frame and removed the photo. Grabbing scissors from my drawer, I extricated Billie from Santa’s knee and dropped her into the trash can. While this gave me a momentary but fulfilling high, Spring looked pretty silly sitting there that way. I grabbed a magazine and flipped through the pages until I found the right one: a family standing in front of a Volvo. They were all smiling and, more importantly, about the same scale, so I ripped out the picture, taped Spring and one-legged Santa next to them, and put the frame back on my desk. It was better for me than what had there before.
After I dropped the scissors back into the drawer, I saw Diane staring up at me from her picture on my desk. Diane would have said that I was being silly. Or maybe that was me putting words in her mouth again. What did she know? I lost her before ever telling her my secrets. After sharing them with Billie, she dumped me for Mr. 600 IQ. I should have kept it at six days and ten hours. Wasn’t there a point not that long ago where I felt the world was turning in my direction? What happened to that?
I picked up the phone and dialed. It was time to get proactive.
“Good morning, this is Dylan Hunter returning Mr. Waverly’s call.”
Waverly was in with a client, but his assistant knew who I was, which I considered to be a good sign. She said that Waverly would call back as soon as he was free.
Calling Waverly didn’t make me feel anywhere near as much better as I thought it would, and I began to pace around my office. My neck was tight. My shoulders were tight. Perhaps Laurel could fix me up. I’d do anything to get Billie out of my mind, and if anyone could do it, it was Laurel.
I picked up the file on the Magenta Martini. I had been staring at the file for weeks without making any creative breakthroughs. I’m not sure what was hanging me up; it wasn’t that hard. I used to go there a couple of times a week. A few months ago, they were involved in a lawsuit over alcohol liability. Although they won the suit, there were a few unresolved P.R. issues left to smooth over. For some reason, though, neither Billie nor I could give them a solution that made them comfortable.
I called Hank. He was involved in the project, as well. I certainly wasn’t going to call Billie to confer. “I’ve got some ideas on the Martini file,” I said. “Come on down.”
If I could get a little spin going, perhaps I would feel like my old self again. After Hank and I stomped on this fire maybe I would call Laurel. After all, I was the D-Man: drinker of tequila and conqueror of…
“Hey,” Hank said, walking in. “Did you get some inspiration or what?”
“I think so.” I tried to shoot the energy through my body to force my inspiration. “What if we positioned the Magenta Martini as an equal opportunity pourer…?”
“It’s got potential…but not very good potential.”
“I want something that suggests personal responsibility… something that says, don’t blame us, if you get drunk and have an accident.”
“You really want to go in that direction? I mean, I know they want to get their cojones off the chopping block, but not my fault seems to be the wrong message.”
Hank was right. This line of thinking was dreadful. The thing with Billie was obviously affecting me more than I thought. I saw her image in the trash. It wasn’t her fault if I was a pre-fab or that I had changed. But she should have known what she was doing. She should have known that there could never be anything casual about us, even if we’d been pretending that everything was casual for years.
I looked over to Hank who stared at me as though I might actually have an answer in my brain. I tried again. “What about if we try something softer…friendlier… driving home the responsibility point, but not the way your father would do it?”
I was just throwing stuff into the air and I could tell that Hank knew it. I looked at Spring and one-legged Santa and the happy Volvo family, and then to Billie’s discarded picture. Despite her smile, the picture reminded me of one of the last things she said to me:
Dylan, this was a nice weekend. Don’t ruin it.
“What about…” I looked out the window, as Hank waited for my brainstorm. “What about, sometimes a friend needs a hand.”
Hank smacked my desk. “Now you’re talking, D-Man!”
“What?”
“They’ll love it. I love it. Mason’s going to love it. Sometimes a friend needs a hand. Simple and brilliant. We can build a whole campaign around that message. I’ll start wo
rking on the pitch.”
Brilliant? It was crap and Hank would figure that out by the time he got to Mason’s office.
Waverly called back a few minutes after Hank left my office and we set up a time to have a longer talk later in the week. Right after I got off the phone with him, I went back to thinking about Billie as if I didn’t already have enough things already keeping me off my game.
When I went to pick Spring up from daycare, my head was still in the same place. The more I walked, the more I thought about the little things: Billie’s hair blowing in the wind, her perfume, her warm giggle in bed when I tickled her foot with my toe. When I saw. Stephanie Eckleburg wave from the desk, I almost welcomed the mental break almost.
Fortunately, she didn’t wait for conversation to ready Spring, and we were out the door without more than a nod and a brief hello. On the walk home, Spring held my hand. For a demanding four year-old, all she really wanted was to swing arms. Her hand was so small and sometimes two of her fingers fell between mine. Despite her being no bigger than a yard gnome, holding her hand comforted me. I needed to tell Spring everything. I needed to chatter. I needed to confess. Me, me, me. Instead, we swung arms.
I really wasn’t sure what made me snap at Billie. I suppose I could have responded differently. I should have known that everything was just too perfect: she was a gorgeous woman I’d known and admired a long time, a good friend, a person who showed up when I needed her, who Spring really liked and who really seemed to like Spring back. But we were in such completely different places. Billie was still out there bending life to her will. When we made love, I thought for a short moment that we were getting ready to take on the world together. But it was like one of those auto races where two cars momentarily seem to be neck-and-neck, but where one is actually going much faster than the other. Billie was in the process of lapping me.
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