by Lisa Loomis
I hung up the phone without a reply. The lie about who I was with came entirely too easy. “Love you”, did I love him? Could I be with Mathew if I totally loved Max? I went to the restaurant and got two cups of coffee to go. If my wrinkled formal attire was unusual at this time of day, she didn’t seem to notice. I unlocked the door to the room to find Mathew propped up on the pillows.
“Glad to see that Cinderella didn’t vanish. I looked to see if there was a glass slipper, but could only find a purse. I figured if you ran off, leaving me money, you were desperate,” he teased.
“Shut up, and just so you know, there is no Cinderella, no glass slipper, no white horse, nothing; it’s all made up. I went to get us coffee. My head hurts,” I said, handing him a cup.
I set my coffee on the nightstand, took the dress off, and jumped back in bed. He set his coffee down.
“I know the perfect cure for a headache,” he said, pulling me to him.
Walking out into the sunshine I laughed at our attire. We’d showered, but having no other clothes we’d had to put back on our wrinkled wedding clothes.
“Your pumpkin awaits,” Mathew teased.
“No prince either,” I said. “Life just isn’t a fairy tale, it’s messy. You’re messy.”
He smiled at me and took my hand. When we left the hotel, he drove me to Gayle’s where we found Gayle and Bridgett sitting in the kitchen. They were dressed in Dolphin shorts and T-shirts, looking like they were just back from a run.
“Long night?” Gayle asked, her forehead wrinkling.
“The clothes give it away?” I teased.
Bridgett laughed.
“Morning girls,” Mathew said with a grin.
“I’ll just be a minute,” I said squeezing his arm.
Mathew glanced at me and then sat down at the table with Bridgett as Gayle stood up and followed me into their spare bedroom.
“Do tell?”
Her tone was part scolding, part amusement.
“I spent the night with him,” I answered.
“I know that part. Talking, I presume?” she said sarcastically as she sat down on the bed.
The room was bright, painted white, with blue and white printed side panels on the window and a checkered patterned blue and white bedspread. The sunlight through the window spilled across her legs.
“It’s Mathew, Gayle.”
“I thought, maybe,” she emphasized maybe, “with you having a boyfriend and all, he wouldn’t be able to work his magic power.”
I was feeling deliriously happy and I didn’t need a lecture, not from her.
“I thought so too,” I said somewhat annoyed.
I dug through my suitcase and pulled out a pair of shorts and a T-shirt.
“Morgan…”
“I know Gayle,” I said pulling my dress off and changing.
I stuffed my dress in the suitcase and closed it up. Gayle frowned at me and I gave her a cheesy smile.
“Leaving already? Lengthy stay. I assume you’ll be finishing your visit at Mathew’s,” she said.
“It doesn’t make sense. I’m cheating okay. I know. I want to be with him, wrong or right.”
“What about Max?”
“I’ve been told to try really hard not to think about that,” I said.
“I’m sure you have,” she said.
Mathew had asked me not to think of Max. Being with him it was entirely too easy, and again I questioned my feelings for Max. I pushed the thought quickly away.
“I’ll deal with that later.”
Gayle pulled at my T-shirt.
“Sit for a minute,” she said. “I need to understand what it is about him that makes you act crazy.”
“Me, act crazy?” I smiled at her.
“I’m serious. What does he have that can pull you back so easily? What is it about him, Morgan, besides the obvious?”
I sat down next to her on the bed. I thought about it before I spoke.
“Gayle, over the years I have asked myself that so many times, you can’t even imagine. Besides the obvious? I assume his looks are the obvious, his body obvious, our chemistry totally obvious. So besides the obvious, he makes me laugh, Gayle. Even when I am determined to be pissed off at him, he can make me laugh. He makes me laugh at myself, at him, at us. He has a way of taking life in stride that doesn’t make sense, so somehow it makes sense, like last night.”
“The wedding probably made you feel all romantic and shit,” she said. “Add booze, oh, I’m sure he plied you with that, drugs too maybe.”
I sighed. How could I make her understand? When I didn’t understand it? I adjusted myself and turned towards her.
“There’s a history Gayle…”
“Really? A fucking long history of stupidity,” she snapped.
“When you first had feelings for Bridgett, did you think they were stupid, wrong?” I asked defensively. “When the butterflies filled your stomach, or your heart, or whatever feeling it was, did it feel stupid?”
“We aren’t talking apples and oranges,” she protested.
I inhaled deeply. She was wringing her hands in a way she did sometimes when she was frustrated. I was frustrated.
“Just listen to me, no snide comments. Since the time we were kids I’ve loved him and hated him.”
She started to say something and I put my hand up.
“He’s not perfect, terribly flawed in fact, but there is something that draws me to him, and him to me. I see through the rock star part, he knows I can see through it, in fact I’m not even interested in that side of him. I’m not some groupie he can have meaningless sex with and toss aside.”
She rolled her head in irritation. I knew she thought that’s exactly what he did.
“I can see the little boy, see us jumping rocks in a creek, see us under the stars in a hot tub in Tahoe, remember the time he took my hand in his at the beach, the time he asked me to ride the merry-go-round on the Boardwalk, remember the first time he kissed me. And,” I said drawing it out, “yes, I also remember my anger at him, the times he hurt me.”
I stared into her eyes. Eyes that had witnessed the majority of it and still couldn’t comprehend it. I smiled and tears filled my eyes.
“He can be so tender and kind that it rips at my heart. Yes, there is that part you don’t see. We can talk, and I guess, love and fight, and then in the end, we still care deeply about each other. He said something last night the blew me away and yet made perfect sense.”
I remembered his tender words from last night about us.
“Growing up together, we learned so many things about each other. Things sometimes I don’t even think we grasped at the time. Our time together has always been in small increments unfortunately, so we had to learn to not have expectations, unrealistic expectations.”
I looked over at her. She stared at me, saying nothing.
“You know I’ve always been obsessed with him. You were the one who told me I’ve loved him forever.”
I was just getting the look.
“Oh yeah, and he’s a leader in a rock band, so he plays a mean guitar,” I teased.
She finally laughed.
“There have been so many times I thought you would get over him, but you don’t, it just worries me,” she said.
“Don’t worry, I still get on a plane at the end of the day and fly home. He can be very good in small increments,” I said smiling. “And the sex is awesome. I’d forgotten how hot it can be.”
I pictured Max’s face.
“You’re screwed up, Morgan.”
I picked up my suitcase and walked back to the kitchen with her following me.
“Ready,” I said, feeling excited.
Mathew gave me a look like where have you been and took my suitcase.
“Nice seeing you, girls,” he said, headed out the door toward the car.
“Thanks for the wonderful time we did spend together,” I said, hugging Gayle.
I turned from her and hugged Bridgett.<
br />
“Don’t let her spend too much time trying to figure it out,” I whispered loud enough for Gayle to hear. “There’s no real answer.”
“Deep down she knows that,” Bridgett said smiling. “Love has no rhyme or reason.”
She put her arm around Gayle and squeezed her.
“Love you both,” I said and was out the door.
“Okay, I’m all yours,” I said, getting in the car, leaning over to kiss him.
“She still hates me,” he said.
“She’s never hated you. There’s a lot of history between us, she knows about. Not all good. She sees me doing something I shouldn’t be. She thought Max would stop me this time. She’s worried about her crazy friend.”
“Is that what took you so damn long?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I chuckled. “I had to try and explain myself.”
“Not so easy, I’m guessing,” he said.
“Ya, think?”
We drove a ways in silence with the radio playing. I felt content and happy.
“She knows what my feelings are where you’re concerned; she just can’t understand them. She thinks you have some kind of magical power over me. That probably worries her the most,” I said.
He shot me a long glance like I was out of my mind.
“Keep your eyes on the road,” I scolded.
“So she believes I’m magic?” he teased.
“Only when it comes to me.”
He’d rolled the sleeves up on his white dress shirt, and it was unbuttoned and open at the neck. I could see a little bit on his chest, his tanned arms, and his hands on the wheel. Hands that could make me melt. He looked incredibly sexy and I couldn’t wait to be with him again, and again, and again.
“What feelings are those?” he asked.
“The complex messy ones, the ones we never talk about.”
He laughed and it was like music to my ears.
Mathew and I spent the next day and night together.
“Once again she’s leaving my bed,” he mused. “I never did finish that song. Maybe it’s time.”
We were lying in his bed, my head resting on his chest.
“Don’t go beating yourself up over this, Morgan. And don’t get the guilt’s and tell Max. It would finish you two.”
Maybe be the best thing. He ran his fingers through my hair, from my scalp to the end and back again. I closed my eyes, feeling the tug, hugging up against him.
“Don’t talk. Right now, what I want is right here. I can’t think about getting home, can’t think about my feelings for Max.” I said, swallowing hard. “About my feelings for you.”
I kissed his chest.
“I wish things weren’t always so convoluted when it comes to you,” I said.
He squeezed me.
“Simple, remember? Just a boy in a band,” he said, rolling on top of me.
“That boy has never been simple,” I said as I ran my hands down his back.
Mathew dropped me at the airport. Once again I was getting on a plane with my heart aching. I called Max’s house when I got home. He didn’t answer, and I left a message on his machine. He called back about six.
“Long day?” he asked.
“Long day,” I answered feeling exhausted emotionally and physically.
“How was the rest of the trip?”
“Good.”
“Gayle?" Max asked.
“She’s good. I had a nice time with Bridgett and her.”
“Was Mathew at the wedding?”
He knew we had been long-time friends. He also didn’t hide it very well that it bothered him that I had a male friend. He thought it was weird.
“Yeah, he was there,” I said.
I pictured him when our eyes first locked at the wedding, and saw him walk out of the bathroom at the hotel without his shirt on. I closed my eyes, pictured him driving, his white dress shirt rolled up. Oh, Mathew.
“You two spend all night talking and ignoring everyone else?” he asked, digging.
My eyes flew open.
“We didn’t get much time to talk. He had a date,” I lied, wanting to divert any more specific questions.
“You sound tired.”
“I am. I think I’ll stay home tonight and see you tomorrow after work.”
“I’m pretty tired myself,” he said displeased.
I could tell he was miffed at me. He wanted me to come to him, but wasn’t offering to come to me. I wondered what I possessed that I seemed to attract the selfish men. I went to bed early and dreamed that I was sitting next to Mathew in a church. It was someone’s wedding. I kept trying to remember whose wedding it was. The groom was waiting with the minister at the front of the church, his face not clear to me. We kept looking up the aisle, but there was no bride. “Here Comes the Bride” started playing again, and I looked at Mathew.
“Something‘s wrong,” I said.
I looked back at the groom. He was looking directly at me, his face suddenly clear. I woke late and lay there thinking about the dream. The wedding part I could understand as I had just been to Melanie’s, but the groom confused me. Why had he been looking at me, or was he looking at me with Mathew? I closed my eyes and thought about us in bed together yesterday. I could see his face smiling at me. I thought I’d worked Mathew out of my heart. It had taken one night for him to get back in, to totally confuse my feelings about love.
I reflected back over the years. I could hear him play. “Play for me” I would say. Kim jumped into my head. I could see him sitting at the end of the pool, Kim reclined against him, the afternoon he kissed me hard in the bathroom, the night I gave my virginity to Kevin. I tried to remember all the times we had been together since then. Was it possible he still had such a hold on my heart, or was it just the memories that came flooding back when I saw him?
What I felt for Mathew was different from what I felt for Max. What did I feel for Max? Did I truly love him? If I did, why would Mathew be able to reel me in like he did? How was I going to feel tonight when I saw Max? I wanted to run back to Mathew. For the first time, I wanted to run to him, instead of away. I’d always sort of run away. If not physically, when he was an asshole, emotionally, tried to stuff it down; afraid of my feelings, afraid of what he made me feel for him, afraid of what I assumed he didn’t feel. I called Gayle.
“Are you surprised?” she asked when I told her how I felt.
“I didn’t think I would be so confused.”
“Confused about Mathew or Max?”
She was being a friend, listening not scolding.
“About my feelings for Max. Mathew told me not to beat myself up about it, but I am. Don’t get me wrong, not about being with Mathew. I’m beating myself up on what I don’t feel. I should feel guilty as hell, but I don’t,” I said.
“Go see Max tonight. Put Mathew out of your head. He’s not an option, Morgan. Mathew is like a drug to you. Knowing full well it’s not the best thing for you, you keep going back. I’m not judging, just been observing for years,” she said as she drew out the word years.
Chapter 44
I didn’t hear from Mathew for days. I took Gayle’s advice for once and went back to Max. She was right; Mathew was not an option. He was not so easy to remove from my heart, however. He finally called a few weeks after the wedding, and we’d talked several times since then. We talked about the nights we had spent together recently and our past. We reminisced fondly; I could hear the miss in his voice. Anything else we kept light, simple. Living so far apart, and our lives wrapped up in where we lived, it was better for both of us that way.
When fall came, both Mathew and I started back to school, and he started part-time as a paralegal. Kingdom Come was still playing gigs, but I think he had come to realize they might never make it big. His frustration was evident, and the partying seemed to be spinning out of control. He always played it down with me, but I could imagine. Having been in the back room of the Apollo only once, I knew that scene happened every time th
ey played.
Over the next year-and-a-half, I would be with Mathew two more times: once in Los Angeles when Kingdom Come played there, the other in San Jose when I went to visit Gayle. Both times he would recapture my heart. “Like a drug” Gayle said. She was right. I had picked my drug of choice long ago. I’d been unfaithful to Max three times, all with the same person. It made me have doubts about my ability to love or be committed to anyone, even Mathew. When we were together, it was intense. When we were apart, we went back to being best friends.
Max and I had been growing apart slowly. I was focused on school and work; Max focused on work. Our relationship was going nowhere. My trysts with Mathew screamed at me that something was missing, otherwise how could I do it. I realized that I didn’t want to analyze it, so I kept pushing my feelings down. I remembered the summer Mathew told me to lose Ben; he had made me look hard at my feelings. Mathew had made me realize, all those years ago, that I didn’t love Ben; I’d loved the thought of being in love.
Ironically, Max and I finally broke up over his indiscretion with another girl. He never did know about my rendezvous with Mathew. I thought about throwing it in his face when I caught him, but I didn’t. It wouldn’t have changed anything. The reality of my twisted thinking was that I with Mathew first, so I really hadn’t done anything wrong. I’d spent five years trying to make Max and me work. Like Ben, I realized that what we’d had wasn’t love, at least not love like I thought it should be. I was single for the first time, and it felt odd.
I was living at home again, full-time. I started San Diego State that fall after taking several years off school. I’d worked, and then moved to Park City, Utah with Pat to ski and work for a winter. The University was so much bigger than the junior college I attended out of high school. It was hard to get classes. Harder it seemed in every aspect. I thought I’d been grown-up at thirteen; now at twenty-four, I felt as if I knew nothing. It seemed I’d spent a lot of years going in the wrong directions. Now I was going through the motions of what I thought I should do, and I’d hit another roadblock. And emotionally, regarding men, I felt dead inside.
