One Less Problem Without You

by Beth Harbison

  He handed her the paint and turned his back to her.

  She took the sponge brush they used and started smoothing it over his skin. And she was amazed at how sensual and yet not sensual it felt. The warmth from his body was comforting, kind; it didn’t have uncomfortable sexual overtones. There was no sense of threat from him at all. Just his own vulnerability in his smooth, bare skin.

  Huh.

  She finished and set the can down. “You should stand in front of the fan for a few minutes. I put it on a bit thick.”

  “Thanks.” He moved to the fan and stood with his back to it. “So, tell me, what do you plan to do after this?”

  Now he was going to ask her on a pity date? Where he could either try to subtly toss in a bunch of hints that he “just wanted to be friends,” or where at some point he would “get everything out on the table” and tell her he just wasn’t into her? As if she didn’t get that yet?

  No thanks. She did not have the time or inclination for that.

  She bristled at the very idea. “Oh, I’m just going to go home and get some sleep. I’m really tired.” She made a show of yawning, to prove it.

  He laughed. “I mean after this job. Are you planning to go onstage or into movies like so many people here, or what?”

  She was surprised at his question. It wasn’t like it was so easy to just decide to go onstage or into the movies. If she could have just decided that, she would have done it a long time ago, and she wouldn’t have this bullshit job as a statue in a train station.

  “I think I’ll go ahead and be a movie star,” she said. “But I haven’t decided for sure yet.”

  “That’s awesome.”

  She looked at him. “Are you serious?”

  “About what?”

  “About thinking I’m serious. Do you know how hard it is to get onstage or into movies? Even in a tiny role, much less something major and starring.”

  From the way his shoulders slumped, she imagined he was blushing. She’d been too sarcastic. Apparently he really didn’t know. Now she was being a shrew. Probably making him really, really glad he hadn’t gone on a date with her after all.

  “I don’t really know that much about it all,” he said. “I’m an electrician.”

  “Wait, what?” That was not what she’d been expecting. This pretty boy, here half naked in a job that was typically something real actors used as a stepping-stone, was actually an electrician? “What are you doing here, then?”

  “Aw, it’s such a stupid story,” he said. “Let’s just say I needed money fast and someone recommended me for this job. It’s been a lifesaver, honestly.”

  “Why?” She was interested, and for the first time her mood lightened and she wasn’t thinking about her situation.

  “I bought a truck three months back and got the wrong insurance for it. I asked for comprehensive when what I needed was collision, and it’s a stupid, boring story but basically at the end of the day I had a collision.”

  “But no collision coverage.”

  He shot a finger gun at her. “Boom. And I owe the guy who fixed it. If he hadn’t given me the credit and let me pay him back, I’d have missed a hell of a lot of work.”

  “Wow. So you’re not a model?”

  “Me?” He gave a genuine laugh. “Hell no!”

  “Not an actor.”

  “If I were, I’d have come up with a better story than that and somehow made you believe it.”

  She laughed. Her heart lifted. “We’d better get out there.”

  “Here are the pictures.” He reached for prints of three beautiful Maxfield Parrish paintings. “They have a set out there, and all we have to do is stand about twenty minutes at a time. Much better than the usual.”

  “I don’t know.” She pointed to a picture where she’d be bent backward and he’d be holding her, bent over her as if about to kiss her on the throat. “That looks a little challenging.”

  “It’ll be totally relaxing,” he said in a way that she could almost believe. “Don’t worry, I won’t let you fall.”

  * * *

  HE WAS BEAUTIFUL. Yes, he was covered in white greasepaint. Yes, they were in a public place where everyone was staring at them, so there was nothing like what you’d call sexual tension, and she was glad for that. She would have thought that, having been so unceremoniously rejected, she wouldn’t be able to muster desire for the guy, but apparently she was wrong. She would have thought that after that night, the awful, awful night, she would remain gun-shy—not that she’d wish, suddenly more than anything, that she didn’t feel so damaged. And she didn’t know him well enough to feel this, but she wished that he could take away the pain.

  So many girls depend on Band-Aids and crutches to get past the tough stuff, Chelsea thought. They seek out someone to fix it for them. They seek out someone to fall into, so they don’t have to be their own person. My problem has always been that I won’t ask for help. Ever. Yet something about this person makes me want to be saved.

  How unhealthy was that? She’d just found out how untrustworthy, how evil, human beings can be, and here she was letting herself lean completely into somebody she didn’t even know.

  The first position they had to hold would have been hard on her, but, true to his word, he held her up easily, seemingly without effort. And as weird as it seemed, being in his arms like that was very comforting to her. She had no choice but to let go; otherwise everyone would have seen the shaky strain of her effort. So she let go. Completely.

  And that made all the difference.

  * * *

  SHE COULDN’T HELP it. She couldn’t say no just because she “should,” or because it was “too soon,” or even because he’d already turned her down. When he asked her out at the end of their shift, she couldn’t say anything but yes.

  And so they did go out for that drink, finally. At Madhatten down off Potomac Street. It was small and quiet and there was no crush of people, as there was at so many other places in Georgetown.

  “So do you really want to be famous?” Jeff asked her, sliding her second Schlafly ale to her across the wood table they were sitting at.

  “I used to think so. Now, I’m not so sure. Fame is one thing. Success is another. I think I’d rather have success. A lot of people have fame and aren’t happy.”

  He smiled, and she loved the way his mouth turned up at one corner. He really was cute. Wavy brown hair, tawny skin, denim blue eyes. He was a little bit cliché—she’d certainly thought so when she’d first met him—but now she realized he was less of a cliché than she was.

  Out-of-work actress trying to make it in an impossible dream, mourning her passing youth and losing roles to a younger actress she had no right to loathe so much.

  Wasn’t there a Bette Davis movie like that?

  Chelsea had to accept that a lot of things in her life were good right now. She had to stop trying to become Halle Berry and accept that if she was incredibly lucky and worked incredibly hard she might become a Maggie Smith sort of character actress.

  That would be fantastic.

  “A lot of people with success aren’t happy, either,” Jeff said. “Look at all those lottery winners who end up blowing their fortunes and becoming destitute. Miserable.”

  “It’s true.”

  “But you know who isn’t miserable?” he asked. “Across the board, the happiest people there are?”

  She smiled. “Well, lottery winners would have been my guess, but you just nixed that one.”

  “Nah.” He waved the notion away. “Money won’t do it. Fame won’t do it. The only thing that makes people really happy is actual love.”

  Chelsea heard herself make an involuntary noise of surprise. “Wow. That’s a good attitude. A little sappy for an electrician.” She smiled.

  “Ha. Yeah, I know, I grew up with sisters. But it also … it also kind of leads me to something a little awkward.”

  Uh-oh. That was never a good intro. “What’s that?”

  “Do yo
u remember that night you called and asked me to meet your friend Andrew and you for a drink?”

  Did she remember that night? Hm. It would take a little thought, but, God help her, yes, she probably remembered that night.

  She’d never forget that night.

  “Yes?”

  “I’m just wondering. Not offended or anything, but just wondering. I’d been trying so hard to ask you out. Why did you think I was gay?”

  “Gay?”

  “Yes?”

  “Why do you think I thought you were gay? Of all things!”

  “You were pretty insistent on me meeting Andrew, and you were saying how he almost had a date with Andrew Lloyd Webber once…” His face colored.

  “Oh my God.”

  “I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that, it’s just…” He shrugged. “I guess my male pride was a little wounded. Or at least confused.”

  She shook her head. “I was so self-conscious that night. I was asking you out, but I was so nervous that I think I bungled the whole thing.” She shook her head, thinking how very thoroughly the whole night had gotten “bungled.”

  “Aw, man.” He raked his hand through his hair in that way he did. “I’m sorry I wasn’t clearer. Man, I had no idea. I thought … I mean, it seemed so obvious.”

  “It seemed obvious to me, too,” she admitted. “Now I totally see your point. Ugh.” Stupid, stupid misunderstanding. How could she have let that happen?

  More to the point, why did she let it break her down so much that she allowed herself to be so vulnerable?

  Well, she wasn’t going to let her experience make her vulnerable with men again. She couldn’t afford to waste a bunch of her life in therapy because of some random awful thing that had happened to her.

  “So we’re just two people who tried to ask each other out and refused to see it?” He shook his head with a laugh. “Remember those sisters I mentioned? They would be smacking us both in the back of the head right now.”

  “I’d say we deserve it.”

  “Well, how about this. How about we just start over?” Jeff suggested, raising his bottle. “Hi. I’m Jeff. I’m an electrician, not an actor. Certainly not a model.”

  “I’m Chelsea. I’m an actress and the least psychic psychic the world has ever known. Nice to meet you.”

  They clinked their bottles together, and, for the first time in weeks, Chelsea had the feeling that everything might actually end up being all right after all.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Prinny

  Prinny had not been expecting Leif to show up at her door again.

  Even more, she had not expected him to be there to blame her for “taking his wife away” and “filling her head with crazy notions.”

  He was a madman at this point. Flushed, sweaty, raging. Prinny had seen him angry many times before but this was a new level.

  Leif Tiesman was not pleased that a woman had left him, and so he blamed the only other living woman that he hated as much as, or more than, his wife.

  “Send her home,” he said, referring to Diana. “Send her back now before anyone realizes she’s left of her own accord.”

  “I don’t have the power to send her home!”

  “You took her away.”

  “You sent her away! This was nothing to do with me, this was all you. It’s always you. You make everyone hate you! It’s no wonder your wife left.”

  It was curious how his face registered acceptance but not regret. Somehow it was clear that he knew it was his responsibility even though they both knew he’d never take responsibility for it.

  He was either diabolically evil or just plain insane.

  She had no idea which.

  “If you wanted her, you should have treated her with respect,” Prinny said. “And that’s not her talking, it’s me. It’s me, knowing that ever since you were a little kid, the one thing you were never able to muster for anyone else was respect. It’s disgusting.”

  “If you or your mother had earned my respect, you would have gotten it.”

  “Don’t you bring her into this!”

  “How can I not? She brought you into this! And you, little sister”—he spat the word—“are the problem with everything.”

  “Meaning what?” She straightened her back and hoped she sounded braver than she felt.

  “Meaning you need to stop. You need to stop or be stopped.” He took a step toward her. “And your big brother is here to help you with that.”

  That was when Prinny knew that he was even worse than she’d feared.

  “How dare you!” she shouted at him.

  “How dare I?” He stopped. He stopped dead in his tracks and didn’t move one more step forward.

  Prinny summoned all of her internal resources and hurled them at Leif like some swirling, filmy ghost made of anger. “Yes, how dare you threaten me! You have been a monster to me my entire life, and I have never, ever done anything to you!”

  He laughed, but she knew he was scared. And she finally fully understood why. He was terrified that she’d be able to see his terror of her. He was terrified she’d be able to see everything inside him.

  And he was right.

  She could.

  The thing was, there just wasn’t that much to see.

  “You’re scared of me,” she said to him. “You always have been. Since I was little. I had no idea what your problem was. Remember when I gave you that toy Mustang for your birthday? I thought you’d be so fucking happy, and that finally—finally—maybe you’d smile instead of being such a dour old prick, but nothing could crack your veneer except the truth.”

  “What truth?” he asked, then cleared his throat. She noticed he straightened his back as well.

  “That you can’t hide from me. You can’t hide anything from me. You couldn’t hide from my mother, either.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about, little girl,” he snarled. “You’d better stop now.”

  “I’m not stopping! Not now, not ever. You made my mother’s life miserable all because you were a horrible little toad with a lot to hide and you knew you couldn’t hide it from her or from me. God almighty, imagine the stress that must have put Daddy through!”

  Leif’s face went scarlet. “Dad was fine. In fact, he was better before he ever met Ingrid.”

  “Oh, please. She made him happy. I’m sorry that was so fucking agonizing for you.”

  “It was…” He straightened his back and cleared his throat again. His face remained red. “Everything was ruined when you and your witchy mother came along. I was glad when she was gone, and I’ll be glad when you are, too.”

  “Fuck you!” she spit at him. “Fuck you, Leif. I hate you. Are you happy now? Is that what you wanted? Because that’s what you got. I hate you!”

  “Go … to … hell…” He put a hand to his chest. Then his other hand, and he coughed again. This time it was a raspy cough, odd.

  And before she could even think, he had fallen to the ground.

  * * *

  BEING IN THE waiting room was as impersonal and uncomfortable as sitting at a metal fold-down table in an elementary school cafeteria. Why buy such cheap, squared-off chairs for people who would inevitably be waiting a long time—and very tensely—for news, good or bad? They might as well have been hanging from monkey bars for all the comfort those seats provided.

  And why was there always a fuzzy station playing some sort of foreign sports on TV? Was that cricket? Every time Prinny had been in the hospital, she could find only three channels, all local news, seemingly all the time. Why did the waiting room seem to have the boring upper 900s of cable?

  Was the cafeteria ever open? Not as if hospital cafeterias ever had food worth bragging about, but here the only thing available to eat or drink came out of a vending machine. It was deplorable. So far all she’d had was a Butterfinger and half a Diet Cherry Coke, and she felt completely disgusting.

  If there was one place that should be filled
with easy chairs, spa music, and chamomile tea—or, on second thought, maybe a full bar—it was a surgical waiting room.

  Prinny and Diana had been sitting there for an hour already with absolutely no idea what was going on, no idea what they were even waiting to hear. To say nothing of the fact that they had no idea what to hope for.

  That was a tough admission Prinny never wanted to make.

  She’d done this. She knew she’d done this. She never fully knew her power before and now … now it was too late to harness it.

  Finally a nurse came out and, after stopping at the desk for long enough for Prinny to think she wasn’t part of Leif’s team, looked in their direction and came over to them.

  “Ms. Tiesman?”

  They were both Ms. Tiesman, of course, but Prinny knew that the nurse meant Diana, and indicated her. “This is his wife,” she said, and then swallowed, a new and unexpected fear gripping her throat. Was this about to be some sort of it moment?

  She wasn’t feeling anything intuitively. The adrenaline was too distractingly high. All psychic energy was cut off, and she was running solely on nerves. She was too invested to see it omnisciently.

  “What’s going on with my husband?” Diana asked. “Is he going to live?”

  “We’re still working on figuring out exactly what’s going on. Mr. Tiesman presented with an apparent arrhythmia—”

  “I thought it was a heart attack,” Diana interrupted, and Prinny noticed her forehead knitted. Disappointment? Was arrhythmia worse or better?

  The nurse, whose name tag identified her as Shannon C., was patient with the interruption. “The symptoms are very much the same: He had palpitations and was short of breath and diaphoretic.”

  “What’s diaphoretic?” Prinny asked.

  “Sweaty,” Diana shot at her, then turned her attention back to the nurse. “So what is his condition now?”

  Diana was absolutely panicked. Her voice was coming out in quick, breathy bursts. Nervousness radiated off her like heat waves. And talk about diaphoretic—a sheen of glistening sweat was appearing on her forehead. She was kneading her hands in her lap, too, scratching the skin next to her thumbnails. It was like watching someone in a full-on panic attack. Or, more specifically, Prinny was watching someone in a full-on panic attack.