Belonging

by Alexa Land

  He grumbled about all of that being unnecessary, but did as he was told. I returned to the kitchen and found a zip top bag, which I filled with ice cubes and wrapped in a clean dish towel. When I brought it to him in the den, he tried to hold it in place by wrapping his left arm over his shoulder. I could tell it was awkward and uncomfortable for him, so I sat down behind him and held the bag for him as I said, “We need to leave it in place for twenty minutes.”

  “You really don’t have to sit there and hold it.”

  “I know, but I’m going to do it anyway.” I pulled out my phone and awkwardly set a timer with one hand, then put it on the couch.

  We sat in silence for a few minutes. At one point, his hair fell across his back and I swept it over his shoulder. It was surprisingly soft. It smelled good, too, which wasn’t news to me since I was the one who bought his shampoo. I could see the edge of a big, round tattoo between his shoulder blades and was curious about it, but decided it was none of my business so I didn’t ask to see more.

  After a while, he said, “You would have made a good nurse. Maybe you should think about going back and finishing your studies.”

  “I can’t, I’m way too squeamish.”

  “Can’t stand the sight of blood?”

  “That’s bad enough, but even worse is vomit. It makes me throw up instantly, every time. It’s like flipping a switch. I’m fine, I see vomit, I puke. That’s a terrible attribute in a nurse.”

  “So, don’t get a job in a hospital. If you worked in, let’s say, a podiatrist’s office, your chances of encountering upchuck would be pretty negligible.”

  “I know. But I’d have to make it through nursing school first, and that means hospital internships.”

  “Is that the only reason you dropped out? There’s probably some way around it.”

  “No,” I admitted, “it’s not the only reason, it’s just the one I tell people. I messed up a patient’s meds when I was interning and I realized that wasn’t the right job for me. I can’t be responsible for anything that important.”

  “What happened to the patient?”

  “Nothing. My supervising RN caught the mistake. But God, what if I messed up again and no one caught it? I’d never be able to live with myself if someone got hurt because of me.”

  “But you were a student, you were still learning. That was why you had a nurse supervising you in the first place.”

  “Still, I’m not smart enough to be a nurse. At least I had enough sense to realize that and walk away from it.” Zan pivoted around and stared at me. “Hold still,” I said, reaching around him to keep the icepack in place. “It hasn’t been twenty minutes yet.”

  “Who told you that you weren’t smart enough?”

  “Nobody needed to tell me, it was obvious.” He stared at me for another long moment. We were in an awkward position, since I was partially embracing him to keep the ice on his shoulder.

  “I never would have guessed that, not in a million years,” he murmured.

  I grinned a little. “That I’m stupid?”

  “Damn it Gianni, stop saying that. You’re not even sort of stupid. What I meant was, I never in a million years would have guessed that you’d have self-esteem issues. Everything about you exudes confidence. And now to find out you think this about yourself? It’s just incomprehensible.”

  I lowered my gaze embarrassedly and suddenly, I became acutely aware of our proximity. I was close enough to feel the warmth of his body and breathe in his clean scent, which I tried to ignore as I muttered, “I don’t think I have self-esteem issues, I’m just really self-aware. I see my shortcomings clearly, and even though you’re being nice to me right now, I’m sure you see them, too.”

  Zan’s voice was low and gentle as he said, “You’re stubborn as hell and you have a temper on you, but if I’m being honest, I look at those things as pluses, not minuses. Beyond that, from where I’m sitting, you’re pretty damn perfect, Gianni.”

  I tried to laugh that off, even as some sort of strong emotion welled up in me. “Which just goes to show that you really don’t know me at all. Perfect has got to be the very last word I’d ever apply to myself.”

  “And you think you’re self-aware,” he muttered.

  I had such an overwhelming urge to put my arms around Zan and hold on tight, but that was insane on so many levels. So what if he was showing me a moment of kindness? That was only because I’d stirred up some pity by talking about my total failure as a nursing student. The fact that he couldn’t stand me surely hadn’t changed.

  “Here, hold this in place,” I said as I picked up his left hand and draped it over his right shoulder so he could grasp the edge of the icepack. “If you lean back with this between you and the couch, you can keep it on your shoulder without tiring your arm.”

  I got up and grabbed my phone. “You have eight more minutes. Please use an icepack a few more times today, and take some ibuprofen if you have any. Both of those things will minimize the swelling and bruising.”

  “Where are you going?” he asked as I headed for the door.

  “I’ve bothered you enough for one day. I’m going to get out of here and give you some space.”

  “I live all alone in the middle of nearly a hundred acres, Gianni. About the last thing I need is to be given space.”

  “Well, I’m giving you some anyway.”

  He came after me when I left the den and asked, “Did I do something wrong? I mean, more than usual?”

  “No, of course not.” I turned to look at him and said, “Shit Zan, that wasn’t twenty minutes. Go back and get your icepack.”

  “Close enough.”

  “No it wasn’t. Go ice.” I scooped up the canvas shopping bags and started to leave the kitchen.

  “You’ve forgotten something,” he called after me.

  I stopped at the far side of the room and turned to look at him. “What did I forget?”

  He went up to the kitchen island and offered me a little grin as he touched the center of it. “My fruit-based irritant.”

  “I think I’ve annoyed you enough for one day. And for the love of God, go ice your damn shoulder!”

  “Come on. What did you bring me? You were so disappointed when I took the lychee fruit in stride, so I’ll bet it’s really feckin’ crazy this time.”

  I frowned at him and crossed the kitchen to stand on the other side of the island. “If I show you, do you promise to ice five more times today?”

  “Five times? No chance.”

  “Right. Because you have something better to do.”

  There was that little grin again. “I do, as a matter of fact.”

  “While watching Blade Runner for the six hundredth time is admittedly important, you could ice your shoulder at the same time.”

  “That’s not what I do all day.”

  “So, how do you pass the time?”

  “Show me what you brought me and I’ll tell you,” Zan said.

  “You watch movies and read books. I already know this, since I’m the person who brings them to you.”

  “I’d go utterly stir crazy if that was all I did.”

  I raised an eyebrow at him. “I’m guessing you also occasionally have dates with Rosy Palm and her five sisters,” I said, making a fairly rude gesture with my right hand, “but that’s none of my business.”

  He burst out laughing. “For fuck’s sake, I wasn’t going to confess that I pass the time by wanking! I haven’t lost all sense of what constitutes polite conversation!”

  “Okay. Then what were you going to tell me?”

  “First the fruit, then the confession.” I sighed at that, then reached into one of the canvas bags, pulled out an apple, and placed it on the island. Zan’s face fell. “That’s it? That’s what you brought me?”

  “No. I bought that to eat on the drive home. Who says I brought you anything? Maybe I decided I was going to be cooperative and stick to your shopping list from now on.”

  “That seems
highly unlikely,” he told me.

  “You’re right. I actually brought you the single-oddest fruit known to man.” I grabbed one of the bags in its center and cinched it in my hand, so he could see the shape of it through the fabric. “You really want to see this. It’ll set you off on a twenty minute rant! It’s so totally objectionable, in fact, that you’ll be yelling about it for weeks to come. To see it, you just have to do two things: swear you’ll ice your shoulder, and tell me what you do when I’m not here.”

  “Why do you care what I do all day?”

  “Because you’re the only crazy hermit I know and I’m intensely curious about how you pass the time. I mean, if it was me, I’d have gone stark raving mad at about the one month mark, but you’ve been at this shit for more than a decade! What the hell do you do to keep yourself sane?”

  He walked around the counter and stood right in front of me. “I write songs.”

  “You do?” When he nodded, I asked, “But how? There aren’t any notebooks around here, and you don’t have a computer. If you write songs, where are they?”

  He tapped the center of his forehead once with his index finger. “Right here. I come up with the music and lyrics and go over it again and again and again, until it’s as good as I can possibly make it. Then I begin a new one. If I didn’t have that, you’re absolutely right. I would have lost my mind a long time ago.”

  “Oh.” I was acutely aware of his proximity again. Zan stood less than a foot away, staring right into my eyes while I stared back, an amused expression on his face. God, was he beautiful. It wasn’t as though I’d never noticed before. But at that moment I was just overcome by it, so much that I wanted to reach out and touch him.

  Fortunately, Zan snapped me out of my completely misplaced reverie by snatching the canvas sack from me. He stuck his hand inside and pulled out what I’d brought him, then yelled, “Bloody hell, what is that?” as he tossed it onto the counter.

  “It’s called a Buddha’s hand. It’s a citrus fruit.”

  “It isn’t! It’s a fat, yellow octopus!”

  “Not even close.”

  “The thing has tentacles! Where did you find this monstrosity?”

  “The market,” I said flatly.

  “There’s absolutely no way that’s fruit, or even edible!”

  “It is! I want you to try it, I hear they’re good.”

  “Aha! You hear they’re good. That means you’ve never been daft enough to try one yourself. I won’t be the first one down that gangplank!” He plucked it off the counter by one of its long, yellow fingers and rushed for the back door as I ran after him.

  “Don’t you dare throw that thing! It was expensive!”

  “And now it’s doubly crazy! Also, just look. You yourself called it a thing!”

  “Only because it sounds pretty freaking insane to yell don’t throw Buddha’s hand outside!” He flung open the back door and went to throw it, but I grabbed his arm as I exclaimed, “I mean it! Don’t do it!”

  A ridiculous game of keep-away ensued, worthy of a third grade playground. I burst out laughing and told him, “You’re being really immature!”

  Zan was laughing, too. “It belongs outside,” he said as he twisted his body to hold the fruit away from me. “That way, it can crawl back to the mothership!”

  “Granted, it’s a little weird looking, but it’s a fruit! Its cousin is an orange!”

  “Maybe you should have brought me its cousin, then,” he said, grabbing my left wrist while I grabbed his.

  “You’ve had oranges! I wanted you to try something new.”

  “So you brought me an octopus alien!”

  “Okay, I’ll concede that I might have been aiming a bit too high. But try it anyway! I’ll reel it in next time and bring you some grapes or something.”

  “I don’t like grapes,” he said.

  “You can’t make a blanket statement like that,” I told him. “There are dozens of grape varieties and they’re all different. If you tried a few, I bet you’d find one you liked.”

  “But they’re all squishy little balls, and I want no part of that.”

  “God you’re weird.”

  “You think?”

  He executed a surprisingly graceful move all of a sudden and pinned me to the wall, holding me in place by leaning against me. “You’re going to injure your sore shoulder,” I told him.

  “It’ll be worth it for the immense satisfaction of seeing the space octopus become airborne,” he said with a smile.

  My heart was already beating quickly because of our game of keep-away, and it stuttered when I looked in his eyes. He let go of my wrist and I let go of his, both of us becoming serious at the same time. My gaze dropped to his full lips. I wanted him to kiss me so fucking bad. God I wanted that.

  But he didn’t do it. He didn’t do anything. Zan just stood there, his body pressed against mine as lust shot through me. He was breathing hard just like I was, his chest rising and falling, but aside from that, he remained perfectly immobile.

  Was he waiting for me to make a move? I looked in his eyes again and seriously considered leaning in and planting one on him. But I just couldn’t do it! What if I was the only one feeling this? What if I went to kiss him and he pulled away? How incredibly embarrassing would that be?

  Besides, if he wanted to kiss me, he would. It wasn’t like he was shy, given what he used to do for a living. There was just no way.

  Zan stepped back from me abruptly and muttered, “Sorry.” Then he (and the fruit) went back to his cave. He closed the door to the den behind him. I stared after him for a moment before I retreated too, heading straight for my car.

  I rolled the window down and took a few deep breaths, trying to calm myself as I drove back to the city. Traffic was thick when I got to the town of Larkspur, and on the Golden Gate Bridge, it came to a dead stop. It was a beautiful Saturday. That basically meant that everyone who lived outside the city was going to San Francisco, while everyone who lived in the city was going somewhere else. I swore under my breath and leaned against the headrest.

  What the hell happened back there? Did Zan and I have a moment, or did I totally imagine it? The more I thought about it, the more I became convinced that it must have been completely one-sided. After all, he usually barely spoke to me and had never shown the slightest interest in me.

  And good lord, why was I even drawn to him in the first place? Zan Tillane made my life miserable. He was stubborn and argumentative, and a real pain in the ass.

  Well okay, he had his good points, too. For one thing, he was undeniably fascinating. How did someone go from performing in front of thousands of people to totally cutting himself off from the rest of the world? He was such an enigma.

  Zan was beautiful too, especially when he was happy and the light came on in his eyes. He was also incredibly damaged and vulnerable, but in a weird way, that added to his appeal. I kept finding myself wanting to protect him and take care of him. Not that he wanted that (or anything at all, really) from me.

  That alleged ‘moment’ must have just been a product of my imagination. I’d been right not to kiss him. Zan didn’t want me. He didn’t even like me. He’d been making that abundantly clear for months.

  Traffic started to move and I sat up and tried to concentrate. I only rolled forward about three inches, though. I sighed as I ground to a halt once again.

  Chapter Eight

  Over the next couple weeks, Zan completely withdrew from me. Apparently whatever had happened (or totally didn’t happen) between us had made him really uncomfortable around me, so the few interactions we had after that were formal and stilted. Mostly though, he just stayed in the den when I came over and avoided me entirely.

  One Sunday afternoon while I was at Christian’s apartment, I asked him, “How has your dad seemed to you lately?”

  “Fine. We were just over there yesterday and he was in a good mood. Why do you ask?”

  We’d been sitting on the living room f
loor sorting through a bunch of paperbacks, and I looked up from my task. Christian and Shea were in escrow on the house and would be moving in just a couple weeks, so I was helping my friend go through his stuff. We were packing up unwanted items to donate to a local thrift shop that supported hospice patients. “I was just wondering if he was in one of his downswings with his bipolar disorder.”

  “No, it’s been a few months since the last one,” Christian told me. Then he asked, “Is everything okay between you two?”

  “I guess. I’ve never exactly been his favorite person, and lately he’s just really been keeping his distance. I mean, more than usual.”

  “I’m sorry,” Christian said. “I know how difficult he can be. I’ll talk to him if you want.”

  “No, don’t. That’ll make it worse. I was just concerned about him, so I thought I’d ask.”

  A few minutes later, Shea came home with a couple bags of groceries. “Hi guys,” he said, then bent to kiss his fiancé. “Making any progress?”

  “A bit.” Christian smiled up at him.

  I got to my feet and gestured at a cardboard box as I said, “That’s pretty full. If you want, I’ll drop it off at the thrift shop for you since I’ll be driving right by there. I’m supposed to meet Chance in half an hour for another photography session.”

  “Thanks, that’d be great,” Christian said as he shifted himself from the floor to an upholstered chair. It was nice to see he was getting his strength back. “Say hi to Chance for us.”

  “Will do, and you’ll be seeing him tonight since all of you are coming to Sunday dinner. That reminds me, you might want to eat before you come over. Nana is threatening to get ‘experimental’ with tonight’s dinner and film it for her cooking show. I’m just going to go ahead and guess it won’t go well.”

  Shea smiled at that. “Thanks for the heads-up.”

  *****

  After a quick stop at the thrift shop, I met Chance at the Sutro Baths. At one time, they’d been grand, indoor pools just steps from the ocean. The lavish nineteenth century buildings were long gone, and all that remained were some concrete ruins. It was an interesting setting, and my friend had thought it would make a good backdrop for some black and white photos.