Fifteen Minutes of Summer

by Wardell, Heather

  “Almost for sure.”

  As I parked, he pulled out his phone and did some typing, and once I’d turned off the car he said, “I won’t bet on it being there tomorrow, actually.”

  “No? How come?”

  He held out the phone. “Because it’s there now.”

  We peered at the tiny screen for a moment then he made the intelligent suggestion that we go to his apartment and look at the posting on his laptop.

  “Caught in a kiss... again! A reader spotted Aaron and Summer, or Summaar as you voted to call them, tonight on an intimate dinner date recreating the kiss you loved on ‘Ragged Royalty’. Looks like they can’t think of anything but each other. Aw, twu wuv.”

  “They make it sound like it was all our idea,” I said after studying the pictures of us locked together.

  “Hey, I didn’t exactly mind a little kissing.” He put the computer down on the coffee table and wrapped his arm around my shoulders. “Did you?”

  I pursed my lips and pretended to look upset, and he laughed. “Well, I guess a gossip site got it right. For once. Because you obviously can’t think about anything but me and I...” He pulled me closer. “I have definitely been thinking about you.”

  “Really?” I murmured, but I didn’t get further than that because he kissed me and in seconds I was having too much fun to talk.

  His mouth felt amazing on mine, but when his hands began to roam I pulled away.

  “Sorry,” he said, then slapped himself on the wrist. “Bad boy. Coffee first.”

  Though I was scared I was about to lose him, I said, “It’s not about the timing, Aaron.”

  Obviously recognizing I wasn’t fooling around, he leaned forward. “What’s up?”

  I cleared my throat. “Well...” I’d explained this to guys before but it never got any easier. They either pretended they hadn’t wanted to have sex with me at all and made me feel stupid or acted so stunned that anyone wouldn’t want to have sex with them that I felt stupid in a different way. But I had to tell him so I made myself say it. “I’m not going to sleep with you, or anyone, until I’m married again.”

  He blinked. “Wouldn’t your husband mind?”

  I blinked too, then had to smile. “I meant I’d sleep with my husband. And only my husband. I didn’t have sex before I married Kent and I won’t again unless I get married.”

  “Okay,” he said, sounding like me after a family member spewed forth some long complicated thing that I knew I should understand but didn’t want to admit I didn’t get, then added, “Why?”

  I shrugged. “I’ve just seen it cause so many problems. So I don’t want to do it unless I’m married.”

  “But you said you loved it. On the island.”

  “I do. That’s part of why I don’t want to do it with just anyone.”

  He looked taken aback, and I grimaced and said, “I’m sorry, that came out wrong. You’re not ‘just anyone’. But... I mean, you’re getting phone numbers right in front of me, so it’s hardly like we’re even dating, never mind... I’d say ‘committed’ but I remember from the show that the word gives you hives.”

  He laughed. “It has at times, yeah. I have to say, though, I’m not quite as allergic to it as I was. Still allergic, but not fatally so. Things might change some day.”

  A warm glow spread through me. “Good to know.” Not wanting him to think that meant I was okay with sleeping with him, I added, “But for now, I’m not doing it. That’s how it is. Do you hate me?”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Why would I? I am disappointed, because honestly I think we’d be spectacular together.”

  A shiver ran through me. I knew he was right. “Me too.”

  “But I like hanging out with you, and I think you like it too, and the public loves it and we both like that as well. So I’ll take what I can get, gorgeous. Which is... I can kiss you but I need to keep my paws to myself. Right?”

  I wanted to say yes, but the memory of how good his hands had felt on my body made it impossible.

  He chuckled. “I saw that little shudder. And I feel the same way. What if I keep my paws largely to myself and cop the occasional feel? Would that work?”

  Though I knew it was dangerous, and I knew “I’ll take what I can get” wouldn’t be enough for him for long, I said, “Yeah, that’d work.”

  For the next fifteen minutes or so, until his mom called and broke the mood, we proved it could work beautifully.

  Chapter Five

  Comparing Aaron’s sexiness to Simon’s felt like comparing a buttery-soft silk to burlap. My potential boss wasn’t bad-looking if you liked slicked-back hair and carefully maintained beard stubble, although nowhere near as hot as he obviously thought he was, but the repulsive way he ran his eyes over me made him uglier than I’d felt after twenty-one shower-less days on the island.

  “Summer,” he oozed, shaking my hand and holding it too long. “Peter told me all about you but he didn’t do you justice.”

  “He didn’t do you justice either,” I said, making myself smile at him.

  He laughed. “He did tell me you were quick on your feet and I’m glad to see he didn’t lie. Okay, down to business. Take a seat.”

  I sat in the guest chair he indicated and sank deeper than I’d expected. His big leather office chair was easily a foot taller than mine, so I had to look up at him. I felt sure it wasn’t an accident.

  “Courtney,” he said, leaning back. “You know her, right?”

  At the moment there was only one person he could mean, so I said, “that ‘Snowflakes in My Hair’ song, right?”

  “Excellent. Some older girls lose touch with the new music. Glad to see you haven’t.”

  At thirty, did I count as a girl at all, older or not? I wasn’t sure, but that wasn’t the word that was stinging. I didn’t want to get ‘older’, because that was just a few letters away from ‘old’ and if I lost my looks I’d have nothing.

  I gave him a smile like someone was stomping on my foot and I was trying to hide the pain, and he winked at me. “Aw, honey, don’t worry. I like mature ladies.”

  “I’d like mature men,” I said, “if I believed they existed.”

  He roared with laughter. “I like you, Summer. We’re going to be great together. Anyhow, Courtney. We’ve got a ten-minute interview slot with her Friday in Toronto, and you’re going to fly there on Thursday and at the interview you’ll get something out of her we’ve never heard before....”

  “Okay,” I said, knowing I wasn’t supposed to complain about not being asked whether I was available to visit another country tomorrow, and also knowing he wouldn’t want me asking whether I could be back in time for Kent and MC’s party. “What’s the something?”

  He raised his eyebrows. “If I’ve never heard it, how would I know what it is?”

  I felt my face getting hot at his ‘duh’ expression but I made myself keep going. “I thought you were going to tell me what I was supposed to find out.” He’d said it like he wasn’t finished talking.

  “Nope, Red,” he said, using my least-favorite nickname ever, worse even than Polly. “That’s your job. At least, that’s your job interview. Get us some scoop and I’ll bring you on, doing articles for now until the TV stuff gets going in a few months, as Mimi’s new underling.”

  “Mimi?” I said, feeling even more lost and hating it. I so often felt like I had no idea what was going on, and Simon seemed to be enjoying making me feel that way. Plus, I’d wanted to be on TV sooner than a few months from now but I didn’t think he’d appreciate being pushed on that.

  “Mimi!” Simon’s shout made me jump.

  High heels clicked their way toward us, louder than they seemed like they should have been through his closed office door. I understood why when the door opened and a woman who had to be three hundred pounds appeared wearing an painfully bright pink and almost certainly painfully tight dress and matching spike heels. “You bellowed?”

  “I did. Mimi, Summer. Summer, Mimi
.”

  Mimi nodded once at me then turned back to Simon. “And she is?”

  “Potential new underling.”

  “Ah.” She looked me over again with a hint more interest. “And from ‘Ragged Royalty’, yes? Something of an insider, at least a little. Good.” As I both enjoyed being called an insider and felt annoyed about all the qualifiers she’d put on the term, she added, “Looks tougher than the last one anyhow. That’d be nice. I got tired of Meili crying whenever I got mad at her. Doing a test interview, I hope?”

  “Courtney.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Good luck getting anything that’s not on the web site from that one,” she said to me. “Courtney’s been so well trained she probably actually believes everything in her bio is true. She’ll be a tough little nut to crack.”

  “Summer’s a nutcracker, aren’t you?” Simon winked at me, and I knew he was thinking of different nuts.

  Mimi gave a dramatic shudder, setting her dress rippling in a way that made me hope its seams had been double-stitched. “You’re gross, Simon. Okay. Back to work. Maybe I’ll see you later, Summer.”

  Her tone said she doubted it, and she was gone before I could say anything.

  Simon laughed when the door had closed behind her. “I love that look. Everyone looks like that after meeting Mimi.” He ran his eyes over me again. “Don’t get her mad at you, she’s at least twice your size. I’d hate to see you squashed under her.”

  Ignoring the way his mouth was fighting off a smile that seemed to say he wanted to see me squashed under him, I said, “Well, I’ll try not to. And I’ll do my best with Courtney.”

  “Better do better than that,” he said, standing up to indicate he was done with me. “Better work a miracle.”

  Chapter Six

  Trying to be subtle, I scanned Kent’s living room to see how it had changed in the two years since I’d moved out. MC had brought some family photos, and a stack of dull-looking books on computer programming sat on the bookshelf where my Sex and the City DVDs had lived, but the walls were the same rich shamrock green color Kent and I had painted them and all the soft furnishings we’d chosen were still there. Our wedding pictures were gone, of course. My half of them were in a box under my bed, and for the first time I wondered what Kent had done with his.

  I wouldn’t ask, obviously, especially not in front of MC, so I just grinned at Kent and said, “Love what you’ve done with the place.”

  He laughed. “Of course you do, because I’ve done nothing. But that’ll be changing soon, I bet,” he said with a sidelong glance at MC.

  Her eyes roamed around the living room. “Maybe a little,” she said, looking uncomfortable. “But it is all really pretty. I do like it. It’s just maybe not... quite... me?”

  It wasn’t all plain boring beige, so no, it probably wasn’t her. I was truly happy for Kent that he’d fallen in love again but it did hurt that he’d picked someone so unlike me. The girl seemed as flat as my matte silver nail polish, with no depth or excitement to her at all, and if he loved her how could he have also loved me?

  He leaned over and kissed her cheek and said something about wanting to make the condo perfect for them, and I remembered the kisses they’d shared on the reality show and the clear hunger between them then and wondered if I might be wrong about MC and her dullness. Though she seemed guarded and quiet at all times, they’d been fierce together on the island, in a way I wasn’t sure Kent and I had ever truly experienced. We’d been hungry for each other, sure, but that kind of intensity...

  A loud knock at the door fortunately cut off my memories, since sitting beside my ex-husband’s new fiancée dreaming about sex with him wasn’t exactly appropriate, and in moments Aaron had given me a short but surprisingly sweet kiss and was settled beside me. “How’s it going, gorgeous?” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder. “Full of maple syrup and poutine?”

  “I wasn’t even there for two whole days, so not full,” I said. “But I’m fine. It went great.”

  MC tipped her head to one side. “What did?”

  I hadn’t been sure I wanted to tell her and Kent since it was such a fluffy job but the story began to bubble out of me because I was so proud of how I’d done. “I was in Toronto yesterday and today, to get a scoop out of that popstar Courtney. Simon, my potential boss, made it basically a job interview for me... do well and you can work for us. And I’ll do anything to make that happen.”

  “Anything?” Aaron said, making it sound ominous.

  “Yup.”

  “Lie, cheat, steal, mud-wrestle, jaywalk?”

  “Sure, why not?” I said, laughing. “Except the jaywalking. Even I have limits.”

  We all chuckled and I said, “And I wouldn’t do the other stuff. Probably not, anyhow. Unless I really had to. But I seriously want this to work. So I was terrified to talk to her, obviously.”

  They chuckled, and I made myself chuckle too although I didn’t understand their amusement. I had been terrified. Peter had promised me his help at the reunion show but had then pulled way back, and Simon seemed like my only chance to get into the world I so longed for. All my research into Courtney, though, hadn’t gotten me anywhere, and so I’d shown up to meet the kid with no idea of how to get something new out of her.

  Aaron gave me a squeeze. “Doubt it, gorgeous. You can talk to anyone.”

  “Sure, but...” I shook my head. “Anyhow. For the first bit I asked all the usual questions and she was giving all the usual answers.” I shivered a little at the memory of how desperate I’d started to feel as Courtney told me nothing I couldn’t have picked up from her Wikipedia page. Simon had sent a videographer with me, and his shifting back and forth with boredom hadn’t exactly helped me much. “And then I saw her playing with her arm, kind of slapping it, and it hit me that she might have just got a tattoo. Mine got itchy and I slapped it so I wouldn’t scratch, and what she was doing looked the same.”

  MC shook her head slowly. “I would never have thought of that. And were you right?”

  I nodded, a grin taking over my face. “And after I asked her about that I couldn’t shut her up. It was her first one, and she’d drawn it herself. It was gorgeous, just lines up close but when you looked at it from a distance the spaces between the lines made a star and moon and heart, and they represented her and her dreams and her fans. She was adorable talking about it, and nobody, nobody, knew she could draw. Not even her people. She showed me tons of her drawings, all really cool, and her manager had to basically drag her out of the room because she didn’t want to stop talking to me. I got that scoop. And all on video too, so it’s even better.”

  “Earth-shattering,” Aaron said, running his hand lightly over my bare arm.

  I shivered again, differently this time as his touch woke me up, but also felt miserable. Of course it wasn’t earth-shattering. It was tabloid journalism. But it was mine. I’d done something nobody else had been able to do.

  “And where is this tattoo? Don’t remember seeing it on the island.”

  I pulled my arm away from Aaron. “None of your beeswax,” I said, not wanting to show him or anyone else here the three tiny hearts I’d put on my breastbone during my honeymoon in Paris with Kent: a bright pink one representing me and a deep soothing blue one representing him, with the middle one a rich purple to symbolize the two of us together. It hadn’t shown on the island because I’d made my bikini top to cover it, and I wouldn’t pull down my shirt and bra and flash it here either. Showing that off in front of his fiancée? Awkward.

  MC cleared her throat, and I wondered whether she knew what my tattoo was and what it meant. “Well, I think it’s cool, Summer. I didn’t think Courtney could do anything more than sing either, and I wasn’t even sure if she wrote her own songs.” She leaned forward. “Does she, by the way?”

  I shook my head, thinking she might be teasing me but not sure since nothing showed on her face but a polite blankness. I could read most people but MC was a closed book to me
. “She’s planning to start but all of her stuff so far has been written by other people. That’s another reason she didn’t tell about the art before. She felt like it was one thing she could do and she enjoyed having a little secret nobody knew about.”

  A faint frown crossed MC’s face, which passed for high emotion from that girl. Then it cleared and she said, “I was thinking that a tattoo is hardly secret but if nobody knew she drew it... I can see that. Yeah, for somebody that famous to keep one thing hidden, it must be a good feeling. One area of your life that doesn’t belong to the world.”

  As if in answer to this, my phone gave its ‘new Twitter message’ beep. I nodded at MC and took a quick peek at my direct messages, only to read, “You love sex, huh? You’d love it even more with me. Email me.” I didn’t recognize the guy’s name, or his email address.

  I deleted the message without answering, realizing it had been an answer to MC’s statement, in a way. My boyfriends from back before Kent knew I hadn’t slept with them, of course, and already one had told a tabloid he thought I was gay. They hadn’t believed that given my obvious interest in Aaron and my marriage to Kent, and not surprisingly nobody had jumped to the conclusion that I was waiting for the right man, waiting to be married, before I had sex again. That secret belonged to me. Well, me and Aaron and Kent.

  The condo’s door opened, without an alerting knock, and I looked up with the others to see Ron arriving. As the brothers slapped each other on the back and Ron hugged MC, I got up to await my own hug and wondered whether Kent had ever told Ron I’d been a virgin on our wedding night. I doubted it. Kent knew how to keep secrets.

  I did too, even though nobody ever believed that given how much I talked. For one, I’d never told anyone that when I’d come home and told Kent I didn’t think we were good for each other I had not wanted to divorce. I’d hoped my announcement would jar him into making changes, but instead he’d sighed and said he understood and before I’d known what was happening we were in the process of splitting up and I’d started to believe maybe it was right since he thought so. But at the beginning I hadn’t wanted to lose him. I’d loved him, and part of me still did. I shouldn’t have been so over-dramatic as to make that big statement. But dramatic was all I knew how to be.