Love Hacked

by Penny Reid

  Maybe even share a private conversation.

  Janie’s husband, Quinn, owned the building—or part of the building—and they now lived together on the top floor. Being in the (not always technically legal) private security business, we all knew Quinn was a freak about privacy.

  Perhaps then Alex would feel freer to relax and enjoy himself. Let me enjoy him, I mused. Let me enjoy his body. Let me enjoy watching him enjoy himself.

  However, I planned to ignore his last request. No way was I going to destroy this letter. I loved this letter. Touching it made me feel things; reading it made those feelings almost overwhelming. This was my letter, and I wanted it, just for me.

  CHAPTER 15

  Tuesday Horoscope: Friendship will save the day, but will be tested in the process.

  THROUGH AN EXCHANGE of short notes over two days, we decided that Wednesday and Thursday nights as well as Saturday late afternoons into the evening were the best days and times for our interactions, as Alex termed them.

  I wasn’t willing to give up my Thomas lunches on Saturdays at noon or my Tuesday knitting nights. Just because I was googly-eyed over my mysterious and manlicious Alex didn’t mean it was okay to drop my friends and standing commitments.

  I had a whole other life and interests before Alex. I intended to continue that life and those interests while we were together. In fact, though it made my stomach tie in a lasso knot just thinking about it, I might be required to have that life again, without Alex, at some point.

  Alex always worked lunch shift during the week as well as most Friday evenings. Though the restaurant was closed Sundays, he indicated that he had a standing conflict all day Sunday every week.

  I didn’t ask him to expand nor did he volunteer any additional information.

  Typically, I looked forward to Tuesday nights with a remarkable amount of impatience considering I’m a fully-grown functioning member of society. However, gathered with my girlfriends in the ridiculously opulent yet somehow spartan penthouse that Janie shared with Quinn, I wasn’t my usual effervescent self.

  Admittedly, I was watchful for any opportunity to get either Elizabeth or Janie alone so I could ask one of them about the apartment. As well, I was distracted because tomorrow was Wednesday—Alex day: only twenty-four more hours.

  My Alex man-hat and scarf were finished, and I was now working on the gloves. I’d opted to make mitts with removable tops instead of fingered gloves. Bulky yarn is thick and is therefore a whoreson to knit on double- pointed needles and achieve appropriate gauge. Plus, mittens took less time.

  The girls—plus Elizabeth’s husband Nico—chatted merrily, buoying my spirits and improving my attention span. We’d given Nico the nickname Nicoletta, a symbolic label that he was one of us. This was hilarious because he was a sexy Italian stallion.

  He didn’t seem to mind—likely because he was the youngest of eight children, loved his mother, and had older sisters. Men with older sisters and a positive maternal role model, I found, tended to have a good grasp on both their masculinity and sensitivity.

  “What are you making?” Ashley leaned forward, squinting her eyes at Nico’s work in progress. “Some kind of pouch?”

  “It’s a reusable market bag.” Nico held it up so we could all admire it. His long form was stretched out on a black leather chaise lounge, and Elizabeth was curled up beside him. They were disgustingly adorable at the moment, but that could change at the drop of a hat if he decided to tease her. Once he ended the night face-first in a seven-layer dip.

  “Nice.” Ashley nodded her approval. “I find it’s best to go to the market or shopping if I have to pee. It saves me from buyer’s remorse.”

  “It’ll also give you a urinary tract infection,” Elizabeth mumbled.

  “Yes, but those can be treated with antibiotics and cranberry juice. An empty bank account can only be treated with whoring myself out down by the industrial park.”

  This was met with a few chuckles and headshakes.

  “Is this a habit of yours? Whoring yourself out down by the industrial park?” Elizabeth asked.

  “Not since I discovered the money-saving properties of urinary tract infections.”

  “That’s too bad, because Dr. Ken Miles was asking about you yesterday.” Elizabeth and I shared a covert glance.

  Nico stiffened. He was not a fan of Dr. Ken Miles because the man used to pursue Elizabeth. In fact, none of us who worked at the hospital particularly cared for Dr. Ken Miles.

  Nico gave Elizabeth a sharp smile. “I’m sure he frequents the industrial park enough, dearest. If Ashley had been there, he would have found her.”

  “Me-ow, Nicoletta!” Ashley reached over and gave Nico a high five.

  Elizabeth rolled her eyes good-naturedly at her husband. “All this talk of urinary tract infections and whoring at the industrial park is making me thirsty. What does everyone want to drink?”

  “Can I make lemon drops?” Janie was already shifting her work in progress to one side. “I was thinking about the ratio of vodka to sugar, and I have an idea.”

  Elizabeth stood to help, stretched. “Sure, sounds good to me.”

  I jumped at the opportunity, nearly tripping over the large glass coffee table as I sprang from my seat. “Oh, let me help. I’ll come too.”

  “Yes. Good thought. Between us we’ll have enough hands to carry all the beverage glasses.” Janie motioned me toward the kitchen and led the way.

  The kitchen was just as spartanly opulent as the rest of the apartment. All the appliances appeared to be the latest and greatest, all stainless steel, but this also made the space feel very sterile.

  “Elizabeth, can you get the vodka out of the freezer?”

  “In a minute.” Elizabeth leaned both her palms against the granite countertop and looked across at me, her blue eyes shrewdly assessing as they moved between mine. “First, I want to know why Sandra followed us in here.”

  I didn’t try to look innocent. Since last summer, I was usually the last one to help with the preparation of drinks. We’d all flown to Vegas for Janie’s bachelorette party, I’d inadvertently spiked our drinks with Amsterdam-grade absinthe, and Elizabeth had woken up married.

  I don’t think it was the getting-married part that irked her. I think it was the not-remembering-the getting-married part.

  “Fine.” I sighed, mimicked her stance, and glanced between Janie and Elizabeth. “I do have a favor to ask.”

  “Who needs help?” Elizabeth asked.

  “Me.”

  As though pulled by the same string, both Janie and Elizabeth’s eyebrows jumped. Their eyes widened in unison—synchronized surprise.

  “You?” Janie asked.

  I nodded. “Yes. I need a favor. It’s for me.”

  They shared a look—super secret best friend silent brain wave communication—but it was easily readable. Neither of them was expecting me to request a favor for myself.

  “Anything you need, it’s yours.”

  “How can we help?”

  I cleared my throat and tented my fingers. I hadn’t exactly thought through how I was going to go about requesting use of the apartment without explaining why I needed to use the apartment.

  I decided to wing it. “So, about your old apartment, I was wondering if….”

  “Done! When are you moving in?” Elizabeth bolted upward from her leaning position and began hopping from one foot to the other.

  “This is excellent news. I am so pleased.” Janie beamed at me. “You’re going to like the bathtubs.”

  I tried to speak, but only a strange stuttering sound made it past my lips. They both wore mirrored expressions of excitement, and I loved them for it.

  “You had me thinking you were going to ask for an actual favor. I thought it might be the first sign of the apocalypse.” Elizabeth tossed me a grin as she padded to Janie’s freezer, drawing out the bottle of vodka.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I wrinkled my nose at her back, find
ing my voice.

  “I’ve never heard you ask for a favor—ever.” Elizabeth handed the bottle to Janie.

  “That’s not true.”

  “It is. It’s true.” Janie confirmed.

  I tsked and frowned, studying the flecks in the granite countertop as I searched my memory for the last favor I’d asked.

  “Also, you never talk about yourself,” Janie added, “unless it’s a humorous and self-deprecating story.”

  “It’s a sign she’s too well adjusted.” Elizabeth nodded. “She’s the queen of sublimation.”

  “I talk about myself. I’m my favorite subject. And I’m not well-adjusted. I’m plucky and neurotic.” I crossed my arms over my chest. As proof of my lack of demonstrative maturity, I felt inexplicably defensive and upset about Elizabeth’s accusation of emotional stability.

  “You’re humble, not neurotic. You don’t talk about yourself.” Elizabeth poured sugar onto the dusting tray. “You never ask for help, but you’re not a martyr. And you never share anything personal, because you already have everything figured out. All your decisions are based on altruism and mindfulness.”

  “You’ve been reading Vaillant’s categorization of defense mechanisms,” I grumbled.

  She ignored me. “In fact, it’s been weeks since you shared a funny dating story. Haven’t you been going on any dates? You know us old married ladies like to live vicariously through your misadventures.”

  “That’s ridiculous. You never dated, Elizabeth. You never wanted to. And now you’re married to a movie star.”

  She narrowed her eyes at me. “When you put it that way, I sound kind of badass. But I applaud your immature deflection and changing of the subject. I took some psychiatry courses in med school too, you know.”

  I rolled my eyes even though I smiled.

  “Elizabeth has a valid point.” Janie glanced between us. “You do often deflect the conversation away from yourself.”

  “I suspect it has more to do with introjection and emotional self-sufficiency than it does with repression,” Elizabeth said, winking at me and earning her my glower.

  Janie censored her smile and said, “While I appreciate your willingness to help others, perhaps it would be good for you to discuss what’s going on in your life. So on that note, what is going on with you? Anything new?” Janie looked earnest. But then Janie always looked earnest.

  “Yeah, what’s going on with your man-fan club? Still adding members to the harem?” Elizabeth did not look earnest. But then she rarely did.

  I considered this. My first instinct was to say something silly, but I didn’t. Instead, I chewed on the inside of my bottom lip and allowed myself to recognize the truth in Janie’s words.

  Elizabeth’s categorization of my defense mechanisms as wholly mature irked me so much because I didn’t want to be that person—a person who never needed anyone, who was never vulnerable; a person who could only give strength to others, yet required nothing in return.

  But I did need people, and I did discuss my troubles—with Thomas.

  Thomas had been my sounding board for so long simply because talking to him was like talking to myself. He was comfortable and familiar like a pair of well-worn slippers. However, he was never going to challenge me.

  He was never going to push me to divulge more than I was initially willing to share, or to call me on my subtle contradictions of character. This was especially true if all my external reasoning and thought processes manifested themselves as healthy, normal, and mentally stable—it went against his training as an adult psychotherapist.

  Now I had all these feels—about Alex, about me, about me and Alex—and it hadn’t occurred to me that I could talk to these women, my friends, about my doubts, fears, excitement and everything in between.

  I sighed because I was worried. What if I told Janie and Elizabeth about Alex, and they thought I was crazy to date him? What if they thought I was being self-destructive and blind? What if they were right?

  Then again, what if they thought it was great?

  I typically hated worry, and knew it was a worthless emotional state. However—inexplicably, at that moment—I found it somehow liberating. My training told me that worry was counterproductive. My friend-feels told me that reveling in and sharing my worry with my friends was an effective and efficient way to bond.

  “Sandra, you don’t have to tell us anything you don’t want to.” Janie’s comforting words pulled me from my internal dialogue—because I was having a dialogue. Most people had monologues. Not me. I asked myself questions—like a psychiatrist—and answered—like a patient.

  “Yes, she does—yes, you do!” Elizabeth pointed at me. “Janie is right. You know every intimate detail about us, what makes us dysfunctional, mental, and emotional train wrecks. It’s sharing time for Sandra. Sharing is caring.”

  “Fine….” I pressed my lips together, excited by the prospect. I wondered where to start and glanced at the ceiling hoping it would give me a clue. “So, I met this guy.”

  “Oh!” Janie’s eyes widened further. She looked like a startled ostrich—albeit a very pretty one.

  “I knew it! I knew you were acting weird. Tell us, what’s he like? And what’s wrong with him?”

  “Why does there have to be something wrong with him?”

  “Because if he were one of your responsible, khaki-wearing, golf-playing hedge fund managers then he would’ve left the restaurant in tears and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

  I gave Elizabeth an appraising look. Sometimes she surprised me. “Well, you’re right. He’s not a hedge fund manager, and I’ve never seen him in khaki—the color or the pants.”

  “What does he do?” Janie began measuring out the ingredients for the cocktails.

  “Well, remember a few weeks ago when we all went to that Indian restaurant?”

  “Yeah, yeah—and Marie was manhandled by that man-whore. Yes.” Elizabeth leaned over the counter, her eyes searching and attentive.

  “Remember the waiter?” I winced as I said the words. My shoulders tensed, and I braced myself for their reaction.

  Elizabeth caught on first, and her grin was immense. “Oh lawd, nice! I approve. He’s got that voice. Is he in a band?”

  “You’re dating Alex?” Janie smiled expectantly.

  “You remembered his name?” I asked.

  “Oh, yes. Hard to forget waiter Alex,” she added, looking a little shy.

  “Janie!” Elizabeth and I exclaimed in unison.

  “What?” Her cheeks shaded crimson. “He’s very nice looking, and he helped Marie. For the record, I approve.”

  We all laughed, and the tension in my shoulders started to release, although not entirely. They didn’t yet know the whole story. I gave them credit for not balking at him being younger than I am, but I wondered what they would think when I told them he was out on parole.

  My smile faded and I covered my face with my hands. “God, I don’t know what I’m doing.”

  Elizabeth placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Why are you so nervous about this? He seemed perfectly nice when we met him. I’m so glad you’ve found someone that you really, actually like instead of dating all those defunct financial advisors.”

  I half-chuckled half-sighed and shook my head. “There’s more, so much more, and I know you’re both going to think I’ve lost my mind when I tell you.”

  Elizabeth’s hand started rubbing circles on my back. “Sandra, what is it? Is it because he’s younger? I say hell yeah to that. If you like him, then his age doesn’t matter.”

  “I do like him. I like him a lot. But he’s…he’s….” I didn’t know how to say it, so I just said it. “I don’t know if I should tell you any of this, but he’s out on parole from federal prison for something he did when he was fifteen—don’t worry, it wasn’t violent; it had something to do with computers—and now he’s under surveillance by the government, and we can’t talk in public, which is why I need your old apartment.”
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  Elizabeth’s hand on my back stilled, and when I peeked between my fingers, I found them watching me with stunned disbelief. In fact, they were both rendered speechless.

  After several moments during which they both stared gaping holes in me, Janie released a loud, long breath between her teeth, her eyes narrowed, and she leaned her hip against the counter. “So…could you repeat that please?”

  And so I did. But this time I filled in some blanks—not all the blanks, of course; just enough to give them a clear picture of the situation, but not anything that Alex might consider a breach of trust. I filled them in on Agent Bell and my early misunderstandings of Alex’s intentions with her. I described his stealthy smarts and how he knew all about current events and art and how I admired his brain just as much as I admired his external assets.

  They, in turn, asked questions, looked thoughtful, surprised, suspicious, and settled on matching pensive expressions.

  “And you don’t know what he went to prison for?”

  I shook my head. “No. No idea.”

  “God, Sandra, you never do anything half-assed.” Elizabeth exhaled loudly. “You either date a vanilla trust fund pretty boy or a fish and cookie dough ice cream ex-con. Nothing in between for you.”

  “Don’t you want to know?” Janie asked, passing me a lemon drop. “Don’t you want to know the specifics of his conviction?”

  I licked sugar from the rim before responding. “Yes, honestly, I do. I want to know everything about him. I’d also like to know how it is possible to feel so deeply for a person I know almost nothing about. This is not sane behavior.”

  Elizabeth smirked at me. “It’s nice to see you flustered and behaving irrationally for once. Besides, love is the definition of insanity. Look at Janie and Quinn.”

  Janie made an I am not amused face at Elizabeth, and I stiffened at the implication. “I’m not in love with him. I don’t even know him. He’s so sexy, and smart, and stubborn, and aggravating. We’ve been on two dates…maybe two and a half. Okay, maybe three altogether.”