by Tiana Laveen
“Okay, that’s enough. Stop. Right. There.” Bailey put her hand out like a stop sign. “I don’t need your red-light warnings, your alien Hartmann sightings, your old wise one Yoda-like insight, your lopsided opinion, your judgmental beliefs or your crazy viewpoints about Chancellor. None of that. Whoever comes in my yard—the front, the back or the side—is none of your concern. Whoever visits me to shovel my snow, have a friendly chat or more is absolutely none of your business, either. How you could think your behavior is even remotely appropriate is beyond me.”
“I can’t believe it! I’m just trying to be a good neighbor. How rude of you!” The woman’s voice trembled as if she’d suffered a great violation of epic proportions.
“Winnie.” She pointed her finger at the woman who stood there with her mouth open and eyes wide like saucers. “I’m going to need you to find Lake Business and jump in it. Swim in it night and day, just like your walks, like it’s your new religion. Make yourself so busy in it that you can’t see anything else, but your own damn business! If you do that, you won’t have time to worry about Tom, Dick and Harry, Chancellor, Moe, Joe, Curly and Larry. Goodnight!” And with that, Bailey turned away and marched inside the house with her dog, slamming the door behind them.
CHAPTER SIX
Eating Crow & Letting Go
Chancellor sat on the edge of his bed, butt naked and wet, just out of the shower. His mind was such a blur, he’d forgotten his towel and didn’t care. Foreigner’s “I Want to Know What Love Is” played on low as he sat there moping, not sure how he felt or even how to put it in words. He’d missed a call from Bailey while he was getting ready for bed. It had been a couple of days since they’d last spoken, but he did send her a text wishing her a good morning earlier that day. He’d wished to say so much more, but didn’t want to dump his troubles on the woman. She’d seemed rather tired the last time he’d spoken to her, as well as a bit stressed out and fighting a cold.
He felt cold, too, but not in the same way. The weather was brutal—maybe it matched the way he was. He wondered now if what the counselor had said was true. Was he truly sad and simply using anger as a way to express his dismay?
Those words tossed his way tore him up inside, but he’d refused to let that man know how deeply impacted he’d been by it all. Irate, he’d driven home from the meeting, riddled with thoughts that had bothered him all night and well into the next day. He kept replaying the scene from the therapy session—how they’d looked at him, what they’d said to him, and the fact that, though he knew the guy had made a couple of valid points, he couldn’t bring himself to admit it, to simmer down, and accept that not everyone was out to get him.
How did this happen?
He looked down and stared at those sad big feet of his… They’d walked so many miles, run newsworthy marathons, climbed hills, taken him to great heights and helped him escape record lows. But had he used them, at least metaphorically, to step on people and break their poor spirit so he could reach the next emotional plateau? Had he used his words to hit high notes of cruelty? His mother had once told him he could be harsh, and she wasn’t certain as to why. To her, his attitude simply came out of the blue. He couldn’t blame his childhood. Sure, no childhood was perfect, but he had pretty good parents. Could he blame it on friends who’d used him and stabbed him in the back? Possibly. There were a few incidents that had happened while he’d been still in his 20s and full of optimism.
Maybe it was his divorce from Maddie, but he honestly didn’t feel much when they inevitably separated. So many things had gone wrong between them. He’d had to finally accept that they came from two separate worlds. She was from the South, her family being the kind of people who wanted everyone to help them, as opposed to pull their own selves up by their boot straps. He hated that, the whole freeloader mentality. Something about it drove him bananas. But that wasn’t the actual cause of their split, just one of many things. But he’d loved her—deeply. It had scared him at times how much he’d loved her. And it scared him even more, how much she’d loved him but even still, he questioned if it was the right type of love. Something was missing. Something had always been missing. In some ways, though he felt he’d cheated her, and she’d cheated him. She wasn’t the prize, she was second best…
Shaking away his thoughts, he got to his feet. There was no need to get the towel now; he was completely dry. Walking to his bedroom window, he looked out into the darkness that stretched up the street, his gaze settling on Bailey’s residence. He wished he was kissing her, wished he were inside of her, in her bed, warm and safe against her. Something about her made him relax and feel less on edge, no more like he had something to prove. Maybe it was her cut and dry personality—just like him, only she was able to deal her doses of truth with honey, while he delivered his with acid.
On a swallow, he turned away from the window and slumped back down on the bed. He reached for the phone, prepared to call her, then changed his mind. Hanging his head, he made another call instead.
“Um … hello, Josh. This is Chancellor Hartmann. I am leaving this voicemail to first apologize for my behavior at the meeting a couple of nights ago. I’ve had some time to think about what you said, and though I don’t agree with all of it, I agree with enough of it to realize that I do need help, and that there’s a problem.” He took a deep breath and continued. “And that problem is me. I … I am ashamed of how I spoke to you, and … I don’t know what to do with myself. I don’t know how to be better. I have so many great things in life, but I’m still not happy. I am so messed up, I don’t even think you can help me.” He laughed mirthlessly as a tear streaked his cheek. “But I’m willing to have a go at it. I will see you next week, okay? I can’t fix something if I don’t know how it got broken, or even what it is.” He shrugged. “But I—”
“Press 1 if you are finished with your message, press 2 if you wish to re-record, press 3 to mark urgent…” And so the automated message went. Chancellor hung up and fell back onto his bed. He remained that way until he fell asleep, dipping into a series of strange dreams, all of them to do with him crushing things between his hands and under his feet.
He woke up remembering everything. He didn’t need a dream analysis book to figure it all out. He knew well what it meant.
Time to unclench his fist, and open up his mind and heart…
“See? Not a bit of dog hair in sight!” The woman laughed, holding the hand-held vacuum in one hand and his heart in the other. Her living room fireplace was roaring and Bernie had been placed upstairs in the guest bedroom, undoubtedly much to his chagrin.
“It looks nice,” Chancellor said, sitting down on the large olive couch. “It’s no problem, and Bernie is actually pretty funny.” He smiled at her sincerely. She sat next to him and nestled close. Wrapping his hand around her neck, he pulled her in for a kiss.
“I’m so glad you told me,” she said in between pecks. “There’s nothing to be ashamed of Chancellor. Going to a counselor, speaking in a group setting, what have you, is a good thing.” She nodded reassuringly.
“Yeah.” He turned towards the fire. “I know.”
“Did you really tell him he needed a toupee?” The woman pursed her lips in displeasure. He looked at her sheepishly, then she burst out laughing and slapped her knee. “What am I going to do with you! Why would you say that?”
“Because I’m mean,” he half-jested as he lounged back on her couch, already feeling the effect of the first glass of wine.
Earlier that morning he’d called her as soon as he awoke and asked if she’d like to take a morning walk together, with Bernie. She agreed. They’d had a great conversation, one in which he’d confessed the details of his recent trials and tribulations. Chancellor wasn’t certain what he was expecting when he’d told her of his outburst—the way he’d stormed out of the room, the anger that had swelled within him on the drive home. But, her replies didn’t match anything he’d conjured in his mind.
“You were wrong, C
hancellor,” she’d said, pausing from her walk. “Now you know you were wrong and you can do something about it. Don’t lament over it. Don’t blame anyone but yourself. Then do what you need to do to improve.” And then, she’d embraced him and offered the sweetest of kisses. She hadn’t shunned him, cold and heartless; she’d been real, then kissed his pain away.
Now here he was at her place, ‘chilling’ as she’d called it, after a great dinner she’d made for them.
“I like the hell outta you,” he blurted. Her eyes twinkled and she grinned, real easy and sexy like.
“I like the hell outta you, too.”
“Tonight, before I came over, I was online reading about anger stuff, you know.” He shrugged. “Ways to help. One piece of advice was to talk openly about yourself with people you trust. So, I’m not sure where to start but if you have a question for me, I am going to answer it.”
“I always have questions.” With a chuckle, she crossed her legs and placed her glass of wine to her lips.
“And I always have answers, even if they aren’t very nice.”
She swatted him on the shoulder.
“All right, I think we’re at the point in our friendship where I can ask you—”
“Wait, wait, wait—” Leaning forward, he placed his wine glass down on the coaster. “I think we’re more than friends now.”
“Oh really?” Her brow arched. “How so? We’ve not known each other long enough to be more than that.”
“Well, I don’t know about you, but where I come from, when a guy shovels a woman’s snow, it means he’s interested in more than just friendship.” At this, she laughed so hard, the sound echoed. “Okay, jokes aside, I’m telling the truth, Bailey. I’m interested in you. I like you. I care about you. I don’t think about a woman day and night if I only see her as a friend…” He drew serious, his smile fading, as did hers. “I don’t tell my secrets, open myself up like this to a woman I only envision taking to dinner every now and again, screwing, then going on our merry way. I have feelings for you, Bailey. If you don’t feel the same way, then I will of course accept that—but this isn’t funny or playtime for me.”
“Wow … I’m just, surprised is all.”
“It’s not a pressure type of thing. You don’t have to feel the same or even understand it. If you tell me ‘no’, I’m not going to pout or never speak to you again. Things will roll on as they have been, but I won’t stop trying to convince you that we should be together…” He didn’t miss how her lips curled in a smile. “I didn’t even expect to discuss this with you tonight, but we have an undeniable, special connection.”
“Yes, I agree with that.”
“You can see me for who I am, regardless of what I say and do. And you are so carefree, talented, and you love life. I wish I were more like you. But I’m not.” He dropped his head. “So,” he said, reaching for the side of her face and caressing it, “when I look into your eyes, I see not what I am, but everything I want to be. And since I can’t be you, I’m settling for being by your side and being there for you, in every way possible.” She kissed him, then pulled him into a needy embrace. He followed her lead, feeling the heat of her body compete with the roaring fire before them. After a while, they reluctantly let one another go and held on to the comfort of the moment, their fingers intertwined.
“So, I’m ready to ask my questions.”
“All right. Let’s go.” He reached for his wine glass, took a swig, then set it back down on the table.
“What happened between you and your ex-wife?”
“Maddie? Well, we had different values, different ideas about how life should be. Different views on how to raise our son. Everything was different. We loved each other, but we didn’t have enough in common. We were quite young when we got married. We changed—both of us. We matured, figured out who we were as people, and in that process, realized that we had a child who was keeping us together. If it weren’t for him, we would have divorced probably before our two-year anniversary of marriage. That was when things first began to get rocky.”
“And what about your son? You said he moved to Tennessee with your ex and her family.”
“Anthony, my son, is there for college as well, but yes, he moved out. We talk quite a bit, but he’s just at a stage in his life where he is trying to discover himself. His mother gives him way more freedom than I ever did, so though I didn’t want him to leave, it came as no surprise to me when he told me he wanted to attend school down there. I knew it was coming.” He was quiet for a spell. “I miss him … sometimes it hurts how much I miss him. He was not just my son. He was my friend.”
“Do you tell him that?”
He looked at her for a spell. “Not often enough.”
“Why not?” He rubbed his hand over his knee and stretched his leg as the questions became more distressing.
“Because … I don’t want him to feel guilty for leaving. He has his own life to live.”
“Are you sure it’s not because you don’t want him to know how much you care?”
“I love him, he knows that.” His brows furrowed at the woman’s ridiculous comment. “Of course I care, and I have no problem telling him that I care about him.”
“No, that’s not what I said, Chancellor. Listen.” She tapped her ear and gave him a serious look. “I am saying that you don’t want him to know how much you care about him leaving. First, after your divorce, you felt like a winner, didn’t you? Because your son wanted to stay with you, and not his mother. Then, as more years passed, he chose her, and here you are alone. You feel like you’ve lost now … and you hate to lose. He’s not only your son; he is some trophy. And you know that’s wrong. That isn’t how you should view this because Anthony is a person, not some blue ribbon to be hung on a wall.”
His body heated with pain. Perhaps the rabbit hole was even deeper than she stated. Had Anthony been his only companion? Or, the only one he allowed to be semi-close to him? Perhaps she was on to something…
“Maybe you’re right. I honestly never thought about it like that.” He shook his head. “I do want him to be happy, to live his life. But I want him to value education, too. And yes, I did feel kind of like a loser when he chose his mother over me.”
“But see, that’s just the thing.” She clasped his hand. “He didn’t choose her over you, Chancellor. It was never about you; it was about him and what he needed. Though I believe you realize that, on some level, there is a hole somewhere inside you, one that stays open and gaping and makes you feel this way … turn things around in your mind, in a desperate act to protect yourself. You loved your wife, and that didn’t work out, so she left. You lost. You love your job, and now here you are on paid leave. You lost. You love your son, and he left. You lost. I bet you think everything you love leaves, so you see it all as losses. But it’s not a game, Chancellor. There are no winners and losers, just life… This is just life, okay? So now you’re scared and you think to yourself, ‘why keep loving?’”
He swallowed so hard and deep, it burned.
“It’s true … it’s all true. You amaze me! How can you do that? How can you look at me and see all of that?” His eyes stung with moisture.
“Because I was just like you!” A tear ran down her face as she gave him a hard squeeze. “From the first day I saw you, I’ve watched you leave for work early and come home late at night. And then, I saw you take your evening jog, and you’d pause in front of my house and smile. This was before we’d even had our first date. I watched you pick up people’s papers and set them on their doorstep, especially the older people who have a harder time getting around. I watched you move an injured bird out of the road so that it wouldn’t get hit by a car zooming down the road. And my snow wasn’t the only snow you’ve shoveled either. I’ve seen you give to door-to-door salesmen when you really probably didn’t want to be bothered. But you appreciated their hustle, the fact that they were out here trying to sell something, trying to bring a little money home.
<
br /> “And those are just the things I just happened to see you do … and I’ve only lived here a short while. There is no telling what magic I missed! You are good, just bruised, like a peach that got prodded with a thumb and dropped on the ground. But you’re still sweet to your core. You can’t fool me. I know a good man when I see one because I had a good father, good brothers, good stepfather, and some good ex-boyfriends, too. You’re a peach alright, but instead of concentrating on trying to ignore your bruise or say it was justified or no big deal, you need to start asking yourself how did you fall off the shelf and get the contusion in the first place? And why are you afraid to find out? And yeah, we’re more than friends, but I wanted to hear you say it first.” She laughed, and his heart melted. “I don’t know what this is between us, Chancellor, but I like it. I’m willing to see where it goes.” She kissed him long and gently, until their breathing was in sync. He exhaled, then inhaled … exhaled, inhaled. “So, just know you’re not in this alone. I’m completely on board. I’m curious to find out more about you ’cause you make me laugh.” Her cheeks turned rosy.
“I make you laugh? I like how that sounds. I don’t get told that often.”
“You please me in every way a woman should be pleased, but most of all, I love your honesty, Chancellor. And being real goes a long way with me.” Their eyes hooked, he laid her down along the couch and wiggled himself between her thighs, mounting her. Their kisses turned from sweet and longing to a passionate inferno. With their tongues dancing in easy twists and turns, his longing for her exploded. The taste of her mouth, the smell of her skin, and her soft moans titillated him.
Running his fingers through her hair with the crack of the fire as their music, they moved in the rhythm of passion. Ditching their clothes, their bare bodies soon lay intertwined on a thick rug on the floor in front of the welcoming flame—naked on the inside and out. The heat of her breathing and moaning along his neck as he dominated her body, made her his, held him spellbound. His rock-hard dick wouldn’t take no for an answer, his lust for the woman propelling him forward. He reached for his tossed pants, removed a condom from the pocket, and sheathed himself.
