by Anne Calhoun
Prior experience taught him the stall was too small to accommodate the length of his shins, so, turning his back to the wall, he went to his heels and widened his knees. “Come here,” he said.
She did. Head bent, she stood under the pounding water and let him worship her. He kissed her cheeks, her lips, her throat, then the soft skin lifted and offered by the bra. With his teeth he nipped at her nipples, then licked them, then scraped and soothed the firm, confined flesh of her breast. She was whimpering and writhing in his hold when he’d finished, one hand braced on the wall, the other wrapped around his neck.
He unhooked the bra and let it drop to the floor, then kissed his way down to the sexy panties. A millimeter at a time he tugged them off her hips, teasing her as thoroughly as she teased him, sliding his tongue between stretched elastic and her skin, then the soft swell of her mound. Even with the water pounding all around them he could taste the salt of her arousal. When he slipped the panties low enough to work his tongue between her outer folds and touch her clit, she shuddered and cried out. The sensitive flesh was swollen and hot, and she trembled with each pass of his tongue.
He cupped her bottom with both hands, let his head drop back against the wall, and pulled her forward. His erection jutted into the air, tortured by the absence of touch other than water coursing down it, but he shoved that aside and focused on her. Her hand fisted in his hair, holding him even when he had no intention of going anywhere at all, not until she was spent and shuddering in his arms. He slid his hands up over her hips to cup her breasts, pinching her nipples in time to her rhythmic hip movements.
Her knees buckled when she came, so he tightened his grip at her ribs and held her up. Fighting back the urge to back her into the opposite wall and fuck her until he came, he turned off the water and snagged a towel from the shelf over the toilet, then dried her face. She squeezed most of the water out of her hair, then began to quickly dry off.
“I’m as wrinkled as a prune,” she commented.
The bathroom barely held him, let alone two people’s elbows and knees as they dried off, so he stepped past her and dried off in the living room. He released the Murphy bed, then pulled her into a deep kiss. “Want you,” he growled.
“Yes,” she whispered.
The light had an odd, flat quality to it, dampened by the rain and dulled to gray. It washed Sarah’s skin to pale cream, softened by prolonged exposure to water, heated from within by several hours of foreplay. She sprawled on the bed and spread her legs, her fingers trailing over her belly and thigh as she watched him put on a condom. Something in her gaze niggled at the back of his brain, but he pushed it aside to settle between her legs and push inside her.
She was slick and hot and tight, coiling around him with the first stroke, breath hitching to a higher register. He gripped the back of her thigh while she braced her arm on the wall behind her head, as if she wanted more, deeper, more. As if she wanted a connection, to make this a shared experience, not a challenge.
“Tim.”
He kissed her, partly to stop her from saying whatever she was going to say, partly because the flush on her cheeks and collarbone matched the hue of her lips and he wanted to feel that heat against his own mouth. Maybe she had breath in her she would share with him. That tight feeling in his chest was back, constricting everything, making his heart race. He’d almost missed this, getting a hand job on the High Line, trying to move at the speed of light so nothing could touch him. Speed thrilled, and speed killed.
He couldn’t breathe. She was wound tight under him, heels digging into his ass, thighs trembling, one hand gripping his nape while the other flattened at the base of his spine. With a low cry she threw back her head and came apart under him. He tumbled over the edge after her. All he could think was while he’d won the occasional battle in their running challenge, the war had been hers to lose from the moment he saw her. She’d won. Skirmish, challenge, battle, war—it was all hers. He was hers, except the thought terrified him because that kind of victory meant a future together, and he had no idea what he was going to do about it.
He shifted off her and dealt with the condom, then found dry clothes on the shelves in the Murphy bed’s frame and pulled on a pair of basketball shorts. Sarah lay sprawled on her stomach, watching him with sleepy, satisfied eyes that sharpened when her phone buzzed. “I can’t reach that,” she said, lazily amused, extending her arm in the direction of the kitchen.
Tim found her phone in the pocket of her denim jacket, lying in the pile in the sink, and brought it over. She pushed her hair out of her face, dried the screen on the sheet, and pushed the home button. He watched her tap and scroll, then her face went blank.
“What’s up?”
“Captain Jones asked me out for dinner next Saturday night. A little café on the Upper West Side a friend of his opened a few weeks ago. He thinks I might like meeting his friend, and says the chef is really interesting, too. Studied in Spain.”
His brain kept right on cruising along at a hundred miles an hour even as his gut dropped six inches. Very classy: a dinner date plus an introduction to like-minded people, a connection that might be helpful to her business. Thoughtful. Jonesy didn’t waste time on stupid shit like challenges. No, he saved fooling around for AnonEMT and went for the kill when the stakes were high. Sarah Naylor was high stakes indeed.
Sarah looked up at him. “Did you know he was going to ask me out?”
Tim’s heart started to do things that, professionally, he found frightening. A weird stutter-step punctuated by a hard thunk against his breastbone. He ignored his body, because it was telling him a truth he didn’t want to know. Her question was an awkward one even if he hadn’t been inside her five minutes earlier. The text, and Sarah’s question, made the future that much more immediate, more real. “Yes.”
“You knew,” she repeated, but it wasn’t a question this time. It was disbelief.
“I knew.”
“You knew that another man was going to ask me out. You probably told him that was okay,” she said, connecting the dots, “and had sex with me anyway.”
It wasn’t a question. It was a statement of fact, and her matter-of-fact tone and phrasing hurt worse than anger or indignation.
She pushed back onto her heels and looked at him. “All right, then.” She got off the bed and stepped into her underwear, discarded on the floor.
“Your clothes are soaking wet,” he pointed out. He should have thought about that before keeping her outside in a pounding rainstorm, but even the length of time it took to dry clothes was too much of a commitment to the future.
That’s what he’d become?
“It’s fine,” she said, and wriggled damp satin and lace up her hips. “I’ll take the train home.”
He watched in silence as she finished dressing. Finally, she lifted the strap of her messenger bag over her head and looked at him. Say something. Start with I’m sorry.
The thing is . . . futures can be exciting, or terrifying.
Tim looked down at his hands. “Are you going to go out with him?”
“Do you have an opinion about that?”
He could stop this with a single word. Yes. Yes, I have a problem with that.
No. No futures. Just the here and now. No fear, no anticipation, no regrets.
“Before Aunt Joan got sick, I would have dated both of you at once,” she said into the heavy silence. “That’s who I was then. Aunt Joan wanted me to go back to being the woman I was before she got sick. But I’m different now. The thing is . . .”
His head jerked up when he heard the litany of the last few weeks come out of her mouth.
“The thing is . . . I’m not that woman anymore. I can’t pretend that what happened to me, what is happening to me, doesn’t affect or change me. I can’t keep doing this, Tim. I’m sorry. I know I’m changing the rules mid-game, but this is what’s best for me.”
“Sure,” he said, far more casually than he felt. He didn’t know what el
se to say. He felt like a cartoon character the second after impact with a brick wall, birds tweeting over his head, body numbed by contact with an immovable object. Except the immovable object was a foodie chef who liked life spicy and wasn’t settling for anything less than . . . anything. She wasn’t settling, period.
She rummaged through her messenger bag until she came up with her MetroCard. “Hey,” she said. “Still friends, right?”
“Right,” he said. “Still friends.”
“Then I’ll see you around.” The door closed gently behind her. He heard her scuff into her clogs, clatter down the stairs, and out of his life.
***
Tim wiped sweat from his temple with his jersey as he dribbled the ball down the playground court. Kids from the neighborhood stood on the sidelines, waiting for the court, calling a mixture of good-natured encouragement and trash talk at the players. They were down four, with a couple of minutes left, based on the informal rules governing the playground. Normally he’d be focused on what his team needed to do to win, but right now his heart wasn’t in the game.
He’d gotten exactly what he wanted. He got a spring fling with a sweet, sexy woman who was as inventive and in-your-face challenging as he was. He got the best sex of his life. He found a new place for lunch. Best of all, they’d made a clean, uncomplicated, no-harm-no-foul break a couple of weeks earlier.
He should feel great. Fantastic. On top of the world. Living life balls to the wall. Instead he felt like he was circling a race track at top speed, running hard and going nowhere.
He felt like shit. Because he’d had sex with a woman he really, really liked, who made his days brighter and a little easier, knowing he’d told another man it was okay to ask her out. When it wasn’t. It wasn’t okay. It wasn’t even on the same continent as okay. And he was a grade A asshole. It ended like it always ended, very grown-up and mature, very cosmopolitan. Very New York. Sophisticated. Sarah wouldn’t throw a fit, or one of her deadly clogs. Still friends. So the kiss on the cheek and a thanks-for-the-memories wasn’t the problem.
“Doing okay, LT?” Casey called from the other side of the free throw line. “Your head bothering you?”
“My head’s fine, Casey,” he muttered. His heart, not so much. This was speed and indifference led him to, feeling sick at heart from what he’d done. He started driving toward the hoop. Jonesy held his ground. He was six inches shorter than Tim, but a bulldog when it came to defending his territory, and Tim ran the risk of fouling him.
Jonesy would take her seriously. He was quiet, committed, hardworking, perfect for a woman who’d walked through hell and come out the other side. He’d appreciate Sarah for who she was, know exactly what he had, cherish it.
Tim bumped Jonesy’s chest with his shoulder, nudging, nudging, dribbling while he forced Jonesy to concede territory. In his peripheral vision, Casey and Gutierrez jockeyed for position under the basket.
He spun on one foot, shifted his weight to the other, and went for the easy jump shot, but his timing was off and Jonesy knew his moves. He went up at the same time Tim did and smacked the ball backward, out of bounds. Hoots and whistles arose from the observers as a neighborhood kid waiting for the court gathered the ball in one hand and spun it up on a finger.
Jonesy beckoned for the ball. “You’re off your game today,” he said, breathing hard.
That’s what futures did to you in the moment. They threw you off your game. He was thinking about the future, what could be, if he could figure out how to make it happen, what he’d lose if he didn’t. He could wait for a moment like hers, a searing grief, to change his outlook, or he could learn from his own mistakes and her losses and admit he was wrong. Totally dead wrong. Speed didn’t stop the pain. It just numbed it. In the aftermath of the let’s-be-friends speech, he understood one thing: A future where he was friends with Sarah Naylor was a future he didn’t want.
“Earth to Cannon.” Jonesy snapped his fingers in front of Tim’s face. “Sir? Do you know your name?”
He finally realized . . . the game had changed.
***
Tim pulled on a sweatshirt against the cooling May evening air, then fell into step next to Jonesy. He knew he hadn’t taken Sarah out yet, because no one gossiped like first responders. If the captain had a date, the whole station would know. “Have you gone out with Sarah yet?”
“We had a date last weekend, but she had to cancel. She had a long day at work and she didn’t feel up to it. We’re rescheduled for this weekend,” Jonesy said noncommittally.
Thank you, Jesus. Tim’s heart expanded in his chest. Maybe she’d put off Jonesy because she needed time, or maybe she really was too tired. Either way, he had a second chance at the first really good grovel of his life. “Remember when I said I didn’t care if you asked Sarah out?”
“Yeah,” Jonesy said, eyebrows halfway up his forehead.
“I changed my mind.”
Jonesy’s brows lowered into a pissed-off frown. “You said—”
Tim cut him off. “I know. I do care.”
“So you are dating her?”
“It’s complicated,” Tim said.
“Meaning you fucked it up,” Jonesy said, exasperated, because he knew Tim all too well. They stopped for the light, Jonesy scanning for a break in traffic to jaywalk. “Give me one good reason why I should do the right thing and clear out of your way.”
“Because you always do the right thing,” Tim said. He waited until Jonesy looked at him. “Because I like her. I really like her.”
“Shit.” The word dripped disgust.
“Yeah.” The more steps he took in the future, the firmer the ground felt under his feet. It was still scary, but right. Really right. Okay. He could do this. Slower. Careful. Care-full. Sure, high velocity was appropriate in emergency situations, but the rest of the time? Care-full. He’d make it his new motto.
“It’s gonna cost you.”
No problem. “I’ll clean out the back of your bus for a month.”
“That’s a start,” Jonesy said grumpily.
“Thanks,” Tim said. “I mean it. Thanks.”
“Asshole.”
“I know,” Tim said, taking it in stride. If Jonesy were really mad at him, or really set on dating Sarah, he wouldn’t have given up so easily.
The next question was, where did he go from here?
***
Not quite sure where to start, he went home, showered, changed into jeans and a T-shirt, then went for a walk. He had a place in mind: a rent-controlled apartment in a six-floor walkup housing a couple married for over fifty years. He stopped and bought flowers, then rang the bell.
“Yes?”
“Mrs. Cohen, it’s Tim Cannon. Can I come up?”
She buzzed him in and had the door open when he got to the top of the stairs. The climb went a little faster when he wasn’t carrying fifteen pounds of equipment and a stretcher. “Come in, come in,” she exclaimed. “Arthur, look who’s here to see us! I’m sorry, but it’s his dinnertime. I make meals according to his medications now,” she said, and sat back down at the table.
Mr. Cohen turned to look at Tim. He had a tea towel tied around his neck, but his eyes were calm and curious. On the table in front of him sat a bowl of soup. The stock pot simmered on the ancient gas stove.
“I’m sorry to interrupt your meal,” he said.
“Sit down,” she urged. “Have you eaten?”
“No, ma’am,” he said.
“Would you like to join us? I have plenty. I got in the habit of doubling the recipe when the boys were little and never got out of it. It freezes nicely, and sometimes I take some down to Mary in 4C.”
“I’ll get it,” he said hastily.
In between spooning bites of soup into Mr. Cohen’s mouth she directed him to the bowls, the silverware, the juice glasses. Feeling a little out of place, he ladled out a bowlful of soup and took a slice of bread from the plate on the table. Mrs. Cohen surveyed his meal and nodded her appr
oval.
After he blew on the soup to cool it, he sipped. “It’s good,” he said.
“It’s my grandmother’s recipe,” she confided, then dabbed at Mr. Cohen’s chin. “Beef and barley. When we were first married I made it nearly every week because it was cheap. Then we had the boys and I made it every week because we could stretch it with potatoes and vegetables. Now I make it because the smell reminds me of our life together, and it’s easy for Arthur to eat.”
She took a bite herself while her husband chewed and swallowed. In the spring sunshine her skin was paper-thin, dotted with age spots, creased and wrinkled around her mouth and eyes.
“Did you make the bread, too?” It was a dark brown bread, a dense, chewy compliment to the soup.
“Yes, dear.”
Tim looked at her hands, gently lifting a piece of buttered bread to her husband’s mouth, then lifting a piece to her own. He saw Sarah’s hands in fifty years, hands that made the things that made life worth living, good food, cleaned wounds. In that moment, he knew what he wanted to do.
***
“You really didn’t have to stay home,” Sarah said. Trish had canceled her weekend in the Hamptons. They’d spent Saturday scrubbing the food truck, then come home to scrub the apartment. Now they were stretched out in the squishy chairs, watching the sun set over Manhattan and drinking wine. “I know how much you like the Hamptons.”
“After your date canceled, I thought you might need a friend. Plus, we got all the cleaning done. Keeping busy helps.” She sipped her wine. “Tim hasn’t called? Texted?”
“Nope,” she said, trying for lighthearted. “It’s all right. I was already getting more emotionally involved than he was. The signs were all there, even before Captain Jones asked me out. I did the right thing. It’s just . . . not what I would have done in the past.”
“What would you have done in the past?”
“Honestly? Probably gone out with both of them at once. I mean, not at the same time, but dated both of them . . . gone out at different times . . . Oh, hell, just pour me some more wine.”
