Love Handles (A Romantic Comedy)

by Gretchen Galway

  No, first she would stop thinking about Liam.

  She sat down and stared out at the vent pipes on the neighboring rooftops, thinking about Liam. About the way he’d looked, his hair slightly damp like he’d just come out of the shower. How his dress shirt fitted his shoulders. The hint of guilt in his eyes while he was trying to put her down, that he probably didn’t think she could see.

  With all the radioactive energy of two hundred milligrams of caffeine, she got up and went looking for HR. Let him think he could scare her into hiding. She’d quietly learn about the people laboring along at every level and figure out how to win then over. Whether they liked it or not.

  Even him.

  Chapter 8

  Two days later Liam watched Wendi arrange the line into groups on the rolling rack next to his desk. “Did you bring Bev the binders?” he asked.

  Wendi nodded and shoved her glasses up her nose. “What’s she going to do with all that old stuff?” she asked, then added like the infant she was, “Some of those lines went back into the nineteen hundreds.”

  “She wants to learn as much as she can about the business.” Which should keep her busy for a couple weeks, at least. That and the rolling racks of samples he’d had delivered to her office. “She has no background in apparel and doesn’t want to screw things up with her ignorance.”

  “But the binders are just full of spec paperwork and production stuff that’s totally out-of-date now. They’re not even on the new database. And we don’t source in half those countries anymore.”

  He continued to rearrange the line samples by delivery date, not interested in explaining himself to an entry-level assistant. Ever since he’d rescued Wendi from Ellen, she’d latched onto him without any of the subservient reserve he’d nurtured in the rest of the team. He missed it.

  “And why is she making boards?” Wendi continued. “She asked me for her own glue sticks and foam core.”

  Liam turned his head away to hide his grin. “I suggested she sketch out a few ideas of her own. And share with us her first impressions at the line meeting on Monday.”

  “On Monday?” Wendi gaped at him. “When Darrin and Jennifer get back?”

  “Maybe they’ll find her fresh perspective useful.”

  Wendi snapped her mouth shut, her eyebrows flying high on her forehead, and Liam suspected she was imagining the same thing he was.

  Bloodbath.

  It would be an awkward but necessary experience to convince her she would be happiest owning the company from a distance. Orange County was only about six hundred miles away—an easy flight, once or twice a year. At the most. He’d made sure Wendi had told her all about her experiences as Ellen’s assistant and left a stack of HR paperwork about the dozens of young, talented people who had quit under her thumb—some within a week. Bev wouldn’t be selling to Ellen now, not with her determination to be nice.

  But she would tire of being here in person.

  In the meantime he’d keep her busy. For the rest of the week he kept her snowed under useless minutiae in the guise of “Training.” She kept to Ed’s suite and the business offices, far away from him and the product development team. By Friday, the staff had accepted his description of her as a temporary technicality and was getting optimistic about Ellen’s lengthening absence.

  Friday night he was so optimistic he left before seven, the first time in months, and even made it to the 24-hour Safeway before dark. He parked in his condo’s basement garage, a luxury he never failed to appreciate, and took the elevator up to the twentieth floor, humming and smiling to himself.

  But when he got to his door he paused, hand on the doorknob, and felt his mood turn black. The condo, with its expensive one-eighty view of the Bay he seldom got to appreciate, was now distinctly, unhappily occupied.

  Though they sounded happy enough. He let the door slam behind him, dropped his keys onto the shelf by the kitchen, went to the fridge for a beer. Not again.

  He strode across the carpeted hallway as loudly as he could, closing his eyes when he got to the bedroom door, which was open. “April.”

  He heard muffled exclamations and groans, bodies rolling across the mattress, and finally, feet on floor struggling into pants. “Uh,” said a male voice.

  “Oh, God,” April groaned, sounding like an exasperated teenager, which she hadn’t been for seven years. “He’s just my brother. You don’t have to go. ”

  “Yes, you do,” Liam said. “No bed of your own?”

  “You know I—” April began.

  “I meant him.” Liam leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed and eyes still closed.

  “I should go,” the guy said. “Nice to meet you, uh—”

  “Her name’s April,” Liam said.

  “He knows my name!” April said, then sighed. “Right?”

  Silence. Jeans zipping, one foot hopping on the floor as a shoe was pulled on the other. Hurried breathing, then his throat clearing.

  “Right?” Liam asked him.

  He skulked past him in the doorway. “Maybe I’ll see you around.” The guy fled down the hall and out the front door.

  After a few long seconds, April stalked over to him. “You can open your eyes now.”

  “Handsome guy,” Liam said, peeking out at her. “Not too bright though.”

  Her face was torn between guilt and anger. “Couldn’t you have waited a few minutes?”

  “That’s my bed. Thank God I didn’t.” He glared at her, not kidding anymore. “What’s wrong with the couch? Where you sleep?”

  She bit her lip and looked away. “He said he’s got a bad back.”

  “I’m going to make us some dinner while you wash my sheets.”

  “But I told you, we were just getting—”

  He held up his hand. “Stop, stop, stop. You want to ruin your life with some stupid loser with orthopedic problems, do it in your own home. Which means you'll have to get one first.”

  “That’s not fair,” April said. “I pay rent.”

  He tilted his head. “What?”

  “Not, like, in cash,” she said. “But I buy stuff for the place.”

  “Ah. Stuff.”

  She pointed down the hall towards the bathroom. “Toilet paper.”

  “It offends Paige,” he said. “I had to put it away.” Each square had a picture of Rush Limbaugh’s face.

  “Paige is a Nazi. Humanity offends her.”

  “I found it rather disturbing myself.”

  April, eager to push the conversation further away from her own culpability, jumped on the topic of his latest girlfriend. “Admit it, she’s horrible.”

  “Don’t change the subject.” He looked down at her bare shoulders sticking out above his comforter she’d wrapped around herself and frowned. “Now you’ll have to wash the duvet, too.”

  “You have gotten so gay, I swear.” April turned around. “You were never like this before you started working in fashion.” She sashayed over to the bed.

  “Now who’s offended by humanity?” Liam shut the door, walked to the kitchen, put down the beer, and wondered if he’d be better at his job if he were gay. People wouldn’t doubt his career so much, he’d meet plenty of candidates for casual sex, and he wouldn’t be thinking about what Bev Lewis would feel like under him naked.

  “I can’t believe I used ‘gay’ as an insult.” April came back into the kitchen in jeans and a tight T-shirt that said 100% Natural across her chest. Her curly brown hair was a messy cloud around her head. “I’m really disgusted with myself.”

  He frowned at her shirt. “Did you wash my sheets yet?”

  “You are so anal.” She walked past him and plucked a note off the fridge. “She called, by the way. Das girlfriend.”

  “What did she say?”

  “To eat shit and die?” April got herself a beer. “What do you think she said? That you better call her back, or she’s going to dump you. That you don’t deserve her.”

  He reached down to ge
t a pot out of the cabinet and filled it with water. “So if I don’t call her back, she’s going to dump me?” He was surprised to find he didn’t feel too bad about that.

  A small smile formed in the corner of April’s mouth. She lifted the bottle to her lips. “That’s right.”

  He put the pot on the stove and turned on the gas. “Was there any time limit on this offer?”

  April burst out laughing and gave him a squeeze. “That’s my bro. Mr. Commitment.”

  “It’s not commitment that’s the problem,” he said.

  “It’s your taste in women?”

  He saluted her with his beer. “I like my women.”

  “No, you don’t. You just like to sleep with them.”

  “Pot, meet kettle,” Liam said.

  “You just sleep with the bitchy ones so you’re not tempted to marry them. I’m on to you, bro.”

  “I almost wish you were right, April. Thing is, I like ‘em bitchy. They turn me on.” He raised an eyebrow. “Sure you want to hear more?”

  April jabbed him in the chest. “Fine. Then marry one of them, if you like them so much. Poor Mom. That’s all she talks about, you living alone.”

  He glared at her. “I wish.”

  “Seriously. What’s your problem with getting hitched?”

  “I don’t want to suffer the side effects.”

  She lowered the bottle, sobering. “You mean children. So, just don’t have them. Keep buying your condoms at Costco.”

  “I do not want to know my sister has been stealing my condoms,” he muttered.

  “As if even you could use them all up before the expiration. Anyway, just because you’re afraid of being like Dad doesn’t mean you can’t date women who don’t totally suck. Scratch that, who do suck, like in the right way—”

  “April—”

  “And you could never be like him. You’re a total pushover. Can you imagine Dad letting Aunt Shirley sleep on his couch?”

  He shook his head. “You’ve never seen me at work. I’m a demanding tyrant, just as bad as he was. Worse actually, because I’ve got more people to manage and higher stakes than my own reputation.”

  “I don’t believe it.”

  “Believe it.” He pulled open a drawer, looking for a spoon. “At least they’re adults. I’d never risk lording that shit over a kid. Or the kid’s mother.”

  “As if a woman like Paige would ever let you lord any shit over her.”

  “Which is why I date women like Paige,” he said.

  April’s mouth flattened. “I don’t think bitchy women make you happy.”

  “You don’t know what I’m really like, April. I do. I’m an arrogant pain in the ass, and any woman nice enough to put up with that for long would end up hurt, just like—” He stopped himself.

  “Just like Mom,” April said. He stared back at her, seeing he’d finally made his point. Their mother was everything sweet and light and wonderful and had deserved better than their domineering father, yet she’d loved him with her huge heart and still mourned him. April took another swig of her beer, dropped her gaze. “At least you’re getting rid of Paige.”

  “Don’t tell Mom yet. I think she kind of liked her.”

  “Are you kidding? Paige ordered veal.”

  “Ah, right. Of course.”

  “Then didn’t touch it. Insult to injury.”

  He found a box of protein-rich pasta in the cabinet. “I don’t think I ever did see her eat. We were too busy, you know, doing other things.”

  “Ugh, spare me. I refuse to believe a woman who doesn’t eat could be any good in bed. Totally wrong personality profile.”

  Liam stared off into space, reflecting. He had no intention of telling his sister about the sordid details of his love life, even—or especially—when she was right. “Do you want any pasta?”

  “So you’re not even going to call her?”

  “What, you’re on her side now?”

  “I’m on womankind’s side.” She came over and picked up the box of pasta. “This stuff organic?”

  He took it from her and waited for the water to boil. “I’ll call her.” But only to say goodbye. They’d been seeing each other for two months, which was longer than he’d expected. She’d liked his money and his job and his family’s house in the Oakland Hills, but Liam?—not so much.

  “Please wash my sheets. I’ll grill you some portobellos.”

  She slapped her forehead. “Crap, I forgot. Mom invited us over tonight.”

  “Again?”

  “Some lovesick guy went to Alaska and brought her a ton of halibut.”

  “So I have to scare away a guy who wants to sleep with my mother?” he said. “Again?” The women in his family were much too popular with men.

  “No, he won’t be there. Just the fish.”

  He looked down into the pot of tepid water. Alaskan halibut sounded pretty good. He wondered what Bev was doing tonight, all alone in Ed’s empty house on Friday night. How had the rest of her week gone? Had Ellen changed the locks again?

  He twisted off the burners. If he was thinking about Bev, his mother certainly was. And Trixie Johnson had already tagged her. Released her into the wild—for now—but standing by to recapture her for future and ongoing study. Perhaps over a slab of white fish.

  Liam dumped the pot in the sink and went down the hallway to his sister. “Come on.”

  April was tearing the sheets off his bed. “You told me to put these in the wash.”

  “Forget it. Let’s go.”

  “Make up your mind. Jeez.” She shrugged and followed him down to the car.

  With the Friday night traffic the drive over the Bay Bridge to Oakland took them almost an hour. A strange old Honda was in their mother’s driveway, and when they walked in and saw the dining table was set and glowing with candles, Liam was afraid the lonely fisherman was lurking nearby.

  But it was their brother Mark sitting there, eating a deviled egg off a napkin. “Hi, guys.”

  April ran over and threw her arms around him. “When did you get back? Mom said you wouldn’t be able to visit this summer!”

  Mark’s light brown hair was shaggy and uncombed, his nose was sunburned and peeling and his ill-fitting khakis exposed orange and yellow argyle socks at his ankles. “Couple hours ago. Like the car? I just bought it. Got almost fifty miles to the gallon on the drive out. It’s not a hybrid either. At least, not when I bought it. I did a few modifications.”

  Liam went over and squeezed his little brother’s shoulder—though he was hardly little, just over six feet tall, and still had a few muscles left from Liam’s reign as his personal trainer before he moved away a few years before. “Great to see you.”

  Trixie came into the dining room with a shit-eating grin. “He’s staying. He’s staying.”

  “Those kids in Milwaukee don’t need you anymore?” Liam asked.

  Mark opened his mouth, but his mother spoke. “He’s applying for a job at Lawrence Hall of Science. Math camps and stuff,” she said. “He’s back to stay!”

  “Dude, that’s great.” Liam smiled at him, curious to hear more, but his brother had a pained look in his eye that he recognized. “So, you watching the A’s this year?”

  Trixie came over and poked Liam in the arm. “Don’t change the subject. Ask him why.”

  “I’m sure he’ll tell me when he feels like it,” Liam said.

  “He quit. He got sick of being so far from home, so he quit.” Trixie snaked an arm around his waist and rested her cheek on Mark’s broad shoulder.

  Liam met Mark’s eyes and raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

  Trixie frowned at him. “Don’t say it like that. Of course he did.”

  “I bet there was a girl,” April said.

  “I wish,” Mark muttered, and they all laughed. Mark wasn’t much of a ladies’ man.

  Letting out a deep, noisy sigh, Trixie squeezed Mark so hard he flinched. “I am bursting with joy. Bursting!”

  Liam st
epped towards the kitchen. “Man, I’m starving. Mind if I make myself an appetizer, Mom?”

  “Don’t you dare!” Trixie released Mark and ran after him. “You stay out there where you belong. It’s bad enough Mark stole one of the eggs.” She shoved Liam back into the dining room and disappeared into the kitchen.

  Liam walked over and poured himself a glass of lemon-spiked ice water. “You’re moving in here?” He cleared his throat. “With Mom?”

  Mark eyed him over the rim of his glass, then kicked it back and drained it. “Just for a while. And don’t. Just don’t.”

  Liam was tempted to tease him about not being ready to survive in the wild, but that might drive him away again. Liam realized he was damn glad his only brother was back home. Trying to keep his face innocent, he asked, “What?”

  Mark shook his head and looked at April. “What have you been up to? I hear you got a job with an insurance company in San Francisco?”

  “Just temping, thank God,” April said. “As if I’d want a career in insurance. I’d rather die.”

  “Tough hours, then, Ape?” Mark asked.

  “Eight o’clock. In the morning. It’s practically dark. I had to move in with Liam to get there on time.”

  Mark’s pinched face softened into the sweet, open grin Liam remembered. “How long as she been crashing there?”

  “Just a few weeks—” April said.

  “Six months.” Liam edged their sister out of the way and put his arm around Mark. “You should see the losers she drags home.”

  “That’s one way to get rid of her. Can’t she live with one of them?” Mark said.

  “I’ve tried, but none of them will keep her for long.”

  April kicked him in the shins and strode to the kitchen. “Just for that, I’m never moving out.”

  When their sister was gone Liam gave his brother a hard look in the eye. “Why are you really here?”

  Mark’s mouth dropped open to protest, but the fight drained out of him like air out of a bag. “Mom was right. I was lonely.”