by Beth Ehemann
“Wow. Lawrence Finkle has met his match. Who would’ve thought?” He stood up, scooped his bag up off the floor, and flung it over his shoulder. “Hey!” His eyes flashed up to mine. “Speaking of chicks, guess what?”
“What?”
“We’re having another girl!” He smiled proudly at me.
“Seriously?” I turned to face him. “Does your dick not know how to make boys or what?”
Brody picked the damp towel up off the rack and threw it at my face. “Just say congratulations, asshole.”
“Congratulations, asshole,” I joked.
He rolled his eyes and turned toward the door. “I’m gonna grab a bite to eat after I’m done with my workout. Wanna join me?”
“Thanks, but I can’t. I have… plans.”
He turned to face me. “With the mind reader?”
I nodded.
He stood there and stared at me for another second before grinning. “Proud of you, brother.”
“Proud of you too… big daddy.”
After workouts, I showered quickly and hustled to Dr. Roberts’s office, getting there with only one minute to spare. I flipped the light switch and took my phone out, shooting a quick text to Michelle.
Hey. Just checking on you to see if you need anything.
The minute I hit send, the door opened and Dr. Roberts stood smiling at me in the doorway. “You’ve been on time twice in a row now. I’m impressed.” She waved me in cheerfully.
“Don’t get used to it. I can almost feel myself getting ready to oversleep,” I teased as I walked past her, silencing my phone and shoving it into my back pocket.
“Ha ha.” She sat in the chair across from me. “So, how was your weekend?”
“It was good.”
“Did you do anything exciting?”
“Not really.”
She turned her head to the side and looked at me out of the corner of her eye. “I feel like there might be something more to that ‘not really.’ Why don’t you tell me about it?”
“There’s really nothing to tell.” I shrugged. “I talked to someone I haven’t talked to in a long time, went to the grocery store, got laid, worked out—”
“Wait, wait, wait.” She closed her eyes and shook her head, trying to process everything I’d just thrown out there. “You talked to an old friend—”
“Well,” I interrupted, “more like a friend of a friend. It was Mike’s wife.”
“Mike. The Mike?”
I nodded.
“Wow. How did that come about?”
“I thought about what you said, all night long, actually. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. About what kind of man I was and what kind of man I wanted to be.” I paused.
“And…”
I cleared my throat. “And I don’t want to be the kind of guy that makes promises and doesn’t keep them. I know that guy. He sucks.”
“Good! I’m proud of you for being proactive about this. How did it go?”
“Um… okay. It was hard at first, being in that house. Being with her. All of it. But it ended well. It ended really well.”
Life was weird. If someone had told me a month ago that I’d be sitting in a therapist’s office, spilling my guts, and actually enjoying it, I would have told that person they were off their fucking rocker. But I couldn’t deny it. If any good was going to come out of this thing with Mike, then it was going to be a brand new Viper. A better Viper.
She was leaning forward in her chair with her elbows resting on her knee, listening closely. “Tell me more. What did you say? What did she say?”
“First, I apologized for what happened to Mike, then I told her about what I promised him in the hospital room. I told her I felt awful that I hadn’t contacted her at all and then I asked if she needed anything.”
The corners of her mouth turned downward and her eyebrows dipped low as she shook her head slowly. “You know, for someone who tries so hard to be a badass and keep people at arm’s length, you really are a great guy.”
“I’m not great,” I denied, annoyed that she was praising someone like me. “Did you miss the part where I told you I had a one-night stand? I went to my favorite bar, for the second time in a week, in an attempt to talk the waitress into coming home with me. She turned me down—again—so I set my sights on another innocent woman. A woman who didn’t know who I was or what I do for a living. She simply thought I was cute. I brought her home, fucked her brains out, gave her cab money, and sent her on her way. She left her number in hopes that I would call her again. Instead, I tossed it into my kitchen drawer on top of the other five hundred or so scraps of paper with phone numbers on them.” I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, real great guy. I’ll be back. I gotta piss.” I got up and stomped out of Dr. Roberts’s office, down the hall to a bathroom near the elevator.
I didn’t have to piss.
I needed out of that room.
One minute I was okay with talking and working some things out, and the next I wanted to leave and never go back in there. I didn’t deserve praise, certainly not from someone like her. I was a heartless bastard. I pulled my phone out of my pocket to check how much longer I had to sit in that room and noticed I had a text… from Michelle.
M: Hey. Thanks so much for asking, but nope… we’re good. :)
That text calmed me more than any mindless fuck ever could. I’d done what I was supposed to do. I’d followed through, for once. Gripping the side of the counter, I stared at my reflection in the mirror. The reflection of a man who was desperately trying to change, trying to find himself but didn’t know how.
This therapist is a gift, you fuckhead. Don’t mess this up. Listen to her.
I slowly walked back to her office. She was waiting for me, sitting in the exact same spot she had been in when I’d had a tantrum and left. The leather crinkled as I sat back down and took a deep breath. “Sorry about that.”
“Don’t apologize,” she said softly. “Don’t ever apologize for how you’re feeling. I’m never going to tell you how you’re feeling is wrong or that you should feel a different way about something. Your feelings are yours and yours alone.”
“You just said the word ‘feelings’ like twelve times in three sentences,” I teased, trying to lighten the mood. “Here’s the thing… I don’t know what’s going on with me. Six months ago, I was happy. I was playing amazing hockey, had the best friends in the world, fucking whoever I wanted… life was great. In one stupid moment, it all changed, and now I can’t get that happiness back. I don’t remember what happy feels like anymore. Everything is dark and dreary, and even when I’m balls-deep inside a woman I just met, I’m not happy. She’s just a thing. Just something I’m using to fill a void and try and find a moment of happiness, but it doesn’t work anymore.”
“Wow.” Dr. Roberts stared at me. “That was intense, Viper. You know yourself better than most people. Most people don’t know that they aren’t happy. Most people don’t admit that they’re using drugs or alcohol or sex to cope.”
“Wait.” My head was spinning so fast I couldn’t catch it. “You lost me.”
“You use sex the same way some people use drugs and alcohol. I’m not saying you’re addicted because you’re not out getting hookers or masturbating excessively, that I know of, but you definitely use it as a distraction from dealing with whatever it is you’re going through.”
“No way. That’s bullshit. I’ve always had one-night stands and sex with strangers.”
Okay, saying that out loud sounds a little strange.
“How many women would you say you’ve slept with in your lifetime?”
I raised one eyebrow at her without saying a word.
“Okay, scratch that. How many one-night stands would you guess you averaged a week before the accident?”
Am I really sitting in a therapist’s office trying to calculate the average number of women I fuck per week?
“One, maybe two typically.”
“Okay, and since the accid
ent?”
“Three to five.”
Her eyes grew slightly bigger when she heard that number.
I shrugged. “I’m just being honest.”
“No, I’m glad you are. Viper, don’t you see? You’re out there trying desperately to find your next fix so that you don’t have to deal with what’s really happening inside of you.”
I stood up and started pacing the small room, rubbing my temples with my fingers. “Well how the fuck do I fix that?”
“Do you trust me?”
I stopped walking and spun to face her. “Fuck.”
“Do. You. Trust. Me?” she repeated, emphasizing each word like it was its own sentence.
“Two weeks ago, I didn’t know you existed.” I strolled over and plopped back down on the couch.
She crossed her arms over her chest and raised an eyebrow at me, clearly waiting for my answer.
“Yes, I trust you.” I sighed, nervous as fuck about what she was going to say next.
“Good. Then I need seven days from you.”
“Huh?”
“Seven days. I need you to completely abstain from sex for seven days.”
“You’re out of your fucking mind.”
“Maybe, and maybe not. Can you just try it? It’s one week.”
“Sure. I’ll just call my friend Brody over to nail boards over my doors and windows so I can’t leave.” I covered my face with my hands and sighed again.
“Calm down, drama queen. I didn’t say you couldn’t eat for a week, I simply said no sex.”
“Wait, can I—”
“And no sex acts. No oral—giving or receiving—no petting, no making out, nothing. And I want you to go to the bar where you said you normally pick up women, at least once.”
Petting?
“Petting?”
She tilted her head back and forth. “You know… caressing, touching, all of that.”
“You’re trying to say I can’t touch any tits?”
“Yes, that’s what I’m saying.”
The light by the door flipped on before I could protest and tell her she was crazy—again.
Her face lit up. “Perfect timing!” She sprang from her chair and went over to open the exit door for me. “Seven days. You can do it.”
I’m glad one of us thinks so.
“Wait,”—I was almost through the door when I remembered to ask something—“can I rough up the suspect by myself?”
She frowned at me. “What suspect?”
“Ya know, can I charm the snake? Unclog the drain? Slap the sausage?”
I wished I had a video camera on her face as she realized what I was talking about. Her eyes bulged and she pressed her lips together tightly as she pushed me through the door. “Good-bye, Lawrence.”
I swear I heard her laugh on the other side of the door as she closed it behind me and I walked away.
THE FIRST FOUR days had been easy. I hadn’t thought about my dick except when I’d held it to piss. On day five, the Viking started talking to me. He was twitchy and ready to play. Ignoring it became harder and harder, literally. I was trying to settle into a new norm.
One of the positives of my new normal was my contact with Michelle. I’d remembered to text her every morning when I woke up and ask how her and the kids were and if she needed anything. Every day she responded the same way.
M: Thanks, but so far, so good. :)
She didn’t need me and that was okay. As long as she knew I was there, just in case, I could sleep at night. I’d visited Gam not once but twice, and I hadn’t missed one workout. In fact, I’d been putting in extra time at the gym. All in all, it’d been a great week, but I still had the weekend to go before I could strut into Dr. Roberts’s office Tuesday afternoon and prove to her that I could go a week without sex, standing on my head. And… one of Dr. Roberts’s stipulations was that I had to leave the house and go out once, but she hadn’t said anything in the rules about not bringing backup, so I called Brody and Kacie to have them meet me at Stumpy’s.
I got there before anyone else and grabbed our usual table in the corner. The saloon doors opened and Portland came striding over to the table with a big smile on her face.
“Hey, you!” She beamed.
“Hey.”
I didn’t know how to act. Typically, I would have jumped up and hugged her and said something inappropriate, but it was only day five, and I had to behave.
Portland tilted her head to the side and chewed on the end of her pen. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” I tried to sound as casual as possible. “Why?”
“I don’t know, you just seem different.”
“Nah, I’m good. Just tired. It’s been a long week.”
“Okay.” She smiled. “You want a root beer?”
“Sure.”
“All right. I’ll be right back.”
She turned around and had just disappeared into the kitchen when suddenly, two little hands covered my eyes.
“Guess who?” a female asked, but it was clear she was trying to disguise her voice.
“Uh…” I was stumped. I’d picked up so many girls at this bar it literally could have been anyone. “Is it…”
“Your worst nightmare!” A man laughed. I knew that voice for certain. I pulled the hands down and Brody was already sitting across the table from me, cracking open a peanut. Still holding her hands, I looked to my left and saw Kacie.
“Did I get ya?” She grinned, wrapping her arms around me.
I nodded and laughed. “You totally did. I had no idea who the fuck it was.”
As Kacie came around to sit at the table, I noticed she wasn’t alone. Michelle followed behind her.
“Hey!” I was excited to see her.
“Hey yourself, stranger.” She moved in for a quick hug too. “Long time no talk, huh?”
“Yeah, really. It’s been what, almost eight hours?”
“You guys talked today?” Kacie stared back and forth between the two of us. “When?”
Michelle gave me a small smile before glancing over at Kacie. “Viper has been really sweet. He’s been texting me every morning to see if the kids and I are okay or if we need anything.”
Brody’s and Kacie’s faces mirrored each other. Complete shock.
“What the hell are you making those faces for?” I snapped at them.
“I’m just stunned to hear someone call you sweet. I don’t think that’s ever happened before,” Brody joked. I picked up a peanut and threw it at him.
Kacie’s face lit up as she looked past me and started waving. I turned in my seat, just enough to see Darla’s smiling face walking toward us, dragging a man along behind her.
“Hey, everyone!” Darla said cheerfully as she walked up, looking at everyone except me. “Kacie, Brody, you guys remember Neil. Michelle and Viper, this is Neil, my boyfriend.” She motioned toward the guy in a suit standing just behind her. He stepped forward and held his hand out for me to shake. I looked down at it and back up at Darla, who was biting her lip with her brows drawn in together, clearly anxious about my reaction.
Grasping Neil’s hand tight in my own, I shook his hand and smiled. “Hi, Neil. Nice to meet you.”
He smiled back, showing off a row of perfect white teeth that looked more like pieces of Chiclets gum than actual teeth. “Nice to meet you too, Viper. I’m a huge fan.”
Wonderful.
He turned and shook Michelle’s hand, offering her the same fake-ass smile. Darla took a step behind him and looked to me for my approval. Instead, I rolled my eyes and pretended to gag.
“Why don’t you guys have a seat?” Kacie asked, scooting her stool closer to Brody to make more room. Portland came back from the kitchen carrying my root beer and set it in front of me.
“Is that root beer?” Neil laughed, looking down at my bottle.
“Yeah,” I said firmly, staring him in the eye as Darla rested her head on his shoulder and cringed.
“What can I get everyone els
e?” Portland asked as she took out her pen and pad of paper.
Brody held up his index finger. “Beer.”
Michelle pointed at him. “Copy that.”
“Make it three,” Darla added.
“Do you have sparkling water?” Neil asked Portland.
“I have regular water,” Portland answered innocently, “but I can put ice in it so it sparkles.”
“Never mind. I’ll take a beer also.” Neil looked annoyed with her, and that annoyed me.
“Can I get a coffee, Anna?” Kacie asked.
“Sure. We don’t have any made, but I’ll get a fresh pot started for you.” Portland smiled at her. “Be right back, guys.”
“Coffee? Now?” Brody looked at the time on his phone. “You’re gonna be up half the night.”
“Yeah, well the girls had that birthday party at the jumpy house place after school, and if I don’t get something to keep me up, I’m going to be sleeping on this table within five minutes.” She stuck her tongue out at him playfully and squealed as Brody caught it between his lips. While Brody and Kacie slurped each other’s faces off, I looked to my left to see Darla and Neil leaned in close, nose to nose as they laughed about something quietly. I sighed and stared straight ahead at the same time Michelle looked back at me and shrugged, a tight smile on her lips. We both felt it, the awkwardness of being the oddball out. I wasn’t worried about being the oddball. I was used to being alone, and it didn’t scare me. But she was new to this alone thing, and I was concerned that everyone else so obviously coupling off would weird her out. I smiled back at her and gestured over toward the pool table area. She nodded eagerly and stood from the table.
“I didn’t know you played pool.” She looked up at me and grinned as we made our way across the bar.
“I don’t,”—I shrugged, pointing straight ahead—“but I like music, and there’s a kickass jukebox in the corner past the pool tables. I figured we could pick out a few songs while the lovebirds all calm down.”
