One Long Kiss

by Susan Ward

  His voice is casual. The look he gives me is not. It’s enticing and intense and everything inside me starts to twirl.

  Oh shit! Did he just invite me to join him in one of his sexcapades again? Christ, I can’t tell for sure, and since I definitely don’t want him asking me or the unexpected internal reaction it generates, I frantically rummage for something funny to say.

  “So you only fuck two women at a time because you don’t want women to fall in love with you? Is that what you’re telling me?” I laugh, a little too loudly, scathingly. “Good luck with that one, Alan. You don’t understand women at all.”

  He gives me a hard stare, amused and enigmatic. He gathers the dishes and takes them to the sink.

  “No, Linda, you don’t understand me.”

  Seven

  I climb from the car after an early dinner out with Alan.

  I peek at him from under my lashes, standing there holding my door open for me. He can be quite the little gentleman at times. His manners have been impeccable the past three days, but I feel it even stronger, an undercurrent of sexual tension and a sense that he is trying to hit on me.

  It’s in the way he looks at me, the way he touches me in those brief fleeting instances of flesh to flesh, but I feel it even more intensely in the way he doesn’t touch me. Even separateness with Alan is a sexual kind of thing. The nearness he places his body to me, out of nowhere so I can’t escape it. How he leans in a chair while we’re having dinner or drinks, the elegantly languid arrangement of his long limbs, suggestive but appropriately without contact. An expert blending of closeness, with no contact, a sense of being hunted and not yet caught.

  Like now, near enough to me that I feel surrounded by him, but no contact. It’s unnerving.

  Whatever this game is he’s playing, it’s a good one. I’m completely disoriented and frazzled and too aware of him in every second we’re together. I don’t even know if he’s interested in me, if I’ve read a single signal correctly, and there is an alarming sense that that is exactly what he’s intending.

  We start walking toward the house. My gaze roams over him and I note how sexy he looks tonight, though how it is possible for him to look even more beautifully him in that getup is a mystery. Expensively tailored black slacks, a crisp, immaculate light gray dress shirt, with no tie and opened just the right amount. Spotless Italian-made leather shoes. Who the fuck dresses him? He looks like he fell out of GQ.

  Deciding a smidge of distance might not be a bad thing, I inch away from him, stumbling off the edge of the walkway. He grabs me, clutching my shoulders to prevent a fall, and I am spun around as he pulls me into full contact with him.

  “Be careful,” he admonishes, holding me against him.

  I try to jerk back, flustered, but he doesn’t release me. “Careful won’t do a damn bit of good. It’s too dark out here. Do Brits have an aversion to light? Everything here is so dark, always.”

  He stares down at me, amusement flashing in his eyes. “I’ve always considered a dimly lit pavement romantic.”

  I notice how close our mouths are and I can’t move. I’m paralyzed and unwantedly captivated by the way he’s looking down at me, his gaze shimmering and darkening.

  I somehow manage to lift a brow. “Romantic, my ass. It’s a safety hazard.”

  He stares at me as if I’ve offended him on some level.

  “You see things too logically too much of the time. Most things in life aren’t logical. They simply are. When you try to give them order you ruin them. It’s better just to run with the way things are and not give it too much thought.”

  His breathing quickens and mine has stopped altogether, and it is as if he’s carefully watching my reaction to that. A sickening suspicion that he knows exactly how he affects me shoots through my veins. That he enjoys it makes me angry.

  I step back and he lets me. “Everything in life is logical, kid. We pretend it’s not so we can cope with not wanting things to be the way they are.”

  There. A statement packed with subtle innuendo just like his to me. I’m enormously pleased with myself.

  “Things in my life are always exactly how I want them,” he murmurs.

  That statement unexpectedly make me think of Jack, how much my life isn’t how I want it, how much I miss him and wish I were with him now. I swallow down the sudden lump in my throat. The thought of Jack is a very timely thing.

  “What’s the matter?” Alan asks softly. “You’re frowning. Was the dinner not to your liking?”

  I shake my head to scatter my thoughts. “The dinner was fine. I’m just tired and ready for bed.”

  He checks his watch and gives me a smile that makes my heart somersault. “At nine thirty?”

  My cheeks flush at the way he says nine thirty, a hint of a suggestion that he thinks my eagerness to end the night has something to do with him.

  “It’s eight hours later in California,” I tease glibly.

  “No. It’s eight hours earlier. You should be well rested. Ready for anything.”

  Those black eyes hold me spellbound and I feel a little tingle there and then everywhere. Even when I don’t want to, the way Alan looks at me at times turns me into instantly lusting and overly-demanding flesh.

  Crap.

  Inside the house, I lift my chin. “Well, the only thing I’m ready for is my bed. Good night, Manny.”

  I move quickly toward the stairs and hurry up them. I can feel him watching me and I’m relieved when I am safely in my room.

  I sink down on the bed. My heart is thumping too quickly, and my sex is definitely more alert and shouting for consideration than I want it to be. Being with Alan is like nonstop sexual foreplay, whether he touches you or not.

  I drop my face into my palms and clutch my hair with my fingers. What the hell is happening to me? I can’t stand Alan Manzone, but he looks at me and I have thoughts.

  Fuck! Thoughts, Linda? What are you, in junior high school? You think about what it would be like to fuck the guy, if he’s half as much a turn-on in bed as he is out of it, and that’s not right.

  I reach for the phone. For some reason, calling Jeanette seems like a really good idea. Nothing hits me like a cold shower faster than talking to my bestie. She doesn’t approve of anything I do. Not my affair with Jack, not my current profession, and definitely not the type of guys I’m hanging out with. She’ll snap me back into sanity with her acerbic lectures.

  I punch her number into the phone and wait. Ring. Ring. Ring. Shit, maybe it’s too late to call.

  “Hello?”

  I stop slouching on the bed and straighten up. “Hello, Mrs. Grayson. It’s Linda. Is Jeanette around?”

  Silence comes through the receiver for a moment. Then, she says, “We were expecting you to arrive four days ago. A call would have been polite. Are you all right?”

  She rattles off the words coldly, rapidly like bullets from a machine gun. Jeez, I can definitely see where Jeanette gets her very not warm and fuzzy manner.

  Tension runs through my body, instantaneously pushing away those other things I didn’t want to feel in my flesh. “I got stuck at work. Sorry I didn’t call. I know I should have.”

  “We’re pleased to have you stay with us, but we are not pleased to be worrying about you. Don’t forget to call again.”

  My cheeks burn. Crap, she isn’t even my mother and she has made me feel two inches tall.

  I make a face at the phone. “Is Jeanette home? Can I speak with her?”

  “One moment, please.”

  I stifle a laugh since that sounded like an operator, and Mrs. Grayson is far from working class. The first time I saw the fancy white house with the massive wood door and black iron gates in Belgravia and met the Graysons, it suddenly made sense that Janette is the way she is.

  I crinkle my nose as I listen to dead silence through the phone as Mrs. Grayson makes her way through the house to find her daughter. I wonder if Jeanette thought the same thing the first time she met my moth
er, Doris, and saw the hovel I grew up in in Reseda. I so get why Linda is this way!

  “So you finally decided to turn up,” Jeanette says in that vacuously polite yet deeply cutting way.

  “Sorry my working interferes with your routine, Jeanette.”

  There’s a pause. “It doesn’t especially, but my mother was concerned even after I told her she didn’t have to be.”

  Oh, I bet you told her. I don’t even want to know what other things my bestie let spill about me.

  “Where are you?” she asks. “What have you done now?”

  I clench my teeth. “I told you. I’ve been working.”

  She gives a long, heavy, aggravated sigh. “I have messages for you.”

  Oh crap.

  I hear through the phone her rummaging around through her things. “Sorry. Hold on. I can’t find them. Mother dropped them somewhere…ah. Your mom called. She wants you to call immediately.”

  Doris? Doris sprang for an international call? Alarm hits me.

  “Is she all right?” I ask in welling panic. “Why did she call?”

  “How am I supposed to know?” Jeanette says, irritated. “I didn’t take the message. Mother did. Oh, and Jack called. Three times.”

  Oh fuck.

  “What did you tell him?” I ask anxiously.

  “Excuse me?” she snaps, snotty.

  “Just tell me what you said to him.”

  More silence and I can almost feel through the phone her enjoying this.

  “I’m not your answering service, Linda. And I don’t enjoy being involved in other people’s drama.”

  Drama. Damn.

  “For once can you just be a good friend, Jeanette?”

  “Fine,” she says, clipped. “He called, and when I said you weren’t here, he wanted to know where you were.”

  Oh fudge. “What did you tell him?”

  “The truth, Linda. I told him I didn’t have a notion where you were. He’s called every morning since.”

  Way to go, Jeanette. Way to fuck up my relationship.

  “If he calls again, what do you want me to tell him?” she asks.

  “Nothing. You’ve done more than you should.” I say that with just the right amount of bite.

  “Are you coming back to Town?”

  “No. The tour starts again tomorrow. Two more weeks. I’ll be back then.”

  “Then I’ll see you then, won’t I?”

  I can’t tell if she wants me to return or is dreading it. Maybe it’s time to part ways with Jeanette. Maybe we’ve outgrown each other. Not that we ever fit together very well.

  I shake my head. “I’ll be back in two weeks. I’ve got to run, Jeanette.”

  I click down the phone before she can answer. I take in a deep steadying breath, trying to decide if I call Doris next or Jack. I feel just panicky enough to call Jack first and I’m not exactly sure why I feel that way. Secretive. Like I’ve lied to him. But I haven’t. Not really. I just didn’t tell him everything because I didn’t want to add any more emotional stress to this incredibly stressful separation from him.

  I didn’t tell him about me staying at Alan’s because I didn’t want him to have thoughts about it. Not that he would. He’s neither jealous nor a run-away-with-assumptions kind of man. He’s calm, patient, loving Jack.

  Why the fuck am I lying to him?

  I hold up my hands, shaking them, trying to fling away my chaotic feelings. I want to talk to Jack first. It’s been three days and I miss him terribly. But I shouldn’t call him now. Better to talk to Doris and calm a bit.

  I dial her number and inhale and exhale as I wait for her to answer. Answering machine. Damn. Then I look at the clock. Duh, Linda, it’s afternoon in LA. She’s at work.

  I dial the number for the label.

  “Sunrise West Records,” a voice announces.

  “Doris Miller, please.”

  “One moment.”

  I hear click, click, a ring and then, “Hello, this is Doris.”

  “Mom…”

  “Linda!” The way she says my name makes me cringe. “I called you two days ago. Why didn’t you call me back? Are you OK?”

  Jeez, she sounds distraught and that’s not like Doris. Aggravated. Annoyed with me. Those are common reactions. But worried, no never.

  “I’m fine, Mom. I’ve just been working. This is the first chance I’ve gotten to call you. What’s going on?”

  “Jack Parker is what’s been going on,” she whispers fiercely into the phone. “He called me to ask about you. What’s going on that I don’t know about?”

  My entire face puckers and tightens. “We’re sort of friends.”

  Shit, that sounds lame. My face tightens even more.

  “Friends, dear. Or do you mean friends?”

  Now my cheeks are burning. “We’ve been seeing each other for nearly a year, Mom,” I blurt out and add in a rush, “A serious relationship. Not the kind you’re thinking I’m having. We’re involved. We’re in love, and hopefully someday we’re getting married, and I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you blabbing it to the world—”

  “I don’t blab—”

  “You’re the worst gossip in LA, Mom.”

  She sighs loudly. “What do you mean in love? Married, really? Listen, sweetheart, men like Jack are fun, and he’s one of the good ones, but don’t buy his pillow chatter as something real. He’s like all the other musicians you’ve chased after. A few laughs, some nights, but he’s going to walk away.”

  Anger surges through my veins. “See, this is why I don’t tell you things. You say the wrong things, and you blab.”

  “I just don’t want to see you hurt, dear.”

  “The only one hurting me is you!”

  Damn, I’m crying and I don’t want to.

  “He did seem concerned about you,” Doris mutters. “And was more than a little bit anxious when I told him I didn’t know where you were. What’s going on, Linda?”

  I growl in my head. “Nothing, Mom. I’ve just been working and I didn’t have a chance to call until now. I’m fine. The tour is done in two weeks. I’ll be home every day after that.”

  “Well, I’m glad things are going well for you.”

  I didn’t say they were going well. I shake my head to chase away my thoughts.

  “So this thing with Jack is serious?” Doris asks, more curious.

  I roll my eyes. “I just said it was. And I’d appreciate you staying out of it.”

  “I’m hardly in it,” she counters, indignant and reprimanding simultaneously. “You seem to keep a lot of things from your mother these days.”

  Fuck, I’m feeling like I’m ten years old. First Mrs. Grayson, then Jeanette, and now Doris. Does the entire world think I’m a screwup and is unhappy with me?

  “You doing well, Mom?”

  “I’m fine, dear.” A long pause. “I miss you, Linda.”

  “I miss you too, Mom.”

  “Maybe you can come home for a visit soon. I don’t think I can wait an entire year to see my girl again.”

  Emotion clogs my throat. That was a really sweet thing to say, so unlike Doris.

  “It’s very expensive to fly internationally, Mom.”

  A sigh. “I know. I just miss you.”

  I brush at my tears. “I’ve got to run, Mom. It’s late here.”

  Doris laughs. “I forgot we’re not on the same time zone.”

  “Nope, it’s night.”

  “Call me again. Soon, Linda.”

  “I will, Mom.”

  I click off the phone and brush at my tears. That call didn’t do a darn thing to settle my nerves. Crap, but it seems Jack has been doing a lot of worrying and stirring people up needlessly.

  I frown, wondering what’s up with that. Jack is the most level-headed man I know. He never overreacts. Dread nips at my digestive lining. Is it just the separation making us both a tad nutty when neither of us normally is? Or is he reacting to something he’s feeling from me? Some
thing I’ve let slip and show that I don’t want to?

  Oh God, please let it not be that, since I’m not exactly sure about some of the things I’m feeling, but definitely sure I don’t want to share them.

  I take a handful of minutes to compose myself, and then I dial Jack’s number. Saving the best and hardest call for last.

  I lie back on my pillow, curling the cord around my arm as I wait for the phone to be answered.

  “Hello?”

  Crap. Jack answered the phone himself. I shut my eyes tightly.

  “Hi, sweetheart. How are you?” I say quickly.

  “Better now.”

  My limbs tense. He sounds relieved and a hint angry.

  “Where are you, Linda?”

  “I’m not in London.”

  “I know that. Why do you think I’ve been so—” He breaks off, sounding impatient with himself. “No one seemed to know where you were.”

  “I was working, Jack,” I say contritely.

  “That’s not what you told me, Linda.” He exhales heavily. “Talk to me, baby. I’ve been out of my mind wondering—”

  I sit up. “Wondering what?”

  “If you’ve decided not to try to stick this out and if you’d found someone else. The disappearing. The not telling me what you’re doing. The not calling back. It made me wonder.”

  Tears burn my eyes. “Well, don’t wonder. It’s not that. I love you. There isn’t anyone else.”

  “I can feel it, you know?”

  “Feel what?”

  “When you’re not being honest with me,” he murmurs.

  I cringe. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I don’t always tell you everything. This is just so hard. I’m not always sure how much is the right amount to tell you.”

  “Everything,” he says firmly. “Everything in every detail is the right amount, Linda. You are the most important person in my life.”

  I nod even though he can’t see it. “I’ll do better. Things are just different, odd and stressful here. There’s a lot going on, and I don’t want to dump my shit on you. You have enough being dumped on you because of Chrissie.”

  “It’s not dumping, Linda. It’s called spending your life with someone. There’s nothing you could tell me that would ever be you dumping on me.”