by Kristy Tate
She watched insecurities flash across his face. This was a side of Kirk she hadn’t seen before, and she had thought she knew all of him. How many years had she spent studying him?
A lot.
And yet, this awkwardness was new. And unexpected.
“Of course. I’d love some company.”
“Great.” Relief flooded his expression. “If you don’t mind waiting just a second, I’ll be right back with my bag.”
Charlie opened the car door and slipped behind the wheel. While waiting for the car’s heater to kick in, she fiddled with the sound system, wondering what Kirk liked to listen to. How did she not know this? She had planned on listening to an audiobook, but with Kirk in the car, this was out of the question. She’d much rather listen to him than some silly murder mystery. What she needed was some nice background music so they could talk about their mutual interests. Which were…?
This was ridiculous. They were both healthcare professionals. Maybe he’d like to listen to a Ted Talk on nutrition. No. She wanted to talk to him and learn about his hopes, dreams, and plans for the future. Then she would tell him hers and try to leave out the fact that they all centered around her having his babies.
Instinctively, her fingers went to her lips. If she closed her eyes, she could still feel Zach’s burning kisses.
But those hadn’t really happened.
Or had they?
She needed to talk to Zach. Why had he left so suddenly?
A cold breeze circulated through the car when Kirk climbed in. He settled his bag between his feet as if he had to keep it close in case he decided to jump ship. For some reason she didn’t know how to define, this bothered her.
“Something wrong?” Kirk asked.
“No.” Knowing she was being ridiculous, she shook herself and put the car in gear.
“This is nice,” Kirk said. “Just the two of us. I can’t think of the last time we’ve really had the chance to talk.”
The words and whose fault is that? sprung to Charlie’s mind, but thankfully, she bit them back and nodded in agreement.
“I mean, we’ve been friends forever,” he continued, “but you’ve always been surrounded by your brothers.”
“My brothers?” Charlie echoed.
“Yeah. I’ve always been intimidated by them.”
“Huh.” Charlie didn’t know what else to say.
“Did you know that in seventh grade, Dan beat up Max Miller because Max took a guess at your bra size?”
Charlie braked hard at the stop sign, sucked in a deep breath, and really looked at Kirk. He gave her a sheepish smile. She eased onto the highway that would carry them home. What was he saying? Would he have asked her out earlier if he hadn’t been scared away by her brothers?
“My brothers never threatened you though, right?”
“No, because I was never interested in you…that way.”
“Ah.”
“Until now.”
Charlie almost lost her grip on the steering wheel, which would have been disastrous. She tried to refocus on the winding mountain road. “You’re interested in me now?” she asked, just to make sure her mind wasn’t playing tricks on her. She hadn’t slept well last night—not with that From Here to Eternity dream where she’d been kissing Zach and nearly igniting with passion…
“Well, you weren’t really my type,” he added.
Charlie pressed her lips together. “And you were always interested in girls like Layla.”
“Well, I’ve learned my lesson,” Kirk said. “Would you like to go with me to the hospital fundraiser at the Harbor Yacht Club Friday night?”
A date? Kirk was asking her on a date! “Of course!” She didn’t have a dress, but she could get one at Dotty’s Dresses, along with the shoes, of course. She’d been eyeing a pair of sparkly silver stilettos that she wanted but didn’t have anywhere to wear, and now she did! She hoped they were still there.
“My mom always said you were the girl for me, but I wanted someone more glamorous.”
“Glamorous,” Charlie echoed, her confusion and anger mounting.
“Mom was probably right. I need someone more down to earth.”
Down to earth. Maybe he meant that as a compliment, but it sounded suspiciously close to dowdy, dull, drab, and a host of other unflattering D words.
“What happened with Layla?” Charlie asked.
“She went home. Took my car without even asking.” He pressed his lips together and glanced out the window. “She left a note.”
“Did she break up with you?”
“Break up with me? No. I’m breaking up with her! She doesn’t get to break up with me.”
She felt his anger and hurt reach out and squeeze her heart. “Do you want to talk about it?” she asked, hoping he would say no.
“She’s a skank!” He drummed his fingers on his thigh. “I don’t know how she made it through nursing school. Not that nursing school is much of a challenge. Still, she’s so brainless, I’m surprised she graduated. She should have gone to beauty school!”
Charlie flexed her fingers around the steering wheel as her indignation on behalf of stylists ramped up. “Because all beauticians are idiots?”
“You know what I mean!”
“I’m not sure I do,” Charlie said. “I went to nursing school. It wasn’t a cakewalk.”
“But it’s not medical school,” Kirk said.
“No, but—”
“If she hadn’t been working at the hospital, we would never have gotten together.”
She wasn’t following him.
“Most relationships are based on proximity and convenience,” he continued.
“That’s cold.”
“But true.”
“Not really. C.S. Lewis said something really beautiful about friendship.” She racked her brain to remember the quote. “It’s something about how there’s nothing accidental about who we meet. God has chosen our friends so that we can bless and be blessed. Besides, as you pointed out, I’ve been next door to you most of your life.”
“But you’ve changed,” he said.
Was he referring to her weight loss?
“Men aren’t like women,” he continued.
He was. She tried not to bristle. “True, they have different body parts,” she said, trying to lighten the mood between them.
“It’s not just about testosterone.”
“Women have testosterone, too.”
“But men have significantly more.”
She added, “Most men.” But probably not the ones who are scared off by other people’s brothers.
“Men are attracted by visual stimuli, while women seek men who can be good providers. The differences are in our DNA.”
“I’m sure some are culturally imbedded.”
He snorted. “Men gravitate toward facts and logic, while women are a lot more emotional. Neuroscience literature proves the human brain is a sex-typed organ with distinct anatomical differences in neural structures and accompanying physiological differences in function. Men’s brains are bigger.”
“Yes. They have bigger heads.”
He didn’t laugh at her joke. “Women retain stronger, more vivid memories of emotional events. That’s why they enjoy soap operas.”
“I don’t watch soap operas.”
“But you used to.”
“Do you really want to talk about high school?” Did she have to remind him about how he cried during a chess competition because Annie had broken up with him?
“Not if you don’t want to. I’m sure that time must have been painful for you.”
“Why?” She’d been an A student and a first chair violinist in the orchestra. Like Kirk, she’d been a solid member of the brainiac crowd, but a few grades younger. Painful wasn’t the word she’d use to describe her high school experience. She’d had a crowd of friends.
He flashed her a smile to soften his words. “Well, you had braces and you went through that weird stage where you and all your friends wore th
ose cat-with-bowtie T-shirts. What was that about?”
“Teenage drama.” She really didn’t want to explain to him the rules of the Kitty-Kat Club—a circle of girls from their church that prided themselves on their pledge of sexual abstinence.
“Ah, thespians…” he said, misunderstanding her. “You were in a couple of plays, as I remember.”
She nodded, not really wanting to talk about her role as the Cowardly Lion in their high school production of The Wizard of Oz. Mrs. W. had told her that she’d been given the role because of her long hair, but she had always had a sneaking suspicion that she’d been selected because she filled out the costume. “Have you seen any good movies lately?” she asked, casting about for a change of subject.
“I don’t have time for movies. I’m surprised you do. But then, you’re a nurse and I’m a doctor.”
She bit her lip. “Are you interested in listening to an audiobook?”
#
Charlie sat in the comfy pink chair and watched while Maddie sat on the floor and pulled items of clothing out of a large cardboard box.
“He sounded so…not like him,” Charlie said.
“Have you really ever had an in-depth conversation with him before?” Maddie asked.
“Well, of course. I mean, I’ve known him for most of my life…” Her voice trailed away. “So, yeah…”
Maddie frowned as she held up a frothy pink negligee, which she soon tossed into the cast-off pile. “Is it possible that the Kirk in your head is a really different person from the Kirk everyone else knows?”
The thought that she might have been deceiving herself for most of her life was too painful for Charlie to entertain. “No. It’s like he said, we need to spend more time together.”
Maddie made a guttural sound and smoothed a navy-blue sweater out on the floor. “Does this have too many pills to be saved?” She picked up the tool she called the baller and began to stroke the sweater with it.
“I’m seeing him on Friday night,” Charlie said.
“Yeah? What are you going to do?”
“There’s a party hosted by the drug dealers.”
Maddie snorted. “Pharmaceutical representatives.”
“Same thing,” Charlie said with a sad smile. She wished that Kirk had asked her to do something fun—like bike riding, or maybe play games with friends, or really, just about anything other than sitting around and schmoozing with doctors and the drug dealers. It wasn’t as if she didn’t know most of the doctors who would be there. She sighed. “It’s at the Harbor Yacht Club.”
“That should be fun,” Maddie said.
Charlie shrugged. “But only because I’ll be with Kirk.” She paused as her thoughts went back to her conversation with him in the car. Why had it been so stilted and weird? She’d only relaxed after turning on the audiobook. Maybe she should try making him his favorite dessert or something to loosen him up.
Dotty bustled into the room, carrying a wooden box. Charlie jumped up to take it out of her grandmother’s arms. “Dotty, what is this?”
“I found it in my attic,” Dotty said breathlessly. “I thought you girls would want to see it.”
“What is it?” Maddie asked.
The box was made of burnished burl wood with leather hinges.
“It’s my grandmother’s journals from when she and my grandfather served as missionaries in New Zealand around the turn of the last century.”
Charlie itched to open it, but instead set it on the counter and waited for Dotty to do the honors.
A musty smell escaped the box as Dotty lifted the lid. Inside lay a leather-bound journal, a beaded purse with a tarnished gold clasp, a silver necklace with a large pendant featuring a woman’s silhouette, and a velvet beret.
Maddie let out a small squeak of happy surprise.
“I wonder what New Zealand must have been like way back when,” Charlie said.
“I wonder what it’s like now,” Dotty said. “Well, there’s only one way to find out.”
Maddie had a violet-colored tunic held up in front of her, but she was looking at her grandmother and not the shirt. “And how’s that, Dotty?”
“I’m going to go!” Dotty announced.
“Grandmother!” both girls exclaimed in matching horrified voices.
“Well, why not? I’m not getting any younger.”
“Who’s going with you?” Charlie asked.
Her grandmother gave her what her mom called the stink-eye. “You are.”
“Me?” Charlie shook her head. “I can’t go!”
“Why not?”
“I have a job!”
“So, it’ll still be here when you get back.”
“I don’t have the money.”
Dotty snorted while she emptied the box’s contents onto the counter and lined them all up like shooters in a firing squad. “Money. Why do you let it control your life?”
“It doesn’t.”
“Well, it shouldn’t, but in your case, it still does.”
“Why would you say that?”
Dotty didn’t answer, but picked up the journal. “Now, your great-great-grandmother was brave.” She waved the journal in Charlie’s face. “You should be as brave.”
“I’m plenty brave,” Charlie said, trying not to think about her role as the Cowardly Lion in the high school play. She ran her fingers over the beaded purse. It was so pretty, she was almost afraid to touch it.
“Then why are you still at that hospital you despise?”
“I don’t despise the hospital,” Charlie said.
“When you wake each day, are you excited to get to work?”
“No, but who is?”
“There’s plenty of Good-Doer-Gilberts out there. I bet if you quit there’d be twenty other nurses lining up to take your place.”
“And then what would I do?”
“You’ll figure it out,” her grandmother told her.
#
“But what if I don’t want to figure it out?” Charlie asked her mom later that night over the phone.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart, what did you say?” her mom asked.
Charlie blew out a sigh. Why did it feel like no one in her family really talked to her about anything?
“I said I like my job!”
“Of course you do. Why wouldn’t you? You get paid well. Your hours are flexible. You’re doing important work.”
“Right? Going to New Zealand would be ridiculous.”
“Yes, ridiculous,” Mom agreed. “I don’t know what Dotty is thinking. She can’t just go trotting off across the world. Your father needs to speak to her. Did I tell you about your Aunt Mindy’s garden?”
But Charlie didn’t want to talk about her Aunt Mindy’s garden. Instead, while her mom told her about the horrific aphid infestation, Charlie looked up New Zealand on the computer. Now, where had her missionary great-great-grandparents served?
Then she got sidetracked by a pop-up about a lemon-cream dessert. If she remembered right, Kirk loved lemon meringue pie. Chances are he’d love this lemon-raspberry cheesecake. And she had a whole tub of cream cheese! Her neighbor’s tree that hung over the apartment complex’s fence was bursting with lemons and she had frozen raspberries in the freezer…
She forgot about New Zealand and went to bake Kirk a cheesecake.
#
Zach followed Ricardo through Wonder Weight Loss Company’s campus. A basketball court on the right. A skate park on the left. Beyond a plaza, a glass and chrome building that seemed to be made completely of windows.
“That’s my workout studio,” Ricardo told him. “And yes, you’ve told me a million times that you hate it. But you’re not the one making the videos—I am. And I like having everyone look at me. It’s why I do what I do.”
They passed through double-wide glass doors into the main lobby. A giant staircase rose to the upper floors. Zach paused to count the stories.
“That’s right. No elevators or escalators.” Ricardo leaned in to
whisper, “There is an elevator, but only people with health issues or delivery men are allowed to use it.” He resumed his normal speaking voice. “Here at Wonder Weight Loss, we always take the stairs!” He leaned back in for another whisper. “Clive’s idea. It’s not very popular.”
Zach gaped at the life-size images on the wall. They were, presumably, before and after photos of clients. Men in suits or jeans. Women in dresses or shorts and T-shirts. The young and the old. The only commonality was all of the clients looked considerably smaller and happier in the after pictures.
“What makes my app different from all the other online calorie counters?” he asked Ricardo as they climbed the stairs to their offices on the fifth floor. “Why is mine worth a million dollars?”
“It’s a billion dollars.” Ricardo led him to a security panel beside a heavy stainless-steel door. “And it’s worth that because no other calorie counter was created by you.” Ricardo placed his palm flat against the panel and the door clicked open.
“Yeah, but last night I scrolled through the pages of code. Even though my computer science days are long past, I could tell I’d put together a simple program, easily duplicated.”
Ricardo led him into an office that was supposedly Zach’s. Floor to ceiling windows looked out at the back bay. A giant desk topped with three computer screens dominated the room.
“The people at Wonder Weight Loss took a gamble on you and it paid off. Big time.” Ricardo pointed his finger in Zach’s face. “You’re what sells the Wonder Weight Loss app. Every dude wants to be you and every woman in America thinks if she follows your program, you’ll become her personal diet guru.”
“But I don’t want to be a personal diet guru to millions.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“I’m not sure about anything! I can’t remember what happened last week!” He paused. “If I’m so rich, why don’t I have a dog?”
Ricardo snorted. “That’s what you’re worried about?”
“Yeah. I always wanted a dog but could never get one because of my football schedule. I didn’t think it would be fair to the dog to travel so much.” He tapped a pencil on the table, pondering this and all of his other mounting questions.
