Tamed (22 page)

Early the next morning, Dee wakes up just long enough to kiss me good-bye. I walk past Billy—dead to the world—on the couch and go home for a long shower. Then I drive up to Drew’s parents’ country place for the day’s festivities.

All the usual suspects are in attendance—John and Anne, Steven and Alexandra, George, and my mother and father. I make my way through the handshakes and hugs to the back sunroom, which affords a panoramic view of the pristine backyard. And a view of Drew—with Mackenzie—riding opposite ends of the very same seesaw we played on, as kids, a lifetime ago.

Although they seem to be engaged in a serious conversation, I walk out the back door anyway, to join them. Drew lets Mackenzie know I’m here and she jumps off the seesaw, runs, and throws herself into my arms like she hasn’t seen me for months. But I eat it up and give her a long hug when her little arms wrap around my neck.

Then I set her down and we walk back to Drew. “Hey, man,” he greets me.

“What’s up?” I ask. “You go out early last night? You never came back to the party.”

He shrugs. “My head wasn’t in it. I hit the gym and went to bed.”

Huh. That kind of behavior is weird for Drew, and I wonder
if it has anything to do with his pissy attitude toward Kate and Billy at the party.

“You hung out with that Delores chick?” he asks.

I nod. And test the waters. “Her, Kate, and Billy.”

He shakes his head. “That guy licks ass.”

Mackenzie walks over to us and holds up the Bad Word Jar—Alexandra’s invention—to keep us in check around her kid. It’s simultaneously a bane of my existence and completely fucking hysterical.

“He’s not so bad.”

Drew says, “Idiots annoy me.” And he loses another dollar.

I think he does it on purpose—actually curses more than he would if the jar didn’t exist. Like a twisted sort of reverse psychology, just to buck the system and show his sister that he won’t be controlled.

And maybe you’re wondering why I haven’t told him about Billy and Kate’s breakup? The answer is simple: Guys don’t fucking gossip. We don’t talk about shit like that—other people’s relationship issues. We barely talk about our own relationship issues. It’s just that simple.

Plus, Drew would be on Kate like white on rice, if he knew she got dumped. Because everyone knows dumped chicks are low-hanging fruit. Easy pickings. I think it would give him an unfair advantage in their little battle of the sexes. One he doesn’t need.

Lastly, people break up all the time . . . only to get back together the very next day. Despite what Dee said, Billy seemed pretty devastated over Kate. I have a feeling he’s going to try for one more at bat before that particular game gets called.

There’s no point in getting Drew’s hopes up in the meantime.

“So what’s the deal with you and Delores?” he asks.

I smile. And keep it simple. “We’re hanging out. She’s cool.”

“I’m assuming you’ve nailed her?”

I frown. Because even though I know he doesn’t mean to be disrespectful, Dee’s not just some random chick. Hearing him talk about her like she is
feels
disrespectful. So I set him straight. “It’s not like that, Drew.”

Now he’s confused. “Then what’s it like, Matthew? You haven’t hung out in over two weeks. I can understand you being too pussy-whipped to come out if you’re getting some. But if not, what’s the deal?”

I wait for Mackenzie to approach us with the Bad Word Jar . . . but she doesn’t. Guess she didn’t hear that one.

Then I try to get Drew to understand, but since he’s never been in love with anyone except himself, I really don’t know if he can. “She’s just . . . different. It’s hard to explain. We talk, you know? And I’m always kind of thinking about her. It’s like the minute I drop her off, I can’t wait to see her again. She just . . . amazes me. I wish you knew what I meant.”

He warns me. “You’re in dangerous territory, man. You see what Steven goes through. This path leads to the Dark Side. We always said we wouldn’t go there. You sure about this?”

I just keep smiling. And in my best Darth Vader voice I tell him, “You don’t know the power of the Dark Side.”

This Thanksgiving dinner is definitely one for the record books. Or the scrapbooks. If I’d had my camera handy, I totally would have documented the entire hilarious, horrifying debacle. It was
stupid of me to think the all-hearing Mackenzie didn’t pick up on Drew calling me “pussy-whipped.” She heard, all right. The reason she didn’t charge him was because she didn’t know it was a “bad word.”

After she repeated it at the Thanksgiving Day dinner table? Then she knew. And all hell broke loose.

I can’t help but chuckle again. Her asking Steven, “ ‘Wha’s
pussy-whipped
, Daddy?’ ” will forever live in my brain as the funniest fucking thing I’ve ever heard. I was so shocked, I spit out the black olive in my mouth and almost blinded Steven when it hit him right in the eye. Drew’s father practically choked to death on his turkey and my mother knocked over her glass of wine—leaving a permanent reminder on Anne Evans’s lace table cloth.

Good times.

Alexandra was rightly and truly pissed. Of course, if her ire was directed at me, I probably wouldn’t find it so awesomely amusing. But it’s aimed squarely at Drew, so I laugh over Mackenzie’s parody and its aftershocks the entire ride home.

I only wish Delores had been with me to see it. Speaking of Dee, before I get back to the city, I stop for gas and call her to see how her day went.

“Better than expected,” she says. “But, can I stay at your place tonight? My cousin is channeling his feelings into his music. And while I love listening to him sing, if I have to hear one more fucking song about his heart breaking, I’m going to make our food poisoning episode look like a hiccup.”

And my life just got a whole lot more perfect. I know when things first started with Dee and I, she said she wasn’t into relationships. And I know she’s had her moments of insecurity—but look at us now. She’s coming to me, asking to stay at my place. That’s a huge tell. It means she wants the same things I do. That we’re
on the same page. That she’s invested—interested in a future—with me.

I chuckle against the cell phone. “Sure, I’ll be at my apartment in thirty minutes. Come on over, baby.”

It’s always darkest before the dawn.
It’s a common saying. What’s less common, but equally true is,
Pride comes before the fall
.

Remember a while back I told you that women needed to stop playing the victim card? Stop reading into a guy’s actions, thinking they mean something more than they do, and just accept what a man is telling them, straight up? I was so into Dee, so eager to take what we had and run with it all the way into the end zone, I ignored my own advice.

Ever heard of the myth of Icarus?

You probably weren’t expecting a Greek mythology lesson, but indulge me anyway—this is important. Icarus was the son of a master craftsman. His father made him a pair of wings out of feathers and wax and warned him, before he took off, to stay on the flight path. Not to fly too high. Icarus agreed.

But once he was airborne, he was so caught up in how amazing it felt—the beauty and warmth of the sun—he forgot all about the warning. He ignored the signs that were right in front of him because he was positive he knew where he was going, thought he had everything under control.

You can guess what happened next. Yep, Icarus got burned. His wings fell apart and he came crashing back to earth.

Unfortunately . . . I can relate to that.

T
he Bible says there’s a time for all things under heaven. A time for peace and a time for war, a time to reap and a time to sow . . . a time to love . . . and a time to
tell
a girl you love her.

It doesn’t actually say that. But it should. Because many poor bastards make the mistake of telling a woman at the wrong fucking time.

Like after sex.
Wrong.
That’s just asking for trouble.

Or during an argument.
Really wrong
. There’s a reason the Doors’ song “Love Her Madly” is still popular today. Because the lyric, “Don’t you love her as she’s walking out the door” is timeless. Men don’t like to lose. Not a bet, their favorite T-shirt, or a girlfriend. In the attempt to keep from losing the latter, we could say something stupid—things we really don’t mean.

But for me, tonight is the perfect time to take my and Dee’s relationship to the next level. I had a key to my apartment made for her, and when I put it in her hands, I’m going to tell her I’m falling in love with her.

You’re not surprised, are you? Jesus, you had to have seen this coming.

I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. It happened gradually, but that’s the best way. In four weeks, Dee’s gone from a girl I wanted to nail, to a girl I wanted to hang out with, to a girl I really liked . . . to someone I don’t want to live without.

I think about her all the time, I crave her—miss her—when we’re apart, no matter how long we were just together. She’s funny and beautiful and interesting . . . and sure she’s a pain in the ass too, but—like I told you in the beginning—I love her because of her quirks, not in spite of them.

The last week and a half has been amazing. Billy’s still crashing at her apartment, so except when she’s there checking on him, she’s been here with me. But I still want more. There were plenty of times that I could have dropped the bomb on her during the last few days, but I wanted it to be memorable. Special. Something she’ll proudly tell Kate about, or someday—our kids. Girls love that shit.

I haven’t talked to her yet today. I was out of the office all day, visiting with one client after another. But she’s coming over tonight and I have the whole thing planned. You want to hear about it?

We’ll start with an excursion to the Jersey shore. My parents used to take me there all the time when I was a kid. It’s December, but most of the rides and boardwalk games are open year-round. There’s an indescribable magic to the place—an aura of simpler days—a nostalgic beauty. I’ll hold Delores’s hand, spend thirty bucks to win her a two-dollar stuffed animal on one of those games where you have to knock the weighted cans over with a baseball. We’ll ride the bumper cars, maybe a roller coaster, and we’ll share a delicious but incredibly bad for you funnel cake.

Then we’ll kick off our shoes and walk down the beach, near enough to the water so we can watch the waves in the moonlight without getting wet. It’ll be cold, so she’ll lay back against me and I’ll wrap my arms around her to keep her warm. And then, with the thunder of the crashing waves in the background, I’ll tell her.

That she’s changed my life. That I want to share the rest of it with her. That nothing looks or feels the way it did four weeks ago—because of her—it’s unbelievably better. I don’t think she’ll freak out, although it’s possible. If she does, I’ll tell her she doesn’t have to say anything back. I’m a pretty patient guy. I can wait.

Then we’ll make out. And it’ll be awesome. Sex on the beach isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Sand is not a friend to genitalia. But . . . if Dee is interested, I’m sure as hell not going to turn her down.