9. Chapter 9
Chapter 9
I awoke with a start, assuming I’d overslept. But seeing 6:35 on the clock, I breathed a sigh of relief. After checking to make sure my alarm was still set for 7:30, I buried myself under the soft covers again. But as I started thinking about the morning ahead, I felt increasingly awake and decided to rise early.
Minutes later, I was standing in my kitchen buttering a bagel, my favorite pre-run breakfast. When my phone buzzed with a text from my sister, I nearly jumped out of my skin. I cleared the notification, telling myself I would read it later. Texts from Lillian were never urgent. I turned off the coffeemaker and decided that some soothing green tea might be more appropriate this morning.
Why am I so jumpy? I asked myself while filling my favorite Austen mug. It had been a gift from Jack last year, fittingly saying, “It’s rudely early,” a quote from Sidney Parker in Austen’s unfinished work Sanditon .
Instead of dwelling on that question, I decided to take a quick shower. It’s usually pointless to shower before a workout , but this would be a good way to wake up .
Not that I needed to look good or anything.
Freshly showered, I stood in front of my mirror, debating whether to wear makeup. Foundation and lipstick have sunscreen in them, so it’s probably a good idea .
Not that I needed to look good or anything.
Gathering my running clothes, I remembered the new sports bra I hadn’t broken in yet. A massively popular purchase in the women’s running community recently, this bra was supposed to be less unflattering than a typical sports bra. It would at least provide better breast support, and maybe less chafing, by virtue of being new instead of worn out, I assured myself as I pulled on the pink bra and admired my form in the mirror.
Not that I needed to look good or anything.
At the sudden knock on the door, I quickly pulled on my running tee. The weather was supposed to be warmer this weekend, but given the early hour of the day, I opted for capri leggings. After opening the door, I said hello and waved Jack in.
“Morning, Vivi,” he said cheerfully, always the morning person. His eyes widened a little as they skimmed over me. “Well, you look quite nice for a sweaty long run. What’s the occasion?”
Jack didn’t yet know about the addition to their running group, as I feared he’d be tempted to cancel and leave me alone with Gregory. I was not ready to be alone with him yet, especially since I still hadn’t figured out his motives. Or whether I even liked him.
I looked away from Jack, blushing and waving my hand as if he were exaggerating. “Nothing, I, uh, I mean, I just woke up earlier than usual, so I figured I might as well shower and put in a little bit of effort.” Seeing Jack’s amused expression, I added, “No big deal, really.”
Jack’s easy laugh usually made me feel at ease, but this time, my nerves only increased. My anxiety would be super obvious to him as soon as he saw Gregory … or as soon as I told him.
“Sure, Vivi. Ready to go?”
“I am.”
When we left the building and headed out the door toward the trail, only a few blocks away, we both noticed simultaneously that I was walking very fast.
“Are you in a hurry today, Vivi? Are we running late for an important event?” He looked at me curiously.
“Oh, did I not mention?” Now was the time to tell him, before I could lose my nerve. “Dr. Fitzgerald is meeting us to run this morning. It’s not a big thing.”
His eyes widened in surprise and then something else, maybe dismay or even hurt.
But that’s silly. Why would he be hurt?
“He is? Why?”
“It’s Ellen’s fault. He’s training for a triathlon, and suggested we all run together. Her idea,” I explained, looking at the sidewalk, the trees, anywhere but Jack.
“Ah, Ellen,” he said softly, nodding as if that explained everything.
“ I didn’t invite him!”
“OK, I got it.” He paused for a moment. Then, in a voice that sounded somehow different than my best friend’s, he said, “But it would be all right if you did invite him.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. “But I didn’t. I don’t even think I like him.”
“I see,” he said, his eyes shuttered. My lips curved into a frown, realizing he disapproved of Gregory.
But of course he does. Gregory’s only good quality is being insanely hot, and Jack is a straight guy. Well, Greg is also rich. Also not something that should matter much to Jack. Or me.
After a few moments of silence, I forced a casual tone. “It’ll be interesting, if nothing else. He’s not a great conversationalist, from what I’ve seen.”
“That’s rather obvious to anyone, I would think. But we can give him another chance,” he said with an easy laugh, the strange tension, or disapproval, or whatever it was having faded as quickly as it came on. Though Jack’s approval wasn’t required, I always felt better having it.
But why did it matter what Jack thought? When I looked inward, only one reason surfaced.
It matters because I want this to be real.
If Jack believed, maybe I too could believe this crazy theory that Gregory was my real-life Darcy. Maybe I could let my guard down and even fall in love—it had been a long while since I had allowed myself to do that. Maybe Darcy, er, Gregory would fall for me. Maybe by next year, I could even whisk him away to Italy to meet my parents. Was it too much to hope for?
Interrupting my internal dialogue as we reached Harriet Avenue, Jack nudged me. “Well, there he is. He gets points for being punctual.”
Gregory was standing near the running trail at the designated meeting place, stretching his calves. Since he hadn’t seen us yet, my eyes swept over him. He looked gorgeous even while standing there doing stretches. The man took “tall, dark, and handsome” to another level, one that apparently rendered his lack of social graces unimportant. There was something about him in a natural setting too, as though the surrounding trees, birdsong, and morning sky made him seem a little more human.
“Hello, Greg—Dr. Fitzgerald.” I strode toward him while Jack trailed a bit behind. But when Gregory’s eyes met mine, disaster struck.
I promptly tripped on a tree branch, landing hard on the ground.
“Are you OK, Vivi?” Jack stepped forward quickly, concern etched on his face. He offered a hand to help me up, while Gregory moved into a hamstring stretch without a word.
I closed my eyes, steeling myself against the mortification. Why was I always embarrassing myself around him? “I’m fine, just a bit of grass stain,” I said with a shaky laugh. “Dr. Fitzgerald, I’m pleased to see you this morning. Have you been waiting long?”
Jack gave me an odd look as his eyes shifted between us, having never heard such formalities when greeting a running partner. Gregory must be rubbing off on me. It wasn’t possible that I was trying to speak formally like him to impress him. No, that couldn’t be it.
After a full minute of silence, except the birds high in the sky, Gregory finished stretching and stood tall, looking at me directly. “Good morning, yes, I have been here a while. I have been cycling on this loop for the past hour.”
“Is that your bike?” I asked, pointing to a cycle not two feet away from him. I groaned inwardly. What an idiotic question.
“It is.”
“Right, yep, triathlon training.” My head bobbed up and down. “Is this your first one?”
“Yes, it is,” Gregory said before looking at his watch. “I’m on a tight schedule. Are you ready to begin running?”
Early in the run, Jack tried to make small talk, but Gregory barely responded. Jack gave me a meaningful glance, which I ignored, determined to give Gregory a chance this morning. Besides, I was becoming used to his disdain for small talk. Perhaps he was just socially awkward. Like the real Mr. Darcy.
Well, technically, Mr. Darcy isn’t real.
I shook my head to clear my mind. “Dr. Fitzgerald, where did you get your PhD, and what did you study?” I found myself thinking about Ellen’s divulgence that young Gregory had tragically lost a sister. How did his family experience the loss? But I couldn’t very well come right out and ask him about something so delicate … at least not yet. Instead, I attempted to draw him into a conversation that he might actually want to partake in.
He took the bait. “I studied at Yale and then Oxford before coming to Columbia for my PhD. It seemed somewhat pedestrian to return to New York after my time abroad, but my father wanted to begin grooming me for the publishing world. My PhD was in literature, of course, and then I returned for an MBA.”
Pedestrian to attend Columbia University? OK, he was definitely a snob, but we couldn’t blame him for his upbringing . “That’s interesting, both a literature PhD and an MBA.”
“Is it interesting?” Gregory asked.
“I guess the sort of people I’ve known with literature degrees have just been very different from the business sort. I’ve never known anyone with interest in both,” I admitted. “Then again, I don’t have such high connections in the publishing world.”
“Indeed,” Gregory said.
I sucked in a breath.
Did he, with his impaired social skills, mistakenly believe that using the word “indeed” somehow made it acceptable to be rude? He’d said it twice now in response to my self-deprecating remarks. Could one hold a prestigious role in the publishing industry while lacking such basic social graces? I made a mental note to ask my father, who surely knew of many publishing types, though likely from a distance.
Jack cut in, eager to defend me. “Well, that’s not entirely true. You have me as a connection, Vivi.”
“And your father,” Gregory added. “Certainly your father must have such connections.”
I nearly choked on the water I’d been drinking. How much did he know about Dad? I’d said very little when he’d awkwardly questioned me before. Did Gregory know him? Surely not. My father had been somewhat more open about his identity at the very beginning of his career, before he’d realized he could withdraw from the public aspect. But back then, Gregory would have been, well, a toddler. “Perhaps he does, but he prefers a quiet life, so he has fewer connections than one might expect.”
“Of course, one hardly needs connections when one is as talented as he,” said Jack good-naturedly, apparently ascertaining that Gregory did know something of my father. “He doesn’t need to play the game.”
“I must agree,” Gregory said. “Though it is probable that his prospects and wealth could increase considerably if he did make an effort to, as you say, play the game.”
I said nothing. My view was sometimes similar, but I respected my father’s desire to live quietly and not seek fame or recognition. My parents didn’t consider themselves rich, but they lived quite comfortably. That hadn’t always been so, however. Although Mom came from wealth, Dad’s background was middle class. Because he was stubborn and a bit prideful, they’d spent years devoting their earnings to paying off his large student loans from grad school, which took quite some time for a not-yet-established writer and an associate professor working long hours while trying to provide for their two daughters. Fortunately, I was introverted myself, so I hadn’t actively resented any lack of attention from their time-consuming careers, and Lillian had always been self-sufficient. We weren’t deprived as young children and certainly not as teenagers. Unlike our parents, we weren’t saddled with a mass of student debt—only a modest amount. Lillian had married a banker soon after obtaining her biology PhD, and I assumed from my sister’s wealthy neighborhood that they were set financially. In my much less lucrative career as an editor, I was not wealthy by any means and had some debt still to pay off, but I was as comfortable as I needed to be. Or so I often told myself. In my early 30s, I still had plenty of time to get rich or snag a rich husband like Gregory, right?
I bit my lip.
What a ridiculous thought. As if Gregory would marry someone like me. Why am I even thinking about marriage anyway? My life isn’t a Regency novel.
In any case, my goal in life had never been wealth; I only wanted to be happy. If only I knew what that even meant. Of their own accord, my eyes drifted over to Jack, who was eyeing me thoughtfully.
Our running pace had become uncomfortably fast for me, so I slowed a bit, refocusing on my surroundings.
After catching my breath, I attempted to return the subject to his lofty education, which was a safer subject than my father’s career. “So, Gregory, what was your dissertation on?”
“Yeah, I’m curious as to how your literature PhD informs your work on the business side of literature, as you might say,” Jack added. I smiled at his attempt to be friendly despite disliking my new love interest.
To this, Gregory spoke for several minutes about his dissertation, ignoring Jack and his question altogether. He spoke quite freely and naturally about his doctoral work, and I wondered if being in the business world felt stifling to him. Perhaps academia was his true calling, and he was stuck in an elite publishing job against his will.
I groaned inwardly, realizing that was taking my assumptions too far.
Let’s not start feeling bad for the smart, handsome guy with more wealth and privilege than I could imagine .
After a break in the conversation—or rather, the monologue—Gregory asked, “Do you always run so slowly, or is this a recovery run for you?”
Clearly startled by Gregory’s bluntness, Jack coughed. “Do you always blurt—”
“Well, Jack and me,” I cut in, before Jack could say something probably very un-Jack-like, “we could be a lot faster, but I’m pretty stoked that we’re no longer in the back of the pack at races. What’s your normal pace, Gregory? I mean, Dr. Fitzgerald? Sorry again.”
Seeming not to hear my question, Gregory said nothing and, a moment later, returned to inquiring about my family, this time peppering me with questions about my mother’s work. I told him that Mom was a scientist, omitting any details. Although she wasn’t secretive about her work and had no reason to be, Dad often worried that fans (or critics) would find him through me, so I usually tried to steer any conversation away from both of my parents.
Yet Gregory could hardly be a threat, given his own high connections. It was probably safe to speak more openly about my mother’s work as a tenured professor. He appeared to listen intently, until Jack cut in.
“Janet is a very interesting woman. They make an interesting pair, the two of them. She’s very much his opposite in nearly every way, yet I’ve never met a happier couple. Vivi, you’re very lucky to have such a happy model of what marriage can be like.”
“Yes, I am lucky. But maybe, well … maybe they set the bar too high,” I said with a laugh.
“How so?” Gregory said.
“Oh, I just mean, I—since I’m still, uh,” I stammered, “well, never mind. They’re lovely people, really. I am very lucky—”
“How often do you see them? Do you visit them, or do they visit you?” Gregory resumed his questioning.
I sighed before answering him. His social skills would need some work if we were ever going to get serious.
Get serious? Wow, that’s taking a big leap. We’re just running together. With a chaperone. Let’s not book the wedding venue just yet.
All the same, my mind began conjuring up visions of wedding dresses. And Italian beach scenes.
I glanced at Jack, who wore a slight grimace. He was probably frustrated, or perhaps the miles were wearing on him. The air was growing warm and a bit humid by now, and I would normally be feeling quite hot and tired at this point, yet the conversation with Gregory—awkward though it sometimes was—was invigorating to me.
When Jack finally made eye contact with me again, I smiled apologetically, knowing this run was likely far from invigorating for him. Even for me, I wouldn’t have suffered through this conversation for anyone else. That had to mean something. Gregory had to mean something.