Chapter 19
19
J oan stood in a circle with Kendall’s coworkers, wondering when she could go home. The forecasted potential rain had held off, so she couldn’t use that excuse. The hour inched toward ten o’clock and the black, starless sky stretched out above like a strip of velvet. Strands of fairy lights twinkled along the rows of vendors, strung between the small street trees like a rustic woodland scene in the middle of downtown, and it should have been lovely.
Kendall’s friend Joe was nice. He had impeccable manners, a head full of thick brown hair, and straight teeth. He didn’t seem insecure about her height. His polo shirt revealed a muscular physique, though he was several years older than her, as expected, given his specialty as an orthopedic surgeon. His braying laugh did startle her at first, and he’d belted his khakis so tight the waistline bunched up underneath it, but she could move past that stuff. The real problem was that the thought of explaining her problem to this stranger exhausted her and set off a round of queasiness.
Joe, or Dr. Fields, as his patients referred to him, placed a pale hand on her shoulder. Even that innocent contact made her want to shut down advances.
“You need another drink?”
“Actually,” she said. “I think I’m going to head home.”
He must have read something in her expression, because his hand dropped and he nodded.
“Well, it was nice to meet you.” His smile looked genuine. They both knew this wasn’t going anywhere, but he didn’t act put out. He was a pleasant man, and like Kendall had claimed, only a bit of a bro.
“Same to you.” She nudged Kendall’s forearm. “I’m going to grab a cab.”
“I’ll come with you.” Kendall tapped a finger on her chin. “I bet if you texted Lucas he would take us back, and I can drive home from your place. I only had one drink, anyway.”
“I don’t want to interrupt your night out, or Lucas’s.” She hated bothering anyone or asking for things.
“Nonsense. I’ll pull up the app, unless you want to ask Lucas.” Kendall curtsied for her coworkers, who chuckled at her. “Ladies and gents, it’s been real.”
Joan waved one last time before they started down the street, then she linked her arm with Kendall’s.
“It was a dud, wasn’t it?” Kendall said. “Like with Martin.”
“Dr. Fields is likable. And he’s cute.”
“But?”
“Same thing as always. I pictured telling him about my vaginismus, and it made me nervous. Like, I was clenching everything just thinking about it.”
“Eek. That seems counterproductive.” Kendall watched a tall, attractive man pass by. “Wonder where he got that ice cream cone?” She grinned at Joan. “Sorry. Squirrel. I know you’ve been wanting to meet someone, so I thought of Joe. I kinda wondered if he would be your type, though. You usually go for sweeter men.”
“I do like sensitive guys.” Joan checked her phone to see that Lucas had asked them to meet him by his car, and yes, of course he would give them a ride home. She showed it to Kendall. “What’s wrong with what I like?”
“Absolutely nothing,” Kendall said. “I can picture your ideal man in my mind: his favorite comic book movie is the one with the lady superhero. He listens to women’s folk rock. He apologizes for his erections.”
Joan withdrew her arm from Kendall’s to swat at her playfully. “Now you’re describing all the pretend feminists I’ve gone on dates with.” She steered them in the direction of the parking garage. “God, my feet are killing me.”
Lucas indeed waited for them. He leaned against his truck, ankles crossed, hat on backward. The jolt of sharp awareness she experienced upon seeing him shocked her. His dark bangs stuck out from his cap, and the look worked for her in the most delicious way. Was it the nostalgia? That had to be it. But then he flashed his warm smile, and his eyes raked over her slowly. She didn’t think he’d ever looked at her like that in the entirety of their friendship. Did she have something on her dress? She glanced down to check.
If she and Lucas were trying to remain only friends, these were dangerous thoughts, and they needed to be shoved away. Was it so bad, though? They were both single, and having some occasional feelings of attraction didn’t mean much.
Lucas had offered to help her with her problem. It terrified her, but she let herself dwell on the possibility for a moment. She wasn’t getting anywhere with her other dates, and she knew Lucas would treat her well, without any expectations.
Oof. Could she consider his suggestion?
The truck seemed quieter on the way home, which almost never happened with the three of them together, but Joan kept sneaking glances at Lucas and stopping herself before she said anything. She couldn’t think of anything to say that wasn’t some version of “so, are you feeling turned on lately too?” The surrounding air crackled.
Her phone chimed with a text alert.
Kendall
What the fuck is going on up there?
Joan angled herself away from Lucas to reply.
What are you talking about?
Kendall
I feel like I’m living the start of a porno I didn’t intend to be part of.
That startled a laugh out of her. Lucas shot her a confused look.
Kendall
Is there something with you two?
No, nothing’s going on.
She tucked her arms under her thighs, feeling a little dishonest despite telling the technical truth. She wasn’t sure what percolated under the surface of her recent interactions with Lucas, and the thought of investigating it further brought on a round of nerves so powerful she thought she might faint.
After they dropped Kendall off at her car, Joan turned to Lucas. “I know you’ve got your lesson in the morning, but do you want to come up for a bit? Watch a show or something?”
Lucas regarded her warily for a moment before he nodded. “Probably need to leave by midnight, but I can hang out.”
Joan’s hand trembled as she unlocked her door. The knob stuck before she wrenched it open. Darkness choked her living room. Lucas stumbled into her from behind, and the contact sent a thrill shooting up her spine.
“Sorry,” she breathed. “Shoulda left a lamp on.”
He steadied her with a hand on her shoulder before she shuffled over to her light switch and flipped on the television.
“You have a preference? For a drink or a TV show?”
“Just a water if that’s okay. I still have to drive home. And no preference on what we watch.”
Once they seated themselves on the couch, Joan took a deep breath. She had come to a decision, but her nerves stretched taut at the reality of bringing it up. She touched her glass to his. “Cheers to finally being home.”
Lucas wrinkled his forehead. “I take it the set up didn’t go well?” He traced lines in the sweat on his glass, looking fidgety.
“He was okay. I mean, he’s great for someone. Just not for me.”
“Did he ask you out again?”
“No. But I think I kinda shut it down. He was sweet about it though.”
“Ah. Well, that’s good.” Lucas sat back against the couch, looking more relaxed. They watched a few minutes of a sitcom rerun and sipped their drinks.
“Hey Lucas?” Her voice shook, and she tried to clear her throat.
He set his drink on a coaster. “Are you alright? You look like you’re about to jump out of your skin.”
Joan ran a finger over a seam in the arm of her couch. On the screen, a laugh track erupted.
“You know how we were talking about my problem, and I said I wanted to experiment with someone I trusted? And you said you would help?”
When she looked at Lucas, he had gone still.
“My dates have been going poorly. Or not poorly, necessarily, just not huge successes. I’m in my head about my issues.”
He nodded. “Did you want to talk about that?”
“I mean, that’s part of it.” Joan found herself unable to suck in another full breath, to get to the bottom of her lungs. “I’ve been irrationally angry. Not only at my body, but at this idea that I’m somehow deficient.” She winced. “I’m angry at my exes. I know that’s probably not healthy.”
“I get that. It’s okay, really.”
“Were you for real about helping?” She spoke quietly. “Because what I’m talking about isn’t clinical. In fact, I think if it were too detached that would defeat the purpose.”
“Trust me.” Lucas gulped, looking for a moment like a cartoon character struck on the head with an anvil. “I don’t think I would be feeling very clinical about it.” He hooked his ankle around hers and tugged her closer to him. Goosebumps erupted along her skin. “I was dead serious.”
He took his hat off to run his fingers through his hair then put it on backward again. She melted at the sight. Her desires had become untethered from good judgment and were now dancing about without her permission.
Joan folded herself in half as though speaking to the floor. It gave her a little thrill, talking to her best friend about having sex, someone off limits as of a month ago.
“I think I would be worried about what it would do to us, you know?” She felt she had to bring that up. “I realized recently I want you in my life no matter what. I wonder if when we wake up in the morning, we’ll think this isn’t a smart idea. And I know I want to stay friends. I already wonder if we could go back to where we were before.” She found it difficult to make sense of her thoughts with Lucas’s direct stare nearly burning a hole through her. “This could be short term. Something to help me. But what’s in it for you? Besides potentially ruining our friendship?”
“Is that a serious question?” He laughed, though the sound vibrated with anxious energy.
“Okay. But I thought you wanted to stay single a while?”
“Well, technically I would still be single, I guess. And maybe this would be good for me, too. Something to break my usual pattern with women. We can work through whatever this is.” He gestured between them.
She stretched her arms over her head. Lucas scanned her form, starting at her fingertips and landing somewhere south of her knees.
“You’ve never looked at me like that before.”
His gaze trailed back up to her face. “Like what?”
“I don’t know.” Her throat worked. “Like you want to touch me.”
“God,” he said. “This is such a mindfuck. I keep having all these—” he stopped, laughing at himself.
“All these what?”
“Thoughts,” he breathed. “About you. It’s like we’ve opened a door I had firmly closed or something.”
Joan was burning up. A flush started at her toes and swept up her body. “I’ve had the same problem. My head’s a mess. I’m all turned on.”
Lucas’s soft whimper melted something in her brain. Her prefrontal cortex? Whatever was responsible for helping her make mature, reasoned decisions.
He puffed his cheeks and released a slow breath.
“So how would it work?” he asked. “I don’t think I’m smart enough to say no. I just wonder how we would stay friends. And what would it mean?”
“What would you want it to mean?”
“Well.” He scratched his chin. “You’ve joked about me being a serial monogamist. I do think that’s true. I’m kind of a relationship guy, even though they don’t last. It’s not like I’m leaving a string of broken hearts behind me, but things always seem to burn out, or go wrong somehow, and I wouldn’t want that to happen to us. You’ve been the best friend I’ve ever had.”
“Okay.” Joan leaned back and propped her feet on her ottoman. Lucas let his gaze travel rather shamelessly up the length of her legs again, causing her to squirm. “So then we separate the sex stuff from the friendship. I think I can do that. Go back to normal after.”
Lucas’s scrutiny returned to her face.
“Sorry, I’m really distracted by you in that dress,” he said, then winced, as though it was weird for him to say something he might reserve for a girlfriend. “You’re saying we would be friends with benefits?” He wrinkled his nose. “I’ve never done that before, but like I said, I think it would help me to try something new.”
“Well, you don’t want us to fizzle out, or for things to go sour. You want us to keep being friends. We can do that if we keep things compartmentalized. I need help with my issue, and you’ve offered, so we just leave it at that. You’re, you know, assisting me or whatever. It’s therapeutic.”
Lucas eyed her for a prolonged beat.
“And what about other people?” he asked. “Dates or other dalliances?”
An awful burning sensation climbed her throat. “Is that what you would want? To keep seeing other people?”
He shook his head. “Definitely not. I’m a one woman at a time kind of guy, but I wanted to set parameters first.”
“I wouldn’t be dating anyone. I would feel icky about that personally. It would just be us for now.”
Lucas reached over to squeeze her hand. His touch felt friendly, like they’d always been, and her head cleared a little. The fog of attraction receded a bit as he spoke. “I’d like to offer one more point here, to act as the voice of reason before we go down this path,” Lucas said. “If we still decide not to do this, we can stuff all this back into Pandora’s box again. It’s just—you know how messy this could be, right? I’m still hanging on to some of my sanity here, and some of the scenarios I’m envisioning could be a problem. And now that we’ve talked, you seem remarkably calm about detonating a bomb in the middle of our friendship.”
“I'm not calm at all, actually.”
Lucas’s chest heaved with his next breath.
“Me either,” he said.
“Maybe we should think about it. We can take a week or so.”
“Okay.” He nodded. “Okay.”
“Eloquent.”
“Shut up. I’m not a wordsmith.” He grinned at her again. She loved his smile. His happiness expanded into the room, filling it with joy.
“So if we sleep on it and then we still feel like it’s a good idea, we’ll come back to it? What do you think?”
“Deal,” he said, holding her eyes. “I’m going to go before this escalates, in that case. Because that feels like where this is headed.”
She nodded, wooden in her movements, as she showed him to the door and gave him a brief hug. After he walked out, she leaned against her wall, trying to calm her breathing. She wondered if she was making a huge mistake, but it didn’t feel like it.
“Mornin’.” Martin nodded to Joan as she refilled her water bottle. He held her eyes for a beat longer than usual, but he didn’t seem upset, for which she found herself grateful.
“Hope you’ve got your running shoes on,” she said in lieu of a greeting. “Apparently Addie called in.”
“Damn.” His head hung. “I mean, I hope she’s okay. We’ll make it work.” His eyes met hers. “You doing okay?”
“I’m fine. I’m also really sorry.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“For all the mixed signals, I mean,” she said.
“Ah.” He planted a hand on the wall. “I’m a big boy. We’re all good.” His smile stretched wide. “I’m always glad to have another friend at work.”
Her shoulders dropped in relief. She still thought he was pretty cute, and maybe their timing had been way off, but she was glad things weren’t weird. Frankly, she needed the support, and she thought he did, too.
The morning progressed at a lightning clip. Somehow, she still found time to indulge herself in memories of her recent conversation with Lucas. She didn’t let it distract her, but the situation did force its way into her mind more than once, and it created a little jolt of energy each time. The mystery generated excitement, a swelling need for her next fix of that potent drug, desire.
After she scarfed down a truly disappointing ham sandwich for lunch, she found herself in the supply room searching for compression hose.
Celeste peeked around the corner. Wonder of wonders, Joan actually needed her at the moment.
“Who reorganized this room? I can’t find anything.” She was too irritated to censor her annoyance.
“It needed doing.” Celeste anchored her hands on her hips, looking ready to do battle.
She located the hose and turned back to Celeste. “Addie and I did that last week. We spent most of our lunch break on it, too.” They’d even busted out the label maker. The supply room had been a time-consuming nightmare before then.
Celeste waved that off. “You can’t waltz into a place and reorganize everything. We had a system.”
Joan rolled her eyes. She never would have dreamed of doing that in front of a superior in her past life, but God help her, she hated this woman.
“Also, you haven’t updated your whiteboards,” Celeste said. “Don’t think you can neglect your job responsibilities just because you’re busy.”
Joan pushed past Celeste.
“I’ll do that, but you have to know how busy we are today. I don’t have time for this.” She couldn’t believe her brazenness. It might cost her the job, but it was worth it to watch Celeste standing there shocked, mouth hanging open like a broken zipper.
The regrets started creeping in as she walked to her car that evening, but she tried not to ruminate. She’d been doing counseling in addition to her physical therapy, working on some of her extreme people-pleasing tendencies, and on setting boundaries even when other people objected to them. She resisted the urge to march back in the building and apologize, which she might have done a couple of years ago. Hell, maybe even two months ago, despite not being the one in the wrong.
She was damn tired of trying to make other people happy all the time. She considered Lucas again, and their unprecedented sexual tension. For once, she thought she could do whatever she wanted, and the freedom of that notion invigorated her.