Seven
There was light coming from the windows in my room, and I turned my head to look out at the overcast sky.
It was going to be another gray day in Chicago.
I loved the dark days with the smell of rain in the air and the sky a comforting shade of clay.
The sun always assaulted me. I liked the slower pace of a storm-washed day.
Turning, I laid my head back down on Sam’s chest and listened to his slow in-and-out breaths and the steady rhythm of his heart.
I’d never been this close to anyone for such an extended period of time.
His arms wrapped around me, and he pulled me up, rubbing his chin in my hair, my face buried now in the hollow of his throat, my mouth resting on the warm skin of his neck.
I didn’t want to move because I didn’t want the day to begin.
“Hey.”
I tried to raise myself up off him, but the hand on the back of my neck kept me there, close.
“Jory.”
I looked up at him as he yawned and stretched under me. He gave me a lopsided grin before leaning close to kiss me.
“You should see your face.” He smiled lazily, rolling over on top of me, pinning me to the bed. “You should see how you’re lookin’ at me.”
I could only stare at him. Unbelievable that he had stayed. I’d never expected him to be there in the morning. I had expected him to run.
“Your eyes are…something.”
He wasn’t used to talking, to saying what he was thinking.
“Oh shit, that’s what time it is?” he yelled, suddenly having glanced at the alarm clock on my nightstand.
He scrambled out of bed, almost doing a face-plant when he got tangled up in the sheets.
He was a whirlwind of activity, running around my apartment, grabbing his belt off the couch, his shoes from under my table, untangling his shirt from the down comforter.
I sat up and watched him dart around before he took the stairs, and I heard the door slam as he went out.
It was weird to go from all that noise to dead silence.
Seconds later the door creaked back open and he was crossing my floor to flop back down in front of me.
“You didn’t even lock the door, idiot. What if I was trying to kill you?”
I just stared at him.
“Don’t look at me like I’m crazy. I’m not crazy.”
I only nodded, squinting at him.
He leaned in and kissed me hard and fast before standing up again and looking down at me. “What time do you get off work tonight?”
“Why?”
“I’m gonna come and get you.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why you wanna get me?”
“I’m gonna feed you.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Dinner’s on me.”
“Why?”
“’Cause I wanna make sure you’re safe. Is that all right?”
“Yeah, that’s all right.”
“Okay then,” he said, looking into my eyes. “Come walk me to the door and lock it behind me.”
I trailed after him, wrapped in a sheet. At the door he reached out, put a hand around the side of my neck and eased me close, parting my lips with his tongue. The kiss was very hot and left me breathless.
“What time?”
“What?” I had no idea what we were even talking about.
His smile was wicked and smug at the same time. “What time is work over?”
“Six.”
“Good. I’ll be there. Wait for me.”
I nodded.
“And lock the goddamn door,” he growled as he walked out of it. “I don’t want anybody in here with you.”
After he left, I stood there trying to figure out how I felt for a long time before I gave up and went to take a shower.
After much deliberation I decided the one thing I knew for sure was that I was really looking forward to seeing him.
And that was a miracle in itself, since I couldn’t remember the last time I’d cared at all.
At eight that night, as I emerged from the elevator on the ground floor, I got a call.
“Jory.”
“Yeah.”
“Hey, it’s Sam. I’m real sorry I didn’t show up, but I got kind of roped into something.”
“Sure.”
“You didn’t wait around, did you?”
“Nope. Six fifteen, I was out of there.”
“Oh. So you waited a whole fifteen minutes, huh?” He sounded irritable.
“Yep.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.”
I hung up and stopped walking for a minute. When had I become one of these loser guys who equated great sex with anything more than a one-night stand? I knew better. When my phone rang again, I answered it as I crossed the street.
“Jory.”
“I’m just leaving work now,” I confessed, because it didn’t really matter if he thought I was a loser or not. We were done anyway. “I waited for you all this time. Just so ya know.”
“Oh.” Sam cleared his throat. “I’m glad.”
“You’re glad?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, whatever,” I grunted. “Bye.” I made sure I put my phone on vibrate before I walked toward the curb to get a cab home.
“Excuse me.”
When I turned to the guy standing beside me, I realized he was studying my face.
“Yeah?”
“Are you Jory Keyes?”
I yawned. “Yeah.”
Big smile suddenly. “I’m Caleb Reid.”
I groaned and turned to go.
“No, no, wait,” he said, chuckling, gently but firmly grabbing my shoulder, holding on so I couldn’t leave.
“C’mon, I swear, even though your boss thinks I’m crazy, I’m not.”
I squinted at him.
“Lemme feed you.” His arm went around my shoulders, pulling me close. I continued to stare. “Please. I just want to talk to you so maybe—just maybe—you can talk to him.”
Heavy sigh as I agreed. I was just too curious to know what my boss was hiding to turn him down. And besides, I had nothing else to do.
Caleb Reid looked like a farm boy even though he had grown up just outside the big city of Dallas, in the even bigger state of Texas. Between the warm trace of an accent and his big blue eyes, I was intrigued.
“You’re wondering what in the world this has to do with your boss.”
“Pretty much.” I nodded, shoveling French toast into my mouth.
“Well, see, it turns out that his folks are my folks.”
I paused in midbite to stare at him. “I’m sorry?”
Quick sigh. “My mother is his mother. My father is his father.”
“How is that even possible?”
“My mom, she got pregnant in high school and put him up for adoption. She never thought for a second that she’d end up meeting her high school sweetheart again years later and falling in love with him all over again.”
“Wait…what?”
“Yeah.” He laughed. “I mean, here are these two kids that both run like hell from their hometown and end up meeting a world away.”
“You’re going way too fast,” I told him. “Pretend I’m drunk.”
He laughed at me. “You’re really funny.”
I gave him a fake laugh. “Just back up.”
So he explained it slowly for the impaired.
Susan Pomeroy and Daniel Reid had been high school sweethearts.
Halfway through their senior year she had gotten pregnant.
She never told him, she just disappeared.
Her mother, Lynn Pomeroy, who did not believe in abortion, sent Susan to live with her sister in Atlanta for the duration of the pregnancy.
When the baby was born, he was put up for adoption.
Susan finished high school there and went on to college.
Daniel went to college on a football scholarship.
Both of them wanted to save the world, and so both joined the Peace Corps.
They met again in Somalia, digging ditches, doing relief work.
Their chemistry was rekindled almost instantly, and they reunited as though they’d never parted.
I nodded after several minutes. “It’s a good story.”
“I know. It’s totally a Lifetime original movie.”
I smiled at him. He was funny too. “How does it end?”
“They moved back to their hometown to open a solar paneling company.”
“Cool.”
“They also put up windmills, and we raise our own food and… What?”
I shook my head. “Nothing.”
“Just say.”
“I figured you for a farm boy, Dallas or not.”
He chuckled. “It’s gotta be more than that. You look like you’re ready to throw up.”
“No.”
He smiled at me. “So, anyway, my mom.” He took a deep breath. “Like, six months ago, she all of a sudden calls a family meeting and just brings out all these papers and lays the news on my dad, and the rest of us, that she gave her first son up for adoption.”
I stared at him.
“And my dad felt sorry for her until she told him the baby was his.”
“Oh.” I exhaled.
“Yeah. He took it really hard. And if you knew him, you’d get it.
I mean, his family… Nothing’s as important as us, ya know?
He just… It almost killed him to think his son was out in the world without him.
He was just sick thinking that maybe Dane had been hurt and there was no one there to protect him. ”
I nodded. “Well, they gotta know that wasn’t the case. His parents…they adored him.”
“Sure.”
“He turned out all right. Everything turned out all right.”
“Yeah, they know. Turns out my mom knew everything about Dane. It was an open adoption because that was the only way she would consent.”
“So she should be okay.”
“Yeah, but she’s not, and neither is the old man. They gotta see him.”
“So they should just come and see him.”
“I know they should, but, Jory, he won’t even see me, let alone them.”
“And you told him all this?”
“Yes.”
“And what’d he say?”
“He thanked me for coming and told me he wished me and my family well.”
Ouch. “That sounds like him.” I forced a smile. “He can be a bit cold at times.”
“Yeah, but even if he’s pissed at my mom…my dad didn’t even know about him. He should at least want to see my dad.”
“Again, you don’t know Dane. He’s just not real…” I searched for the best word, thinking. “Inviting. He doesn’t allow others in. He’s private, and he doesn’t trust very many people, and to him this would be something that’s done and over.”
“That’s not normal. Most people would want to meet them and talk.”
“I don’t think that’s true at all. Everyone’s different, and however you think most people would react, Dane’s different.”
“But that creates a problem for me.”
I nodded. “’Cause your folks really wanna see him, huh?”
“Exactly. I mean, they’re eventually going to get sick of me stalling them, and then they’ll just hop on a plane and come confront him.”
“That’d be bad.”
“I know. If my reception is any indication of theirs…it would be very bad.”