Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Indefinable emotion cast the next several moments in a fog of gray grumpiness. Sandra, after one look at my expression, made excuses for our hasty departure. I said nothing. I allowed her to steer me through the crowd of Manganiellos with a plastic smile pasted on my features.
Just as we were nearing the front door, Nico shuffled into the dining room looking like a kicked puppy. I blinked against stinging moisture as the beginnings of an inexplicable, epic cry fest forced my chin to wobble. I clenched my teeth and bit my tongue to hold back the deluge.
Sandra led me to the car. Rose followed us out.
I could tell that Rose was disappointed, but I couldn’t think clearly enough to pacify Nico’s mother. I promised, with a head nod, that I would visit the next time I was in town.
We drove in silence for several minutes, my hands flexing and gripping the steering wheel intermittently as I replayed my encounter with Nico no matter how hard I wanted to forget it.
I wasn’t paying much attention to where we were going.
When I ran a stop sign, Sandra made me pull over so that she could drive.
As soon as we switched seats and my seatbelt clicked into place, the tears started to flow.
It was a messy cry—a snotty, snorting, sobbing cry. It felt like someone was trying to pull my lungs and stomach from my body. And, damn it all, I wasn’t sure why I was crying, which only made me cry more.
Sandra, bless her, drove in circles until I was ready to give directions to the interstate.
“Oh, Elizabeth.” She sighed and reached for my hand as we climbed the ramp to I-80. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s ok.” I hiccupped. “I don’t know why I’m so upset.”
Sandra cast me a sideways glance and offered a small smile. “Let me know if you want to talk through it.”
I nodded and pulled tissue from the glove compartment. I didn’t want to talk about it—not with Sandra, and maybe not with anyone. I just wanted to forget the last twenty-four hours.
That would be my plan A.
But, try as I might, I couldn’t stop thinking about Nico, and his expression when I told him how I’d used guys. This recollection caused new tears. I kept seeing how his eyes changed from worshipful to pitying, and for several moments, I really felt like I was going to be sick.
Miles of empty cornfields passed by in a blur, and I tried to console myself. I silently repeated that I’d done the right thing. I’d been honest with him. It was in his best interest that I’d dispelled any residual delusions about me. I would only disappoint him.
We continued in this way until my eyes stopped leaking. Sandra didn’t push me for details about what happened in the bathroom, and she voluntarily turned on the Backstreet Boys as driving music.
I knew she felt bad. At some point, I would need to knit her something nice to prove I wasn’t upset with her. I really wasn’t upset with her. I understood her motives, and part of me—the part of me I was trying really hard to disregard—was quite euphoric to have kissed Nico.
The rest of me was gorging on pity party pie.
I didn’t consider myself broken, because I wasn’t broken. I was merely content to be shallow, and I actually really hated that about myself. Nico would never want to touch me again, now that he knew what I was like. He deserved better.
As my breathing normalized, I found myself touching my lips, remembering, daydreaming. Sandra was kind enough to disregard my wistful sighs. Instead, she made jokes about the apocalypse and finally having a chance to see the World’s Largest Truckstop as we neared the state line.
The actual apocalypse occurred as we were on the exit ramp.
My cell phone rang. I glanced at the number. I made a face. “Ugh. It’s Meg.” My voice was still nasally and thick. I had a cry headache.
Sandra made a face that mirrored mine. “I like that you call her Megalomaniac Meg. The description fits her like a pair of bike shorts.”
I smirked my agreement and rejected the call.
My cell phone rang again. I glanced at the number. I made a face. “Ugh. It’s Meg again.” I rejected the call.
Sandra laughed. “She thinks you two are besties.”
I tried to chuckle, then sighed and sniffled. “Nah. She knows what’s up. She’s my nemesis. We’re on the same page.”
My cell phone rang again. I glanced at the number. I frowned. “What? It’s Meg—again.”
“Do you want me to answer it? I could tell her you’re in the bathroom and seem to have a nasty case of gastroenteritis.” We pulled into the truck stop parking lot. Like the rest of the World’s Largest Truckstop, the parking lot was truly massive.
“Yes, please, if you don’t mind. I don’t particularly wish to speak with her right now.”
Once we parked, Sandra slid her thumb across the touch screen and brought the phone to her ear. “Elizabeth’s cell phone answering service, this is Sandra. How may I direct your call?”
Almost immediately, Sandra held the phone away from her ear. Meg’s indecipherable screeching filled the car.
“Ah, take it off speakerphone!” I winced and covered my ears.
“It isn’t on speakerphone. She’s banshee screaming.”
I took the phone from Sandra and held it a safe distance from my ear as I yelled into the receiver. “Meg. You have to stop screaming—what is the problem? I can’t understand you.”
“Oh, my God! Elizabeth Finney—you are in so much trouble! Why didn’t you tell me you had a child with Nico Moretti?”
I held the phone away from my ear and in front of me. I stared at the screen. The sound of Meg’s continued expletives blasted from the small device. I stared at it. I just stared at it. I couldn’t think.
How did Meg know about Nico?
I glanced at Sandra who was wide-eyed and horrified.
“You didn’t…? Did you call Meg and tell her about Nico?”
“Hell, no.” Sandra held her hands up. “Your secret is safe with me.”
“How did she find out?” My palms started to sweat.
I glared at the phone. It felt suddenly dangerous.
Tentatively, I brought the speaker to my mouth, and when Meg paused in the middle of her enthusiastic screeching to take a breath, I interjected.
“Listen. Meg, listen to me. What are you talking about? What did you hear?”
“It’s all over the place. I saw the article on Yahoo Celebrity Stalker and watched the YouTube video just seconds ago.”
“What are you talking about? What YouTube video?” I stared at the sign for the World’s Largest Truckstop. I had the abrupt sensation of being trapped in a Mel Brooks movie.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about, Elizabeth. It’s the YouTube video of you dancing with Nico Moretti, then later yelling at the top of your lungs about HAVING A CHILD WITH THE MAN!”
I choked. I actually choked on air.
Sandra pulled the phone from my hand and handed me a bottle of water.
Between coughs, I motioned for her to hang up the phone.
When I caught my breath, I set the bottle of water between my thighs and gripped the dashboard.
I was in a Mel Brooks movie. I was certain of it.
I couldn’t have been more confounded if someone had jumped in front of my car wearing a giant pretzel and singing “It’s Springtime for Hitler. ”
“I couldn’t understand her. What did she say? How did she find out?” Sandra sounded as perplexed as I felt.
I shook my head. My voice was now both nasally and raspy due to my recent coughing fit.
“She said there was a YouTube video of Nico and me dancing, and then…” I swallowed another gulp of water, “…then later the video shows me announcing to a room full of people that I—that he and I had a child together.”
Sandra covered her mouth and gasped; her green eyes were wide with disbelief. “Oh, my God. Someone must’ve been recording at the reunion.” She shook her head, stared unseeingly out the windshield. “Oh, my God.”
“Maybe it’s not that big of a deal. Maybe no one will care and it’ll be a little blip.”
She was already shaking her head before I finished my sentence. “No, Elizabeth. This is a big deal. Have you followed Nico at all? Have you followed his career or his personal life?”
“No.” I hadn’t followed him. In fact, I’d more or less purposefully avoided his personal life and stories about him in the news.
“Elizabeth.” She turned in her seat and unlatched her seatbelt to face me better.
“He’s notoriously private. Like, he never talks about his personal life or his family.
He’s never been photographed off set with a woman who didn’t work on the show.
It’s to the point where a lot of people assume he doesn’t like women. ”
“He likes women.”
“I know. I saw him kiss you, remember?”
I didn’t respond. I just tugged on my left eyebrow.
“This is not going to blow over. People are going to think you have a love child with Nico Moretti. And you’re a doctor. That’s not a typical attention-seeking type of profession, if there is such a thing. You appear to be a credible person.”
Love child with Nico. That was a strange concept to think about. It made me feel all kinds of warm things I couldn’t define.
We sat in stunned silence for an interminable period; the engine was still running. I abandoned plan A and wallowed in my memories, rewinding the last twenty-four hours. I played back all my Nico interactions that could have been recorded.
Sandra placed her hand on my forearm, rousing me from my remembering; “Elizabeth…what are you going to do?”
My throat hurt. I shook my head. I couldn’t think, so I answered honestly. “I don’t know. I don’t know.” And, because I really didn’t know, I said it again. “I don’t know.”
When I arrived home Saturday evening, I decided to redouble my efforts to ignore all thoughts and feelings associated with the kiss under the mistletoe and the resulting bathroom fiasco, as well as the viral YouTube video.