23. Elizabeth
Twenty-Three
Elizabeth
It’s like Kellen and I knocked over a hive, and a swarm of energetic passion bees buzzes between us. Every evening after he gets home from work, he comes over and we make out. Once Jake gets situated in his room with his video games in the evening, I sneak over to Kellen’s and we make out.
We kiss and we touch and he makes me come without ever taking off my clothes.
I give him hand jobs in his kitchen, both of us fully dressed with just his zipper opened.
It’s messy and raw and everything I need.
After a week of this petting and pawing, I thought I’d feel less obsessed but I find I can barely concentrate throughout the day.
I think about showing up at Kellen’s office wearing nothing but a trench coat.
I think about positioning myself naked on his bed so he comes home from work, slides off his tie, and startles, finding me there in his bed.
But of course, reality shows up. Kellen’s family needs his guidance and security. Jake needs my help with his Spanish homework. Lisa needs me to listen while she vents about her sons peeing on the bathroom floor. And walls.
I have no idea how that happens. Jake isn’t exactly tidy, but he’s not peeing on my walls.
“Anyway,” Lisa says after she screams at the men in her house. “Enough about my piss walls. What’s going on over there.”
I debate what to tell Lisa.
I still haven’t been fully up front with her about Kellen because I don’t yet know what we are to each other.
We’ve had stolen time alone together, sneaking like teenagers.
But we haven’t had intentional time, planned to be together, where I can talk to him.
Maybe I’m to blame for all of that because I keep reaching for his pants when we are together.
“I have no idea if Todd will show up for his custody time on Friday,” I eventually tell Lisa.
She scoffs. “Of course he won’t. Fucker. What’s the next thing that happens with court?”
“I don’t know, actually. I’m sort of thinking Todd will want to make a big show of being an involved dad now? I don’t know. I just don’t know. My lawyer was sort of vague about what I should expect. I hate this.”
“You’re telling me,” she says. “My eyes are burning from the ammonia smell.”
“Are you still talking about the piss?”
“Yeah, I mean the human piss stain that is your ex-husband,” she says. She’s quiet for a bit and I think she’s maybe scrubbing or spraying a cleaner around. “So did you bang the silver fox yet?”
“Lisa! No,” I respond quickly. Though I wish I had slept with Kellen. I want to get naked and rub my skin against his and feel that beautiful, raw fullness of having a man inside me.
“Have you been using the cream?” She doesn’t miss a chance to emphasize vaginal health. “Get Jake one of those gamer headsets for his Among Us rounds and bag the fox.”
“I’m working on it,” I say, and we hang up because I hear Jake mounting the steps on the way home from school.
I can tell by his face he’s upset about something. “What’s up, babe?”
He growls at me. “I have an 89% in Physics.”
I close my eyes and take a deep breath. Jake is a perfectionist. If he feels he should be getting a higher grade than that, he will become mired in frustration and things will snowball until he’s not able to complete any of the work. “Is there a concept you need help with?”
“You said you don’t understand any of it. You said I surpassed you years ago with math and science.” I nod. Jake shoulders past me into the kitchen and gulps down a glass of water. “I am trying to use my strategies.”
“I know you are, sweetheart. Let’s talk this through. Was it one assignment that took your average down or a slow creep?”
He takes a breath, closes his eyes. “Slow creep. I have been missing approximately five points per homework assignment.”
“And it’s actual wrong answers, not something like rushing and forgetting a decimal or something?”
He rolls his eyes and I’m worried I lost him.
If he thinks I’m nagging or scolding, rather than seeking information, he will detonate.
I decide it’s time for another partner session with Amy, his therapist. He’s been seeing her alone lately and I haven’t been privy to any new strategies or triggers.
Jake grips the edge of the counter. “I’ll never get back on track.
I will never get accepted into MIT. I will never be a scientist.”
“Oh, Jake, I know it seems that way. Let me think for a minute about what we can do.”
“Why don’t you know more about physics?”
I snap at him. “Because my degree is in marketing.” I take a breath. “This isn’t useful. Can I see the assignments?” Jake kicks his backpack across the floor and starts pacing. I rummage through until I find his physics folder.
I have no idea what I’m looking at among the mess of shapes and equations, but one of the word problems catches my eye. Something about calculating the talus slope of a dirt retaining wall. “Kellen,” I mutter. “Kellen works with this stuff all the time.”
Jake’s eyes light up. “I’m going over there,” he says, reaching for his bag. He yanks the folder from my hands. “He said I can knock on his door any time. This is any time, Mom. Right now.”
By the time I gather my wits, Jake is across the street and tearing up the steps to Kellen’s front door. He’s not home from work yet and I watch as Jake realizes this and plunks down, seated on Kellen’s steps.
I pull out my phone, thinking to text Kellen at work, but I decide I want to hear his voice and call. He answers almost right away. “Hey, there,” he says in that deep voice I love to hear close against my ear.
“Hey,” I start. “I have a favor to ask.”
“Anything, Beth. Shoot.”
I sigh. “Well, Jake is upset about something from his physics class. I don’t even know where to begin and—“
“I’d love to help him!” He sounds like he means it, too.
I love this about Kellen Brady. He’s not nice to us because he wants to get in my pants.
He’s just nice to us. He’s nice. And that makes me want to let him in my pants.
Focus on your kid, I remind myself. Kellen shuffles some things around in the background.
“I’m packing up for the day,” he says. “I was in early this morning and, well, I run this joint. I’ll be home in a half hour. ”
“Please don’t feel like this is a priority.
You don’t need to rush or cancel things,” I start into familiar patterns.
If, in the direst of emergency, I ever called Todd, he made sure to emphasize repeatedly how many opportunities he was missing to get ahead at work.
How much face time with a client or superior.
“Beth,” he says, his voice firm. “You and Jake are a priority to me.”
I sink into the wall. Yep, Kellen Brady makes me dizzy. “Ok, then,” I whisper. “I’ll let Jake know.”
Jake decides to wait on the steps for Kellen, who pulls into the driveway 21 minutes after we hang up. I see the smile on his face as he gets out of his car and watch as he extends a hand to ruffle Jake’s hair. I’m stunned when my son squeezes Kellen in a hug.
It’s not that Jake is not affectionate. It’s that his affection is very hard earned.
Where Kellen seems to use affection as a means of communication for the people in his life, Jake reserves his hugs for moments of deep importance.
Kellen glances over at my house and sees me watching from the window.
He beams and when Jake pulls back, Kellen gives me a thumbs up as they walk inside.
I decide to make dinner for three, wanting to both demonstrate my appreciation and to do something kind and nurturing for Kellen in return for this amazing thing he acts so cavalier about. I’m no wizard in the kitchen, but I can whip up a pretty mean chicken parm with a homemade bright sauce.
I’ll set aside a plain chicken breast and some of the noodles to butter for Jake. Kellen and I can eat the flavorful stuff.
Every brush of the lemon across the zester, every sprinkle of basil into the skillet, I think about my gratitude.
I’m thankful for the tingle between my legs, for the knowledge that my body still functions in that way.
And most of all I’m thankful that my son has at last found a man he admires who he can turn to when he has a challenge.
An hour later, I’m plating the breaded, cheesy chicken from the broiler and lugging the sauce and noodles across the street in my biggest tote bag, slowly with my boot so I don’t spill anything.
I let myself in the front door and freeze in my tracks at the sight of my son, bent over the dining room table with his head almost touching Kellen’s.
This is the image I’ve longed for. Affection, shared respect. My son calmly working on his homework with a man who is happy to help him with it.
Jake mutters to himself, working on a problem and Kellen smiles, patiently. Calm radiates from him along with…is that pride? Jake beams, slamming his pencil down on the table. “I’m certain it’s perfect,” he says. If my arms weren’t full of food, I’d clutch my heart, because he’s right.