7. Melanie
Chapter 7
Melanie
I have two enormous problems hanging over me when I get to Nick’s the Monday after the competition. First, and most pressing, is that my secret’s out. My phone’s been lighting up non-stop with messages from friends and family about placing third this weekend. Most of the messages are simply links to the event results followed by strings of question marks and exclamation points. Unfortunately for me—and Nick—my parents’ response was a little more detailed.
Which brings me to the place where my first problem and my second problem collide. I’m about eighty percent sure I’ve developed a crush on Nick. On its own, it’s a minor crisis. But my parents want to meet him. At their house. For a formal dinner. In two days. The last time I brought a man to their house for a formal dinner, it was Paul, and he nearly died of embarrassment under the weight of their scrutiny, which makes this dinner a major crisis.
The link my parents sent me along with their dinner invitation is a blog post with a great big splashy photo at the top of Nick hugging me. I’ve stared at the photo for an unmentionable amount of time, so I know his hands are in a perfectly respectable place for a coach’s hands to be: one banded across my shoulders, and the other pressed against my mid-back. My legs are kicked up in the air, and there are a merciful six inches of open space between my hips and his. All body language points to something entirely platonic. The problem is my face. I’m in profile, but the stars in my eyes practically leap off the screen anyway.
If there were any doubt about the conclusion my parents drew from the picture, Mom’s text cleared it up:
I didn’t realize there was a new man in your life. We’d love to meet him, since you’ve been spending a considerable amount of time together, apparently. Dinner is at seven-thirty on Wednesday. Cocktails at seven. Please do not be late .
They don’t think they’re sitting down to dinner with my new show jumping coach. My parents think they’re meeting a new boyfriend. That’s mostly my fault, since I promised them a long time ago that I was done chasing the Olympics, and for some reason they believed me. But I really don’t want them to treat him like a boyfriend, because he will notice, which will very rapidly lead to him noticing the aforementioned crush, and then the rest of these competitions are going to be a whole lot more uncomfortable than the first one. If we manage to make the Olympic team, it’ll be unbearably awkward. It’s a crisis sandwich, with a panic garnish.
I could always tell my parents the truth—that there’s nothing romantic happening between Nick and me. But that will make them more suspicious. They’ll behave exactly the same way—interrogating Nick like national security is at stake—but Dad will repeatedly wink at me, as though we’re sharing some kind of secret and Mom will sigh twice as much as a normal person ever does. Even if Nick doesn’t pick up on the crush, he’ll definitely notice all of the weirdness and judge me for it.
Worse, Nick could decide there’s not enough star power in my bones to warrant sticking around through this nonsense, and he’ll find some other rider to save his butt. Which, I have to admit, is a pretty nice butt from what I’ve seen through all the perfectly broken-in Levi’s he wears. Today’s pair is no exception. He bends over, manure fork in hand, and I bite my lip so I don’t audibly gasp at the sight. This is the first time I’ve ever found the act of mucking out stalls sexy. From my ineffective hiding spot by the open stable door, I’ve got a front-row seat to the Nick Korbel Buns Show, and it is absolutely worth the price of admission.
“Pretty good view, isn’t it?” Edwin whispers, coming around the side of the stable to find me staring.
Okay, leering.
“Something unrequited going on you want to tell me about?” I tease quietly.
“Not from me.” He holds up his left hand and the gold wedding band on his fourth finger glints. “Even if there were, pretty sure my wife would fight him for me. God, I love her. I keep telling Nick he should get a wife, too, but he’s not warming up to the idea yet.”
“Commitment-phobe?” I ask, hoping the shadows are hiding the sudden flush the thought of Nick getting married brought to my cheeks.
“The phobiest,” Edwin says. “The man’s longest relationship is with that pair of jeans, and I’ve got it on good authority he bought ‘em last winter. ”
It’s a disappointing answer, but I have to shake it off. I’ve got no reason to be dreaming of wedding bells when Nick has said a grand total of seven words to me since we left Cheyenne, and four of them were “See you on Monday,” as I left the ranch on Saturday night. All the hugging and smiling after I won was about winning. One unexpectedly raw conversation in a hotel bar and a few twirls in each other’s arms doesn’t mean things are different now. We’re not even friends. I’m here because he needs a win, and that’s exactly what I gave him last weekend.
Nick turns around with his manure fork full of dirty hay and catches sight of Edwin and me watching him. He’s madder than I’ve ever seen him, which is such a contrast to the unprecedented—if restrained—joy of our drive home from Cheyenne that I take a step backward.
“Hey! What are you doing here?” he barks.
I open my mouth to give him a furious, wounded piece of my mind because I’m supposed to be here today for training, but he keeps shouting.
“Those trails aren’t going to clear themselves, Soteres. I told you to get it done before noon. Move it!”
His anger isn’t directed at me, I realize, but Edwin.
“What did you do?” I hiss.
Edwin grins at me, then winks. “Nothing I wouldn’t do again. Learn from my mistakes, though, Melanie. He’s a wild mustang—has to be broken before you can ride him safely.”
Now I’m definitely blushing. I’m not sure what Edwin means, but I can think of all sorts of ways to ride Nick safely, and none of those images are helpful at the moment. My goal is to act normal around Nick, not giggle and fall apart like tween with her first crush.
Once Edwin has sauntered off to take care of the trails, Nick turns to me and offers his signature mouth twitch before slinging the shovelful of hay into the manure pile. His expression is a lot milder than the rage he turned on Edwin, but all of the weekend’s happiness is gone and we’re right back where we started.
“Sorry about that. I wasn’t yelling at you,” he says.
I shrug. “Felt pretty normal, actually. It’s nice to see your anger management problems are back in full force.”
His eyes roll skyward and his jaw tenses. “Yeah, yeah, I’m a dick. Get GT ready, and let’s get moving. ”
I don’t budge. If I don’t tell him about dinner before we start training, I’ll chicken out. If I show up to dinner on Wednesday without him, there will be more dinner invitations until I do show up with him. Better to take care of it now, so we can all move on.
“I actually need to talk to you about something first,” I say.
Nervousness flickers over Nick’s face. It’s not enough. He should be breaking out in a cold sweat and running for the hills—he just doesn’t know it yet.
“Okay, go ahead,” he says.
“My parents have invited you over for dinner on Wednesday.”
The change in him is immediate—shoulders dropped, forehead smooth, fists unclenched around the handle of the manure fork.
“Oh, okay. What time?” he asks.
“Did you hear what I said? Dinner with my parents ,” I repeat. He must not have heard the parents part, or he wouldn’t be so calm.
“What’s the big deal? You’re looking at me like you just invited me to my own execution, not dinner,” he says.
“It’s a formal dinner,” I say carefully, not sure how best to voice my worries.
“So? I’ve got fuckin’ table manners.”
I sweep my hand in front of me with a flourish, as though presenting Nick on a platter to Ophelia Jane, who’s been following the whole exchange with great interest.
“That. That is the big deal. The cursing, the shouting…my parents are a bit….” I hunt for the right word, twisting my fingers together. “Proper?”
He leans the manure fork against the side of the tack room with a sigh and walks toward me. Way too close. One more step, and he’s going to spot the blush.
“I can behave, Miss Manners.”
“You’re not really easing my fears yet,” I say, taking a shaky step backward. “The way you addressed Edwin a minute ago is a great example of why I’m nervous.”
Also the way my heart beats faster than usual when Nick looks at me, the way my parents will talk to him, and the inevitable moment when the conversation will turn to show jumping and all of my raw, tender feelings on the matter will be ripped open and laid out for the room to feast on. But those are private fears.
“I promise I’ll be a perfect fuckin’ gentleman,” he says, crossing his arms over his chest and frowning at me, dark eyes boring into mine .
Thank God he can’t see the ripple of goosebumps along my spine. I’m not sure what exactly that says about me, but I don’t have time to dwell on it while I’m trying to convey the gravity of the situation we’re in.
“You’ll have to wear a suit. With a jacket,” I say. “And a tie.”
“I figured. What’re you really getting at? Do you want me to say no, and refuse to go? You need an excuse from your coach to blow off your parents?” he asks. “Explain what’s going on, and maybe I can help you. Otherwise, you need to do all this floundering on the back of a horse. We leave Thursday for the next competition, and I liked winning. Think you might have, too, so we ought to focus on that, instead of how I’m going to embarrass you in front of your folks by eating strawberries with a shrimp fork instead of a strawberry fork, or whatever unforgivable crime against etiquette you think I’m gonna commit.”
“There’s no way Mom would serve strawberries or shrimp this close to Thanksgiving. Those are summer foods,” I mumble, because I’ve done a splendid job of embarrassing myself without anyone’s help.
He shoves his hands in his back pockets, then pulls them out and crosses his arms again, looking every bit as uncomfortable as I feel. I wish I could rewind the morning and start over. Given another shot at it, I wouldn’t immediately set fire to all the goodwill Nick and I established over the weekend.
“About how I spoke to Edwin…it’s stupid,” Nick says. “He was hassling me all morning about a…tricky subject…and he knows he pushed my buttons. We’ll be fine. He can give as good as he gets. I promise I’ll be on my best behavior with your parents, and I promise my best behavior is decent.”
“You’ve got a lot of tricky subjects, don’t you?” I ask, too curious to resist prodding at the aforementioned buttons.
Nick scrubs a hand over his face, which does nothing to hide the rush of color to his cheeks.
“He was bugging me about a woman, okay? Makin’ fun of me for having feelings and not acting on them, like I didn’t listen to him mooning over his wife for a thousand fuckin’ years before he got up the nerve to tell her,” he says, not meeting my eyes. “It’s nothing you need to worry about.”
I nod, ignoring the stinging sensation in my chest. “Right. None of my business. So, cocktails are at seven on Wednesday, dinner afterward. Don’t be late. I’ll text you the address. ”
I hurry toward GT’s stable without waiting for his response. He doesn’t need to see how much I care about that revelation, because I shouldn’t care at all. Nick’s got a whole life that doesn’t involve me; I shouldn’t be surprised that life involves women, or that his feelings for one of them are “nothing I need to worry about.”
For the next two days, I throw myself into training with an intensity I’ve never exhibited before. I’m in the stable getting GT ready before Nick finishes his morning chores, and I don’t stop riding until Nick orders me off the horse so I don’t injure GT. I don’t stop there, though. After riding, I head to my gym for cross-conditioning for my own stamina. By Wednesday morning, I’m exhausted and my legs feel like stretched taffy someone lit on fire, but I’ve gone nearly forty-eight hours without imagining Nick naked.
He texts at six, just after sunrise, to cancel training:
Stay home this morning. You’re running my horse ragged, and don’t think I haven’t noticed how sore you are, too. Go back to sleep.
I type and delete, “Make me,” “Yes sir,” “Or what?” and, “Do I get a prize if I do?” before admitting he might have a point. I wouldn’t text a single one of those things to him if I were well-rested. If he were standing in front of me, I definitely wouldn’t have the gall to say them out loud. In the end, I settle on something I hope feels closer to how I normally speak to him:
Fine. Don’t forget to wear a tie tonight.
His answer comes in quickly, accompanied by a picture of a sad clown in an enormous purple necktie:
Don’t worry, Miss Manners. I’ve already picked out my outfit.
This is not the least bit reassuring.
Okay—how’s this one ?
My phone slips out of my hands when I see the picture attached to his latest message. I scramble to unearth it from the depths of my duvet so I can make sure my eyes aren’t deceiving me. My second glance proves the first was accurate: it’s him, in a tailored slate gray suit, complete with a dusty blue silk tie. It fits him infinitely better than the crappy rental tux he had on the night we met, and suddenly I’m picturing my fingers loosening the tie and sliding it free of his collar. There goes my forty-eight hour No-Naked-Nick-Fantasies streak.
Like a coward, I send him a thumbs up emoji, and then toss my phone back onto the duvet. I’m definitely not going back to sleep now, because if Nick is going to show up to my parents’ house looking that good, I have to step it up a little. I’ve been so worried about Nick wearing jeans and a sun-faded flannel that smells like hay, I’ve neglected all worry related to my own appearance.
By nine, I’ve tried on every article of clothing I own, and have subsequently lost all sense of perspective for what’s appropriate. I dig through the pile of taffeta, chiffon, lace, and tulle on my bed to retrieve my phone so I can text my friend Olivia for outfit help.
She’s arguably my closest friend, and despite being a trust-fund kid like me, she’s shockingly down to earth since her parents sent her to public school instead of prep school. She made college more fun, but it was after we graduated that I discovered she’s easy to talk to even when we aren’t at parties. I leaned on her a lot in the weeks after Paul dumped me, so I’ve been reluctant to reach out again, but I can’t think straight. I need guidance.
SOS. I need outfit help for dinner tonight.
Her reply reminds me immediately of why I was hesitant:
What kind of dinner?? Omg are you finally leaving behind the Lean Cuisine on the couch, pants-optional phase of your heartbreak? Does it have anything to do with the scrumptious new coach you’re all pressed up against in that photo?!?! I’m SO PROUD OF YOU!!!!
OLIVIA. PLEASE THIS IS SERIOUS.
My phone rings with a FaceTime call from her. I flop back onto the mountain of clothes on my bed with a groan, and answer the call. Her freckled face fills the screen, beaming, then she takes in the sight of my clothes-nest and panicked expression and her smile falters.
“Ooookay, what am I looking at?” she asks. “Are you…wearing a ballgown? Now you really have to tell me what kind of dinner this is. Is it a gala?”
“Uh, it’s dinner at my parents’ house,” I say. “With my new coach.”
“I’m going to go ahead and say no ballgown.”
I roll my eyes. “Oh, well in that case, my problem is solved. Thanks so much for your insights.”
She laughs. “I’m kidding. Grab the navy-blue Ted Baker mini-dress your mom bought you last Christmas.”
I wrinkle my nose. “That’s the most confusing dress I own. How does it have a turtleneck, but also is too short for me to bend over in without showing the entire world my vaginal canal?”
“Was that not the vibe for this meal?” she asks, all faux-innocence.
I raise my eyebrows at her.
“What?” she protests. “I picked something that meets your mom’s standards—ugly, vaguely Puritanical—and also shows off your assets for your hot, broody coach. It is the mullet of dresses, and since your mom bought it for you, she can’t be mad that your legs are out and about.”
“My legs don’t need to be out and about!” I argue. “I’m not trying to seduce my coach. What I need is a dress that says, ‘Hello, parents, this is my coach, who is definitely not my boyfriend, and there are no sexy feelings here at all,’ while still looking pretty. ”
“Oh! I know! The black lace Anna Sui dress you wore to Kennedy’s birthday party!” she says, as though I didn’t say anything at all. “Throw a cardigan over it if your shoulders offend your parents. It’s knee-length, but the lace will still put all sorts of tantalizing images into the hot coach’s mind. Parentally approved and sexy. I nailed it.”
“Who says I want tantalizing images of myself in Nick’s mind?” I say, wishing my blush wasn’t so obvious. Since I can see my own face in the bottom of the screen, I know there’s no way Olivia is missing it.
She snorts and holds my gaze, challenge in her expression. It’s a brief staring contest, because we both know she’s right.
“It can’t be anything but a crush,” I say finally, not bothering to hide the disappointment in my voice. “I might not get a third shot at show jumping if I mess this one up. I need him to be my coach, so I can’t risk that relationship. Plus, he owns the horse I’ve been competing. There’s too much at stake for me to be making moves on him. Not to mention he’s super bossy, and always annoyed with me. ”
“Girl, please. I’ve seen the photo of that hug,” she says.
“You know what the photo doesn’t show? Him awkwardly putting me down, and then immediately returning to business as usual. I haven’t gotten so much as a smile since getting that trophy. Then on Monday, his head groom warned me that Nick has commitment issues,” I say glumly.
There’s also the matter of the woman who’s nothing I need to worry about , but I don’t need to belabor the point. Other woman or not, Nick’s wrong for me. He’s not the kind, gentle type of man I usually go for, and I’m sure I’m not the kind of woman he’s drawn to, either. The women Nick likes are probably free-spirited and fun, not uptight and sharp.
“So? Let it be just a crush. It’s not like you’re on the prowl for a husband,” Olivia says. “Do you know what this means?”
I shake my head, confused.
“It means you’ve turned the corner on your heartbreak. You’re thinking about someone other than Paul, which is major progress,” she says, smiling again.
She has a point; I’ve been obsessing so hard over every interaction with Nick that Paul’s faded into the background, small enough that I’m starting to believe in a future where I don’t think of him at all. I’m not there yet, but it feels nice to be closer to that reality.
“Take the win!” Olivia encourages. “Flirt with Nick a little. Let him boss you around. It doesn’t have to mean anything or go anywhere.”
I pout and burrow deeper into my clothes-nest. “What gives him the right to be so beautiful and so unavailable?”
“That’s the spirit!” Olivia says. “Make him feel the same way—wear the Anna Sui, and for the love of God, tart it up a little. Wear a decent bra, swipe on some lipstick. Fluster that man in front of your parents. It’ll make the awkward small talk a lot more bearable.”
I blow a raspberry at the phone, even though I’m going to take every single scrap of her advice. If I have to look at Nick Korbel in a suit all night, he’s going to get an eyeful of cleavage. It’s only fair.
“While I’ve got you, I have gossip,” Olivia says.
Something cautious in her tone of voice catches my attention. She’s not normally hesitant about sharing other people’s juicy news, so the restraint is unsettling.
“What?”
“It’s about Paul, and it’s pure speculation, but since you’re moving on—”
“Nope, don’t want to hear it,” I interrupt. “Last time I speculated about Paul’s life, I wound up showing his girlfriend my tits. That’s not an experience I need to repeat. ”
Olivia chews the side of her cheek. “You know what, you’re right. Better to focus on how to make sure Nick’s too distracted by your hotness to notice your mom silently judging the way he holds his silverware. Call me after—I want all the details.”
I blow her a kiss, then hang up. I find the Anna Sui dress near the top of the tangle of garments on my bed, then hang it on the back of my closet door so I can steam out the wrinkles before tonight. Then I head for the vanity by the window to look through my lipsticks for the right shade. If I throw myself into the task, hopefully it’ll keep me from thinking too much about what Paul is up to that warrants gossiping about, or about what Nick is doing in that suit on his unexpected day off.