45. Chapter 45
Chapter 45
When Paige invited David to dinner at her place on the following Sunday, he quickly accepted.
He arrived a few minutes early and when she opened the door, he took a moment to basically look her up and down. Today, she was dressed comfortably in soft gray leggings, a fitted Fleetwood Mac concert T-shirt, and a navy, boyfriend cardigan. Her hair was loose, looking like she might have straightened it and she had very little make-up on, which he liked. He also liked that she was barefoot, her toenails painted a bright pink, which probably made him a pervert.
As he was finishing his perusal of her, he realized she was doing the same to him. He was immediately glad he’d worn his favorite cargo pants that were tight enough to be flattering, yet loose enough to make it seem like he wasn’t trying too hard. Paired with the cargos, he’d worn a white Henley and he knew he’d made the right choice by the way she looked him over. He told himself it wasn’t ridiculous that he’d also showered and brushed his teeth twice before coming over. He hadn’t done it for her—oral hygiene was important and he was all about hygiene. He only had one set of teeth, right?
Once inside her apartment, which was decent-sized and pretty open, he had a bit of a surreal moment. While he knew she hadn’t kept all of their stuff because of space issues, everything she did have in the apartment was still their stuff and looked a little displaced in the different setting.
She saw his odd expression and asked, “What?”
“It’s stupid,” he replied with a slight grimace. “But, it kind of feels like coming home, even though it’s not our home. It’s both comforting and disturbing at the same time. And I don’t mean disturbing, like it’s awful. It’s just …”
“I know what you mean,” she said softly. “After all, I sleep in our bed.”
For a second, he thought about how hard that would be and without thinking, reached out and took her hand, squeezing it.
“It’s okay.” She squeezed back, liking the feel of her hand in his.
“You know, I really wish I’d gotten your email about the furniture. I would’ve taken whatever you couldn’t use. Especially the sectional. I really loved that thing.”
At that, her mouth turned down for a moment as she thought of something. “You know, I’m actually glad you didn’t get that particular email. Because honestly, I wouldn’t have wanted you sharing any of our furniture with Ashley.” She took a deep breath and exhaled. “And that makes me such a petty asshole, doesn’t it?”
David shook his head, more amused than anything. “No. I understand.”
They exchanged a quick smile and then she tilted her head. “You’re more than welcome to have the sectional now, though.”
“What?”
“I still have it.”
“You do?” He glanced around, like he might have overlooked it in the living room.
“In the end, I couldn’t bring myself to sell any of our things. I ended up putting what I didn’t have room for in storage, so if you want the sectional, it’s yours.”
“Are you kidding?” He was sure he looked like a little boy on Christmas morning. “I’ll absolutely take it. The loft is still a bit of a work in progress and the sectional will be perfect. Thank you. Holy shit, yeah.”
She shrugged off his gratitude. “You’re welcome. You’re the one who actually picked it out and paid for most of it, so I’m not being overly generous by letting you take it. Plus, you know … you really love it.”
“You seriously just made my day. Maybe my year.”
Given the year he’d had so far, she figured it wasn’t that much of an exaggerated claim and she didn’t think twice before sweetening the deal. “If there’s anything else in the storage unit you want, you can take that, too. In fact, feel free to take it all, so I can quit renting the place.”
“For real?”
“For real.”
She then told him to go have a seat while she opened a bottle of wine and as she eased her hand out of his, he realized he’d been holding it for several minutes. Feeling slightly off-balance, he turned toward the living room and as he passed a tiny alcove office with a desk buried in clutter, he couldn’t help but tease her. “Some things never change, I see. You’re still so organized.”
She looked to see what he was referring to, before narrowing her eyes at him. “Shut-up. I take shit about not being organized at work from Andrea, but I draw the line at taking shit about not being organized in my own home. Especially from you, when you made me do all our taxes.”
“Of course I did. I didn’t want to do them.”
“Neither did I.”
“Really? You should’ve said something.”
“If I had, would you have done them?”
“Hell no,” he scoffed. “I’d have taken them to H she looked so flushed it was almost comical.
“His name is Sputnik.”
Sputnik gracefully jumped up onto David’s lap, like they were old friends and David set his wine on the coffee table so he could rub the cat’s head. “Sputnik?”
“He’s a Russian blue.”
“So … Sputnik. I get it.” He smiled at the large, silvery-gray cat with moss-green eyes. “Good name.”
Still rather embarrassed, Paige sat down in her favorite overstuffed chair and tucked her bare feet underneath her. “I got him about six months after Spook died. He’s really great. He’s affectionate like Spook and follows me everywhere. But, unlike Spook, he’s really quiet. He doesn’t meow much, but he purrs like crazy and sleeps with me every night.”
“I really missed Spook after the divorce,” David said, as Sputnik started purring like a chainsaw, as if on cue. “I thought about getting a cat, but couldn’t because of Ashley’s allergies.”
Paige took a sip of her wine. “It’s interesting you say that, because I read somewhere how evil people are often allergic to animals.”
“That is interesting. Where did you read that?”
“Oh. In some scientific magazine, I think. I can’t remember the name of it, but it was one of those widely respected scientific magazines. You know what I’m talking about?”
“Not really. I don’t read a lot of scientific magazines, to be honest. Respected or otherwise.”
“I usually don’t either, but it was in my doctor’s waiting room, I think. Yeah, that’s where it was. I read it while I was waiting to see my … doctor.”
David was about to call ‘bullshit’ on that obviously fabricated story, when there was a knock at her door. Paige set her wine glass down and jumped up to answer it. A few moments later, he could hear her talking to someone and then saw her carrying a few bags into the kitchen.
“I made dinner,” she called out.
He set Sputnik down on the loveseat cushion and hurried to join Paige, who was in the process of setting several containers of Chinese food on the counter. “Is this from The Great Wall?” he asked, the delicious aroma of the food almost making him cry.
“Of course.”
God bless her. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“You bought dinner the other night. I’m just returning the favor.”
“Well, thank you.” He was oddly touched. It might not have been a big thing, but in the entire time he’d been with Ashley, she’d never once ‘returned the favor’. “I haven’t had The Great Wall in ages.”
“Oh, David,” she murmured with exaggerated sadness. “That’s no way to live.”
Sharing a laugh, they opened the boxes and David thought he was in heaven. Mongolian beef, sweet and sour chicken, house fried rice with shrimp, and egg rolls … and not a sign of tofu anywhere.
As they loaded up their plates, with Paige piling on almost as much food as he did, David found himself looking at her chest. He told himself it was kind of her fault for wearing a shirt tight enough to draw attention to the girls, thus giving him no choice but to look, because ...
He was a man.
He had always liked the girls.
The girls looked pretty spectacular in a tight shirt.
When she glanced over and caught him, he smiled without any embarrassment and asked, “Did you go to the concert?”
Unlike Paige, he knew the key to getting away with ogling someone was to have a reasonable excuse to be looking in a particular spot. If she’d simply said something to him like, “I’m sorry, for a second it looked like your zipper was undone,” she might have gotten away with staring at his dick.
She glanced down in the vicinity of her boobs which sported the iconic Fleetwood Mac Rumours album cover. “I did,” she gushed. “Jules and I went. It was great—we had amazing seats. I was a little disappointed because Lindsey Buckingham wasn’t with them, but it was still great. Stevie Nicks! I love her. What about you?”
Their musical tastes had always been more similar than dissimilar and a love of Fleetwood Mac was something they’d had in common.
“I was there. I went with my mom, actually,” he told her. “Yeah, I was that guy.”
“It’s not like anyone would’ve known she was your mom. I mean, unless something happened in the last five years, she probably still looks like your older sister.”
“She does. But still … going to a concert with one’s mom …”
She patted his forearm. “Makes you a good son.”
“Thanks.”
On the way out of the kitchen, Paige paused for a second, then grabbed the bottle of wine.
They went into the living room again and resumed their previous seats. Paige already had some music on, coming from what was obviously a nice sound system, with several small speakers placed around the room. She grabbed her phone and after a few swipes on the screen, Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” started playing, cutting off the previous song.
“Jesus, I can’t get over how different you are,” he said quietly, after they’d been eating for several minutes. Sputnik had once again parked himself on David’s lap, making it so there had to be some maneuvering in order to eat. To some people this might’ve been aggravating, but not to David, who firmly believed cats ruled the world.
Paige bit into an egg roll. “Different, how?”
“Jesus, I’m sorry. That sounded so bad.”
“It’s fine.” She waved off his concern and repeated her question. “Different, how?”
“Healthy. Strong. Confident.”
“Normal?”
His expression darkened. “Damn it, Paige—”
“It’s not a loaded question. I honestly want to know if you think I seem normal. Like, if you didn’t know me, would you think I was just a normal person?”
“Yes,” he finally replied. “You seem like a ‘normal’ person. Your inner sadness or inner reserve, I guess, is gone.”
At that, her entire face lit up and she looked so beautiful, David almost couldn’t breathe; if he’d been standing, it probably would’ve brought him to his knees.
“I can’t tell you how glad I am to hear that.” She was still smiling, although her eyes had taken on a bit of a shine. “I worked really hard to become normal.”
He wasn’t exactly sure what to say to that, so he didn’t say anything.
Paige finished her egg roll and set down her empty plate. Then, giving him a long look, she asked quietly, “You sure you want to do this?”
He set his empty plate down as well. “I’m sure.”
“All right.” She took a deep breath and released it slowly. “I’m going to ask you to just listen for a while and not say anything. Okay?”
“Okay.”
She took a drink of wine and then began quietly, without shame, “An hour after signing our divorce papers, I was home doing my best to finish a bottle of Merlot. It helped me get through that night, so I did it again the next night … and the next. I did it until the day I lost Spook and I realized I’d been doing it for almost six months—”
“Jesus Christ.” He stared at her in dismay.
“Well, that lasted all of ten seconds,” she said drily. “This is going to be a long night.”
“I’m sorry. That was just hard to hear.”
“I hate to break it to you, but my drinking isn’t the worst thing you’re going to hear tonight.”
“Fuck.” David breathed in harshly, leaning back against the loveseat, his hands running over his face. “I know. You’re right.”
“I don’t want you focusing on my drinking. It ended long ago and that part of the story is just one small part in the journey from point A to point B. Nothing more, nothing less,” she told him, dismissing her near-alcoholism with a shrug of her shoulders. “All right?”
He nodded, but the thought of her drinking every night while alone in their house still annihilated him, and he didn’t think he’d be forgetting that any time soon.
She went on. “Losing Spook was my ‘get my shit together moment’. I cut back from one bottle of wine a night to one glass, which led to some other changes—eating better, sleeping better, things like that. Then, when I sold the house and moved into my apartment, I thought exercising would be a good idea so I signed up for a yoga class, but …” she trailed off, making a face. “I learned really quickly that wearing yoga pants was the only part of the class that I actually enjoyed, so I quit that.
“Next, I decided to give swimming a try, so I bought a bathing suit, a cap, and goggles, then got a limited membership at a local gym so I could swim laps. I remembered liking to swim when I was really young, but the second I got in the water that morning to swim my first lap, I felt … uncomfortable. Almost to the point of anxiety.
“I swam for like half an hour, hoping it would go away, but when I got out it was worse, which didn’t make any sense. I dried off and quickly got dressed, not even bothering to take a shower first, then left. Later, I wondered if showering would’ve changed anything, but as I was driving to my apartment, with the smell of chlorine surrounding me in the car …”
She stopped to take a drink of wine. Despite her steady voice, David could see her hands were shaking a little.
“I’m not sure how to describe it,” she went on, “but all of a sudden I was a child, standing in the shallow end of my Uncle Carter’s pool.”
Her voice dropped a notch. “Carter was sitting on the steps that led down into the water, holding me tightly between his legs, his erection pressing into my back.
“I was wearing my favorite bathing suit. It was the one with pink flowers on it and a ruffled skirt that made me feel like a princess and the crotch had been pushed aside so he could shove two of his fingers inside me.”