64. Chapter 64
Chapter 64
For the next few days, David pretty much lived rent-free in Paige’s mind, so that by the time his ‘victory’ dinner was upon her, she was more anxious than she’d been in a long time, buzzing with nervous energy.
She dressed deliberately, not wanting to look like she was trying too hard, but also not wanting to look sloppy, either. She chose a long-sleeved, cream colored T-shirt with a whimsical drawing of a daisy on the front and paired it with khaki green, wide-legged cargo pants. Her hair, which had been straightened that morning, was now casually tucked behind her ears, putting all the attention on her subtle make-up and the lipstick she put on at the last second.
When she answered his knock promptly at 7 p.m., he practically barreled his way into her apartment, pushing her backward a little bit in the process, while holding a bottle of Merlot in one hand.
“What are you—”
“I don’t want to be seen,” David explained in a rush, looking over his shoulder before closing the door swiftly.
“You mean by Dolly?”
“To you, she’s ‘Dolly’. To me, she’s ‘Mrs. Harte’.”
Paige couldn’t completely stop her smile; Dolly had been on fire the other night.
“Is that funny?”
“No.” Clearing her throat, Paige tried to squash all traces of amusement. “Not at all.”
“That woman’s a menace,” David complained.
“Because she gave you a hard time the other night about your hair? You poor thing.”
He gave her a look that said he didn’t appreciate her minimizing the trauma he’d gone through. “It was more than just my hair. She threatened to call the police on me and what did you do? You hid in your apartment and let me fend for myself.”
“I figured you could hold your own … and you did.”
“Hmm.” David frowned. “I think I get it now.”
“Get what?”
“You were hoping she’d chase me off, weren’t you? You were rooting for that barracuda.”
“What? Of course not.” She did her best not to laugh. “What a terrible thing to say.”
“Oh, my God, you totally were.” He shook his head as if disappointed in her actions. “You should’ve known nothing was going to chase me away after our world-class make-out session. Not even that barracuda.”
Even though it was pleasing to hear him call it ‘world-class’, Paige knew she had to shut him down and narrowed her eyes at him. “I thought we had an agreement not to continue that particular conversation.”
“I was only referencing it.”
“How about we don’t ‘reference’ it, either?” she asked, just as a timer went off in the kitchen.
His head instantly swiveled eagerly toward the sound. “I hope that means my victory dinner is ready.”
Before she could answer, he was already making tracks down the hall, leaving her to follow him into her own kitchen. The only thing that kept Paige from being annoyed by this was the opportunity it provided to check him out without having to be discreet in any way, which she took complete advantage of despite knowing she shouldn’t.
He was wearing the pants from the other night and she couldn’t help but wholeheartedly agree with Dolly’s assessment that he wore them well. Did he, ever. He also had a shirt on that Paige had picked out for him when they were married, and while she didn’t know if he’d worn it on purpose, it made her smile to see it.
They fell into an easy, familiar rhythm, which probably should’ve felt strange, but didn’t. David took care of opening the wine and pouring it into two glasses before moving on to setting the table, while Paige got all the food ready and arranged it on the island.
A few minutes later, as they sat down to eat, he gazed at the array of food he’d piled on his plate with true appreciation and sighed with pleasure. He could see how much effort she’d put into the meal—the sauce was homemade (from her grandmother’s recipe), as were the meatballs, and the green beans had not come from a can. Even the salad appeared to be relatively ‘homemade’ and not from a pre-packaged bag. “This looks fantastic.”
“Thank you.”
“No, thank you.” He raised his glass and waited for her to do the same, before announcing, somewhat grandly, “Here’s to your lack of bowling skills, which made all of this possible. Cheers!”
Her jaw dropped as he clinked his glass to hers while she stared at him. Then, seemingly oblivious to the fact she was practically glaring at him, he took a drink of wine before setting the glass down and beginning to eat with enthusiasm.
She cleared her throat. “What was that?”
“It wasn’t an insult. I’m extremely grateful you’re not any good at bowling because, Jesus, this is good.” David was on his third meatball already, even though they were almost the size of tennis balls. “I should’ve had the foresight to make decent music a condition of our bet, though.”
It took Paige a few seconds to realize he was obviously targeting the song “Bye Bye Bye”, which was currently playing. “This is N’Sync.”
“I know. And you just illustrated my point very nicely.”
She leaned forward. “What’s wrong with N’Sync?”
“God, where do I start?”
“What? They’re the world’s greatest boy band.”
“That, right there. They don’t play their own instruments, so they’re not a ‘band’,” he told her, doing a one-handed air quote, since the other hand was busy using his fork to shovel food into his mouth.
“I don’t care. I love them.”
“You love them?”
She nodded. “I. Love. Them.”
“Really? Then you can name every boy in the ‘band’, right?” David asked, using air quotes again.
She slapped at his hand. “Justin Timberlake.”
When she didn’t say any other names, he prompted, “Keep going. There’s four more boys in the ‘band’.”
Paige slapped at his air-quoting hand again. “Justin is the only one who matters.”
“I’m sure the other four in the ‘band’ would disagree with you.”
This time, he kept his hand out of reach.
“They can disagree all they want. Justin’s the one with all the talent.”
He rolled his eyes. “Barf.”
“Did you just roll your eyes and say ‘barf’? Are you thirteen?”
“I feel thirteen. I am listening to N’Sync, after all. Do you have some Backstreet Boys coming up that I can look forward to?”
“Actually, I do have Backstreet Boys in this playlist,” Paige told him, grabbing her phone off the table. “But I’ve got something even better.”
“Better? That could literally be anything.”
Making a face at him, she scrolled for a moment and then after a quick tap, the opening notes of “Hangin’ Tough” replaced “Bye Bye Bye”.
His eyes widened in horror. “New Kids on the Block?”
To mess with him, she turned up the volume a little bit, only to jump a little when David grabbed the phone from her hand.
“I’m voting hell no,” he said, immediately killing the song.
In the abrupt silence, Paige semi-lunged forward and tried to grab it back, without success. As David held the phone away from her in a mini game of keep-away, “The Bitch Is Back” started emanating from it. When he glanced at the screen to see an incoming call from Jules, his eyebrows rose.
“Does Jules know this is her ringtone?” he asked, as he handed the phone back to Paige.
She quickly declined the call, sending it to voicemail before answering. “She’s the one who programmed it into my phone.”
He started in on his spaghetti, which he’d been neglecting. “Does she know about our make-out session?”
“What part of ‘not referencing’ that do you not understand?”
“I’m not referencing it. I’m simply asking if Jules knows about our make-out session. Totally different thing.”
Paige leveled her best I’m going to punch you in the nuts look at him, knowing that even if she wanted to toss him out of her apartment, she wouldn’t be able to because he was too heavy. “I’m going to be as clear as I can, okay? No discussing what happened the other night. No referencing, no alluding to, no hinting at, no insinuating, no mentioning. At all.”
“What about our bowling game? Is that forbidden, too?”
“You know I’m specifically talking about our make-out session,” she told him, only to purse her lips together in aggravation. Jesus Christ, now he had her saying it!
He grinned and held up his hands as if in surrender, one of them still holding a fork. “Okay. No talking about our make-out session the other night, or referencing, or alluding, or hinting, or insinuating, or … what else? Oh, right. No mentioning our make-out session, either. I promise,” he said, lowering his hands and going back to his meal. “Besides, I’d much rather talk about our next make-out session, anyway.”
It took her a second to realize what he’d just said. “The next one? Are you out of your damn mind?” she burst out. “There isn’t going to be a next one. There shouldn’t have even been a first one!”
“But there was,” he said matter-of-factly. “And it was fucking fantastic. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it—how good it felt and how much I liked it. And, more importantly, how much I want to do it again.”
“You want to kiss me again?”
“Yes. For starters.”
“For starters? What does that mean?”
“It means I want to do a lot more than that.”
“More? What, more?” Paige asked, hearing the shock in her voice. “There is no ‘more’. Not for us, anyway. We’re divorced, David.”
“I know. But I don’t think we should let that get in the way.”
“Get in the way of what?”
He put a forkful of green beans in his mouth. “Your healing.”
“My healing,” she repeated slowly.
“The other night when I couldn’t sleep, I thought about you,” he said. “I thought about everything that you’d told me when we got together in your apartment, and it occurred to me I could help. That I want to help.”
She watched him eat like a ranch hand; apparently this conversation wasn’t affecting his appetite in any way. “You want to help with my … healing?”
“Yes. You said you were hesitant to get into a sexual situation and have it fall apart like it used to because it would be devastating. And you didn’t want to put a man through what I went through and feel like I did, right?”
She nodded slowly.
“Well, the way I see it, I’m the perfect solution. You know me and I know you and we’ve talked about your abuse in great detail. We’re comfortable with each other. We have respect for one another. Trust. Affection. And … if the other night is any indication, we have an abundance of chemistry.”
Paige grabbed her glass of wine and drank half the contents. “Are you suggesting I use you for sex?”
“Yes.”
The confirmation had her blinking rapidly as her brain started to melt down. “You’re serious.”
“Yes.”
She set her glass on the table and stared at him as a near silence settled over the kitchen.
“Okay,” she said, very slowly, as if speaking to a child. “Let’s pretend for one batshit crazy second, that your offer is real—”
“Oh, it’s very real.”
“I just don’t know if I could do that, because every generalized fear I have about sex becomes specific when applied to you, versus another man. With a different man, the worst that would happen is that he’d be disappointed if the sex was terrible. But with you, I’d be hurting you in a way I never want to again. And I’m sure this makes me a terrible person, but I’d rather disappoint someone else than hurt you again. I know I said finding out I still don’t like sex would be devastating, but hurting you again would be just as devastating. Maybe more.”
He pushed his plate away and leaned toward her. “I appreciate your concern. I really do, but I don’t want you to worry about hurting me because that’s not going to happen.”
Paige shook her head. “You can’t know that.”
“Yes, I can. Just like I know we’re not going to fail.”
“You can’t know that, either,” she sputtered.
“Again, yes, I can. You know why? Because we’re not going to quit until we succeed, that’s why. ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again’. That’ll be our motto.”
Pushing her untouched plate away as well, she leaned toward him, searching his face very carefully for any sign of mental illness. “So, you’re proposing we have sex as many times as it takes to ‘succeed’? That if I don’t like sex the first time, or the second time, or the fiftieth time, we just keep going?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying. I don’t care how long it takes, Paige. This is important to me.”
“Why?”
“Because if anyone should get to share your sexual ‘awakening’ with you, it should be me,” he answered evenly. “I want that privilege.”
After letting that settle for a minute, she asked, “What would happen afterwards?”
“I don’t know. I guess you send me a giant gift basket or something? The kind with assorted muffins are my favorite.”
Paige gave him an exasperated look. “Will you take this seriously?”
“What makes you think I’m not?”
“Oh, I don’t know, because you’re suggesting I send you a basket of muffins after we have sex?”
David could see she was a little overwhelmed, so he reached over and took her right hand. “We’re friends, right?”
After a brief pause, she said, “Right.”
“Well, I think we’re better friends than we were before, to be honest. And we have a stronger bond now, too, so after everything is said and done—so to speak—you and I are going to be just fine. Better than fine.”
“You really think so? You think that’s possible?”
“I do,” he insisted. “I wouldn’t be suggesting any of this if I thought otherwise. The last thing I want is for either one of us to get hurt.”
Then, as if they hadn’t just had the strangest fucking conversation ever, he got up from the table to get them each a piece of tiramisu, even though she hadn’t eaten any of her dinner. When he returned to the table, Paige watched him eat the dessert with appreciation, and then after getting the green light, started in on hers.
After he was finished, David then surprised her by not staying and continuing to make his case for them having sex, which she appreciated. In turn, Paige surprised him by packing up almost all of the leftovers for him to take home, minus what she saved for Dolly, and walking him to her door. Instead of a repeat of the other night’s make-out session, David pulled her in for a one-armed hug and gently kissed her temple; when he pulled away, she told herself she wasn’t disappointed.
“Think about it,” he said.
“I will.”
“But don’t overthink it,” he added.
“I won’t.”
“Good night, Paige.”
“Good night, David.”
He opened the door slowly and to her amusement, scanned the hall, ostensibly looking for any sign of Mrs. Harte, before deeming it safe to leave. Paige watched him, much like she had the other night, until he was out of sight, before closing the door.
Then, in a bit of a daze, she wandered back to her kitchen and sat down, poured herself another glass of wine, and finished off her cold spaghetti. When she felt somewhat fortified, she picked up her phone and called Jules.
“Please tell me you weren’t still at work when I called earlier,” Jules said upon answering.
Paige took a deep breath, girding her loins. “No. I was actually having dinner with David.”
There was a lengthy pause and then, “You were? Why?”
Slowly, Paige began giving Jules the rundown, filling her in on the divorce anniversary outing—dinner, bowling and the bet—but when it came time to tell her about basically dry humping David in the hallway, Paige faltered.
“So, where’s the meat in this sandwich?” Jules demanded. “There has to be more to this story than dinner, bowling, and a bet.”
“We also might have … made out.”
In the dead silence that followed, Paige chugged the rest of the wine in her glass.
On the other end of the line, Jules cleared her throat. “Might have? You either did, or didn’t.”
“Fine. We did.”
“And you’re just now telling me? This is information you should’ve shared thirty seconds after it happened.”
“It was getting late—”
“Not buying it. But even if it was—and it wasn’t—you could’ve told me the next day. But you didn’t, which makes you the worst friend, ever. Maybe even worse than Hitler.”
Paige almost snorted. “Hitler?”
“Yes, Hitler. There were people who counted Hitler as a friend, you know.”
“So, you’re saying I’m a worse friend to you than Hitler was to whoever he was friends with?”
“You got it.”
“Well, that’s just mean.”
“So was not telling me you made out with David. Now, is there anything else you haven’t told me?”
“Maybe. Do you want to hear it?”
“I don’t know. It’s getting late.”
Paige ignored the dig and told her what David had suggested less than thirty minutes ago, finishing with, “He wants me to basically use him for sex.”
“Oh. So, what did you tell him?”
The fact that Jules sounded more curious than appalled had Paige frowning in confusion. “I told him I’d think about it.”
“Paige, Paige, Paige. Paige.”
“What?”
“Do you really need to think about it?”
“No, of course not. Why would I need to do that? People fuck around with their ex-spouses all the time. It’s perfectly normal—”
“I think you should do it.”
That brought Paige up short. “What? Are you serious?”
“Yes. And you should do it a bunch of times.”
Huh? “I need you to focus, Jules. This is serious.”
“I know it’s serious. That’s why I said you should do it a bunch of times.”
“You don’t think it’s weird?”
“Who cares if it is? Just do it.”
Just do it? “It doesn’t feel like it’s … allowed.”
“Allowed by who? Look, I understand your heartburn. Well, I’m pretending to because unlike you, I’m a good friend. But I think, as long as you and David are both going into it with a clear objective and an expiration date, then what’s the real harm? You’re consenting adults, you’re not related, neither one of you is underage and he’s not a farm animal. I’d say the path is clear,” Jules told her, then tacked on, “And I have to say, his idea is kind of brilliant and actually makes a lot of sense … but don’t you dare tell him I said that.”
“I won’t.”
“I know your knee-jerk reaction is to make this complicated, but it doesn’t have to be complicated. In and out. Smash and grab.”
Paige rolled her eyes, even though Jules couldn’t see her.
“You know you want to do it,” Jules continued. “You were only asking if I thought it was weird because you wanted me to tell you it wasn’t and tell you it’s okay to do what you want to do. And now that I have, you can tell David it’s full steam ahead.”