Chapter 24
A new relationship is taking shape in the Page of Pentacles. However new beginnings can often be unstable.
CAL
We make coffee together, moving in tandem around my kitchen like an old married couple. I protest when Danny pours my coffee and adds cream. Not that I’m a control freak or anything…
He hands me a cup and I take a cautious sip. The coffee is perfect. The woo-woo side of me wants to take this as a sign that this man is my perfect match. My skeptical side says, “do you really want to set yourself up for another broken heart?”
Cal, The Psychologist, counsels, “This is interesting. Let’s see where it goes.”
It occurs to me I have as many voices inside my head as Juliet does.
We carry our cups to the living room and sit on either end of the sofa. Carl settles himself comfortably between us. Sometimes Carl is the wisest one in the room. “Keep your distance, humans,” he seems to be saying.
I’m extremely nervous, and I can tell Danny is as well. He makes small talk. “Every woman I’ve ever known has tons of these blanket things. What’s with that?”
Without a word, I tossed a chenille throw to him. I get up, arrange a few soft pillows under his elbows, and motion for him to put his feet on the coffee table. He looks at me in amusement. Until I tuck the throw around him and he burrows into the soft cave I created for him. “Oh, yeah, now I get it.”
Carl lays his head in Danny’s lap.
Traitor.
Neither of us know what to say so we sit for a while in silence, enjoying our coffee.
What the hell am I doing? Men say they like my independent streak at first but when they start to feel a little bit threatened, they flex their macho muscle. Once a man begins to tell me what to do, where to do it, how to do it, why to do it…well, let’s just say my anger management issues show up. I have never had a relationship that didn’t end badly.
Why did I invite him in for coffee? Why didn’t I just send him away?
Oh yeah, the kiss.
Dear God, what a kiss.
Danny clears his throat. “Why did you decide to become a psychologist?”
My guard goes up. He doesn’t need to hear about my abusive mother and absent father and all the reasons I went into psychology to try to fix myself. For all I know he’d use it against me in trial.
I give him the G rated version. “I had an eighth-grade teacher who took an interest in me. You know how tough middle school can be, especially for a gawky, nerdy kid. She helped me understand my value and my worth. When I graduated from high school, Mrs. Ferrin and her husband gave me a scholarship to the University of Georgia. All four years were paid for by a schoolteacher and her janitor husband. Those two guardian angels changed the course of my life. They helped me discover my life’s purpose—to help people like they helped me.”
“I can’t imagine you were ever gawky or nerdy.”
I pull a photo album off a built-in bookcase and turn a few pages. “See?”
I can see him struggling not to laugh. He doesn’t know what to say. I was all cat-eye glasses, braces, crooked bangs, and mismatched knee socks.
“To my credit, in tenth grade, the braces came off, I got contact lenses, and Mrs. Ferrin took me to a beauty salon for my first professional haircut.” I turned the page and showed him another photograph. The transformation was remarkable. That was the year I was voted Junior Homecoming Queen.
He turned back to the first page. “I don’t know…I kind of dig those knee socks and braces.”
Dammit, this man has all the right moves.
It is time for him to go.
“I decided to become a police officer for the same reason—to help people. Want to hear about it?
It would be rude of me to say, “no.”
“I’d love to.”