Chapter 14
Rose
Despite needing to be up early, there is no way I’m falling asleep when I climb into Tank’s comfy guest room bed.
Because he almost kissed me!
And replaying that moment, thinking about what could have happened and what might soon happen, takes up a lot of my brain real estate. I have the giddiness of a teenager, and the feeling is both wonderful and uncomfortably itchy as I toss and turn.
What I know for sure is that when it happens—not if—a kiss from Tank Graham might do irreparable damage to me in the very best way possible.
Which is a strange thought. Because after David died, I didn’t miss kissing. I hardly thought about it.
There was too much grief to wade through, too many piles of paperwork to go over with the Emilys, who helped me figure out the things that David always handled. Thinking about kissing would have been an indulgence I didn’t have room for. Life in those days was thin.
Plus, David and I had gotten to the point in our relationship where we were long past the frantic, frenzied makeout sessions.
We kissed occasionally, but it didn’t hold the same spark.
Our romance was more routine, planned out on dates on the calendar and an unspoken agreement about how often we locked our bedroom door at night.
I would have loved more romance, more emotion, but I also felt content with the life we built.
After David died, I ached for his companionship and his physical presence, but I didn’t think much about kissing. If given the option to have one more moment with him, I probably would have chosen a hug over a kiss.
And while I suspect that a hug from Tank will be amazing, it’s his kiss that keeps me up now.
At least, until the worries start to seep in about the fact that in not very many hours, some of his kids and their significant others will be in my kitchen.
It is nothing like a job interview. But I absolutely have pre-job-interview type of jitters.
What if they don’t like me?
A silly thought, I know. I could tell by their faces last night how thrilled they are about Tank and me.
Still, there’s a lot of pressure. This is all very new. Like, very new. And yet it’s moving at warp speed. I feel like I’ve made more forward progress with Tank in a few days than I did in months after meeting David in college.
Being older means we both have more certainty about who we are and what we want. We have the perspective of time, and how quickly it moves. I don’t want to be rash, but I also don’t want to waste a single moment. Tank seems to have the same sense of rightness I do about being together.
Still … it’s fast.
And there’s a lot on the line. In the darkness of Tank’s guest room, doubts rise, a muddy torrent of floodwaters spilling over the banks of my rational thoughts.
What if we get to know each other better and Tank decides he doesn’t like me after all? Or I don’t like him? (This one is less possible, but still.) Or we simply decide that we don’t want to do the whole relationship and marriage thing again?
I honestly don’t know if I could withstand a breakup. My husband dying? Sure. I got through it. Because I was younger and had energy and kids at home who basically forced me to keep living.
But now, the idea of even an amicable breakup after tasting this kind of hope sounds far too bleak. It would destroy me.
I also have a whole subset of silly worries but worries nonetheless. Like, would I tell people that we are dating? That Tank is my boyfriend?
For some reason, it all sounds very wrong.
Dating and boyfriend both feel too flimsy, too juvenile for people over fifty. There needs to be a more mature set of vocabulary because I’ve lived too much life to have a boyfriend. I’m not fifteen.
Once I finally fall asleep, my brain continues working like a CPA in April.
I have immersive and stressful dreams. Like one where I’m late to try out for the high school track team (I would never!) while wearing a bathing suit and rollerskates.
Or another where I’m climbing the Sheet Cake water tower in order to rescue baby raccoons who offer thanks by way of biting me repeatedly on the way back down the ladder.
I wake from that one gasping for breath and mildly panicked about rabies. Going back to sleep sounds like the worst idea ever, so I get up just before four and start prep. But I’m a jittery, shaky, exhausted and emotionally-fraught mess.
Which means that when there’s a knock at the door around five o’clock, I jolt and drop my coffee mug.
Which promptly shatters on the floor and spills coffee everywhere.
Which leads to me cutting my heel on a ceramic shard on my way to open the door.
Which means I’m stupidly nervous and bleeding on the floor when everyone comes inside.
Good thing this really isn’t a job interview.
“I’ll grab the first aid kit,” Molly says, assessing the situation and heading straight for Tank’s bedroom. I appreciate that she’s wearing plaid pajama pants but can still be decisive.
James, frowning down at the bloody smudges I’m leaving on the floor, picks me up before I can protest and deposits me on a stool at the island. Collin already has a broom by the time I’m settled, and Kyoko is handing me a fresh cup of coffee.
“Sugar? Cream? Milk?” Her short, dark hair is pinned back from her face with two plastic barrettes, one pink and one lime green, and she’s wearing a shirt that reads Kiss the Cook with a picture of Bryan Cranston from Breaking Bad.
I didn’t watch the show, but it was surprisingly one of David’s favorites. “Just some milk, please. And I like your shirt.”
She looks down, as though she forgot what she was wearing, then laughs. “Oh, thanks! I just sort of rolled out of bed.”
“Lucky you,” Winnie says through a yawn. Pushing her glasses aside, she rubs her eyes. “You can roll out of bed and look adorable. I’m an ogre.”
Winnie does not look like an ogre. Her messy bun is cute, and she’s the kind of naturally beautiful that doesn’t need makeup.
I don’t spend as much time anymore thinking about my own appearance.
Sure, I have a skin care routine, and I don’t like going out without giving my hair and makeup some attention.
But my physical appearance has just felt irrelevant for such a long period of time, like the kind of data you can exclude from a study.
Going on a date and now being around these girls who are so young and fresh and gorgeous makes me suddenly hyperaware of my face and my body and my clothes.
I don’t need a movie-style makeover montage, but maybe I do need to update my wardrobe, make an appointment with my stylist in Austin, or get a pedicure.
Molly joins Winnie at the island and sets the first aid kit down. “I am also an ogre. All of you morning people are the worst! I’m looking at you, Kyoko.”
“Oh, I’m not a morning person,” Kyoko says, with the kind of cheerfulness that belies her words. “Or, not just a morning person. I’m a no-sleep person. I like nights. I like mornings. I like days. And I love coffee. Say when.”
She starts to pour milk in my mug and has already added more than I usually would before I can hold up a hand to stop her.
“Y’all really didn’t have to all come help,” I say apologetically.
“Of course we did!” Molly digs through the first aid kit and locates Band-Aids and some triple antibiotic cream. “You think we’d miss a chance to hang out with you and pump you for information on what’s going on with you and Tank?”
“Um,” is all I can manage in response to that.
Collin groans. “We said we were going to be subtle, Molly-girl.”
“Aw, Collin. Were you under the impression that Molly has a subtle setting?” Winnie asks, and all three women laugh.
I watch as Kyoko digs through her tote bag and begins to hand out aprons without asking who wants what.
She chooses a pink gingham apron for James that looks like it was made for a child.
Surprisingly, he puts it on without complaint.
Collin curls his lip when Kyoko hands him a purple toile apron lined with frills and a big bow at the back.
For Winnie, it’s a black one that says But First, Coffee and Molly gets a white one with a graphic sketch of three charcoal grills and the words Grills, Grills, Grills.
“Where’s your apron?” James asks Kyoko, tugging at his, like this might possibly make it longer.
“Oh, I don’t like aprons. Or umbrellas,” she adds, as though the two facts are somehow connected.
“Give me your foot,” Molly says. I’ve been so distracted by the dynamics of the group that I forgot all about my cut.
As though to remind me, it throbs and I wince.
“You can’t just ask people for their feet,” Winnie says, taking the seat next to me as I angle in the seat to offer my foot to Molly.
“Should I buy her dinner first?” she deadpans, which makes Collin laugh and James snort. Kneeling, Molly carefully rubs a dab of ointment on my foot. “It’s not too bad. But you could probably still sue Tank for damages if you want. Technically he’s probably liable. And loaded.”
“I don’t think I’m interested in litigation at this time,” I tell her.
“But you are interested in Tank?” Molly sticks the Band-Aid on and gets back to her feet, her eyes bright and hopeful.
And suddenly everyone in the room is staring at me, waiting for my answer. I feel the weight of their gazes pressing in on me until it’s hard to breathe.
Tank and I talked about our children, but in a more superficial way. Names, ages, where they live, what they’re doing in life. The kind of bragging you do when you’re first explaining to another person why your kids are the absolute best.
Now, I really, really wish we’d discussed this part, the part where our grown kids might have some opinions on us dating.
Right now, neither of my kids knows about this.
In my defense, it did come out of nowhere.
After my call with Chelsea the other day, she’s probably already matchmaking and buying new monogrammed towels or something.