Chapter 11 #2
“Lisette said she thinks of improv as a way of approaching life. But it feels like, if I was acting on impulse, I’d hurt a lot of people.”
“It’s different. When we’re up there, we’re making theater. It may not be Hamlet, but it’s about finding truths, in some way. But I guess…the way I think of it is, improv isn’t about doing whatever you want. It just reminds me to have courage. To take some risks. When it matters.”
“So what big risks have you taken recently?” I asked him.
“I’m taking one right now.” His eyes were warm and sincere. It took a moment to find words.
“Is this when I tell you about my seven dead ex-husbands?”
He laughed. “Maybe. I’m here even though I may get hurt. And I drew a line in the sand with my mother. She’s not allowed to come stay with me again. She’s not even allowed to call me.”
“Not because of me, I hope.”
He shook his head. “Not entirely because of you. I’m not doing a very good job of keeping things light, am I?”
I smiled. “Shall we change the topic to something superficial? Dogs wearing sweaters? Are you for it or against it?”
“For it.” He grinned, but then his expression shifted. “Should we talk about the fact that you may be leaving?”
I felt tears prickle behind my eyes. “Not yet. Can we pretend that this could work? For just a little longer. Because I really…”
I stopped.
“What?” he asked.
Now it was my turn to be brave. If he had done it, so could I. “I really like you, and I want to stay. And I don’t want to keep things safe now, just because it will hurt more later.”
“You’re right,” he said. “Let’s stop being safe.”
He took my hand, and I felt the heat pooling in my palm.
“Where do you want to go?” Paul asked me. Dinner was over, and we sat together in the parking lot, taking in the night sky scattered with a thousand stars.
“Your place? I want to see your wood stove in action.”
“In the middle of summer?” He grinned.
“This may be my last chance.”
Paul nodded, and we drove there in silence.
I watched him taking corners, pulling down streets that he had driven a million times.
This was a mistake, I knew. Getting close was a mistake, and I couldn’t stop myself.
We were both going to get hurt, and I wanted it.
I wanted to care enough about someone to let myself get hurt.
When we got to his place, he locked the door carefully behind us and bolted it, which I’d never noticed him do before. I wondered if he was thinking of his mother. The living room was in disarray—a broken vase arranged in a corner, a few books off the shelves.
“I should have cleaned up more,” he said. “She knocked down a couple of things on her way out.”
“Your mother?”
“She was just being melodramatic. I just stood still and waited until she knew she couldn’t get a rise out of me.” I stepped forward and then carefully kissed him, my arms wrapping around his shoulders. He was lean, his arms warm even after the drive in the darkness.
“Let me get the stove started,” he said after a moment. “I want you to get your money’s worth from Canada.”
I watched him building up a pile in the stove.
Kindling and logs carefully built into a stack.
Once it was lit, he turned back to me and smiled, and I could see flames in his eyes, briefly.
The room began to smell of winter restaurants and the farmhouses I’d been to for friends’ weddings.
I thought about one of my mother’s boyfriends who had let us build a fire in his fireplace, and how much we’d liked him.
He’d been one of the good ones, which meant he hadn’t lasted long.
Paul walked up and sat next to me on the sofa. “Hey,” he whispered.
“Hey.”
He ran one hand along the back of my neck and the other behind my waist, pulling me into a kiss.
It was gentle at first, but it seemed to flip a switch inside him.
All the passion was at the surface, suddenly.
It felt like I was experiencing the real Paul, just for a moment, without all the careful measures of control.
When he pulled back, his irises were darker, his expression intense. Then something shuttered again.
“Abby, I really want to take you to bed,” he said at last.
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Yes?”
I nodded. He smiled a little, then he took my hand and led me upstairs, leaving the scattered remnants of chaos behind in his front hallway.
Paul’s room was filled with floor-to-ceiling bookcases and an old wooden desk with even more books stacked on it. I hadn’t considered what a reader he was, but this was a reader’s room, piles of books on every available surface. There was a large photo on one of the walls of a Southwestern desert.
He hesitated at the door as I stepped in ahead of him.
“It looks like you,” I said. “Your room.”
“Boring and steady.”
“Smart and sexy.”
He closed the door behind us and then leaned back to kiss me against it. He was kissing my neck, my forehead, and then he paused again, breathing hard. It was the same push and pull I always saw from him: desire and then control. Careful, always stopping himself.
“What is it?”
He shook his head and then leaned his head against my shoulder.
“Paul, what is it? It’s okay.”
“I just want to make sure I get this right.”
“You are.”
He nodded, but he didn’t move. I waited for him to say more. I was pretty sure this was the first time he had slept with anyone since his divorce. Was he thinking of Trish? Regretting this already? I put one hand gently on the back of his neck, waiting until he spoke.
“I’m sorry. Trish told me I was bad at this.
At sex. When we were breaking up, she said a lot of hurtful things, but that was one of the last things she said on her way out the door.
I know she was just trying to justify what she was doing, but it got in my head.
So you have to tell me if what I’m doing is working for you. ”
“You don’t kiss like you’re bad at this,” I said, rubbing my hand along his shoulder.
“I just start to overthink,” he said finally. “I want to get this right.”
“You’re in your head about it? That’s not allowed. You’re an improv guy.”
“I know, but that’s my point. This is exactly the kind of situation where I can’t follow my instincts. I don’t trust myself.”
“Please tell me your instincts aren’t cannibalism.”
I felt him laugh against me. He shook his head slowly. I thought about what he was saying. I also thought of what a disaster it would be if I started giving him precise instructions, turning this into an exercise where he felt like he was being graded, trying to measure up.
“Alright,” I said. “How about this? Let’s treat this like an improv exercise.
For the next thirty seconds, you follow your impulses.
Do exactly what you want, and then you can stop and check in, okay?
Within reason, of course. If you have a very specific 50 Shades of Grey thing, you might want to run it by me. ”
“Yeah, of course, I would never…” He stopped. I watched as he considered it.
“And unless I’m uncomfortable, I won’t make you stop, and you don’t have to stop yourself. And then you check in with me, and I’ll tell you if I didn’t like anything. Okay?”
He nodded. He took a slow breath. “Does the thirty seconds start now?”
I nodded. “If you want.”
As soon as I said it, he pulled me close to him, spun me around, and then gently lowered me to the bed, climbing above me.
He leaned over and began kissing my neck, right below my ear, and then moved to my mouth.
It was almost too fast, almost overwhelming, but then he slowed down.
He moved down to my dress and began to kiss me through the delicate fabric.
I arched up to get closer to him, unable to stop himself.
His wife was a fool or a liar, I thought.
He was ridiculously good at this. But maybe he hadn’t let himself be like this, with her.
I knew it could be easy, once someone made you doubt yourself, once they hurt you, to hold back all the time, to keep the most vulnerable parts of you safe.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt like this with anyone either: like anything I did next would be okay.
Paul, not holding himself back, was on fire.
He kissed gently through the dress, down my chest, then below my belly button. He ran his hands along the edge of the fabric, then gently slid both hands underneath, up my thighs. His hands were warm and slow. His eyes were hungry. He leaned over and kissed between my legs through the fabric.
Then he paused and looked up at me.
“When does the thirty seconds stop?” he asked.
“I’ll let you know,” I said, smiling a little. “Maybe a few more minutes until your time is up.”
His eyes warmed, and then his full focus returned to where he was gently running his hands up my legs. He began to slide my dress up to my waist. I pressed closer to him, unable to stop myself. I was going on impulse, too.
Later that night, I lay awake, wondering if he was asleep. I pulled a handknit woolen blanket around my shoulders and walked to the window. The stars were an epic poem now that the last fingers of clouds had blown away. The Milky Way forged a clear path across the darkness to an unseen horizon.
“Not quite as exciting as New York.”
I turned to see Paul sitting up in bed. He looked very handsome, his chest pale and muscular in the half-light, his hair looking chestnut-dark.
It felt like he wasn’t quite real. “The stars are better here,” I said.
“You never see very many back home. Growing up in Troy, it was like this, but ever since I went to college, I only see stars when I’m traveling. Which is basically never.”
Paul rose and walked behind me, putting an arm around my shoulders. He leaned his chin against my shoulder as he looked outside. It felt right to have him there.
“So how many days did I last?” Paul’s voice resonated against me.
“Before what?”
He breathed a laugh into my shoulder. “How long did I manage to keep my distance from you?”