A Fine Mess (Over the Top) (3 page)

The knotting in my gut intensifies.

Then she babbles like she does when she’s nervous, her words flowing over one another. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have called. I don’t know why…I mean, I do, but…anyway, it’s late. And I probably interrupted something. I should let you go.”

I don’t throw her a life preserver. I listen as she

drowns

drowns

drowns.

Dick. Dick. Dick.

I roll my head over the car hood. No stars are out tonight; invisible clouds blot out the pinpricks of light. Her breaths come faster, matching mine.

What is wrong with me?

Maybe this is like the time I begged Finn to give me his
Mutant X
comic, issue twenty-one. (The boobs on the cover contributed to my Masturbation Olympics.) For weeks I pleaded. I cleaned the asshole’s room. I took out the garbage for him. A week after he handed it over, the comic lay discarded under my bed.

I’m pretty sure Lily’s tits are nicer than Jean Grey’s cartoon hooters, but is this the same thing? The chase? Once I have her, will I discard her, used and unwanted? The way nearly every member of the West family has cheated and moved on? Which means I’d ruin our friendship and working relationship and become an even bigger asshole.

The twisting in my stomach worsens, and I sit up. “Yeah, it’s late,” I say.

Dick. Dick. Dick.

“Yeah,” she repeats. “I guess I’ll see you in a week?”

Right. The company Christmas party for our Toronto branch. The one where I’ll see the newly single Lily. My
friend
. “One week,” I confirm. “Get some sleep. You’ll feel better in the morning.” But something tells me I won’t.

I press end and lie back down. I’ve never clicked with a woman the way I do with Lily. We are effortless, like floating down a ski slope in a foot of powder. Working on designs together, sharing a laugh over Chinese takeout. Not to mention her gray eyes and pink lips have a direct line to my dick. And she called me for a reason. I bet she wants me to know things can move forward with us, past our hour-long phone chats, beyond our jokes and flirting. She wants more. Suddenly, I’m not sure I’m the guy to give it to her.

That
didn’t go as expected. I toss my cell on the bed, the pink cover of my iPhone disappearing into the folds of my duvet. No matter how many times I played this conversation in my head, it never sounded like suffocating silence and vacant words. I must have been misreading him all this time. The way he brushed by me in a room seemed like flirting. The dead air at the end of each phone conversation hinted at unspoken words. At lunch today, I could have sworn he felt something for me. Maybe, after eleven years with Kevin, I’ve lost the ability to distinguish interest from friendship, attraction from playfulness.

At least I can thank Sawyer for helping me move on.

I grab the throw pillow beside me and tuck it under my arms. The right side of the bed is still made. No dent where Kevin normally sleeps. No half-read biography strewn over the white covers. I wish my shivered breaths were because Kevin will never sleep beside me again. That would be rational. Expected.
Normal.
But Sawyer’s distant voice burns a path over all thoughts of Kevin. One edge of my phone pokes out from my sheets, and I kick my duvet over it, smothering that choking conversation in downy white. An urge to visit an antique store spikes, and my eyes cut to the feather pen and ink on my desk, their imagined story forming in my mind:
A knight writes his wife a last note before he leaves for war.

I dig my hands into the center of my pillow, gripping at something, anything, trying to understand why my thoughts keep wandering to Sawyer when I should be heartbroken over Kevin. My thumbs find the beads I embroidered in large rose patterns, each flower made of recycled colored stones.

Yellow.
The belt I found at a secondhand shop in New York.

Pink.
The thick bracelet from an antique store on Queen Street.

Red.
The necklaces someone tossed in the trash.

Hands created these beads. Imaginations wove them into art. People bought, loved, and discarded them. But I’ve given them new life. The smooth surfaces calm me—like the moon taming a rough sea. Realization ebbs and flows with the movements of my thumbs. I may have an unhealthy crush on Sawyer and had hoped things would have played out differently, but he’s not the reason I broke up with Kevin. Not really. I shed so many tears this past year while sorting through my feelings for Kevin, it’s like I’ve already done the getting-over-him part. The ice cream eating. The lonely nights sitting solo in a café listening to Regina Spektor.

Clutching the pillow tighter, I lean forward and rescue my phone from below my duvet. Shay will be fast asleep by now, so I pull up Raven’s name, my fellow night owl.

She answers after one ring. “Yep.”

I tuck up my knees, the beaded pillow squashing against my chest. “I broke up with Kevin.”

“Holy shit.” A toilet flushes in the background, and I scrunch my nose. Why she takes her phone into the bathroom baffles me. The sound of running water, the click of a shutting door, then, “I knew you were planning on it, but when it didn’t happen after that night at O’Day’s, I figured you were having second thoughts. But Jesus—are you okay? Do you need me to come over?” She finishes with another “Holy shit.”

“I’m fine, but thanks,” I say, wishing Sawyer sounded a fraction as concerned as Raven.

“Give me a sec while I change. I just walked in from a movie.”

Hunching farther forward, I tug my braid over my shoulder and pick at the split ends. As far as breakups go, mine couldn’t have gone smoother. Every fear I’d had of hurting Kevin was unfounded. When I mustered up the nerve to do the deed, he smiled at me, actually
smiled
. He agreed as I described our relationship as platonic, nodding the whole while. He even echoed my thoughts when he said the notion of losing me as a friend is what’s kept
him
from ending things. He’s wanted to move on as much as I have, and I didn’t have a clue. By the end, my need to shop had decreased, but that call with Sawyer brought the sensation rushing back.

“Okay. I’m done.” Raven breathes heavily as though she’s been running around. “Here are my words of wisdom: No matter how hard this is, you did the right thing. The hard thing, but the right thing. Don’t question that.”

My voice must have betrayed my uncertainty, the slight quiver unsettling. I slow my breaths. Kevin may be my best friend, but friends aren’t lovers. If Raven had known Kevin and I haven’t had sex in a year, she would have waltzed over to our apartment and forced us to face the facts of our chaste relationship ages ago. Probably after claiming Kevin was a eunuch or blind.

I huff out a laugh, picturing her tattooed arms flailing with indignation. “I know it was right. I don’t feel sad, really. It’s been a tough year. If anything I’m relieved. And I think we’ll stay friends. Kevin’s been feeling all the same stuff, struggling to end it. We’ll need time. A break, I guess. We still love each other…just not how couples should.” I drop my hair in favor of picking at the blue polish on my nails. “I called Sawyer,” I add.

The man who doesn’t want me.

“
That
deserves another holy shit.” When I don’t comment, she says, “Do you seriously think you can get away with sharing that tidbit and not elaborating? He must have flipped. Has he booked a flight?”

I glance down at the shards of blue dotting my duvet. “Not even close. He doesn’t seem interested in me like that. I must have read the signs wrong. Not that I broke up with Kevin for him, it’s just…”

“This requires wine,” she says as my voice trails off. Glass clinking against tile travels through the line, then the pop of a cork, liquid sloshing—probably Australian Shiraz. “First,” she finally says, “I know you didn’t break up with Kevin for Sawyer. If you ask me, you haven’t been in love with Kevin for years. So don’t worry about what other people think or say if you move on quickly. People, for the most part, are idiots. And Sawyer? That boy is gaga over you. A blind man can see that. Give me the instant replay.”

So I do. His lengthy silences. His lack of emotion. No sign he even cared. I don’t mention how differently I envisioned my moment of revelation. In my favorite fantasy, he booked a flight, and our meeting at the airport—a public affair where we ran at each other—was
Gone with the Wind
epic. (There may have been glitter and roses.) I finally felt his hands on my body. His lips on mine. In my fantasy.

A lump swells in my throat, my first sign of tears since Kevin closed the front door. I clench my jaw to keep my emotions at bay.

“Interesting,” Raven says when I’ve finished. She’s probably perched on her purple couch, feet tucked underneath her, black hair fanning over her shoulder.

I toss my throw pillow off the side of the bed and steady my voice. “If by ‘interesting’ you mean ‘What a horrible way to find out you’re into someone and they’re oblivious to you,’ then I’ll go with ‘interesting.’”

“No. By ‘interesting’ I mean, ‘The boy is scared shitless you’re no longer off-limits.’”

I shake my head at my empty room. “You didn’t hear him, Rave. It was like he was bored to be on the phone with me. Like I was describing the weather. It was awful.”

“I get it, but his actions since Aspen say otherwise. The two of you talk about everything. Not just work and design stuff. The man has it bad. He just doesn’t know it yet. When’s the last time he was in a relationship longer than a few weeks?”

I catch my breath as a spider saunters over my duvet. Careful not to bounce it under the sheets, I grab a Kleenex from my bedside table and squash the little guy. If only I could squash the icky feeling squirming through my gut at the mention of Sawyer’s entourage of women. I toss the tissue into my wicker basket. “He had a relationship during high school, but it only lasted a few months.”

“Exactly my point. He doesn’t know what to do with his feelings for you. Give it time. I mean, you work together, so it’s not like he can avoid you. But I bet it gets super weird.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

“Just calling it like I see it.”

And she’s right. After that call, working with him will be as pleasant as sewing sandpaper. “His reaction’s probably for the best,” I say.
Lie.
“I should focus on being on my own.”
Lie.
“Take some time for myself.”

Lie. Lie. Lie.

An urge twitches through my fingers then, an impulse.
Shop. Search. Scour.
Find tossed belongings, bits and pieces with history and stories yet to tell. Stories that will help me forget mine. I knew this need would resurface, felt it picking at me all day. Maybe, in the end, Sawyer’s reaction
was
for the best. He’s never seen me like this—jumpy and desperate to browse antiques. He and his pleasure-seeking ways would probably run for cover. A small shopping trip wouldn’t hurt. Other people do it. Call it retail therapy, and everyone snickers at the joke. That’s all this would be. Just a little something to help me come to terms with my new life.

“You’ll have to put off that alone time,” Raven says. “I feel a flu coming on—high fever, sweats. I think I need to call in sick tomorrow and spend the day with you.”

I nearly bite through my lip. I can’t sift through thrift stores with Raven. It has to be on my own. Always on my own. “Honestly, I’m fine. Don’t skip work on my account.”

She responds with a dramatic
pffft
. “Nonsense. It’s already done. I’ll take any excuse to get out of that place, and my classes are in the middle of art projects. A substitute teacher just has to walk in and supervise. We can wander around downtown at those vintage places you like. Go for lunch. I’ll text Shay in case she’s free, and call you in the morning.”

I force a swallow, warmed she cares, but agitated. I’ll have to lose the girls early enough to do my own shopping. Accustomed to hiding my anxiety, I smile my sweetest smile as though she can see me. “Okay, thanks. It’ll be nice to spend the day with you.”

And it will. I’d be lost without Raven and Shay. Still, the frenetic need to
buy, buy, buy
has me hanging up quick.

I swing my legs out of bed and hurry to my craft room. The door barely opens, the stacks of shirts and jackets behind it fighting for dominance. I squeeze inside and sit on the floor. Last time Raven saw this room, she gave it a once-over and threatened to put me on an episode of
Hoarders
. Her tone was laced with amusement, and I did my best to grin and laugh at her joke. Internally I came undone. I had to remind myself she doesn’t know about my property. She’s never seen the farmhouse. Her words were said in jest.

I lie down and close my eyes.

“I have to buy this.” Raven holds up a black T-shirt printed with a bikini-clad Princess Leia holding a massive gun.

Shay peeks over the cable-knit sweater she’s admiring. “It
is
black, so it should go with the rest of your morbid wardrobe.”

I run my hand over a suede purse and glance at Raven’s tight black jeans, black boots, and black leather jacket, all accented by her straight black hair and thick bangs. “Don’t listen to her, Rave. Black suits you. It’s your signature style.”

She winks at me. “I knew I was friends with you for a reason. Shay, on the other hand…” She narrows her dark eyes at Shay, who blows her a kiss back. Raven throws the T-shirt over her shoulder. “I may not be the badass I was in high school, but I can still dress the part. I’m trying it on.”

She disappears into the dressing room, and Shay nods at the purse in my hands. “It’s nice. Not as cool as the ones you design, but it would totally go with your flowy tops. You should get it.”

I tighten my grip on the soft suede, my neck prickling like it does when I need to buy something. I roll my fingers through the fringed bottom and force a quiet “Maybe.”

Two stores into our shopping spree, and I’ve purchased one top, one belt, and a pair of earrings, each transaction easing the stress of last night’s call with Sawyer. But I can’t overdo it. Not with the girls here. I release the purse, adding it to my mental list of must-buy items for when I return later today. I apply some strawberry lip gloss to busy my fidgety hands.

“I’m proud of you,” she says, probably assuming my limited words have to do with Kevin, not my urge to buy the entire store. She squeezes my elbow. “So many people stay in relationships because it’s easier than moving on. Exhibit A.” She makes a face and points at herself.

I shake my head. “But look where you are now. My nana always said every step in life, good or bad, takes us where we need to go. If you hadn’t suffered through your relationship with Richard, you might not have met Kolton.”

I frown, unsure if my delay in ending things with Kevin hurt my chances with Sawyer. From his reaction last night, I doubt I ever had a shot.

I focus on the vintage dresses decorating the walls like works of art, the racks below bursting with used clothing. Shay wanders through the cramped space, stops at a shelf, and puts a red sun hat over her mass of brown curls. She throws a man’s vest over her bomber jacket and picks up a carnival mask from a basket.

Holding the elaborate leather piece over her eyes, she says, “Your nana was wise. I hope you take her advice, too. And if you ever need to vent, even after I’m gone, I’m just a call away.”

Her hazel eyes glaze through the feathered mask, a common occurrence since she’s decided to move across the country. More often than not, she recovers quickly and chatters about the interior design firms she’s considering. Her face lights up when she goes on about making things more permanent with Kolton and his son. After spending an afternoon with her and Jackson at the library, I’m not surprised at how close they’ve become.

“Just a call away,” I agree. “And a short plane ride.” I grab one of the masks from the basket, this one decorated with rhinestones. I mimic Shay and hold it over my eyes, hoping to disguise my rising emotion. Crying over her move won’t help settle her nerves. “Five hours is nothing. I plan on visiting often.” But I’ll miss her like crazy.

“You better.”

We nod our silly, masked heads.

She grabs a purple cloche hat and tugs it over my messy bun, her smile fading. “Raven mentioned you spoke to Sawyer, and it didn’t go well.”