Arizona Allspice (58 page)

What? She thought I was perfect? What?
And if that wasn’t confusing enough, I was even more perplexed that she didn’t just flip me off and walk away.
I cross my arms. “I’m
so
perfect that you couldn’t stand to make my life even more perfect by being with me? Is that supposed to make me feel better? You’re crazy.”

Elaine’s eyes flicker with resentment. I knew she didn’t like that word, ‘crazy’. I didn’t care. It dawned on me that this was the last tactic I hadn’t tried; Manny’s tactic: Arguing. A tactic I’d thought was too aggressive a manner for someone as short-tempered as me to handle an issue as sensitive as this one. This is working
though
and, underneath my withdrawal-induced bad attitude, the tornado of anxiety within me is so tranquil and strangely settled that I know it’s what needed to happen all along.

“I’m not saying that just to brush you off.” Then her eyes lower in shame. “For the longest time, Joey, I told myself you were a woman-beater.”

A flushed feeling comes over me, like the one I experienced before my panic attack. However, I maintain a poker face and keep on. “You never did forgive me for hitting you. I knew you wouldn’t.”

“No, this was before that, back in high school. And still I thought you were perfect. For God’s sakes, I thought you smacked your girlfriends around and it didn’t matter. I was still drawn to you. You walked into a room and I felt you there. I would get
goosebumps
. I’d lose my train of thought. Believe me,” she urges at seeing my brows furrow in shock and slight disbelief. “I hated that I couldn’t control my reaction to you. Deep inside, I knew who you really were and what you might mean to me. It scared me. So I told myself horrible things about you. In actuality, everything you do is so honorable. Everyone’s your friend, and I just seem to screw up every relationship I have. My best friend left town without saying goodbye. I didn’t know my dad was sick. I didn’t see that my own mother was being
beaten.
That’s saying something, Joey. I’m cold and self-absorbed.”

“No, you’re not,” I state plainly, trying hard to hide my commiseration as tears trickle from her beautiful eyes.

“It’s true, Joey. Let me admit it. I valued my comfort more than I valued your heart. All this time I’ve just been deflecting, putting the focus on you instead of my own flaws and fears. You scare me, because I know once I let you in, I won’t be able to control what loving you could do to me. I’m stubborn and controlling, even when I don’t know what I’m doing. I think about Mama and how she didn’t look out for her own health ‘cause she was so busy keeping Manny and me happy. She loved everything about my Daddy, even the sickness that made him want to harm her. So, isn’t it unhealthy that I love everything about you?”

“What?” I breathe. An intoxicating sensation washes over me.  

“I love everything about you, Joey. Even the parts of you that I think could change for the better.”

“You love me?”

“Yes,” her voice shakes with emotion and rises in frustration, “but how can I say I love you when I want you to change? That’s selfish and wrong! And how is it possible that I trust you with my life and yet I’m still afraid of being with you? It doesn’t make sense and you don’t deserve that from me. I love you, but it’s all just too complicated”

I didn’t let her finish.

******

He kisses me and my inner quarrels fall divinely silent. I kiss him back fervently, until I’m breathless and my lips are swollen and tingling. I can’t deny it anymore. I feel the kiss through my entire body. All along I’ve been trying to
know
if loving Joey was right. I’ve been combing through my brain trying to understand my feelings, but with my eyes closed, his body and lips pressed against mine, I can
feel
that this is right. My heart, mind, and soul have come to an agreement: Joey is
the one
. Tears of bliss burst from my eyes and our kiss becomes more tender, slow and savoring. Too soon, Joey breaks it. He cradles my face in his hands and says, “It’s not complicated now. I love you and you love me. I can be better for you. I
want
to. Could you tell me again? That you...”

“I love you.” I laugh through my tears. His lips crash into mine for another ardent kiss. “I love you,” I utter once more.

“I want to make you proud of me,” he whispers, his eyes glistening.

My heartbeat gallops with happiness. “I want you to be proud of me, too. I want Mama to be proud as well.” I smile and glance at her grave marker.

“Yeah, Miss
Marna
, too.”
He softly wipes the tears from my face with his thumbs and we make our way out of the Oaks Cemetery. I keep myself molded into his side and he keeps me close to him in the security of his arms.  The kisses he plants on my temple and at my ear causes a slow walk back to the truck since each teasing kiss leads us to one deep kiss after another. We hold hands on the way back to Cadence. Linked, we walk into Joey’s empty house. He leads me down the hall by the hand. I know where we are going, but I ignore my nervousness. I trust him more than I trust myself.  Inside his bedroom, we become more exploratory with our hands. I assist Joey in removing his shirt. We pause, searching each other’s eyes. Then I reach up and bury my hands in his hair. He bows his head and I pass my lips across where there are freckles; below his eyes, across the bridge of his nose and under the other eye.

Standing at the foot of the bed, I take my hands from his hair and ghost them over his sculpted torso. Joey’s blue eyes become intense and hungry. My fingertips graze over his freckled shoulders, his broad chest, down his abdomen, and stop just above the waist of his jeans before traveling back up to his chest. He shudders and groans lightly. Like stage fright, I suddenly doubt my abilities and my hands start to tremble. “Joey, I’m not sure I know how to do this right,” I whisper timidly.

 “I don’t want this to be about me,” he shakes his head. He plants a row of kisses along my jaw and up to my ear. He nuzzles the sensitive space behind it and then his soft hot lips caress my earlobe. He whispers. “This is about pleasing you, Laney.” My legs go unstable with quivers just as he grabs me tight against him, locks his lips with mine and pushes us towards the bed. Carefully we lower ourselves onto his full sized mattress. His hand slides under my shirt as he devours my mouth. I bite playfully at his lower lip and he responds by claiming my mouth with a possessive suction that melts me further into the sheets beneath me. Once I recover enough to think straight, I start to trace his spine with soft strokes of my fingers. He shivers at the sensation of my fingertips. His hot hand finally makes its way up to the taut, tingling contents of my bra when a familiar voice calls out from the front of the house.

“Anybody home?
Joeeey
?
Elaaaine
?”

We freeze immediately. Both wide-eyed, we stare at each other silently until Joey clears his throat and responds. “Be there in a minute!” he yells. “You stay here,” he tells me. He slides off the bed and heads for the door.

“Hey! Put your shirt back on!” I whisper loudly, dismayed. He stops, shrugs and retrieves his shirt from the floor. He gives me a wink before slipping out the door. Horrified, I sit up against the head board and listen to the low rumbling of Joey’s voice and the lilt of Miss Amelia’s voice as they speak to one another too quiet for me to hear. Until, I hear her excitedly yelp “Really?!” and Joey shushing her while chuckling. After five minutes Joey returns to the room with a big smile on his face. He falls onto the bed.

 “She’s gonna go hang out with Frank for the rest of the day.”

“What did you tell her?”

“That you were spending the night.”

“Oh gosh!
This is
humiliating
.” I slump back down to lay flat on the bed and cover my flaming face with my hands. I’m jolted when I feel Joey’s talented mouth sucking on my neck. “Joey…I don’t want to do this, um, right now,” I manage to say between breaths.

“I know.” He kisses me on the chin and quickly on the mouth. “I’m sort of glad my mom dropped by because this is not how I imagined our first time,” he says.

I raise an eyebrow. “Don’t lie.”

Joey blushes slightly. “Okay, so maybe I
have
imagined it this way once or twice.”

I burst out laughing. Joey buries his face in a pillow and laughs along with me. “Ideally, I wanted it to happen in the near future,” he finally says. “In someplace that was
our
place or at least our place for four days and five nights, on an island somewhere, maybe,” Joey’s eyes gleam. I throw my arms around his neck and hug him tight. My stomach flutters like a flock of butterflies. He’s talking about a honeymoon. It was always my hope to give myself to my husband. I am so lucky that Joey is an honorable guy who respects that. Maybe in a year or so, my dream will come true. Today has felt like a dream already.

We remain in bed the whole day, leaving only to grab some fresh fruit from the refrigerator. Snacking on plums and pears and feeding each other strawberries, we relax in the opulence of the love between us. We talk for hours and hours, hanging on to each other’s every word and delighting in the slightest contact of our bodies as well as the incredible intimacy of our kisses, until at last we fall asleep. I stir awake in the middle of the night. Through heavy eyelids I admire the full moon glowing in the
curtainless
bedroom window. I remember one of Joey’s poems.
Bright moon mirrored in my dark eyes. Wish that I could feel that bright and full.
I don’t have to wish for that any longer. I feel just like that moon. Joey does too. I smile, snuggle back into his chest and fall asleep.

******

 “Okay, time for a goalkeeper drill! That means you, Max!” I chuckle as our goalie jogs quickly to the center of the goal. “We’re going up against Los
Exterminadores
this weekend! Their goalie is nothing to laugh at! Nor is their footwork! Max, we’re going to come at you from every angle! I need my forwards to step up to this line! Push the ball to the left, to the right, straight ahead, switch it up!”

I walk along the edge of the penalty box and point out a spot for them to stand on. Once each has a soccer ball, I blow the whistle and one by one they charge towards Max, using their dribbling skills to confuse him as to where they will kick. Max deflects or catches every single ball. Max shrugs his shoulders at his own impressive display while all the forwards’ shoulders slump in disappointment. The servers turn around to me, waiting for their punishments.

“Good, Max. The rest of you, don’t sweat this. We’ve got plenty of time to sharpen up. Just try harder next time. Stay focused. Okay?”

None of them answer. They stare at me puzzled. Worriedly, they look to their teammates to the left and the right of them. Both my eyebrows go up when they start whispering to each other in Spanish. Finally, I clear my throat to get their attention.

“What’s the problem, guys?”

Niko
steps forward. “Uh, Joey?” he refers to me by name rather than as his captain, “Are you feeling alright? You know, in the head and all?”

I guffaw. “I’m fine! Where is this coming from?”

“It’s just that you’re being sort of…
nice,
” he gulps.

“Really?
Was I a mean captain before today?”

“No! No,” all the team members respond suddenly.

I laugh. “I’m just feeling good for once. Don’t be startled.” My team gapes at me with question marks on all their faces. I try to stop it, but a grin spreads across my face. I shrug. “She loves me.”