If You Lived Here, You'd Be Home Now (36 page)

“No, it’s not that. And you’re not. It’s the fact that you’re willing to say things like that. You’re vulnerable, Rickie.
Open and honest and able to admit that sometimes things suck.”

“If that’s what you’re looking for in a girlfriend…” I twisted my mouth sideways. “But I’ve got to say that that perfection
thing sounds more appealing to
me
.”

“You’ve never had to live with it.” He settled back against the cushions and put his hand back on my leg. “Plus you’re cute.
Did I mention that?” He rubbed his cheek against the top of my head.

“Don’t be so patronizing,” I said. “Calling me cute…”

“You started it.”

“I have to be honest with you,” I said. “I was kind of hating on Gracie a little bit over the last few months. I was jealous.”

He said slowly, “That night—last Saturday, after the party—she accused me of deliberately sneaking off with you to my office.”

“Why
did
you invite me to go with you?”

“I swear I wasn’t planning to. I’d just had a drink or two and I wanted to get away from her and what she was doing with those
movie stars, and I saw you standing in that dress with Pammy’s dick of a father hitting on you—and I just thought I should
take you away somewhere.” He pulled me closer. “Preferably far away and forever.”

“But you didn’t
do
anything. In your office. I wouldn’t have minded, you know. Actually, I was kind of hoping.”

“Technically I was still going out with Gracie. There are rules.”

“For a guy like you, there are.” I took my leg off of his and sat up a little. “Will you tell me what she said?”

“Gracie? About what?”

“You told me she said something that night that made you realize it was really over.”

“Oh.” He hesitated. “She was mad. She didn’t mean it.”

“I won’t hold it against her. I promise. I just want to know what makes a guy like you finally say it’s over.”
So I won’t make the same mistake
.

He looked down at his knees. “She said that there was something wrong with a guy who would keep turning down the chance to
go away for the weekend with his girlfriend”—his voice faltered—“just so he could teach some little spastic kid to be less
spastic.”

“Oh.” I just sat there for a moment. Then I said, “I don’t think he’s
technically
spastic.”

“I doubt she was using it in a medical sense.” He put his hand on my arm. “She knows better. She’s not like that. But she
was angry and hurt and said it without thinking.”

“I know,” I said. “I get that. I’m not mad.”

He put his hands up and let them drop helplessly. “But she still said it. And that was it for me.”

“Would you have broken up with her anyway?”

“I think so. But that moment just made it… very clear.”

“Did you break her heart?”

He looked surprised at the question, like it hadn’t even occurred to him. “I don’t think so. I certainly hope not.”

“But it
is
over, right?” I said. “Definitely over?”

He reached out and took my hand. “I don’t do things quickly,” he said. “But they tend to stay done.”

W
e were alone together in a rapidly darkening apartment with a view of the sun setting over the beach. Everything felt unreal,
like we were moving through an even thicker fog than the one blanketing the coastline at the moment.

We kept doing this dance, coming together to kiss and hold each other, then moving apart again, both of us nervous about pushing
things too far too fast. Andrew, of course, was just naturally careful and cautious. As for me, well, given my history and
what he knew about me, the last thing I wanted to do was come across like some ravenous, sex-crazed nympho. Even if I pretty
much fit that description at the moment.

Anyway, it was nice—no, more than nice, it was incredible—just to be held and kissed as the sun sank lower over the ocean,
and while some parts of my body felt inflamed and desperate for more attention, they could wait. I could wait.

“Would it take anything away from this moment if I said I was hungry?” Andrew asked eventually.

We ordered in Thai food and then I called home to let them know I wasn’t on my way back yet.

“Where are you?” Mom asked.

“The condo, actually.”

“The condo? You mean our condo? At the beach?”

“Yeah.”

“I had no idea you were going there.”

“I didn’t either. Not originally.”

A pause. “Remember to turn the lights off when you leave. And unplug any appliances you use. Is Andrew a safe driver?”

“Very. Just like you’d expect. So, are you okay watching Noah for a while longer?”

“And if I said I wasn’t?”

“I guess I’d rush back. But I don’t want to.”

She relented. “It’s fine. We were thinking of going out to dinner. We’ll take him with us. But, Rickie—”

“What?”

“Be careful.”

“When am I ever not?” I said jovially. “Oh and Mom?”

“What?”

“Thanks for babysitting.”

“You’re welcome.”

It wasn’t easy to get the words out, but I did it: “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“You don’t ever have to find out,” she said and hung up.

“What’ll we do until the food gets here?” Andrew asked with a smile as I put my phone away.

We managed to pass the time.

The food smelled good and I piled heaps of it on my plate, gooey pad thai and some kind of gingery chicken and lots of sticky
rice, and then I took one bite before looking up and catching Andrew’s dark eyes watching me… and I couldn’t eat any more.
I pushed it around on my plate with my fork, waiting for him to finish.

His appetite was apparently unaffected by whatever was destroying mine: he finished off the rest of the food.

Together we tossed the take-out containers back into the bag they had come in, and then I went out into the hallway and threw
it down the garbage chute. When I came back, Andrew was washing the plates in the sink. I leaned against the counter and watched
him, watched his arms with the too-
narrow wrists and the slender forearms and big-knuckled slim fingers as they neatly and efficiently sponged and wiped and
propped up the plates in the dish drain.

“You’re good at that,” I said.

“I’ve had a lot of practice. You could help, you know.”

“Nah. I like watching you.”

A minute later, he put the last dish in the drain and wiped off his hands on a dish towel. “Now what?”

“Want to play Scrabble?”

“I seem to remember that you’re awfully easy to beat.”

“Them’s fighting words,” I said. We went back into the living room and I pulled the game out of the cabinet where Mom stored
it. We set up the board, kneeling on the floor on opposite sides of the coffee table.

Andrew’s very first word was “exotic.”

“You suck,” I said. I made “deluxe,” using his “x.”

“Not bad.” He studied his letters, rearranging them on the wooden rack.

I shifted on my knees restlessly. “You take too long.”

“I can play fast or I can play well.”

“Is it my choice? Because I know which one I’d pick.”

“Here.” He put down the letters to make “wreck.”

“Huh,” I said and played around with my letters, trying out different combinations on the rack.

“Now who’s taking too long?” he said.

“Shut up.” I reached up absently to stroke my eyebrow; I had a habit of fiddling with the ring there when I was thinking.
Only it wasn’t there. I hadn’t put that or the nose stud back since Casino Night. I ran my finger over the unfamiliar smoothness.

“Why’d you take it out?”

I looked up, startled. I hadn’t realized he was watching me. “I don’t know. Wanted to look pretty at the party, I guess, and
just forgot to put it back in.”

“If you didn’t think it made you look pretty, why’d you get it in the first place?”

“Because it made me look like I wasn’t someone’s mother.”

“You don’t look like anyone’s mother,” he said. “Even without the hardware.”

“What do I look like?”

He stared at me a moment, thoughtfully. Then he swept his arm across the table, sending the board and the Scrabble tiles flying.
He got to his feet, pulling me up with him.

“We’re done playing Scrabble?” I said, my breath catching in my throat.

“For the time being.” He pressed against me and our mouths found each other. His hand burrowed inside my hair, feeling the
shape of my head, holding it in place so I couldn’t move away. Not that I wanted to.

Our kissing wasn’t just eager anymore—it was desperate. “I never showed you the bedrooms,” I said against his mouth.

“Show me,” he said and released me. I led him down the hallway, into the room Melanie and I had shared last time we were there.
“Sea horses,” he said because there were patterns of them all around the room, on the blankets and curtains, painted on the
walls. “Which one is yours?”

At first I thought he meant which sea horse and was trying to figure out an answer to that, and then I realized he meant which
bed. “Does it matter?” I said. “But I usually sleep on this one.”

He steered me backwards and gently pushed me down on the bed. I reached my arms up and pulled him down on top
of me. For a while that was enough: we kissed and pressed our bodies together, his hard and heavy on top of mine, the weight
and the feel of him so delicious I didn’t need more. For a while. He moved against me, just a little, maybe even unconsciously,
his hips kind of rolling against mine. Then he stopped and lifted himself up onto his elbows. “I don’t suppose—”

“No, sorry. Do you have anything with you?”

He shook his head. “What about your mom’s medicine cabinet? You said she—”

“Only back home. Not here.”

He gave a funny little sigh. “Oh, well… it’s okay. No rush, right?”

“Right,” I said. “This is nice.” He lowered himself and we kissed some more, our hands slipping under each other’s shirt.
Then I pushed at his chest until he raised himself up again and grunted out a “What?”

“On the other hand,” I said, my voice also a little thick and hoarse, “there’s a drugstore in town. Less than five minutes
away.”

“I like drugstores.” He rolled off of me and onto his feet, then reached out a hand and helped pull me onto mine. “Let’s go.”

“You might want to straighten out your hair,” I said. It was sticking out all over his head.

“You’re one to talk.”

We shared the mirror over the dresser, nudging each other out of the way so we could see, each of us running fingers through
our hair. Mine were shaking a little. “Better?” he asked, turning to me.

“Yeah. Me?”

He tugged on a lock of my hair. “Yeah.” He kissed me
again—very quickly, his mouth open against mine and then gone. “Let’s go.”

In the car, I let my hand linger on his thigh.

“You’re not helping,” he said. “Unless you want me to limp in there.”

“Yes,” I said. “I’d like that.”

He shot me a look. I snuggled my fingers into the space where his thigh met his hip and left them there.

We went into the drugstore together and surveyed the choices on the “family planning” shelf. “If you’re going to be watching,”
he said after a moment, “I’m going to have to go for the extra-extra magnum size.”

“Fine. I’ll leave you alone—I want to get some candy for later, anyway.”

“Really? That’s what you’re thinking about right now? Snacks?”

“No,” I said. “That’s not what I’m thinking about. Hurry up.”

We met at the cash register a couple of minutes later. Andrew paid and we headed back toward the car. We were both quiet and
tense on the short ride back to the condo, but in a good way.

“Where were we?” he said when we were back in the apartment and the door had swung shut behind us.

“Playing Scrabble?”

He answered that by tugging my jacket down off my shoulders. I pulled it the rest of the way off and he was already grabbing
at my T-shirt, yanking it up until I took over and hauled it over my head. I ran down the hallway then—even though we were
alone, it felt like we should be in the bedroom, not out in the living room, maybe because it was my parents’ place—and he
followed close behind. When I turned around,
he was naked from the waist up—must have discarded his own T-shirt along the way—and reaching for me. The feel of his naked
skin against my stomach and chest and arms was so blissful I closed my eyes and gave a little moan of delight.

“I haven’t even done anything yet,” he said, amused. But that wasn’t true for much longer. We were both in a hurry and it
didn’t take long for everything else to come off and for us to join the sea horses dancing on the bed.

We didn’t make it back to LA that night. I called around nine to see if it was okay for us to sleep over at the condo. I was
worried my mother would be annoyed that I wanted them to babysit overnight, but she was just relieved we weren’t driving back
in the dark.

She put Noah on the phone so I could say good night to him. “I’m staying at the beach place tonight,” I told him. “I’ll see
you in the morning.”

“Can I sleep in Grandma and Grandpa’s room?”

“That’s kind of up to them.”

“Grandma said I could sleep in a sleeping bag on their floor if I
had
to.”

“Fine with me.”

“Is Coach Andrew coming to play games with me tomorrow morning?”

“That’s a very good question. Hold on. You coming tomorrow?” I asked Andrew, who was lying next to me. We were kind of cramped
in the twin bed, but neither of us was complaining. “To play with Noah?”

“Sure,” he said. “Just not too early.”

“He’ll be there,” I said into the phone. “So get a good night’s sleep. I love you, Noey.”

“Love you too, Mom. Can I watch TV until bedtime?”

“It’s already bedtime.”

“Can I watch TV anyway?”

“Take it up with Grandma. She’s in charge tonight.” I hung up and twisted toward Andrew.

“Hi,” he said.

“Hi.”

He took my hand and raised it to his lips, then lightly traced the tattoo on my wrist with his thumb. “ ‘
Noah,
’ ” he read. “Were you worried you’d forget his name?”