Something's Come Up (13 page)

Sidney let go of her and chuckled. “So she’s not ugly after all. Congrats.” He stood and walked away as if he nearly threw down with his frat brothers daily. Knowing Sidney, he probably did.

I watched him to make sure he continued on walking, then turned back to her. She looked embarrassed and a little shy. I figured the direct approach was in order.

“Why are you here?”

“You asked me to come,” she said defensively.

“Why’d you bother?” I shot back.

“Because I wanted to. I like you, Pace.”

“And the way you answered my phone call tonight. That’s how you talk to people you like?”

“That’s how I talk to
everyone
.” She sighed, but when I started to turn away from her she stood and wrapped her arms around my waist. “I’m sorry. I suck at this. But I really do like you. I don’t want to stop seeing you.”

My stoicism failed me, and I relaxed against her, enjoying the familiar way she melded into my hands. I firmly turned her chin up to me. “I don’t want to see another man touch you again; you understand me?”

She nodded. I fingered her scarf possessively.

“So I’m your girlfriend, huh?” she teased, a satisfied smile turning her amazing lips upright.

“I guess so. I supposed I’ll have to take you out now. Buy you dinner first.” I heaved a sigh of mock annoyance, but I took her hand in mine and led her promptly out of the bar.

I
t would be impossible not to recall with perfect clarity the moment I met Pace’s parents; those two were
anything
but forgettable. In order to tell this story properly, I have to go back a bit to explain myself.

The last week in February, Pace and I had finally decided to “go out.” As in a real, honest-to-goodness date. We weren’t sure how else to handle our situation—I had an uncomfortable, driving urge to see him and he seemed fixated on staking some sort of claim with me. We agreed we would make a real and true attempt at least twice a week to “date.” Hopefully we’d see if we had anything in common or actually liked each other outside of sexual festivities.

The term awkward didn’t begin to cover how this felt at first. After a couple bungling trips to the movies that ended up X-rated on our end, we agreed to approach it as a game and that loosened things up a bit. Unfortunately, Pace and I playing things fast and loose led to some unwanted attention for us both.

I took him to a particularly cool bijou theater that was showing Casablanca. We were mildly entertained by the kitschy style of the old-time acting and a few choice lines, such as one guy turning to another and saying, “And remember, this gun is pointed right at your heart.”

Pace and I laughed when the other dude replied, “That is my
least
vulnerable spot.”

We got bored after that. I found a way to amuse myself. And him. And anyone watching, most likely.

A week later, we saw a show on Broadway and decided to go out for drinks afterward in Times Square. Admittedly, we tended to get a bit frisky when we drink and our public displays of affection are pretty sultry. When I ducked into the ladies’ room, two fat-assed tourists from some flyover state cornered me by the hand dryers.

“You know, young lady, there are families trying to dine here tonight.” She turned her pug nose up at me and I looked over my shoulder like she was talking to someone else.

“Yeah. Why don’t you get a room?” her soccer mom sidekick chimed in, fluffing her out of date hairstyle in the mirror.

I smiled sweetly, remembering my mom’s advice on the first day of high school.

Kill them with kindness, Steph.

Oh, I’ll kill them alright, Ma. Each and every one of them.

“Why don’t you put the Ho Ho down and drop fifty pounds, Hoss?” I beamed like Miss America as I brushed past the two heifers like they were unfashionable clothes on a sale rack.

Pug Nose called after me. “You know your babies are going to be zebras, right?”

I kept walking, but I felt my face catch fire. By the time I got back to the table, I was fuming.

Pace pushed up his glasses and looked up from checking his phone. When he saw my face, he frowned. “What’s wrong, Red?”

“Nothing a little shock therapy won’t cure,” I muttered, snatching up the check. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

He took my hand in his and leaned his elbows on the table. “Tell me what happened.”

I pulled away from his grasp and looked around, paranoid. I was angry that I’d let some hillbilly’s opinion taint our good time. I realized I was shaking uncontrollably as I waved the check in the air at our waitress. “I want you to take me home.”

Later, when we were safely in my apartment, I explained what had happened. Pace was unimpressed.

“How can you not be fucking livid?” I gestured wildly, stalking back and forth like a crazy person. I’d been obsessively replaying the scene over and over during the entire cab ride home. I imagined coming up with a better insult and delivering a flying split kick to both women's empty heads.

He shed his suit coat and rubbed his eyebrows. “To put this in terms your friends from the ladies’ room would understand: this ain't my first rodeo. I know it’s yours, Stephanie, but I promise if we continue to date it won’t be your last.”

I shook my head as I followed him into my kitchen and watched him open the fridge. “Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Did I fall into a manhole cover and climb out in 1955?”

“It ain’t pretty, but you get used to it, Red. Here. Have a beer.”

A week later, I modeled my new t-shirt for him, proudly displaying the words “Zebra Nation” in black and white stripes. He smiled tolerantly and kissed me on the nose, then dragged me out for lunch without demanding I change first.

Pace and I were in the middle of one of our dare wars that day—a unique pastime of ours that I
really
enjoyed. So when he took me to a kosher deli for lunch and dared me to fake an orgasm, like Meg Ryan’s scene in
When Harry Met Sally
, I wasn’t the least bit surprised. I told him to get bent, though. I was really enjoying my Reuben and had no intention of performing like a trained monkey. He was still pouting about it when we left. Since he looked like a kid who’d let go of his balloon, I threw him a bone while we were getting out of the cab.

He covered his smirk and held the door for me as we entered his building. Considering my unladylike behavior a moment before, I thought it rather chivalrous.

“I can’t believe you flashed your tits at that cab driver,” he finally said.

I snorted. “I can’t believe
anything
I do still surprises you.”

“Nice bra, by the way. I’m going to enjoy removing it with my teeth.”

We stepped onto the elevator and he pushed me against the wall before the door even closed. His mouth was on mine, his tongue undulating against mine in rhythm with his hips. His hand slid inside my unzipped jacket and groped my breast greedily.

I gasped air as I broke away from the kiss and saw that the elevator door hadn't closed at all. There was a sharply-dressed, middle-aged black man holding his hand against it, his expression best described as disapproving. Over his shoulder, an older black woman dressed like Condoleezza Rice’s stunt double shook her head. Her lips were a thin, pale line as she placed a graceful hand on her hip. From the murderous look on her face, I assumed she wasn’t just a neighbor. Pace continued to suck on my neck without discretion, and I slapped his shoulder more than once before he stopped and fixed me with an amused frown.

“Feeling violent today, Sugar? I kept the crop we used last time...”

I cleared my throat and silently shifted my eyes nervously over his shoulder. He glanced back to see what I was looking at, annoyed that I’d stopped him. Straightening to his full height and taking his hands off me like I was a hot iron, he turned toward the couple, blocking them from my view.

“Dad… Mom…” he murmured.

I slammed my eyes shut, thankful they couldn’t see my face as I tried to compose myself. I glanced down to see if Pace had unzipped my pants—something he was famous for doing in public—and saw the bold and jagged “Zebra Nation” across my chest.

FML.

“Pace.” His father nodded as he stepped gracefully onto the elevator. “Nice to see you, son.”

“Yes,
Carrington
,” his mother accentuated, looking at me pointedly, “it’s good to see you.”

Pace rolled his eyes. “She knows my birth name, mother. What I don’t understand, though, is why you insist on using it as a litmus test when women are around me.”

The elegant woman blushed, but cleared her throat to try to cover it up. It was as good a time as any to make my exit.

“Probably because that name is verbal birth control,” I piped up, scooting around them. “I’ve gotta go. Pace, thank you for lunch—”

He grabbed my hand, pulling me away from the elevator door. “You don’t have to leave. Stephanie, this is my mother, Celia, and my father…Carrington.”

Fuckity fuck FUCK! Carrington Pace Turner III. The third!!! Duh, Steph!

Pace smiled the most fantastically manufactured smile I’d ever seen. And I believed it.

His mother looked horrified as she fumbled to find her manners. She stuck out her hand. “Stephanie, is it?”

I nodded, shaking her hand. “Stephanie Brier.”

“Well, nice to meet you, Stephanie. That’s a…colorful shirt you’re wearing.”

“
Mother
.” Pace ground his teeth together so hard I should see his jaw clench beneath his skin.

The disapproving look on her face nearly mirrored the look on that white trash cow’s in the restaurant bathroom from the other night. I knew what I had to do.

“Thank you, Celia.” I smiled and turned to Pace’s father. “Carrington, it’s a pleasure to meet you. Pace speaks very highly of you.”

Truth be told, the only time I’d ever heard a single mention of his parents was the night he told me what they did for a living, which was the same night Pace told me his plans to sue the shit out of all kinds of high-powered people. Even though the elevator was tiny, I was glad that Pace had trusted me with that information to give me an emotional leg up on this oppressive couple in front of me.

“Please, young lady,” Carrington II smiled sweetly, “call me Cary.”

My face burned as I tried not to laugh in his face. There was no way I could use the nickname I used with Pace when I was being a total ass. Pace slowly slid his hand behind me and pinched my ass, evidently worried about the same thing but demanding full control out of me all the same. My instinct to tell him to fuck off was overridden by my need to get through this little parental rendezvous in one piece.

Once the elevator doors opened, Pace was the only one with enough constitution to exit, while the rest of us stood in awkward silence. Eventually, we trooped down the hall to his apartment, each lost in our own world of discomfort. I was certain I’d hear the clicking of Celia’s heels in my nightmares for eternity. I took a seat in the chair at the back of the living room. It was the only place in the entire apartment we’d never fucked.

“I forgot you were in the city this week. How’s the conference?” Pace asked his parents as he took his parents’ coat and gloves like the gracious host he was and hung them carefully on cedar hangers and placed them in the coat closet. It looked startlingly choreographed, but natural.

“You wouldn’t forget if you checked your email once in a while. The conference is well done, as always. There’s a symposium this afternoon about maternal mortality in the United States as compared to the rest of the developed world. I’m really looking forward to it,” Celia replied as she turned for the more formal of Pace’s two couches.

I half-wondered if it was in here just for her, the way the stiffness of the upholstery matched her starched skirt and blazer. Her skin was the same milky shade of mocha as Pace’s, and her eyes were the same amber color as his, too. She was tall, probably about 5’10”, but closer to six feet with her heels on, and her hair was secured back in a tight French twist. She looked like she commanded attention, and liked it, too.

The apple doesn’t fall far...

To prevent myself from sinking into full observer status, I spoke up. “Do you work for a hospital or do you have a private practice?”

Celia smiled only slightly and looked between me and Pace for a moment. It dawned on me that she likely didn’t think her son and I were serious, since I didn’t know this very basic detail. Pace was on his way to the bar at the edge of the living room, ostensibly to continue his hostess-with-the-mostest routine and serve everyone a cocktail. He nodded, displaying a study in charisma by rotating looking each person in the eyes as he followed along the conversation.

“I work for The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Labor and delivery.”

As she spoke, her husband, who looked more like Pace’s brother, Adrian, from pictures I’d seen, took a seat next to her. He had a slightly darker complexion and looked significantly younger than his wife, though the absence of a scowl does wonders for age.

He, at least, smiled at me, but before he could speak, Celia continued, “Cary is a top-level researcher for L. G. Greene Laboratories.”