"In a bit, I think."
"And now the woman you"ve been waiting all week for," Randall boomed, "Celine Griffin!"
Celine closed her eyes, whispered something to herself, then whisked onstage with a brilliant smile.
I stared at Tess, not a word in my head that I could even articulate. She looked... great. Smelled great. She was wearing a clinging aqua jumpsuit that I knew from personal experience unzipped all the way down to her crotch. It clung to parts of her so suggestively that I wasn"t sure she was wearing a st.i.tch underneath it. Finally, I found my voice and produced a quiet, "Hi."
"I"m glad you"re back safe," she said. "I thought you might make it back for tonight, though." Then she hugged me, hugged me the way Aunt Dot had hugged me, barely touching.
Celine"s first comment drew a laugh.
"Thank you for everything you did at my place."
She shrugged. "When I woke up it seemed the least I could do. I had my own laundry."
"You changed the sheets."
She flushed and looked away. "I"m sure that will be welcome this evening."
"Yeah. After motels..."
Tess said something, but it was drowned out by another burst of laughter. In the following lull she said, "You"re missing the show."
"I know." I let my eyes drink her in. She seemed distant, and I didn"t know what to make of it. "Aren"t you going to see it?"
"Sure. A couple of women invited me to sit with them."
"Oh. Okay."
Tess walked toward the stage door stairs.
"Tess? What"s wrong?"
She turned briefly to face me. "Nothing," she lied, with a big fake smile on her face. "Be safe."
Stung by her unwillingness to talk about whatever was bothering her, I said, "Don"t do anything I wouldn"t do."
"Or anyone?"
What the heck had that meant?
I followed her into the audience and she sat down alongside someone I didn"t know, but then again, I"d missed most of the chances to mingle with the ladies. I also found a seat. Paying attention to Celine was difficult, even though, judging by the howls of laughter, she was at the top of her form. When she came down the main stairs into the audience, it was easier to forget that Tess was sitting a few rows back.
"All you grownups come back later for another set, just for the over-eighteen crowd, if you follow, but I thought what I"d do now is ask some questions." She paused next to two women, each with a small child on her lap. Carefully, she got the nearest child to answer a few questions about his age and his moms" names.
"What does Mommy Bet do to make money? What"s her job?"
From where I sat I saw the mother in question put her face in her hand as if she dreaded the answer.
The clear, piping voice answered, "She rents U-Hauls."
After the laughter died down, Celine said, "Never work with kids. They upstage you every time. What does Mommy Nina do?"
"She"s a therapist."
"That"s what I like," Celine quipped, "the convenience of one-stop shopping. Rent the U-Haul, proceed directly to therapy."
I laughed as heartily as anyone, but I still wasn"t losing myself in the performance. I would have told anyone that one of my dreams was to see Celine Griffin live and all I could think about was Tess"s being upset with me. I was bemused and distracted. Lovelorn, sunstruck, moonstruck, you name it. I thought about the night I left, how she had kissed me like a lover. Kissed me like she wanted to do it for hours. I wasn"t living in a fantasy world; she had wanted me.
When Celine moved to the other side of the room I snuck over to the side aisle and slowly moved up a few rows.
"Tess," I hissed.
The woman nearest me gave me an irritated look.
"Tess!"
Tess turned her head in disbelief. I beckoned. She rolled her eyes. I beckoned again.
"I"m sorry," she muttered as she stepped over the irritated woman. "What?"
"Shh!" The irritated woman vented her annoyance. I took Tess by the arm, leading her to the back of the room, then into the deserted foyer beyond the rear doors.
Tess was looking at me as if I"d lost my mind. "What"s wrong?"
"That"s what I want to know. What"s wrong? Why are you mad at me?"
"I"m not mad at you, Brandy. It"s like being mad at the ocean for washing up too high on the sand."
I tried to work my way through that but got nowhere. "Something is wrong, though."
"I thought you wanted to see the show."
"I do, but not if you"re upset with me." I wanted to say that she mattered too much for me to a.s.sume that later was good enough to talk to her. I wanted to ask her to kiss me again.
"I"m not upset with you."
"Then with something."
"This is pointless, Brandy. I would like to see the show, too. Now I know why you had her picture."
I flushed. "You remembered."
She nodded. "It"s okay."
"I don"t have a crush on her."
"I know." Her eyes were filled with sadness. "Randall got Barbados."
I blinked. "He did?"
"Yeah. He wants to take some of the fitness staff with him."
"Oh."
We stared at each other. I had no idea what she was thinking. Was she going to apply for it? Was there room for two, or did she want to get away from me? We"d made love, and that had been too much?
"So," she finally said. "That"s that."
I didn"t understand what she meant, and my mouth had disconnected from my brain. There were a million words spinning in my mind but not one would join with another to make any sense.
A burst of laughter startled us both. "I really would like to see the show," Tess said. Say something, my mind wailed. She shrugged. "Okay then."
"Did you read the note I left?"
"Yeah." She turned to the door. "I obviously didn"t get it." She was gone before I could even voice my confusion. I didn"t understand.
What"s a girl to do? I escaped to the nearest ladies" room, where the mirror told me the dress looked great and the panties were visible enough to be criminal. Tess hadn"t wanted me in this package. She hadn"t seemed to even want to talk. I was a dumbs.h.i.t. I couldn"t be happy with her wonderful, supporting friendship. No, I had to want more.
Instead, I was losing both. Madeline had broken my heart in college, and it had hurt, but it hadn"t felt like this. I"d been upset and angry, devastated even. But I"d accepted that of course I would survive it, because one survived such blows and went on to write bad poetry about it. Adversity built character, didn"t it?
I looked at my frozen, pale face in the mirror, remembering that I had wished for what I felt inside-loving Tess, loving women-to show on the outside. It seemed like it showed tonight. I didn"t recognize my mouth or the stricken look in my eyes.
I had stood there and said nothing. Our conversation had made no sense at all, and I had done nothing to change that. I stepped back and flexed my biceps. I was good with my body, but at words I sucked. I hadn"t always been able to lift double my weight, however. It had taken practice, patience and fort.i.tude. I didn"t finish the first three marathons I started, but I did the fourth.
So, if Tess was worth having-and she was, I wanted to wail-I would have to work harder. I would have to try again.
I looked at myself in the mirror and said aloud, "I don"t understand. Could you say that another way?" Right, I could be that calm. Sure.
Okay, fine, I told myself. What you"re doing isn"t working, so you have to change if you want her. Wrapping yourself up in a cute package is not the same as saying loud and clear, "I want to be with you. I want to walk a road with you, and see how long it goes."
Tomorrow, I thought.
I was fragile and frazzled. Tomorrow I would talk to Tess. Tomorrow I wouldn"t be so afraid as to ask what opportunities in Barbados meant to her. I would try again tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that.
The crowd was stomping and laughing when I headed for my quarters and bed. I was missing a live Celine Griffin performance, but maybe it wasn"t so bad that I recognized what mattered more to me.
Chapter Nine.
The night sky was bright with stars, but the moon hadn"t yet risen. I loved the soothing sound of the surf and I wished not so much for the romantic picture of Tess and me strolling hand in hand on the beach, but for the reality of her hand in mine, wherever we walked.
I hung up the dress and dropped the panties in the empty laundry basket. Stark naked, I unpacked my suitcase. Most of my clothes smelled of rental car and stale motel rooms. Toiletries I put back in the bathroom, shampoo in the shower, shoes neatly under the closet shelving. I might as well try to keep the small s.p.a.ce looking as tidy as Tess had left it.
Knowing I"d feel better after a long, hot shower, I started it running. My brain seemed content to replay every moment of my life with Tess, every gla.s.s of wine, every brownie, every laugh over a flubbed workout move, every high five after a routine that felt really good. We didn"t get to watch much television, but there was always time for a little bit of talk, many times throughout any given day. My life was full of her but my heart seemed to ache with emptiness.
I stood under the needles of hot water for a while, just breathing in the steam. Shampoo and conditioner felt good, as did my favorite mango-scented body wash. I was still letting the conditioner soak in when I glimpsed something rounded and aqua through the fogged gla.s.s door.
"You scared the s.h.i.t out of me!" I scrubbed furiously at the gla.s.s to see Tess better.
"Why aren"t you f.u.c.king Celine tonight?"
"I don"t want to f.u.c.k Celine tonight!"
"I thought she was your type!" Tess was just on the other side of the gla.s.s, her neck and shoulders flushed with red.
"She was. I thought men were your type!" The gla.s.s fogged and I smeared it again.
"I thought so too. I got over it."
We stared at each other through the gla.s.s. She said something, but I couldn"t hear over the water. "What?"
"If you didn"t want to see Celine"s show, why did you rush back here and drape yourself all over her?"
I licked water off my lips and chose the easier question to answer. "I didn"t drape myself all over her. I like her, and I needed a hug and I guess... we"re sort of friends."
Tess put her hand on the gla.s.s. She was breathing hard. "Then why are you here, if it wasn"t to get back in time to see her again?"
"This is home." I took a deep breath. Talking takes practice. "This is where you are."
"What?"
"Oh, f.u.c.k this," I snapped. I leaned back into the water to rinse the conditioner out of my hair. "Give me a minute."
I scrubbed furiously, in a strange place emotionally between irritation at having my shower interrupted, trepidation at having to talk to Tess so soon when I hadn"t really thought through what I wanted to say, and the simple reality that I was naked in front of her and wet in more ways than one.
Emotions were raging through me, and they all wanted words. I had to find them or I didn"t have a chance of any kind of life with Tess. Even if she didn"t love me back, talking was the only shot I had at keeping her as a friend. I could not imagine life without her there.
The air in the shower changed and I blinked water out of my eyes. Tess had opened the door and her eyes were... devouring me. My heart skipped a beat.
"Close the door," I said automatically. "You"ll slip on the wet floor in those shoes."
She kicked off the delicate sandals and stepped into the shower with me.
"Your... your jumpsuit, it"ll get-"
"Did you say you hurried back because I was here?"
Yes, I tried to say. Yes was the right answer. I nodded.
She pulled the zipper of the jumpsuit down and it parted slowly to reveal nothing but skin. Water gathered on her chest, drops spilled between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and I wanted to chase them with my tongue. It was hard to swallow, even harder to think, but somewhere inside I remembered enough to know that another fabulous night of s.e.x would be grand, but it was not a subst.i.tute for simple words like yes and I love you.
"You hurried back so we could go on being buddies? f.u.c.k buddies?"