Page 37 of House of Desire

“Anya, I don’t think I told you how beautiful you look tonight,” I tell her. Her jeans and white t-shirt are casual, but they are perfectly tailored to her, keeping her from looking anything but put together. My hands twitch, wanting to run down her curves.

“You didn’t, but I decided to forgive you and not hold your terrible manners against your parents.”

“I’m sure they appreciate that.”

“Can I ask you something? Something you might not want to answer?” she asks, nervous, but I know I’ll tell her anything she wants to know.

“Yes, I’d still like you if you were a worm. I would make sure you had the best worm terrarium.”

She snorts, a hand flying up to cover her face. “That wasn’t going to be my question, but I think I can breathe easier knowing that.”

“What’s the question,” I tell her, taking her hand and leading her to another painting.

“Do you want to talk about what was going on today?”

“What was going on today?”

“Parker, you had a panic attack. I’ve had them a few times in the past and I recognized the signs.”

Not wanting to look at her, embarrassed she was so easily able to see what was happening, I try to decide how much I want to tell her. Fear gnaws at my stomach. Fear she’ll leave. Fear she can see how broken I still am.

“It’s no big deal.”

Her heels click against the floor as we move from painting to painting in silence. It’s not an awkward silence, but it is a heavy one. I can feel it pressing against me, tightening around me like ropes.

“There was this one time I was asked to enter a cake into a competition that had the ability to change my entire career. I had carte blanche to create anything I wanted. The prize was a quarter of a million dollars.”

“What happened?” I ask, curious how this well put together woman could ever fail at such a competition.

“Every day, I would try to sit down and come up with a design and new flavor combination. Every day I would think ‘Maybe tomorrow’ and then, eventually, tomorrow was, well, tomorrow and I had no idea what to do. In a panic, I put together a cake that looked like a novice had done it. I couldn’t get my hands to stop shaking.

“When they started the judging, and showed mine on the screen for the audience to be able to see, there were some snickers. And then a few people outright laughed. It got so loud in my head and I thought my lungs would never be able to draw in air again.” She continues moving through the room until she’s standing right in front of me and a sculpture titled A Symphony of Dreams that has two lovers entwined on a bed, but the man has wings.

The moment grows and I can almost feel Sharon’s eyes boring into me telling me to take a chance and open up.

“The thought of my ex-wife and how things ended kind of blindsided me. And a part of me is scared it would happen again.”

She nods, reading I don’t want to go too much further into depth with the camera crew around us. I am counting down the minutes until I can get away from all the cameras.

“It’s understandable some things would remind you of something so monumental in your life. Especially on this journey. I won’t hold it against you, considering I made the choice to come here after a guy I had been flirting with all night at an event ended up having a girlfriend. I wouldn’t say I was in the best head space to apply,” she jokes. “I’m glad I’m here, though.” She touches my hand before moving off to another painting and the ropes of pain and hurt and betrayal from Brittany’s abandonment loosen around me just a little.

The fact she’s not running away in the opposite direction is leeching the worry from me.

“I signed up after my therapist said something to me.”

“You’re in therapy?”

“Going on nine months,” I tell her. One thing I decided when I finally took Charlie’s advice and found Sharon was, I would never hide the fact I needed the help. “Don’t worry, she’d give me a gold star.”

“Do you have a little chart where you collect your therapy gold stars?”

Her quick wit and joking manner are quickly becoming my favorite things about Anya. Even when we are discussing something heavy, she has an ability to put me at ease.

“Right beside my bed.”

“It’s good to see your accomplishments daily.”

“That’s what I think, too.” I grab her hand, interlocking our fingers. “You’re very easy to talk to.”

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