Page 75 of Head Over Heels

Sometimes, I think I should wash them

But something inside me keeps saying NOT YET…NOT YET…NOT YET.

We’ve just fallen silent when we emerge into the parking lot, slaphappy, ridiculous, and smelly.

Sometime on Sunday, I stopped caring about the pains in my body or the sad shape of my personal hygiene. By Sunday night, I was so happy to eat the strange brew of rice and beans that Chase fed me that I waxed rhapsodic about it all the way through the meal. And later that night, I was so ecstatic to be horizontal on the ground and headed toward dreamland that I couldn’t have cared less that my little rectangle of territory was hard and rocky.

I sleep all the way back to Chase’s house in the car, and wake only when he pulls into the driveway. It feel like I’m surfacing from ten feet under.

“The only thing better than camping is the first shower afterward,” Chase declares, as he shoulders his pack—and mine—into the house. All I can do is stagger behind him and feel grateful that I don’t have to carry the pack even ten feet more.

“Do you want to go first?” I ask, not because I am being gracious but because I know I will take waaaay longer than he does.

“We can both go,” he says suggestively, but I roll my eyes at him. Sex is not compatible with my current physical state.

Which is not to say it’s not on my mind.

Katie is with her grandmother until tomorrow morning, so it’s only the two of us in the house. I’m grateful for that, because there are only three more nights before I drive to Denver. And even though we had really amazing sex on Saturday night and even more phenomenal sex Sunday night after a romp through a waterfall, I am still wanting more.

I wasn’t kidding when I said I’d miss sex with Chase.

Still, I’m in no condition to share a small space—yet. “You go first,” I say, and he doesn’t try to argue with my assertion that it would be sexier for us to get clean first and have happy naked times after, which I take as a sign that I stink as bad as I think I do.

So, after he goes, I have a blissful, steamy, solo experience of sloughing off two days of dirt and, um, scent. I spend quality time with my flat iron and even put on a little bit of mascara and lip glossbecause I can.Then I stand in front of the mirror and feel like myself for the first time in three days.

Except the truth is, I felt surprisingly much like myself hiking those trails with Chase, sleeping out with him at night.

Not that I won’treallyenjoy making him come with me to a schmoofy restaurant where he will have to put his napkin on his lap and order in either French or Italian.

The thought makes me smile.

I head downstairs and find him slouched on the couch, watching something on his iPad.

“Did you have a blissful reunion with your personal grooming products?” Chase looks up. “Oh, wow. Yeah, you did.” He runs his gaze over me and gives an appreciative wolf whistle. “You clean upreallynice.” He holds out both hands, takes mine, and tugs me toward him.

The doorbell rings.

“Who the f—? On a Monday night? At dinnertime?”

All of a sudden I remember. “Oh,shit.”

“Liv?”

“It’s—I forgot to tell you to put it in the calendar. And I didn’t either. I totally spaced. It’s the nanny candidate I told you about. Remember? My replacement.”

He’s staring at me like I’m speaking a foreign language.

“I’m so sorry, Chase! I can’t believe both of us spaced. Gah! At least we’re showered and dressed! We could have stood her up completely, or greeted her in our smelly camping stuff.”

I can’t read the expression on his face at all.

“You should get the door. Or I can.”

He hasn’t moved, so I get up and cross to the door. I open it, and Gillian is standing there, wearing a pencil skirt and silk blouse. She’s tall and slim, with jet-black hair and beautiful green eyes, rimmed with smoky makeup.

“I thought I might have the wrong day!” she says, stepping forward to hug me.

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry! I never put it my calendar, but we’re fine! We’re both here, and it’s Chase you really need to talk to, anyway.”

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