Page 34 of Taking It To Overtime

I don’t realize I’ve spoken out loud until she’s answering me. A sheepish little shrug of her shoulders accompanying her words.

“Easier for both of us.” A blush spreads along her cheeks. “I’m having a hard time keeping current events separate from the past. You know?”

Idoknow. I just don’t know if I care.

I’m a masochistic asshole who enjoys having her near me just a fraction too much.

“I want to be sure I’m not stepping on any toes,” Vera says. Instead of looking at me, her eyes are on the back of her hand, the one tugging at a loose thread in the worn comforter.

Toes? I want to laugh. I’m not the one being photographed with new men on a semi-regular basis.

“You aren’t.”

The look she gives me is pure skepticism, accompanied by another perusal, top to bottom. If I flex my pecs and abs and biceps while she’s looking? Well, who’s going to tell on me?

“Really, Robbie?” The total disbelief in her voice urges me to tell her how long it’s been since I was with a woman, just to prove there’s no territory to poach or partner to anger, but Idon’t. Instead, I nod my head and let the sound of my name on her lips soak my brain like a sudden downpour.

“I’m not the one whose dates get photographed.” I look down at my hands as I fist them in my lap.

There’s a beat of silence, one the stretches out into the room and I can feel like a weight on my shoulders. Fuck. Why did I say that?

“Keeping tabs on me?” There’s a curve to her brow and a twinkle in her eye. She’s waiting for my answer, even though she already knows it.

“Yes.”

She bumps her shoulder into mine, the same bony nudge that she’s been giving me since she was eight, and then her head nestles right into my neck. She smells like sunscreen and sweat and Vera. Our reflection is centered in the mirror and my gaze traces the lines of her face, connecting the freckles one by one the way I used to. The same freckles I’ve studied in grainy tabloid photos and glossy magazine covers.

“It’s okay,” she says. “I do too. Old habits die screaming or something like that, but this is probably further proof that we need some boundaries of some sort.”

Boundaries. Right.

“I’m here until Saturday, so we only have to make this work for a few more days. Or we could just fess up and tell everyone the truth.”

The truth that we’re strangers still treating our past like an elephant sitting in the middle of the living room?

My initial yes was automatic. Vera asked, and I didn’t hesitate. That’s always been the way I operate. She needs something to happen? I make it happen. No questions asked. No passing go, no collecting two-hundred dollars. Being near her again is like sliding into the hot tub my parents used to keep on the back deck. There’s the initial burn, skin-melting-off-my-bones heat, and then it’s comfortable. Soothing. And getting out into the chilled night air feels like a chore not worth pursuing.

And after seeing how happy Mom was? Dad? The way Vera settled right in next to me at the dining table? It was just beautiful enough to justify taking these next few days with the one woman I will never fully get over. I can have this week, this taste, to fuel me through the next sixteen years and who knows? Maybe by the end of the next decade and a half she’ll be unavailable, married to the perfect guy with two point five perfect children covered head to toe in freckles. And maybe, just maybe, that will be the push my brain and heart need to finally leave this girl behind.

“I can handle four days.”Probably.

“I don’t know about you, but I thought tonight was pretty easy.” She nestles in closer to my side and my cock decides now is a perfect time to stand up and take notice. I lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees and dislodging Vera. It’s some middle-school shit, hiding a boner as I hunch over, but I don’t think he’ll be a welcome addition to this conversation.

To Vera’s credit, she either doesn’t notice that I’ve shifted away from her, or chooses not to comment on it.

“I wasn’t sure if we should just not correct them, or really lean into the dating thing, but…” she gets to her feet and crosses to the middle of the room, hands propped on her hips. “That kiss?” She fans her face.

I hadn’t planned to kiss her. It was natural. Like stepping up next to her to help with the dishes—despite the top-of-the-line dishwasher I installed last summer—or stepping onto the ice as the crowd chants our names. As simple as breathing.

“I should have asked,” I say and scrub a hand down the front of my face so I don’t have to see her agree with me. “I overstepped…”

“I loved it. I wouldn’t mind doing it again sometime.”

My head comes up and there’s a record-scratch sound echoing in my ears. She what?

“Would that be overstepping a boundary? To tell you that I want to kiss you? To touch you?” She licks her bottom lip, and there’s no blood in any part of my body except my dick.

I shake my head. “Not overstepping.” I wish I was smooth enough to hook my arm around her waist and pin her under me. “I feel the same.”

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