Page 82 of I'm Not Yours
“Good to see that you’ve lost your head,” Estelle said, taking a pin out of her mouth one sunny afternoon, the kite flyers out in force on the beach, two surfers braving the waves. “Didn’t think you could do it. You were a wedding dress designer who didn’t believe a woman should ever wear a wedding dress. Now you’re a wedding dress designer who is dreamy and woozily distracted and only half thinking, all the time. Yoo-hoo. Are you there?”
“She’s in love!” Leoni said.
“I’m trying not to be in love,” I said. “Trying hard.”
“You have an aura of love,” Leoni said. “And quit trying not to be in love, embrace it with open arms, bring the sparkle to your life.”
“And you’re in raving lust,” Estelle said, pointing a needle at me. “What woman wouldn’t feel lust with that bull of a man with steel-you-know-whatsits strutting around in heat?”
“He’s not a bull, he’s not in heat.” I was a bullette in heat, though. I fanned myself with a paperback book on Victorian lace.
Leoni nodded. “Have to agree on the bull comment. He’s got the equipment! And he’s romantic. Always bringing you lunch, and the flowers, ooh la la! And the cushion for your back on your rocking chair so your back wouldn’t get sore . . .”
“And the new light that hangs perfectly over the rocking chair,” Estelle said.
“So your eyes don’t get tired.” Leoni patted her chest and sighed.
I sighed, too. In a happy way.
My friend Reece made me happy.
And nervous.
Morgan walked in with her NASA outfit on. “What is ‘lust’? What do you mean about a man being a bull in heat? And what is the equipment of a bull?” We froze. Oh, sheesh.
“Hey!” She tapped her NASA helmet. “I wrote another letter to NASA. This time I included information on why I think we can get to Mars, based on my studies. Nine pages plus drawings. I think they’ll write back. I’ll show the letter to my dad when he comes and visits me. I’m going to be a famous astronaut and he’ll say, ‘That’s my daughter,’ and be proud.”
I stifled a groan, then patted Leoni’s back as her eyes filled up with tears.
8
“I’ve changed my mind,” Grayson said, thumping a fist on the conference table in Cherie’s office.
“What do you mean, you’ve changed your mind, El Monster?” Cherie asked. She tapped both sides of her temples. “You been thinkin’? Did it hurt?”
“I mean, that I’ve been on your website, June, and I think you’ve got a sweet little business going. I could see it making a lot of money. So, I’ve decided that I want half the business. You developed it during our marriage, after all.”
I honestly thought my whole body had been invaded by an iceberg. The last time we met, he was using my business as a bargaining tool: the house for June’s Lace and Flounces. I choked on my own words and had to cough through my shock. “I will not give you any part of my business ever.”
“So keep working,” he went on, as if I hadn’t spoken. “The better June’s Lace and Flounces does, the better I do. I might even buy a beach house! Is there one for sale by you? We could live right next door!”
I swore under my breath. This divorce, after all this time, was actually getting worse, not better. My legs, under the table, started to shake and I felt nauseous, the room starting to tilt.
“I do believe, Grayson, that June would rather stick her head in the open mouth of a Tasmanian devil than share June’s Lace with you.” Cherie crossed her legs. Zebra-print skirt today and a black leather jacket. Underneath the black jacket, zebra-print shirt. She is so cool.
I was wearing a white lace dress with a white liner and a jean jacket I’d added lace to on the cuffs, with silver bangles up one arm. I had made the dress. Grayson had gawked at me when Iwalked in, eyes moving from head to toe, then had swallowed hard.
He hadn’t stopped staring at me.
“That ain’t gonna happen, Grayson.” Cherie chortled.
Grayson flushed, high on those cheekbones that I’d come to hate. I remember kissing those cheekbones. Sometimes he’d tell me how many times to kiss the cheekbones, then how many times to kiss him in other places, where to run my hands, how to move. He had a playbook for sex. Yes, a playbook. He’d say, “We’re going to have Sex C tonight,” and then he’d show me the moves.
Gall. And I followed those instructions. I was a female robot. A robot in a suit who had lost all emotion and lust for life the second she quit sewing.
“The thing is, June, I know you. I think you’re going to make this business successful, and I want to be a part of it. We’ll share the profits. We’ll spend time together.”
That comment chilled my bones so hard I thought they’d crack. The thought of him leaning over my shoulder, making comments and suggestions, paying him a monthly check off the profits, made me ill. I wouldn’t do it. I couldn’t do it. “Never. No.”
