Page 6 of Befriending the Bear
I devoured the apple pie, sipping from my espresso between bites. Friday night. Library book club. It wasn’t jumping out of a plane into a wildfire, but maybe that was the point. Maybe it was time to find new passions.
But my mind kept circling back to that collision in the parking lot, to the way Calloway had struggled so hard to issue that invitation. He’d pushed past his own walls to tell me about the book club. The least I could do was show up.
Because obviously, I was doing this for him. Not because I was interested in seeing Calloway again. Obviously.
If I told myself that often enough, I might even believe it.
3
CALLOWAY
Imade it three blocks before the full weight of what I’d done crashed over me like a rogue wave.
My hands shook as I fumbled with my keys at the front door, nearly dropping them twice before managing to get inside. The poetry book—now slightly scuffed from its encounter with asphalt—felt like it weighed fifty pounds. I set it carefully on the hall table and pressed my back against the closed door, trying to remember how to breathe normally.
What the hell had I been thinking?
Book club. Friday. We’re doing poetry.
The words echoed in my head, each repetition making them more absurd. I’d invited a stranger—a gorgeous, patient, interesting stranger—to book club. Me. The man who hadn’t voluntarily initiated a social interaction in seven years had stuttered through an invitation to a man who looked like he’d stepped out of a romance novel written specifically to his tastes.
Tall frame. Broad shoulders. Weathered hands. Gorgeous moss-green eyes that had shown nothing but kindness and patience. That voice, low and careful, like he was used to talking people through dangerous situations. God, I even loved hisbeard, and I didn’t usually like longer beards. Same with his bald head, shaved smooth and shiny.
But most of all, it was the way he’d been so patient while I fought with my words, not rushing or finishing my sentences or looking away in discomfort. Just…waiting.
I pushed off from the door and headed for the kitchen, needing the ritual of tea to ground me. My reflection caught in the hallway mirror, and I stopped. Flushed cheeks. Bright eyes. I looked alive in a way that terrified me. “Absolutely not,” I told my reflection. “You’re f-f-forty-eight years old. You’re not d-doing this.”
The stutter mocked me even in my own home, worse now because of the adrenaline still coursing through my system. This was exactly why I’d built my careful, quiet life. No surprises. No handsome strangers with kind eyes and careful hands. No possibility of embarrassing myself or, worse, of wanting something I couldn’t have.
The kettle took forever to boil, or maybe time had gone strange since the collision. I couldn’t stop thinking about the way Fraser had bent to retrieve my book, the controlled way he moved despite obvious pain. Another damaged soul navigating Forestville’s too-perfect streets. The cane wasn’t for show. I’d seen enough grief to recognize someone carrying loss in their body.
“Her line about what we plan to do with our wild and precious life has been rattling around my head.”
When was the last time poetry had rattled around in my head? When was the last time I’d thought about my life as potentially precious instead of something to endure?
I carried my tea to the living room and sank into my reading chair, but the words on the page might as well have been hieroglyphics. All I could see were moss-green eyes and the wayFraser’s face lit up when we talked about Mary Oliver. Like I’d handed him an unexpected gift.
The smart thing would be to skip book club on Friday. Eleanor would understand. She always did, even when I disappointed her. I could hide here in my sanctuary, safe from the possibility of stuttering through a poetry discussion while Fraser watched. Safe from the way my body had felt when his hands steadied me, like every nerve ending had suddenly remembered it was capable of feeling, of wanting.
But even as I planned my retreat, I could hear Marcus’s voice in my head:You’re doing that thing again, Cal. Building walls before anyone even tries to climb them.
“Shut up,” I muttered to the empty room. “You don’t get a vote anymore.”
Except he did, didn’t he? Seven years gone, and Marcus still haunted every decision, every moment of potential happiness that I immediately shut down because how could I possibly deserve joy when he was gone? He’d died alone on our bathroom floor while I’d been comparing tomatoes at the farmers’ market, debating between Cherokee Purple and Brandywine, like it mattered.
My phone buzzed. A text from Eleanor.
Missed you at the library today. Everything okay?
Seventy-two years old, and the woman was better at technology and texting than most people half her age.
I stared at the screen, fingers hovering over the keyboard. Everything was not okay. Everything hadn’t been okay for seven years. But today, for a moment in a parking lot, I’d forgotten that. I’d looked into a stranger’s eyes and felt possibility crack open like a seed that had been waiting underground.
Fine. Just busy.
Busy hiding, you mean. Don’t forget about book club on Friday.
Oh, I had every intention of forgetting about book club, but I could hardly tell her that. That would only be an invitation for her to try and persuade me to come after all.
