Page 119 of Sharkbait
I place my hand over hers. I don’t know if it’s too much too soon, but I’m dying to touch her. To make some kind of contact with her.
To my surprise and relief, she doesn’t move her hand away. She just looks deep into my eyes.
“I can’t stomach lying, James. I just can’t.”
“Good. Neither can I.”
“Withholding the truth feels like lying sometimes,” she says in an almost whisper.
I drop my head toward my chest.
“It does. You’re right. And I can’t tell you how sorry I am for how this all came out.”
“Well, Mabel has a big mouth,” she jokes. “And you’ve already apologized. I didn’t come here to make you grovel.”
“You didn’t?”
“No.” She pauses. “But I would like to understand.”
I pull up a stack of crates I keep behind the bar and sit on them so we’re on the same level.
I clear my throat and begin.
“This is not an excuse—I promise you that—but when you said you’d never in a million years date a guy who was a father, that felt an awful lot like judgment to me. It especially stung being that—I’m not sure you’ve gotten the memo yet—I’m reeeeeeally interested in dating you.”
This gets a laugh out of her.
“You don’t know the circumstances of how I became a dad. You don’t know what my relationship is like with my daughter or with her mom. Seems to me that if you lump me in with the bad examples of parenting you’ve seen in your past, then you might miss out on something pretty damn good. We’d miss out on something good.”
She nods.
I take a big risk and say, “I’m not your dad.”
She scoffs. “I know you aren’t.”
“I’m not the other guys you’ve dated either, who, I’m getting the distinct sense didn’t treat you very well.”
“I know that too.”
“But you don’t,” I argue. “Not really. You’ve never given me a chance to get past that wall you’ve erected.”
“Why you go and say the word ‘erect?’”She takes a long sip of her beer.
“Are you kidding me right now?” I laugh.
“No, I’m not! I can’t take anyone who uses that word seriously.”
“In fairness, the word has multiple uses. You can stand erect. You can erect a building. You can erect an empire. A wall. A monument. Your spine can be erect.”
“Alright, alright, stop, please.” Her laughter softens. We listen to the Goo Goo Dolls play through the speakers. “Here’s a little sidebar for you: never google ‘erector set.’
“Oh no?”
“No. You’ll get a mishmash of pictures of children playing with cranes interspersed with diagrams of handheld pump thingies for elderly men. It’s confusing and disturbing.”
“Noted. I promise to never google ‘erector set.’”
“I think that would be best.”
