Page 53 of Third Time Lucky

Once in college, I agreed to be the sober buddy for a friend who wanted to try mushrooms. I only let him in my apartment because it wasn’t meth and he was doing a paper on the spiritual rituals of shamans or something.

His long hair and Cross Fit body might have been a factor. He was also attached and unattainable. So, you could say I’ve always been on brand.

Anyway, I was there to keep him grounded, get him water and record his observations for posterity. I can still remember the way he described his skin. His awareness of it as almost a conscious part of him. Every pore, every hair, the way it breathed. He could feel it all.

And then he stripped and wandered bare-assed through my apartment, touching all my things. By the time his “trip” was over, I really felt like I got way more out of it than he did.

My attraction to Elliot is a little like that. Like taking hallucinogenic drugs that make you want to get naked and rub your body on things that don’t belong to you.

The moral of this story is (probably) don’t do drugs.

I inch away from him and text Tani as a distraction. She missed the meeting, so I’ve been trying to find out what’s going on. My issues with Elliot’s closeness instantly fall by the wayside when it occurs to me that I haven’t heard from her since right before I went on my date last night.

Maybe we’re finally adapting to the distance? She could be out with her other friends—unlike me, she has a few of those—and she forgot to check in. On the other hand, she was expecting a detailed report on date number one, and she hasn’t missed a meeting since I was advised to step back a bit, so this really isn’t like her.

I wonder if it has to do with her brother’s odd behavior. If I don’t hear from her by tomorrow, I’m calling her parents.

Fine. I’ll call mine and have them do a drive by. Tanisha would never forgive me if I put her already overprotective parents into panic mode.

J-Pop:I’m off to get drunk at a pub with my neighbor. Too bad you’re not there to talk me out of it. Why aren’t you there? Blink twice if A is on your couch again.

“Texting the princess?”

My phone flips out of my hand and tumbles onto the floor. Nice. “How did you know?”

“Wild guess. I’m sorry about that. We got a little carried away about the game.”

“History,” Derek’s impassioned whisper drifts back to us and Elliot tosses me a wink.

“I love baseball,” I lie, and he laughs in my face. “I mean, it’s obvious I’m missing out. I’d love to try it some time.”

He squeezes my knee, and I try not to react to the innocent contact. “I’ll take you to the batting cages next week.”

“You’re always trying to take me somewhere,” I joke.

“I am, aren’t I?”

I remember Derek’s presence and change the subject. “If you’d been discussing Skyrim or Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, this wouldn’t be a problem.”

Elliot lifts his eyebrows. “One of those has dragons, right?”

I press my fist to my chest. “I’m so proud you know that.”

He and Derek share a laugh at that, and then he’s shifting to face me, his strong thigh brushing mine. “I know how odd it is from the outside. To be this focused on one thing.”

It sounds like he didn’t have much of a choice.

“It’s natural to want to do what you’re good at. What you love.” I point to myself. “Babysitter.”

He looks thoughtful. “But no one is supposed to love just one thing, are they? Even if it’s the only thing they’re good at. I think of all the things I’ve missed, the jokes I don’t get. I traveled all over, but I never saw much more than my hotel room and the baseball diamond. It narrows your field of vision. It limits your circle of friends. I don’t know, looking at it now, it feels like a smaller way to live.”

My throat is tight. “Good points. On the other hand, if you scatter your attention too much, then the people in your circle, people you’re supposed to protect, might fall through the cracks.”

Why did I say that?

Elliot’s closer now, his warm hand lingering on my knee. “Is that what happened to you?”

“What? No. Not me.” I shake my head, but I can’t stop the words from escaping. “This isn’t… I’ve been thinking about what you said to your mother. I’m supposed to be relaxing. Stepping back because I’ve been too controlling, and I’m driving all my case managers crazy. The nannies too.”

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