Page 21 of Scout Takes the Lead
I felt myself relaxing. R&R I could talk about. I’d already been able to open up to Grace. “A buddy and I rented bicycles and went through the Loire Valley in France,” I said. Just the memory of that trip was calming.
“Really? I can’t see you interested in all those castles.”
“Why not?”
“You’re too tough for French provincial. I saw you look around when you came in here. You were thinking uber-gay, right? Too fancy?”
I shook my head. “Not at all. I like the stuff you’ve salvaged.” I pointed at the mantle and the tiles.
“The mantelpiece came from my nonna’s house in New Jersey,” he said. “I have a stained-glass window upstairs that came from there, too. I bought the tiles at a salvage shop in New Orleans when I went for Mardi Gras one year.”
Just the thought of all those people crowding the streets of New Orleans was enough to make me shudder. “I know, Mardi Gras,” Kenny said. “Uber-gay again.”
“I’m not prejudiced,” I said. “I know it’s a cliché, but I knew guys in the Army who were gay and I got along fine with them. Even considered some of them my friends.”
“What about Grace?” he asked. “Considering her as a friend? Or something more? I may be gay as a box of Froot Loops but I can tell when a girl is interested in a guy.”
I shook my head. “We had dinner last night, and I totally messed up.”
“What? You tried to put the moves on her too quickly?”
“Nope. I knocked her to the pavement and then fell on top of her.”
His eyes opened wide. “Deliberately?”
“I thought I heard bombs going off, and I wanted to protect her. My doctor says I have PTSD. You know what that is?”
“Of course. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. My cousin was in the first Gulf War and when he came back he couldn’t get his head together and he ended up killing himself.” He caught himself. “Oh god I didn’t mean to say that,” he said in a rush. “I’m sure you’re totally different.”
If only he knew. I wasn’t that different. “I tend to freak out in crowds and I have trouble sleeping at night because I have bad dreams. That’s why I got Scout—I hope that having him around will calm me down.”
“Is it working?”
“When he’s with me, I don’t feel so stressed. I can even manage to sleep a few hours at night, too.” I sighed. “Dinner with Grace last night was my first attempt at dating in years,” I said. “Big disaster. I know I freaked her out. I texted her afterward that I was sorry and I was going to drop out of the class.”
“Maybe we can find a different class to take together,” he said. “I totally get that she might not want to see you again after what you did, even if it was with the best intentions.”
“I don’t know that I’m going to keep Scout,” I said. “I have so many problems, and it’s too much to expect a dog to heal me.”
“That’s what dogs do,” Kenny said. “You know what dog spelled backwards is?”
I thought for a second. “God?”
“Exactly. Cheyenne’s crazy, I’m the first to admit, but he’s been good for me. I tend to be kind of scatterbrained, you know, and having him around has forced me to pay attention to him. To feed him and walk him.” He paused. “And I was lonely, because I had a boyfriend for a long time and he dumped me a while ago.”
“Sorry to hear that. Did he give you a reason?”
“He was a real type-A kind of guy. Always on a schedule, multi-tasking, pushing his career, working out. Eventually he said he didn’t have time for me dithering around.”
“They say opposites attract,” I said. “But you both have to be willing to change, and move toward some center. It sounds like he wasn’t willing to do that.”
“Or that I couldn’t,” Kenny said. “I mean, I tried. I let him decide where we should eat and when we should have sex because I knew it bothered him that I couldn’t make up my mind.”
“And did he make any concessions for you?”
“He said everything he did was for me. But it wasn’t true. It was all for him, with a thin covering. Like he knew I wouldn’t get around to working out, so he pressured me to go with him. Said it was all about me, but it wasn’t.”
He looked at me. “I think you should give Grace some time to get over the surprise you sprung on her last night, and then see what she says.”
