Page 52 of Torn
I shook his shoulder. “Honey? I wasn’t kidding.”
He rolled over and eyed me. I almost reconsidered going in the morning. His topaz eyes made me melt. I was nearly overcome with shame and lust for the guy lying next to me under warm sheets.
“I don’t get it. Why can’t I stay?”
I sat up and sighed. I groped around on the nightstand to find my smokes. I shook one out and lit it.
“Can I have one?”
I tossed him the pack, and we both smoked in the dark for a while.
“I should have told you this, but—”
“Uh-oh,” Tom said.
“No, no, it’s nothing bad! I just, uh, neglected to mention that I’m heading out for a few days. No biggie. Slipped my mind.”
Tom sat up next to me, our shoulders touching. “Where are you goin’? Can I come?” He pushed against me a little with his shoulder.
“I wish you could! But I planned this trip a while back, before we met.”
“Are you going to see another man?” He snorted with laughter.
I shivered. “Well, not exactly.” I opted to tell the truth, sort of. “I don’t know if you knew this about me, but I always wanted to check out Boston. See, I was accepted by Emerson College back when I graduated high school, and I wanted to go there so, so bad! But in the end, my parents just couldn’t afford it. Anyway, when I was over in England, I made the acquaintance of this guy who’s from there. Just at one of the bars. He said I could come and check out the city, and I could crash at his place. So I took him up on it. Just to see Boston, you know.”
“Okay.” Tom sounded dubious. I couldn’t blame him. But what could I say? I didn’t want to hurt him. I didn’t want to jeopardize this magic thing that was beginning to bloom between us.
If it’s so magical, I wondered,why am I running off to Boston?
The answer to that was that my time with Walt had been magical too. And I needed to see if there was something there.
I was a hot mess and hated myself a little right then.
“I’ll just be gone through the weekend. We can meet up as soon as I get home next week. You can stay over then for sure.” I touched his shoulder. “I hate to throw you out, baby. You know how much I love to fall asleep all curled up next to you. But I need to get up early. I left all my packing to do in the morning, plus I need to allow plenty of time to get to O’Hare.”
Reluctantly, he’d dressed and left, a little morose. But at least he didn’t press me about Walt.
Until this morning. Why had I answered the phone?
“So, this guy in Boston? Is he, like, special?”
“He’s just a friend,” I answered, feeling like a heel. Yes, I suppose Walt was a friend, but he was something more too. The fact that I didn’t know quite what—not yet—was just a point for further pondering and exploration.
“You sure?” Tom sounded incredulous, and I certainly couldn’t blame him, since I was stretching the truth well past its breaking point.
I skirted the question about my certainty. “Look, it’s just for a few days. I’ll be home Monday morning. Why don’t you plan on coming over after work on Monday? I’ll grill us a couple strip steaks and make a big salad. I’ll even make an apple pie.”
Except what if I came home even more in love with Walt? What if my four days out east turned out to be transformational? What if I saw, at last, that Walt and Icouldmake a long-distance romance work?
Would I really want Tom lumbering around my apartment, expecting dinner and sex? Would I feel annoyed with him when he switched onThe Nanny, at which he’d laugh throughout every episode while I cringed at Fran Drescher’s voice?
“You know what?” Tom asked. I could hear the rage simmering beneath his words. “I don’t know if I buy your story. So you go off and see your ‘friend.’ Have a great time and don’t even give me a second thought.”
He hung up without giving me a chance to say another word.
Wow. I never knew Tom had such a propensity for anger. He was my easygoing, simple, uncomplicated guy, or so I’d thought.
I saw the yellow cab turning from Ashland onto Fargo and went back inside. I had this sick feeling that I was gambling with very high stakes and could come out of this game empty-handed.
