Page 10 of Pipe Dreams
All that history sat squarely on the vast stretch of leather between them. Now he knew why Lauren hadn’t wanted to share a car. The ghosts swarmed.
But fuck that. The ghosts shouldn’t get to win. There were enough ghosts in his life already. Even if Lauren was still as angry as she’d been the day he broke it off, that was all the more reason to push through the awkwardness.
“Can I buy you a drink?” he blurted out. “We should catch up.”
Her gaze remained locked on the Smithsonian out her window. She was going to tell him to go to hell, and he wouldn’t blame her. “It’s not a good idea,” she said finally. “People remember...” she cleared her throat. “They’ll talk.”
Shit. He didn’t give a rat’s ass about other people’s speculation. But she wasn’t wrong. If he had a drink with Lauren at the hotel bar, a half a dozen players would ask him about it in the morning.
Just as he had that thought, the car pulled up in front of the Marriott, and their time together was already over.
“Bus to the airport leaves at six thirty,” she said, climbing out of the car. “Don’t be late.”
“All right.” Even though she seemed eager to get away from him, he still made a point to hold the hotel door for her. They barely stepped onto the escalator when voices called out from a group of tables off to the side. “Heyyyy, Beak!” “Get over here!” And, “Hey, it’s Lauren! No way.”
She gave him a look that could freeze sunshine into rink ice, and climbed the escalator, moving rapidly away from him.
Right. He watched her go. And when the escalator arrived on the mezzanine level, he made his way over to his friends.
“Shit, man,” O’Doul said, his fingers around a longneck. “You and she patching things up?”
“Does it look like it?” He tossed himself into a chair. “What are we drinking?”
FOUR
LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK
AUGUST 2012
Mike waited a week to go and see Lauren after she returned from her beach vacation.
He stayed away for seven long days, every one of them harder than the last. His conscience required it. He wanted to be the guy who’d never cheated. Hewasthe guy who’d never cheated.
Unless longing counted.
For eight years they’d circled each other. They laughed too long over nothing, and at company functions their gazes always seemed to collide across even the most crowded rooms.
A million times he’d wondered how she’d taste if he kissed her, and whether she’d be sweet and silent or wild and noisy in bed. He wanted her long, toned legs wrapped around his ass while he pounded into her.
But the closest he’d ever come to any of it was an elbow squeeze when she’d saved him the last chocolate donut.
He waited a week because he needed those years of restraint to matter. Yet did they? His wife must have beenpretty fucking unhappy to boff the tennis instructor in her car in their three-stall garage.
One day in late July—when training camp was just starting up again—the facilities manager had messed up the ice temperature at the practice rink. Nobody could skate. Beacon had driven home in the early afternoon, pulling carefully into his usual spot. When he snapped the keys from the ignition and got out, his wife’s startled face looked back at him from the passenger seat of her 4Runner. And she wasn’t alone on the seat. She was straddling someone.
His first thought had been,that looks really uncomfortable.
Stunned, he’d gone inside the house, taking a seat at their kitchen table. A few minutes later she’d appeared, face red, eyes tearing up. They’d had the most awkward conversation of his entire life, wherein Shelly admitted that she’d been screwing the tennis guy for almost a year.
That same night he moved out, first to a teammate’s sofa, and then into a house he’d rented without asking the price. Then came the legal complications—hiring a lawyer and working out a temporary custody plan. He went to the Pottery Barn and bought whichever furniture could be delivered the quickest. A sofa and a king-sized bed for himself. A white twin bed with carved roses for nine-year-old Elsa, so she’d have somewhere to sleep when she visited.
These past three weeks were entirely surreal.
Lauren kept popping into his mind at the oddest moments.The new rental house has hydrangeas in the yard.Those were her favorite flower.She’d bust a gut if she knew I bought a sofa in ‘mushroom’ because I’m always ordering them on pizza.And,Lauren would roll her eyes at that neighbor’s lawn ornaments.
But every little thought of her made him feel guilty. Maybe if he didn’t think of her so often his wife wouldn’t have found someone else.
Was the whole thing his fault?
