Page 64 of An Overdue Match
I don’t answer, my heart hammering as I beeline for the concealed recess. As soon as we turn the corner, I pivot and face Tai. “No audience. There’s no one here but you and me.”
Tai’s chest is rising and falling in sync with my own. I don’t think I’ve ever been this bold in my life. It feels powerful. Freeing.
“I’m ready for you to prove that you can kiss me better.”
One second Tai is a foot in front of me and the next he’s on me—his lips, his hands. The concrete wall at my back holds me up against the onslaught of Tai’s mouth. His lips move over mine in feverish insistence, demanding and crushing in their need.
Tai isn’t kissing me in gentle caresses. He’s not treating me with fragile delicacy or even with an ounce of tenderness. He’s kissing me like he can no longer hold himself back. Like I’ve driven him wild and need of me has overtaken his senses.
He’s kissing me exactly how I didn’t know I needed to be kissed. Every heated stroke of his lips is a balm to my wounded heart.
Brett, society, the world—they told me I wasn’t desirable.
Tai kisses me as if I’m the sole object of his desire.
They said no one would want me.
Tai kisses me as if he’s never wanted anyone else before and will never want anyone else ever again.
A warm tear escapes the corner of my closed eyes and tracks over the swell of my cheek, pooling on the pad of Tai’s thumb that cradles my face. I know when he feels it because his kiss changes. He slows himself down, gentles himself, sweetens the contact. His lips move from my mouth to my cheek, and he kisses the salty liquid.
“I-I’m sorry if I came on too strong.” He sounds pained, and I know it’s because he feels guilty, worried he might’ve hurt me.
I place a fingertip on his lips to stop any further apology. “You were right.”
“I was?” His brows draw together in confusion.
“Youcankiss better.”
28
I wake up the next morning a little more in love with love than I ever have been. The missing ingredient—hope. I don’t know for sure how Tai is going to respond to my revelation, but for the first time in a long time I have hope that a man—that Tai—will still see me as a woman he wants to be with whether I have a full head of hair or my scalp is as shiny and smooth as a cue ball.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m still quaking-in-my-boots scared. I admit that my heart is on the line here. The thought of rejection ... well, it’s enough to chase me to the toilet to toss my cookies. But there’s also anticipation. Fear and hope, battling it out like two WWE wrestlers using my stomach as their ring.
Unfortunately, I have to wait until tomorrow until I can see Tai again. I’m headed to Granny and Grampie’s today, and Tai has a client that’s going to keep him busy all evening. But tomorrow we have plans to picnic at Chilhowee, a nice spot overlooking the Ocoee River. That’s where I’ll tell him about the alopecia and let him see me without my wig.
In the meantime, I’m not giving up on matchmaking. Poor Stacey at Cotton-Eyed Cup of Joe is probably wondering what happened to her secret admirer since I haven’twritten her any other letters, not since the dumpster fire results of the first one. Time for that to change. After reading Grampie’s letters to Granny for inspiration, I’m ready to try again.
An hour later, with two letter-stuffed envelopes in hand and the addresses of Caleb and Stacey that I pilfered from the library’s system loaded into my GPS, I depart on my morning’s love mission. Stacey lives downtown in an apartment above the hardware store, and I slip the envelope with her name on it through the mail slot. Caleb is fixing up an old Victorian-style house on the outskirts of town. Much easier to leave his letter in his mailbox instead of hiking to the middle of nowhere, like I had to with Dalton’s workshop.
I have a good feeling about these two. This time my matchmaking scheme is going to work out the way the others were supposed to. In fifty years, they’re going to be telling people how they met and fell in love, just like Mrs. Goldmann does.
I point my car south down the 411 toward my grandparents’ house. As usual, once I hit I-75, I strip off my wig and set it gently on the passenger seat next to me. I haven’t cued up the audiobook I’m in the middle of, opting instead to bebop to an oldies station. Aretha Franklin and I are demanding a little r-e-s-p-e-c-t when a deer teleports itself right into the middle of the road. I scream, slamming on the brakes and holding the steering wheel in a death grip. I squeeze my eyes shut tight, bracing myself for impact, the crunch of bones and metal, and the torment of knowing I killed Bambi’s mom.
But the impact never comes. My car stops, the smell of burned rubber singeing my nostrils, and I finally allow my eyes to slit open. The deer stands there, looking at me like she doesn’t have a care in the world. Like I didn’t almost mow her over with my Toyota or that I’m now recovering from a miniheart attack. The doe picks her way across the rest of the road and then disappears into the woods.
My pulse is still pounding, and I think the fright has shaved at least a few years off my lifespan, but that seems to be the only lasting damage done. I wiggle my fingers and toes, mentally cataloging my limbs and torso. Yep, intact. I look around the inside of the car. Everything seems—
I suck in a sharp breath through my teeth. There, on the floor, is my wig. My wig that is changing color right before my eyes as it soaks in the tea that apparently got knocked out of the cupholder and onto the floor. I groan but leave it. There’s nothing I can do about it now. Hopefully the wig isn’t completely ruined and a good washing with a special shampoo and conditioner for synthetic hair, along with some time to air dry, will make it as good as new.
Finally, I ease my foot off the brake and on to the gas pedal. I drive ten miles per hour under the speed limit and scan the surroundings on either side of the road like my gaze is a metal detector and any animals that might jump out are made of alloy instead of flesh and bones.
Five minutes from my grandparents’ house, my cell rings with an incoming call, Granny’s name showing on the screen. I accept the call with the car’s Bluetooth and practically yell to make sure she hears me. “Hey, Granny.”
“Sweetie, you there? I need you to go to the store for me. I’m making potato salad, and we’re out of mayonnaise. Make sure you get the good stuff. Duke’s mayonnaise, Evangeline. Can you hear me?”
“I can hear you, Granny. A jar of Hellmann’s. Got it.” I shouldn’t tease her, but it’s too easy and too fun.
