A Life That Fits (23 page)

My eyes filled with tears but I managed to
get out, "If it's what you want, of course."

She sniffled. "It's not, but I think I need
it." She pushed her chair back. "I'll miss you."

I said, "I'll miss you too," as she headed
for the door but she didn't look back.

I slumped in my chair and let a few tears
escape to see if I wanted to give in and bawl, then wiped them
hastily when Loren appeared in the doorway.

"You okay?"

I shook my head.

He closed the door then came to sit beside
me. "What a mess, huh?"

"I never wanted to be on a soap opera."

He rubbed my shoulder. "I'm not Loren, I'm
his evil twin brother that everyone--"

"--thought was dead," I finished with him,
then we both chuckled. The amusement didn't last long, though, as
our eyes met and we turned serious at once.

He reached out and brushed a tear from my
cheek. "I have to apologize."

His tenderness brought up more tears but I
forced them back. "For what?"

He swallowed, looking into my eyes, and I saw
him gather his nerve before he said, "For not telling you before
how much I like you. And for doing it now."

As my heart swelled with sweet painful
emotion, another tear got the better of me and slid down my face.
"Loren..."

He again dried my skin. "I know. I missed my
chance. I didn't want to push you, and I wasn't sure I was ready
either, and now it's too late." He shook his head. "But I couldn't
screw up yet again by not telling you. You're amazing, and Alex is
a lucky guy. I hope he knows it."

The words 'this time' hung in the air but he
didn't say them. Instead, he got to his feet. "I know Wendy told
you she needs a break from you. She feels terrible about that, but
I can understand why she did it."

I tensed, afraid he'd do it too. I couldn't
lose both of them in one day.

He looked down at me, those amazing eyes
soft. "I'm going to Starbucks. What can I get you, my friend?"

I burst into tears of relief and pain, and he
pulled me out of the chair and into his arms. He was bigger and
taller than Alex and I felt surrounded and safe in a way I never
had in Alex's embrace. But that didn't matter any more. I'd taken
Alex back, and I'd never feel Loren's hug again, not like this. Or
his kisses. I buried my face in the green shirt I'd helped him buy
and sobbed, the words "I like you too" rushing through my head
until I was mouthing them over and over against his chest without
making a sound. I couldn't say them to him. Not now. But they were
so terribly true.

He held me close, stroking my hair, until I
managed to get myself under control and looked up at him. "Sorry
for crying on you."

He gave me a sad smile. "I'm not a witch
either, I won't melt."

My mind flashed back to that moment before we
went out into the rain for those incredible kisses. How could I
already have so many memories with this man, and how would I live
without adding more?

I sighed and snuggled back against him. He
held me for only a few moments this time, though, before gently
setting me away. "We can't do this any more. It's not right."

If I'd been hugging anyone else, it wouldn't
have mattered. But hugging Loren mattered. I wiped the tears from
under my eyes and nodded. "I know."

"So, Starbucks?"

I nodded and tried to smile. "If you're sure
you don't mind, I'd love another latte. But don't bother if you
weren't going anyhow. I'm okay."

He brushed my hair back from my damp cheek,
then moved to stroke it again but stopped himself before he touched
me. "I want you to be happy, not just okay."

I managed to keep from crying again until
he'd left, but it was close.

All Alex seemed to want, over the next few
days, was for me to erase the memories of our time apart. He didn't
come out and say that, of course, but every time I did or said or
used anything different he frowned or sadly made some comment about
how he'd never seen that sweater or that nail polish before.

Thursday night before rehearsal I said,
"Look. You've been gone nearly four months, and I didn't expect you
to come back. I won't apologize for not turning my life into a
shrine in your honor." Fortunately, he didn't know how close I'd
come to that at the beginning.

He sighed. "I know. I just hate how much time
we've lost together. Do you really have to go to that rehearsal
tonight?"

"Of course. They're counting on me. And even
if they weren't, I made a commitment."

I wasn't trying to say anything by that but
that I needed to go, but he flared into anger in an instant. This
was something new and unpleasant since his return, this
hair-trigger temper. "Yeah, I know, I broke my commitment to you.
Want to rub it in a little more?"

"I didn't mean it like that." My own temper
had been on a less than even keel since he'd come back and
disrupted everything, and now it took over. "But you know what? If
I want to rub it in, I can. I'm not the one who cheated."

"What about Loren?"

I threw up my hands. When I'd come home from
work that Monday, exhausted and miserable from a day spent staying
out of Wendy's way and working in stiff awkward silence with Loren,
Alex had said, "You broke it off with Loren, I guess?" I'd stared
in shock, and he'd admitted what I'd already suspected: poor Wendy
had in fact told him about newly hired Andrea from DataSource and
how cute she was with their coworker Loren and how sure she was
that they were headed for a relationship. "For the millionth time,
there's nothing going on there."

"Yeah, right. Wendy told me--"

I lost control completely. "You will not say
her name to me. She deserves better. You pretended to care about
her stories and then you dumped her when she told you I was sick
and vulnerable."

I'd hinted at this before but never said it
right-out, and his eyes widened, the anger disappearing from them
in an instant. "You really think that?"

I did, but I didn't want to fight any more.
I'd never wanted to fight. "No," I said, then took a deep breath to
try to release the sudden sick feeling in my stomach. "No, I
don't."

"Good." He reached out and squeezed my arm.
"It really wasn't like that. I just decided we should be back
together, realized I love you."

Again my stomach twisted unpleasantly. I'd
recovered from my terrible cold but ever since I'd had a
near-constant dull nausea nagging at my insides. No doubt from
everything the cold had taken out of me.

"You believe me?"

I nodded, and he smiled and pulled me into a
hug. "Good. I hope rehearsal goes well."

"Me too." Each of our last few rehearsals had
been more acrimonious than the one before it; though everyone was
healthy again the split in the group hadn't remotely healed.

Alex tipped my face up and kissed me gently.
I let him for a moment, but then couldn't stand it any more.
Feeling sick as I did, I didn't like having his mouth on mine. I
drew back and said, "Sorry, I should get going."

"Yup. I'm sure everything will be back to
normal today."

Ten minutes into rehearsal, it was clear that
if anything we were even closer to falling apart completely. We
were supposed to be running the show's second act, but it was more
limping than running. When a minor error became a screaming match
for the third time, I knew I had to fix what I'd done to the group.
I put my clarinet on its stand, got to my feet, and shouted, "Shut
up!"

Everyone turned to me, shocked.

"Shut up, seriously. Because it's nobody's
fault but mine. I had that cold before everyone else and I didn't
know it and I made everybody sick. So stop yelling at each other
and yell at me." I took a breath to go on but found myself choking
back tears instead and ended up mumbling the last. "Because I
deserve it."

Silence hung heavy for a long moment then
David said, "Hardly. I was fighting it off too, on the long
weekend, and I've been thinking it's all
my
fault."

"Me too," said a few other people scattered
around.

Then, amazingly, everyone started laughing.
Somehow my confession, and the other confessions it had sparked,
had lightened the awful tension.

When we'd calmed a bit, David said, "All
right. Apparently at least a few of us brought in the plague and
most of the rest succumbed. That stinks, but it's a fact. It's also
a fact that our show is set for October and can't be changed. So.
Are we going to be brave like our lovely clarinet friend here and
figure out how to make this work, or do we want to keep being whiny
little bitches?"

"Can't we do both?"

David laughed. "Fine, George, you do both.
How about the rest of you guys?"

They began clapping and cheering, and tears
overwhelmed me in an instant. I didn't even know why I was crying,
but I couldn't stop. George reached over and gave me a hug. "Come
on, girl. Hold it together. You don't want to see me bawling."

"You really don't," several people around us
said in unison, making everyone in earshot laugh again and those
who hadn't heard demand an explanation then chuckle when they'd
received one.

I laughed with them through my tears, and the
joy of being part of the group combined with George's strong arm
around my shoulders helped me get myself under control. I wasn't
usually such a crier, but the cold and the drama with Wendy and
Loren had really done a number on my emotions.

Once we'd all settled David said, "Okay. No
more feeling guilty for being sick, or frustrated at where we are.
We are where we are and that's all there is to it. Now let's get to
where we want to be."

*****

My little outburst changed everything. The
show wasn't any better, but our attitudes did a complete one-eighty
and rehearsals were fun and productive again. People who knew their
parts were now helping the ones who didn't instead of standing
around looking aggravated, and the ones who still needed to learn
were working incredibly hard and steadily getting better. Everyone
was on the same side now, and we were fast getting closer to where
we needed to be.

"The problem is," David said when he gathered
us together at the end of rehearsal a week after I'd shouted at the
group, "we're still nowhere near ready to go. I think we need to
consider changing the show, simplifying the harder dance numbers
and maybe making a few songs solos or duets instead of more
complicated combos. I am not saying we're
going
to do this,
but I'd like to discuss possible ways we could make that
happen."

At first some people weren't happy about even
broaching the subject, but they began to relax and participate in
the discussion when David again made it clear he wasn't making any
decisions yet and especially when he promised not to make any
decisions before we talked again.

With everyone working together to think of
ways to modify the show, we were soon building on each others'
answers and climbing to solutions none of us could have reached on
our own. We proposed doing medleys instead of singing each song in
its entirety, using some of our amazingly talented dancers as
soloists while those with a little less experience basically stood
around in character and cheered them on, and lots of other
interesting and unusual variations.

David scribbled frantically, getting down all
the ideas, and once we eventually fell silent he said, "That's
amazing. It'd be a totally different show, but I think it has a lot
of potential. Here's what I'd like to do. I'll take all this away
and think on it, then chat with the executive, and in a few
rehearsals I'll let you know what we're going to do. In the
meantime, keep learning your parts, okay?"

We all hung around even though we'd been
dismissed, not wanting to leave. The bond between us had been
growing since I'd blown up, and I'd lost count of the number of
people who'd thanked me for taking the blame even though I didn't
deserve it, but today had deepened our connection yet again. I
loved being with the group: we were like a close-knit family.
Close-crocheted family.

My relationship with Alex, on the other hand,
was coming unstitched, especially with his emphasis on the sex we
weren't having. When I got home he said, "You look tense. I know
how to relax you," and began kissing me with clear intent.

I pulled away. "I told you, not yet."

He sighed. "It's been two weeks. How much
longer do you need?"

I had my period so he wouldn't want me
anyhow, but even if I'd been available and longing for him I
wouldn't have slept with him after that crack. "Oh, I'm sorry. How
long am I supposed to take to get over my boyfriend cheating on me?
I guess I didn't get the schedule."

He opened his mouth, clearly to snap back,
but instead closed it and pressed his lips shut as if afraid the
words would leap from him. Then he took a deep breath and shook his
head. "I hate this fighting. It never used to be like this."

I didn't bother pointing out that he'd never
used to cheat on me either. Then it hit me like a thunderbolt:
maybe he
had
. Why did I assume it had only been once? "Was
Kelly the first time you cheated on me?"

He sank onto the couch and pulled me down to
sit beside him. "Yes. And I shouldn't have done it. Obviously. But
yes, she was the first one." His eyes and face radiated sincerity,
and I let myself believe him because I hated the alternative. Not
that cheating once was okay, but it was somewhat better than a
pattern of lies and deceit.

"You believe me?"

I nodded. I couldn't quite make myself say
it.

"Good. Now, about Loren."

"I told you, we're not together and we never
were." I had
not
told him, though, about our kisses. They
were none of his business, for one thing, and I knew he'd ask how
they were and I wouldn't lie and say they were terrible but also
couldn't think of any way to say "Loren set me on fire in a way you
never have" without being maybe a little unkind.