Isn't It Time (14 page)

By the time 5:00 rolled around, I was feeling pretty pleased
about all I had accomplished in a few short hours. I had remembered to pick up
detergent for my pressing laundry needs and managed to get that odious chore
out of the way.

After getting the laundry started, I changed into clean
clothes, eying my old pink and white striped panties with disgust. Deciding it
was well past time to replace them with something newer and less frumpy, I
tossed them into the trash, and sent a dozen more pairs in similar condition
into the basket after them.  My bras had also seen better days, so I got rid of
a few of those as well.

I hated to waste money on anything, but especially on things
like underwear that hardly anyone ever saw.  But I did just get a raise, and I
hadn’t bought new underthings in at least two years, so I justified the
expenditure and made a quick trip to the mall.

Bypassing the overpriced big-name lingerie store, I sorted
briskly through all the pretty lingerie the department store had to offer. 
Even though I told myself to quit buying so much pink stuff, I couldn’t help
it.  When it came to clothes, it was my favorite color.  I came home with five
new bras, two of them pink, fifteen pairs of assorted matching bikinis, thongs
and boy shorts, seven of them pink, and a bad case of sticker shock. I put them
all in the washing machine and consoled myself with the reminder I probably had
several more years before I had to go through that again.

Around 4:00, I got dinner started, breading pork chops and
peeling potatoes.  I figured a guy who like potatoes as much as Nate did would
enjoy them mashed, so I chopped them in small pieces and put them on the stove
to boil.  The only fresh vegetable I had on hand were green beans, so I threw
those in a pan on the stove, too, and then went to look for my birth
certificate.

After twenty minutes of increasingly frantic searching, I
still couldn’t find it. I berated myself for not being more organized and hoped
Nate wouldn’t be too disappointed to find out we weren’t going to be able to
get into Canada.

As a last-ditch effort, I called my mom.

“Hey, honey,” she answered.

“Hey, Mom.  Listen, do you happen to have my birth
certificate around anywhere?”

“No, we gave the only copy we had to you.  Did you lose it?”

“Yeah,” I sighed. “I think I did.”

“Well, it’s easy enough to get another copy.”

“I know, but I needed it for tonight.”

“What’s going on tonight that you would need your birth
certificate for?” she asked.

I continued to look through drawers that I had already
searched twice while I explained about Nate and gave her the shortened version
of who he was and how we had met.

“So, anyway, long story short, Jack’s got a meeting tonight
and asked me if I’d hang with Nate to keep him company - and he wants to go to
the casino in Windsor.”

My mother didn’t respond at all and remained
uncharacteristically silent.

“Mom? Are you still there?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m here.” She paused for a moment and I heard
her take a deep breath before continuing.  “Angie, you know I don’t like to
butt into your business, but are you interested in this guy?”

I thought about how to briefly answer that since I didn’t
have a lot of time before Nate was expected.  I really wished I could discuss
the whole situation with her – my issues with Nate and my feelings about Jack,
but I didn’t have time and I couldn’t really do it without revealing my secret
- or Jack’s.

“Well, yeah, I guess I am, in a way.  He’s a nice guy and
everything and I really like him – but it’s kind of a long story and I’m short
on time right now.  But if you’re worried about me rushing into anything, don’t
be.  I mean, he’s only going to be here for the rest of the week and he lives
in Ohio, for Pete’s sake, so I don’t really know that it could even go
anywhere.”

“I see,” she said slowly.  “What does Jack think about you
and Nate?”

“I don’t think he thinks anything about it. He hasn’t said
anything one way or the other. But we’ll have to talk about this later.  I’ve
really got to go.”

“Okay – just one more thing.  Why don’t you come over for
dinner tomorrow night?  I’ve got something I made for you - and your dad picked
up those shelves you wanted.”

“Oh, he did? He didn’t have to do that.”  I had talked to
them about how I wanted to get some short shelves, paint them a pretty color
and put them in my bedroom. But I hadn’t expected my dad to do anything other
than help me hang them.

“Well, you know your father.  Once he gets into Home Depot,
he can’t stop buying – so he picked them up while he was there.”

“That was nice of him.  Okay, sure, I’ll come to dinner.  And
what did you make for me?”

“Just wait and see,” she said.

“Okay, then I’ll see you tomorrow night after I get done at
the gym. Around 6:30?”

“Yeah, that sounds perfect.  Have fun tonight.”

“I will.  Thanks, Mom. See you tomorrow.”

“You’re welcome. See ya, honey.”

I disconnected the call and rushed to get dinner on the
table. The doorbell rang just as I finished mashing the potatoes and I hurried
to the door to let Nate in.

“Hey,” I said, pushing the storm door open.  “Come on in.”

“Hey.” He stepped inside and looked around while I closed
the door behind him.  “Wow. Nice house. It’s so…
cozy
.”

“Is that a polite way of saying it’s small?”

He laughed.  “No, not at all.  That’s an honest way of
saying I like it. Reminds me a lot of Kayla’s house with all the family
pictures.” He turned to the wall next to the door and studied the three
pictures hanging vertically there.  “These are cool.”

“Thanks,” I said.  They were pictures of Jack and me from a
weekend trip we had taken the previous summer to the western part of the state.
I had blown up maps to show the detail of where we were when the picture was
taken and then matted a photo on top of each of the maps. I had been pleased
with the way they turned out. They showed us in front of a waterfall, on sand
dunes and on a boat. It had been a great trip and I loved seeing the reminder
every time I entered or left my house.

“You two look like an old married couple,” he observed.

“Sometimes it feels like it,” I said and laughed.  “Although
I’m not too crazy about the ‘old’ part of that description.”  I turned and
started walking toward the kitchen. “Come on, let’s eat.”

While we ate, I told him about the misplaced birth
certificate and offered alternative plans. There were three casinos in downtown
Detroit, so we discussed the options and he assured me he wasn’t disappointed
about not going to Canada.

“I’ve just never been to that one,” he said. “I thought it
would be fun to see it, but I’m okay with any of them.  I’m more interested in
the company than the location.”  He smiled and scraped the last bite of
potatoes off of his plate.

I laughed, and noted how he ate like Jack, eating his
favorite part of the meal first, and handed him the serving bowl.  “Here, have
some more. I made plenty.”

“Thanks.”  He took the bowl and piled another large mound
onto the empty spot on his plate. As he was covering it with gravy, he said,
“So, I met Marla today and you were right.  Her boobs are definitely better
than Frank’s.”

We laughed and finished eating while we talked about his
afternoon, what he had accomplished and whom he had met. When we were done and
I was clearing the table, he asked me what I had done all afternoon.

I cleared my throat nervously, not about to tell him about
my underwear expedition.  “Nothing much, really. Got caught up on my laundry.”

“That sounds…interesting.”

“Not really.  But anything’s more interesting than actually
working.”

“True. Speaking of which, Jack seemed really excited about
your new job.”

“Yeah, I am, too. It’ll be good for both of us. He’s
overloaded with his work and I’m overly bored with mine.  I’m looking forward
to the change.”

His eyes never left me as I loaded the dishwasher and
finished cleaning up the kitchen. Although I hoped I wasn’t showing it, his
scrutiny was making me a little nervous and I chattered almost continually
about basically nothing while I finished up.

“Am I making you nervous?” he asked when I finally rinsed
out my sponge and turned around.

“Am I that obvious?”

He laughed.  “Yeah, you’ve been talking without taking a
breath for the last ten minutes.”  He stood up and walked over to me. “Why are
you nervous?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t really know.”

“Well, don’t be.” He put his hands on my shoulders, leaned
in and kissed my temple. “Thanks for dinner. I really enjoyed it.”

That
. That was why I was nervous. Although it was a
simple, friendly kiss, I was afraid he was going to try to take it further. 
And I was starting to have second thoughts about whether or not I wanted that.

I eased myself out of the semi-embrace. “You’re welcome. Are
you ready to go?”

“Yep.” He winked at me as if he knew exactly what I was
thinking. “Can you point me in the direction of the bathroom first?”

I walked him down the hall to the guest bathroom then,
deciding that was a good idea, went to use the bathroom in my bedroom. While I
was washing my hands I was thinking of Jack.  I was happy about going out
tonight, something I didn’t normally do during the week, and I liked Nate, but
I was wishing Jack was coming along. It wasn’t like we spent every minute of
every day together, so it was strange for me to realize that I was missing him.

And something was going on with him.  I couldn’t quite put
my finger on what it was.  The change was subtle, because he was always sweet
and affectionate, but it seemed he was ramping the affection up a notch and I
wondered why.

Maybe he had felt more from our kiss than he had let on. 
Maybe he was trying to work up to trying it again - or maybe he was indirectly
trying to move our relationship in a different direction. I realized I was
almost hoping that was the case. My own feelings were doing some subtle
shifting and I had been giving a lot of thought to what a romantic relationship
with Jack might be like. Deep in my heart, I knew it could only make our
already strong relationship even better – and I wouldn’t have thought that was
possible. But I still had that damn fear. A fear I was starting to question as
maybe being irrational.

But Nate was waiting and I didn’t really want to get started
on looking for answers I would never be able to find on my own.  Jack and I
needed to talk. I decided I would try to work up the nerve to have an honest
conversation with him, maybe sometime after Thursday when my period would be
over and my emotions should be more stable.

Nate was waiting by the front door when I came out. “All
set?” he asked.

“Yep, let’s go.”

He was slightly behind me as we walked the short distance to
his car and he put his hand on the small of my back, directing me to the
passenger side of his car.  He held the door open while I got in and by the
time he got to his side and got behind the wheel, my nervousness was back. 
This felt a little too much like a date, rather than two friends getting
together for a night out.

Thankfully the traffic wasn’t too bad and we both laughed as
we saw the mile-long line of trucks waiting to exit the expressway and get into
Canada. “Holy shit. I think I’m glad we changed our plans,” Nate said, looking
incredulously at the back-up. “We would have wasted most of the night just
trying to get across the bridge.”

“Here’s something you don’t know about me, Nate.  I don’t
wait in long lines for anything. There is nothing I want so badly that I would
be willing to waste all that time just sitting there.  I would have made you
change plans the minute I saw that,” I said, with a nod toward the line of
trucks.  Even travelling at seventy miles per hour, we still hadn’t reached the
front of that line.

“You would have made me, huh?”

“Yeah. You would have gladly given in just so I would stop
bitching about it.”

“Ah, the power of the bitch,” he said, laughing.

“Works every time,” I smugly informed him.

He snorted at that and during the short drive to our exit he
told me some of the tricks his sisters used to get what they wanted. He claimed
their tricks didn’t work on him because he knew them too well.

“Well, they’re your sisters, so that’s different,” I said.
“What about Kayla? Doesn’t she ever play the bitch card to get her way?”

“Never,” he said firmly.

“Oh, I doubt it,” I argued.  “Maybe she’s just perfected the
art and you don’t even realize she’s getting you to do what she wants.  We’re
good at that, too.”

He turned left into the casino parking garage. “Huh. Maybe I
don’t know women as well as I thought I did.”

“And you never will.”

He laughed and we turned our attention to trying to find a
parking space. He went up several tightly-packed levels before finding a spot
on the fourth.

“Wow,” I said, unbuckling my seat belt and looking around
the garage.  “Look how crowded this place is.  And it’s Monday!  Doesn’t anyone
stay home during the week?”

“Apparently not.” He removed his own seat belt and we got
out of the car, meeting at the rear. “I hope there aren’t any long lines
inside, or you’ll make me leave.”

“You got that right.”

We walked rather quickly across the parking lot, as if we
had only seconds to make it inside before the opportunity was lost forever. We
entered the casino and squeezed ourselves into the packed elevator and rode it
to the first floor.

Finally reaching the casino itself, we stopped and took it
all in. There were people walking about everywhere, and they all seemed to be
in a hurry. Slot machines were insistently ringing and lucky winners were shouting
over the more subtle sounds of buzzing conversations.  A light cloud of
cigarette smoke drifted toward the ceiling as some heavy-duty exhaust fans kept
it from being irritating.