Off The Market (4 page)

ETTA

The night began to wind down and Mr. & Mrs. Lawson had yawned more times than I could count. I knew it was time that I should probably head back to my sister’s, but sitting on the couch, wrapped in Andrew's arms, was the best place I’d been in a long time and I didn't want to leave. Being with his family on Christmas Eve was so much different than my own. My parents barely stayed around in the winter and my sister basically took any night I was around as an excuse to use me as a babysitter. I would have probably been watching cartoons with the kids and getting them ready for bed while she was still wrapping presents. It was good to be somewhere where I felt like more than a babysitter.

"Well, it's about time this old man hit the hay," Mr. Lawson said, standing up from his recliner. "Marion, do you care to join me or are you going to stay up with the kids?"

Mrs. Lawson looked up from her spot in the opposite recliner, her eyes fluttering briefly before she jolted herself awake. "I guess I should be joining you."

"Andrew, I'm sure you won’t mind putting out the fire before you and Etta leave?" Mr. Lawson raised an eyebrow.

Before Andrew could respond, Mrs. Lawson
had already bound from her chair and had her arms out to give me a big hug. I gladly stood up and got lost in her warm grasp. "It's good to have you back my dear. We hope to see more of you around." She shot a wink in my direction before she gave a quick hug to Andrew.

"Don't worry, Dad, I'll put out the fire and we will be leaving shortly," Andrew said with a nod and a smile.

Mr. Lawson smiled back. "Good. Merry Christmas, you two."

"Merry Christmas," we said practically in unison before Mr. and Mrs. Lawson turned and headed back to their bedroom.

"Let me just put out this fire and then I can take you back home, Etta," Andrew said, picking up a poker near the fireplace and leaning down against the small stack of wood that was barely fizzling with flames.

I watched the way his back muscles clenched when he bent over. His strong shoulders moved like a matador waving a
flag and I longed to see the way they moved when he was without his shirt, the way I did just a few hours before. I could definitely get used to the site of him.

"Do you remember our last Christmas together?" Andrew glanced back from the fire.

I took a seat back on the couch. I didn’t know how long he would be and I hated standing in heels for too long. They always killed my feet after a day of work. "How could I forget? I believe you begged me at least a hundred times not to go away to college and to stay here, with you."

Andrew frowned, focusing his gaze back at the fire. "That wasn't the part I was talking about."

"Oh, you mean the promise ring," I said, barely above a whisper. The one I knew that he saved for up for weeks to buy and that I still kept hidden in my jewelry box. Sometimes, I would take it out just to gaze at the small diamond ring. It wasn't an expensive gesture, but I knew that when he gave it to me, right in the very living room that I walked him through at Pine Hill, that he put his whole heart into it.

"Do you still have that crazy thing? I can't believe I thought that would make you stay here, l
ike I would ever keep you from going for your dreams," Andrew said poking the last licks of a flame that remained on one of the logs.

ANDREW

I didn’t think the ring crazy. I still thought about it every day. I used up all of the money I had been saving for a new truck and instead took it down to the local jewelry store, hoping to find something with a diamond in it that I could afford.

I poked the last of the fire and stood up, brushing the soot that had gathered on my jeans. Etta looked up at me, slowly shaking her head.

"Andrew, it wasn't a crazy thing, it was a wonderful gesture. One that I wish I would have taken more seriously. I was the crazy one," she said standing up to face me.

I put my fingers to her chin, tilting her head up ever so slightly so our lips were almost touching. "You weren't crazy, at least I never thought of you that way. Sometimes it's just all about timing. Maybe it took a few years, but I think this is how things are supposed to be. We found our way back to each other and even if you never sign that offer, I'd like to know that we at least had this Christmas together."

ETTA

I leaned up and lightly pressed my lips to his. I could feel all of the love he had for me pour through his mouth and flush my face. This was where I was supposed to be, if only I could get over my own insecurities. We had broken up
before, even when he'd given me a ring, I didn't have it in me to stay. I couldn't bear to break his heart again.

Andrew broke the kiss and looked down into
my eyes, tucking a fallen strand of hair behind my ear. "Are you ready for me to take you home?"

I shook my
head slowly. "How about we go to your place instead? I want to wake up Christmas morning next to you."

Andrew's grin spread so far
I thought it might fall off of his face. "Really? Does this mean you are seriously thinking of taking up my offer on the Pine Hill house?"

I let out a deep breath of air. I should have known that was coming
. "I didn't say that. I just said that I wanted to spend my Christmas with you. When the new year rolls around we can talk about the Pine Hill house and see where things lead."

Andrew nodded, n
ot saying a word, but taking my hand in his and leading me down the stairs and into the waiting truck. I thought of the ghosts of gifts past. All those years I had with Andrew. All those Christmases we shared. But I silently said a small prayer that this wouldn't be our last.

ETTA

Andrew lived in a small studio apartment on the other side of town. The complex was brick with only two floors and lit up by dozens of street lights. I thought a guy like him would have already had his own
house. Maybe a little bungalow close to downtown that he was always working on projects for. But maybe he was like me. Maybe he was just waiting for the right time or the right person to share it with. Maybe that was the Pine Hill house.

He parked his truck in the back lot and lead me through the small parking lot and into a back door that he had to enter in a code to unlock. We went up a small staircase and ended up in a long, wooden hallway. There were a few lines of doors on each side and Andrew stopped at the first one on the right. He took out a set of keys, jangling them until he found a small, gold one and then unlocked the front door. He turned on a small lamp on a nearby table and bathed the room in a warm glow.

I didn't know what I was expecting from Andrew's apartment, but what I saw wasn’t it. The whole place looked industrial, like a large warehouse with exposed piping on the ceiling instead of a man's home. Large floor to ceiling windows faced the opposite wall without any curtains blocking the view of the buildings across the way. A king sized bed with red, flannel sheets sat in front of the window and to the right of the bed was a small, stainless steel kitchen and a TV mounted on the wall by where a tiny lamp sat on a stand. There weren’t any touches that someone actually lived there; no pictures on the walls or even some kind of bill on the refrigerator. It didn't feel like home. It didn’t feel like the Pine Hill house, where I knew that Andrew really belonged.

"Where is your Christmas tree?" I asked, walking in and setting my purse down on the counter.

He didn’t even have a kitchen table or anywhere to sit beside his bed. I guess he didn’t have much company. Neither did I. Most of my friends were off at school or living their own lives. Sometimes I went out with some co-workers, but I would never invite anyone back to my mom’s house or my sister’s for that matter.

"I don't have one," Andrew said, matter of fact-like.

"You don't have a Christmas tree?" My eyes widened. I remembered how much he used to love going to the tree farm with his parents to cut down their Christmas tree. I went with them a few times and we would spend hours trudging through the woods looking for just the right one, or until our toes were so numb that we had to take the next one we saw.

Andrew shrugged. "There really isn't much room in this place for one."

I looked around the small room. Sure it wasn't a very big apartment, more like a studio, but neither was the room I had at my parent’s. The bedroom may have had its own bathroom, but I also had to share with my sister’s kids when she watched them. That meant there were a lot of toys in the bath tub and sometimes even more disgusting things. I would have loved to have a place that I didn’t need to share with them. Not that I didn’t like kids or love my nieces and nephews, but someday, when they were my own it would be better. Not as intrusive, I guess.

It was the first time I really ever thought of kids of my own. After babysitting my sister’s kids for so long, I thought I never wanted them. But the more time I spent with Andrew and thought about the Pine Hill house, the more I thought about filling the upstairs bedrooms
with kids’ toys and sitting by the fire on cold Missouri nights with them in their footie jammies as Andrew made them hot chocolate.

"Luckily, there is plenty of space for one at the Pine Hill house,"
I said, smiling. I didn’t know why I said it out loud, but it felt good to. I didn’t want to stop talking about a future in that house.

Andrew took off his coat and boots, tossing them in a pile near the entry way. "Remember how my mom would always gather us around to decorate the tree in the front window? She would play Christmas music and make us all hot cocoa to get us in the spirit."

I remembered it vividly. I never felt more at home then when I was at the Pine Hill house and never more alive than when I was with Andrew and his family. Even that night, sharing Christmas dinner and watching his mom and dad gaze at each other, still in love after all these years. The way they hugged me. All of that and I knew they still loved me too as the daughter they never had. I had to pull myself together or I would end up in tears right in front of Andrew.

"Shall we head to bed?" Andrew asked. "I can let you wear one of my t-shirts if you'd like."

ANDREW

I
always loved the way Etta looked when she was wearing one of my t-shirts. Whenever I could convince her to play basketball, I would get her to wear one of my old team t-shirts and I loved the way it would fit her small frame. I had to bite my lip thinking about how the shirt would now fit against her well developed curves and how sleep might not come into play.

Etta smiled, shrugging her coat off and placing it next to her purse. "I wouldn't mind getting in an old t-shirt off yours or crawling beneath your sheets."

My body was in full attention of her seductive smile. I’d thought about having her back at my apartment for so long, but it wasn't the right time. There were so many times I thought about looking her up and calling her, but I couldn’t do it. We may have had sex twice that day, but I didn't want to wake up the next morning tangled with her knowing that it would be the last time I could possibly share the bed with her, especially if she decided she didn't want to move into the Pine Hill home.

"I'm pretty tired, Etta." I
faked a good yawn, stretching my arms above my head. "My shirts are in the drawer under my bed. I'm going to head to the bathroom to wash up and I will meet you in a few minutes."

ETTA

I watched as Andrew walked right past me and into the tiny door to the right of the kitchen that I could only assume was the bathroom. After all we’d done that night and yet he pushed me away. Was it because of the house? Part of me thought that maybe he would forget about the idea of me moving in right away. Maybe we could take our time and get to know each other again. But another part was starting to gravitate toward the idea of moving in with him. Taking the chance and letting love in. I let out a long sigh and walked over to the bed, pulling out one of the drawers underneath it.

The top t-shirt caught my eye, the one from our high school powder puff. I
couldn't believe he still had it. I held up the shirt, thumbing the worn-out cotton fabric. A blue drawing of a boy in a cheerleading outfit and a girl in a basketball uniform graced the front with
Winter Powder Puff
scrawled out underneath. I laughed to myself, remembering the way Andrew fumbled over the cheers he had to perform and how I missed just about every shot on the basketball court because I was too busy watching him.

I slid off my
clothes, so that I was only wearing my panties, and put on the soft cotton shirt over my bare skin just as Andrew walked out of the bathroom. He looked absolutely mouth watering in just a pair of plaid pajama bottoms, slung low so I could see the line of his hip bones. "Are you ready for bed, Andrew?"

ANDREW

I couldn’t believe my eyes. Standing there in the middle of my apartment, Etta looked like the girl I had met so many years ago. Wearing my old high school shirt, it felt like I took a step back in time and we were high school kids again, and it was our first time sharing anything intimate. I suddenly felt nervous, like first day of school jitters, to be sharing my bed with Etta. Never mind that I had just seen all of her, twice, just in one day and many more times before. This was different. This was us holding each other and falling asleep together. Almost more intimate than sex.

"Yes, all ready."
I swallowed, taking a few smalls steps until I was at the bed.

Etta crawled on, giving
me a very nice peek at the lace underwear, the only thing I saw that she was wearing underneath the shirt. My boxers rumbled just from the site of it. But I adjusted myself quickly before she could see anything. I climbed on the other side of the bed and moved closer to her, laying my head down on the pillow. Etta turned off the only light left on, the one on the stand near the bed, and snuggled up next to me, her head on my chest. I felt her warm breath tickle my skin in a rhythmic beat that was the same as my heart. This was where we belonged. I just hoped she could see that and would be there the next morning. I hoped that she would be there every morning when I woke up in the Pine Hill house. Forever and ever.

"Merry Christmas, Andrew."

"Merry Christmas, Etta."