Playing With Her Heart (19 page)

His lips quirk up as if
he’s intrigued by the question, considering it. “I hadn’t
thought of it that way. But yeah, maybe that’s part of it. I spend
all my hours constructing the most believable artifice I can, so when
I’m not playing pretend, I want to know what’s real.”

Real.
There it
is again, and the word makes me wince because I’m struggling so
much with holding onto real and make believe, and they seem to be
seeping into each other.

He fingers a strand of
my hair absently and it’s such a sweet gesture, because that’s
all it is. It’s not a prelude, it’s not the start of something
more. It is what it is. “What about you, Jill? What do you read?”

I take a long but quiet
inhale and I stare off at the faraway balcony of the theater. The
balcony that will be full of people soon. I flash back to Sunday with
Patrick, to how I was paralyzed with some strange fear about
answering truthfully. Maybe that’s why I’ve been asking Davis
these questions. Maybe I’ve been asking so he could ask me back. So
I can test myself. See if I can do it. If I can speak a simple truth.

I look at him, and it
doesn’t hurt, I don’t feel like all my words are stuck. It’s
easy, remarkably easy to answer.

“Romance,” I say,
and it’s as if a piece of my regret floats away when I voice a
truth. It feels good, so I keep going. “Racy romance, to be
precise.”

A grin tugs at his
lips. “Of course you read racy romance,” he says in a flirty,
sexy voice. No judgement. No teasing. Just knowing.

“Why do you say
of
course
?”

“Because you couldn’t
play this part if you weren’t a romantic. Because I see it in you.
Because I see all this passion, all this pain, all this hope. All
this sexiness.”

I can feel it again.
The same thing I felt when I sang in our first private rehearsal. As
if a fragment of my frozen heart is breaking away, as if the ice I’ve
encased myself in is calving off, freeing up a tiny part of me that
wants to be known. And it feels good, so more words spill out, like a
confessional. “I read dirty stuff. And racy stuff. And erotic
romance. And I love books with heroes who talk dirty,” I say as I
move closer, and run my fingers along the smooth buttons on his
shirt.

“I had a feeling you
did,” he says, and he can’t stop grinning.

“It doesn’t bother
you?”

“Why would it bother
me?”

“I don’t know,” I
say with a shrug.

“Do you masturbate
when you read your erotic novels?”

“Yes.”

“I would love to
watch you sometime.”

My eyes widen with
shock. “You would?”

“Of course,” he
says, as if it’s the most normal thing in the world, when it never
occurred to me he would. Or anyone would want to. “I want to know
how you touch yourself.”

My skin is burning
again, and if we keep talking like this, I’ll be doing a striptease
for him in the middle of the stage. But I can’t seem to resist. I
reach for him, trailing my hand through his hair. I love the way his
hair is so soft under my fingers. He sighs deeply, and leans close to
me, resting his forehead against mine. “Jill,” he says in a low
voice.

“Davis,” I say, and
that’s all, because there’s nothing more to be said. Then we’re
silent like that, quiet for a few moments, and there’s something
very comforting about being with him, as the snow falls outside, and
we’re inside. But soon I break the silence.

“Can I ask you a
question?”

“Yes.”

“Did I taste like sin
and heaven?”

He nods, then presses
his lips lightly to my forehead. “You are my sin.” He brushes
them gently against my earlobe. “And my heaven.” Then the barest
of kisses on my lips. “And everything in between.”

Then he pulls back, and
his expression has changed from the softness of the moment to a
steely one. “And I hate that you’re in love with Patrick. I hate
it. Because it makes me crazy to want you this much and to know how
you feel for him. It makes me utterly insane.”

I open my mouth to say
something, to deny it, to ask how he knew it was Patrick. But I stop,
because he’s right. And he’s waiting for me to offer a denial,
but when no words come, he stands up and turns away from me, his
voice suddenly cool as he reminds me why I’m here. “We need to
get back to work.”

“Do you want to do
that scene again?” I ask tentatively, the words coming out all
choppy.

He shakes his head, and
waves a hand dismissively. “The blocking is fine. We’ll work on
your solos.”

So we spend the next
two hours working and nothing more. When we’re done, he holds open
the door for the car, but doesn’t join me. And of course, that’s
because he doesn’t want anything more from this actress.

* * *

Reeve grunts as he
bench presses a heavy set of barbells. He’s working out even more
as he preps for his leading role in
Escorted Lives
.

We’re at his gym in
the East Village early the next morning after a run. I do bicep curls
with ten-pound weights, to the sounds of dumbbells hitting the floor
and machines slamming down.

“How did you know it
was real?”

“What do you mean?”
He gives me a curious look.

“With Sutton,” I
say, as if he should be able to follow the random thoughts that have
percolated in my head since my last private rehearsal with Davis.

“Ah,” he says with
a twinkle in his eye. “With the complicated, vexing, inscrutable
Ms. Brenner.”

“Yeah. How did you
know that you were feeling something for real?” I switch to
triceps. No flabby chicken arms for me. “Or that she was?”

He pushes the barbell
up for one more rep then places it in the rack. He sits up on the
bench, elbows on his knees.

“It wasn’t easy,
let me tell you. She was a tough one. Hard to read. Lots of layers of
self-protection there. Took a while before I could really figure out
if it was real.”

“And even then she
tried to deny it,” I say, remembering when Reeve came to my
apartment a few days before my
Crash the Moon
audition,
completely flummoxed over what to do next with her. Before he laid it
all on the line for her.

“That’s my woman.
She could put up walls like no one I’ve ever seen.”

“Hmm,” I say, as I
push my arm back for another curl. If Reeve only knew about my walls.
My secrets.

“Is this about
Patrick?” he asks, tilting his head to the side and pushing a hand
through his brown hair.

“Yeah, of course,”
I say quickly. Too quickly. Because my mind isn’t on Patrick at
all. But it should be.

“He’s doing that
whole let’s-be-friends-first thing?”

“Yep.”

Nearby, a burly man
with a worn blue t-shirt that shows off arms as big as tires brings a
set of weights to the ground. They clang loudly. “Are you going to
go out with him again on another of these,” he stops to sketch air
quotes, “
Friends
dates?”

“I hope so,” I say.
Then once more, as if the repetition will make it true. “I hope
so.”

Because I do hope for
Patrick. I hope that I can connect with him the way I’ve always
wanted to. That it can deepen now that he’s a real thing in my
life. It has to. Really, it has to.

“What do
friends
do next?”

“I don’t know. I
can’t ask him to dinner. That would feel like a date. And we’ve
already done coffee.”

He wiggles his eyebrows
as he stands up from the bench. “I know what you can do!”

“What?” I ask
eagerly, my eyes lighting up.

“Bowling. There’s
that bowling alley in the Port Authority. It’s awesome. It’s two
blocks from the St. James so you can go there some evening after
rehearsal.”

I nod and smile, liking
the idea. Bowling with Patrick. It sounds fun. Easy, low-key, we’ll
have a few laughs, we’ll do something friendly. It’ll be the
perfect second non-date. And it’ll help me get my mind off all the
things that aren’t real. All the things that can’t possibly be
real in any way, shape or form. All the things that I don’t know
how to fit into my life.

“I’m brilliant,”
Reeve says, moving to a sit-up bench. “Just admit it.”

“You’re the most
brilliant one of all,” I say as Reeve curls up in a crunch. My
phone buzzes. I reach into the pocket of my workout shorts, and for
the briefest of seconds, I find myself hoping it’s a text about
another private rehearsal. But it’s from Kat, and it’s a picture
of a wedding gown she wants to try on this weekend.

I smile and write back.
Can’t wait.

She’s going to look
beautiful when she walks down the aisle to marry the only man she’s
ever loved.

* * *

Patrick holds the green
bowling ball in front of his chest, pausing on the polished wood
floor. He bends, his arm swinging gracefully behind him, then in
front of him as he shoots the ball down the lane.

Lifehouse plays loudly
in the Port Authority bowling alley, a strange choice. I’d expected
a bouncy Katy Perry tune, or even some hair metal from the 80s like
Poison. But the guy who runs this place loves his alt pop music, so
we’re treated to one of my favorite songs—“Broken.”
I’m
falling apart, I’m barely breathing
mingles with the sound of
arcade games and gutter balls, but I push away the sadness in the
words, and focus instead on the beat, on the way the band sings of
possibilities, of healing, of becoming whole again.

And on Patrick, as he
watches the ball roll in a perfect straight line. Ten pins spill with
a loud crash, rattling under the lane.

Patrick raises his arms
high in the air, spins around and smiles widely.

“Strike!”

I shake my head, but I
can’t mask how impressed I am. There’s nothing he can’t do
well. Not only has he landed strikes and spares effortlessly in most
frames, he’s a perfect gentleman. No grandstanding in the bowling
alley for him. Just a few happy pumps of the fist with each frame.

“You are a rock
star,” I say as I high five him. He’s a golden boy. He’s good
at everything. And he’s literally the nicest guy I’ve ever met.
He’s like sunshine, and I don’t think anything could ever get him
down.

He waves off my
compliment, as if it’s nothing. “Nah. I’m just having fun.”

I take my final turn,
knocking down five pins.

I return to the
scorekeeping table, and I know I’ve been defeated, but I don’t
care because it’s been fun. How could it not be fun? Patrick’s
not hot and cold. Patrick doesn’t make my brain hurt. Patrick
doesn’t confuse me with all his mixed messages. It’s simple with
him, and maybe that’s how this will be as we move forward after
Crash The Moon
—a steady, sturdy sort of thing.

No drama. No angst. No
worrying.

We train our eyes on
the TV screens, waiting for our final scores.

188 flashes across the
black and white monitor under his name. Mine is much lower.

“You finished with a
102,” he says brightly, placing a hand on my back. “That’s a
great score.”

“It was a good game.”

“We should get back
now or Shannon and Milo will have our heads,” he says, and I flinch
at the mention of our director’s name. They’re working with other
chorus members, so we had two hours free at lunch and used that time
to slip out to the nearby lanes. We leave the Port Authority and head
the few blocks back to the theater.

“You know what would
be cool?” Patrick muses as we turn into the alley that runs
alongside the St. James. “If we did a movie together someday. I’ve
got a few things I’m looking into, and it’d be fun to work on a
film with you.”

“Um, yeah!”

“But I also think we
need to find mini golf somewhere in Manhattan,” Patrick says as we
reach the stage door.

“Randall’s Island,”
I tell him, as he holds open the door for me. “There’s mini
golf on Randall’s Island.”

“Then, Jill, that’s
exactly what we’re going to do the next time we get together,” he
declares as he bounds up the steps and into the hallway. I’m right
behind him as we round the corner, but I freeze when I see Davis at
the end of the hall, head down and enrapt in a conversation with
Shannon who’s holding her clipboard and taking notes.

He doesn’t even see
me, but an icy dread spreads through my bones, as if I’ve been
caught. I’m ready to turn around, run, hide. Then I remind myself I
did nothing wrong. There’s no reason I can’t hang out with my
cast mate. No reason at all. So I tell myself to pick up my boots and
put one foot in front of the other and walk on.

I keep pace next to
Patrick, who’s musing about whether the mini golf range at
Randall’s Island has one of those crazy, macabre clowns for the
final hole, and I force a smile on my face, and then I even manage a
laugh, because I’m sure I’ll feel as lighthearted as I possibly
can while whacking a small white ball into a clown’s face.

The sound of Patrick’s
voice carries in these cramped hallways, and it’s enough for Davis
to look away from Shannon. He appraises the scene instantly—Patrick
and I coming from outside, Patrick and I gone for two hours, Patrick
and I chatting. His blue eyes turn dark and steely, and I can almost
feel the anger radiating from him as we pass by. He’s like a high
tension line, and his jaw is set hard, his eyes narrowed.

“Hey Milo,” Patrick
says amiably, giving him a quick salute. “I’m all ready to start
on whatever you’ve got for me this afternoon.”

“Great,” Davis says
through gritted teeth.

Patrick points with his
thumb to the stage. I tell Patrick I’ll see him out there, and then
duck into the bathroom. I lean against the wall, take a deep and
shaky breath. I press my thumb and forefinger against the bridge of
my nose, wishing I could erase that encounter. Wishing I knew what I
wanted to do differently. But I can’t go out and face Davis right
now, so I lean forward, my hands on my thighs, as if I’m winded and
need air.