My eyebrows rise and my eyes widen.
“How do I know, you ask? Ah, well, one time, I just so happened to be in the office with him when she busted in and ripped off that overcoat, revealing her whole self, bare as the day she was born.”
“Oh man,” I remark with a laugh.
Maria giggles. “Oliver jumped up so fast, I swear he set a land speed record.”
“To try to cover her?”
“Ha! No way. He was like the freaking Flash with how quickly he got me out the door of his office and dropped the blinds.” She smiles and smacks her hands together in a speedy gesture, remembering. “It was the one, singular time in my adult life that I ever wished to be married. That I ever felt sadness for not going the traditional route. That I mourned the house and the white picket fence and the two and a half kids.”
My smile cracks a little, her sadness becoming my own.
“But I never experienced anything remotely close to what they had. I never had the rush to the office in nothing but an overcoat kind of feeling for someone, you know?”
I nod. Fuck, but do I know.
She shrugs. “I was content anyway. I almost never even thought I was missing out. But now, I can see… Now, I see all the things about living every day like you have no more left, and they make a whole lot of sense.”
I swallow hard against telling her something like it’s okay, you’ve done what you were meant to or platitudes equally as dismissive to her feelings right now. It’s in my nature to fix things, but as in this case, some things really aren’t meant to be fixed.
“What about you?” she asks quietly. “You never thought about it again…you know…after Charlotte?”
I shake my head.
“Do you still think about her?”
The question almost catches me off guard, but it’s not hard to understand why she might think I would. Just tonight, I acted in a way that suggests I’m still harboring those demons. But the truth is, none of my demons has a single thing to do with Charlotte. If anyone deserves to know what really goes on inside me, it’s Maria.
“Charlotte and I were not meant to be. I know that now, and, to be quite frank, I knew it then.”
Her eyes widen slightly, and she sits up, turning her back to the couch again so she can face me, and I sigh, running a hand through my hair.
“The only thing that haunts me about what happened with her is the way I acted.” I pause. “I’ve never told anyone this, but Charlotte only did the leaving because I forced her to.”
She sits up straighter, suddenly looking more sober than I’d like. “What do you mean?”
“She wanted me to move to California with her. She got a job offer, a major opportunity. I said no. Me or the job.” I scoff. “A fucking ultimatum.” I shake my head. “What I didn’t understand then that I do now is that I wanted her to need me, and she didn’t. It’s a stupid thing, wanting someone to need you like that—I get that now. Someone can need you around without having to depend on you.” I shrug. “Back then, I just didn’t know the difference, and I guess she did.”
Maria studies me closely, and I turn to glance out the dark window just so I don’t have to watch as she does it.
“We weren’t right for each other at all because it wasn’t easy. And it’s never been easy with anyone else.” I laugh. “And that’s the tale of my long-standing run of bachelordom.”
“Worked out pretty good for me.” Maria smiles at me. “I don’t know if I’d be surviving without your help at this point.”
“Crazy,” I remark, making her eyebrows pull together.
“What?”
“It’s crazy…” I repeat, studying her beautiful face just a little bit closer, “…how a favor for you can feel like it’s doing so much for me.”
She stares at me for the longest time, her eyes intently searching mine, trying to find something I don’t quite understand. She does this for so long that I honestly start to wonder if my words came out wrong.
But then, she surprises the hell out of me in one fell swoop.
Mouth to mine, Maria kisses me.
Maria
I don’t know what came over me, but between one breath and the next, I went from a woman thinking about kissing Remy to a woman who is kissing Remy.
He’s shocked at first, his lips parting out of pure surprise, but when I coax my tongue inside his mouth, I feel him give in to the moment.
He tastes like tequila and Remy and all the things that make me feel good inside.