This didn’t change anything.
We were still just friends.
* * *
? ? ?
After our impromptu sleepover and leisurely breakfast on Sunday, we finished the living room, painting over the primer with the acceptable-but-boring Eggshell. Monday morning I took all the painter’s tape off the edges of the wall, waiting for Mitch to come by to help me move the furniture back. When he got there he didn’t even knock, just came right in the front door. Making himself at home.
“So what are we working on today . . .” His voice trailed off and I heard his footsteps come toward me in the kitchen. I glanced over my shoulder to see a puzzled expression on his face. He took an exaggerated sniff of the air. “What’s that . . . is that . . . ?”
I shrugged. “Nothing exciting. Pork shoulder in the slow cooker again.”
“Yeah, but . . .” A grin crawled up his face. “You made this for me?”
“I did not,” I said a little too quickly. “I made it for me. I can’t afford takeout every night, you know.” It’d seemed like a good idea when I’d started it last night, making a big slab of meat for us to devour at the end of the day, but not if he was going to be all smug about it.
He nodded firmly, moving to the coffeepot to pour himself some coffee, which of course I had also made extra of, in case he’d want some. “It’s for me.”
His conviction was maddening, but when he was like this it was easier to just not argue with him. While he sipped his coffee I went back to what I was doing when he got there: staring at the kitchen with a critical eye.
“You sure I shouldn’t do anything in here?”
He shrugged. “Like what?”
“I don’t know. But now that the rest of the house is starting to look better, it looks kind of dingy in here, don’t you think?”
“I don’t know that I’d say that.” He leaned his elbows on the kitchen island and studied the room with me. “Your appliances aren’t all that old, and the floor’s in good shape. But it’s up to you.”
“Yeah.” I decided to table the thought for now. One room at a time, one project at a time. “Let’s get the living room put back together.”
The living room was so much brighter now that it wasn’t blue anymore. The Eggshell wasn’t quite as soulless as I’d feared, and once we’d put the furniture back the way I liked it, the whole room looked larger and sunnier. It wasn’t bad, but I wasn’t sure if it was me. But it didn’t have to be. I wasn’t making these changes for myself. I was making them for whoever owned this place next.
We prepped the dining room on Monday afternoon and it was painted by Wednesday evening. Mitch brought over a second six-pack of beer, so my fridge remained stocked. I gave him shit for it, more because he expected it from me than because I wanted to.
Wednesday night we ordered a pizza and demolished it sitting on the floor in the living room while watching a superhero movie. Then we had sex on my living room floor because Mitch’s arms reminded me of Captain America’s. He didn’t seem to mind.
We took Thursday off from home renovations; Mitch said he had errands to run, and I had book club that night anyway, so I spent the day lazing on the couch, finishing the book just in time. I’d been busy that week, what with doing all the work on the house and doing the guy helping me out. Who had time to read?
It was Caroline’s night to host, and when I walked into her house, there was a mountain of cupcakes on her dining room table.
“My God, woman.” I reached for one and accepted the glass of wine she handed me. “Did you go to an orgy or something? This is a lot of cupcakes.” But I wasn’t complaining, because she’d made red velvet again. My favorite.
“Oh, these aren’t mine,” Caroline said, mischief sparking in her eyes. “These cupcakes are all yours, April.”
I froze, the cupcake halfway to my mouth. “Excuse me?”
She scoffed. “Oh, come on. You think I haven’t noticed a certain red pickup truck in your driveway since, oh, the minute your daughter left for Beach Week?”
“Wait. Red pickup?” Marjorie turned to me with a grin. “That wouldn’t be a certain baseball coach I saw you with at graduation, would it?”
“Oh, really?” Caroline’s smile was wider than Marjorie’s, and the combined force of their gazes was like a spotlight.
Marjorie nodded emphatically at Caroline. “You should have seen them, they looked so cute together. Screw the book, I’m going to need to hear more about you and Mitch Malone.”
I’d heard the phrase “blood running cold” before, but I’d never experienced it firsthand. “I . . .” I put the uneaten cupcake on the table, barely having the presence of mind to put a napkin down first. “It wasn’t . . .”
But the conversation about me had, oddly, moved on without me. “You know, I always say it’s the quiet ones that you have to look out for,” Caroline practically sang. “They’re the freakiest.”
“Who’s the freakiest?” Oh good. Everyone was here now: the last two stragglers had just shown up and Caroline made a beeline to the living room to meet them, where they were going to get a recap of my love life. Except it wasn’t my love life. It was an elaborate lie with a side of friends with benefits, and I’d been caught.
I spun for the hallway, looking for the bathroom. I needed to hide. Possibly for the rest of the night. The rest of my life.
“Hey.” Marjorie hooked her hand around my arm, stopping me. The smile had fallen from her face as she caught what had to be a wild look in my eyes. “I’m sorry. I was just teasing. I’m happy for you if—”
“It’s not,” I blurted out. “I mean, we’re not. He’s a friend. I don’t know what you think you saw at graduation, but it wasn’t that.” I was lying. She saw exactly what she thought she did. But right now some light gaslighting was preferable to explaining the weird tangle of subterfuge that had become my relationship with Mitch.
A peal of laughter came from the living room, and I winced. “I can’t do this,” I whispered. I didn’t realize I’d said the words out loud, but Marjorie’s grip on my arm relaxed and turned into a pat on my shoulder.
“Go to the bathroom.” Her voice was low and urgent. “Take some deep breaths and a few sips of water. I’ll shut them up out here, okay? Give me five minutes.”
I nodded dumbly and fled to the back of the house. Once I was safely locked in the bathroom I leaned against the door, breathing deeply, trying to slow my heart rate before it pounded all the way out of my chest. I barely recognized the woman in the mirror. She looked wild; she looked miserable. God, the irony. This had been one of the best weeks of my life, because Mitch had been in it. But now all I wanted was to erase the last few days. Scrub out the evidence of the red truck in my driveway.
My phone chimed in my purse, and speak of the devil. I unlocked my phone to see a picture taken at a big-box home improvement store. If you’re still worried about your kitchen, we can replace your cabinet fronts with something like these. What do you think? I can pick them up tomorrow and bring them by.