“Sounds like a good time,” I told Becca over the phone. “Who is our fourth?” If we were going to trivia night, I needed to know who was on our team. I was kind of competitive. Correction: Very competitive.
I knew Jodi would be an asset to our team, and that Becca could hold her own, but a bad fourth person could be the difference between victory and getting sacked.
“Jodi invited one of her friends from that baby and me class she goes to—Amber something. Seriously, your office is like five doors down. Why don’t you just come down here? Are you busy or something?”
I wasn’t busy, but I was kind of hiding out in my office with the door shut that Tuesday morning. I’d thought I saw Ryan Smith, or Coach Smith, pull into the parking lot outside my window earlier, and I was hoping to avoid him.
It wasn’t at all against the principles of the New Dana plan, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Not yet.
He’d never came out and directly asked me on a date, but he never left without hinting at one either. Since I was in admissions, and part of his job, as assistant coach of the baseball team, was to discuss possible recruits with our office, he stopped by on the regular.
For a coach, Ryan always came across as soft spoken to me. Always polite. Always very calm and easy to work with. Some of the other women in the office thought he was a catch, including Becca who’d suggested I just give him a shot on more than one occasion.
He just didn’t do it for me. Well, he didn’t do it for the old me.
He was, by definition, the exact guy the new me was supposed to be on the lookout for. Around my age. Great job. Nice, average, and local.
Basically, he gave off the exact opposite impression of a man like Cord Taylor, who had shown up in a dream the night before. It had been a complete figment of my imagination, but quite a show.
I confessed, “I can’t. I’m dodging Coach Smith. I think he’s in the building.”
“Oh, my God. Would you please make up your mind already? Are you done with assholes or not. Ryan is a good guy,” Becca whined.
Since she was engaged, suddenly my relationship status was a much bigger deal to her. Best friends are like that sometimes. When they have something good—and they love you—they just want you to have what they have. I can’t blame her for that. Honestly, she was right; I did want someone.
I also wanted to sit in my desk chair and not writhe in pain, but such was life. I’d worked out more in the past three days than I had in the past three months.
Twice on Monday, don’t ask—I’d plead the fifth.
At least, I learned Cord usually worked out in the mornings. I could avoid him, which was why I went so many times yesterday. I wanted to know when he went so I could plan to go some other time. My logic was irrational at best, but it would work.
That’s what I told myself the day before, and that’s also the reason I went again in the same day. You know, to start a routine.
You’d never get me to answer why I’d went again just that morning. There was no way I was ready to figure that out. We hadn’t even made eye contact. I did, however, watch him lift weights while he sweat like a beast.
I was an addict, okay? Quitting cold turkey was hard as fuck.
Besides, after I sent him the thumb—the worst possible reply to a message—I was pretty sure I’d blown any chance of him trying to talk to me again. It was a bitch move, albeit intentional. Self-preservation.
Looking didn’t hurt anything. Right?
I thought of it as being weaned. Old Dana would have jumped at the chance for a shot with a guy like Cord. New Dana was supposed to be open minded to guys like Ryan, though. Maybe I was just the in-between-phases me that Tuesday, because I just wanted to hide.
“Okay, you’re right. He’s a good guy, but I can’t walk right today. My legs hurt, and I don’t want to look dumb. You come down here.” That was the other reason I called her from only down the hall. My body felt like it had been hit by a Mack truck.
I’d totally over done it.
“Are you okay?” she asked, her tone more concerned than argumentative now.
I crossed my fingers, to protect myself from the white lie I was about to tell. “I’m fine. I just over did it on the treadmill.” She didn’t need to know the ugly details.
“Fine, I’ll be right down.” She hung up.
As carefully as I could, I stood. I felt like hell, but I had to unlock my door for her. The second I did, there was a knock.
I had one of those moments where you hear the words so close in your head. It was Ryan, I didn’t even have to open the door to know. That was just my luck.
I pressed the handle down on the door and greeted him with a smile, “Hi, Coach Smith. How’s it going?”
Subtle creases around his eyes appeared as he grinned back at me. Wasn’t that the moment when someone should feel something if they were attracted to the other person? All I could think was damn, he had nice pores and wondered what sunblock he used.
It was fucking sad how little I felt for a great guy like Coach Smith when he was right in front of me and how excited I was from simply thinking about Cord.
“It’s Ryan,” he gently corrected. “Everything’s great. Are you busy?”
I could smell the mint on his breath mixed with some cologne I couldn’t put my finger on. Still, nothing.
“Actually, I was about to meet up with Becca to hash out a few things for summer term.” Don’t worry, my fingers were crossed for that one too.
I peeked behind him, and, thankfully, she was headed our way. He stepped aside and glanced back following my gaze.
“Oh, that’s fine. I should have called. I was just driving by and thought I’d pop in. My mistake.”
“No worries. Shoot me an email; we’ll set something up.” I gave him a closed mouth smile which he returned.
He wasn’t ugly, not at all. Light blond hair, blue eyes. Nice smile.
Mostly, it was a confidence thing. He didn’t act like he had much, and men who had confidence—usually way too much—were always more attractive to me. But, if I’m telling the whole truth, I liked them a step just past confidence. Cocky, bordering on arrogant. That’s what really turned me on.
Men with swag. My biggest vice.
There wasn’t even any push back in his voice when he said, “Yeah, okay. I’ll do that.” Had he acted like he really wanted it, like he didn’t want to take no for an answer, I might have given in.
I was beginning to hate myself.
Who in the fuck did I think I was?
A shallow bitch—that’s who—but at least when I dated pricks, I got what I deserved.
“Hi, Ryan,” Becca said. She worked with him some too, but not as often as I did and we both knew why.
“You know you can’t monopolize all of Dana’s time,” he jested.
“Yeah, sorry. I have to get this paperwork done by tomorrow. It’s crazy around here.” She shifted the weight of the load she carried to her other hip.
He studied the folders in her arms. I prayed, for her sake, she didn’t really have that much stuff to get done, because I was pretty much caught up.
“I’ll let you guys get to it then. Hopefully, I’ll catch up with you soon, Dana.” He looked into my eyes, and I’d be more than white-lying if I said I didn’t see something comforting and kind. It was too damn bad I didn’t sense anything beyond friendship. He added as expected, “Maybe we can get dinner sometime or something?”
“Yeah, maybe.” Then my phone rang, saving me. “I need to get that. See you later.”
I didn’t pay attention to what they said to each other and dealt with the room change I’d requested with housing for a student for next fall. When I was finished, he was gone, and she was sitting in the chair across from me—throwing shade like only a real best friend can.
“What?” I asked her, which only opened the door for her to scold me.
“Why don’t you like him? He’s so damn sweet and cute. You can’t deny that.”
I slouched, not feeling like going into it. “I’m not saying he isn’t cute. He’s just so … passive.”
“Maybe you should go to a game and watch him coach or something. See if he’s aggressive on the field.” The pervert wagged her eyebrows at me, then continued. “Or maybe you could go out with him and see if he’s just being professional here at work. We don’t act the same at work as we do out in our real lives, Dana. Maybe he has more personality than you’re giving him credit for.”
“Why are you always trying to get me to go out with him?”
It had been going on for months. Through the last few guys I’d dated, she’d always remind me afterward how Ryan probably wouldn’t have done this or that.
“Do you owe him money or something? Did you lose a bet?” I leaned over my tidy desk and asked conspiratorially, “Is he blackmailing you?”
“Shut up,” she said and threw a pencil at me. “You could do a lot worse than a guy like him, and he’s actually interested in you, and …”
There it was. The and—the real reason—but she hesitated and sat back in the club chair, crossing her tan legs.
“And what?”
“I don’t want to say. You’ll laugh at me.” Her round face lost most of its expression, and she glared with her mouth pursed.
“Laugh at you?” I never laughed at her when she was serious.
She looked away, and her long brown ponytail fell over her shoulder. “You don’t get it, and when I talk about stuff like this you call me—and I quote—a silly girl.”
Okay. I had called her that a time or two. In my defense, she’d considered wearing a tiara at her wedding. She just had more fairytale in her blood than I did.
Still, she was Becca. We’d been roommates for six years, and we worked together every day. She kind of knew my shit.
“I won’t laugh,” I promised with a hand on my heart.
She snapped out of the terse attitude, pushed the folders into the other chair, and moved hers closer to my desk. “I know you think that I’m all into the lovey-mushy stuff right now because I’m moving in with Reuben, and we’re getting married, and all that lala-woohoo-life-is-grand bullshit. You think I’m looking at everything with rose-colored glasses. Maybe I am somewhat, but you’ve been telling me for the past year—after every one of those assholes is gone—that you want something more than what you’d just gotten out of that relationship. True or False?”
Oh, God. She was best friend pop quizzing me. I’d been through that with her before. It was serious.
“True,” I droned.
“And you just said yourself that you are more interested in finding an average guy than just some hot, sheet warmer. True or false?”
I gave her the stink eye. “Sheet warmer?”
She returned the stink eye and upped the ante with a sassy head cock.
“True.” Bitch.
“And which one of these men are interested in you? A—some guy you’re chasing at the gym. I’m a little wiser than you give me credit for. Your treadmill has been holding your purses since you moved there. Okay? Okay. B—some prick you might pick up at the bar this weekend. Because I’ve seen all this before. Or C—a nice looking, sweet guy who would actually treat you how you deserve.”
Ha! Little did she know, hot guy at the gym probably was interested in me—even if it was just to warm my sheets, which was likely. “I guess I didn’t tell you that Cord sent me a Facebook message.”
She clapped her hands, and it startled me. “Well. Fuck me. When are you two picking out China? A Facebook message? It must be love.”
Bitch: The Sequel.
I squinted hoping she’d notice I’d almost reached my limit.
“This is my point. I think Ryan would love you. Like really love you. Cherish you. Worship the ground you walk on.” Then she gave me the puppy dog eyes.
“Becca, I just wish I could find a little bit of both. You know? I don’t want some guy who’s totally crazy obsessed with me, but, at the same time, I want to be a little crazy obsessed with him.” A woman’s prerogative.
“Maybe if you stopped focusing on the outside, you’d find more on the inside.”
“Okay, now you’re going full-on Confucius Fortune Cookie After School Special on me, and I want to slap you.”
Shrugging, she admitted, “Yeah, I over shot that.”
Yet, to a degree, she was right.
The problem was: it didn’t change a damn thing.
My ass still hurt like I’d walked up two hundred flights of stairs in the past three days. Oh wait, I had. I was still fantasizing about a tall drink of water lifting my body like he did the bench press that very morning. Good Lord.
However, I knew better than to give into the urge to talk to him or send him a real message back. He really was way too sexy to be long-term boyfriend material.
Then it hit me. An epiphany.
A last hobag-hoorah. A final farewell to my fuck-hot man fetish. A final one for the road. One last, really great one-night stand.
Becca smacked the top of my desk, startling me out of my thoughts. “Hey. I don’t like that face. What are you thinking?”
“What about a compromise?” I suggested.
“Dana, you don’t have to negotiate your love life with me.” She pulled a nail file from my pen cup and started to use it.
“No, I do. You’re pretty much right anyway. What about if I have one last hoorah. You know? Like good bye Norma Jean, except with my disastrous sex life.”
“Jesus Christ, Dana. How bad do you think dating Ryan Smith would be? You make it sound like your last meal before execution.”
“Dude. That’s what it feels like. Afterwards, I’ll do what’s best for me, and I’ll be happy and yada yada yada. But before I go all … well, you … I’m going out with a bang.”
And I knew just the guy to light the fuse.