Perhaps she’d heard him right the other night, and he did think he was falling for her. Because Greta was beginning to have the sneaking suspicion that Jon was not even remotely put off by her sabotaged dates. For example, she really thought feeding the animals at the zoo with Mina in the sun all day would be miserable. It sounded miserable to her. But here was Jon, wearing a rubber trunk and ears and chasing Mina around while trumpeting at her.
Who was really being punished here? She decided not to delve too deeply into that one. After all, Mina was still having fun and that was really the whole point of this one.
Bob had texted her earlier that he had double-booked dinner with different women that evening, and would she mind telling Mina he wouldn’t make it to her school play? Actually, Bob, I mind plenty. Some day, some day when she was more financially stable, she was going to tell that tumbling dickweed just what she thought of him and his terrible parenting.
Today was not that day.
Although the thought of that reminded Greta that she still had a painting to finish before she could send off her piece of the proposal to her author. It was going to be her project while Bob was at the play—Greta had gone to the dress rehearsal, so she wouldn’t feel guilty missing the big show.
After the play wouldn’t work, because Greta was heading straight to Jon’s. An addiction was forming, she knew it, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Sleeping with him was the best decision she’d made since deciding to invest in Netflix, and that was pretty much the highest praise she had for anything. Luckily, he hadn’t brought up that thing he’d said that night again in their texts, so she was willing to chalk it up to the heat of the moment, and carry on with the benefits.
“I’m coming for you!” Jon warned as he charged again, and Mina shrieked, but she wasn’t his target. Greta was unwittingly swept into the air and over Jon’s shoulder.
“Put me down!” She tried pounding on his back, but it did nothing to break his grip. He was a marauding pirate elephant, and she was the booty. No sooner had the thought popped into her mind, but she felt him wind up for a smack on her booty.
“If you’re ready,” came a stern voice. Greta felt herself carefully lowered to the earth as the zookeeper cleared her throat. She had gray hair, khaki pants, and a resting bitch face Martha Stewart would envy.
“We’re ready, mum,” Jon said in his most charming voice, smiling that crooked-toothed grin and generally charming the pants off both Greta and Mina. The zookeeper, Karla, was having none of it.
“I am not your mum,” she said crisply, “Now follow me.” No one bothered to explain that was just how he pronounced “ma’am”. They just followed.
“Who do we get to feed first?” Mina asked, oblivious to anything except the animals. She was so damn cute. Jon grabbed Greta’s hand and grinned, and she knew he was thinking the same thing. It was funny how much like a family they felt all together like this. Fake, crappy animal-scented date or not, she was happy.
The difference was that a pretend family never fell apart. She squeezed Jon’s hand. Pretend families probably had more fun than the regular kind too. And way better sex. She could hardly even wait until Bob’s return. Sadly, Mina’s presence here prevented her from just pulling Jon into a secluded exhibit and seeing how much they could get away with before someone called security.
She made a mental note to add it to the sex bucket list. Because they had a sex bucket list now. She was so pleased. It had been her idea, and they’d spent an entire night on the phone planning it out. Sex tape and lap dance were probably the top honors on other people’s—assuming other people actually did stuff like write a sex bucket list—but Greta and Jon had set their sights higher.
There was church sex, inspired by a naughty Catholic novel called Priest Summer had forced them all to read last year. Forced, suggested, same difference. There was museum sex, because Jon had a real hard-on for history. It was one of his finest qualities. The Mile High Club was Greta’s idea, the Golden Gate club was Jon’s.
Best of all, showing the list to Summer and Amy solidified the appearance of a relationship. They had fully accepted him as her boyfriend, so there was no real reason to carry on with the date charade if she didn’t want to. They could just ride out the remainder of their time together in bed.
“Dolphins first, they’re the easy ones,” Karla announced. “I’ve got a bucket of fish and you just toss them. No one’s squeamish, I hope.”
“Can I go first?” Mina asked, clapping. Mina. She’d miss the dates. Maybe they should keep fake dating. For the kid.
“My bucket of dead fish is your bucket of fun, little one,” Jon said. Greta had never actually planned on touching one of the nasty little things to begin with, but made a show of allowing Mina to have hers too. It took a couple tries for the girl to figure out exactly how hard you had to grasp them so they didn’t flop back into the bucket.
“Slippery little blighters, aren’t they?” Jon said, grabbing Mina’s small hand in his own and helping her figure out a better method so the poor dolphins would actually get a meal. They were all gathered in anticipation around the little bridge. When the first fish flew through the air and landed neatly in a cetaceous mouth, Mina looked ready to cry tears of joy.
Even Karla looked slightly mollified with the response. It was beyond Greta why this wasn’t something Bob made time for, but she’d spent enough of her time and thoughts today thinking rude things about the man. His loss was her gain; this was turning into a pretty cool day despite the sun and the outdoors and the animals and the weird smells and the no-alcohol stipulation. Well, as cool as something like that could be. She made a mental note to hint to Jon that a bottle of wine and a bath together might not be out of line.
“Do we get to do tigers now?” Mina asked hopefully.
“Unfortunately, the zoo has deemed that too dangerous for civilians.” The look on Karla’s face left no doubt as to her preference for feeding civilians to the tigers. “We’ll do the hippo instead.” A slow grin spread across her lips.
“Is Mina going to be safe doing that?” Greta was immediately suspicious.
“Oh, the child isn’t going to be feeding Cyrus. Your … gentleman friend can do it.” In that case, then, no big deal. He could handle it.
They approached a large enclosure containing a single greyish lump. The path surrounding the hippo area was raised up about six feet and bordered by a low cement barrier. As they walked closer, the grey lump lumbered to its feet and headed straight towards its servers.
“Hippos kill so many people every year. So many people,” Karla mused. “Their mouths open 180 degrees. Then they just snap shut. It’s beautiful.” She demonstrated with her hands, making a brisk clapping noise that Cyrus didn’t seem too impressed with.
“What’s he eating, then?” Brave Jon asked.
“He loves fennel. Apples, too.”
“Ah, a man after my own heart, eh, chap?” Jon tentatively reached out to pat Cyrus’s monstrous snout, then seemed to think better of it. “Where’s the fennel, then?”
“Oh, we’re all out. You’ll feed him grass.” Karla pointed at a bale of green a few feet away. Jon was a much better sport than Greta would have been, hoisting the bale and yanking tufts out to offer the prehistoric beast in front of him. “Wave it in front of his nose, he’ll lift his head and you can toss it in.”
“I want to see his mouth do the giant thing!” Mina whispered, thrilled, to Greta.
“Me too, actually. It sounds disgusting.” She could always google pictures later if the animal didn’t comply. Jon did, though, taking a large handful of grasses and waving them in front of Cyrus. His head moved forward as he sniffed. Jon moved forward too, prepared to deliver the animal’s salad.
In the blink of an eye, Cyrus’s mouth went full open, as widely as the keeper had promised, revealing enormous yellow teeth and emitting a heart-stopping roar. Jon shrieked as loudly and at the exact same pitch Mina had earlier during their game and fell over backwards. As soon as he hit the ground he began crab-walking backwards, scuttling as quickly as he could away from the pissed-off hippopotamus.
Greta and Karla clutched each other as they howled with laughter. Mina was holding herself so as not to pee. Jon turned a shade of red not normally found in nature.
“There’s today’s life lesson, Mina,” Greta finally choked out when she could breathe again, wiping tears from her eyes. “Even tough guys sometimes meet their match.” I so wish I had videotaped that.
* * *
“How did no one videotape that? It would have been YouTube gold!” Rust could not have been more disappointed if the whole of Belgium had stopped making beer.
“That would have ruined my credibility, mate! You’d probably be the one to send it to the media too, you scoundrel.” Jon was certain his red face would never fade back to its normal shade. He fervently hoped for it to cool sometime between now and when Greta came over. He had to find some way to reclaim the pride he had lost.
“Of course I would have. You’d do the same to me. It’s what men do—enjoy every advantage. And speaking of advantages, where’s the girl?” Rust glanced down at his phone. “I got a gig later I don’t want to be late to. I was late last time I played there, and they threatened not to give me my drink tickets next time. Like hell that’s happening.”
Jon glanced down at his phone too. She was extremely late, and hadn’t sent any texts. Maybe the play hadn’t started on time or something. Still, he’d have thought it would have ended a couple hours ago, so that would have been a preposterously late start.
You on your way?
“I just texted. I bet she’ll be here any second. I’ve never known her to be late before, so I’m not worried.” He was worried.
“I bet she’s done with you after today’s little performance. You can’t show weakness in front of chicks, man. They want alpha male, all the time.” Rust got up grabbed another beer from the fridge and tossed one to Jon.
“I don’t think that’s so. Not all the time. It isn’t practical,” Jon said thoughtfully, popping the cap.
“It isn’t about practical. It’s a sex thing. Don’t you ever read, man?”
“I read all the time, but I don’t know where you’re getting your information. It seems a bit dodgy.” The beer was cold and fresh, but he really would have preferred the wine he had waiting. Maybe just because he associated the taste of it with the taste of Greta.
“You gotta get a Kindle. Chicks write down all their fantasies about getting spanked by billionaires and shit. It’s kind of hot, actually. No one talks like that in real life, so it’s pretty easy to make the ladies swoon when you do it. Man, I can’t believe no one’s told you about this before. That’s probably why you never get dates.” Rust had set his beer down, animated. “And now you’ve ruined your shot with Gretel.”
“Greta. And no I haven’t.” Had he? She really wasn’t ever late. Shit! “And I don’t have dates because I don’t just sleep with every girl who crosses my path. Unlike some of us.”
Rust looked very doubtful. “Huh. Do you order her food for her in restaurants? Salads and shit. Keep her skinny.”
Well, there was the reason women thought men didn’t like an appetite. Good heavens.
“No. No, I like to actually enjoy my food with someone who is enjoying their food too. You order girls salads? I imagine you are singlehandedly responsible for many, many therapy visits.”
“What, it was in that book! The one with the contract. They like it, because it shows you like the way they look and want to keep it. Oh, I do contracts now, too. Rice can get you one if you want, he did mine. Probably too late for Gretel, though. Not after you screamed like a little bitch.”
Jon couldn’t have been more horrified, both at the words coming from his friend’s mouth, and by the fact that he was truly concerned he had ruined things by screaming like a little bitch.
“Better head off, then, traffic’s tough of a Friday night and you don’t want to get cut off before the show even starts. You can meet Greta another time. Perhaps we’ll pop round and catch the last of the set.” If she showed. Seriously nerve-wracking, this. Luckily, Rust didn’t argue.
“Perhaps you’ll ‘pop round’ solo, bro. I’ll leave your name at the door just in case.” With that, he’d grabbed his leather jacket and headed off to the nameless crowds of submissive women just waiting for him to order them a salad and then pop them one on the rear.
Jon gave a heavy sigh, and started pacing the floor. He set his phone on the counter, checking for the umpteenth time that she hadn’t texted. Or called. Or emailed. Or sent an owl. While Rust did have a point about today being a bit of a turning point for them, displaying weakness wasn’t what had Jon truly concerned.
It was more that he’d come on too strong. He knew full well she had come into this—whatever this was—with no intentions of staying. That hadn’t bothered him particularly, he’d never really gone into a relationship with expectations of forever on his mind. She was just slightly more pessimistic than that. Jon was an optimist himself, and he had blind faith in his ability to wear her down.
Now he had to wonder if he’d read the situation wrong. Maybe he wasn’t wearing her down, but wearing her out.
Maybe she just needed a reason to run, and all these plans they were making gave her one. Maybe by pushing her to get close, he was actually pushing her away. A little voice reminded him he’d known it was too early to say the L word, but he shoved that voice down. She’d ignored it, and they’d carried on afterwards.
That wasn’t going to stand, though, not without discussing it. He tried calling, but the phone only rang fruitlessly in his ear before the voicemail lady came on, reciting the number he’d reached and inviting him to leave a message.
“Bit worried about you, love, ring me back when you get this.” He hung up and tapped the phone against his palm. What if something had happened to her? He texted Amy.
Greta…?
She’ll call u
The reply was immediate and terse. Oh heavens. She was going to break up with him. Jon felt a bit sick to his stomach. After all the moments they’d shared? He’d truly believed she was falling for him.
And he knew with utter certainty that he’d fallen for her.
He paced some more. What did one do when one was preparing for heartbreak? The couple other times in his life he’d been dumped, he’d either seen it coming or hadn’t cared for longer than a few beers at the pub with his mates. If this was it for Jetta, he was about to be leveled like an old building.
He wondered if he’d told her he secretly gave them a celebrity name, if that would have charmed her at a crucial moment. Possibly it could have caused her to dump him on the spot though; it was so difficult to tell with these things. He replayed a hundred conversations in his head, trying to isolate the moments that had led to this. He’d had such certainty that she was opening up to him. The last time they’d had sex—no, made love, the night he’d told her so—she’d seemed different. Softer, somehow. Like she was showing him her heart.
It kept coming back to one thing though—today had almost certainly been the tipping point. The blooper reel went through the loop in his mind again.
Leaning forward, dangling the grasses, simultaneously seeing the depths of the digestive system of the beast, hearing its ungodly roar, and smelling the sulphurous stench rising as though it was hell’s mouth that yawned before him and not Cyrus the hippo.
Falling backwards, becoming slowly, humiliatingly aware that the high-pitched keening noise echoing throughout the park was being emitted from his own mouth.
Scrabbling for purchase on the hot concrete, logically knowing Cyrus could not leap from the pit and swallow him whole, somehow unable to communicate that bit of knowledge to the lizard brain powering his motions and screams.
On the whole, it could have been far worse, Jon reflected, as he could have soiled himself.
Yes, it was certainly an undignified business. He found he couldn’t blame Greta for being reluctant to shag this evening. But a break up felt a bit unnecessary. How could he salvage the situation?
He paced the floor, racking his brain. If she truly thought that men always left, he would have to find some way to show her that he was staying. He needed a way to prove to her that not everyone was like her father. To prove to her that she meant so much more to him than a series of bets and dares.
The phone rang. It was her, at long last, and he was ready for this moment.
“Greta.”
“I’m so sorry.” She sounded like shit on rye. Perhaps she’d already decided against the break up. What a relief.
“You sound upset, love, are you okay?” Such a relief. Not that he wanted her to feel bad. It was okay to have second thoughts.
“No. I just got done with the police.” His blood ran cold, and all the snarky thoughts disappeared in his concern for Greta.
“Are you okay?” he asked again.
“I’m okay. But Bob’s been in a car accident. The cops came to tell us he was killed on the scene.”
Oh God, the little one. What would become of Mina?