Away From the Spotlight (12 page)

“Yes, I guess we are.”
  I held him tightly as he kissed me, with worry at the back of my mind that the happiness I felt with Will would be short-lived.

I had been to
Sweeney’s
once or twice before.  It didn’t have the bands that
Callaghan’s
did
, but was a little bigger
and more open
, had a pool table, and was a big hangout for the local rugby team
.

As Colin, Gemma, Will and I entered the pub, I noticed that t
here were a lot of green polo shirts marked with
the
local
Rugby Club
logo
on them. 
Clearly, it was game day and the pub was crowded with the men that had played rugby earlier in the day. 
As we
passed
by, a number of the men in the room were yelling
their greetings
over the music coming from the jukebox and either shaking hands with Colin and Wil
l or slapping them on the back.

After a number of these brief stops, we ended up
seated
at
a
long table
in the restaurant section
of the
establishment
. 
The table had a bench along the wall and chairs on the opposite side.  Stephen
,
Kate and two other
athletic-looking
guys
I recognized
from the concert
the weekend before
were waiting for us.  I scooted in on the bench side with Will next to me and Colin and Gemma took the chairs facing us.

It didn’t take long for me to figure out that Colin and Will had played rugby with the club when they first
arrived
from England.  They must have been two of the few Brits on the team because most of the guys who came up to the table to talk to us
were
from Australia, New Zealand
,
or South Africa.

At one point I asked Will, “Do you ever play anymore?”

Will
responded
,
“When I first
arrived here
, I played a little, but
I found it
impossible w
ith my schedule.  It’s been a few years now since I last play
ed.  I make do with watching a match
every now and then
,
and coming out and drinking with the
team
when I can.  Colin played for a few years, but he hasn’t been able to play much this year
due to
work commitments.”

Dinner was
soon
ordered
and served.  The
dinner
conversation
became
animated
as the two guys from the concert, whose names I learned
were
Chris and Rob,
related
how well the match
against Back Bay had gone.  After dinner, Will sat back and
I leaned against him.  He
put his arm around my neck, kissing the
side
of my head every once in a while.

Our group
eventually
migrated to
the bar
area
where there was more back-
slapping over the
result
.  E
very time I turned around
,
I ended up with another full cider in my hand.  It seemed like a normal evening
with
no hint that anything was
amiss
.  N
o one was staring and I never felt like the conversation was being changed on purpose. 
I thought that m
aybe
my
earlier
fears
were
unfounded
.

I was not going to feel very good in the morning
though
.  Th
e
salad
at
dinner was a little too light for all th
at
drinking.
  There was one benefit
, however,
from the drinking in that
Will and I
were a little more
adventurous in bed that night.

The next morning
,
I realized that
I had been smart to take some aspirin and drink water before I went to
sleep
.  A
lthough I never felt really drunk last night, I did have a bit more than usual and could feel that, in the absence of the aspirin and water, I would have been hung
-
over.  That would not have been good for all the studying I needed to do t
hat d
ay.  I went to the bathroom with my usual routine of trying to clean myself up before Will saw me.  Bed head,
smeared
ma
scara
,
and morning breath were not a fabulous combination.  The longer I could put off the inevitable time when
Will
would see me in the morning in all my
lack of
glory, the better.

Will slept a bit longer than me so I was able to get a little over an hour of studying in before he
awakened
.
 
Will
always brush
ed
his teeth almost immediately upon
rising
.  He apparently was a little insecure about morning breath too.

“How are you feeling?” I asked tentatively, hoping that the water and aspirin had done him some good as well.

“I’m alright.  I
’
m glad neither of us was driving last night though.  I haven’t had
that
much to drink in a
while
.”

“Yes, thank God for Kate acting as our designated driver.”

Will
crawled back into bed, helped
me
remove
my
nightgown and held
me
for a while,
seeming to
simply
enjoy the feel of
my
body against
his
. 
After a while, I couldn’t help myself
. 
F
or the first time since
our first
time
,
I
initiated sex
.
  It didn’t ta
k
e
long for
Will
to get on the same page.

While we were lying together afterward,
I
leaned up on
my
elbow and
asked,
“What
do we have planned for today?”

“Today, we’ll
continue to
make it your choice.”
  He winked at me and smiled
.

I thought about how w
e had already enjoyed my choice. 
“Really?”

He nodded in the affirmative.

I
thought about it for a few minutes and
decided that, since Will had spent the last two weekends feeding me, I would do somet
hing I almost never do – cook.

“I have an idea.  You
’v
e been taking me out for the last two weekends
. 
I think it’s my turn.”

“You don’t need to do anything for me other than what you already do.”
He
leaned forward and kissed
me
,
and it was clear what he meant.

“Yes, I do, b
ut I wasn’t thinking of taking you out.  I was thinking of doing something here.  Actually, I could do something for all of us, you, Stephen, Colin, Kate and Gemma.”

What I said seemed to make him happy and he
asked
,
“What
did you have in mind
?”

“Well, believe it or not, I’d like to make dinner for everyone.  I could break in your kitchen for you.  It doesn’t look like it’s been used much.”
I
laughed.

“Very funny
,
”
h
e
said as he
grimaced.  “
You don’t have to go to all that trouble.”

“It’s no trouble.
It
’
ll be something different, a
nd something I can do for you for a change.”
  Although I doubted there could be balance in our relationship in terms of what we did for each other while I was still a student, there would finally be something in my column.  It was only a
small
thing, but it made me feel a little better.

“All right
, y
ou have me intrigued.”

I generally lived on anything that can be microwaved
, restaurant
take
-
out
,
and
fast food
.  Whenever I am asked if I can cook, I usually say that I burn water, but that’s not
exactly
true.  My mother
taught
me to make two things
:
spaghetti and lasagna.  Lasagna
requires
a lot of t
ime
to prepare
so I settled on spaghetti.

I called my mom to
obtain
the
recipe
specifics
and then
headed
to the local grocery store
alone
to pick up the
necessary ingredients
. 
Will offered to
accompany
me, but I wanted to do this myself. 
At the store
,
I
located
the
items needed for the
salad and spaghetti,
selected
two bottles of wine, and
decided on
sorbet and fancy cookies
for dessert. 
I
also
purchased
a light lunch to ensure that everyone’s appetite was intact th
at
evening.

As I waited in line
at the
checkout
counter
,
uncharacteristically, I succumbed to the temptation to pick up a
tabloid m
agazine to read during m
y brief break between classes
the following day
.  I was getting sick of reading only textbooks.  I threw the grocery bags in the trunk of my car and pulled out the magazine to leave it in the car so I would remember to
throw it in my book bag.

After a few hours of studying in Will’s room
while he read
,
it was time t
o start dinner.

As I got up,
Will
asked, “Can I help?”

“No.  This is something I want to do myself for
you
.”

When I
entered
the kitchen, I realized that I didn’t know whether the boys had any pots and pans.  As it turned out, I needn’t have worried.  I was able to assemble enough pots, pans and utensils to get the job done.  Despite the fact that the boys had these things, they did not appear to have been used much, if at all.

I would take breaks with Will in his room every so often while I waited for something to boil or cook, and we would
kiss for a little while
. 
I could tell that Will wasn’t happy when I would have to return to the kitchen, but he didn’t say anything.  When it was time for everything to simmer for a while
,
I returned to Will’s room and let him know that I
had a
little
time
to spend
with him
.  I had
underestimated how much he had
n’t
wanted me to leave earlier as he
practically attacked
me.  I laughed, thinking
t
hat I didn’t care
at that moment
if dinner burned to a crisp.

We all
ate
dinner
out on the patio
around sunset
.
Everyone looked at my meal strangely at first for some reason I couldn’t understand, but then it seemed
that
everyone like
d
it.  There wasn’t much, if any
,
left when we were finished. 
I
smiled in delight as
I could tell that
my
dinner
was
a success.