Following My Toes (11 page)

“Well,” I replied, smiling, “what’s not to admire? He was honest, fair, extremely intelligent....”

“Just like any good car mechanic should be.”

“So, are you a good car mechanic?” I was expecting him to make another joke about how he had serviced my car, but he didn’t. Instead he leaned forward, and took my hand in his.

“Let me put it this way,” he said. “I’m only 50% American, but if that’s mutually exclusive with being a good car mechanic, then I serve as the perfect example for both.”

I had no idea what he meant. It didn’t matter. His voice had that Sunday morning pancake quality again. Combine that with how he was holding my hand in his, he could have been reciting the phone book and I’d still have been thrilled. I smiled and savored the moment.

“So, Faith, what’s your story?” He looked down at my hand that he was holding, and began to play with my fingers.

I struggled for an answer. I wanted to reply with something witty, but my mind drew a blank. So I settled for honesty. “Well, I’m here, and everything is so new. I’m trying to make sense of it all.”

He considered this, looked up at me, and nodded his head. “You said that you just moved down here. Where did you move from?”

“
Duluth
.”

“Why did you decide to do that?”

I didn’t want to launch into the whole explanation, it was way too soon to bare my soul. I had already said too much when I had yelled at him that day in the shop. “I felt disconnected. My life felt so predictable. I needed a change. You know?”

He nodded again. “Sure, I know. I feel that way everyday.”

“Really? That’s funny, because you strike me as a person who seems fairly content with yourself.”

He let go of my hand, leaned back, and took another swig of his beer. “Content, maybe. But satisfied? No.”

“What’s the difference between being content and satisfied?”

“There isn’t much of a difference, it’s more a matter of degree. When you’re content you have what you need, it’s like a five out of ten on the happiness scale. But being satisfied, that’s having your desires fulfilled – like an eight or higher on the scale of happiness.”

I smiled. “I thought only English teachers thought about the distinctions in meanings of synonyms.”

He drummed his fingers on the table, and I met his gaze. He was grinning. “No, some car mechanics do too.”

“Tell me about how you became a mechanic.”

“You don’t want to hear about that, that’s boring.”

“Why? Don’t you like it?”

“Sure, it’s fine. It’s good money. But it wasn’t what I had planned.

See, I didn’t do very well in high school because I didn’t do any assignments I wasn’t interested in. Not that I didn’t read.”

“Were you the type of student who read just about anything except the required material?”

He laughed. “You mean that there are others like me? Yeah, I was like that. But anyway, I couldn’t get into a decent college, and my cousin Andy, who owned the garage, said he would train me for free. I figured it would be a good job until I decided what it was that I really wanted to do. But now, ten years later, Andy moved to
Portland
, the shop is mine, and I’m still figuring out my next step.”

“But it sounds like you’re set. You’re not even thirty yet, and you own your own shop. Why do you need a next step?”

“I’m sort of bored.” he said. “And you’re right. Here I am, 28 years old, and I’ve fallen into something I don’t care much about. I’ve got to figure out what it is I do care about, before it’s too late.” He tilted his head up and looked at the sky. “Wow, those clouds are ominous looking. Are you sure you don’t want to go inside?”

“No, I like it out here.”

He laughed as if I had made a joke. “You’re not one to be intimi-dated, are you Faith? I like that about you.”

I wasn’t sure that he actually had the right perception of me, be-cause I feel intimidated all the time. But if he wanted to think that, I sure wasn’t going to stop him.

“So are you glad you moved here?” He asked.

“Yeah,” I responded. “Things have gone well, I guess.”

“That doesn’t sound too convincing.”

“No, no. It’s just that my roommate, Missy, is a little odd.”

Ethan scrunched up his face. “Missy... is she a little shorter than you, brown hair, likes to wear tight clothes?”

“Yeah, that sounds like her. How do you know her?”

“I go to that coffee shop on your block, and I used to see her in there a lot. She mentioned that she lives in your building.”

“Oh, that’s weird, she told me she never goes there because she doesn’t like the decor.”

“Maybe it’s a different Missy then,” he said. Then there was another pause. I took another sip of my drink, finishing it this time. “So, besides your roommate, how is everything else going for you?” he inquired.

“Well, I haven’t been able to find a job yet.”

“You teach high school, right?”

“Yeah, high school English.”

“And you like it?”

“I love it.”

“Why?” He leaned forward again, resting his chin in his hand, his elbow on the table. Again he practiced that intense gaze with strong eye contact. Either he was honestly interested in hearing about me, or he’s an expert at playing the game. But I was certainly willing to play.

“Because it’s never boring. There’s always a better way to do things, you know? I’m always challenging myself to come up with a better lesson plan, or a more creative way of tricking them into learning something. And I like the kids.” I laughed. “A lot of times it’s me who ends up learning something from them.” A couple of fat raindrops fell onto our table. “Hmm... it’s sprinkling.”

Ethan’s response was to shrug his shoulders. Then he spoke. “I envy you – how you feel about teaching. I wish I felt that way about something.”

“So if money and training were no option, what would you want to do with your life?”

“Arragg!” He cried and laughed at the same time, looking back up at the sky. Then he once again locked his eyes with mine, and said with a smile, “I hate that question. Because I have no idea.”

“Why? Because there isn’t enough that you’re interested in?”

“No, because I can’t decide what I’m most interested in. That’s my problem. This world is far too full of possibilities to spend your life stuck in a garage, fixing other people’s cars.”

“Well, then maybe you should bust out of here. Go travel and see the world.”

He leaned in closer. “Maybe I should. Would you like to come?”

Then there was a flash of lightening and a clap of thunder. All of the people who were sitting at tables around us got up to go inside. But Ethan simply reached up, and opened the umbrella that was attached to our table. We both had to scoot our chairs in to be underneath, so our knees were touching. The rain had certainly started to fall, but sitting next to Ethan, I was sheltered from it.

“Is this okay?” He asked. I nodded. It definitely was. This close I could enjoy the smell of his skin combined with the fresh laundry smell of his shirt. I had the urge to reach up and brush away that lock of hair that had again fallen onto his forehead, but my inhibitions prevented me from doing so.

“So, how about it?” he persisted. “Want to come traveling with me?”

I gulped. “Um, don’t you think it’s a little soon to ask me that? You don’t even know me.”

“That’s true. But I know that there’s something about you.” As he leaned in to kiss me my brain was screaming, “Don’t let him! He’s a player! Stop!” But at the same time, my toes were itching so much they tingled, and tingling in my toes was only the beginning of the story.

Then his lips were on mine. His kiss was firm yet gentle. He placed one hand on my knee, using his other hand to run his fi n-gers through my hair. And as our mouths opened to each other, all thought exited from my mind. I was aware only of how good being close to him felt, until I was brought harshly back to reality when the waiter said, “Excuse me folks, but we need you to move inside. There’s danger of a lightening strike.”

Ethan broke away from me and laughed. “It’s already happened.”

Chapter 8

The next morning I smiled as I woke, remembering how my date with Ethan the night before had gone. After we went inside, we stood at the bar for a while, waiting for the rain to stop. Once it had, we walked through the wet streets of downtown. The storm had cleared only temporarily however, and when it started to rain again, Ethan pulled me underneath the roof of a large church and began kissing me again.

It was like we were in movie or a perfume ad. I can’t remember ever having such a good time on a first date. Maybe we knew each other in a past life or something, because usually I get all nervous and uncomfortable, but with Ethan, I could totally be myself, minus all my usual stupid and awkward moments—well, most of them anyway. And I didn’t even think about Peter once, which is sort of amazing. But then later, when Ethan was dropping me off, things took a slight turn.

We were standing outside my apartment building. “I’d invite you in,” I said, “but Missy might be home, and I’m not ready to expose you to her yet.”

He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “That’s okay, I have an early day tomorrow, I should get going anyway.” My stomach turned with his words. He didn’t want to be asked up?

I played it cool. “Okay. Well, thanks for everything. I had a great time.”

“Me too Faith. I’ll call you.” He reached up and stroked my cheek, gazed into my eyes, then turned tail and ran. Okay, he didn’t exactly run. But he didn’t kiss me again, and there was no mention of another date, only the promise of a phone call, which we all know is guy-speak for, “You will never hear from me again.”

But then, I couldn’t deny the date had gone well up until that point. I went upstairs to my apartment, and had a pleasant night’s sleep, with Thomas purring by my side. He was the best kind of guy to share my bed with anyway; he didn’t hog the covers, and his only demand was to cuddle.

The next morning I had been awake for about twenty minutes; I was lying in bed, petting Thomas and replaying the events of my date with Ethan in my mind, when the phone rang. I was far too content to get up and answer it—petting Thomas had that effect on me. So I let the machine pick it up again.

“Hello, it’s me. I hope you had a good time last night. I’m still thinking about you. I guess this proves that intimacy is priceless.”

It was the same voice that had left that mysterious message before. Was it Ethan? I wasn’t sure. It sounded like it could be his voice, but why wouldn’t he identify himself? He referred to last night, so maybe it was him. But then, what was with that weird comment about intimacy?

I tried star 69 again, and again the number was blocked. I looked to see if Missy had come home last night, and it looked like she hadn’t. Probably she had spent the night with whomever she had gone out with. I vowed to ask her about it later, I had forgotten to do so with the last message.

The phone rang again. Startled, I jumped a little and caught my breath, but still managed to answer it on the second ring.

“Hello.”

“Hello. Is Faith there?”

My breath caught in my throat. It was a male’s voice. “This is she,” I whispered.

“Faith, hi, it’s Max. From the other night at the bar.”

Disappointment permitted me to breath freely. I should have known instantly that it wasn’t Ethan, but oh well. “Hi Max, how are you?”

“Great. So you do remember me?”

“Of course. What’s up?”

“Not much. I was wondering what you’re up to later on today. I thought maybe you’d want to go out and get something to eat.”

“Gosh, I can’t. I already have plans.” That was a lie, but it was possible to play hard-to-get with Max.

“Oh, sure,” he said. “I figured it was probably too short notice. How about sometime next week?”

I contemplated for a moment, and decided it’s never good to put all your eggs in one basket. Going out with Max could serve as a good distraction while waiting for Ethan to call. Plus, he seemed like a nice enough guy. Why not?

“Okay,” I told him. “How about Thursday?”

“Thursday sounds great. I’ll pick you up at seven.”

I gave him my address, and we made small talk for a couple of minutes before we hung up. Afterwards I went into the kitchen to make myself some breakfast. There I found a note:

Faith –

Could you please try and do your share of the housework a little more often? Between physical therapy, meeting with my lawyer, and looking for a job, my hands are tied. The bathroom needs to be cleaned, and it wouldn’t hurt to vacuum either. Thanks roomie!

Sincerely,

Missy

* * *

I hated it when she did that. Missy often left notes for me when things were bothering her. I much preferred to just be told; that way I could respond. But when I told her this, Missy simply explained leaving notes was her way of communicating. However, I had to admit I hadn’t been doing my share of the housework. So after some coffee and toast, I set to work cleaning the bathroom. I had about finished when the phone rang again. I went to answer it, and this time it was Carolyn.