Just Rules (12 page)

Pamela emptied her glass of tequila and set it on the bar.

“You’re right, we can’t stand each other,” said Susan, finishing her drink. “At least now I won’t have to see him again.”

“You and Mac are attracted to one another,” said Pam, shaking her head. “It’s so obvious that it’s uncomfortable to even be around the two of you.”

“You’re out of your mind.” Susan spit out the tequila and had to look for a napkin to dry herself off. “You’ve drunk too much.”

“Yes, I’ve drunk a lot, but you and Mac want each other. Believe me. I’ve been through this before. I know what it’s like to want a guy that you can’t have, and your mind tells you that you can’t stand him.”

“Oh no, no, no. That is teenage nonsense. I don’t like MacMurray. I’ve never wanted him,” she said, playing off the fact that she was blushing.

Pamela was hitting the bar with her the palms of her hands as if she was playing the drums.

“Whatever you say, Sue, but —she put her hands in the air, giving up— that’s how I see it.”

“Well you should get glasses then.”

“Why haven’t you opened the box of chocolates?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Do you know why you haven’t opened it?” Pam asked, moving the box toward her friend. “Because this way you can return it to him. I know you, Sue. Inside your little head, you probably thought about giving the box back with a note saying that he’s an idiot. But the truth is that you want to see Mac again.”

Susan gulped. It was exactly what she planned to do, although she would never admit it to Pamela. Anyway, she didn’t want to give the box of chocolates back so that she could see Mac. Instead, she wanted to give it back so she could tell him exactly what she thought of him. Once again.

“You’re mistaken, Pam.” She grabbed the box and pulled the ribbon off. She took the lid off, grabbed a chocolate and stuffed it in her mouth. “MacMurray is the last man on the face of the earth I would be attracted to.”

Pamela shrugged her shoulders and got off the bar stool to put on her coat that she had left hanging on the back of it.

“I’m afraid, Sue, that it’s not in your hands. There’s a reason why they say that physical attraction is irrational. And you, my friend, are very irrationally attracted to MacMurray.” She saw that Sue had a blank look on her face and she gave her a hug to cheer her up. “I’d better be going. It’s already one o’clock, and I haven’t even unpacked my bags. I’m sure when I get home my dirty clothes will have taken on a life of their own.”

“Why don’t you stay the night, Pam,” said Susan, getting off the bar stool as well, although a little less confident than her friend. “The guest room is ready, you know, and tomorrow I’ll help you with your clothes.”

“Thanks, Sue, but honestly, I miss my bed.”

“At least let me call a taxi for you,” said Susan, picking up the phone to ask the doorman if he would take care of it.

Pamela put the glasses in the sink, and gave her friend another hug.

“Forget everything I said. I start acting like Jane Austen when I drink tequila.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Call me tomorrow when you wake up,” said Pam. “I’m going to hold you to your promise about helping me with my dirty clothes.”

Susan said goodbye to her friend and went to the bathroom to splash some water on her face. Her head was spinning because of the tequila and because of what Pam had said. It was absurd. She went back to the kitchen and put the bottles of tequila next to the garbage so that she would throw them out tomorrow. Two bottles. They had drunk two whole bottles of tequila. Maybe that’s why she thought it was such a great idea to eat one mint truffle after the other.

And when the box was empty, she put on her coat left her house.

Ninth rule of American football:

The objective of the offense is to advance as many yards as possible to get to the end zone in order to score points. There are two ways to advance: by passing the ball to another player and by running with the ball.

Who the hell was knocking on his door at three o’clock in the morning on a Friday? Whoever it was, they weren’t going to give up and Mac thought about directly calling the police. But he decided not to because he lived in the suburbs in a cabin that had belonged to his grandmother, and it was far away from the highways near the woods. On more than one occasion he had to help out a hiker. And there was also that one time when a truck broke down nearby and the driver asked him for help because his phone didn’t work. When these people realized that the person who opened the door was the captain of the Patriots, their facial expressions went from shock and disbelief to embarrassment and gratitude. He always insisted that it was no big deal, and although he had given up on people treating him like a normal person, he missed it sometimes, especially during situations like those.

He got out of bed. He had gone to sleep with just his pajama bottoms on so he grabbed a t-shirt and threw it on quickly as he walked toward the door.

The doorbell rang again.

“I’m coming. Just a minute.” He rubbed his face in order to wake up all the way and opened the door. “What…” He wasn’t able to speak when he saw her.

Susana hit him in the chest with the box of chocolates and because of how light the box was Mac could tell that they were all gone.

“I ate them all,” she said, pushing him out of the way to go inside. “They’re my favorite.”

Mac closed the door and turned around slowly, convinced that he was hallucinating and that when he turned back around he’d realize that he was alone in his living room.

Nope. She was still there. Was she trying to steady herself? Susana was standing in front of the chimney and in one hand she was holding a photo of Mac with one of his siblings and Tim. They must have been eleven years old in that picture, which was taken at a summer camp. He was very fond of it, it always made him smile.

“Tim doesn’t know,” said Susana without turning around, and Mac thought that she was slurring her words a bit.

Was she drunk? Had Susana gotten drunk and taken a taxi to his house? What for?

“What’s that?” he asked, clearing his throat, standing back while he tried to make sense of it all.

Susana turned around and looked him in the eye for a second. To Mac seemed like an eternity, and then without even trying to hide it, she looked him up and down. Her eyes moved to his torso, then to his waist, where she stopped and stared for a second, and then moved down his legs. When she finished, she looked him in the eye again. Mac could barely breathe.

No, Susana wasn’t drunk. Those weren’t the eyes of a woman who didn’t know what she was doing, but they weren’t really the eyes of the sensible and reserved Susana Lobato either. They were the eyes of just Susana.

“What is it that Tim doesn’t know?” repeated Mac, after running his tongue along his lower lip, which caught Susana’s attention.

“That my favorite truffles are chocolate and mint. Actually, I think my ex-fiance doesn’t even know that I suffer from a slight chocolate addiction.”

“Slight? But you always order chocolate desserts. I’m sure Tim knows,” he added, realizing that his words meant that he paid attention to her. He couldn’t hide it anymore. Wouldn’t.

“Yes, Tim knows that I like chocolate, but he doesn’t know that those truffles from that specific shop are my favorites.” She shook her head. “He doesn’t know.”

Susana looked down at the finger where she used to wear her engagement ring. Mac had no idea what had happened to that ring. She probably gave it back to Tim the day he left her, or maybe she had it stored away at her house. Or perhaps she flushed it down the toilet. He really didn’t care. The only thing he knew at that very moment was that Susana wasn’t wearing it anymore, and that he didn’t want her to think about the ring or the man who had given it to her.

“It doesn’t matter. It’s not important,” said Mac, with a hoarse voice, referring to the chocolates.

“Yes it is,” insisted Susan, finally lifting her head. “How did you know? Did you just happen to buy them there?” She moved closer to him, and she didn’t stop until she was right in front of his torso.

Say that it was just a coincidence
—
thought Mac
—
she better step back or she’s going to realize what’s going on underneath your pajamas.

“You said that they were your favorites at Quin’s wedding,” he confessed, disregarding his own advice, and he felt his heart beat faster and faster.

“That was more than eight months ago,” said Susan, recalling the time Mac was referring to. “And you weren’t even part of that conversation.”

“I must have overhead it. Why does it matter so much?” He folded his arms and raised an eyebrow. “Have you been drinking?”

“Yes. Pamela and two bottles of tequila paid me a visit tonight, but I’m not drunk if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Of course he was worried about that. He wasn’t going to have
that
conversation with her, or any other, in that state of mind.

“You should leave, Susana.” Mac went to open the door. “I’m sure tomorrow you will regret having come here, and I don’t want the sports commentators at your channel to tear me to shreds on their programs,” he said, trying to regain some normalcy between the two of them.

“At Quin’s wedding you were wearing a black suit with a gray tie, and you had a bruise on your left cheek from the last game,” she said quickly without taking a breath and without giving herself time to think about the risk she was taking by being so honest with him. “During the dinner you told Mike that you couldn’t see well and that you’d probably have to wear glasses. Your favorite wine is syrah, and you hate oysters, but you pretend that you like them. Your favorite dessert is pineapple. And although you’re left-handed, you use silverware as if you were right-handed. And you have tic. Whenever you are nervous, you scratch the back of your right ear.”

Mac stopped the hand that was doing just that.

“How do you know all that?” he asked, looking her in the eye, his heart beating out of his chest.

“I don’t know,” she confessed, her eyes sparkling. “I don’t know.”

“You can’t stand me,” Mac reminded her.

“You can’t stand me either, and you still know what my favorite chocolates are, and you bought me a box. Why did you visit me at work?”

“I already told you,” he muttered. He had to get her out of there as soon as possible.

“Ah, that’s right, because Tim asked you to. You could have told him no. He’s in Paris and can’t make you do anything you don’t want to.”

Susan did not believe him. The explanation he had given her would have made sense if they had a cordial relationship. But they did not.

For more than a year they had been at each other’s throats whenever they had the chance.

But that night, in that living room, neither of them could remember why.

Susana took another step and touched Mac. He stepped back until he hit his back against the door.

“What are you doing, Susana?”

“I am trying to figure something out.” She lifted her hand and touched his wound that had become infected weeks earlier. Mac closed his eyes and breathed through his teeth. He had the palms of his hands on the wall and Susan was fascinated by the strength of his body. “You always smell like mint.”

“Alright already, Susana.” In a last-ditch effort, he took his hands off the wall and held her by her shoulders. “What kind of game are you playing? What the hell are you trying to prove with all of this?”

“Shut up and kiss me, Kev.”

“Kev?” His own name sounded so strange to him.

“Yes, Kev. Kiss me.” The hand that she still had close to his face moved, and he brushed a lock of hair off of her forehead. “Kiss me, and maybe that way I will stop thinking about you.”

Mac could barely breathe, his heart stopped for a second, and then beat frantically. His hands burned as he felt Susana’s skin. Her smell was driving him crazy and he was just about to get lost in her gaze. He shook his head, but she got on her tippy toes and kissed him on the neck.

God.

Mac lost it.

With a move that seemed like it was directly taken from a football game, he turned her around and they swapped positions. She was now against the door and he lifted her arms above her head.

He held both her wrists with one hand and stopped his other one near Susan’s neck. He pressed his body against hers and neither his t-shirt nor her dressed served as a barrier between them. He could smell the tequila on her breath with the chocolate mints. His mouth was watering and he stopped asking himself where did this unstoppable urge to kiss her come from.

Tomorrow she would hate him, despite the fact she had been the one who asked him to kiss her, actually, she had ordered him to kiss her.

Yes, she was going to hate him, but Mac couldn’t stand to spend one more second not knowing what Susana’s kisses tasted like.

He kissed her.

As soon as Mac’s lips touched hers, Susana felt her heart stop for a second, and when it started up again, it beat differently than before. It was not what she expected to happen. He wasn’t going to kiss her, and if he did, she would not kiss him back. Kev’s kisses were going to leave her cold or bore her with indifference. However, she felt anything but indifference since seeing him in his pajamas.

His tongue demanded to be inside her and she felt him scrape her lip with his teeth. No. She definitely wasn’t feeling indifference. To say that he made her weak in the knees was an understatement. Mac’s kiss melted her entire body and the only thing she could do was kiss him back.

She had never kissed anyone like that before. She became angry. At thirty years old, why had she never felt like that before? And why had to be Kev MacMurray the one who made her feel that way?

He moved the hand he had on the wall and caressed Susana’s face, separating her lips to kiss her like he needed to. He wasn’t going to stop now, he couldn’t. He had to kiss her again and again. He ran his tongue up and down the inside of her mouth without stopping, and Susana tried to get her hands loose. Mac erroneously thought that she was trying to move away from him and held down her wrists. Susana, although she was reluctant to, moved her lips away from his.