Sliding Past Vertical (20 page)

Chapter 32

She’d completely forgotten
Rashid was supposed to come over tonight and cook for her.
Nice way to greet your guests, Sarah
.
Bleeding, a complete mess, glass everywhere
,
and dinner already started, for another man.

From what she overheard,
Emerson was as surprised as his housemate about the dinner. She heard the
tinkle of glass. Somebody must be picking up the pieces. Then she heard more
muffled conversation.

She had to go explain
herself. Hobbling out, she held the bloodstained towel over her thigh.

Rashid’s eyes widened.

“From the broken glass,”
Emerson said.

The younger man continued
staring at Sarah.

“I’m really sorry, I forgot
about our dinner,” she said. “I’ve had kind of a strange day.”

Rashid helped himself to one
of the Kingfishers he had brought. “So I am seeing.”

Emerson put his hand on her
shoulder. “Sarah...we still have to clean up that cut.”

“I’ll tell you all about it
in a minute,” Sarah said to Rashid.

She sat again on the toilet
lid. Emerson’s mouth was tight and he didn’t speak, but his hands felt as
gentle as a shy groom’s on his wedding night as he knelt before her and eased
up the wide leg of her pajamas. He dabbed her with peroxide (she barely felt
the sting) and then crisscrossed bandages over the wound to hold it closed.

“I should be going,” he said.
“You ought to stay like this until the bleeding slows. If it doesn’t, have him
take you to the emergency room. You might need a few stitches. But I doubt it.”

Her heart pounded. “Em...please
don’t go. I need to talk to you.”

“But you have plans. I do
too...in a little while. It’s later than I realized.”

The girl from the nursing
home, Sarah thought, casting her eyes downward to his hand still on her thigh.

Then she looked up to meet
his gaze.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I
didn’t mean to...I mean, with Jay and all, I really did forget Rashid was
coming to cook dinner. I wish you could stay. I’m sure he won’t mind.”

The hand was removed but the
sensation lingered, as did Emerson’s eyes—pale, a little sad.

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said.

Shortly after Emerson left,
the bleeding stopped. Sarah, back in her jeans and a different sweater, stood
in front of the bathroom mirror trying not to feel sorry for herself. Harder
still was trying to forget the tenderness of Emerson’s hands on her body, and
wondering if later he’d be touching the girl from the nursing home in the same
way.

With a sigh, she wandered
into the kitchen and found Rashid at the cutting board, up to his wrists in
chopped tomatoes. She didn’t remember the role of tomatoes in curry but figured
he knew what he was doing. He was slow with the knife as if he enjoyed the act
and the feel of the pulpy juice and seeds on his skin. He gave her a quick,
embarrassed smile and returned to his task but without the grace and sensual
abandon of before. The knife skidded across the board and a hunk of red flesh
landed on the floor with a splat.

“I am making a mess.” He picked
tomato off the tile and wiped dribbled juice from the counter with a paper
towel.

She opened one of his
Kingfishers and rested her elbows on the counter that backed up against the
stove. “That’s okay. Kitchens are washable.”

He continued to clean. “Yes,
but it isn’t my kitchen.” His movements were stiff as he rinsed the paper towel
and hung it on the edge of the sink to dry. Then, still without looking at her,
he returned to his tomatoes, chopping with quick precision until he’d gone
through the entire bowl.

She sighed and assumed he was
angry with her for forgetting their dinner, but he was trying to make the best
of it. Like she was.

She hated herself for wishing
he were Emerson.

“I owe you an explanation,”
she said.

He dumped the tomatoes into a
steaming pot containing the garlic, onions, and green peppers she’d already
prepped. The aroma bathed her in familiar comfort. That and the beer were
starting to make her feel almost normal.

“That isn’t necessary,” he said,
his tone dismissive. “I’m here now, and I’m cooking for you, so that’s all.”

Being pushed away made her
want to push back. “Jay was here.”

Rashid jabbed out the wooden
spoon, flinging a piece of tomato onto the backsplash. “He did this to you?”

“No. That was me.”

“So he didn’t hurt you?”

Not
anymore,
she
thought. “Actually, he hurt Emerson. That’s why he was in bed with the ice
pack.”

Rashid’s eyes widened. “In
your bed?”

She shrugged her shoulders.
“It’s the only bed I have.”

“But he’s so tall. Wouldn’t
he have been more comfortable on that nice long sofa in your living room?”

“Jay had been lying on the
sofa, and it really smelled.”

He cocked his head.

“He was unconscious,” Sarah said.
“I couldn’t just leave him on the stairs.”

“There was an unconscious man
on your stairs.” He grabbed the paper towel and hunted for bits of tomato
around the stove. “Perhaps, Sarah, I am better off not hearing the rest of this
explanation of yours.”

He was taking this all too
calmly. She slammed her beer bottle on the counter. He jumped.

“You come here expecting to
make me dinner. Find your best friend with his pants unzipped and me bleeding
in torn lingerie. And you aren’t the slightest bit curious about what’s going
on?”

He blinked slowly at her,
mouth open, but then looked away. “I think this is none of my business.”

She took a long swallow of
beer while he tended his tomatoes. “Fine.” She dragged out the silence, tapping
her fingers against the counter. “Then I won’t tell you.”

“That’s your decision.” Rashid
stirred a while, lowered the heat, and let the pot sit while he opened another
beer. He sipped at it, leaning back against the sink. Watching her. “Okay,” he said
finally. “So why was this
goonda
unconscious on your stairs?”

She told him.

His eyebrows shot up.

“I didn’t mean to do it,”
Sarah said.

“Forgive me,” he said. “But I
don’t think I want to see what you can do when you ‘mean’ to do something.”

“Keep cooking for me and
you’ll never have to find out.”

He smiled. She sensed he was
no longer angry. She felt more relaxed as well—flirty from the beer but
in control. Making the best of it. She leaned over until she could smell his
cologne over the garlic and onions. “What are you making?”

“Marinara sauce and spaghetti
and garlic bread.”

“That doesn’t sound Indian.”

“You’re disappointed?”

Actually, she felt relieved.
The last time he made Indian food she’d been up half the night with
indigestion. “No,” she said. “It just wasn’t what I was expecting.”

* * * * *

When they were ready to sit
down for dinner, Sarah opened the wine, the same bottle she’d put on to chill
for Emerson.

“I’ll pour,” Rashid said.
“Where are your glasses?”

“Glass. I broke the other
one. Emerson must have swept me up when I was in the bathroom.”

Rashid blinked. “This is
another one of your idioms?”

She realized the other
meaning, another irony, for all the good it did her. It should be illegal for a
man to touch a woman so tenderly and then go off to someone else. “No.” She
pantomimed the motion of sweeping. “I mean he cleaned up the broken glass.”

Rashid nodded but didn’t seem
convinced she meant this innocently. “Yes, he did this before you came out. Odd
how he’s never been to your apartment before yet he knew exactly where you kept
your broom.”

She shrugged. “I guess he
just knows me well enough to know where I’d keep it.”

“This I wish for myself.” He sighed
and poured wine into the two matching juice glasses she’d pulled out for him.
“A woman whose broom I know where to find so I may sweep her up.”

“I’m sure your wife will let
you do the sweeping,” Sarah said.

“It’s not the same.” He held
her chair and then sat down himself. “And idioms aside, Sarah, we both know
we’re not talking about housework.”

She felt lost in alcohol and
subtext. “What are we talking about?”

He didn’t answer.

The mood changed after that.
She tried flirting with him like before; it worked in fits and starts but in
the end he remained wistful and for the most part, silent. She asked him what
was wrong and he told her he was tired. He’d had a long day in the lab. Then
she saw the sagging around his eyes and chose to couple fatigue with his lack
of enthusiasm, instead of jealousy over Emerson and his broom. At nine thirty
he announced that he had to get home to bed; the next morning he had a class.

The next morning would be
Sunday, but she didn’t want to push. “I’ll get your coat.”

She walked him downstairs. It
was raining—a cold, fine mist that made the night sky milky.

He hesitated at the door. She
offered him an umbrella but he declined. For a long time neither of them spoke.
The damp wood still smelled like cigarettes and Jay’s cologne.

“I’ll miss this place,” he said
finally. “Even this miserable cold weather.”

Away from Emerson’s house,
working downtown, she’d been out of touch with the rhythms of the school year
and had almost forgotten that at the end of this semester, Rashid would be
leaving. “So you’re taking the job in California?”

He let out his breath, his
shoulders sagging forward. “I’m returning to New Delhi.”

“But that’s just for the
wedding, right?”

He shook his head. “No. It’s
going to be permanent. She doesn’t want to leave her family.”

So
she can marry someone else who wants to stay
, Sarah thought. “What about what you want?”

He looked smaller somehow.
“It is best for everyone if I do this.”

“But you told me you didn’t
want to live there. You wanted to become an American citizen, and continue your
research, work on cancer treatments, why are you letting her tell you—”

“You don’t understand,” he snapped
at her. His harsh tone rang through the vestibule. Then he said it again, his
voice softer, his eyes pleading with her not ask him any more questions.

Yet he lingered, watching
her, like he wanted them to be asked.

She waited for something to
happen. Thinking that slightly drunk, in the rain, frustrated with longing,
anything could.

“I should be going home,
now.” Rashid burst off toward his car.

She followed, arms hugged
around her chest, freezing mist beading in her hair. “Do you still even want to
marry her?”

He stopped and turned. The
rain spotted his glasses. “Go inside, Sarah. It’s cold.”

Chapter 33

Emerson called late the next
morning and asked Sarah to meet him at the diner on Westcott. Although it was
one of her favorite dives because they served breakfast all day, she took the
location as a bad sign. He would have invited her to the house if there hadn’t
been things he didn’t want her to see. Inadvertent evidence of an overnight
guest, for instance. Guilty looks on housemates’ faces? An orange juice glass
with lipstick stains? Sarah would prefer not to be exposed to them, either.
She’d slept wretchedly, thinking about him with the girl from the nursing home,
and didn’t need the physical remains thrown in her face.

He was waiting at a booth
when she arrived. He hadn’t ordered. This she took as a good sign. If he’d been
having sex all night, he’d be ravenous and wouldn’t have waited.

But maybe he’d already had
breakfast with her.

Gritting her mental teeth, Sarah
flung herself into the seat opposite Emerson. “How’s your back?”

“Okay.” He smiled. “How’s
your leg?”

He looked annoyingly well
rested. She hated that she still felt the tingle of his hand on the inside of
her thigh from when he bandaged her wound, and shot him a bitter glare. “I’ll
live.”

“You’re awfully prickly this
morning,” he said.

“A vat of coffee should cure
that.”

He signaled for a waitress. That
was another thing Sarah liked about this place. They had women of respectable
ages for waitresses, in old-fashioned uniforms, without bits of metal pierced
through their faces. Sarah ordered coffee and an English muffin. He asked for a
cup of tea, and a bacon and cheese omelet with pancakes.

Her stomach tightened.

“So what’s up?” he asked,
after one of those wonderful women brought Sarah a fat, steaming mug.

She shook her head.

“Last night,” he prompted
her. “You said you needed to talk to me.”

“Did I?” She blinked at him.
“I don’t remember. I must have still been upset about Jay and everything. Guess
I got over it.”

“Uh-huh,” he said, looking at
the table.

She forgot that verbal sleight-of-hand
didn’t work on him like it worked on Rashid and all the other men she’d ever
known. She gulped at her coffee. It was strong and steeled her nerves. It made
her feel less like the squishy little thing she’d been the night before, as her
mind tortured her with racing thoughts about losing Emerson and being unable to
lose Jay.

“It’s no big deal.” She shrugged.
“I’m sorry if I got your curiosity up on false pretenses.”

“Not a problem. I needed to
eat, anyway. And, well, there was something I wanted to talk to you about.”

She gaped at him, instantly
squishy again—weak and blind and spineless.

“And maybe it isn’t any of my
business.” His fingers danced around the rim of his teacup. He watched them.
Then glanced up at her. His pale eyes looked sweet but pained. “It’s about Rashid.
I wanted to make sure you knew what you were doing.”

Out of her squishy core
flared an urge to leap up and slap him. “You’re sleeping with some bimbo and
you have the gall to ask me—”

“She’s not a bimbo!”

The force of his tone caught
Sarah mid-breath. Everyone in the diner was staring at them. But she didn’t
care. Tears welled up and she blinked them back.

“She’s not a bimbo,” he said
again, in a normal tone. “She wants to be a writer.”

Sarah rose, slowly, glaring
at him. “That’s even worse.”

She dropped her napkin on the
table and walked out.

Emerson followed, calling her
name. She walked faster. Not too fast. She wanted to be caught but didn’t want
to make it easy.

Finally he pulled up even with
her in front of the movie theater. She stopped and turned away, hiding the
tears that streaked makeup so carefully applied for him, although he always
said he liked her best without it.

For a long time he just stood
there. She looked at his sneakers, the splayed-out angle of his feet.

“I’m sorry,” Emerson said
finally.

She glanced up.
That face. That rested, unlined,
I-got-laid-last-night face
. “You don’t look sorry.”

He huffed out a breath. “Just
because you don’t love me, I’m not allowed to look for someone who can?”

“Who says I don’t love you?”
she said, barely a whisper.

His mouth softened. “What?”

If not for imagining where
his lips might have recently been, she might have kissed him. “Nothing. Never
mind.”

“You said something. What was
it?”

“I’m not doing anything with Rashid.”

“That’s really what you
said?”

She leveled a cool gaze at
him. “Yes. Although now you make me wish that I was.”

His eyes narrowed. “You’d
sleep with him. Just to get back at me?”

“No. Just because he’s a nice
guy.”

“Who until last night was an
engaged nice guy.”

She didn’t understand.

“He wants to call off the
wedding. He told me last night. After he’d been at your apartment.”

The accusation in Emerson’s
tone left her fumbling for words. “But we’re…friends. That’s all. How did he
get the idea—”

“Sarah, don’t be stupid,” he said
tiredly. “Even in America, when a single man offers to cook dinner for a single
woman, the last thing on his mind is the food. Some are just more patient about
it.”