The Story of You and Me (12 page)

“I think…” Cole leaned down and grabbed Gidget. He tucked her under his arm, pulled his shoulders back as he stood up tall and sucked in his stomach. “…that because you are gorgeous, Alejandro, and most likely popular, you believe people will listen to your every word like you are a savvy politician, a charismatic self-help author, or a Kardashian.”

Alex frowned. “You did not just compare me to a Kardashian.”

Cole sniffed. “Because you are charming with your cookies and flowers, you most likely believe your every suggestion will be obeyed. But I am here to tell you that you don’t really understand what it’s like to love an animal. A pet. You probably don’t even know what it’s like to love
anyone.
Probably not even another human being.”

“Cole!” I exclaimed. “Stop being a douche! Alejandro’s my friend. You’re my neighbor and my friend. And frankly, even though Gidget only growls at me, I believe we’re pals. I’m here until the end of summer. Could you all just play nice until I leave? Someone needs to apologize to someone else. And that suggestion is meant for all of you.”

“Not me, not Gidget, not tonight.” Cole disappeared back inside his apartment and slammed the door.

That left Alex. Sitting on my front doorstep. Awkwardly shifting from side to side. “Look,” he said.
 

“Thanks for trying,” I said. “Today was a tough day. I need to be alone.”

“I disagree.”

And that’s when I heard it. A single tiny, “Eep.”

“Oh my good God,” I said. “No freaking way.”

“Mew. Eep. Mehhh…” The sounds emanated from behind Alejandro.

“You rescued Napoleon, didn’t you?”

He smiled. “Yes.

I couldn’t help myself as I jumped up into the air, crouched back down and high-fived Alejandro.
 

He edged to the side of the concrete step revealing a cardboard cat carrier that featured round air holes carved in its sides. A tiny pink nose stuck out of one opening. It was Napoleon, his nostrils widening and narrowing as he sniffed the air.
 

“The head guy was closing the place early, Bonita, and I had to make a decision. So I got him. I signed the forms and adopted Napoleon. And now I’m giving the little bastard to you.”

“Oh my God!” I threw myself on Alex and hugged him hard. He fell back against my front door and I landed awkwardly in his lap. He grabbed me around my waist and stopped me from dropping off the porch onto the concrete.

“Oops,” I said my lips inches from his. I looked up into his eyes. “When I was a kid I was a bit of a klutz.”

“There is nothing remotely klutzy about this moment,” he said. “I wouldn’t mind catching you every time you fall.” He leaned toward me and his lips brushed mine. I felt the stubble on his chin on my face: It was rough but intoxicating.
 

I suddenly couldn’t breathe, and falling I was.
 

There was a small insistent scratching sound, claws on cardboard, followed by one pathetic mew.

I pulled my lips from Alejandro’s, backed away and ripped myself off his lap. “Thank you, thank you…” I knelt down next to the cardboard carrier and peered though a hole at Napoleon who was eyeing me suspiciously with one round yellow-green eye. “You are mine!” I exclaimed.

“You’re welcome.” Alex looked a little befuddled. “If I had known you would have plastered yourself all over me like Saran Wrap, I would have gotten you a cat a couple of weeks ago.”

“Any cat a couple of weeks ago wouldn’t have mattered. Napoleon matters. You matter. What you did for me today matters.” I broke into a sweat and fanned myself. “When did it get so hot out? I need to take him inside. I’m so excited! We need to get cat food and treats and a litter box and catnip.”

Alex stood up and pointed at two giant grocery bags behind him. A large scratch pad poked out the top of one bag.
 

“Oh, my God!” I hugged him again.

“Damn, should I get you
another
cat? I can only fantasize what might happen if I got you
a second
cat.”

I shoved the key in the door, opened it and picked up the cat carrier. “I don’t want another cat. I want this cat. You didn’t do just good, Alex. You did great. Want to come inside?”
 

He shook his head. “I thought you’d never ask.

* * *

“You owe me,” Alejandro said. “I saved your cat.” He drove the Jeep, top down, as the summer sun blasted down upon us.
 

Per usual, I rode shotgun in the passenger seat. He wouldn’t tell me ahead of time where we were going but he suggested I dress casual. I wore shorts and a
 
halter top with a flared hem that landed at my waist.

“I tolerated your bitchy neighbor,” he said. “I attended yoga classes with you and did downward dog in front of complete strangers. I spotted three people checking out my ass. Jeez, that was embarrassing.”

I pretended to stare saucer-eyed at his butt. “Oh my God, has anyone ever told you what a fine behind you have?”

“Stop!” He covered a laugh. “I even took needles for you. This afternoon is
my call
.”
 

Strands of my hair whipped across my face and blew behind me under my new straw hat that I held onto with one hand on top. I discovered it wrapped up in tissue paper in the bottom of one of the bags with the cat supplies and bottled water. I pulled it out thinking it was an awfully big cat toy.
 

“You’re in L.A.,” Alex had said. “You’re going to be a beach girl and you need a hat. I wanted something a little different for you. Hence the cross between country-western and a typical floppy beach hat.”

“I love it!” I plopped it on my head and rolled up the woven rim. “But I’m from Wisconsin—a state squarely in the northern part of the Midwest. What about me screams ‘country-western’?”

“Your take no prisoners attitude,” he said.

Now we drove through funky narrow streets where ramshackle apartment buildings were plopped between modern four level houses with pristine rooftop gardens. I smelled the ocean air and leaned back against the seat. I kicked my bare legs up and draped my feet out the passenger window. “I agree, Ralph,” I said. “I totally owe you for the Napoleon rescue. Where are you taking me?”

“Venice, Bonita. Because you haven’t lived in So-Cal until you’ve experienced the splendiferous, crazy Venice Beach scene.”

I thought about Pintdick Oscar and his friends, and despite the heat from the sun glaring down on us I suddenly felt cold. I closed my eyes and remembered how scared I was a couple weeks ago when I was lost and assaulted. “I heard Venice has a bunch of gangs. Are you sure it’s safe?”

“Venice Beach is technically part of L.A. Every big city has gangs. Hell, even small cities have them. And bullies know no boundaries—they’re everywhere.” He reached out and squeezed my arm. “You’re with me today. I’m your Driver. I’m your protector. I saved your cat. Stop questioning your safety. At least for today.”

“Okay.” I smiled and shook my head. “Today I am in your hands, Alejandro.” I placed my hand on top of his that was on the wheel.

He smiled at me from behind his Ray-ban aviator sunglasses: the faintest twinkle wrinkles etching next to his eyes, the dimples in his cheeks deepening.
 

I’d pushed every guy out of my life for the past year and a half because I was scared to death to fall for anyone with a beating heart. Now I’d fallen for a fuzzball with a beating heart—a kitten. But worse, I feared I was surrendering my heart to a real man.
 

The last boy I dated—let’s just say the relationship didn’t turn out so well. When I told Joey, my old boyfriend, that I had MS? He sprinted so fast from my house that I don’t think he even put on his running shoes until he was easily a half a mile away. And to top it off, he had a new girlfriend on his arm within a week, hanging out at all our old haunts. Showing her off to our mutual friends.
 

I sincerely hoped Joey had developed a nasty case of blisters from all that running. Everywhere.

I wasn’t sure I could stay open to a new guy in my life, especially someone who was warm and sweet and strong. Like Alejandro. A man who
did not know
my life’s reality. And I was still uncertain how much I should share if any of my deets with him.
   

Deet #1: The Girl (Me) who you’re driving is keeping secrets from you.
 

Deet #2: Same Girl (Me) has one secret you might not be all that happy about upon discovering. In fact, you might even bolt and leave Same Girl high and dry. Just like my dad left my mom.

“I trust you, Alex,” I said. “But I’m not as tough as you think.” I pulled my legs back inside the car, placed them firmly on the floor and sat up straight in my seat. “Not to be a bitch, but don’t screw it up.”

“What is the mysterious ‘it’ that I might screw up? If you give me a warning, I might be able to avoid screwing up whatever, ‘it’ is?”

“You’ll figure it out as soon as you figure out the Ralph thing,” I said.

It is whatever we are right now. It is the beginning of something between us… or maybe it is nothing.
 

He shot me a look that made my heart pound. Stop. And restart again. “I will figure that out you know. Soon.”
 

“Good. I’ve been anxiously waiting.”

“Look,” he said. “I’ve had my share of girls and screw-ups, but overall I’m not a bad person. I’m actually kind of a good person. Or at least a person, who, maybe if I’m lucky, will find meaning in the mundane of everyday life.”

“I’m not trying to—”

“I got ‘it.’” He shook his head. “I’m human, Sophie Marie Priebe. I’ll
definitely
mess it up. But when I do?” He slid his sunglasses down his nose with his index finger and stared down at me with his impossibly sexy hazel eyes. “Remind yourself, Bonita, that you’re hanging out with a guy who has not only the heart, but also the balls to make it right.” He smiled at me and laughed out loud. Which made me laugh too.
 

Mick Jagger crooned “Symphony for the Devil” on the Jeep’s sound system. Alejandro dialed up the volume. “Hang on!” He thrust one arm across me holding me back in my seat. “Short cut.” He whip-turned the Jeep onto a side street and we careened down a hill on a narrow one-way street lined with parked cars.

Chapter Eleven

The sun was bright, the beach air warm but oddly enough, at the same time cool. It wasn’t like summertime in Wisconsin with ninety-nine percent humidity. Alejandro and I dangled our shoes from our fingers as we walked barefoot through the sand. We trudged past the famous Venice Beach boardwalk on our way to the ocean in the near distance.
 

The choppy water had long rolling waves topped with white caps.

“God.” A dreamy look grew on his face. “It’s a surfer’s paradise today.”

A pod of wet-suit attired folks with their surfboards bobbed in the ocean water a decent distance from the pier while they waited on their next wave. “I need a picture,” he said. “I need a picture of you in that hat with the ocean in the background.”

“I’m not very photogenic,” I said.

“Come on! It’s a freaking perfect day. I want something to remind me.”

I grumbled. “Okay.”
 

He backed away a couple of yards and aimed his iPhone at me.
 

I smiled. Awkwardly.

“You look like you’re at the dentist’s office. Could you do something kind of cheesecakey for me, my little Cheesehead?”

I stuck my tongue out at him.

“Tempting,” he said. “But not quite what I had in mind. Come on. Humor me.”

I bent my knees slightly off to the side, put one hand on them, leaned forward, displayed my modest cleavage, puckered up and blew him a kiss.

“Way better!” He snapped the shot, checked it and smiled.
 

When Alex’s friend Nathan waved to us from the hard sand a hundred yards away.

Alex waved back. “Ready?” He held out his hand to me.

“I thought today was about us.”

“It is,” he said. “Come on!” He grabbed my hand and we jogged across the sand toward his buddies. “I want you to officially meet my fellow Drivers. They’re my best friends.”

“They tried to steal me away from you two nights after we met.”

“Of course they did. I’d expect nothing less of them. We’re a little competitive.”

* * *

Alex and I stood next to his friends, Nick, Nathan, Tyler and Jackson just yards from where the choppy cold Pacific waters hit the sand. Nathan and Jackson already had their wetsuits on and were checking out Jackson’s new top-of-the-line board. Nick and Tyler were partially suited up which meant they were also half-naked from the waist up.
 

They were built. Nick had exotic tats up and down his left arm. Tyler had one ear pierced—and not that hideous hole-in-the-ear the size of Wyoming fad. I tried not to stare, as that would be incredibly wrong considering I was officially under Alex’s care today. What did they put in the water here that grew such awesomely yummy-looking guys? Was it a miracle potion of sunshine and sand and salt water mixed with magical guacamole?

When Tyler called me out. “Stop trying not to gawk, Sophie. Yeah, we’re privileged sons-of-bitches from SoCal. And not necessarily in the monied sense. We range from poor to stinking rich. Well, at least our parents do.”

“You must be mistaken, Tyler,” I said. “I was checking out Jackson’s new surfboard—
not you.”

“Speak for yourself, Tyler,” Nathan said. “I have my own money. Gawk all you want, Sophie. We’ve got a bit of a reputation for copping attitude, being smart as well as smart-asses.”

“But we’re the best Drivers in L.A. And sometimes that combo’s a turn-on,” Nick said. “An aphrodisiac of sorts.” He yanked on the top part of his wetsuit. “We’re kind of like firemen.” He winked at me.

“Not to brag,” Jackson said, “but the Drivers, and well, their best friend—lucky me—usually score the hottest chicks in a hundred mile radius.”

I backed away from them as well as Alex. “Have I just meandered into the beginning of a low-budget porn movie?” I asked.