Truly (New York Trilogy #1) (8 page)

He would sell so many clothes.

“You should be a model,” she said.

He made a deeply cynical face.

“What? You’d be great for catalogs. It probably pays better than washing dishes.”

Oops. That had been a rude thing to say. She really
was
nervous, if she was forgetting the social niceties so thoroughly.

“You think I’m a dishwasher?”

“Aren’t you?”

“No.”

“Oh. So what are you, then?”

Ben sipped his wine, and the silence drew out between them. She couldn’t read his expression—bemused, bewildered? Finally, he said, “I guess I’m a beekeeper.”

Of May’s mental list of all the things he might have said,
I’m a beekeeper
was way, way down toward the bottom. So far down, she couldn’t think of a response. Finally, she came up with “This is New York.”

The quirky little smile. “I know that.”

“Where are the bees?”

He pointed up, and like an idiot, May looked toward the ceiling, searching for buzzing insects. “On the roof,” he clarified.

“So that’s …”
A job?
“That’s a surprise.”

“I’ll bet. I keep hives on the roof. They’re not my bees, actually, they’re Alec’s. He gives me a break on the rent in exchange for taking care of his bees. But I’ve got a bunch more hives all over the city.”

“Why?”

“For the honey,” he said. “And because I like it.”

“You sell the honey?” She was still trying to figure out where the viable career was in all this.

“Yep. And some of the bees are leased to rooftop gardeners, so I get paid to make sure their crops get pollinated. I do some of that, too.”

“Some of what?”

“Gardening. That’s what I do for Cecily and Sam—I guess you didn’t see their menu, but a lot of the produce at the restaurant comes from a garden up on their roof. I’m in charge of the garden.”

“And their bees.”

“Right.”

“So when you said, ‘Best honey in New York’ …”

“I was bragging. That was spring honey from the hives on their roof.”

“Your honey.”

“My honey.”

“I think I would like some wine after all,” she said, and he grinned. Which just made her want the wine even more.

He was a farmer. In New York City. It figured, didn’t it? Only May would leave Wisconsin behind, move to New Jersey, stumble her way into a total life meltdown, and then pick a Wisconsin bee farmer to go home with.

A Wisconsin bee farmer who looked like a male model in disguise.

And didn’t want to get in her pants.

He got up to pour her a glass just as his phone began to ring from the countertop where he had left it. “Why don’t you get that?” he asked. “It’s probably for you.”

May retrieved the phone. “Hello?”

“May! It’s Anya! Are you okay? What’s going on?”

“I’m all right. Thanks for calling back.”

“We were worried about you! I saw the video—oh my goodness!”

“Yeah.” She heard music blaring in the background. “Where are you?”

“We’re all in Green Bay for Teeny’s bachelorette. I didn’t see your message until right
now.”

“That’s okay. I was … I lost my purse, and I can’t get in touch with Allie or my parents because they’re at the cabin.”

“That sucks! And you and Dan …”

“We broke up.”

“Oh, May. Oh no.” The background noise died down. Anya must have decided she needed to take the conversation somewhere more private. “I guess you were mad at him. For that proposal.”

“I guess I was.”

“So you just …”

“Yeah.”

“When?”

“This afternoon.”

“Honey, I’m so sorry. Maybe if you take a breather, he’ll pull his head out of his ass. I know you guys are meant to be together. I mean, how long has it been?”

“Four years.”

“And this whole year long-distance from Wisconsin to New Jersey—you guys did so well. I thought you were totally back on track.”

Separated by two flights, they’d been the perfect couple. It was only when May had started spending all her days with Dan that she’d begun to recognize what a profound gulf separated them, and how tiring it was to be responsible for bridging it.

Ben nudged her shoulder and held out the wineglass. She took it and held the phone a few inches away from her ear. Anya was talking too loud, which she did when she was drunk, and far too much, which she did most of the time. You could probably hear it in the bathroom. Ben had to be catching every word.

He lifted his wineglass in her direction and mouthed,
Cheers
.

May gave him a faint smile and knocked back half the glass in one go.

Meant to be together
, Anya had said.

She’d heard that before. From her mother. From Dan up on that stage, when he was telling his version of their love story to three hundred strangers and she was realizing with horror that Dan’s version of their love story
sucked
. That the woman he was describing wasn’t her—not
deep down—and she’d suffocate if she married him.

She hadn’t forked him on purpose. Not with malice aforethought. The fork itself had been an accident, a bit of flotsam she’d nervously clutched in her hand when she’d been sitting at a table in the audience and had realized that he was talking about
her
instead of giving the speech she’d come to watch him deliver.

She’d carried the fork to the stage accidentally, and it wasn’t until she got halfway up the steps that she’d seen it glinting in her hand and thought,
May, you idiot
.

Then he’d said all those things. Given that speech that was supposed to be wonderful but instead had pierced right through her shield of illusion and deflated the bubble of her romantic hopes.

Dan had dropped to one knee and pried open the lid of the jewelry box, inside of which was a very big diamond. “I’ve known for a long time that we’d end up here, May,” he’d said. “You keep me centered, and you make me a better man than I’d ever be without you. Coach was right—you’re the kind of woman I need in my life. Will you let me do the right thing and make an honest woman out of you?”

May had glanced at Dan’s hand, joined with hers.

She’d looked at the diamond, winking under the lights.

And she’d finally gotten angry. So angry.

If Dan was a Viking god, in that moment May had become a Valkyrie: the tallest woman in the room, dressed to the nines, her shoulders rounded and her biceps toned from endless stress-relieving laps in the pool.

“You
dick
,” she’d hissed.

And then without thinking—without weighing the consequences—without even hesitating, she’d gone for him. Sweet, polite, innocent May Fredericks had stabbed her boyfriend in the meat of his thumb with a shrimp fork, and it had felt
great
.

She finished her wine. Ben sauntered over and poured her another glass. Anya was still talking.

“—so romantic, when you two are together. And you look good together, too, with all that blond hair, and so tall. I always thought you’d have the most beautiful children, and—”

“Sweetie?” May said, interrupting. “It’s all right.”

“You’re so brave.”

May put the wineglass between her eyes and rolled it back and forth. The cool, smooth pressure felt good. “Can we leave the subject of Dan for the moment and talk about why I called?”

“Of course! What do you need? You know we’re here for you.”

“If I could borrow a credit card number, that would be great. Just in case. I have a room for tonight, but I’m not sure what it’s going to take to get home … I’ll pay you back, I promise.”

“I know you’re good for it. Hold on, let me go get my purse. I left it with Beth.”

The background noise got louder again, and then after a few moments Anya said, “Have you got a pen?”

“Wait a sec.”

Ben was already up, rummaging through a kitchen drawer. He returned with a take-out menu and a Bic.

“I’m ready,” she said.

“Okay, here goes.” Anya rattled off the numbers, and May wrote them down. It took a few more minutes for her to assure her friend that everything was fine, and then another few to get her off the phone.

It didn’t occur to Anya to ask her where she was staying. But everyone she’d left a message with would be at the bachelorette party, and Anya would definitely tell them all what had happened.

“What’s wrong?” Ben asked.

“She’s going to tell everybody I know. And then they’re all going to call. Drunk.”

He plucked the phone from her hand and turned it off. “Problem solved.”

“I’ll have to face the music sooner or later.”

“You don’t have to face anything you don’t want to tonight.”

She thought of her friends calling and getting no answer. Her family up at the cabin, wondering how she was doing. Or possibly upset with her for not calling yesterday afternoon or this morning. For hiding out with her phone turned off.

It had seemed better, more fitting, to encase herself in silence. To lie awake most of the night next to Dan, wondering what she’d done and what she was about to do.

“They’ll worry about me.”

“Not your problem.”

An intriguing thought. She lifted her glass. “I’ll drink to that.”

When their goblets clinked together, his toast back at Pulvermacher’s came to her.
Cheers, then. I can’t fucking stand Einarsson
.

How liberating it must be to be able to say whatever you wanted that way. To be rude without guilt—without even obvious awareness. How did someone get to be that way? If she asked him, would he teach her?

He settled back into the couch, and she kicked her shoes off and tucked her feet under her butt, leaning her head on the cushion as the wine wove its way into her bloodstream. Her toes were cold, her blood warm, her hair tangled from walking so many blocks today in the wind. She felt gritty and sleepy, but somehow cocooned from having to worry too deeply about it. Ben had turned off the phone and absolved her of responsibility for one night.

“Why bees?” she asked.

“Why not bees?”

“Oh, I can think of some reasons why not.”

He sipped his wine, which was disappearing at a much more reasonable rate than hers. She wondered if she was guzzling something precious and expensive.

Probably not. Beekeepers couldn’t possibly earn much more than dishwashers.

When she’d nearly given up on getting a real answer, he said, “I like them. They’re calming.”

“Bees are calming? The little buzzing guys with the stingers?”

“They don’t sting much. If you don’t disturb them, they’re too busy living and working to bother stinging. They’re … purposeful. Dispassionate.”

“Very Zen.”

“Yes.”

She considered that. “Busy buzzing bees,” she said, and then covered her mouth with her hand, because she sounded a little too relaxed. “This is just regular wine, right?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Are you asking me if I drugged you?”

“Or if this is, like, malt liquor that only tastes like wine.”

“Nah, it’s regular wine. It hits you harder when you’re tired. Why, are you getting loopy?”

“I’m kind of melting into the couch here.”

“You can put your legs up if you want.”

May considered the wisdom of that. Her bare feet would be right next to his thigh.

But then, he’d already seen her feet. It wasn’t as though her flats did much to disguise their enormity. And it would feel good to put her legs up.

Ben retrieved the wine from the kitchen, filled her glass again, and put the bottle on the coffee table, propping his feet beside it. May stretched her legs out beside his thigh.

“Thank you,” she said. “You’re really nice.”

He chuckled. “You’re about the only person to think so.”

She nuzzled her cheek against the couch. It was soft, covered in some kind of velourish fabric. “It took me a while to figure it out.”

“What tipped you off?”

“You gave me your taco.”

“Ah.”

“Those tacos were so good.”

“I know.”

“And that fig jam. Oh my God.”

He set down his wineglass and reached for her foot, then hesitated.

“I’m going to rub your feet,” he said. “I’d just go right ahead and do it, but I promised not to touch you.”

“You can’t rub my feet.”

“Why not?”

“They’re smelly.”

“That’ll keep me from getting any ideas.” He lifted one foot into his lap, then the other. Her heels balanced on hard thighs. His thumb found the seam down the ball of her foot and pushed into the sore muscle.

May tipped her head back and closed her eyes.

“You can’t rub my feet,” she repeated weakly.

“I’m still waiting for a real reason.”

“They’re enormous,” she admitted.

“Your feet are the size they need to be to move you around.”

She groaned. “That just means you think
I’m
enormous.”

“I think you’re tall. Maybe
you
think you’re enormous, but that’s because you’re a chick, so it’s like a law that you have to think something’s wrong with you.”

Ask those reporters who were mobbing the elevator right before I got robbed. Ask the one who called me Fatty. I’ll bet he thinks I’m enormous, too
.

But she couldn’t say that, because it was stupid to care what reporters said about you.

She kept waiting for someone to teach her how not to care.

May looked at Ben’s hands, enveloping her toes. Her feet didn’t seem so big when he had his hands on them.

“I bet I weigh more than you,” she said.

“I bet you don’t.”

She slitted her eyes open to glare at him, but it was hard to keep them open when she was so sleepy, and his hands on her feet felt so insanely good.

“I’m not telling you how much I weigh.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“But you tell me how much
you
weigh.”

“Buck ninety.”

She closed her eyes again. He had her beat by a couple inches of height and fifteen pounds of muscle. He could manhandle her into submission if he wanted to. Stake her to the floor.

But frankly, there wasn’t room.

“I can’t believe you’re a farmer,” she said, nestling deeper into the couch.