Cream of the Crop

  There are no words. Scratch that. There are words. And some of them are . . .

  Pumping.

  Up.

  Down.

  Hands.

  Wrapped.

  Around.

  Wood.

  Cream.

  Splashing.

  Tongue.

  Poking.

  Out.

  Concentrating.

  Rhythm.

  Thrusting.

  Sweating.

  Eyes.

  On.

  Me.

  The.

  Entire.

  Time.

  Is.

  It.

  Hot.

  Or.

  Is.

  It.

  Just.

  Me?

  (This is Roxie . . . it’s not just you.)

  If it was possible for someone to spontaneously combust from watching a grown man churn butter, then I’d be the first to do it.

  After he won, I managed to tug him behind the stone barn afterward and cop a few good feels, enough skin to tide me over until tonight, at least, when I planned on riding my champion until I’d brought him right across the finish line.

  The day was perfect, one that if you could watch from above, could pull back to a wide camera shot and observe, you’d think you were watching an ad for the New York Tourism Board, or at the very least a small-town council’s print ad in a regional magazine. Shiny, happy people—and now we were dancing.

  No, really, there was even a square dance in the middle of all this Martha Stewart meets Norman Rockwell visual perfection.

  While my sore back kept me from allemanding left and promenading right, Oscar and I did manage to sneak in a slow dance when the bluegrass band played its own version of Patsy Cline’s “Crazy.” We swayed back and forth under the October sky, eyes seeing only each other, his hands trying his damnedest not to be full of my sweet ass. Every few bars his hands would start to slip down, and I had to remind him that we were on display here, with kids everywhere.

  We saw every stall, visited every booth, chatting with everyone I’d come to know in the few short weeks since discovering this wonderful town. Eventually we nabbed a picnic table, filled it with Leo and Polly and Chad and Logan, and Roxie and I headed to a stand to grab hot dogs for everyone.

  “You two seem cozy,” Roxie said, bumping my hip on the way to the hot dog stand.

  “We do, don’t we?” I replied, feeling my cheeks creak as I grinned for the thousandth time that very day. “I gotta admit, it’s pretty great.”

  “That’s obvious.” She jumped into line right before a gaggle of junior high kids beat us to it. “So where is this headed?”

  “Can it, Callahan.”

  “Shut the fuck up with your can, this is me. Give me the deets please.”

  “The deets are that it’s an impossible question to answer. Besides, who says we have to decide where it’s heading right now? I’m heading in the direction of the biggest hot dog I can find.” This placated her for a moment, and we moved up another space in line. But then she simply couldn’t resist . . .

  “At least tell me something about his hot dog,” she said, shooting me a conspiratorial look.

  “It’s in the direction of the biggest hot dog I can find,” I repeated.

  “I knew it! I fucking knew it!” she cackled, squeezing my arm. “Sometimes it’s like God handed out great bodies and beautiful faces, but then absolutely nothing in the trouser department, and it’s just the worst! And Oscar is so beautiful, I was afraid for his trousers.”

  I laughed in agreement. It was rare that someone so blessed above was so blessed below. And some of the least attractive guys could have the most talented cock out there. But not often did the two converge. And I was beyond delighted to have that convergence occur between my thighs.

  I leaned in close. “Be not afraid of his trousers, for it is good and we are well met.”

  “I love when you go all Middle-earth on me,” she said, just as I heard one of the kids behind us ask—

  “What the hell are trousers?”

  “I think they’re some kind of old-timey pants,” one of the other ones answered.

  She caught my eye, and we silently agreed to keep the rest of our conversation trouser-free as long as we remained in line.

  “Three hot dogs, please,” I chirped to the guy behind the counter.

  “How d’you want them?” he asked, gesturing to the array of condiments.

  I had no idea. When in doubt, go bold.

  “One with just mustard, and put everything on the other two.” I grinned as I watched him pile them high with all kinds of goodies, thinking that Oscar seemed like an everything kind of guy.

  Once we were headed back I looked up over the hot dogs I’d procured for my man, and his eyes met mine. Pure heat burned across the barnyard and made my pulse once more go crazy fast.

  Then my gaze shifted a smidge to the right, and the heat turned to fury. Because seated next to Oscar, sandwiching herself right in the middle of the bench, was none other than ex-wife Missy, looking decidedly wifelike as she set a tray of hot dogs right in front of my guy.

  “Oh, sister, did you pick the wrong seat,” I seethed, and Roxie looked where my eye daggers were landing.

  “Oh boy,” she muttered, and tried to step in front of me. “Take a breath, Nat. Just—”

  “I’m calm,” I said through my teeth as I continued toward the table. “Perfectly calm.”

  So calm, in fact, that when we reached the table, I stepped up onto the bench between Leo and Polly, stepped up on top of the table, stood in front of Oscar with my tray of hot dogs and smiled down sweetly at Missy.

  “Thanks for saving my seat, Missy.”

  I set my foot down between them on the bench, turning at the last minute to place my posterior directly in her face, then wiggled down into the space she suddenly had to vacate.

  Across the table Leo, Polly, Chad, and Logan were all staring back at me with dropped jaws, and behind them Roxie shook her head with a tightly drawn mouth.

  Oscar, however, looked like he was trying very hard not to laugh.

  “Hot dog?” I asked brightly, setting the tray down in front of him.

  “Looks good,” he answered, running a hand along his jaw and failing to conceal his laughter miserably. “Which one is mine?”

  “The two with everything,” I replied with a grin, picking up his bottle of beer and draining half in one draft. “Thirsty.”

  I felt an insistent tapping on my shoulder, and though I at first tried to ignore her, it soon became clear that she wasn’t going away.

  “Yes, Missy?” I asked in my nicest voice, turning toward her.

  “Oscar doesn’t like his hot dogs like that,” she chirped, looking over my shoulder at the tray.

  “Sorry?”

  “Oscar never gets anything but mustard on his hot dogs.”

  “You don’t say,” I answered, trying to keep my cool. Who the hell did she think she was? Ex-wife meant ex- on having a say; ex- on being a know-it-all; ex- on weighing in on anything about Oscar.

  She looked carefully at the tray in front of him, cataloguing everything that was wrong with the wieners. She raised a critical eyebrow, cocked her head to the side, and through tiny pursed lips said, “And he hates onions. Did you know he hates onions?”

  I let a smile creep across my face—the smile I used for creepy guys on the subway and men who make fat jokes. Part Stepford, part demon, all New York City Don’t Mess With Me. “How would I know he doesn’t like onions? We’ve been too busy fucking.”

  Leo picked Polly up and spirited her away from the table, shaking his head in the same way Roxie had, while Polly giggled something about needing a larger piggy bank.
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  Chad and Logan stopped cold, their mouths full of hot dog.

  Roxie was frozen, too, but the O shape of her mouth was more resigned than surprised.

  Missy’s eyes filled with tears, first the edges, then spilling into the center, blending with her now visible mascara to make mud.

  Oscar’s hand settled on my shoulder. And it felt . . . different. Could a hand feel disapproving? I turned and saw his face—and holy shit, that eyebrow was beyond disapproving.

  Missy climbed out of the seat and took off for the barn. I caught the image out of the corner of my eye, and it wasn’t lost on me that her hands were over her eyes.

  How is she managing to navigate, then?

  Inner snark, it’s time to stand down.

  Now Oscar was standing up—and looking down at me with an unidentifiable expression. Confusion? Hurt? Shame?

  Disappointment.

  “Oh come on,” I muttered as he squeezed my shoulder, then took off in a slow jog in the same direction as Miss Missy.

  “How is this . . . but why would he . . . but she knew that . . . and I didn’t mean . . . but she’s always around and . . . son of a bitch.” I slumped onto the seat I’d claimed so dramatically and studied the hot dogs. “How was I supposed to know he didn’t like onions?”

  “Because you’ve been too busy fucking?” Logan said.

  I looked up to see them all watching to see what happened next, and I slouched farther into the table, chin in hands.

  Logan exchanged a glance with Chad. “You okay?”

  “Am I way off base here? I mean, it’s weird, right? That she acts like she’s—”

  Three mouths spoke at once.

  “Still in love?”

  “Wants him back.”

  “Would love to have that hot dog back inside her bun.”

  “Wow,” I said. “I’m glad it’s not just me.”

  “Totally not just you, sweetie,” Chad said, patting my hand. “Those two are like the poster children for how adults should behave after a divorce—”

  “—if one of those adults is still totally in love,” Logan finished.

  “You don’t have to say it like that,” Chad admonished him. “Natalie’s clearly upset here, and I think we need to make sure that—”

  “Oh, make sure nothing. She’s a big girl, and she knows what’s going on. Didn’t you see that Dynasty moment just now? She annihilated Missy; it was—”

  “Oh, you two stop,” Roxie said, turning to face me. “It doesn’t matter what we say about Oscar and Missy. What does Oscar say about him and Missy?”

  “Not much. We haven’t really talked about it,” I admitted. “I guess we should, though, right? I mean, that’s what grown-ups do . . . I think.”

  “Don’t ask me. I’m still not sure if I’m an official grown-up yet, although being listed as a second emergency contact at Polly’s school made me feel about ten feet tall—and scared to death. But also kind of . . . honored, that Leo entrusted her to me.”

  I sat quietly for a moment. “You really are an official grown-up.”

  She nodded. “God help us all.”

  We threw away the hot dogs and went off to find Leo and Polly. I got a stern glance from Leo, a high five from Polly (who then got a stern glance from Roxie), and a big handful of nothing when I went to find Oscar.

  He was nowhere to be found.

  Grabbing a ride home with Roxie after we helped Leo clean up a bit, I tossed and turned on the guest room bed, clad in one of her T-shirts, since my weekend bag was in Oscar’s truck.

  Where the hell was he? I’d texted him twice, but he didn’t answer. Never one to chase what doesn’t want to be caught, I gave him his space. But I still wondered where he was . . . and what he might be up to.

  This, this right here, what I was feeling—confused, unsettled, unsure—was why I never got in this deep this fast. And I was in very deep. I had it bad for this guy, and I didn’t see that going away anytime soon.

  Ugh. I flopped over onto my stomach. The biggest T-shirt Roxie had was snug across my hips, and most certainly my breasts.

  I flopped back over onto my back. I sat up, punched my pillow repeatedly, lay back down, sat back up, then flipped once more onto my stomach and starfished. Just as I was finally getting settled, there was a knock at my door.

  “Nat?” a quiet voice called.

  “Yeah?”

  “There’s a good-looking dairy farmer at the front door. Go see what he wants.” Then Roxie’s footsteps went back down the hallway toward her room.

  It was after 2 a.m., for pity’s sake. Curious to know what he had to say, I threw off the covers, slipped into a robe, and padded down the dark back steps to the kitchen, then let myself out onto the porch. Shivering in the cold night air, I was grateful for the thick woolen socks I’d pulled on before going to bed.

  Standing in a puddle of moonlight, rocking back and forth on his heels, Oscar was watching the front door. Nervous? Still disappointed? The moonlight wasn’t bright enough to tell, but something was clearly on his mind.

  A board in the porch creaked, and he whirled in surprise.

  “Hi,” I said.

  He looked at me, taking in my robe and socks. And said nothing.

  “You woke me up out of a sound sleep, Caveman. What’s going on?” I didn’t want to let on that I was losing sleep over what had happened.

  “I wanted to talk to you,” he finally started, taking a step toward me on the porch.

  “Talk to me about what?” I asked.

  “About what happened tonight.” Step. “With Missy.” Another step.

  “Oh. That.” I made myself sound like it hadn’t affected me in the slightest that he’d left me to go chase his ex-wife to wipe her oh-so-convenient tears. “Yeah, let’s talk about that.” So much for unaffected.

  “What Missy said, about the way I like my hot dogs, was . . .”

  Rude. Assuming. Territorial.

  “. . . true.”

  I blinked at him. “True?”

  He nodded. “She’s right. I don’t like relish. And I don’t like onions.”

  My hands were suddenly on my hips, and my right foot was tapping furiously. “Fine, Oscar. You don’t want my relish and my onions, then just say so.”

  “I just did, actually,” he said, his eyes watching my foot tap.

  “So Missy knows everything there is to know about you, and I know nothing.”

  “She was my wife, Natalie,” he said softly, and something very small and almost foreign to me, way down deep inside, twisted over at hearing those words. “She knows I sometimes like chocolate chips in my pancakes. She knows I’m terrible at folding laundry but that I love to iron my sheets. She knows that when I’m sick, I like to have the ginger ale swished up to get rid of all the bubbles.”

  “If you woke me up in the middle of the night just to list all the wonderful things Missy does, this really could have waited until the morning.”

  “And she makes great muffins,” he continued as if I hadn’t said a word, looking at me with the faintest hint of amusement.

  “Tell me again why you divorced her?” I asked sweetly. “She sounds like the one who got away.”

  “What’s wrong with two people staying friends after they divorce?”

  “It’s weird,” I answered promptly.

  “It’s weird?”

  “Yeah, it’s weird. You’re supposed to, I don’t know, hate each other, and be bitter and angry, and fight over things like coffee tables and salad spinners.”

  “What’s a salad spinner?”

  “It’s a bowl that you put washed greens in and— Oh stop it, that’s not what this is about!”

  “You brought up the salad spinner, it must be something pretty amazing if I’m supposed to be . . . what did you say? Fighting
over it? Along with a coffee table?”

  “You. Are. Infuriating.” I spat each word out slowly and clearly, not wanting him to miss them.

  “Missy used to tell me the same thing.”

  I launched myself at him, threw myself on this giant man with his giant shoulders, and literally tried to take him to the ground, my sock-clad feet sliding on the cold wooden planks. My hands struggled to land a blow, to do anything other than hang pitifully from his enormous shoulders, while he simply braced himself and let me tantrum in midair.

  When he began to chuckle, I really lost my cool. “Don’t you dare laugh at me, you motherfucker! I can’t believe that you’d laugh at me, after what you did to me tonight at that stupid hoedown!” I swung wildly at him, missing by a mile.

  “Okay, that’s it,” he grumbled, grabbing me across my middle, throwing me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, and starting across the lawn. “’Night, Roxie, sorry about the noise,” he called out.

  I looked up to see her hanging out of her bedroom window and waving merrily at the two of us.

  “Thank goodness, now I can go back to sleep,” she said good-naturedly, starting to close the window. “It used to be so quiet out here in the country.”

  He carried me over to his truck, kicking and screaming obscenities. Opening the passenger side, he dumped me inside, then closed the door. As I continued to yell at him, he stood outside the door until I’d exhausted every insult I could think of, which was a lot.

  “—until it falls off and rots!” I finally finished, panting. The passenger-side window was almost completely fogged over, but I could see his shape through it, just waiting it out.

  I rubbed the tie of my robe over the fog, making a clear spot. He leaned down to look through, his eyes twinkling in the moonlight.

  Sonofa— “Let me out.”

  He said something, but I couldn’t understand the words.

  “What?”

  He pantomimed rolling down the window, and I rolled it down a crack. “Let me out,” I repeated.

  “I’ll let you out when you calm down.”

  “I really don’t take orders well. You should know that about me,” I said, seething.

  “Duly noted.” He smiled that damn killer grin. “You ready to talk like normal people now?”