The Smart One and the Pretty One

  Russell sat down and patted the sofa next to him. She came over, but remained standing, looking around, studying the room. “You decorated this yourself,” she said, remembering what his mother had said.

  “You like it?”

  Now that she was opening herself up to him, Ava could clearly hear the anxiety in his voice, the desire to please her and the fear that he might not. Why had she rushed to see him as overly self-confident, even swaggering, when he was so clearly the opposite? Hadn’t he admitted to her and Lauren at the very beginning that he faked the appearance of self-confidence? Why hadn’t she believed him?

  “It’s lovely,” she said, and, to her now far less judgmental eyes, it was. He had done a wonderful job of keeping the house masculine enough for a bachelor without sacrificing warmth or comfort.

  “Why aren’t you sitting down?” he asked, reaching his hand up to her.

  She took his hand and sat down at his side. “I’m a little scared,” she said.

  “Of what?”

  “You know.” She couldn’t quite look at him, so she stared down at their linked hands. “I’m a slow starter. I need time to process all this.”

  “You’ve known me for over twenty years.” His fingers moved among hers. “Isn’t that enough time to get used to the idea of me?”

  “It should be,” she admitted. “Especially when you consider the fact that we’ve been engaged for almost the whole time.”

  “Hey!” He nudged her knee with his. “That’s the first time you’ve ever willingly brought up the marriage contract.”

  “It’s the first time I’ve ever felt glad it existed.”

  “So you’re no longer horrified at the thought of being paired with me?”

  “I’m getting there,” she said and lifted her head.

  He smiled down into her eyes and she looked right at him and she knew him. When hadn’t she known him? With a little sigh of acceptance, she moved into his arms, meeting his eager kiss with a mouth that was just as greedy as his.

  What Ava had told Lauren was true: she wasn’t a prude and she liked sex a lot, once she was comfortable enough to shed her clothes with someone.

  When they were entangled on his bed, their clothing strewn about them, Russell said, “I told you I’d like the way you looked even if you were naked, and I was right.”

  “You do seem to approve.” Her mouth was inches from his ear at that moment, so her whisper made him shiver a little, although the way her hands were moving along his naked shoulders and down his muscled back may have had something to do with that, too.

  Meanwhile, Russell’s mouth was now buried in her neck, so she could just barely make out his next words. “Think our parents would be pleased?”

  “I guess so. This was what they wanted all those years ago, right?”

  He raised his head and said, more clearly but somewhat hoarsely, “I’m not sure that this was exactly what they were picturing when you were six or whatever you were.”

  His shifting body extracted a moan out of hers. “Ah,” she breathed. “Just as well they can’t see us, then.”

  “That’s kind of a given.” He pushed up on his hands so he was in a plank position over her—a move that elicited another inadvertent noise of pleasure from her. “Can we stop talking about our parents now?” he said, his voice uneven.

  It was all she could do to close her eyes and nod, and then she wasn’t really capable of saying or thinking anything even remotely coherent.

  “I should thank your trainer,” Ava murmured a few minutes later into Russell’s shoulder.

  “Yeah?” He was lying on his back with her snug against his left side. He raised his right arm, made a fist, and studied his bicep muscle. “You like this?”

  She nodded, a bit drowsily. “That and the whole package.”

  “Well worth all those hours of training, then.” He dropped his arm. “I feel the same way about your package.”

  She made a face against his skin. “It doesn’t sound good when you put it like that.”

  “You’re right.” He turned on his side so they were facing each other and stroked her bare shoulder with his free hand. “You’re soft,” he said.

  “Thank you.”

  “Soft and real.”

  “As opposed to what? A blow-up doll?”

  His fingers made circles on her skin that skimmed along her shoulder, then dipped down to her upper arm and across to her breastbone. She sighed with pleasure and rolled lazily onto her back. “It’s just been a while since I’ve seen a real breast,” he said. “One that doesn’t stand up and salute you no matter what position its owner might be in.”

  Ava laughed. “Mine are definitely natural.”

  “You have no idea how appealing that is.” He bent over her and gently rubbed his nose against her nipple.

  “Hey!” she protested, pushing him away and pulling the cover up over herself.

  “What? It feels so nice. Soft and real.”

  “Stop calling me soft.”

  “It’s a good thing.”

  “Yeah? You want me to call you soft?”

  He lay back and flexed his arm muscle for her again. “How could you possibly call this soft?”

  “You’re a man of steel,” she said.

  “Better believe it.”

  His cell phone rang. “Who calls you so late at night?” Ava asked with another spasm of jealousy.

  He leaned over the side of the bed to extract the phone from his pants pocket and collapsed back onto his pillow as he squinted at the screen. “Your sister. She’s probably worried I’m still waiting at the restaurant for you.”

  “I should let her know I’m here,” Ava said. “It’s not like I’m in the habit of staying out late. She may actually be pretty worried.”

  “I’ll take care of it,” Russell said, and did by answering the phone and telling Lauren that Ava was there with him. It was clear she was peppering him with more questions because after listening for a moment—while grinning at Ava—he said, “You can ask her yourself—later. We’re a little busy right now.”

  Ava could hear the hoot of delight on the other side of the line.

  Russell hung up and they were both quiet for a moment. Ava pushed her foot against his. He pushed back in a friendly way. They lay quietly again. Then Ava yawned and shifted. “I need to run to the bathroom.” She sat up, holding the blanket modestly to her chest, scanning the floor for something to throw on for the short walk. “Mind if I borrow your shirt for a second?”

  “Be my guest.”

  She reached down to scoop up the white dress shirt that had been abandoned by the side of the bed. Turning her back to Russell, she slipped it on and quickly buttoned a few of the buttons before sliding to her feet. The tails came down to her thighs.

  “Nothing more appealing than a cute girl wearing your shirt,” Russell said, lazily putting both hands behind his head as he regarded her. “And you all know it, too. I can’t tell you how many shirts I’ve lost to—”

  “Don’t tell me,” Ava said, putting her hand up. “Seriously, I don’t want to know.”

  “Hold on.” In a sudden transition from inertia to movement, he leapt over to the side of the bed and got onto his knees in front of her. Ava couldn’t help glancing down between his legs and grinning. “Hey,” he said, “watch where you’re looking.”

  “I can’t help myself,” she said. “Men are made funny.”

  “Come closer, will you?”

  She obediently moved closer to the bed and he reached out to her. She thought he was going to embrace her and leaned forward, but his hands went up to her neck instead.

  “The collar’s all messed up,” he said, frowning and fiddling with it. She couldn’t see what he was doing, but could feel the stiff shirt collar being pulled out from where it had apparently been caught inside-out against her neck. He flipped it back into place, smoothed the points down, arranged her hair on her shoulders, then unbuttoned another button at the top of the s
hirt. “Looks better a little more open like this,” he said. “I get to see more of the good stuff.” Proving his point, he buried his face briefly in the soft skin just below her collarbone and then kissed her lightly on the chin and sat back with a nod of approval. “There,” he said. “All fixed. You look perfect now.”

  “You can’t just let me be, can you?” Ava said, crossing her arms. “You’re still trying to pretty me up. It’s never going to stop with you, is it, Markowitz?”

  Russell put his hands up in remonstration. “I’m not trying to change you, I swear. If you prefer that button buttoned—” He reached for it again, but Ava stopped his hand by taking it in hers.

  “It’s okay.” She squeezed his hand. “I think I could learn to like it when you make me look good. I mean, what’s the downside, really?”

  “You look good no matter what I do,” Russell said and pressed her hand to his lips. “Better than good. I’m just gilding the lily here.”

  “I’m a lily?” Ava said and her heart beat fast with sudden delight.

  “Of course,” he said. “Haven’t you noticed yet?”

  “Well, then gild away,” Ava said. She pushed him down and fell on top of him. “Gild away.”

  She never intended to spend the night at Russell’s, but between drowsing and cuddling and drowsing and having sex and drowsing and getting something cold to drink and drowsing and talking . . . somehow the sun was on the verge of rising before Ava realized she still hadn’t gotten herself out of there.

  “I’ve got to get back to my place before I go in to work,” she said when she realized how late it was.

  “I should get up soon, too,” Russell said, although he was lying on his back with his eyes shut tight and didn’t look like he was going to be going anywhere in the near future.

  Ava got dressed and dropped one last kiss on his forehead. He half opened one eye. “Call me?” he said sleepily. “Have dinner with me tonight? And then spend the whole weekend with me?”

  “Yeah, okay,” Ava said. “All of the above. Go back to sleep.”

  “I should work out,” he said, but his eye had already closed again. He’d be asleep before she left the house, Ava thought affectionately.

  On her drive back to the Westside, one half of her brain kept ticking off her agenda—drive home, park, shower, get dressed, go to work, finish the Brodericks’ will, and so on—and the other half was singing some lively old rock song about love that she couldn’t completely recall because the tune slipped away from her whenever she tried to focus on it.

  The sun was in the sky when she walked into the apartment, making the yellow-green living room drapes glow. Ava tiptoed across the floor and was about to open the door to her bedroom when a loud “Aha!” made her jump and scream.

  “Jesus, Lauren!” she said, collapsing back against the door, clutching her heart. “Was that really necessary?”

  Lauren had reared up in the sofa, the better to scare Ava apparently, but now she collapsed back down in laughter. “Oh my God, you should have seen your face!” she chortled.

  “If only there’d been a mirror nearby,” Ava said.

  “Yeah, then maybe you’d also notice that you’re wearing the same clothes you were wearing when you left the house yesterday morning!” Lauren said. “The clothes that I picked out for you, I might add.”

  “I know. I’m on my way to change.”

  “Get over here and talk to me first. Come on, Ava, you’re doing the Walk of Shame! That can’t happen to you very often. You’ve got to tell me what went on last night.”

  “I don’t have to tell you anything,” Ava said, but she came closer.

  “Yes you do.” She bounced excitedly on the cushions. “Did you meet him for dinner or not? I’m all confused about that and Russell wouldn’t tell me anything on the phone.”

  “I met him,” Ava said. “And I was really pissed off at you for lying to us both, by the way. If you ever pretend to be me again—”

  “Yes, yes,” Lauren said, impatiently waving her hand. “Whatever. So you went straight to his house afterwards?”

  Ava leaned her hip against the armchair. “Yeah. We had to take separate cars, though. I thought about just leaving mine, but I wasn’t sure what the valets would do with it after the restaurant closed—”

  “Fascinating,” Lauren said. “Tell me more about the cars. And about the valets. What color are their jackets? And how much did you tip them?”

  “Shut up,” Ava said. “The answer is yes, we went back to his house.”

  “And—?”

  “And it was nice.”

  “Nice like watching TV and ordering in Chinese food with a good friend? Or nice like wild sex all over the house?”

  Ava looked up at the ceiling. “Well,” she said. “We weren’t about to order in Chinese food. We’d just eaten.”

  Lauren pumped her fist triumphantly. “I am so glad I set this whole thing up! You totally needed a good screw. No offense.”

  “None taken.” She reconsidered. “Well, maybe a little bit.”

  “I’m so brilliant,” Lauren said. “Admit it. Admit I’m brilliant. First I introduce you two and then I make sure you keep seeing each other, because you’re such an insecure mess that you’d have driven him off right away if I hadn’t forced things along. No offense.”

  “Will you stop saying offensive things and then saying ‘no offense’? I’m not an insecure mess. I’m just cautious. Something you wouldn’t know about.”

  “Call it whatever you want.” Lauren peered up at her. “You like him, don’t you?”

  “I do,” Ava said.

  “Which means you owe me, because if it hadn’t been for me you wouldn’t have met him. Or given him a fair chance.”

  “I probably wouldn’t have met him,” Ava said. “As adults, I mean. Anyway, I’ll give you that.”

  “Good.” Lauren sat back and took a deep breath. “I’m glad you owe me, because I have something I have to confess to you. It’s been weighing on me and I was waiting for the right time. Given your happy post-sex mood at the moment, this is probably as good a time as any.”

  “Oh no,” Ava said. She lowered herself into the armchair. “What did you do, Lauren?”

  “It’s not that bad,” Lauren said. “I didn’t murder anyone or anything like that. I just bought some clothes. I know I promised I wouldn’t and signed that stupid piece of paper, but there was this top—”

  “The one you were wearing the night Daniel came over?”

  “Yeah. The shoes were new, too.”

  Ava shook her head. “I knew you looked too good that night. And you were so upset when you stained the top that it made me wonder. But I wanted to trust you.” She chewed on the side of her thumb. “Why is it so hard for you to control what you buy, Lauren? It hasn’t even been a month since you signed that contract.”

  “I don’t know,” Lauren said. “I thought I was being pretty good, actually. It’s just . . .” She thought for a while, rocking gently, knees to chest. “Honestly? It was kind of wrapped up in the whole Daniel thing. I wanted to make him really notice me. I thought maybe the right clothes would make a difference.”

  “One top isn’t going to change how someone feels about you,” Ava said.

  “Maybe not. Anyway, I was also kind of mad at you for making me sign that thing in the first place. Buying these things was my way of rebelling.”

  “Very mature.”

  “Fuck mature.”

  “That’s what he says in Diner.”

  “I know. It was a quote.”

  “I thought the contract would help you stick to your resolution,” Ava said. “I was just trying to help.”

  “It’s hard to be the one who always needs help.”

  “We take turns at it,” Ava said. “Haven’t you noticed?”

  Lauren clasped her hands together. “So . . . Does that mean you forgive me?”

  “What choice do I have? I can’t exactly cart you off to fashion jail
.” Something occurred to her. “How did you pay for all that stuff, anyway?”

  “Used the household AmEx.”

  “Didn’t you think I’d notice the charge?”

  “Why?” Lauren said. “Do you actually read through your statements?”

  “Of course I do,” Ava said. “Don’t you?” Lauren shook her head and Ava said, “Well, that’s part of the problem right there. You need to learn to monitor that stuff. And I expect you to pay me back once you’re earning money again.”

  “I will.”

  “Which reminds me: you need to start earning money again.”

  “I’ll start looking today. I told Mom I’d bring lunch over and hang out, but the rest of the day is free.”

  “It’s nice that you’re spending so much time with Mom,” Ava said. “I’m a little jealous.”

  “I’m a little jealous you spent the night with a great guy,” Lauren said. “You owe me for that one. Actually,” she said with sudden excitement, “when you think about it, it’s because I spend too much money that you ended up with Russell.”

  “Excuse me?” Ava said.

  “No, really. If you hadn’t annoyed me by making me sign that contract, then I wouldn’t have hunted down Russell because of the other contract. So you should really thank me for not paying my bills.”

  Ava stood up. “That is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

  “Say ‘Thank you.’ Say ‘Thank you, Lauren, for not paying your bills.’”

  “I’m going to take a shower,” Ava said and went into the bedroom.

  Lauren called after her, “If you don’t say ‘Thank you,’ I’m going to tell Mom on you.”

  Ava just shut the door. She went to run water for her shower but stopped at the sight of herself in the mirror. You could tell she had just had sex, she realized with amusement. All the classic postcoital signs were there: flushed cheeks, overly bright, almost feverish eyes surrounded by smudged mascara (thanks to Lauren), wavy, tousled hair, lips that were dark red and swollen from a night of kissing . . .

  She stood there and she looked and she smiled and she thought, Now there’s a pretty girl.