Rita
Coming back to Dallas feels like returning to the real world.
If the real world is also a total mess.
Scar heads back to work. We don’t talk about Gregory Callahan. We barely mention the move to Boston. It’s like what happened at the beach didn’t follow us home, and now the tension between us grows worse every day.
I hate it. I don’t understand this backslide. I want to go back to that Sunday morning, lying out on the beach with Scar, watching Orin and Molly playing in the water. I want to feel that sun. Feel his eyes on my body. I want to think about his taste in my mouth.
Most of all, I want to feel good like that, something that’s been missing from my life for a long time.
Instead, he throws himself into his job like he always does while I lounge around his apartment. I don’t bother pretending like I’m still his assistant. That was never going to work out-especially not now that Gregory’s sniffing around us. It wouldn’t make any sense, not if Scar and I were really married.
Which leaves me with nothing to do for a week except call Cait.
“Tell me again why you two have a no-sex clause?” she asks, wandering through the woods near her house with her dog and her baby. “Because it seems like you don’t want a no-sex clause anymore. Your contract isn’t actually legally binding, right?”
“Good point,” I say, running my fingers through my hair. I need a wash day.
She grins at me as the camera pans around the woods. She’s always out walking. It took me a little while to figure out why, but now it feels painfully obvious.
There’s nothing else for her to do.
It’s either go for walks in the woods or sit around her house watching screens. She opts for walks.
I thought she had the dream life-big house, lots of property, middle of nowhere, gardens and babies and barking dogs.
Reality isn’t always so beautiful.
“So why keep it?” she presses.
I groan, stretching my legs out. I got back from the climbing gym twenty minutes ago and I’m feeling pleasantly tired. “At first, it was to avoid complicating things. Also because I wanted to piss him off.”
“How’d that go for you?”
“Things are definitely complicated,” I say with a sigh. “Mostly it backfired.”
“Have you talked about Boston at all?”
I pause, chewing my lip, then shake my head. “He hasn’t brought it up and I haven’t either.”
“Seems like something you should discuss. I mean, you’re supposed to be married, right?”
“Fake married, but yeah.”
“Even fake married, he can’t expect you to move across the country for him without at least a conversation.” She whistles at Rex off-camera. “Hey, outta there! Sorry, he’s trying to burrow under a fallen tree.”
“I think we’re in a holding pattern right now, you know? He’s getting work done, I’m hanging around bored out of my mind. It’s like we’re just waiting for the other person to make the first move.”
“Do you want to? Make the move, I mean. Like, sexually.”
I snort. “Not at all. Not sexually or otherwise.”
“But you’re still thinking about it.”
“If by it you mean the move, then yeah. That’s the deal we made, right? Marriage for a year. And anyway, what do I have keeping me here in Dallas?”
“I don’t know,” she admits, looking worried. “I’m just nervous for you. I mean, if you follow him out to Boston, what will you have then? You’ll be trapped, won’t you? Sort of at his mercy.”
“That’s a little dramatic.”
“I’m serious. What if he turns out to be, like, a psycho murderer? And he tries to cut off your toes and eat them?”
“You’ve been listening to too many podcasts.” I hesitate, trying to remember if he ever looks at my feet. But no, Scar’s not into that. I’m pretty sure.
“I’m just saying, try to think about what a move like this would be like. Strange city, reliant on a man. All that stuff.”
I’m quiet for a moment, staring at the ceiling. “I have thought about it, and I’m pretty sure I want to do it. I like Scar. I like spending time with him. Those two days at the beach-” I hesitate, not sure how much detail I want to give her. I’ve hinted at what happened between us in the outdoor shower, but I haven’t outright said it.
“You know what I wish? I wish you two would stop with the whole fake-relationship thing and just make it real.”
I laugh softly. “You want me to be actually married to him?”
“Maybe date a little first before you take the plunge.”
“Too late for that.”
“It’s obvious you’re into him, Rita. Every time we talk, you’re constantly going on about him. Why not just say fuck it and… fuck him?”
“I thought he was a toe-collecting psychopath?”
“Don’t get cute with me. You’re into him, he’s got to be into you. Just go for it.”
I glance away from the screen. “That’s the thing, I’m not sure he is.”
Scar seemed into me down the beach, but since we’ve been back? He pulled into his shell again. It’s all, up early for work, home late, bed immediately. He’s either working out or doing lawyer stuff. I haven’t been able to talk to him about things, not without sounding like I’m needy and obsessed or something.
“You’re crazy if you think that. Look at you, Rita! You’re hot as fuck and super smart. Just stop playing this game and go for it. Sorry, hold on.”
Cait shouts at her dog again. I try to picture dating Scar, but it seems impossible-we’re living together, we’re married, it’s like the dating phase is way behind us.
There’s a knock at my apartment door. I jump in surprise, craning my neck to look down the front hall.
“Someone’s here,” I say. “Gotta go. See ya.”
“Rex, damn it, stop doing-”
I hang up before I find out what trouble Rex has gotten into. The knocking stopped and hasn’t started again, so I’m thinking it was a package delivery. I head over, crack open the door, and peer out.
There’s a box on the ground. I stoop over, curious. Scar rarely buys stuff online. I turn it over, checking the label-
It’s addressed to me.
I pick it up and carry it inside. The box is moderately heavy, rectangular, not too big, but not small either. I place it down on the table, staring like it’s a bomb. Curious, I shoot Scar a text.
Rita: Did you send me a package? Something just showed up.
Scar: Strange. A mystery package. Open it.
I’m smiling to myself as I type.
Rita: You sent it, didn’t you?
Scar: I will neither confirm nor deny that. Open it.
Rita: If it’s lingerie, I swear.
Scar: I wish it was. And you swear, what? You’d wear it for me?
Rita: I’ll make you wear it.
Scar: I look good in fishnets. Open the box, Rita.
I grumble to myself, trying not to smile, before grabbing scissors and cutting it open.
Inside is a shoebox from a new climbing company I’ve been really into lately, Adirondack Peaks. I blink rapidly and my heart rate doubles.
Rita: Did you get me climbing shoes????
Scar: Might have. Do you like them?
I open the box and suck in a breath. It’s their top-of-the-line model, their best shoe, the sort of thing I could never, ever afford on my own. I’ve been lusting after these for a really long time. And they’re in my size. He must’ve looked at my old climbing shoes to figure out what I wear.
This is the most thoughtful gift anyone has ever given me.
Rita: You didn’t have to do this.
Scar: Things have been weird between us since we got back from the beach.
Scar: I wanted to do something nice.
Rita: Well, this is nice. Thank you. I love them.
I’m grinning to myself as I sit down to try them on.
Like a dream, they fit perfectly.
“Damn it,” I whisper to myself, laughing like a maniac, thinking about what Cait said.
Should I really set aside the no-sex clause?
Try to make this fake thing into something more?
I’m tempted. And this spontaneous gift tempts me even more.
It’s a bit of a mixed signal-he pulls away into his work, but then he does something like this.
A gift that suggests he actually knows me and pays attention to what I want.
He’s obviously into me too-I think Cait’s right about that.
What does that mean for us though? Our relationship is complicated enough without catching feelings.
Except that seems to have already happened.