“I danced with him,” I say out loud to the empty room. “Yep. A lot. He said some things to me. About… things. That I can’t remember right now. But, oh! He called me ‘pretty!’ That’s right. Jet Knox called me ‘pretty.’ And he smells good. Well, maybe not right at this second, but he smelled good when he called me ‘pretty.’ Yes, indeedy, he—”
I gasp when he drops back to throw, and the pocket of guys who are supposed to protect him from the other team disintegrates around him. “Oh, gosh! Watch out!” I bellow, putting my hands over my eyes and peeking through my fingers as a long-haired gorilla of a guy comes from Jet’s blind side, swinging his arms in a determined effort to take off the QB’s head.
On nimble feet, Jet scrambles out of reach and launches the ball down-field, where the original Mr. Tight End, Keaton Busch, has run a route and is wide open, waiting for the pass. Busch catches the ball, fakes out a defender in the open field, and runs for the end zone. He has one more man to beat, which he does, easily, when one of his teammates comes to his rescue and provides a phenomenal block. BOOM!
I jump from the couch and raise my hands above my head. “Aw, yeah! Touchdown, Kan…sas City!” I crow, swinging my hips and smacking myself on the butt. “Whoop-whoop! What’s that, Broncos? Ride ’em? I think we just did!”
The camera cuts to a shot of Knox joining Busch in the end zone, where they bang their helmets together and hit each other so hard on their bottoms, I can feel the sting from eight hundred miles away. That’s a whole lotta beautiful butt-slappin’.
“Yeah, baby!” I drain the last of my eggnog and point to the TV. “He called me ‘pretty.’”
Six
Catching up with Colin
Nearly two weeks later, all evidence of the holiday season seems to have magically disappeared. The city has removed the snowflake lights and holiday banners they hang from select street lights in early December. The New Year’s confetti has been swept from the streets. All that remains is cold, gray winter, soon to be followed by short, wet spring, then hot, steamy summer, and…
I shudder at what awaits me in the fall, usually my favorite season but sure to be a different story this year, thanks to the news I received earlier today.
The buzzer on my desk startles me from my unfocused, despairing stare.
“Like, Colin Bennett is, like, here?” Becca, one of the many part-time receptionists, announces in typical questioning fashion.
I press the button on my phone and say, “Like, send him in?”, standing and rounding my desk to greet him.
After he closes the door and faces me, he shakes his head and backs away from my impending hug. “Ah, you’d probably better not,” he says in a thick voice. “I’ve caught a bug, so I’ll have to forgo my three hugs today. I’d hate to get you sick.”
I drop my arms and retreat behind my desk. “I hope you weren’t sick while you were on vacation.”
He shakes his head. “Picked it up on the return flight, most likely.” After taking the seat across from my desk, he considerately scoots the chair back a foot or so. “Anything interesting out there?”
I riffle through the temporary postings I’ve already printed out for him to peruse, looking for the one I think he’ll like the most. As I’m about to pass the stack across the desk, my cell phone rings, or—more accurately—moans, on my desk.
“Oh, crap,” I mutter, fumbling for the device, trying to hit the button to reject the call and send it to voicemail. I eventually manage to silence it but not before Colin shows noticeable amusement at the noise and my response.
“What the bloody hell was that? A cat in heat?” His laughter brings on a coughing fit that lasts long enough for me to consider he might need a good whack on the back—for more than his health.
When he finishes spluttering, I slide a box of tissues toward him and say with as much dignity as I can muster, “That’s one of my favorite actors, singing.”
“‘Singing’? Are you sure about that?” He hacks and honks into a tissue that he then tosses into the tiny trash can next to my desk. “It sounds like maybe one of his crazed fans got hold of him and is torturing him in their cellar. Or perhaps he has a severe case of food poisoning. I sounded a bit like that after you and I ate that egg salad that was off. You say that was an actor making that noise on your mobile?”
“Yes. He experiments with music in his spare time.”
“That certainly sounded more like an experiment than a song.”
“I put it on my phone as a joke, and I keep forgetting to change my generic ringtone back to something less… moany.”
While we laugh at each other, I idly wonder who would possibly be calling me in the middle of the work day. All of my usual callers should be at work; plus, they have their own custom ringtones. I’ve written it off in my head as a wrong number when the phone, now in vibrate mode, buzzes in the middle of my desk to let me know I have voicemail. Both of us stare at the device for a second before I grab it and toss it into my deepest desk drawer.
Colin turns his head and looks at me from the corner of his eye. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” I answer honestly. “I’m trying not to be rude. You’re here in a professional capacity—”
He snorts at the notion.
“—and I want to give you my full attention. And tell you about these jobs, so we have time to catch up before my next appointment.”
Seeming unconvinced, he nevertheless humors me. “Hmm. Right.”
“Anyway,
