“Where are you going?” She furrows her brow when I put on my blinker to turn right at the light near my apartment instead of left. I grin.
“I still don’t have any furniture,” I tell her. “I was hoping you could help me pick out some stuff.”
Her eyes widen and then her entire body relaxes. She grins. “Are we going to West Elm?”
“Does West Elm sell couches?”
She smacks my chest. “Are they even open this late?”
“They better be.” Lucy purses her lips and moves to get out her phone.
“I checked! I checked. We have til ten. And I’ll need every second.” I shrug as she laughs. “People usually do that shit for me.”
Lucy rolls her eyes. “West Elm sells very expensive couches. And coffee tables. And night stands.” She pokes me with her index finger and then looks toward the store, considering as I park.
I don’t want her to run off again. I don’t know why. Yes I do, damn it. I like her. I like that she’s thorough and organized and good at coaching. I like that she’s helping the guys improve their soccer skills by opening up their hip joints or whatever the hell she says her exercises do for us.
“Come help me pick stuff out,” I tell her. I bring her hand up to my mouth and kiss her knuckles.
“I don’t know.” She sighs.
“Come on. It’ll take a half hour. Then when we get my new couch back home, I can...”
Lucy roars with laughter, her head dropping back, her throat moving as she laughs. “Just what I always wanted! Couch sex.”
I wink at her. “I promise I’ll make it worth your while.” She sighs. “I’m just teasing, Lucy. I could take you out for a drink after. Or make you some tea.” She gives a tiny nod, and I know I’ve got her. Two minutes later, we’re breezing through West Elm with a sales clerk hot on our heels.
I try to hold Lucy’s hand, but she shakes herself loose from my grasp and I remind myself that I can’t push her too far or she’ll leave. I point to a living room display. “Do I want leather furniture, Lucy? It says it’s timeless.”
She shakes her head. “You’ll get sweaty and your thighs will stick to it.”
I grin. “Wouldn’t want sticky thighs.” Everything I’m saying to her is an innuendo and she knows it. She blushes while she steers us toward a thick, plush sofa.
“This one is nice,” she says. “And it’s on sale.”
“Whatever the lady thinks,” I say to the clerk, who has an electronic tablet where she’s checking stock or some shit. “Can you deliver this tonight?”
“Oh.” The clerk seems surprised. “Well, I’d have to check our stock room…”
“We want the floor model,” I tell her. I hand her my black Am-Ex card and her eyes widen. “We’re going to pick out a bunch of shit and I’ll pay whatever for you to bring it across the street when we check out.”
Lucy stands with her mouth hanging open, making eyes with the sales clerk. Lucy shrugs. I smile. “You said I need a coffee table, too?”
The clerk taps a finger on her lip and studies me. “Do I know you from somewhere?”
Lucy initially grins that I’m being recognized, but then shirks back, as if she’s scared she’ll get noticed too. I want to tell her there’s really not too much chance of that, since I know it makes her nervous, but she’s already wandered away to where they have the bedroom models set up.
A few minutes later, Lucy has picked out a cushioned headboard for me as well as a bunch of pieces of furniture. Everything comes with human first names like Anton and Parker and I tease her about it while I wait to get rung up. “Are you going to start naming your drills after guys on the team? Tell me the really shitty workouts will be named Todd.”
Tucked behind a column, Lucy must feel confident nobody can see us or else she’s just gotten more comfortable, because she swats at my chest again but smiles at me like she’s warming up to the idea of hanging out with me where people can see.
“So.” I put my hands in my pockets and lean a shoulder on the wall near her. “Couch tea or bar beer. Is that a thing?”
“Bar beer…I don’t think it sounds like a thing.” She bites her lip. “Can we do the tea?” She gestures around the shopping plaza. The stores are closing but the restaurants and bars are hopping, with football on the huge TV screen and a live band getting set up out in the courtyard.
“Sure,” I tell her. “It would be hard to hear each other talk out here, anyway.” I drive us across the street with the delivery truck right behind us. I slip the guys a few fifties from my wallet and they get my shit set up faster than I can pour Lucy some herbal tea.
She perches on a stool in my kitchen while I see the crew out of my house and lock the door behind them. I flop backward onto my new couch, which smells slightly like plastic wrap and air freshener. “What do you think now, Lucy? More settled?”
She sips her drink and spins around to stare at me. “It’s a big difference.”
“You should come see it from this angle.” I pat the cushions next to me. She laughs and shakes her head. I feel a surge of joy when she sets her tea on the counter and walks over to the couch. She squeals when I tug her toward me and pull her in, wrapping my arms around her. I run my fingers through her hair and I wait for her to talk to me. When she doesn’t, I ask, “How did you meet him, anyway?”
I feel her shrug in my arms. “He was working on something electrical at the stadium, where I was training the college players. I caught his eye.” I stiffen as she tells me he was charming at first, how he bought her things and seemed so eager for her attention. I try not to draw similarities to my own pursuit of Lucy, knowing her story is about to take a dark turn. I feel her swallow. “Eventually I realized the attentiveness was jealousy, and then the jealousy began to feel scary. But I was pregnant and had left my job and sold my car. Hawk, I was totally reliant on him.”
Her voice is quiet, almost a whisper. “I think he cut holes in the condoms. We always used condoms. I don’t have any way to prove that. And I don’t regret Wyatt.”
“Of course you don’t.” I kiss the top of her head and squeeze her tight. I see how her son lights up her world. And I know because my own mother has always told me how much it meant to her to be my mother.
“I have implants now,” she says. “For birth control. I asked for them at my checkup after Wyatt was born. The doctor just puts them in my arm. I wanted to be in control of my body. I wanted it to be my conscious choice, you know?”
I can’t help but laugh at that revelation. “You saw how I am with condoms. Trust me, Lucy, I get it.”
We’re silent as we fall asleep and I just hold her, and she lets me.