Authors: Elizabeth Hayley
“Trust your feet!” Rain bellowed.
I did as Shane said, but after about five more feet my hands were quickly beginning to tire. I looked back down again, and I was sure my fear was obvious to more than just me by this point. I had so much left to go. There was no way I would get to the top. “My hands hurt!” I yelled. “Just let me down. I’ll try an easier part.”
“Oh, no
. Stay up there. You’re fine!”
Fucking Rain.
“Thrust your butt out,” Shane yelled.
“It’ll give you better leverage.”
“Is that what you say
every
time you make that request to a woman? Leverage?” I was glad to see that even in my compromised state I hadn’t lost my quick wit.
“I’m serious, Amanda.
Try it.”
To my surprise, it actually worked, but my hands were killing me from grabbing onto such smal
l grips. And I was only about twenty-five feet up. “Just bring me down,” I nearly whined. “I can’t do it. I feel like my fingernails are coming off. Seriously.”
Shane’s encouraging “You can do it,” was cut off by Rain screaming, “
Thpit on your hands, and keep going!”
Is she serious?
“I’m not
spitting
on my hands!” I yelled down. I clung to the wall with all my strength while my fingertips started to turn purple.
“Let go of the wall for a minute to give your hands a rest,” Shane suggested
compassionately. “I’ll keep you up there.”
Cautiously, I let go of the wall, careful not to look down.
I rubbed my hands together, stretched my fingers, and cracked my knuckles.
“Okay, good,” Shane said.
“Now swing back to the wall again.”
As I shifted my weight to gain some momentum, I felt the straps on my legs move a little higher.
For a moment, I wondered if this was what being in a sex swing was like.
Good God, I really
am
sexually frustrated.
At last, I managed to grab hold of one of the larger grips and push myself up with my legs.
That was no thanks to Rain, who was yelling comments like, “God dammit, you can’t even get up a wall? I can bench my own weight.” That
I don’t doubt.
And “Grab that jug like you mean it.”
“Come on, Amanda.
You’re almost at the top. Even sedentary people can do this,” Shane yelled through his laughter.
That last comment was enough motivation to propel me to the top.
When I rang the bell, I was so relieved that I’d gotten up there, that I forgot my fear of heights altogether as I repelled back down. Shane wrapped his strong arms around me when I landed. I was surprised at how safe and secure I felt in them. “Well, I guess you’ve had enough rock climbing for one day,” he said smiling. “You ready for some lunch?”
“Thank God you're done,” Rain chimed in.
“I’ve had a one-legged midget waitin’ to get up that wall for the last ten minutes.”
***
Fifteen minutes later we were seated across from one another in a booth at a nearby diner. “So Spiderman, did ya have a good time?” I looked up from my menu. “Seemed like you had a real bromance goin’ with your boy Rain.”
Shane chuckled softly and shook his head.
“Wait, let me get this straight. I do something
well
and you
still
find a way to make fun of me?”
“Right.”
“And a
bromance with Rain? Seriously? I was afraid to get too close to her. I kept thinking a squirrel was gonna claw its way out of her dreadlocks any second and attack me.”
I was pulled away from my daydream of a rodent jumping from Rain’s head onto Shane’s back when the waitress arrived. She was a cute girl, probably in her mid-twenties, with silky auburn hair and boobs that made men
—and most women—want to squeeze them to find out if they’re real. She gazed longingly at Shane as he studied his menu and ran a hand through his messy blond hair. “What can I get for ya?” she asked with a flirtatious smile.
What is it with Shane and waitresses? Enough already.
Shane remained quiet for a few moments.
“Um,” I chimed in, since Shane still hadn’t decided and the waitress was clearly oblivious to my presence completely, “I’ll take an iced tea and a cheesesteak with mushrooms and ketchup. Oh, and a side of fries.” I must have worked up quite an appetite clinging to that wall. I was friggin’ starving.
The waitress wrote my order down without a word and looked back at Shane expectantly.
“I’ll just take tuna salad on a plate and a side salad without dressing.”
“And to drink?”
“Water’s fine. Thanks.”
Seriously?
I’d ordered normal food because last night Shane had gotten wings. And today he gets tuna? And a salad with
no
dressing?
Who eats a salad with
no
dressing?
“Way to make me look like a pig,” I said with an embarrassed laugh.
“You could never look like a pig,” he said sincerely.
He cleared his throat and shifted nervously in his seat. “So back to my 'bromance' with Rain.”
I could tell by the way he changed topics so quickly that he was a little self-conscious of how I might react to his first comment.
And for some reason, I was eager to make him feel at ease again. “Yeah, I’ve never really been a fan of dreadlocks either,” I said. “Though I actually dated a white guy with dreadlocks before. Not something that I'm especially proud of. So your new relationship with Rain won’t really be that unique?"
“Really?”
Shane looked surprised, clearly choosing to ignore my snipe about Rain.
I felt the need to justify it.
“But he was an awesome tattoo artist and had his dick pierced, so I think those two things should count for
something
.”
What that hell did you add that last part for? Shane isn’t one of your girlfriends. He doesn’t give a shit about your ex-boyfriend’s private parts.
Shane raised an eyebrow and laughed out loud.
Something about knowing that I had made Shane laugh caused me to want to continue.
I took a sip of the iced tea that the waitress had just put down in front of me. “Yeah, not exactly the highlight of my dating history. I was like sixteen, and he was twenty-one. He came into this hippie store I used to work in. I swear to God, he bought incense and scented oil. Not lying. Then he showed me his tattoo portfolio he had with him because he’d been out looking for jobs. When he walked around the store on his hands, I fell for him immediately.” I knew how ridiculous it all sounded, and Shane had burst into complete hysterics about halfway through my love-at-first-sight tale.
“He was really such a loser,” I continued.
“He didn’t have his license, so I had to drive his stoner ass around everywhere. I
did
get free pot from him though, and he bought me and my friends alcohol.”
“Wow, this guy . . . what was his name?”
“Lip.”
“Lip?”
“Yeah, well Phillip, but everyone called him Lip.”
“Well, this ‘Lip’ doesn’t really seem like he was up to your standards.”
Our conversation paused as we let the waitress put our food down. My eyes darted from my “fat girl feast” over to Shane’s meal.
Oh well, I think my time for feeling shame vanished when I confessed that I'd dated an unemployed tattoo artist who wore patchouli.
“Lip and I dated before all my rules. Actually, I don’t even know if you could even call it dating. We were either getting high or getting laid most of the time. Ah, those were the days,” I sighed to feign my nostalgia at the memories. “I was young. My only real regret was not getting a free tattoo out of the whole deal. I was still a little nervous to let Lip tattoo me since he was doing it out of his cousin’s basement. And he never got a job in a real shop the entire time I knew him."
“Wow, Bishop
. Sex. Drugs. All you’re missing is the rock and roll.”
“That came later when I dated the bass player in a Creed cover band," I laughed. "That’s actually my third regret.”
“Third? What was the second?”
“That I never got to find out if the dick piercing enhanced the sex because I only slept with Lip in the backseat of my two-door car.
Not enough room to try different positions. Ya know?” I could tell that I may have taken things a bit too far revealing that last part. I laughed awkwardly. “I’m actually not sure which is more embarrassing, dating a member of a Creed cover band or telling you about the piercing thing.”
“
It’s fine,” Shane assured me as he finished the last bite of his salad. “I like that about you. You’re just . . . you’re yourself. You don’t really worry about what people will think," he laughed. "Even when you probably should."
“Come on, don’t leave me hangin’.
I can’t be the only one with a story like that. What crazy girls do you have hidden in your past, Shane Reed?”
“The usual . . . just a few ex-girlfriends, I guess."
He grinned widely. "Can’t say I’ve ever dated a girl with a dick piercing.”
"You’re so funny,” I said sarcastically.
“I know,” he replied, smiling as he pulled his wallet from his back pocket. “You keep telling me that.”
***
I had insisted to Shane that we each pay our own way this morning, but he still stole the check as soon as the waitress laid it on the table and stalked off toward the register before I was able to protest. Even though I glared at him as we walked to the car, to which he simply laughed, I was secretly appreciative of the gentlemanly gesture. The ride home was spent in easy conversation. The kind that comes naturally to close friends. It was strange.
As I said goodbye to Shane and walked up the path toward my apartment building, I began rifling through my bag, looking for my keys.
While I was in there, I yanked my phone out as well. I slid my phone to wake as I climbed the stairs and noticed five text messages and two missed calls. All from Kyle.
I unlocked my door, threw my keys down on the small table in the foyer and plopped myself down on the couch as I began to scroll through the text messages.
The first one was sent at 10:26 AM. I was already in the car with Shane and it had never even occurred to me to check my phone during our outing.
Hey, just making sure you weren’t beaten and buried alive in a shallow grave by that Shane guy (sorry, Kill Bill is on). Text
me back.
God, why
are all of my friends so morbid?
HELLO!!! Juicy details are awaiting you. Text
me back.
If you’re trying to punish me for leaving you with Captain Musclehead so I could get some alone time with that sexy girl you’ve been keeping from me, then you’re not the girl I thought you were. Text me back, loser!
So, now I’m actually getting worried. Your phone is like your eleventh finger. Stop being a brat and text me back.
Amanda, what the FUCK!?! Where are you?? Don’t make me call your mother. Seriously, get in touch with me.
Somewhere amid all of that, he had also called and left me voicemails. I didn’t bother listening to them, electing instead to just call him and calm his overprotectiveness down.
His crazy ass answered after one ring.
“Amanda, Jesus Christ, where have you been?”
“Relax, nutjob, I was out.”
“Out? Out where? Guam? You could’ve texted me back. I was freaking out.” The anxiety was seeping from Kyle’s voice.
Damn, he really had been worried.
“I’m sorry.
My phone was on vibrate. I went rock climbing and I didn’t want to get reamed out by the flower children in there for my phone ringing and interrupting the mating rituals they were doing with the walls. You know, there have been other times when I haven’t texted you back right away. You never skitzed out before.” Part of me found it endearing that he had worried about me. Another part wished he’d stop acting like a pansy.
“I’ve never left you in the care of a guy I don’t even know before either.
I would’ve felt like such a dick if I had to explain to your family that you’d been murdered because I left you in a bar so I could get a piece of ass.”
“So, you did get laid.”
It probably said a lot about me that the only thing Kyle said that had caught my attention was that very last bit. I chalked it up to sexual frustration. Being in close proximity to a man who was earth-shatteringly sexy, but who having sex with was not an option, had done things to me. Suddenly I found myself on familiar ground.
This was all Shane Reed’s fault.
Kyle let out a loud sigh, probably regretting what he had allowed to slip out of his mouth.
“You really are sex-obsessed. You know that, right?”
“Yeah, yeah, I know.
Get to the good stuff.”
“Well, to answer your question, no, I did not get laid. But . . .”
“Damn, that’s really unfortunate.” I couldn’t help but interject. Kyle was a phenomenal lay. Kate should’ve climbed him like a beanstalk.