Kaitlin rushed away from the counter as quickly as she could. The awkwardness that was about to happen was nothing that she wanted to be part of, and I couldn’t blame her at all. Being awkward around men was kind of my thing. No matter how hard I tried to act like a normal person, my words inevitably got twisted and I sounded like some sort of weird woman.
“I don’t love you. I said a joke and Kaitlin said something. Then, well, I don’t know how it came to that. But I’m not some sort of weirdo. I don’t love you.”
He chuckled at my awkwardness and smiled. He certainly no longer seemed to care that I had hounded him about going home for Christmas. I liked it when he smiled. His teeth were amazingly white and the creases in his face made him look distinguished as his face lit up. He really should smile more often.
“You guys are going dancing?” he asked as he expertly changed the subject.
“Yeah, I don’t know why I agreed. I’m a horrible dancer.”
His eyes lingered as he followed the curves of my body and looked over every inch of me. He took his time and then let his eyes focus on mine before he responded. I felt hot as he looked at me. My actual temperature was rising the longer his eyes stayed on my body. There weren’t too many times in my past that I remembered a man looking at me with that level of affection. It was nice, I felt desired, and that gave me a little confidence – which I was certainly going to need if I was going dancing with Kaitlin.
Dancing wasn’t my thing at all. While drunk, I had had fun with it, but while sober, I could only imagine how horrible the night would be. But I didn’t care. I wasn’t going to go out to impress anyone. I was simply going to go dancing so I could spend time with my friend.
“I doubt you’re bad at anything that involves using your body.”
My breathing stopped as I processed what he had just said. Is he saying he thought I was good at sex? Or dancing? I couldn’t think straight and stood there staring at him like I physically couldn’t speak.
“We are going dancing,” I managed to mumble.
“Yeah, I know.” He laughed.
“Here you go,” Kaitlin said as she looked at me and then back at Erik. “What’s wrong with her?”
“I think she’s excited that you guys are going dancing,” he said jokingly. “Have fun tonight, ladies.”
“Oh, we will!” Kaitlin hollered after him as he went back toward his room.
She waited until he closed his door before she looked at me in search of some sort of answer as to why my face was bright red. I felt like she had to know there was something going on between Erik and I, but she didn’t seem to care. Kaitlin was a good friend and someone I could count on no matter what stupid stuff I did in my life.
“Don’t ask.” I laughed.
“You only get that embarrassed by a man if you like him,” she said smugly. “And tonight, we’re going to talk all about it.”
I rolled my eyes and went back to work. I knew what she was saying was exactly the truth. Kaitlin wasn’t going to let me off the hook without drilling me all about what Erik had said and why my face had been totally red.
Chapter Twelve
Erik
“Phone call for you, Erik,” Susan said while she held the phone at the nurses’ station.
It was Christmas Eve, and I hadn’t expected anyone to call me. Pretty much I didn’t expect anyone to call me on any day that I had been there, but on a couple occasions my friends from back in San Francisco had called to chat. And of course Spencer had called a few times, as well.
“Hello,” I said with hesitation.
“Hey,” the voice said.
Instantly, I knew it was my brother Heath. Then all I could think about was that something must have happened to our father. Heath wouldn’t have willingly called me if he didn’t have horrible news. I took a deep breath and prepared myself.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“Nothing much. Dad said you called the other day.”
Yeah, I had called like a week earlier, was what I wanted to say. But that was the old me; instead, I tried to be thankful that he was calling now. I loved my brother; I loved my father. They were both important people in my life and I had made the decision to try and mend our broken relationship. I couldn’t do that if I revered back to my old ways.
Although it had taken me a few weeks to get into the hand of group sessions and therapy, I actually felt like I was growing and becoming a better person. The coping skills that Jarrod was teaching me had really helped when I started to feel panicked and I felt more in control of my emotions than I could ever remember feeling.
“Yeah, I just wanted to check in with you guys and let you know how I’m doing.”