One day we were alone in my room, and one thing led to another. I kissed her like I’d been fantasizing doing for days, and then we’d melted into each other and made love. It was the first time I’d had sex where I hadn’t felt like I didn’t really know what I was doing. It was so natural, so easy, so right.
When I found out she didn’t have a date to the prom, I asked her to go with me. I was falling for her hard.
I didn’t care what any of my friends thought about it.
Maisey wasn’t one of the cool kids.
But to me, she was better than all of them.
I’d looked forward to that night so much.
“Do you remember standing me up for prom?” I asked, staring at her back. It was a nice view. Where she was all angles and sharp turns before, she’d become curvy and feminine. Her shoulders stiffened at my mention of prom, but she still didn’t turn around.
“Standing you up? I don’t think we ever really set anything in stone, did we?” she asked, finally turning around and looking at me again.
“You’re kidding, right?”
“No, I’m not. Seriously, Mr. Collins, I don’t remember much from high school. It was a long time ago.”
“Not that long. For fuck’s sake…” I muttered. “Call me Jesse.”
“Right. Jesse,” she nodded. “Now, about your treatment plan…”
She rattled on and on about torn ligaments and the importance of keeping my knee active by exercising it, but I wasn’t really listening.
I was thinking back to that night so long ago. I’d never been so humiliated in my life when she’d stood me up. My friends never let me live it down. The jock of all jocks being stood up by the nerdy girl from biology class… Some of those bastards still liked to bring it up every now and then when they were particularly hell-bent on ribbing me and running low on material.
“Don’t look like she’s showing up,” Tom, the manager of the gas station said. I’d been sitting on the hood of my cherry red Ford Mustang waiting for Maisey to show up for half an hour already. The sweltering heat was punctuated by the bow tie that was practically strangling me while I waited.
Maisey had insisted I meet her at the gas station instead of picking her up at home. I’d protested, we’d argued about it, and she won. I checked my watch again before jumping back in my car and heading to her house anyway.
When I’d gotten there, I found the front door wide open and Clyde passed out on the couch. I was dying of thirst because of the heat, and after calling Maisey’s name, I went to the fridge and opened it, hoping for a bottle of water or something.
Instead, I found Maisey’s note saying she’d left. I walked into her room and saw that everything had been cleared out, except that one white dress hanging in the empty closet like a scene from a bad movie.
I’d gone to the prom alone, been crowned King and at the last minute, in Maisey’s absence, the Student Council had finally decided to make Barbara Simmons, the head cheerleader, into Prom Queen. I’d endured countless questions that I didn’t have the answers to, so I told everyone the joke was on them, that I never meant to take Maisey Jayne, of all people, to the prom.
I told them I wanted to go alone, that it was a joke all along, just to save face.
But inside? I was dying of embarrassment. The goddamned King doesn’t go to prom alone…
I’d never heard another word from Maisey, but after thinking about it for years, I’d come to the conclusion that she left for reasons that had nothing to do with me. Hell, if I lived in that shitty trailer, I’d have left too.
“Rehabilitation will be extensive and frankly, exhausting. In addition to traditional methodologies, we’ll be doing acupuncture, aquatic therapy, cold-laser therapy —,” she was still rattling on, and now I was staring back at her, studying her to see how she’d changed.
As far as I could tell, the years had been good to her.
Real good.
“Are you married?” I interrupted.
“What?” she asked, her eyes widening.
“I was just wondering what happened to you. You disappeared off the face of the Earth, embarrassed the hell out of ol’ teenaged me, and I never heard from you again. What have you been doing with yourself?”
“Oh. Well, this is it,” she replied. “Been going to school, trying to become the best PT I can be.”
“You must be great if you’re working here.”
“I try.”
“So, you’ll be working with me? The whole time?” I asked.
“Yes, Mr. Collins,” she nodded.
“Maisey, stop calling me Mr. Collins, for fuck’s sake.” I wanted to remind her that my cock had been inside of her, but I refrained, because she was so uptight that she’d probably explode.
“Right. Sorry. Jesse,” she replied.
“Looks like we’re going to get a lot of time to get reacquainted, huh?” I asked, my eyes raking over her curves.
“Look, Jesse. I’m here to help you get better,” she snapped. “That’s all. We don’t need to waste time talking about the past.”
“Wow, you’ve become quite serious, haven’t you?” I mused. I could have sworn I saw a slight blush creep into her cheeks, and it surprised me how much it pleased me that I’d gotten to her, even if it was a small victory.
“I take my job very seriously. Let’s just get started, shall we?” she said, clipping her words.
“Sure, baby, whatever you want.”
“Don’t call me baby. Please.” She turned around and put her hand on the door handle, before turning back to me. “Actually, Mr. Coll — Jesse — I’m going to need to do an exam. Please take off your clothes and put on the gown lying there on the chair. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
She was gone before I could comment, which was too bad because I really wanted to make a joke about her asking me to get naked. Instead, my laughter echoed behind her in the empty room.
Maybe this rehab thing wasn’t going to be so bad after all.
MAISEY
“I don’t understand the problem, Maisey,” Larry said, his voice growing increasingly full of annoyance. This was the third time I’d asked him to take me off Jesse’s case.
“I don’t know. It’s just a feeling I have. I don’t think I’ll be able to do the best job for him.”
“That’s nonsense. You’re the best in your field. You’ve brought athletes back from worse injuries, you’ll be just fine. I don’t know why you’re so upset about this,” he said, shaking his head, “any other woman would be jumping at the chance to work on Jesse Colorado’s body.”
“Larry, that’s so unprofessional,” I replied, rolling my eyes.
“We’ve already established I’m not the most professional guy in the building, haven’t we?”
I sighed, completely defeated. There’s no way in hell I was going to tell Creepy Larry why I didn’t want to spend another minute in the room with Jesse.
“Alright, fine, then I don’t want to be alone in the room with him.”
“What? Why not? Are you afraid he’s going to assault you or something? That seems out of character. Maisey, is there something you aren’t telling me?”
“No! No I’m not afraid of him, I just - just - oh god, never mind, Larry.”
“Well, you know we’re short-handed. I don’t really have anyone I can spare for the long sessions he’s going to require, and there isn’t a damn person in the building better suited to making Jessie ready for the next football season. In fact, I’m taking you off all your other cases, so you can focus on him. You’re going to have to just buck up and handle this, Maisey. Can you do that?”
“Yeah,” I relented, sighing again.
“Maisey, when I hired you last year, I had the utmost confidence you were the right person for this job,” he said, peering into my eyes. “I hope you don’t make me regret that decision.”
Fuck! Maisey’s face flashed in my head, reminding me that I couldn’t afford to lose this job.
“No, Larry, it’s fine. I’ll deal with it. Forget I said anything, okay?”
“Good,” he nodded, “make sure you do the best job you can, Maisey,” his voice growing serious. “A lot is riding on this. Not to pressure you, but bringing the golden boy of Colorado back to full form could bring us a lot of great press.”
“I understand,” I nodded, standing to leave as I hid my shaking hands from his view. I had to figure this one out by myself. I had no choice.
And I knew, after my brief visit with him earlier, that Jesse wasn’t going to make it easy on me.
I walked back to his room, determined to keep my guard up, no matter how much he tried to penetrate it.
I knew how he worked. He’d worked his charms on me once before, but I wasn’t going to let it happen again.
I nodded to the big guy he’d called Grady who was still standing outside of his door like a pit-bull on guard duty and knocked quietly on Jesse’s door and walked in. He was standing by the window leaning on his crutches with his back to me, looking out the window.
The hospital gown opened in the back, giving me a perfect view of his bare ass.
“Oh!” I said, turning around quickly and covering my eyes. “You should have left your underwear on! I’m sorry, I guess I should have said that.”
“I don’t wear underwear,” he said, “unless I’m on the field.”