Madly (New York 2)

She watched him write the numeral ten, with one of those European number ones that looked like an upside down V. He didn’t write anything after, but he did ink in a three, and then brought his other hand up to hide what he wrote there.

“Gimme.”

“Hmm?”

“The list, gimme the list.”

He slid it over like it was a shot at last call.

3. Spend an hour kissing, keeping one’s hands over clothing.

Oh, fuck, fuck, fuckity.

She added her number four: Everything but. By the look on Winston’s face, he knew exactly what she meant.

His number five made her finish her cold tea in a big gulp.

Then he wrote his six right after, and she stood up.

Not because she had anywhere to go, or a plan, or one single thought in her head. She just couldn’t quite account for how much of her brain space was now being taken up by pounding—between her legs, but in a variety of other places, too, more of a full-body pounding that crowded out thought and, apparently, inhibition, because she snatched the paper and pen from Winston, inked in a seven and an eight before her better sense could catch up and stop her, and then leaned over, shoving the paper back in front of him, and blew out a long, slow breath across the back of his neck.

She watched goose bumps rise up along that vulnerable bit where his hair was cut close and sharp. His shoulders went tense, and the quiet got thick.

“I had been wanting…I mean.” His words were slow, strangely unaffected sounding, otherwise, which turned Allie on even more. “This list. It’s meant for us? To—”

“Check off. Yes. I think so. You don’t have to.” He had to.

“Together. I just want it to be perfectly clear. We’re to do these things together. To…each other.”

“Or, according to seven, to ourselves, while the other one watches.”

“Right.” He took up his pen and bent over the paper, scribbled something, and then lifted it up and blew on the letters, folded it, and tucked it into his trousers pocket. “All right, then.”

“I feel like we should shake hands,” she joked. Because his distant face, and his confiscation of the list—she was pretty sure this was just how Winston got when his feelings were big. And she was pretty sure, too, from everything that had happened, that he wouldn’t turn her down. Hadn’t just turned her down.

But not one-hundred-percent sure.

He stood up. Her heart stopped.

“It’s late, and I think you’ve had a big day, and may have an even bigger one tomorrow.”

She nodded.

He turned his forearm over and lifted the catch on his thick gold watch. He placed it on the counter, laying the links out just so.

“Thirty seconds?”

She nodded again. “At least thirty. To get the maximum benefit.”

He took a step toward her, and she took one toward him.

They’d been in a bar, drank too much whiskey, walked several blocks, stuttered through their personal histories, but somehow he smelled good. She imagined mysterious European toiletries as he pulled her in close—French deodorant bars that could only be ordered from two-hundred-year-old shops on cobblestoned streets in ancient shopping districts. Colognes mixed by perfumers whose ancestors had served the kings and queens of England. Clove-oil tooth powders. When his arms met behind her, she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, smiling.

She liked that she knew some of his worst things, which were ordinary sorts of worst things. She liked that she didn’t know everything about him yet. And even more, that he felt like someone she could know without the things that made him Winston infringing on anything that made her Allie.

The top of her head came up to his chin. She rested her cheek against his chest. He felt solid in her arms, warm but not too hot, his embrace comfortable but not too much.

She glanced at his watch on the countertop. Ten seconds in.