Kate Hoffmann - The Drifter

He pushed up and looked into her pretty face. Eve smiled and Charlie chuckled. “Yeah, I know.

We solve all our problems with sex.”

“I guess it works,” Eve said.

“Then you’re not angry with me?”

“No,” Eve said.

“Maybe we should try talking about it?” Charlie said. That’s what two people were supposed to do if they had a disagreement. It seemed like a logical suggestion.

Eve groaned. “No. I just want to curl up beside you, close my eyes and sleep for the next twelve hours.”

Charlie stood, then drew the covers back. When she’d crawled beneath them, he joined her, pulling her naked body into the curve of his. Resting his chin on her shoulder, he drew a deep breath, then let it out slowly. If there was a perfect spot in all the world, this would have to be it.

Forget mountaintops or beaches or rainforests, forget deserts or canyons or the open ocean. Here, in his bed, with Eve in his arms, he was home. And home was the most perfect place he could imagine.

EVE YAWNED as she scooped freshly ground coffee into the filter basket. She pushed the basket in then flipped the switch, waiting for the coffee to begin trickling into the mug she’d set where the pot belonged.

Charlie was still sound asleep-last night completely exhausted him. But even though Eve wanted to sleep, she couldn’t. All night, her mind had whirled with confusion. She’d come to Charlie’s house to tell him that she wanted a future with him. But in the end, she couldn’t bring herself to do anything but tear off her clothes and allow him to seduce her.

What did that say about the depth of her feelings? That instead of honest conversation, they always resorted to sex? She’d talk to him this morning and clear the air. In between fitful bouts of sleep, she’d managed to formulate a plan, one that didn’t put her heart at risk but offered the chance at a real relationship.

Eve grabbed the mug when it was nearly full, then shoved the pot beneath the stream of coffee. She dumped a spoonful of sugar into the mug, then added milk, preparing it exactly the way Charlie preferred.

She grabbed a peanut butter cookie from the jar on the counter and stuck it in her mouth, then walked back to the bedroom. Charlie hadn’t moved since she’d left him, his naked body tangled in the sheets, a long, muscular leg hanging off the edge of the bed.

Eve sat down, then gently shook his shoulder. He moaned softly, then opened his eyes and stared up at her. “Are you really waking me up?” he murmured.

“I am,” she said, taking the cookie from her mouth. “I need to talk to you.”

“Is that coffee for me?”

Eve nodded. “The cookie, too.”

“Cookies for breakfast?” He pushed up on his elbow and took the coffee mug from her hand. “What would the food police say?”

“Since these cookies aren’t made with refined sugar, the food police would give you a pass. They’re better than a lot of other breakfast choices.”

Charlie took a bite of the cookie and grinned sleepily. “Maybe this is why the sex is so good. I’ve been eating nutritious meals. Just think of how good it could be if I started eating tofu. I could go all night long.”

Eve laughed. “No tofu for you. I have to sleep sometime.”

He set the mug down on the bedside table, then reached out and ran his finger beneath her eye. “You look tired. I shouldn’t keep you up so late. Tonight, I promise, we’ll go to bed as soon as you get home from the restaurant. And we’ll go to sleep.”

“I’m all right,” Eve said. “I was up last night thinking…about us.”

“Why don’t I like the sound of that?” Charlie said, his expression shifting from playful to concerned.

“I’ve made some decisions. About us.” She paused for moment to collect her thoughts, then shook her head. “No, I should explain first.”

“Explain what?”

“I haven’t told you much about my family. In fact, we haven’t spent a lot of time talking about the details of our lives.”

“We have time for that,” Charlie said.

“Now is the time. I want to tell you about my parents’ marriage. And maybe you’ll understand why this is so difficult for me.” Eve tucked her legs beneath the T-shirt she wore, resting her chin on her knees, her arms wrapped around her shins. “My father was a philanderer. He used to cheat on my mother all the time. Maybe he still does, I don’t know. For a long time, she didn’t know. Even after I found out, she still didn’t know. My father used to take me out to the park on Saturday mornings and I’d play on the swings while he’d sit on a park bench with some woman, having coffee. At first, I thought she was just some mom at the playground with her kids. But then, I realized that she was there to meet him.”

Charlie reached out and smoothed his palm over her shoulder. “Eve, I’m sorry.”

“Once I’d figured it out, my father just assumed I’d help him keep his secrets. Which I did, because I was afraid if I told my mother, she’d want to divorce him. And even though he was doing this, I still loved him. By the time I was ten, I was helping to hide the evidence. I’d go into his coat pockets and pick out the credit card receipts before my mother found them. I’d throw out the matchbooks from the bars and phone numbers scribbled on scraps of paper. Then one day, my mother caught me doing this and I thought it was all over.”

“What happened?”

“I think it was the first time she knew for sure. She might have suspected, but at that point, she knew. She told me not to mention this to my father and to go on as if nothing was wrong. And I did.”

“For how long?”

“I was an active enabler until I was thirteen. I begged my father to stop seeing other women, we got in a huge fight, and after that, he stopped for a while. But then it all started again and I did what my mother did. I looked the other way.”

“And when your husband cheated on you?”

“I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t ignore it. Nor could I ever trust him again.”

“And you can’t trust me, can you?”

She turned her gaze away, staring out the window. “I want to. I really do. You don’t know how much.” Eve turned back to him, gathering her resolve. Though she might be taking the biggest risk in her life, Eve was ready to open her heart to him. “I need time. We need time. You seem to know exactly how you feel, but I can’t trust how I feel.”

“I can give you time,” he said. “I have plenty of that. As long as you want. I’ll be here for you.”

“No,” Eve said. “I want you to take the job. We both need to work. In case this doesn’t happen for us.”

“You can’t think that from the start,” Charlie said. “You have to believe in us.”

“I believe in the us that’s here right now. And I believe there might be an us in a month and maybe a year. But this-everything we’ve shared in this bedroom and in this house, and a few other places, too-that’s a fantasy. We have to start to live in the real world.”

“I don’t want the job,” he said. “I don’t want to go back to Everest again. I’ve just barely recovered from the first trip.”

“It’s a wonderful opportunity. You said so yourself. And I’ll miss you when you’re gone. But you’ll come back. This time, I know you’ll be back.”

Charlie searched her face, as if he were hoping to find a trace of uncertainty there, a chink in her logic. This was for the best, Eve mused. He had to see it the way she did. If they continued as they’d begun, the fantasy would slowly fade and they’d be left wondering if the emotions that accompanied it were fading, too. This way, they’d force themselves back into reality, before it was too late.