Pipe Dreams(6)

"Can I buy you a drink?" he blurted out. "We should catch up."

Her gaze remained locked on the Smithsonian out her window. She was  going to tell him to go to hell, and he wouldn't blame her. "It's not a  good idea," she said finally. "People remember . . ." she cleared her  throat. "They'll talk."

Shit. He didn't give a rat's ass about other people's speculation. But  she wasn't wrong. If he had a drink with Lauren at the hotel bar, a half  a dozen players would ask him about it in the morning.

Just as he had that thought, the car pulled up in front of the Marriott, and their time together was already over.

"Bus to the airport leaves at six thirty," she said, climbing out of the car. "Don't be late."

"All right." Even though she seemed eager to get away from him, he still  made a point to hold the hotel door for her. They barely stepped onto  the escalator when voices called out from a group of tables off to the  side. "Heyyyy, Beak!" "Get over here!" And, "Hey, it's Lauren! No way."

She gave him a look that could freeze sunshine into rink ice, and climbed the escalator, moving rapidly away from him.

Right. He watched her go. And when the escalator arrived on the mezzanine level, he made his way over to his friends.

"Shit, man," O'Doul said, his fingers around a longneck. "You and she patching things up?"

"Does it look like it?" He tossed himself into a chair. "What are we drinking?"





FOUR


LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK

AUGUST 2012


Mike waited a week to go and see Lauren after she returned from her beach vacation.

He stayed away for seven long days, every one of them harder than the  last. His conscience required it. He wanted to be the guy who'd never  cheated. He was the guy who'd never cheated.

Unless longing counted.

For eight years they'd circled each other. They laughed too long over  nothing, and at company functions their gazes always seemed to collide  across even the most crowded rooms.

A million times he'd wondered how she'd taste if he kissed her, and  whether she'd be sweet and silent or wild and noisy in bed. He wanted  her long, toned legs wrapped around his ass while he pounded into her.

But the closest he'd ever come to any of it was an elbow squeeze when she'd saved him the last chocolate donut.

He waited a week because he needed those years of restraint to matter.  Yet did they? His wife must have been pretty fucking unhappy to boff the  tennis instructor in her car in their three-stall garage.

One day in late July-when training camp was just starting up again-the  facilities manager had messed up the ice temperature at the practice  rink. Nobody could skate. Beacon had driven home in the early afternoon,  pulling carefully into his usual spot. When he snapped the keys from  the ignition and got out, his wife's startled face looked back at him  from the passenger seat of her 4Runner. And she wasn't alone on the  seat. She was straddling someone.

His first thought had been, that looks really uncomfortable.

Stunned, he'd gone inside the house, taking a seat at their kitchen  table. A few minutes later she'd appeared, face red, eyes tearing up.  They'd had the most awkward conversation of his entire life, wherein  Shelly admitted that she'd been screwing the tennis guy for almost a  year.                       
       
           



       

That same night he moved out, first to a teammate's sofa, and then into a  house he'd rented without asking the price. Then came the legal  complications-hiring a lawyer and working out a temporary custody plan.  He went to the Pottery Barn and bought whichever furniture could be  delivered the quickest. A sofa and a king-sized bed for himself. A white  twin bed with carved roses for nine-year-old Elsa, so she'd have  somewhere to sleep when she visited.

These past three weeks were entirely surreal.

Lauren kept popping into his mind at the oddest moments. The new rental  house has hydrangeas in the yard. Those were her favorite flower. She'd  bust a gut if she knew I bought a sofa in ‘mushroom' because I'm always  ordering them on pizza. And, Lauren would roll her eyes at that  neighbor's lawn ornaments.

But every little thought of her made him feel guilty. Maybe if he didn't  think of her so often his wife wouldn't have found someone else.

Was the whole thing his fault?

Thank God Lauren was away at the beach with her friends from high  school. She'd said she wasn't taking her work phone, either. So texting  her wasn't a temptation. But then, when he knew her vacation was  finished (and he knew to the day-what did that mean?) he found himself  avoiding the manager's office. For a week he tinkered around his new  place, rearranging the meager furnishings. And he let the guys get him  drunk after practice. Beacon was the team captain then. His boys had all  been very loyal.

"Crazy bitch! Didn't know how good she had it."

"The tennis pro? There's a fucking cliché."

His teammates were full of sympathetic grumblings, but not a single  thing they said made him feel better. Each time they badmouthed Shelly,  he felt uneasy.

Sure, he was pissed off at his soon-to-be-ex for taking down their  marriage in such a sleazy fashion. But he also knew she never had it  easy. While he was off living the life of a pro athlete, she'd gotten  married at eighteen to a teenage boy who was obviously too stupid to use  a condom correctly. He was the high school jock who'd knocked up the  smartest girl in the class. She'd become a stay-at-home mom instead of  going to college, because that's what all their relatives expected them  to do.

Beacon sure didn't want to be married to her anymore. But he felt a ton of guilt at the relief it brought him not to have to be.

"Twenty bucks says the tennis pro will drop her by the end of the month," someone said.

Jesus, no. He hoped the dude in white tennis shorts made her insanely happy.

The night he finally went to see Lauren, he hadn't even planned it. One  moment he was driving around his new neighborhood thinking about where  to buy another lonely dinner. The next thing he knew, he was on her side  of town, and then on her street. Not once in the eight years they'd  known each other had he ever stopped by her house. He only knew where it  was because it was the manager's house too. When he saw the light on in  her tiny apartment over her father's garage, he didn't even hesitate.  He parked his car in front of a neighbor's house and jogged up the  driveway.

He tapped on her door having no idea why he was there.

"Just a second!" she called, and the sound of her voice made his pulse  quicken. The downside of avoiding her for a week was that he'd made this  moment into something bigger than it needed to be. Two friends from  work could commiserate about his shitty life, right? It didn't have to  be weird.

The door popped open and he got his first glimpse of Lauren in over a  month. She wore a tiny tank top and cut-offs, her hair up in a knot on  top of her head. She held an accounting textbook under one tanned arm,  and a pair of reading glasses was perched on her nose.

If there was a sexier human on the planet, he'd never met her.

"Hi," he managed.

Wordlessly, she opened the door wider and he walked in. But when she  shut it, Lauren stayed right there, her back to the door, hugging her  book. "You okay?"

He flinched. "Yeah. It is what it is." Stupidest statement ever. They  were staring at each other now. The moment stretched and grew heavier.  "I, uh, if you're studying, we can talk another time."

She looked down at the book in her arms as if she'd never seen it  before. "No. It's okay." Her blue eyes flew up to his. "Haven't seen you  around," she said carefully. "Sorry for your troubles."

"I suppose I'm this month's gossip at the office."

"Yeah." She made a wry face. "They live for this stuff. But only until  the next juicy disaster comes along. And there's always something."                       
       
           



       

He nodded. Grief picked that moment to hit him hard. He'd spent almost a  decade playing house with Shelly, listening to her complain that she  hadn't gotten the life she'd planned. He'd told himself he was a good  man for staying in a loveless marriage.

But what was he now? Just another asshole with a divorce lawyer at five  hundo an hour and two houses to pay for. He was really fucking lonely,  and there was nobody who knew how he felt. Not his teammates. And not  even Lauren, because he couldn't admit any of the ugly, desperate things  in his heart.

He stood there, rooted to her rug, his throat tightening up and his eyes  stinging. He needed to find his way back to casual conversation, but  the words just couldn't make it past his teeth.