Change of Hart(18)

“You too, Addison. I’ll see you Saturday.”

“See you then. Sweet dreams.”

“You too,” I said, and she hung up.

I got out of the car and headed toward the elevator. It didn’t even occur to me until I walked into my apartment that, despite all the comfortable conversation, Addison never even asked why I had called.





“I just don’t get it, man,” Deuce said in between reps on the leg press. The man’s ability to talk while lifting was amazing. I couldn’t do much but groan during reps. Deuce, on the other hand, could hold an entire conversation. “We had a fantastic honeymoon, an even better homecoming, and now . . . now she’s pissed at me all the time. How many reps have I done?”

I finished my push-ups and sat back on my knees. “I have no idea how many reps you’ve done. I was counting push-ups.” I grabbed my water bottle and popped open the top. “You must have done something stupid to make Vanessa mad at you, Deuce. She’s feisty, but she’s never been a bitch.”

Deuce locked the leg press in place. “I think that’s twenty,” he said before standing up. “I’ve been trying to figure that out, man. But she’s all over the place,” he said, adding a twenty-five-pound weight to each end of the bar. “One minute she’s all over me and being her spicy little Mexican self. The next she’s mad that I brought the wrong brand of garlic salt home.”

“You know how she is about her cooking,” I said, moving back into push-up position. “You should always ask her what brand before you go shopping. Even I could have told you that.” I started the up and down motion of push-ups again. My arms and shoulders were burning. Just how I liked it.

Deuce climbed back onto the leg press machine. “I don’t know, man. It doesn’t feel like that’s it. Something’s going on and it’s making me crazy.” He released the lock and started pressing more weight. “I know marriage isn’t easy. But we’ve only been married like two months. I’m still excited about having something to do with my morning wood every day. I don’t wanna fight yet.”

I snorted and finished my push-ups, sitting back again. “Does Vanessa know you say things like that to me?”

“I’m not sure Vanessa would care. You should hear some of the conversations she has with her sisters when they come over. I know more about visits to the gynecologist, mammograms, and some table that has a hole to put your boob in when you get a biopsy,” he said a little more winded than before. “I’m sure the size of my junk has come up, but I haven’t caught them talking about it yet.”

“Probably because there’s not much to talk about,” I joked.

“More like she’s trying not to brag and make them feel bad.”

I laughed out loud. “Are you sure? You know what they say about the size of a man’s hands. And your hands are kind of tiny for a football player.”

He locked the bench press in place again and threw his towel at me. “Fuck you.”

“It’s ok, man,” I said with amusement. “You know what they say, it’s not the size of the wave, it’s the motion of the ocean.”

He stood up and started re-racking the weights for the next person. “Oh, but when you have a giant wave that moves just right . . . it’s the best feeling your woman can ever have,” he said, his eyebrows waggling up and down.

“Obviously not, since she’s pissed at you,” I reminded him, earning a scowl in my direction.

“I don’t know why I talk to you about Vanessa,” he said, squirting his water bottle into his mouth and swallowing. “It’s not like you have any experience with relationships.”

“I’ve had relationships before,” I argued as we headed toward the treadmills to get our cool down in. And by cool down, I mean five-mile run. “I just don’t have enough time to make a real commitment.”

“Is that what happened with Sara Perez?” he asked, the treadmill next to me creaking when he stood up on it. I don’t know how we didn’t go through more of these things with the size of all the players.

I shrugged. “I liked Sara,” I said, programming the machine. “Just not as much as I liked my job.”

Sara Perez would be considered a B-rated actress by most standards. She had done several films, but never as the main character. She was beautiful and really sweet. We got along just fine. There just wasn’t much spark. Not to mention, she lived in LA and you know how easy long-distance relationships are. We were still friends but hadn’t seen each other in a while. Different lives and all that.