Hot and Bothered(81)
“Tell me why not,” Elisa said.
“I’m not the right guy for her.”
“She tell you that?”
“Not in exactly those words, but yes—”
“Tell me why you think you’re not the right guy for her.”
“Just look at us,” said Mark. “You’ve got Haven on one hand, totally put together, totally on top of things, beautiful, sexy, polished, dressed up, made up, hair up...and then you’ve got me.”
Elisa shrugged. “Good-looking guy. Could use a shave. I’d lose that jacket—does anyone actually wear denim jackets? And those shoes look like they’ve seen better days.”
“Seriously,” Mark said. “Seriously, look at me and tell me you can see us together.”
Elisa did exactly what he’d asked. She gave him a full-fledged, unrestrained, once-over. Before Haven had come along, getting such a look from a woman like Elisa would have been sexy, but now it felt as remote as an army sergeant’s inspection.
“Okay,” she said. “This is why you came here? So I could look at you and tell you to lose the jacket and buy a better pair of shoes?”
“No!”
“Then why?”
All at once he felt totally defeated. His head hurt because after he’d left the fund-raiser on Saturday night, he’d gone out and played blues and gotten stinking drunk, and he’d stayed stinking drunk for the better part of three days. His heart hurt now that he was sober, and he missed Haven in a way it hadn’t occurred to him you could miss someone you’d known only a couple of weeks.
“I have no idea,” he said. “I guess I wanted you to tell me I was wrong. I wanted you to tell me to fight for her, or—I don’t know. I wanted some hope, I guess. When you look at us, do you see two people who can make things work? I guess I thought if anyone would know if it could work out, it would be you.”
Elisa ran the pad of her thumb over the clip on a pen, a back and forth motion that was, somehow, soothing. She had a way about her, a professionalism, that he could see would inspire faith in her clients.
“No one knows if it’s going to work out,” Elisa said. “And when I look at you, I see two people who have whole entire worlds hidden inside them that I know nothing about. I can’t do what you’re asking. I can’t look at the two of you, as if the answer is written on your skins, and say what will happen.
“I will say this. I think you’re comparing your insides to her outside. People make that mistake all the time. You look at someone else and you think, I’m not good enough, I’m not worthy, they’re so much more together than I am, or whatever you tell yourself. But you’re comparing the mess on the inside to the neat and tidy package they present to the world.
“The real answer to the question is what happens when you finally stop trying to keep everything neat and just let the messes mingle. Do they add up to more than the sum of the parts? Here,” she said. “Let me show you something. I don’t think Haven would mind. Well, I’m sure she’d mind, but she’ll forgive me someday.” She turned her laptop around so he could see the screen. “Here are all the men I’ve fixed Hav up with.” She began scrolling through them.
His first reaction was sheer envy. They were those men, those Don Dormers that Haven belonged with, neatly groomed, tidily dressed. He could see bits of their profiles rolling by, president of this and CEO of that, this big investment bank and that big corporation, well-known philanthropists. Men he wasn’t. Men he couldn’t be. Men he didn’t want to be.