Truly(23)
“Why bees?” she asked.
“Why not bees?”
“Oh, I can think of some reasons why not.”
He sipped his wine, which was disappearing at a much more reasonable rate than hers. She wondered if she was guzzling something precious and expensive.
Probably not. Beekeepers couldn’t possibly earn much more than dishwashers.
When she’d nearly given up on getting a real answer, he said, “I like them. They’re calming.”
“Bees are calming? The little buzzing guys with the stingers?”
“They don’t sting much. If you don’t disturb them, they’re too busy living and working to bother stinging. They’re … purposeful. Dispassionate.”
“Very Zen.”
“Yes.”
She considered that. “Busy buzzing bees,” she said, and then covered her mouth with her hand, because she sounded a little too relaxed. “This is just regular wine, right?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you asking me if I drugged you?”
“Or if this is, like, malt liquor that only tastes like wine.”
“Nah, it’s regular wine. It hits you harder when you’re tired. Why, are you getting loopy?”
“I’m kind of melting into the couch here.”
“You can put your legs up if you want.”
May considered the wisdom of that. Her bare feet would be right next to his thigh.
But then, he’d already seen her feet. It wasn’t as though her flats did much to disguise their enormity. And it would feel good to put her legs up.
Ben retrieved the wine from the kitchen, filled her glass again, and put the bottle on the coffee table, propping his feet beside it. May stretched her legs out beside his thigh.
“Thank you,” she said. “You’re really nice.”
He chuckled. “You’re about the only person to think so.”
She nuzzled her cheek against the couch. It was soft, covered in some kind of velourish fabric. “It took me a while to figure it out.”
“What tipped you off?”
“You gave me your taco.”
“Ah.”
“Those tacos were so good.”
“I know.”
“And that fig jam. Oh my God.”
He set down his wineglass and reached for her foot, then hesitated.
“I’m going to rub your feet,” he said. “I’d just go right ahead and do it, but I promised not to touch you.”
“You can’t rub my feet.”
“Why not?”
“They’re smelly.”
“That’ll keep me from getting any ideas.” He lifted one foot into his lap, then the other. Her heels balanced on hard thighs. His thumb found the seam down the ball of her foot and pushed into the sore muscle.
May tipped her head back and closed her eyes.
“You can’t rub my feet,” she repeated weakly.
“I’m still waiting for a real reason.”
“They’re enormous,” she admitted.
“Your feet are the size they need to be to move you around.”
She groaned. “That just means you think I’m enormous.”
“I think you’re tall. Maybe you think you’re enormous, but that’s because you’re a chick, so it’s like a law that you have to think something’s wrong with you.”
Ask those reporters who were mobbing the elevator right before I got robbed. Ask the one who called me Fatty. I’ll bet he thinks I’m enormous, too.
But she couldn’t say that, because it was stupid to care what reporters said about you.
She kept waiting for someone to teach her how not to care.
May looked at Ben’s hands, enveloping her toes. Her feet didn’t seem so big when he had his hands on them.
“I bet I weigh more than you,” she said.
“I bet you don’t.”
She slitted her eyes open to glare at him, but it was hard to keep them open when she was so sleepy, and his hands on her feet felt so insanely good.
“I’m not telling you how much I weigh.”
“I didn’t ask.”
“But you tell me how much you weigh.”
“Buck ninety.”
She closed her eyes again. He had her beat by a couple inches of height and fifteen pounds of muscle. He could manhandle her into submission if he wanted to. Stake her to the floor.
But frankly, there wasn’t room.
“I can’t believe you’re a farmer,” she said, nestling deeper into the couch.
“I can’t believe you thought I was a dishwasher.”
“Nothing wrong with being a dishwasher.”
“No.”
“You should move back to Wisconsin if you want to work with bees and dirt. We need farmers.”
His hands stopped moving. He exhaled, then started up again. “That’s not going to happen.”