"What happened to you last night?"
Keanu's voice on the other end of the phone evokes feelings of both urgency and guilt.
Nathan is gone, having caught a morning flight out to New York to start his stint in an off-Broadway role. When the phone rang, she assumed it was him, letting her know he'd landed and was settling in. Instead she is met with this excruciating question she doesn't want to answer. She says nothing for the moment, walking over to the small console table that holds various important photographs of those nearest to her heart. Squeezing her cordless phone between her ear and her shoulder, she carefully lifts the newest frame and caresses the black and white photo behind the glass.
At this point, anyone else would've been repeating the question or otherwise prodding, but he is comfortable with the silence even if he isn't comfortable with the event that led to his question. He waits, patiently, the sound of his breath the only sound he makes until finally she can no longer stand the silence.
What kind of zen bullshit mind trick is this? she wonders. The tables of holding out on a response have been expertly turned.
"I—," she starts to answer but halts, having no idea where she is going with this. What happened to me last night? Well, let's see. I went to the premiere with my sister and boyfriend and watched you...what? What did I watch? What was that look on your face that I didn't know happened until last night? Something? Nothing?
Nathan didn't spend the night last night. After the tense limousine ride to Sandra's home, he handed the driver two hundred dollars and asked if he'd continue the drive, dropping him and Aaron off on Sunset Boulevard. Hiding her relief, Sandra and Gesine exited without much fanfare: no conversation between them as the gravel in her driveway crunched beneath their feet. No sounds as their heels echoed on the wooden steps up to her porch. The turn of the key in her door was all but deafening, contrasted with the absence of anything else. Sandra set her keys down on the kitchen island, her fingers lingering, and then turned to face her sister who promptly stepped forward, sweeping her into a hug.
"Get some rest, Sandy. We'll debrief later."
There was a tacit understanding between them that they'd be analyzing the night's events later, perhaps with old movies playing in the background, definitely with a bottle of beer, or ice cream, or both, but tonight was a time for rest and decompression. Sandra ascended her stairs and entered the master bedroom, not bothering to close the door before reaching behind her to unzip her skirt, pulling her chunky, black heels through and leaving it in a pink, mountain-shaped pile on the floor in front of her bed. She tugged on the long sleeve of her pink shirt and pulled the stretchy material off of one arm, then the other, finally yanking it over her head and tossing it on the armchair in the corner. She wanders to her dresser where she removes her earrings and bracelets, dropping them into her jewelry box. Left only in her heels and matching bra and panty set, she enters her closet and haphazardly kicks off her shoes. She stares at the clothes hanging in a row for a second before unclasping the hook of her bra and dropping it where she stood, landing on top of one shoe. She dresses in an oversized nightshirt and moves to her sink where she brushes her teeth and washes the layers of makeup off of her face.
When she woke to get ready to take Nathan to the airport, she was surprised to hear his message that Aaron drove him to catch an earlier flight. The pinprick hole that had been growing since Jude's death gaped, but she was unsure what emotion filled it at that moment. She moved about her morning in a zombie-like daze, not even remembering her morning run or shower or anything that had happened all day up until this moment when she stood, phone pressed against her ear, fingers tracing the outline of the sole, black-and-white figure in the frame, searching for an answer to this unanswerable question.
She jumps a couple inches into the air when she hears the doorbell ring, snapping her out of her trance. She watches her sister move to the door, peeping through the hole at the person on the other side. "I have to go, there's someone at my door, I'm so sorry. Can I call you—"
She watches as Gesine turns toward her, eyes wide. Unsure if she'd finished her sentence or not, she lowers the phone from her ear and dissects her sister's facial expression.
Gesine tries on a cheerful demeanor and opens the door. "Keanu! Hi! What a surprise!"
Softly gasping, Sandra fumbles with the frame, setting it facedown on the table with a loud thud, almost dropping the phone in the process.
"Come on in!" Gesine invites Keanu, who politely plants a kiss on her cheek. Gesine giggles and touches her hand to her skin. She turns toward Sandra again, mouthing "Oh my God!," still caressing the sacred spot.
Sandra clicks the button to hang up the phone and watches him, his tall, lanky figure draped in ragged jeans. He tucks his mobile into his black leather jacket and stows a red, scratched-up helmet under one arm.
Her bare feet pad the wood floor, then the tile in the kitchen as she nears him, line of sight never breaking. She ends a foot away from him, phone still in her hand, the deep plum color of her toenails standing out next to the worn brown leather of his Timberlands.
He is motionless, his hawk eye trained on her, his shoulders moving slightly with each slow breath.
"You left before I could give you this," he explains, reaching inside his jacket and producing a small, rectangular package wrapped in shiny, gold paper with a black bow.
Confused, she asks what it's for and is promptly filled with dread when he replies that it's a present to celebrate the premiere and she realizes she didn't get one for him. "Wait, is that a thing?" she asks, "premier presents, is that a tradition I didn't know about?"
Those liquid brown eyes shine as the skin around them wrinkles. He covers his mouth, looking to the side. "I guess not. I mean, I guess it is for me. To you."
That same rush reappears, dripping from her chest down to the bottom of her stomach, that warm, rollercoaster feeling that she hadn't felt in the months between the wrap party and the premiere, at least, not until last night. Shoving it down with a hard swallow, she replies, "You didn't have to do that."
He raises one eyebrow like he does when he has someone on the spot, lifts his hand, and using the small package as a makeshift prop gun, points it toward his temple.
She rolls her eyes and wraps her fingers around the hand that isn't holding the gift and squeezes. "Thank you."
He angles his fingers to encircle hers, gently tugging her another inch closer and dipping his head down. "Are you going to open it?"
She tears the paper open like a five-year old on Christmas, dropping the wrapping paper on the table and revealing an unopened VHS tape. Baxter raises onto two feet and slowly reaches his open jaw onto the table, snatching the paper and running off into the living room with his new prize. Sandra turns the tape over and reads the title, "Indiscreet." Her eyes light up and she presses the tape to her chest. "I've never seen this one, I've never even heard of it!" She excitedly exclaims. "I can't believe you found a new one for me!" She holds the tape away from her chest again, this time reading the summary on the back, stopping mid-sentence to look up at him. "Keanu, I can't believe how thoughtful this is. I wish I had something for you."
"Not at all, that's not why I gave it to you," he insists, running his zipper back up and shifting his helmet from hand-to-hand.
She peers over his shoulder, meeting Gesine's eyes, who jumps like an animal in a trap, having been caught watching the two of them like a telenovela. "Oh! I've...got, got to go to do that, thing. You know," she gestures toward Sandra while taking slow steps in a backward direction, "The thing? I've got to go do that now, so....." She dances around, twisting her head in either direction before hastily spinning around, grabbing the car keys and walking out the door.
Keanu turns back to Sandra, squinting.
"Nevermind her. She's been strange all day."
He nods his head slowly, eyes lowered to his feet for a minute before returning.
"Well, goodnight, Sandy."
He angles toward her, one hand on her arm to hold them both steady. His stubble tickles her as he lays his lips softly against her cheek. Slanting back, he takes her in for a minute before leaning again, touching his lips to the other cheek now. He idles, offering her time to close her eyes and soak in his familiar scent.
She doesn't remember putting her hand on his chest, but she can feel the soft leather under her palm, and she can feel the bristly trail of his skin as he drags himself away again. She raises her lids in time to see him cast a visual path from her eyes, down to her mouth and back. Subconsciously, she traces her lips with her tongue, surprised to see him drop his hand suddenly and take a step back...
"Then what happened?"
Sandra stirs her chamomile tea before pulling the tea bag from her mug and laying it down on the saucer. She grabs it by the handle, her other hand already holding another mug, and walks over to the kitchen table where Gesine is sitting on the literal edge, both of her hands holding her head up. She sets a mug in front of her sister.
"Nothing."
Gesine slams her hand down flat on the table. "Come on!"
"No really, nothing. He reminded me of the handprint ceremony we have coming up at Planet Hollywood, and that was it."
Unsatisfied, Gesine flops back in her chair, arms crossed over her chest. "You guys suck, you know that? You suck."
Sandra snorts. "What did you expect?"
This is the second time in Sandra's adult life that she lied to her sister.
She wasn't ready, yet, to speak out loud about what happened next. She wasn't ready to tell Gesine that he didn't actually take a step back from her at that moment. She felt the roughness of his unshaved skin as he pulled back from her cheek, this was true. She did watch him move his eyes from her own, to her mouth and back again, but she didn't divulge to her about his inward lean while he did it, dropping his chin until it was level with hers, stopping a hair away from her, giving her the chance to decide if she would meet him the rest of the way. She didn't tell Gesine how her hand clutched onto the leather of his jacket like one might grip onto bedsheets, or how his own hand slipped around her waist, pulling her sharply into him. She didn't describe how softly his lips conformed to her own, or how this time she saw the look on his face that she'd only seen before on the widescreen. They let the world around them disappear, thinking of nothing but the sensation of their lips pressed together, without direction, without witness, without reason beyond their magnetism.
Just as suddenly, then, everything came falling back in between them, pulling them apart with the realization of the line they aren't sure they should cross. Her hand flew to her mouth with furor, as though she could detect with her fingers the tingling she felt in her lips. And she sure as hell wasn't going to tell her any part of the conversation they had afterwards, something she was still trying to digest herself. So she stuck with an easier version of the story, accepted her sister's vicarious frustration, and moved on to discussing a more benign topic, like what she'd wear to their next promotion, anything to take her mind off of the residual tingle on her lips.