“Nothing to worry about. I’m in Napa.”
“Ohhh, nice. With Max?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I’ll let you get back to doing him—I mean, I’ll let you get back to him.” She laughed.
“Okay,” I said, “I’ll be home later sometime today.”
We stayed in Napa for lunch and went on a private tour of one of the oldest wineries in the area, escorted by the founder’s grandson who looked to be about Max’s age or early thirties at the most. His wife joined us, and more than once I caught her looking at Max in a way that was pretty risky considering her husband was standing right there.
It might have bothered me at some point in my life. Maybe even just a few weeks ago. But I was getting more comfortable in the feeling that Max wanted me and only me, so I didn’t care how she looked at him. Plus, the way Max was holding on to me made me think he noticed it, too, and might have been reassuring me.
It sounds ridiculous, I know. After all, what could he have possibly done? Lost me somewhere on the grounds of the winery, found a way to distract her husband, and gone off somewhere private and fuck her?
But Max knew how uneasy I was. I had expressed to him in no uncertain terms that I doubted my ability to keep up with his style of life. So far, though, I’d been doing just fine. But I still like to think his tight hold on me was a signal…not so much for her, but for me.
On the plane ride home, I raised the subject I had avoided the day before and asked him about his love life.
“I thought we were going to nap on the way home,” he said.
“When did we decide that?”
“We didn’t. I did.”
“Okay,” I said. “Well, I veto the idea. So start talking.”
He was good natured about me being so forward. Which is exactly what I expected. Otherwise I wouldn’t have gone there.
Max’s first girlfriend was a girl named Denise. They were fifteen when they started dating, and sixteen when they had sex. It was the first time for both of them. Max admitted to being a fumbling ball of nerves during the act, and to freaking out when he saw a spot of blood on the sheet when Denise got up to go to the restroom afterward.
“Cherry-popper,” I said, hitting him lightly on the shoulder.
“You say that like I’m guilty of something.” He looked at me, an uncharacteristically sheepish look on his face.
“Well, aren’t you?”
“No more than the guy who popped yours,” he retorted. “Why don’t you tell me about him?”
“No, no. You go on.”
He laughed. “That’s what I thought.”
I didn’t want to talk about the time I lost my virginity. It was unremarkable. Actually, quite a boring story. I was older than Denise had been when she lost hers, and the guy was no Max Dalton. God, how I wished it had been Max that night….
I let go of the fleeting thought and focused on the rest of his story….
Denise cheated on him with a wide receiver on the football team. He never spoke to her again. Shortly after that, he met Katherine, and within two months they were talking marriage and kids. This was during his junior year in high school, and Katherine was much like my sister—wanting to get married young, have kids, settle down. Max played along for a while, figuring there was no harm and that he wasn’t leading her on. After all they were teenagers.
Their relationship ended when he left town, of course.
Once in California, he dated, but nothing serious. Mostly surfer girl groupies, the bleach-blonde bunnies who kick up sand all day while fit, tanned, athletic boys show off their board skills. Max wasn’t that great at surfing but, he said, the girls liked him anyway.
“Yeah, I bet,” I said. “Who could resist you?” I squeezed his bicep.
“Turns out a lot of girls could.”
“Oh, go on…”
“There’s nothing really interesting,” he said. “I haven’t been serious with anyone in quite a while.”
“Do you want to get married?”
He looked at me. “Are you proposing?”
I blurted out an indelicate laugh. “You know what I mean.”
“Yeah. Marriage? I don’t know. I guess it’s just a matter of being with the right person.”
“Well, sure.”
“No,” he said. “I mean the desire. How can someone just want to get married? I think you really only have that desire when you’re with the right person. Nobody knows if they want to be married, as some kind of abstract idea. You don’t know what it’s like, and if you’re not with someone you’d marry, how can the thought even be serious?”
There was a pause and I guessed he was waiting for me to answer. “I think you’re over-thinking it.”
“Hmm. Maybe. All that matters is that you’re here.”
We were quiet the rest of the way back to Los Angeles. We hit some turbulence about ten minutes out, but otherwise it was a smooth flight.
Smooth in the physical sense, at least. Emotionally, things were a little rocky.
I didn’t want the weekend with Max to end. Tomorrow would mean back to the grind. And while I loved the work I was doing, it would be an extreme understatement to say I was distracted by thoughts of being with Max all the time.
On the opposite end of the emotional spectrum, I was a little nervous about Max being so vague and dismissive about his relationships with women during recent years. I knew it was probably nothing more than him sparing me lurid tales of encounters with Hollywood’s hottest, horniest, and most desperate female starlets and socialites.
If that’s what he was doing, then he did the right thing. I really didn’t want to know about those women. All I wanted to do was see where this was going with Max. And, so far, he’d given me no real reason to be afraid. He had done and said absolutely nothing to make me feel like I wasn’t enough for him.
I mentally kicked myself for letting my negativity and self-doubt cap off such a wonderful weekend.
FIVE
Krystal wasn’t there when I got home. She hadn’t mentioned it on the phone earlier, but I guessed she had to work.
It was a little after 5pm so I decided I should do my regular Sunday check-in with my parents. Mom answered on the first ring. Dad got on the other extension. They asked how my week went, and I filled them in, minus the little jaunt up the coast with Max Dalton, of course.
They were having their kitchen remodeled, so I had to listen to about ten minutes of Mom describing precisely what the contractor was going to do, with Dad piping in every thirty seconds or so complaining about the cost of the new counters, cabinets, and pretty much everything else. A little bickering ensued and Mom finally said they should have that discussion when they’re not on the phone with me. Thank God.