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In fact, my reputation is quite the opposite: Frank the Crank.
While Ren is warm and always gentlemanly, Matt is, in short, a natural disaster of Grade A douchery.
“Your scepter, my liege.” I feel a rare smile lift my cheeks. “I have heard rumors that you’re a closeted Shakespeare dork, Bergman.” “They got it all wrong.” He straightens and smiles. “There’s nothing closeted about it.”
“Uh, about how I like her. I want to keep her. I love her bone-dry humor, she knows everything possible about Harry Potter, including the latest horror that is its author’s Twitter drivel—” “What did she do now?” Ryder asks from the back seat. “Just showed that you can write a magical world brimming with complex, label-defying characters and still be a trans-exclusionary feminist disappointment.”
Yanking the package my way, I tug warily at the string. Knots are the bane of the arthritic’s existence. But the string unravels effortlessly. I glance up at him and feel myself smile. “Thanks for avoiding the double knot.”
“Does she know you’re waiting?” Also, shit. What guy waits for a woman these days? Most men I’ve known do not have that kind of old-school courtship patience. They can’t even wait ten minutes in a Starbucks line for a mediocre latte.
There were twenty-two printouts of the “rude mechanicals” scenes from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and a smorgasbord of Swedish food.
“Moreaux.” Andy pokes François. “Swap parts with me.” “Get fucked,” François tells him. “Do you know how long I’ve been waiting to play Thisbe?”
This is the moment where Pyramus and Thisbe, two lovers meeting in the garden and separated by circumstance—a Romeo and Juliet homage, no doubt—meet for a clandestine kiss.
He delivers his lines in a French-accented, perfectly over-the-top falsetto, before Tyler puckers his lips near Andy’s hand, where his thumb and pointer create the chink. “ ‘O kiss me through the hole of this vile wall!’ ” François leans to purposefully misplace his kiss—his next line is supposed to be “I kiss the wall’s hole, not your lips at all”—but before he can, Andy lowers his hand so that Tyler and François actually smash mouths.
Her smile deepens, making the dimple appear. “Thanks. Now, how about you tell me why everyone’s acting like we’re heading into arctic hell to get our asses handed to us.” “Because we are heading into arctic hell, probably to get our asses handed to us.” Saint Paul, Minnesota, has a hell of a cold front tearing through it for early April, and the Wild aren’t playing around this year. There’s a fair chance we’ll lose.
Tonight, I’m wearing my lucky Hedwig boy shorts, meaning, as the Ren Effect takes place, this time it’s Harry’s beloved pet owl that gets caught in the rain.
“Just go see him. Humor the guy. He’s with Amy, and he’s comically disoriented.” “That’s not very reassuring.” He chuckles as he yanks off his jersey. “Come on. He’s always so well behaved. Ren unfiltered is a rare treat. You should be thanking me.”
“Your friend Lorena?” I frown. “Y-yes, Lorena. But how did you know?” “You’ve mentioned her a bunch of times, Frankie.” Pretty sure I might have mentioned her once,
With nothing left to do at the bungalow, I navigated us, per her request, to the In-N-Out drive-through, prepared to buy the franchise if necessary, whatever it took to put a smile on her face.
“You, uh, speak some Italian?” “Oh. Pretty much fluent. My dad came over with my grandmother when he was five. So I grew up speaking it with them. And I’m a bit of a polyglot. I love learning new languages.” Great. Just great. The woman who’s about to be a guest in my house and for whom I harbor unrequited, inappropriately love-like feelings also speaks a sexy Romance language.
“Don’t worry. You’re still cute, even tripping over your words, Mr. Calm, Cool, and Happy.” I frown at her. “That’s how you see me?” Try Crazed, Hot, and Bothered.
“No, wait.” I swallow nervously. “That came out wrong. I—I need coffee. Let’s go inside, and I’ll try that again.”
“He cares about his community. After this you’re going to go take video of him reading to sick children, for goodness’ sake!”
“Hallelujah, she’s gonna get laid. Then maybe she won’t be so salty at book club.” My pizza gets the brunt of my emotions. I bite down viciously and tear off another mouthful. “I wasn’t being salty. That book was trash. Nothing happened for, like, six hundred pages.”
“Hey. I’m sorry.” I set a hand on his thigh, and Sweet St. Nicholas Stuck in the Chimney, this man’s legs are granite hard. I yank my hand back like I burned it.
A weird surge of jealousy pricks me. Who is this woman he’s waiting for, who has this deep claim on his heart?
Walking down the hallway, I notice Frankie’s limp is a bit more pronounced, but I’ll be damned if I say anything about it or offer to pull the van right up to the exit. She’ll shove that wand of hers up my butt faster than I can open my mouth to say sorry I asked.
‘Hey, Frankie. I’ve been pining for you for three years, secretly wishing I could date you, and now I can’? I sound creepy. Stalkerish.” I scrub my face. “Why is this so complicated?”
“Before we form a plan of attack, I have to ask. Have you told us everything we need to know?” “Well, I guess there’s one part I forgot to mention. She’s living with me temporarily.”
It takes every feminist, evolved, twenty-first-century corner of me not to growl and throw him against the wall. Caveman moment conquered, I stroll in.
“No hookups, either.” Her fingers still. She drops her hand. “Holy shit, Ren. You’re a virgin?” Turning, I face her. “Yes.” “You’re messing with me.” She smacks my chest. “This isn’t funny.” “Frankie, I’m not messing with you.” “You’re twenty-five. Smart. Handsome. Like soaked-panties, sexually deviant handsome—” “I’m sorry, I’m what?”
Don’t worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will worry for itself, my dad’s always told me.
Rob stills Tyler’s hand. “Ren can fight his own battles. And if he doesn’t want to, they’re not yours.”
“Mammering rough-hewn eunuch,” I mutter. Rob snorts in hysterical laughter, skating next to me.
have to try not to picture him walking around his room, gloriously naked, with that Viking sledgehammer between his legs, which I’m now shockingly acquainted with after the yoga and shower-towel debacles.
“I have to get my frustration off my chest somehow. I don’t fight. I don’t take the bait. I don’t say nasty things about their mother or call them homophobic slurs. Elizabethan oaths are how I hold on to a little shred of dignity.”
I tell myself to breathe, even as heat simmers beneath my skin and every hair on my arms stands up. It’s probably reading Sense and Sensibility for book club this month, but what is it that’s so sensual about the simple touching of hands? How can sharing the barest contact feel so intimate?
“ ‘If I profane with my unworthiest hand this holy shrine,’ ” he whispers, eyes still shut, “ ‘the gentle sin is this: My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand to smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.’ ”
How do you say no to someone as beautiful as Ren Bergman? Especially when he’s even more beautiful on the inside. I don’t know. He’s got a heart of gold but buns of steel. It’s a toss-up which is better.
If he touches me any further, I won’t be strong enough to resist Ren anymore. I’ll throw myself at him, beg him to give me everything for just a little while. To give me for now until he can have forever with her. Her. God, my blood boils, and a kick of anger surges through my veins. I hate her. I’m wildly jealous of this woman, who I can only assume is entirely, completely worthy of him.
I pull away, but he steps with me, fluidly, intuitively, just like the Great Naked Towel Tango.
And I swear to whoever is the patron saint of sexual satisfaction—trust me, there is one, Catholics have patron saints for everything—if that man doesn’t seduce me the moment that I walk into his house tomorrow, I’m going to lose my mind.
“What’s up, man?” Ren says. “Just wondering if—” I lift my cane, arced over my head like a wand, and say, “Sectumsempra!” “Jesus!” The guy stumbles back, knocking into a chair and running back to his booth.
“You know what you can call me?” I glance up as he leans over me and we brush noses. He kisses the tip of mine. “What?” “Grumpapotamus.”
The only thing I have on my side, I realized, is time. Time to show her I can take it slow, build trust and comfort.
What I failed to anticipate was exactly how cranky it would make her to go slow. So, making an adjustment, I figured I’d tuck her in, touch and kiss her, give her an orgasm, and put a smile on her face.
“The heating pad helps my joints, but it makes me sweat like a prostitute in church.
“I’m feeling a little worried.” I grasp her chin, tilting her head so she’ll look at me. “Why?” Her face is tight, anxiety clear in her features. “What is it?” She reaches and kisses me. “Because if it’s that great when our clothes are on, what the hell’s going to happen when they all come off?”
“That’s impressive length. If you read Harry Potter with any kind of dedication, you’d know me calling your penis a wand is the world’s best compliment to a man.”
Ren smiles at me, hooking an arm around Freya’s neck, pulling her in and giving her a noogie. She twists his nipple, which makes him yelp and spin away. “Strumpet,” he calls her.
“I’m glad you brought Frankie,” she says. Ren grins at me over Ziggy’s head. “I’m glad I brought Frankie, too.”
Freya rolls her eyes. “Why are men so fragile? We have other things to talk about besides the time you pooped in Grandpa’s hat after it had fallen off the coatrack and landed upside down.” “I was potty training!” Ren yells. “It looked exactly like the kiddie toilet upstairs.”
“They don’t speak our language, Frankie,” Ziggy says, swiping through her phone. I think she’s reading. At her own birthday party. Smart girl.
“How long have you, uh . . .” I clear my throat, trying to be conversational with her. “Sworn off men?” “Let me think.” Rooney taps her chin and stares at the ceiling. “Five weeks. It’s been brutal. But I ordered a dildo, which should be here any day, so things are looking up.”
